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bobstopper
Reviews
Elephants Dream (2006)
A success for the free (as in freedom) software and open-source community
Considering this is a low-budget film made entirely with free and open-source software this is an impressive success. The technological successes made with this film can not be denied and is a testament to the suitability of free software and open source in serious projects. The movie itself was also released with an open license allowing anyone to redistribute or modify the movie as they please.
Clearly, this movie was intended to say something about copyright from the way it was created to the way it was released. It would not seem much of a leap to suspect that the movie itself might also have this intention. It is with this context I feel the movie must be watched.
At first blush this movie's story is extremely confusing. It has an extremely abstract feel and seems to make no sense at all. It is here that context helps; knowing that the makers want to speak to their audience about copyright guides us to look for this message in its metaphors.
I think the important places in this movie to look for meaning in this context include: the complexity of the machine and what it represents; what Emo and Proog represent, particularly the contrast in how Emo and Proog respond to the machine differently; what the "danger" might represent; and how each scene might be speaking about some specific use of copyright, patent or other legal restriction in some abstract fashion.
Regardless, without this preliminary context the movie seems completely pointless and baffling. Though I think it may be seen as a masterpiece to those who understand and appreciate it it offers very little but eye candy to anyone else. This failure to communicate its message to anyone who doesn't already know the message is something I consider a failing of this film. -2 stars from the otherwise 10 for this disappointment.
The Color Purple (1985)
Tedious and Irritating
I don't mind a film which uses tragedy to pull at heart strings, but it has to be intelligent and tasteful. The Color Purple is no such film. Spielberg lays the tragedy on with a thickness which makes it seem ludicrous. It seems the vast majority of the film does little more than try to insist upon its viewers that this woman's life is sad and unfair using methods which are so exaggerated and transparent that it distracts the viewer from getting lost in the story and simply keeps reminding them that they're watching a film which is trying far too hard to make them feel something.
Some examples of this over-reaching can be seen in Whoopi Golberg's portrayal of Celia; the ridiculous state Celia first finds her new home in; the way Celia and Shug read in turn; and the irritating mood music played on cue each time Spielberg tries to saturate us in whatever emotion he's trying to evoke in us. The concept of subtlety has been completely lost on Spielberg in this film.
The film does have its saving graces however. Apart from Goldberg's overdone portrayal of Celia, the acting is good, particularly from Oprah. The story itself (which I have not read) would quite probably be very emotional and interesting if it hadn't been told with such awkwardness. Margaret Avery's singing was divine, truly the only thing in the film that made me authentically feel something other than the urge to stop watching. For these things I give the film a 4. Had Spielberg not corrupted it so badly it quite possibly might even be worth the 7.6 stars it currently sits at on IMDb.
King Kong (2005)
Make sure you bring food, a blanket and a pillow cuz you won't be leaving for a while
My wife and I just got back from this movie. I already had an idea of the general plot and figured we wouldn't be out too long. I didn't take into account that this was a Peter Jackson movie.
I have no idea why this movie had to have every moment drawn out into its own feature length saga... and then have additional unnecessary stuff thrown (eg: the bugs and the romance) in and those also drawn out into feature length sagas. I'm not kidding; every sideways glance is emphasised and drawn out. When it reached the famous empire state building scene I thought the movie must finally be almost over (we were getting sick of it by this stage) but alas, that's not good enough for Mr Jackson. He drew it out to last over 20 minutes. We finally left where we thought the movie *had* to be finished and managed to leave the cinema in our cars without seeing another soul leave. Apparently it was *still* playing despite seemingly having nothing left to say.
If you plan to watch this movie, be prepared that it is very drawn out. Far far far more than it needs to be in my opinion. Many scenes would have had their points made with a few seconds rather than the minutes upon minutes devoted to them. It may help to watch it in breaks since the movie effectively seems to be three movies crammed together. Watch the pre-jungle movie one day, the jungle movie another and the New York movie yet another day. Watching them all in one sitting will probably only suit die-hard fans of Jackson like watching a whole season of Star Trek in one sitting would only suit die-hard fans.
On the other hand the special effects are *very* good. King Kong looks brilliant and the visuals are superb. It truly is magnificent to behold.
As for my wife and I, we've decided to never watch another Peter Jackson movie. We didn't mind Lord of the Rings too much, but this movie had taken the ego stroking so far that it was blatant and it was insulting to the intellect of its audience by assuming so much time is needed for its audience to grasp simple ideas. If it wasn't for this, I'd give it an 8/10, mostly for special effects since its storyline is just yet another Hollywood recycling and fails to say anything particularly new.