Like VS Good

There is a pretty massive problem that runs through the general human community. It’s always been there, and I’m pretty sure that it always will be. But that doesn’t mean that something can’t be said about it. Considering that I’ve been stewing about this particular issue for a few weeks now, and it just keeps whirling faster and faster in my mind, I feel like that time is now.

Everybody who is alive has an opinion. Which is fine. You’re allowed to like what you like and hate what you hate. There’s really nothing concrete that can be used to forecast what a person will be drawn to or steer away from. No complex algorithm can predict 100% of the time which direction a person is going to veer. Just because you’re attracted to one thing does not mean that all things similar are going to be to your liking.

There are people who think that Joss Whedon is God and can do no wrong. There are just as many people who enjoy a few of the things that he’s done but by no means do they like all of them. Fans of Firefly do not automatically have to be fans of Dollhouse. I know somebody who likes none of the movies Guy Ritchie has done except for Sherlock Holmes.

And you know what? It’s okay to not like things.

This is a concept that is hard to grasp for some. I don’t know why.

Like does not always equal good and dislike does not always equal bad. It’s a personal opinion. What you enjoy and what you do not. There’s this stance that a lot of people take that if you don’t like what they like, then you’re going to burn in eternal hellfire.

I get a very strong reaction from about 99.9% of people who find out that I don’t like Doctor Who or Torchwood. I understand that this is a very popular thing right now. I can accept that I travel in circles of people who have very similar tastes and that nearly all of them are Whovians. What I cannot abide and do not like is that very few of those people have said to me “that’s okay, it’s not for everybody” once I utter the most forbidden of phrases “Not really a Who fan, sorry”. There’s no reason for hostility. I’m not saying that Doctor Who is a bad show. I’m saying that there’s not anything in Doctor Who that has grasped my attention to the point that I had to continue watching. I’m not personally insulting your mother, or any other member of your family, and I’m not saying that you’re any less of a person because it’s something that you enjoy.

On the other side of the coin is the problem of things that people dislike. I am very careful to say things like I didn’t like it, I couldn’t get into it, or it wasn’t to my tastes for most things. Because that’s the truth of the matter. These things are more than likely not actually bad, I just didn’t connect with them. Most, however, do not take the time to consider that point of view. Most are more than willing to state “Ugh, that was SO BAD” or “What an awful ___” even going so far as “I can’t believe you like that, it’s so bad”.

Now, see, that is personal, and it is insulting.

I don’t think that everybody needs to have the same opinions on things. That would make the world a really boring place. I do think that people need to learn to respect the opinions of others, and not jump down the throats of those that might disagree. Or insult those things that people around them like. You don’t like Star Wars? That’s fine. I like Star Wars. I like Star Wars so much that I have Star Wars tattoos. It’s pretty funny to watch people frantically backpedal when they attempt to talk shit about Star Wars to or around me and then realize who they’re talking to. Now, I don’t care if you don’t like Star Wars. I’m not going to get mad at you for that. Your opinion is not going to change mine. I am quite open to debates about it, I can tell you my side of things and you can tell me yours. You might even discover that I agree with you on some points, and you might be interested to learn that I like Star Wars despite certain things. But don’t insult me.

There are very few things in the world that line up with the I don’t like it/it’s actually really bad combination. Off the top of my head I can think of just a couple examples. The Watchmen: The End Is Nigh video game is one. There are very few games which I won’t play to the end. Curiosity has me wanting to know how the story unfolds, what the end is. Barring that? Determination sets in and I will power through it. This game though, this game had nothing going for it. And you know what? Every single person I have talked to feels the same way about it. A lot of people that I know didn’t even play it long enough to get the first achievement. The funny thing is that going through various rating sites, I’ve seen that there are reviews with high numbers scores that just talk about how repetitive and boring the game is. Proving, I guess, that sometimes people will overlook a lot of problems in the face of a sprinkling of good. Another example would be The Manitou. A movie so bad, it can’t even be made fun of. I recently watched this in a theater filled with people who had been riffing on movies all night long. When it got to this one, about the only thing that could constantly be heard was the call for the credits to roll.

These are two things that I would gladly say “That was a giant stinking ball of shit” and not feel the least bit bad about it.

