Monday, August 26, 2013

Movie Rant ( Oblivion ) and List of Best Movies !



Friday, August 23, 2013 11:13:37 PM


Movies

How many films have i watched ?


Never mind TV Programs, or even Made for TV ‘Movies’.


Prior to Cable & Netflix
At least 4 a Week on TV, Probably much higher. 
There were a lot of Afternoon Films, really old ones,
& Featured Films on Given Days, & Late Night Movies was a Given. 
From 1963 to 1990 with a few substantial Gaps for homelessness & periods that i was institutionalized :
52 x 4 x 27 = 5,616
Then with Netflix & Cable :
Catching up on many films that are comparatively obscure, foreign films, popular films & such…
1990 to 2013
6 films a week
52 x 6 x 23 = 7176 
Comes to about 12,792 ±
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A lot of these films are going to be repetitive, according to genres & general laziness But occasionally a film is so packed with plagiarism that one has to consider that they are attempting to pay homage to previous films that The Makers Admired.


But.


That interpretation is sometimes hard to cough up.


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The Recent Film ‘Oblivion’ with Tommy Cruise is so packed with Segments & Scenes pulled from previous films, that i often thought that i was watching a collage, rather than an original film.


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As someone that makes a lot of collages myself, this seems like a particularly hypocritical criticism, But i have often thought that The Bible’s Parable warning The Traveler to hold their tongue when informing their companion that they may have a mote of dust in their eye, while they may have a timber in their own eye.


i have never seen any problem with The Pot telling The Kettle that it is Black.


Would its own Burnt Sides make The Kettle any cleaner ?


No. Of Course Not.


If i am dressed in rags, would it not be prudent to tell The Man in The Suit that his Tie is spotted with Gravy, so that he might change it.


Wouldn’t this be showing consideration & concern ?


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It also seems to me that there’s Collages & then there’s Patch-Works.


Oblivion is a Patch-Work.


It just seems to me that when The People that wrote this travesty were sitting around & discussing various scenes, & someone suggested that they include a battle scene with spaceships careening through a Gorge


Someone else would have mentioned that Not Only has this been done to death, but it’s been parodied to death as well.


And The First Person would say; ‘But I Love it, It’s so Cool!’


And someone else would suggest; ‘OK, But if we’er going to go in that direction, lets pump it up a little, go off in a different direction, Add some kind of Additional Something to it ( ? )’


And The First Person would say; ‘NO! That would ruin it, It has to be just like The one from Star Wars !’


And so it was.


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They didn’t mean to pay Homage or Parody this; This is a film with an Amazing Absence of Clever Dialogue or Humor of any kind.


i’m sure that they thought that copying The Battle Trench scene from Star Wars was going to be really good.


This wasn’t The only Example;


There were clips from many other films.


In fact; The More i think about this film ‘Oblivion’, i have come to suspect that it’s an ‘Experimental’ Film, of The Genre that ‘Forest Gump’ Was. Forest Gump was a film whose elemental plot was thin at best, but contained numerous CGI Special Effects that were Cutting Edge at that time. That was The True Theme or Intention of Forest Gump, to provide The Film Makers with a Template or Medium to Showcase Several comparatively New Special Effects & Demonstrate & Refining of Effects that had Previously been done, but may not have been as convincing as they could be Now.


While i am reluctant to give Oblivion any Credit where no Credit is Due; i now suspect ( after thinking about it for 2 days ) that if The Film were to be Divided into Pieces, each representing an ‘Idea’ or ‘Effect’; There would be No Original Ideas at all. Each Division would represent a Snippet from a Previous Film. Was this Intent of The Film Makers ?


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And this brings up another point.


Do these Class A Actors Not Know that they’re making stinkers ?


It seems to me that if i were a class A Actor, i would insist on seeing a fully Story-Boarded Film, & not just the Script before committing myself to it.


And then; If i did discover numerous egregious problems, i would use my Star Leverage to Insist that it be fixed.


Don’t they Care, or is Tom Cruise an Imbecile ?


