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SPOILER ALERT !!
Hi, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab...
Holy crap. I hope this is exactly how I feel after the film, because this review got me all wound up:
Hi, Harry.
The reason I'm writing you is that I saw War of the Worlds last
Wednesday. It was a special screening and I was a guest.
Just a few words about the movie. Being the huge Spielberg fan I am, I
really believe that, since that masterpiece called A.I., he's been
proving that he is in one of the best periods of his career: Minority
Report kicked ass, Catch Me If You Can was just wonderful and The
Terminal is one of his most underrated movies.
War of the Worlds is not less good than all those movies.
The action sets in 12 minutes into the movie and, from that point on,
it never stops. But it's NOT the typical blockbuster movie like, let's
say, Independence Day, The Day After Tomorrow or Crap Helsing. We never
see the destruction of any major city or landmarks: everything we see
is through Tom Cruise, Dakota Fanning or Justin Chatwin's eyes. There's
no hero that saves the day. And the real terror doesn't come from those
amazing tripods (or the aliens inside them: yes, we see them at some
point!): it comes from the humans. There's an incredible lynching scene
that left me speechless. And there's another scene where one character
is killed that goes beyond anything we've seen in a Summer movie (while
watching it I was thinking: He's not gonna do it, Spielberg, won't do
it... And he does it).
Beyond all that, the movie has a few shots that will stay with me
forever: Dakota Fanning looking at a river covered with tens of bodies,
so many we don't see the water; Cruise and Tim Robbins' faces covered
with blood that falls from the skies; a train in flames crossing in
front of a bunch of survivors; the facade of a church separating from
the rest of it and threatening people around it; the remains of a plane
crash... Yes, War of the Worlds has lots of action: it's like Jurassic
Park, without all the bad dialogue; and amazing set-pieces: the first
attack in New Jersey, another attack to a ferry that recalls Titanic,
the sequence in the basement, that could be described as Jurassic Park
meets Signs... But it's mostly the story of a father willing to do
anything, and by anything I really mean ANYTHING, to save the lives of
those he cares about. I'm afraid the Summer audience will be kind of
disappointed, because it's more than just a Summer blockbuster. But I
think we should thank Spielberg for reinventing the Summer blockbuster.
Again.
Call me SpongeMan, if you post this.I know it’s just a taste. But man... what a taste it is. Is it June 29th yet?
"Moriarty" out.
Hey folks, Harry here -- SpongeMan and I know each other very well. He's not only not a plant, but an incredibly cool film loving fiend. I once got to spend about 10 days watching the greatest genre films in the world at a festival I was a jury member at and can say we talked quite a bit about what he loved and didn't in the American Genre scene. He's far more particular than me, tending to shy away from most of the mainstream blow it all up films. Whereas - I tend to grock big splosions! He has zero ties to the film industry in terms of Hollywood, so say what you may... but this is most definitely not a plant. And if you get the name he calls himself - you're cooler than 99% of the world.
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elliot...be go...go fuck yourself!
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I'll buy the DVD when its out in November. I wont rush out to see it in theaters.
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It's the last big movie this summer, it better be awesome!
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"that masterpiece called A.I., he's been proving that he is in one of the best periods of his career"
mr. spielberg, step away from the computer and go to bed. and tell george lucas that revenge of the sithh still sucks, even with vader in it! died of a broken heart my ass -
The Man has returned to show these pissant wannabes how to make a fucking summer movie. You show people what they've never seen before and you don't forget that the most important thing are the people. The Pharaoh of FX, the Lord of Epic Adventure, the Baron of Blockbuster, THE KING HAS FUCKING RETURNED.
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Here's the kicker: "I'm afraid the Summer audience will be kind of disappointed, because it's more than just a Summer blockbuster." Plants always try to sneak in a "criticism" that is nothing more than a thinkly-veiled compliment. Oh, and "Crap Helsing" was a no-no, too. I think I'm going to start a school about how to identify plants. Vile weeds.
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That's just a retarded thing to say. I'll probably go see this one, but I'm only giving Spielberg one more chance after AI and Minority Report. I don't see which aspect of this review is supposed to make me want to see the film more. And the next review of this movie needs some fucking spoilers. And how come AICN can get ahold of a script review to X3, a film they haven't shot a single frame of, and we've got nothing on the Superman Returns front? Let's get that script leaked already.
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Truely a fine example of the green stuff....
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I do hope this one is good. It would be nice to have another movie to look forward to. So far havent heard anything bad about it. Anyone know when it will be out in Japan (where I live)? I know Tom and Steven where just here for the premiere, does that mean its already here and I have to take the train to Tokyo?
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And here was me thinking it was shit.
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... or PLANT?
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Died of a broken heart my ass.Lol.Excellent
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Youve got to be kidding me with this bullshit. It's nothing more than SIGNS with a tinge of that nutty Brendan Glesson character from AI. Wow. I cant believe this site stands behind this clearly imposter and rip-off bullshit. Yet, it wont give the Fantastic For a fair shake. Fuck AICN for this stance because The Beard deserves NO LEEWAY. When he starts ripping M. Night This film should fucking bomb like Pearl Harbour. Fuck it, fucking POWER LEVEL FOUR Tom Cruise, and Fuck the Beard for perpetrating this shit on the American public.
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for both sentences of course. and i also like to suggest that 'The Terminal is one of his most underrated movies.' to be repeated in all future spielberg related talkbacks. thank you.
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You'd think they wouldn't need a plant for this one, wouldn't you? Also, by now, you'd think the studios would have plant-writers who know how to be a bit less obvious. When I think of the guys who write these, all I can picture are forty-year-old men giving a thumbs up to teenagers on the street and saying "tubular shoes, dude!"
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Sounds cool, but A.I. sucked. I'm not sure I can trust any review from some who called it a masterpeice. I did enjoy Minority Report though. You'd think if this plant, ummm I mean reviewer, was going to mention Speilburg's masterpeice he would have mentioned like Saving Private Ryan, or Jurassic Park, or God anything but A.I. god that movie sucked the hair off of monkey balls.
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Not saying WotW won't be a great film, but gee, AI a master piece? Or is the reviewer just a Master-Baiter?
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all of Spielberg's movies have to have a nice ending which makes the previous 2 hours you just watched make sense or having been worth it, such as Private Ryan where yes he was saved and had a loving family so it was all worth it. Don't even get me started on Schindler's List. This is supposed to be the definitive movie about the Holocaust and all the Jews survive. Another typical Spielberg ending. AI was the same thing. It should have ended with him at the bottom of the ocean staring at the statue forever, but the aliens had to come and make everything right. I could go on and on. Spielberg is a hack and all of his movies are crap.
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That last WOTW talkback was a good laugh.Someone has done a AICN tribute.http://www.gumgod.com/images/cp_superfriends.jpg
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Jun 17, 2005 2:25:20 AM CDT
I actually really liked AI (although it was a bit of a mess)
by monkey butler
but this review still didn't make me excited. Oh, and Devilsadvct, they weren't aliens, they were robots.
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Jun 17, 2005 2:26:03 AM CDT
harry and mory are genuinely excited about everything, dont you
by cloudrider`
expect when it has the name rothman attached to it. then it must be absolute shit because he's just the king midas of shit. everything he touches turn to shit. good directors and writers cannot be blamed for making shitty movies. it's all rothman's doing for simply tapping those guys on their shoulder, or shaking their hands. he's good at jedi mind trick too, because he can hypnotize them into thinking there are no other studios existed but fox, and no other producers to make movies with but him. all those guys' hands are all tied up, see. jedi mind trick and an ability to turn to shit anything he touches - that's what i call a supervillain.
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Sounds like another pile of celluloid crap is about to be layed at our feet by Steve-O. Throw him in a snake pit already!
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A.I. wasn't Spielberg, he just did another man's job and The Terminal was horrible. I am still looking forward to seeing Tom "The Midget" Cruise run from and kill Aliens.
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when tom cruise put his hand on his pregnant wife's belly(just so we know they're soooo happy and looking forward to having another child), and ends with the both of them looking over the horizon. that just got me teary eyed everytime because i'm so happy for them.
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Jun 17, 2005 2:35:48 AM CDT
Don't Do What Donny Don't Does... they coulda made this
by zikade zarathos
NOT LESS GOOD?! LMAO. Anyways, MINORITY REPORT was great, AI was muddled, brilliant-at-times mess of a movie, and THE TERMINAL was Spielburg's first official horrible movie in a long time. Which doesn't bode well, seeing as how that was his most recent one. I'm excited for WAR OF THE WORLDs, but I already saw the movie I would've sold my children to see early (BATMAN BEGINS) so I'm fine to wait another two weeks. If it's two-thirds the movie JURASSIC PARK was, I'll leave happy.
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"If this review doesn't make you want to see War of the Worlds, nothing will." Well, this review certainly didn't do a single thing to make me want to see WotW. So, if I take Mori's advice, I guess I will skip it and watch "Madhot Ballroom" or some German foreign flick with a salt mine in it.
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"The masterpiece that was A.I.....?"
A.I. was crap...Minority Report was crap....and The Terminal...was....well terminal. Ha...wow I crack myself up.
But seriously...plant, plant...planty plant plant plant! -
Jun 17, 2005 2:49:59 AM CDT
AI a masterpiece? Terminal underrated? Minority Report, the Loga
by elab49
That persuades how?
Spielberg is always worth having a look - even if the poster looks like the TV show logo and the planet looks like a cricket ball and not that impressive. And we worry about Cruise as 'father' when genuine emotional connection is hardly one of his 'acting' achievements.
But not from someone with those critical oopsies at the start. -
When will they ever learn they're not fooling anybody with this nonsense. Hope the movie's good, though.
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Yeah, you can really see what a hack director he is in his crap movies. Crap movies such as Jaws, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Close Encounters, The Color Purple, Empire of the Sun, and Jurassic Park. I could go on and on...
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...for this film, but when someone prior to a review lauds The Terminal as being "underrated" and describes Minority Report - a film I absolutely loathed - as having "kicked ass",I automatically disregard anything which may follow. I love Spielberg, but the man has made a few really obvious and obnoxious stinkers. I can't take anyone seriously who refuses to acknowledge that.
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HUH !!!!! Well thats one warning sign right there about War of the Worlds.
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"If This Review Doesn
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...Moriarty ends the article asking if its JULY 29 yet. I'm pretty sure that WOTW comes out June 29 but hey what do I know I'm just a lowly talkbacker.
PS A.I. sucks -
Yeah, that's right. A single one of us none pussy gettin, Jujitsu since third grade takin', bifocals since puberty prescription gettin' mofos could idealize and praise their own idealistic, imaginative views on life and storytelling way better than Spielberg! We all could get atleast four hundred million each for our own pornographic versions of Pinochio and Tom, "mofrackey" Sawyer! That is why we all live in much bigger digs and live much more enriched lives than Stevey himself! Damn y'all! You grew up with this man's imagination reinventing you rpsyche, yet you still wish to downgrade his genius to irrelevancy? How dare you corrupt your own imaginative innocence! Hope to god this works cause I've never posted trash b'fo.
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I've yet to see anybody elaborate on why they think it "sucks" besides for 1) Kubrick didn't make it and 2) It should have ended with David underwater (no, it shouldn't have). Although it is tonally inconsistent, even people who called it a disappointment at the time of its release didn't go so far as to say it sucked.
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Jun 17, 2005 3:21:28 AM CDT
roll up roll up, I'm still willing to sell you all a clue...
by zissou's revenge
I actually can't believe it ... for a web community that supposedly loves movies, you guys seriously need to remove the concorde-sized carrots from your ass. What is it? Seriously, I don't get it. Here's a guy widely regarded as one of the greatest film-makers of all time, and you're all acting like he gave your granny the pox, and now your wobbly bits are starting to smell funny....
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Let me know, what would you have done if on of your most closest friends, a person so close you call him only by brother, had died without giving his children a final note to let them know how he felt about his humanity and legacy?
After my own Father took his life when I was fourteen, and both my Fraternal and maternal Grandfathers took their live's a year later. I decided to find whatever literature those men had put down on paper and transfer it into a transcript of sorts so that my children would know the sacrifices of Vietnam, Korea, and WWII. now, after twelve years since my last blood father figure has passed, I take on the challenge of letting my boys know, "it's not in vain." I hope that I can pass on all the viewpoints and ideologies of my brotherhood so that my friend's children as well as my own can make a more informative and respectable decision on their ideas of humanity. Sorry for taking it off track
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You gotta laugh at all these bedroom dwelling arseholes screaming plant at every new review that comes in. I remember a couple of months back a guy posted a review of Batman Begins and the sad wobble gobs chirpped up. Turns out everything in the review was correct.
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I don't beleive many people have been bashing Speilburg. Most of us have been bashing the crapfest that is A.I. If you liked it good for you. If your to in love with Speilburg, however, to see that he has made some horrid movies and are offended by people actually noticing that an awesome diretor can fuck up from time to time, well... dammit I don't know where I'm going with this. That damn Pinochio comment caught me offguard. I keep hearing Sawyer say lie some more Pinoch, Lie some OH GOD!!! then a group of Texas rangers bursts in and drags them away.
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I think Kubrick's legacy is pretty well established without A.I. Also if you saw the documentary on Kubrick it seemed his family had a good idea of who he was. I don't think they needed Spielberg to tell them or us.
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terrible movie
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...it committed the first cardinal sin of movie making: It was boring. The reason I wanted the movie to end with the boy robot at the bottom of the ocean is because it would have lent some poignency to the whole picture, and given me some real emotion. Spielberg does not trust that an audience can formulate their own opinions and emotions, so he has to tell us what to feel at all times. Catch Me If You Can was pretty ejoyable, if 20 minutes too long, and Minority Report had promise but was ruined by a ridiculous plot twist, a tonally misfired scene with Peter Stormare, and a complete bullshit sentimental ending. I'll still see WOW, just in case.
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Not enough explosions for most of you, eh?
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Everything else he says about War of The Worlds sounds interesting.
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Jun 17, 2005 4:06:33 AM CDT
Speaking of AI, I sure hope there's something like a moon-ba
by burnhollywood
...Just so a character can cry out something really dramatic sounding like "Full moon rising!" Just because that balloon ship thing looked really fucking stupid and utterly undermined the first half hour of the movie is no reason to pass on a dramatic-sounding line like that. Oh, and make sure there's a Robin Williams-voiced cartoon so that my credibility is finally and utterly destroyed and I feel like a complete and total sap for not sneaking in from another movie. See if you can squeeze Chris Rock in somewhere inappropriate, too. And motorcycle thugs. And lots and lots and lots and lots of ads, disguised as "social commentary", like Minority Report. --> Ya know, now that I think about it, this guy owes me more than Lucas does...
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Yes that is right, There was not enough mindless killing and destruction in A.I. thats the sole reason I don't like. Actually I did not really mind A.I. until he was rescued from being underwater. That was ridiculous. No I don't care if anyone thinks it fulfilled a purpose. It's purpose was to bore the living Hell out of me. It'd be like if in The Passion of the Christ if Jesus got up after being beaten to death and started a big sermon on why we should all eat rice or something stupid like that. Anyway it was boring, had no emotional impact (I'm to care about a robot and a talking teddy Bear why?) It's better than a lot of movies out there today, but when those movies are Dracula sucks your Mom to death Part V, one must question what makes a movie good.