There have been some things that I have stated on this vehicle for geekery of mine are bad. The Cowbows & Aliens graphic novel, for one. But I can admit that I went into that the opposite way that most did. I saw the movie first. I liked the movie a lot. When I read the graphic novel, it did not hold up for me. Conversely, many people who read it first did not like the movie. Which is something that I can understand. So while I detested the graphic novel and wrote a whole diatribe here on how bad it was, it’s a matter of opinion and not fact. I know this. And I don’t unleash the same volcano of negative words on a day to day basis when confronted by people who liked it. I revert to the simple and un-insulting “I didn’t particularly enjoy it”.

This is not passiveness, by the way. Refraining from being a dickbag is not the same as rolling over and letting people walk all over you. It’s allowing for the fact that not everybody has the same brain. It’s accepting that if everything was uniform and all people had the same tastes that life would be a monumentally dreary trudge. You don’t have to agree with everyone on everything. You don’t even have to agree with your friends on everything. In fact, you can be friends with people that have mostly differing opinions than yours. It works. That’s how you learn new things. That’s how you expand your horizons and become a more complex and interesting person.

It takes more character to disagree with those around you than it does to surround yourself with minds that share every opinion you have. And it shows true intelligence to understand that not everybody has to think the way you do.

Doom Plague Movies

I recently got pretty sick. Sick enough that I was incapable of doing anything at all except laying on my couch in complete delirious misery. I wasn’t even able to sleep, it was so bad. This gave me a lot of hours to fill. A lot of hours. Needless to say, perhaps, I cleared out a good number of things from my instant queue, and even hit a few things that were just randomly picked hoping they’d lull me into oblivion.

In total, I hit 20 movies in about 60 hours.

So I thought I’d do a bit of a brief writeup on each, and use a very easy scoring system. + if I liked it, - if I didn’t, \ if I don’t really go either way or maybe go both ways.

Here we go:

-American Loser: I really feel like they used Sean William Scott and Gretchen Mol as magnets for this movie knowing that people would flock to it, and then didn’t bother, you know, writing anything. This was such a boring movie. The idea that a guy is an alcoholic with learning disabilities and is trying to form a relationship with a chick that is just as fucked up as him has potential. It was not met. Or even glanced at.

+Assassination of a High School President: This was a lot better than I expected it to be. There were really interesting layers and the story was pretty intriguing. Bruce Willis’ character was simply amazing, his aversion to gum was well played out (something that I thought was going to be really stupid). It had a kind of noir-ish feel to it, but doesn’t quite dive into the pool. This isn’t a bad thing, even though it sounds like it should be.

+Let Go: Another movie I really thought was going to be blah, but turned out better than hoped. The description that Netflix gives it doesn’t really do it justice, not that I’m surprised by that happening anymore. Everybody they cast did a brilliant job at their parts, though I have to say my favorite was Kevin Hart. I love that guy. I really felt for him through the whole movie. He just kept trying and failing, and it so wasn’t even his fault.

+Safety Not Guaranteed: Granted, this movie has some kind of strange moments in it, and those moments wouldn’t have worked in any other setting, but they did in this one somehow. They only really left one thing untouched that nags at me, and that’s the like “I have only done this once before”. It’s never questioned, never brought up to the guy. Everything else is taken care of. Why not that? WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT TO ME!? I WAS SICK!

+Heavenly Creatures: I’ve known this story for some time. I have a couple of true crime books that talk about it or give the short version. When I found out that a movie had been made, of course I had to see it. I had never previously encountered the journal entries, and the addition of those just made the whole story more … more. It adds a level that you just don’t get when you’re reading the basic facts.

\The Snowtown Murders: So. So, I really liked the information this movie put forth. The facts of what went on. Depicting all the characters really well. It just wasn’t a very exciting movie. At times it was incredibly graphic (a scene where one brother rapes another goes on a lot longer than you’d think), and there was enough to keep my attention, but I think that I would have much rather read about all of it. As detailed as it was, there were some spots that didn’t really touch on things too deeply, and that was weird. I didn’t hate it, but I won’t watch it again.

-Jerk Theory: Fucking suuuuuucked. There was no redeeming moment in this movie at all. Not one. Nothing. The acting was bad, the story was stupid, it was boring, it had obnoxious songs in it. Bad. All bad. No good.

