Aeon Flux, Talk Amongst Yourselves

Kasracer writes "The movie Aeon Flux has been getting a mixture of reviews since its debut and most tend to be on the negative side. A review posted on BinaryIdiot goes a bit more in-depth than most reviews and gives the movie a fair shot. From the review: "First of all, I have to say that I'm disappointed, but not altogether surprised by the reviews I've seen thus far. Those who review films for a living are notoriously unreliable, and in many cases, they miss the whole point altogether. Rest assured, even though I'm as skeptical as they come, and can find a flaw in absolutely anything, I won't pick on this movie simply because the plot may be too hard for some people to understand." "

Comments

About the movie

[locke411]

It wasn't that bad, he's right. The plot, while confusing, did have some good points. The silliness of clones remembering their past was... well, there was a reason behind it at least, for the "love" portion. (Which wasn't particulartly great, though.)

This was a review?

[geeber]

FTFA:

you were able to get into the mindset the movie prepares for you, you'll find these characters as believable and as real as they were meant to be. If you found yourself bored and not at all involved within the first 10 minutes, blame it on your lack of imagination.

and even better:

It's easy to be biased toward Charlize, and if I were capable of being biased toward anyone, it would be her, but I managed to control myself. The way I saw it was that the movie was fantastic and Charlize was phenomenal, but if anyone else had done it (as well as or better) and had that same "it" factor that Charlize has flowing out of every pore on her gorgeous face, I would have felt exactly the same about the film as I do right now. And that is true.

Proof that the ability for any schmo to publish their thoughts for all to see is not necessarily a good thing!

Re:This was a review?

[Shelled]

"If you found yourself bored and not at all involved within the first 10 minutes, blame it on your lack of imagination."

Bored? I was laughing to hard too be bored. That movie was a collision between a Grade B music video and a runway show. The 'fight' scenes were closely shot and rapidly edited to hide the fact the main characters naturally moved in bullet time. Eveyone dressed coutire, every line meant to be poinient or intense to the MTV/Hallmark crowd. This movie is the strongest argument against DRM yet. The Filthy Critic nails it:

http://www.filthycritic.com/filthy/

Re:This was a review?

[phasm42]

Fuckin' A! The Filthy Critic is back -- he stopped reviewing a while back and I didn't think he'd come back.

If you haven't read the Filty Critic's review, you should check it out. His reviews are very entertaining and blunt. And if you look closely, pretty insightful.

Re:This was a review?

[east coast]

If you found yourself bored and not at all involved within the first 10 minutes, blame it on your lack of imagination.

How is this different from the fanboys who cried out "If you didn't like the Matrix it's because you didn't get the Matrix"? Not that you are one of the fanboys who did that but I recall a time in slashdot history if you said anything bad about the Matrix you got modded as a troll and for those who didn't have mod points to beat you down with you were called a fucktard as they flung daggers at you.

Bottom line? Fanboys suck. I'm afraid that some womans racks is no reason for me to spend 8.50 to see a "geek" flick. That's what eMule is for, after all. I hate to even use the term geek in this context but I guess it is time for me to realize that, frankly, I'm not cool enough to hang with the geek crowd since I don't have the imagination it takes to make crap anime and comic book live action films seem worth my time.

Re:This was a review?

[Cromac]

That movie was a collision between a Grade B music video and a runway show

Did you expect anything more from MTV Films? Just look at the movies they've made: http://www.the-numbers.com/movies/series/MTVFilms. php

Re:This was a review?

[Anonymous Coward]

> Proof that the ability for any schmo to publish their thoughts for all to see is not necessarily a good thing!

Couldn't agree more!

Oh, it wasn't a self-deprecating comment? Never mind, then.

Re:This was a review?

[DeafByBeheading]

It's not any different, but that's the point:

1. Why are articles like this accepted?
2. Why are articles like this submitted in the first place?

If either the editor or the submitter had read the "article", and had used minimal brainpower to analyze it critically, he or she would have seen that it's utterly devoid of content, and it wouldn't be sitting here on the front page. Any random page off teh intrawebs would have made a better article.

Re:This was a review?

[MsGeek]

Well according to that list they made Napoleon Dynamite. And Election. I'd say that's enough of a raison d'etre for any movie studio. And look at the size of those budgets! Napoleon Dynamite cost only $400,000 to make! Vote for Pedro indeed. MTV Films has definitely been a profit center for Viacom. Look again at the numbers. These guys are (normally anyway) smart.

Missing from that list: Beavis and Butt-Head Do America. Cost $10 Million to make. Made it back twice the first week of release. It came out through Paramount *as* an MTV Films release.

http://www.the-numbers.com/movies/1996/BEAVI.html

As far as Aeon Flux goes, they should have done it right. Give it to Peter Chung to make it as an animated feature. Thanks to this very *stoopid* move on the part of MTV Films, it will *never* happen. Thanks a lot. :P

Re:This was a review?

[Jack William Bell]

My review of Aeon Flux. Spoilers are very limited.

Review summary

[palad1]

1/ Other reviewers are dim-witted and don't look into the real depths of the universe/plot (8 lines) 2/ OMG Charlize is teh Roxor. (40 lines). He may have a point though. (don't you sometimes wish you could mod down an entire story instead of a single comment?)

Re:Review summary

[BarryNorton]

You're reading a movie review on a geek site on a Sunday!

Re:Review summary

[Poltras]

It is a slow day...

Re:Review summary

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, I did. Then I realized Kuro5hin offers exactly that, and lately I haven't really been reading much of Slashdot any more. Between them and Digg, I don't see why anyone does, really.

Maybe just to comment on how bad it is?

I, for one, am shocked!

[Telecommando]

Aeon Flux had a plot?

That's news to me.

Re:I, for one, am shocked!

[JamesTRexx]

Maybe the same as the site? All I get is a black screen...

Re:I, for one, am shocked!

[Anonymous Coward]

News to me too. I thought it was jack off material for kids my age when it was on MTV 12-15(?) years ago. I mean where else could you go to see chicks in thong outfits doing gymnastic leg spreading moves? Of course, now we have the net for that.

Re:I, for one, am shocked!

[juicemansam]

As did Resident Evil 1 and 2 (especially 2), and Punisher (the newer one), and AVP. *baarrrffff*

Re:I, for one, am shocked!

[nizo]

Yeah, it consisted of some story I don't recall wrapped around scenes with the central aim of showing Ms. Theron in tight fitting clothing, except the ones where she had nothing on at all. I give this movie three thumbs up by the way.

Re:I, for one, am shocked!

[archen]

Not to sound like a purist... ah, what the hell, I'll sound like one anyway. You really can't make a movie about Aeon Flux because the nature of the way it flows just doesn't fit into the way a movie is done - or what would really work for a movie anyway. I can't really imagine the 'no-risk' people in charge in Hollywood would be into the kinky/erotic sort of undertones that pervade much of the series.

Aeon Flux also almost never has a beginning. You are typically cast into the middle of Aeon on some mission. You usually don't know what the point of the mission is (sometimes even at the end), nor are there explanations for much of what is happeneing. Aeon Flux is also a coy play on mindless violence, with weird erotic voyeristic imagery randomly stuffed in the middle.

Now that's okay with other weird crap on Liquid Television, but not movie material at all. So the result is exactly what we see. A basic action movie with character designs used as templates.

That's not even a review...

[Anonymous Coward]

That's not a review. It's two or three comments about the movie and a big parahraph about how he's basically got a boner for Charlize Theron. Booooooo.

I saw the movie last night. It was O.K. from a purely entertainment standpoint. I.e. popcorn flick. But I think if you don't know anything about the MTV anime you'll be lost for half the movie (as I was). It was one of those movies that appears to have a ton of backstory but that they had to cut out a lot to make the movie fit in two hours. Jerky editing in some spots too. Bottom line, I think it would've made a decent tv series but not a great movie.

Re:That's not even a review...

[Anonymous Coward]

there was an anime version screened on mTV? I just remember that terrible Korean animation from the early nineties that looked like every other Korean animated show that pops up on any given saturday morning.

Re:That's not even a review...

[MSZ]

Now, now, you can't blame him too much. She is hot.

But there is one question that I wanted to ask and didn't find a better place: WTF are thay making live-action Aeon Flux movie? For that matter, why is there some kind of mania of making live-action versions of animated stories?

Re:That's not even a review...

[Anonymous Coward]

"he's basically got a boner for Charlize Theron. Booooooo."

Duuude, it's a GIRL who wrote the post.

Difficult plot?

[yahyamf]

I won't pick on this movie simply because the plot may be too hard for some people to understand." Who cares for the plot? I only saw this movie because of Charlize Theron, and I understood all about her

Re:Difficult plot?

[Pneuma ROCKS]

I agree, Charlize Theron is like butter.

I was pleasantly surprised.

[X-rated Ouroboros]

I just went to see Charlize Theron in a series of successively tighter and skimpier leather outfits. While none of her costumes approached the level of Aeon Flux of the Liquid Television era, I wasn't terribly disappointed on that front.

I didn't expect the movie to be very interesting or very good... but it did exceed my, admittedly low, expectations. I don't know that I'd recommend it, but I wouldn't try to talk someone out of seeing it if they were consiering it.

Re:I was pleasantly surprised.

[jbrader]

I just went to see Charlize Theron in a series of successively tighter and skimpier leather outfits. It that kind of attitude that gets crap movies like this made. Do all of us film buffs a favor please, if you want to look at some titties get on the internet and look at some porn. This is better for you because its free and its better for me because this kind of movie will stop turning a profit and maybe film in general will improve a little.

Re:I was pleasantly surprised.

[GreyDuck]

Hear, hear.

I went mainly because my girlfriend wanted to see it. "What? Charlize Theron with dark hair running around blowing shit up? We MUST see this movie!" (Could I love her more? Heh.) I'd seen a few bits and pieces back in the old LTV run, just enough to know that what plot there might be would be fairly thin.

Color me pleasantly surprised. It's not a GREAT movie by any stretch of the imagination, but it held my interest, usually managed a respectable level of internal consistency, and very few of the set pieces or talky bits or wide shots set off my Cringe-O-Meter. The movie telegraphed a couple of the "twists" well in advance, but in a less-hamhanded fashion than one might expect. And for whatever major faults it may have, it looked good through and through... and I'm not just talking about Miz Theron (who makes a far better brunette than blond, it must be said). For instance, the sets don't carry that "we borrowed a university campus for a weekend" feel that we get in so many other B-grade "futuristic" genre flicks.

See it during a matinee, or rent it and watch it on a decent entertainment system. It's worth that, at least.

Re:I was pleasantly surprised.

[Gulthek]

Movies aren't a tide.

Good movies will continue to be good, no matter how much crap is made around them.

Re:I was pleasantly surprised.

[Hurricane78]

What you want is soooo wrong!

I want good stories AND sexy women!

Is that too hard?

Btw: If i ever gonna make a game or movie, i WILL include both. Even more: If a man meets a woman in a game and in any natural case they would become intimate, then it will happen in this game or movie. Even if it then will never be visible in the usa. ;P

I don't know who began with this madness of "ohh... sex is baaad and diirty. you will go to hell" (oops... question answered),
but i consider anyone who thinks that way as sick and perverse.

Think of how great it could be if you would combine the greatest film you ever saw with the sexiest porn scenes you ever saw?
I would pay for it... oohhh yeah! :)

The problem with the movie

[tkrotchko]

First of all, the movie is a fairly typical Hollywood special effects/sci-fi film. So its entertaining. But it suffers from the same problem as I, Robot, which is to say, it has nothing to do with the what it's named after.

The problem when you watch the original Aeon Flux animated series is that other than people having the same names, it has little in common. Aeon Flux is fairly, er, kinky in the animated series. This is almost a defining part of the role. In the series, the Trevor Goodchild is really a bad guy. In the movie, he's a nice guy who is just misunderstood. In the series, the plots were odd, bordering on bizarre. In the movie, its "good guy trying to save the world".

I'm saying all this as somebody who isn't a particular fan of the series. But the movie just misses the point. I would think they would have been better off making more of the animated series; it would cost less, and probably entertain people more.

Re:The problem with the movie

[displaced80]

I get the feeling however that, should the film have attempted to get the point of the original series, it would never have been released.

Sadly, because of the expense of making a film in this style, the studio's are only going to allow something to be made which they can sell. Even some of the bigger studios who're known to take risks (Miramax, for example) probably wouldn't have touched a true-to-the-series Aeon Flux film with a barge pole.

The only ways I can imagine a 'true' Aeon Flux being made is: someone like Canal+, Momentum or similar pick up the rights and make a grittier, less expensive film. If you choose your style carefully, you can mask budgetary restrictions, and often come up with a fantastic film (something like Delicatessen).

Or, Peter Chung takes the characters into full-length anime. That'd be great to see. Or perhaps even some flat-out CGI'd romp... awesome and other-worldly. Sure, it'd never enter blockbuster territory, but a handful of well made, AF animated films, free to indulge in the bizarre world of the original series, could easily become a cult classic.

Re:The problem with the movie

[displaced80]

Man... how many commas, subclauses and sentence fragments did I want to use in that post? Somewhere a grammar checker is crying on the shoulder of my English professor. Lucky grammar checker... she was cute.

Anyway, sorry for the appalling sentence structure :)

Re:The problem with the movie

[Evil Adrian]

Sometimes when people make movies from books or TV, they take a good concept and go in a different, more movie-friendly direction with it.

For example, if there was a cartoon on MTV where the characters and basic plot were really good, but each episode was consistently strange, stupid, and always left you thinking "why the hell did I just watch this crap", then they might want to go somewhere different with the story.

You know what I'm saying?

Re:The problem with the movie

[Megane]

Heck, I had a problem with the later version of Aeon Flux where she (and everyone else) talked. The original Liquid Television episodes were a sort of Groundhog Day of her trying to accomplish some mission, failing in various squicky ways, then starting over again.

Re:The problem with the movie

[johneee]

I saw it last night, and I liked it. Actually, I really liked it.

It's entirely possible that one of the reasons for this was that I'd never seen the original series. What it came down to for me was that it was a Hollywood action flick with a bit less straightforwardness than ordinary. Yes, the plot was a bit confusing at first, because they didn't give you all the answers right at the beginning, but by the end, they gave you everything, and there was the thrill of discovery along the way. I found that the special effects didn't overwhelm the rest of the movie, and while it may have been a little emotionally detached, it built a kind of atmosphere which at the very least was honest to itself. And yes, Charlize was hot with a capital T. It was an action flick that was worth the popcorn, and better than most.

My full disclosure statement here is that I did see Punisher on TMN the night before, it's possible that pretty much anything would look good in comparison.

Re:The problem with the movie

[Dun Malg]

Sadly, because of the expense of making a film in this style, the studio's are only going to allow something to be made which they can sell. Even some of the bigger studios who're known to take risks (Miramax, for example) probably wouldn't have touched a true-to-the-series Aeon Flux film with a barge pole.

As a co-writer of several scripts (many optioned, none produced), I have noticed there a singular problem with getting approval of "risky" works. The problem is that "hollywood" is actually highly risk-averse. It's such a nasty, backstabbing business that nobody ever wants to stick their neck out. To this end, there is constant pressure for approved scripts to be comparable to something that has worked before. The classic script pitch jokes along the lines of "it's like The Omen meets Cocoon, in outer space" are an exaggeration of the pathological need to have every "new" idea be a permutation or hybrid of something that has been successful before. More points are awarded if another studio is in the process of making a similar movie. This is why you see the same damn movies come out over and over. Remember when all those "funny" cop-buddy movies came out where one of the cops is a dog? (shudder)
The last thing the money men want to hear is "we don't know how this will play, no one's ever made a movie like this". The last thing the pitchmen want is to say that. To that end, every time you go in to show them what you've got, they'll be almost singleminded in their goal of getting you to make your work comparable to something they think the money men will go for. The integrity of your concept is wholly immaterial. They will indeed actually make the most absurd suggestions for how you might change the script to make it more salable. Things like "can you put a scrappy kid in?" or "could you change the setting from fantasy to modern reality, get rid of the magic stuff, and make the main character a handsome young guy instead of a tough old man?"-- these are not exaggerations, this is the kind of stuff they actually say! And even if you don't want those changes, if you sell them the script they'll give it to someone else who will make those changes. On rare occasions it'll end up in the hands of someone who truly understands the underlying idea and we'll end up with something interesting, but for the most part the pressure to turn scripts into pablum leaves us with theaters full of stuff like "Cheaper By The Dozen 2".

