The Expendables

05 Mar – €13 @ DVD-Börse Ludwigsburg

Double Impact

05 Mar – €5 @ DVD-Börse Ludwigsburg

Knight and Day

05 Mar – €10 @ DVD-Börse Ludwigsburg

The Running Man

05 Mar – €9 @ DVD-Börse Ludwigsburg

The Town

05 Mar – €12 @ DVD-Börse Ludwigsburg

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Categories: DVD / Blu-ray, Purchase Diary 2011
Tags: Armageddon · Beyond Sherwood Forest · Date Night · Dexter · Dollhouse · Double Impact · Knight and Day · Leverage · Mad Men · Superman · The Expendables · The Librarian · The Running Man · The Town · Universal Soldier · V
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The “adventure” 3D is over for me for now. I my opinion it adds nothing to the experience of watching a movie or enhances it somehow.. In contrast to well-used special effects I don’t get the feeling that the movie is getting better just because there’s a depth perception now and then.

But now to the movie itself. I’m not naïve. When I’m watching movies like Independence Day, Armageddon or Transformers then I know exactly what kind of intellectual level I have to expect. I’ve got no problem with that as long as I’m well entertained. It’s like a ride on the roller coaster. You end up where you started but you had a lot of fun while riding it.

But that’s the minimum requirement: Fun. And this is where Clash of the Titans fails abysmally. The same guy who portrayed the hero in Avatar tried it again and failed again at this relatively trivial task.
One doesn’t bond with any of the characters – maybe with the exception of Zeus – especially not the main character.
So what’s left? Battles and CGI effects of course, they were the reason we went into that movie. But on that front, too: Oh, well. Only 2.5 things that one might call battles and once again they were cut so fast that one couldn’t really follow and at the same time they were not really spectacular. There’s a giant Kraken that comes out of the water and demolishes an entire city? Honestly, it didn’t feel that way at all. I also had the feeling there was something wrong about the fight against the scorpions. It seemed as if more warriors were involved that the group had heads and despite the casualties nobody seemed to be missing afterwards.
Nothing really worked for me.

You know the scene, in which William Wallace/Aragorn/President Mitchell gathers the troops and gives a speech, to motivate them one last time to hold the line against the darkness and to be the last line of defence against doom. Perseus tried that one, too. I can’t even slightly remember what it was about…

PS: And the worst thing of all: Two thirds of the time you didn’t even get the feeling to watch a 3D movie; just a 2D one while wearing sun glasses. Only in the panorama shots you got some depth. But you have to pay an additional 3€ because they don’t even play the 2D version!

Categories: Cinema
Tags: Armageddon · Avatar · Clash of the Titans · Independence Day · Transformers
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Deutsche Version

I can’t remember how it started but I can’t seem to stop it now.

Every time I watch a movie or a TV show I think about what could be the earliest time one could premiere this without destroying the pop culture references.

I am not talking about stylistic means, I am talking about visual or textual references to the real world or other movies/shows.

To make an easy example: In the opening of Dirty Dancing baby makes a reference to JFK’s murder. Thus you couldn’t premiere this film before 1964 without making that comment a un-funny aneurysm.

Yesterday evening I watched Kill Bill Vol.1 and apart from the indirect references to eastern movies in general (and to Hattori Hanzo) there were two references that stood out: The owner of the restaurant is referred to as “Charlie Brown” and Sophie looks like a “villain from Star Trek” with ST being the later time anchor (Charlie Brown strips have been around since the 50s).

Interestingly there are only a few main anchors that pop up all the time: Fixed anchors like JFK’s murder, the moon landing in 1969 and it recent movies 9/11 and variable anchors like Star Trek and Star Wars. The latter ones are variable because if I can move a movie back in time I surely can move the referenced movie, too.

Luckily both Stars are basically endpoints, especially Star Wars. Since it plays in a galaxy far, far away it does not contain textual references to our real world and can be moved back in time to the dawn of cinema. Star Trek makes historical references to the 2nd World War and the Chicago of the thirties but I tend to play that game only until the beginning of the 50s.

