The visuals of this movie are breath taking. This is the only point on witch no other movie could ever compete with it. Except perhaps Renaissance, that I haven’t seen. I had seen the first trailer for this movie last year and was really wondering why they went to all the trouble to modify every single frame of the movie to give it this unique look. It’s only at about half the movie you see how practical these effects have become. The story is based in the near future were a new drug called Substance D creates a very high level of addiction. Keanu Reeves plays a double agent working for the narcotics police department as well as a supposedly involved in drug traffic. The movie is about addiction and how your life could be turned upside down by it. There is a nice twist to the movie and the first few minutes do not give it justice. I refer to that because the weekend of it’s released the first seven minutes were made available online. I had totally turned me off (bugs, hate them), this time around I sat down and decided to process it and see it through. It’s a bit lengthy and is not an action movie. It’s a candy for the eye and brings a lot of reflection to mind. However, I will only give A Scanner Darkly a 6 out 10, because it’s not one I would recommend to everyone. You need to think to really enjoy it, the eye candy alone was worth it. But I don’t think I’ll see it again until they’ve got it on TV… and that nothing else will be playing.
Archive for December, 2006
A Scanner Darkly
Sunday, December 31st, 2006Indiana Jones 4: It’s a go!
Saturday, December 30th, 2006
I bet you didn’t see this one coming, at age sixty-four, Harrison Ford will take back his role and give us a forth Indiana Jones! The project was rumored for years, delayed, confirmed, then delayed again. Many sure did loose hope. But Lucas just said it : “It’s going to be fantastic. It’s going to be the best one yet,†reports Cinema Fusion. The movie is set for a May 2008 release and should start filming next summer. There is no way they can screw this one up but I am confident that George Lucas and Steven Spielberg can come up with a great movie that will be a major blockbuster. How large can the fan base be? I was still a kid when I saw Indiana Jones, if the trailer hooks me, they’ve got my money.
Silver Surfer
Friday, December 29th, 2006I’ve said it before; Fantastic Four was not a success and I did not enjoy it as much as I expected it to be. The initial trailers gave away a stupid movie with dumb jokes. I was skeptical when they announced a sequel that would include the Silver Surfer. Still I believe adding him might help the franchise and I doubt Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer will be worst than the first one. The teaser trailer was leaked days ago but let’s agree that that YouTube blurry videos are sometimes a waste of time. We’ve been surved an official trailer for Apple Trailers and I can say I’m pretty satisfied with the visual effects. You’re in for the return of Dr. Doom and the imminent destruction of Earth. See the trailer now! Leave your thoughts in the comment section and let’s wait for the release June 15th 2007. Summer 2007 will be wild; Spiderman 3, Transformers, Die Hard 4…
Lady in the Water: Underdog
Tuesday, December 19th, 2006
This movie is a coming back for a second round at hitting some revenue with it’s DVD release. Lady in the Water is the latest piece from M. Night Shyamalan, he’s the mind behind Signs, The Village, Unbreakable and The Sixth Sense. His name itself was used to market the movie, and loves doing a cameo appearance once in a while. However, this latest movie had some bad press and very bad reviews. This was the first one I was willing to see in theater and was sure I would love it when I see it. Unlike previous work from him I did not find it to be exactly the same type as the others.
Apartment building superintendent Cleveland Heep (Paul Giamatti) rescues what he thinks is a young woman from the pool he maintains. When he discovers that she is actually a character from a bedtime story who is trying to make the journey back to her home, he works with his tenants to protect his new friend from the creatures that are determined to keep her in our world. (IMDB)
I was surprisingly interested by this fairy tale. It almost got me to tears at a certain point in the story. This lady found in the The Cove’s pool is called a Narf and she has a destiny to fufill, she needed the help of everyone to survive in our world. It’s quite different from previous movies from Shyamalan and I was a bit deceived by it. Don’t expect the same treatement (or should you…). It’s all based on character interaction, it’s profound and I guess everyone who likes a good story will enjoy. It’s a fair movie and whenever you got the time make sure to rent it. I’ll give it a 7 out of 10. Just hoping the next M. Night flick (if any studio wants him now) returns to his roots… in some form.
Step Up: DVD release
Tuesday, December 19th, 2006
When I first saw trailers for this movie I got pretty hook on it. I was in my “Save the Last Dance” mood. The critics weren’t so pleased with the movie and got a poor 21% from RottenTomatoes.com. But we all know that you can’t always trust what others think of a movie and you can end up being in love with it. I did follow my insticts and avoided wasting money to see it in theaters. However this movie is a pretty good rent IF you’re into trip hop music.
