New movies coming out...

[AndyWan Kenobi]

Maybe I'm in the minority, but I liked it pretty well. I'm a strange audience for it, because I'm a fan who doesn't really remember much about the books. I read all of them and loved them back in high school, but I haven't read them in about 12 years. So I was looking forward to the movie, but not with particular expectations. The movie felt a little disjointed to me, and truthfully I think a lot of the appeal of the book is in Douglas Adams's wonderful narrative voice. It's hard to capture that tone on-screen, because mostly you're dealing with the characters and events, which are great and all, but somewhat secondary to the narrator. Still, I felt that a lot of good things came through on-screen. The movie did make me laugh quite a few times, and I enjoyed seeing how they visualized everything on screen. I don't think I was blown away by it, but I wasn't terribly disappointed either. All in all, a good time was had.

 

[Docnzhoss]

I didn't have a problem with Hitchhikers, but I didn't find it terribly entertaining either. I attributed it to the fact that I was quite tired and maybe my sleepiness affected my perception of the movie. Perhaps the flick was that boring, after all.

The way Zaphod's character was portrayed was in poor taste. His was probably the most forgettable role in the movie, which is a shame because Zaphod is such a terrific character in the books. I felt that Arthur was played very well by Martin Freeman; Trillian's character was unfairly scaled back, giving her a very minimal role; Mos Def played Ford about as well as he could (he was funnier than I thought he'd be); Slartibartfast was portrayed quite well by Bill Nighy, though I expected Slarty to be more "alienish"; and Marvin, oh Marvin, what happened? He was adequately depressed, but there was no comedic timing and he ended up being more boring than just about anyone.

I'm betting I'll watch the movie again, just to be sure that I see it with a clear and alert head. I will then know for sure if it's worthy of being the #1 film in America or if it's an injustice to the book just as most fans feared it might be.

 

[DanDanStrawberry]

I haven't read the books, so I can't compare it to much, but I really liked. I'm also a big Bill Nighy fan; so it's necessary that I liked it!

 

[ryhoyarbie]

Back to the CGI question, I think if they're done right, cGI movies can make a whole bunch of movie. I liked The Incrediables because it was different than all of Pixar's other movies. It also felt like a real superhero movie, which was good. I also enjoyed Toy Story, Monsters Inc., and Finding Nemo. I thought Monsters Inc. was really halarious. But movies I haven't seen but I heard they were bad were movies like Shark Tale.

Did the earlier Pixar movies go to high on setting the bar? Yeah, I'd agree with that. But each CGI movie is different. But if you have a string of good movies from a company, in this case Pixar, and there's a new movie from Pixar coming out, then you'd expect the movie to be as good if not better than the companys previous films. That's setting the bar high for a company's new movie. It's not Pixar's fault, it's the critics and people who see the Pixars movies that think each movie will be better than the other. And because of that idea, Pixar has to use all its power to make something better than its previous film.

Pixar has dug itself into a hole because of this idea thanks to critics and people who see this movies. So although other CGI films may have to compete with Pixar's quality, Pixar has to compete with its previous movies.

ryan

 

[Beauregard]

Very true. But I'm thinking that Cars is definatly going to be good. It has a new edge to it, in that it is totally different. Each of their films (except Toy Story 2) have all been different enough, and also things that can't usually be done, moving toys, fish, bugs, monsters, etc. Cars will again be doing that, and I can't wait to see it.

 

[McFraggle]

I agree Beau, and even with "Toy Story 2," while having the same characters it was completely different in a lot of ways.

 

[Docnzhoss]

I hope Cars does okay for Pixar. It looks pretty dull to me. Then again, cars bore me anyway. I can't see myself sitting through an hour-and-a-half cartoon about them.

Kingdom of Heaven begins playing tonight. I'll be interested in that one, despite my wife's obsession with Orlando "Mr. Three Facial Expressions" Bloom. I'm also eager to see Crash (Don Cheadle, Matt Dillon) after reading a good review about it this morning.

 

[DanDanStrawberry]

I hope Cars does okay for Pixar. It looks pretty dull to me. Then again, cars bore me anyway. I can't see myself sitting through an hour-and-a-half cartoon about them.

Kingdom of Heaven begins playing tonight. I'll be interested in that one, despite my wife's obsession with Orlando "Mr. Three Facial Expressions" Bloom. I'm also eager to see Crash (Don Cheadle, Matt Dillon) after reading a good review about it this morning.

My exact thoughts!!

 

[AndyWan Kenobi]

I hope Cars does okay for Pixar. It looks pretty dull to me. Then again, cars bore me anyway. I can't see myself sitting through an hour-and-a-half cartoon about them.

You know, I absolutely adore Pixar's movies. I've never been disappointed by one. But for some reason I almost never am really hooked by the trailers. The only exception is The Incredibles. I knew from the first trailer that that movie was going to be great. But all the others, which I think are amazing movies, didn't really hook me with the trailers. So I'm reserving judgment on Cars until I actually see it. I'm sure that the Pixar people will somehow pull another perfect movie out of their hat.

 

[ryhoyarbie]

I saw Crash yesterday. It was a movie that was about 9 or so different characters and some of them meet at various points in the movie. It was very dramatic movie and also complex but it was also great at the same time. Very good acting on the people who were in the movie. This is probably the best movie I've seen so far this year. If you go see this movie, be prepared to witness real life problems that occur in people's lives everyday. A lot of the problems were tragic.

3 1/2 out of 4 stars.

ryan