:: theMediaman journal ::

:: Tuesday, June 25, 2002 ::

OK, a lot of movies seen since I took a couple of vacation days on Thursday and Friday.

After a day downtown with Simone (where I almost fainted after a Mr. Greenjeans 32 oz. beer, a sunny sky and a severe smog warning), Paul and I finally got around to spending an evening in the apartment, drinking beer and watching "Joe Dirt". We managed to laugh non-stop throughout the movie - although I'm sure that we laughed twice as much and twice as hard since we're both from Barrie. There were entirely too many people in the movie who reminded us of our days growing up there.

The plot is as thin as you would think it to be, but it's still a good Friday night (or in this case, Thursday night) movie to be enjoyed when you just don't feel like seeing a "Saving Private Ryan".

I was split between seeing "Minority Report" and "Lilo & Stitch" - both opening the same day. The decision was made for me when I found out that everyone was going to the former. In the end, both movies racked up $35 million on the weekend, and differed in takes at the box office by about $400,000. Simone and I saw Lilo & Stitch last night in a neighbourhood theatre well after most kids' bedtimes, so we were able to enjoy the movie with mostly other couples.

"Minority Report" was as I thought it would be - a comfortable mix of Tom Cruise-esque action with a Spielburgian "A.I." texture. While the comparison wasn't obvious, there was definitely the same undertones as are in "Blade Runner"... appropriate since both Minority Report and Blade Runner are based from novels by Philip K. Dick.

Those I went with agreed that the comedic relief scenes were out-of-place... they were almost too funny. They were a stark contrast to the rest of the movies subtle dialogue, sharp photography, futuristic style and thrilling action.

The end of the movie was an appropriatly creepy ending, leaving the viewer unsettled in his or her seat... but Spielberg being Spielberg, he pulled the movie out another 20 minutes to tie up all the lose ends and make a happy ending. It wasn't out of place or "tacked on", but I just thought that the movie could have been just as good by ending a little earlier - but that wouldn't have played as well with the audience. Maybe I could appropriately compare it to the absence of a happy ending in the Directors Cut of Blade Runner... but I prefered the original cut, so I couldn't say that in good concience.

Lilo & Stitch was drop-dead hilarious. When I wasn't laughing at how cute Stitch is, there was usually some other odd thing happening to make me laugh. Stitch is a trouble-making alien who makes friends with Lilo in Hawaii. After Lion King, there were no real massively successful movies for Disney. My opinion is that this is in part because Disney has been trying to get the non-Disney-philes in to the audience over the last few years - resulting in the alienation of their faithful crowd.

It's obvious that Disney started doing some major experimentation with the style of Classic Disney movies. "Toy Story" was the first feature-length 3D animated movie, "The Emperor's New Groove" featured a lot of Warner Brothers-style humour, and "Atlantis" was the first movie to not have a bunch of musical numbers thrown into the mix.

Lilo & Stitch was sort of like the final product of what they learned about these movies - both what worked and what didn't. All the "traditional animation" movies after Lion King had a lot of 3D animation pushed poorly into the mix with cel animation. It was particularly distracting in "The Hunchback of Notre Dame". L&S had Futurama-style 3D, allowing it to blend into the cel animation better. There's a lot of Elvis music in place of the usual Elton John or Phil Collins "Oscar grabby" music-with-a-theme. Also, the humour in L&S was more extreme, without having to get dirty like Warner Bros.

On a side note, there were at least a couple of obvious WB references in the movie. Near the end, one of the characters jams a carrot (that came out of nowhere) into the barrel of a ray-gun a la Elmer Fudd and Bugs Bunny. At the end, Stitch dresses up like Batman. I'm fairly sure that there was a third reference, but I can't seem to remember it... I suppose I'll have to see it a second time.

That's fine, since there's nothing else interesting to see until MIB:2 and Crocodile Hunter come out.

:: Stephen 4:10 PM [+] ::

...

Armed with the knowledge that most of the trivia added to IMDB is only from the biggest of nerds, I decided to go see what minute details people have picked out about Episode II: Attack of the Clones. We're talking about ultra-comic-store-guy nerds who pick on the stupidest things.

Why am I so bitter? It probably has something to do with the fact that they'll pick the smallest and most excusable inconsistancies from people with nothing better to do than find these details, but IMDB won't add the stuff that I've submitted about Jurassic Park or The Saint (stupid &$%&#ers).

Anyway, here's my favourite entry from the "Goofs" list on IMDB's Episode II page:

When Obi Wan sends the message for help to Anakin and Amidala, Amidala presses a red button in order to transmit the message to the Jedi council. A minute later she presses the same red button in order to view a map of a galaxy, without first doing anything which might be expected to change the function of the button.

Now say this next part in your best Comic Store Guy voice:
"Are we to believe that this is some *magical button* that can do anything the user desires?"

pffehh!!... nerds.

:: Stephen 3:54 PM [+] ::

...

Despite how brillant a cinematic event the new Scooby Doo movie is, Paul and I decided to see Episode II on Friday. He hasn't seen it yet, and I've already stated my interest in seeing it on the big screen again.

