Author Topic: Great idea; Piss poor execution  (Read 12775 times)

Chicago At Night

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Re: Great idea; Piss poor execution
« Reply #70 on: September 19, 2010, 07:57:08 AM »
Devil - The first movie in M Night Shymalan (sp?) chronicles.

Nice idea, but not scary or particularly interesting in the least.

oldkid

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Re: Great idea; Piss poor execution
« Reply #71 on: September 19, 2010, 10:28:45 AM »
Tim Burton's Alice In Wonderland

They didn't give a single interesting idea, or a single provocative character.  I think it could have been great if some extra effort had been put into it.  As it is, meh.
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1SO

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Re: Great idea; Piss poor execution
« Reply #72 on: September 19, 2010, 10:36:32 AM »
That movie made a lot of mistakes, but the biggest sin had to be making the story a sequel that often wasn't.  They thought it gave them license to divert from the text when they wanted to but it muddled up everything.

FroHam X

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Re: Great idea; Piss poor execution
« Reply #73 on: September 19, 2010, 01:34:40 PM »
Tim Burton's Alice In Wonderland

They didn't give a single interesting idea, or a single provocative character.  I think it could have been great if some extra effort had been put into it.  As it is, meh.
That movie made a lot of mistakes, but the biggest sin had to be making the story a sequel that often wasn't.  They thought it gave them license to divert from the text when they wanted to but it muddled up everything.

That movie's mistake was being made at all. It wasn't even a great idea. Nevermind whether we needed another Alice tale or not, giving Burton the license to force his Burton-ness down our throats with terrible CGI and non-existent character work, and an extremely irritating Johnny Depp was the mistake. Is it even possible for Burton to make a movie anymore without being totally drowned by his own need to flaunt his idiosyncratic style?
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FLYmeatwad

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Re: Great idea; Piss poor execution
« Reply #74 on: September 19, 2010, 01:49:55 PM »
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FroHam X

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Re: Great idea; Piss poor execution
« Reply #75 on: September 19, 2010, 01:58:31 PM »
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Don't look at me like that. I'm not like you and your irrational hate of everything Spielberg. I love a good number of Burton films. Beetlejuice is great. I love Edward Scissorhands. Big Fish. I even love Mars Attacks! Ed Wood is one of my very favourite films of all time. I just think lately his style has become overbearing to the point of self-parody. Corpse Bride, a film I still enjoyed, had this as well, but Alice took it to a level that completely destroyed my hope for him.
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FLYmeatwad

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Re: Great idea; Piss poor execution
« Reply #76 on: September 19, 2010, 02:10:49 PM »
I like Jurassic Park, I just don't like bad films that Spielberg makes, which are the other ones. There's no irrationality, just poor film making. Conversely, Burton makes great films and constructs them incredibly well. That opening to Sweeney Todd is something no other director has proven capable of constructing. The queen's castle in Alice is only going to be found in a Burton film. His use of bright and dark colors to set up a contrast in that film is noticeably different from the primarily dark frames on display in Todd and Bride. You operate under the assumption that Burton is making these films in some attempt to be like Tim Burton, combined with an inexplicable denouncement of one of the most talented actors working today prevents prevents you from acknowledging these apparent differences. All the claims you are making are just as easily leveled against Martin Scorsese.

FroHam X

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Re: Great idea; Piss poor execution
« Reply #77 on: September 19, 2010, 02:34:43 PM »
I like Jurassic Park, I just don't like bad films that Spielberg makes, which are the other ones. There's no irrationality, just poor film making. Conversely, Burton makes great films and constructs them incredibly well. That opening to Sweeney Todd is something no other director has proven capable of constructing. The queen's castle in Alice is only going to be found in a Burton film. His use of bright and dark colors to set up a contrast in that film is noticeably different from the primarily dark frames on display in Todd and Bride. You operate under the assumption that Burton is making these films in some attempt to be like Tim Burton, combined with an inexplicable denouncement of one of the most talented actors working today prevents prevents you from acknowledging these apparent differences. All the claims you are making are just as easily leveled against Martin Scorsese.

Any claim can be leveled against anyone. Burton has played with contrasting colours with darkness to great effect in both Batman and Edward Scissorhands. In Alice there is a weird washed out quality to picture that I think comes from a lot of the digital work. it just doesn't look that great. And the self-parody comment is not me working under any assumptions. It comes from a feeling I have gotten in his last few films that he continuously abandons his great storytelling abilities for pure style (which I am not always a fan of anyway.) And the "inexplicable denouncement" of Johnny Depp is not a denouncement at all. i love Johnny Depp. Unfortunately I found him irritating and Alice as well as in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. In both films he does something similar to what Burton does that I have a problem with. Instead of really getting into the character as he has done on so many other films, he simply plasters on a dark quirkiness that I do not find appealing in any way. Once again, I love Ed Wood. In that film Burton and Depp perfectly infuse quirk with character and come out the other end with a story that is heartfelt and entertaining. Alice, to me, comes off as a lot of shoddy CGI thrown at the screen in a visually unappealing way and without any good story to back it.

I do like Burton, and I want to love whatever he makes, but he has made some films I cannot stand (Planet of the Apes anyone?) and Alice in Wonderland is one of those.
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oldkid

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Re: Great idea; Piss poor execution
« Reply #78 on: September 19, 2010, 04:40:49 PM »
Both Planet and Alice were unnecessary.  I really do like the basic idea of Alice "returning" and her previous visit seeming a dream.  I think a lot could have been done with that idea.  I just don't think this was the movie. 

For complete disclosure, both of my daughters loved Alice.  It was just right for them-- 10 and 14.  Mercy gave it a 5/5.  I am stunned, but they have their own minds, which I am pleased to have helped encourage.
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Dellamorte Dellamore

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Re: Great idea; Piss poor execution
« Reply #79 on: September 20, 2010, 02:34:44 PM »
Cold Souls.