Thursday, June 03, 2004
a movie even YOU will hate
this has been a bad week at work so far. i've had to focus on my job alot more than usual, working long hours etc. that's why posts have been poor & sporadic this week.
damore, why review a movie you said was the worst you've ever seen? cos i'm fresh out of any good ideas (like always) & this is too easy. not to mention that hopefully at least a couple folks will be inspired by it to not see it out of spite. if i miss some details it's because i a) fell asleep no less than 4 times or b) the movie makes no logical sense & i screwed up the interpretation.
the day after tomorrow
even a hangover on a rainy chicago day couldn't make this movie the least bit tolerable. i see about 8 movies per year in the theatre, & this is no kill bill. it starts off in Antarctica, where dennis quaid & 2 of his scientist cronies are collecting some data or something. a giant faultline cracks the ice causing a giant rift that's ~10 feet wide to start. at 45 yrs old, dennis quaid somehow manages to jump across it, in full arctic gear mind you, to save the precious boring data they no doubt spent laborious months collecting. he grabs 3 tubes of data & the rift then becomes 20 feet, stretching now miles wide & thousands of feet deep. wielding the data tubes, he takes 2 steps (in snow shoes) & takes a huge leap & BARELY makes it across. his trusty ice hammer saves his life as he's about to plunge to his bloody death. this would be where a logical movie ends, but alas his friends pull him up to safety.
somehow later that day he's in DC & reporting his findings. he's a world renowned environmentalogist (i think i just made up that word), & he reports that a major change in the world's weather will start in 6-8 months. the vice president is there, & he's pretty much dick cheney to a tee. he scoffs at quaid & say's he's full of it, & does nothing, blah blah blah. hours later in tokyo, a giant ice storm starts. like 10 pound chunks of ice, smashing cars & skulls effortlessly. so it's starting now, not 6-8 months from now. i can't remember the next parts so well, but i think it's character development where we learn that he's divorced workaholic, has a teenage son named donnie darko, & he's a bad father w/ good intentions who was never there for the fam. donnie goes to nyc for a 'mathletes'type trip, which he joined for a cute girl.
some parts i found hysterical:
-giant tornados in the LA. news reporters standing on the street 50 feet from giant cyclones, destroying the capital records HQ, the hollywood sign, etc. alot of people died & all i could do was laugh alot. the city pretty much gets completely leveled, foreshadowing what the stones will do to the lakers in the nba finals.
-a giant ice storm starts in europe which covers the entire continent. there's 15 feet of snow pouring down on every EU country.
-while all of this is happening across the globe, the us government has dennis quaid, his 2 cronies, & a woman who works at nasa working on the problem. seriously, 4 ephing people! not even sporting interns, temps, or international resources. 3 scotsmen isolated somewhere have all of this ocean data to crunch, but no resources to do it. solution? email 50gig files of data across the atlantic to quaid & his crew. done & done. all the data is thrown into quaid's computer model, & bam!, 4 hours later they know what events will happen next. the next ice age.
-nyc gets flooded w/ rain, a giant tsunami hits, & there's 800 feet of water covering the city. luckily, donnie & co go to the safest place, the nyc public library, duhvs. moments before, darko's gf runs out to a taxi to help save a mother & her child get to safety. upon hearing that they left their passports in the cab, she runs out to certain death & cuts her leg badly in the process. risking your own life to saves other lives=noble. risking one's life to save passports=dumbest thing ever. darko narrowly rescues her & as they get inside, the building is completely flooded, & they manage to escape. suddenly it's snowing & very cold.
-it starts snow storming, the water freezes, & all the people want to leave & walk out of the city to go down south. darko remembers what his dad told him just hours ago, & tries to convince everyone that if they leave, they will freeze to death since it will soon be -150 deg f. they laugh, & later they all die. lesson: don't eph w/ quaid the scientist.
-dennis quaid promises to get from dc to nyc in 1 day to save darko & co. there's 10 feet of snow on the ground. no roads, no visibility. so they take a dodge ram pick-up w/ a snow plow. i'm mr plow, that's my name. that name again is mr plow. somehow they get to phily alive in 2.5 hours, crash into a bank, & then quaid says, 'get out, it's time to throw on the snow shoes, we're walking. it's 40 miles to nyc. if we don't get there by tomorrow donnie darko dies. i made a promise to my son'.i couldn't walk 40 miles in 2 days in the summer. these guys are going to make it in 0 deg weather, wearing snow shoes, carrying 100 lbs of gear, etc in 1 freaking day?
