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    • CommentAuthorTimmer
    • CommentTimeOct 6th 2013
    Nice one Peter biggrin applause

    As for Dexter, I still haven't seen the last two seasons and I've not heard one-single-person have anything good to say about that last season.
    On Friday I ate a lot of dust and appeared orange near the end of the day ~ Bregt
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      CommentAuthorSteven
    • CommentTimeOct 6th 2013 edited
    The writers completely fucked up Dexter's character by making him far too human and far too emotional (by means of introducing pointless characters such as Hannah McKay rolleyes ). I think some emotional progression was needed for the character, because it presented him with some interesting choices and 'moral dilemmas'. But they humanised Dexter to the point that he was a softer than wet cheese... and that's NOT what Dexter is about. He is a serial murderer who needs to kill. That's the selling point of Dexter, that's what the audience wants to see. We want to see the dilemmas of being a sociopath living a double life, one that gradually seeps through to his sociopathic world and vice versa.

    And what a missed opportunity with Harrison, his son! I thought the obvious and natural choice would be to make the son like the father, given that he too had a similar experience which gave rise to Dexter's sociopathy.

    I'm just amazed at the writers of Breaking Bad. They had plenty of choices, and they just kept making the right ones. shocked
    • CommentAuthorTimmer
    • CommentTimeOct 6th 2013
    Y'know? I might just give that final season of Dexter a miss.

    As for Breaking Bad, starting the second series tomorrow evening, it'll probably be another marathon of multiple episode watching.
    On Friday I ate a lot of dust and appeared orange near the end of the day ~ Bregt
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      CommentAuthorSteven
    • CommentTimeOct 6th 2013
    The season as a whole was very mediocre considering what had gone before it, but the ending was the worst thing about it without a doubt. It's always had to get an ending right, so it was never destined to be that good anyway. But they went full retard.
    • CommentAuthorTimmer
    • CommentTimeOct 6th 2013
    From your description it sounds like the writers failed the character, it sounds dishonest.
    On Friday I ate a lot of dust and appeared orange near the end of the day ~ Bregt
  1. I've been a fan of "Remo Williams: The Adventures Begins..." since I first saw it many years ago.

    I was disappointed there was no sequel, but was interested when I found out there was a failed TV pilot. But I was never able to find more than two short clips on Youtube.


    But I have finally found the full pilot, turning out to be 49 minutes, on Daily Motion:
    http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xstlrf … shortfilms



    I was disappointed. It's unecessarily slow and quite frankly boring. It lacks the writing and humor of the original film. But a plus side: the score for the pilot is also done by Craig Safan, and he reuses all the major themes from the film, along with some new material -- a great find. There's enough score in it to double-header it with another score for a release.


    Overall, it's really for completists. Not really worth your time.
    The views and opinions of Ford A. Thaxton are his own and do not necessarily reflect the ones of ANYONE else.
  2. And now I've made a very quick trip into another pilot I had previusly not been albe to find: "Coming To America".

    Oha and another character are ordered to the U.S. to learn to become better people.

    Ys, a pilot spun off from the film.


    Results: TERRIBLE. Do not watch this crap.


    The servicable and cheesey score is by John Beasley.
    The views and opinions of Ford A. Thaxton are his own and do not necessarily reflect the ones of ANYONE else.
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      CommentAuthorplindboe
    • CommentTimeOct 8th 2013 edited
    justin boggan wrote
    I've been a fan of "Remo Williams: The Adventures Begins..." since I first saw it many years ago.


    Yep, I remember seeing that one several times as a kid and enjoying it a lot. I still remember it well, even though it's been years since I saw it.

    Anyway, just finished watching the final episode of Breaking bad. Read on Tim, no spoilers below.

    Wow! It was perfect. Same with the the 14th episode, which was incredibly gripping. I'm amazed how well the writers continually avoid loose ends and plot holes and always find logical ways to wrap everything up in a neat package. In most movies when a character is in a danger one thinks that he can't possibly get out of, usually a comet falls on their heads or some other unlikely event manages to save the day. But here there's always some logical and believable way, that ties into another part of the story.

    Anyway, I wasn't a huge fan of the series to begin with, as I found it a bit too depressing. But after seeing how it all worked out I can't help but sit back in awe.

