list http://www.spout.com/ Recent community activity around 300 on Spout Copyright 2005-9 Spout, LLC Spout RSS http://www.spout.com/images/SpoutLogoRSS.jpg http://www.spout.com/ 136 30 http://www.spout.com/films/300/268461/default.aspx Title: 300
Year: 2007
Director: Zack Snyder
Plot: Sin City author Frank Miller's sweeping take on the historic Battle of Thermopylae comes to the screen courtesy of Dawn of the Dead director Zack Snyder. Gerard Butler stars as Spartan King Leonidas and Lena Headey plays Queen Gorgo. The massive army of the Persian Empire is sweeping across the globe, crushing every force that dares stand in its path. When a Persian envoy arrives in Sparta offering King Leonidas power over all of Greece if he will only bow to the will of the all powerful Xerxes (Rodrigo Santoro), the strong-willed leader assembles a small army comprised of his empire's best fighters and marches off to battle. Though they have virtually no hope of defeating Xerxes' intimidating battalion, Leonidas' men soldier on, intent on letting it be known they will bow to no man but their king. Meanwhile, back in Sparta, the loyal Queen Gorgo attempts to convince both the skeptical council and the devious Theron (Dominic West) to send more troops despite the fact that many view Leonidas' unsanctioned war march as a serious transgression. As Xerxes' fearsome "immortals" draw near, a few noble Greeks vow to assist the Spartans on the battlefield. When King Leonidas and his 300 Spartan warriors fell to the overwhelming Persian army at the Battle of Thermopylae, the fearless actions of the noble fighters inspired all of Greece to stand up against their Persian enemy and wage the battle that would ultimately give birth to the modern concept of democracy. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
Times Tagged: 212
Number of Lists: 97
Number of blog posts: 67
Number of discussion threads: 12
SpoutRating: 3
]]>Sat, 11 Jul 2009 06:52:33 GMT3002007Zack Snyder<a href=/films/242411/default.aspx style='text-decoration:underline'>Sin City</a> author Frank Miller's sweeping take on the historic Battle of Thermopylae comes to the screen courtesy of <a href=/films/8197/default.aspx style='text-decoration:underline'>Dawn of the Dead</a> director <a href="/players/P___367818/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Zack Snyder</a>. <a href="/players/P___240591/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Gerard Butler</a> stars as Spartan King Leonidas and <a href="/players/P____31362/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Lena Headey</a> plays Queen Gorgo. The massive army of the Persian Empire is sweeping across the globe, crushing every force that dares stand in its path. When a Persian envoy arrives in Sparta offering King Leonidas power over all of Greece if he will only bow to the will of the all powerful Xerxes (<a href="/players/P___296401/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Rodrigo Santoro</a>), the strong-willed leader assembles a small army comprised of his empire's best fighters and marches off to battle. Though they have virtually no hope of defeating Xerxes' intimidating battalion, Leonidas' men soldier on, intent on letting it be known they will bow to no man but their king. Meanwhile, back in Sparta, the loyal Queen Gorgo attempts to convince both the skeptical council and the devious Theron (<a href="/players/P___200983/default.aspx" style='text-decoration:underline'>Dominic West</a>) to send more troops despite the fact that many view Leonidas' unsanctioned war march as a serious transgression. As Xerxes' fearsome "immortals" draw near, a few noble Greeks vow to assist the Spartans on the battlefield. When King Leonidas and his 300 Spartan warriors fell to the overwhelming Persian army at the Battle of Thermopylae, the fearless actions of the noble fighters inspired all of Greece to stand up against their Persian enemy and wage the battle that would ultimately give birth to the modern concept of democracy. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide212Tag Target (>10)9767123http://www.spout.com/ProductImages/s268461.jpghttp://www.spout.com/films/300/268461/default.aspxFilm http://www.spout.com/blogs/kevynknox/archive/2009/7/11/43001.aspx Post By: KevynKnox
Post To: KevynKnox Blog
Post Date: 7/11/2009 2:52:33 AM
Body: (this review was first published at www.thecinematheque.com on 4/1/07) From the very first moment, as the Warner Bros. logo flashes and slashes its way across the darkened screen, as if forged by mighty Hephaestus himself, we instantly know that Zack Snyder and his X-Box-weened posse of computer geeks, graphic novel junkees and comic book fanboys are about to mightily thrust upon the unsuspecting public a vast and mighty display of ultrasupercoolawesomeness to the very freakin' tippy-top apex-eroding grody-to-the-max. Of course, for those of us who are not brought to the very precipice (or beyond) of orgasm by the thought of a CGI-created universe full of rabid bare-chested oiled-up steroid-pumped half-men half-beast warriors led by a pompous half-man half-pariah (all bad actor) who is just one note (and a lot less work-outs) away from a certain White House residing war monger of our own, fighting an equally rabid über-army of glimmer-masked maurauders, gigantic Frankensteinian monstrosities and a few big-ass battle elephants led by some sort of mascara'd crossbreed of Marilyn Manson and Rupaul, way beyond Thunderdome, this film, full of lusty vim and vigor and spewing ultrasupercoolawesomeness out its proverbial watusi, gets real tired real soon - and I got real pissed off real freakin' fast. Now to begin, please allow me to say that if your artistic sensibilities are not totally grossed out within the first ten minutes or so, as if someone had just thrown-up big fat chunks of falafel and moussaka all over you, then this is surely the movie for you - vacuous, demeaning, completely devoid of any substance whatsoever, repleat with all the idiotic, brain-numbing, Nietzsche-praising video gaming geekocity one could ever dream of while sleeping snug and cozy at age 37 in their mommy's basement rec room, copy of Maxim under their pillow and thoughts of Pamela Anderson floating like sugar plum fairies throughout their heads. If this is you, then nothing I can say or do will ever sway your opinion away from the ultrasupercoolawesomeness of this computer designed crypto-movie atrocity that blatantly spits in the face of cinematic integrity, and perhaps you should just stop reading right now and go finish that saved game of Warcraft you've been so buggin' to get back to. Meanwhile, everyone else, my faithful readers perhaps, please read on, for I truly scathe only very few and far between and you wouldn't want to miss any of the mordacious tongue slathering that is sure to follow. Based upon Frank Miller's graphic novel about the 480 B.C. Battle of Thermopylae, where the King of Sparta led his meager army of 300 strong against the interloping throng of the mighty Persian horde, which in turn was apocryphally based by Miller upon the 1962 film, The 300 Spartans, he saw as an impressionable (if not a bit ADHD) child, Zack Snyder, who gave us all quite the surprise with his quick-witted Dawn of the Dead remake a few years back, tries to have his cake and eat it too by attempting to recreate the feeling of cinematic overzealousness and pop-pulp flim-flam that was the last Frank Miller penned adaptation. Yet Sin City, even with all its many flaws, still managed to hit its intended target at least half the time, while Snyder's overwrought mega movie just falls deeper and deeper into the inevitable chasm of CGI-induced banality, ending up nothing shy of a deadened, terrifically dull, plodding slab of man meat-cum-action figure tableaux, perfectly in tune with the Maxim reading machismo of modern "man". Snyder's film may indeed have its momentary visual exaltation of larks, but once one gets beyond such slapdash smattery and one-dimensional eye