Topic: I'm tired of...

[GSyren]

...zombies and vampires. It feels like these themes have been milked for all they are worth, and then some.

Isn't it time for Hollywood to put them to rest for a while and think of something new? Well, "new" might be asking for much, we seldom see something truly new, but at least shift to something else.

Anyone else feel like that?

[addicted2dvd]

Sorry... not me... I could watch these movies non-stop. Especially vampires. What I tired of... and would love to see Hollywood pull back on them a lot is the whole 3D craze.

[Kathy]

I know there's a lot of TV shows about zombies and vampires. I'm not sick of them though because I haven't seen a single episode.

A reason Pete doesn't like 3D is because with his eyes, he can't see in 3D. 

[addicted2dvd]

yes... and it makes me sick when I want to see a film at the theater... and they seldomly show the regular 2D version of the film. I am far from the only person that has vision in only one eye.

But not sure if I should blame the studios or the local theaters.

[Jimmy]

Take a guess about what I am tired of?...

Endless heartless by the book CGI showcase...
Remake / reboot, be original (can you believe another remake of Day of the Dead is on the way )...

[DSig]

Take a guess about what I am tired of?...

Endless heartless by the book CGI showcase...
Remake / reboot, be original (can you believe another remake of Day of the Dead is on the way )...

Although CGI isn't as high on my radar (sometimes it is done well and adds to the story OR like in Avatar there really isn't any other way to do the story) but I am 100% with you on the Remake/Reboot bits.  I didn't mind the first Superman movie.  It had been some 20+ years and it was a different media ... and even Superman Returns which was what .. about 30 years on down the line.  But what they have done/are doing with say "Spiderman" ... really.  But that is just about making money .. not creativity.  I really am surprised they aren't bringing more of the Classics out.  Maybe  Citizen Kane staring Will Farrel or ...

[GSyren]

3D: I don't go to the cinema so that's no problem for me. In fact I haven't been to the cinema in this millennium... Haven't got a 3D telly either, and doubtful that I'll ever get one. I would like to see House of Wax with Vincent Price in 3D, though, and I have read that they'll release it later this year. That's the one film that could have lured me back to the cinema, but the chances of it being shown theatrically is nil. 

CGI: Overuse of CGI is annoying. Bad CGI is a pest. I prefer "traditional" visual effects whenever possible. CGI has its place, but it's too often overdone.

Remakes, Reboots, Re-imaginings: I can't say they are all bad, but way too many are totally unneccessary.

[Jimmy]

Although CGI isn't as high on my radar (sometimes it is done well and adds to the story OR like in Avatar there really isn't any other way to do the story).

My problem with the CGI is more with the fact it takes too much place to the point of being detrimental to a movie. What I mean is that almost every one of those films are too long for no reasons (not that I can't watch long movies, Novecento is more than 5 hours and I enjoy it), nothing is cut because the CGI cost a ton of money. The result we got is film who are boring to watch, repetitive and with no story flow...

A film is suppose to tell a story not show long repetive unecessary scenes mechanically done (it's the same problem with the modern adult films, but this is another story...).

[Achim]

As a horror fan I am not tired of zombies or vampires as well. But then I only watch a select crop, not every run-of-the-mill DTV movie that's out there. And there is A LOT!

Bad CGI is always terrible. And what was good ten years ago may not hold up well; surprisingly the first big one, Jurassic Park, holds up incredibly well. Too much CGI make a film look lifeless, especially if it's bad. The best CGI is "invisible"; like when we don't even notice it I period films...

I have no love for 3D whatsoever. I wear glasses and putting a second layer on top of this is total BS. If I have a choice I always choose 2D. In few cases I don't see it at the cinema if 2D is not available to me, like Monsters Univeristy (there is 2D, but only dubbed those into Chinese ).

[Dragonfire]

I can take or leave 3D..mostly leave it I guess since for the most part, it doesn't add diddley squat to the movie.  I heard or read something within the last few months about how the 3D isn't how 3D was originally...it isn't for making stuff pop out of the screen...it is to create a ...what was is...deeper visual or something like that.  Bunch of bs.  3D is for making stuff pop or fly out of the screen.  The 3D that I have liked the most have been ones that took advantage of the 3D to do that..snow looking like it is falling out over the seats in the theater...stuff like that.

I haven't seen a lot of the zombie stuff that has been out recently.  No real reason why not..just haven't.  So no idea if I would be sick of it or not.  The vampires...well... Twilight vampires...oh am I tired of that and hearing about it.  I seen a lot of vampire movies - though not as many as Pete  - and read a lot of books with them.  I don't mind changes.  But vampires do NOT sparkle...and they especially don't look like they were dumped in a vat of glitter. 
I'm behind with True Blood..but I have liked what I have seen.  I liked the Fright Night remake. 

