| Author | Message | ||
     David_lees (David_lees) Username: David_lees Registered: 12-2011 Posted From: 92.22.33.83 |
There are few things I like more than a truly bizarre "true" ghost story: http://www.thisistamworth.co.uk/Ex-security-guard-shivers-memory-ghostly-attack/ story-15121524-detail/story.html | ||
| Carolinec (Carolinec) Username: Carolinec Registered: 06-2009 Posted From: 92.232.199.129 |
Ooooh. That's nice and creepy. I think theme parks, funfairs, circuses and the like make excellent settings for scary stories. Hey, there's an idea for an anthology theme for you editor folk out there!  Now, my brain's not functioning too well at the moment - can any of you tell me some nice stories with that kind of setting, either on film or on the written page? | ||
| Lincoln (Lincoln_brown) Username: Lincoln_brown Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 120.144.181.153 |
Hello Caroline, a couple that come to mind: 'The Companion', by Ramsey 'Out and Back', by Barbara Roden | ||
| Barbara Roden (Nebuly) Username: Nebuly Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 216.232.188.106 |
'Flowers in Their Bridles, Hooves in the Air' by Glen Hirshberg 'Dead Man's Handle' by Stephen Gallagher 'This Place' by Paul Finch 'Mr Dark's Carnival' by Glen Hirshberg | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 2.24.18.255 |
And of course: 'The Black Ferris' by Ray Bradbury Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury The Black Carnival by Charles L. Grant | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 99.126.164.88 |
"Spurs" by Tod Robbins. "The Animal Fair" by Robert Bloch. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.25.19.91 |
The stories listed above would alone make a superb antho. | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 82.145.210.25 |
There's an adaptation of the black ferriss in season 3 or 4 of the bradbury tv theatre. It's a bit odd because that's the short story that became something wicked this way comes - which had already been turned into a rather excellent film over a decade previously | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
Some short stories: "Satan's Circus" by Lady Eleanor Smith "The Illustrated Man" by Ray Bradbury "The Swords" by Robert Aickman "The Twins" by Harry E. Turner "The Frogwood Roundabout" by Roy Harrison "King Of The Fair" by Dorothy K. Haynes "Mumsy And Sonny" by Ken Johns "The Companion" by Ramsey Campbell "Other Than The Fair" by Joel Lane Some films: 'Freaks' (1932) by Tod Browning 'Circus Of Horrors' (1960) by Sidney Hayers {the first gory colour horror movie I remember seeing as a nipper} 'Carnival Of Souls' (1962) by Herk Harvey 'The Funhouse' (1981) by Tobe Hooper 'Santa Sangre' (1989) by Alejandro Jodorowsky | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
We've got the anthology line-up already, all we need is the publisher. But 'Other than the Fair' is pretty lame I have to say. The X-Files episode 'Carny' is a pretty good excursion into this theme, though it rips off Tom Reamy's short story 'The Detweiler Boy' – not sure whether that story has a carnival setting, will check... and reread the whole book while I'm at it... | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 129.11.76.216 |
Didn't Tony Richards write a circus tale set in Edinburgh? | ||
| Ramsey Campbell (Ramsey) Username: Ramsey Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 92.8.20.221 |
Charles G. Finney's The Circus of Dr Lao for sure! | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 178.116.59.249 |
Don't forget Dorothy K. Haynes' "Zelma, my sister-in-law". You'll find it in The 19th Pan Book of Horror Stories. And David Fletcher's "Corabella". | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 178.116.59.249 |
Robert Bloch's "Girl from Mars". | ||
| Carolinec (Carolinec) Username: Carolinec Registered: 06-2009 Posted From: 92.232.199.129 |
What a brilliant line-up for a themed anthology we have here! Thanks, folks - and sorry to David for my threadjacking, but you must admit it's on the same kind of theme. How could I have forgotten Ramsey's "The Companion"? I ended up getting "Alone With the Horrors" out last night, re-reading that and several other stories, and ending up having a Campbellian nightmare. Thanks, Ramsey!  Re film, "Freaks", "Circus of Horrors" and "Carnival of Souls" all popped into my mind later too. "Freaks" and "Carnival .." are particular favourites of mine. And that "X-Files" episode - loved that one! | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
And let us not forget 'The League Of Gentlemen' and a certain bigamist... Well it stuck in my head, Joel. 'Other Than The Fair' is the story I had to read over again, scratching my head but oddly intrigued, more than any other in 'The Earth Wire' and I still haven't a clue what it's really about. Please explain. My own garbled attempts to make sense of it are of the little girl perceiving subtle intimations of doom during a day at the funfair that subsequently come true, kind of. Very Lynchian. | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
