Recently Seen Films

[Stu]

So you didn't like it. Boohoo. No reason at all to play the hype card.

[Vector]

So you didn't like it. Boohoo. No reason at all to play the hype card.

Well, when I hear 'scariest movie of all time' thrown around in the advertising for the film, I expect to be just a little bit rattled by what I see...and I wasn't. The only way I was even remotely scared by the movie was when I used my own imagination and tried putting myself in their shoes, and still even then, it seemed farfetched. I'd much rather watch a documentary on real events, true possible paranormal activity.

[Ray]

Probably the reason people are scared where I live (San Diego) is probably because it takes place here. I'm watching it tonight with a few friends; I'll just have t wait and see.

[Inferno04]

I, literally, just got back from watching Cirque Du Freak: Vampire's Assistant.
...Why did I even expect anything? >< 5/10

Okay, this movie, is a clusterfuck. I promised myself I woulldn't bitch about book differences. And I really don't care. Stuff like changing Cormac to a woman, Mr. Tiny's color from yellow to purple, I don't care. But it jumbled up the story the the point of certain events. It revealed things and hinted at things that were in the LAST BOOK. That's what I had a problem with, book-to-movie wise.

So here I shall list pros, cons, and general rambling on what I thought. This will spoil the entire story, book and movie. So if you haven't or want to read the books, don't look. And if you plan to see it, then maybe don't read...I just don't want my bias to affect others. ><

Spoiler:

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Let me list Pros first so I don't sound like a complete movie snob >< Don't get me wrong, this movie wasn't insufferable. I'd see it again but, it's just slightly painful to watch.

Pros:

-Evra. He practically saved this movie's sad attempt at humor. He was a regular teen, casual, kinda snarky, and I still have that fangirly crush on him. Thank god his, "I just wanna play music! D8" subplot went NOWHERE.

-Mr. Tiny. Lord I loved how this man played Mr. Tiny. He was jolly, he was mysterious, and all he wanted was destruction. The problem is, while his motive was clear, his wasn't played as neutral in the books. In the books, he wanted to see destruction, yes, but he prodded both sides. He was neutral, not sided more one way or the other. That aside, this guy was a GREAT Tiny in my eyes.

-The setting. I really loved the theatre and the Cirque's camp most of all, but every place was just right. From the white picket fence homes, clean school, to the dark and obscure cirque, all of it. I think that's what I liked about the setting. It wasn't just dark, it was obscure. Don't think Burton obscure either, it didn't feel like it was trying to be his style AT ALL.

-Rebecca. Sort of...eh. I hated Debbie. Always have and will, she's boring, flat, and has no business being in the books past 3. Rebecca could at least do something to save herself. So, hurray for monkey tails, +1 respect point.

-The 'Freaks' Wow. Just wow. I think the actual performance was my favorite part of the movie. Maybe it was just my anticipation, these books having be my favorite series, but I was so giddy to see all of the talents, all of the characters come to life on the screen, just as I had imagined them looking. I can't wait to see how Merla will look, or Evra's children.

-The Score. Note, not the songs...That's a con. >< The score was greaaaat. Epic feel, sad when he bid his family goodbye, very good general epic movie feel.

I wish I could say more pros but...whew, here goes.

Cons:

-THE HUMOR. God I cannot begin to bitch about this. Let me say, yes I did laugh at the jokes. Did I like that they were there, nooooo. >< Swearing in a sentence, does not make it funny. We're going to like, Transformers humor here. Larten probably wouldn't say, 'That's bullshit' either, just to bitch about characterization issues...
It has the same problem as the Pirates of the Caribbean movies. Let me put it like that. Those movies were good. They had a pretty dark and good plot. But uh oh, it's licensed by Disney, let's have some ZANY sidekicks, and how about a little monkey that grins, see, THAT'S family humor. 8D It's like everytime something serious would happen, they feel the need to pull us out of there with a joke so inapropriate for the moment. That is exactly what Cirque Du Freak's main problem was. Some random slapstick moment, or swear at the wrong time. ><

-The Music. I'm going to say it right now. The score was good, but the actual soundtrack, songs played? Hey. Hey movie. Stop trying to be like Watchmen. Stop putting in different, older tunes in at an inappropriate time, it's not clever cause you didn't work it right. >< Half the time the music was saying "LAUGH" while the movie was saying just the opposite. I noticed this most in the beginning, during Darren's funeral. The music was all, upbeat, ho-dunky. xD Thanks for taking a moment that made me cry in the book and make it humorous, thaaanks. xD

-Steve's involvement so early.
WHAT. THE. HELL. MOVIE. When he says, "I'll never forget this" in the books, it's presented like teen bitching, emotional angst that will pass. Sure, when he comes back in the latter half of the books, his "Oh I iz a good guy" is obviously fake, but the point is. We were never expected, never hinted, never thought to see him again. so many other important events made us forget him. But in the movie he's so instantly thrown in immediately after Darren leaves. He's immediately turned into a villian. His apprerance as the main big bad, in a final showdown with Darren, is way later. The book's plot progress to many enemies, now the movies will have Steve reoccuring as a villian again frequently, like the Joker and Batman for Christsake.