porn, one must surely see 300 for what it truly is - a simultaneously homoerotic and homophobic testosteronic monkeyshine, full of so much hokey ham-handed faux pixilated battle scenes, one trick pony actors-cum-glistening torsos, slathered in enough body oils to simultaneously and permanently ejaculate each and every last gay porn connoisseur from P-Town to the Golden Gate, naked writhing slave-girl oracles straight off of a Maxfield Parrish calendar and enough level-ending melees with every fanged, clawed and muscled monster this side of the Khyber Pass, to nearly eradicate the ever-blurring fine line between modern mass market movie making and the benighted art of video games, not to mention giving every person over the IQ of drooling monosyllabic Spartan, a headache the size of the Persian Empire at its glorious behemothic height. As our mighty Spartan heroes, led by the churlish Gerald Butler, not even attempting to disguise his thick Scottish burr, form an "impenetrable phalanx at the hot gates" and the equally mighty 8-foot-tall man-muffin god-king Xerxes sends wave after wave of circus sideshow lallapalooza at them, one can not help but notice the totally ludicrous identity crisis this movie has in spades. Both sexually confused (this entire freakin' shama lama ding dong is full of enough beefcake bunnies and chest-piercing blood-n-gore for both the leather-boy and the frat boy to be both aroused by and bothered by) and politically metaphored (aka macho jar-headed white guys vs. interloping terroristic golden brown guys), Snyder has pounded every square peg into every round hole he could find and in doing so has let loose a Pandora's box of phallic Freudian psychobabble and right-winged rhetoric spin-doctoring unto an already applesauce'd burlesque of inanity. Ultimately, Snyder's sophomore (and sophomoric) film plays out as an excitably unexciting yet hilariously hysterical (as Nathan Lee of The Village Voice has called it) mélange of utter flapdoodle and mad cow-riddled absurdity - all fried up in a synthetically manufactured landscape of digital drudgery. Run, don't walk from the blob that is 300.
]]>Sat, 11 Jul 2009 06:52:33 GMTKevynKnoxKevynKnox Blog7/11/2009 2:52:33 AM(this review was first published at www.thecinematheque.com on 4/1/07) From the very first moment, as the Warner Bros. logo flashes and slashes its way across the darkened screen, as if forged by mighty Hephaestus himself, we instantly know that Zack Snyder and his X-Box-weened posse of computer geeks, graphic novel junkees and comic book fanboys are about to mightily thrust upon the unsuspecting public a vast and mighty display of ultrasupercoolawesomeness to the very freakin' tippy-top apex-eroding grody-to-the-max. Of course, for those of us who are not brought to the very precipice (or beyond) of orgasm by the thought of a CGI-created universe full of rabid bare-chested oiled-up steroid-pumped half-men half-beast warriors led by a pompous half-man half-pariah (all bad actor) who is just one note (and a lot less work-outs) away from a certain White House residing war monger of our own, fighting an equally rabid &uuml;ber-army of glimmer-masked maurauders, gigantic Frankensteinian monstrosities and a few big-ass battle elephants led by some sort of mascara'd crossbreed of Marilyn Manson and Rupaul, way beyond Thunderdome, this film, full of lusty vim and vigor and spewing ultrasupercoolawesomeness out its proverbial watusi, gets real tired real soon - and I got real pissed off real freakin' fast. Now to begin, please allow me to say that if your artistic sensibilities are not totally grossed out within the first ten minutes or so, as if someone had just thrown-up big fat chunks of falafel and moussaka all over you, then this is surely the movie for you - vacuous, demeaning, completely devoid of any substance whatsoever, repleat with all the idiotic, brain-numbing, Nietzsche-praising video gaming geekocity one could ever dream of while sleeping snug and cozy at age 37 in their mommy's basement rec room, copy of Maxim under their pillow and thoughts of Pamela Anderson floating like sugar plum fairies throughout their heads. If this is you, then nothing I can say or do will ever sway your opinion away from the ultrasupercoolawesomeness of this computer designed crypto-movie atrocity that blatantly spits in the face of cinematic integrity, and perhaps you should just stop reading right now and go finish that saved game of Warcraft you've been so buggin' to get back to. Meanwhile, everyone else, my faithful readers perhaps, please read on, for I truly scathe only very few and far between and you wouldn't want to miss any of the mordacious tongue slathering that is sure to follow. Based upon Frank Miller's graphic novel about the 480 B.C. Battle of Thermopylae, where the King of Sparta led his meager army of 300 strong against the interloping throng of the mighty Persian horde, which in turn was apocryphally based by Miller upon the 1962 film, The 300 Spartans, he saw as an impressionable (if not a bit ADHD) child, Zack Snyder, who gave us all quite the surprise with his quick-witted Dawn of the Dead remake a few years back, tries to have his cake and eat it too by attempting to recreate the feeling of cinematic overzealousness and pop-pulp flim-flam that was the last Frank Miller penned adaptation. Yet Sin City, even with all its many flaws, still managed to hit its intended target at least half the time, while Snyder's overwrought mega movie just falls deeper and deeper into the inevitable chasm of CGI-induced banality, ending up nothing shy of a deadened, terrifically dull, plodding slab of man meat-cum-action figure tableaux, perfectly in tune with the Maxim reading machismo of modern "man". Snyder's film may indeed have its momentary visual exaltation of larks, but once one gets beyond such slapdash smattery and one-dimensional eye porn, one must surely see 300 for what it truly is - a simultaneously homoerotic and homophobic testosteronic monkeyshine, full of so much hokey ham-handed faux pixilated battle scenes, one trick pony actors-cum-glistening torsos, slathered in enough body oils to simultaneously and permanently ejaculate each and every last gay porn connoisseur from P-Town to the Golden Gate, naked writhing slave-girl oracles straight off of a Maxfield Parrish calendar and enough level-ending melees with every fanged, clawed and muscled monster this side of the Khyber Pass, to nearly eradicate the ever-blurring fine line between modern mass market movie making and the benighted art of video games, not to mention giving every person over the IQ of drooling monosyllabic Spartan, a headache the size of the Persian Empire at its glorious behemothic height. As our mighty Spartan heroes, led by the churlish Gerald Butler, not even attempting to disguise his thick Scottish burr, form an "impenetrable phalanx at the hot gates" and the equally mighty 8-foot-tall man-muffin god-king Xerxes sends wave after wave of circus sideshow lallapalooza at them, one can not help but notice the totally ludicrous identity crisis this movie has in spades. Both sexually confused (this entire freakin' shama lama ding dong is full of enough beefcake bunnies and chest-piercing blood-n-gore for both the leather-boy and the frat boy to be both aroused by and bothered by) and politically metaphored (aka macho jar-headed white guys vs. interloping terroristic golden brown guys), Snyder has pounded every square peg into every round hole he could find and in doing so has let loose a Pandora's box of phallic Freudian psychobabble and right-winged rhetoric spin-doctoring unto an already applesauce'd burlesque of inanity. Ultimately, Snyder's sophomore (and sophomoric) film plays out as an excitably unexciting yet hilariously hysterical (as Nathan Lee of The Village Voice has called it) m&eacute;lange of utter flapdoodle and mad cow-riddled absurdity - all fried up in a synthetically manufactured landscape of digital drudgery. Run, don't walk from the blob that is 300. http://www.spout.com/groups/Movie_Polls/Which_of_these_films_based_on_graphic_novels_is_yo/657/40619/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: Risselada
