Freeza Under The Shower - 5/50 books | 91/50 movies | 5 shows
Books:
1. Short stories that I will count as one book: Wool, and I have No Mouth And I Must Scream. That was fun.
2. Story by Robert McKee (1999). Extremely helpful in getting down to writing structure.
3. Snoop (2008). Not as insightful as I had hoped, as basically the only semi-good predictor of personality is 'what's in the bookcase', with personal websites giving the best chances at a correct guess. The correctness is determined by self-reported scores though, so it's unclear to what extent this measures ecology instead of psychology.
4. Papierverwerkende industrie (2009).
5. Superfreakonomics (2009). The less said about this the better.
Movies:
1. Big Hero 6 (turd)
2. Hobbit 3 (turd)
3. Birdman (excellent!)
4. Tintin (holy sheeet is this movie insane. Zhou wasn't kidding)
5. Safety Not Guaranteed (nice, though it cheapens the ending a bit. I also felt the main character was written to be male, with the whole Star Wars thing)
6. Hotel Transylvania (bleh. Bleh bleh. Felt restrained for some reason)
7. Legend (never saw it in full, but that early Ridley Scott insane amount of details is there. The doll scene in Blade Runner is exceptional in this regard though. It's strange to see how patient Scott was back then, allowing an insane amount of detail to carry the viewer's attention instead to pay them off with some spectacle. The walk-through-glass in particular combined with the oner just before it still holds up very well. As does Alien, of course. Legend is no different in that regard, with the dance scene and 'the kitchen' . The Grey does show that same patience though, not too eager to jump to 'the next action' like most people would. )
8. Starship Troopers 2: Hero of the federation (basically cheap body horror based on an idea from Roughnecks, but it's not altogether unserviceable. It has nothing to do with the novel though)
9. Jupiter Ascending. Damn shame they choose cinderella as their entry into a Dune-like universe. It's kind of a mess, but it's not for lack of trying. I do want an entire movie of 'the Kunis family' though. Those scenes are charming and worth it, but the 'House Artreides' stuff just doesn't pan out the way it should. As said, this movie hinders its own story by its narration perspective. This could have used a merciless editor, but damn if they didn't try to make this a spectacle. Also: the ship you see within the first ten minutes just screams Warhammer 40k to me.
10. Red Planet (2000). Somehow I had never seen this movie. Like pretty much all movies involving Mars it's kind of a mess, but I have to say that it feels 'better' than the average of its day and age. I mean, it doesn -kind of- try to keep its science self-consistent, where 'the other Mars movie' by Palma didn't as far as I remember. Somehow however, this movie bombed hard and that movie did even.
11. Mission to Mars. Yup, still a turd
12. Heat (1995). Holy hell, this shit ERUPTS.
13. Logan's Run (1976). Somehow missed this one. It was solid. All I could think off with the soundtrack was "MASS EFFECT" though. Man, that is just never going to stop hurting isn't it...
14. Silent Running (1972). It's official. I do not know my genre of choice, apparently. I had not seen this one either, but I've seen that ship design EVERYWHERE.
15. Forbidden Planet (1956). A dashing young Leslie Nielsen finds himself stranded on a planet with one woman and a horde of horny shipmates. Oh right, and an invisible monster that wants to kill them all. details, details.... fun movie though. Heavy on the exposition (like, really damn heavy), but fun either way. I can see why people liked Robby the Robot so much though.
16. Nightcrawler (2014). See:
this post I loved it.
17. No country for old men. I have to admit I don't really 'get' the ending, other than on a superficial level. It probably helps if you know the title came from a poem, but that doesn't really help much.
18. Leviathan (1989). A seemingly expensive rip-off from Alien and The Thing, but it does entertain, even if the direction is messy with ques and such.
19. Of Origin Unknown (1983). The polar opposite of Leviathan: a tight, well made struggle between a '80's yuppy and a rat. Wonderful movie.