My interest was in going to see Matt Damon in "The Bourne Identity" since it's playing at AMC 30, but we needed to make sure Paul sees Ninja Yoda on the big screen. This time, we saw it on a good ol' film projector. There was slight degredation in quality since digital does give sharper colours - and since it's data instead of film - it won't get worse over many plays. This copy of the reel must be a few weeks old by now, but it was still pretty good quality. The Matrix trailer, however, was noticably worse off.

*side note* For any KaZaA users out there, do a search for "Matrix Reloaded". Amongst the list will be the 24 MB QuickTime video directly downloaded from the Matrix web site. Move your mouse over the selection and it will come up with a bunch of information including file name, artist and keywords... Read the keywords and take note of the last one in the list ,^_^

Between Jack Astors and the theatre, Paul and I were comparing "Sum of All Fears" and "The Bourne Identity". Two movies, released a week apart, were based off novels by competing authors, Tom Clancy and Robert Ludlum (respecively). However, they each starred one half of the notorious duo, Ben Affleck or Matt Damon...

...we were pretty drunk and the movie was about to start, so that's as far as the comparison went.

Simone, Rita and I went to see "The Bourne Identity" on Saturday night. It was a very thrilling film - but I think I was expecting something more Frankenheimer from the car-chase scene. The scene was good, just not great.

Anyway, it was cool to see both Franka Potente (from "Run Lola Run") and Clive Owen (from the BMW short films) in an exciting film like this. Matt Damon also put in a good performance in his first spy-thriller, but his action scenes left something to be desired. A lot of the one-on-one fights involved the audience watching the back of his stunt-double's head. Overall it was a really thrilling movie.

Well, if I go to see a movie this week, it'll probably be "About A Boy". After Friday, there's "Minority Report" and "Lilo & Stitch" starting, so that should keep me busy for a while longer. I still think it's sad that last Summer I had to go to AMC 30 or Colossus two or three times a week just to keep up with all the movies I wanted to see. This year, I'm able to plan what I want to see right to the end of the Summer blockbusters...

...but at least it won't be stressful this year.

:: Stephen 9:14 PM [+] ::

...

Will the fallout from September 11 never end?

The creators of the flag-waving "Independence Day", Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich, created a script outline for ID4:2 following the "Attack on America". The movie isn't even at script stage yet, and won't be until next year at the earliest. Let's hope that Armageddon comes first (and no, I'm not talking about a sequel to the Aerosmith-soundtracked crap-in-space movie).

:: Stephen 11:16 AM [+] ::

...

Sweet, Dude! Here's a link to South Park Studios where you can build your own South Park character.

This would be a cool link, but I found it while surfing Wil Wheaton's official web site. His is a fairly decent site, except for the fact that he likes Cake.

:: Stephen 4:51 PM [+] ::

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One more Matrix-related article... just a warning... it contains a mild spoiler about the second movie's final scene.

:: Stephen 10:07 AM [+] ::

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Here's a good article that draws parallels between "The Matrix" and Jesus Christ. There are a lot of dumb links in the bottom third of the site, so don't bother reading past "Related Articles & Papers".

One thing I didn't realize before about this movie - it was released around Easter 1999 - appropriate for a film that has a lot of Christ references. Another is that Neo's last name, Anderson, can be derived from "Son of man".

:: Stephen 12:57 AM [+] ::

...

...Following up my entry about AMC night with Paul, the new full trailer came out for "Crocodile Hunter: Collision Course". Now here's a movie that you should be loaded to watch!

Don't watch the teaser trailer, watch the full thing. The teaser makes it look like an episode of Crocodile Hunter stretched out for 90 minutes with bad, token plot thrown in to keep you in your seat for the full stretch...

...the second trailer confirms it! But this looks like a great, campy film. This summer is looking unusually barren of good movies. Sure, there's "The Sum Of All Fears" opening today, and I'm interested in seeing it. Same thing with "Bad Company". But I see both these movies as rentals. I would much rather see Attack Of The Clones on the big screen again than blow $13.50 per person on those movies.

Coming up, here's what I'm interested in:

Seeing Episode II again. Either that or "About A Boy"... another movie from a Nick Hornby novel - he wrote "High Fidelity".

Opening this week, Bad Company is the only new movie I could be dragged out to see. It looks good, but so did the Batman franchise until Joel Schumacher got his hands on it - he directs this feature too.

Opening June 14, "Windtalkers" - more Nicolas Cage crap, and directed by John Woo, who I still haven't forgiven for making Mission: Impossible 2 so brain-dead. Also opening is the cartoon-to-movie conversion of Scooby Doo, starring an all teeny-bopper cast. As much as I hate Matthew Lillard, he does a Shaggy voice that Casey Kasem would be proud of. About the only movie opening on the 14th worth my time and money is the Robert Ludlum movie adaptation, "The Bourne Identity". Matt Damon in an action flick. I hope it makes up for "All The Pretty Horses".

