At Last!

Hopefully my creation works here...

Sorry to those hoping for a real blog post... google+ didn't play my animated gif, and I am in a photoshop war.

Troll Hunter - 2010

Hooray, I did it!

I managed, in between many other things, to finish Troll Hunter over the weekend. Maybe it's just my American sensibilities, but I expected this fake documentary about the Norwegian government's conspiratorial cover-up of the existence of the Troll menace to be a comedy. Worse yet, maybe it was one.

I saw it.. I still don't

While I did, in fact, enjoy Cloverfield Troll Hunter, it wasn't spectacular. It wasn't funny, the action and suspense were a bit lacking, and there wasn't anything particularly terrifying about the trolls themselves. I'm already pretty used to the idea of "things that go 'bump' in the night", and to the type that can be killed by sunlight... I've heard of that somewhere before... but where?

Urban thug throws "gang sign" (probably a "Blood")

The trolls in Troll Hunter were unintelligent beasts, which meant you pretty much had to intentionally get in their way for them to be a threat. Granted, that is precisely what a hunter of trolls would do. Add to the mix a student film crew who stumble on to this hunter's life and mission, and you have the recipe for some pretty fun chaos.

Fun. That's about all there is to say about Troll Hunter. It was fun.

I kept thinking that one of the stars looked familiar.

Yergen splergen Norwegian gergen

Perhaps it's my old friend, and rock legend, Andy Zipf:

Or maybe all gingers look alike.

Every last one of them (Eric Stoltz... allegedly)

You should watch Troll Hunter for a bit of fun
You should listen to Andy for a lot of awesome.
You should not watch Troll Hunter if you are easily duped by fake documentaries.
You should not listen to Andy if you are prone to awesome-induced seizures.

Subtitles

I wanted my review this morning to be on the Norwegian "mockumentary" Troll Hunter.   Instead I have to give a few facts.

I work a 9.5 hour day. 

My job is 33 miles away from my home.

That commute involves something known as a "Beltway".

Beltways circumnavigate major cities, they are parking lots in rush hour. 

They are comprised of an "inner loop" that travels clockwise, and an "outer loop" that travels counter-clockwise.

I am only allowed to work my 9.5 hour day between 6AM and 6PM.

I can only avoid 1 rush hour in that range.

To do so, I depart my home by 5:30AM.

To do so, I wake by 5AM.

Every hour I stay up after 9PM is one less hour than 8 I get to sleep on a weeknight. 

Even dodging 1 rush hour, I still work what amounts to 11.25 hours when you factor in the driving. 

I am also a husband to my wife and the father of our infant.

All of the above to say, I am pretty tired some evenings.

I watched the first hour of Troll Hunter and promptly passed out on my couch. I was on baby duty. Reading subtitles made me extra sleepy. I love a lot of foreign films, and I despise having them overdubbed with English audio. But with my current lifestyle, I am far too tired or lazy or apathetic to put up with reading while watching a movie. This is a shame, especially if you saw what percentage of my Netflix queue was foreign. 

I leave you with the hope of a Monday Troll Hunter review, and a relevant youtube clip of a delightful British comedy, The IT Crowd.

The Z Axis and its Role in the War Against Joy

Apparently Disney got it into their heads that they ought to re-release some of their successful films in theaters. I am all for that idea. I remember roughly 6 years ago going to see Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade in the theater with a lifelong friend who had also grown up with Indy as his hero. The theater even had Guinness on tap. It was a perfect experience.

Imagine my surprise at discovering that The Lion King, probably my favorite Disney movie, was playing at my local theater. My wife and I would love to one day take our daughter to see the Disney movies we grew up watching. They are certainly better than some of the other garbage being marketed to children these days. But we'd want her to see the movies we saw.  This wasn't The Lion King, it was The Lion King 3D.

Disney as I knew it

Disney's 3D Extravaganza!

I have gone to great lengths in the past to explain that just because a movie is 3D doesn't mean it is somehow superior. So far only one movie has used 3D correctly, and it was The Smurfs, Fern Gully, Dances with Wolves,  Avatar.

Avatar... oh, wait...

Wow, Smurfette! Have you been working out?

James Cameron, a film-making legend, put so much time, thought, energy, and money into making a film that is a visual masterpiece. I won't say that he put even 1/100th of that time into creating an original story. Also he didn't break the cardinal rule of film making, letting Michelle Rodriguez's character live through the movie... I mean, come on... who lets that "woman" "act"?

His entire film was planned to be a 3D experience from the get-go. Nowadays, thanks to the success of Avatar, just about everything imaginable is adding 3D effects during post production.

Hollywood, this does not work!

Wearing the 3D glasses reduces the amount of light that reaches your eye, so your precious film is now darker than it is supposed to be. There were entire moments in the tragedy that was Tron 2 and the respectable superhero movie, Thor, that I flat out could not see. It was just too dark.

I realize that it has been proven by a gigantic douchebag that there is money to be made by the torture, rape and murder of classic movies held in the highest regard by a die-hard fan base of idiots who liked the prequels. This crime has been called "digital enhancing". (and yes, expect them in 3D)

The aforementioned giant douchebag

A finished work is a finished work, film is film, and 3D is 3D. It's not like Da Vinci, 20 years after painting the Mona Lisa, said "You know what would be great? Now that there has been 20 years worth of advances in art, I will take my painting and wrap it around a marble figure of a woman. Now I can have the sculpture I always wanted".

Disney intends to re-release Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid, and a few others in 3D by 2013.

You should boycott 3D movies that aren't The Hobbit or Avatar sequels.

You should punch George in his neck-fat.

You should admit that the prequels are terrible movies.


You should not badmouth the three Indiana Jones movies... (That's right, three. Go on... say something)