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May 30, 2009 1:24:46 GMT -5
Post by Georgina on May 30, 2009 1:24:46 GMT -5
Does anyone here enjoy animated movies? I've been a fan of Pixar since they first started. They've had a few misses in my estimation (although friends of mine have loved what I've considered misses) but this time they've outdone themselves.
I went to see Up this evening at the theatre with some young friends. (We thought we were attending one of the theatres presenting the movie in 3-D. We were wrong.) And I laughed. Oh heavens did I laugh. I laughed until I felt good all over.
The story was rich and deep and well considered. The characters were multi-dimensional (if predictable in a G-rated movies sort of way) and the writing and visual comedy were superb. There weren't any children in theatre, so I don't know how a younger audience would respond to it, but there was an abundance of mature, intelligent humour that had my friend and me laughing long and loudly. (We likely annoyed people.)
The touching moments were, again, predictable, but enjoyable all the same. The animation was awe inspiring and flawless. Truly, truly a wonder show for growed-ups who enjoy losing themselves in animated movies. I want to go see it again, now, and make sure I have the right presentation theatre this time. But even without the 3-D eye-candy, it was marvelous.
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wheelspinner
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May 30, 2009 7:25:47 GMT -5
Post by wheelspinner on May 30, 2009 7:25:47 GMT -5
Very much looking forward to seeing Up when it launches (sorry) here.
It can't be often that Cannes has opened with an animated film, but they did this year.
A noted reviewer here pointed out the similarities with the Clint Eastwood film Grand Torino, and it does seem that there are some, with the "old man/picked on kid" dynamic.
If you like animated film, you should take a look at Mary and Max, an Australian animated film that is definitely for adults. It's about a misfit Australian girl who starts an epistolary relationship with a middle-aged NY Jewish man with Aspergers.
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Up
May 30, 2009 10:57:52 GMT -5
Post by Georgina on May 30, 2009 10:57:52 GMT -5
Mary and Max looks delightful. I'll see if I can find it around here. Thanks for the recommendation.
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Calluna
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May 30, 2009 20:30:54 GMT -5
Post by Calluna on May 30, 2009 20:30:54 GMT -5
I love Pixar films too, but haven't heard of this one before this thread (probably because I haven't been watching much TV lately to notice ads). I had a wonderful time watching Cars with my boyfriend. We laughed until our eyes were watering. And, it wasn't just the jokes in the dialogue that were neat, but the details in the animations themselves. So, yeah, when something from Pixar comes out, I try to get my paws on it.
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wheelspinner
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May 31, 2009 1:23:55 GMT -5
Post by wheelspinner on May 31, 2009 1:23:55 GMT -5
Mary and Max looks delightful. I'll see if I can find it around here. Thanks for the recommendation. It has a great cast: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Toni Collette, Eric Bana and Barry Humphries. Plus the director, Adam Elliott, won the Oscar for Best Animated Short in 2004.
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May 31, 2009 2:21:20 GMT -5
Post by Georgina on May 31, 2009 2:21:20 GMT -5
Actually, Calluna, all of the ads I saw for "Up" were online. And Cannes opened with it this year.
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Calluna
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May 31, 2009 7:33:35 GMT -5
Post by Calluna on May 31, 2009 7:33:35 GMT -5
That's what I get for using adblock then. I don't pay any attention to things like Cannes.
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Pax
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quod erat demonstrandum.
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May 31, 2009 13:11:48 GMT -5
Post by Pax on May 31, 2009 13:11:48 GMT -5
I can't think of one that I've considered a miss. Frankly I loved Bolt and Wall-E.
Yeh, UP... Speaking complimentarily, it felt like an adult-oriented story set in a children's book. That's gotta be a hard line to walk, and they managed it. The animation was amazing. I laughed, I cried, not to be cliche. Being a dog person, I loved 'Dug.' lol. I did manage to see it in 3-D. :-). Georgina -- as you may suspect, 3-D would of course add a bit of a dimension to the film, but not terribly much... it was used, deliberately, much more subtly in this film than is typically the case. You didn't miss a lot.
Anyway, those who haven't seen it... you're in for a treat. :-)
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May 31, 2009 13:42:45 GMT -5
Post by Georgina on May 31, 2009 13:42:45 GMT -5
Wall-E (I caught that one on a plane) was brilliant in that there was no dialogue and yet you always knew precisely what was going on and how each character felt. It was fantastic for that. Oh, a miss was Monsters Inc. . I thought it was flat and boring. It was a huge disappointment. The last, and only, movie I've ever seen in 3-D was Vincent Price's 1953 House of Wax that I saw in an art theatre in the early 80s. I'd like to see how the technology has changed. (It was a very cool show, by the way.)
