Kevin's Watch

Great film. I always liked the character of Hook, myself.

You're entitled to your incorrect preferences. I think I just find him an irritating distraction from the important bits. I don't see the need for him.

Additionally, I can see why his family stormed out of the premiere. It's not the most flattering portrayal.

I just saw Changeling. Great film. About 3/4 of the way through, I said to myself "This looks an awful lot like a Clint Eastwood film." Checked the case, and it is

I've also started a watch-a-thon of Babylon 5. I never caught the entire series, so this is my first time through the whole thing.

I was bored, so I just sat down and watched The Simpsons Movie, and then Secretary. The most incongruous double feature ever?

I'm weird, I know.


(Next week: Toy Story and Audition. )

Rigel:

I just saw Changeling. Great film.

A friend of mine keeps trying to recommend this to me. But he's a luvvie, so i try to resist!

Street Fighter: Legend of Chun Li. I expected it to be bad, and it was.

CovenantJr wrote:You're entitled to your incorrect preferences. I think I just find him an irritating distraction from the important bits. I don't see the need for him.

Additionally, I can see why his family stormed out of the premiere. It's not the most flattering portrayal.

Apparently the real guy was almost the exact opposite of the film character. I think the film needed a character like him to break the whole 'stiff-upper-lip' Brit characters of most of the rest of the cast.

Finally got around to seeing the third Matrix flick, Evolutions was it? Pretty amazing conclusion, even though I was nonplussed about some things in the 2nd...

It got a lot of flak, but I liked it much better than the second.

I watched Southland Tales the other day. It was interesting.

danlo wrote:Finally got around to seeing the third Matrix flick, Evolutions was it? Pretty amazing conclusion, even though I was nonplussed about some things in the 2nd...

Revolutions.
Anyway, danlo, glad you got something out of the movie.
I really disliked it the first time around - I called it "Revulsions."
The middle film, Reloaded, was more fun, but I accept Revolutions more now as part of the grand(iose) design.

The special extended edition of Aliens. I've seen a director's cut of it before, with the sentry gun section put back in, but this version features a load of stuff in the colony before it's wiped out, and we see Newt with her family. According to James Cameron's introduction, all this stuff was cut for brevity, not quality.

Funny that after all these years, I still have not seen the extended version of Aliens (except for the sentry gun bit, which was shown in the TV version).

It makes it a much better, fuller film.

I like the theatrical cut, cept the sentry gun scene is nice. I really didn't need to see Newt's family, or any of the other extra scenes. Kinda too much info before getting to see the Marines prep. Less wait till that cool scene gave it more impact for me.

While I like the extended cut, I never thought the movie suffered for lacking those scenes. There was something creepy about getting to the colony, and not knowing anything about it... who the people were, what the place looked like, etc.

I liked seeing Newt before the disaster; it gave some context to a character that had previously always seemed to me to be gratuitous. It was also helpful to see the colonists cheerfully acting on the company's orders before everything went bad.

One of the big benefits of this edition for me was that it balanced out the rampaging marines a bit. I've always felt that Aliens was a bit too much straight action, particularly sandwiched between the claustrophobic tension of Alien and Alien 3. This extended version allows more time for things other than marines shouting and shooting.

I can see Rigel's point, though. There was a certain atmosphere that came from knowing no more about the colony than Ripley did. And I have to criticise the scene of a facehugger on Newt's father. That did nothing for the film, and was a clumsy reveal of something we knew was coming anyway.

On balance, I think the extended edition is a distinct improvement over the theatrical release.

Kiss of the Dragon starring Jet Li is on TV. So far it's one of the dumbest action movies I've seen in a long time.

Over the last few days I watched Once upon a time in China and the first sequel. Tomorrow night I'm watching the third.

Every time I see these films, I'm struck by what a good story they contain. The first one, especially... the opposing master that Jet Li fights in the end, just seems to tragic to me, beaten down by the world, selling out his principles just so he can eat a hot meal... he's not really a bad guy, he's just disillusioned with the world.