Go and see Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow Now!

[karohemd]

Hurried to the VUE after work, spotted mazzarc at the ticket machine which then tried to eat my credit card but eventually would accept my switch card.
whiskeylover, necro_angel and crag_du turned up as well and we entered an empty cinema which remained largely empty (a few others were there but not more than 20 in total). Good thing I decided to go this week, then...

The film was everything I expected it to be and even more so. Roll the classic Flash Gordon TV serial, War of the Worlds, a bit of Metropolis and Batman, Indiana Jones and Star Wars into one and add stylish retro costumes, props and scenery in a coloured b&w colour scheme and you get the idea.
Peril! Adventure! Damsels in Distress! Mad Scientists! Doomsday Devices! Rayguns! etc. etc.
Anyone moaning about the cheesiness, hammy acting and other deliberate "shortcomings" has clearly missed the point of this wonderful film. Spoilers behind the cut.

Fitting title for the cut, I think. ;o) Movie German tends to be quite dire in general, anyway but it was particularly bad in this one, quite possibly deliberately so.
Short explanation: If someone took a dictionary and literally translated "Emergency Release" (which the word morphed into in the film) into German, they might end up with "Dringlichkeitsfreigabe". The compound doesn't exist (although it does sound rather bueraucratic) but "Dringlichkeit" means "urgency" and "Freigabe" indeed "release" (one possible meaning but not in this context). A reasonable translation could be "Notentriegelung".

Lots of stuff, scenes and the like that were almost stolen from other films like Star Wars (big stompy robot death, the maneouvres he flew, the jungle they came out in etc.), Indiana Jones and James Bond.

The use of footage of Lawrence Olivier as the projection of Dr. Totenkopf (meaning death's head or skull in German) was really cool. I don't think they could have managed to make a modern actor look like someone from the 30s so effectively.

Everybody found something different in the newspaper clippings towards the beginning of the film. For example, necro_angel and I saw Godzilla in the Tokyo Paper and whiskeylover saw something about Bill Clinton in another.

The only criticism really is that there could have been a little more depth to the characters. For example, I would have loved some elaboration on the rivalry between Polly and Frankie. Still, Paltrow's look while sitting in the back of the plane was priceless.

Comments

[georgechance.livejournal.com]

I thought it was enjoyable, I went in knowing it was "campy", for lack of a better word. So I was ready for all that stuff. Good enjoyable time. I really enjoyed the "feel" of the picture. Reminded me of the old Shadow movies.

Also, if you like that kind of thing, check out the new PC game called Evil Genius. You have an island, a pile of money, and you go to take over the world :)

[sogoth.livejournal.com]

Sadly there were only about 20 people in the conema when we saw it on sunday too. As far as I'm concerned though, this gets my vote for film of the year so far; it's been far far too long since I enjoyed a film to quite the same extent.

As for the newspapers... I spotted Godzilla too :D

[twicedead.livejournal.com]

Nooooo, no no no no. Hammy acting was not a problem. No spark between the heroes was. Cheesiness not a problem, the cheesy moments were some of the highlihght of the film. The lack of heart and grounding was a problem. And most of the aerial fight scenes were overdone with CGI so they failed to serve the story due to their being too busy.

It was all fine, except for the film :). It just fell short of the mark almost across the board.

[zenmeisterin.livejournal.com]

Paltrow's performance irritated me for reasons I can't explain yet but otherwise I thought it was GREAT! :-D

Spent half the performance pointing at cool things and referencing them and goggling over the GIANT stompy mecha and the rayguns and underwater aeroplanes and all the clichés... (as I'm sure malakite will attest to ;-)

[karohemd.livejournal.com]

Wow, a comment from George...

Yeah, I've heard cool things about Evil Genius, too. I don't have the money for a graphics card atm so I won't buy it, though.

[georgechance.livejournal.com]

Well yea, I comment ONCE in awhile.

Don't need huge graphics for the game, but at least a geforce2 or so, 16mb of ram only. If you equal that, you are fine.

[mazzarc.livejournal.com]

Was very very fun and a great film. How ANYONE can take it seriously is beyond me. And you're right, the dagger look was priceless.

[karohemd.livejournal.com]

I only have on-board graphics without 3D gubbins atm.
I'll see if I can borrow it from someone.

[karohemd.livejournal.com]

I hadn't really refered to your criticism. ;o)

[twicedead.livejournal.com]

Did you see the reference to THX 1138?

[karohemd.livejournal.com]

Yes. ;o)
There were so many. I guess the person who found the most (but sadly didn't list them) is ffutures, a steampunk/retro-future/pulp freak. Have a look at his latest entry.