Post To: Movie Polls
Post Date: 2/24/2009 3:28:14 PM
Body: Please reference this thread for the rules of this group. Watchmen is coming out pretty soon, and up until last week I don't think I could ever say I'd read a graphic novel before. Someone lent me their copy of this book, and I'm actually only halfway through it still, but I'm really hooked. So for this poll I tried to pick movies that came strictly from graphic novels. For instance there were some I was originally going to add, but my research indicates that The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen is a comic book series and 30 Days of Night is a comic book mini-series. In the case of American Splendor I couldn't tell if these were "comic books" or "novels" (I haven't seen the movie either...) so I just left it off to keep the list as focused as possible. And as for anything Japanese or manga based, that's just another huge world that I might do another poll about later, but for now I didn't include anything from that. Sorry if I missed your favorite, but please feel free to discuss. Please vote only once in each poll. Movies referenced in this poll:300From HellGhost WorldA History of ViolencePersepolisRoad to PerditionSin CityV for Vendetta
]]>Tue, 24 Feb 2009 20:28:14 GMTRisseladaMovie Polls2/24/2009 3:28:14 PMPlease reference this thread for the rules of this group. Watchmen is coming out pretty soon, and up until last week I don't think I could ever say I'd read a graphic novel before. Someone lent me their copy of this book, and I'm actually only halfway through it still, but I'm really hooked. So for this poll I tried to pick movies that came strictly from graphic novels. For instance there were some I was originally going to add, but my research indicates that The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen is a comic book series and 30 Days of Night is a comic book mini-series. In the case of American Splendor I couldn't tell if these were "comic books" or "novels" (I haven't seen the movie either...) so I just left it off to keep the list as focused as possible. And as for anything Japanese or manga based, that's just another huge world that I might do another poll about later, but for now I didn't include anything from that. Sorry if I missed your favorite, but please feel free to discuss. Please vote only once in each poll. Movies referenced in this poll:300From HellGhost WorldA History of ViolencePersepolisRoad to PerditionSin CityV for Vendetta http://www.spout.com/blogs/risselada/archive/2008/12/19/38590.aspx Post By: Risselada
Post To: Risselada Blog
Post Date: 12/19/2008 11:16:45 AM
Body: The Dark Knight I’m finally writing about The Dark Knight. So much has been blogged about this movie since years before it came out, to the massive avalanche of advertising well before the release date of the film, through the record breaking box office attendance, and still in its aftermath and upcoming award season. It’s kind of overwhelming, and I’m not sure I have anything new to say for anyone who really cares about the movie at all. Yeah Heath stole the show. It’s sad that he’s dead since it seemed like there wasn’t much resolution for the Joker character and they were probably originally intending on bringing him back in a sequel. But apart from the Heath’s performance, the rest of the film wasn’t much more impressive to me than Batman Begins which did not blow me out of the water the way it did for many people. But I never expected it to. Christopher Nolan’s take on the world of Batman is a very realistic one. It was extremely strange to see so many familiar parts of Chicago, the city I live in, on the screen with Batman running around, especially since nothing was covered up or glossed over. It basically looked like a real, dirty street without any of this comic book stylizing that has been so popular recently like in Frank Miller’s Sin City or 300 for extreme examples. But I just can’t accept a realistic Batman. I’ve always said Adam West was my favorite Batman and “real comic book fans” usually think I’m joking or are appalled. The producer on that show thought comic books were silly and played up the campy aspects. Well that’s the way I enjoy them too. I was actually at a bar last night celebrating my girlfriend’s birthday with some of our friends, and one of the TVs was playing the old Adam West Batman movie. Now that’s fun! And when they pull out that Bat Shark Repellent you can laugh at it and say boy that’s silly, what fun! But in The Dark Knight when they invent this device that lets them create some kind of remote 3-D model of the real world by somehow using people’s cell phones, they act like you are supposed to believe it!!! I’m not saying that The Dark Knight wasn’t fun, I’m just saying maybe that’s all a Batman movie should try to be (in my opinion)… Rating: 7/10
]]>Fri, 19 Dec 2008 16:16:45 GMTRisseladaRisselada Blog12/19/2008 11:16:45 AMThe Dark Knight I&rsquo;m finally writing about The Dark Knight. So much has been blogged about this movie since years before it came out, to the massive avalanche of advertising well before the release date of the film, through the record breaking box office attendance, and still in its aftermath and upcoming award season. It&rsquo;s kind of overwhelming, and I&rsquo;m not sure I have anything new to say for anyone who really cares about the movie at all. Yeah Heath stole the show. It&rsquo;s sad that he&rsquo;s dead since it seemed like there wasn&rsquo;t much resolution for the Joker character and they were probably originally intending on bringing him back in a sequel. But apart from the Heath&rsquo;s performance, the rest of the film wasn&rsquo;t much more impressive to me than Batman Begins which did not blow me out of the water the way it did for many people. But I never expected it to. Christopher Nolan&rsquo;s take on the world of Batman is a very realistic one. It was extremely strange to see so many familiar parts of Chicago, the city I live in, on the screen with Batman running around, especially since nothing was covered up or glossed over. It basically looked like a real, dirty street without any of this comic book stylizing that has been so popular recently like in Frank Miller&rsquo;s Sin City or 300 for extreme examples. But I just can&rsquo;t accept a realistic Batman. I&rsquo;ve always said Adam West was my favorite Batman and &ldquo;real comic book fans&rdquo; usually think I&rsquo;m joking or are appalled. The producer on that show thought comic books were silly and played up the campy aspects. Well that&rsquo;s the way I enjoy them too. I was actually at a bar last night celebrating my girlfriend&rsquo;s birthday with some of our friends, and one of the TVs was playing the old Adam West Batman movie. Now that&rsquo;s fun! And when they pull out that Bat Shark Repellent you can laugh at it and say boy that&rsquo;s silly, what fun! But in The Dark Knight when they invent this device that lets them create some kind of remote 3-D model of the real world by somehow using people&rsquo;s cell phones, they act like you are supposed to believe it!!! I&rsquo;m not saying that The Dark Knight wasn&rsquo;t fun, I&rsquo;m just saying maybe that&rsquo;s all a Batman movie should try to be (in my opinion)&hellip; Rating: 7/10 http://www.spout.com/groups/Community_Recommendations/Re_Collaboration_Best_Films_of_2007/643/37905/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: mercurial
Post To: Community Recommendations
Post Date: 12/3/2008 4:13:53 PM
