Hannibal, I think, is actually underrated. Gladiator, overrated, haven't seen Black Hawk Down, American Gangster I'd say was only good, nothing standout, and Body of Lies looked alright but not interesting enough to watch. He needs to stop working with Russell Crowe, or Russell Crowe needs to get some of his old talent (ie The Insider) back.

Alien and Blade Runner are such genius, but the more I think about it, the more the real genius is really just set design in both films, putting you the viewer in that place. Alien in particular has a pretty minimal story, while all the cool ideas in Blade Runner come from Phillip K Dick. One might even argue that the neat ideas in Alien come from Giger and through him from Lovecraft. Whereas Nolan excels at scripts and ideas; he certainly has his faults but so far I've really liked all his films except Insomnia which was alright. "Following" is a gem and Memento is genius. I've never been interested in James Bond but if Nolan makes a James Bond movie (or a romantic comedy, lol) I'm there. 

Nolan doing Bond? Fuck I hope not, Bond is just popcorn over the top action. Although the last couple films with Daniel Craig has been better than the Pierce Brosnan crap.

Yeah Tronyn, you're right on that one - Alien and Bladerunner were all about the atmosphere and setting.

And yeah Ridley definitely needs to stop using Russell Crowe. Crowe I really liked in American Gangster because he wasn't the lead. And he was a flawed character. But he kind of annoys me too much for lead roles. 

has always been about atmosphere and setting, his better films just have a decent script in addition. Nothing to do with Russell Crowe.

Also, a lot of people have only seen the theatrical and rightly hated it, but the director's cut of Kingdom of Heaven is excellent.

And The Duellists is awesome! 

Prometheus was pretty bad. :(
Why do movies have to be made for stupid people. Seems like it wouldn't have required so much work on the script to turn it into a nice sci-fi film, just replace the bullshit with a bit of subtlety, and fix the nonsensical science. 

cos it hasnt opened here in Aus yet. 

a trillion dollar science expedition that behaves like a bunch of tomb raiders?

Film is ok, but certainly flawed, like they had some themes and set pieces they wanted to use but couldn't be bothered making an effort when filling in the missing parts. 

It looks like noone has mentioned this one yet. Low budget sci-fi from Switzerland that was released back in 2009. Small cast of characters, a nice promise, subtle yet effective set-design. Reminds me of Alien and Silent Running to a degree, even though it's nothing like those two (story and progression-wise). Recommended. 

i do enjoy a good sci fi, but horror is my favourite genre. will have to see cargo it looks good. 

I quite liked it. Sure, the tie in to the Alien mythology is weak and problematic but th rest was pretty good.

Will take this over The Avengers anyday. 

Over the Avengers, totally. I haven't seen that and I'm not going to, I disagree in principle with the idea that you can make a movie, but without a story, or with a story so predictable you basically don't have a story, or with a story that is an exact copy of a previous movie so that again, you basically don't have a story.

PROMETHEUS SPOILERS!!! DONT READ!!





Prometheus was good, though somewhat frustrating. I was disappointed by the aliens being humans, and by what they chose to explain (ie that) and not (ie everything else!). The new monsters weren't explained, characters behaved in ways that were stupid, inexplicable, and contradictory, even Fassbender's character which is the most interesting. The idea of a munitions dump is alright I guess, but it blows wide open the plot hole in the original xenomorphs-as-designed-bioweapons theory: WHY NOT JUST NUKE THEM. If you're powerful enough to design species on a whim, why would you bother creating evil parasites. I guess it could be psychological warfare, or some alien mad scientist who just wants to fuck with people. Finally, tying humans into the whole thing and having humans created, to me just totally contradicts the message of Alien: it's a huge universe out there and all kinds of beings and forces exist that it's really better not to mess with - tasty little mammal! This "search for human origins" "humans are special" thing makes it feel like Scott is trying to do 2001, which is what Alien originally was rebelling against.

Overall, better than any of the other sequels/tie-ins to the original Alien, including the overrated Aliens, but still kind of disappointing.

Best line: "I didn't think you had it in you." 

