"But the special effects were good"

[plonq]

I was originally going to post about something else, but I've been discussing movies with a co-worker and the more we speak, the more I have come to conclude that he represents the reason why we keep getting so many bad shows out of Hollywood. He was gushing about the latest X-Men, and when I mentioned that it was getting pretty mediocre reviews from the critics and from pretty much everyone I know who has seen it, he got a bit defensive and suggested that people were going to see it with their expectations set too high. Apparently it has pretty good special effects.

The conversation then migrated to television. We both agreed on many of the better shows in current (or recently finished) running, and I mentioned that the theme shared between all of the shows was that they had solid writing. I steered it back to movies then, and suggested that writing was the difference between the first three Star Wars, and the more recent abominations bearing the same name. Once again he got defensive, saying that he really liked the last three movies.

Me: "But the writing was horrible, especially the dialogue. Everything that made the first three movies so great was missing from the later ones."

Him: "Ya, but people don't go to these movies for the writing. Sure, the writing was pretty bad, and the dialogue was pretty brutal - especially the love scenes - but the special effects were good."

Oy.

Comments

[atara.livejournal.com]

So if someone does a movie of JUST big, impressive special effects, then they don't have to come up with plots or characterization or...

Oh, wait...

[amarafox.livejournal.com]

I liked wolverine, but I go into most movies with my expectation bar set low enough that I can enjoy just about anything. :)

[warheart.livejournal.com]

This annoys me too and I was just talking about it with Chris. I can't stand when someone justifies seeing a shitty movie, that they admit and know is shitty, by saying "it's just a popcorn movie lawlz!" That just means it is a terrible movie that you have to make an excuse for seeing in my opinion.

[pfcottontail.livejournal.com]

Charlie's Angels 2 was fucking awesome and no one is ever going to take that from me!

But I still agree with you! But you should really see it, it's amazing.

[warheart.livejournal.com]

I -tried- to watch that movie because I thought the first one was funny. It was like a music video for a commercial about a movie trailer selling sports drinks. It was pretty unbearable and my friend fell asleep halfway through. I couldn't finish it alone.

[kfops.livejournal.com]

That's amazing!!!

[ducktapeddonkey.livejournal.com]

As one of those million or so people that saw the movie without most of the special effects completed, I'm pretty sure that I won't think much differently about the film if I do go and see it in the theater.

I think my inner geek will actually find the unfinished special effects even cooler than the completed ones.

[kfops.livejournal.com]

I grew up on Star Wars (like many of us), and I loved the original three movies so much. I really held out the hope that the prequel trilogy would be amazing, and I think it is hard to come to grips that it'll never be as good as I was hoping.

A lot of the dialogue was stilted, a couple bits to the point of being painful, but I think deep down inside Star Wars is more than that to me... I think I'm in love with Lucas' anal attention to detail. I think (maybe because of my attention span), I also have the ability to quickly forget the parts I don't like and focus on the bits I do.

I do like Lucas' special effects, but at the same time I also lament them at the same time... I'm a huge fan of using "cheap" effects to come up with amazing special effects, the whole by-hook-or-by-crook motif. One of the items that sticks on my mind is a photo of filming a Death Star fly-by, which consisted of a large model on its side and the crew sitting in the back of a truck driving by. There was something more "solid" about real models versus the whiz-bang effects. But I digress.

I think I've got so much loaded into Star Wars that I have trouble being critical.

[dronon.livejournal.com]

Your posts are thoughtful and intelligent, but boring. Could you add some special effects?