I'm one of those damned fools who believes he can judge a new acquaintance by the look on his face, and a movie on the basis of the trailer. When I was a kid, the trailers were much better. They gave you a small taste, a teaser basically, but they never clued you in to the plot. Nowadays, the trailers are twice as long, and they tell you the entire story upfront. I guess the money people at the studios did some research and found out that people like to know upfront what it is they're going to be watching. I'm not one of them. Anyway, based on the trailer, I thought this movie was going to be much better than it was.
First of all, it had a lot, and I mean a LOT of voice over narration, and this was coupled by a lot, and I mean a LOT of explanatory dialogue between the two main characters played by George Clooney and Ewan McGregor. And you guys remember how I used to rail against voice over. My criticism that a movie should be shown and not told is, in many instances, unfair, because the structure of a particular film may call for narration, and the narration may be organic, and not "cheating." But I hate it anyway.
By the way, forgive me for using this opportunity to return to my former profession, but the film is a send-up of another film, a parody in other words. The references are not heavy-handed, but if you've seen the other film, you'll recognize it. Nick? Are you listening? I figure you'll see this film. And I know you've seen the film that it parodies. Hence, I am putting you on the spot. I don't recall seeing it mentioned in any reviews, but doing research of this kind is cheating, and I have always expected, (and received) more from you. Hence, quiz commences. Or gauntlet thrown, if you prefer.
For the rest of you, I do not give this one a high rating.
N.B. Professor, I thought you were going to send me a link to that video of my Ticker-tape parade. Can you just give me the Facebook account, or do I have to be invited by the postee?
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I actually haven't gotten a chance to see this film yet haha. I planned on it because much like you, the trailer appealed to me. However, I have heard from multiple people, you being just the latest, that this movie was disappointing. Would I be able to figure out which film it parodies just from the information in the trailer? Or was it more of a "you have to see the movie to understand" kind of deal?
ReplyDeleteIn an unrelated topic, for my birthday my parents bought me The Seventh Seal. They couldn't understand what I wanted with a Swedish film from 1957. I am going to have to make them watch it.
I was also wondering if you have ever seen the movie "Sleuth"? I am referring to the 1972 film starring Laurence Olivier and Michael Caine, not the 2008 remake starring Jude Law and Michael Caine (playing Olivier's role this time). I saw it about a year ago and I asked for it on DVD only to discover the only copies available are used, and the cheapest one I could find was $52. I was just wondering if you saw it and what you thought of it.
Mr. Bennett, I apologize. I realize that I forgot to post the links, because after having some technical difficulties with them originally, I never got back to them. Here are the two links, although I'm still not sure they work:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.facebook.com/home.php#/video/video.php?v=188454747812
http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/video/video.php?v=188454652812
I hope it works!
I believe that in order to watch it, you will need to copy the link into your browser and I hope that Facebook will allow you to view it publicly, if not, I will come up with another solution for you. I apologize for the delay.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I also wanted to comment on the Men Who Stare at Goats because I actually did have the chance to see it. The trailer looked great to me, and I expected to see a great movie, or at least a good movie. However, less than 10 minutes into the movie, you will be happy to know that I noticed the very prevalent voice over and literally thought in my head, "If Mr. Bennett sees this movie, he will hate it," based solely on the voice overs and because of your class, I was immediately turned off to how often they used voice over and how it just made the movie a jumbled mess.
But the second those voice overs began, you will be proud to know that you immediately sprang to mind. And much like you, I was highly disappointed in the movie because it just lacked some essential ingredient to make it a strong movie. It wasn't terrible at all parts but I was sitting through it almost uncomfortably because of all of the problems the film had.
It seems, that this movie, like some others, (i.e. Pineapple Express - about drugs) is that you need to be on drugs to enjoy this movie, although people will argue that you enjoy everything more while doing drugs but this movie was just flawed from start to finish.
I was a sucker, like yourself, and drawn into the names and the cleverness of the original story but I came out asking where the men I had gone to see actually went. It was very sad.