Monday, December 27, 2010

ON TRON.
"Your're really messing with my zen thing, man."*
THere was a moment during TRON:LEGACY where I thought "Holy shit, TRON: Legacy is to 2010 what TRON is to 1982!" and - truthfully -it probably is, but shortly thereafter I started to wish (quite strongly) that I could turn back time ...and change many of the decisions which Disney and the filmmakers had made concerning the film's direction... and that feeling grew and continues to grow, even a day after I saw it... grrr. Crap. grrr...
THe problem is or was or IS that my expectations were reeeealllllllllyyyyy high. So (no matter what) I basically set this movie up to fail.
THe special effects, the Daft Punk soundtrack and the girls in tight techno costumes are more than enough to carry the film so that sitting in the theatre for two hours isn't painful... but I was nevertheless profoundly dissapointed in this film.

If you make a film like TRON: Legacy (or Star Wars: Episode 1 The Phantom Menace or Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull - all films which were revamps of franchises which had 25-30 years to marinate themselves into legends in/of the public mind) WHY not assemble a panel of nerds to openly and honestly critique your film before it is released... or before it is even shot, for that matter?... the SCRIPT, even... Why not harvest these expert opinions? WOuld it be that difficult?

No, it would be perfect.

NOTE: One thing that was interesting though was my off-the-mark expectations for the Jeff Bridges character... in my mind he was a serious, smart computer hacker/genius, but in the film he was kind of a stoner goofball - much like a young Dude Lebowski, which was pretty annoying... until I YouTube researched scenes from the original and discovered that - no, in fact, even in the original Bridge's character is more or less a stoner goofball... hurm.

I had intended to write a long, detailed post about this but the glögg is taking hold, gotta back off... maybe more later.


*Jeff Bridges quote from the film.

Labels:

Google Book Search

Sunday, December 26, 2010

so, I went to church yesterday - Christmas mass, Catholic style, that is - and two things happened:

1: I grabbed an old tweed jacket from my dad's closet and in the pocket were a set of κομπολόι I had been searching for for the past 9 years ever since returning form an extended hiatus to Greece! I missed them terribly because somehow they were the most perfect κομπολόι for my hands, no other has felt quite so perfectly right as these, and all throughout mass I fumbled with them noisily - which was ok because from a distance they pretty much look like a decade of the rosary.

2. I hadn't been to church since LAST Christmas, but to my surprise I felt really good about my life - unlike the previous 29 years where I felt like I could've been a much better person, or felt guilty or crappy or I was really totally ok with myself. In 2010 I was a pretty damn good, fair, giving person... so I felt that really leveled things out there... like, if people go to church looking for community, guidance, answers, etc. I completely felt like I had all that in-check, not only that but just felt bad standing there amongst a bunch of adults with their heads bowed... it was all a bit odd-er than usual. But fortunately there was at least one or two semi-attractive women to look at, i.e. a Filipino woman who was either/anywhere between the age of 12 or 35 years of age with a guy who was either her father or husband -impossible to tell, really, but she was pretty. That is pretty much the only thing that has ever made mass bearable for me, looking at semi-attractive women and the overall freakishness of the social groups who show up to church, trying to figure out which one is the dad and and which one is the boyfriend...
Anyhow, I sang extra loud and felt all holy and spiritual and shit like everything was in its right place in the universe for a moment. It was, in fact. Good job, church! Thanks but no thanks!

Labels:

Google Book Search