Body: In no particular order: 1.) Persepolis - I really enjoyed this animated bildungsroman. 2.) 300 - I know it got a lot of flack, but damn if it wasn't one of the coolest looking movies. Nudity, blood, gore, and violence to the umpteenth degree. No extraneous thought necessary and I liked it. 3.) Year of the Dog - Molly Shannon in an amazing role for her. The vegan, PETA freak subject matter turned a good amount of people off this film but definitely worth a look. 4.) Waitress - Keri Russel is just so darn lovable in this flick it's practically unbearable. 5.) Grindhouse - Again, lots of divided people with this one. Some loved just one of the two films or hated it with a passion. I loved the whole thing (especially the faux trailers during intermission). 6.) Southland Tales - The convoluted plot and army of bizarre characters made this one unwatchable for some . . . but not for me. 7.) Margot at the Wedding - Just a great little emotional romper-stomper screwball comedy. 8.) Angel-A - Luc Besson is the shit. In a non-stinky poo kind of way. Great movie. 9.) Smiley Face - Completely unlike Gregg Araki's other films, but Anna Faris is unbelievably hilarious in this film. 10.) Ira & Abby - Quirky romantic comedy. I'm a sucker for those. Some family flicks that were also pretty good: Hairspray - Nothing like the original, but decent nonetheless. The Last Mimzy - Adorable little sci-fi flick for kids. Shrek the Third - I actually thought I would despise this considering the second film in the series annoyed me considerably, but I actually enjoyed it. Enchanted - Amy Adams carried this live-action fairy tale.
]]>Wed, 03 Dec 2008 21:13:53 GMTmercurialCommunity Recommendations12/3/2008 4:13:53 PMIn no particular order: 1.) Persepolis - I really enjoyed this animated bildungsroman. 2.) 300 - I know it got a lot of flack, but damn if it wasn't one of the coolest looking movies. Nudity, blood, gore, and violence to the umpteenth degree. No extraneous thought necessary and I liked it. 3.) Year of the Dog - Molly Shannon in an amazing role for her. The vegan, PETA freak subject matter turned a good amount of people off this film but definitely worth a look. 4.) Waitress - Keri Russel is just so darn lovable in this flick it's practically unbearable. 5.) Grindhouse - Again, lots of divided people with this one. Some loved just one of the two films or hated it with a passion. I loved the whole thing (especially the faux trailers during intermission). 6.) Southland Tales - The convoluted plot and army of bizarre characters made this one unwatchable for some . . . but not for me. 7.) Margot at the Wedding - Just a great little emotional romper-stomper screwball comedy. 8.) Angel-A - Luc Besson is the shit. In a non-stinky poo kind of way. Great movie. 9.) Smiley Face - Completely unlike Gregg Araki's other films, but Anna Faris is unbelievably hilarious in this film. 10.) Ira &amp; Abby - Quirky romantic comedy. I'm a sucker for those. Some family flicks that were also pretty good: Hairspray - Nothing like the original, but decent nonetheless. The Last Mimzy - Adorable little sci-fi flick for kids. Shrek the Third - I actually thought I would despise this considering the second film in the series annoyed me considerably, but I actually enjoyed it. Enchanted - Amy Adams carried this live-action fairy tale. http://www.spout.com/groups/Spout_Customer_Care/Re_Bugs_and_Errors/420/36800/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: Risselada
Post To: Spout Customer Care
Post Date: 10/30/2008 12:35:00 PM
Body: [quote user="rjsprague"] [quote user="Risselada"] Thanks a lot, that worked. Any idea why I can't open the page for the movie 300 though? 300's detail page [/quote] My guess is that with the new changes to film detail page addresses that a movie whose name is a number is NOT able to be accessed because the function is expecting a string of characters in order to search the database and return the correct film detail page. My theory could be way off, but in any case I can't open it either if it makes you feel any better. I'm sure they'll fix it soon though. :) [/quote] Well if you could let the programmers know, I'd appreciate it. :)
]]>Thu, 30 Oct 2008 16:35:00 GMTRisseladaSpout Customer Care10/30/2008 12:35:00 PM[quote user="rjsprague"] [quote user="Risselada"] Thanks a lot, that worked. Any idea why I can't open the page for the movie 300 though? <a href='http://www.spout.com/films/300/268461/default.aspx'>300's detail page</a> [/quote] My guess is that with the new changes to film detail page addresses that a movie whose name is a number is NOT able to be accessed because the function is expecting a string of characters in order to search the database and return the correct film detail page. My theory could be way off, but in any case I can't open it either if it makes you feel any better. I'm sure they'll fix it soon though. :) [/quote] Well if you could let the programmers know, I'd appreciate it. :) http://www.spout.com/groups/Spout_Customer_Care/Re_Bugs_and_Errors/420/36794/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: rjsprague
Post To: Spout Customer Care
Post Date: 10/30/2008 10:33:13 AM
Body: [quote user="Risselada"] Thanks a lot, that worked. Any idea why I can't open the page for the movie 300 though? 300's detail page [/quote] My guess is that with the new changes to film detail page addresses that a movie whose name is a number is NOT able to be accessed because the function is expecting a string of characters in order to search the database and return the correct film detail page. My theory could be way off, but in any case I can't open it either if it makes you feel any better. I'm sure they'll fix it soon though. :)
]]>Thu, 30 Oct 2008 14:33:13 GMTrjspragueSpout Customer Care10/30/2008 10:33:13 AM[quote user="Risselada"] Thanks a lot, that worked. Any idea why I can't open the page for the movie 300 though? <a href='http://www.spout.com/films/300/268461/default.aspx'>300's detail page</a> [/quote] My guess is that with the new changes to film detail page addresses that a movie whose name is a number is NOT able to be accessed because the function is expecting a string of characters in order to search the database and return the correct film detail page. My theory could be way off, but in any case I can't open it either if it makes you feel any better. I'm sure they'll fix it soon though. :) http://www.spout.com/groups/Spout_Customer_Care/Re_Bugs_and_Errors/420/36793/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: Risselada
Post To: Spout Customer Care
Post Date: 10/30/2008 10:27:18 AM
Body: [quote user="csprague"] [quote user="csprague"] [quote user="Risselada"] I am experiencing two different bugs or errors on Spout currently 1. Whenever I visit a movie page, I get this error message in a window that pops up. "div with id:modalTypeAheadContainer already exists" After I close the window everything seems to work fine, but it's annoying obviously. I am using Internet Explorer 6 on Windows XP if that helps. 2. When you are viewing a discussion in a group, if there are multiple pages for the discussion there are links at the bottom of the screen to go to the different pages. These links are not working. [/quote] Hey Riss, Thanks for reporting those, I told the dev team about them, so hopefully they will be on that soon. Let us know if you see anything else. We are in the middle of pushing out a bunch of new development and so the site is kind of buggy. Every bug you report is helpful! Thanks, Christi [/quote] Hey Riss, The dev team says to refresh your cache and the first issue will go away. They are looking into the second issue. Cheers, Christi [/quote] Thanks a lot, that worked. Any idea why I can't open the page for the movie 300 though? 300's detail page
