Friday, December 4, 2009

Disastrosity

Things I could've done instead:

- Put my child to bed.
- Watched telly.
- Read another chapter of Alan Carr's autobiography Darwin's On the Origin of Species By Means of Natural Selection.
- Collected newts from a pond.
- Climbed some trees.
- Invented a cocktail and called it Long Hard Innuendo Rammed Right Into Your Digestive Tract.
- Change my name to Lord Champion of Awesomness
- Had me some sex.
- Written a poem.
- Done a blog entry.
- Learnt a new tune on the ukulele.
- Practised being lucky.
- Made some modern art with toenail clippings and a balloon, called it 'Edge of Uncertainty', and challenged the humanistic concept of an anthropocentric existence in light of the uncaring universe in a contemporary post-9-11 setting.
- Plucked my ear hairs.
- Looked at the moon through binoculars.
- Shaved a hedgehog.
- Eaten a curry.

Instead of what, I hear you cry.

It's all right. Don't cry. I'll tell you.

Watching 2012 at the cinema.

Crivens it was bad.

As we walked out of the cinema, the Goodladywife asked one of the attending oiks if we could have our money back please, as the wares that his employers had just sold us were so shoddy, but his mutating, semi-pubescent voice box would allow only a hoarse, nervous squeak about supervisors not being around so we let him scurry away to drain his face.

Over twelve quid, that film cost us.

Twelve pounds, which is, according to some quick mental arithmetic, about twelve euros, twelve US dollars, or three hundred and ninety Australian dollars. Roughly.

And for that, we got some admittedly good special effects showing buildings falling down, some cars driving hither and thither as buildings fell down, some aeroplanes flying around as buildings fell down, and various unlikely geographical upheavals with lots of glowing larva, flying debris and buildings falling down.

We also got absolutely no good characters or dialogue though. We got about three scenes where a suddenly emotive parent phoned their grown up child to tell them how they loved them and shouldn't have been so distant all these years. We got Woody Harrelson being "crazy" with a capital Meh. We got John Cusack meandering through the film as though he's on a green screen or something. We got Danny Glover as the US president who looked like he'd died recently and been partially reanimated.

(Now there's a pitch for a movie. Black President? Female President? Gay president? What about . . . Zombie President? "Assassination is but a minor annoyance to him.")

There was more cheese in this film than you'd find in the finals of the cheesiest cheese competition held in Cheeseton, Cheeseshire, by the Institute of Cheesology. In the Democratic Republic of Cheese.

Awful, awful film. I wonder if I can write to the people who made it and ask for my money back? Seems the least they can do after promising entertainment and not delivering. There should be a clause under the trade descriptions act that states any film that says it's good should actually be good. If not, it should be relabelled appropriately, and the traditional deep, overly gravelly voiced chap should read a more accurate description:

"John Cusack appears in a film which would be better if they simply cut and pasted all the special effects scenes together for half and hour and left out all the actors and, for want of a better word, dialogue."

You may be getting the impression that I wasn't impressed with 2012, the fillum. At the end of it, you're rooting for the tsunami.

Additionally, the whole cinematic experience was rubbish. There are twenty minutes of adverts, and then no trailers, which are the only reason you're not too pissed off at watching the adverts in the first place. Instead, a chirpy announcer shouts "Passion!" at you, and then there's a quick montage of passionate bits from upcoming films. Then the announcers yells "Intrigue!" which is followed by some seizure inducing flickers of presumably intriguing bits you might see. Then someone hollers "Adventure!" and you get a few bits of people falling down, shooting and exploding. Then the announcer wails "Pornography!" and a man with a seventies moustache arrives to fix a naked lady's washing machine.

You can't get excited about any upcoming attractions from that sort of mess.

I know that this isn't the fault of this particular film, but 2012 didn't exactly improve the situation, what with being crap and all.

More importantly though, it stole two and a half hours of my life away which I can never get back.

Despite what some more esoteric physicists may tell you, we travel through our spatio-temporal dimensions in a linear fashion, taking a generally mono-directional route from birth to the depressingly close and unavoidable moment of carking it. Of bucket-kicking, farm-buying, toe-upturning, daisy-pushing, maker-meeting, dust-biting, chip-cashing deadness that awaits us all.

Euphemistically speaking.

We can't afford to waste time paying to be bored and unimpressed, as we've only got a finite amount of it as it is, which is why I'm so narked about it all.

Maybe I'm expecting too much. I love films, but a film is simply supposed to be a momentary diversion, perhaps to make you think a bit, maybe to amuse you, but I shouldn't use it to replace bits of my life. Perhaps I should only watch a film if I haven't got anything else to do, otherwise, I'll end up substituting reality for something made up, and if I'm going to do that I may as well just go to church.

Mind you, a life is a bit like a film, in that it is the intrinsic quality of the content that is required and not good special effects in order to ensure that it's a good one.

If you were thinking of going, and this review has rightly put you off, then don't despair. There are plenty of other things to look at, which are naturally pretty.

You've got everyday things like flowers:


Or in fact the whole world, or bits thereof:


The world is particularly good to look at because, amazingly, it pre-empts the latest technology in cinematics by already being in 3D!

You can practically touch it.




30 comments:

  1. Thanks for the movie review. Looks like I won't be going to see 2012 now.

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  2. had me in tears, of laffter..... see? thats why I don't go to the movies, and rely very little on video entertainment.

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  3. You've just confirmed what my powers of clairvoyance had already told me. That film looked like a belching swamp of suckery from the very first preview...

    Sorry you got bamboozled.

