Topic: Rate the last movie you've seen

[tendoboy1984]

You don't see us using VHS tapes to watch movies at homes anymorel. Home media is transitioning to a digital format (DVD, MP4, WMV, etc.) so it's kind of ironic that movie studios still cling to film while the rest of the world has moved on. Even photography has moved on from film.

[gbuell]

The problem with high frame rates in movies is that it makes everything look so real, that it looks fake, if that makes any sense.

I had the exact same thought while watching The Hobbit at 48 FPS. It was very strange. Somehow the "realness" of the motion made the fact that the actors were wearing makeup and wigs much more noticeable and distracting. Maybe it has to do with the mental association of high frame rates with low-budget soap operas. Whatever it is, it felt incredibly bizarre. I will say that the high frame rate actually seemed to benefit the many full-CGI characters. I really got the sense that they were inhabiting the same space as the real actors.

[TJ Spyke]

You don't see us using VHS tapes to watch movies at homes anymorel. Home media is transitioning to a digital format (DVD, MP4, WMV, etc.) so it's kind of ironic that movie studios still cling to film while the rest of the world has moved on. Even photography has moved on from film.

tendo, things are not as simple as you think they are. Here is a good article to start with: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_versus_film_photography

[Pixelated Pixies]

I don't think I'm perceptive enough to tell the difference (or perhaps I just don't care), but you could argue that there's a warmth to film that you don't get from digital. I guess it's the equivalent of preferring to read an actual book as oppose to reading it on a brightly lit high resolution screen. The content overall might not change that much, but often the manner in which something is consumed can be just as enjoyable as the content itself. I for instance still enjoy listening to vinyl.

[ThePerm]

The warmth of film isn't an accurate way to describe it.

Until recently with the REDcam, Flm had a higher resolution than digital. Different films have different feels. Film will always have its place. A good example of film vs digital is grindhouse. Planet Terror was shot digitally and then fake grain was added, and Death Proof was shot on film. Tarantino and Rodriguez have similar directing styles, but Rodriguez advocates Digital and Tarantino advocates film. Black Dynamite was shot on actual old school film for an old school look.

[TrueNerd]

Look out y'allz I'm about to drop some SCIENCE.


http://movieline.com/2012/12/14/hobbit-high-frame-rate-science-48-frames-per-second/


tl;dr: While our eyes can perceive 66 frames per second, our brains only perceive 40 moments per second and any motion (or frame rate) higher than that looks off.


Personally, I have no interest in EVER seeing film in any other frame rate than 24fps. It looks the best to me.


Oh and I saw THE HOBBIT. The first half was booooooooooring. The second half got better but never really came close to reaching the heights of the LotR trilogy. I dunno what happened to Jackson. He did an AMAZING job adapting LotR and cutting/streamlining all the bloat and lore that works in novels and just being economical with storytelling. And then KING KONG happened and he seems to now think that being indulgent is the way to go. We could have gotten one awesome Hobbit movie or even two, two-hour movies. Instead we're getting another nine hour trilogy and I'm still not convinced the material supports it. I reserve the right to re-evaluate this opinion in a year and a half when all three are out.

[Sarail]

Year and a half?

I was under the assumption that Jackson was releasing each subsequent Hobbit film each holiday season in December. Is this not right?

[TJ Spyke]

The thing with The Hobbit is that there is really only enough material for 1 movie, but he is stretching it out to 3 movies originally 2, but even 2 was pushing it), so of course there will be bloat and filler.


Racht is right. The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug will be December 2013 and The Hobbit: There and Back Again will be December 2014.

[TrueNerd]

Bullshit.

Luke has to learn to use the Force, and doesn't defeat the emperor without help from Vader. He ultimately balances the Force by swaying Vader emotionally and getting him to throw Palpatine down a hole or w/e.

Ang can't fulfill his destiny without first mastering all four elements, which he goes through a lot of hardships to do. Sure, the bending masters who teach him just fall in to his lap, but he still struggles with each one. Growing and changing as a person along with his fighting style.

And Harry Potter had to go to class? I dunno. Not the biggest HP fan.

/nerd rage

Side note: I liked Kung-Fu Panda.

Okay yes they all still do hard work (and I would argue Po does too in KUNG FU PANDA) but all of those characters are still "the chosen one" and none of them did anything to be "the chosen one." Han couldn't learn to use the force. Katara couldn't master all four elements. Ron couldn't kill Voldemort. Well, maybe he could, Harry Potter is a little less strict on this stuff. The point still stands.