The best novels I've read that tap into the otherwordly freakishness of carnival life are; Bradbury's 'Something Wicked This Way Comes' (of course) - somehow never seen the movie! - and the at least equally impressive 'The Dreaming Jewels' by Theodore Sturgeon (which, if you haven't read it, do so now!) Haven't read the novel but the film, 'The 7 Faces Of Dr Lao' (1964), by the great George Pal, has always been a firm nostalgic favourite of mine. It was that film, along with 'Send Me No Flowers' (1964) [the first time I saw my Mum hysterical with laughter] and the 70s sitcom 'The Odd Couple' (diabolically underrated) that forever enshrined Tony Randall in my affections. Always loved 'Humbug' too and pretty sure I included it in my "Top 10 X-Files Episodes" list on here some time before. Any of the Darin Morgan scripted eps were amongst the finest of the show's run. Whatever happened to him? | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 178.116.59.249 |
Speaking of The X-files, I rarely sit in front of a telly, but yesterday evening I watched an episode of Fringe and really liked what I saw. I'm thinking of buying the dvds if the episodes are uniformly good. Anyone familiar with the series? Now back to fairground attractions, circuses, carnivals and other horrors. | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.148.240.90 |
How can you not have seen the film of Something Wicked? Jonathan Pryce as Mr Dark is fantastic. It's a scary film indeed. | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.29.252.215 |
It's the best show of its kind since 'The X Files', Hubert. Nothing else comes close. Thanks to Frank I got to see the first season on DVD and really must catch up with the rest of them. Great characters, fascinating story arc and individual stories, excellent special effects, scary, exciting and also deliciously funny. A hugely undervalued modern TV classic, imo. | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.29.252.215 |
It's just never come on at a time I could see it, Weber, and never noticed the DVD about. One of those films I've long looked forward to catching some day. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 2.24.7.228 |
Stevie, 'Other than the Fair' is about a child on the edge of puberty starting to see what the adult world is like: marriage, divorce, desire, jealousy, loneliness, all that. I think the last couple of pages are OK, but the rest seems rather clumsy to me now. | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.29.252.215 |
As I said... intimations of doom on what should have been a fun day at the fair. It's very well written. I'd rather read a "clumsy" literary story than an XYZ potboiler anyday. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 99.126.164.88 |
I must see the film of SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES again, because the first time I did - many years ago, mind - I came away thinking it nothing too great. But I was a mite young then, so.... | ||
| Pete_a (Pete_a) Username: Pete_a Registered: 07-2011 Posted From: 75.85.10.161 |
"the at least equally impressive 'The Dreaming Jewels' by Theodore Sturgeon" Seconded, Stevie! A wonderful book with -- apart from all its other felicities -- one of the all-time great opening sentences: "They caught the kid doing something disgusting out under the bleachers" How could anyone fail to read on? | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 178.116.59.249 |
Thanks, Stevie, I think I'll try the first season if I can find it. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.156.210.82 |
I must see the film of SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES again, because the first time I did - many years ago, mind - I came away thinking it nothing too great. But I was a mite young then, so.... Me too, Craig. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 178.116.59.249 |
If you've read the book prior to seeing the movie, it will be a disappointment. Bradbury's world is pretty difficult to translate to the screen. Jason Robards is splendid as Will's father, but Mr Dark isn't nearly as dark as Bradbury's villain and he doesn't look like Mr Dark. | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
There's also a great long carnival sequence about the middle of Heinlein's 'Stranger In A Strange Land'. When Valentine Michael Smith, the man from Mars, goes on the run from the authorities, who want him dead, it is only among carny folk that he is initially accepted. He uses his paranormal powers to fit in amongst them as a magic act but after a trial period is considered not showy enough - "you just don't have it kid" - and given the boot. The joke being that he has the talent in spades but not the showmanship. | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.66.23.11 |
I thought Jonathan Pryce was fantastic as Mr Dark - and I had read the book (twice) before ever seeing the film. I think it's the best role I've seen Pryce in - and that includes Brazil. Bradbury himself wrote the screenplay BTW. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 99.126.164.88 |
