What bugs me about that part of the essay is earlier he even says
So even he realizes there could be a simple explanation for it (air is rare in space and they might not have enough to spare) plus dozens of other possibilities such as the ship not being able to survive a massive depressurization anyway or that there’s no way to vent the air in that manner.
Copied from my LJ after a rewatching of The Day After Tomorrow…
I mean, seriously, what the hell was Dennis Quaid going to do?
DQ: “So, heya son, I made it all the way here from Philadelphia, despite being near death the entire time, and even losing one of my colleagues on the way, but here I am!”
JG: “Great, dad, did you bring us food or firewood or weapons or warm clothing or clean water or blankets or a satellite phone or a survival guide or a snow shovel or a Swiss Army Knife?”
DQ: “Well, er, no…”
JG: “Yay! One more mouth to feed with no benefit whatsoever! Great fucking idea!”
Exactly, and it’s the mark of a bad audience to demand immediate explanations of all points, instead of being able to let explanations unfold organically. I despise it when filmmakers don’t trust the audience to survive in confusion for part of the film (and Dark City was therefore nearly ruined for me by the initial exposition).
As just mentioned, if they let the air out, they won’t have anything to breathe, either. I don’t recall any sign that they had inexhaustible supplies of air. (Smoking doesn’t destroy air, of course: it just converts oxygen into carbon dioxide, and presumably a life-support system could convert it back).
Wasn’t he in an intersection? If so, how do you tell him which way the critter’s coming from, without knowing which way he’s facing? I’m sure they could have figured it out, given time; but that’s not an easy explanation to offer on the spur of the moment.
The change in mass issue seems legit, though.
Daniel
Oh yeah, that’s the shitties piece of introduction voiceover ever done. I was lucky enough to accidentally start watching the movie right after it the first time I saw it. I can’t imagine how much worse the movie must seem to the people who don’t.
Whoops, forgot to mention the crucial bit: Get your arses back into suspended animation, then let the air out. I’m sure Mother could handle it.
Good point, he was just a blip to them. Presumably, they’ve seen the way the blip’s moving, though.
I choose to believe that the alien raided a food store, but it should have been mentioned.
First time I saw Dark City I missed the very beginning I came in just as he was waking up in the bathtub. Wow I was totally enthralled by the movie the twists turns and surprises. So when I bought the DVD I was totally shocked by the intro. Now when I show it to people I fast forward over the beginning and tell them just to trust me.
Now, guys, RealityChuck is an actual published author, that means his opinion has more weight than ours (you do realize he wrote that review, don’t you? Kinda disingenuous to link to your own work without letting people know that it’s you, innit?). I’m sure that nobody could go to the bargain bin at Goodwill and pick up one of his books and proceed to nitpick a half a dozen minor plot inconsistencies to death. Nope. No way that could happen. :dubious:
[Johnny Carson]I did not know that![/jc]
I am stunned. Seriously. That’s pathetic.
Yeah because if you want to do a real ad hominem attack you could have used the quote :
However I think the main problem is that the writer completely misses the point of the film. And more importantly doesn’t seem to understand perfectly normal irrational human reactions to stress.
Characters don’t die because their are just a bunch of idiots. they die because they make very human mistakes when it comes between saving their skins or aiding a fellow crew member. Lambert (sorry the annoying Lambert) is useless but why wouldn’t she be? She is trained to navigate a frieghter… that’s it. When stress come she folds up and never recovers.
Regarding The Spring loaded Cat bit: The charcter becomes less tense because the sudden fright was a release of tension. Next time you watch a horror movie you can see that in action. There could be two cheap frights in a row but they come quick because the first always breaks the tension. Once you have a scream the tension breaks and must either be built up all over again or paid off quickly.
Yeah there are some plot holes and some things that don’t make sense when you really think about it, but Aliem was more about Atmosphere and character than logic. Hell all horror movies are just that illogical and irrtional because that is what fear is.
Now you may dislike the film but to rank it with the likes of Face off or say Battlefield earth is just plain stupid. The movie ranks quite highly in many circles and by film makers for a reason.
I had no clue. That’s really lame.
Yes, *Alien *would have been a MUCH better movie if it had been about people always doing exactly the right thing, at the right time, for the right reasons. If they’da only done what Chuck woulda had them do, we coulda spent the rest of the movie watching them quietly fill out the paperwork. Certainly no plot holes in that scenario.
Maybe he can fix *Vertigo *for us, too; that movie didn’t make a lot of sense either. Or Citizen Kane: if Kane had just explained what he meant by “rosebud,” we never woulda had to sit around and wait for the other guy to figure it out.
