SMAX... that blue guy in TOP 10, right?

[Buster's Uncle]

-So far, this seems very good, notwithstanding a title that sounds like a Marvel Comics crossover event about Thanos taking up classical music.

That makes Thanos...smile!

He has good taste in music...

[Sigma]

I never got why The Matrix impressed so many people so much.  I found it merely okay for the kind of thing it is.

I maintain that the original Matrix still stands up very well. It's got clear purpose and clean storytelling not excessively bogged down with exposition beyond the initial "Desert of the Real" info dump, and some great action scenes. The tragedy is that it is harmed retroactively by its sequels.

[Buster's Uncle]

Would you agree with "good if you like that sort of thing"? 

It's too much of a contemporary shoot-'em-up for me to enjoy as SF, and the SF element isn't even original to movies, let alone print SF.  A lot of what blew people I knew's minds was the investigation into the nature of reality - but only because they hadn't seen The Thirteenth Floor or Dark City or Existenz (if I'm remembering that last right).

[Sigma]

Would you agree with "good if you like that sort of thing"? 

It's too much of a contemporary shoot-'em-up for me to enjoy as SF, and the SF element isn't even original to movies, let alone print SF.  A lot of what blew people I knew's minds was the investigation into the nature of reality - but only because they hadn't seen The Thirteenth Floor or Dark City or Existenz (if I'm remembering that last right).

Yes but film is also a visual medium in addition to one about plots and ideas, and you need to factor in the quality of the acting, effects, editing and direction in addition to the originality of the ideas when you judge a film. There's hardly an original bone in the Matrix's body-- it cribs from everything: Neuromancer, Snow Crash, Terminator, Plato and the films that you mentioned, but what makes it a good film is how well it presents itself. Bullet time is used everywhere since the Matrix, but remember that it is the first film that figured out how to do it.

[Buster's Uncle]

I'd be happier if no one had invented bullet time; witness my earlier remarks about the Watchmen movie...

[Sigma]

I'd be happier if no one had invented bullet time; witness my earlier remarks about the Watchmen movie...

The Watchmen film is justified to me exclusively for the sequence where Dr. Manhatten travels to Mars and then reminiscences about his past, which I thought was fantastically realized.

[Buster's Uncle]

That part has slipped from my memory, for what it's worth.


BTW, Dr. Manhattan looked scarily like my dad back when he was human.  That right there was a strange part of my reading experience that I can't imagine how it affected my perception of the whole work differently from the experience of others.  It certainly didn't improve my grammar. 

Coincidentally, I happened to have re-read Watchmen just last month.

[Sigma]

Oh and I also enjoy the fact that the movie exists at all, nevermind whether it is good or not. I imagined that a Watchmen movie would be all but unfilmable.

The opening credits set to The Times They Are A-Changin were great as well.

[Buster's Uncle]

Agreed with that last, for sure.  I didn't hate the movie, in general.  It was okay.

[Vishniac]

Would you agree with "good if you like that sort of thing"?

That could be said for anything: any movie / book / painting / song.
It's like people using "IMHO" everytime they post an opinion.
No risk.  Above all not antagonizing anybody. Total relativism: everything can be good and everything has the same value.

So I don't really agree. Some works stand. Even I can recognize that some I don't like stand as well.

[Buster's Uncle]

Yeah, but I'm comfortable to label my opinions as such, and don't mind it from others, because it's one of those things that greases the social interaction.  Most arguing on the innernets is over matters of opinion, and, lordy lordy, can nerdz ever get HOT over a difference of opinion. 

Sure, I can say that Citizen Kane is a better movie than Dune without much fear of contradiction, and saying it would be truth, but those are tricky things to measure, and ultimately come down to I liked one and didn't like the other.  It's a matter of opinion.

I frequently tell my mother "they didn't make it for you".  I generally mean that the work in question is actually good, but nothing a 73 year-old church lady would like.  I try to warn her off about stuff she'll find to be dirty - it's my duty. (She likes The Big Bang Theory anyway.)  (And Daddy didn't believe me and tried to watch Boogie Nights twice.  And didn't finish either time, because Boogie Nights, while a genuinely good move, isn't the kind of thing he liked.)

There IS such a thing as the kind of thing that people who like that kind of thing will like; I've met David Lynch fans who loved Dune.

Go figure.

[Vishniac]

Most arguing on the innernets is over matters of opinion, and, lordy lordy, can nerdz ever get HOT over a difference of opinion.

There is a French cinema forum where I am not registered but where I go to read news about future movies and reviews of movies I have seen.
Just reading some threads can make you hate geeks: the constant nitpicking about details or music you didn't even notice while in theatre...

Sure, I can say that Citizen Kane is a better movie than Dune without much fear of contradiction...

And I wouldn't support you: I never watched Citizen Kane but actually like Dune.

There IS such a thing as the kind of thing that people who like that kind of thing will like; I've met David Lynch fans who loved Dune.

Go figure.

And so I figure: I never understood why people DIDN'T like Dune.

[Buster's Uncle]

Have you read the book?  I'm not sure Lynch did.

Citizen Kane is as good as you've surely heard.  Honest.

[Sigma]

Lynch's Dune is awesome because it's clear that Lynch did read the book, he just didn't care about what any of it actually meant and just interpreted everything through his own crazy lens. Which leads to stuff like Paul's remark that the Fremen have made his name into a killing word translating into Paul arming the Fremen with weapons that blow things up using sound, and having the Fremen shouting his name to kill people.

[Buster's Uncle]

And there's some of the crap I hated most.

It's all a matter of opinion.