But there you go, Weber. I didn't like BRAZIL so much either: I think it's Gilliams' weakest film. But Pryce was great in the supporting role he had in BARON MUNCHAUSEN. But the best I've seen Pryce do is, well... of course there's his "Timon of Athens," but that was a BBC thing, so next would have to be... Pryce as Lytton Strachey in CARRINGTON. | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.66.23.11 |
Stevie - we need a list of great films that Craig inexplicably doesn't like - so far we've got Donnie Darko, The Mist, Inception, Dark Knight and now Brazil... Stone cold classics all 3!!! Brazil is eaily Gilliam's best film (unless you've only seen the US studio version with the happy ending). Your lack of knowledge regarding film never ceases to amaze me mr Scwartz. | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.66.23.11 |
For 3 read 5 | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.155.202.231 |
I suppose those weird ghosts never bothered anyone who didn't deserve it. I don't like Dark Knight, Brazil, or The Mist, but Donnie Darko is one of my favourite films now, since watching it on the projector the other week. I think it's a classic - a dreamake of Back to the Future. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 99.126.164.88 |
It's not inexplicable - it's perfectly EXplaceable. In a phrase each: DONNIE DARKO - pretentiously overwrought fluff. THE MIST - silly impossible-to-suspend-disbelief embarrassment. INCEPTION - not terrible this one, but in the end, much ado about nothing. DARK KNIGHT - also overwrought, with stale cliches (I've had enough of troubled superheroes battling their dark sides! Cheeses-fudge-'n'-rice already!!!), and a mishandled villain. BRAZIL - boring. But these are all just my own personal opinions. I understand the fans for each, and can only sit in stunned amazement at their liking these, as they probably sit in such-like amazement at my own dislike.... | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.155.202.231 |
If somebody can send me the happy ending version of Brazil I might like it again... | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.155.202.231 |
Craig - Darko is a mood film, like Company of Wolves. It's not nuts and bolts. My second viewing - and on a big screen - was phantasmagorical. | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.66.23.11 |
Brazil = Boring????!!!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!? I'm speechless. It's a fantastically funny satire. I wish I'd known the office scenes were based on the pplace I'm working now - they're about to move me to a desk so small that if I stretch and yawn I'll accidentally punch the girls on either side of me in the face(s). The running joke with the plastic surgery going further and further wrong is simultaneously grotesque, disturbing and deeply funny. It's in my top 10 films of all time. Tony, the happy ending to Brazil is pretty much exactly what they did with The Descent when they gave that a happy ending. They just chopped off the last scene so that the final escape was real and not just the wish fulfilling fantasy of a dying mind. So if you want to watch the US version just switch off the DVD a minute early. | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.29.252.215 |
Go to my 100 Greatest British Films of All Time List, Craig, and think again. 'Brazil' is easily the second greatest work of cinema of the 1980s! Gilliam has been struggling to match up to its perfection ever since. You should all know by now what I consider to be the greatest btw. | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.66.23.11 |
Street Sluts in Sellophane? | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.155.202.231 |
As I've got older I've started seeing the importance of happy endings. I used to like the opposite - when I was younger, when I could deal with them.  | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 220.138.161.234 |
"You should all know by now what I consider to be the greatest btw." Once Upon a Time in America, unless my memory fails me? | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.29.252.215 |
That's the one, Huw. My favourite movie of all time and 'Brazil' is possibly second. Strange that my two fav movies both came from what I consider to be one of the weakest decades for cinema. It all went so wrong so quickly after the glory years of the 60s & 70s... in cinema as in music, TV and so much else of popular culture. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 99.126.164.88 |
Uh-oh... if there's a film more overwrought and in many ways boring than OUATIA, I'm not sure what it is... it's a spaghetti-mobster flick. It's not bad, but I just think it, again, overrated. It's inferior to its counterpart, OUATITW, though that too is overwrought. But I'm in a bad movie place - I find my patience level for film is at a low ebb, I find more pleasure in movies of the distant past, than much of recent decades. Here's some much finer examples of greatly enjoyable films, than those two movies of the 80's: Altman's O.C. & STIGGS; any given Woody Allen pic (especially HANNAH AND HER SISTERS, CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS, and THE PURPLE ROSE OF CAIRO); Boorman's EXCALIBUR; Carpenter's THE THING; David Lean's A PASSAGE TO INDIA; Scott's BLADE RUNNER; Lynch's BLUE VELVET; any given Scorsese 80's film; etc., etc., etc..... Okay, I know you said your own personal "favorite," Stevie... but are you going to stand here with a straight face and actually say you like BRAZIL and OUATIA over... drum-roll please... RAIDERS OF THE LOST MUTHA-FUCKIN' ARK?!?!? | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 82.145.209.123 |