Re:The problem with the movie

[ImTheDarkcyde]

I'm going to have to disagree with a couple of points - the first being that the series isn't even related to itsself, how could they possibly make a movie related to it? And in the series I wouldn't say Trevor is "bad", he's still the antagonist but he is only doing what he thinks is right.
 
  Though Aeons greased up hair in the movie - I'm not too fond of it.

Re:The problem with the movie

[Eesu]

Damn straght I in fact loved the animated series, and the movie was nothing like it, very dissappointing. And i never even went to see I, Robot, knew it would be dumb just from the previews, it clearly had nothing to do with the book.

Re:The problem with the movie

[n6mod]

The problem is that "hollywood" is actually highly risk-averse. It's such a nasty, backstabbing business that nobody ever wants to stick their neck out.

This is an interesting take on the problem. I have a fair bit of experience with Hollywood, though all from the technical side.

The problem, as I've heard it presented, is basically that the studios are public companies. Especially in this litigious society, that forces the studios to be risk averse. It's easy to defend a long series of moderately profitable formulaic films to the board and shareholders. It's hard to defend four (or ten) flops and a blockbuster.

And you'll never get the blockbusters if you don't make the flops.

Re:The problem with the movie

[MsGeek]

The closest thing you can get to that at this point is Peter Chung's 30-minute prequel OAV animated short "Dark Fury" which was released concurrently with "The Chronicles of Riddick" and has ownage over both "Riddick" and the original movie "Pitch Black."

Both movies were like live-action video games where you were cheated out of the fun of actually controlling a character. Peter Chung's work on "Dark Fury" was excellent and although the movie still felt like a video game (animated, this time) there was more substance to it and the animation, as usual, rocked.

Oh yeah, Chung did "Matriculated," one of the nine "Animatrix" shorts. It was one of the better ones.

Between "Animatrix," "Dark Fury," and the "Clone Wars" animated shorts by Genndy Tartakovsky it is obvious that if you really want to do a good sequel to an blockbuster SF movie, you should do it animated. And get decent directors. Someone like a Tartakovsky or a Chung.

Re:The problem with the movie

[blincoln]

The problem when you watch the original Aeon Flux animated series is that other than people having the same names, it has little in common.

I disagree.

There are definitely some significant differences, but consistency wasn't exactly a hallmark of the original animated version. Aeon Flux died on a regular basis, Trevor Goodchild turned out to be (for one episode at least) a hollow shell controlled by a Custodian - which was itself controlled by a strange little bean-shaped thing, etc.

I watched some of the episodes after seeing the movie. It had been awhile, and I was surprised just how much was from the original series (spoilers):

- (Obviously) Sithandra and the run across no-man's-land
- Trevor's cloning experiments
- The in-phase/out-of-phase thing
- The odd flat/detached acting
- Una (although she isn't Aeon's sister in the series)
- The Relicle and Aeon climbing up its tail is right out of "War," although it has a different purpose in that episode
- The jungle outside the city at the end is from the jungle-outside-the-cities episode of the series
- The end of the film story is similar in spirit to the end of the animated series, just under different circumstances
- The "lady in red getting snatched" shot in the film vs. "lady in red gets shot by a sniper, then dragged into a hidden closet by two soldiers" in the series.
- The past lives thing is reminiscent of the animated episode about the drug that erases peoples' memories.

I'm sure there's others, and I haven't finished re-watching the original series yet.

Obviously no Hollywood studio was going to make a film exactly like the original series. But I thought they did a pretty credible job in keeping the same feeling. There were certainly some believability gaps, but that's hardly an issue when we're talking about a film based on a series where a secret agent travels between two connected cities via cars that open a passage between each other through a giant zipper in the freeway.

Re:The problem with the movie

[Squidbait]

I'm actually shocked that anyone who was a fan of the original series could have liked this movie, for exactly the reasons you mentioned. Aeon and Trevor in the series were both more... alien characters, and Trevor was essentially pure evil. That was what made it good! The series was pretty twisted and bizarre, and didn't really respect the moral attitudes that are prevalent in most fiction.

Everything that made the series unique and interesting was ripped out of it and replaced with ho-hum Hollywood storytelling. Sure, the movie would have to have a bit more plot than the series. But it didn't have to be "main characters fall in love and try to save the world". In the movie, Aeon is trying to kill Trevor to avenge for her sister's death. Give me a break. In the series, it wasn't obvious what she was motivated by, or whether in fact she was trying to kill him. She was just fucking with him! They were just two people who were at the top of their game, and so maybe that's why they identified with each other. That whole dynamic was completely absent from the movie.

This is just another step in Hollywood's relentless drive to strip mine the last 50 years worth of underground comic, fantasy, and sci-fi material since they have zero fresh ideas themselves. I wouldn't object, except that in many cases they completely miss the point of the material they are adapting, and turn it into more of the same garbage they would have produced anyway. Aeon Flux had zero relationship to the animated series, and was at best a weak sci-fi action movie.

Re:The problem with the movie

[displaced80]

Thanks! I'd forgotten that Chung did one of the Animatrix shorts. I'll watch them again after work tomorrow... I've only watched the DVD once, and I never get too critical of stuff on the first view. First view's for switching off the hair-splitting analytical bit of brain. Second viewing's for "Ahh... so that's where that bit gets set up..." and the third's for "That bit's a bit weak... but holy crap that next bit's well done!". :)

I've just stuck Dark Fury on my Amazon rental list, so I'll have that to watch too come Tuesday. Then I suppose I'd better sit and watch my Aeon Flux (the series) DVD's. The film's not out here in the UK 'till February.

Chris

Re:The problem with the movie

[Yhippa]

Gee, does this sound familiar?

*cough Video Game Industry *cough*

Re:The problem with the movie

[asdfghjklqwertyuiop]

- The end of the film story is similar in spirit to the end of the animated series, just under different circumstances

End of the series? as in End Sinister? At the end of that episode aeon uses trevor's invention and wipes out the future human race, then knocks trevor out and takes him back into the time capsule with her. I don't see the similarities at all.

- The Relicle and Aeon climbing up its tail is right out of "War," although it has a different purpose in that episode

You should watch that episode more closely. That isn't the Relical in War, and that isn't Aeon climbing up into it (I think that's Aeon's father). The Relical comes out of the comic book, but like everything else its underlying purpose was completely changed in the movie.

But I thought they did a pretty credible job in keeping the same feeling.

Were you watching the same original series I was? The movie didn't keep the same feeling at all. All of those other things you listed are very minor things in comparison to the deep ways in which the movie & series differed.

Trevor's character: completely different. In the movie, he's a soft, good-natured scientist at heart. In the original series he's a true megalomaniac.

Trevor & Aeon's relationship: It was always a love/hate on/off thing in the series. They never developed that stable warm-hearted loving relationship in the series.

Monica: In the movie, the Monicans are some underground secret rebelion. In the series, Monica is a nation. Monica was Brega's equal and opposite (like Aeon and Trevor).

Cloning: The whole thing with the world continuing on via cloning alone was never in the originals. Trevor's cloning experiments were just that and not the human race's sole method of procreation.

The walls: In the movie, the walls separate the city from the natural world which has become out of control and must be held back from the city with walls and pesticides. In the originals, the purpose of the walls was to divide Monica from Bregna.

I'm sure I could think of a lot more if I saw the movie again...

Re:The problem with the movie

[blincoln]

You are still comparing things too literally. This is why I said that it had the spirit of the series, even though it wasn't consistent with it.

E.g.:

That isn't the Relical in War, and that isn't Aeon climbing up into it (I think that's Aeon's father).

The design of the floaty thing in War is nearly identical to the floaty thing in the movie. It's also got an opening on the underside, from which long things trail, and a Monican climbs up. The purpose is different, but visually it's the same. That's what I meant.

The original series has almost no consistency, or internal logic. It's more like a dream than a standard story-telling. I see the film as just another variation on that dream.

Re:The problem with the movie

[cfuse]

They will indeed actually make the most absurd suggestions for how you might change the script to make it more salable. Things like "can you put a scrappy kid in?" or "could you change the setting from fantasy to modern reality, get rid of the magic stuff, and make the main character a handsome young guy instead of a tough old man?"-- these are not exaggerations, this is the kind of stuff they actually say! And even if you don't want those changes, if you sell them the script they'll give it to someone else who will make those changes. On rare occasions it'll end up in the hands of someone who truly understands the underlying idea and we'll end up with something interesting, but for the most part the pressure to turn scripts into pablum leaves us with theaters full of stuff like "Cheaper By The Dozen 2".

And then they wonder why I don't buy/rent/watch hollywood movies anymore ...

Re:The problem with the movie

[Anonymous Coward]

Remember when all those "funny" cop-buddy movies came out where one of the cops is a dog? (shudder)

Not only do I remember, but I remember when that genre reached its absolute lowest point. They replaced the dog with a gnome. That's right, a human/gnome buddy cop film!

Strength of Character Acting

[polv0]

While I enjoyed this film, I think that the major reason it receives poor reviews from popular culture critics is the poor character acting. Scenes designed to build emotional rapport between the main characters came of stiltingly, leaving me wondering if the director was so engrossed in the costumes and special effects that they forgot the actors. Charlize Theron is such a brilliant actress (Monster) that I couldn't understand how amatuerishly some of the dialog was delivered. The scene between Aeon and her sister in the market comes particularly to mind.

That being said, I thought the plot of the movie was fantastic, and some of the acting lived up to it. But there's no way a film this far out is going to be accepted by the mass consumers unless they can very closely relate to the characters, as evidenced by the success of Serenity.

Re:Strength of Character Acting

[wampus]

One thing that everyone seems to forget is that all the characters, as far as I understood it, were having severe problems due to remembering their past iterations. In my mind, this explains the flat delivery that just about everyone gave.

Re:Strength of Character Acting

[drsquare]

But there's no way a film this far out is going to be accepted by the mass consumers unless they can very closely relate to the characters, as evidenced by the success of Serenity.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't Serenity a commercial flop?

Re:Strength of Character Acting

[Shelled]

And it also illustrates the ridiculousness of the core plot elements. (SPOILER ALERT) A clone is an individual distinct from its donor. It's not a 'second life'. The movie treats clones as both depending the requirements of the plot. Time is spent explaining how the two leaders 'taught' their clones their memories but gives no reason why the general population who are unaware of being clones would experience the same past-life memories (or the Oedipal complexities of teaching his 'son' romantic love for his dead wife!)

Re:Strength of Character Acting

[THE ROCK]

Monster was such a disappointing movie. It was nothing but a sugar coated fairy tale designed to be appealing to the masses. Anybody who doubts the truth of this knows NOTHING of the true life of a drug addict...NOBODY is giving anyone head for 5 bucks just because they want a beer.

Also, Serenity didn't do very well. I personally liked it, but I was also a fan of the show and I personally liked that too. At least they stayed true to the show (which apparently they didn't with aeon flux, I wouldn't know, I've never seen the original and I doubt I'll take the time to download a DVD rip.) and even had the original cast, who I gather have all just been sitting by their phones waiting for the studio to call back to say "hey we have some more firefly related work for you!" Seriously, that probably wasn't the best choice to turn into a movie, from a commercial standpoint.

Re:Strength of Character Acting

[gad_zuki!]

Right. One of the traps of creating sci-fi is that the assumptions that people will all be these quiet stoic types is too often believed. Look at the wooden acting from Natalie Portman (and others) in the new Star Wars movies. Those born in the republic are so cultured they're like Victorians who are too embarrased to properly display emotion, which kinda kills the whole acting thing. Good writing, be it sci-fi or not, has to do with flawed everyday humans not some near-future stoics. Look at Bladerunner, even the replicants come off more human that Aeon Flux or Padmé Amidala.

Note to sci-fi movie makers: If you write a future where everyone is on qualuudes, then tell us they are on qualuudes, or else the audience will assume its just a bad movie.

Re:Strength of Character Acting

[Planesdragon]

A clone is an individual distinct from its donor.

Not in Aeon Flux, they aren't. The scientists explicity created the cloning process to persist all the information it could, likely including as much of the former person (mitochondira, possibly brain chemistry) as they could.

Remember: there were no more human eggs. What we currently think of cloning, re-coding the DNA inside an egg, wouldn't be possible. So, some new form of cloning was required.

Re:Strength of Character Acting

[Anonymous Coward]

You missed the point. The parent recognized the lack of success of Serenity. In other words, Aeon Flux and Serenity are similar in that they are too far out there to succeed with commercial success.

Re:Strength of Character Acting

[sconeu]

Look at the wooden acting from Natalie Portman (and others) in the new Star Wars movies. Those born in the republic are so cultured they're like Victorians who are too embarrased to properly display emotion

Maybe I'm giving Lucas too much credit, but perhaps that's what he was going for? I almost got that impression, that the Republic was so "civilized" that they didn't really know how to react to what was going on.

Re:Strength of Character Acting

[maxpublic]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't Serenity a commercial flop?

No one will know until after foreign and dvd sales are counted.

Most movies these days don't make back the money they spend on initial theater releases. The real money comes long after the movie hits the theater. So we won't know about Serenity for another year or so yet.

Early indications are that it'll probably make back more money than was spent to produce and promote it, but not by much. Even so, it's enough to get a second movie going (most movies don't even do that well).

Max

Re:Strength of Character Acting

[Anonymous Coward]

i thought somone had succesfully gotten stem cells to form an egg cell and divide... by applying some form of substance to protect and fool the stem cell into thinking it was an embryo... perhaps i am wrong...

Re:Strength of Character Acting

[Anonymous Coward]

According to these stats, Serenity has about broken even, counting domestic and overseas ticket sales.

Rule of thumb would be that the theatrical release generates around 25% of a film's income. DVD/video sales and rental are usually around half the total gross. Given the nature of Firefly/Serenity's fan base, I would think it likely they might get more than the usual percentage from DVD sales. Word of mouth and unexpectedly high DVD sales were what spurred creation of the movie in the first place.

I don't know if there's a definition of "flop". It seems that Serenity is almost certain to be a money-maker overall, and about equally certain not be be a block-buster of "Titanic" proportions. Still 100% return on an investment isn't bad.

I can recall seeing Josh Whedon quoted to the effect that Serenity needed to make $80M to guarantee development of another sequel film. I don't know if that's total, or just theatrical release.

Re:Strength of Character Acting

[Anonymous Coward]

While I enjoyed this film, I think that the major reason it receives poor reviews from popular culture critics is the poor character acting.

So, you enjoyed the movie, other than the minor issue that the acting was poor? I just saw it, and it sucked shit through a straw. Beyond the bad acting, it was quite boring. Overall, the movie sucked hard, and I don't mean that in a good way.

Re:Strength of Character Acting

[hardburn]

Still 100% return on an investment isn't bad.

No, 100% return on investment is money that would have been better off sitting in a savings account generating interest.

Still, Serenity will probably have great DVD sales, so it can be expected to be profitable.

Re:Strength of Character Acting

[daVinci1980]

Actually, ROI is expressed as a percentage above and beyond recoupment. So 100% ROI would be doubling your money (significantly better than sticking that money in a savings account).

Reference:
http://management.about.com/cs/adminaccounting/g/r eturnoninv.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Return_on_investment
http://www.valuebasedmanagement.net/methods_roi.ht ml

On topic, I've no interest in seeing a movie that got 10% at Rotten Tomatoes. That's embarassingly bad and puts the movie in with some truly fine company. (Catwoman, anyone?)

Synopsis: if you don't get it you're dumb

[httpamphibio.us]

Did Taco actually RTFA? This isn't a review at all, it's just some TNA starved sci-fi geek saying "no, it isn't" a whole bunch.

The movie has a bad plot. No, it doesn't!
The movie has bad characters. No, it doesn't!
The movie has poor special effects. No, it doesn't!

How very very useful... the only thing that's correct about the review is the fact that it's on a site with "idiot" in the domain name. It's a good thing this made the front page so the guy can get some extra banner ad clicks.

Re:Synopsis: if you don't get it you're dumb

[SamSim]

it's just some TNA starved sci-fi geek saying "no, it isn't" a whole bunch.

No, it doesn't!

Re:Synopsis: if you don't get it you're dumb

[jackal!]

Did Taco actually RTFA? This isn't a review at all, it's just some TNA starved sci-fi geek saying "no, it isn't" a whole bunch.

Well you paid for the five-minute argument. How can there be an argument if he doesn't take a contrary position?

Re:Synopsis: if you don't get it you're dumb

[DrWho520]

Bad form, Taco. Bad form...