-along the way, they fall through the glass topping of a mall. they cut lose the sled full of gear, & 1 of the cronies cuts himself lose & dies to save his friends. how did they end up on top of a mall at least 300 feet high? did it snow that much in a day?
-10 people stay at the nyc library, they bunker up on the top floor, raid the vending machines & the lost & found (for clothes), & burn books stay warm. annoying banter ensues about which books should/shouldn't be burned. the girl gets really sick & a librarian pulls a rabbit from the hat by figuring out that her symptoms mean that she has an infected cut on her leg. 'see...books are good for some things'. she needs penicillin/antibiotics to save her. darko & co board the mysterious freighter that is now docked in front of the library to find some. some CG wolves that escaped from the zoo somehow end-up on board the freighter, after smelling food (darko & co) on board. seemed kind of like the doberman sequence in resident evil, even that the wolves jumped through the cage at the zoo. worst. the kids escape, & it's about to become -150 deg f outside. they literally out-run the freezing air & freezing building. just as the freezing process hits upstairs, they close the door, it freezes, but the warmth from the blazing book burning session stops the air from freezing.
-they make it to nyc, quaid says, 'where's the library?'. crony #2 looks at his gps & says, 'we're on top of it right now. i don't think we made it in time'. they walk 4 steps, & suddenly the library is revealed.
-they walk into the room where the kids are, & it looks like they're dead. nope, just sleeping. the pres sends rescue choppers from mexico to save them. the us highjacks mexico's land AGAIN. the end. so thought provoking. there was a great quote in the trib this past weekend (written by mark caro) where he wrote, 'environmentalists trying to rally support for environmental causes/reform using 'let's clear the air: environmentalists latching onto 'the day after tomorrow' to generate thoughtful discussion about global warming is akin to animal-rights activists rallying around 'scooby-doo' or free-trade advocates using 'star wars: episode I-the phantom menace' as a teaching tool. 'the day after tomorrow' is a dumb, dumb movie'. perfect analogy. the water/freezing CG fx in this movie were pretty much exactly the same as the fire/explosion CG fx in independence day. how original.
worst movie ever. sorry this is so lengthy, but it's really that bad.
damore, why review a movie you said was the worst you've ever seen? cos i'm fresh out of any good ideas (like always) & this is too easy. not to mention that hopefully at least a couple folks will be inspired by it to not see it out of spite. if i miss some details it's because i a) fell asleep no less than 4 times or b) the movie makes no logical sense & i screwed up the interpretation.
the day after tomorrow
even a hangover on a rainy chicago day couldn't make this movie the least bit tolerable. i see about 8 movies per year in the theatre, & this is no kill bill. it starts off in Antarctica, where dennis quaid & 2 of his scientist cronies are collecting some data or something. a giant faultline cracks the ice causing a giant rift that's ~10 feet wide to start. at 45 yrs old, dennis quaid somehow manages to jump across it, in full arctic gear mind you, to save the precious boring data they no doubt spent laborious months collecting. he grabs 3 tubes of data & the rift then becomes 20 feet, stretching now miles wide & thousands of feet deep. wielding the data tubes, he takes 2 steps (in snow shoes) & takes a huge leap & BARELY makes it across. his trusty ice hammer saves his life as he's about to plunge to his bloody death. this would be where a logical movie ends, but alas his friends pull him up to safety.
somehow later that day he's in DC & reporting his findings. he's a world renowned environmentalogist (i think i just made up that word), & he reports that a major change in the world's weather will start in 6-8 months. the vice president is there, & he's pretty much dick cheney to a tee. he scoffs at quaid & say's he's full of it, & does nothing, blah blah blah. hours later in tokyo, a giant ice storm starts. like 10 pound chunks of ice, smashing cars & skulls effortlessly. so it's starting now, not 6-8 months from now. i can't remember the next parts so well, but i think it's character development where we learn that he's divorced workaholic, has a teenage son named donnie darko, & he's a bad father w/ good intentions who was never there for the fam. donnie goes to nyc for a 'mathletes'type trip, which he joined for a cute girl.
some parts i found hysterical:
-giant tornados in the LA. news reporters standing on the street 50 feet from giant cyclones, destroying the capital records HQ, the hollywood sign, etc. alot of people died & all i could do was laugh alot. the city pretty much gets completely leveled, foreshadowing what the stones will do to the lakers in the nba finals.