[TrueNerd]

Year and a half?

I was under the assumption that Jackson was releasing each subsequent Hobbit film each holiday season in December. Is this not right?

The third one comes out Summer 2014.


EDIT: Link for proof that I'm right.


http://blog.zap2it.com/pop2it/2012/08/the-hobbit-third-film-gets-a-release-date-while-part-2-gets-a-new-title.html

[NWR_insanolord]

Bullshit.

Luke has to learn to use the Force, and doesn't defeat the emperor without help from Vader. He ultimately balances the Force by swaying Vader emotionally and getting him to throw Palpatine down a hole or w/e.

Ang can't fulfill his destiny without first mastering all four elements, which he goes through a lot of hardships to do. Sure, the bending masters who teach him just fall in to his lap, but he still struggles with each one. Growing and changing as a person along with his fighting style.

And Harry Potter had to go to class? I dunno. Not the biggest HP fan.

/nerd rage

Side note: I liked Kung-Fu Panda.

Okay yes they all still do hard work (and I would argue Po does too in KUNG FU PANDA) but all of those characters are still "the chosen one" and none of them did anything to be "the chosen one." Han couldn't learn to use the force. Katara couldn't master all four elements. Ron couldn't kill Voldemort. Well, maybe he could, Harry Potter is a little less strict on this stuff. The point still stands.

The entire point of the whole "chosen one" thing is that they were, well, chosen. If they did something to be there they wouldn't be the chosen one, they'd be the guy who showed up and did stuff.

[TJ Spyke]

In Harry Potter, he wasn't really chosen. Voldemart basically flipped a coin since Neville met the same criteria as Harry.

[nickmitch]

Bullshit.

Luke has to learn to use the Force, and doesn't defeat the emperor without help from Vader. He ultimately balances the Force by swaying Vader emotionally and getting him to throw Palpatine down a hole or w/e.

Ang can't fulfill his destiny without first mastering all four elements, which he goes through a lot of hardships to do. Sure, the bending masters who teach him just fall in to his lap, but he still struggles with each one. Growing and changing as a person along with his fighting style.

And Harry Potter had to go to class? I dunno. Not the biggest HP fan.

/nerd rage

Side note: I liked Kung-Fu Panda.

Okay yes they all still do hard work (and I would argue Po does too in KUNG FU PANDA) but all of those characters are still "the chosen one" and none of them did anything to be "the chosen one." Han couldn't learn to use the force. Katara couldn't master all four elements. Ron couldn't kill Voldemort. Well, maybe he could, Harry Potter is a little less strict on this stuff. The point still stands.

The entire point of the whole "chosen one" thing is that they were, well, chosen. If they did something to be there they wouldn't be the chosen one, they'd be the guy who showed up and did stuff.

Which is the title you'd see in some sort of parody movie.

[tendoboy1984]

@TrueNerd -- Peter Jackson is the new Spielberg, and King Kong was amazing. I can't believe it took him 30 years to finally get recognition in the movie industry. From Dead Alive to The Hobbit, the man certainly has a varied career.

[broodwars]

In Harry Potter, he wasn't really chosen. Voldemart basically flipped a coin since Neville met the same criteria as Harry.

Which by "choosing" him and deciding his Destiny, Voldemort made him "The Chosen". Game. Set. Match. :

[Oblivion]

I disagree with TrueNerd. Jackson is still amazing, and King Kong was a breathtaking remake of the original. Your name points out your bias, and is the reason Star Trek Into Darkness is getting so much hate despite looking amazing.

[TrueNerd]

Who was talking about STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS? I hope that movie is good and not just a half-assed KHAN remake.

As for Jackson, first off, you all seem to be conveniently skipping over the abomination that was THE LOVELY BONES. Secondly, I do kind of like KING KONG, but you could easily cut at least an hour from that movie and it would be better for it. You could do the same with THE HOBBIT. I know I was negative in my initial assessment, but I wouldn't call THE HOBBIT a bad movie. Just a very messy one.

Regardless of how you feel about the guy, there is no debate that he has become more indulgent. The LotR trilogy is around 1300 pages. Jackson turned that into 9.5 hours of film. The Hobbit is a 300 page book that he's also turning into 8-9 hours of film. This is the definition of indulgent.


