Atheory wrote:stevësto wrote:
no because ive seen great acting and dialogue in foreign films (non USA made), off the top of my head: Slum Dog Millionaire, and Life is Beautiful.
the guys that made District 9 messed up on storyboard layout and script, they just also happened to be south african. oh well. this could have been a really great movie, it had the potential to go down in history and be remembered, its just a shame and frustrating to see it come close and get screwed up from the bad acting and the rushed storyline.
the main character who grows an alien arm ... holy crap talk about over acting. he's on the phone crying to this wife, that part was fukn stupid. and when the main alien sees like 3 or 4 of his alien brothers being experimented on and suddenly gets all emotional, that part was stupid too. the message of the movie being the aliens being segregated from humans and discriminated against as a metaphor for blacks vs whites was drilled into the fukin head WAY TOO MANY TIMES throughout THE WHOLE GODDAMN MOVIE. it was like a movie about racism shoved into a sci fi movie. square peg crammed into round hole.
I am not sure i fully get what your are saying.
Isn't sci-fi always about dealing with issues (past or present) but taking them out of original context and examining them? So they do end up dealing with issues like politics, sex, war, famine, fear of the unknown, governmental control etc but in a way thats not as explicit as it might be.
Its like when people say 1984 is a mans prediction of the future. Its not, its a direct response to anxieties because of the present post war government.
Also, I can't understand why a man crying on the phone to his wife because hes turning into an alien or a species experiencing empathy for his fellow man is "stupid" Was it as over acted as the last 20 years of al pacinos career?
i dont know if sci fi movies are ALWAYS about dealing with issues, but if they need to be then fine. but giving a movie a genre label "sci fi" excuses it for its shortcomings and also limits it with rules. why does it have to be "sci fi" movie? how about just a movie? a movie that just happens to have aliens in it.
the scene of the guy crying to his wife is not stupid because he's crying to his wife, its stupid because the actor was over acting. the level of intensity of his emotions didn't feel appropriate because 1, we didn't have enough time to get to know both the wife and husband for us to give a sh!t. they tried to cram character development in too small a timeframe. 2, they probably did have enough time for character development for the main character but they didn't make him interesting or believable enough throughout the movie for us to give a sh!t if he was turning into an alien or dying or whatever it was that was supposedly so horrible.
let's put it this way, in star wars, if han solo was going through a metamorphosis/dying process/whatever dreadful thing, the audience would give a sh!t! why? because the audience will be like "oh no! not Han Solo!!! i dont want that guy to die! because he's cool! he's funny, entertaining, and a badass. this is exactly why the first series of star wars was so good and the last series was such crap. remember the symbol for theatre is a smiling mask and a frowning mask next to each other? a good movie will make you laugh and make you cry and hopefully as many emotions as possible in between that spectrum. the first series of star wars movies had that range: it had the laughs ("knock it off fuzzball!", "well excuse me your heiness!") it had the romance with the princess vs solo, and of course the action/suspense. it covered the spectrum. then look at the last series of star wars movies ... NO comedy, nothing in those movies were funny, the characters were too serious all the time. its a chain reaction because now we dont give a sh!t about the romance later in that series either because we dont give a sh!t about the characters because the characters suck!
if people don't like the character they're certainly not going to give a sh!t if he is turning into an alien and when he cries on the phone like its the end of the world it will just make us roll our eyes, it wont make anyone shed a tear. but in this case he's not supposed to be a likeable character, he's supposed to be the mean old man that evicts aliens and takes his job too seriously and is not putting in perspective - putting himself in the alien's shoes - not sympathetic enough, and all those general flaws in character. in that case, when he cries on the phone the audience should be like "ha ha!! serves you right! now you know how it feels! good for you asshole!" OR "hmm, i feel bad for him but at same time this is good because he needs to see the other side of the fence, hmm maybe WE ALL need to take at look at ourselves and how we perceive other people, hmm wow this movie is so enlightening". but instead, no one gives a sh!t. so obviously somewhere along the line they messed up the part of making him a good villain, making the audience hate him.
Atheory wrote:
But the reason that movie is, as said originally, "worth talking about" isn't about the performances. Nobody watches sci-fi expecting gritty Mike Leigh realism. Its about the creation of a world that reflects back on our own and makes us ask questions. The movie did that really well. Its not perfect, but there wasn't many perfect movies over the last decade anyway. The first Alien movie isn't great cause of the acting, likewise Planet of the apes, original Solaris, Blade Runner, Total Recall, The fly (original), the first matrix, 2001.......No one watches them as studies in great acting. Thats not what they are about. Its missing the point.
like i said the whole "creation of a world that reflects back on our own" was way overdone, it was too overly obvious, too overpowering and in our face and shoved down our throats the whole entire movie. So I disagree I think the movie did not do that really well at all. it was like, "enough already! i fucking get it! next!". So you say it makes us ask questions. Ok then, well why don't you share with us what questions it made you ask? It didn't make me ask any questions at all. I already knew, as most people do, that segregation sucks and is fucked up.
So then you acknowledge the movie isnt "perfect", but excuse it because neither were many great classics, as if this movie should even be mentioned in the same sentence as the ones you listed. Bad acting in "Alien"? Wow, I majorly disagree. Bad acting in "2001" and "Blade Runner"? Your like, listing the sci fi movies that actually have good acting for a change, LOL. But then you put Total Recall in that same list, WTF?
District 9 will not be remembered and brought up in conversation as one of the all time greatest sci fi flicks. The ones you mentioned, Blade Runner, 2001, Alien, etc, those definitely always will.
