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Sen To, X-Men 2
liquidbrains writes "With 'Princess Mononoke' fresh in our memories, the number one highest grossing film in Japan -ever- is coming to the US. Thanks to Disney and Pixar's John Lasseter, who has supervised the dub, we can soon expect a fine English adaptation of animation master Hayao Miyazaki's latest masterpiece, 'Spirited Away'. See the trailer here." Reader thefalconer writes "It seems that Apple has just released the very first trailer to X-Men 2 on their website. From what I've seen this movie looks like it's going to rock! Too bad I have to wait for May of next year!"
It's about time they made an english dub of the masterpiece that is sen to chihiro. I hope that now it can get the international success it deserves.
Here in France it has been out for about 6 month and it rated quite high in the box office. In japan it has been a huge success, I think that it even beat Titanic.
Check out Nausicaa.net for more about Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli. These people are brilliant, and Disney bought the North American distribution rights because they're (as much as I hate them) good business people. Porco Rosso, Mononoke Hime, Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, The Castle of Cagliostro and Tonari No Totoro are all examples of pure brilliance.
This is what Animation should be. Also, Disney's trailer sucks, ignore it, the trailer for the French release was WAY better, check out the official France site or follow the "La Fiche du Film" link here (they took down the really good trailer, damn). There are other trailers around, anyone got links?
I don't know about the rest of the /. crowd but I extremely surprised by how much I enjoyed the first X-Men movie.
As an avid comic book reader (and a one-time X-Men fanatic) I was apprehensive about the film adaptation of my favourite band of super heroes.
After all, the track record of comic book characters on the silver screen wasn't exactly filled with success - Superman, Batman were both good movies but their follow-ups got progressively worse, Judge Dredd had so much potential (see Robocop, which even includes some classic Dredd on-liners) but was such a disappointment, The Punisher, etc. (The less said about Supergirl the better.)
Compared to all of these, X-Men rocked.
Not only was it true to the comic book in most regards but it got across the underlying moral message of the comic book title - that no matter what we look like on the outside or what we can do, we are all equal - without having to excessively spoonfeed the audience or dragging its feet.
OK, if we're nitpicking then Rogue shouldn't be a teenager and neither should Bobby (Iceman). Jean Grey should be called Marvel Girl - or Pheonix at a pinch - when in costume not Jean (did anyone else find it silly that her's was the only alter ego that didn't have a proper name?). Ororo should have either had a headpiece or a mohican hair cut. Toad should have been fatter and stupider. Mystique should have had a costume. It should have been the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants.
But, there are things that will work in comic books that won't work on screen. The writers allude to this when they have Wolverine question the fashion sense of the team's costumes, to which Cyclops replies "What would you prefer, gold spandex?" - any X-Men fan will recognise this immediately as a reference to Wolverine's own comic book costume, which was originally blue and gold and later orange and brown.
In fact, this was one of my favourite scenes in the movie, and even my girlfriend who wouldn't read a comic book if you paid her laughed along with the joke.
Bottom line is this: rather than nit-pick over minor details why don't you just enjoy the film?
Brian Singer, the cast and the crew did a great job. Would it kill you to acknowledge it?
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
A great movie is released in France before the US. I always thought we were considered to be a third world country for the movie industry...
And yes, Spirited Away is a Masterpiece, along with Princess Mononoke, Ghost in the Shell or Avalon. It's poetic, beautiful and really carries you away. I'd give it a 5/5 rating without any hesitation.
It's been out in France since March or Feb, in french and subtitled versions. It have been quite successful. As in Princess Mononoke, and maybe even more, the quality of animation is exceptionnal.
yes the thin waist stuff was to counter the charge of politically correct
...
Disney is almost as reactionary as you can get without becoming propaganda.
I appreciate your link but the term has moved on from that early definition. Rectionaries use it as a term of derision to label any progressive or inclusive thinking as "loony left".
And as a political act, stealing terms and abusing them is a proven tactic. It's demoralising.
In the UK most political action toward and of the common people is ruthlessly mocked in the popular press and I'm sure that must be the case elsewhere.
Those who coined "political correctness" as a liberating way of thought seek to enable and free people from the cultural constraints of our heritage. Breaking institutions is a necessary and difficult task in human society. Leave them in place too long and many will die when they eventually crumble, break them too soon and people become confused as the cultural landscape shifts around them.
anyway back to the xmen
I'm sure Jack Valenti will enjoy it.
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
It should also be remembered that the R1 DVD was not at first supposed to have the Japanese soundtrack. It was only after a massive petition effort on this very web site that Disney opted to throw it in. They had to delay the DVD by several weeks to add it, if I recall.
I will agree that the DVD came out fantastic and was well worth the several weeks' delay. The Japanese portion used seamless branching to play back both audio and video bit-identically to the original version, a faithfulness that I would love to see adopted by other R1 DVDs.
Has anyone seen other well-done dubs from studio Ghibli on DVD?
The only other excellent dub I've seen from Ghibli is the French language dub of "Porco Rosso". Out of all the thousands (eek) of hours of anime that I've accumulated, the French "Porco" track is the only dub that I actually prefer over the original Japanese--a standard that Mononoke doesn't even match.