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Pax
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May 31, 2009 15:40:39 GMT -5
Post by Pax on May 31, 2009 15:40:39 GMT -5
You know, as much as I like Vincent Price, I've seen virtually none of his movies. I liked him for the bit part he did in Edward Scissorhands, where for the three minutes he was on screen he projected love. I also liked him as essentially the straight man in what struck me as a dark comedy -- The Raven. And, well, I love his speech at the end of Thriller. And no one could do an evil laugh like he could. :-)
House of Wax? I'll see if I can get ahold of it. I think Paris Hilton's in that one. :-P
Monsters, Inc. -- well, I didn't hate it, and it was about what I expected, but, yeh, not a great concept.
Wall-E -- my wife usually buys me these movies, but she's holding off on this one until we get our HDTV and Blu-Ray. :-)
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May 31, 2009 16:03:46 GMT -5
Post by Georgina on May 31, 2009 16:03:46 GMT -5
I don't know that I'd watch House of Wax for its own sake unless you enjoy cheesy old 50s horror flicks. What made that one particularly cool was seeing it in a theatre with 3-D effects. I don't know that the movie minus that ambiance would even be worthwhile.
The best Vincent Price movie I've seen, and would recommend, is Theatre of Blood -1973. The story surprises you and it's Vincent Price at his villainous best. A bit campy, but, meh. Worth it.
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Pax
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May 31, 2009 16:09:16 GMT -5
Post by Pax on May 31, 2009 16:09:16 GMT -5
Thanks!
Come to think of it, I think he actually did do a movie called "The Thriller." Oh! I'm thinking of "The Tingler." I only caught like the last half hour or so. There was something about how you couldn't avoid The Tingler. It was essentially some sort of evil slug that grabbed onto unpleasant people and made things unpleasant for them. Or something. Even as a teenager I thought it was weird to name a rubber monster after something that goes buzz in the night, but, I didn't write it, and God knows what writers do in the late hours when they're sweating a deadline and need a distraction.
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Jun 1, 2009 21:07:46 GMT -5
Post by Georgina on Jun 1, 2009 21:07:46 GMT -5
The 3-D animation capabilities these days is nothing short of astounding. We went and saw "Up" again this evening (I conned a bunch of people from work to come with) and got the theatre right this time. The movie was great without the 3-D effect; the 3-D effect was mind boggling.
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Calluna
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Jun 5, 2009 10:36:28 GMT -5
Post by Calluna on Jun 5, 2009 10:36:28 GMT -5
Oh, yes, Wall-E was absolutely amazing! To have no dialogue, yet be able to have animated characters that are so expressive you always knew exactly what was going on was brilliantly done!
I thought Monsters, Inc was just okay. It was cute, but didn't have as much of the clever appeal to adults as other Pixar films; it was much more of your standard children's movie with only enough appeal to adults to keep the parents from going insane as their children watch it over and over and over again.
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Pax
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Jun 7, 2009 14:57:09 GMT -5
Post by Pax on Jun 7, 2009 14:57:09 GMT -5
I've seen virtually every 3-D movie they've come out with that use those polarized glasses. They're usually good movies, and one will never get to see them that way again (at least until they invent home versions of the projectors, which come to think of it may not be that farfetched).
I have to say as well, I'm glad to see that the film industry finally "got" 3-D. For decades it seemed like they only made the suckiest possible movies into 3-D, almost like a "with this technology, we don't have to bother with plot" philosophy. I'm glad they're finally actually making movies that are worth watching with it now.
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wheelspinner
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Jun 9, 2009 7:47:21 GMT -5
Post by wheelspinner on Jun 9, 2009 7:47:21 GMT -5
Coraline is coming to the Melbourne International Film Festival in 3D. I'm a bit of a Neil Gaiman fan, so I'll certainly be seeing that.
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Jun 13, 2009 13:21:17 GMT -5
Post by Georgina on Jun 13, 2009 13:21:17 GMT -5
It's not here yet. I'll keep an eye out for it. I think I'm a 3D fan now.
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Calluna
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Jun 15, 2009 18:45:53 GMT -5
Post by Calluna on Jun 15, 2009 18:45:53 GMT -5
I can't watch 3-D movies. They always make me slightly motion-sick...it's not the movies, but the glasses. My eyes just can't handle wearing those polarized type 3D glasses. I had a similar problem with a pair of polarized sunglasses...I guess my eyes don't like being polarized.