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  4. Hi Jules,

    I rarely attend the opening of a movie, choosing to rely instead on the few friends I have who actually attend a movie opening; relaying to me the relative merits of said movie.

    I've tried to remember a recent John Cusak action movie which I found entertaining and strangely, I couldn't. Although I did like Gross Pointe Blank with Minnie Driver.

    Danny Glover as U.S. President? Hmmmm....not feeling it! But I did like him as the character Harry in the movie To Sleep with Anger.

    Thanks for the critical movie review; I do appreciate the tip.

    U

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  5. thinkfyou - I like to help!

    Gregory - You have the right idea.

    Hunter - lol at "belching swamp of suckery". I'm so going to use that in conversation.

    U - You're welcome. Some people get paid for it you know! Grosse Pointe Blank is an ace film. Haven't seen To Sleep With Anger though.

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  6. Rooting for the tsunami! I love that.

    The unfortunate thing about that movie, and what the characters never realized in time, was that if John Cusack had just put on a long brown cloak and played "In Your Eyes" on a boom box over his head outside the tsunami's window, everything would have turned out fine.

    Also, when I read this I was just starting a post involving fingernail clippings and their various uses in art and weaponry. Not kidding.

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  7. Thanks for the info on this film, I might have gone to see it. Is it as big a trainwreck for John Cusack's career as 'Pushing Tin' was?

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  8. So, you wouldn't recommend it then as a date movie? Bummer, M. DeFarge and I needed a little injection of romance into our otherwise dull suburban lives.

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  9. If I could pick somebody to review 2012 it would be you and this post didn't disappoint.

    Unlike Alan Carr's autobiography which is just not funny and reads like he dashed it off in a couple of hours.

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  10. Steamy - I think that's a viable and oft-neglected subject, nail clippings and warfare.

    Eric - If my 2 hours of boredom prevents it from happening to you, my suffering was not in vain.

    Mdme DeF - Fraid not. Nothing dampens ardour like 6 billion deaths and the fact that you don't care.

    MLS - Ta. I quite like some of Mr Carr's stand up, but the book was a bit of a throw away item. Better than 2012 though.

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  11. I don't go to the movies anymore, too much money to put up with crying kids and loud moviegoers, I wait till they come out on dvd and rent them, but 2012 won't even be on THAT list now, I think..thanks for the warning! :)

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  12. Come on Jules, dont be shy...tell us what you really think of it!
    ..and go easy on the Oz dollar, since the economic disaster our dollar's worth way more...only 227 to the pound now!
    ...and whats this about the church not being fair dinkum? I'm SO going to tell the Easter Bunny on you!

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  13. Your analysis of the film was accurate. I d/loaded same and upon watching deleted it, whereas I usually save to disc. Waste of a gigabyte.

    Would have been more exciting watching the grass grow.

    AV

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  14. Mr Mischief - Wise move. You'll have more fun, whatever you do!

    Tempo - No disrespect to the Easter Bunny. He's the reason Jebus came back from the dead, so he could get his egg.

    AV - Glad you share my opinion. Grass also has better dialogue.

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  15. Buildings falling down are to Roland Emmerich films as poo is to a toilet. It might not be that great, but at least you know it belongs in there.

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  16. I'm curious. When you shave hedgehogs do you mean you pluck them, then shave them? How much do you charge?

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  17. Kurt - Excellent way of putting it.

    Mo - Immac.

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  18. Dear Lord Champion of Awesomeness,

    Are you one of those people who can't leave until the film is over? My husband sat all the way through Bagger Vance, huffing at how awful it was the whole time.

    Also "three hundred and ninety Australian dollars. Roughly." hahahahahahaha, it's all true!

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  19. Great! This means I won't have long to wait until it "premieres" on HBO or Showtime. I like the "end of the world" concept, though. As do we all, I think. (otherwise why would they make so many movies and novels about it?)

    Yeah, Gross Pointe Blank was a classic. Pity.

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  20. Soda and candy - I paid good money to be bored and I'm damn well going to be bored all the way through!

    Douglas - Go tsanami! Go tsumani!

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  21. Glowing larva!!!

    I love glowing larva, especially if you get some radioactive butterflies or bees out of the deal.

    Now if you tell me John Cusack was glowing I'm going to have to see this film anyway, despite my reverence for your cinematic judgement. (You didn't happen to like Synedoche, New York, did you? Just checking.)

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  22. Lovely timing of your post. I've just recorded a 2012 documentary on my TV's DVR and plan to watch it as I drift off tonight. It may lack special effects but my nightmares ought to be good.

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  23. Vic - lol. Well spotted. Of all the extra letters I could've put in lava it had to be an R didn't it? Although I also like the idea of a glowing larva.

    Ana - If they mention how to get my money back in the documentary will you let me know please?

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  24. Well, I'm going to have to check out this Democratic Republic of Cheese to see if you're telling the truth, or if I should get out those toenail clippers and an art board.

    Thanks for the warnings though.

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  25. i read a review that said the movie was so bad it had you rooting for the apocalypse, sugar!

    i think i'll wait for this to be on tv...

    and i'm out of drink

    and drugs

    and it's 4am...

    xoxoxox

    p.s. thanks for the review!

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  26. Fragrant Liar - I hear the DRC is particularly fragrant at this time of year.

    Savvy - Wish I'd seen that review. Huzzah for the apocalypse!

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  27. Nice picture of The World, there, but I'm not sure it's any place to bring up children - what are the schools like? And on the Alan Carr/Darwin thing, I've half a mind to write a book entitled
    On the Origin of Alan Carr By Means of Natural Selection.

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