Brazil or raiders? No contest. Raiders is a fantastic popcorn movie but nothing more. Brazil is one of the best films i've ever seen on many levels. Brazil takes that one by 20 country miles | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
Craig, it is my opinion that the best Cinema as Art should be "overwrought" but well enough put together to make us suspend our disbelief and engage our higher emotions. That is why I called Cinema the Opera of the 20th Century. Masterpieces of visual and musical choreography, like the 'Once Upon A Time...' movies and the works of the great auteurs, like Gilliam, Hitchcock, Scorsese & Lynch, have consciously built upon this larger than life element of grand drama, that arguably reached its purest form during the golden era of Silent Cinema, when all there was was pictures and music. | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
As for the 1980s, I agree it wasn't the weakest decade - that accolade belongs to the 90s, an awful wasteland of conveyor belt crap - but there was a marked tailing off of quality and ambition in the 80s with the films you mentioned representing a valiant last stand against the dictates of plastic commercialism. We saw the same tragic process played out in TV and pop music. From the glories of Punk & the New Wave to the soul sapping victory in the public consciousness of Stock Aitken Waterman and all that they spawned. I blame Thatcher, the old bag!! | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.177.115.204 |
Brazil or raiders? No contest. Raiders is a fantastic popcorn movie but nothing more. Brazil is one of the best films i've ever seen on many levels. Brazil takes that one by 20 country miles Yep - with you on that. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.155.202.231 |
But Raiders makes you happy... | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.66.23.11 |
Brazil makes me laugh far more than Raiders. It's a funnier film even though it does have the downbeat ending. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.177.115.204 |
But Raiders makes you happy... Maybe, but that in itself doesn't make it a 'better' film. Brazil makes me laugh far more than Raiders. It's a funnier film even though it does have the downbeat ending. Looking at it another way, Brazil has a happy ending as Sam gets away in the end, albeit only in his head. He's smiling, don't forget! | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.66.23.11 |
There is also that. I nearly said that myself. I adore Raiders. I can watch it 6 times a year and not get bored. But I reckon I could watch Brazil 6 times a week quite happily. | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
The success of his family friendly popcorn epics like 'Raiders Of The Lost Ark' & 'E.T.' - great as they were - is what ruined Spielberg as a director. I've always thought this. He hasn't half plumbed the depths of such crowd pleasing fluff since... albeit it to occasionally fine results, when he really connects with his subject matter, such as 'Jurassic Park' & 'The Secret Of The Unicorn'. | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.66.23.11 |
The thing that bugged me most about any Speilberg film ever was the fact that in Shaving Private Ryan there was no one in France in WWII except for the Americans and Germans. No French, no British... It annoyed me so much that I didn't watch any more of his flms for years. It's unfair to say he only churns out the fluff movies. He does those to pay for the serious stuff like Schindler's List and Amistad. both of which appeared long after Raiders and ET. His fluff films are classics of their type though. In many director's hands, Raiders would be a complete pile of poo instead of the incredibly good film that it is. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.155.202.231 |
Happy is good...it's undervalued. It's odd but I think the fluffy Spielbergs are deeper than the serious ones. Thing is, I do like Brazil. It's quite exhilarating. | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.66.23.11 |
I agree with you Tony. That's odd. That's very odd. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.155.202.231 |
Yes, wake up!  | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
