TheBoost

GUINEVERE

1994 TV movie retelling Arthuring legend from the POV that Guinivere was the hero. Tragically miscast with a young Noah Wiley as Lancelot and Young Indiana Jones as King Arthur. Sheryl Lee as Guinivere looked 15 years older than either of them.

A couple weeks back I was chatting with my mega-Evangelical brother in law. Nice guy, but he started saying how silly Catholicism was, because they believe in a magic hierarchy, and how some magic man (the Pope) could actually know the mind of God and it was all superstition and  foolishness.

Then he started talking about his magic, flawless book (the Bible) that perfectly expresses the mind of God.

I asked him if he saw any correlation between his view on the Catholic church, and his view on the inerrancy of the Bible, and he didn't understand the question.

EyeShotFirst said:

I'm a Christian and I don't read the bible, isn't that weird?

 Actually I'm pretty sure you're in the vast majority on that one.

Hipster: Someone who is trendy in a manner I do not approve of.

Coffe thermos, picture of my kid, leather cup full of pens, stack of papers to grade. I have three Star Wars collectors plates hanging on the wall above the desk.

Honestly I find them deeply flawed movies, but there are days I'd rather watch a bad Star Wars movie than most other entertainment. Especially Phantom Editors cuts made 1 and 2 actually watchable.

Bingowings said:

The castle exterior from Dracula's Daughter is much more interesting in my opinion it may be possible to swap it over.

A rough illustration but maybe someone like angel could give you a more polished matte to use.

 

 Funny, I never thought to replace that shot, but it would be lovely. I have no earthly idea how to make a decent matte shot, but I'll look into the Dracula's Daughter exterior.

As for the eyes, again i think that's beyond my technical abilities but very cool.

I have most of the inserting from Mexican Dracula in, and need to spend a bit more time on the score. My model is "Bride of Frankenstien" which has

Still scouring old movies for a shot of a strom battered ship to replace the awful Demeter establishing shot.

 Oddly, I don't own White Zombie. Must procure a copy.

There's a shot of a wolf on a patio in Jess Franco's "Dracula." I'm trying to make it b/w and blend into the movie without being too jarring. It would only be a couple seconds.

I can't imagine being told that I only like a univrsally loved best picture nominated classic film more than I like a critically panned CGI-fest with atrocious acting because of nostalgia. Who would say:  

"You only like The Godfather more than the new Clash of the Titans because it was out when you were a kid!"

George Lucas is demonstrably a liar, and to believe in the "master plan" theory requires either overwheling cognitive dissonance or just being criminally naive.

Lucas: "Despite all evidence to the contrary, including my own words and actions, I've always had this all planned out and just kept it secret, including contradicting myself and reworking things decades later in order to trick people.'

If someone loves the PT more than the OT for real, why weren't their points about the quality of the PT.

"I prefer my lightsaber combat manic and FX enhanced"
"I was deeply moved by the great love story"
"Finding out Boba Fett was some kind of clone kid really increased my enjoyment of the character."
"I was intrigued that young slave Anakin somehow made droids in his spare time."

But none of this is said. One dude said something he liked about the PT. The rest was all SE justifying and explanations why what fans don't like about the PT is invalid.

"Yoda's a crazy non-wise monkey in the PT because he's not there yet."
"Hayden in ROTJ really clicked!"
"The PT somehow improved the OT! Really!"
"Lucas always had a plan! "

I watched all three over the summer, Phantom Editor's version of Ep 1 and 2.

Really, I probably watch them a couple times a year, when Im in a SW mood but have watched the OT and Caravan of Courage more than enough times.

The product itself is, on the conceptual level, not prone to being improved.

If you cut the cheesey parts out, there's be nothing left. It's a cheesy TV special, not a bad movie.

It would be like trying to edit the "Brady Bunch Variety Hour" into something serious.

none said:

Bingowings wrote:

It's evidence that Star Wars was at one point after the first film was going to be a nine part saga.

And according to a 77-78 Kenner promotional video and Bantha Tracks (Issue 02 pg 4) the old fan magazine the saga was 12 films... at one point. 

 It's so odd that Lucas, rather than being glad he made one of the best films of all time, immediatly started spinning yarns like that.

Not "It would be cool to make 12 (or 9 or 6) films"

but

"I have this master plan already mapped out."  Which is so demonstrably false.

While I think there are nits to pick with the review, I think the RLM dude has really tightened up his humor. The jokes and the editing were really working for me.

zombie84 said:

I don't buy any of that. There's plenty to think about in ST, as it deals with time travel, alternate universes, and it plays with the established timeline so you don't know how the future will truely unfold and how character dynamics will play out. TOS didn't have every episode filled with endless pondering, lots of time the main focus was just on action and adventure and humor. A good example are two of the best episodes from season two and the series period, The Trouble with Tribbles and The Doomsday Machine. Great episodes, classic Trek. Theres some interesting ideas in there, but the episodes are really just about characters, the plot, and humor (in the case of tribbles) and action (in the case of doomsday), you aren't going to have a lot to think about after those episodes are over any more than with the new film, its mostly whats there on the surface with a couple interesting ideas for the plot. Its just solid entertainment, and before the 1990s Star Trek series screwed things up a bit people used to remember what the original series was actually like--it varied from episode to episode. And so should the films. In some ways, ST encapsulates all the qualities of the original, because it had time travel and sci-fi ideas like alternate universes, it had some inter-planetary relationships between cultures, some element of mystery, it had humour and some cheesiness, it had tragedy and pathos, it had sexiness, it had space scenes, planet scenes and fighting on the Enterprise, and it had action. Thats pretty much every thing that was in the original series, and it balanced it all to pretty close preportions. It could have used a bit more intellectualism, and the original series actually had more romance than the new film, but I think it captured the spirit of the original astoundingly well.