The more references a movie/series uses the more fun it is to think about but the more likely it is that it will be “anchored in time”. To move Buffy as a whole back in time is a sheer improbability even if you accept to lose a third of the references. So I break it down to an episode level (so when Spike mentions that he fed of a flower person, it makes Woodstock the fixed anchor for that episode).

Once I’ve established the earliest premiere date I try to imagine how the movie would look like in the eyes of that year’s people. For example, premiere Back to the Future in the actual year 1955. That would work since people would assume that Marty’s car and the music and everything from the “future 1985″ were invented by a writer. Like the same writers imagined a year 2015 with hover cars and a holographic Jaws movie.
Although there is a reference to a “John F. Kennedy drive” it mentions nothing specific and JFK was already a senator at that time, so that wouldn’t be a problem.

This way my mind keeps active even if I have seen that movie several times. Imagine Top Gun in the early 50s where the US military was testing their first jet engines. Imagine Armageddon (with all its special effects) shortly after the founding of NASA (although that would be prevented by the actual naming of Neil Armstrong as the first man on the moon -> fixed anchor; Armageddon also mentions Star Wars (several times), the Kennedy murder, Evel Knievel and some other things which have to be taken into consideration).

Somehow it can be a lot of fun.

Categories: Thought Storm
Tags: Armageddon · Back to the Future · Buffy the Vampire Slayer · Dirty Dancing · Jaws · Kill Bill · Peanuts · Star Trek · Star Wars · Top Gun
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Deutsche Version

It wasn’t planned as such, but in the last few weeks I have watched quite a number of Science-Fiction movies and a good part of them were “Doomsday” movies, so I might as well write a few words about them. Most of these movies are very, very US-patriotic but when you can accept that and when you can ignore the scientific “inaccuracies” you can have a lot of fun with them.

Independence Day

Will Smith   …    Captain Steven Hiller
Bill Pullman   …    President Thomas J. Whitmore
Jeff Goldblum   …    David Levinson
Mary McDonnell   …    First Lady Marilyn Whitmore
Judd Hirsch   …    Julius Levinson
Robert Loggia   …    General William Grey
Randy Quaid   …    Russell Casse
Margaret Colin   …    Constance Spano
Vivica A. Fox   …    Jasmine Dubrow
Adam Baldwin   …    Major Mitchell
Brent Spiner   …    Dr. Brackish Okun

Synopsis: July, 2nd. Some aliens come in a huge ship. They place their UFOs all over the world and blow everything apart. July, 3rd. We try to strike back and fail miserably. July, 4th. We give them a cold and blow them apart.

My Opinion: Great movie. Love it. It’s so cheesy that falls out of the bottom of the scale and comes back from the top of it. The characters are so overdrawn that you can’t take them seriously and that saves the movie. Imagine you would have to look at this movie with a serious eye. The president that fights in the final battle, the drunken pilot that saves the day, the scientist that writes a computer virus for an alien computer and Will Smith in the middle of it.
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Categories: DVD / Blu-ray, DVD Marathon, Mini Marathon
Tags: A Knight's Tale · Armageddon · Daylight · Deep Impact · Demolition Man · Firefly · Galaxy Quest · I Robot · Independence Day · Star Trek · Star Trek TOS · The Day After Tomorrow · The Island · War of the Worlds
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Deutsche Version | Season 6 | Season 8

Disc 1

Fallen

Synopsis: SG-1 is still searching for the “Lost City” or – as Jonas translates it now – “City of the Lost”, a city of the Ancients that wasn’t fully completed. They try to find the city with the help of the Gate addresses Jack entered into the computer when he had the knowledge of the Ancients. But they find something different – someone, to be precise.

My Opinion: The attack on Anubis’s ship was a nice homage to the battle above Yavin in Star Wars IV, including Jack’s comment that his F-302 (it’s obviously not eXperimental anymore) should have the call sign “Red Leader”. Michael Shanks has re-joined the main cast and returns to his role as Dr. Daniel Jackson. And while I liked Jonas, Daniel is somehow better. Jack and Daniel know each other for over seven years and even in the end Jonas was still “the new guy”. The chemistry between Jack and Daniel worked instantaneously again in terms of: they like each other but are totally different.

Homecoming

Synopsis: Daniel and Jonas are still aboard Anubis’s ship which hovers now over the capitol of Kelowna. Anubis wants to have the Naqahdriah and the knowledge of how to create a stable reaction.

