Last movie seen — Page 172

Stake Land (2010).

Nice looking film, with a good cast and all but it does seem to be a compendium of scenes and people from already familiar films.

3 Fangs.

Trooperman said:

There was only one thing wrong- George Lucas apparently snuck in the CGI shot of the truck going over the cliff in the chase.  When I saw that I was livid.  It took me about 5 minutes to get over it. 

 

what.the.fuck.

It almost makes me not even want to see it.

Almost.

Jesus it's a 5 second shot! We're talking about RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK here! IN IMAX! GO SEE IT!

(Kind of annoyed because I might not be able to go because of my work schedule)

But SERIOUSLY guys!

DominicCobb said:

Jesus it's a 5 second shot! We're talking about RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK here! IN IMAX! GO SEE IT!

(Kind of annoyed because I might not be able to go because of my work schedule)

But SERIOUSLY guys!

Oh I'll see it if I can, but it's a huge buzzkill. If it were a full-out Special Edition, like Star Wars, it might actually be easier. But when you're watching this super-authentic restoration of the film and then all of a sudden--HEY! BAD CG SHOT!!!--and then back to the regular film...it's so jarring. I mean, really, what in gods name is the point if it's just that one shot, which was fine anyway?

But like I said...almost. ;)

The argument is moot anyway since it doesn't appear to be playing in my country though. Guess I'll have to stick to the beat-up 1981 prints they show around here once or twice a year.

Raiders of the Lost Ark: The IMAX Edition!

Just came back from seeing Raiders of the Lost Ark myself. It was a very good presentation overall.

The quality was hampered by the inherent imitations of 1980's 35mm film stock, but no bad post-processing prevented it from reaching its full potential. Grain was intact, though there seemed to be one shot I noticed (a transition to a composite), which had DVNR freezing grain; it's the shot that transitions from the plane to the first map, by the way.

Soft-focus shots were emphasized by the IMAX upconversion process. Strangely enough, the black (too light) and saturation (too much) levels seemed to be off for the first few minutes (jungle sequence); I wonder if this is a by-product of Spielberg brightening it. The rest was fine though. The most spectacular shots, for me, were the ones in the streets of Cairo: wonderfully vivid and detailed.

I wasn't too blown away by the audio, like some others here. It was an average mix: nothing miraculous. That may have been because the IMAX I went to didn't have a good sound system.

However, important note...

Trooperman said:

There was only one thing wrong- George Lucas apparently snuck in the CGI shot of the truck going over the cliff in the chase.  When I saw that I was livid.  It took me about 5 minutes to get over it. 

In the presentation I watched, I saw the original non-CGI'ed shot. Sorry, man, don't know what you saw, but, I'm about 80% sure that it was the original shot in the IMAX presentation. I noted it, since the background looked "crinkly"/"folded"/1980s-fake. The truck also stuck out like a composite and wasn't blended like in the CGI version. Though, the shot did seem like it was re-timed. That threw me off, for a second, since the new color timing more resembled the yellowish, less reddish timing of the CGI version. Has anyone else seen the CGI shot at their IMAX showings?

The establishing shot of Washington D.C. also looked extremely blurry and computerized compared to the surrounding shots and I suspect it may have been CG altered too. 

Again, Trooperman, sorry, but I have to disagree with you there. Like Silverwook said, it may have been from another film. It looks like very dupey stock footage to me, rather than a CGI enhanced shot. It may have been DVNR'ed then re-grained. The grain structure was weird on that one.

In conclusion, I give it my top recommendation. My TOP RECOMMENDATION.

10 out of 10 boulders rolling at you

Trooperman said:

...the truck shot was definitely CGI in the screening I saw.  The camera followed the truck down the cliff, rather than tilting down.  I wish it wasn't true, but I saw what I saw.

it was the bottom shot:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_sFW8grQtU

For me, it was the top shot of the video. Unfortunately, I wasn't paying attention to camera movements; I just paid attention to the background, which didn't look as smooth as the CGI, and the composited truck. I still think I saw the original shot because the composite would have been cleaner if it was CGI. I suppose we'll just have to agree to disagree... until someone else verifies either one of us that is. :-)

The Legend of Hell House (1973)

There was a lot of nice atmosphere present in the film, and it was interesting to see Clive Revill in an actual on-screen performance, but the story felt rushed and the ending was a little too anticlimactic for my tastes.

6/10

^ Nice to hear the Radiophonic Workshop members (including Delia Derbyshire) moonlighting on one of the freakiest film scores ever though ain't it?

And Michael Gough's dialogue is perfect ;-D 

captainsolo said:

It did have the original cliff shot.

I don't see why they would replace the IMAX version with the CGI cliff shot if the same restoration is being showcased in 35mm with the original cliff shot. I really hope I'm not wrong on seeing the original... The intermediate LaserPacific restoration also has the cliff shot, which really hasn't been an edition since the Lowry restoration.

That may be due to the over-processing done to blow the film up to 6K for Digital IMAX because I imagine they had to do a lot of scrubbing to eliminate the inherent qualities of the 1981 stock.

Actually, surprisingly little scrubbing appeared to be done: it was filmic 80s stock upconverted: warts and all. I was happily surprised. No DMR EE or DNR for the most part.

There were only two shots that seemed "processed": the transition to the first map and the DC shot. The first was visibly DVNR'ed since it was an optical combined with a transition (would have looked ridiculously grainy). The latter may have been degrained then regrained: something oddly artificial about the grain movement.

