3-Duped

I got a little glimpse of the future last night.
And it involved a lot of people wearing funny glasses.

I happened to see two different 3-D experiences. First, Samsung’s new 3D TV, and then the 3-D film Clash of the Titans.

Care to guess which was the better experience?

It was the TV.
The screen was crisp and the graphics hovered out in front of the set like something out of Minority Report. The content wasn't much, a loop of sporting events, but 30 seconds of a soccer game was all I needed to understand the potential.

Of course, for the full 3-D experience you'll need a new TV, a new Blu-Ray player, and don't forget the special 3-D glasses. A steal at $249 a pair.

Well now, perhaps the movie is looking a little more affordable eh? An extra 3 dollars a ticket doesn't seem so bad if you get a 3-D experience in return… Except this isn't real 3-D. This is a 2-D film, converted into 3-D.

Seems the producers of Clash of the Titan decided they'd spend an extra 5 million to convert the flat 2-D film into 3-D. Or almost 3-D. Call it 2 and half.

Now, I’m not a fan of 3-D but I’m know when it’s done right. Avatar. Coraline. Up.
Of the new breed of 3-D films Clash of the Titans is the worst viewing experience I have seen in years. Some scenes have no depth at all. Take off your glasses and you'll see little or no difference. Often one or two characters appear to hover in front of the background. The effect is basically that of a children’s pop-up book.

Many film blogs have relished sharing the details that the producers actually outsourced the 3-D conversion to a shop in India. Meanwhile SFX wizards are pointing out that most theatres aren't equiped to properly project 3-D films. The polarized sunglasses you wear darken the image and hurt picture quality. One can imagine the animators who worked on the new and improved Kracken crying when they see the muddy results.

Now, let’s be clear. Without or without 3-D, Clash of the Titans is no future classic. It’s the Showgirls of action films. A quick and silly sword and sandals adventure, (regarding Medusa, our hero says “Don’t look the bitch in the eyes”) with a plot that belongs in the Mighty Hercules cartoon.

But who cares right? We just want to watch Sam Worthington slash stuff!

Meanwhile movie theatres are converting to 3-D capable systems as fast as they can. Far from being a novelty, 3-D films are beginning to clutter up the multiplex forcing theatre owners to make tough decisions. The charming How to Train You Dragon barely got a foothold before Clash of the Titans came along.

But the worst effect of the return of 3-D is how it brings out Hollywood’s shallow side.
Now more than ever it's not about how good a picture is, it's about the spectacle.


The industry considers movie like State of Play or Duplicity failures. All that money for big movie stars and nothing to show for it? So why waste time writing something smart and hard to sell? If you have a movie with a great visual component just slap a 3-D on that title and you’re set!

So get ready for Tron 3-D, Smurfs 3-D, Piranha 3-D, Harry Potter 3-D, and Erector Set…3-D.
(Really. )



A now in honour of the next ten years of squinting through sunglasses, a classic from Timbuk3.


*Update*
The Big Picture has an interesting take on why Movie Stars should fear 3-D the most.

Dammit He Can Sing Too (Whedon on This American Life)

So there I am doing the dishes and listening to the recent live show from This American Life.
If you don't know what This American Life is then you simply just don't love radio. Recently This American Life did a live show in Chicago and beamed it to theatres across North American. They had special guests, John Savage told a moving story about his mother and faith. And fan fav, Joss Whedon appeared. (Creator of Buffy, Firefly, Dollhouse and more.)

Before Whedon took to the stage they set things up by showing a couple clips from Whedon's hilarious Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog. A musical, about a super villain, told in the form of a video blog. Yes, that is three flavours of awesome right there. And it works. Check it out if you haven't.

Anyway, now that the musicial, which started as a web-based experiment during the writer's strike, has become a big hit, Whedon had to cough up some bonuses for the DVD. And because he's evidently exploding with creative output, Whedon decided to SING parts of the of the commentary.

Which is my very long way of setting up this song. Here is a song, where creator Whedon sings on a commentary track about the pitfalls of telling the audience too much. It's a song about the value of mystery to link back to my last post on JJ Abrams.

