I can well understand why the sequels are rated lower. I was certainly not as impressed by them as by the original. But I still maintain that they are really great movies of comparable quality, but very different in almost all ways.
The ratings are understandable, but it is quite intersting how many of low ratings for M2 and M3 were driven by irrational hatred for the sequels. Check out IMDB, there is a huge share of 1/10 ratings for both M2 and M3 (same can be seen at rottentomatoes, but they don't have a simple way to see how many critics rated the films exactly 1/10). I take this as evidence that opinions of a lot of people should not count, because they clearly suffer from some deep psychological problems.
The story and the philosophy of the Matrix are really quite simple and unsofisticated. I think that in the sequels the brothers took it too far for the general public and, although clearly within the reach of any remotedly educated person, the movies lacked the simple narrative and the "Wow, that was deep and original!" factor of the first film.
As for the acting, I simply refuse to believe that with the same actors and the same directors the acting can become stiff and wooden in just 4 years. Some people actually think that reserved and subtle acting was one of the main requirements to letting the brothers tell their story. In particular, Will Smith explained in his recent Wired interview how he would fuck up the film if he accepted Neo's role in the Matrix (by being too lively and expressive) and how Keanu played it as it should be played.
As Morpheus might have said, where you see stiffness, I see conception, where you see woodeness, I see purpose. I would not change anything in the acting, because everything fits as it is.
I don't understand what everyone means when they say FX were obvious? So what? That was the movie set inside a computer program. The action was not supposed to be limited by laws of nature. That was the whole point and if that distracted anyone too much to enjoy the film, well, first they were not supposed to be watching it, second they lacked imagination and third, they had some deep psychological problems that caused them to hate the sequels, but, refusing the admit it, they tried to rationalize their hatred instead.
Yes, but on the demand site - hitmen as tools, not hitmen as business. But how would that be different from paying for cocain by buying music and movies legally? The money you pay the record studios might well be going towards buying shitloads of crack.:)
Complain and go to the different theatre. In theatres I go to I usually only see one or two trailers and no ads at all. The prices are from 1.5$ (morning) to 6$ (evening).
Hey, real smiff, read what you just wrote. Do you seriously think that organized crime uses subsidies? Do you think the Mafia are as retarded as the government? Do you think that they use profits from piracy business to finance the unprofitable drug distribution or production of kiddie porn? If yes, you are retarded.
Criminals do what is profitable. When piracy is profitable, they use the profit to buy expensive cars, plasma TVs and spend vacations in expensive resorts. They don't use it to prop failing business models.
So by paying for pirated CDs and DVDs you are paying for the equipment of pirate groups, you are paying for translators, packagers, couriers, for warehouses, transport, wholesalers, retailers, sales clerks, web site admins, but not a dime goes to drug producers, hitmen, slave traders or illegal casinos. You are creating jobs and you are spending your money on something else, so the economy in general benefits. And stop that talk about crime nasties.
I downloaded The Return of the King before it came out on DVD. But I also saw the movie in the theater opening day and three other times after that, plus bought the DVD the day it came out, plus I will buy the Extended Edition DVD the day it comes out as well. A different story here. I downloaded the RotK cam version, realised what a dreadful pile of dreck it was and will absolutely refuse paying anything to its creators. I saw it in the cinema once, but only because a friend begged me to do it and got us free press passes.:)
I am not saying you (or anyone else) don't get them, I am saying that you don't get all of them. Many people enjoyed both sequels very much. There is no evidence that Wachowski went in it only for money and all facts that we have point in the direction that they weren't. Given that the brothers are pretty decent directors, I would be very surprised if they made dreadful movies - it is quite possible that they make a movie that some people don't like, but chances are it would still be a well-made movie. Just like William Shakespeare didn't write bad plays - you may not like all of them and some may be worse than others, but technically all of them are quite good.
The main complaint I hear about M2 and M3 is actually "I didn't like it or some part of it". One can't say that acting was horrendous because it wasn't (not Oscar-worthy, but all of it quite good and some really great). One can't say special efffects were pathetic, because they weren't. One also can't say the script was bad, because even though it might not have been universally liked, it was as good as in the Matrix, not that original, sure, but consistently good (with some weaker moments, sure). So it's really wrong to claim that the sequels were dreadful, because that's false.