Q: Did anybody see the snake reflection in IMAX?

Nope. No, snake reflection in the IMAX screening IIRC.

Trooperman said:

There was only one thing wrong- George Lucas apparently snuck in the CGI shot of the truck going over the cliff in the chase.  When I saw that I was livid.  It took me about 5 minutes to get over it. 

Sometimes the mind can be deceiving, because when I went to see it today, they used the original shot of the truck going over the cliff. I know this for a fact, because I made it my primary mission to check to see if they had kept with the cg version or not. They didn't, which was a relief.

Anyway, I saw the film today, and it was one of the best movie experiences I've ever had. I think it sounded fantastic, and overall the picture looked pretty stellar too. But that didn't really seem to matter too much to me at the time. The fact was, I was seeing Raiders of the Lost Ark in a theater, which I have wanted to do since I first saw the film when I was six. 

Since I haven't seen really any classic movies in a theater, mostly due to my age and where I live (Wyoming), this was a rare treat, which made the experience even more awesome.

By the way, what did you guys think of the Struzan-ish posters?

SilverWook said:

DuracellEnergizer said:

The Legend of Hell House (1973)

There was a lot of nice atmosphere present in the film, and it was interesting to see Clive Revill in an actual on-screen performance, but the story felt rushed and the ending was a little too anticlimactic for my tastes.

6/10

Hell House scared the heck out of me when I was a kid, and it's still damn creepy. Makes a great double feature with The Haunting. (The original, not the remake.)

And Roddy McDowall is great as usual.

Me too.

I wish someone would do a proper Resident Evil film with interiors like that.

My dad once did building work at Wykehurst Place (where the exteriors were shot) they opened up a blocked chimney and found it stacked from top to bottom with mummified birds.

Ziggy Stardust said:

Sometimes the mind can be deceiving, because when I went to see it today, they used to original shot of the truck going over the cliff.

Good, at least one person saw the same thing I did.

By the way, what did you guys think of the Struzan-ish posters?

Loved it! I grabbed 4, and I'm definitely hanging one up in my room. It's a nice design, and a change from the typical Raiders art work.

If I had one complaint, it's that Indy looks very similar to how he does in the TOD poster. They'd probably look nice together though: like bookends.

Creature From The Black Lagoon (1954)

Revenge Of The Creature (1955)

The Creature Walks Among Us (1956)

Watched Saving Private Ryan recently (yes, it was edited for content, and I'm pretty sure they did a good job, as it wasn't nearly as graphic as I remember in my youth when watching R movies without guilt).  An excellent and powerful movie.  The message is important and striking.  I also have Band of Brothers and The Pacific edited, so I hope to watch those soon.

Actually, I wanted to see Band of Brothers last night, but my wife talked me into watching the movie my father-in-law had loaned us: Battleship.  Previews looked dumb, but I gave it a shot.  If I could pick one word to describe the flick, I'd have to pick "cliches."  Let's see, alien invasions aren't that new, but it's what you do with it that makes it interesting.  This felt much like a Transformers ripoff (not that those movies are any good or very original IMO--didn't even make it through the second).  Aside from the cliches and predictable lines, it was too far outside reality to be enjoyable.  I mean, sure, I come to a Star Wars forum because I love a space fantasy, but I don't watch a film about real naval vessels for a fairy tale.

The planet in question is 22 lightyears from earth, meaning that our little signal would take 22 years just to get to the planet.  From there, the aliens would have to construct ships that cannot even travel as fast as light.  But let's assume they somehow found a way to travel faster than light, well, they wouldn't yet know of our existence till our signal got to them.

Okay, so let's assume we are dealing with such intelligent beings.  Their weapons are relatively crappy given their capacity.  Their projectiles (designed to look like the pegs from the boardgame) are rather weak and have no homing abilities.  Their little spinning things that tear everything up were not particularly impressive for such alien tech.  A massive gun shooting an alien 6 feet from you would destroy your ears and organs as well as knocking you off the ship.  The aliens can place a giant shield over Hawaii, but a couple of our surface to surface missiles can take out their ships.  Their ships don't really float on the water and don't hover either; they hop from place to place!  They were invisible to our radars, but couldn't detect us in the dark either.  The aliens are morons because they only attack if they determine something to be a threat (conventiently coloring it red or green to signify dangerous or safe).  A ship fires a warning shot...they destroy it.  Another prepares to attack it...they prepare to destroy it but another fires on it...so they destroy that one instead.  The third ship again prepares to attack, but decides to turn away...and they ignore it.  Minutes later, they destroy Hawaii highways.  The aliens are too dense to actually get that they are being drawn in a particular direction.  Arg, I don't even make sense as I try to list the crap from that movie.  Cliches like arrogant male becomes hero, girlfriend is authority figure's daughter, two lines that I called, slow motion explosions, old men on the museum battleship Missouri walking in slomo in their moment of glory, the servicewoman who is tougher than most of the guys, avenging the lost family member (who was an idiot to provoke a response in the first place), and on and on and on.  Was there anything redeeming in it?  Well, they tried to mimic the nature of the game for a few moments with the guessing and firing on a coordinate ("Tango 13!").  Part of the implausible storyline, but at least it had a bit of charm to it.  For that alone, I promote this movie from being a complete turkey to a turkey with stuffing in its rear.