    Peter punk

    PS. The rap battle was fantastic!
    • CommentAuthorTimmer
    • CommentTimeOct 8th 2013
    Spoiler warnings are much appreciated beer
    On Friday I ate a lot of dust and appeared orange near the end of the day ~ Bregt
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      CommentAuthorplindboe
    • CommentTimeOct 8th 2013 edited
    beer
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      CommentAuthorplindboe
    • CommentTimeOct 8th 2013 edited
    Steven wrote
    The writers completely fucked up Dexter's character by making him far too human and far too emotional (by means of introducing pointless characters such as Hannah McKay rolleyes ). I think some emotional progression was needed for the character, because it presented him with some interesting choices and 'moral dilemmas'. But they humanised Dexter to the point that he was a softer than wet cheese... and that's NOT what Dexter is about. He is a serial murderer who needs to kill. That's the selling point of Dexter, that's what the audience wants to see. We want to see the dilemmas of being a sociopath living a double life, one that gradually seeps through to his sociopathic world and vice versa.

    And what a missed opportunity with Harrison, his son! I thought the obvious and natural choice would be to make the son like the father, given that he too had a similar experience which gave rise to Dexter's sociopathy.


    I hadn't really thought deeply about my problems with the last season of Dexter, but you summed up my main annoyances perfectly. I also thought that the Masuka and daughter thing was poorly done. Masuka was a hilarious character before his daughter turned up. I can see the comedic potential of a guy like Masuka discovering that he has a daughter who looks like that, but the show didn't manage to squeeze any hilarity out of it and it just felt awkward and forced at the end.

    Though I'm fine with Harrison not becoming a killer like Dexter. It would have been such a cliché if that little kid murdered someone, or even caused serious harm and daddy sociopath had to clean up the mess. In real life, kids that age don't cause serious harm, sociopaths or not, because they don't have the strength or intelligence to pull something like that off, so for such a little kid to become a serious problem would be as unrealistic as Gandalf turning up in the middle of it all to cast a magic missile on Dexter.

    I guess the first time I started feeling bothered by the show was when Deb confessed that she not only loved Dexter as a brother, but that she was "in love" with him. Argh! It annoys me to no end that almost every movie or series today, that has a male and a female lead character, has to shove some love interest in there, even in places where it bloody doesn't belong. She had grown up with Dexter, and viewed him as a brother, so to fall in love with him was just senseless and a blatant attempt at emotional manipulation.

    Anyway, it's not that I hated it. I just thought it was ok. Season 2 is still my clear favourite. Season 4 had some unexciting episodes, but the season was overall rather memorable as well.

    Peter smile
  3. I got $10.00 to spend on myself, so I went and saw a movie. It cost exactly $10.00 -- go figure.


    So I went and saw "Gravity". Well worth the money.

    I just got back -- it was a late night showing. So, a mostly empty theater and not a lot of talking from movie goers.


    Great movie. I'm not saying it's an all-time classic, but it's good strong. Strong drama, good charcters, and the writing was terrific.


    The following may contain some spoilers, but I'll try to keep them to a minimum.:


    It's a routine space repair mission. They're upgraing the Hubble telescope. Everything is fine until Houston announces Russia has launched a missile to take out one of it's own satelittles and it creates a debris field which causes a chain reaction and more satellites are taken out and a huge debrisfield is created, now heading straight for the five of them. Now Clooney and Bullock must try to survive.


    It's a dramatic rollercoster, with nice quieter moments, trying to get back to Earth.


    I wish I could say this movie had it all, but there was one quite lacking factor: the film's score.
    The film's score cheapened the whole thing; it made it sound like some NBC prime time movie scored by some police-proceedrial composer.
    It was even poorly handled emotionally; often scenes had music that was trying to make you feel emotion rather than become one with the scene or help carry it. The score felt wrong for a number of scenes and even made me think what the hell was the compsoer thinking? It felt like a faux emotion was created by the music and that made even the most emotional scenes, seem emptier than they should have been.
    I have no idea if there were any scene after the end credis, because the overpowering and annoying end credits score drove me out of the theater.