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I liked it a lot. My problem with it was the very ending. The narration. For the rest it was the perfect synergy between Kukrick's ideas and Spielberg's vision. It was in my personal Top 3 of 2001 and I will defend it till I drop. The problem with A.I. was that it's slow (some of you Michael Bay fans confuse that with boring) and it had probably more ideas than five random summer blockbusters combined. It's still a very intelligent fairy tale. And as for WoW, I am sure it will kick ass and will check it out in the first week.
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A.I was not spielbergs film, it was kubricks film and I think at the point where the aliens come in A.I is where spielberg lost that movie after it went on and on and on.
I remember watching Private ryan and thinking, with a smug grin, speilberg on my face That the berg couldnt do a tough war movie and despite yucky sentimaentality which opened and closed the movie, he did just that, ie he made a tough war movie albeit one that major historical plotholes.
Last year after my mother died i saw The terminal with my old man and apart from the story of the guy being stuck in the terminal, I couldnt tell you what the movie was about.
As it stands now, Its war of the worlds Vs the fantastic four. And from what your reviwer wrote, it sounds like this a really nasty piece of filmmaking.
I think that most people will be put off seing the movie because of two words:TOM CRUISE.
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Yeah, it was off-track, but, as the Scots' say, "Good on ya"!!!!! Thanks! My dad was in WWII. I wish I could have recorded some of his "stories" for future generations. I only have the memories of what he told me! That is what made me a student of WWII, and other wars! People need to remember! You seem like you appreciate Spielberg. As I put on another post, one of my favorite comedies is 1941!!! I've seen it, at least, over 100 times! It's a classic!!!!!! 50 years from now, it WILL be a classic!!! Like "The Little Dictator" by Chaplin! Oh well, maybe I'm over-reaching here, but I REALLY believe it!!!
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I'm throwing both my shoes at the screen the moment I hear the following dialogue: "DADDY!!!" "HOLD ON HONEY, I'M COMING!!!" --> Fuck, I hate "child in peril" scripts...should've made it about a guy and his drinking buddies...more suspense...
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If he had left David lying at the bottom of the ocean, wouldn't Spielberg have been telling the audience how to feel, just then? There aren't really too many ways to interpret that one. In my opinion, the ending as is is slightly more ambiguous. The mom fucking died at the end, fer Pete's sake. As for people who think I'm just "so in love with Spielberg" that I get mad at the possibility that he doesn't always make good movies, ummm, you couldn't be more wrong.
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Oh, and... "Plant?" :)
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"I need you to be brave, honey. Daddy needs you to braver than you've EVER been before. Can you do that for me? Can you, honey?" (sniffling) "O-Okay, D-daddy."
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Jun 17, 2005 4:47:06 AM CDT
I'm not cool. Help me. What is Spongeman? I want to be 99% c
by trevor goodchild
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Jun 17, 2005 4:48:04 AM CDT
AI should have ended with David under water staring at the Blue
by trevor goodchild
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Jun 17, 2005 4:49:30 AM CDT
"Daddy!", "I'm coming" sounds like dialogue from the kind of
by salvatoregravano
...and that Gary Glitter would watch with his tongue hanging out.
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Jun 17, 2005 4:50:21 AM CDT
Like ET was a Christ metaphor WOTW sounds like a Holocaust alleg
by trevor goodchild
Maybe when this gets re-released in twenty years time on Special Edition Mind Chip he'll replace all the shot guns with walkie talkies.
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Jun 17, 2005 4:53:17 AM CDT
Ribbons I really liked the design and concept of the aliens and
by trevor goodchild
But it just felt like it was from another film. Was that ending in the Kubrick version?
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Jun 17, 2005 4:55:47 AM CDT
Minority Report had an almost identical plot to LA Confidential.
by trevor goodchild
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Jun 17, 2005 5:01:35 AM CDT
I am a lifelong Spielberg fan- but AI and Minority Report were a
by sithlord_999
Terminal and Catch me if you Can were great.
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What the fuck is that supposed to mean? Are you to have us believe that Spielberg only called Kubrick "brother" and never "Stanley" or "Stan?" Is it a Hulk Hogan joke? When the shit did this talkback become a WWII memorial? I'm really sorry your dad died and you never got to write down his memoirs, but that has to do with WOTW how?
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Jun 17, 2005 5:14:47 AM CDT
Excactly where in A.I. are the aliens you guys are referring to?
by colonel_blimp
There are NO aliens in A.I. In the final act David is discovered by robots. That's right they're ROBOTS. And that sort of lends a new poignancy and meaning to the entire last act of the movie. I suggest you guys rewatch it, (try to be objective, I know you'll never manage, but TRY) and then pass your judgement. And deliberately paced isn't synonomous with boring. Just because you expect a big explosion on cue every couple of minutes to remind you you are watching a blockbuster movie doesn't mean that movies that actually demand something of the viewer are bad by default. A.I. is one of Spielberg's most daring, challenging pictures, and it would've been completely fucked up (but possibly less demanding) if the final act was dropped. Christ, you guys don't understand anything do you?
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Jun 17, 2005 5:21:35 AM CDT
I personally thought they missed the point with "Minority Report
by shan
In the short story, the whole principle of pre-crime was 100% accurate, just like fingerprints are unique, it's a completely proven science. The protagonist is, given his job is in a unique position in that there is one way to subvert and destroy the system through him. The dilemma is, does he save himself or sacrifice himself to save the system and many more people. What completely spoiled the movie for me is that, to me, the ending completely missed the point of the entire premise. That and it was in my opinion, a terrible ending.
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..when he said that AI was great...also, Catch Me If You can was kinda lame and The Terminal could not have been that good. He's a Spielberg d*ck sucker, so he is not objective. I am really looking forward to this film, but I am not expecting greatness.
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It's a mistake often made. These robots are the next step in Meccha evolution. I always liked that bit, although most people didn't get it.
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I thought A.I. was great. The story and world, though uneven, was cool. About as uneven as our real world is now (watched Hit me Baby O1 more time and gagged at IreneCara). But the Robot evolution was cool, and the removed from the real world scientists were cool, lving above it all. I wish there was some exposition of the rest of the world, either dead or starving, which is implied in the short story/poem I think. But as a 2hr movie telling a tale, I loved it.
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This is sounding less & less like Welles WOTW, & a lot more like the wankers who do things like, The Haunting, where they swipe the title & write whatever crap they feel like instead. Sounds like the only elements coming over from Welles novel are the Martians, & from I keep hearing, they aren't supposed to be "martians" at all! They should have just called it something else, anything else, if this is whats going to happen. I'll still see it, & hope to love it, but, goddamnit, I still want someone to DO WELLES NOVEL & not their special "vision" or, my personal favorite, "reimagining" of the original story. I am holding out hope that Jeff Wayne will get his (albeit) musical version of WOTW out in 2007; I know there were no tunes in Welles version, & the story in the musical differs somewhat from the novel, but its still closer than this version by a moonshot. For the record, I thought AI was borderline quality dogfood, Minority Report was pretty good & Jaws remains Speilbergs finest hour, although its a close call.
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Unlike a lot of the other talkbackers here I make a point of knowing what the fuck I'm talking about before I go all condescending and comicbook guy on someone's ass. Not you moviemaniac, you're a good guy.
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As for the earlier comment questioning why you should feel any emotion in a story about a robot boy... That was the point, wasn't it?
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The review is obviously a plant or an idiot. Maybe both. The list of movies quoted must be Spielberg's worst. What happened to Jaws, Indie and CE3K? The fact that there have been so few previews of War of the Worlds tells us that execs are afraid of bad publicity. It might be an interesting movie, but it's sure to disappoint those waiting for a blockbuster and the Hollywood execs know it.
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Jun 17, 2005 7:21:11 AM CDT
Dakota Fanning 'looks across tens of bodies'. Really...
by big_bubbaloola
I think he meant tens of thousands. Although he one HUGE, flowering, man-eating plant of a reviewer, i'm still gonna be there opening day. FEED ME SEYMOUR...FEED ME!!!
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Haha...you are the pickiest bunch of people I have ever seen...classic
It doesn't matter what anyone writes, news or reviews. 75% of the talkbackers will take issue
For movie lovers, a lot of the people who frequent this board sure seem to hate a lot of films.. -
Jun 17, 2005 7:48:17 AM CDT
Oh, and thankyou zekmoe for being the only other person in the w
by cherub rock
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Jun 17, 2005 7:49:55 AM CDT
Why would there be tens of thousand of bodies in one tiny little
by monkey butler
Dumb fuck. I bet you don't like AI either.
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when you have seen it. Does anyone not go to see a movie because it was panned or praised by a plant or critic? Be your own person - see it or don't and if you do then rain poo if you need too.
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Jun 17, 2005 8:14:03 AM CDT
Great line emeraldboy, I'm surprised no one called you on it
by drlektor
"with a smug grin, speilberg on my face" says it all really. Empire magazine voted Senor Spielbergo the number one director recently, Empire being the only credible movie magazine out there at the moment. Seriously, if a million an one "professional" reviewers rated WotW as an absolute masterpiece you'd still come to talkback and read the shit that you naysayer's spout. Don't get me wrong, your opinions are as valid as anyone's but what's the age range here? 16 - 30? What would you say was a great movie? Oh, can't have Lawrence of Arabia right? Too boring, how about Ghandi? In fact, remove any oscar winning films right now because that award is all fixed and stuff, right? Anything over 2 hours is too long, forget those boring films. Jeeze, your taste in movies must lie between the "straight to video" market (what's the DVD equivalent?) and lowbrow explosion duffers like bad boys and die hard. Yeah, I know, a thousand die hard fans chime in for me comparing the two, I actually liked it because it was dumb action, movies like that are geared perfectly toward my generation. Anyway, back on topic. Spielberg is a fantastic director, I've grown up with his films and he's never failed to disappoint, I've been all over the world with him, seen things on the screen a kid can only dream about. I give the dude credit for making my life better through his movies.
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Jun 17, 2005 8:15:40 AM CDT
"War of the Worlds is not less good than all those movies. "
by tv casualty
Jesus, take a writing class or something. And A.I., while I enjoyed it, even own it, is far from a masterpiece. It's about as good as Minority Report. That said, I'm excited to see this anyway, despite this weak-ass review.
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Jun 17, 2005 8:21:27 AM CDT
Ultimately, A.I. says the human race is no better than machines.
by rant breath
When you watch A.I. you're looking at the ugliness of human nature. It's not I, Robot where humans are the good guys and stuff blows up real good.
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Jun 17, 2005 8:26:41 AM CDT
Yes, I like the fact that we are not getting an ID4 sequel...
by lost skeleton
This flick sounds very scary which will equal good. Oh, for you naysayers...Batman Begins is the best movie I have seen this year....better than ROTS! I went to a randam show yesterday after work with a couple of co-workers, one of which hates comic book movies and even she thought the flick was great. Nolan just nailed this thing and I think Speilberg will nail WOTW.
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"Hey folks, Harry here -- SpongeMan and I know each other very well. He's not only not a plant..." Harry you big bastard, if you have to re-assure the talk back readers thats this fucko is NOT a plant, he probably is. That german reviewer was more convincing than this garbage. Icebox out.
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The emotional conflict it seeks to explore is presented in a trite, cloying, heavyhanded, and ultimately supremely annoying and redundant way. There's more real emotion in the pizza scene in ET than in the entire ghastly run of AI. AI is the one film where Spielberg's famous ability to emotionally manipulate his audience fails him, probably because he abandoned his melodramatic roots and tried to pretend to be an artiste. Unless his intention was to make the audience absolutely hate and despise Haley Jo Osment and Jude Law, and cringe at every last line of dialogue they have, the film is a failure. Unless you're supposed to laugh at William Hurt playing a caricature of himself, the film is a failure. Spielberg is great but not even he hits a home run every time at bat. Sometimes he fucks up, and AI is one of those fuckups. // That being said, this review made me more confident about WOTW, since as I noted in another talkback what I'm looking for in this film is some sense of exactly how dangerous the modern American public would be in a REAL disaster, as opposed to a telethon disaster or a 12-hour blackout. To me that's the only way to make an honest "scale of one family's experience" film about the US being crushed by an outside force. It would NOT be "let's all jump in our RV's and pull together and help each other" as in Independence Day. It would be "every man for himself", "there's not enough food so I'm stealing Dakota Fanning's food", "the cops are gone so it's time to pay Whitey back", "give me your truck or you're fucking dead", "hey, the world's ending anyway, so let's rape everything we see", etc. etc. etc. Spielberg doesn't seem to be pulling any punches on that.
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I remember seeing the film in the theater and thinking to myself, "This is one of the best science-fiction movies I've ever seen." But then came the ending, and Spielberg had to get all warm and fuzzy on our ass. And a potentially great movie was reduced to being merely good. I thought Minority Report was a huge rebound for him - at least that film maintained its edgy tone all the way to the end. My expectation is that WOTW will be more like that film than AI.
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How's that for a subject header. Anyway, ET, said he would be back at the end of the movie. I would love it if this was ET coming back, kind of like the second coming of Christ apocalyptic, etc.
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AI was not that great.
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Even though A.I. failed overall, it's an incredibly interesting failure that I have appreciated more and more each time I watch it. Out of 21 movies he's directed (not counting War of the Worlds or Twilight Zone), the only real stinkers are Hook, 1941, and Lost World. Pretty good track record in my opinion.
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Jun 17, 2005 9:33:17 AM CDT
He has zero ties to the film industry in terms of Hollywood
by harker-writes
Hmm. Harry says SpongeMan has no ties to Hollywood. But doesn't exclude ties to the European film industry. Isn't Europe where Cruise just announced his engagement? SpongeMan is definitely a EuroPlant!
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Jun 17, 2005 9:40:09 AM CDT
Not less good than Minority Report? Well that's faint praise
by torgeaux
Given that Minority Report was hilariously bad (script, acting, direction, you name it, only the effects people did anything right), the ability to discern a good movie by the reviewer is seriously in doubt. Much like Lucas, Spielberg is coasting, but I'll throw money at him anyway.
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First of all, A.I. is a MASTERPIECE and if you don't realize this than you are stupid. Go back to Electra crap. Second, Minority Report ruled. Third, Saving Private Ryan kicked major ass and you all know it. Fourth. Spielberg is the master. This is the guy who invented blockbusters for shits sake! He's gonna show all the Michael Bay wannabees out there how it's done. This movie is going to kick major ass!
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Look, as a movie-goer, I realize this sort of immaturity isn't going to win me any artistic brownie points, but it's getting harder and harder to accept Tom Cruise 'the actor' when Tom Cruise 'the man' just keeps getting more and more insufferable. His hysterical rants ("I love this woman! I love heterosexual love-making and so forth!") are just fucking killing me. I'm glad he found true love, or whatever, but give me a break, man. And, keep in mind, this is the least bitter time of my life. Five years ago, I would have hung myself after the Oprah/sofa jumping show.