]]>Thu, 30 Oct 2008 14:27:18 GMTRisseladaSpout Customer Care10/30/2008 10:27:18 AM[quote user="csprague"] [quote user="csprague"] [quote user="Risselada"] I am experiencing two different bugs or errors on Spout currently 1. Whenever I visit a movie page, I get this error message in a window that pops up. "div with id:modalTypeAheadContainer already exists" After I close the window everything seems to work fine, but it's annoying obviously. I am using Internet Explorer 6 on Windows XP if that helps. 2. When you are viewing a discussion in a group, if there are multiple pages for the discussion there are links at the bottom of the screen to go to the different pages. These links are not working. [/quote] Hey Riss, Thanks for reporting those, I told the dev team about them, so hopefully they will be on that soon. Let us know if you see anything else. We are in the middle of pushing out a bunch of new development and so the site is kind of buggy. Every bug you report is helpful! Thanks, Christi [/quote] Hey Riss, The dev team says to refresh your cache and the first issue will go away. They are looking into the second issue. Cheers, Christi [/quote] Thanks a lot, that worked. Any idea why I can't open the page for the movie 300 though? <a href='http://www.spout.com/films/300/268461/default.aspx'>300's detail page</a> http://www.spout.com/groups/Spout_Customer_Care/Re_Bugs_and_Errors/420/36775/1/ShowPost.aspx Post By: Risselada
Post To: Spout Customer Care
Post Date: 10/29/2008 5:50:31 PM
Body: For some reason I also can't load the movie page for the movie 300 300's detail page
]]>Wed, 29 Oct 2008 21:50:31 GMTRisseladaSpout Customer Care10/29/2008 5:50:31 PMFor some reason I also can't load the movie page for the movie 300 <a href='http://www.spout.com/films/300/268461/default.aspx'>300's detail page</a> http://www.spout.com/blogs/pippin06/archive/2008/10/13/36262.aspx Post By: pippin06
Post To: Reel Thoughts
Post Date: 10/13/2008 3:05:28 PM
Body: After quite a few Oscar films, artsy independent flicks, and American Film Institute-lauded classic films, the next few entries on my Netflix queue will be a welcome combination of lowbrow comedies and popcorn flicks. Hey, I am a movie fan, which means I like to watch all kinds of movies. Truthfully, I probably would not have been interested in 300 had not a few friends (all guys) told me that this was a great film. I was skeptical. I mean, I could already tell it was a movie ripe for mass merchandising when it first came out, not to mention the fact that I thought one would need a certain amount of testosterone to enjoy the film. Yet, with the few friends singing its praises, I popped it on my queue. Unfortunately, my predictions were correct (and see if I listen to them again). Now, just so's y'all know, I have nothing but respect for the concept here, but it was clearly a film made more for entertainment than art, so certain expectations need automatically be revised and relaxed. Basing my blog on that premise, I'm going to try to keep it lighthearted, even though I will, more likely, come off as a snob. What can I say? This is a film I should probably have passed on - because it's not a film that I probably ever had any chance of liking based on my own personal predilections and biases. Hey, at least I admit it. Gerard Butler plays Leonidas, King of Sparta, but for my blog, I'm going to call him the Phantom. The film tells the story of how Leonidas (i.e. the Phantom) led 300 of Sparta's best warriors against Persian forces, looking to conquer and enslave, in the Battle of Thermopylae. It's based on a graphic novel by the same guy who did Sin City. These 300 noble madmen fell to the thousands of forces commanded by Xerxes (Rodrigo Santoro, aka, Lost guy), but Sparta's heroic efforts inspired men from all areas of Greece to stand against Persia in the end. Also, the film covers how Leonidas did this against the wishes of the Spartan council, though the council appears to have been bought, so his Queen (Lena Headey, aka, Sarah Connor, even if this came out first) does what she can to persuade the council to allow more troops to help Leonidas face the onslaught of Persia. Oh, and Faramir (David Wenham), narrates the story. I don't remember what his character name was. So, 300 is like a cross between Clash of the Titans, Lord of the Rings, Sin City (with the two-tone color cinematography), and a big budget porno. I'm not lying. There's a lot of style and very little substance. It's all about war (grunt) and courage (growl) and honor (grunt again). Not that there's anything wrong with that, but, hey, it's precisely as I predicted. Did I mention that the friends who recommended this film to me were all guys? I'm sure girls like it too... I mean, there are a lot of bare-chested, loinclothed men, but there are also quite a few topless women, and frankly, I was just waiting for the action to start...the battle action! Get your heads out of the gutter, now, though there was a decent smattering of that too, hence the porno part. Of course, the battle action was pretty stylized, as this director really loves slow motion and stop action shots. Good God, were those employed to excess. This movie could have been a half hour shorter if at least some of the fighting could have been more real-time. Almost every round of fighting was punctuated by gently gliding but hard-piercing spears, CGI-rendered motion ripples from speedy warriors slowed to a crawl, blood spattering in a delicately pseudo-artistic way, showers of arrows taking their sweet time in puncturing shields and flesh... This film wasn't as gory as I thought it would be (Apocalypto was far more graphic), but it was definitely more boring than I thought it would be. Since I was waiting to be entertained, I felt a big sense of ennui as each battle kind of followed the same pattern. Phantom shouts orders, his loyal warriors duck behind their shields, the Persian thugs with Lost guy commanding them (and given a somewhat demonic visage) charge, the Spartans defend themselves in slow motion for awhile, and then they stand around and talk about honor and bravery, and ha ha fooey on those Persians. Of all of the characters, Sarah Connor was the most interesting. She had sort of the woman-fighting-for-her-man-in-a-man's-world motif and had to face some hard choices. She was the substance to the movie, but since the film was short on dialogue past that of Faramir the narrator, it didn't do much to redeem the film from the boredom it caused. Again, I had no high expectations, but I didn't expect to be, as I've mentioned a few times, downright bored. The film was visually interesting, emphasizing red and sepia and using CGI to create ancient Greece and magical things like possessed oracle women. The performances were as good as they could get in the movie they were in. Still, I couldn't help thinking that, as a video game, 300 probably rocks, but as a film, I just couldn't get into it. It didn't help that I had a scratched copy of the movie - I managed to play most of it, but I lost about two minutes and had to spend at least that amount of time trying to fix the boo boos. Still, I probably shouldn't have watched 300. Chances are, if you are a guy (or girl) who likes nothing but action and manly men being manly in their best alpha manner by fighting and being passionate about their women, then this film is for you! If you like to play video games, and you like playing video games based on movies, see this movie and then play the video game on which it is based. I have no idea what platform it's on. If you are looking for a movie to just sit back and be entertained for any reason, and no reason in particular, I don't think 300 will do it for you. Seriously, I was hoping for a good love story or thrills-a-minute action or something at least a little interesting. I got nothing, so...I am inclined to rate this film a 5 for utter mediocrity. I know there are some who will cry "blasphemy!" I think the film pulled off what it tried to pull off, and I think it has some unique features, like the visuals, but I just think it feels like a combination of other things I've already seen, and I was too bored to stop comparing. Also, it doesn't pass my test. I can't watch the brave 300 battle again, unless my friends force me to give it another try. I'm not trying to be a snob, but I was hoping for a little more, well, anything. I am of the belief that this film was created for a target audience, and I'm just way off target. Again, at least I admit it.