Re:Synopsis: if you don't get it you're dumb

[Anonymous Coward]

Though, he has a point.. i saw the movie two days ago, and liked it.. it had all the elements i expect from a action / sci-fi movie..

Weird engineering, lots of shooting, hot chicks, bad guys, cloning.. now what else do you want? a good plot? well.. it's ok.. and has some interesting feats..

So i liked it.. :)

Aeon Flux == Horrible Movie

[Anonymous Coward]

I've watched the movie, and all i can is that its one of the worst movies i've ever seen.

The movie had potential. A good story, nice scenary, amazing CG but it lacked something really important. A good script and good acting. The dialog in the show is just horrendous, not to mention the tone they used trying to sound "cool" totally made their conversations look so unreal.

Just like how good graphics don't make a good game... the same thing applies to movies. Just because its got good CG and a hot actress doesn't make it a good movie. Its obvious that the reviewer has no idea what a good movie is or is just paid to write something good about Aeon Flux because no one else would.

The Review Sucked

[rolfwind]

It actually informed what the movie was about for about a sentence or two - that it was 400 years in the future and 5 million people were left after some disease wiped the rest out.

So there's the set-up, but anything about the plot/storyline?

Not anything coherent (a hint of romance between two unnamed characters), but mostly just fanboyish drooling over Charlize Theron.

This "review" was just pathetic.

Re:The Review Sucked

[Anonymous Coward]

heh...not that I won't disagree the review sucked. It did. However, not because it lacked details about the plot. The less a reviewer tells you of the plot, the better. I've resigned to stop reading reviews before going to see a movie because of the ridiculous amounts of spoilers reviewers tend to include.

A good review should focus on plot-independent points. Were the actors doing a believable job? Were the special effects worsening the movie experience (either because they were really bad or because there was too much focus on them and not enough on what's actually going on)?

Heh heh...you said "parahraph"!

[Anonymous Coward]

Smaller, stouter cousin of the gihraph, of course.

recommended reading

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, not having R'd TFA (who does?), but having watched the movie a few hours ago, I must say it reminds me a lot of Arthur C. Clarke's "The City and the Stars". So much in fact that I would call that book a required preliminary for watching the movie. It doesn't make the plot much deeper in itself, and it certainly doesn't help you suspend your disbelief if you need any help for that, but it may bring you to ask yourself more questions about immortality, eternal memories, constrained societies and whatnot. Plus, Clarke's book is required reading for any self-respecting sci-fi reader anyway :)

N.B.: I never really watched the TV series this movie is based on. I guess that would again change my impression.

Re:recommended reading

[Mr. Slippery]

I must say it reminds me a lot of Arthur C. Clarke's "The City and the Stars"....it may bring you to ask yourself more questions about immortality, eternal memories, constrained societies and whatnot. Plus, Clarke's book is required reading for any self-respecting sci-fi reader anyway :)

That sounds like an...odd...comparison to me. But yes, everyone should read that Clarke story.

If you can find it, read the original novella, Against the Fall of Night. I found that The City and the Stars didn't really add anything, and the original version was more direct and compact.

The Clark/Benford book Beyond the Fall of Night, where Benford continues Clarke's story, was IMHO disappointing.

Re:recommended reading

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, Against the Fall of Night is a classic. The City and the Stars adds a few details I liked, but I don't think it's as good as the original novella. The one odd thing, looking back on it now as an adult in a less naive time, is that it never occurred to me that the two main characters (both teenage boys) might be in love. I suppose that would have horrified me as a teenager. As an adult, it's just a different way of looking at the book.

Waxing Autoerotic

[toiletsalmon]

Gee. Looks like SOMEBODY is a fanboy. From the article:

"Charlize gave a terrific performance and she looked just as lethal and capable as the previews promised. She makes for a terrific action hero, leaving the Terminator looking even more obsolete than he was in his last film, and making Lara Croft look like a whiny wannabe. It's easy to be biased toward Charlize, and if I were capable of being biased toward anyone, it would be her, but I managed to control myself. The way I saw it was that the movie was fantastic and Charlize was phenomenal, but if anyone else had done it (as well as or better) and had that same "it" factor that Charlize has flowing out of every pore on her gorgeous face, I would have felt exactly the same about the film as I do right now. And that is true. Reality: Charlize was in it, and she was amazing, and I can't think of anyone who has the talent and the physical grace, strength, and stamina to pull it off as well as she did."

I almost felt dirty reading this guys review. Should you trust a movie review from a guy you woldn't shake hands with??

Bah! I'll probably just wait for the DVD...

Re:Waxing Autoerotic

[Anonymous Coward]

Does it make you feel more or less dirty to find out the author was a female?

Re:Waxing Autoerotic

[Hal_Porter]

More, but in a good way.

Re:Waxing Autoerotic

[ezzzD55J]

That reads just like e.g.

Ninjas can kill anyone they want! Ninjas cut off heads ALL the time and don't even think twice about it. These guys are so crazy and awesome that they flip out ALL the time. I heard that there was this ninja who was eating at a diner. And when some dude dropped a spoon the ninja killed the whole town.

Re:Waxing Autoerotic

[Anonymous Coward]

hey idiot... BinaryVixen is a chick. dumbass.

Re:Waxing Autoerotic

[toiletsalmon]

That sounds like

REAL ULTIMATE POWER!!!

Of course, I realize now that the author of the review was a she. So that means that there are GIRL NINJAS too! ;)

Re:Waxing Autoerotic

[Celsius 233]

Bah! I'll probably just wait for the torrent.

Re:Waxing Autoerotic

[Anonymous Coward]

hey idiot... BinaryVixen is a chick. dumbass.

So that's what he claims? I know it's very unlikely for a guy on the internet to pretend to be a chick. But you know maybe this is one of those rare cases?

Re:Waxing Autoerotic

[heinousjay]

Good reply! Your intelligence level is obvious to all.

I'll throw in my two cents here - the cartoon was pretty stupid, too. It was made to placate stoners and losers staring at MTV for their latest pop culture fix. It's no surprise that remaking a turd resulted in a bigger, shinier turd. After all, the nature of shit is such - you can dress it up, polish it, gold plate it, encrust it in precious stones, and box it elegantly. It's still shit.

Re:Waxing Autoerotic

[StikyPad]

Exactly. The way you tell it, ninjas sound like they'd be able to beat pirates, but only a ninja fanboy would believe that.

Relation to MTV animated series?

[Anonymous Coward]

I have vague memories of the MTV animated series this movie was based on. What I remember is it being intriguing, with a unique visual style, and very weird. After watching the movie, I can say that it has the same name, its own (maybe not so unique) visual style, and some of the intrigue due to it's background setting.

But I am at a loss as to a further connection. Did the story have anything to do with the stories from the animated series? And where's thew weirdness?!

Low Budget

[Snap E Tom]

At the first fight scene, I was wondering why the director kept using closeup shots. You couldn't see the setting that well. Without a background, I thought it took away from the whole majesty of a good martial-arts fight (See Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Matrix). Then I saw the the military uniforms. God awful. Wow, they were cheap looking. These guys looked like they came out of an 80's Sci-Fi Movie. I realized that this is probably a pretty low-budget flick. A simple search on Google confirmed it.

Basically, Charlize is ok. The actors were pretty good. It was helluva lot better than SW Ep I-III acting. I the story was out there, but it's sci-fi, so I'll let it slide. The cheap look, though, really took away from the one area that I was expecting it to excel.

Re:Low Budget

[tkrotchko]

I think he used close-ups during the fight scenes probably because none of the leads had extensive training in martial arts. A lot of close-ups with quick edits pretty much confirms that.

Re:Low Budget

[greginnj]

...It was helluva lot better than SW Ep I-III acting.

Wow, your standards are low!

Re:Low Budget

[damsa]

It was a "she" that directed the movie. She directed Girlfight. But it makes sense that she would use similar shots as in Girlfight if the leads weren't up to snuff, and I think having Charlize Theron doing her own stunts was a bad idea, which probably led them to use those tighter shots.I think have Charlize Theron was a bad idea, as she vetoed the original outfit, I think a no name, martial arts person would've been better for this kind of movie.

Someone else can add something about a woman directing a action movie but I'm not going to.

Re:Low Budget

[Quelain]

I don't watch a lot of TV, I prefer wasting my time playing Anarchy Online, which is a sci-fi MMORPG.

The funny thing is that I had seen the in-game video billboards showing advertising for 'Aeon Flux', which I assumed was a bit of a joke by the Funcom developers about crappy sci-fi movies still existing in the year 29000.

I was quite surprised when I found out it was for real.

Re:Low Budget

[uforgotten]

... or they spent all their money getting Charlize.

Not just any TNA starved sci-fi geek...

[geeber]

Did Taco actually RTFA? This isn't a review at all, it's just some TNA starved sci-fi geek saying "no, it isn't" a whole bunch.

The article was written by BinaryVixen who is identified, on the BinaryIdiot forums, as the Webmaster's girlfriend.

Lucky webmaster!

Re:Not just any TNA starved sci-fi geek...

[BushCheney08]

So if the webmaster can convince Charlize Theron to participate, he can have a threesome!

Re:Not just any TNA starved sci-fi geek...

[geeber]

I liked your .sig. Is that a quote from someone?

Re:Not just any TNA starved sci-fi geek...

[BushCheney08]

I liked your .sig. Is that a quote from someone?

I lifted it from a book by Richard Dawkins titled A Devil's Chaplain. Specifically, it comes from 'The Great Convergence'. There are about 30 pieces in there, from book reviews to lectures, published and unpublished essays, along with a couple of eulogies (including the one he gave for Douglas Adams). Highly recommended reading.

Childish review

[FlynnMP3]

The reviewer ends up daring the movie watcher to enjoy the movie. I thought the movie was great. Mostly because it has a very strong and believable science fiction plot. The trailer I saw on TV had me thinking second thoughts about it. It cast this IMO negative light on it about it being another action thriller. True the movie did have it's action sequences and a couple were integral to moving the plot forward, but the rest of the 'action' was thrown in to presumably make the movie appeal to the larger movie going crowd. But it certainly wasn't needed. It is true that if you missed a critical 10 minutes of the movie spread out into small segments, a watcher could be left very confused about what the heck is going on. I plan on seeing it again. The movie has that quality of being one of those that can survive multiple watchings. I never did watch the MTV series. I had heard about it and always wanted to, but never made the time. No matter, the movie was very entertaining to me and well worth the 8.50 I spent on it.

-FlynnMP3

W00t! You go fanboy!

[Anonymous Coward]

Um, the only thing this "review" goes in-depth on is the author's fascination with Charlize Theron.

This month's Wired has a review by Peter Chung, original create of the animated series. Note that Chung is in no way involved with the movie.

He says it is OK, but they kind of missed the point. Changed some important details and focused on some unimportant details.

My impression is that true fans of the cartoon may be dissappointed is they are hoping for an Aeon Flux that is true to the original, but as a work on its own, it might be fun.

Ok so this can only mean one thing....

[3seas]

... it'll be in the #1.99 DVD rack at Movie Traders in a year. Then I can still frame it all I want and plaster my walls with CT....Who needs a plot for that?

Re:Ok so this can only mean one thing....

[Anonymous Coward]

Then I can still frame it all I want and plaster my walls with CT....Who needs a plot for that?

...does CBN need a plot?

Talking about biased movie reviews...

[Fearan]

I don't know but I get the feeling this reviewer has some biases towards Charlize in skin tight outfits. And maybe instead of insulting the audience that "doesn't understand" this movie, he should analyze the issues they bring up instead of saying they're wrong?

I'll give the guy some points though, the movie was better than made out to be in a lot of reviews. But I still don't understand how this random review gets on the front page of /..

Hair

[EnsilZah]

They could have made the hair look more like in the show.
I mean that's a major part of the character's look, it can't be that hard to get the hair look right after all the millions they put into this movie.

Plot: whose fault

[Himring]

A movie critic said something once that stuck: if I don't get the plot it's not my fault....

Re:Plot: whose fault

[Anonymous Coward]

> A movie critic said something once that stuck: if I don't get the plot it's not my fault....

It's a classic tactic of the self-proclaimed "intelligentsia" - a bad movie is actually a GOOD movie, it's just that you're too stupid to understand why.

Feh.

Re:Plot: whose fault

[espressojim]

What if you get a movie's plot, and the guy next to you doesn't? Are you then too smart, or is the movie shit?

I don't know that a movie has to reach everyone to be a good movie, just like not everyone will understand certain music or art. Does everything have to be dummed down to the lowest common denominator?

Re:Plot: whose fault

[centipetalforce]

Yeah but whent a movie spells something out and trats me like a moron, that's even worse. Writers cannot worry about whether you are quick enough to get it, their job is to make good stories, which is hard enough to do without appealing to the slow and unobservant, the masses.

movie ok, go get animated series DVD set

[Tim Fraser]

The live-action Aeon Flux movie was entertaining, although it had little in common with the original animated series other than some shared names and a fascination with super-spy/assasin heroines. For hollywood, I'd say it was a pretty imaginative effort.

Go see it for the eye-candy, and then go home and watch the newly-released complete DVD set of the original animated series for the true Aeon Flux experience.

Re:movie ok, go get animated series DVD set

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, if you're going to pick up the series, do it first. It includes a free ticket to see the movie, at least if you buy it from Blockbuster.

Re:movie ok, go get animated series DVD set

[Fnord666]

And if you want to see the series as it evolved, you should watch the discs in order 3,1,2.

• Disc 3 has the original pilot and the shorts that ran early on MTV.
• Disc 1 has the first full length episodes directed by Peter Shung.
• Disc 2 has the remaining full length episodes directed by Howard Baker.

Disc 3 also has featurettes that go into background detail of the series which I found interesting. The director commentary is interesting to listen to as well, especially on the original shorts.

And a movie done directly from the original animated series would have almost certainly earned an NC-17 rating! When you consider the time frame that this series aired, it was quite out there.

Learn to spell "its", moron.

[Anonymous Coward]

Spelling matters.

Re:Learn to spell "its", moron.

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm pretty sure you mean punctuation.

I just got the animated DVD a week ago....

[Dusthead Jr.]

I just got the animated DVD a week ago, I'm not even thinking about that movie. I might pick it up in the bargin bin.

Obligatory link to highly rated DVD collection...

[TheRealStyro]

If you are old enough to remember this series, when MTV actually played music videos, then this is the only Aeon Flux series you want...

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000B8I9XQ/qid=11 34311210

Accept no live-action, wanna-be, bottom of barrel, low-rating imposter.

movie looks bad

[fermion]

movie simply because the plot may be too hard for some people to understand.

I have not seen the movie, but in curiousity have read several review. Universally, the plot, the actions, and the characters do not seem as free. But even if the plot and acting and all that is excellent,the live action movie would have a difficult time being Aeon Flux. Aeon was as much about the animnation as the writing and character. Without the complexity introduced by Peter Chung, I fail to see what hope any of this has.

In the end, the plot might be more difficult that the average movie. This would not be an issue if the visuals were as dramatic as the animations were.

Whoa, timeout.

[Anonymous Coward]

"The movie AeonFlux has been getting a mixture of reviews since it's debut and most tend to be on the negative side

The mixture of the reviews of AeonFlux are uniformly bad! The reviews can't have the status of being "mixed" and "most tend to be on the negative side." Rotten Tomatoes is sitting at a 10% Positive review status(7 positive out of 67 total).

On the plus side, In the Mix (4%) and Yours Mine and Ours (6%) are the two movies rated below AeonFlux in the top 50 movies out today.
Sorry to be critical, but at least the OP can acknowledge that the movie is getting TERRIBLE reviews, and try to make his points afterward.

The only movie critic you'll ever need

[DreadfulGrape]

Slashdot doesn't link to him anymore, but he's still out there:

http://www.bigempire.com/filthy/

My very first thought about this movie....

[StressGuy]

was, "Well, noone will be able to accuse him of deviating from the original story line." Back in the Liquid TV days, this seemed more about an artist having a little creative fun with a character without being hindered by any consistent storyline. Oh sure, toward the end he played around with an actual story, but I always got the impression that this was just a character study.

On the other hand, I'm sorry I never got to see Reign. The concept was interesting and I'd really liked to have seen what he would have done with a fully developed study.

As this movie goes, it just screams "renter"

Re:My very first thought about this movie....

[js7a]

Note:

(spoiler warning)

I thought the movie was okay, but was more than a little disappointed about how the director set up the final scene in the present without any story behind it. In a world where people have conversations using drugs to communicate, they could have told us why the clones were experencing past-life memories instead of just showing some mystical visions.

