meddow: Lix Storm (Default)
meddow ([personal profile] meddow) wrote2007-12-11 09:49 pm
Entry tags:

Movies, Comics and Zombies

I hate child characters in horror movies. They’re bound to do something stupid or get captured and in doing so endanger all the other characters, you know they can’t die because that’d be too grim and you feel guilty if you root for them to die.

I caught 28 Weeks Later , a movie I had been avoiding since hearing that it was being created, since I adore the original. First of all you have pseudo-zombies, something that always wins. Then you have wholesale ‘borrowing’ from one of my favourite books, Day of the Triffids. And then it has Cillian Murphy, Christopher Eccleston, Naomi Harris and Brendan Gleeson, and to top of it, the meaty message that it ain’t the zombies that are the monsters in this world. Plus Danny Boyle is one of my favourite directors.

*Loves*

Then you have the sequel, which prompted that above statement about child character, missed the opportunity to focus on something really horrific (though essentially a moral dilemma in the form of the carrier) and a plot propelled along by the characters being stupid and not sharing information. It’s not bad, but it’s certainly not as good as the original.

Speaking of movies that shouldn’t be made, I’m going to now state my disgust at the Watchmen movie. I understand adapting books to a visual medium, but it was a graphic novel, it was already in a visual medium and in that medium much more layered than you could get in a movie. I read Watchmen a couple of months ago, and I know it gets its praises sung from the high heavens all the time, but it just is brilliant. It’s one of those things that you have to take a few hours to get yourself together after reading.

And while I loved Sin City, the more relevant movie to judge it by is 300, which I hated. Sure the nudity and homoeroticism was fun for the first half an hour, but by the end of it I found myself yelling “just die already!”

[identity profile] artic-fox.livejournal.com 2007-12-11 09:59 am (UTC)(link)
I felt the same about 300. I mean Gerard Butler is all very pretty, and well, but it kind of had no plot.

[identity profile] meddow.livejournal.com 2007-12-12 07:04 am (UTC)(link)
Plus while there are some actors that are hot when yelling a lot and sporting a dead rat of a beard, Gerard Butler unfortunately is not one of them.

[identity profile] artic-fox.livejournal.com 2007-12-12 07:33 am (UTC)(link)
Hear, hear.

[identity profile] naushika.livejournal.com 2007-12-11 02:59 pm (UTC)(link)
I've been very afraid to see 28 Weeks Later, because 28 Days Later is just about one of the most brilliant films there is, and I was fairly certain any sequel made would not live up to it. I'm glad you gave that little review; now I know not to bother watching it.

[identity profile] meddow.livejournal.com 2007-12-12 07:05 am (UTC)(link)
Well, I will say that it's still a lot better than a lot of horror movies. It's just when it's judged against its predecessor it's not so brilliant.

[identity profile] frenchroast.livejournal.com 2007-12-11 03:07 pm (UTC)(link)
Whoa, whoa, whoa. I knew 28 Days Later had Cillian Murphy, but I didn't watch it because...well, I don't do horror.

But I don't think I can possibly turn down a movie with Cillian *and* Eccleston. Oh, cruel fangirl fate!

Egads, a Watchmen movie? No. No, no, no. Leave my precious Watchmen alone!

[identity profile] meddow.livejournal.com 2007-12-12 07:07 am (UTC)(link)
He doesn't show up for ages, but it's certainly a movie that does not disappoint Eccleston fans. You should totally got out and find a copy to watch.