In unrelated news, stumbled upon this on the movie blog I read:
Summit Entertainment announced today that "New Moon" completely trounced midnight opening records by "Harry Potter And The Half Blood Prince" ($22.2 million) and "The Dark Knight" (previous record holder with $18.5 million) by taking in a whopping $26.27 million in midnight screenings from 3,514 theaters last night. Predictions for box-office receipts this weekend are ranging in the $90-$100 million range which is outrageously good numbers if they can hit those targets and pretty good indication that no matter how much critics and many adults hate "Twilight" it is here to stay.
Wait, whaaaat? How did it do better than The Dark Knight? I mean come on, seriously? And alright, I haven't seen it yet but I will at some point provided someone is going with me since I can't very well go by myself, but my expectations are about as low as they were for the second Transformers movie. Just the thought that it is put in the same frame of reference as the Dark Knight is a bit laughable really. I mean hell, that had Christian Bale (who I'd back against Cedric any day) and a brilliant performance by Heath Ledger. There was excellent cinematography, dramedy, explosions, a great score, facial expression...aaaah I am so petty, I'll stop. The New Moon reviews have been less than promising. I'm always a bit sceptical when it comes to this because often reviewers will just hate something because they expect they should hate it. It's not really about the actual output at all. The whole Twilight franchise gets so much crap, people just mock if because that's the expected thing. That said, I've heard a couple of fans saying that it isn't as good as the first one. Now in my humble opinion the first one was rather ridiculous, so I'm concerned where we can go from there.
This is from another review:
We're the first to admit that we're not the target audience for "New Moon" (you know, because we have taste and aren't swooning teenage girls). But there's playing to your base, and there's making a bad film, and this is more a case of the latter. Even teenage girls (who have previously been responsible for the success of Hanson and "Saved by the Bell") are too smart for this movie. And if they're not, we're in trouble as a species.
Promising, isn't it? I really don't understand why these movies aren't better. I don't know if it's the casting, the direction, the script or just a basic problem with the source material. So the books aren't exactly prize winning literature, but they still had a spark about them that made it readable and enjoyable enough to spawn such a rabid fanbase, and that is clearly not translating. It probably has something to do with the books having a heavy internal reflection going on that can't really be carried into film. I have half a mind to try and script them myself just to see if it can be done properly.
Yes, that is delusions of grandeur you sensed in that last line. Studying a semester of screenwriting and watching Adaptation does not qualify such throw-away lines. But hey, I may be bored sometime, you never know.
Anyway, I'm revelling in the breeze and my freedom from the evils of air-conditioning. It makes me feel so sick, it's insane. Meanwhile, they're predicting 49 degrees for the inner west tomorrow. Beach, yes/yes?
Music: The world has its shine - Cobra Starship
Mood: Lazy
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