Yes, I noticed that, but it doesn't count - the sunrise was made by Sati and Trinity was already dead. So it appears that the machine world of the Matrix didn't, in fact, have a sun. Whether people there actually knew about sun is unclear, but it might have very well been so that Trinity never saw Sun before.
P.S. If I recall correctly, Beyond from Animatrix had sun.
Have it ever occured to you that the creators of that "cool movie" actually know what they are doing much better than you do? And that the reason you don't like Matrix 2 and Matrix 3 is because you either are too stupid to understand them or too stupid to have your own opinion?
I don't see it that way. In LOTR, FOTR was The Shit, TTT was just shit and ROTK was utter shit. So buying a bundle would mean wasting 67% of the money. The Matrix, on the other hand, had 3 good, but very different films. The Reloaded might not have been to everyone's liking, but you can't ignore the fact that about 50% of it was some of the the best non-stop action ever filmed.
And in some countries (such as Russia) there are laws (the Civil Code, specifically) that say you can't discriminate customers and refuse service to them if you make a public offer (i.e. generally open your doors to anyone).
It seems that the management at Best Buy wants to turn the its stores into an Arab market and all its personnel into an army of hawkers. That would be a nice idea, if not for the fact that Arabs can do it with cetain grace and without annoying the heck out of the customers, while American clerks can't.
I wonder if such behaviour is commonplace in other chain stores.
Perhaps it was a bad idea to have one phone number for emergencies? In many countries there are separate numbers for police, ambulance, etc. For example, in Russia there is "01" for fire department, "02" for police, "03" for ambulance and "04" for gas service (to report leaks). So, unless you have a fire, a criminal/security situation, a medical emergency or a gas leak, you don't have a reason to call emergency. It's not like anyone would be stupid enough to call "02" to ask the number he forgot. In addition to that, there is no reason not to fine people who waste the time of operators.
These people are generally as smart as you are. The only thing they lack is education. And education is access to information (and vice versa). There is no reason to believe that people in 3rd world country will be completely unable to cope with information technology. In fact, what limited evidence we have shows that they will manage to cope and use it to their benefit.
Most people actually don't realise that. Despite having, what, about 10 thousand years of technological progress, most people still foolishly believe that the future will be the same as the present. Absurd? You bet. But they still can't fathom the idea that change (to the better) is inevitable. Ask any random person what do they think the Internet in 2050 will look like and they will be completely buffled, because they have never though that it will be different. Come to think of it, most of them probably have never even though that there will be, you know, the year 2050.
Well, DRM-pushers (according to Pournelle too) keep talking about "good enough" protection. But good enough protection doesn't work against commercial piracy. So we are confusing two entirely different issues. To fight commercial for-profit piracy you need better international LE cooperation, more transparency in business, more straighforward legal system in regards to copyright, police that is not wasting their time on file-sharers. DRM doesn't help, because you need to break it once and then the work it can be distributed. You can't close the analogue hole anyway (that can give close to perfect quality given right equipment) and there will be many ways to do a quality digital transfer too. It's not entirely clear what purpose does DRM serve.
Current mood: defiant Current music: pirated Posthumus MP3 (Antissa)
It's very easy to be macho now, but normal breathing people already feel attached to their Aibos. Heck, they even feel the same to their Rumba vacuum cleaners. They already prove that you are wrong. Personally I don't feel attached to anything in particular (may be to some websites...), but I will probably be even more attached to my robotic "friend" than to a real pet because of the fascination with AI.:) What is another dog after all?:)
Acceptable and perfect don't mix. I can play FarCry at "acceptable" framerates in 1024x768 on my Radeon 9600 (not XT, though, and the CPU is P4 1.6) with decent settings, but to play it perfectly I need to be able to crank up the resolution to 1280x960, set every single setting on Highest and still be getting 40+ FPS. That would be perfectly acceptable and I am afraid one would need an X800 or GeForce 6800 for that. I don't think D3 or HL2 would be much different.
That's crap. Most people simply don't care whether their car lasts 10 years or 30, because they are going to replace it sooner anyway. If there was demand for long-lasting cars, some manufacturers would produce them and conquer the market. The fact that this didn't happen means that there basically is no demand for it.
It seems that many people here are too attached to the present to be able to imagine the possibilities of the future. So as a public service, let me post a quote from the "Nanonet" book by Alexander Lazarevich.
