I found Fanboys when going through Kristen Bell's IMDB page. If you've followed me for any length of time and/or know me in real life, you already know of my undying adoration for Ms. Bell's person and catalog of work. Since I am a fangirl for so so many things, I thought that checking out any movie called Fanboys would be right up my alley. What I found in Fanboys is a thoroughly enjoyable movie that I have been able to watch again and again.
One of the things that I loved the most about it is it's generality. Granted, the movie is about Star Wars fans and the fandom associated with it. What I mean to say is that the movie didn't have to be about Star Wars specifically. You could have dropped the idea of any fandom into the movie and it would have been a great concept. Ages and ages ago when I was a teenager, I worked at the local movie theater. That was my first experience with fandom in general. There were people sleeping in their cars trying to make sure they had the best seats for the movie. This was back before the days of stadium seating and showing movies in multiple theaters. One print of the movie had to be run between two projectors. Not an easy feat back then since it was actual and physical film reel. People lined up throughout the entire mall. They stayed for multiple viewings. Just as crazy, the projectionists were made to stay in the booth with the print at all times, something which up until this point had never happened before. I was never a Star Wars fan. What little I had seen I enjoyed well enough, but not enough to understand why everyone was freaking out. In a way, even though I'm still not a fangirl for Star Wars, it was my fandom gateway. I started branching out with regards to the things I loved. I joined online communities and chat rooms (Hey, remember AOL Chatrooms? That was a thing that existed. Ha!) , I started to realize that there were hardcore fans of the things that I was into at the time. I found entire groups of people who were unashamed nerds and geeks. People who would gladly talk with me for hours about Buffy cannon. BEFORE we even called it cannon. Fanboys, as a movie, relayed all of those things to me. Even in the opening scenes at the Halloween party when they are discussing minor details of a movie that has long gone by. This movie was me. This movie was my friends. The subject matter didn't have to be the same. This was us. There are a million little things to love about this movie. I would attempt to list some of them for you but I think you'd be better off discovering your own favorites without me having to tell you. We had a lot of fun recording the podcast for this movie. I'm still incredulous that the biggest Star Wars fan of the group had never seen it. I hope you enjoy the movie and the episode of the podcast.
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And all through the house, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.
Wait, wrong story. Let's start again. For this week's release we decided to give you two episodes for the holidays. Instead of going with the usual picks of classics or family favorites, we decided to expand our holiday movie repertoire and watch something different. One of the picks was The Night Before. I personally enjoy the majority of the movies that Seth Rogan and Joseph Gordon Levitt appear in so I was excited to see this one. I was not disappointed. The movie premise is that three friends are ending their yearly holiday traditions in favor of moving forward into new ones. What occurs throughout the film is your typical buddy shenanigan comedy with a holiday twist. The writing is moderately clever with some of the best lines being delivered by Levitt and Rogan throughout the film. While there is a fair amount of physical comedy within the movie, it's far from slapstick. I also wouldn't consider it too profane or vulgar. Of course, you likely don't know my gauge for such things, but nothing really shocked me. Krampus on the other hand is touted as a horror movie. This movie actually felt like two movies within one. If you don't know the historical context of Krampus, I suggest you check here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krampus The first half of the movie is used to build the personal drama and suspense as Krampus is picking off the family members one by one. The second half of the movie plays out visually like a Dark Crystal remake. One of the things that I like best about the monsters themselves is that for the most part they were not computer generated. There are obvious exceptions to this but all of the larger "people sized" monsters were clearly people in detailed costumes. I didn't find the majority of the movie very scary and despite my general dislike of her work, Toni Collette was tolerable. And this is coming from someone who hates horror movies. We hit a milestone in our listenership last week. It's a small one, but a good one. We're so excited to continue making content for you and we hope you're still enjoying listening. We also wish you and yours a very Happy Holiday!
To say that the movie Blade Runner was a disappointment for me would be a massive understatement. It’s considered a classic. It’s considered a paragon of the Science Fiction community. The problem is that it sucks.
I know, I know…what is WRONG with me? I genuinely wanted to like it. After all these years of hearing how wonderful it was, I expected that I would like it. Harrison Ford? Check. Dystopia? Check. Androids? Check, check, check. I enjoy Science Fiction but this movie was so incredibly boring to me. I should have known not to read the book prior to watching the movie. I think that may have led to the majority of my disappointment. The novel by Phillip K Dick is so much richer in scope and tone. You’re on an existential journey with the main character as he tries to understand what it means to be truly human. The desolate wasteland that is described on the page is far richer than what is portrayed in the movie. I realize that the movie is only meant to be based on the book. A loose interpretation of it. As with so many book to movie adaptations, certain liberties are taken with the plot in order to make the movie more enticing. While I agree that there are aspects of many novels-turned-movies that need a bit of a boost cinematically, I don’t think this is one of them. That being said, I do understand the limitations of attempting to portray such a cerebral novel onto the big screen. One thing I did like about the film were the visual effects. The effects they were able to pull off given the technology at the time are fairly mind-blowing. Unfortunately, there were no effects that could erase Daryl Hannah from the movie. The entire team was bored and confused by the movie which made it nice for me. I hate being the only one who didn’t like the movie we watch. Have a listen. Do you agree with us? Did you read the book or watch the movie? www.geekendcast.com Itunes: http://apple.co/2eBvJ8P Soundcloud: http://bit.ly/2f0cZm1 Google play: http://bit.ly/2dQY37q
What can I say about the movie Authors Anonymous that I haven’t already said? There have been several movies over the course of these recordings that I’ve loved. This was not one of them. The characters were just so unlikeable that it was hard to care about the struggles they faced.
The idea that one of the main characters becomes a published and successful author without being able to name a favorite author is disheartening. How could anyone who is a legitimate writer or even a lover of books have faith in that person's work? What if you read an interview with John Grisham, or Stephen King; in which they said something to the effect of “I don’t read other books.” Or, “I don’t have a favorite author”. All the heart would go out of their work. It would for me at least. As an aspiring writer, the idea that Hannah is getting by on her looks is flat out horrifying. With literature, it should always be the subject matter that counts. We should be able to succeed based on the quality of the worlds we create. We shouldn’t be creating content just for the sake of creating content. We should be creating because we’ve found something true that we want to share with the world. Movies like this present a problem for us as a podcasting group. We struggle to fill our time. We don’t want to have wasted the effort of watching the movie but it’s hard to find things to talk about when all you want to say is “I didn’t care for it” and then move on. As always, we hope that you enjoyed this episode. Even if you were only moderately entertained by the podcast it would still be way more entertaining than the movie itself. As always, you can find us with the various information below or on the right-hand side. www.geekendcast.com Itunes: http://apple.co/2eBvJ8P Soundcloud: http://bit.ly/2f0cZm1 Google play: http://bit.ly/2dQY37q |