Also, too many gunfights and not enough cool tech scenes.

Cool

[DDNPMF Nigeria]

Cool article
huh! is slashdot sort of an online news agent or what
We haven't yet got some thing that can be worth publishing here that is why we've got no article of our own here.

thanks
dominic and donatus nwaogu
DDNPMF Nigeria
http://ddnpmfng.tripod.com/

Slashdot "experts" strike again.

[mumblestheclown]

"Those who review films for a living are notoriously unreliable, and in many cases, they miss the whole point altogether."

This is the main slashdot arrogance. Basically, "everybody who disagrees with my view is an idiot, shortsighted, underinformed. I, as a coder, am much more capable of being objective and have a wider ken than credentialed or recognized professionals in:"

• Law (especially pertaining copyright, etc.)
• Politics
• Economics (especially the economics of copyright, etc.)
• Business (especially when it involves telling copyright holders how to run theirs..)
• and now... movie reviews!

Double plus extra my comment if the subjet matter involves one of the following:

• intellectual property / copyright
• geek lore ("Aeon Flux", "Star Wars", "Lord of the Rings", "Simpsons").

Re:Slashdot "experts" strike again.

[foniksonik]

Does this also apply to analyzing people you've never met and don't know a thing about? If so , then you're spot on.

Re:Slashdot "experts" strike again.

[at_slashdot]

People are entitled to opinion if only "profesionals" would be allowed to talk than you'd find that you cannot open you mouth to say almost anything. People will say: Hey aren't you a coder? Maybe you should not talk about politics, you have no clue about movies, etc.

But I do agree that this is arrogance (and it's even worse when it comes for somebody who doesn't get the point himself).

Re:Slashdot "experts" strike again.

[ivan256]

Every single poster to slashdot is a copyright holder. Doesn't it seem to follow that we'd all have opinions on the matter?

Many of us create "Intellectual Property" for a living as well, so it's not like everybody here is talking out of their asses on the subject; especially since most people here aren't wealthy enough to lobby to have revenue legislated for them, and all we can do is sit on the sidelines and bitch when other orgainizations manage to pull off such things.

If self reflection reveals that you find no subject matter on which you can consider yourself expert enough to post authoritatively about, then fine, but don't assume that the rest of us are uninformed, inexperienced idiots that just like to rant for the hell of it too.

Re:Slashdot "experts" strike again.

[hkb]

Right, because we could never surmise that the average Slashdot commenter is a geek, likes sci-fi, likes linux, loves natalie portman, and so on.

Re:Slashdot "experts" strike again.

[Mondorescue]

"Those who review films for a living are notoriously unreliable, and in many cases, they miss the whole point altogether." - This is the main slashdot arrogance
That would explain the MPAA's intractible attitude to ... almost everything. The MPAA's senior members all hang out at Slashdot.

Re:Slashdot "experts" strike again.

[Anonymous Coward]

        * Law (especially pertaining copyright, etc.)
        * Politics
        * Economics (especially the economics of copyright, etc.)
        * Business (especially when it involves telling copyright holders how to run theirs..)

A lot of the people who post here are creators of primary intellectual property living in a democratic society, so I think we are at least as qualified as the pundits on the major media outlets to comment on the matters of law (which is created by, enforced by, and interpreted by the officials we elect), politics of those elected officials, economics of our society especially as it pertains to the intellectual property we create, and business. One could even argue that those pundits (some of who may only create secondary content -- that is, content about content) are LESS qualified to talk about it than the average poster on /. Now, OK, maybe the lawyers are more qualified to talk about the interpretation of current law, but we do need to discuss it because we should be considering that every time we go into a voting booth.

        * and now... movie reviews!

Double plus extra my comment if the subjet matter involves one of the following:

        * intellectual property / copyright
        * geek lore ("Aeon Flux", "Star Wars", "Lord of the Rings", "Simpsons").

Since /. contains a disproportionate amount of consumers of this type of material, I think double plus extra likely that we're double plus extra qualified to discuss it.

Re:Slashdot "experts" strike again.

[houghi]

To say this you must be an idiot, shortsighted and underinformed.

Re:Slashdot "experts" strike again.

[Omestes]

And what would this make you? Better then the average /.er? It seems like meta-egotism to me now. "You think you have a privledged view, well I have more privledged one than you and can tell you otherwise!" Seems arrogant to me.

And yes, geeks DO know more about some of the things you listed, since they actually create the culture which gives these works context. (granted not so much Aeon Flux, or the Simpsons, which is given context by some potheads in the 90's, and everyone else, repectivly). How much of the lay public have READ the Lord of the Rings, or have digested all of the Starwars mythos? Just by this I think we have a slighly priveledged point of view OF those topics, since we have created the context in which they are read. Before LoTR or Starwars I-III came out, what did people think of these topics? That they were geeky. Thank you.

Other than that, EVERYONE has a privledged point of view, and should express their opinion on the topics (the real, non-media ones) you express. We got in this mess because these business asshats have been running the show free from public scrutiny. Sadly, they are beginning to over-step bounds into effecting our actual culture adversly, and thus all participants in this culture have the right to comment, or fight. It is now in our domain, and it would be absurd to sit back and take it.

I'm sorry, movie reviewers do not count as "credentialed or recognized professionals, their opinions are as good as mine, yours, or some homeless parapelegic guy with a frontal lobotomy. Hence the mixed revies EVERY movie gets (or for literary critics, EVERY book gets). If these people were "professionals" don't you think there would be a method? No, they are coughing up pure opinion, and if you ask most of them they would agree. Unless I'm missing some objective, empirical methodology in which they secretly use. Thus the lay public IS allowed, and encouraged, to critique movies, AND the asshats that review them. This is how Hollywood makes or loses money. How many movies have you seen because your freind told you to see it, and how many because some fat moron on TV told you to see it?

This comes back to culture. This is a geek culture, and we listen to our fellows opinions since they have similar interests as us. The things that my fellow /.ers like are more likely to be something that I like than something some rich, hollywood mouthpeice tells me to like. I share a common culture, common goals, and such with people on /. (a higher percentage than in the world outside, at least, meaning still low).

So what is your ideal world like? Everyone shuts up and takes it? Experts are as gods, and we should bow to their will? Seems like a sure path to complancence, and domination. On should ALWAYS question the experts, this paradigm works.

Re:Slashdot "experts" strike again.

[Omestes]

Drat. Wasted my mod points in commenting to the troll-ish parent.

Good point though, I never really thought of the whole copyright issue from the view of a direct participant, only as one subject to the issue.

I like this idea. Since now it seems that they are ignoring 99.9% of copyright holders in the interest of the extreme minority. Can you put a value on ideas with this view? It seems that ideas become like gem stones, with some artificially inflated to high levels, where the rest of them are probably superior.

Re:Slashdot "experts" strike again.

[Aranth Brainfire]

Uh, movies aren't a terribly objective thing. It's all about whether one enjoys it or not.

I figure that guy simply has run into the same thing I have far too often: many people say a movie sucks, I see the movie, I love it. I stopped paying attention to anyone who says things about movies I haven't seen- this guy decided movie critics didn't know what they were doing.

I don't like some laws. That doesn't make lawmakers/lawyers/whatever WRONG. I like some movies that get all-negative reviews. That makes the reviewers, while still not really wrong, not entirely right, and totally useless.

Re:Slashdot "experts" strike again.

[Eli Gottlieb]

Welcome to the real world, oh guru of University-Run Scientific Management. Here, normal people get to have opinions.

Re:Slashdot "experts" strike again.

[mumblestheclown]

Ah. I have cells. Does that make me a doctor?

I have absolutely no doubts that you personally can wax intellectual on IP issues. However, slashdot as a whole has shown itself to be a morass of ignorance, superstition, and bullshiat "folk wisdom" or equally bullshiat "new thinking."

Not that the lawyers are often right, but to dismiss them out of hand simply BECAUSE they are lawyers, politicians, or, (like myself), an actual trained economist (who happens to run a small software company), is ludicrous.

Re:Obligatory link to highly rated DVD collection.

[Anonymous Coward]

Hell, this was on WAAAAAAAAAY after MTV stopped playing videos. The Aeon Flux things was early/mid '90s. MTV stopped being MTV around '89...

Death by End

[Solokron]

Isn't the big trademark of Aeon Flux is that she dies at the end of each episode?

Re:Death by End

[Anonymous Coward]

She died at the end of the LiqTV shorts, yes. I don't think it carried over to the episodes.

Re:Death by End

[Anonymous Coward]

she didn't die at the end of each episode. In season one, she only died at the very end of the season, but it you watch season one all at once, it's basically a 30 min episode and she dies at the end. In season two, she didn't always die at the end... In "War" she dies about 1 to 2 minutes into it...

Cool

[Anonymous Coward]

cool article
sounds like good news to us

thanks
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DDNPMF Nigeria
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Re:About need Movies Like Autumn Rangers

[22RealMcCoy]

The new big thing in Hollywood will be performing the classical ideals in contepmorary times.

No need for the pomo-hipsters behind Aeon Flux.

Story will also empower the next generation of video games.

http://gamestorytelling.com/

And Story & Truth's Beauty, will reform Wall Street and culture in general.

http://autumnrangers.com/
http://autumnrangersgame.com/
http://autumnrangersmovie.com/
http://autumnrangersnovel.com/

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[StateOfTheUnion]

This so called "review" is exactly why I've fallen away from posting on /.

This isn't a review. Its an opinion . . . and it seems to have been posted by someone that thinks the movie is "great" but really cannot or chooses not to explain what made the movie great (a single actress alone does not make a good movie). He attacks other reviewers for not understanding the plot and attacks those that aren't captivated by the film for having no imagination . . . but he offers very little of his own opinion. He attacks others . . . but fails offer a convincing opinion of his own . . . except that it was an "awesome" film. I finshed reading the article and I was unconvinced . . . there is very little substance to the review . . . except that other reviewers are wrong . . . and this one is right . . . like the logic of a six year old.

Is it just me or has slashdot been posting a lot more lame articles like this? I'm not sure but I get the opinion that the editors have changed tack and are going for a more inflammatory style. The rhetorical questions that they post at the end of their first posts are often poorly thought out and sometimes just plain illogical or indicative that they failed to read the article or pay attention when they read the article.

I can only assume that inflammatory opinions posted as reviews or illogical rhetorical questions serve as flamebait to drive up the number of posts on /. As circumstantial evidence of competitive pressures I submit ancedotally that /.'s competitors such as Digg and other sites have been getting more press lately.

I don't know whether the editors will read this comment or take it into account . . . . but I have to say that I have been highly underwhelmed with the recent content of slashdot. This inflammatory attack on other movie reviewers that is thinly disguised as a movie review is more evidence that Slashdot is using a strategy of posting material that might otherwise be considered flamebait to drive up the number of posts.

Article Review: Aeon Flux, Talk Amongst Yourselves

[Aesiq]

If you found yourself not bored and very interested in the first 5 sentenced blame it on your lack of reading ability. It's not your fault really, but you sure missed out, and don't blame me for rubbing that fact in your face. Poor baby.

[Note: This is funny if you read the article.]

Actually went to the movie

[esconsult1]

I went to the movie without any pre-conceptions and without knowing anything about AeonFlux. I've not read the comics, or anything.

I was wary going in because of bad reviews, but the movie was surprisingly, evenly good. There was a good story, and the acting was fair. Here's the main difference between AeonFlux and the Matrix, in my opionion:

Both movies start off with jaw dropping premises. AeonFlux actually carries the premise through to the end in a satisfactory conclusion.

Re:Actually went to the movie

[Bezben]

The premise for both films was very good, and they both started out well. Aeon Flux didn't deliver in the plot department I felt really. It built it up well, the whole killer virus, survivors left in one city, everything outside is unknown, evil goodchild regime, people disappearing thing gave me high hopes for the plot being interesting. But then they fubared it really. The whole matrix idea of our minds are trapped in a computer, lets fight the machines has been done before, but that at least the matrix felt fresh. The whole clones thing in aeon came across in a cliched way really: we're clones? thats bad. lets blow up the cloning facilities. I just felt they could have done a lot more with the plot, rather than almost entirely ignoring the back story.

Re:Actually went to the movie

[StikyPad]

Except the premise of the AF movie was explained up front and didn't really catch you off guard, unless the idea of cloning people particularly bothers you. To people who aren't shocked by things like people wearing white after Labor Day, it came off as just another weak "clones are teh devil part v," uh.. clone.

I think it's a good film for its target audience, which is the same target audience the series had: People who watch MTV.

The conclusion was only better

[Poltras]

Bottom-line: A fantastic thriller with a rare combination of action and imagination; two entities that we rarely see together on the same screen. Even more, it fucking rules.

This guy knows how to finish a "serious" review with a NPOV. It looks very ethical and pro.

Re:The conclusion was only better

[Anonymous Coward]

You've been hanging out on Wikipedia too much. ;-)

I gave up

[rsilvergun]

when they gave her a backstory (the ever popular family killed/revenge story). wtf, she's suppose to be all mysterious and crap. All I can figure is Peter Chung had to bend over backwards to get this made, just like when The Tick made evil his bitch.

Re:I gave up

[tedgyz]

Uh... Peter Chung was not involved. He reviewed the movie just before it came out and had your exact comment. He didn't like the backstory.

I guess back when the MTV series was playing late at night, Peter Chung was glad to get paid anything. MTV owned the rights and made the movie. It still sucks that they left him out of it. MTV +10 roll for chaotic evil.

movie was not aeon flux..

[Lord Bitman]

I dont understand why they named it "Aeon Flux" when all it shared were poorly-placed references to the series. This might have been a half-okay-maybe movie (*I doubt it) if they just called it The Clonus Disaster or something. All that was gained by calling it Aeon Flux was my thinking "Why would you try to tack on some silly lame-ass reason for Aeon and Trevor's relationship?"

Re:movie was not aeon flux..

[damsa]

Hollywood likes doing that, redoing a TV series without actually doing the work of redoing a series. So you have movies like Bewitched and the Brady Bunch movie. The reason is simple, it is easier to market something with a built in brand name, and face it the original shows that were on weren't even that great in the first place.

Re:movie was not aeon flux..

[Lord Bitman]

but that's the point. It's easier to market something with a built in brand name, but (maybe I'm wrong about this) isn't Aeon Flux a bit obscure to try applying this principle to? If Aeon flux were some wildly popular thingy with a huge fanbase, this would make sense. But a late-night MTV show that only had ten and five-quarters episodes to its name?

Re:movie was not aeon flux..

[damsa]

I'm not saying it's a great idea. But I can see why a lazy producer would want to go this route. There are successes where a small cult following resulted in a full fledged movie. One of the more notable successes is Office Space, it was based on the Mike Judge short. Office Space the Movie only had a little to do with Office Space the short and yet it did well in both theaters and dvd. Producer thinks, okay, a cartoon short can be made into a live action movie and make money, if Mike Judge can do it I can do it too. So producer looks at MTV, and sees an adult cartoon, and goes hey, I should do that. And ff you look at David Gale's producing credits, it looks like that's what he is doing, it includes such classics as, Beavis and Butthead Do America, Pootie Tang, Crossroads staring Britany Spears and Jackass the Movie.

Except the producers in this case made several bad choices, 1)the lack of involvement of Peter Chung, 2) choosing a director with little or no action movie experience 3) choosing an superstar Oscar winner as its heroine thereby driving the budget of the movie upwards.

Anyways, these producers make more money than you and I will ever see in a lifetime, so they must be doing something right.

Re:movie was not aeon flux..

[Anonymous Coward]

> choosing an superstar Oscar winner as its heroine thereby driving the budget of the movie upwards.

You have a point. They should have picked some no-name (but hot) actress who would have been willing to wear a real Aeon Flux outfit.

Reviews

[Jas0nC]

Doesn't every movie get bad reviews? It had no chance.

Aren't you contradicting yourselve?

[SmallFurryCreature]

Aeon Flux was not a music video and it was played on MTV. So Aeon Flux was one of the non-music video broadcasts that turned MTV into what it is today. What it is today I leave up to people who actually still watch it. I can't blame MTV for me growing old.

Re:Aren't you contradicting yourselve?

[Jack9]

I would argue Liquid TV was a sampler of videos without bands. Then came The Real Life...sigh.

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[geeber]

Oh, I don't know. I think that Slashdot has always been much like it is today. You can see it as a good thing, or a bad thing, but at least they are consistent. Poor spelling, off base comments at the ends of postings, lame articles that make the front page, and the dubious practice of calling themselves editors when they don't have been here at least as long as I have, back in '96 or '97.

