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So Who Saw What Last Week? (me - Sin Nombre: B, Dave Matthews Band in 3D: B+, Avatar: B)

Posted by: islander (a.k.a SONYXFund) on Dec 21, 08:26

Avatar spoilers at the end of this IM

Sin Nombre: Very sad film with two intertwining stories: one about two boys in a brutal gang and the other about a girl, father, and uncle trying to illegally cross from Honduras to the US. Well acted, directed, filmed, etc, only thing holding it back is a lack of depth and its familiar plot. Still, well done though.

Dave Matthews Larger Than Life in 3D: Not a big DMB fan, but couldn't pass up free tickets, and this turned out quite good. The opening acts, neither of which I was familair with, were the highlights. Gogol Bordello, sorta Gypsy punk rockI'd say, was bugnutz insane, and got me into checking out their music. Next was Ben Harper and the Relentless 7 which is like blues-y hard rock. Harper has really cool guitar style and what a voice! DMB still not my fave type of music, but they really are good at what they do.

Avatar:

The Good: The fx (for the most part). It's not even much how they look, but how they feel, and much of it felt totally real, way much more than say your GIJoes and Transformers. Slight quibble, a few scenes felt too busy, like the 3D couldnt quite keep up, and then there's the use of mist to obscure the cg backgrounds (most notably the large buildings at the military)

The scene where Avatar Jake tames that first bird was BREATHTAKING in its excitement, one of the too few moments that was really transcendant

The shot near the end when Neyteri is holding real Jake's body in the science trailer was MIND BLOWING. The perspective of 10 ft Neyteri and 6ft Jake was perfect, wish there had been more shots of that extreme close interaction between the Navi and the humans (the scene where the Navi guy lands on the ship and starts tossing soldiers around was pretty good too)

The Bad: Story was a little hippie-dippie at times. Scene where the Navi are holding hands, swaying back and forth, and singing to the mother nature tree was like the WTF flower-power flipside of the orgy scene from Matrix Reloaded.

The Colonel character was so over the top, only thing missing was a evil handlebar moustache for him to twirl.

Some back story stuff wont stand up to close scrutiny. Apparently, Obama (or the 30 or so presidents that will follow) never passes a health care bill. When we are introduced to Jake, he says theres a cure for paralysis but he cant afford it, especially "IN THIS ECONOMY" I cant stand it in current shows when they mention the economy let alone one 150 years in the future, a future in which WE ARE TRAVELLING TO DISTANT PLANETS and CREATING HUMAN ALIEN HYBRIDS. But we're reduced to 5 dollar wheel chairs and mining for coal (yes unobtainium is coal)

Also its a little sad that we're still a war mongering, racist people 150 years from now

The Ugly: Nothing ugly here. In fact, Neyteri and Avatar Jake were both pretty damn hot!

So Who Saw What Last Week? (me - Sin Nombre: B, Dave Matthews Band in 3D: B+, Avatar: B) islander Dec 21, 08:26

Avatar A, Up in the Air B+, Princess and Frog B+, Ingl. Bastards B. {nm} JMT Dec 21, 08:32

AVATR (A+), Meatballs (C), Elf (A-), Nataional Lampoon Christmas Vacation (A-), 500 days of summer (A), {nm} gogreen Dec 21, 08:36

Avatar. Action/story B+ , movie magic/overall entertainment value: A++ {nm} Facto Dec 21, 08:56

Popping Cloverfield into the DVD-player now. One of the hundreds of DVDs I've bought but have yet to see. Facto Dec 21, 09:57

Avatar (A+) tealfan Dec 21, 08:56

avatar 100% visual/40% story, COVE - one of the best doc's ive seen, messenger - great first act then meanders to nothing {nm} adrenalin112 Dec 21, 08:59

sorry if i spoiled too much of the cove for you, but that damn movie hyped up my inner conservationist. {nm} maceodkat Dec 21, 09:14

PBS NOVA: The Spy Factory (2009) A , Donnie Darko (2001) B , The Girl from Monaco (2008) C , Inglourious Basterds (2009) C {nm} joeoftexas Dec 21, 09:03

im glad someone else thinks inglorious is mediocre {nm} sneak Dec 21, 16:10