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...or spell particularly well. And you misused the term, If you grokked explosions, you would in fact, explode at some point although with your bulk, that remains a possibility. As for SpongeMan...what's so cool about being named after a vaginal insert?
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Wait til Dawson finds out
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It's a perfectly serviceable little comedy and if anyone else made it, it wouldn't have been received as negatively. The "dance riot" scene, the "swallowed compass" scenes, the "airplane sex" scene, and the scene where Lex Luthor's sidekick destroys his own house with the coastal defense gun are all comedy classics.
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Jun 17, 2005 10:29:40 AM CDT
Hey Monkey Butler: a) he said it was a river and hat you couln&#
by big_bubbaloola
that would lead me to believe that it was a large body of water. And b) i quite liked AI actually. Oh and c) your a fucknupple, now piss off and eat out yo momma.
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Sorry, I'll be seeing Batman again.
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Jun 17, 2005 10:32:15 AM CDT
Proman1984 "First of all, A.I. is a MASTERPIECE and if you don&#
by tv casualty
Congrats man, on winning the award for asinine fanboy quote of the day award. Dig your heels in, state your opinion as gospel, shit on those who disagree. Also, congrats on being a living, breathing AICN cliche. Nice work.
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"...and they all stood around in awe as ones of arms and legs fell from the sky."
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That's cool man, real cool. I remember when I thought Jaws was insanely violent, things have changed with Spielberg. But now... now with violence he has turned into old Jaws/Duel Spielberg... My favorite Spielberg... Amen. -- http://www.cafepress.com/thenewpulp
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Aliens, drama, emotion, explosions - sounds great to me! I'll be there opening day.
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Just had to get that in there.
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I thought they were sort of relective liquid-like aliens. That makes the ending of the movie more enjoyable to me but how did you know they were robots? Seriously
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Jun 17, 2005 10:55:10 AM CDT
Steve Should Have Scrapped most of A.I. and just done a story ab
by cookylamoo
Joe was the only interesting character in the movie, and without a doubt Jude Law greatest performance ever. A robot pimp who gets framed for murder. Now THAT's a Spielberg movie. Maybe it's not too late to do a sequal. It would not less good than the Terminal, that's for sure.
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I think it's pretty clear that they are robots if you pay attention to the scene and dialog. A while since I saw it last so I don't remember any excact examples. I agree their design added with the fact that it is directed by the father of modern alien movies makes it easy to assume they are aliens. The design is quite ambigious, don't know if this is intentional or not. anyone?
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Jun 17, 2005 11:05:32 AM CDT
"And the real terror doesn't come from those amazing tripods
by right bastard
Yeah, because that's why I want to see a movie about aliens invadint the Earth. So I can watch a bunch of humans fighting. I will actively avoid a movie where I have to see Dakoda Fanning's "human side".
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At first I thought he was being sarcastic. Then, to my horror, I realized he was serious. I read the rest of review but man, after such a show of bad taste, how could I get excited by any of it?
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AI that is - and I suggest you all watch it again, because it IS a fucking masterpiece - you'll see that the insignia of the company that creates our lead character looks exactly like the robots at the end. Also people don't seem to get the ending. It's by no means "happy" in the conventional sense. The robots want to give the "boy" closure (ironically they have more mercy and compassion for him than humans ever did) so they give him one day with his mother so he can die at peace. Remember, when he goes to sleep, that's his death. It's not real by any means, because this mother is much warmer than the one we met at the beginning - it's really all about emtional masturbation. The real poignance comes his blind love and the other robots "humanity". As flawed as it may be at first glance, I wouldn't change a single frame of that movie. To me, it is better than any Kubrick film - and visually just jaw-dropping.
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No wonder people didn't like the ending. If you don't realize that they are robots you missed the entire point. The little boy is their missing link. They are trying to understand their origins just like we try to understand ours through archeological digs. The robots represent the next step in evolution in some ways, but also about their search for their creators. The Gigilo robot (why can't I remember his name?) comments about human religion at some point and about what robots can and will become. I can't remember the exact dialogue. I don't care what any of you say, I liked the movie and I think it is underrated.
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A.I. should have ended right when HJO was at the bottom of the water talking to the fairy. It would have been a let down- a real human emotion for the boy. The robots rescuing and learning about the boy and through him about Man would have been a great end to another movie. It was not really a happy ending. Plus, the whole 7-day clone alive thing was stupid.
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Jun 17, 2005 11:45:44 AM CDT
Yeah, That War In Iraq Has Done So Much Against Global Terrorism
by rebeck
Dude,you drank the fucking kool-aid.
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I didn't know you were a geek. A crazy right-wing freak, but a geek. Welcome.
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I loved that film, from the look of the future to the story. Something that dazzled my eyes and heart. Perhaps some may argue that you didn't 'feel' for the characters of whatever, (I disagree), but hey it's supposed to remind YOU of your own reality. I thought the alien thing did get a bit far fetched and felt it should've ended with him in the water. But learning now that those were advanced robots and him being the missing link or whatever from some of your posts makes it better. I still agree that the 7-day clone thing is a bit stupid but whatever. After watching a film like that I appreciated life better, and that's a rare thing for a film to do for me nowadays. Oh and Minority Report kicked ass. I've yet to be let down by Spielberg's films. Was thinking of skipping WOTW, but I think I'll check it out now.
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Gigolo Joe says "They made us too smart, too quick, and too many. We are suffering for the mistakes they made because when the end comes... all that will be left is us."
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Even the ending was something I'd argue had a place... But ultimately the movie does not work simply because it is Spielberg aping Kubrick and occasionally allowing himself to sneak in. The ending is as far as we can tell constructed just as Kubrick wished in terms of what happens - but it's a perfect display of how something happens is different than what in filmmaking. It should've been heartbreaking and nihilistic - an admonition that all we are after is some basic Oedipal acceptance, ultimately. Spielberg gets close but coats it in saccharine warmth right at the end. Then there's the moments that just jerk you out - Chris Rock and other robo celebrity voices. They utterly make you aware you are watching a movie. As for this being a rip off of Signs, how come no one's mentioning that Spielberg planned years before his emulator Shyamalan showed a film about people in a house during an alien invasion called "Watch the Skies"? And ultimately, the word on Spielberg should be left to Terry Gilliam who said something like "When he's at his best, there's no greater filmmaker who's ever lived when it comes to communicating in visual language. But every single movie he has to do that one thing where he tries to make his audience happy and it always ruins it". Think about and you know an example of this in every movie of his since Jurassic Park...
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Jun 17, 2005 12:12:06 PM CDT
Oh and what made me realize that AI totally failed...
by sherlockjunior
Even as an argument about Artifical Intelligence, was Ghost in the Shell 2. Together with part one it annhilates all other attempts at discussing where post-humanity is headed. After seeing that movie I knew that AI was some neat ideas and scenes but mostly hogwash.
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Alright, folks. A.I... definitely a film I've heard too much whining about one way or the other throughout the years. Let's face it... Haley Joel Osment is friggin' incredible in it, it's a small heady Pinocchio sci-fi fairy tale that asks you to sympathize with a robot. Yes, Kubrick and Spielberg's styles mesh in a weird way, but I think it's to the film's benefit. As for the ending, all of you Kubrick-crazed fans who say that Spielberg tacked on the sequence 2000 years later are totally wrong... There are plenty of storyboards that Kubrick had, and in fact, it was one of his more well-developed plans for the movie. In fact, it was the whole second act of the film in Rouge City that Spielberg needed to flesh out more, and without a doubt, if it had been Kubrick, we would have seen a racier side to that place. But the first and third acts were almost entirely developed by Kubrick; Spielberg just put it on screen. Both directors never fail to tell a good story, and I'm totally psyched for War of the Worlds. I wish he'd make something a little more lush and warm lately, everything has looked cold and stark. (With the possible exception of The Terminal, but that was, in my mind, an unsuccessful attempt at a Capra flick) I'm anxious (as we all are) for Indy IV. Anyway, to quit this ramble, one piece of advice: look up the facts, check the storyboards, and see for yourself who did what for A.I. before you start passing judgements. I don't care whether you liked the movie; I've been through too many debates about it already. Personally, I love it, but to each his (or her) own.
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This is what I think Harry is talking about when it comes to the "reviewer's" moniker (considering what state he hails from). There is a 60's punk song, Mr. Spongeman, from a group called The Human Expression that came from Texas. http://aintitcool.com/talkback.cgi?article_id=20487
Maybe? Anyone find anything else? -
Jun 17, 2005 12:42:35 PM CDT
This is the URL I wanted to paste. Damn Firefox auto copy plugi
by psimonsez
http://www.artistdirect.com/nad/music/artist/card/0,,514088,00.html#bio
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If some can guarantee a scene like this: little evil alien shooting at the fleeing earthlings. tom and dakota are dashing through a field. lasers zip everywhere. fear, utter feer. A big blast hits near tom and he falls. stumbling he climbs to his feet and looks at his daughter's hand in his. It leads to a bloody, stump of an elbow and the rest of dakota is spread in chunks all over tom and the surrounding area. if someone can promise spielberg would have guts to brutally murder a character's daughter that way, I'll go so it. it won't though. "spielberg is the confectioner of pop culture and cotton candy." pauline kael.
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"Not less good."
Wow, that review made me less excited to see "WOTW." -
They've been living amongst us for years! But now they've come out. They're dancing on furniture.
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They're A.I. Jude Law says "When they (the humans) are gone, we'll still be here?" Did everyone in the entire Universe miss that line? I FEEL LIKE I'M ON CRAZY PILLS HERE!!! Aliens? Fuck!
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War of the Worlds is "not less good"...jesus christ
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I love it that whenever a reviewer has a different opinion about a film, so many of you scream "plant." I'm definitely in the "AI is a masterpiece" camp. The film blew me away when I saw it and haunted me for some time afterwards. I disagree that it was saccharine - the ending made sense for the scope of the film and it was NOT happy, definitely a mix of emotions, like nostalgia which is a good feeling in general but mixed with regret and melancholy. Of course, as a kid I was a huge fan of the Close Encounters, E.T., and Indy Jones. I never saw Color Purple or Schindler's List, only saw Empire of the Sun recently and really liked it. Didn't like Private Ryan, I didn't like Private Ryan much, I was entertained by Minority Report (a good but not great film) and Catch Me but they didn't really stick with me. Never saw Terminal. I'll see WOTW but I don't expect to love it like I did AI. I agree that Spielberg's mostly overrated, but I respect him. Having said that, I think AI is his best film, hands down, if nothing but for the mix of emotional depth and cold imagery. The contrast is really the point, about robots transcending our emotional capacity. I don't care what the rest of you say - this was NOT a feelgood movie. And if it's too slow, watch Alien vs Predator.
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you, sir, have no clue as to the science of plant-detection.
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Jun 17, 2005 1:29:50 PM CDT
WOW!!!! First time I've ever seen Harry put a disclaimer to
by kai_mah'gra
.....which by the way does not make what he says about the movie...'any less bad'. Or is that "any less badder"? Clearly, I don't do grammar, you see I'm not less uncool than Spongeman here, like Harry says, since I'm in that 99% of the world that seems to think that coherency might just be a bit more important than being cool.
Oh... and the review "does not make me want" to see the movie any more mucher neither, so I guess nothing will.
........"any less good!" JEEEEZ!!! -
studio language blah blah blah. Seems like most people's evidence for plant on this thread is that they don't agree with the reviewer's opinions on Spielberg's films.
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The other thing that gave it away that they were robots and not aliens was the fact that it was actually quite clear if you were paying attention to the film.
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And that whore in it just ruined it even more. "Leo" ruined catch me if you can, as he ruins everything he's in. If spielberg is less lazier;), this'll be less badder.
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they were NOT aliens! they were robots.
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Yawn yawn and double yawn.
We need a new Oscar category: Best Movie with a Budget of Under $5 Million. If only to encourage more creativity. Force writers and filmmakers to be creative and inventive and not take the easy out of throwing dollars at flicks or CGI'ing it. I'd love to see this bloated monstrosity tank, but given all the free pub crazy Church of Scientology eyes Tom is getting in conjunction with his new beard, it will probably drawn.
Personally I'd rather see a film in which some veteran actor Scientologist corrupts a young starlet and convinces her she was also evolved from clams and that Lord Xeno is waiting to destroy us all unless we get out Thetons cleared, then she is taken and deprogrammed, after which she goes back and infiltrated the CoS ship at sea to extract vengeance and free all the abused children they keep in the hold of those yachts. That would be a good flick. -
I'm glad to see everyone staying true to form with the whole AI/Minority Report debate: 'I'm right.' 'NO, I'm right!' 'Listen, fucker, you don't know what you're talking about!' 'Yeah? Yeah? Well, your mom's a cocksucker, cockfag!' 'Oh, okay. I see your point now.' 'You do?' 'Yeah, yeah. After considering how much cock my mom sucks, I'd have to say you're--I'M RIGHT, FUCKHEAD!' Dear Lord, people... It's like monkey's throwing shit from their cages. It's fun to watch for a little while, sure, but then there's just shit everywhere and who wants to clean that up? What's the point in debating a film--or anything, for that matter--if no one's actually listening? All you're doing is pushing the shit over to the other monkey and giving him something else to throw back at you. I, for one, wouldn't mind seeing TalkBack cleaned up a bit and the "cockfag" portion removed from the equation. Am I alone on this? Or am I now a cockfag?
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...A.I. is still a hell of a lot better than Minority Report which, apart from Jaws The Revenge, is the most insulting film I've ever seen. It's not just the repulsive cop-out ending, but the myriad loopholes in the plot which occur at such a staggering frequency that they make any ten Nu Image productions look like examples of airtight storytelling. The special effects and the overall look of the film are fantastic but there is not one thing other than that which works. It's a horrible, horrible movie. Still, I haven't lost faith in Spielberg and will be there for WotW on day one.
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At the end of A.I., they were ROBOTS not fucking aliens. Listen to the Gigolo Joe comment at the end. The robot boy was the key to there understanding of their creator...man. Imagine if we found a clue to who are creator is and had the technology to give it what it wants...wouldn't we do it to better understand ourselves. Ans as I said before in another talkback, Signs was about faith and destiny and not an alien invansion movie.
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Jun 17, 2005 3:14:56 PM CDT
MasterWhedon: .....er that would be a resounding "Yes" to that l
by kai_mah'gra
.....actually come to think of it, that's a yes to both the last 2 questions.........ask a dumb question, well......
