Posted on June 8, 2009 by Darren
I was at home over the weekend and I had the grave misfortune to witness what passes for children’s entertainment these days as my little sister forced us to endure the Disney channel. What we got were a series of ridiculously condescending ‘comedies’ revolving around spoilt tweenagers who can’t act. These were followed by reality “so-you-think-you-can-sing” family gameshows themed around Miley bloody Cyrus. And my sister seemed to love it. Maybe I’m just getting old, but when did children’s entertainment become so brain dead?
Who can see this ending badly?
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Filed under: Television | Tagged: animaniacs, batman: the animated series, childrens television, dcau, freakazoid, hannah montana, kids television, looney tunes, miley cyrus, Television | 2 Comments »
Posted on June 7, 2009 by Darren
I’m not a comic book fan, I must admit. I own a few Absolute editions (
Watchmen,
Sandman,
The Long Halloween) and a rare few prestige format books (
The Green Lantern Archives and
The Killing Joke), and I’m planning on bulk-buying Grant Morrison’s run on Batman in those nice hardcover editions to tide me over on my holiday this summer. So, what I’m about to say must be tempered with that little caveat. I’ve read relatively little of Batman lore, save what my parents would pick me up from the grocery store in Ghana when I was small (and – to further outline the differences between myself and your comics fan – I remember them merely for what they contained rather than by issue and series number; I fondly recall
“the one where Swamp Thing meets Killer Croc” or
“the retelling of The Riddler’s origin”). Still, on reading the coverage and preparing to jump headfirst into Grant Morrison’s magnum opus, one thought is running through my head:
If they are threatening to end Bruce Wayne’s run as Batman, they should do it.
Na na na na na na, Batman!
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Filed under: Opinion | Tagged: batman, batman begins, batman rip, bruce wayne, Comics, dick grayson, final crisis, grant morrison, robin, The Dark Knight, the death and return of superman | 1 Comment »
Posted on June 7, 2009 by Darren
I’m back…
Science-fiction film Moon, starring Sam Rockwell and Kevin Spacey is opening in the States next week. It actually looks quite good – with reviews seemingly spanning the divide from “it’s solidly entertaining with a great performance” to “it’s classic science-fiction”. It looks likely to be one of those films I will really try to get to see over the Summer (when it eventually opens here in Ireland), and the trailer is well worth a look. Still, this got me thinking about how the fictional fascination with life on other worlds has been embraced by the genre, and whether that has really changed in recent years.
Sam Rockwell's many jobs on the lunar station include changing lightbulbs when needs be...
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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: aliens, avatar, doctor who, forbidden planet, independenc day, james cameron, mars, moon, Movies, outland, plan 9 from outerspace, planets, red planet, roswell, sam rockwell, saturn, science fiction, star trek, the day the earth stood still, total recall | Leave a comment »
Posted on June 1, 2009 by Darren
I’m off on holidays for the next few days, so you won’t hear from me until next weekend. I just thought I’d have a very quick look at how the “now arriving a month early” summer box office season is going so far. Back at the start of the month I predicted a massive summer, even by Hollywood’s standards. Would I care to revise my estimates, one month in?
Keep on Trekkin'
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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: angels & demons, blockbusters, box office, fast & furious, managing expectations, may, Movies, Night at the Museum 2, star trek, terminator: salvation, terminator:salvation, The Dark Knight, up, watchmen, wolverine | Leave a comment »
Posted on May 31, 2009 by Darren
Probably the only “feel-good film of the year” to involve excrement-covered urchins, the blindng of beggars and brutal police interrogation methods within the first half-hour of screentime. I have to admit I love the marketing for the film, which has pitched it as a movie that will leve you feeling as though you just spent two hours basking in sunshine. I’d suggest the experience is somewhat different. That’s not to say I didn’t greatly enjoy the film – it was one of the best of the year – just a warning to viewers not to expect sunshine and lollipops for most of the film’s runtime. So, how does the official Best Picture of 2008 stack up?
Jamal noticed he was getting a lot more attention after he went on Who Wants to be a Millionaire?