-LartenxTruska. AHHHHHH. Just AHHHHHHHHH. I WANT ARRA. >< THIS IS NOT A GOOD PAIRING. ><

-Gavner. Oh Gavner, sweet Gavner, what have they done to you...>< You just have to Google how Dafoe looks here for yourself. They made him into a little dandy boy. >< Little pencil mustache, bright colored tux, oily and just gaaah. He's even more fancy than you'd expect Kurda to be. Book-vets may be the only ones that know this but, the vampires are general barbaric in nature, so not Rice's vamps. Animalistic, and Gavner was one such type.

-All the hints. STOP DROPPING SPOILER HINTS MOVIE. Harkat doesn't introduce himself, somebody just says his name right off the bat. Larten's death is slightly alluded to, Tiny keeps calling both boys, "Son" WAY too frequently to be a coincidence. There's this one part where Truska has a vision, and lists off words like "Redemption, destruction", which all kind of hint at an order of future events. We were never supposed to know how Tiny creates Little People until the Lake of Souls journey, but oh, Murlough gets turned into one after his death. Tiny's powers and role are expanded on WAYYYYYY too early. He's the damn puppetmaster, you don't reveal that early. ><

-The editing. Really, REALLY bad jump cuts at certain points, you can just tell that had to snip five seconds of walking to make some kind of deadline, it was bad. The pacing was disrupted this way, and people who haven't read the books may be left confused

Well, despite the likes and dislikes...I can still say it's better than Twishit. It's a shame that such a shitty series got the budget while a decent vampire series got shit, and a shit movie to show for it that's STILL better.

Cirque Du Freak, like a Series of Unfortunate Events, unfortunately suffered bad production, bad budget, and a sub-par movie that probably won't be expanded into a sequel, while much shittier books with worse movie adaptations will get to keep going. ><

Speaking of, I had to sit through a New Moon trailer, and lord help me they made it look GOOD. It certainly made the action sequences look good, along with some better CGI effects, but you just KNOW it's going to be a craptastic angst fest. xD I'm not wasting my money on it. Seeing Bella toss her body around and scream like a mental patient over a BREAKUP, made me lol hard. Some girls stared at me. It was amusing. <3

[Ray]

I just saw Paranormal Activity.

7/10

It was a good movie, all in all, but it doesn't do justice to the [over]hype.

The two main actors were good (Katie and Micah). They acted... real. Though, that Amber girl seemed rather forced just to make it seem like they had contact with the outside world. The psychic was funny, but was only there for a short while.

What probably stopped me from being scared was my motion-sickness. But come on, really, even if you WEREN'T freaked out, would you still shake the FUCKING CAMERA OVER AND OVAAR!!? It was hard to tolerate, but at least the still scenes were pretty good.

Story wise, it was really nice. The backstory of Spoiler:

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Katie being haunted since childhood

was a nice lil' touch. The build-up to the end was good, too. Also, the fact the Spoiler:

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thing haunting Katie was not a ghost, but a demon

was rather... intriguing.

The hauntings (specifically the night-related ones) were really freaky. Too bad they were always presented either right before or right after the fucking shaky scenes.

The end (I think the first of the 3 total), where Spoiler:

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Katie (possessed) kills Micah

was nice. Though, I'd rather have the ending where Spoiler:

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Katie gets shot by the cops after her friend Amber calls them in after seeing Micah's dead body.

It would've provided better closure, as we all know the possibility of a sequel is rather low. At least it wasn't the Spoiler:

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throat-slitting ending

with Katie. That just seemed... dumb.

In the end, it was enjoyable. I just had to keep my head together from all the fucking shakiness. Half the time it was just SHAKE SHAKE SHAKE. Oh well. It was still worth the money I used to buy the ticket.

[Stars1356]

I also saw Paranormal Activity and while I was not really scared I did have chills running up and down my body when

Spoiler:

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the covers move on the bed

I like how everything was build up and things just got worse and worse but think the ending didn't suit everything that happened.

Spoiler:

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To think that Katie is still missing is corny and hope there isn't a sequel planed. I think the ending where Katie dies would have fit better as that would be the ultimate end to the build up of the demon.

Does anyone know where all the other ending were mentioned?

[TheOvermind001]

So you didn't like it. Boohoo. No reason at all to play the hype card.

