nemuren

Reading this synopsis of TF2 was about as mind-numbing as sitting through the first movie was, but at least it only took a few minutes.

http://www.toplessrobot.com/2009/06/bonus_robs_transformers_2_faqs.php

Michael Bay's Transformers is one of the worst films I have ever suffered through. I found it abrasive, interminable, soulless, joyless, senseless, stupid, insulting, aggressively unfunny, completely devoid of anything recognizably human and frankly painful to endure. I saw it with some close friends who didn't think it was that bad. Guys, I love you, but I think I went home that night questioning everything I thought I knew about you and the nature of reality.

But I have no one to blame but myself. I remember asking myself, how could giant robots smashing each other not be fun? And so, even though I knew Transformers was directed by Michael Bay, and even though I knew I couldn't stand Michael Bay's films, I went and saw it. There's a scene in an early episode of Arrested Development that serves as a perfect metaphor for my experience:

Michael Bluth opens the refrigerator. Inside is a paper bag with a note on it that reads, "DEAD DOVE, Do Not Eat!" Michael grabs the bag, opens it up and looks inside. He then says to no one in particular, "I don't know what I was expecting."

Point is, I'm staying the fuck away from the sequel.

...so watch this clip from some Japanese show trying to gauge the lifting strength of cats.

Daft Punk may be is doing the score for the Tron sequel currently in development. Sweet Jebus. No way the universe is this awesome. (EDIT: Billboard says it's confirmed.)

What the hell's going on? First, Terminator Salvation suddenly looks amazing after this week's trailer, now a Tron sequel is starting to sound like a good idea. I must be getting soft in my old age.

I can't stop laughing at this.

So I guess the live-action Cowboy Bebop is really going to happen.

Honestly, I don't have much of an opinion (Note I used the "crossed arms" Jet pic for this post instead of the "facepalm" one). My biggest gripe is that I'm not writing and/or directing it, but I'll get over it.  But really, any criticism before actual footage comes out would be pure fanboy wankery. I'm surprised it's getting off the ground due to the show's similarity in concept to Serenity, which we all know underperformed at the box office not so long ago. Plus, the megaflop of Speed Racer last summer and all the negative buzz surrounding the upcoming Dragonball: Evolution had me figuring anime adaptations might be viewed as toxic for a while. The moral of the story is never underestimate the power of name value to move projects in Hollywood.

A good live-action Cowboy Bebop isn't impossible to imagine, so I have some hope. Keanu Reeves may not be my first choice for Spike, but since this project exists almost entirely on the basis of his involvement, he must have some passion for the material which is a good sign. The most potent thing they could do to boost the fans' optimism would be to hire Yoko Kanno and the Seatbelts to do the score. That, more than anything, would tell me that they get it.

A frequent argument I hear against buying a Blu-ray player is that BD is already obsolete because we're only a few years away from downloading all our movies and TV shows in HD. Not that I think we're not heading in that direction, but how come you never hear the argument that you shouldn't buy a Wii or 360 because we're only a few years away from downloading all our games?

The original title was 24: Exile, but the change makes sense. Just about everyone agrees that Season 6 sucked, so a little redemption for the franchise was in order.

Redemption is mildly entertaining, if mostly familiar. The story finds Jack Bauer doing humanitarian work at a school in Africa with an old Special Forces buddy while dodging federal subpoenas from back home for torturing terrorists. This being 24, and still being in real-time, it doesn't take long for things to go crazy-go-nuts in the form of a military coup that rolls by Jack's school to kidnap children for their army. Jack Bauer, of course, won't let any ruthless warlord, slimy bureaucrat or pansy U.N. representative stop him from bringing the kids to safety at the U.S. embassy, which will be evacuated... in less than two hours. BOOP BEEP BOOP BEEP

Meanwhile, 24 swears in its first female president, and makes it pretty obvious her son will become a liability at some point in Season 7. As a promo to whet our appetites for Season 7, especially since this is the first new 24 in 18 months(!), it's not bad, but we've seen it all before. The showrunners appear to understand the show needs a jumpstart, and thus CTU is no more, and the action will be centered around Washington D.C. instead of L.A. It's a start but then again, we're being asked to swallow that Tony Almeida didn't really die in Season 5. Oh, and he's now a bad guy too.

