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Movie: The Matrix

Fight scenes used to bore me - why did people like them? Then The Matrix happened, and it was like a revelation.

It brought a lot of Hong Kong into action scenes, which is mostly a good thing. That said there's enough dodgy CG-assisted wire work choking up bad movies with leaden pointless fights out there now to maybe prove me wrong.
posted to FanFare by Artw at 9:35 AM on September 30, 2014

Biggest things action movies get wring these days is the pacing - it's just action, action, action without buildup or relief. The Matrix is pretty perfect in that regard.
posted to FanFare by Artw at 9:36 AM on September 30, 2014

There's a great article from The Dissolve on the fight scenes in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Deagon here, and I'd say it's main failing is it applies things uniquely to that movie that are pretty universal: All fight scenes, especially in martial arts films but not just there, are part dance and part dialogue. They should always communicate something to earn their place in the movie.

"This character is really cool" and "character you previously thought was… [more]
posted to FanFare by Artw at 10:06 AM on September 30, 2014

Only in Bill and Ted is he more perfect. He is The One for this.
posted to FanFare by Artw at 10:43 AM on September 30, 2014

In fact, how perfectly cast is the entirety of this movie? Mostly it's stick roles, but they got the exact right person for each of them.
posted to FanFare by Artw at 10:47 AM on September 30, 2014

I will tell you at length about how any story with a Chosen One is lazy cop out garbage and I still love this movie.

Talking of which: The Lego Movie remake of or refutation of The Matrix?
posted to FanFare by Artw at 11:03 AM on September 30, 2014

The Gaiman thing might be the only time Gaiman has made something more Hard SF, with the swap out of the battery concept for something that makes *a little* more sense.
posted to FanFare by Artw at 11:27 AM on September 30, 2014

Maybe it's because I've since moved to America, where guns are real, but them murdering quite so many cops is a little more wince inducing now.
posted to FanFare by Artw at 12:25 PM on September 30, 2014

I'm beginning to wonder if 1999 was the peak of my culture.
posted to FanFare by Artw at 12:35 PM on September 30, 2014

Movie: The World's End

It's Welwyn Garden City, it's the archetypical new town.
posted to FanFare by Artw at 10:02 AM on September 13, 2014

(I think bits of it might be Letchworth, which is a similar deal.)
posted to FanFare by Artw at 10:03 AM on September 13, 2014

Well, often there's be one place like that and one shithole dive that was a bit more alternative. Or it'd be the same place on alternating nights.
posted to FanFare by Artw at 10:48 AM on September 13, 2014

On the other hand, there's a reason most of those New Towns didn't turned out to be near-Utopian planned communities and instead became ghastly shitholes, and it wasn't really the architecture...
posted to FanFare by Artw at 6:51 PM on September 13, 2014