Since 'Raiders' & 'ET' Spielberg always wants to make us happy, that's what ruined him as a director. 'Duel', 'Sugarland Express' & 'Jaws' showed the serious director he could have been, and almost got back to with 'The Colour Purple' [spelling consciously corrected], 'Schindler's List' & 'Saving Private Ryan', before shaking off the schmaltz entirely with 'Munich' (quite possibly his masterpiece), and delivering a family film that bucked the trend of studio interference and political correctness with his Tintin adaptation. 'Amistad' & 'AI' were brave steps in the right direction that floundered in over-worthiness and don't even mention his popular sci-fi adaptations with bloody Tom Cruise - pure pants! Spielberg, like Stephen King, is one talented bastard, with the ability to be a great artist, who got trapped on the tightrope between crowd pleasing and being his own man. Lets call it the Mom's Apple Pie disease. With maturity comes wisdom and I sincerely hope that he has yet to deliver the films that will forever enshrine his greatness! Same goes for Mr King... | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 99.126.164.88 |
Yes, MUNICH is quite possibly Spielberg's crowning achievement, in the very real sense of that term: coming latest in the line of his great films, it's almost finer than them all, though decidedly different in style, tone, etc. If one can say "King Lear" is Shakespeare's crowning achievement, then.... The critics seem to think this latest novel of King's to be something that will re-invent his greatness, Stevie: 11/22/63. Dunno, I'm not the one to judge even if I did read it. Look, I adore Gilliam's films, but not sure what went wrong with my viewing of BRAZIL. I just remember being awfully un-entertained by it. But all of these back-and-forths are doomed to devolve into that final, unbreakable "I like this"/"I don't like this" death spiral, so perhaps I should just slink away.... Stevie, I've argued before, I think we're entering that age where film will not so much "suspend our disbelief and engage our higher emotions," as be "built upon this larger than life element of grand"-- not "drama," but spectacle. The film age we're entering might closer resemble Madonna's Super Bowl half-time show, than traditional narrative structures.... The only spectacle anyone knows how to do now in film, was also evidenced by data from the Super Bowl: the commercials for upcoming 2012 tentpole films. THE AVENGERS, BATTLESHIP, JOHN CARTER, etc., they show a dearth of imagination in Hollywood, where everything must resemble a video game. All of these current Hollywood popcorn films strung together are like one vast bizarrely interconnected video game... the same video game... and that very sameness, seeping down through (for example) lesser large-crowd-pleasing genre films (this remake of THE THING, really, is not much different from its more popular comic-book mega-budget older siblings) - hell, seeping down through the commercials on TV! (woe to the Hollywood execs who just sit by and allow uber-SFX extravagance be frittered away on TV commercials: the audience is fast becoming blunted to their power to awe) - is creating the opposite effect: we've seen it all, we've seen it all EVERYfuckingWHERE, and we're sick to death of it now. Like all things Hollywood as it's ever been, back to the beginning, glut is promoted, leading to revulsion. There are two ways to go: backwards, minimalist, anti-modern, etc. Or forward, to new and as yet unimagined realms of splendor, wonder, and imagination: i.e., pure spectacle. The Sistine Chapel as film.... | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 99.126.164.88 |
Again, I'm reminded of Jaron Lanier's remark, that we have to realize that a handful of elite ivy-league twenty-somethings' notion of social media has become the very ground of being of what is social media, of what it's supposed to look/feel/seem like... when no, not at all, it's just one interpretation. There was another one you can point to, that died: myspace. There might be others to come, except that (as he goes on to say), the new "master servers" are determined not to die like previous models, and so are working furiously towards one goal: to consolidate their power. Someone in the audience asked, can't another company come along and create their own "master server"? Jaron laughed devilishly, and said, the current "master servers" are not going to allow that to happen... they are exceedingly clever in their ways of preventing that from ever happening.... In film, the video-game "look" has become THE model, the ground of being, for all tentpole/popcorn/mainstream/4-quadrant entertainment. But as film tries to replicate that experience, video games keep advancing, and so keep spawning the original from which film tries breathlessly to pace, in its efforts to be an ever-less imperfect copy. Film now trails behind the video game in imaginative scope, and that produces a gag reflex in me, that very concept. It can't hope to keep pace: video games already are far out$$$ing films; and it's only going to be a few evolutionary steps before the video game literally replaces film's requirements - interactive stories, characters, worlds - the seamless connection of spectacle, story, and character, that were the three pillars of film. Adding one extra dimension film can't provide: control. Once that event horizon's been breached... where will film go, that has become so subservient/pandering to its fickle audiences? Loss of control will be its keystone strength (where else is that he case? in places of worship), coupled with the materials video games cannot provide (gigantic screens, mass physically-there audience participation, etc.), etc. (where else is that the case? again, in places of worship)... and so, film will have to fall back upon the religious intensity of spectacle to survive, I think... though this may be many years from now in arriving.... | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.66.23.11 |
