Posted by kim on February 2nd, 2010
SO we finalllllly went to see Avatar on Sunday, we were hanging on until we could get tickets for the iMax (Imax? is everything that starts with an i meant to be written in the apple standard?) 3D showing. I went in with no expectations, I’d previously thought it’d just been supremely hyped and wasn’t going to be that good. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I saw titanic at the cinema 5 times (yes. I know.), so I knew that Mr. Cameron was capable of some good cinematic shit, but my god the hype surrounding Avatar has been pretty immense.
Straight off the bat I’ll say that the story is weak sauce, not terrible, but not very original. If you’ve seen that Pocahontas story outline with the names changed floating around on the internet then you pretty much get the gist. Luckily the film isn’t really about the story, it’s a giant ‘Look how pretty!’ pissing contest entry that should hopefully pave the way into some beautifully rendered digital effects.
It is stunning, no bones about it. There are points in the film where your concept of digital effects and reality become so warped that you start wondering if they did actually find some random 6 legged dog and put it in mask. The massive fly over shots of Pandora were amazing, just as filler they probably cost more than a regular Hollywood film.
I came out with my expectations gladly beaten around the face.
This is a dog in a suit from TOS, the ones in Avatar were much better.
Oh hey, this is the chick that played Uhura in Trek 11, but blue.
Posted by kim on October 26th, 2009
Saw this film yesterday, and to say it lived up to my expectations would be an understatement. I didn’t quite know how this was going to be a Wes Anderson film, though, I originally thought it’d just be a quirky stop-motion film, a little James and the Giant Peachish, but still very much aimed at kids. Oh oh, how wrong I was!
This film couldn’t be anymore Wes Anderson, it was… perfect. The characters, the dialogue, the minor actions… so very Wes. Whilst the story didn’t hold incredibly true to Roald Dahl’s original tale, I’m sure he would have approved (apparently his Widow does), it was quirky and not sugar coated like most kids films. Swear-word replacement throughout the film was the best thing I’ve heard in a long time. “Cluster-cuss”. Amazing.
Now, the animation. I’ve long, long, long been a stop motion fan, from back in the day when I used to watch Harryhausen films with my Dad, and then, of course, to The Nightmare Before Christmas (if you didn’t know, I have little problem with that film… a huge giant box full of expensive problems), I used to do a lot of my art/design research around various forms of animation. Whilst I enjoy, and am awed by, modern CGI animation there’s just something about stop motion that makes me gawp. Coraline earlier this year was a great stop-motion, but really it was just a smoother NBC/James and the Giant Peach, with better equipment and skills. Fantastic Mr Fox, however, really held a torch to old-school stop motion.
Yes, you should go see it. It’s a bit strange, and you might not get it, but it was lovely. Also, who thinks it’s ok to take a tiny baby to the cinema? wtf?
Posted by kim on September 8th, 2009
Hey guys, I haven’t disappeared off the face of the planet, just been super busy. Let’s see…
On Saturday, after a mad dash to the cinema and being stuck in a huge line of traffic, we went to see (500) Days of Summer. Such a lovely film, even though I came out of it with a severe disliking of Zooey Deschanel’s character >:| The film was shot really well, put together perfectly (it’s not a linear film) and featured the delectable Zooey wearing some super pretty outfits (she seemed to wear blue throughout the film).
blue, blue. High-waisted skirts, trousers and shorts matched with tailored wispy shirts featured heavily.
A particularly nice dress by Marc Jacobs (currently in a competition at ASOS).
Sunday held another trip to the cinema, this time to see a film I’ve been looking forward to for quite a while – District 9. Set in Johannesburg, and dealing with issues of immigration and xenophobia through allegory of Aliens stranded on Earth, this film follows the story of Winkus Va De Meer and his exposure to some alien technology. I don’t think I’ve seen another alien film like this before, the ‘real-life’ness of it and the way the story’s told is amazing. Not for the squeeeemish though, the worst part for me (naymind the blowing up of heads and exploding of bodies) was a scene where Winkus lost some of his fingernails. I have a ridiculous fingernail phobia. Gah!
In other news, I dyed my hair a dark brown for Autumn/Winter, I think it’s much better. Has a slightly red tint to it, too. Homemade chai lattes are the in thing at my house right now, so much cheaper than buying them from the coffee shop. We almost have a complete bathroom, the flooring went down over the weekend and my Dad’s been spending the past couple of days putting the sink in. Our electrician’s coming around next week so we’ll finally have hot water! and a working shower! Oh, god, it’s gunna be amazing. I’ll update with something more substantial later this week. Keep well x
Posted by kim on July 31st, 2009
Did you enter the giveaway yet? It’s not too taxing :) Go enter.
How was your week? Mine was so-so, between dodging the rain and wrestling kittens off the curtains, it was pretty run of the mill. I did start reading the Harry Potter series again, though, which is always uplifting. So, I missed a weekly good stuff last week for some random reason, here’s a combined list of last week’s and this week’s stuff :D
- Great use of a t-shirt for the new Resident Evil: darkside chronicles. Win.
- Article about web fonts, or lack of, at the i love typography blog.
- I’ve featured Helen Musselwhite’s work in my weekly good stuff, last week there was a great interview with her on the Creative review blog. A really nice read!
- The amazingly lovely work of Courtney Brims. Pretty girls with animals, fairy tales and woodland scenes. It’s all I’m about lately! See more at her website. pretty.
- We saw Moon last weekend, you should really check it out. And did you know the director is David Bowie’s son? He goes by his regular old name nowadays, though.
Posted by kim on July 16th, 2009
I’m always up for a good vampire movie, with the Lost Boys possibly being my all time favourite. Alas, in these times of Twihardism it’s getting pretty difficult to not appear like a fang-girl. I’m not gunna say I hate the Twilight saga, I’m compelled to it like a car crash, I think that’s more to do with pretty boys rather than story lines, though.
Last year I came across some discussion of an indie film coming out of Sweden that was causing a bit of a stir in the vampire world. ‘Låt den rätte komma in‘ is a subtle love story between two 12 year old kids in the suburbs of Stockholm, one of whom happens to be a vampire. The story is bitter sweet with a haunting setting, the cinematography plays really really well with the subject matter, and both the young actors take their parts very successfully. There’s a lot of vampire lore in the tale and, having not read the book and reading the synopsis of the film on IMDB later, there’s a lot of nods to the original book. We caught the film at a special screening by our local cinema, but you can get hold of it on DVD from amazon from August 3rd.
Unfortunately, as with any popular foreign movie, Hollywood think they can do it better. They’re untaking a ‘remake’ of an already beautiful film, probably set to iron out those subtleties and make the film understandable for Middle America & cash in on the current resurgence of vampire popularity. Hollywood, when will you learn to leave things the fuck alone?