20. Debug (2014). Doc McKay from Stargate Atlantis presents: a fairly decent space slasher movie featuring hackers this time. It's a little over-doing it on the special effects and somewhat underwritten(scenes and characters, mostly), but it's serviceable. One rather 'newbie' mistake however, is the names of characters. You should also make sure your character have very different names, so the audience can always tell them apart, particularly in dialogue about another character. Every character in this movie seems to have an a at the end of their name, which makes it hard to tell who is who. And of course character motivations needs more background and less telling, more showing. So basically newbie mistakes, but the integration of effects into the movie is quite good.
21. I completely forgot I watched Avengers 2: Age of Ultron (2015). It's an easy movie to forget about, though not for lack of trying. It just doesn't work as it should.
22. There Will Be Blood (2007). Hmm. Excellent performances, but I find the implied mystic element to be a detriment to my enjoyment of the story.
23. Gone Girl (2014). Good story, but as a film there is a certain disconnect between the novel as a 'dark comedy' and Fincher's usual thriller tone. There is also the evident mismatch between the character of Ben Affleck and him clearly being buff for Batman. It's impossible to ignore that, as well as the cops immediately starting an investigation. That's jumping the gun a bit, and a bit too much 'jump to conclusions' with awkward Law & Order reference as a result. It takes an hour to get down to business, and it is worth it once it gets there, but I feel that the movie could have used a little bit more refinement. For a first screenplay by a novelist it's great though.
24. Ex machina (2015). Good, but perhaps in need of a little refinement to make certain elements more evident. I suppose it's nitpicking though.
25. Chappie (2015). Well this movie is pretty fucking dumb. Very good effects work, but not a lot story meat to it. Also I got tired of the Die Antwoord peeps real fast.
26. Kingsman (2015). Freeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee biiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiird, the entire fucking thing. Amazing. 007 is going to have to work to earn his keep with Kingsman around. Also, you can tell Bradley James Allan did stunt coordination, and that is a very, very good thing.
27. The imitation game (2014). A dramatized account of the Enigma decryption program, focused on Alan Turing. Quite nice and good performances, but it doesn't escape that whole 'propaganda / oscar bait' that these movies tend to have. It's a good movie though.
28. Rollerball (1975). Okay. It's movie about the re-discovery of individuality in a future dystopia, with the game serving as its means to do so, but it fell a little flat. The 'game' scenes themselves are solid though.
29. Network (1976). I can pretty much stop watching movies now, because I think I really have just seen the perfect movie. Prophetic, erudite without shame, awesome performances, and edited without mercy for maximum meaning. THIS is a real movie, for real people. Call it satire all you want, but you will see what I mean when you watch it.
30. The Princess Bride (1987). Hadn't seen this one yet, so all those references were lost on me.
31. something something feminism, in theathers. Neat.
32, Jurassic World. I wish I could say it was good, but it really isn't.
33. Terminator Genisys (2015). Much more entertaining than I expected. Much better than Jurassic World, I would say.
34. There and back again (2015, fan edit of The Hobbit movies). I'm counting this one because it's three hours long and basically creates a 'new' movie, which is basically the 'old' story of The Hobbit. Both awkward in terms of cuts as well as surprisingly better than the actual movies in terms of the titular character.
35. Day of the dead (1985). Eh. Romero's least serviceable movie in the 'dead' series, probably.
36. Altitude (2010). Got tricked by gaf into thinking this was a Lovecraft type movie. It's just a regular teen slasher / shlock movie. Creative in terms of how to drag shit out into scenes, but aside from that curiosity rather boring.
37. Battle for Terra (2007). A little simple CG and stiff narrative, but a good story otherwise.
38. 12 Angry Men (1957). Still relevant.
39. Halloween (1978).
40. THX 1138 (1971; 2004. The original version is apparently better than this 2004 cgi changed version, mainly because the changes don't stop at just backgrounds (which would be harmless).
