Comment on In the Lost Lands | Official Trailer
southsamurai@sh.itjust.works 1 week ago
I’m legit hyped the this movie.
I love Milla in everything she’s done. Bautista has turned into a surprisingly restrained actor for action. And the concept is classic fantasy, which hasn’t been done on screen a lot recently. Anderson directing is a surprise, but he’s done good work, so I’m down with it.
tacosanonymous@lemm.ee 1 week ago
This is going to sound dickish but I swear it isn’t. I’m actually curious to know what anderson’s “good works” are.
southsamurai@sh.itjust.works 1 week ago
Pretty much all of the resident evil series that he did, and the alien v predator movie
The resident evil stuff, he’s got a distinct action style. It manages to get the balance between being showy enough for movies with staying story based. Like, you know how some movies the stunts and explosions and such become the focus of the movie rather than the plot? He’s good at not going that far, but still making it a spectacle.
And he’s good at doing action while still giving a sense of progression. The individual scenes move the story forward. Which is partially about the script, but direction is where the details come in, and it’s the details that make a movie be more than just a series of fights and explosions with dialogue in between.
Like, in the first resident evil, the way he used the dogs. It gives you information about the “zombies”, brings tension, and delivers an eventual payoff in action.
Now, is it high art? No. I don’t think anything he’s done even approaches that. Even the three musketeers movie is a divergence from the literary origins of the story. I don’t see that as a bad thing. But it is an easy thing to screw up and turn into schlock.
He has a wheelhouse, and he stays with it. Pretty much, he does action movies with a secondary genre with his wife (he and Jovovich are married). Within that scope, he turns out very watchable movies. I’d even say that he’s damn good at turning out action movies overall. A lot of his can stand up to anyone else doing action. If he has a weakness, it’s as a writer more than as a director. His dialogue can be stilted.
tacosanonymous@lemm.ee 1 week ago
I Appreciate the reply.
southsamurai@sh.itjust.works 1 week ago
No worries :)
UKFilmNerd@feddit.uk 1 week ago
I really like the original Mortal Kombat and am a huge fan of Event Horizon. Then Anderson stumbled with Soldier, which is OK. The most interesting fact is that die to an Easter egg, it is actually set within the Blade Runner universe.
Alien Vs Predator I really like, despite the alien gestation time being really short, but the film does contain the best shot ever, the look of a surprised predator. Always makes me laugh.
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southsamurai@sh.itjust.works 1 week ago
Yeah, I agree, soldier was a huge stumble lol.
I don’t know that I’d be as enthusiastic if this was him trying to make something like a period romance, or a serious drama. But just switching out a fantasy setting for the sci-fi type settings he usually does? It’s a good bet that it’ll at least be entertaining.
SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 week ago
I’m personally with you, I’m no fan of Anderson, but we can’t deny that the Resident Evil movies were moneymakers, which means on some level they were actually very popular films. Often popularity and perceived cinematic quality are in direct opposition of each other, some of the films that are considered cinematic masterworks are often kind of boring and most average people hate them.
He directed the first one and then the fourth one, only writing the second and third. The fourth one is when the money started really rolling in. 1-3 made about $100 million profit each, while 4 is when the series started pulling closer to 250 million per movie.
And all that’s just for box office numbers, it doesn’t include money made from like DVD/Bluray sales and streaming services. Undeniably popular series, even if we don’t think it’s anything to write home about.
tacosanonymous@lemm.ee 1 week ago
That is interesting to learn. I remember really liking the first RE and thinking the rest were poorly written, directed, and acted. Then I rewatched the first and noticed that it was pretty bad too. I think it’s just that I’ve been more critical of films and less awed from action as an old person.
southsamurai@sh.itjust.works 1 week ago
Exactly. There’s a lot to be said for movies that are just escapist entertainment, which is what the resident evil movies are. It’s a game series brought to the screen that you can slap on and see some cool stuff happening.
That’s a perfectly valid form of film. Lots of people like that kind of movie (including myself as long as that isn’t all I have to watch), and it’s popular for that very reason.
It’s exactly that kind of movie that he specializes in.