My Opinion: On one hand it’s understandable that Jonas returns home. Daniel is back and all three countries on his home planet know about the Stargate now. It’s a bit sad, though. But since Daniel and he had basically the same role within SG-1 it would be hard to acknowledge this fact in future scripts.

Fragile Balance

Synopsis: When Jack awakes one morning, he is a teenanger of fifteen years. No one believes that he is Colonel Jack O’Neill. After his DNA has been confirmed they try to find out what happened and how to reverse it.

My Opinion: This time I even looked on the clock. The first appearance of RDA was in the 31st minute of this 42 minute episode. On the other hand one has to get used to it since his screen time will drop considerably from the 8th season on.
But it was good to see that not all Asgard are good and perfect, that even they have black sheeps.

Orpheus

Synopsis: After T’ealc has been wounded on a mission, he begins to doubt himself. Since he has lost “Junior” and has begun to inject Tretonin he doesn’t feel as a full-fledged Jaffa anymore. But then there’s a new crisis arising, Bra’tac and Rya’c are prisoners in a work camp that one only leaves dead.

My Opinion: A very good episode to show that something has changed for Teal’c. A symbiote has been part of his body for about 90 years (Teal’c is approximately 104 years old at this time) and now this part is missing. I can imagine that this is hard to get used to. I also liked the scene where his son helped im through the crisis by letting Teal’c kill the other Jaffa with his bare hands.
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Categories: DVD / Blu-ray, DVD Marathon, SG-1 Marathon
Tags: Armageddon · Buffy the Vampire Slayer · Star Trek · Star Trek VOY · Star Wars · Stargate Atlantis · Stargate SG-1
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Deutsche Version | Season 4 | Season 6

Disc 1

Enemies

Synopsis: Caused by the explosion of the sun and the activated Hyperdrive SG-1s Ha’tak has been catapulted into another galaxy. But Apophis is also there with his huge motherhip. But as soon as they have arrived another ship is apporaching that attacks Apophis’s ship. It is the Replicators.

My Opinion: Nothing against a good deus ex machina now and then, but this time they’ve overdone it. First they land in a remote galaxy, then the Replicators arrive, then Teal’c has been brainwashed somehow and in the end the Replicators kindly bring SG-1 back home. Honestly! At least Apophis has breathed his last breath.

Threshold

Synopsis: Teal’c is still brainwashed. According to Bra’tac, the only way to get him out of this, is to remove the larva and bring him to the brink of death.

My Opinion: Even though the events that led to this were rubbish, this was a very good compensation. It showed us how Teal’c became the man he is and how Bra’tac tought him all this. A great character drawing.

Ascension

Synopsis: SG-1 discovers a device that could be a powerful weapon. But then Sam faints and has to be brought back to the SGC. When she is put on leave and comes home, she is awaited by a non-corporeal being. It declares that it comes from the planet Sam has just been to.

My Opinion: The most important information in this episode was the fact, that Teal’c has watched Star Wars nine times while Jack has never watched it. That aside this episode was a goof examply why in Star Trek a Prime Directive exists: Because it is not predictable, what happens if one interfers with the developement of a culture. But the extinction of that entire planet was also over the top, they simply could have taken the Stargate away.
The appearance of John de Lancie (Q in Star Trek: The Next Generation) was also nice, especially because it won’t be the last.

The Fifth Man

Synopsis: Sam, Teal’c and Daniel return to the SGC under heavy fire while Jack and Lieutenant Tyler are grounded. But the real problem is: In the SGC no one knows this “Lieutenant Tyler”. Only SG-1 can remember this man.

My Opinion: I liked this episode, too. Another fact has cought my eye here: Stargate SG-1 has found a good balance regarding the number of alien races. The universe isn’t as crowded with non-humans as the Star Trek universe. But it is also not as empty as the Battlestar Galactica universe. While most of the aliens are still humanoid they aren’t simply knobbly-nose-aliens but really alien-aliens.
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Categories: DVD / Blu-ray, DVD Marathon, SG-1 Marathon
Tags: Armageddon · Battlestar Galactica · Star Trek · Star Wars · Stargate Atlantis · Stargate SG-1
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