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As a small side point;


i have noticed that in many of these films that i’ve been watching lately with Gratuitous Violence, The Film-Makers use perfectly conventional Weapons.


The Most appalling example of this ( ? ) was when The Aliens in StarGate SG-1 ( which is a little Redundant ) used ordinary Guns.


i thought ( at that time ) that it would be fun, if whenever an alien used a weapon of some kind, it would always be different each time, & it would be really kooky.


StarGate SG-1 would often use kooky weapons, so they knew that this was The Principle that they should be using, but then they’d falter. ( ! )


Being Creative really isn’t that hard. Especially when you’re rewriting something. You simply identify those places where you used a cliche or plagiarized something, & switch it up, changing some elementals of The Idea, Subtracting or Adding this or That, or adding something irrelevant.


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i was just this afternoon ( trying ) to watch an episode of _30 Rock_ which i have loved for a few years now, but it suddenly occurred to me that while watching this episode, they were using this technique a little too much.


Everything that The characters were saying, was, just crazy.


It was way beyound being quick or clever; they were instead exhibiting dangerous schizophrenia.


i used to like that; But like a dog that suddenly decides that they’ve had their belly scratched enough, i had to twist around & snap The Video off.


i had had enough of _30 Rock_.


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Some Programs that i think exhibit just The Right Balance of Clever Wit, Intelligent Banter, Crisp Innovation & Bumper-Car Surrealism, While Providing a Solid Foundation of Commonality to allow our brains to hold onto The Railings.


Not in any particular order.



Rabbit / 2005 by Run Wrake / Short Animation

The Good Fairy / 1935 / “I’m going to buy a pencil sharpener with a handle!” Dr. Max Sporum

Panique au Village / A Town Called Panic ( Best Stop Action Film

The People vs. Larry Flynt ( Best Freedom of Speech Documentary

The Professional

Charade (1963) The only flaw to this film was when James Coburn uses the phrase ‘Greenhorn’ twice in one sentence.

Major Barbara / 1941 / Best AntiWar Film with The Prince of Death as it’s Hero

Aliens : The Directors Cut — is much better than The Theatrical Release

Aliens 4

District 9 ( Best Alien Film Ever

Zombieland ( Very Good Zombie Film

Fido ( Best Zombie Film Ever

Kung Fu Hustle ( Best Kung Fu Film ( Terrible Title !

The Life of Brian ( Best Monty Python Film

Unforgiven ( 1992

Wreck-It-Ralph ( 2012 ( Best Remake of Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer

Eraserhead ( Best Surrealist Film Ever

Charlie’s Angels I ( i very rarely watch any film more than once, but i watched this one about 5 times, The night i got it.

The President's Analyst / 1967 ( Best Political, Military Industrial Complex Film Ever

Pushing Daisies

Frank Capra’s WWII : Why we Fight ( 7 1_h± Films Terrific Historical Analysis of WWII

The Lost Room

The Teletubbies

Xavier: Renegade Angel

True Grit 2010 ( Wonderful Dialogue

Crank / Crank 2 : High Voltage ( Best Remake(s of DOA

Paint Your Wagon ( 1969 ( Best Musical Comedy

Kick Ass ( Best Super Hero Film; Along with _My Super Ex-GirlFriend_

Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991) Best of Series

Run Lola Run ( Best Recursive Time Loop Film

Oldboy ( Very Good Surrealist Mystery

Our Man Flint / In Like Flint

Once Upon a Time in the West (1968) ( Fabulous Epic with 3 Bad Guy Cliques

Save the Green Planet! ( Excellent Mystery/Crazy Person Film

The Nightmare Before Christmas / Best Halloween/Christmas Cross Over

Watchmen ( Best Over The Top Epic Scale Superhero Film

Wallace & Gromit ( Series

Despicable Me

Toy Story ( Series

Time Bandits ( Best ( ? ) Terry Gilliam Film

Being John Malkovich / Best Main Stream Surrealist Film

Cabin in The Woods / 2012 / Best Teens with Monsters in The Woods Film

Zero Effect / Best Crazy Detective Film

Equilibrium

Ted ( 2012 / Best Film of a Stuffed Animal Magickally Endowed with Life

Ink

Little Miss Sunshine

Love Me If You Dare ( Best Love Story

My Super Ex-Girlfriend ( Very Good Superhero Film

Sick: The Life & Death of Bob Flanagan, SuperMasochist ( 1997 / As a Documentary, this lags quite a bit from time to time.

