Sunday 22 June 2008

Movie night

Managed to watch an impressive amount of TV/movies last night. Started out with 'Cloverfield.'.. which we had heard mixed reviews of.

First complaint, Blair Witch-type camera work. I thought it was rubbish in the Blair Witch and I still think it is rubbish. One of the reviews said it was a good movie if you could get over the camera work. I got over the camera work. It still wasn't a good movie. The effects, it must be admitted, were brilliant. Especially when the head of the Statue of Liberty landed in the street. The plot, though, was weak. The provenance of the 'monster' was never established, and you kind of new the end at the beginning (as it were) due to the text on the screen at the start of the film. Nothing wrong with that (I suppose) but just so unresolved. Apparently one of the reasons for the vagueness of the movie (what was the monster, where did it come from, how did it escape, who were all the people, etc. etc.) is that it has a huge 'viral' campaign online. It makes me want to yell. If I'm watching a movie (or for that matter a TV show) that's what I'm doing. I don't want to spend ages trolling around the internet for stuff which frankly should be on the screen! No suprise this one as the producer for Cloverfield is J.J. Abrams, yes, he of Lost fame. Another example of irritating and annoying so-called viral campaigns.

After this dissapointing movie we moved onto watching 'Definitely, Maybe'. There were some funny moments in this moive but it was rather a film 'chick-lit' in as much as the end was pretty much obvious from the beginning. The acting was good enough... I was rather alarmed by the appearance of Kevin Kline as a sixty-something. I actually couldn't believe that it was Kevin Kline. I had such a crush on him when I was about eleven (although I suppose that was twenty-odd years ago).

I give 'Cloverfield' 1 out of 10 and that is only because it was such a thankfully short film and I give 'Definitely, Maybe' 7 out of 10.

We also managed to watch Doctor Who. Thankfully almost the end of the season. I really don't know why we watch it as it annoys us on a weekly basis. Acutally I do know why we watch it, there is pitifully little TV to watch! Last night was a really superb example of how not to put a TV show together. The attempted theme was a complex one of quantum physics with parallel universe type ideas. Complicated... too complicated really for a Saturday night TV show. Many shows have attempted to deal with these themes. What happens if we don't make the decisions we made, what happens if one event happens differently... Quantum Leap and Sliders (two excellent US made shows) both deal very well with these ideas. This show didn't really have the time to. We give it some benefit of the doubt has it is the end of the season and a two part story... but even so. Here's my problem. I don't like the Doctor's assistants. I didn't like Rose... I didn't like Martha and I don't like Donna. Any time that we have to have two of them at the same time is way too much. Another weakness of last night's show was that the Doctor wasn't really in it. Hello people. The name of the show? The only really likeable character? Big mistake, huge. Oh, and who wants to have a bet on the big bad in the next episode. I'd tell you what I thought, but I've found spoilers on the internet and I'm right... and I'd hate to spoil it for anyone!