I would just like to add that I saw a preview for Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter before Prometheus, and it struck me as perhaps THE dumbest movie preview I have EVER seen. The concept is so idiotic it defies words; I could swear that the mix of America-glorifying bullshit, CGI, vampires, slow mo and epic music, 'meaningful' one-liners, with nary a hint that it was smart enough not to take itself seriously at all, was actually created as a joke. This can't be real. 

Remember loving the comics, dont remember this much ceasless exposition and non stop unbelievable action? Did they just amp the movie version to 11 or is my mmemory failing me? 

I wish anyone with a bag of money would at least think twice before handing it over to Spielberg to do another "adventure" movie after the last Indiana Jones and the Tintin movie. 

Maybe they're just using bio-engineering as an art form, they get to play gods/angels and then stage epic mythological scenes of Ragnar�k/Hell on earth...

Anyway I liked the 3D-scanning probes in Prometheus and apart from perhaps the tiny levitating sphere part they don't seem that far off into the future (bet DARPA already got one...). Wonder when Google will send out swarms of quad-copters equipped with cameras and 3d scanning tech to map the whole world for Google Earth. Handling the massive amount of data would be the hardest problem. 

Maybe this POV is ridiculous, but it seems to me like Scott had a choice back in 1978 or whatever, and his choice was, "NOT 2001." Now I love Arthur C Clarke. I consider him one of the most profound human beings to ever translate thought to the written word. But In 1979 Scott said no to that, it's like a junkie who said no to Narcotics Anon on the principle (in fact the identical principle) of being anti-superstition!
...But the lack of any higher idea is a big, important part of agreeing to exist in this. 

No, Scott, you will NEVER touch Kubrick!
and you would have done better to leave him alone - Dave!!!! 

Spoilers? ! ?










The movie has nothing to to with aliens or god. Searching for god only turns out to be a non terminating quest as always. What they find instead of aliens is "Humanity 2.0" which has god like powers to tamper with life and is not only dangerous to the current version of humanity but also to itself. 

glad someone else thought the same re Tintin (although I'm one of the few who liked Indy 4), a couple of the set pieces were good but most left me scratching my head. 

Saw tonight. Thoroughly enjoyed in theatre but doesn't hold up now that I'm thinking it over, in so many respects. An interesting mess though, better than I'd expected from the word going round and def more interesting than avengers in long run. Disagree that it's going in a Clarke trajectory, still fairly Zizek. Agree about stupid characters, so so acting. Worried about next ones but wil be in theatre to see em. 

http://cavalorn.livejournal.com/584135.html#cutid1 

OK, if you like EMO movies like Hesher, or Forest Gump or Good Will H. or suchlike, you will probably love this. (I know F.G. and G.W.H. are pretty high-brow and legendary films, but the sentiment is in a similar vein).

I dunno, I watch a lot of random films, I can't think of all of the movies that are 'EMO' as such, but anyway....

Just thought that the film had great character dev, and played with my opinions of the characters in just the right way. Really enjoyed it. Also quite cleverly put together I thought. And the performances were just so (in a good way). 

Watched this solely to pass an evening and because I have been playing Deus Ex 3 and reading The Wind Up Girl so was happy to have a cyberpunk vibe irrespective of the quality. Well it certainly did cyberpunk....at it's worst. Utter drivel, exceptionally dated, appallingly "acting" and dialogue, cliched garbage in all respects. 1/2 a point for the Oriental boss who was not quite as dire as the rest, 1/2 a point for being ticking the cliche boxes so relentlessly well = 1/10 

Watched this solely because....it was recommended and looked pretty cool in the trailer. Well it certainly was pretty cool and by "pretty cool" I mean "really good". Well put together, nice take on the superpowers genre, good characters, and a great escalation from lowkey beginnings to a good finale. Good job all round. Something/10 

I think last time I saw that I was eleven. Wasn't the plot that Keanu has the ability to store computer files in his brain? So he moves illegal files around for shady dudes and the authorities are non the wiser. Pretty hilariously dated concept.

I'd like to see a modern update where Keanu just takes a bunch of free USB drives from a conference and shoves them up his ass. Or uses the internet. 

So yeah he rocks, dunno what the hell he's doing in that movie.