Video games bore me. I don't own a games console of any type. I've played a few games on my neice's console at Christmas and was substantially underwhelmed by the whole experience. | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.66.23.11 |
I see part of your point about films looking like video games. It's the main reason why I can't stand the Star Wars prequels. Watching them just felt like watching someone else play a computer game (which is more tedious than actually playing one by a long way). One of them even has the jumping from level to level from flying car to flying car section and a stuck on conveyor belt, duck the obstacles round. | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.66.23.11 |
*niece (from earlier post) | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 99.126.164.88 |
I don't own one either, Weber. I too find them underwhelming... but for now, their target audience is solely: young men (and women), a young male's mindset. They are characterized by two things that repel others like you and I: complication (controllers, the vast comic-book mythos info, etc.), and a reliance upon action, over anything of substance. But once they evolve... to become more interactive, as some are attempting now... they need to change, fundamentally, but once they do.... God, yes, the Star Wars prequels - to which I never got beyond the second. And now Lucas is re-releasing them in 3D?!? Is this not the worst level of imagination-less $$$-grubbing pandering? These are the kinds of things that accelerate a culture's decline, a culture's inability to imagine at all. The machine is now solely providing wonder; the circus is piling up dead gladiators. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 109.79.142.178 |
"Happy is good...it's undervalued. It's odd but I think the fluffy Spielbergs are deeper than the serious ones." Yes, I think he's being more honest with himself. He's being who he is, rather than who he's expected to be. I felt I parted company with him when he entered that awful THE COLOR PURPLE, AMISTAD and SCHINDLER'S LIST phase. He's making JURASSIC PARK 4, isn't he? I didn't like the Star Wars prequels until REVENGE OF THE SITH, which gives Ian McDiarmud space to show his talents. It has some lovely quiet, wordless scenes which allow it to breathe, gives us (as Lynch says) room to dream. | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.148.240.90 |
Revenge of the Sith was the worst of the lot IMHO. The big transformation of Anakin from good guy to bad guy done in about thirty seconds of very bad acting before he was sent out to kill the "Younglings". Just using the word Younglings instead of children was enough to dock it 7 points for scriptwriting quality for me. I've always wondered how Darth Vader is so tall as well when you consider that Haydn Christenson is only about 5'10". Dave Prowse is 6'5" so where did the extra height come from? | ||
| David_lees (David_lees) Username: David_lees Registered: 12-2011 Posted From: 92.22.4.197 |
When he was Vader he was supposed to be more android than human, wasn't he? Would explain the extra size. I loved Star Wars as a kid but I am completely baffled by the amount of devotion it gets from adults. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.155.203.66 |
I grew to like the prequels. I've gone off the films lately due to all the toys they keep bringing out but now and then when I catch a glimpse of the films I'm reminded of that sure sense of seeing somewhere that exists, a better universe than ours. I liked Color Purple. Computer games can be great unwinding tools, and if you have your kids around you or whatever and you're playing/watching them play it's like movies, only you get yourselves into the cliffhanger situations and there's real tension and fun. Maybe it's different for diffeent people, I don't know. If the game is done well it's like the holodeck off Star Trek. You go somewhere else. But you do have to find a good game. Craig - the video I linked to, that for me was film that was exciting and mysterious, and it looked cheap. Also it was technically silent cinema, everything said in action. I'm a little sad nobody at all felt my reaction. It makes me feel a little nutty. | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.59.115.60 |
I play some computer games - I'm not a 'gamer' as such as I only get hooked on a game once every year or two. Last one I loved was Portal 2. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.156.233.255 |
Craig - the most popular films on our projecter are the small scale films, ones that are in urban/domestic settings. They feel more involving to us I think - or maybe it's the directors of these films, paying more significance to character and story, who are gripping us. | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