+He Was A Quiet Man: Not really something that I expected to see Christian Slater in. I mean, obviously he is, but the role, the character he plays, isn’t really Slater norm. I think it really shows his diversity as an actor, his amazingness, really. This movie was really touching. There were a lot of unexpected things, too, which I liked. I kind of wonder why I didn’t hear more about this movie, but I kind of don’t. You don’t really know what to expect going in, and there’s no real way to describe it to anybody else that doesn’t make it sound trite or unlike the movie you just watched.

+The Killing Jar: It could be that I just really really love Danny Trejo, Michael Madsen, and Harold Perrineau, but I had a lot of fun with this one. A lot. The plot synopsis makes it sound really boring, but I was not bored for one second.

\Capote: I like things that Capote has written, I just wasn’t really interested in the movie. I can’t exactly say why, either. Maybe just because I was sick and it’s not really a great sick movie? I don’t know. I also didn’t hate it. And Phillip Seymore Hoffman’s portrayal of Capote was glorious. Beautiful. He was stunning in that role. That’s what kept me watching the whole time, honestly.

-HottieBoombaLottie: Just. Shut up. This was a movie I hoped would destroy my brain and let me sleep. Unfortunately, I stayed awake for the whole thing. There were tiny funny moments, and that’s all it’s got going for it. So bad. So very, very bad. I might have actually gotten sicker due to this movie.

+Repeaters: What happens when you Groundhog Day a trio of recovering drug addict kids? Chaos! Wonderful, wonderful chaos. It’s not the most intelligent movie on the planet, and there are some plot holes that never get cleared up (really kind of minor plot, thankfully). Still, it was fun.

\Hick: The actors played their parts well, the concept was interesting, but when it was all said and done, I just wasn’t into the story. It wasn’t bad, it was just blah. Not the best. Also, Netflix should learn how to properly describe things, because this movie is nothing like how it’s written up.

+Nightwatch: There are two movies of this name. One of them is Russian and the other has Ewan McGregor and Josh Brolin. It is very important to make sure that you do not watch one thinking you are watching the other. They are very very different movies with very different plots and you will get VERY confused. That said, this Nightwatch was FANTASTIC. Man, I loved it. I was on the edge of my seat. As much as I could be, since I was laying down curled in a ball. WATCH THIS MOVIE. Goddamn.

\Howl: I am not a fan of the poem, Howl. This movie, however, was pretty well done, and the animation was amazing. Jon Hamm and James Franco nailed their parts. And the story of the trial is pretty interesting, too. They cut out the more boring bits, of course, making it seem less tedious than I’m sure it was. It was entertaining enough to keep a sick girl happy.

-Arthur: I hate Russell Brand. I do. There’s only one thing he’s in that I can think of that I enjoy, and that’s Despicable Me. I’m not sure why they picked him to redo something Dudley Moore did so well, but it was a poor, poor choice. He just didn’t pull it off.

\Project X: I watched this largely because I saw a preview for it with a friend of mine and the dog in the jumping castle was really amusing. I’m ambivalent toward the movie in general, as it had some fun parts, but the concept is not really… anything I’m into. If that many people were anywhere near my house, people would be getting shot. By me.

-Nine Dead: I don’t think I’ve been so disappointed in a movie in a really long time. This one should have been great. Nothing about it was, though. It was flat, it didn’t have suspense, it didn’t have interesting characters, the actors failed at getting anything across (except for the mob guy, he was pretty believable), and I will never – not ever in my life – believe Melissa Joan Hart in a role like that.

+Employee of the Month: This movie really starts out shitty. I gave up on it a couple of times just because the flow was off and the story wasn’t catching me. But I hit a certain point and all of it turned around. From then on, it was good times for everybody. Okay, just for me, since I watched it alone. Blood, laughter, things that were completely unexpected. It’s like the recipe for awesome.

+Killer Elite: Yep. Yes. All the time yes. All the yesses in the whole world. I cannot yes enough. I did go into this thinking that it was all action, which it’s not, but I wasn’t upset at the absence. There were actiony parts that were enough to fill my desires. The rest of it… wow. Wow. And the line “Strawberry or fuck you”? I knew I was in love as soon as it was uttered.