In other news, I just remembered how much I loved Ancel's King Kong video game. I should get my hands on that guy again.

[broodwars]

Regardless of how you feel about the guy, there is no debate that he has become more indulgent. The LotR trilogy is around 1300 pages. Jackson turned that into 9.5 hours of film. The Hobbit is a 300 page book that he's also turning into 8-9 hours of film. This is the definition of indulgent.

While I don't necessarily disagree with you on that, bear in mind that these Hobbit movies aren't just an adaptation of the Hobbit novel, but also incorporate a sizeable chunk of the LoTR Appendices as well detailing Gandalf's mission with the White Council to drive out the Necromancer/Sauron from Mirkwood.  So there's plenty of material to do 2-3 movies.

I'd have personally preferred 2 films at most, but given the quality of what I've seen so far in The Hobbit, I'm not going to complain too much about Jackson overindulging on fan service.  I like seeing the little things like the songs and whatnot incorporated more into the films, as Tolkien often seemed to care more about showing the culture of Middle Earth through song than anything else.

I'm seeing a lot of complaints about the film being too long, and to be honest it is.  You could have probably chopped at least half of the White Council's "Wizard Intervention" with Gandalf and lost nothing.  The addition of Thorin's pale-skinned orc "nemesis" seemed extremely tacked-on and reeked of padding.  But throughout the entirety of my time with the film, I was never bored.  So long as Jackson can keep me engaged in the film experience, he can make his films as long as he wants as far as I'm concerned.

[TrueNerd]

Yeah. Everyone's tolerance for that stuff will vary. Mine wasn't that high.

And yes, Jackson is throwing more stuff into these movies from the appendices. But again, he is adding things here where with LotR, he was cutting things and turned in some of the best book adaptations ever. (I would argue in a couple instances he improved upon the books.) It's an interesting decision, but one that kind of feels like it's serving two different masters. It's tough to know how this will turn out in the end, but as you say, right now it feels like some of it wasn't seamlessly put in. If I had my druthers, I would have loved to see one pure, svelte three-hour Hobbit adaptation and then go ahead and make two or three or seventeen movies dedicated to the appendices. Maybe one day the Tolkien estate will give up the rights to The Silmarillion and then we can keep getting Middle Earth movies from here to eternity. Anyway, the jury is still out whether or not grafting The Hobbit with appendices material was a good idea.

[Plugabugz]

Has anybody watch The Man With The Iron Fists?

I should be seeing this tomorrow. Lucy Liu in a role where the trailers reminds me, of her, in Kill Bill. That's all i need.

[TJ Spyke]

Who was talking about STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS? I hope that movie is good and not just a half-assed KHAN remake.

Khan isn't the villain in it, so no worry. The current reports are that it is Gary Mitchell (though not confirmed).

[TrueNerd]

Who was talking about STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS? I hope that movie is good and not just a half-assed KHAN remake.

Khan isn't the villain in it, so no worry. The current reports are that it is Gary Mitchell (though not confirmed).

True, but they still might be doing a riff on WRATH OF KHAN even if Cumberbatch isn't playing Khan. Mostly the shot of Kirk and Spock touching through the glass has me worried. Also there's a shot of what appears to be cryo tubes in the trailer which could easily be the Botany Bay, the ship Khan was on. I hope they avoid all KHAN story points/imagery as that will be just inviting comparisons that Abrams cannot win. Plus, they went out of their way in the last movie to let the audience know that this is a brand new timeline and anything can happen. Why do that if all you're gonna do is rehash the old movies? Hopefully all my concerns are unfounded. It sure looks pretty!

[Pixelated Pixies]

Just got back from seeing the HFR version of The Hobbit. The film overall wasn't offensively bad, but man digital at 48 frames per second looks terrible! I actually laughed out loud when I seen the Shire, which looked like the set of the Teletubies. It's perhaps very subjective, but to my eye it just looked terrible.

[Oblivion]

I disagree completely. I loved the HFR version, and it actually pulls me into Middle Earth more so than the normal 3D version.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Has anybody watch The Man With The Iron Fists?

I should be seeing this tomorrow. Lucy Liu in a role where the trailers reminds me, of her, in Kill Bill. That's all i need.

http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/forums/index.php?topic=28364.msg766293#msg766293