The Latest Movies (Non-Anime) You Are Watching Right Now

Non-anime/manga-related TV, movies, books, and comics, especially but not limited to pre-2000 titles
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Re: The Latest Movies (Non-Anime) You Are Watching Right Now

Post by _D_ »

Greg...have you ever read Zero! By Masatake Okumiya and Jiro Horikoshi with Martin Caidin? A very good book on the war, concentrating on the Zero pilots. I forgot to ask Walter Koenig when he was in town last year if he had read it as he is a big bug for WWII books. I got to talk to him briefly during a convention up here.
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Re: The Latest Movies (Non-Anime) You Are Watching Right Now

Post by greg »

That's cool you got to talk to Walter Koenig. I've been able to chat with David Prowse (Darth Vader) and a bit with Bruce Boxleitner. I haven't heard of that book. It sounds interesting.
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Re: The Latest Movies (Non-Anime) You Are Watching Right Now

Post by _D_ »

Book seems to be out of print:

http://www.amazon.com/Zero-Story-Japans ... ero+Caiden

However, if you want to borrow mine, let me know.

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Re: The Latest Movies (Non-Anime) You Are Watching Right Now

Post by usamimi »

Finally got around to seeing Mad Max: Fury Road today. One of the best looking action films I've seen in years! The direction, cinematography, costumes, editing, the fact that CG is used VERY SPARINGLY, and just so jam-packed with actual ACTION!....it was super fun to watch.
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Re: The Latest Movies (Non-Anime) You Are Watching Right Now

Post by greg »

Yes! I wanna see Mad Max too. I like that Mad Max gets another Interceptor car in this one. I never did see Beyond Thunderdome. I once caught The Road Warrior on IFC and it was not sped-up. I've only ever seen the movie on TV, and I thought the only cheesy thing about the movie is how the film was sped up for some reason in places. But the last time I ever saw it, on IFC, it was not sped-up. I wonder if the versions of the movie on DVD are at regular speed or not. Maybe the bluray version is the best to get?
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Re: The Latest Movies (Non-Anime) You Are Watching Right Now

Post by llj »

Speed ups could be a PAL source issue. I don't know how to tell if something is sped up unless it's noticeable, like the voices being high pitched or something. I think some of the Speed Racer DVDs of the original cartoon were noticeably sped up--chipmunky voices, etc,.

I'm not a big fan of the first Mad Max, but I consider The Road Warrior to be a real action classic, though probably not for the reasons people think today. It certain delivered the tension and wow factor, but even aside from those elements which many people might now consider "dated", I think it's just a superior example of visual storytelling. The film has probably less than 10 pages of actual dialogue; it's almost purely told through visuals and behaviour. Show, don't tell. I'm always partial to show-dont-tell movies. Too bad Mel went crazy, though. Even though he's getting old, I have to think he could have suited up for Mad Max again and still made it work. He didn't even get a supporting role in Fury Road.
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Re: The Latest Movies (Non-Anime) You Are Watching Right Now

Post by usamimi »

The "sped up" parts in Mad Max are intentional--they actually used the same sort of thing in some of the previous MM films, if I recall (I need to rewatch the rest of the movies, it's been a while...I only had time to rewatch the first film beforehand.) So I assume that that's something the director likes to play with. And from what I've read, it's not really a matter of "oh they filmed something and then sped it up during the editing process", apparently you can achieve that kind of effect by shooting video with a very high shutter speed: https://www.reddit.com/r/Filmmakers/com ... t_and_mad/ (I know it's Reddit, yuck, but there's relevant links in there.)

As for Mel not being in it, according to the director here: http://www.cinemablend.com/new/Why-Mel- ... 70379.html, when he was first plotting the movie years ago apparently he DID want Mel to be in it, but then the economy after 9/11 gave them budget issues, and then Mel went crazy, like you mentioned...By the time they were FINALLY ready to start production, he realized the movie needed a young Max, not an older one, so he just found someone else. TBH I feel like Mel Gibson's glory days are pretty much done and over with so I didn't mind him being absent from it. A cameo would've been cool, but I could understand if people just wanted to avoid him all together now, lol.

I do agree that "show rather than tell" is one of the great aspects of Road Warrior, and I was very pleased that that sentiment was very much alive in Fury Road. More writers/directors need to take a page from Miller's book.
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Re: The Latest Movies (Non-Anime) You Are Watching Right Now

Post by greg »

I went to see Avengers 2: Age of Ultron at the theaters yesterday. It was finally released in Japan on July 4th. I really enjoyed the movie. I dug the slow-down action stills that really captured the feel of watching a large, single panel that's full of action. That really was great. All it lacked were the speech bubbles of the heroes describing their own super powers at length as they fight. The friend I saw the movie with said that the plot seemed fairly similar to the first movie, as in someone wants to ruin everything and has an army of minions to help them do so, and the Avengers have to thwart the evil plans. But really, if it isn't broken, why try to fix it? This works very well with a comic book plot, so it doesn't need to be overly-complex.
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Re: The Latest Movies (Non-Anime) You Are Watching Right Now

Post by llj »

Finally saw Mad Max: Fury Road. Was gonna catch it on DVD/BD but I said, ehh, why not see how it plays on the big screen; one theatre here is still showing it and it's probably the last week it's running.

Have to say, I wasn't too impressed with the first 30 minutes or so. Too much modern MTV-style editing and "Look how crazy this guy is/looks" moments that had me wondering if Miller was just trying a little too hard to appeal to the "current generation." The guitar guy is popular on the internet, but I was worried that Miller had already jumped the shark early in the film when I saw him. I'd even say the first 25-30 minutes or so are among the worst Mad Max ever filmed. When Max finally meets up with Furiosa, though, the movie goes from -10 to +5000. Classic Mad Max minimalist storytelling and dialogue, exciting and well edited action scenes, GORGEOUS cinematography (I haven't seen a digitally shot film look this good EVER before) and pretty much non-stop action and tension from start to finish. Funny enough, though, this also really reminded me of the original Speed, with Keanu and Sandra Bullock. It's pretty much the best "Runaway Bus" movie since Speed, LOL.
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Re: The Latest Movies (Non-Anime) You Are Watching Right Now

Post by llj »

Boyhood. This is notable on this forum because of the DBZ references early in the film, which was cute. Heard there was also a Sailor Moon reference but I didn't catch it. Good film, moved along quickly despite near 3 hour runtime. I wouldn't say I loved it but I definitely enjoyed it. Ethan Hawke is a tremendously likable performer. I have a feeling his role would have come off less flattering if it were played by someone else. The early 2000s is still fairly fresh in my mind, but to many of today's young adults it must seem like a long time ago.

I'd quibble a bit and say that parts of the early part of the film seems more 80s and 90s than early 2000s. Gigantic walkie-talkie style cellphones were already mostly phased out by the late 90s. Most people also would already have had some basic internet access--so the one scene with the kids getting off on a Victoria's Secret magazine seems very quaint to me. I can tell you that I know for sure most people were already looking at porn online by 1997. So the early part of the film, which paints a picture of an almost pre-internet early 2000s, seems a bit off. The only true marker is the music, which grabs from Britney Spears and so forth. I understand that not all parts of America were necessarily "online" at this point but I am quite sure Houston was and is a fairly modern and up-to-date city, which the early parts of this film is set in.
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