The good, the bad, and the indifferent. Mostly good, for once.

[cerusee]

Good movies I have seen lately:

I Capture the Castle: omg, this was fantastic. Solidly filmed, lovely material about characters who are quite likable and interesting. Must read the book, now. Hey, Marc Blucas! I used to have a little crush on him when he was on Buffy, which came back for this movie, although he looks less impressively mountainous when he's not standing next to tiny Sarah Michelle Gellar.

Blade Runner (the Final Cut): No, I'd never seen it before. It was pretty fine. Harrison Ford was pretty fine. My friend from Los Angeles, who was sitting next to me, assures me that LA is exactly like that, including the flying cars, and who am I to argue?

The Music Man: I'm tempted to go into detail on this. It's not as good a movie as the others here--it's an okay movie and an okay movie version of an absolutely brilliant musical that I love--and I've seen it before (both this movie, and a high school production of it that I doubt was as good as I remember it being), but it got me to pondering what I like specifically about Marian as a character. Maybe more on that later.

Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark: Again, no, I'd never seen it before, although I have seen bits and pieces of the second and third Indiana Jones movies. Christ, it's racist, but what a solid and (despite the racism) enjoyable piece of filmmaking that was. Harrison Ford is pretty fine. So's Marion Ravenwood. More heroines should be named Marian; it seems to lead to good things.


Not so good:

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom: I gave up halfway through. It was just as racist as the first, and much nastier and darker to boot, requiring me to grit my teeth a lot harder. Harrison Ford is again pretty fine, but there are better, more pleasant movies in which he's fine, and plenty of them. When I read that Spielberg himself later admitted to not liking it (he thought the only good thing about it was that he met his second and present wife while filming it), I stopped trying to finish it. Ehhh.

Suburban Girl: As I described elsewhere.

Comments

[retsuko.livejournal.com]

Yup, L.A.'s definitely like that! :D

I enjoyed IJ&RotLA, but have never gotten around to seeing ToD. My parents thought it would too scary for me when I was little, and then I didn't watch it on my own. For some reason, though, Last Crusade was OK by them. Go fig.

[cerusee.livejournal.com]

Well, why undo that good work now? Funny, but Temple really is much scarier than Raiders--it's not just the violence, but also some of the specific imagery and atmosphere that made me queasy (being served the bloody brains of of hominids, still in their flesh-bearing skulls, at a meal, for instance). I haven't seen enough of Last Crusade to be able to compare the scariness level. The horrible death of the Nazi who picks the wrong cup is intense, though, I do remember that....oh well.

[windsorblue.livejournal.com]

I hated Temple of Doom. I still can't sit all the way through it. I blame the heroine's bloodcurdling screaming.

[mikkeneko.livejournal.com]

She was a champion screamer, all right. I liked Indy's other two heroines, but I couldn't stand her.

[cerusee.livejournal.com]

The third one is a Nazi sympathizer, right? This should be interesting.

[mikkeneko.livejournal.com]

The third one is a Nazi sympathizer, right?

Er... well, no...

[windsorblue.livejournal.com]

She was a champion screamer, all right.

I still wonder why she didn't have a long and storied career in horror movies.

[cerusee.livejournal.com]

And she screams SO MUCH.

I have enormous respect for the actress for doing a sincere job with an embarrassing part she didn't like (she described the character as something like, "just a screaming broad," which is pretty accurate), but it's just not enough. Marion was an *awesome* character. I know they were specifically trying to differentiate her from Marion, but they ended up with...well, a screaming broad.

[windsorblue.livejournal.com]

YES. I mean, I'm glad that the actress and Spielberg have had a good marriage, so something good came out of it. If only the courtship wasn't part of the Indy series. >.>;;

Marion is spectacular - she's my favorite Indy character of them all. <3

[putri-nih.livejournal.com]

Em, what's the difference between Blade Runner :Final Cut and every other version?

[cerusee.livejournal.com]

Hell if I know. This one is FINAL, I suppose. NO MORE.