In practical terms this means that if, for example, we design a automobile for the NanoTech, it should not have a dashboard - all the necessary information about the status of the car systems should be fed into the driver's optic nerve, to be superimposed on his actual field of vision. Also, such a car should not have a steering wheel or pedals - mental commands from the driver should be routed directly to the car's final controls, without any mechanical intermediaries. All this allows to radically simplify the design, and consequently, to considerably reduce the time needed to "grow" a car.... an automobile built in compliance with the NanoTech principles doesn't have any transmission, and the function of the engine is performed by the wheels themselves...
And to completely visualize a NanoTech-style car, please remember that it always has just as many seats as it has passengers and its trunk is never larger than the luggage it carries. And if you take into account the fact that it just doesn't make any sense to transport things that can always be grown at your destination, it means that usually such car doesn't have any trunk at all.
That was an explanation given in one of the dialogs. And here is how it works:
In the street, a few amazed passers-by could see how a big white bubble started to grow from a puddle right opposite the main entrance to a gloomy imposing building without any signs. In a few seconds the bubble turned into a very strange-looking, compact single-seater car. One could see only one seat under its transparent upper body. There was no driving wheel in front of the seat, no pedals, no control panel. The strangest thing of all was that the car didn't have any doors. In a few more seconds a mustached guard with high cheekbones came out of the building and approached the strange car. A big oval hole suddenly appeared in the car's upper body. The passers-by were staring with their mouths wide open. "Good morning" - said the polite guard, eased himself into the hole, and sat in the only seat there was. The hole immediately healed over as if it had never existed, and the car pulled out without producing any sound or exhaust gases.
In fifteen minutes' time, when Levshov was already driving along an out-of-town highway he saw his pursuers. The car increased its speed. And then it sprouted wings, like aircraft wings. In one more minute it got off the ground, and its wheels dissolved - not retracted or folded, but dissolved, while at the same time the wings became a little longer. In a few more seconds the plane left his pursuers beyond the horizon.
When you want to know about something interdisciplinary, like terraforming Mars, your best chance is to ask a scientist/engineer with experience in terraforming. Barring that, the next best option is a scientist with good knowledge, experience, imagination and the ability to put it all together. The last two qualities are usually missing in most scientists. An old study I once saw (made in 1980s) showed that most specialists are only capable of looking less than 5-7 years into the future, after that their experience breaks down.
Science fiction writers, on the other hand, often are quite comfortable thinking about the future, decades or centures ahead. And if they have the necessary scientific background, they are as good experts as you can ever find.
The problem with Flash is that you either spend loads of time on making your innovative idea usable or you end up with some flashy abomination. If such applications were all made open source, some extremely useful things could be made and perfected very quickly. The HTML/WWW approach is extremely old and not really as good today as it was a decade ago. Innovation is slow - if only we used open standards and open source more... we could have already had something like Semantic Web.
Slashdot Mirror
I can well understand why the sequels are rated lower. I was certainly not as impressed by them as by the original. But I still maintain that they are really great movies of comparable quality, but very different in almost all ways.
The ratings are understandable, but it is quite intersting how many of low ratings for M2 and M3 were driven by irrational hatred for the sequels. Check out IMDB, there is a huge share of 1/10 ratings for both M2 and M3 (same can be seen at rottentomatoes, but they don't have a simple way to see how many critics rated the films exactly 1/10). I take this as evidence that opinions of a lot of people should not count, because they clearly suffer from some deep psychological problems.
The story and the philosophy of the Matrix are really quite simple and unsofisticated. I think that in the sequels the brothers took it too far for the general public and, although clearly within the reach of any remotedly educated person, the movies lacked the simple narrative and the "Wow, that was deep and original!" factor of the first film.
As for the acting, I simply refuse to believe that with the same actors and the same directors the acting can become stiff and wooden in just 4 years. Some people actually think that reserved and subtle acting was one of the main requirements to letting the brothers tell their story. In particular, Will Smith explained in his recent Wired interview how he would fuck up the film if he accepted Neo's role in the Matrix (by being too lively and expressive) and how Keanu played it as it should be played.
As Morpheus might have said, where you see stiffness, I see conception, where you see woodeness, I see purpose. I would not change anything in the acting, because everything fits as it is.
I don't understand what everyone means when they say FX were obvious? So what? That was the movie set inside a computer program. The action was not supposed to be limited by laws of nature. That was the whole point and if that distracted anyone too much to enjoy the film, well, first they were not supposed to be watching it, second they lacked imagination and third, they had some deep psychological problems that caused them to hate the sequels, but, refusing the admit it, they tried to rationalize their hatred instead.
