I admit, there are movies that I watch due to the hype. Most of the time, I am sorely disappointed. Who the hell are all these morons that thought Bug was the scariest movie since The Exorcist? Are these the same people that nearly shit themselves watching Paranormal Activity? The list of over hyped movies is endless, most are crap, and I keep falling for it over and over again; luckily I don't go to the theaters anymore and just buy the DVD... hell of a lot cheaper.
Then there are those movies that are good, but received negative hype. Watched one of those today, but more on that in a bit.
Last category: movies that are refused to be seen because they are a remake. Not just any remake, but a remake of a loved movie. How dare they take something and redo it? How dare they take a treasured classic and bastardize it? Fer christ's sake, what's wrong with Hollywood, don't they have any imagination or good source material any more? Broke down and watched one of those today as well.
First, the "this movie sucked ass" movie...
Battle: Los Angeles
Checked this out from the library to see just how truly bad it was. With all the negative reviews and crap that's been posted by it, I was thinking something horrible.
It wasn't.
I thought this was a damned good movie, well worth the watch. So what was up with the bad reviews? Well, here is some feedback of the film, collected from various sites. And yes, these are real complaints of the film.
1. This movie sucked because we never found out why the aliens were attacking us in the first place.
What? Does a movie have to spell everything out for you, you dim wit? I suppose it would have been nice of the invading aliens to do so, just to give us a fair warning. After all, history is full of examples of countries invading others after having told them "we're going to invade you, and here's why", or of foreign countries attacking and slaughtering indigenous people only after they've been told "why, don't mind us, but we like what you have, and well, we're going to slaughter you and occupy your lands now".
2. This movie sucked because the aliens didn't look like us, and because they had mechanical parts embedded in their bodies.
*facepalm* Thew aliens didn't look like us? Are you freaking kidding me?! Would an alien invasion movie been more effective if aliens from a different planet looked like us?! Embedded mechanical parts?! Dear god, best remove ear and heart implants, prosthetic limbs, artificial joints, and halt all research into cybernetics. There was actually a sub question related to this one, of people complaining about how could the aliens have reproduced because they had so much replaced with mechanics. I'm going to assume that those people live in the deep south and have never heard of cloning or artificial reproduction of, oh yeah, cybernetics.
3. This movie sucks because they kept mentioning that the Staff Sergeant killed his previous team, but they never gave details.
"Hey Sarge, I know we're outnumbered and trapped behind a hostile alien force with weaponry well beyond our own, and bombs are going to be dropped any minute now... but before we go any further, we demand you tell us exactly what happened." *eye twitch*
4. This movie sucks because there was too much violence, not enough story.
Oh dear god, you have to be kidding me. Too much violence, not enough story?! That's the point! If you were keeping track at all, the entire distance between the FoB and the police station was just a couple of miles, and the return was essentially doubled. The squad was trying to work their way through enemy held territory, freshly occupied so that the enemy was still present. The story lies in the fact that no one knew what was going on, why anything was happening!
There's more, but I hope you see the point. This is a good film to watch. Is it cliched? Yes and no. We've seen alien invasion movies before, but that's it. This probably has more in common with Blackhawk Down than [Independence Day[/i].
Rise of the Planet of the Apes
I LOVE the original movies. Not the television show, just the movies. In my opinion, the remake Planet of the Apes blew ass chunks. What the hell was this prequel going to do to tie in the original remake? What, absolutely nothing? Oh yeah, of course I'll see this one. Pfft.
This movie... wow... it has more to do with the original series and absolutely nothing to do with that abomination remake. This was truly outstanding and fits in with the... mythos? background? of the original films. Personally, I thought there were a couple nods to the original that could have been done without, but they were a nice touch. And the part with the manned space craft going missing? EXCELLENT way to tie in with the original film! Oh, and the way they dummy down humanity!
If you haven't watched either of these films, I recommend you do so. Don't fall for the hype!