I guess the good news is that I'm not dreading Season 7 as much, though my expectations remain low. Sutherland still brings it as Jack and I liked Robert Carlyle as Jack's friend Benton. I wish they could've brought him into the series proper. But of course, Jack can't have friends, THERE'S NO TIME!

TETSUOOOOOOOOOO!

The presence of anime on Blu-ray in the US has been meager so far (unless you really like the DBZ movies), so this is great news. $50, huh? Well, I'd complain more if I weren't so pleased with how gorgeous the Wings of Honneamise BD turned out.

Jeez, it seems like only yesterday I dropped $40 on the "Special Subtitled Edition" VHS. Followed by another $40 on the 2-disc metal case limited-edition DVD.

At long last, the PS2 Cowboy Bebop "movie" is unleashed on the public. Seeing the first new Bebop project since the movie was reward enough for me, but I'd love it if a lot of people saw this. Spread the word!

Special thanks again to nekoewen  and _thiefofhearts_  for making this possible.

Time for my semi-regular rant on the video release of Kill Bill and Grindhouse.

I was so disappointed with the news that Kill Bill would make its debut on Blu-ray in the same R-rated Vol. 1/Vol. 2 configuration it exists in now on DVD, I didn't bother to note it here at the time. And now they announce that Grindhouse will be released on Blu-ray, you guessed it, as separate releases for Planet Terror and Death Proof. Dagnabbit. As much as I love both these films (or is that all four?), I ain't double dipping until they do it right. 

Say, are they going to put that 6-disc Grindhouse set on BD in Japan? We share the same region with them now...

http://www.aintitcool.com/node/38074

So there may be at least one more hour of Red Dwarf on the horizon. I still think it's a shame the show stopped after Series VIII (10 years ago!) so that Doug Naylor could pursue a movie version that never happened. Though some were upset at Series VIII's resurrection of Red Dwarf's entire crew (or just reject everything post-Rob Grant's departure on basic principle), I thought the reboot was a huge shot of adrenaline that the show sorely needed (especially after how turgid Series VII turned out). Honestly, I'd rank VIII as one of the best all around series of the show's run, marred only by its weak "cliffhanger" ending (Rimmer kicks Death in the nuts? That's the ending?), which is even more disappointing after watching an alternate ending on the DVD that would've served much better as the show's finale. If this really is what they say it is, I hope it'll give the show the send-off it always deserved... or maybe open the door to more new adventures...

Cesiumfrancolythicmixioribidiumrixydixydoxidexidroxhide
/from memory, biatches

While there are a few noticeable changes (No more opening narration! John Murdoch has a weird spiral fingerprint! The prostitute John "tested" himself with has a daughter!), most of the 11 minutes added to the director's cut of Dark City are trickier to summarize. A new line of dialogue here, a different shot there, there aren't any "new" scenes in the new version, but many old scenes are given more room to breathe. Even the pauses between lines of dialogue present in the original version feel longer. The persistent musical score of the theatrical cut has also been dialed down, even removed completely from some scenes.

Dark City's strengths lie in its visuals, plotting and pacing, not its dialogue or characterization, and by making the same story take longer, the director's cut puts those weaknesses more at the forefront. I guess I prefer the theatrical cut due to its relentless pacing, but I still found getting an expanded tour of Dark City via the longer version to be a worthwhile experience.

33% on Rotten Tomatoes? Ouch. Still, like that would stop me from seeing the first new X-File in six years. And you know what? I liked it.

I don't disagree much with the negative reviews. It is a slow story without much actual suspense that wouldn't rank very high on the list of classic X-Files stories. It is something that will appeal more to established fans of the series than those who aren't already. It is odd that Fox would position something so low key at the tail end of the summer blockbuster season. But for me, the film worked mostly on the strength of David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson's still awesome chemistry as Mulder and Scully. I was definitely more drawn in by the "what have they been up to?" aspect of the story than the actual case, which turns out to be a gruesome, if slightly ludicrous, spin on The Silence of the Lambs. It is comforting to know that six years later, Mulder and Scully are still having the same arguments, still driving each other nuts and still acting as the anchor the other needs to remain grounded. It feels just like old times.