This movie stars Channing Tatum and Jenna Dewan as two students coming from VERY different backgrounds. Tyler, Tatum’s character ends up being a bad boy stuck doing 200 community service for vandalism in the school of arts. Nora, played by Dewan, is desperate to find a new dance partner for her final school project. Their worlds collide when they deceide to team up and learn from each other. Every one has a goal in life, and this movie is about the hard work to get there, to find your voice, and be true to yourself.
The movie has a very nice pace, both the music and dance moves are teen sawvy. This picture is like one big motivationnal tape pointing out everyones mistake but showing us how to make it all better. I didn’t hate the movie, it was aleast entertaining most of the time. Not a buy but a good rent for the holidays.
Ninja Turtles: Sewers Side
Monday, December 11th, 2006
When the first trailer was out for TMNT I was really digging it. I mean by that it looked dark and like some slick animation would take place in that 3D environment. Now a new trailer was released and I will express my disappointment. Now it really looks like a Saturday morning cartoon; only with a larger budget. In opposition the teaser had a small joke towards the end but this new trailer puts the lame jokes in front row. Despites the directors efforts I am now TOTALLY turned off by it. If they can bring a new trailer and show a new light they might save the day. But in my case it’s stacked along side “The Ant Bully, The Incredibles and Cars”; movies I’ll see when they come on TV or cheap rental. I think that they should not mimic the cartoon so much. It’s good on TV, but we’re talking a movie! Now it reminds me the live action Ninja Turtles back in the 90’s. They’re heading back to the sewers then.
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Democracy
Friday, December 8th, 2006We all know what democracy should be right? Even if some political parties don’t seem to fully follow those guide lines… but earlier this week I discovered that democracy can also be a media player. Now if it were your average player I would not even speak of it since Windows Media Player 11, Winamp 5 and Quicktime 7 are pretty popular and known out there.
What I love about Democracy is it’s emphasis on IPTV, by that I mean you now have program that can easily let you gather different videos to download onto your system. Whether it be a funny video from YouTube or a Vidcast about technology or video games. You can add “channels” using the RSS subscription feed to have Democracy download the new shows automatically as they are released. There is a expiration system that auto-deletes old episodes after a period of time (you can change the default expiry or save the file so it is never deleted). The player supports pretty much all video formats out there and has support for torrent files and can download videos from Flash video service. This means you can have all your personal videos in your library AND download movies from YouTube or Google Video to your hard drive.
The product is pretty strong and still has a way to go before version 1. The two features I feel are missing is the option to reduce to tray and let it run in the background. If you want it to download a show you need have the player open and take space on your desktop. Same would happen if you download a large torrent file. The other thing I’d like is the ability to come back and forth from a video to the different channels. Because each time it interrupts the playback. You can get it at getdemocracy.com and they are at version 0.9.2 it is available for Mac, Linux and Windows.
Heroes Fall Finale
Monday, December 4th, 2006
They’re not serious! They always do it on purpose, bring the hype up just before a big break… What did I do wrong Tim Kring? I love the show and it keeps giving every time. Now that the “Save the Cheerleader” mini-plot is on hold they needed something to bring back the action together. Sylar was caught but is still very dangerous, as always they underestimate the bad guys. This final episode before the Winter break was advertised as the one where one of the heroes “with powers” would die. They did deliver on that but the promo clips were a bit misleading and hopefully did not spoil the fun (I won’t say the answer).
A quick recap of what happens; Peter was arrested because of the Sylar attack but most obviously since it was only his own blood they found on him they could hold him forever. Not until Matt came by along the FBI to do some investigation. It was priceless to see Peter and Matt meet as it is known that Peter can absorb powers of those around him. The show goes on with extra development with “The Haitian”; an un-named character that displayed unusual powers in the past. The final 10 minutes we’re the ones to wait for when we see Peter’s health degrading and slipping into a coma (after effect of multiple powers absorption we’d say). At this precise moment he gets a kind of vision/premonition of what might actually happen concerning the destruction of New York. It’s pretty clear that they could use that as a twist but it was hard to guess they would use that card now. The show loves to bring more questions as it answers some of them… we got to see pretty much everyone in a set of sub-plot but we’ll have to wait until January 22, 2007 before a fresh set of episodes emerge. I really love that show. (Period)Previous post: Heroes