That said, I keep coming back for more. Go figure.

MTV series

[tedgyz]

As someone who saw the original MTV series, I actually liked the film. I realized that it was not going to be identical and once accepting that, it was enjoyable. I give it a 7/10.

Looking back at the series, there was definitely more bizarre behavior, sexual ambiguity, and such. They briefly hit on these points, but if you never saw the series you might not even notice. I'm kinda glad they didn't try to replicate the tall, anorexic species. It's much more enjoyable watching Charlize instead of some 7' tall freak. :-)

BTW, I didn't RTFA. The title said talk amongst yourselves. Based on the comments, it looks like I saved myself some time.

Re:MTV series

[nan0]

Indeed, it was a fair job.

i did want to walk out halfway through it, but was glad i stayed ;)

a few points

1) 10 minutes into watching, i realised i'd much rather be watching a feature length *animated* movie instead of live action. (the dialogue was perfect for an animated movie - but as live action, gave no ability for actors to, well, act/emote; so it feels stilted.)

could probably take the final edit and run it through linklater's 'waking life/scanner darkly' rotoscoping software and end up with a more enjoyable film than pure live action.

2) the plot was well done

i enjoyed how they brought together the whole series into a cohesive storyline. suprisingly, it didn't ruin it for me; in fact, gave a sense of completion i never got from the series (but didn't miss, frankly ;)

3) humor was completely absent

so much of the subtlety and ambiguity and *perversion* of the animation - did not translate to screen AT ALL.

so - all in all - decent aeon flux adaptation, good sci fi movie.

not without it's problems; primarily because it's such a genius series and nearly impossible to bring to screen.

Re:MTV series

[Spiked_Three]

Just wanted to second your comments. I used to watch the cartoon series a lot.

When I thought about going to the movie all the negative reviews had me expecting a really bad film.

What I saw was almost perfect as far as I as concerned. Yes, it differed from the cartoon some, but so what?

One thing that really pisses me off is all the negative comments about the dialogue. One earlier poster mentioned the exchange between Aeon and her sister as being poor acting. As someone who watched the original cartoons I found I was amazed at how the dialog duplicated the original cartoon and that fact sucked me into the movie even more. The reviewers apparently never watched the cartoon and do not understand that the dialogue is being delivered intentionally as it is. Like Dr. Smith in the Lost in Space movie, it took a lot of talent to duplicate the original character dialogue so well and I applaud the actors and director for doing so. It is a point not missed by everyone.

I can't wait for the DVD to be out (probably real soon and real cheap) so I can buy and watch it again.

There are reasons for the negative reviews...

[sargosis]

I made the mistake of actually watching the movie, and i would like to point out that there are good reasons for the negative reviews. For starters, a plot that lacks the ability to make sense from mone moment to another is not "complicated." It just sucks. If you read the reviews that showed this movie in a positive light, you'll ind that the majority are adolescents that justify all of the rest of the movie's shortcomings with the simple phrase "but she's hot, so it's ok." The public should recieve a formal apology from the director, producers, and writers of AeonFlux for releasing something so horribly done.

Re:There are reasons for the negative reviews...

[jnelson4765]

Ummm... The plot made sense - at least a hell of a lot better than the animated series did. Trying to make a coherent pop-sci-fi storyline out of that series took heroic effort - especially one that wouldn't get the director and screenwriters tarred and feathered by thirtysomethings that watched the series on Liquid Television.

I didn't expect a Lord Of The Rings-level theatric masterpiece, but a Hollywood sci-fi movie.

It delivered on that.

My personal favorite was the setwork - that carried the animated series' design better than anything else. There was an asthetic that I really liked - that of being futuristic without being cheezy (for the most part).

So its..

[jlebrech]

.. matrix meets equilibrium with a chick. cool!!!

So all you need to get posted on Slashdot is...

[Anonymous Coward]

A web page, however lame, and an opinion, however completely idiotic, on some nerd related topic?

I predict next year Slashdot editors will be "reporting" on blogs about bowel movements as long as they mention something about nerd culture or evil content owners.

Posted by CmdrTaco on Sunday December 11, @09:09AM
from the thats-how-studios-get-ideas-to-begin-with dept.
ColonClean writes: "This morning when I took a crap, I noticed that one of my stools resmembled the photon torpedo casing they used to commit Spocks body to the Genesis planet in Star Trek II. I'm concerned that Paramount may be suing me for unauthorized reproductions of their intellectual property. Should I call the EFF? This could be a dangerous trend. Have other readers crapped out replicas of copyrighted material? Did the content owner come after you? How did you handle it?

Then two hours later Hemos would post the same story, because they just don't care anymore.

"it is" debut??

[Anonymous Coward]

Come on now!! Simple: The only time it is spelled "it's" is when you mean "it is."

How hard is that, folks??

Re:"it is" debut??

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, seriously. It's not hard; ITS is already possessive. It's like HIS DEBUT. No one writes HI'S DEBUT. So why does anyone write IT'S DEBUT?

I've got tons of other peeves: like "noone", THERE'S NO SUCH WORD! Or "alot", but no one writes "alittle"!

Filthy says: 1 finger

[amcdiarmid]

http://filthycritic.com/filthy/

No seriously, read it: I cannot begin to summarize how bad he considers the movie.

Off to see Harry Potter at 70mm...

Decent Movie

[grahamkg]

I remember the reviews for The Matrix when it was first released. Mostly the reviews panned it.

The reviews for Aeon Flux are probably even worse than for The Matrix. Okay, it's an MTV movie, and so I expect it to be a little light on things. However, I still expected it to be good. The trailer looked interesting. I wasn't disappointed when seeing the movie.

The story was good with an interesting twist. The acting was okay to good overall, directing was good, editing was very good. Never was I bored in the movie.

I watched the movie last night, and enjoyed it. Today I still think it was a good movie.

Logan's Run

[foniksonik]

I saw the movie, saw the original animated series as a teen and remember it fondly, but it looks like they reworked the screenplay from Logan's Run and fit the characters and basic premise from Aeon Flux into it.

I say this because it's what hollywood does... they take screenplays that worked and use them as the basis for anything that might have a cultural hook to it, to appeal to a younger audience.

I also say it because the interpreted premise of Chung's world (which I don't recall being quite so detailed in the backstory) has become very very similar to the premise of Logan's Run, with a few modern twists to incorporate technology that is a bit more believeable...

Regardless of this (Logan's Run was a good movie, which makes Aeon Flux pretty good too).... I hate the fact that hollywood always feels the need to overdo the explanation of the backstory on these films. Can't they just jump in to the story and characters and let the backstory reveal itself?

Let the audience figure out the fact that it's an isolated civilization in a post-biological-disaster future.... sure plant clues with cryptic dialogue and solve the mystery at the end but don't tell us everything in the prelude... it makes me feel like I already know everything there is to know about the story and all I'm watching is the characters go through the motions of predestined roles.

Re:Logan's Run

[Anonymous Coward]

If you liked remakes of 'Logan's Run' you should check out 'The Island'.

Movie was great, review was right on target

[caffiend666]

The movie was great. I was a little disappointed in the start, nothing more than nuevo-kung fu action. But, as soon as the story actually get's going it's riveting from there on in. The movie is not a re-interpretation of the series or a continuation, to me it was more of an explanation and a conclusion. If you looked at the Aeon Flux animated series as trash, you will not like this movie. If you looked at the Aeon Flux animated series as pure action, you will not like the movie that much (costumes aren't skimpy enough, and the scenes are too pretty, the animated series, was, well, disgusting and morbid...). If you looked at the series as a precursor for something more, this movie is that conclusion. It's always interesting to see mind benders like the series come out making sense, this is one of those rare times when they pulled it off. Why is Trevor Goodchild a good/bad guy? Why does everyone (including Aeon) keep dying? How will it all end? What is the point? Also, one warning, a Yahoo individual review said that this is an art film, if you can't stand art films you shouldn't see the movie. As far as I'm concerned, they only made one mistake all in all, and that was with the ending (which was still good)....

Stinks on ice

[oDDmON oUT]

Having been a fan of the edgy, stream-of-consciousness, animated predecessor and convinced that Charlize Theron would not lend her talents to anything *bad*, I went to see it with high hopes that it would not be...well...what it was.

What was it?

A bad Hollywood retelling that took key characters from the original and dropped them into a mutant hash of a plot (read:dumbed-down-for-mass-market back story with lots of thud, blunder, and CGI, because we're afraid anything else will shoot way over the heads of our target audience) that succeeds in convincing me of one thing:

Suits concerned only with box office revenue, marketing tie-ins and DVD after sales should not be allowed near animated/comic properties for the purposes of making a live action movie.

Leave that to those who can do it right

In regards to the reviewers gender

[raist21]

Just so everyone is aware, the reviewer is not a "fan boy" and is in fact a girl! So the comments about having a hardon for Charlize would be quite impossible. Although, still being sexually attracted is not out of the question.

Re:In regards to the reviewers gender

[Fremandn]

I think that it isn't totally impossible for her to have a hard on. It depends on how you define gender.

Re:In regards to the reviewers gender

[cornface]

I think that it isn't totally impossible for her to have a hard on. It depends on how you define gender.

Yes, and the sky is purple with flashing plaid spots, depending on how you define "purple" and "flashing plaid spots."

Not Bad

[1st Wiz Rules]

Anyone who watched a few of the MTV cartoons years ago should understand that odd, quirky and unusual is... (along with sex) was what Aeon Flux was all about. Whats with the "difficult to follow" complaint... Come on... it was supposed to be. You should have left the film wondering "what the hell was that?". Like trying to make sense of 2001 A Space Odyssey (not the Aeon is in that class) you should have been left... well.. confused. If anything Aeon it tried to make too much sense.

Translation:

[Black Parrot]

"I'm a fanboy, and I think everyone else should like it too."

Re: This was a review? This is news?

[Black Parrot]

> Oh, I don't know. I think that Slashdot has always been much like it is today. You can see it as a good thing, or a bad thing, but at least they are consistent. Poor spelling, off base comments at the ends of postings, lame articles that make the front page, and the dubious practice of calling themselves editors when they don't have been here at least as long as I have, back in '96 or '97.

See? Nothing changes.

Filthy has a review

[zecg]

And I find it intelligent and persuading enough not to see that film, ever.

Re:Filthy has a review

[Anonymous Coward]

Intelligent and persuading? You're trusting the reviewer? What's so wrong with you that you can't decide what movies you should and shouldn't see without hearing the opinion of a perfect stranger? No, most of the people in here don't know what they're talking about, but at least they got their opinions from themselves and not from someone else.

Re:Filthy has a review

[Austerity Empowers]

Probably not wanting to give $5-$10 (depending on where you live) to some suit in Hollywood who just wanted to turn on the wallet vac for a couple hours without actually putting effort into it.

I for one have given quite a few dollars, against the opinions of reviers, in hopes of finding the jewel in the rough. My reward for it has been lost time and money I won't get back. Many of us do not wish to waste any more time or money unless someone who got to see the movie for free can manage to give at least a luke warm review.

Re:Filthy has a review

[zecg]

The point is not paying for shit and not getting myself into a position to waste two hours of my life on shit.

I watched it yesterday - may contain spoilers

[GuyFawkes]

Good points -

The tech stuff was nice, like the "living" gardens that were bio-engineered permieter security systems.

The lead actress was worth looking at.

The over all look and feel was nice and clean, it looked fresh and sharp.

Bad points -

The plot could be summed up as pandemic hits the world, a few are immunised just in time to save humanity and congregate in a single "utopian" city (movie starts here) the cure has a side effect, infertility, so they started cloning each other, 7th generation clone leader/dictator searches for a cure only to discover nature has spontaneously fixed the problem somehow, clone leaders clone sibling tries to supress this to maintain the status quo, cue lots of fighting scenes.

The action was cartooney, eg not credible, blade runner did it right, one "soldier", no matter how well trained, cannot take on and defeat hordes of other soldiers with at least equal access to military tech

The acting was two dimensional, but then that's all this film ever called for.

The ending was of course utterly predictable.

Was it worth watching? -

Seeing as I downloaded it for free from usenet it was worth the expense and the 90 minutes of my time to watch it, I've seen a __LOT__ worse films.... eg compared to the dukes of hazzard this was a masterpiece, but compared to blade runner it was trite, it was on a par with a trekkie type movie mebbe

If I'd paid ten UK pounds for a cinema ticket I'd have been well pissed.

HTH

Always entertaining

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's an entertaining review:
http://www.bigempire.com/filthy/

The Monster as Aeon Flux

[ILikeRed]

I think she is too fat to be Aeon Flux, I mean she's not at her Monster days... but still, it's more like they casted an overweight monster who lost a little bit of weight for the role than someone who might actually fit the role. And yes, I think Milla Jovovich, Lori Petty, Gigi Edgley, Dina Meyer, or Kate Beckinsale would have been better choices, but just about any skinny unknown would have fit the physical role better.

Re:The Monster as Aeon Flux

[EnronHaliburton2004]

If you think that Charlize Theron is "Fat", you are one warped motherfucker. Perhaps you should spend less time looking at cartoon images of women and spending time with real, actual women.

I'm not a fan really, but Charlize Theron is thin by any stretch of the imagination.

Re:The Monster as Aeon Flux

[Anonymous Coward]

but real women require money by the hour.

Re:The Monster as Aeon Flux

[calculadoru]

Hey man, he meant to say 'phat'...

Re:Fire CmdrTaco

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you ever stopped to realize that maybe they post this "pointless drivel" because so many people like you respond to it?

Liquid Television...does anyone here miss it?

[SirDaShadow]

I was wondering if anyone here remembers LTV back in the day...it was a really nice segment that was unique and refreshing...does anyone here miss it at all in the middle of the mud that is reality tv?

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[jeffehobbs]

That said, I keep coming back for more. Go figure.

I bet the last portion of the topic headline ("Talk Amongst Yourselves") is actually the reason why you keep coming back to Slashdot; it's certainly why I keep coming back. Increasingly, the articles that slashdot will link to (including this one) are completely irrelevant and what is truly interesting and informative reading are the comments that the article elicits. Slashdot should have more posts that are completely opinionless "talk amongst yourselves" kind of posts; the community and the moderation system will assuredly provide content far more interesting than one link to one guy's smoldering blog. Slashdot should act as the "Tim Russert" character, bringing up the topics for discussion and then getting out of the way.

~jeff
my smoldering blog

Re: This was a review? This is news?

[geeber]

See? Nothing changes.

I don't have the nerve to call myself an editor...

How much did they pay to get this story?

[Anonymous Coward]

Man, I hope they felt they got their money's worth for this payoff. Can we talk about other things instead, like the fact that SETI@Home has been dead for a week and there's been no story on that?

What's sad...

[Chmcginn]

is that people would still mark things off-topic, even when there wasn't any real topic to get off of. No topic of which to get off. You know what I mean.

Decent Review

[Anonymous Coward]

It was a fantastic movie. If you saw it and don't agree, that's one thing. If you think the movie sucks and you haven't even watched it yet, no one wants to hear from you.

Aeon and Narnia

[technoCon]

I went to Aeon Flux with a bunch of guys from Work Friday afternoon, and then to a late-night showing of Narnia with some friends from Church. I enjoyed both.

And each makes a cultural / mythic statement, touching a part of human nature. Aeon Flux did a good job of showing the MTV cultural milleiu from which it sprang. Fairly nihilistic / materialistic showing the alienation of living in a comfortable prosperous society. When Aeon says there's something wrong inside everyone, that wrongness resonates with me. (The Pope said something about America's "culture of death" and I wondered how much he had this in mind.) Don't get me wrong, I really enjoyed Aeon Flux a lot. I'd seen it on MTV but hadn't been able to catch enough episodes to grok the story arc. Seeing it all at once, it made sense. I thought it said something significant about human nature.

Narnia also said something about human nature. I like to think myself something better than I am. In truth, I'm more like Edmond the traitor in the Narnia story. Almost everyone in Narnia was flawed in some way. And that's the point of that story. How does one cope with one's own flaws? How does one cope with a loved one who betrays us?