No, really... the entire advertising campaign is based around hype. It was artificially inflated and built up.

Although I do agree it was a bad film... I don't think it was a waste to see it (keep in mind I did not pay to enter the theater ). If you thought the Blair Witch Project was scary, you'll think this movie is scary too. It strikes a chord with anyone who has sometime during their life experienced some kind of unexplainable or eerie situation while in their bedroom trying to sleep at night.

[P Anderson DIE]

Spoiler:

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Saw it again watch the bedroom door for a shadow on night number 19. Didn't notice this the first time.

Out of like 50 people's opinions on this film around 40 of them loved it. There is no film out there that everyone like's. I'm not saying it was prefect it was far from it specially the ending but as handheld camera horror's goes this is by far the best in MY opinion.

[Stu]

No, really... the entire advertising campaign is based around hype. It was artificially inflated and built up.

People artificially inflated and built up the feeling that they were terrified from this movie? haha bullshit! There are people watching this film without having seen all the advertising hype (try to remember the world consists of more than America) and are still getting scared shitless out of it.

My point was really more that why blame hype when it suits? CR29 has been blowing his load over one of the most hype-driven games of the generation, yet because he likes it he'll ignore the over-hype. But when it's something he doesn't like, boooooo! Fuck hype!!1!

Makes no sense.

[P Anderson DIE]

People artificially inflated and built up the feeling that they were terrified from this movie? haha bullshit! There are people watching this film without having seen all the advertising hype (try to remember the world consists of more than America) and are still getting scared shitless out of it.

My point was really more that why blame hype when it suits? CR29 has been blowing his load over one of the most hype-driven games of the generation, yet because he likes it he'll ignore the over-hype. But when it's something he doesn't like, boooooo! Fuck hype!!1!

Makes no sense.

Lmao that was beautiful, well said!

[Darkmoon]

Now children, I haven't had to beat any of you with a coal sack for several weeks now. Don't make me go find the sack. Play nice.

[BadWolfX]

Makes no sense.

It makes perfect sense. He's whining about the overhype because he didn't like it. He isn't going to complain Uncharted 2 is overhyped because he loves it. It's one of the easiest things to blame when you're disappointed with something.

I'm not saying it's a valid complain because the reason he thinks its overhyped is because he got pulled in by the hype. If he went in to see it completely clueless and not having seen any reviews from people then he may of liked it because he didn't have any expectations.

[Vector]

My point was really more that why blame hype when it suits? CR29 has been blowing his load over one of the most hype-driven games of the generation, yet because he likes it he'll ignore the over-hype. But when it's something he doesn't like, boooooo! Fuck hype!!1!

Makes no sense.

It's simple, really. I was part of the hype for Uncharted 2 because I loved the first one and was excited for the sequel as soon as it was announced. Paranormal Activity was just a movie I heard about, getting rave reviews, "scariest movie of all time," so I figured I'd check it out. Uncharted 2 lived up to the hype for me because it's a great game, and this lame movie obviously didn't live up to any expectations in my mind.

To be perfectly honest, I didn't have high expectations for this movie because I don't ever have any expectations for 'horror' movies that come out these days. I didn't like the movie. At all. Why is it so hard to grasp? It didn't scare me, it did nothing for me. Some of the late night haunting scenes were cool, but that's really it. I didn't buy the actors like everyone else did because I felt like they were actors trying to act like real people like characters in most 'shakey camera' movies.

I've heard "THIS MOVIE IS SO SCARY" soooo many times before, and I've seen each of these films by taking what people say with a grain of salt, because I'm just not scared like normal people, I guess. I'm not trying to be macho or tough, and I'd be honest and say "this movie made me shit my pants out of fear" if it happened, but it doesn't happen.


I honestly don't see what the big fuss over my post is about. Where in my original post about the film did I say "I WAS EXPECTING THIS MOVIE TO BE AWESOME BECAUSE I HEARD IT WAS AWESOME AND IT SUCKED!!"? Oh that's right, I didn't. Must've struck a nerve somehwere else.

I didn't fucking like the movie, who gives a shit? Just because some people here pissed their pants in the theater, had their lives changed, had to turn the lights on and lost sleep doesn't mean that I have to feel that way. You think I give a fuck if someone says they HATE Uncharted 2? Give me a break.


And Stu, seriously, you really should stop trying so hard to be so scathing. Everyone understands that you're the insulting asshole of the boards, so you really don't need to go out of your way to do it anymore. Pump the fucking brakes once in a while.

[TheOvermind001]

This is getting retarded ... lol

[DarkMemories]

Just finished SAW VI not too long ago. Despite having thought the spoilers for it sounded retarded, I actually kind of liked it. I'm interested to see where they go with VII.