ANDROMETER: ***

I knew there was a good chance I'd see The Dark Knight at least one more time while it was still in theaters, but I didn't think it likely that I'd be standing in line for an hour for another late night screening on another work night. But such is the siren call of IMAX. I went with my brother and his friend to the closest IMAX theater, in Dublin, about a half-hour drive away.

While Hollywood films being projected on IMAX screens is nothing new (the result of standard film stock being blown up to IMAX proportions), The Dark Knight broke new ground by being the first Hollywood production to shoot scenes with IMAX cameras. The result can be disconcerting if you're not prepared for it. While the majority of the film appears in the 2.40:1 aspect ratio of its standard theatrical exhibition and thus is shown "letterboxed" on the 4:3 IMAX screen, the IMAX-shot scenes fill up the entire frame. Rumor has it this presentation will be somewhat preserved for the Blu-ray release, with the IMAX-shot scenes expanding to fill the entire 16:9 frame of HDTV. What surprised me was that often the film would cut to IMAX footage for just a single shot before reverting back, usually for pretty establishing shots flying over Gotham. Thus, IMAX footage is sprinkled in small doses throughout, with only three sequences (the opening robbery, the middle truck/cycle chase, and the final Joker confrontation) done (nearly) entirely in the larger format.

The IMAX footage injected new life into this 150+ minute movie I'd just seen days before. Super crisp and clean, you could hear the audience get excited every time the image got big again. And the film's still awesome too. Though the visceral experience is not the same when you know where everything's heading, I picked up more plot details this time and even felt more forgiving of the plot's scatterbrained nature. If you have the chance, definitely check out The Dark Knight in IMAX.

I borrowed this from Judy and just beat it, and yes, it actually does a good job resolving the dangling plotlines of the series. Of course, the plotlines of Metal Gear Solid are so absurd, trying to make sense of them serves to underline the craziness even more.

You know exactly what to expect from MGS by now. Cool gameplay, great graphics, amazing attention to detail, a bizarre and sometimes juvenile sense of humor that clashes with the serious themes being explored, and cutscenes that are compelling but always seem to take much longer than they should (Minor Spoiler: The game's very last scene has to pose a record for the most prolonged death scene in any visual media). Frankly, if MGS2 wasn't enough to turn you off the series forever, nothing will. If you're still a fan, I can easily give MGS4 a solid (ahem) recommendation.

Imagine, if you will, the following three scenarios:

1. Batman inspires citizens to take up vigilantism, but they don’t share his discipline for not using lethal force (We'll ignore "I won't kill you, but I don't have to save you" from Batman Begins for now).

2. An accountant thinks he has sussed out Batman’s true identity after studying Wayne Enterprises’ R&D financial records and tries to blackmail Bruce Wayne.

3. Lucius Fox inadvertently develops a technology that allows Batman to eavesdrop on the entire city without anyone’s knowledge and has ethical qualms about it.

I could see any of those intriguing situations being the basis of an entire comic book issue or an episode of an animated series. All three occur within the runtime of The Dark Knight but take up maybe less than 5 minutes of screen time each. But really, that's the greatest strike against the film: too many good ideas battling for attention. I think this is especially true of the film's last half-hour, particularly how Harvey Dent's story resolves just as it's getting interesting.

I'll skip the plot synopsis and just say, yes, the film is quite good. I don't agree that it's "#1 on the iMDB Top 250" good, but it is very good indeed. Director Christopher Nolan grounds Batman even further in a realistic setting, making The Joker's wave of terror feel less like comic-book excess and more disturbingly in tune with post-9/11 paranoia and despair. Nolan's also improved as an action director. I wouldn't call any of the fight scenes in Dark Knight brilliant, but at least you can tell what's going on this time. Heath Ledger's Joker is in a class of its own, even in a film packed with as many good actors as this one. He really seems to be conjuring the character as he goes, like he refuses to read from the script that every other actor in the film has been given. I realize that's an absurd statement, but that's the effect his Joker has on the film, to make you stop thinking about movies and acting and facepaint and comic books every time he appears onscreen and simply fear whatever he'll do next and dread that you can't predict what that is.

My last critique would be that Christian Bale's Batman voice still doesn't quite work, especially when he's given more than four words to say at a time. But still, how great is your movie when a silly voice by your main character in no way diminishes the impact of everything around it?

ANDROMETER: ****