I think you're onto something there, Craig. Where cinematic spectacle in the 20th Century was of an operatic grandiosity that strived to touch us on an artistic and emotional level we do seem to be seeing a transition to spectacle for spectacle's sake, designed to wow the senses and melt the brain while paying vacuous lip service to the emotions, as in the likes of 'Avatar'. I blame technology taking over from true craftsmanship and draining the human touch from filmmaking. That and the streamlining of conveyor belt commerciality into a well oiled machine of terrifying efficiency these days. Hitchcock must be spinning in his grave ffs!! | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
I love computer games, when I get the time to play them, but I don't take them at all seriously. For me a good first-person blastathon is one of the purest sit-back-and-switch-your-brain-off destressing experiences it is possible to have. I avoid films based on computer games like the plague. No matter how good or complex the original game is, at the end of the day, it is still only a game and an ultimately trivial way of passing the time. The very element of control is what makes games non-narratives and removes them entirely from the realm of the Arts. The game of Chess is a thing of genius in which great things can happen but it isn't a work of art and neither is Pac Man! Cinema is a narrative form with a single creative vision that cannot be altered by the viewer but must be engaged with and understoood on its own merit and has most definitely resulted in great Works of Art. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.155.202.234 |
I think games can be art; I think it will happen, maybe even has. I loved strolling round the world of Grand Theft Auto, not shooting or killing or racing but just looking. I had a stroll on a beach in that that is still in my memory as something special. | ||
| Hubert (Hubert) Username: Hubert Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 178.116.59.249 |
About Revenge of the Sith - when you see the scenes left out of the final product, you begin to wonder about the sagacity of Lucas' decisions. There are splendid scenes covering the growth of the rebel alliance and the developing relationship between Anakin and Palpatine. The final fight, on the other hand, is protracted beyond the limits of endurance: as a result Anakin's transformation, the birth of Luke and Leia and Yoda's exile come across as mere afterthoughts. And some of Christiansen's lines - "You'll not take her from me! - are exceptionally cheesy. | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 82.145.209.126 |
And not only are his lines cheesy, he delivers them with all the emotional intensity of a cheese salad sandwich that's gone soggy in the fridge. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 99.126.164.88 |
Tony, that video was actually a prime example to me of "spectacle," because it's just a pure visual/audial experience, sans traditional character/story structure. Just because I wasn't in the right frame of mind for it, and may or may not be, didn't mean I didn't appreciate it for its craftsmanship. Personally, I have no patience right now for superheroes, for angst, for certain cliches... it's not you or your video, it's me. I have nothing against video games - I envy those who can get such guilt-free pleasure from them. Also, I see coming another evolution, that will draw in those like me, and others. When one looks around in the entire world of entertainment for "ground that's not been occupied," that is surely the most logical place to go. Hollywood subconsciously fears it, which is why Hollywood (in one of its aspects, though for long its most lucrative [the "tentpole" production]) subconsciously keeps trying to imitate it, to be pleasing like it is, now. I'm attacking movies that have become desirous of replicating the video game experience - the utterly bankrupt nature of this mindset, is what's disgusting about Hollywood. To me, what is ironic, is that what's become the least imaginative product of Hollywood, is what was for so long considered its most awe-some and entertaining, the summer/popcorn/tentpole film. These films now feel like the worst of the worst Hollywood has to offer anymore..... | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.122.107.8 |
Maybe what I saw in the video was what wasn't there? Maybe I was responding to the back story that we needed to fill in for ourselves. I do like questions - what became of the kid? I wanted to know. | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
There are, and always will be, great independent works of cinema and music being produced. The difference now is that technology has reached such a level of accessability and the big corporate entertainment conglomerates such a level of omnipotence that the populist crap has created an impenetrable crust in the popular consciousness through which the cream has no chance to rise to the surface but is buffeted in great clotted lumps of purity in the hidden currents underneath. Only those with the passion to want to drill through, don scuba gear and go exploring will ever be able to access these havens of excellence... and that ain't the general public. God help us all. |