June 21, we finally get to see Tom Cruise in a Steven Speilberg sci-fi action flick. This could very easily be lame since it looks like AI meets M:I 2... MAI2? The new Disney movie "Lilo & Stitch" starts today and looks like good entertainment. Maybe they're trying to make up for last year's "Atlantis" and it's documentary-like excitement.

"Pumpkin" looks like it puts Christina Ricci in a teen comedy. That's sad. The new Adam Sandler flick looks like Happy Gilmore stuck in the world of Billy Madison. Nothing else worth talking about for this week ... I'll probably go see Episode II for a third time by this point.

The "King of the July 4th Weekend" returns to claim his throne in "Men In Black 2". Will Smith gained the title after pulling a one-two punch with MIB and ID4 in consecutive years, but has fizzled since. He had no holiday weekend release in 1998, and in 1999 his movie "Wild, Wild West" sucked ass. I think his soundtrack rap did better than the movie.

According to the director Barry Sonnenfeld, Tommy Lee Jones was a lot more comfortable with his role in a comedy in this movie, so I'm hoping for even better chemistry between the two actors for MIB2.

In the same weekend, there's the "PowerPuff Girls Movie". I'm not sure about watching candy-like bold cartoon drawings on a giant screen, but it may be a healthy alternative to Scooby Doo.

Well, that covers up to the next month. I'll revisit this topic once we get closer to July... or when I'm bored at work again. Whichever comes first.

:: Stephen 3:43 PM [+] ::

...

Paul and I finally got out to an AMC night yesterday. Now that he's working 15 hour days installing sprinkler systems, he's usually too tired to go out at nights. With John in Japan for who-knows-how-long, I'm usually stuck without my two primary drinking-buddies.

On top of that, the AMC 30 at Hwy. 400 and 7 has been playing crap for the last month. Sure there's movies like "The Fast Runner" and "Gosford Park" - which are apparently great movies - but if I'm going to go out on a Wednesday night, eat Boston Pizza and drink two litres of beer, I want a popcorn movie to watch - not "Halle Berry's breakthrough performance in Monster's Ball"!

Luckily, the Colossus (the Famous Players megaplex across the street that usually gets the good movies first) stopped showing The Scorpion King this week, and it was one of the few raw entertainment movies that I haven't seen in the last six months (the average age of the movies showing at AMC 30 right now).

Paul and I finished off most of two medium pizzas and a secret "4 litre pitcher" of Rickards Red that Boston Pizza doesn't tend to advertise. We had a difficult time convincing the waiter to bring it to us - despite there only being two of us.

It's a good thing too, since if we finished a single normal-sized pitcher, we would never have gotten a chance to order a second one.

The last three times that I've been to a restaurant, the waiter/waitress has appeared several minutes after we sit down to take our drink orders, appears again to bring drinks and get our order, brings us our dinners, then disappears for 30 minutes until we manage to flag him/her down for the bill. It doesn't take much to get the full 15% tip from me when I pay the bill, but it does require more than the bare minimum - and that's what I've been getting lately.

Incidently, the best place for service is still The Owl and Firkin near my work on Woodbine Ave. just north of Steeles.

Back to the movie... The Scorpion King was definitely a "prequel" to "The Mummy" series in character outline only. This movie was much, much closer in style to the Schwarzenegger "Conan" series than it was to "The Mummy"... (and a helluva lot better than "Kull the Conqueror")

...AND I HATE THAT WORD "PREQUEL"!!! The movie is clearly a spin-off series. "Prequel" has only been used thanks to it's buzz-word status from the Star Wars movies. When the only connection to another movie is a name and a vague character outline - and the genre of film isn't even the same - it's not a "prequel". As a stand-alone film, however, it's quite entertaining. Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson was supposed to be in Jet Li's role in "The One", but the fates smiled on moviegoers and The Rock got a role he fit and Jet got the role he fit.

Anyway, good popcorn movie. However, I was a little drunk after two litres of beer, so it might have sucked... I don't know...

...and Kelly Hu (Hollywood's Next Big Thing) is very, very hot... very hot.

:: Stephen 10:29 AM [+] ::

...

Whenever someone comes to my web site via a search engine, the referring site is marked in my server logs. Whenever I want a chuckle, I browse through this list to see what search terms people have used in order to get to my site. Whether they have relevance or not doesn't matter, the simple fact is that they searched for words that happened to be on one web page - even if I was talking about two different things.

Here's the new list of search terms where I'm at (or near) the top of on Google:

• tim horton's japan (heh... I wish)
  
• japanese gameshows (still in the top 5!)
  
• simpsons fugu (still number 1!!!)
  
• japan exclusive jordans (after this I got a weird email from Pakistan asking for round-trip ticket prices to Japan ?_? )
  
• japan buddist temples (despite - or perhaps because of - the 'Buddhist' misspelling)
  
• suped up suvs (there are some people you just don't WANT to come to your web site)
  

So what have we learned today?

• Using common misspellings on your web site will rank you high when surfers type the wrong word into a search engine (like gameshows instead of game shows, or buddist instead of Buddhist)
  
• My site seems to rank high with people searching for specific information on Japan
  
• Stupid people know how to use search engines.

:: Stephen 3:52 PM [+] ::

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