Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[Dr. Strangelove]

When the first Star Wars came out I'm not sure if cable tv even existed anywhere and watching movies at home probably meant you had a screen and an 8mm projector. You can now get those on ebay for $20-40. I'm sure they cost a mint in the 70's. Not long ago at my parents house I found the receipt to our first VCR. It cost over $500...in the 80's! Before Best Buy pulled them for being obsolete I think they could be had for $30-40

[Wild Hoss]

Has anyone seen Lone Ranger? I haven't but it seems likes a fascinating case study of complete failure. Bring back a character no one under 70 cares about...make him secondary to Johnny Depp...cast Johnny Depp in a role that was an outdated racial stereotype...include wacky comedy alongside horrific violence (which can work-see Deadpool-but you tread a thin line).

I did not, but The Mouse was betting the house on Depp for that one. And to be fair, he'd made them a PILE with the Pirates franchise...albeit starting a decade earlier, when attendance was at all-time highs. But yes, putting Depp up against all the negatives you note seems like an obviously bad bet. And it was.

$215M production budget...probably another $100M in marketing. Made $89M domestic. Another $171M overseas, but the studio only gets pennies on the dollar for those sales. Probably lost a legit $200M for Disney. Unreal.

[Wild Hoss]

When the first Star Wars came out I'm not sure if cable tv even existed anywhere and watching movies at home probably meant you had a screen and an 8mm projector. You can now get those on ebay for $20-40. I'm sure they cost a mint in the 70's. Not long ago at my parents house I found the receipt to our first VCR. It cost over $500...in the 80's! Before Best Buy pulled them for being obsolete I think they could be had for $30-40

The transition to home viewing is definitely coming more quickly, and that matters. Force Awakens is going to available digitally (Which is how I purchase films now) on April 1st...3 1/2 months after it opened.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Interesting statistic just quoted on CNN. 69% of white men without college educations support Trump, the same as Reagan in 1984.

However, there are about 50% fewer white men w/o college educations as in 1984.

[hack]

Movies are shit. Always were, always will be. Only exceptions are The Big Lebowski, Spinal Tap and The Jungle Book.

TV is suddenly very interesting though, yeah. It's still basically sucks as a genre, but it's hitting its potential regularly all of the sudden now that it's been disrupted.

[CGVT]

Ha!

[ame]https://youtu.be/HesDbCLSOpM[/ame]

[Hannibal]

TV has gotten surprisingly good. I thought it was dead forever when reality TV hit it big but it's genuinely better than it used to be. Movies used to be where you would see variety and people taking chances while TV had lots of shallow nonthreatening crap. The two media have basically switched places.

[Hannibal]

I haven't seen it but the recent Mad Max film was universally hailed as one of the best action movies ever. I'm not sure the genre has an indefinite lifespan. Hollywood used to put out 4 dozen cowboy movies a year...now they're nonexistent. There's only so many times you can retell similar stories...and the comic book movies will eventually hit the same wall.

If you talk to younger people and kids who didn't grow up with the original Star Wars trilogy, a lot of them will tell you the 2015 film is a lot better than any of the original 3. Having re-watched the original trilogy recently I can't really argue that the acting was better in 1977...cuz it wasn't. Empire has aged the best...can't say that the Ewoks glorious victory over the Emperor's best storm troopers really holds up well today.

There's good and bad from both eras. I do agree that Hollywood is a lot less willing to take risks nowadays than back in the 70's and 80's. Reboots, remakes, adaptations are a lot safer bet. The overseas market means considerably more today than back then as well.

The Mad Max movie, even despite the praise it has received, is still viewed as inferior to The Road Warrior by just about everybody above the age of 12 who has seen both movies. It's thought of as a "great" movie largely because its competitors in the action genre are festering dogshit. It's like being the best team in the MAC. Big deal.

The Star Wars prequels were also highly regarded when they came out. People forget this but it is true. Especially Revenge of the Sith. Now they are widely regarded as shit. Episode VII will be viewed the same, if not worse, than Episodes I-III once a few years have passed and the cognitive dissonance has had time sort itself out. That's another way of saying that time is the ultimate critic. If you think that the acting and dialog in The Force Awakens were not significantly worse than Episodes IV-VI then you have to actively be trying to find reasons to dislike the originals. The action scenes were all much better too since they actually took the time to choreograph them and build some drama into them instead of just puking a bunch of special effects all over the screen.

[Hannibal]

Here is a video series that I highly recommend from a guy who explains very well what has gone wrong with modern action movies. He talks specifically about The Road Warrior vs. Fury Road, but pretty much everything that he says can be applied to modern action movies.

[youtube]9_2sPkfPKwc[/youtube]
[youtube]ggkyN6pmVEg[/youtube]
[youtube]dWfFpdI4aaU[/youtube]

[Dr. Strangelove]

lol...there's no way in hell I'm going to view Star Wars as far superior to Force Awakens in a few years. The latter isn't original, but neither was 1977 film...it's originality came from putting a very standard fantasy/rescue the princess story in a sci-fi setting.

If you think 1977 Star Wars had better acting than 2015 then you are simply resting on nostalgia. Mark Hamill and Carrie Fisher are mediocre at best in that movie. Sir Alec Guinness looked tired as hell and reportedly thought the movie was trash. Darth Vadar is stereotypical "bad guy" and there no depth to his character in the slightest...it wasn't till Empire that they turned him into an epic villain.

There is no hint that Luke & Leia are siblings or that Vadar is their father. Lucas had no clue there'd even be a sequel. It's a straight action-adventure story with only two real settings: desert planet and death star. The climactic fight between Vadar and Obi Wan is embarrassing to watch by today's standards. That fight only has "drama" because you know the backstory that they invented later.

You say I'm trying to find a reason to hate the originals? I say you're trying to find reasons to hate the new one while ignoring all the flaws from 1977.

[hack]

Fight scenes are always basically ridiculous. I thought I'd watch Game of Thrones a second time before Season 6, because there's so much I like about it and a lot to pick up second time around, but I can't take how not realistic the fight scenes are.

[froot loops]

I just wish it wasn't all comic book movies.

[CGVT]

I just wish it wasn't all comic book movies.

I agree. I was never into comic books and I have no interest seeing comic book movies.

[Cody_Russell]

Fight scenes are always basically ridiculous. I thought I'd watch Game of Thrones a second time before Season 6, because there's so much I like about it and a lot to pick up second time around, but I can't take how not realistic the fight scenes are.

I'm re-watching GoT for the 3rd time before season 6 starts. There is SOOO much implicit meaning with dialogue and shots that people re-watching will pick up... it's incredible.
Like I think the opening scene (episode 1, season 1) of GoT implicitly shows what happens from beginning to end of the entire series.
But yes, I agree that some of the fighting scenes are meh... like Eddard vs Jaime. It isn't as epic as LOTR. Though there is one recent episode no GoT viewer can ever forget when it comes to the fight scene/ action (Hardhome)...
GoT gets you with the politics, acting, narrative, dialogue, characters.... a lot of positives.
Basically if you love "Braveheart" or LOTR, you should love GoT. IMO, GoT is so similar to "Braveheart" ... something I never hear.

[Wild Hoss]

I just wish it wasn't all comic book movies.

Its not, and they are 100% avoidable.

I will forever maintain that anybody who hasn't seen The Dark Knight is a communist however.