    This is a score that shoudl have been replaced. In fact, I am still for replacement even now. This was obviously ripe scoring ground for people like Cliff Eidelman and Alan Silvestri. it could be rescored in time for other countries where it hasn't opened yet, or DVD release.

    This and "Attack the Block" -- guess I'm just not a fan of Steven Price.
    The views and opinions of Ford A. Thaxton are his own and do not necessarily reflect the ones of ANYONE else.
  4. justin boggan wrote
    I wish I could say this movie had it all, but there was one quite lacking factor: the film's score.
    The film's score cheapened the whole thing; it made it sound like some NBC prime time movie scored by some police-proceedrial composer.
    It was even poorly handled emotionally; often scenes had music that was trying to make you feel emotion rather than become one with the scene or help carry it. The score felt wrong for a number of scenes and even made me think what the hell was the compsoer thinking? It felt like a faux emotion was created by the music and that made even the most emotional scenes, seem emptier than they should have been.
    I have no idea if there were any scene after the end credis, because the overpowering and annoying end credits score drove me out of the theater.

    This is a score that shoudl have been replaced. In fact, I am still for replacement even now. This was obviously ripe scoring ground for people like Cliff Eidelman and Alan Silvestri. it could be rescored in time for other countries where it hasn't opened yet, or DVD release.

    This and "Attack the Block" -- guess I'm just not a fan of Steven Price.

    A traditional score belonged nowhere near the set of Gravity. For me it was either the way Price did it, or no score at all...certainly a Silvestri score would have been way, way out of place. You're obviously pretty alone in that reaction anyway, as pretty much everyone I've talked to thinks the score worked amazingly in film. Can't say I disagree.
  5. And, Justin, you are aware that sometimes it's the director who tells what he wants and it's not even up to the composer?
    http://www.filmmusic.pl - Polish Film Music Review Website
  6. I could give a flying fuck less what the director may or may not have wanted. The end results matter. This was a good film, it deserved far, far, far, far better. This score was widely out of place.

    And so what about it? Sometimes a director tells a composer what he wants, the composer delivers just that, and the score still gets chucked. If we're going to talk about what the director may have done, then let's talk other possibilities:

    -- The director had the composer thrust upon him.
    -- The direcor wasn't happy with it but decided not to say anything.
    -- The director wanted a new score, but couldn't afford one/studio said "No".
    -- The director got the score and said "Good enough".

    Hell, we have all kinds of possibilities, but that's all null and void; the film opened, the score is bad.
    The views and opinions of Ford A. Thaxton are his own and do not necessarily reflect the ones of ANYONE else.
  7. justin boggan wrote
    I could give a flying fuck less what the director may or may not have wanted. The end results matter. This was a good film, it deserved far, far, far, far better. This score was widely out of place.

    And so what about it? Sometimes a director tells a composer what he wants, the composer delivers just that, and the score still gets chucked. If we're going to talk about what the director may have done, then let's talk other possibilities:

    -- The director had the composer thrust upon him.
    -- The direcor wasn't happy with it but decided not to say anything.
    -- The director wanted a new score, but couldn't afford one/studio said "No".
    -- The director got the score and said "Good enough".

    Hell, we have all kinds of possibilities, but that's all null and void; the film opened, the score is bad.

    How about this: the director got exactly the score he wanted and needed for the film, and pretty much everyone agrees with him? I honestly don't see how the score to Gravity was out of place...an Alan Silvestri score, now that would have been out of place.
  8. Having not seen the film, but having an idea how it looks like and what it aims at... I can imagine that everyone in the world is right... except Justin.
    http://www.filmmusic.pl - Polish Film Music Review Website
  9. Funnily enough, I think sometimes noone is more rigid in their definitions of 'good film music' than those who buy film score albums. If GRAVITY, with its effective balancing on the line between action and emotion, its brilliant spatial manipulation (few scores are spatialised over 7.1 to this degree and this meaningfully), its journey from noises to a voice, and the contrapuntal scoring of the debris assaults... if all that makes it a bad score, then the world could do with a lot more of them.
    A butterfly thinks therefore I am
  10. We just got back from seeing GRAVITY. What an experience! If that film doesn't win the oscar for best picture, director, cinematography, and actress, it will be a great injustice. I hope it wins a bunch of others, too, and I wouldn't be surprised or displeased if it wins best score. Spectacular film. Definitely see it in 3D (which I normally don't enjoy, but in this case I think it's almost necessary).
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      CommentAuthorplindboe
    • CommentTimeOct 19th 2013
    Sounds like I better gravitate towards that movie, as everyone seems to love it. Anyway, just saw:

    After Earth

    Everyone seems to hate this one, but I actually found it to be a rather decent movie. It's major flaw is how predictable it is, but I thought the rest worked. Sure, Jaden Smith and his dad aren't the best actors in the world, but I liked them in this movie.