-a giant ice storm starts in europe which covers the entire continent. there's 15 feet of snow pouring down on every EU country.
-while all of this is happening across the globe, the us government has dennis quaid, his 2 cronies, & a woman who works at nasa working on the problem. seriously, 4 ephing people! not even sporting interns, temps, or international resources. 3 scotsmen isolated somewhere have all of this ocean data to crunch, but no resources to do it. solution? email 50gig files of data across the atlantic to quaid & his crew. done & done. all the data is thrown into quaid's computer model, & bam!, 4 hours later they know what events will happen next. the next ice age.
-nyc gets flooded w/ rain, a giant tsunami hits, & there's 800 feet of water covering the city. luckily, donnie & co go to the safest place, the nyc public library, duhvs. moments before, darko's gf runs out to a taxi to help save a mother & her child get to safety. upon hearing that they left their passports in the cab, she runs out to certain death & cuts her leg badly in the process. risking your own life to saves other lives=noble. risking one's life to save passports=dumbest thing ever. darko narrowly rescues her & as they get inside, the building is completely flooded, & they manage to escape. suddenly it's snowing & very cold.
-it starts snow storming, the water freezes, & all the people want to leave & walk out of the city to go down south. darko remembers what his dad told him just hours ago, & tries to convince everyone that if they leave, they will freeze to death since it will soon be -150 deg f. they laugh, & later they all die. lesson: don't eph w/ quaid the scientist.
-dennis quaid promises to get from dc to nyc in 1 day to save darko & co. there's 10 feet of snow on the ground. no roads, no visibility. so they take a dodge ram pick-up w/ a snow plow. i'm mr plow, that's my name. that name again is mr plow. somehow they get to phily alive in 2.5 hours, crash into a bank, & then quaid says, 'get out, it's time to throw on the snow shoes, we're walking. it's 40 miles to nyc. if we don't get there by tomorrow donnie darko dies. i made a promise to my son'.i couldn't walk 40 miles in 2 days in the summer. these guys are going to make it in 0 deg weather, wearing snow shoes, carrying 100 lbs of gear, etc in 1 freaking day?
-along the way, they fall through the glass topping of a mall. they cut lose the sled full of gear, & 1 of the cronies cuts himself lose & dies to save his friends. how did they end up on top of a mall at least 300 feet high? did it snow that much in a day?
-10 people stay at the nyc library, they bunker up on the top floor, raid the vending machines & the lost & found (for clothes), & burn books stay warm. annoying banter ensues about which books should/shouldn't be burned. the girl gets really sick & a librarian pulls a rabbit from the hat by figuring out that her symptoms mean that she has an infected cut on her leg. 'see...books are good for some things'. she needs penicillin/antibiotics to save her. darko & co board the mysterious freighter that is now docked in front of the library to find some. some CG wolves that escaped from the zoo somehow end-up on board the freighter, after smelling food (darko & co) on board. seemed kind of like the doberman sequence in resident evil, even that the wolves jumped through the cage at the zoo. worst. the kids escape, & it's about to become -150 deg f outside. they literally out-run the freezing air & freezing building. just as the freezing process hits upstairs, they close the door, it freezes, but the warmth from the blazing book burning session stops the air from freezing.
-they make it to nyc, quaid says, 'where's the library?'. crony #2 looks at his gps & says, 'we're on top of it right now. i don't think we made it in time'. they walk 4 steps, & suddenly the library is revealed.
-they walk into the room where the kids are, & it looks like they're dead. nope, just sleeping. the pres sends rescue choppers from mexico to save them. the us highjacks mexico's land AGAIN. the end. so thought provoking. there was a great quote in the trib this past weekend (written by mark caro) where he wrote, 'environmentalists trying to rally support for environmental causes/reform using 'let's clear the air: environmentalists latching onto 'the day after tomorrow' to generate thoughtful discussion about global warming is akin to animal-rights activists rallying around 'scooby-doo' or free-trade advocates using 'star wars: episode I-the phantom menace' as a teaching tool. 'the day after tomorrow' is a dumb, dumb movie'. perfect analogy. the water/freezing CG fx in this movie were pretty much exactly the same as the fire/explosion CG fx in independence day. how original.
worst movie ever. sorry this is so lengthy, but it's really that bad.