Strictly Ballroom

The Jacket ( Best Psychological Time Travel Film

Delicatessen

Kingpin

Miami Blues ( Best Petty Criminal / Chase Film

Shakes; The Clown

The School of Rock

Searching for Bobby Fisher

Archer ( Cartoon Series / Sterling Archer is a Super Spy for a Privately Run Security Agency, but doesn’t have any Spy Gear & Each Episode features only a small amount of Gratuitous Violence. It’s mostly just chit-chat between Sterling & Lana ( Female Spy ) & The Other Characters. Very Witty.

Bob’s Burgers / Cartoon : The Voice of The Main Character ‘Bob’ is provided by H. Jon Benjamin, The Same guy that voices over Sterling Archer in The Cartoon Series ‘Archer’. These Two Characters couldn’t be ( hardly ) more Opposite, but once this is overcome, The Other Characters in Bob’s Burgers makes it very endearing & Very Surrealistically Witty.

Wilfred / The Basic Premise of this TV Series is that A Drug Addict perceives a neighbor’s dog as a human in a dog suit, wears thin very quickly. But The ‘Buddy’ Chemistry between The Two Main Characters is Amusing.

Boston Legal / The only flaw to this series was in one of the best episodes, a female character is introduced that has a very peculiar speaking cadence, which at the end of the episode, we discover is fake! But then; in a slightly later episode, this character is brought back with fake speaking cadence as her natural inflective accent.

Buffy; The Vampire Slayer ( 2001- ?

Call The Midwife / 2012 Season One / BBC 6-Part Series

Django Unchained / 2012 / Best Nuevo ( Black ) Spaghetti Western

Resident Evil ( Series

Northfork / How much of this was Real & How much was a fever induced hallucination ?

Northern Exposure

Forbidden Planet ( Best Skiffy Film before 2001: A Space Odyssey

Shakespeare in Love

GhostBusters

Hoodwinked ( Best Fairytale Film

The Bone Orchard / Film within “Mythic Journeys” / 2009

Profit (1996) The Best TV Series Ever ( ! )

Fantastic Mr. Fox

Fight Club

Sealab 2021/ Season One /

St. Elsewhere / Parody of many Hospital Programs from this era.

What did you do in The War Daddy?

Casino Royale : With David Niven ( Best 007 Film

Cat Ballou

Chicago Hope / A Slightly more Serious Version of St. Elsewhere

Star Trek : Original Series

Stargate SG-1 / Very long lived, but deeply flawed, rather cheaply made series. The Principle Strength of it was that all The Characters were so enjoyable to watch.

Special Unit Two (2001-2002) / SU2 / This was a very short lived, cheaply made show, but i loved it. It was on right before -Seven Days-, which came on before -Enterprise-, and when Enterprise ended, they took out this whole block of programs, even though Seven Days and SU2 were doing pretty well in the ratings ( ??? )

The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius

The Hitchhikers Guide to The Galaxy

The Lost Room / Very Original Premise, In which Objects from a Lost Motel Room have quirky quixotic properties.

The Mentalist ( First few Seasons

The Prisoner / TV Series / Weak Conclusion

The Riches / Ends before Required Final Season !!!

The Rocky & Bullwinkle Show

The Tick

Veronica Mars ( Season One 2004-05

Wonderfalls / This has one of the best endings of any show i’ve seen. It still gives me the chills when the joan of arc character is told by the bronze monkey bookend why she was selected as their emissary.

Xavier: Renegade Angel

Xena: Warrior Princess





Plus all The other films &; TV Series that i loved,


But am ashamed to include in this listing.

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