    Rating: 7


    Pacific rim

    Basically a children's movie, crammed with archetypical characters, but the impressive effects is what made it entertaining. Oh, and giant monsters. I love giant monsters!

    Rating: 7

    Peter smile
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      CommentAuthorSteven
    • CommentTimeOct 19th 2013 edited
    You are very forgiving when it comes to films! shocked
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      CommentAuthorplindboe
    • CommentTimeOct 19th 2013
    That depends on the film. There are plenty out there I loathe.

    How would you rate these two?

    Peter smile
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      CommentAuthorSteven
    • CommentTimeOct 19th 2013
    After Earth I've not seen (though my spidey senses tell me it's not something I'd like), but Pacific Rim was pretty bad.
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      CommentAuthorplindboe
    • CommentTimeOct 19th 2013
    I pretty much agree with your review, but as you so eloquently put it, it's about giant robots punching giant monsters. Let me repeat that.... Giant robots punching giant monsters!!!! That's an instant 7 right there!

    If that's not enough for you, I don't even know what to say...

    But seriously, I would have preferred if the film would have had a much more serious tone. The premise with giant monsters appearing from the ocean at increasing frequency and mankind is about to be annihilated, while desperately trying to protect themselves building huge walls, that's one of those premises that can be fascinating and terrifying if done right. So it was indeed a lost opportunity.

    But it kept me entertained at least, and that's my only concern when rating films.

    Peter smile
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      CommentAuthorThor
    • CommentTimeOct 19th 2013
    It was OK, but it was a bit too noisy for my taste.
    I am extremely serious.
  11. Thor wrote
    It was OK, but it was a bit too noisy for my taste.

    Do you have a hotkey set up for this particular sentence, Thor? wink
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      CommentAuthorThor
    • CommentTimeOct 19th 2013
    I should have. smile
    I am extremely serious.
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      CommentAuthorSteven
    • CommentTimeOct 22nd 2013 edited
    Monsters University

    This feels entirely like the decision of some studio executive who looks at graphs and decided the data on those graphs should be pointing in a more upward direction. This is not the Pixar that makes genuinely thoughtful and original stories, this is the Pixar that are now in the business of brand recognition and making sequels and prequels to generate more revenue.

    The actual film itself isn't bad per se, but it is profoundly mediocre, especially considering what has gone before it from the same studio. Gone is all the charm and magic of the first film, and instead replaced with a cheap attempt to appeal to 'teen' audiences. This is more akin to one of Dreamworks' lesser animated films rather than Pixar. (In fact, aside from the obvious, this is pretty much unrecognisable as a Pixar film.) How this achieved a 78% rating on Rotten Tomatoes is beyond me!?

    The score is also very forgettable.
  12. I enjoyed it, but it doesn't have the lasting memorability of most Pixar movies. The 78% is a little misleading, considering that a lot of the "fresh" reviews contributing to that score are mildly positive 3-3.5/5 reviews (the review average is 6.8/10). Also, maybe critics were just relieved that it wasn't a repeat of the Cars 2 fiasco. And it's "safer" than Brave was, but also perhaps not as obviously flawed and it doesn't give that feeling of "this movie could have been so much better than it turned out".

    More or less agree on the score, too; the new theme in "Rise and Shine" is catchy, and the rest is as accomplished as ever, but Newman's done better.
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      CommentAuthorplindboe
    • CommentTimeOct 22nd 2013
    I found it to be very good, and not cheap at all. Monsters inc is one of those movies that has always deserved a se-/prequel and this prequel I found worthy. It's not quite as good as the original, but then again sequels/prequels almost never are.

    Monsters inc. Rating: 9
    Monsters university. Rating: 8

    Peter babydino