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It's frankly astonishing that so many label the 'tacked on' ending of AI 'saccharin'. Let's do a check, shall we: The entire human race has been extinct for ages, the artificial intelligence that now inhabit the planet, don't even remember humans, any more than we remember homo habilis or homo egaster. As Gigolo Joe said
outside a church 'the ones who made us, are always looking for the ones who made them...' And so the robots are obsessed with discovering who their creators were. David is their missing link, as has been pointed out. And so, as a tribute to him, they give him the illusion that he has his mother back, and that she loves him. The one thing he was programmed to want, and the one thing that the bitch never gave him. And after the illusion is over, David and his illusory mother cease to be. It's only this ending that makes the past two hours worth while. Everything leads up to this. This is the big pay off. They weren't aliens, and they didn't 'teleport' his mother in time. This ending is stark, it's painful, and it's the least warm and fuzzy, mindlessly reassuring thing Spielberg's ever done. Spielberg's movies, as most 'geek films' are, are the directorial equivalent of a benzodiazepine. It calms you down, shelters you and comforts you from the harshness of the world. You don't notice how much you end up relying on it, and how you end up needing it. The problem AI has, is the same problem the Hulk movie had, and why the stupidly life-affirming and hollow Spider-Man 2 was showered with fan-protein. Fanboys need to know that the hero will overcome in the end, and get the girl, and the glory in the end. "Go get 'em, Tiger". Now, I'm no snob. As Tom Wolfe said, all storytellers live with the Aristophanic Oath: Above all else, entertain. It's not that fans are too stupid for 'real art' or whatever. It's just that time and again, they've proven that they just don't want anything else. Fans haven't just come to want sugar in their entertainment instead of meat and potatoes, they've come to demand it, all while maintaining a sly, elitist superiority toward the rest of the movie going public. There's room for all types of entertainment, but fans only want one kind. Fans will reject anything outside the formula, and then scream like a man with his balls cut off, when the formula is all hollywood gives them. As this review only confirms, fans now want gore, explosions, tits, ass, ninjas, and the chance to worship at the altar of 'badass-ness' (A little piece of trivia, badasses were the ones tripping you in the highschool halls. They're nothing to be admired), darkness in the guise of depth, machismo masquerading as , ninjas, car chases, wire fu, and ninjas. Fans thought they were getting more of this emotionally tranquilizing fair. It was this simple failure of audience expectations, that doomed both the Hulk and AI. In AI, audiences thought they were getting ET, instead they got 2001: A Space Odyssey. If this movie had been an anime, or any other foreign film, and people discovered it on their own, they would have deemed it brilliant and provocative. Conversely, if Oldboy or Akira, or Ghost in the Shell, had been directed by Spielberg, and given a wide summer release, it would have been universally reviled inititally as well. Just look at the dichotomy of AI getting panned in it's theatrical run, yet ending up on critics' the top ten movies of the year lists, after they had taken a second look at it, free from the trappings of its blockbuster expectations. AI had the appearance of a typical Spielberg movie, and in the end people didn't care if it was anything more. -
I didn't dislike AI because of the lame robots at the end (and it was completely NOT obvious that they were hyper-advanced AI's). I disliked that Robin Williams CG character, the ror-distruction durby (with Ministry playing?); well, basically the way that the first half of the movie was great, and then they dropped the ball. The movie had a brilliant set-up, and then they ignored it. Kubric was a spontanious director, and I know he would have made many better decisions than Spielberg.
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Jun 17, 2005 3:33:31 PM CDT
I don't care what everybody says, the movie is already ruine
by drompter
I bet it was Tom Cruise's idea to have this movie centered on him instead to give us a full scale alien invasion/war, that egocentric worthless fuck. You don't invest that kind of money to shows an "intimate" perspective of the mayhem. That's the reason the so-called superstars suck donkey dong, always putting their selves before anything else. I'll see this anyway, but fuck Tom Cruise's Xenu's loving ass.
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And I hope they run over-budget in promoting this film.
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Jun 17, 2005 3:40:01 PM CDT
Whatever, Adambalm. It's not about fanboys wanting explosio
by fluffyunbound
It's about the fact that the emotions in AI are alternately insipid and offensive. The people who rolled their eyes and gnashed their teeth at the interminable whining of a toaster smothered in skin and deceived into thinking it's a boy were the ones who were in the right. If you sat there listening to all that blue fairy nonsense and got all teary and doey-eyed, I suggest you check YOURSELF for vulnerability to superficial emotional manipulation, and not the people who like "darkness in the guise of depth". Frankly, AI could have been interesting if its emotional perspective had been turned around 180 degrees: if it had focused on the absurdity of a mother feeling guilt because she doesn't feel human love for an IPod with a haircut that keeps playing the same needy little whine over and over again, or if it had dwelt on the irony of the fact that the human audience at the festival of robot destruction was experiencing sadistic titillation over the torment of MACHINES THAT AREN'T FEELING ANYTHING. That, at least, would have spoken to the fact that theatricality and mimesis entangle the audience in a corrupting and decadent process of emotional falseness, and would have had parallels in the way our own entertainment makes us feel profoundly in response to images that are completely fabricated, and in sympathy with characters that don't exist. Instead, Spielberg chose to focus on the robot boy, and used that character as the vehicle for the somewhat disgusting notion that the robot's love is superior to man's, because the robot does not change. Of course he doesn't change, he's been programmed to have NO CHOICE. If Spielberg's actual position is that mankind is flawed because his emotions are not permanent, I wish I could ask him to quantify the value of the love of an entity with NO CHOICE. Frankly, that message is much more offensive and dangerous in its implications than anything you could come up with by exploding a few ninjas.
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YOYou wrote two of the most moronic things I've ever read. I can't believe how stupid people can get.
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Tell us your great second half! I can't wait to hear it. Adambalm is right - the whole thing is a pursuit of approvla and love from his mother (and therefore, from life itself)...which is how most of us spend our lives, whether it's in vain or not. It's a very profound metaphor. What else did you want?? And maybe you just want a whole different movie. And what makes the robots lame at the end - they didn't shoot rays out of their eyes? Sigh. Whatever. Also...Kubrick was ANYTHING but a spontaneous director!! He did every take about 166 times. How is that spontaneous? It took him like two years to make that piece of crap "Eyes Wide Shut". Oh yeah, he could do no wrong. He was perfect. Spielberg's touch made Kubrick's material probably much much more interesting and nuanced than if Kubrick had done it himself.
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Have someone explain your fucking post to me! It makes no sense.
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Jun 17, 2005 3:51:53 PM CDT
Anyone who thinks the ending of AI is happy, treacly or obvious
by some dude
Oh, and plant callers? OWNED!
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I'd like the buy the world a Coke and teach it harmony... C'mon, let's hold hands.
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And puke.
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Jun 17, 2005 4:05:57 PM CDT
I actually understood WHY the beings at the end of AI gave him o
by ray garraty #47
...but I just figured it was supposed to be ironic that another race, not humans, finally could provide him with that closure. I seem to have liked the movie more than most of the people who have posted here today but I guess I, too, had zoned out by the end.
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The thing is, it wasn't always this bad. Even when 'A.I.' first came out, even though people's opinions ran the gamut from "unqualified masterpiece" to "self-indulgent piece of crap," there would be mounds of crazy-long dissertations on what worked and what didn't in TalkBack. Now we all state our opinions like they're fact -- myself included -- and make them vague enough so as to not set ourselves up for scrutiny by other TalkBackers, and then we hope that no one will call us on it. And because no one wants to either because we're afraid our criticisms of other people will in turn be critiqued, it's all mindless namecalling. "I absolutely feel this way about this thing and if you don't absolutely feel the same way then you're a total moron with 'poor taste' in movies, because I'm the arbiter of good taste, apparently, or because I even know enough about what appealed to you about this particular movie that makes your liking it in poor taste." I'm guilty of it a lot of times myself. Also, I know my lamentation sounds like a bunch of granola bar mumbo-jumbo, but it made sense when I was thinking it. The vague posts and namecalling has a lot to do with people being afraid of their own opinions being challenged.
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Once again, some more poor grammar on my part.
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It's just that...as elitist as it may sound...there is such a thing as people being too stupid to appreciate a really good movie. And with the constant dumbing down and Michael Bayization of movies today it's just getting worse. That "Citizen Kane", it like totally sucks... "Casablanca" - corny, too old. "Seven Samurai" - it takes forever, soooo boring. And foreign movies? I don't like to have to read at the movies. Yeah, everyone has a right to their own opinion... And... Some of them are just stupid. (ha ha)
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That was probably the most honest post I've ever read on this sight. Good work.
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Of course I meant "site" instead of "sight."
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Even the best and most shamelessly-popcorn genre pieces usually and should have another level to them. Some resonance, some meaning that strikes a chord in us. Today, even that tiny bit of substance seems to be out the window. I never wanted to be one of those people who started to mourn and whine about the state of movies...but I feel lucky if I see three movies a year now that I want to own.
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"Jaws" is...as Yoda would say. Incredibly simple and exciting. But you also have a great trio of characters - three very different men - who have to work together to kill the monster. And the fact that we like those guys and believe that they are real flesh and blood, invests us emotionally in how it turns out. It's Drama 101 really. You need to CARE what happens - because you like, hate, or are fascinated by the people in the story. Now it's too often about the plot wheels turning and the characters are just action figures. Oh and let's make it look like it was shot through a bag of Skittles.
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Jun 17, 2005 4:50:54 PM CDT
Can this be the first Sci-Fi movie to be given a best picture no
by imaximus
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Jun 17, 2005 4:52:04 PM CDT
Can this be the first Sci-Fi movie to be given a best picture no
by imaximus
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Jun 17, 2005 4:52:08 PM CDT
Can this be the first Sci-Fi movie to be given a best picture no
by imaximus
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Jun 17, 2005 4:58:40 PM CDT
Sorry my talkback was posted three times, something happened to
by imaximus
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Anyone confirm this?
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I'll try to be more direct: Spielberg wants the audience to identify with David [that what the wretched little machine's name, right? David? I may be remembering it wrong though] and is aiming to achieve pathos by making the audience feel bad about how he's abandoned by his "mother", how he is misused by the human world, etc. And, simply put, that's crap. David is a windup toy bleating on and on about needing to be loved. That's all he is. I found him to be nothing but annoying, and was aghast that Spielberg wanted us to have sympathy for him. If anything, we should have sympathy for the character of the mother. She's presented with this awful little device that chases her around demanding a response, and since it looks like a little boy, it tricks her into feeling guilty about the fact that she doesn't feel love for a Sony Playstation with legs, despite the fact that this is the only possible sane and healthy reaction. That's why I said that the movie would be more interesting, and less offensive, if flipped around 180 degrees. David doesn't deserve the audience's sympathy and asking for it is a cheap trick, of the same variety as the trick played on the character of the mother. If THAT was Spielberg's intention, it is in fact a masterpiece. But we can be 99% certain that wasn't Spielberg's intention. His intention seems to have been to make the point that the emotions felt by actual humans are somehow lacking, because they aren't permanent, in the way that the emotions felt by the robot boy are. The humans in the film are brutes, interested only in commoditizing affection, and only the robot boy's love is "pure". And that's just...gross. David's love is pure because it isn't actually love. It's programming. A tape-recorded message. Nothing more. I don't know if Spielberg has deep-rooted fears of abandonment or what, but holding up the programmed doggedness of a robot staring at an underwater wreck for NO REASON as an example of a superior love, and slighting actual human emotion in the process, is just lame. Doing it with the absolutely horrific dialogue the film uses goes beyond lame, and becomes a crime of audience abuse. // My original post may have been confusing because I went off on that "theatricality" tangent. Look at it this way: the film itself specifies that David was the first robot made capable of emotion. I would further claim that David isn't really capable of emotion, anyway, given the way Spielberg has the robot behave. That means that the film is spending a lot of time showing us the emotional responses of the human characters to robots that aren't feeling anything, but which the humans for one reason or another treat as if they ARE feeling something. If the robots can't feel, torturing a robot makes about as much sense as torturing a rock - so the humans watching the show where robots are tortured are behaving in an absurd manner. They are being sadistically entertained by the fear of objects that can't feel fear and the pain of objects that can't feel pain. That seems somewhat absurd to me. The character of the mother feels obvious guilt because she doesn't love David "back" - despite the fact that David isn't really feeling anything, he's just programmed to act as if he DOES feel something. The same thing, over and over, forever. That also seems somewhat absurd to me. I was just pointing out that there are some interesting concepts in there, in working out the implications of those two absurdities, if Spielberg hadn't taken them in exactly the wrong direction. Spielberg uses these episodes to build sympathy for the robots, and isn't any more interested in them than he needs to be to paint a big "Humans - bad" sign over Act II. They could have been used to make a statement about, you know, emotion [what the movie is supposedly about, after all] - since we aren't all that different from the humans in the film, due to the fact that our entertainment inspires us to emotional reactions that are based on images that are just as fake as the fake robot fear, pain and love the humans characters react to in the film. It's insane for the humans in the film to react emotionally to smashing and burning robots, because the robots can't feel - but that implies that it's also insane for you and I as filmgoers to react emotionally to, say, ET dying and then coming back to life, because ET doesn't exist and is a foam-rubber model. // I've said this before, but I have to thank the pro-AI people that populate the internet, because I've gotten much more satisfaction out of arguing with you folks for the last couple of years than I got out of the actual film. The film itself was agonizingly bad, but that's pretty much outweighed at this point by all the fun I've had arguing about it.
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But I still completely disagree. Cest la vie, right? I don't buy your premise that Spielberg is holding up the robots or their feelings as better than us. Not at all. He's saying what if we end up creating something that so approximates a real living being, where will our feelings begin and end? Will we be confused and maybe, SHOULD we be confused? In other words, isn't the best part of our human nature to take care of any "lesser" life? Isn't that what we do when we anthropomorphize our pets and other animals? Or even when we water plants? Obviously those kind of nurturing and protective feelings are really not a problem for you, guy. Ha ha. To me, the whole idea is where do you draw the line? What counts as real life? Consciousness? Emotion? Articulation? If we play God, will we end up creating something that has all the rights we do?
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Come on, it's true. Clockwork Orange was a piece of crap. Even Kubrick thought so. And if he didn't, he should've. 2001? What the fuck was that about? I'll tell you what- about 2 hours too long. There's 'cerebral' and there's 'overblown'.
.........Just thought I'd give Spielberg a respite. AND Kubrick rated Cruise. The evidence is all there! -
How can anyone say A.I. ends happily? After his mother ditches him in the forest, David spends the rest of his existence trying to become "human" so he will be worthy of her love. When the mechas find him in the ice several thousand years later, they give him the option of bringing her back for one day. This is when David becomes human -- unaware that it's all an illusion, he exploits his mother by bringing her back for just one day for his own, as one poster put it, emotional masturbation. She doesn't know she's being used, doesn't know she's about to die again, and David can't be bothered to tell her. It's all about him, and he's finally human -- he's become just as selfish, greedy, and short-sighted as his mother. Then, when his 24 hour delusion fades, he dies, a wretched creature about as horrible as the mother that rejected him. A.I. is by no means a perfect film, but it's a compelling one with a lot of interesting ideas and some of the most memorable imagery I've seen on film. It's also got the darkest, most depressing ending to any Spielberg work.
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Get excited here about:
- some crappy looking King Kong Toys making them think King Kong is gonna be the most awesome-est movie ever
- this "review", thinking it'll make everyone want to see WotW after the reviewer praises AI, the Terminal, Catch Me if you can. I mean what the hell exactly in this review is supposed to make us want to see the film? Get excited over it?
- And some images from Fantastic Four making them slam FF as worse than the previous live action FF film.
