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Many Eyes, Shallow Bugs, and Spider-Man
Danious writes Seems
Spider-Man is clocking up 'bugs' at
movie-mistakes.com faster than any previous movie (now 95 and counting). The reason, according to this Independent article, is not that it may have more mistakes than usual, but that 'huge numbers of people are going to see it - and that makes for lots of pairs of eyes checking every inch of the screen.' The top movie is currently 'The Matrix' with 147." A lot of the bugs simply aren't really errors, and I'm sure the comic book guys out there can debate them.
Most of the "mistakes" that are being filed are NOT mistakes, just kids inventing mistakes. The owner of the site confesses that he hasn't seen the movie yet (he's in the UK), so he's not really in a position to make any judgement calls on these.
Some people just don't pay attention or think they see something when they don't. For example, one mistake was listed under LOTR about seeing a car drive by in the scene with Frodo, Sam, and the scarecrow. Maybe I'm blind, but I didn't see any movement at all in the background. Another mistake filed several times was for Harry Potter about a player falling on sand appearing out of nowhere in the Quddich match. Maybe if they had payed attention when the camera showed the entire field they would notice the goals are mounted on sand pits.
Movies do make mistakes, but it seems that the bug watchers also need watchers of their own.
I am suprised at the number of "non-industry" people that are complaining about the CG.
... my brain filtered it all out. I enjoyed the movie so much that I did not notice the technical problems. It has been a while since the last time I could say that. And that goes for co-workers of mine as well. Each of them with different backgrounds from CG studios. Not a complaint about the CG at all.
I am in the industry.. specificly pure CG, not mixed with live action, so I am used to seeing smooth animation, perfect compositing and what not. I normally pick up on the technical problems with a movies CG.
With Spider-Man
Maybe its because we know how hard it is that we filter out the tough mistakes. But I think it was the pace and quality of the movie that kept us in and kept us from noticing the glitches.
-Tim
-I just work here... how am I supposed to know?
What's wrong with going to a movie and simply enjoy it? You either like it or not. Who cares if the CG work is not up to someone's standards or there is a costume error. I have better things to do with my time than watch a movie numerous times to look for all mistakes. Who cares if you didn't hear a footfall when spiderman landed. Do you also complain about all the noise spaceships make in scifi movies?
You are exactly right- I have a short story from college to illustrate. There's a prof at my college that has a reputation for being "that guy you don't want at any of your presentations." One of my friends my first year was the first person ever to do two honors theses- one for mathematics, and one for physics. Friend told me flat out, right before his defense started, "If that bitch even tries to correct my grammar, you can beat him with this newspaper." Ten minutes into friend's honors project, prof had already pointed out two incorrect uses of it's/its, and three spelling mistakes (which were actually British/American usage differences). So the person sitting next to me (an older friend of mine) grabbed the newspaper out of my hands and smacked the prof on the back with it. The prof looked like he was going to cry. He walked out of the room immediately, and the rest of the presentation went off without a hitch.
The next year, the annoying prof (who has a degree in Mathematics) gave a talk about the motion of a "hopping hoop" as this complicated system of parametric equations. About fifteen minutes into his presentation (which was scheduled for 45 minutes), the second reader for my friend's presentation called him out. "Isn't this just rotational mechanics? I mean, you only need one equation for the motion, and you capture all of the effects of friction and momentum in one equation. Who do you think you are - do you think you're going to do better than Newton." Within five minutes, three Math profs had also joined in on the tongue-lashing. He left the talk about twenty minutes before it was supposed to end.
I never actually hit the prof - I was just a first-year, and I didn't want to ruin my relationship with the To this day, my not beating the shit out him with the newspaper remains the only thing I regret about my college experience. So I think there are two morals here: 1) If you can ever get away with beating an idiot with a newspaper, do it; otherwise, you may regret it for the rest of your life; and, 2) If you ever go to a presentation and try to turn it into a witchhunt (gramatical, mathematical, or otherwise), don't be surprised when they're lashing you to the stake and dousing you with gasoline. Or "love thy neighbor in his infinite capacity to mangle language". Or something.