Saturday, November 7, 2009
Sunday, November 1, 2009
(of course there are spoilers in the following comments)
PARANORMAL ACTIVITY
Not as scary as the hype, but still pretty creepy. It didn't induce any nightmares/sleepless nights following the viewing, but I think that can be attributed to a few factors.
1) The hype. Lots of hype can really have a negative effect on films for me. (See: viewing experiences of both The Blair Witch Project and The Ring). I really would have been surprised if it had lived up to *all* of that hype.
2) The theatre of our viewing experience was a very chatty theatre. Not to the point of being distracting, but it was there nonetheless. Also lots of nervous laughter and lots of "zomg, I love horror movies & scary shit gleeful laughter". All of these things make a movie going experience inherently less terrifying.
I don't think it was boring at all. Paranormal Activity definitely kept my attention the whole time and definitely built up the creep factor as we went along. I've read articles that say the movie was edited significantly from its original version that was screened at film festivals, and that the edits were for the better. The scares and incidents with the being ramp up along the way; apparently before they were just in random order.
The one thing that really did disappoint me, the one thing I wish the movie had done was bringing back that knife. Early on in the film, Micah is cooking and holding a large knife. As an audience, we are clearly meant to see this object. Does it ever come back? No. That would have been a wonderful bookend to the film; if that knife had come back in the final scene.
(Apparently, in an alternate ending to the story, it does. This ending was only screened once and is significantly more gory than the ending the film currently has, but in terms of storytelling and the pay off that comes with bringing back something you saw earlier, I really would have preferred that alternate ending. Something to look forward to on the DVD, I suppose.)
Also: While I see how this film is a story better told as mockumentary/found footage, I still really like horror movies for their mythology and back stories. I really want to know more about this creature/where it came from and you simply don't get that in a found footage sort of film. I know it makes it more scary, but I personally just really enjoy backstory.
So, not an earth-shattering experience, but a nice time indeed.
ZOMBIELAND
There are some things that, if a movie has them, I'm probably going to like them. Zombieland had all of the following elements, there really is no question that I had a great time.
-a mexican stand-off
-rockin soundtrack
-main character voice over
-lists
-reference back to lists (teach us something, then show it to us again to prove your point)
-stylized violence/slow motion fight scenes (Zack Snyder movies, anyone?)
-gleeful gore (really getting into it, balls to the wall) (because really, if you're going to do that, you gotta go all out (example: Kill Bill) )
-an amusement park at night
-montages
-pop culture references
This was really fun. End of story. I probably will see this again.
PARANORMAL ACTIVITY
Not as scary as the hype, but still pretty creepy. It didn't induce any nightmares/sleepless nights following the viewing, but I think that can be attributed to a few factors.
1) The hype. Lots of hype can really have a negative effect on films for me. (See: viewing experiences of both The Blair Witch Project and The Ring). I really would have been surprised if it had lived up to *all* of that hype.
2) The theatre of our viewing experience was a very chatty theatre. Not to the point of being distracting, but it was there nonetheless. Also lots of nervous laughter and lots of "zomg, I love horror movies & scary shit gleeful laughter". All of these things make a movie going experience inherently less terrifying.
I don't think it was boring at all. Paranormal Activity definitely kept my attention the whole time and definitely built up the creep factor as we went along. I've read articles that say the movie was edited significantly from its original version that was screened at film festivals, and that the edits were for the better. The scares and incidents with the being ramp up along the way; apparently before they were just in random order.
The one thing that really did disappoint me, the one thing I wish the movie had done was bringing back that knife. Early on in the film, Micah is cooking and holding a large knife. As an audience, we are clearly meant to see this object. Does it ever come back? No. That would have been a wonderful bookend to the film; if that knife had come back in the final scene.
(Apparently, in an alternate ending to the story, it does. This ending was only screened once and is significantly more gory than the ending the film currently has, but in terms of storytelling and the pay off that comes with bringing back something you saw earlier, I really would have preferred that alternate ending. Something to look forward to on the DVD, I suppose.)
Also: While I see how this film is a story better told as mockumentary/found footage, I still really like horror movies for their mythology and back stories. I really want to know more about this creature/where it came from and you simply don't get that in a found footage sort of film. I know it makes it more scary, but I personally just really enjoy backstory.
So, not an earth-shattering experience, but a nice time indeed.
ZOMBIELAND
There are some things that, if a movie has them, I'm probably going to like them. Zombieland had all of the following elements, there really is no question that I had a great time.
-a mexican stand-off
-rockin soundtrack
-main character voice over
-lists
-reference back to lists (teach us something, then show it to us again to prove your point)
-stylized violence/slow motion fight scenes (Zack Snyder movies, anyone?)
-gleeful gore (really getting into it, balls to the wall) (because really, if you're going to do that, you gotta go all out (example: Kill Bill) )
-an amusement park at night
-montages
-pop culture references
This was really fun. End of story. I probably will see this again.
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