Granted I'll probably see all three, but gee, I think AICN ought to try subleasing the "Fair-&-Balanced" registered trademark from Foxnews. -
It's as layered and cinematically alive as VERTIGO and PERSONA, and is heads and tails above any movie Kubrick directed, with the exception of 2001. Admit it, you guys would like it more if it were shallow and insignificant. Like, say, BATMAN BEGINS.
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See Tsordiline's post for an example of the "Humans Bad - Robot Boy Good!" take on the film. He reads the mother as selfish and greedy because she, you know, loves her OWN son, and is creeped out by the automatic, unrelenting affections of an object that decided it "loved" her when her husband took it out of its box. I think Tsordiline reads Spielberg's intentions very well. He just happens to approve of them, and I do not.
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Honestly, I do think
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The reviewer didn't say basically off the bat he sucked at the very balls of Spielberg. He sounds like one of Steven's sychophantic cronies for God's sakes. I'm sure the film is good, but it resembles Shaymalayn's (sp?) Sign's WAY too much to be coincidense. Minimalism was good for THAT film, I wanted a grand-scale alien attack. I figured someone like Spielberg would deliver on that promise, I was wrong...
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Jun 17, 2005 6:05:10 PM CDT
The A.I.-haters don't realize that they themselves are like
by rant breath
They want their opinions validated for one reason. To be loved and therefore have an excuse to exist. Maybe that's why they hate A.I. so much, it hit a little to close to home.
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Good post. I thought you, along with Rebeck and adambalm, really encapsulated my fellings about AI. Relating it to War of the Worlds (at least somewhat), the reason I'm most excited for this movie is purely Spielberg. He is, hands down, my favorite filmmaker of all time and I think he's reached a level of technical perfection that few, if any, could even claim to approach. His films move me in ways that many of the "greats" never could. While I respect the work of other filmmakers, I LOVE the work of Steven Spielberg.
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How about you explain why someone should empathize with the character of David? To start things off, I'll explain why you shouldn't. Rebeck talked about "lesser life" and used the example of pets, and that's as good a place to start as any. I have two cats, that are as nuts about my wife and I as any animals could be about their owners. But, contrary to what the people at Hallmark might tell you, the cats don't love us unconditionally. The very idea is an absurd and asinine construction. They love us because we feed them and pay attention to them. We do in fact "nurture" them, and they respond appropriately, with affection. If we didn't feed them, and continually beat them, and chased them around and tried to kill them with power drills, they wouldn't love us. They SHOULDN'T love us. If they did, in fact, love us "unconditionally", the moment we got them, if they chased us around all day demanding the opportunity to demonstrate "love", regardless of how they were treated, they would cease to be entities worthy of nurturing and affection, and would become instead horrifying little monsters, objects of pity and horror, which I would probably flee from or try to kick away. David is in fact in that monstrous position. He's repulsive, if you see past the extremely manipulative dialogue and contrived abandonment scene. The mother's only guilt is that she didn't turn him off - but by making him a doppelganger of a human child his manufacturers did all they could to make it as hard as possible to turn him off. We should empathize with every character that was subjected to David, by the crass marketing engine that produced him, before we empathize with David himself. And since the audience is subjected to David as well, we should empathize with all the audience members that had to listen to him repeat the words "Blue Fairy" about 100,000 times. Those are the people I feel bad for.
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I dislike AI quite a bit, and thing it was a pretty big yawn fest. However, Minority was a great movie, so just because you dislike one doesn't mean you suck. However, if you dislike both, then you're fucking retarded.
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is because you are a loser who lives in continual fear that those around him will abandon him, and you therefore identify instinctively with a monstrous little golem who is programmed to remain perpetually in that position. Want to keep playing "Guess the emotional state of others based on their reaction to a film"?
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I don't think it's quite as simple as "Robots Good / Humans Bad." David, as you pointed out, is a very creepy machine: monomanical, tireless in the pursuit of the object of his monomania, and disturbingly one-dimensional in his "love." What's disturbing is that it's not hard to find shades of human experience in his character -- people just as mechanical in their emotional expression as David is. As for the mother, I agree that she should love her human son over his temporary substitute. But remember how she came to acquire David: she wanted a boy to love, and so she purchased one, and programmed it to shower her with adoration during every moment. Whether or not David actually felt anything is an interesting question, and if we consider that human feeling seems to have a lot to do with chemical reactions and such, I'd say that mechanical reactions ought to count for something. But even if David feels nothing, his mother behaves in ways that are unnecessarily selfish. She buys the boy-bot to fulfill the needs of her ego. When she no longer has a use for it, she discards it. Maybe David and his love were completely artificial -- maybe they were just as artificial as the mother and her love that are constructed by the mechas at the film's end. The parallels run deep. Most people seem to sympathize with the mother and find David creepy, which is to be expected, but it's very interesting since both characters make almost identical choices with almost identical consequences. Personally, I found them equally disturbing. I can see why you and others hate the movie. But as you said, it's still generating good discussion years after its release, and I think in a decade or two A.I. will be, if not liked, at least appreciated much more than it is now.
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Absolutely. Well said, Mecha. You put it better than any of us. The fact that the film is so open to interpretation is what I think will keep it alive and growing in reputation for many years to come. And as TsordiLine said, the imagery is just unbelievable. That silent flight through a dead, snowbound New York is one of the most awe-inspiring things I've ever seen on film. Or David's slow sad fall from the skyscraper to the water below... I could mention a dozen other moments.
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Yes the mother is selfish. That "machine" needed love like you need water and she basically starved it to death. Yes, Steven Speilberg is a cynical bastard for portraying a mother's preferance for her own flesh and blood as selfish, but he has a point. That "preferance" is why red-headed step-children get beaten unmercifully. You seem to despise the idea that the audience can even sympathize with a machine, but has it crossed your mind that the "machines" at the end of the movie where more intelligent and evolved than any human. Maybe mankind wasnt God's master plan. Maybe it was advanced A.I.. A "artificail" species incapable of slavery or genocide or even hate.
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As to why we should emphasize with David, it's set out in the beginning of the film. When the creator (I forget his name) proposes building a robot that can love (the inference from his POV being that we all only experience emotion technically because we are 'programmed' to) one of his audience asks about the responsibility of the 'parent' to love the robot back. His response is something like: It's a question of morality, but didn't God create Adam to love him unconditionally? Or words to that effect. You can't blame the robot (or his creator, completely) for his neverending desire to be loved because, ultimately, his 'parents' reneged on the deal. They washed their hands of responsibility.
It's the blurring of lines between whether he is actually experiencing emotion or just responding automatically that provides the emotional connection.
I imagine it's Spielbergs most personal film. -
As MasterWhedon on the subject of Spielberg. There are many great directors - but none that have played such an enormous and long-running role in my movie geek life. His films can fail just as anyone else's can, but his mastery of film language is just mind-blowing. (Which sometimes makes his failures "worse", because they're too good to ever write off easily) I read the original script for "Saving Private Ryan" before it came out and was not impressed -but that opening sequence has to be one of the greatest ever put on film. When he goes wrong, it's usually the script that lets him/us down. THAT'S why I'm so looking forward to WOTW...plus I think he's really re-energized and excited about returning to the genre he mastered before and "answering" movies like ID4. So, here's hoping David Koepp rose to the occasion...
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Signs was a rip off of War of the Worlds! Idiots!!!
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"Speilberg is a hack and all of his movies are crap..." by Andsoitis. I hope to hell you were being sarcastic about Spielsberg movies. Man if you thought they were all horrible you just lost all credibility of being any type of talkbacker. I mean seriously, after that comment you should be banned from not only AICN but also the Internet.
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I love how it was seperated into completely different feeling acts. The only thing I didn't like was that voice over when he was underwater, it brought me out of the movie. But that really is a nitpick.
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I'd think that a person like you wound know a thing or two about cliches. It must be smart to say that to a person who is one of the few on this board who disagree with all the haters. Yes, I think it's stupid to hate a film you don't understand. And I also think that 90% of all "talkbackers" are just hateful pissy fanboys and morons. You are just of them.
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I enjoy hoe the initial post was about war of the Worlds but since the writer mentioned A.I. as a masterpeice that has become the center of debate. Take that plant. You failed. Yes no one gives a fuck about WOW now. It's all A.I. sucks or A.I. owns your momma's sweet pussy (cat). Yes cry... Cry like the little failing bitch you are plant. HAHAHAHA
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Okay Fluffy, this is interesting now. I guess, mistaking the advanced AI for aliens aside, this film rests on whether you think David can truly love or not. Now my brain is like jello right now here at the end of the day so I don't know if this is coherent or not. I guess I'll find out later. But Fluffer (I kid) just raised the bar on this discussion here.
Strangely enough, I actually did find the mother sympathetic. In fact just as sympathetic as David. The only character that I found to be a monster, was the robot's designer. I'll get to why in a minute. From what we are told in the movie, David is the first robot designed closely enough to his human counterpart, to be able to replicate human emotion. We see this, and Fluffy rightly points this out, during the robot demolition derby. All the other robots don't seem to understand what's going on, or feel any pain. And everyone is shocked when David pleads for his life. And so the head hancho has to reassure the crowd that David's just a very clever mimic. Does he really love, or is he programmed to respond exactly as a human boy would? The classic turing test as it were. I've seen this question being flung back and fourth by AI researchers and philosophers. David would fall under the categorization of 'strong AI' as developed by John Searle (The chinese box asshole). The idea is if you were able to replicate the architecture of the brain exactly, in wafered silicon, could it be thought to be human or not? Jaron Lanier (The guy who invented the idea of virtual reality, and later lived to regret it) doesn't think so for a number of reasons. Here's my thinking on the subject, based on what's said in the movie, and I'm sure you'll disagree. Basically imagine a human boy whose brain has been operated on or altered with some other means, so that all he wants in life is the love of his mother. In fact you don't even need to go that far. Humans are programmed every day by culture and upbringing. Parents abuse children psychologically all the time to be co-dependents, to desperately need the love and approval of their parents.
This is why the designer is the cruelest, ugliest person in the film. As is pointed out by one of the people at the meeting in the beginning, it's reckless and it's appalling to create someone who will feel love, to desperately need that love. Before you had the walking, talking equivalents of alarm clocks. But David was created to be different, as we saw during the film. David searching out the blue fairy or trying to become a real boy isn't evidence of him being sub-human. Any more than that kid who drowned walking into the ocean trying to reach 'Bikini Bottem' and meet Sponge Bom Squarepants. Kids get weird ideas. And so do talkbackers apparently. And whether robot love is any more 'pure' or not is open to discussion, and would have to be the subject of a whole other post. -
Just like the "Spielberg is a hack!" bullshit. Some of you need to pull your heads out of your asses, put down your French cigarette, and smell your own fingers.
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Jun 17, 2005 9:11:49 PM CDT
Tom: "Will You Marry Me, Katie?" Katie: "Yes, Tom, I Will!" To
by flim springfield
I kind of hope Tom Cruise's media whoring backfires. I'm so sick of seeing and hearing about the guy I don't even want to see this movie. Hopefully others feel the same way, because if this is a huge hit it will only encourage him to continue this type of behaviour.
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Jun 17, 2005 9:36:56 PM CDT
Tommy Boy has the mutant power to make any project he's invo
by uncle stan
Why isn't he working at a Burger King somewhere?
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It has a tone unlike any other movie---period. Filled with flaws for sure but totally fascinating. Still holds the record for most times I've seen a movie in a theater.
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I have nothing against Minority Report. I liked it, and have the DVD. War of the Worlds looks cool. But this so called "review" or whatever the fark it is, that is supposed to "make us want to see WotW" just shits me in it's blatant Spielberg sycophantism (sp?), and AICNs gushing over this pathetic excuse for media hype is just embarassing.
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All you haters stomping on Minority Report do yourself a favor and read Oedipus and then watch the movie and be blown away. It is all about the eyes baby. Also killing the "father" of predestination and kissing (oh so sexually a certain "mother" of predestination. The movie is amazingly symbolic. Tom loses his eyes. The wooden balls look like eyes. The camera scan the eyes. Figure it out retards.
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Jun 17, 2005 10:54:07 PM CDT
Some fascinating and well constructed discussions of AI here.
by ingeld
This alone suggests that the movie was far better than a lot of people give it credit for. If I remember correctly, Blade Runner was not appreciated when it first came out. It developed a following.
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Fuck!, you cunts are hard to please....
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Jun 17, 2005 11:43:40 PM CDT
AI, Minority Report, Philip K. Dick, New Age, Scientolgy, and He
by octaveaeon
Actually, now that i think about it, and after reading many (excellent) posts on AI and MR, I'm convinced that what Spielberg (and maybe Kubrick too) is suggesting is a (symbolic) link between the AI robots we created and the aliens we see nowadays. Considering the belief by many of the NewAge tendency that aliens helped shape the evolution of humanity (our original Gods), it would be another interesting twist if we ended up making those Gods in the first place. And this in turn answers one of the paradoxes of time-travel: if it's possible, why hasn't anyone ever come from the future to our present time? Well, maybe they've been here all along! Which makes that one post linking Minority with Oedipus, for then it could mean that Spieberg is bringing in fate (predestination) and the oedipus complex we develop when attempting to tame it (with the use of technology), and this in turn is how we create our Gods (remember in MR how people were beginning to deify the precogs, like the guy who started bowing down ridiculously when he found out he was in front of one). Could this be what Spielberg is suggesting (atleast metaphorically)? Interesting to note is that MR is based on a short story by Philip K. Dick, and so was AI, and I think most people are aware of the particular views good 'ol Dick held concerning alien civilizations (http://www.geocities.com/pkdlw/howtobuild.html). Considering "Taken", I wonder if Spielberg is suggesting some kind of transcendental union between the two, kind of like the Gnostic notion of gnosis, or maybe Hegel's dialectic, considering that in that miniseries we produce a lovechild with the 'aliens'. Anyways, that's just a thought, so no need to panic. Oh, and Tom Cruise is into Scientology. There, that's it.
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I don't know if I've been beaten to the punch or not, but I did notice a few posts mention that they considered 'A.I.' a sci-fi piece in which robots are unfairly treated by human beings. Now, it's hard to tell whether this is just a comment on the execution of the film or what you guys thought the film was actually trying to say. Again, the movie is ambiguous enough to offer up different interpretations, and I choose to look at it not as theoretical science fiction but an allegory wrapped up in sci-fi about people who use one another. David wasn't ready for the real world because his mother didn't love him enough to prepare him for it -- rather, she used him to keep her company in her real son's abscence. And so all David wanted was to get back to his mother because that was the only "real" thing to him in life. When his mother was gone for good at the end, he chose to "sleep" - which may or may not be interpreted as suicide - because he didn't know how to live without her.