]]>Mon, 13 Oct 2008 19:05:28 GMTpippin06Reel Thoughts10/13/2008 3:05:28 PMAfter quite a few Oscar films, artsy independent flicks, and American Film Institute-lauded classic films, the next few entries on my Netflix queue will be a welcome combination of lowbrow comedies and popcorn flicks. Hey, I am a movie fan, which means I like to watch all kinds of movies. Truthfully, I probably would not have been interested in 300 had not a few friends (all guys) told me that this was a great film. I was skeptical. I mean, I could already tell it was a movie ripe for mass merchandising when it first came out, not to mention the fact that I thought one would need a certain amount of testosterone to enjoy the film. Yet, with the few friends singing its praises, I popped it on my queue. Unfortunately, my predictions were correct (and see if I listen to them again). Now, just so's y'all know, I have nothing but respect for the concept here, but it was clearly a film made more for entertainment than art, so certain expectations need automatically be revised and relaxed. Basing my blog on that premise, I'm going to try to keep it lighthearted, even though I will, more likely, come off as a snob. What can I say? This is a film I should probably have passed on - because it's not a film that I probably ever had any chance of liking based on my own personal predilections and biases. Hey, at least I admit it. Gerard Butler plays Leonidas, King of Sparta, but for my blog, I'm going to call him the Phantom. The film tells the story of how Leonidas (i.e. the Phantom) led 300 of Sparta's best warriors against Persian forces, looking to conquer and enslave, in the Battle of Thermopylae. It's based on a graphic novel by the same guy who did Sin City. These 300 noble madmen fell to the thousands of forces commanded by Xerxes (Rodrigo Santoro, aka, Lost guy), but Sparta's heroic efforts inspired men from all areas of Greece to stand against Persia in the end. Also, the film covers how Leonidas did this against the wishes of the Spartan council, though the council appears to have been bought, so his Queen (Lena Headey, aka, Sarah Connor, even if this came out first) does what she can to persuade the council to allow more troops to help Leonidas face the onslaught of Persia. Oh, and Faramir (David Wenham), narrates the story. I don't remember what his character name was. So, 300 is like a cross between Clash of the Titans, Lord of the Rings, Sin City (with the two-tone color cinematography), and a big budget porno. I'm not lying. There's a lot of style and very little substance. It's all about war (grunt) and courage (growl) and honor (grunt again). Not that there's anything wrong with that, but, hey, it's precisely as I predicted. Did I mention that the friends who recommended this film to me were all guys? I'm sure girls like it too... I mean, there are a lot of bare-chested, loinclothed men, but there are also quite a few topless women, and frankly, I was just waiting for the action to start...the battle action! Get your heads out of the gutter, now, though there was a decent smattering of that too, hence the porno part. Of course, the battle action was pretty stylized, as this director really loves slow motion and stop action shots. Good God, were those employed to excess. This movie could have been a half hour shorter if at least some of the fighting could have been more real-time. Almost every round of fighting was punctuated by gently gliding but hard-piercing spears, CGI-rendered motion ripples from speedy warriors slowed to a crawl, blood spattering in a delicately pseudo-artistic way, showers of arrows taking their sweet time in puncturing shields and flesh... This film wasn't as gory as I thought it would be (Apocalypto was far more graphic), but it was definitely more boring than I thought it would be. Since I was waiting to be entertained, I felt a big sense of ennui as each battle kind of followed the same pattern. Phantom shouts orders, his loyal warriors duck behind their shields, the Persian thugs with Lost guy commanding them (and given a somewhat demonic visage) charge, the Spartans defend themselves in slow motion for awhile, and then they stand around and talk about honor and bravery, and ha ha fooey on those Persians. Of all of the characters, Sarah Connor was the most interesting. She had sort of the woman-fighting-for-her-man-in-a-man's-world motif and had to face some hard choices. She was the substance to the movie, but since the film was short on dialogue past that of Faramir the narrator, it didn't do much to redeem the film from the boredom it caused. Again, I had no high expectations, but I didn't expect to be, as I've mentioned a few times, downright bored. The film was visually interesting, emphasizing red and sepia and using CGI to create ancient Greece and magical things like possessed oracle women. The performances were as good as they could get in the movie they were in. Still, I couldn't help thinking that, as a video game, 300 probably rocks, but as a film, I just couldn't get into it. It didn't help that I had a scratched copy of the movie - I managed to play most of it, but I lost about two minutes and had to spend at least that amount of time trying to fix the boo boos. Still, I probably shouldn't have watched 300. Chances are, if you are a guy (or girl) who likes nothing but action and manly men being manly in their best alpha manner by fighting and being passionate about their women, then this film is for you! If you like to play video games, and you like playing video games based on movies, see this movie and then play the video game on which it is based. I have no idea what platform it's on. If you are looking for a movie to just sit back and be entertained for any reason, and no reason in particular, I don't think 300 will do it for you. Seriously, I was hoping for a good love story or thrills-a-minute action or something at least a little interesting. I got nothing, so...I am inclined to rate this film a 5 for utter mediocrity. I know there are some who will cry "blasphemy!" I think the film pulled off what it tried to pull off, and I think it has some unique features, like the visuals, but I just think it feels like a combination of other things I've already seen, and I was too bored to stop comparing. Also, it doesn't pass my test. I can't watch the brave 300 battle again, unless my friends force me to give it another try. I'm not trying to be a snob, but I was hoping for a little more, well, anything. I am of the belief that this film was created for a target audience, and I'm just way off target. Again, at least I admit it. http://www.spout.com/blogs/spoutblog/archive/2008/10/2/35800.aspx Post By: SpoutBlog
Post To: SpoutBlog on spout.com
Post Date: 10/2/2008 2:01:14 AM