Both movies' plots turned upon a traitor among siblings. Each story adopted a different strategy for dealing with traitors. Aeon Flux and Trevor Goodchild were heroes of one sort. The Pevensies were heroes of another sort.

i didnt like it

[digitallysick]

I thought it was ok until after they go over the wall, grabbing the pods and making them shoot at each other, then it just got dumb!! Was not a good movie

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[Jasin Natael]

Amen. That's the way it is already. Posts about a specific RFC or patch digress quickly into a political / technological debate about the merits of the underlying technology, the fix, or the fallacy of penetrate-and-patch. Any story containing "Web 2.0" or "AJAX" turns into a philosophical melee about the direction of Internet content, Applications, and inevitably ends with posters deriding the buzzword simply because they can't put it on their resume. Stories about aviation and space exploration digress into discussions of interplanetary flight, colonization, terraforming, the long-since dead X25, and the over-political nature of state-sponsored flight. Biology and evolution stories turn into religious flamewars faster than you can say "bang".

I've been here for a long time (I'm apparently missing a digit in my UID), and it's never been any different. I don't expect it will. You can't stop the community from discussing the topics that are interesting to it. But, the articles are usually good enough to bring out an informative, relevant discussion on the topic. Enough posters put up links to relevant materials online that sometimes it's better to read their links instead of the actual FA. At least the editors don't post every dot-zero-one update of the Linux Kernel anymore. Or maybe I set my preferences to filter those out. I can't remember.

Jasin Natael

No, she isn't "hot"

[Anonymous Coward]

"She is hot."

No, she's beautiful. Big difference. Angelina Jolie is hot. But I don't think she's as beautiful. Theron is a clasically beautiful woman who doesn't have much sex appeal. You take her home to meet mom. You marry her and have kids with her.

Angelina Jolie is the girl who is so hot that you know you'll do something stupid because of her. She'll bring other chicks home to do 3-somes and 4-somes. And you don't marry her because eventually, she will do something awful to you while you sleep, because she's batshit.

As to Theron, in the movie her outfits were almost baggy on her. THere was nothing that made you sit up and say "yea! I'll bet this girl knows how to party". Its almost like she said to the producer "I'll take the role, but nothing overtly sexual, and tone down the outfits".

Aeon Flux

[midnightthunder]

snerk ....

Well it is a movie, so I guess I can do what I had sort of decided not to do.

A friend had really wanted to see this. I was .... lukewarm.

When it was over, he thought it was pretty good ... I felt it was .... oh well. It could have been worse. Really, it could have been.

I had heard it was based on a cartoon from MTV. But, the movie has to stand on its own right.

Before actors, before special effects, before anything comes story. And that does not just mean a neat McGuffin. It means a good story well told.

That in other words means: A Good Script.

It didn't have one.

The plot hook which is revealed after a while about folks being sterile, clones and needing to be able to reproduce naturally again versus folks more interested in the status quo than the future of humanity. That could be a good story.

But only with a top notch script.

The was perfunctoy story telling.

I can just visualize the backroom discussions: "Hey guys we'll have these sexy ladies in skin tight clothing performing superhuman feats and saving the world !"

"Yeah ! and, and and ..... lots and lots and lots of special effects too !"

"Man this is gonna be so neat ..... "

**********

Does anybody wonder why the scripts for films sometimes go through so many rewrites and often so many writers too ?

Because a good script, though awesome, is not by any means an easy thing to come by.

Just having investors with lots of money, does not a good film make. Nor will any amount of enthusiasm or good (or mediocre in this case) acting.

There just is no substitute for a good script.

If you have a good enough script, you can cut your expenses a TON on special effects and even get by just fine with so so actors.

Heck.

You can put it on a barren stage in front of an audience and simply let the story itself carry the full burden of everything.

But not with Aeon Flux.

And why is the title, not something of meaning. It surely sounds like it should mean something. Instead it is the name of the strangely clad heroine.

Whoever would have the insensitivity and chutzpah to name their baby girl Aeon Flux ?

Yep, I may have nailed it. The whole things starts out wrong on the VERY FIRST STEP. With its bonehead title ...... And never stops stumbling, not even to the very end of the film.

Speaking only for myself, I found Aeon Flux to be a quite annoying film.

Frankly, considering who made it, I think AssHats. .... er Jackass, was for its effort, a better film. And that is not saying very much.

Re:Aeon Flux

[Anonymous Coward]

> Whoever would have the insensitivity and chutzpah to name their baby girl Aeon Flux ?

Mr. and Mrs. Flux?

Rotten Tomatoes

[meanfriend]

Check out the movie's ratings on www.rottentomatoes.com

Aeon Flux is currently running about 10%, which even amongst other craptastic cgi-fests, is suprisingly poor. That rating puts it about even with movies like Catwoman, and Elektra, which should tell you all you need to know.

Re:Rotten Tomatoes

[Anonymous Coward]

If you put all your faith in reviews sure. I can think for myself, and I don't need someone else to tell me what to watch.

I actually enjoyed the movie

[Cyric]

I don't consider myself a hardcore fan, but I am fairly avid. Suffice to say I've never understood how the show hasn't continued or been picked up again ... I liked it enough to think it should, but wasn't dedicated enough to go looking it up.

I take movie adaptations for what they are ... typically minor modifications made to better appeal to the masses. I took the changes in stride and they really didn't bother me. I suppose anyone seriously bugged by the changes is also peeved that Chung re-did the animated show in a DVD set to reflect what he originally wanted ... and took out MTV's adaptations. It's his show - his prerogative to do with it as he pleases - but in paticular I think it's good he went back and made things as he originally intended. George Lucas, on the other hand, changed characters to pander to the masses.

Anyway, I was originally hyped to see AF. Before going, I read some reviews which didn't contain plot spoilers ... by far most were negative. So I kept my hopes in check, and was pleasantly surprised at how good it was.

The movie was a wonderful extention of the show. It takes place between two episodes - giving a little more detail to the animated show. Trevor appears to have been split into two people ... which I thought was necessary if the movie was to appeal to anyone who wasn't familiar with the show. The animated Trevor was a rather complicated individual. The movie also did a wonderful job of explaining part of the relationship between AF and Trevor.

Aeon

[heavyw8t]

Hey, I'm an old man with no life and no friends, and any chance I get to see Charlize Theron run around semi-naked for 2 hours is a good thing to me!

Re:Aeon

[narcc]

Charlize Theron run around semi-naked for 2 hours

Ugh, I'm really tired of these posts. If you want to see preaty naked women there are many more direct ways than watching second rate movies with female protagonists hoping to see a nipple slip past the censors.

1) Rent a Porn
2) Go to a Strip club
3) Go to a Bar (a trendy one)

I'll guarantee that you see naked women and/or half-naked women -- on occasion you'll even see women that look as good or better than Charlize Theron.

Oh! and you might even get a chance to actually *talk* to a woman! How cool would that make you huh?

fucking dorks...

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[Dirtside]

This isn't a review. Its an opinion

And most reviews are, what, unassailable fact? All reviews are opinions. It's not a very well-written review, but that doesn't mean it's not a review.

Seriously, would you consider that good PR?

[Anonymous Coward]

Nobody paid. If they were going to pay, they'd pay someone who could actually write a convincing review. This was obviously just some drooling CT fan with stalker fantasies who likely watched the whole movie with his hand down his pants and only barely managed to keep from turning his "review" into X-rated fanfic.

Or I dunno, maybe they wanted a review targeted squarely at teenage boys and Slashdot geeks who's main criteria for the movie is how many times they'll be able to masturbate to it when they get back home to mommy's basement. Though I have my doubts the review author managed to contain himself that long. I pity whoever sat in his seat in the next showing.

Re:Seriously, would you consider that good PR?

[Anonymous Coward]

I hate to point this out, since others have pointed it out a million times, but the reviewer was a girl, one who obviously was not exactly crushing on Ms. Theron. It was an amusing article, and I didn't get the stalker/lovesick vibe. I got the vibe that SHE really liked this movie. Some of you sound like you're the ones with the creepy obsession.

Re:Seriously, would you consider that good PR?

[Anonymous Coward]

the reviewer was a girl, one who obviously was not exactly crushing on Ms. Theron
Ok, the reviewer was a girl. But it's 2005 and I'm certainly not going to insult the fairer sex by suggesting that they're somehow less capable of being creepily obsessed with and slobbering over a woman than a man is. I mean really, "It's easy to be biased toward Charlize, and if I were capable of being biased toward anyone, it would be her, but I managed to control myself" and "if anyone else [...] had that same "it" factor that Charlize has flowing out of every pore on her gorgeous face" certainly sounds like crushing to me, no matter what the authors sex.

This was a (CREEPY!) review of Charlize Theron, not of the movie. It was a badly written review. It actively insulted everyone who didn't think this movie was genius, which seems to be pretty much everyone. The author is a lousy writer with no taste in movies, but such an egotist that she thinks the rest of the world is the problem. So even if you give her the benefit of the doubt about the hormonal stalker thing, she's still an idiot. Just a less icky one.

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[Anonymous Coward]

This isn't a review. Its an opinion . . . and it seems to have been posted by someone that thinks the movie is "great" but really cannot or chooses not to explain what made the movie great (a single actress alone does not make a good movie). He attacks other reviewers for not understanding the plot and attacks those that aren't captivated by the film for having no imagination . . . but he offers very little of his own opinion. He attacks others . . . but fails offer a convincing opinion of his own . . . except that it was an "awesome" film. I finshed reading the article and I was unconvinced . . . there is very little substance to the review . . . except that other reviewers are wrong . . . and this one is right . . . like the logic of a six year old.

These so-called "sentences" are exactly why I hate reading comments on /. Adding '...' to the middle or end of your sentences at random makes your comment hard to read and you look illiterate. Learn some real punctuation. Spend some time with the comma, the semi-colon, and the colon.

A better suggestion

[weierstrass]

Why don't you and your 'film buff' friends go to the theatre or read a book or something, if you're all so cultured? Then pretty soon mainstream cinemas will stop flogging the dead 'plot' horse and just show straight porn / porn with fight scenes / straight fighting all the time.

You are in the minority, after all.

Hmm. That changes everything.

[Anonymous Coward]

Odd. Now instead of being disgusted by the review, I find it strangely hot.

Unless the reviewer is a fat chick. Then I'm still disgusted.

Yup...

[Greyfox]

Liquid Television was great. Aeon Flux more or less got me into it and I appreciated a lot of the other bizarre shorts once I started watching it. Robot Chicken and some of the other Adult Swim short shows often get as bizarre as Liquid Television did, but it's hard to match the fast-paced violence and surreality of Aeon Flux.

I determined not to listen to the reveiwers of this movie because I figured that they probably wouldn't be familiar with the original Aeon Flux, so I'd have to see it for myself to see if the maker of the movie was true to the original vision of the animated shorts. I was hoping that they'd do no explanation and possibly not even any dialog because Aeon Flux needed neither, but it's awfully hard to get a feature-length movie out of that.

No Atheleticism

[Usagi_yo]

Charlene Theron is beautiful, but what a clutz. She showed no aptitude for atheleticism at all in the movie and the editing showed. Most of her stunts reminded me of the 1970's series Wonder Woman. Cheezy.

Re:No Atheleticism

[Anonymous Coward]

Jeez, were you even watching the movie? She owned it. You can hate it all you want, but if you think she had no athleticism, you just weren't paying attention. Do you have any idea how hard she worked to pull off those stunts? Her own stunts?

First off, its not the cartoon

[Rooked_One]

secondly, its a movie - NOT A FILM. The cartoon series had qualities of films. This is made by MTV movies, so thats what you get. Now if it were only MTV2 movies.... =p

Why was this review posted?

[Anonymous Coward]

This review is terrible, biased, and uninformative. Why was it posted? Just because it's something different from every other review of this movie out there?

I was pleased it had some Aeon Flux 'feel'

[Szplug]

Quite diluted, and maybe not enough for people who hadn't seen the series to pick up on, but, for those who knew it, it was there. I guess I would say to people who didn't like the movie but haven't seen the series, watch the series a bit; the episodes in the series are very short and pretty independent, and aren't about plot so much as banging ideas up against each other uncomfortably (and looking cool doing it).

My review of the movie

[stinky wizzleteats]

Much better than I expected. The acting was good (Trevor is a hard character to get right, and Marton Csokas pulls it off brilliantly), the action was everything you'd expect, and the set design and shooting locations were breathtaking.

The story was well conceived, written, and executed - perhaps too much so. The original concept didn't trouble itself too much with plot, but the movie comes across with an interesting scifi story in its own right. It would have been very easy for a director to invest too much into the movie story at the expense of keeping to the simplicity of the original concept. While the two don't seamlessly combine in the movie, it reflects very well onto the director and producer that the movie story didn't completely overwhelm the movie and leave us all in WTF land ala Highlander 2. I was expecting 2 stars, and I give it a 3. Nice job, guys.

I think the "technical inconsistencies" pointed out by some readers are clearly bullshit - you have a problem with clones remembering their past lives in a world with strap-on transdimensional travel suits and complex multimedia messages being suspended in aqueous solution? Gimme a break. It wouldn't surprise me if all memory of your past lives was stored in a parasitic frog embedded in the abdomen of your next generation. How can you fail at suspension of disbelief in what has always been a consummately unbelievable world both in the cartoon and the movie?

Or a vodcast.

[crovira]

A lot of movies get made and you wonder "WTF? How did this piece of drek ever scare up the capital?"

And for every turkey that covers the screen with its gibblets, there are some movies out there aren't getting screen play or even finding investment money.

Theatre owners and broadcasters are to blame for the entire "supply-side" mess that we're finding ourselves in.

You pour in $100,000,000 of money and it has only got 2 or 3 weeks to run when it's got to make that money back, or you can hope that it makes dough being broadcast and then comes the video rentals.

And the process of making actual movies doesn't cost $100,000,000 but the process of fighting for the screen time does. You're NOT getting your movie money's worth. Ever!

I think that the audience will be the winners what the 'internet effect' comes to movies (like its already begun to come to radio with podcasting, giving the ClearChannels and Infinity Broadcasting oligopolies of the world a hollow victory [There's no one else left standing, but the pool of listeners is shrinking, FAST!]) as its starting to with TV shows coming to the iPod.

Instead of just being viewed as passive vessels for content and cows waiting to be milked of cash, we, the audience, will be active participants in what we actually watch and listen to.

We could/should/would be funding projects, pooling resources and uniting to make sure that 'demand-side' economics get us the most bang for the buck instead of letting the supply-siders waste our money like drunken sailors on their first night ashore in six months.

Movies right now lose money because they are limited in the time they run and the extreme costs of promotion. The 'supply-siders' are in control. They make their money by creating and capitalizing on the foment that having too producers fighting for an audience with access to too few 'supply-siders' media outlets.

They make even more money and exercise more power by restricting what consumers can actually get at the end of the process. Can't stand Brittany Spears? Tough! And you can't avoid her either. And the medium costs the same as it always has despite its vertiginous drop in real value.

Enter the internet where:
* on the production side, you can hunt for capital sources, produce and promote your content and distribute it for practical amounts of money, and where,
* also on the production side, you can hunt for a project you feel would be worth your investment, and where,
* on the consumption side, you can hunt for content of interest to you, for reviews of interest to you, and download this content for filling your senses at a time and place of your choosing.

Content, audio and movies, produced on the 'demand-side' CAN'T lose money.

They're time-shifted, media-shifted and inherently of interest to someone, either the funders who can be garanteed to be in the audience or the producers themselves.

The resources made available to the producers and content originators will reflect the involvement of the resources of the audience.

The content will remain available for download and continue to provide a revenue stream (even if its only a steady trickle) to the content producer, as opposed to the largely useless 'back catalog' of content that's being obscured by new content churned atop of it.

Re:Or a vodcast.

[Lagged2Death]

A lot of movies get made and you wonder "WTF? How did this piece of drek ever scare up the capital?"

It's all the Germans' fault.

Re:Or a vodcast.

[Pseudonym]

And the process of making actual movies doesn't cost $100,000,000 but the process of fighting for the screen time does.

That's not the whole story.

One of the problems is a variant of Blinn's Law. Audience expectation rises over time, and studios feel they need to "up the ante" with every film season. Hence, you find a lot of expensive visual effects which don't add to the story of the film. Even if it's a good story, people WILL say "oh, it didn't look as realistic as that other film".

Another problem is the cost of stars. As Billy West pointed out, Cameron Diaz didn't get paid $19 million for Shrek 2 because she has a nine-foot-wide mouth. And it's not just their paypackets. An old phrase in Hollywood budgeting is "add one third for the shit". "The shit" in this case refers to misbehaviour by the talent. One "star" with a bug up their arse might hold up production, and everyone working in it, for multiple days. Admittedly, this doesn't happen as much as it used to.