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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: anil kapoor, best picture oscar, danny boyle, dev patel, non-review review, Oscars, review, slumdog millionaire | 2 Comments »
Posted on May 31, 2009 by Darren
I checked out Coraline in 3D on Friday night there in Cineworld. While I have my own thoughts on the format that I will talk about next week, I have to say that the film is – in one word – magical. The better half completely agreed with me here. I think it may be the best stop-motion production that I have ever seen – and this is from a guy who counts The Nightmare Before Christmas as must-watch seasonal entertainment. It really was one of the cinematic highlights of the year.
Cute as a button...
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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: 3d, coraline, henry sellick, neil gaiman, non-review review, review, sandman, stop-motion | 3 Comments »
Posted on May 30, 2009 by Darren
Network 2 reaired the whole Terminator trilogy to celebrate Salvation‘s release on Friday. My luck being my luck, I caught the tail end of the franchise, the weak link if you will. As I write this, I face the question that I face when I review any given sequel or part of a franchise: should I judge it independently or alongside its predecessors (and – if I’m a latecomer to the party – its successors)? If I adopt the former approach, is Terminator 3 a reasonably solid sci-fi/action movie? If I look at it as the third installment in the franchise, is it fit to be considered alongside two of the greatest action movies ever made?
Spot the one non-classically trained actor in this shot...
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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: Arnold Schwarzenegger, claire danes, nick stahl, non-review review, review, roger ebert, sequel, terminator, terminator 3, terminator:salvation, terrminator 3: rise of the machines | Leave a comment »
Posted on May 29, 2009 by Darren
Whatever happened to originality? This is the first weekend since Wolverine kicked off the blockbuster movie season a month ago that there isn’t a sequel, prequel or reboot opening at the multiplexes in America. Despite the fact that Pixar’s Up and Sam Raimi’s Drag Me To Hell are reviewing very strongly, most box office folk seem to think that this will be a relatively quiet weekend at the old box office, which is a shame really when we’ve got two of the best reviewed movies of the year going head-to-head. Still, what happened to Hollywood’s originality?
Brideshead Revisited, Revisited
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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: 9, Buffy: The Vampire Slayer, drag me to hell, Flight of The Navigator, Godfather II, harry potter, hollywood, Movies, Nine, prequels, Pride & Prejudice, Race to Witch Mountain, reboot, remake, sequels, spinoff, terminator: salvation, The Dark Knight, The Neverending Story, The Wolf Man, up, wolverine | 3 Comments »
Posted on May 29, 2009 by Darren
In the knowledge that Terminator: Salvation has ‘only’ taken in $71m at the US Box Office, having cost over $200m to make and market, prognosticators are rushing to pronounce the Terminator franchise as dead. The facts don’t look good – so far it has earned less than the previous franchise killer (the disappointing-in-so-many-ways Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines), it is reviewing badly, and it got its ass handed to it by a Ben Stiller family comedy. This is surely bad news for Warner Brothers, the studio that produced the other $200m ‘dud’ of the year, Watchmen – but does it really signal the end for everyone’s favourite time-traveling robotic assassin?
No bones (or metallic endoskeleton) about it...
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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: box office, Gran Torino, harry potter, Movies, Night at the Museum 2, Night the Museum, Sarah Connor Chronicles, summer, terminator, terminator 2, terminator 3, terminator: salvation, Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles, Warner Brothers, watchmen | Leave a comment »
Posted on May 28, 2009 by Darren
How do Pixar continue to do it? Of the ten films they have produced so far, nearly all are considered animated classics (though I remain skeptical of A Bug’s Life). Somehow the company seems to have found a way to not only compress the whole spectrum of human emotion (though it has been suggested that they do better with loss and depression than triumph and love), and distill these precious elements into a technically marvelous computer-animated form. With Up seemingly continuing the trend, how can they continue to do it?
Carl knew it wouldn't all be plane sailing...
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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: animation, cgi, disney, finding nemo, pixar, the incredibles, up | 2 Comments »
