186 replies to this topic

[Carlos Mancilla II]

I watched Midnight in Paris last night. My list of bad Woody Allen movies is very short for someone who has seen pretty much all of them, but Midnight in Paris definitely belongs on my bad list. I'm actually surprised at all the praise it's gotten; it seemed really half-baked to me.

Gasp! I think it was one of the best written movies of the year, if not the best that I have seen of 2011

[stephanie familiar]

Gasp! I think it was one of the best written movies of the year, if not the best that I have seen of 2011

that is high praise indeed.

[Trevor Robertson]

Just re-watched Slither for the first time since it's release, and it's just as great as I remember. It reminds me of Tremors-- a fun pastiche of classic B-horror movies with a funny, likeable cast. Elizabeth Banks is one of my all-time favorite actresses (I've been rewatching the middle seasons of Scrubs lately as well, and she is one of my favorie recurring guest stars).

I also snagged the special edition of Wanted which is a movie I loved far more than I expected to (Another movie I hadn't seen since it was first released). It certainly takes huge liberties with the Chief's source material, but still adapts some of the core concepts and I feel in many ways improves upon the comic. McAvoy, Jolie, and Freeman make everything better, too, and some of the action sequences are just hilariously awesome in their sheer, unabashed over-the-top nature. Great flick.

Edited by Trevor Robertson, 27 January 2012 - 08:46 PM.

[Rory Abel]

Just re-watched Slither for the first time since it's release, and it's just as great as I remember. It reminds me of Tremors-- a fun pastiche of classic B-horror movies with a funny, likeable cast. Elizabeth Banks is one of my all-time favorite actresses (I've been rewatching the middle seasons of Scrubs lately as well, and she is one of my favorie recurring guest stars).

Have you seen Night of the Creeps? That's the direct inspiration for Slither. If you haven't definitely check it out, it's the better of the two.

[Christian U]

Have you seen Night of the Creeps? That's the direct inspiration for Slither. If you haven't definitely check it out, it's the better of the two.

I'll have to remember that, I loved Slither.

Edited by Christian U, 27 January 2012 - 09:06 PM.

[steveuk]

Just re-watched Slither for the first time since it's release, and it's just as great as I remember. It reminds me of Tremors-- a fun pastiche of classic B-horror movies with a funny, likeable cast. Elizabeth Banks is one of my all-time favorite actresses (I've been rewatching the middle seasons of Scrubs lately as well, and she is one of my favorie recurring guest stars).

<SNIP>

The director of 'Slither' started out at Troma, where he was surrounded by a hoard of B-Movies, often extremely weird (aka: Troma films)!

And they say this stuff doesn't scar people for life?!?!?!

[Ian Smith]

Watched David Fincher's The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. I liked it but that's not much of a surprise since it's pretty much a straight remake of the original movie that I really enjoyed.

I would've liked to have seen them change it a bit more, apart from a few tweaks at the end it's Almost a shot for shot remake. Well except for that totally out of place music video opening sequence.

And did it bother anyone else that Daniel Craig was the only person that didn't have an accent, it didn't really make any sense.

[Rory Abel]

The director of 'Slither' started out at Troma, where he was surrounded by a hoard of B-Movies, often extremely weird (aka: Troma films)!

And they say this stuff doesn't scar people for life?!?!?!

It wasn't the films that scarred him it was working for Troma, one of the most unpleasent experiences you can have.

[steveuk]

Watched David Fincher's The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. I liked it but that's not much of a surprise since it's pretty much a straight remake of the original movie that I really enjoyed.

I would've liked to have seen them change it a bit more, apart from a few tweaks at the end it's Almost a shot for shot remake. Well except for that totally out of place music video opening sequence.

And did it bother anyone else that Daniel Craig was the only person that didn't have an accent, it didn't really make any sense.

"Shot for shot"? I think Fincher would be very hurt by that statement.

Craig doesn't seem to do accents any more. He did an American one for 'Tomb Raider', but since then he's mostly sounded like himself. I know he was supposed to be more Estuary English for 'Layer Cake' but persuaded Vaughn to let him speak in his own voice.

[Paul F]

I'm watching Look Around You, the BBC spoof educational show from about ten years ago. Not sure why I haven't seen it before.

[Christian U]

Craig doesn't seem to do accents any more. He did an American one for 'Tomb Raider', but since then he's mostly sounded like himself. I know he was supposed to be more Estuary English for 'Layer Cake' but persuaded Vaughn to let him speak in his own voice.

I don't think it would've been a good idea to give him a fake accent. It doesn't make a lot of sense that everybody is speaking with an accent, anyway, I mean, these are Swedish people in Sweden, aren't they? They wouldn't be talking English with a Swedish accent to each other, they'd be talking Swedish - interpreted as English in the movie for our viewing comfort. So I don't think it'd make more sense to have Craig speaking with an accent, because the accent is not part of the world of the film and the characters. I can understand that it makes for a weird contrast, though.

[Will Carper]

Fincher's Dragon Tattoo wasn't a shot for shot remake at all. The content of the scenes were mostly the same because the films share the same source material. Even then, Fincher and the screenwriter interpret the book differently--Fincher's movies includes parts the Swedish movie dropped and vice versa.

I wasn't a big fan of either, but Fincher's was the better directed film. It pulled me in stylistically and made me a witness to a lot of things I didn't to be witness to, while the Swedish film was pretty flat and unambitious, imo. Then again, after seeing two fair adaptations, I'm wondering if the story is even worth the effort.