 Couldn't agree more. I think the idea that the new film is somehow "not Star Trek" is based on this weird myth that Trek is a deeply thoughtful franchise.

People who found flaws in the time-travel obviously never watched ANY Trek before this, bacause none of it makes much sense. And the idea that the science isn't HARD ("Red matter?! Egads!") enough is confusing coming from a franchise that many of the great episodes dealt with outwitting a trickster god.

It was a fun action romp with some sci fi, some lovin, some big ideas, and some silly bits... as you said, like the show and the good movies.

Frankly, as a TNG kid, I stand that REAL Trek has to have show tunes.

Easterhay said:

TheBoost said:

 

There are LOTR spin-offs? You mean the Silmarillion?

 

I mean The Silmarillion, The Book Of Lost Tales and Unfinished Tales.  Children Of Hurin - which indeed was by Christopher Tolkien, taken from notes by JRR - was so badly written it made his grandfather look like Stephen King.

 Excepting small parts of the Sillmarillion, Chris Tolkien didn't write any of those. His contributions ammount to annotations, explanations on why the stories are not complete, and I beleive changing names to be consistent with the names in LOTR.

Calling these wokrs "spinoffs" would be akin to calling "Empire of Dreams" "Deleted Magic," "Secret History of Star Wars" or the new deleted scene from ROTJ spinoffs.

I'm also not sure what Arthur Tolkien, a bank manager and Chris Tolkien's grandfather, would have to do with it.

TV's Frink said:

Merry and Pippen are friends sharing a two-bedroom apartment in the city.  But when they have to bring in a third roommate to lower their costs, they can't possibly be prepared for what it will bring them.

Tune in tomorrow at 9 for the premiere of Smeagol and the City!

 LOL

Other than "Children of Hurin" which JRR wrote all of before he died (Christopher did some fan-editing to make it presenatble) there really are no Tolkien spin offs. The closest is the videogames and MMORPGs.  Not that I'm complaining.

BUT even if his estate had authorized a LOTR saturday morning cartoon, a series of sequel novels, and a manga, there's a chance some of those might be enjoyable, and I still beleive nothing can take away from  a truly great story well told.

"Dune" is still a great novel, with some great sequels, and nothing Brian Herbert can do can make it worse.

"Star Wars" is still a great film, and nothing Lucas or anyone can do now can make it less of a great film (except of course surpressing the OOT, but that's another topic).

zombie84 said:

I think there were other unpublished stories that Christopher Tolkien found, some of which he filled in himself. I guess you can't expect unfinished rough drafts to be very good, to be fair, Tolkien sr. would probably be horrified to know that people can read them today. They are more for a historical curiosity, I think.

 I just think 'spin offs' isn't really the way to classify something like The History of Middle Earth and the other, largely academic works, that Christopher Tolkien has put out. A great deal of that is just annotated notes and much of it predates LOTR.

It's not like he's Frank Herbert's kid, spitting out crappy sequels of his own invention.

Easterhay said:

As it goes, I don't think Lucas comes anywhere Tolkien, though, when it comes to overegging the cake where backstory is concerned.  Not that I want to introduce Lord Of The Rings and its increasingly dull spin-offs to the conversation.

 

There are LOTR spin-offs? You mean the Silmarillion?

I think it makes since.

Star Wars takes place in the boonies of the galaxy, followed by a trip to the rebel's hidden base.

Phantom Menace takes place in a lush and wealthy planet, followed by a trip to the CAPITOL OF THE UNIVERSE.

TIME QUIZ: The Phantom Menace... the only winning move is not to play.

Bingowings said:

For your consideration may I suggest Augusta Ada King, Countess of Lovelace 1815-1852.

For some people being the only legitimate child of Lord Byron would be noteworthy enough but this lady of letters and renown beauty was an accomplished writer, mathematician and highly likely the first computer programmer.

 Holy wow! Lord Byron's daughter was a hacker!!

Freddy Funston.

US Soldier at the end of the 1800s. Dude was too scrawny to make it into West Point. So he went to Cuba and enlisted to fight the Spanish. Came back to the US, joined the army and  invaded the Phillipines, where he said

I personally strung up thirty-five Filipinos without trial ... ...  all Americans who had recently petitioned Congress to sue for peace in the Philippines should be dragged out of their homes and lynched.

Even TEDDY ROOSEVELDT thought that was too extreme.

Later Funston declared Martial Law in San Francisco (without authorization) to fight the 1906 fire, which he made worser by dynamiting the hell out of what was left of the city.

After busting heads of labor unions, Funston hunted Pancho Villa for a while and was hand picked by Hoover to command US forces in WWI before he keeled over and died at the ripe age of 51, his last words being "How beutiful it all is."

TV's Frink said:

 

How do you guys feel about grass?  What about paint?

Please stay on-topic - grass and paint discussion only.

 

 How about PAINTED GRASS!!

What a great game! Cant wait to start "Attack of the Clones" and to score it around Easter time.

TOTAL 47!!

I looks like Xhonzi really underestimated how FAST they get off Naboo in the start. Luckily he underestimated how damn long the podrace was, which got him caught back up.

Stupid chart!

NONE was doing really well, but underestimated just how long the podrace was.    51 points and the lead!