41. Ant-Man (2015). "nothing's gonna stop us!"
42. Prince of Darkness (1987). eh.
43. The Abyss, special edition (1989). I never saw the whole movie, just bits of it and the ending.
44. Bolt (2008). That was really nice. Surprising selection of voice actors too.
pseudo 45: Paperman (2012, short), per suggestion of VR animation thread.
45. Beneath the Planet of the Apes (1970). meh.
46. somehow I completely forgot about Dragonball: Resurrection of F (2015).
47. 2001 A Space Odyssey (1968). I'm counting this one because I never really watched the thing from start to finish. I bothered to, to see if I was wrong in not enjoying it. I don't believe I was. It remains very much an art movie, but with a big budget. It's obviously a good thing it exists, and has done good things in terms of its legacy, but as a movie I would not force myself to watch it for fun.
48. Halloween II (1981). Well, that was disappointing. Aside from using some unnecessary tropes ('he's your DUN DUN DUN!' ) there is also some really odd behavior from the director. What I mean by that is that at the start he plays it by the numbers and we get a natural flow of things, and then the editing becomes slower and slower and downright sloppy as the movie progresses.
49. Rear Window (1954). A frame story using one set and windows sounds absurd, but this movie pulls it off. It's great.
50. Halloween 3 (1981). A flawed movie, but a reasonably strong script when the movie finally plays its hand (which is basically by the third act, so it's a long sit to get there). That ending is harsh as shit.
51. Halloween 4 (1988). See recent movies thread.
52. Halloween 5 (1989). Better than 4.
53. Halloween: the curse of Michael Myers (1995).
54. Halloween: H20 (1998)
55. Halloween 6: the producer's cut (this is the other, much better, version of the 1995 movie)
56. Halloween Resurrection (2002)
57. Aladdin (1992)
58. Halloween (2007)
59. Halloween (2009). It's dead, Jim!
60. Lockout (2012). Wubba Lubba Dub Dub!
61. The Fog (1980).
62. Night of the Creeps (1986). Thrill me!
63. Plan 9 from outer space (1959)
64. Ed Wood (1994)
65. Night of the Living Dead (1968)
66. Dawn of the Dead (1978): Extended Mall Hours Uncut. I'm counting this fan-edit the same way as the Hobbit movies edit, since it's a fairly different movie.
67. Return of the Living Dead (1985).
68. Escape Plan (2013).
69. Inside Out (2015).
70. The Dead Zone (1983). Barely had the opening credits started and I suddenly recognized the music that accompanied DBZ Abridged's The Dead Zone. D'oh!
71. Escape from the Planet of the Apes (1971)
72. Planet of the Vampires (1965).
73. The Day of the Triffids (2009)
74. The Man from UNCLE (2015)
75. Scanners (1981)
76. Robinson Crusoe on Mars (1964). First half was good, second is pulp unfortunately.
77. Conquest of the Planet of the Apes (1972)
78. Battle for the Planet of the Apes (1973)
79. kind of late to remember I saw this one this year, but Max Headroom (the 1985 TV movie)
80. Spectre (2015)
81. Night of the Comet (1986)
82. Monsters: Dark Continent (2015).
pseudo 83. Florida Man (2015), a fifty minute documentary that's on vimeo. Strangely mesmerizing.
83. Absolutely Anything (2015). Nice, but somewhat underwhelming as a comedy.
84. Childhood's End part 1 (TV movie, 2015)
85. Childhood's End part 2
86. Childhood's End part 3
87. Call Me Lucky (2015). Really good movie, rough topic to go in-depth with after the comedy part.
88. Twilight (2008). Not as bad as I expected, still disappointingly bad in other areas.
89. Fifty Shades of Grey (2015). A miserable pile of secrets.
90. Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
91. The Martian (2015). Sadly, I was left disappointed.
Shows / seasons:
1. Hannibal
2. Defiance
3. Falling expectations- I mean Skies
4. Dragon Ball - the entire run. Abridged jokes now make more sense. All of them?
5. Dragon Ball Z - entire run over the course of this year, mainly to see how much overlap there is with Abridged.