Knight And Day

I truly never thought that I would find myself sitting down to purposefully watch a Tom Cruise movie ever again. Ever. After he went crazypants and then started touting the joys of Freaky Religion and then went even crazier, I more than kind of gave up on him as a person.

But I saw a trailer for this on something else that I’d gotten from Netflix, and I thought that it looked really funny. Imagine that. It attracted my attention, and I decided to put it on my queue.

Now, it wasn’t the worst movie that I’ve ever seen. In fact, it was pretty good where the action was concerned. The story wasn’t half bad at that. But I didn’t really go into this thing for the action. I went into it for the comedy. And in that, it fails. Every single funny part of this movie is actually in the trailer. So if you’re looking for a really good laugh, just watch that, because that’s all there is. You’ll be just as disappointed as I was if you try to watch the entire movie expecting that level of humor through the whole thing.

I also have to make a comment on Cameron Diaz and the level of poorness that leaked out of her all over everything. She’s not my favorite to begin with, actually, to be honest, I usually try to avoid anything that she’s in, because I don’t think she’s a good actor, and she pulls everything down with her. She’s a perpetually sinking ship and her vortex is too strong for anything to escape. This movie was no different. Her attempts to be funny fell horribly short, her tries at smart didn’t fair any better. I certainly didn’t believe her when she was talking about her love of car restoration. I don’t know what the appeal is here for her. I really don’t.

The one other nitpick I have is with the title. The fact that through the entire movie he goes by a different name, and you don’t even get introduced to it until the very end, really bothers me. It really really felt forced when it happened, too. As if they liked this title so much that they just had to use it, but then totally forgot to throw in any on-screen reference until the script was almost done. It might have even be that the script was done and they realized what had happened, and then tacked on the last scene in some rediculous pickup filming day. Better that it had been left out completely and the title changed.

But as I said, as an action movie, it’s okay. Not something that I’m ever going to own, or watch again for that matter, but I know at least one person who has seen it who enjoyed it. They, however, went into it expecting action and not comedy. Had I done the same, perhaps I would feel differently. Right now I just feel gypped and bitter.

Autumn (So… there’s a movie?)

Imagine my surprise, if you will, as I come upon this in the Netflix Instant selection. I think to myself “No, it can’t be…can it?” And it is. I was a little shocked at first that this movie had come out and had not had any sort of mention in the main stream. But then I wasn’t.

It’s hard for me to say that I liked this movie, though it’s also hard for me to say that I didn’t like this movie. It’s such a balanced thing, and the penalty for overstepping one way or the other is a pit full of poisoned jagged spikes. And angry badgers.

This movie clearly suffered from the low budget it was given. Production value was incredibly low. I don’t think they even got to use a good camera. It sort of feels like what they had on hand was something somebody had bought for a kid of theirs a few years ago because that kid said they wanted to make awesome action movies, but the parent didn’t want to get them something too good for a few reasons, namely it’s a camera for a kid and also the kid doesn’t stick to things for long.

There was also some fairly poor acting happening. Mostly this occurred with characters that didn’t really matter anyway, so it wasn’t like it impacted the whole thing very much, nor did it last very long. It wasn’t bad acting that one had to endure from start to finish.

On the other hand, this movie is very true to the book. They took no liberties with the story. They had everything happen the way that it was written. Even the settings were pretty much exactly as I had imagined while I was reading.

They also managed to snare some fairly big named actors, namely Dexter Fletcher and David Carradine. Having two faces like that in your film means something. Unfortunately, it might mean that the whole of the budget went to them to get them to climb aboard, sacrificing other things in the process. But this isn’t really one of those things where they’d be in it just for the cash. This is something that actors do because they like the source material and believe in the project.

I’m really having a hard time deciding how I feel about this. It was pretty badly done, but not so much that I was bored or shut it off. We’ve already established that I’m not against bailing on something fifteen minutes in if I’m really put off by it. I wish they’d done better, I wish that I could give this a resounding hooray. Obviously that’s not going to happen.

I guess I’d say that if you read and enjoyed the book, that you should sit down and have a watch. But if you haven’t, don’t bother. Unless you’re a huge David Carradine fan, because he plays a pretty fantastic nutjob.

Kameo

Let me tell you a little bit about my history with Kameo. It needs to be said, or I don’t think it’ll make much sense, my feelings about this game. My inability to truly feel much about what’s going on.

