Recent Viewing Part IV

It isn't. It also isn't fine, nor from 1997.

Ba! Nonsense. No offence meant or taken right?

glad to avoid this one

This was one of the major plus points for me. It did what no other films do these days and showed restraint. Just look at garbage like Pacific Rim that starts CGI shitting everywhere within the first ten minutes and doesn't let up. It's tiring watching that for two hours. When Godzilla finally does start fighting it's fucking epic.

And I think it was Steven who mentioned the film has some great Spielberg inspired moments. I haven't seen it since it was out at the cinema in April but I still remember the rail bridge sequence, the airport train of death, and when Godzilla rocks up in San Francisco as highlights.

And yes, the chain of exploding planes at the airport is the best shot in the movie - I couldn't have been grinning wider when I saw that.

I didn't mind the cutaway from the airport (as much as I'd like to have seen that), but there was a second one later in the movie where I did think "aww come on", but luckily about a minute later the fight actually started.

Once Wantanabe said "Let them fight", which was 30 minutes before end credit roll, the film should have been a non-stop 30 minute battle between 'Zilla and the MUTO. I might have forgiven Gareth for all the other bullshit if he had done that.

-Erik-

Crikey, you really hate this film.

I find some of his films very enjoyable but there are some stinkers and Godzilla's one of them, for me anyway.

Every Emmerich film I've seen, before I too caught on and stopped watching them, is a big epic shit on the artform of film, if you ask me.

At best the Stargate film was okay, but it's greatly overshadowed by a long-running TV series (even in it's weakest moments). About the only good thing that came out of any Emmerich film: a handful of good scores.

I thought WHITE HOUSE DOWN was surprisingly fun. Still dumb (like all Emmerich films), but better than any of his other films from the last lot of years.

Emmerich is full of shit. White house down was one of the worst films i've seen in years, what a lame excuse for throwing money away. Independence Day was also one of the cheesiest and most ridiculous major films ever, imo as well. I guess i don't understand his type of thinking at all. Is this meant for laughs? is it parody? self-parody? or is it dead, 100% serious ffs?

Emmerich doesn't succeed every time, of course, but when he does it's brilliant. I didn't particularly care for WHITE HOUSE DOWN or ANONYMOUS (I was actually surprised to see him as the director of the latter, a Shakespeare/conspiracy-type film without any of the doom and gloom and patriotism).

For me, he's a bit like Wolfgang Petersen in some ways, especially related to the satirical view of American patriotism. But in other ways, he's more like Irwin Allen -- always on the lookout for more spectacular ways to envelop the audience, esp. in the disaster film genre.

But mostly, he's like himself. He's interested in the effects that disasters in any given shape have on the human psyche and group dynamics. Especially if you can stage that with.....wait for it......some great AUDIOVISUAL ideas, of which there are plenty.

For me, it doesn't really matter if it's Antonioni or Kieslowski on one hand or Bay or Emmerich on the other -- I like directors who do MORE than just pure storytelling and/or dialogue. Who use the medium of film for what it's worth.

That's all very well, but I've noticed that your general line of reasoning only makes sense if movies were shown in art galleries. But they're not. They're shown in cinemas. People go to the cinema, generally, to watch a story (even those who primarily go to see EXPLOSIONS and FIGHTS and BOOBIES - like me for example).

Even though film is an AUDIOVISUAL™ medium, movies need interesting characters and/or a good story to tie the AUDIOVISUALS™ together, otherwise the audience gets bored. (Unless you're constantly high or happen to share a name with certain Norse god.)

I agree the story should be told through AUDIOVISUALS™ as much as possible, this is why most of us love film, but they still actually need to tell a coherent story, and this is where we need a decent script. Regardless of how you interpret the AUDIOVISUALS™ to fit some weird abstract artistic notion you have swimming around in your head, scripts make or break movies. No amount of impressive imagery will save a movie from a bad script, even though the imagery might have value in itself.

Of course you'll just say I've got a narrow perception of what film really is and my point will forever be lost on you. But remember, we're taking about mainstream movie making here. Most aren't trying to be some abstract, high art avant-garde, AUDIOVISUAL™ experience - they're just trying to tell a goddamn story.

I think you've missed my point. It's probably true that most moviegoers are more concerned with special effects and pretty actors than 'watching a story', but whether they admit it or not, they're also watching the film because they expect at least some kind of narrative thread. The films that have good stories, plus good visuals, are the ones people remember and enjoy.

Scarlett Johansson . Beeewwwbbbbbssss