In fact, there's less fighting for "screen time" than you might think. There's a real sense, in fact, in which movies don't really compete with each other. People don't sit down at the start of a season and say, "Well, I am seeing exactly three movies this Summer. Now let's see which three they will be..." Instead, people set a bar, and any movie over that bar will be seen and any under that bar will not be seen. Fighting for brainshare is much more important.

Re:Or a vodcast.

[Anonymous Coward]

Content, audio and movies, produced on the 'demand-side' CAN'T lose money.

The content will remain available for download and continue to provide a revenue stream (even if its only a steady trickle) to the content producer, as opposed to the largely useless 'back catalog' of content that's being obscured by new content churned atop of it.

Sort of like DVDs?

Sarcasm aside, there is a lot wrong with what you said. Video sales are very often the saviours of the "stinkers". Look up the numbers. They're also the saviours of good movies that just don't get any traction (I'll bet that Serenity does very well in DVD).

The idea of the Internet as a provider of movie content has been around for a helluva long time. It's still going nowhere. Maybe someday - but not soon. Maybe when fiber broadband penetration is at the level of telephone penetration. And even then, I doubt it - you might like watching a movie in your living room instead of the theater, but you're a minority.

The idea of combining our resources to get what we want is great and all, but people ponying up their resources for the project will want a piece of the project. Communism sounds great on the surface, but all it takes are a few greedy bastards to screw it up for everyone.

---

Posting anonymously since 1998

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[Snaller]

This isn't a review. Its an opinion

All reviews are opinions.

Did he just insult editors...???

[deft]

"themselves editors when they don't have been here"

You mean "haven't" been here?

I love it when people insult people about their spelling or grammar and then screw up in the process.

Re:Did he just insult editors...???

[PsychoSid]

For those pendants it's also arrogant to expect English to be the posters first language.

Re:Did he just insult editors...???

[Anonymous Coward]

The correct reading of that sentence is: "Poor spelling, off base comments at the ends of postings, lame articles that make the front page, and the dubious practice of calling themselves editors when they don't [edit] have been here at least as long as I have, back in '96 or '97." Omitting the word edit is a stylistic choice intended to enhance the humor value of the sentence by emphasizing the oxymoronic quality of the phrase "slashdot editor", and while it might not be accepted on a grammar test it works fine in informal writing. Replacing "have" with "haven't" changes the meaning of the sentence entirely.

Re:Did he just insult editors...???

[Megahurts]

I disagree. It took me two or three readings to parse the sentence, but after re-reading it, I understood what he meant. Granted, there could have been a much less muddled way to state the idea presented. The basic sentence is '[these things] have been wrong' but it just so happened that the last item in the list was peple calling themselves editors when the have not [edited anything].

Re:Did he just insult editors...???

[Anonymous Coward]

it's pedant, pedant.
-pedant

Plot & story not point of series

[Szplug]

And there is no backstory at all, at least none that matters. The series isn't about plot, one story arc (for instance, Aeon dies in maybe 1/3 of the episodes); it's about ideas of what humanity is, what's good for us, how rulers decide what's good for people, how ideologies clash and whether it all comes out the same in the end, our future, so on and so on; it's a setting for such ideas rather than a story. So, the fact that they took a kernel of Aeon-ness and wrapped a backstory & plot around it to get it to 90 minutes diluted it somewhat, and set the strength of the series to one side. The first 2/3 of the movie, condensed into 1/2 hour would be more typical of what an Aeon series episode would be like.

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[localman]

This isn't a review. Its an opinion . . .

And other reviews are fact?!? I've not seen Aeon Flux, and probably won't, so I've got no agenda here. But all reviews are opinion. And all of them just point out things they liked and didn't like, which only occasionally line up with the things I liked or didn't like, and they fumble arond to justify their opinion. Professional reviewers often degrade to just throwing insults, sometimes personal ones, at the actors, writer or directors. The really good profesional ones do it well with scathing wit. But it certainly isn't any more than opinion.

Cheers.

Irony...

[Anonymous Coward]

so sharp...

It factor

[carpevita]

that same "it" factor that Charlize has flowing out of every pore on her gorgeous face

Ew.

http://www.skinema.com/

Re:It factor

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sorry, but I go to that site and see it going on with things like "Jessica Alba and her acne". Ok, truthfully, my face and that of every girlfriend I've ever had is not "flawless", and regardless of whether that guy thinks Jessica has an acne problem or not, trust me, I wouldn't be turning her away from my bed because of it.

If someone seriously takes this sh*t as being *that* important to someone being attractive, I really feel sorry for them because they're probably going to find flaw in anyone,and be pretty lonely. I've thought every one my my girlfriends was *gorgeous* (and still do, all in their own way), even though I'm sure I could show you pictures and you'd find flaws or think they were 'plain' for whatever. Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder, and if your eyes look for nothing but flaws, I fear you will find flaw with anyone. Look for beauty in everyday things and you'll be happy your whole life.

and then...

[NZ4410110]

+1 = 190 way hey! - - I will always be beneath your current threshold.

The orginal cartoon portrayal

[Rogerborg]

Has about a 12 inch waist. No adult female can look anything like that. Please feel free to go back to wanking over drawings of pre-adolescent girls with implants.

Re:The orginal cartoon portrayal

[Misagon]

Geek note:
Marie Antoinette, Louix XVI's wife and other 18th century french nobility did actually achieve a 12" waist, but only because they were continually wearing corsets, which they started doing at a very early age.
These girls fainted easily ...

Btw, I have seen a few costumers/cosplayers that have been able to pull off wearing an Aeon Flux costume much better than Charlice Theron.

Re:The orginal cartoon portrayal

[Rogerborg]

Got a primary source reference for that? The Marie Antoinette part, not your furry friends.

Re:The orginal cartoon portrayal

[ILikeRed]

So maybe they should not have cast an adult. (Maybe you thought Betty Bronson was a boy in Peter Pan, or that Chris Ackerman's tattoo's really came to life?) Films are just as big a fantasy as cartoons, it's just that the special effects are harder.

Easy audience & saves on advertising.

[khasim]

The same thing with the entire:
"remake old movies"
"remake old TV series"
"remake old comic books"
"remake remake remake remake remake"
and "sequel"!

You have an automatic audience of people who saw the original and have good memories of it. And Hollywood is all about automatic audiences.

Re:Easy audience & saves on advertising.

[shmlco]

Then again, we are getting some movies like Broken Flowers, The Constant Gardener, and Sryiana. But for the most part I agree. Does Superman really need to return? Pink Panther? Do we really need another Dick and Jane? I know Lohan was desparate enough to do Herbie, but why did Kidman do Bewitched?

Ah well, maybe Munich will be worth seeing...

Plot hole in the first 10 seconds

[pherthyl]

In the first 10 seconds of Aeon Flux, they explain that 99% of the population was killed by a virus and the 5 million remaining people live in a city called Bregna.

So.. 1% of 6 billion people is 60 million. 5 million are in Bregna, where did the other 55 million go????

Did anyone else notice this?

Re:Plot hole in the first 10 seconds

[pherthyl]

There's a difference between taking liberties and making mistakes and introducing blatantly obvious plot holes. Here's a couple more:
If 1% survived, why did they still need a cure? Obviously they were immune to the virus.
How did 1% of the human race, scattered all over the world no doubt, manage to gather in one city? Why is this city which supposedly has 5 million people about the size of my hometown (which housed about 20,000 people)?
Why is the evil brother so concerned about women getting pregnant? Even if the rest of the human race procreates normally, there is nothing stopping him from cloning himself just as before.
Why is the DNA stored in a huge, floating, undefended dirigible? If it's so important, you'd think that they would put it in secure storage. How does everyone else get up there?

To name just a few...

Of course there are lots of liberties that were taken, but I've got no problem with those. Like how Aeon standing out in the open manages to not get hit by all the soldiers, but the concealed snipers do, and how her automatic pistol seems to have a couple hundred rounds in it. These are all pretty standard, and to be expected, but there are tons of things that just dont make any sense.

You want to see a movie like the Aeon Flux shorts?

[sesshomaru]

If you want to see a live action movie with some of the spirit of the Aeon Flux shorts, I suggest you see Run Lola Run (unfortunately a Sony product.. caveat emptor)

Wait for the DVD sales.

[khasim]

I've got a couple dozen new people hooked on the TV series since after the movie stopped showing. They didn't even know there was a movie.

The problem with slashdot.

[Anonymous Coward]

"And you'll never get the blockbusters if you don't make the flops."

And yet slashdot lambasts the music companies when they do the same. "Damn music CD's costs too much", "Cardboard cutout [insert artists you don't like here] made another album.","Well that's because the successes need to pay for the flops." "Oh oh, the Internet is the 'new hotness' for that."

The plot in a nutshell:

[Ralph Spoilsport]

Hot babe kicks butt. Shit blows up. A bunch of people in Hollywood get to pay their mortgages. Ho hum.

Why *anyone* would get so worked up over a trivial piece of mediocre entertainment is beyond me.

RS

Re:The plot in a nutshell:

[Anonymous Coward]

This is going to come out wrong, but ah well, I think "Brokeback Mountain" is just for you sport. After that, "Even Cowgirls get the blues" Oh yes, I went there.

One Guy Likes a Film

[Bazzalisk]

How is this news?

Pretty sure it isn't stuff that matters either.

Original Aeon Flux is a parody of Aeon Flux

[camg188]

The original episode was a parody of this movie's genre. You know, the "Bang, bang; you're dead; we're free; yea!" genre. Plus, in the animated episodes, Aeon gets killed in half the episodes.

Re: This was a review? This is news?

[notsoanonymouscoward]

why not? you're obviously over qualified ;-)

Mini Review

[ChicagoDave]

I was not familiar with the MTV animated version or anything about the story at all.

I thought it was good in the same way that watching someone else win a fantasy video game is fun. The visuals were excellent.

Now if I had been in one of those moods where I needed actual character development, well, I would have asked for my money back.

But I was in a rather low synaptic impulse mood so I enjoyed it.

Slashdot "experts" strike again-Adjacent.

[Anonymous Coward]

I also surmised that they like the Goatse.cx guy too.

I'm no psychologist, but I bet...

[heinousjay]

Someone's got woman issues.

Re:I'm no psychologist, but I bet...

[Skreems]

I dunno... Jolie was the one keeping a vial of her boyfriend's blood on a necklace... I don't think the GP is too far off base

Re:I'm no psychologist, but I bet...

[Gadzinka]

Well, from my perspective, he's kinda right. The hotter the girls/women I dated were, the more screwed up and painful the relationships were. I married a woman the is not as hot, just cute and I feel rather happier and safer now.

As for the "issues", IMO the only guys that don't have issues with women are either stupid or gay ;) After all, psychically they are like alien species and most men hurt a lot trying to undestand them, live with them etc.

Robert

Aeon Flux. Good Sci-fi, Bad Aeon Flux

[Gyorg_Lavode]

The Aeon Flux in the theater is a good science fiction movie. The plot is unique and interesting. The problem with the movie is simply that it is not Aeon Flux. Aeon Flux is independent, cold, and calculating. She has a professional admiration for trevor but their relationship is in no way emotional. Second, Trevor is a bad guy.

In the movie aeon is emotionally fragile. Aeon needs a team to cover her. Aeon is having a very caring relationship with trevor who is really a good guy.

Aeon flux the movie is good as far as Sci-fi movies go. It's just not Aeon Flux.

Trevor Goodchild is not a villain. AF isn't heroic

[MsGeek]

One of the most important aspects of Aeon Flux in the original shorts and the series is that Trevor Goodchild is not the bad guy, Aeon Flux is not the hero, and there are no classic melodrama heroes/villains.

http://anp.awn.com/chungint.html

If you are not inclined to follow the link, here's a very cogent quote:

"The disclaimer that MTV runs at the beginning of the show now is not my idea...the show is not necessarily about good and evil. Trevor is not necessarily evil, Æon is not necessarily good...they are like any human being with their own traits and good points and bad points. In some episodes Trevor is actually doing more positive things than Æon is and sometimes the roles are reversed." -- Peter Chung

See, this is where the movie fails and this is why Peter Chung should have gotten greenlighted to do this as the animated movie he wanted to do.

think about it

[maxpublic]

Anyone who doesn't find some value in watching Charlize Theron in skin-tight outfits for two hours isn't quite right in the head.

Max

The plot wasn't "difficult" to understand

[Durandal64]

It was just a stupid movie. Seriously, a virus that wipes out 99% of the population on Earth? How the fuck did that thing spread? Did it travel on the backs of photons? And a society which has mastered genetics to such an extent to be able to clone humans and yet it can't handle something as simple as invitro fertilization? They have to enact a complicated scheme to secretly implant women with cloned embryos unknowingly? Give me a break. Oh yeah, and I forgot. Love conquers all.

Beyond the stupidity of the plot, the action was just boring and uninteresting. It's Aeon breaking people's necks for 2 hours. We never get any explanation at all for where she's acquired these amazing acrobatic skills and killing techniques. We get no information at all about her background in this resistance, who the freaky resistance leader lady actually is, etc ... Beyond the boring action and complete lack of any context at all for the central character, there's the stupid techno-wanking. Seriously, Aeon breaks into a "surveillance center" that looks like some sort of suspended waterfall. And to destroy it, she pulls a fucking drain plug, and all the water swirls down. Who the fuck comes up with technology like this? Anime sci-fi geeks. And the chairman's security perimeter consisted entirely of tree pods that shoot ... well, something, and grass that turns into knives. The latter could have been defeated with a pair of steel-toed work boots.

Beyond that, Charlize Theron looked positively awful. I don't know what it is with anime geeks and making women's hair look like an oil spill (see Trinity in The Matrix for another example), but it looked terrible. Theron's a blond and was just the wrong choice for the role entirely. The outfits weren't exactly flattering either. I don't know why geeks have this unified vision of the fashion of the future being composed entirely of jump suits, but it's fucking stupid. It may work when you can draw women who have a waist line as thin as my LCD, but real women actually have midsections. And what the hell was with Aeon wearing an all white jump suit when she was trying to break in to the surveillance center at night?

This movie was not worth $7.50 and driving through shit weather to get to. It's not even a good rental. It's just stupid.

Re:The plot wasn't "difficult" to understand

[StikyPad]

And what the hell was with Aeon wearing an all white jump suit when she was trying to break in to the surveillance center at night?

Yeah, I was wondering that too. I think we (the audience) are supposed to presume that it was to blend in with the not-very-white roof. But if you can swallow the idea of poison-dart fruit and razorblade grass, a white jumpsuit doesn't seem all that far fetched.

Re:The plot wasn't "difficult" to understand

[justins]

Cry!

Re:The plot wasn't "difficult" to understand

[asuffield]

Who the fuck comes up with technology like this? Anime sci-fi geeks.

When anime sci-fi geeks design technology, it fucking *works*. The planes fly, the guns fire, and the robots are cute. This sounds more like Hollywood/Star Trek prats.

Re:Aeon Flux. Good Sci-fi, Bad Aeon Flux

[cqnn]

I have not seen the movie yet, but I'll have to disagree on a few points from
my recollection of the series.

  "but their relationship is in no way emotional."

  That depends on the situation. The sexual tension between the two characters
was kept fairly constant, and romance was certainly possible, but always seemed
to take a back burner to Trevor's ambition or Aeon's mission to thwart Trevors plans.
Several times Trevor did prove to be doing the right thing under the
circumstances, but the circumstances were so strange and alien that
you were not always sure what the right thing was supposed to be before
the end.

And the series itself was an offshoot of the original animated shorts, which
always played out as a sort of homage to the SpyVsSpy segments in MAD magazine.

Both Trevor and Aeon were both left as undefined characters deliberately, IMO,
to reflect that the conflicts between them are not always black and white.

My main concern for the movie was that they would try to paint the characters
as sterotypical Good Girl/Bad Guy roles. I guess now I have more reason to
see it after all.

Whats going on?

[Anonymous Coward]

How far has slashdot fallen for it to post this childish "review" as news?

It wouldn't even make it onto Aint-It-Cool-News!. It wouldn't.

Pick up your game editiors....or somebody is going to steal your readership!

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[Viriatus]

"This isn't a review. Its an opinion . . ." A review is always a opinion.

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[teslar]

He attacks others . . . but fails offer a convincing opinion of his own . . . except that it was an "awesome" film.

This is called Intelligent Review and it should be offered alongside the blasphemous Theory of Reviewtion so that people can make up their informed minds.

