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Crunching the Numbers: Year Nine (1st Quarter Reviews)

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Godzilla Apocalypse Part 2

Even more braindead monster action porn than Apocalypse Part 1. There is literally no plot in this movie, it is just human characters reacting to what little plot there was in Part 1 and running around to avoid explosions, pressing buttons to make things stop, and shooting aliens because obviously nerdy, physically unfit scientists can handle military hardware competently against an alien invasion force.

There's some nice money shots amidst all the cacophony, but that's it aside from Godzilla's occasional Godzillaing.

C-

Edited by 4815162342
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Heaven

 

In the first of two major Fall Sci-Fi outings starring Cillian Murphy, we have Heaven. Alpha has been trying to convince us that Heaven is better than Transcendence. I haven't seen the latter, but Heaven unfortunately is not a strong film. Its' main problem is that it really doesn't delve that much into world-building or exploration at all. It gives a little lip service to technology here, a little bit to religious beliefs there, and a bit to government paranoia over there, but really, it doesn't say or do that much. For example, Paradisi. We get very little information or visuals about what the Paradisi World is like. In fact, we get very little interaction between people inside Paradisi. Perhaps the single most interesting and important facet of the film is barely touched upon. As for the themes, the film is very passive-aggressive about them. It talks a bit about religious objections to the trans-human world, but only superficially and then decides to avoid further discussion and go "here, crazy Christian bombers." There is no real instance of legitimate technological concerns or objections. Prior to the bombing everyone who isn't a radical religious nut is on John's side. And generally the characterization isn't that good. There's no real development in any of them, they just suddenly change their minds.

 

In short, a very disappointing outing. Alpha had built it up a lot in prior Quarters, but in the end it's a construction that goes nowhere except plot point to plot point with the bare bones of tackling its own premise and themes.

Edited by 4815162342
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Aaand Heaven just went from main OC to Kansas 2.0.

I'm just gonna stop making films with a sociopolitical context, since no matter how hard I try to please everybody nothing goes over well.

I had to do MAJOR changes to Heaven because if I knew I made the fundamentalist Christians the villain that everybody here would shit their pants and claim how "culturally insensitive" it was, especially Blankments, who'll probably get pissed once again despite the fact how much I changed the story so that it would be less biased (and I thought it turned out much better, and helped get the message of unity across better).

Also, important to know, but the "crazy Christian bombers" weren't actually Christian. Just throwing that out there.

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Aaand Heaven just went from main OC to Kansas 2.0.

I'm just gonna stop making films with a sociopolitical context, since no matter how hard I try to please everybody nothing goes over well.

I had to do MAJOR changes to Heaven because if I knew I made the fundamentalist Christians the villain that everybody here would shit their pants and claim how "culturally insensitive" it was, especially Blankments, who'll probably get pissed once again despite the fact how much I changed the story so that it would be less biased (and I thought it turned out much better, and helped get the message of unity across better).

Also, important to know, but the "crazy Christian bombers" weren't actually Christian. Just throwing that out there.

 

Honestly the film would have been better off if you had put more focus on the Christian movement and went into their philosophical and theological objects instead of the watered down superficial treatment you ended up giving them. From what it looks like, you rushed to finish the film for this quarter, whereas if you held off on it you could have developed everything more thoroughly and provocatively (this is a film that should make you think and ponder, not just mellow at people being bummed out cause "they can't fix the world, man."

 

This is a completely different kind of film from Kansas so you would not have had the same universal backlash

Edited by 4815162342
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Life of Galileo

 

So, Baz Luhrmann Bazzed things up, and in part missed the point by doing so, since his focus on making Galileo female added an unnecessary layer of complexity and thematics to the proceedings. By focusing so much on the "hey the Church and medieval society disrespected women, man" angle, the film loses some sight of the central clash of science, faith, and reason. The performances are all very strong and the plot and characters generally shine through, though the film does slip up a bit with Ludovico's sudden face-heel turn. Aside from the completely random, pointless Eminem insertion, Luhrmann generally restrains his more flagrant tendencies. Though the final scene sort of indicates that Charles Laughton screwed up Brecht's work by keeping Galileo male, when in fact Luhrmann is doing the screwing. That sort of disingenuous plotting annoys me.

 

Putting the flaws aside, it's a tight and engaging film, though you could say that by adapting a play about Galileo that includes some historical inaccuracies (everything with his daughter), the material is actual less compelling and interesting than some of the real things that happened.

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IMO Galileo isn't bad per se (and this is coming from someone who generally dislikes Baz Luhrmann) but its random and pointless bits are difficult to ignore. The Eminem bit is laugh-out-loud funny though.

 

Scrooge McDuck is up next. *shudders*

Edited by C00k13
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IMO Galileo isn't bad per se (and this is coming from someone who generally dislikes Baz Luhrmann) but it's random and pointless bits are difficult to ignore. The Eminem bit is laugh-out-loud funny though.

 

Scrooge McDuck is up next. *shudders*

Don't worry. Rukaio and Numbers usually give similar ratings.
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