[David Meadows]

I don't think it would've been a good idea to give him a fake accent. It doesn't make a lot of sense that everybody is speaking with an accent, anyway, I mean, these are Swedish people in Sweden, aren't they? They wouldn't be talking English with a Swedish accent to each other, they'd be talking Swedish - interpreted as English in the movie for our viewing comfort. So I don't think it'd make more sense to have Craig speaking with an accent, because the accent is not part of the world of the film and the characters. I can understand that it makes for a weird contrast, though.

That always bugs me in films. If somebody is supposed to be speaking their native language, then it makes no sense to translate it to English with a foreign accent. In fact, you should logically translate it with the equivalent English accent. So if somebody is speaking posh German, you give them an upper-class English accent, if they are lower class German you give them broad cockney, if they are the in-bred cousins from the provinces you give them geordie or scouse accents. Something like that.

[Will Carper]

I dunno, it was really jarring in Last Temptation of Christ hearing Judas and the voice of God with New York accents. Even though I really love that movie.

[Christian U]

That always bugs me in films. If somebody is supposed to be speaking their native language, then it makes no sense to translate it to English with a foreign accent. In fact, you should logically translate it with the equivalent English accent. So if somebody is speaking posh German, you give them an upper-class English accent, if they are lower class German you give them broad cockney, if they are the in-bred cousins from the provinces you give them geordie or scouse accents. Something like that.

Yeah, exactly. I think that's how it's mostly done outside of English-speaking countries, too. It definitely is in Germany.

[Ian Smith]

Fincher's Dragon Tattoo wasn't a shot for shot remake at all. The content of the scenes were mostly the same because the films share the same source material. Even then, Fincher and the screenwriter interpret the book differently--Fincher's movies includes parts the Swedish movie dropped and vice versa.

I wasn't a big fan of either, but Fincher's was the better directed film. It pulled me in stylistically and made me a witness to a lot of things I didn't to be witness to, while the Swedish film was pretty flat and unambitious, imo. Then again, after seeing two fair adaptations, I'm wondering if the story is even worth the effort.

Okay, maybe saying it's a shot for shot remake is a little harsh, i guess it could just be the fact that the content of the scenes are mostly the same between the two movies that's throwing me off.

I just expected Fincher to do something different with the material rather than a straight remake

[steveuk]

Fincher and co. adapted the book again. It's sort of like a new version of a play; new actors, new director, new sets etc. but the text remains the same.

Sometimes people want to adapt a book (or a film) because they like something about it (they keep "that" but dump the rest) and sometimes because they like a LOT about it. I think Fincher really liked the book.

I don't think it would've been a good idea to give him a fake accent. It doesn't make a lot of sense that everybody is speaking with an accent, anyway, I mean, these are Swedish people in Sweden, aren't they? They wouldn't be talking English with a Swedish accent to each other, they'd be talking Swedish - interpreted as English in the movie for our viewing comfort. So I don't think it'd make more sense to have Craig speaking with an accent, because the accent is not part of the world of the film and the characters. I can understand that it makes for a weird contrast, though.

I've said it before, it doesn't bug me at all, as long as the accent sounds right and not fake.

Movies are inherently artificial and having an audience hear "English" when the characters are speaking something else is just another example of that artificiality. This, and many other things, are handled by conventions that have evolved over a hundred hears or so of cinema and even longer in other forms, especially literature.

The regional accent idea is interesting, but when Oliver Stone made his Macedonians Irish in 'Alexander', was that really less distracting than fake Greek would've been? Or the actors using their own voices?

[Christian U]

The regional accent idea is interesting, but when Oliver Stone made his Macedonians Irish in 'Alexander', was that really less distracting than fake Greek would've been? Or the actors using their own voices?

I have no idea if it was less distracting, but it made a point that none of the other options would have. You usually do it that way in literary translations, too, although it's often different to find equivalents that really work.

I've said it before, it doesn't bug me at all, as long as the accent sounds right and not fake.

Movies are inherently artificial and having an audience hear "English" when the characters are speaking something else is just another example of that artificiality. This, and many other things, are handled by conventions that have evolved over a hundred hears or so of cinema and even longer in other forms, especially literature.

Isn't the latter what David and I said? The only weird thing is when they speak English with a Swedish or Russian accent. If you're employing Swedish or Russian actors, that's just how it is, of course (and may provide a strange contrast in the case of one Anglophone actor, in this case, being the protagonist but supposedly speaking the same non-English language as everybody else), but I get the impression that especially in US films, that is quite often done on purpose. That is the part I don't get.

[steveuk]

"Sounds fake" is not the same as being fake. Acting is fake; literally faking emotions and character that don't actually originate with the person expressing them.

If an actor from New Jersey can do a convincing Upper Class British, or Southern Italian, or Northern Irish Accent, and they (and or the director) feels that adds to the role then I wish them good luck.

The convention we're used to is that people have accents, and that when they speak english they do so with those accent. That applies to native speakers as much as non-native speakers.

The fact that they are, in the context of a movie like 'Girl With The Dragon Tattoo', actually speaking another language is irrelevent. The dialogue we hear is in english and so, conventionally, it's delivered with an accent.

It's like which side of the road you drive on or in what order a three course meal is served. These are just conventions that most people accept unconsciously and actually help them get through something, whether it be a film, a romantic dinner or one way road system.

But in the end its personal taste, for the actors, directors and the audience.

[craggy]

If an actor from New Jersey can do a convincing Upper Class British, or Southern Italian, or Northern Irish Accent, and they (and or the director) feels that adds to the role then I---

---can't think of having seen them in anything.