Film Fanatics - Chat Thread II

I think it's better than the first, and much bolder in terms of scope. I absolutely loved the reveal at the end, I thought it used the first person perspective brilliantly. So yeah, from a first read (albeit very recently, so it's difficult to judge such things) I'd definitely describe it as great. I couldn't say if it's a classic or a book that will stick with me forever, but I really enjoyed it.

I'd also say it's a much, much more challenging proposition to film. There was a lot of disbelief when Gary Ross left, but I think he made a pretty shrewd decision to go out on a relative high.

Riding across Manhattan in a stretch limo in order to get a haircut, a 28-year-old billionaire asset manager's day devolves into a odyssey with a cast of characters that start to tear his world apart

It felt like she needed some excuse to go back to the novel idea she explored in the first book. It dragged on for the most part with Snow, Peeta and the badly written love 'triangle' - I felt indifferent to. The excitement and dread that built up in the first book was largely redundant in the second book too. The only redeeming quality was the new characters and how different events span out in the Quarter Quell. Each to their own I guess. Mockingjay was truly souless book though with cardboard characters and a big departure from the previous two.

An interesting observation: the 'Tessera' thing (necessary for those in poverty to survive) which gives you a year's rations of oil and grain for one person in exchange for an extra entry in the Reaping (tipping the odds of being selected in your favour) - everybody could just come together and agree to get 5-10 portions each and the odds would remain exactly the same.

Mockingjay was truly ****ing terrible.

An interesting article for all you Sci-Fi buffs.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/interactive/2012/apr/24/asteroid-mining-how-work-interactive

The footage opened up with wide expansive shots of people walking on mountains and over rich green landscapes — those awesome shots that became synonymous with the Lord of the Rings series when it began a decade ago. Thee shots looked incredible — almost like something you would see in an IMAX 3D nature documentary — so extremely vivid and breathtaking, and more real than we’ve ever seen these shots before.

This is the future of Cinema… I thought…

But my amazement quickly came to an end as the sizzle reel transitioned from the landscape footage to the character centric. Everything looked so… different. It was jarring.

The change from 24 frames per second to 48 frames per second is HUGE. It completely changes what every image looks like, the movements, the tone, everything is different.

It looked like a made for television BBC movie.

It looked like when you turn your LCD television to the 120 hertz up-conversion setting.

It looked uncompromisingly real — so much so that it looked fake.

More noticeable in the footage was the make-up, the sets, the costumes. Hobbiton and Middle Earth didn’t feel like a different universe, it felt like a special effect, a film set with actors in costumes. It looked like behind the scenes footage.

The movement of the actors looked… strange. Almost as if the performances had been partly sped up. But the dialogue matched the movement of the lips, so it wasn’t an effect of speed-ramping.

It didn’t look cinematic. Not at all, even with a top filmmaker like Peter Jackson at the helm.

“This is the future of cinema,” I wondered?

But it wasn’t just me — almost everyone I talked to, almost every conversation I overheard while leaving the presentation, all centered around how it didn’t look good.

I think it might be too early to completely write off this jump to higher*frame rates. I’m trying my best to be as non-sensationalistic as I possibly can.

Could it be that the footage is so unfinished that it just didn’t look right? Miracles can be accomplished in color time and post processing, so who knows?

Could it be that we’ve grown up looking at 24 frames per second and that this newer, presumably better, higher*frame rate*looks bad only because its something we’re not use to? Possibly? I don’t know. Maybe in 30 years we’ll be looking back at the choppiness of 24fps films and wonder how we could watch something so unrealistic. I really believed this would be possible leaving Cameron’s presentation last year, but this year I’m a lot more doubtful.

Hm, The Hobbit's new 48 frames per second didn't leave good impresssions.



http://www.slashfilm.com/cinemacon-ten-minutes-the-hobbit-underwhelms-higher-frame-rates-cinematic-future-james-cameron-promised/?utm_source=Movie+Magic&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+slashfilm+%28%2FFilm%29

I realise the new Total Recall trailer was never discussed on here. Was anyone else surprised by how good that film looks?

Yes, completely and utterly pleasantly surprised. I watched the trailer for the original film after and couldn't help but laugh at some of the clips...