Recent Viewing Part IV

The character deveolpement is on the level of Germany's weekly Rosamunde Pilcher movie.

For what it's worth I did think the movie was genuinely beautiful, and if it looked a bit digital at the edges then that's defensible as a stylistic choice actually since it's based on a video game series. It was worth seeing in theaters for that alone.

But the plot and characters didn't do much for me. And the score was only okay.

I thought Resident Evil 1 and 3 were good. Prince of Persia is one of the best movies based on a video game, even though it hardly uses anything of the game at all. You could consider Silent Hill to be the best video game representation in a movie. Now that was a film that paid homage to the game (at least in the first part)

The Last Resident Evil film was good enough, at least it was different (with all the dead people reprising their roles) and it was visually amazing (especially the opening scene shot backwards), the rest of Anderson wasn't that great. That first one truly remains utterly scary and has a perfect build up.

That's if you look at the obvious stuff. There are a couple of nuances easily overlooked by the sheer visual overkill, but yes, that aspect could have been better handled. That Garona stuff was going to be a tough seller, anyway. Beside that, Warcraft is always pretty big with the emotions. Nearly every personal character story in the series is pretty epic, which can easily drift into melodrama if handled carelessly. But I could see why they did what they did with Garona the second time around, and watching the deleted scenes also helped quite a bit.

On the other hand, we're talking about a storyline that spans decades (or thousands of years, if you want to consider what's actually going on there), and the movie just took the story of one of the earliest points in the franchise where it was just a strategy game with pixels as big as cell phone icons. Not much interesting character development in the game at that point, either. Just wait until we get to the story of Warcraft III, then we talk again. ^^

And yes, the movie looks stunningly beautiful at times, especially in opening shots where they introduced new locations that fans knew by heart. The transfer from the very comic-like game graphics to a semi-realistic movie world was pitch-perfect. Too much realism wouldn't have worked, at least not for the fans.

There are so many life- and loveless fanrasy adaptations out there that it's really hard-breaking to see how this movie gets smashed to pieces by most critics and a certain kind of moviegoers when you know and see how much work and love went into doing the game world and story justice.

Yes, I really enjoy this movie, and I'm far from being alone with this. Its big success in certain areas and markets is somewhat satisfying. The BluRay is selling astoundingly well, too, so there is hope yet that we'll see at least one more part of the story, even if some production details might have to change.

Well, I'm a big Anderson fan, so I may be biased. Here's my ranking of his films, btw (not including his two TV movies):

https://mubi.com/lists/paul-ws-anderson-ranked

Except for MORTAL KOMBAT and THE THREE MUSKEETERS (both of whom are crap), I think the rest are quite good. EVENT HORIZON is a severely underrated masterpiece.

ROBIN HOOD: PRINCE OF THIEVES ( 1991 )

Worse than I remembered.

Hamming it up and chewing out everyone in a scene with him is a gloriously over the top Alan Rickman who is undoubtedly the only thing worth watching in this movie. Kevin Costner is bland, his 1980's Brit-pop haircut being the most interesting thing about him.

Sean Connery turns up for his pay cheque at the end.

Rubbish!

I haven't revisited it in years, but I've always liked that film tremendously -- the only Robin Hood film that truly does justice to the source material and that isn't just just 'fluffy costumes'.

Define "source material". This legend is a minefield of interpretations.

Man, that makes me want to watch the series again. I love Clannad's score too, there's a pseudo-authentic feel to it if that makes any sense? A dramatic folksy score.

Me an'all!



Hahahaaa! I know EXACTLY what you mean!
My dad , who hated any kind of anachronistic scoring, really liked Clannad's soundtrack to the series because "even though it was modern, it really fit so well!".

The Love Awakens

1981: Excalibur (film)
1981: Lord Of The Rings (BBC Radio)
1982: The Mists of Avalon (novel)
1983: Robin of Sherwood (TV)

Those years had a taste for New Age flavoured fantasy stories. Star Wars too is part of that brew.

What I love about Reynold's ROBIN HOOD is the prologue in Jerusalem(?), the crusades and all that, and the general photography -- lush and green, but with plenty of grit. It's taking all the ingredients of the legend, and making small mini-movies/segments out of it, much like Donner did with SUPERMAN. Costner is OK, and it has ALAN RICKMAN, for Chrissakes! And Kamen's best score ever.

I still hold it SLIGHTLY above Scott's recent ROBIN HOOD (which is my number 2), but as I said -- I haven't seen it in years. I'd be willing to give it another shot to see how it's held up. It was a TOP film for me when I first saw it, and upon repeated viewings in the 90s.