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Jun 18, 2005 12:21:27 AM CDT
wasn't there some movie coming out with aliens blowing shit
by oisin5199
Love the AI discussion and the Oedipus/Minority Report connection. Here's an obvious one for AI: Frankenstein. The monster asks Frankenstein "Why did you create me if you weren't going to love me?" and this of course was also about Shelley's Prometheus and Adam in Milton's Paradise Lost. Fluffyunbound, though I'm impressed with the intelligence of your response, I really think you are missing the point. Our moral compass isn't supposed to be as black and white as you make it out to be (robots good, humans bad). The fact that we do project our emotions onto AIs and pets and babies is definitely something Spielberg wants us to question, which is why the Flesh Fair is ambiguous. Interesting example: I remember taking my stepson who was (I think) 7 at the time and the only thing that made him cry was the Flesh Fair scene because he couldn't distinguish the robots from living beings who were suffering. But seven year olds were certainly not the intended audience (though judging from this thread, plenty of them did see it). And besides aren't children, in a sense, programmed to love? I think it's those questions that are important in the film: where do we draw the line between human and artificial and what choices do we make when that line is virtually non-existent? The mother made one choice, the Flesh fair people another. Not to go all pop-psych but your disgust at David says more about you than the movie. I take it from your comments that you don't have children, because it sounds like you'd think they'd be leeches on you or something. Maybe you'd feel differently if you were faced with a baby who was constantly "whining" for love (which pretty much equals a bottle or to be held or to have their diaper changed). I guess I don't see the difference between the programmed robot and a real child. Do children "choose" to love their parents? Of course not. It's "programmed" into their genes and they're raised to be dependent on the parent. And that's the playing field of the film - the connection between creator/created and parent/child. And Adambalm and Rebeck: Right-freakin'-on!
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AI wasn't a Dick story. Wait, let me reprhase that. AI wasn't a story by Philip K. Dick. It was based on a Brian Aldiss short story "Super Toys Last All Summer Long."
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I always thought that the evolved robots at the end of the movie were just fooling David when they said they could bring his mom back for 24 hours. It was all a simulation so they could learn about human interactions. I suspect there was a true epilogue that was cut where the future Mechas sat around over a couple of beers and laughed about that backwards cro-magnan mech kid and his simplistic pre-programmed "love" for his "mom".
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shit, i was writing something connecting what Ribbons just said about David and his mother, and how it is like a 'meme' of the concept of an emotion (love) that is transmitted in its most basic expression (need), and which is supposed to develop, at least superficially (I guess that a the makers are thinking that a fully developed self-consciousness like ours will better be able to develop through the interplay of emotions, as transmitted by humans), which is how the mothers manipulates it (to fill the emptiness left by her 'real' son). In the end though he succeeds, thereby fulfilling his mission. Still, he represents our 'descendants' missing link, since like him many more were developed, and they became the next step in their evolutionary development (technology and evolution, not to mention the "star child" and alien intervention, being themes explored by Kubrick in 2001 ASO, one of the most visionary, yet still not fully understood, movies ever made). There, that's a short rehash...
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maybe the reason why Spielberg presents humans in the movie under such a critical eye, and the reason why we don't seem to survive (atleast in our usual organic shell), is because we seem to have forgotten what love really is about. Instead, we've fallen in love with things, which is why this mother is eventually capable of transferring her love for her real, but absent, child to this mimetic object. But through this exchange, and its eventual rupture, the robot is able to transcend to the 'human' emotional stage. The rest, as they say, is history...
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Jun 18, 2005 1:07:04 AM CDT
The Terminal is complete shit. Signs would have been good minus
by winterchili
and yeah, massive plant
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Because that review did nothing for me. OH and it screams plant like no review before it.
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Jun 18, 2005 2:48:17 AM CDT
OH yeah and what kind of idiotic expression is "War of the World
by rogue_leader
This guy's command of grammar is clearly not his strong point.
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You mean the one where aliens come to Earth, 90% of which is covered by water, where it rains, and they're killed by-- allergy to water. What, all that technology to reach us in the first place and they didn't look at a travel brochure? Yeah, that's a pretty fucking major plot hole.
Hell, they start attacking you, all you have to do is cry. -
Jun 18, 2005 4:58:38 AM CDT
Sorry, Mori, Harry. Go ahead and defend ol' spongy as you se
by pontsing barset
... but this review doesn't convince me of jack. The trailers look like over-wrought, over-blown ASS, and this review actually sort of reinforces that perception, as much as it does anything else...
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I think the point was that the aliens were allergic to the POLLUTANTS in the tap water, not water in general. I didn't really notice any plot holes in the film, then again I don't remember most of it, it being a somewhat forgettable film.
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"If I could fight anybody, I'd fight Brooke Shields. Look at the reach on her.""First rule about Fight Club is: don't talk about fight club." Second rule is: DON'T TALK ABOUT FIGHT CLUB!"
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The TBers complaining about the reviewers english language skills. Go write a review in German. Then whine.
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Even though it's all off topic, I'm quite impressed at the quality of a lot of these posts. First time I've seen an actual discussion and not just a shit throwing contest. Kudos to all of you! I'm afraid I'll have to bring it down a little bit now, and for that I apologize. Re: WoW: First, why don't you piles of wank wait till AFTER YOU'VE SEEN THE MOVIE BEFORE YOU SAY IT IS A RIP OFF OF SIGNS? Second: Signs is a rip off of WoW. Third: You guys are just shooting yourself in the foot when you complain that this WoW (which I must add once again, that you have not seen yet) isn't close enough to the novel, while at the same time you whine about not wanting to see the invasion from one man's persepctive (one man just trying to save himself and his family) but rather see some full sale ID4 destruction and mapother kicking alien ass. Have you even read Wells' novel? The main character there just observes the invasion while doing the best he can to survive and find his wife. He doesn't save the planet, he doesn't kick alien ass. This movie, apart from moving it to the present and adding the kids sounds pretty faithful to the book. You guys are just impossible to please. If Spielberg did ID4 #2 you would complain about that too, and how it would be much cooler to see a more personal story with the invasion as a backdrop.I Spielberg says up, you say down, if he says down you say up. Well, up yours! Jesus, I feel like I'm talking to a brick wall here.
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Jun 18, 2005 9:26:34 AM CDT
Like in THE LAST SAMURAI, Cruise will survive the annihilation o
by spacesheik
At least Charlton Heston died in his films.
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Everyone seems to find the method in which David's mother returns to be a cop out, but if you watch carefully, you can tell the robots are controlling David's new reality. Once they scan his memory, everything changes. The colors, the film stock, the angles. Very similar to the end of 2001. David never leaves the area where they find him. Teddy never leaves the craft. The robots are giving him his closure. Good stuff.
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Everyone here seems to be debaing plot points about AI, forgetting about Spielberg's biggest travesty, Schindler's List. This has been acknowledged as the defitive movie made about the Holocaust, and in it all the Jews survive. This is really a slap in the face to the 6 million Jews who were slaughtered, their suviving families, and the 5 million other gypsies, Catholics, unionists, and others Hitler had killed in concentratuon camps. Spileberg made the movie this way because he knew it would be guaranteed commercial and critical success as it would be more palatable to the average person than a movie showing the real horrors of the Holocaust. He portrays the nazis as mostly men who act of of corruption, and meanness, but ignores the true fact that these men were evil. Liberals like Spielberg have a very difficult time acknowledging the fact that evil exists. They attribute the actions of evil people to feelings of necessity on their parts, or just to sheer lunacy. The Holocaust was an evil action perpetrated by evil men. It wasn't just thrown together. It was well thought out in terms of logistics, transportation, and means of killing and disposing of bodies. A classic Spielberg moment was when Schindler beseeches the Nazi guards to not kill the plant workers when the war has ended. "Return to your families as men, not murderers." The fact is the Nazis did their best to liqudate the Jews when they know they had lost the war and even up to the very end. The simple reason that more Jews weren't killed at the end is that the Nazis had ran out of ammunition to kill people en masse. This talkback isn't meant to denigrate people like Schindler who really did good. The fact is though that most Germans were indifferent at best and helped the process along at worst. By highlighting Schindlers story Spielberg told the easy story and still came out smelling like roses. Meanwhile almost 12 million victims are ignored.
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Kudos. I guess it's good to get back on topic, although those were probably the smartest posts I have seen ever seen all put together in one talkback. Especially those that disagreed with me. To answer your criticisms point by point: 1) One of the standard tunes sung by talkbackers is "See it befoer u an furking decide, cockfarts, LOL!!!". While it goes without saying that we will only render our final opinions upon viewing the movie, what we're actually doing is forming a tentative opinion ONLY on the information that has been released so far. As the first 64 trailers and TV spots were released, and Spielberg gave an interview confirming this, we came to realize that this movie would focus on a family. Signs did this, the original War of the Worlds book did not. Yes I've read it. Yes I own it. Yes, signs was a 'rip off' of War of the Worlds (Or homage, or commentary, whatever makes a man out of you) but one thought that comes to minds is...why further the similarities, especially when it diverges from the source material? This is the heart of most of the criticisms concerning your point #2. 3) I did voice dissatisfaction with it not being close enough to the novel, however, I personally did not ask for full on hard core ID4 alien killing action. I don't remember who did. Could you cite the post? Again, no we haven't seen this movie, and thank you for using talkback cliche #6 yet again. Remember, no one has ever said 'Wait til u see it, fags' before. You are the first. And finally, no it is not faithful to the book 'apart from moving it to the present and adding the kids'. You are forgetting the biggest criticism, is that the core of the book, martians invading earth, has been excised. They now come from a parallel universe. Now we saw this confirmed from multiple different sources, and although technically we won't know until we see the movie, it looks sure enough now that we can opine on it tentatively now. You could say this is like making the Time Machine, whereas the time traveller travels 'sideways in time' instead. Or the Island of Dr. Moreau where instead of mixing animals and men he was genetically engineering people with superpowers. Same plot, same characters, different core concept. Now, it can be said that people will simply laugh at any 'monsters coming from Mars' idea in this day and age. We're far too sophisticated. Spielberg wanted that same terror and paranoia people got when the book was first published, or when the radio show aired. The 'holy shit, this could really happen!' panic. The argument is you couldn't have got that from Martians. I'm not so sure. This is a director who convinced us that dinosaurs were cloned from a mosquito's blood. And aliens invading from a parallel dimension is far more fanciful by an order of magnitude. Might work for an episode of the X-Files, but it's not gonna leave people sweating and shaking in the theatre like the Bearded One hopes. This is kind of representative of how hollywood does adaptations these days. They change what matters, but include easter eggs to prove that they're real fans. "Okay, we left out the part in the War of the Worlds book, like, well, the War of the Worlds book, but look! We included the red weed! I know it doesn't make sense anymore since they're not from the red planet anymore. And look! We have the opening narration, and we even have *wink* *wink* homages to the 1950s movie!" So we're not saying 'this movie will be shit on a shingle!' we're saying, these changes appear unnecessary, unfaithful to the material, and do not make sense based on the reasons that are given.
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Honestly, I think we would have gotten a far better treatment had Kubrick's Aryan Papers gone through. He shelved it when Spielberg started production on SL. But you're right. Here we have a holocaust movie where none of the main characters die, except for the nameless pink girl who we don't know. Personally, I think the only holocaust movie to date that even comes close to touching on the the loss of humanity, the clean and efficient factory-like destruction of life is the Gray Zone. A hard movie to watch, but a brilliant one too.
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I don't think any one movie can capture the full evil of the Holocaust. It's like looking directly at the sun, you can't do it. And I think that's asking too much from any piece of art, let alone an "entertainment". So, by necessity you have to pick a small piece of it and illustrate it that way. "Sophie's Choice", I think, did this better than any other movie - with all the horror being reduced to one terrible decision. This, even though the movie wasn't about the Jews. My problem with SL is that Spielberg never fully gets us under Schindler's skin - if you're telling a story about a small but important act of heroism, get us to care about that hero. Anyway, just my take.
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1: I don't believe that they've done that whole the aliens are from a parallell dimension thing till I see it on the screen. 2: Where the aliens are from, be it mars, jupiter or dimension x is entirely inconsequential. What matters is that they are invading. It wasn't a major point in the novel that the aliens had to be from mars, except for the proximity to earth making it more believeable. They could just as well have been from venus or wherever. 3: I'm sorry I can't give you any examples of posts wanting ID4 action, as this talkback is way to long to read through again. However, there have been a lot of posts on this and other WoW TBs talking about how they don't want to see the aliens just in the background, and that they want to see some kick ass action, they don't go to see an alien invasion movie to see tom cruise and his kids running away etc. 4: off topic, regarding schindler's list. Devilsadvct, so you would have thought schindler's list a better movie if there were more jews killed in it? The point of that movie was to show hope even in the darkest of hours. It's using the holocaust to tell a tale about survival and redemption. The story about the holocaust has been covered A LOT before, and we already know that 6million jews were killed and that the nazis were cruel, but there is no way we can respond emotionally to such an immense and abstract number. What we can respond to emotionally however is the tale of these people never giving up hope, and this man proving that one man CAN make a difference, to the point that the children and grandchildren of the schindler jews today outnumber the total jewish population of poland. If anything, I think it is brave of spielberg to tell a tale like that about the holocaust, not focusing on the cruelty of the nazis but on the kindness of schindler. To tell an uplifting tale about one of the darkest hours in human history is NOT taking the easy way out IMO. The tagline for SL was "Whoever saves one life, saves the world entire." That's what that movie is about. Not about the systematization of evil. If you want to see a movie about that, see something else, but don't criticize SL for not being that movie.
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Why I don't like him: Orson Welles went to him to ask for some funding for "The Big Brass Ring" and Spielberg wouldn't do it. Oh, but SS bought an "authentic" Rosebud sled for $65K. Why I don't like his movies: they're incredibly middle brow, they're manipulative as hell and they generally have very happy endings where everyone learns a powerful lesson about life and love. RE: AI: I only saw the movie once and will never see it again because I hated it so much; still, some of the criticism of it is very interesting. Anyway-- why the hell do you think the space aliens who came down in the ship were anything other than space aliens?
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Jun 18, 2005 12:25:44 PM CDT
re:"y the hell do you think the space aliens who came down in th
by colonel_blimp
Because we're smarter than you, Drunken Rage. That's why.
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You stupid asswipe.
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Like everything and everyone might or might not be on this site.
Wasting our time just got a whole lot less interesting.
-Az -
Sorry for my tardiness in joining in the A.I. debate as I
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Not even worth downloading...