Once upon a time, I decided to try GameFly. I thought that it might be a good idea, renting games, getting to see what I might like and what I might hate without paying for a whole game. In theory, it’s brilliant. I suspect that for most people out there, it’s a wonderful tool. For me? Utter failure. Complete waste of time. Even though I didn’t pay anything at all for my two week trial with them, I feel like I wasted a lot of effort.

I tried games that I thought I might like, and when I did like them, I went out and bought them anyway. With my track record of games I like when I buy them VS games I hate, there’s not a lot of risk there. I could see where it would be risky for people who just pick up every game they see and give it a try. GameFly would be great for them. So you can see, effort wasted. Time wasted.

One of the games that I tried with GameFly was Kameo. I did like it pretty goddamned quickly, and it also happened to be at the very end of my trial. So I sent it back, went to the store with the intent to buy it and promptly saw something shinier. I can’t tell you now what it was, just that I had to have it more than I had to have Kameo.

Months later, I was back in the store, and lo – Kameo. Cheaply. So I picked it up. Why not? I’d had fun the first time, though I hadn’t gotten very far at all. I took it home and put it directly into my machine, happy as a clam.

And I shit you not, the next day something came out that would once again eclipse my playing of Kameo. And once again, I cannot tell you what that thing was, just that it was bigger and bolder, and called to me so deeply that I ignored the small cries of this newly bought game as I pried the disk out of the tray and shoved it back into it’s case, then onto the shelf. I should note here that I got exactly as far through the game as I had the first time.

A year later. Kameo again. Again it is usurped.

Forgotten in the stacks of games to play, I finally came upon it this year in my quest to finish every half touched game that I owned. I decided that now was the time to let this game shine. Now was the moment. I placed it where it needed to go and sat my ass down on the couch, ready. I restarted my game, because by this time, I had no memory of what I’d learned – however little – and what had happened in the story.

After about a half hour, I realized that I hadn’t gotten very far at all and caught up to where I recalled leaving off very quickly. Kind of sad, really, given all the efforts I’d gone to previously (*cough*). It also occurred to me that not once in my former tries had I ever gotten further than this into the game. Always, something more had come forward and taken my attentions away. For a few hours, I played with fear and trepidation. What if something fantastic were to fall into my lap as I held the controller in my hand? What if it demanded to be played instantly and once again Kameo was thrown to the wayside?

And then I got over it, because I realized I am my own downfall, and if I didn’t go seeking new shiny games, they would not appear.

It didn’t take me long to get through this game. And I did have fun with it. But I just have this kind of apathy going on about it. I don’t care that I played it, really. I guess I’m glad I did, it’s done with, it’s not on my shelf anymore. It’s not waiting for me and mocking me every time I walk by. But I have no sense of satisfaction. I have no feeling of accomplishment. I didn’t put down my controller and think to myself “Holy shit, that was a good game” and I didn’t by any means desire to play it again. It wasn’t a bad game, it really wasn’t. Plus, I am an avid, nearly insanely so, replayer, thus my lack of desire to go through again was and is surprising and confusing.

I don’t know where this feeling – or lack thereof – comes from. Is it because I just let it sit for too long? Is it that I tried too many times to get into this game and it never happened, thus leaving me with an empty hole where my enjoyment should be? I don’t know. I just don’t.

I have passed this game on, a thing I don’t really do, as I like to keep them around so I can play them again at a later date. But I know that I will not ever pick up Kameo again. I won’t ever give it another go round. PLEASE. SOMEBODY EXPLAIN THIS. My world is upside down (I’ll get over it).

Vanity Fair

There’s only one reason I watched this movie. Reese Witherspoon. I adore her so much. She’s not only gorgeous and adorable, but a fantastic actress as well.

This isn’t really my sort of movie, but I can’t really say that it was bad, either. It kept my attention, it was interesting while I watched it, and it was visually appealing to boot.

I suppose I could sit through it again, if somebody I knew wanted to see it, and I won’t own it. I don’t see myself purposefully watching it a second time by myself. But, it’s not really my sort of movie, like I said.

There’s not really any resounding negative criticism I can think of to give it. The actors did well, the story was well written, it wasn’t horribly slow paced as I sort of dreaded it would be. The costumes were fun to look at. If you like this sort of thing, I say go for it.