Umm, I think I'll trust Rotten Tomatoes more

[Jugalator]

This "movie" at RottenTomatoes. Yay, a 10% rating.

It's pretty obvious to me the "reviewer" above was making an advertisement for his site on Slashdot (compare the author URL with the "review" URL, it sure is becoming common these days), and gets a boner from Charlize Theron.

My review

[andrewagill]

Here's My review. It's more balanced. Bottom line: it was a fun film, but it wasn't stellar filmmaking.

Animated would have been better

[Anonymous Coward]

Or at least something non-Hollywood; I mean, there's probably enough of a following of the originals to make a decent profit on an edgier movie along with original dvd sales. Fuck it, it is Hollywood after all what should I expect

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[FlopEJoe]

posted by someone that thinks the movie is "great" but really cannot or chooses not to explain what made the movie great

huh? FTFA: "The graphical quality of this film was superb..." "...the aesthetic quality was down-right captivating" "costumes and hairstyles were deliciously futuristic" "architecture was quite imaginative and had a beautiful" "cast was pretty impressive, as it included Frances McDormand, Pete Postlethwaite, and the always impressive Charlize Theron" "She did her own stunts"

Yeah... I have no idea why he liked it.

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[theveryhushhush.com]

My first thought when reading this was: "Is this a joke?" Followed by the realization that this may only be a sad attempt at the lamest, and most unnecssary troll ever on /.

Irrelevant. Boring. Not very fun.

These are all things that come to mind when reading /. as of late.

I've never posted on here, and have been a long, long time reader- but I have to speak out when it gets so bad that a once reputable source of information and cutting edge techology is left to commenting on a fan boy's empty ramblings.

What makes die-hard readers leave for places like BoingBoing, and Metafilter? Could it be the simple fact that the other community blogs instill a sense of COMMUNITY, and a not a juvenile division of US vs. THEM?

"Is it just me or has slashdot been posting a lot more lame articles like this? I'm not sure but I get the opinion that the editors have changed tack and are going for a more inflammatory style. The rhetorical questions that they post at the end of their first posts are often poorly thought out and sometimes just plain illogical or indicative that they failed to read the article or pay attention when they read the article."

I couldn't agree more. Remember when /. had a little link on the side bar that directed to this?

http://www.filthycritic.com/filthy/

Those were better days, weren't they? (btw, the Filthy review of Aeon is aboultely hilarious, and dead-on).

True, but

[pavon]

I concur that Charlize is not fat. However the one sentence that I do agree with in the GP's stupid rant is that she was not skinny enough to play aeon flux. Aeon Flux wasn't just skinny, muscular and skimpily dressed, she was ridiculously so. The strangeness and grotesqueness of that cartoon is half of what made it interesting. The whole artistic direction of this film doesn't appear to share anything in common with the cartoon. Of course, you would be hard pressed to find a real person with the same measurements as Aeon, however, they definitely could have done something more stylistically inline with the cartoon, compared to the standard slick futuristic feel which they went with.

Anyway, I'm planning on waiting to see the film when it comes out in the dollar theater or rental, but everything I've seen leads me to think that it will be a good action movie, with very little in common with the cartoon.

Re:True, but

[Pseudonym]

So your real problem with it might be that the movie was live action?

Re:True, but

[ILikeRed]

However the one sentence that I do agree with in the GP's stupid rant is that she was not skinny enough to play aeon flux.

Thank you, and although I did go overboard in the Monster criticism, I was trying to point out that even Charlize must realize that physical attributes count for a role, and casting her as Aeon Flux is just as stupid as casting Tom Cruise for a new Conan the Barbarian movie. The body types simply do not match. It does not mean she is ugly, but it does betray the original story, and it means the movie will mostly only appeal to people who only care about seeing her in small leather outfits. (And I'm sure the same converstations will take place with Cruise fans if Tom Cruise is ever cast as Conan.)

And I also gave examples of actresses I believe would have better fit the role - although some of them probably would have had to diet, just as Charlize gained weight for her role in Monster.

Re:True, but

[ccp]

Of course, you would be hard pressed to find a real person with the same measurements as Aeon, however, they definitely could have done something more stylistically inline with the cartoon

Someone like Anne Parrillaud, the original Nikita?
I know, years ago, but the look was right.

Re:True, but

[EnronHaliburton2004]

Then go watch the cartoon.

Personally, I'm disturbed that the "Live Action"-actress had hair, whereas in the cartoon it was straight-black in some scenes. I mean, they tried to replicate it with hair-mousse, but I could still tell it was real hair on Theron's head. Not cartoon hair. That sucks!

And there was some character who had a tounge which was frighteningly long...

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[theveryhushhush.com]

"Yeah... I have no idea why he liked it."

Yeah, too bad there is not a lot riding on those comments though.

Saying a movie has an impressive cast because it contains XY&Z that you've heard of, doen't justify REASONING behind preference and indifference.

So what made the cast impressive? Was there a deep, thought provoking soliloquy given by Charlize, that moved you to tears? Or was she just hot looking running around in her skimpy black vinyl suit?

"The aesthetic quality was down-right captivating"

But why? How?

Simply listing off a series of random observations does not make a good, sound review, my friend...

My two cents...

[nullhero]

I liked the film but I didn't feel like it was my Aeon Flux. The had the catch phrases and some scenes are ripped from the Anime show. But they didn't understand Aeon Flux nor Trevor Goodchild. They are extremes opposite in ideologies but also have a sexual desire. Paramount wanted to make sense of that and created a very Hollywood tale. It has a beginning, a middle, and an ending. And that was my only problem and spoiler - it had an ending. There is no room for a sequel - it can't continue and still be Aeon Flux because then it wouldn't make sense at all.

Easy enough story to follow unless you think Harry Potter isn't easy to follow at all.

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[barefootgenius]

I thought you were dead....Ok, who was in the kitchen?

Allow People to Criticize The War if We Allow This

[marcybots]

If this website that gets millions of people comming to it every day allows people to second guess movie reviewers regarding something as completely irrelevant as a bad movie why cant it allow stories that might actually change the people's minds and the world like discussions about the war in Iraq and the whether the war crimes were committed in the lead when America decided to premptively decided to attack Iraq. Joachim von Ribbentrop was hung at the Nuremberg mostly due to his role for "crimes against peace" which included the lead up and invasion of Czechoslovakia and Poland without any just cause, which it seems that America had no just cause to invade Iraq since they didnt threaten us and no connection to september 11th or weapons of mass destruction or intention of harming us. Shouldnt we hold ourselves to the same standard we hold the rest of the world too? I think we should start thinking of trying the Bush administration as War Criminals...thats a better Slashdot story than stupid Aeon Flux.

No matter how bad the movie is...

[Atario]

...there's a very bright bright side. And that is:

They finally released all the old Aeon Flux stuff on DVD.

(Sometimes marketing tie-in exploitation works in our favor...)

How could I forget?

[blincoln]

...the virus backstory for the movie is from the original Liquid TV short as well. So is Trevor researching a cure for it.

Am I the only /.er that actually liked it?

[Anonymous Freak]

I mean, the plot was followable, interesting, and had a 'social message'. The acting was good, the effects were good. And it kept me interested the whole time.

I mean, I found it easier to follow than the original Æon Flux cartoon on MTV.

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[halltk1983]

Wine cellar. He was going to get more wine, remember?

Backstory: The Real Trouble

[Christopher B. Brown]

The trouble with the film is that it (presumably) is fairly faithful to the earlier cartoon-based stories, which represents a fairly huge body of "complexity of world-view" that is really tough to fully express in the scope of the couple hours you may spend in the theatre.

In effect, if I were creating a movie, from scratch, with no back-story of old material to have to agree with, the story would have been exceedingly different, as there would be no need to express many aspects of the world that the back-story forced them into.

Leaping into this story without the backstory is just like leaping into the story of Serenity; plenty about the situation will be bewildering detail that exists in order to satisfy the longstanding fans.

Re:Backstory: The Real Trouble

[sserendipity]

I respect your point of view.

But the problem I had with Serenity, and expect to have with this film, if I ever find myself seeing it, was the pure level of holliwood suckage involved. Inane dialog, being thrown around by pretty boys and girls, following a plot arch that is neither plausible nor stylistic, and more apropriate to a middle school playground. The reason that it was lame wasn't that 'it was too hard to understand, what with all the back story that you missed', but because it was cheesy and inane.

Lots of pretty effects though. And explosions.

You are very much mistaken.

[sserendipity]

If you RTFA, you would have seen that the astroturfer has gone quite far out of his way to address your criticisms. I quote:

"Rest assured, even though I'm as skeptical as they come, and can find a flaw in absolutely anything, I won't pick on this movie simply because the plot may be too hard for some people to understand."

and, my favourite:

"It's easy to be biased toward Charlize, and if I were capable of being biased toward anyone, it would be her, but I managed to control myself. The way I saw it was that the movie was fantastic and Charlize was phenomenal, but if anyone else had done it (as well as or better) and had that same "it" factor that Charlize has flowing out of every pore on her gorgeous face, I would have felt exactly the same about the film as I do right now. And that is true."

So, there we have it.

What is our beloved /. coming to? And how come such ridiculous stuff get's front paged, while my submissions get dumped out of hand. Do I need a lobbiest? Campaign contributions? Someone please tell me who I'm supposed to taking to golf - it's killing me.

Accuracy

[algoa456]

To be really accurate the film should have Chinese and Indian actors since the white race is self extinguishing through birth control, abortions, self loathing and false guilt. They will be a thing of the past well before 400 years in the future. (In the movie a few whites are kept alive in invention farms to continue inventing stuff for the other races.) I reckon Charlize should have been replaced by sexy Bipasha Basu or similar. Would have been far more realistic.

Mod parent up

[Squidbait]

Wow, that's exactly it. I said in my post elsewhere that Trevor was "pure evil", but that's not it at all. He simply isn't a good guy. And he is ruthless in pursuit of his goals, but that doesn't necessarily make him bad. What I hated most about the movie is how they changed the motivations and attitudes of Aeon and Trevor to make them both into Good Guys, when the moral ambiguity of the original series was one of the best things about it.

Aeon Sux

[Ranger]

I heard it's better than Super Mario Bros. And not much else.

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[barefootgenius]

Sorry, I must have got there first.....omg! It was me!

UK: flop..

[jotaeleemeese]

In spite of being proped up by a couple of very well regarded critics.

Crappy movie IMNSHO.

One can have an opposite opinion....

[jotaeleemeese]

.... but if one does not explain why one holds such opinion, one will be told what a whinny pratty little child one is.

Riiight . . .

[npsimons]

Those who review films for a living are notoriously unreliable, and in many cases, they miss the whole point altogether. Rest assured, even though I'm as skeptical as they come, and can find a flaw in absolutely anything, I won't pick on this movie simply because the plot may be too hard for some people to understand.

Right, those critics and "some people" (anyone who doesn't like the movie) are just too stupid to get it. Tell you what, when you're done kissing Hollywood's ass like most critics do, why don't you go to The Filthy Critic and see how a real movie review is written. He may be a bit profane, but he's honest and incisive (even if he is a fictional character) He's the only critic I trust, and I've discovered more than a few good movies due to his reviews.

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[npsimons]

And most reviews are, what, unassailable fact?

No, but they usually have more substance than, "I loved it, anyone who doesn't is stoopid!"

All reviews are opinions.

Not entirely true. A review is not _just_ an opinion. It may essentially boil down to an opinion, but a good review actually dissects a movie and tells you why it's good or bad. Most reviews are just opinions with hand-waving, but for instance The Filthy Critic's review of "Aeon Flux" picks it apart deftly. Hidden beneath that veneer of filth is a critic who knows his shit, even if he is fictional.

This guy who can do nothing but defend "Aeon Flux" by saying other people are to stupid to "get it" is just a moron fan-boy. His "review" is a tale, told by an idiot (him), full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[Dirtside]

A review is not _just_ an opinion...but a good review actually dissects a movie and tells you why it's good or bad

Well, are we talking about "a review" or "a good review"? I said in my original post, "It's not a very well-written review, but that doesn't mean it's not a review." Which is still true. The original article is definitely a review. But it's not a good review.

Yes, yes, I know this is linguistic nitpicking, but since you proceeded to disagree with me and then say things which exactly proved what I was saying...

Re:Allow People to Criticize The War if We Allow T

[Anonymous Coward]

Wich UN resolution was Germany enforcing?

The Security Council,

Recalling all its previous relevant resolutions, in particular its resolutions 661 (1990) of 6 August 1990, 678 (1990) of 29 November 1990, 686 (1991) of 2 March 1991, 687 (1991) of 3 April 1991, 688 (1991) of 5 April 1991, 707 (1991) of 15 August 1991, 715 (1991) of 11 October 1991, 986 (1995) of 14 April 1995, and 1284 (1999) of 17 December 1999, and all the relevant statements of its President,

Recalling also its resolution 1382 (2001) of 29 November 2001 and its intention to implement it fully,

Recognizing the threat Iraq's non-compliance with Council resolutions and proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and long-range missiles poses to international peace and security,

Recalling that its resolution 678 (1990) authorized Member States to use all necessary means to uphold and implement its resolution 660 (1990) of 2 August 1990 and all relevant resolutions subsequent to resolution 660 (1990) and to restore international peace and security in the area,

Further recalling that its resolution 687 (1991) imposed obligations on Iraq as a necessary step for achievement of its stated objective of restoring international peace and security in the area,

Deploring the fact that Iraq has not provided an accurate, full, final, and complete disclosure, as required by resolution 687 (1991), of all aspects of its programmes to develop weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles with a range greater than one hundred and fifty kilometres, and of all holdings of such weapons, their components and production facilities and locations, as well as all other nuclear programmes, including any which it claims are for purposes not related to nuclear-weapons-usable material,

Deploring further that Iraq repeatedly obstructed immediate, unconditional, and unrestricted access to sites designated by the United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), failed to cooperate fully and unconditionally with UNSCOM and IAEA weapons inspectors, as required by resolution 687 (1991), and ultimately ceased all cooperation with UNSCOM and the IAEA in 1998,

Deploring the absence, since December 1998, in Iraq of international monitoring, inspection, and verification, as required by relevant resolutions, of weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles, in spite of the Council's repeated demands that Iraq provide immediate, unconditional, and unrestricted access to the United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC), established in resolution 1284 (1999) as the successor organization to UNSCOM, and the IAEA, and regretting the consequent prolonging of the crisis in the region and the suffering of the Iraqi people,

Deploring also that the Government of Iraq has failed to comply with its commitments pursuant to resolution 687 (1991) with regard to terrorism, pursuant to resolution 688 (1991) to end repression of its civilian population and to provide access by international humanitarian organizations to all those in need of assistance in Iraq, and pursuant to resolutions 686 (1991), 687 (1991), and 1284 (1999) to return or cooperate in accounting for Kuwaiti and third country nationals wrongfully detained by Iraq, or to return Kuwaiti property wrongfully seized by Iraq,

Recalling that in its resolution 687 (1991) the Council declared that a ceasefire would be based on acceptance by Iraq of the provisions of that resolution, including the obligations on Iraq contained therein,


Was Poland turning on thier SAM sites and targetting German airplanes patroling the no-fly-zone?

Was Poland gassing thier own citizens?

Was Poland refusing to allow German inspectors into the country to check the allegations of WMD?

When chamberlain signed a appeasement aggreement with Hitler, did it work? How about the peace agreement between Stalin and Hitler?

I defy you to proove that the US wouldn't be fighting a wa

Re:This was a review? This is news?

[Anonymous Coward]

A good review will give you enough information to be able to form your own opinion on whether or not the item in question is worth spending money on to find out if you like it.

For example: Movie comes out called "Mr. Bob". It's advertised as a romantic comedy. You like romantic comedies. You read a review that says it's actually an action movie and that all the marketing is BS. You don't like action movies. You don't see "Mr. Bob".

Reviews are not supposed to be an entire paragraph about how the guy spooged his pants seeing Charlize Theron in tights and that's why he likes the movie but he'd still like it if it were any other hot female actress in tights that caused him to spooge his pants because it was the spooging he enjoyed not JUST Charlize Theron causing the spooging.

thats the key RELATE

[cheekyboy]

Unless your making a $3m movie thats using unknown actors, then you have to relate to 80% of the crowd out there in office/service/customer jobs.

Yes you can make a movie that relates to 1% of the crowd, or one more subtle that relates to 90% but looks more 'mainstream'.

So go out there, make 500 friends, know lots of people, know demographic statstics.

Try to be god.