Yes, but on the demand site - hitmen as tools, not hitmen as business. But how would that be different from paying for cocain by buying music and movies legally? The money you pay the record studios might well be going towards buying shitloads of crack. :)
Complain and go to the different theatre. In theatres I go to I usually only see one or two trailers and no ads at all. The prices are from 1.5$ (morning) to 6$ (evening).
Hey, real smiff, read what you just wrote. Do you seriously think that organized crime uses subsidies? Do you think the Mafia are as retarded as the government? Do you think that they use profits from piracy business to finance the unprofitable drug distribution or production of kiddie porn? If yes, you are retarded.
Criminals do what is profitable. When piracy is profitable, they use the profit to buy expensive cars, plasma TVs and spend vacations in expensive resorts. They don't use it to prop failing business models.
So by paying for pirated CDs and DVDs you are paying for the equipment of pirate groups, you are paying for translators, packagers, couriers, for warehouses, transport, wholesalers, retailers, sales clerks, web site admins, but not a dime goes to drug producers, hitmen, slave traders or illegal casinos. You are creating jobs and you are spending your money on something else, so the economy in general benefits. And stop that talk about crime nasties.
I downloaded The Return of the King before it came out on DVD. But I also saw the movie in the theater opening day and three other times after that, plus bought the DVD the day it came out, plus I will buy the Extended Edition DVD the day it comes out as well. :)
A different story here. I downloaded the RotK cam version, realised what a dreadful pile of dreck it was and will absolutely refuse paying anything to its creators. I saw it in the cinema once, but only because a friend begged me to do it and got us free press passes.
I am not saying you (or anyone else) don't get them, I am saying that you don't get all of them. Many people enjoyed both sequels very much. There is no evidence that Wachowski went in it only for money and all facts that we have point in the direction that they weren't. Given that the brothers are pretty decent directors, I would be very surprised if they made dreadful movies - it is quite possible that they make a movie that some people don't like, but chances are it would still be a well-made movie. Just like William Shakespeare didn't write bad plays - you may not like all of them and some may be worse than others, but technically all of them are quite good.
The main complaint I hear about M2 and M3 is actually "I didn't like it or some part of it". One can't say that acting was horrendous because it wasn't (not Oscar-worthy, but all of it quite good and some really great). One can't say special efffects were pathetic, because they weren't. One also can't say the script was bad, because even though it might not have been universally liked, it was as good as in the Matrix, not that original, sure, but consistently good (with some weaker moments, sure). So it's really wrong to claim that the sequels were dreadful, because that's false.
Yes, I noticed that, but it doesn't count - the sunrise was made by Sati and Trinity was already dead. So it appears that the machine world of the Matrix didn't, in fact, have a sun. Whether people there actually knew about sun is unclear, but it might have very well been so that Trinity never saw Sun before.
P.S. If I recall correctly, Beyond from Animatrix had sun.
I am not sure there was sun in the Matrix... I just fast forwarded through the movies and all scenes seem to take place on cloudy days.
Have it ever occured to you that the creators of that "cool movie" actually know what they are doing much better than you do? And that the reason you don't like Matrix 2 and Matrix 3 is because you either are too stupid to understand them or too stupid to have your own opinion?
From here:0 20&cid= 8149141
http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=95
But of course we must honor the best quotes from each of the three movies:
The Matrix:
Context: Morpheus jumps a massive gap between two skyscrapers
Neo: Whoa.
Reloaded:
Context: Neo throws a smith out of the battle, where he lands, hard.
Smith: More!
More context: (More smiths charge in)
Revolutions:
Context: Neo runs out of the train station, off to the left, and we see him come back into the train station on the right.
Neo: Shit!
That sums up the three movies, and also the main reactions that this MATRIX thing seems to be inspired by:
Woah!
More!!
Shit!!!
I don't see it that way. In LOTR, FOTR was The Shit, TTT was just shit and ROTK was utter shit. So buying a bundle would mean wasting 67% of the money. The Matrix, on the other hand, had 3 good, but very different films. The Reloaded might not have been to everyone's liking, but you can't ignore the fact that about 50% of it was some of the the best non-stop action ever filmed.