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War of the Worlds: I semi-agree on this point. This is why initially I wasn't very vocal when it started to leak out that they weren't coming from Mars. What was originally central to War of the Worlds, according to HG Wells, was the proposal of what would happen to the 'civilized' world if they were treated
just as they were treating the third world. It was meant to evoke a sense of fear and shock, of how 'infinitely complacent' we all were as we busied ourselves
around our daily concerns of exploiting others for our own wealth and comfort. In fact, I actually defended Spielberg's decision to move this to the modern day for this reason. It was actually more faithful to change the setting to 'here and now' if one was to try and evoke the sense of fear and absolute panic that HG Wells had intended. I think based
on Spielberg's comments, he's attempting some of those things. However, some of these changes he is reported to have made, do not serve that. The reason some are complaining about the similarity to signs, i.e. the kids and the scene running from the aliens in the basement with an axe, only serve pull you out of the movie. Also, although it could still be pulled off well, the idea of them coming from a parallel earth does the same, in my opinion. It's fanciful, harder to believe, and puts it on less of a 'street level' personal scale. It's all execution dependent, but I'm comfortable at this point predicting that it will not be as believable as Spielberg hoped. I'm still not sure if it would be less believable to do a hard science version of them coming from Mars. This we can never know. I still would like to have seen them tried, and I still think it could have worked. One possibility that I mentioned to someone else would be, that they'd take so long making them Martians believable, that people wouldn't have the instant 'holy shit!' reaction you'd be going for. You also say that you'll refuse to believe this reported origin until you see it on the screen. That's fine. But I must say I see all the time on AICN, people chastising others for stating an opinion on what they've seen so far, before then making an opinion themselves such as the following: "This movie, apart from moving it to the present and adding the kids sounds pretty faithful to the book." I'm sorry, Blimp, but this is the exact same thing you're objecting too. You're making an informed evaluation based on the information at hand, the same as I did. Inductive reasoning of current data, which could change as new data presents itself. Most posts (with the exception of the occaisional 'This will rule, fagtards!!!') if you read them, are exactly that as well. "Well, so far it looks like this or that." I think you and I can both concede that our opinions could change tomorrow if new facts present themselves, and our opinions most likely will change to some degree as soon as we step out of that theatre. Although I don't need to see the movie to like the footage I've seen, or not. Or to like what Spielberg and his production designers have said in interviews, or not.
Schindler's List: I actually wrote a much longer post on the subject, but cut it down since I didn't want to derail the discussion again from WotW. Again, I appreciate you getting back to topic, and I didn't want to go off on a tangent again. But I did write that I do think the holocaust is impossible to deal with in one film. Kubrick believed this, one of the reasons he shelved Aryan Papers. It's like Eddie Izzard says: You kill one person, you go to jail. Kill ten people, they put you in a white room, and look at you through a window for the rest of your life. Kill a hundred people or a thousand, and no one can wrap their heads around that. Paradoxically I think that's one of the reasons genocide keeps being carried out. It's abstract. If a few people die, such as in the Challenger disaster, you see their faces, hear their stories, and it hits you in the gut. But to see a thousand faces, or read the words SIX MILLION...it's just beyond comprehension. From my point of view, I just thought that the Gray Zone did the best job one can do in that situation, on giving something like that a face, and a feeling, hitting your emotions. It's one thing to see people feeling the holocaust as in SL or the Pianist. It's a poignant tale and it makes you feel for them. But it's another thing to see people in that system, to see people taking off their clothes as they're led into the gas chambers, to see the sad desperation of it all. To see them try and save a little girl who survived the gassing because she was on the floor and a pocket of air surrounded her mouth. To understand that it makes no difference, she's still dead, all of them are dead already. To see the cold resignation in their faces...I'm sorry, but I could post a 50,000 word essay on why this movie is as brilliant as it is. Go rent it. It's not better because more characters are killed in it. It's better because more characters come to life in it, and for the first time of any holocaust movie, I began rethinking the kind of person I am. What I'd do in that situation, and the kind of man it would show me to really be. To me, there's no higher aspiration in a movie. -
Your points re: Schindlers List noted, but what you don't realize is that this stands as the definitive movie about (or not about) the Holocaust. Even if you think everyone can understand how bad the Holcaust was and how many millions of people died the fact is most people really don't understand the pure evil it took to for this underttaking by the Nazis and how many people just went along with it. Also your point about the Schindler Jews outnumbering present day Jews in Poland is wrought with an irony you seem to miss...pretty much all the Jews were killed who lived in Poland, so duh. On it's own merits Schindlers List is a well done movie with great performances, but Spielberg took the easy way out by making a movie that didn't really make peole feel bad. If you really want just a small taste of the Holocaust then see "The Last Days" which shows the horror, but still does leave room for hope instead of the whitewash of Schindlers List. Just one story that makes you really understand was the story of a girl who's mother gave her family diamonds to keep while they were in the concentration camp. She swallowed the diamonds and she would have to check her waste every day to see if it came out and then swallow them again. When Spielberg won the oscar for Schindlers List he said this was "paying back what he owed." Well I think he owes even more now.
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Yeah, it's beginning to like like the litmus test on whether enjoyed this film or not would be if you believed his love was real or not. I'm starting to think that this movie could have been as popular as people expected it to be if David was played more straightfowardly like a real kid. Less Mr. Data, less creepiness. It's actually really hard for me to say this because for me this would remove one of the layers that the movie worked on, for me. But I think if he was played more straight forwardly as a regular kid who just really loved his mother (as he's programmed to) I think that far more people would be singing this movie's praises. But people don't like movies with multiple points of view that are all valid. David loves his mother because that's all he knows how to do. The mother finds this creepy and is emotionally torn up over having accepted this thing into her house. It hurts to think about the guilt she must have felt over having to abandon him. This is one of the hallmarks of naturalist fiction, which all of Kubrick's films fall under. Now I realize that even mentioning something like this opens me wide up for attacks of being a snob, or reading too much into it. But Kubrick's movies, and alot of Brian Aldiss's stories (I don't know how many here have also read the Supertoys short story series) are in the tradition of naturalist fiction such as Zola, Crane, Dreiser, and some authors today trying to ressurrect it like Tom Wolfe. In this fiction, everyone is a product of their envionments, their genes and their upbringing, and the ugliness of every character is apparent, while at the same time you feel sympathy for all the characters. It's sad that there's no naturalist film makers left. Instead of films that try to examine human nature, who we are and the lies we tell ourselves (Errol Morris is the only film maker doing this) what do we currently have in art films? We have narccisstic autobiographical stories, mostly political statements that simply regurgitate the rhetoric of the academic left (Not that there's anything wrong with those beliefs, I hold some of them) and stories with more skin, more blood, and more desperate attempts to shock in an attempt to be noticed. AI could have really opened things up.
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A very important point in Schindler's List is that Oscar Schindler was NOT a likeable person. He was a heavy drinker, a womanizer and a war profiteer. He was also a member of the Nazi Party. So how could someone so seemingly void of morality do something so... moral?
And as for the gripe that the movie does not adequately depict the outrageous slaughter of millions of Jews, I must disagree. There are harsh depictions of senseless killing throughout the film, including the liquidation of the ghetto.
But like the true master Spielberg is, he does not concentrate or dwell on the killing to tell his tale. He concentrates on the characters and their stories in the midst of the killing.
And based on advanced word, it sounds like he's done this again in WOTW. -
you're not a retard if you don't like A.I. It was basically Stanley Kubrick Presents: "Pinocchio" as done by Steven Spielberg. Honestly though, between Spiels and "The Bearded Flannel" who is holding up better? Besides that stupid E.T stunt (leave the tampering to Gorge Mucus there Steverino!) the man has held up considerably well. Especially considering the company he holds. I will be seeing WOTW by the second week, and it WILL be good. I am also a plant...a "Creping Charlie" to be exact.
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"Creeping" not "Creping"....FUCK! almost made it.
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...the film is called "Artificial Intelligence" for a reason. People including Roger Ebert who cannot empathise with a so-called robot i think can't get their head around the fact even though it doesn't act totally like a human, it doesn't exclude it from being intelligent and having genuine feelings. A brain is a wired box that is also programmed but at what point does the computerised one gain consciousness. I love how the film melds a children's fantasy with allegories of Pinocchio's quest to be a "real boy" and man's eternal quest for God and the meaning of life, along with science-fiction themes of computer intelligence. There's obvious symbolism of David being abandoned by his mother relating to man being cast out of the garden of Eden by God. Humans aren't perfect and neither is David so to despise David for this is to condemn humanity for all its faults too. To wish the movie ended with him at the bottom of the ocean is to wish man never learn the meaning of life which is pretty cold. I choose to read the cautionary yet hopeful epilogue as man possibly being extinct (due to self-annihilation?) and yet their A.I. creations living on and knowing that the meaning of life is to love and be loved in return (something they share with David as a token of their love for him as being the first A.I. to have genuine feelings). I found it very moving at the end... to be able to dream and follow a dream and make it a reality is something only an intelligent being can do and hopefully some people found this message in the film as well and will in turn make this world a better place.
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concerning Schindler's List and the complaint that the main characters all survive the holocaust.
It's a true story moron. They DID all survive. -
It's fine that Schindler is mercenary and elusive by nature at the start - but he's still the title character and I don't think the movie should stand back ten paces and say, well, we don't know why he did what he did. Isn't that what we're here to find out, among other things? Shouldn't that be the arc of the story? First and foremost it's a story, not a documentary. And before you start shouting (and insulting people) about integrity and subtlety blah blah blah - try to remember that Spielberg has Schindler break down at the end when he suddenly "realizes" what he has and hasn't done. Is this completely accurate? I doubt it. And it feels more false and tacked-on than if the scene had come much earlier in the film and we saw the turning point, the moment he made his decision toward doing good. The fact is he did A Good Thing, and the movie seems almost scared of really celebrating that because it risks being attacked (like it has been on this board) for not being about the Holocaust victims themselves. But again, it's a movie. Movies use their own language and rules to communicate the emotional truth. I think Spielberg's fear of being accused of manipulation kept him from really making Schindler a hero. People were up in arms saying he was going to sentimentalize the Holocaust. Well I'm for emotion and I didn't see anything wrong with that. Hey, it's still a great great film - the raid on the ghetto alone is just devastating. It's one of the few times I found myself crying in a movie theatre just from an accumulation of details, a deep pervading sorrow. I just feel that it ultimately fell short as a MOVIE, and if that makes me a heretic, I'm sorry. Like I say, for me, there is more truth and power in Meryl Streep's face after her "choice" than in any other film on the Holocaust I've ever seen - that wrenching moment goes to the heart and is all you really need to know about the Holocaust: losing the people you love and the guilt of surviving. And the really sad thing is it's happening again in Africa right now.
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My criticisms weren't directed at you. They were mostly directed at devilsadvct. And I agree with your thoughts about the "choice" scene from Sophie's Choice.
But I must say, I have never personally seen the kind of emotional reaction from an audience that I witnessed during the initial theatrical release of Schindler's List. It was both devastating and cathartic.
I disagree with you that Schindler's motives must be explained. They never have and probably never will. And it is that fact, that good and evil are not simplistic and that there are shades of grey, that makes Schindler's story so fascinating.
But by devilsadvct's logic, all films based on some great tragedy, like the holocaust or 9/11, must concentrate on the horror and devastation in order to honor the survivors, instead of the human stories of the those who survived. -
that the fact that we have such different reactions to David, ranging from empathy to disgust, proves that AI worked. I don't think we're supposed to just take it as face value that he has human-like emotions and therefore should be treated like a human. I think we're meant to question that at various times, as indicated by William Hurt's speech at the beginning, and further we're supposed to look at ourselves and what we anthropomorphize, as demonstrated by the Flesh Fair scene. Speaking of Data, similar ideas were used in STNG and the Animatrix: Is slavery, violence or otherwise immoral behavior okay when the victims aren't human? Is the object more important, the perpretator, or the act itself? One of the more disturbing scenes in "The Second Renaissance" is when the humans are tearing apart the female robot. Is it that the more human-looking, the more disturbing? Why are we more disturbed by violence to cats and dogs than violence to chickens and cows? Children rather than adults? These are all interesting questions about where the empathic line is drawn, in terms of how we make our moral and ethical decisions. Though this was only a sub-theme to AI, I think it's a strong one.
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Fair enough, Neary. And I agree completely on your last point - there is no one story to a tragedy or one right way to tell it.
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first of all, Neary, I'm well aware that SL is based on atrue story, I didn't think Spielberg pulled it out of his ass. Maybe you're the moron for not realizing my posts have focused on the fact that SL is typical of Spielbergs "serious" movies where everything has to fit and make sense such as in AI, MR, Private Ryan and others. The fact is that in the real world not everything fits in a nice box with a pretty bow on top, and this is what Spielberg has now done with the Holocaust while somehow managing to brush over the fact that 1/3 of the worlds jews were slaughtered in a systematic, well planned and executed process. This was not haphazard killing or attacks. Families were torn apart, killed in front of each other, experimented on by "scientists" deprived of their land and possessions...we could go on and on. Spielberg is entitled to make any movie he wants, tell any story the way he wants to, but when he says this is "paying what he owes" it's obvious he sees this as an important work in relation to the Holocaust. This movie tells a compelling story from the Holocaust, but in no way does it really address what the Holocaust was. I wouldn't really care if it was one of his other movies that he gave this treatment to, but the fact that it is acknowledged as a defintive movie about the Holocaust, it needs to be more. Rebeck- btw Schindlers emotional outburst at the end "if I could have saved one more" was just a plot device (typical Spielberg) It never really happened. Also, Neary, I think my points have been well thought out and supported, if you don't agree with them, fine. Calling people who disagree with you morons without debating their points just shows your lack of intelligence and ability to argue a point.
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I never said Schindler's was a bad movie either. It's in fact rare that Spielberg does make a bad movie, because you'd have to actually take chances to fail. Spielberg almost always steers right down center of the middle 80%. There's nothing wrong with life-affirming movies. By the end of the seventies, before Rocky, Superman and Star Wars, those types of movies were all but extinct and you'd practically want to kill yourself after going to the theatre. (Not that I was alive back then actually.) But Spielberg has basically boxed himself in with his past work. He can't do a non-happy, audience pleasing, value-reinforcing, slice-of-americana flick without people calling for his balls. It's interesting that no one rants about Spielberg's true failures, his boring movies. I think I heard one person mention 1941, or Hook, or Amazing Stories or Always. It's only where Spielberg tried to step out of his mold, defy expectations, that people crucify him.
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...but if you're correct then Spielberg must have failed in making 'everything fit and make sense' in AI, or we wouldn't have the above 3 million words debating the movie.
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Jun 18, 2005 7:22:19 PM CDT
There is nothing I need to learn from Spielberg and/or Cruise
by i dunno
Yeah, I get it. There is a very thin line that separates the so-called civilized world from that of what we call the third world and it would take only one alien invasion to show us that. And we should be cautious of our self righteous imperialism because there is always a bigger fish and someday we may be victims of the very same sort of imperialism by a species more advanced than us. Really makes you think. Moral relativism from two guys who haven't had to order their own lattes in 20 years, great. Ok, I've passed the written test. Can I see some shit blow up now?
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Amen Adambalm.
I'm beginning to think that devilsadvct never even saw Schindler's List. If he did, he has obviously forgotten about the scenes at Auschwitz. These scenes are extremely powerful. The shots of the women staring at the lines of entire families being led to their deaths in the ovens, ( by calm, smiling Nazis), and the dense smoke pouring from the chimneys, are devastating. Not to mention the emotionally draining shower sequence. These in themselves depict the way Jews were "slaughtered in a systematic, well planned and executed process". Oh, and the previously mentioned "liquidation of the ghetto" scene. And have I mentioned the scenes depicting the Nazi cataloging of gold teeth, shoes, eyeglasses, (and other works of art, personal items and valuables), that have been looted from the displaced and murdered Jews?
Again, you don't have to expoit the horror and devastation to be effective in making your point. That is the mistake of many amateurs. Isn't it the argument of many Spielberg-haters that he's exploitive and manipulative, slamming you over the head with the obvious?