Before I get to my picks, I would like to say something. I have read several negative posts recently (not to mention all the bad reviews) about The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen . Granted, it was kinda silly in parts (as most action pictures tend to be), but I truly enjoyed it. By nature, action films are chock full of improbable scenarios (or am I being too cynical to think that one rumpled explorer with a cheesy hat couldn’t *possibly * take on half the German army?); the key to escapist fare is to get past the improbabilities and just be entertained – I know I was by the IJ movies and LOEG. The appeal for LOEG for me was this: here is an action-adventure film for people who actually read books ! And, if it got a person who doesn’t to pick one up and read it, more power to that film!
Now, for some truly stupid movies:[ul]
[li]Me, Myself and Irene–Granted, some people may think that Jim Carrey movies in general fit this award: however, since he has made some that are actually pretty good, this one goes to the top of the list of the ones that aren’t. One stupid premise after another![/li][li]Communion–Could anything be more asinine than the book? Sadly, yes.[/li][li]Rhinestone–Screenwriter: “Dolly Parton teaches a NY cabdriver to be a country singer–and Sylvester Stallone plays the cabdriver!” Studio Chief: “I had jello today…”[/li][li]Poison Ivy–Where was the Humane Society when that poor dog was being subjected to Sara Gilbert and Drew Barrymore’s acting?[/li][/ul] Now maybe we can get off the Alien debate and go after the real offenders!:dubious:
I figured it out, but only because I already knew that RealityChuck was (is) a published sci-fi author. I wasn’t bothered by his linking to his website.
I did not realize that Reality was linking to his own essay, but i don’t think he was especially disingenuous about it, either. His post about ad hominems definitely had me confused.
In any case, let me just say I don’t find his essay remotely convincing.
Stupidest movies? Soldier was so bad it passed into good and back into bad again. My favorite scene was early in the movie in which stoned-out-of-their-gourd soldiers duckwalk through a Hee Haw set, pointing toy guns and shouting “Blammo!” at extras whenever the extras jump up from the cardboard “houses.” Or at least that’s how I remember it. The production values weren’t exactly top-notch.
And Contact was a manipulative movie about an interesting premise; ultimately, though, it lacked the courage to maintain ambiguity, and took the coward’s way out in a hoary chestnut of a cliche that left my mouth tasting like I’d just drunk spoiled milk.
Daniel
That’s true sometimes. On the other hand, if it’s something so obvious and glaring that it makes the audience wonder “hey, what happened?” or “why didn’t they do that,” the filmmaker has done something wrong, and explaning it an hour later might not help.
Alien is not a science fiction movie, it is a monster movie, it is a horror movie and it is a very successful one at that.
The difference is in *Raiders *the implausibility is in human behavior; in how an ordinary person responds to an extraordinary situation. The implausibilities in *League *were implausibilities of the laws of physics (at least the ones that ruined it for me). Implausible behavior is far more, well, plausible, than a submarine the size of the Titanic stealthily lurking in Venetian shadows.
That’s the main problem with Chuck’s “critique” of Alien: most of his objections are with how people react in extraordinary circumstances. Hell, practically every film noir ever made is about people making bad decisions and being unable to escape the consequences. If you could dismiss every film that ever has a character do something dumb, that wouldn’t leave you with much in your Netflix queue. I’m unable to come up with even one title.
How timely! I just suffered through Van Helsing this weekend; bits and pieces of it, anyway. I couldn’t bring myself to watch the whole thing, but I did return to it occasionally because I recognized David Wenham in a monk get-up, and I love David Wenham.
What a crapfest. There are very few movies that make me laugh at their sheer badness, but this was one. Especially when that lamebrain (I have no idea who the actor was) did his ridiculous Bela Lugosi accent!
I nominate The Deep End. From the very beginning, Someone does Something Stupid. Then it continues, and so on, and so forth.
I vaguely recall the main character dragging some dead body off to a freakin’ shallow area of the lake, and that’s dumb enough in itself if you wish to hide such a thing. Then she realizes that she needs something that is on the body, so she goes back to retrieve it, and…Oh, never mind. It’s too stupid to continue writing about.
Starship Troopers was horrible. Pointless, gratuitous, violent twaddle. The book was light years better than that tripe.
I have to add my vote to The Day After Tommorow. Why? Because the end of the world just wasn’t bad enough. They had to add wolves. :rolleyes:
I’ll nominate the movie Solo starring Mario Van Peebles. I will say upfront that I have not seen the movie. Why am I nominating a movie that I haven’t seen? Because of one line.
To set this up, Mario Van Peebles plays some sort of robot/cyborg killing machine that gains a conscience and goes goody rogue midway through the movie. At some point in the movie, a techy sort of character gives us this reason as to why Solo is no longer following orders.
“Killing makes Solo feel bad.”
It makes him feel bad? That was the best line they could come up with?