And in some countries (such as Russia) there are laws (the Civil Code, specifically) that say you can't discriminate customers and refuse service to them if you make a public offer (i.e. generally open your doors to anyone).
Ah! The infamous "I was just following orders" defence...
It seems that the management at Best Buy wants to turn the its stores into an Arab market and all its personnel into an army of hawkers. That would be a nice idea, if not for the fact that Arabs can do it with cetain grace and without annoying the heck out of the customers, while American clerks can't.
I wonder if such behaviour is commonplace in other chain stores.
Perhaps it was a bad idea to have one phone number for emergencies? In many countries there are separate numbers for police, ambulance, etc. For example, in Russia there is "01" for fire department, "02" for police, "03" for ambulance and "04" for gas service (to report leaks). So, unless you have a fire, a criminal/security situation, a medical emergency or a gas leak, you don't have a reason to call emergency. It's not like anyone would be stupid enough to call "02" to ask the number he forgot. In addition to that, there is no reason not to fine people who waste the time of operators.
Very funny. Not.
These people are generally as smart as you are. The only thing they lack is education. And education is access to information (and vice versa). There is no reason to believe that people in 3rd world country will be completely unable to cope with information technology. In fact, what limited evidence we have shows that they will manage to cope and use it to their benefit.
This doesn't seem like much of an insight to me.
Most people actually don't realise that. Despite having, what, about 10 thousand years of technological progress, most people still foolishly believe that the future will be the same as the present. Absurd? You bet. But they still can't fathom the idea that change (to the better) is inevitable. Ask any random person what do they think the Internet in 2050 will look like and they will be completely buffled, because they have never though that it will be different. Come to think of it, most of them probably have never even though that there will be, you know, the year 2050.
Well, DRM-pushers (according to Pournelle too) keep talking about "good enough" protection. But good enough protection doesn't work against commercial piracy. So we are confusing two entirely different issues. To fight commercial for-profit piracy you need better international LE cooperation, more transparency in business, more straighforward legal system in regards to copyright, police that is not wasting their time on file-sharers. DRM doesn't help, because you need to break it once and then the work it can be distributed. You can't close the analogue hole anyway (that can give close to perfect quality given right equipment) and there will be many ways to do a quality digital transfer too. It's not entirely clear what purpose does DRM serve.
Current mood: defiant
Current music: pirated Posthumus MP3 (Antissa)
It's very easy to be macho now, but normal breathing people already feel attached to their Aibos. Heck, they even feel the same to their Rumba vacuum cleaners. They already prove that you are wrong. Personally I don't feel attached to anything in particular (may be to some websites...), but I will probably be even more attached to my robotic "friend" than to a real pet because of the fascination with AI. :) What is another dog after all? :)
Acceptable and perfect don't mix. I can play FarCry at "acceptable" framerates in 1024x768 on my Radeon 9600 (not XT, though, and the CPU is P4 1.6) with decent settings, but to play it perfectly I need to be able to crank up the resolution to 1280x960, set every single setting on Highest and still be getting 40+ FPS. That would be perfectly acceptable and I am afraid one would need an X800 or GeForce 6800 for that. I don't think D3 or HL2 would be much different.
That's crap. Most people simply don't care whether their car lasts 10 years or 30, because they are going to replace it sooner anyway. If there was demand for long-lasting cars, some manufacturers would produce them and conquer the market. The fact that this didn't happen means that there basically is no demand for it.
When you want to know about something interdisciplinary, like terraforming Mars, your best chance is to ask a scientist/engineer with experience in terraforming. Barring that, the next best option is a scientist with good knowledge, experience, imagination and the ability to put it all together. The last two qualities are usually missing in most scientists. An old study I once saw (made in 1980s) showed that most specialists are only capable of looking less than 5-7 years into the future, after that their experience breaks down.
Science fiction writers, on the other hand, often are quite comfortable thinking about the future, decades or centures ahead. And if they have the necessary scientific background, they are as good experts as you can ever find.
No, he is the inventor of the geosynchronous satellite.
</pedant mode>
The problem with Flash is that you either spend loads of time on making your innovative idea usable or you end up with some flashy abomination. If such applications were all made open source, some extremely useful things could be made and perfected very quickly. The HTML/WWW approach is extremely old and not really as good today as it was a decade ago. Innovation is slow - if only we used open standards and open source more... we could have already had something like Semantic Web.