I don't mind reboots and remakes if they are done well..and if it makes sense to do a reboot.  I still say it is entirely too soon to reboot Spider-Man.  And I keep hearing about multiple bad guys for the next one..makes me think Sony is going back down the same road of villain overload so no one is handled properly and we end up with a mess. 

[Blair]

While I can't speak for movies, the use of zombies in video games is out of control (because they are an easily understood enemy: they keep coming back in large numbers, and people know what they are already, so the games that focus so much on story now don't have to go into great detail as to why they don't die.

[lovemunkey187]

I feel that I need to come to the defence of the Spider-man reboot.
It urinates from a great hieght all over the appauling mess that Raimi gave us. Andrew Garfield is so, so, so, so much better than Maguire could ever have hoped to have been.

[Hulot]

Re: CGI

I’d submit that one has no way of knowing – not without blatant and obvious technical flaws – whether a special effect is digitally simulated/generated or what is called a real-life (or “practical”) effect. Even if one were to possess a comprehensive knowledge of the state-of-the-art in efx, the idea is pure and utter BS. You might as well say something less challenging – but just as silly, like “I prefer ambiently-recorded footsteps and door-shutting sounds to foley.”

There’s no chance that on-set artists and technicians will disappear anytime soon. But it’s also very important to point out that an efx crew is comprised in part of bona fide artists. Artistic talent has not been supplanted, and it’s a necessity: if anything, people who would’ve been painting and sculpting have had to expand their knowledge and toolset, and merge knowledge of plastic or painterly form and color theory with other very technical concerns. It was easier back when artists like Albert Whitlock were making matte paintings and set designers were fudging perspective using adapted stagecraft than it is now, because the standard for verisimilitude (and the resolution of film/video, god knows) has risen hugely. Smashing miniatures while overcranking won’t cut it, anymore…

I grew up loving Harryhausen’s work (and also Doug Trumbull, and in makeup efx Dick Smith and Tom Savini)—but the fact is that as an artist he had his hands tied, with his technique (and that of Willis O’Brien, before him), in the physical expressiveness of his characters, and the mobility of the camera, and so on. It may seem like heresy to say, but what the artists at WETA Digital did with Gollum and then King Kong far surpassed in all aesthetic respects what Harryhausen was able to do in his time.

I don’t think many have any idea what artistic talent, skill and recondite technical knowledge go into even the production of CG efx for TV commercials, let alone feature films. The work is arduous and exacting, and computers do not do work for artists—their purpose is to calculate at superhuman speed. They don’t sculpt or paint (that’s no more possible than GB Shaw’s idea of a million typing monkeys randomly producing Hamlet!): it’s trained human artists who do all the work. Not to belabor the obvious…


I love the way that in some circles mention of that shit-hatcher Roland Emmerich leads so easily into loud denunciations of what people indiscriminately call “CGI”. What is it about computer-generated graphics (obvious or not) which gets people screaming? What the hell? You want good old-fashioned verisimilitude, as in the good ole’ pre-CGI days? Well, they sure as hell didn’t have it back then, either. Art is artifice; cinema is artifice. A fanboy hollers like a stuck pig if an artist or engineer used a computer—but matte paintings and in-camera optical tricks and miniatures with forced perspective and practical effects involving wires and explosions are all right. Absolute nonsense.

[GSyren]

"And depending on how the director composes his images "just cropping" can be worse than pan & scan" - GSyren (Yuk-Yuk)

You know, Hulot, if you want to have a discussion and have a different opinion, that's fine. But resorting to insulting remarks like that just hurts your own credibility. So although I partially disagree with your views on CGI, I won't bother to discuss it with you.

[Danae Cassandra]

I'm tired of finding great stuff in the deleted scenes sections of a DVD.  And by this, I mean the sacrifice of character development for action scenes.  I love comics, flipping love them, have a few thousand in my collection, but even the really good comic movies have done this.  And thing is, the actual comics are generally really great about character development.  They kind of have to be, since what drives them is the attachment of the reader to the character. 

Worst offender I've seen this year: The Incredible Hulk (yes, I know it's several years old, but I only saw it this year).  Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the film.  I had fun watching it, even if it seemed a bit action-heavy when we were watching.  But then we got to the deleted scenes and there was so much great stuff of Bruce Banner and character stuff and development and interaction, and I was like, shit, they could have totally cropped some of those fight scenes down to include that.  It would have given the film so much more depth and complexity to the characters.