Body: We were invited to a Warner Bros. event tonight to see 26 minutes worth of footage from the Watchmen film that’s due out on 03.06.09 next year, and it was pretty impressive stuff. Even the ice cold comic book fan inside of me enjoyed it, and I didn’t think The Dark Knight was worth all the hype everyone was laying on it. As far as a graphic novel turned into a film goes, Watchmen looks like it’ll set the bar for future adaptations. Director Zack Snyder was on-hand to setup the footage and talk about what’s been done so far, and he was joined by costume designer Michael Wilkinson and production designer Alex McDowell. Interestingly enough, it took place in the same place where they held a similar event for 300. Head after the break to get a full rundown on the footage we saw, and what Snyder and company had to say about the film that’s still six months away. Forgive me if I slip into a bit of fanboyism, because this is one of my favorite comic book properties. One of the longest clips we were shown turned out to be the opening 12 minutes of footage from the movie, which includes an opening fight scene with the Comedian, and the entire opening credit sequence. Both pieces are framed by songs: the fight by “Unforgettable” and the credit sequence by Bob Dylan’s “Times They Are A Changing.” As the footage opens, the Comedian is sitting back watching Richard Nixon give a speech on television about aggression from the Soviet Union. He’s having a cup of tea and enjoying a cigar, just a quiet evening at home. He starts flipping channels and settles on a commercial for Nostalgia Perfume from Veidt Industries, with music provided by the idyllic velvet tones of Nat King Cole. Just a quiet evening at home for a former costumed vigilante. That is, until a figure dressed in black busts his door down and proceeds to kick his ass all over the place before hurling him out the window. As he hurtles to the ground, his iconic smiley face pin, now with a dollop of blood on it, lands beside him, providing the iconic cover for the graphic novel, and the most identifiable image from the Watchmen universe. What’s important to note is that this fight scene is entirely created for the film, all you see of it in the graphic novel are a few frames. Snyder provides a real set-destroying piece that might seem a bit over the top, until you realize the guy is fighting for his life. The clip then segues into the opening credits, which are full of iconic photographed moments (in slow-moving live action) that show the history of the Watchmen through the ages. It’s a quick succession of images, set to Bob Dylan’s “TImes They Are A Changing,” and we see moments like the first publicity photos of the first team of Watchmen, the Comedian as the triggerman in the Kennedy assassination, Andy Warhol with Watchmen pop art, Dr. Manhattan filming the moon landing, a young Adrian Veidt outside of Studio 54 with the Village People in attendance, and so forth. It’s a very quick primer about the world of the Watchmen, and the fact that the film is set squarely in 1985. It’s an alternate 1985 with an older Nixon serving as President after term limits have been repealed, and shows the nation’s growing unrest with costumed heroes. The next sequence we got to see was a long piece showing Dr. Manhattan’s origin, which is told in flashback from the surface of Mars. Crudup is perfect as physicist John Osterman who later becomes the blue-skinned, all-powerful Dr. Manhattan, and in this brief but telling clip you see why he’s decided to alienate himself from the human race, and the events that led him to seek solace on Mars. After all, when you can do anything, what’s the purpose with a normal day to day relationship? Most of the Dr. Manhattan effects aren’t final yet, but the ones we saw were impressive, particularly when he disassembles an entire Army tank with a wave of his hand, and later obliterates gangland thugs in a similar fashion, leaving the bloody, skeletal arm of one dangling from the ceiling in a bar. The final scene begins with post-coital bliss between Dan Dreiberg, the Nite Owl, and Laurie Juspeczyk, the Silk Spectre. They’re lying naked inside Dan’s Owl Ship, when Dan says they should spring Rorschach from prison. Another knock-down, drag-out fight ensues inside the corridors of the prison, with Laurie and Dan both in costume. It’s a bit more punching and kicking than you’d expect from Nite Owl, who even Snyder described as more of a “gadget guy” than someone who’d use fisticuffs to “exact justice.” They spring Rorschach, who exacts revenge upon one of his prison tormentors in the men’s room, and then they flee the scene. It’s a bit incongruous because in the graphic novel, the scenes of Rorschach in prison, sans his costume and mask, are chilling, and show how cold and calculating he can be. Moreso than most of the criminals he hunts. So what did we think? It looks impressive. There’s an enormous amount of attention to the source material, without it trying to be a shot for shot remake. It’s also not chock full of 10 minute car chase scenes, or overdone CGI fight scenes. Based on what we saw, it looks like Watchmen won’t have the frenetic pace of a Spider-Man movie, but will take time with the storytelling. Snyder told us that the running time is currently two hours and 43 minutes, and he hopes it doesn’t get any shorter. That’s nearly a three hour movie, which you  really need in order to contain the whole 12 issue storyline from the comics. Especially if they leave in the “comic book story within a comic book story” that is the Tales of the Black Freighter that exists in the book. Warners is releasing Tales of the Black Freighter as a stand-alone DVD along with a documentary (”mockumentary,” says Snyder) of Hollis Mason’s Under the Hood novel from inside the graphic novel before the movie comes out, and Snyder hopes the theatrical film runs with that storyline incorporated into it. So consider this a fair warning that you’ll need to get yourself fitted for a catheter before the movie comes out next year. According to Snyder one of the biggest problems with the film is that “comic book movies have been machine-gunned into our pop culture in a crazy way,” so audiences now have an expectation of what a comic book movie is supposed to be. While he hopes that’ll lure the audiences in so he can clobber them on the head with the decidedly anti-hero message of Watchmen, he also had to consider that and make changes to things in the movie like the superhero costumes, in order to give the audience some of what they’ll expect. Which is why they changed the Nite Owl costume so much. However, that’s just the comic book fan in me grousing. Snyder said there’s no way he’d work on a Watchmen sequel or a Watchmen prequel… which doesn’t mean that tongues won’t wag about the possibility of one if this movie does well at the box office. We now return you to our (normally) fanboy-free Spout coverage. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog
]]>Thu, 02 Oct 2008 06:01:14 GMTSpoutBlogSpoutBlog on spout.com10/2/2008 2:01:14 AM We were invited to a Warner Bros. event tonight to see 26 minutes worth of footage from the Watchmen film that’s due out on 03.06.09 next year, and it was pretty impressive stuff. Even the ice cold comic book fan inside of me enjoyed it, and I didn’t think The Dark Knight was worth all the hype everyone was laying on it. As far as a graphic novel turned into a film goes, Watchmen looks like it’ll set the bar for future adaptations. Director Zack Snyder was on-hand to setup the footage and talk about what’s been done so far, and he was joined by costume designer Michael Wilkinson and production designer Alex McDowell. Interestingly enough, it took place in the same place where they held a similar event for 300. Head after the break to get a full rundown on the footage we saw, and what Snyder and company had to say about the film that’s still six months away. Forgive me if I slip into a bit of fanboyism, because this is one of my favorite comic book properties. One of the longest clips we were shown turned out to be the opening 12 minutes of footage from the movie, which includes an opening fight scene with the Comedian, and the entire opening credit sequence. Both pieces are framed by songs: the fight by “Unforgettable” and the credit sequence by Bob Dylan’s “Times They Are A Changing.” As the footage opens, the Comedian is sitting back watching Richard Nixon give a speech on television about aggression from the Soviet Union. He’s having a cup of tea and enjoying a cigar, just a quiet evening at home. He starts flipping channels and settles on a commercial for Nostalgia Perfume from Veidt Industries, with music provided by the idyllic velvet tones of Nat King Cole. Just a quiet evening at home for a former costumed vigilante. That is, until a figure dressed in black busts his door down and proceeds to kick his ass all over the place before hurling him out the window. As he hurtles to the ground, his iconic smiley face pin, now with a dollop of blood on it, lands beside him, providing the iconic cover for the graphic novel, and the most identifiable image from the Watchmen universe. What’s important to note is that this fight scene is entirely created for the film, all you see of it in the graphic novel are a few frames. Snyder provides a real set-destroying piece that might seem a bit over the top, until you realize the guy is fighting for his life. The clip then segues into the opening credits, which are full of iconic photographed moments (in slow-moving live action) that show the history of the Watchmen through the ages. It’s a quick succession of images, set to Bob Dylan’s “TImes They Are A Changing,” and we see moments like the first publicity photos of the first team of Watchmen, the Comedian as the triggerman in the Kennedy assassination, Andy Warhol with Watchmen pop art, Dr. Manhattan filming the moon landing, a young Adrian Veidt outside of Studio 54 with the Village People in attendance, and so forth. It’s a very quick primer about the world of the Watchmen, and the fact that the film is set squarely in 1985. It’s an alternate 1985 with an older Nixon serving as President after term limits have been repealed, and shows the nation’s growing unrest with costumed heroes. The next sequence we got to see was a long piece showing Dr. Manhattan’s origin, which is told in flashback from the surface of Mars. Crudup is perfect as physicist John Osterman who later becomes the blue-skinned, all-powerful Dr. Manhattan, and in this brief but telling clip you see why he’s decided to alienate himself from the human race, and the events that led him to seek solace on Mars. After all, when you can do anything, what’s the purpose with a normal day to day relationship? Most of the Dr. Manhattan effects aren’t final yet, but the ones we saw were impressive, particularly when he disassembles an entire Army tank with a wave of his hand, and later obliterates gangland thugs in a similar fashion, leaving the bloody, skeletal arm of one dangling from the ceiling in a bar. The final scene begins with post-coital bliss between Dan Dreiberg, the Nite Owl, and Laurie Juspeczyk, the Silk Spectre. They’re lying naked inside Dan’s Owl Ship, when Dan says they should spring Rorschach from prison. Another knock-down, drag-out fight ensues inside the corridors of the prison, with Laurie and Dan both in costume. It’s a bit more punching and kicking than you’d expect from Nite Owl, who even Snyder described as more of a “gadget guy” than someone who’d use fisticuffs to “exact justice.” They spring Rorschach, who exacts revenge upon one of his prison tormentors in the men’s room, and then they flee the scene. It’s a bit incongruous because in the graphic novel, the scenes of Rorschach in prison, sans his costume and mask, are chilling, and show how cold and calculating he can be. Moreso than most of the criminals he hunts. So what did we think? It looks impressive. There’s an enormous amount of attention to the source material, without it trying to be a shot for shot remake. It’s also not chock full of 10 minute car chase scenes, or overdone CGI fight scenes. Based on what we saw, it looks like Watchmen won’t have the frenetic pace of a Spider-Man movie, but will take time with the storytelling. Snyder told us that the running time is currently two hours and 43 minutes, and he hopes it doesn’t get any shorter. That’s nearly a three hour movie, which you  really need in order to contain the whole 12 issue storyline from the comics. Especially if they leave in the “comic book story within a comic book story” that is the Tales of the Black Freighter that exists in the book. Warners is releasing Tales of the Black Freighter as a stand-alone DVD along with a documentary (”mockumentary,” says Snyder) of Hollis Mason’s Under the Hood novel from inside the graphic novel before the movie comes out, and Snyder hopes the theatrical film runs with that storyline incorporated into it. So consider this a fair warning that you’ll need to get yourself fitted for a catheter before the movie comes out next year. According to Snyder one of the biggest problems with the film is that “comic book movies have been machine-gunned into our pop culture in a crazy way,” so audiences now have an expectation of what a comic book movie is supposed to be. While he hopes that’ll lure the audiences in so he can clobber them on the head with the decidedly anti-hero message of Watchmen, he also had to consider that and make changes to things in the movie like the superhero costumes, in order to give the audience some of what they’ll expect. Which is why they changed the Nite Owl costume so much. However, that’s just the comic book fan in me grousing. Snyder said there’s no way he’d work on a Watchmen sequel or a Watchmen prequel… which doesn’t mean that tongues won’t wag about the possibility of one if this movie does well at the box office. We now return you to our (normally) fanboy-free Spout coverage. Originally posted on:SpoutBlog http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/Great/MemberTagFilms.aspxGreat
Number of films tagged: 231

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]]>Fri, 20 Mar 2009 23:37:37 GMT152106240Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/Boring/MemberTagFilms.aspxBoring
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]]>Thu, 24 Sep 2009 02:01:38 GMT7891122Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/intense/MemberTagFilms.aspxintense
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]]>Mon, 05 Oct 2009 20:12:14 GMT837099Tag http://www.spout.com/members/0/tags/blood/MemberTagFilms.aspxblood
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]]>Wed, 25 Feb 2009 18:54:49 GMT585369Tag