484 Subtle Levels.

I’m gonna give my latest interview a little more screen time, since it was posted late.  Me & The Stereo. 

My friends all know that I’m a fan of Transformers, so they all act a little surprised when I say I just don’t care about the new movie.  I enjoyed the first one, it was fun, but it wasn’t Transformers as I enjoy them.  It was something else.  Something made to appeal to the LCD.  There’s nothing wrong with that.  That’s where Hollywood makes its money.  That doesn’t mean I’m obligated to like it.  What keeps it from being right to me?  The robots are so far removed from living beings that I can’t relate to them.  If they die I feel the same way about it as I would if you ran over a toaster.  In fact, I might cry more if you ran over a toaster because at least it can make me delicious toast.

There’s other stuff too.  Like the fact that the camera is so rarely set in a fixed point in space.  Action scenes are just a blurr of colors and sounds.  That’s not a problem restricted to Transformers.  No, that cancer is one afflicting the whole industry.  Right now Hollywood likes its cameras as shakyas Michael J. Fox.  Perhaps steadycams are just too expensive in these tough economic times.

I’ve long ago accepted the fact that I will never, as a fan of anything, get the perfect film adaptation.  The best anyone can hope for is that they don’t rape the idea and leave it in counseling for the rest of its life.  The first Hellboy was pretty good.  The Harry Potter films have done okay so far.  Lord Of The Rings was about as great as a fan could hope for, and even it had some pretty glaring things changed to suit the average moviegoer.  Iron Man was about the best screen adaptation I can think of, but as someone who was not a big fan as a kid I can only guess at how a true fan would feel. 

I hear rumors that there may be a film version of The House With A Clock In It’s Walls on the way.  I was thrilled at first.  I loved John Bellairs books as a kid.  The more I thought on it though the more doubt crept into my mind.  That book was written at a time when children were allowed to experience fear.  What would a modern film company do to such a book?  More horrifying things than anything the writer conjured up I’m sure.  I may well have to endure the agonizing experience of watching a beloved book go down in film flames again…  It’s almost too horrible to contemplate.

10 Comments

I really hate random jump-cuts in the middle of fight scenes, cameras switching every time a punch is thrown. There are a few fighting movies which don’t have the problem — for example, Tony Jaa movies such as Ong-Bak or Tom-Yum-Goong. I’d especially suggest the second, as it has a long fight scene that’s all one cut moving up a wide spiral ramp that’s absolutely amazing.

I agree with everything said about the Transformers movies as well as adapted movies in general. I disagree though that there is indeed something wrong with purposely trying to appeal to the lowest common denominator.

Even if I go to a movie that’s fantasy based and not to be taken too seriously I do not enjoy having my intelligence insulted. And all of Bay’s films to me are him saying that audiences are basically like cats chasing after a laser pointer. Fuck that and fuck him.

HAHA I would have to agree building is definetly easier than managing… done both… and well let me just say when you need your hammer its there and you don’t have to call it’s cell phone and hope it picks up… people on the other hand….

ah let me jump in yet again about the discussion (funny how people used to only comment on the comic and now its almost completely the other way around) in any case it is funny how much things have changed… now they seem adament about actualy showing any violence… in the new batman series you see him throw a punch and then it turns the screen away before you see it… this happens constantly know… when back in the day they didn’t worry about it… heck the opening batman scene had the penguine gunning people down… (oh grabbed this point from a friend since we were talking about the same stuff two days ago…)

even the cartoons have shaky cammeras now… guess those were to expensive as well… i liked it when the cammeras were steady but i guess shaky fast moving unfocessed cammeras have become very popular given that even the cartoons have it now constantly.

You read The House With A Clock In Its Walls, too?! I totally picked up that book at random! Never saw or heard of it before or since!

J.T. – I have a sixth printing, secondhand, hardcover. It took me years to find even that. Paperback, minus the original illustrations, was the only way to find it for years.

I really have to agree about the first transformers. the fight scene at the end looked like they had chained the cameras to each robots leg and then edited it all. And since I was not a big transformers fan as a kid (just a few years to young I was in the GhostBusters, Ninja Turtles, X-Men age) it was just a big mess of couldn’t care less.

Megan Fox though.

I’d drink her bathwater.

Just saying.

Well, I want to comment on the strip.

I think it’s totally accurate. I am a manager and although most of my employees are good, honest hard working people, a very select few that really stand out can make your life miserable. If you want to talk about subtle check this out: people expect a manager to be fair and consoistent, but those two are exclusive of each other, because if you are consistent all the time (treating everyone the same) you are going to be unfair to someone and if you try to always be fair to everyone you will treat them diferently, so you will never be consistent… Catch-22.

And this is just an example.

I have to toss this in, I’ve actually seen a completely faithful book-to-move adaption once, and it was creepy. The book, “The Black Hole” had such a perfect adaption every line could be read entirely out of the book as it was said onscreen.

So there may be such a thing as TOO faithful an adaption. XD

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