Oh, and I think that my "lack of intelligence and ability to argue a point" have been sufficient in disproving yours.
So do you have a real argument, or are you just playing "Devil's Advocate"? -
Neary, you haven't addressed any of my points. I agree SL is a good movie taken at face value. But that's it. From the worldview you bring in you can relate this movie to what you know. But for many people this is their only real exposure to visceral images of the Holocaust and not just reading numbers in a book. This was an emotional well done movie but you're still missing my point. Spielberg fits this moivie into his typical easily digestible formula, and I personally think for a movie about the Holocaust, that isn't correct. But, that's my opinion, just as you have yours. Just stating how good you think a movie is is not disproving my point. The fact is you are just stating your opinion has more value, which is fine, but doesn't make you right.
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who created Schindler's List with the purpose of being "the definitive film about the holocaust". It has been declared that by the moviegoing public. It has also made the Top 10 in almost every "100 Best Films of All Time" lists I've ever seen.
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you're right Neary, I stand corrected. If Ebert and Roeper and Gene Shalit say it is top ten all time then I guess you got me.
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Which points are you referring to? Could it be this one... "Spielberg's biggest travesty, Schindler's List. This has been acknowledged as the definitive movie made about the Holocaust, and in it all the Jews survive. This is really a slap in the face to the 6 million Jews who were slaughtered."
I think I have addressed this directly. Your statement that "all the Jews survive" is a blanket statement and is just factually incorrect.
Or could it be this one... "Spielberg made the movie this way because he knew it would be guaranteed commercial and critical success as it would be more palatable to the average person than a movie showing the real horrors of the Holocaust. He portrays the nazis as mostly men who act of of corruption, and meanness, but ignores the true fact that these men were evil. Liberals like Spielberg have a very difficult time acknowledging the fact that evil exists." Ignores the fact that these men were evil or that evil exists? Ignores the real horrors of the Holocaust? I would argue that the portrayal of SS officer Amon Goeth, the Commandant of the Plaszow labor camp, is one of the most effective depictions of evil ever committed to celluloid. I'm sorry, but these comments just pissed me off, and aren't the "well thought out and supported" points you describe them as. And I don't think that any film, made by anyone, can be a "guaranteed commercial and critical success". Don't you think Spielberg would have used this formula, if it existed, with Amistad as well? -
Jun 18, 2005 11:49:16 PM CDT
"...why the hell do you think the space aliens who came down in
by ribbons
Okay, sorry to bring the discussion back to 'A.I.' You guys can and should ignore me at will, but to anyone who's involved in the "robots vs. aliens" debate, this post may be of interest to you. I understand that the nature of the creatures at the end of the movie is never really spelled out, but a good question to ask would be "Why do you think they're aliens?" Because they look like the stereotypical image of aliens? That's never explained definitively either. I believe (pretty strongly) that they're robots, for starters because of the thematic symmetry between man wanting to understand his "creator," God, and robots wanting to understand their "creator," man (looking like the statue that greeted David on his way out of the factory certainly helps reinforce the idea), which has already been addressed in detail by other TalkBackers. Another thing to consider is that, if you look closely -- that is to say, if you care enough to re-examine the movie -- all of the creatures appear to have tiny circuits inside of their faces. Or maybe that's cosmic goo. I don't know.
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I don't agree on all of them, but good points nonetheless. And kudos to you all for keeping this the most civilized TB ever. Even though it's pretty much off topic all the time, the degree of politeness is so staggering it actually makes me think some of you are actual human beings. To keep it off topic: No other movie has brought greater awareness to the holocaust than SL. For the new generations, us who never experienced the war, this genocide was actually something that A LOT of people hadn't even heard of, let alone knew the vastness of. Then SL comes along, depicting the holocaust in a non-abstract, digestible way, and holocaust-awareness is on the rise, centers, organizations and funds are established etc. I think that's Steven Spielberg paying what he feels he owes.
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because there is no question that they are robots. They say they are robots. They say David is an earlier generation. Besides, having them be aliens would make absolutely no sense and not fit with the story. Anyone who argues that they are aliens needs to see the last part of the movie again and PAY ATTENTION!
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As I wrote above, some of the criticism I've read (not necessarily in this thread) of "AI" is very interesting-- certainly much more interesting than the movie itself (like the Brittan criticism of "Mandingo," which is more interesting, that is: smarter, than the movie itself). I don't recall the design of the statue outside the corporate office, I don't recall the design David was coloring, but I do recall the Gigolo Joe speech about the created searching for a creator. I interpreted Joe's remarks to be a commentary on the inherent immaturity of the species, that man is destined to be unfulfilled and disatisfied in searching for meaning outside himself; similarly, I interpreted the individuals at the end to be space aliens because I thought it was supposed to be ironic-- that the space aliens were the only characters in the movie who actually had any soul. My interpretation of the movie is as valid as anyone else's-- and I still think the movie is boringly awful. Still, I've enjoyed the talkback. Not going to be seeing WotW, though.
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1. You weren't bright enough to see the gaping flaws in its causal logic. OR
2. You don't care about gaping flaws in causal logic.
As one of the two also has to be true to enjoy T2, and most people apparently loved T2, that does seem to suggest that these two categories combined cover most of the population. -
You will be disappointed if you expected a lot more when you see it in theaters.
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DocP, concerning an earlier point you made, I completely agree that one crucial theme explored in the movie (AI) is HOW to create a robot with a soul, that acts and feels like a human, that can grow attachments in a self-reflexive manner, fully conscious of its self. That's what the movie starts out with, a speech by the 'father' of David, and how this whole project is a reaction to the death of his own son, the real David. And then at the end of this scene we see the company logo, which is obviously an allusion to the robots in the end (don't forget the scene towards the end of the movie when David after talking to his 'maker' wanders around his lab and looks through a mask of his mecha self and looks ominously at that prophetic logo, and a bit later on jumps off the ledge into the water while sitting right next to the statue, but lands his plunge right next to another statue, this time underwater: kind of like the Hermetic doctrine
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Quite possibly the most interesting post I've ever read in talkback. Thanks.
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well thank you too, since coming from you, I certainly take that as a compliment. But all what I wrote wouldn't have come about had I not read the posts so far in this talkback (including yours) which got me to reevaluate the film (I too started out thinking the robots in the end were aliens the first time I saw it, and that the film was not as "deep" as I expected, and wanted, it to be), so I watched it again last night. I can't express how warm and fuzzy I feel inside when things start to make more sense, which wouldn't be possible without "each other". I myself am grateful for the opinions posted in this talkback, even the annoying ones (they play a role in one's ongoing process of identity formation). On that note, time to call my Dad for father's day...
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Does anyone have the Cliff Notes for it?
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interesting post indeed, but with the time you spent on it, you could've secured the rights to and written your own remake of Zardoz. It probably would have been greenlight by the time all of us got through reading the post. Keep writing dude...
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Wow, Octaveaeon, that's some hardcore hermetic shit. Really interesting, since I'm always looking for occult links in pop culture (writing a dissertation on it in fact). I'm curious what the Egyptian wisdom in EWS is. I know the rituals had some connection to Dionysian rites (maybe)? I remember reading something that made me think "that's just like Eyes Wide Shut!" but I can't remember what. And I'm glad you saw the light about AI. And DrunkenRage you're perfectly entitled to your own interpretation, even when it's completely WRONG.
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Yeah, the length thing is a serious problem with me that won't be going away any time soon. Actually, I do have an idea for a screenplay (I know what you're thinking, "Oh God, one more...") that actually goes into the themes I've discussed here (and in other posts), but I doubt I would avoid any of the same mistakes I've seen in similar movies. Philosophers (or intellectuals in general, if I may be allowed this pompous label for the moment) do not make good artists (although some have succeeded). Oh well.. ************************************************************************************************** Oisin: (just quickly, since I'm studying right now) I've taken three Hermetics courses in the last year, so I too have a lot of interest in occult links in pop culture (this is actually one of the reasons why I decided to take these courses... throughout my philosophical and political readings, I felt a lot of information used by the authors was based on assumptions not make explicit by the authors [probably because they had not noticed themselves], and this in turn opened up a perspective on our historical and cultural development that had long remained hidden not only to me, but to the mainstream and non-specialists as well). Had I not learned more about the subject, I definately would not have seen these links in AI (which begs the question, "did I see what I wanted to see?", and is something that I, as a philosopher this time, am very weary about from my own perspective, since even academicians and scientists take many things for granted, which in hindsight puts into perspective their initial assumptions and conclusions). However, Eyes Wide Shut has a lot of elements which in the context of what I've been saying are not only relevant, but incredibly interesting (particularly the conspiratorial elements). The first thing that links both movies is the obvious fact that Kubrick was involved in both. The next one which struck me as I was watching AI last night is Venice. In AI, the voice-over describes how many coastal cities were completely inundated due to the effects of the greenhouse effect, and mentions three cities specifically: Amsterdam (where I live!), New York, and Venice. Now, I'm still not sure why the first two are mentioned (here in Amsterdam we do have the Ritman Library, also known as Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica, and is owned by the Rosicrucian Ritman, but whose main collection has been sold to the Dutch State in order to ensure that it's contents could not be sold off in order to pay back some outstanding debts, something I'm glad about... However, I have to say that I doubt this is the reason for the inclusion of Amsterdam, and I'm just mentioning this because I have a tendency of mentioning such trivia, thereby making my posts longer than necessary... still, I should add that Amsterdam was a very important center for publishing during the Renaissance and particulary during the troubles caused by the Reformation thanks to its tolerant approach to controversial ideas, and as a result many esoteric/occult/hermetic/gnostic books were written here, such as many of Athanasius Kircher's works... which eventually found their way throughout most of Europe). New York used to be called New Amsterdam, so there you go. Venice, however, is more clear to me (and I was there a year ago! After being in Verona! So you could say I visited the set of Romeo and Juliet AND The Merchant of Venice in one go! The sad thing is that only now I realize this...). First off, let me just give you this link: http://metaphilm.com/philm.php?id=108_0_2_0 I should add that I hold some different conclusions from what the author states himself, but can't go into them right now. However, if you have any questions or comments, please feel free to post back. I'll just finish by saying that you should look at EWS from the esoteric point of view of transmission, and what Kubrick's agenda could have been. There is no Egyptian wisdom discernible in the movie in the same way that there was none actually transmitted by masons and other secret societies (only assumptions that legitimized their beliefs and practices, while others managed to use the Egyptian origin stories and magic rituals as metaphorical tools for their own purposes). Nevertheless, these rituals continued being developed, and eventually made their way to the New World, to the point that many influential people around the world are affiliated to such groups (whether or not they are seeking world domination is something else). You're probably aware of this already, so I'll leave things here.
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Click to see it large. She wears braces! End of discussion, asswipe.
http://www.dakota-fanning.org/gallery/displayimage.php?album=421&pos=5 -
enough is enough.where are the reviews and spoilers for this movie?the only reason we view this nerd site is to get info and you cocksuckers have signed some non disclosure agreement with the bearded on.sell out mother fuckers
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It was a response to a post which indicated "nothing Spielberg makes is any good" by devilsadvct. Though it is hard to convey sarcasm in print form, I thought my choice of movies was a pretty good indicator. Sorry I got back so late, but i didn't know this thread was still going. Good job folks. Hopefully I won't be "banned from the internet," entirely for something that was my opinion. That would be something.
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In Victor Ziegler's house there is a statue of Psyche and Cupid, which is based on a tale that shows up in Lucius Apuleius' novel, The Golden Ass, written in the second century CE (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cupid_and_Psyche). This is what Frances Yates had to say on the subject: "Apuleius of Madaura is a striking example of one of those men, highly educated in the general culture of the Graeco-Roman world who, weary of the stale teachings of the schools, sought for salvation in the occult, and particularly in the Egyptian type of the occult. Born circa A.D. 123, Apuleius was educated at Carthage and at Athens and later travelled to Egypt where he became involved in a lawsuit in which he was accused of magic. He is famous for his wonderful novel, popularly known as 'The Golden Ass' the hero of which is transformed by witches into an ass, and after many sufferings in his animal form, is transformed back into human shape after an ecstatic vision of the goddess Isis, which comes to him on a lonely seashore whither he has wandered in despair. Eventually he becomes a priest of Isis in an Egyptian temple." This is an obvious reference to the use of occult/Hermetic/esoteric rituals by certain secret societies. However, this fits within a more general critique of how this cultural (wealthy) segment of the population has fallen into decadence. Tom Cruise is constantly bringing out his wallet whenever he needs something from somebody, and Nicole Kidman is practically a high-class tramp whose function is only to look pretty and serve as an object of fancy. Ziegler himself represents the tendency of the rich and bored to fall for the more superficial aspects of occult rituals only as an excuse to exchange favours and be involved in an orgy once in a while. However, the fact that Tom is mesmerized (and later scared) by the secrecy and mystery surrounding this cult and its adherents - combined with the catalyst of his anxiety, the discloruse by his wife of her erotic fantasies involving other men- serves to show sex, money, and power are themes that are intertwined and laid out to expose the vacuity, and self-delusion, of this environment, secret masonic/occultist groups in the States in particular. The title and the ending reveal this critical conclusion: after Tom tells his wife everything that he had gone through, which had been instigated by her questionable disclosure, confronted with the facts and their incapacity to exert any form of control, they remain with their Eyes Wide Shut and escape to their more most primal instinct so as to avoid the consequences of their (blind) subconscious drives. On another note, power, as depicted in the movie, is manifested by control of information, and the illusion of its value, which is the bread and butter of most of these cults, and similarly in elite Gentlemen's clubs (like Bohemian Grove), linked as they are to a network of power analogous to the European aristocracy which they in fact are the inheritors of (and a reason for all the allusions to Renaissance art and other European influences). So, you could say that like AI, it is this interplay between the need for knowledge and self-fulfilment on the one hand, and systems of control on the other, that ensnare and derail us from our course (such as false religious doctrines, materialism, untransparent ideologies, hidden agendas, hedonism, etc.). Both movies attempt to expose our most basic drives in the hope that we may avert regressing to complete lunacy (Clock Work Orange, The Shining?) or conformist acceptance that will only lead to our destruction. The end. Oh, and thanks for clearing that up Andsoitis, I almost emailed Spielberg my concept for an Indiana Jones movie where Hitler gets his hand on this ancient occult book that seems to predate antediluvian times and is in fact a book of laws given to God (which turns out to be a false God, the demiurge, which shatters the faiths of the monotheistic religions and sends large segments of the globe into panic) by a more primal entity. With this book, Hitler is capable of summoning this God (which turns out to have the properties of a demon, though doesn't act directly in a physical form) and eradicate all those in his path to world domination. later on Indy finds a way to transcend this existential plane and combat the demiurge in different dimensions and times, as if experiencing the jolts of quantum displacement. After he wins and saves the day, we see Indy's nurse wakes him up in his last moments before he finally gives his last breath, alone in a nursing home, a victim of the 80's. Oh well, I guess I can scrap that idea...
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If all the sequences he talks about actually happen in the film, then he wasn't a plant, and everyone can go pretend that they never said he was a plant, and go accuse the next reviewer of being one. Vicious cycle, really.
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