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Jun 21, 2009 8:32:08 GMT -5
Post by MacBeth on Jun 21, 2009 8:32:08 GMT -5
California girl gets dying wish to see movie 'Up'HUNTINGTON BEACH, Calif. – Colby Curtin got her final wish. The 10-year-old girl desperately wanted to see the new Disney-Pixar movie, "Up." But the cancer-stricken girl was too sick to go to a theater. Thanks to a family friend who got in touch with the movie studio Pixar, an employee of the Emeryville-based company arrived at Colby's home with a DVD copy of the movie, The Orange County Register reported Friday. The girl died later that night. Colby's mother, Lisa, said she had asked her daughter if she could hang on until the movie arrived. "I'm ready (to die), but I'm going to wait for the movie," she said her daughter replied. "Up" is the animated tale of a grumpy old man who, after his wife's death, tries to fulfill their joint dream of visiting South America by tying thousands of balloons to his house and floating away. "When I watched it, I had really no idea about the content of the theme of the movie," Colby's mother told the Register. "I just know that word 'Up' and all of the balloons and I swear to you, for me it meant that (Colby) was going to go up. Up to heaven." Colby, who was diagnosed with vascular cancer in 2005, saw previews for the film in April. "It was from then on, she said, 'I have to see that movie. It is so cool,'" family friend Carole Lynch said. But the girl's health began to deteriorate. On June 4, Curtin asked a hospice company to bring a wheelchair so that her daughter could go to a movie theater but the chair was not delivered over the weekend, Curtin said. By June 9, Colby was too sick to go anywhere. Another family friend, Terrell Orum, called both Pixar and Disney, which owns the animation studio. The message was received by Pixar officials, who agreed to send someone to Colby's house the next day with a copy of "Up" for a private screening, Orum said. The employee arrived with the DVD, stuffed animals of characters and other movie memorabilia. Colby was unable to open her eyes to see the movie so her mother described the scenes. When her mother asked if she enjoyed it, the girl nodded, Curtin said. The Pixar employee left after the movie, taking the DVD, which has not been released. Lynch, who was with the family during the screening, said the employee's "eyes were just welled up." A call to Pixar seeking comment was not immediately returned Friday. Colby, with her parents nearby, died later that night. Her mother said one of the memorabilia left by the Pixar employee was an "adventure book" based on a scrapbook that, in the movie, is kept by the wife of the main character. "I'll have to fill those adventures in for her," Lisa Curtin said of her daughter. news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090619/ap_on_re_us/us_dying_wish
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Aug 2, 2009 15:20:15 GMT -5
Post by Georgina on Aug 2, 2009 15:20:15 GMT -5
Coraline is coming to the Melbourne International Film Festival in 3D. I'm a bit of a Neil Gaiman fan, so I'll certainly be seeing that. I have Coraline on DVD in my hot little hands this weekend. I'll have to make time to watch it. It even came with four pairs of 3-D glasses. (I admit that I didn't much enjoy The Nightmare Before Christmas, so I've avoided Burton animations since then. I'll keep an open mind with this one.)
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wheelspinner
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Aug 15, 2009 7:55:55 GMT -5
Post by wheelspinner on Aug 15, 2009 7:55:55 GMT -5
Just watched Coraline in 3D at home, using the el cheapo glasses.
Not at all bad. The film looks fantastic, and oh what a creepy villain!
It worked a lot better at home than I thought it would, so I'm keen to try another 3D soon.
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wheelspinner
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Sept 6, 2009 2:13:31 GMT -5
Post by wheelspinner on Sept 6, 2009 2:13:31 GMT -5
Finally saw Up 3D (it just got released this week). Father's Day treat.
An eminent local film reviewer commented that they used the 3D to give depth to the shot, not "to throw things at you" and he's right. It's really well done.
The film was a pretty typical Pixar family film, with something for everyone. I certainly enjoyed myself, but it would not e the best animation I've seen this year (it's been one hell of a year for animated films IMO).
Saw a trailer for Astro Boy beforehand. Oh gawd, they've taken a classic Japanese manga superhero and turned him into an American teenager Yuk.
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Sept 7, 2009 2:48:01 GMT -5
Post by Georgina on Sept 7, 2009 2:48:01 GMT -5
Yes, something in it for everyone, and some lovely humour. Of course, the story is trite with an obvious message, but it was delightful in its execution. It made me laugh. Frequently.
I finally watched Coraline this weekend -- in 3D with horrid made-for-home glasses, even -- and enjoyed it very much. The paper glasses worked just fine. Tim Burton's directing and imaginative flair for off-beat characters and scenery is plain fun. The 3-D effect was entertaining too with things poking out at you and birds flying past your shoulder. It was nicely done.
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