Monday, July 4, 2011

F This Movie! - Independence Day

We will not go quietly into that good night. We will not vanish without a fight. We're going to live on. We're going to survive. Today, Patrick and JB celebrate our Independence Day.



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Also discussed this episode: TrollHunter (2011) 

8 comments:

  1. Lord was I disappointed in that movie. such a promising trailer. In fact, you should name the circumstance of a trailer that promises one thing only to have the movie give you something completely different The Independence Day Paradigm.

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  2. We would, but we're pretty much fans of the movie (except Mike) so it wouldn't make sense. And, actually, I felt like the movie delivered just what the trailer promised (because the White House blew up). That's the thing about trailers, though -- they create such different expectations in all of us, because we all fill in the blanks of what we're not show differently. You filled in the ID4 trailer with a movie you like much better. I filled it in with Vivica Fox stripping. Success!!

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  3. For the "Shock and Awe" thing, TV Tropes calls that the "Funny Aneurysm moment" from a line from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FunnyAneurysmMoment

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  4. Wow. Good looking out, Randi -- that site offers a LOT of different terms for what JB was trying to describe. Thanks for posting.

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  5. I'm so glad that JB likes Troll Hunter. I first saw it at the Traverse City Film Festival in 2011. It definitely helped to go in with no idea of what to expect, but I came out beaming. I've since shown it to a lot of friends, and it tends to get mixed reviews, but I'll always love it.

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  6. I respectfully disagree with JB's argument for why uploading a virus into an alien system is ok within the context of the film (aka "fish can't talk").

    I don't think the movie sets it up properly at all, and that's why so many people have reacted to it. The one fantasy conceit the movie makes is that aliens exist. Anything that comes from that (e.g. alien technology, alien psychic ability, area 51, etc) can be fantasy in nature because it stems from that conceit. For example, nobody was complaining that an alien ship can't possibly turn that sharply in earth's atmosphere... because we don't really know what powers the alien ships and keeps them airborne.

    When it comes to things that are of the earth, the movie keeps them reality-based. You have characters getting stuck in traffic, military and civilian vehicles that are accurate of the time, and general technology, settings, and mise en scene that are true to 1996. There are some exceptions, some disaster movie tropes, of course, such as dogs who jump faster than fireballs. But by and large the movie presents earthly items as realistic. So when the plan used to defeat the aliens is so questionable, it sticks out like a sore thumb, and people noticed.

    It didn't help when years later Dean Devlin said in an AMA that "the programming structure of the alien ship was a binary code. [...] binary code is a series of ones and zeroes. What Goldblum's character did was turn the ones into zeroes and the zeroes into ones." This attempted explanation doesn't work, because the plan was to specifically target the shields of the ships. If you're simply flipping the bits, you have no idea what effect that would have. Presumably every system would malfunction with such a nondiscriminatory attack, not just the shields.

    I like that using a "virus" to defeat the aliens is an homage to War of the Worlds, and if they had only set it up properly it could have worked fine. All they needed to do was introduce a computer scientist who had been examining the ship for 20 years and showed knowledge of its inner workings. Instead Jeff Goldblum came up with the plan, who had seen the ship for like 10 minutes.

    That aside, I do agree that ID4 is a solid piece of entertainment. I've seen it a dozen times if I've seen it once. Classic.

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    1. But doesn't it just serve to show just how brilliant the Goldblum character is?
      Just kidding... I agree with you that an Area 51 IT guy conferring with Goldblum would have helped to sell the conceit... and a scene showing the dog trying out for a track and field team. That dog is fast.

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    2. Goldblum's character is great. One of my favorite Goldblum performances. (is there a Goldblum performance I DON'T like? Probably not.)

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