And it's a damn fine song and the man has a point. Certainly grabbed me, so please enjoy. And of course go listen to the whole show of This American Life, they do a lovely podcast.

The video is from some janky screen grab from the live show. The official version from the Dr.Horrible DVD is here. But I found i liked the live version better.

One the Best (of 2009)

Just saw an amazing film I'm confident I'll be placing on my top ten list come next December.

Coraline comes from the prolific author Neil Gaiman and the director behind The Nightmare Before Christmas. Comes out in February. I'll be reviewing it I'm sure. But keep an eye out.

In the meantime check out this trailer.

Oh and by the way it's in 3-D. More on that later.

Watchmen Will Suck

Sorry.

There's no other way to put it.

Having just watched the new trailer.

It's clear I've been kidding myself.

The director of 300 has taken one of the best superhero sagas ever put into book form and ruined it.

The slow motion shots, the characters calling themselves "Watchmen", the heroes posing like refugees from one of the BAD batman movies...it's all wrong.

Watchmen if you don't know was a graphic novel, actually originally a comic series. It was deranged genius Alan Moore trying to ask the question what would the world really be like with superheroes? We saw how they were compromised by the government, how they sunk into themselves, wallowing in their glory and sadism.

It was a harsh, multi-layered look at another world.

In the trailer, the heroes strut like magazine stars. Their latex outfits glisten. Rorschach the comic's relentless and somewhat psychotic detective now sounds like Dirty Harry with extra hubris.

In the comic you had an idea of what the world with superheros would feel like. Smell like. And some of it was...shabby, awkward even embarrassing. Nothing on earth can make a guy wearing underwear on the outside and Owl Ears look right. Watchmen's writer and artist knew this. Their Night Owl had a middle-aged paunch. He didn't look comfortable putting the cowl on...that was the point.

Instead director Zack Snyder seems to be reveling in it all.

I have a baaaaaaaaaad feeling this is not the masterpiece Comic fans have been waiting for.

Intimate Iron Man

Amazing, intimate and warm pictures of...Iron Man the movie. 

Best of all, shot by Mr.Stane himself, Jeff Bridges. (Link takes you to Jeff's personal website.)

Many of you are fans of the movie I'm sure.  This will solidify that feeling.   We here at G.O.F. have the DVD.  Movie stands up, even for the non-comic geeks out there.  

And speaking of all things comic and geek...I caught Ed Norton's Incredible Hulk.

Ewww boy. That is one bad film.  Hulk is actually one of my fav comic characters.  Hard to say why, maybe because he's so...basic.  Big Green Guy.  Monster Strong. Super Angry.  Plus there's all the great Jekyll and Hyde stuff.  Read some of the good Peter David comic runs if you don't believe me. 

Anyway.  To the incredibly-bad Hulk.  The final fight scene. Wow.  First, I've never seen a multi-million dollar movie like that where I thought the effects were WORSE than a video game.  You got a fine actor like Ed Norton, and then a CGI Hulk that looks like an insert in a Final Fantasy Game or something.  Yeech.  Plus, Hulk grimacing in pain?  Getting his ass handed to him by the Abomination?  Not quite green?  No no no.

(And it has to be said as a Torontonian. That does not look like New York City.  You can go and put up a sign that says Apollo Theatre.  It's still Toronto's Yonge St. and Dundas.  Probably one of the most recognizable intersections in Canada.)

 

Amazing fumble by the Marvel comic company there. I'm now convinced the only way to do Hulk is without CGI. Get a really BIG guy and make him look even bigger using smart camera tricks like they employed in the Lord of the Rings series.  It sounds retro I know but think about it. If they can make John Rhys-Davies appear Gimli-sized, certainly it's doable.  Plus, it gives Hulk what he's missing, the human touch.  CGI has come a long way, but for the moment we're still experts in recognizing true human emotions.  Seems to me a human actor, with the 2008 version of green-screen technology is the best of both worlds.   

 To sum up:  

• Bridges - still a heck of a cool guy and evidently a great photographer.
• Iron Man - solid movie, G.O.F. guaranteed. 
• The Incredible Hulk - steaming pile of gamma-radiated refuse.