Rama's Screen

Most of us don’t have the eye to notice a few things that would indicate a movie’s twist ending. When Bruce Willis‘ character’s revelations was exposed at the end of The Sixth Sense, it was almost like a phenomenon, I think that’s what helped the movie banked big bucks at the box office and won Oscar nominations, because most audiences didn’t see the ending a mile away, it was so well crafted and well-wrapped by M. Night Shyamalan. The same goes for The Usual Suspect, I watched that movie over and over again on my DVD and still couldn’t spot anything early on that would at least inform me of Kevin Spacey’s real character…. Read the rest of this entry »

Going to theaters is one of the things I’ve enjoyed for years, being a movie blogger makes it even more intimate but often times there’d be movies that are just so god-awful, I can’t sit through the entire runtime. I’ve walked out of Friedberg and Seltzer’s horrible spoof movies especially the abomination called Meet The Spartans, I couldn’t stomach Halle Berry’s Catwoman either. I remember walking out, pissed off at Dragon Wars, that movie was trash! I was going to keep watching XXX: State Of The Union just to laugh at Ice Cube but plot got so ridiculous, I pulled a Cartman.. ‘Screw you guys, I’m going home!’
Have you ever walked out of a movie? Which one?

I’m the kinda guy who likes to watch movies in the theater, believe it or not I don’t even have a big collection of DVDs and Blu-Rays. So whenever a movie is going to open on a weekend, I’d always wanna catch it early either through press screenings, screener copies, midnight showings or simply going to the local theater. But often times, ya know how it is, there’d be a gazillion movies that arrive on the same weekend and I just couldn’t get to watch all of them.
So there were some that I missed out on last year but two stand out that I regret not watching, it’s The Boys Are Back starring Clive Owen and Coco Before Chanel starring Audrey Tautou. I’ve always admired those two actors. I’ve always believed Owen who is an Oscar nominee, got more to offer than just pointing a gun at someone and I’ve always thought Tatou would finally get her Oscar nod with her portrayal as the fashion icon but it may be a long shot.

Which movie that you regret not watching last year?

After watching No Country For Old Men 3 years ago, I was so pissed at the ambiguous ending, that and they didn’t show how Llewelyn Moss met his fateful end but then I thought ‘hey I’m a fan of The Coen Bros. I shouldn’t let this film beat me’. And so I watched it again and ya know what, it really helped. I finally understood what The Coens were trying to do and I appreciated the themes that I overlooked the first time around.
My friend thought Napoleon Dynamite was the dumbest thing ever when she first watched it. But after a second viewing, somehow Jared Hess‘ jokes and Jon Heder’s oddball performance got to her.
Sometimes there are movies that… eventually leaves you impressed.
But it doesn’t work all the time, I tried watching AVATAR again the other day to try and understand why everybody but me thinks it’s one of the best films of all time, why Golden Globes awarded it with Best Picture Drama. But nope, didn’t work, my opinion still stands. Despite the mindblowing VFX, I still couldn’t get past the unoriginal storyline and the weak dialogue.

Which movie that you had to watch twice to finally appreciate it?

Let’s see there was that one time in a local theater, where the douchebag sitting a couple rows in front of us had his cell phone on, so the bright light from the screen was distracting. Of course that was nothing compared to the rowdiness of a jam packed theater at the midnight showing of The Hangover, while we were waiting for the “regal first look” ads to start, some jerkoff was laser-pointing the screen and his dumbass buddies were laughing like it was the funniest sh*t in the world.
Not just in the theater, I could remember attending a movie night at my friend’s house, there were like 6 of us or so, and one of them was hella sick, like sneezing and coughing sick, blowing his nose every 5 minutes I couldn’t hear the movie no matter how loud the volume was, downright annoying.

What were some of your worst movie-watching experiences?

Bromantic comedy is under scrutiny, not everybody seems to think it’s a fun concept after all, certainly not the estate of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle which according to WENN has threatened to withdraw the screen rights to SHERLOCK HOLMES from director Guy Ritchie if Ritchie insists on keeping the hints at a homosexual relationship between Holmes and Watson for the sequel… Read the rest of this entry »

My friends and I watched AVATAR last weekend and although we agreed that it was visually spectacular, the story was like Dances With Wolves meets Planet of the Apes but with Cameron’s writing style. Rama’s SCREEN reader moviebuff watched the trailer for KNIGHT AND DAY the other day and it reminded him of True Lies.
Ya know what’s weird,.. most indie,… or so-called indie flicks since Little Miss Sunshine is becoming more and more alike  in their coming-of-age tone, Sunshine Cleaning, Juno, The Wackness,

Nowadays when you hear a project being developed it’s always described as so-and-so title meets so-and so-title, it’s as if it has to be a mixture of two movies in the past to be considered an original work.

Don’t get me even started on the remakes, sequels, game-based movies, TV-based movies, comic-based movies, especially those that were unbearable because they were not faithful to the materials.
The first half of 2000s was like a battle between fantasy adventure flicks like LOTR, Harry Potter and Narnia, the last half of 2000s was full of one vampire movie after another.

Once in a while, you’ll get filmmakers like Paul Thomas Anderson or Quentin Tarantino that dared to kick you in the teeth, turning the victims into heroes like making the Jews actually kill the Nazis for once.
Now that we’re at the end of 2009, as we look back… how would you grade this past decade as far as movies concerned? average? Awesome? 5 out of 5? Was there really a truly original movie?

And as we look forward to the next decade,.. what do you think the next 10 years will hold for us movie freaks? Is it going to be pretty much the same dish, just a modified version, 3D versions of mixtures of titles from the past?

We’re almost at the end of 2009 and I figured, before I go on to share with you some more headlines, let us stop for a moment to think back and remember. Rama’s SCREEN has been around for almost 3 years now and I thank you for being such awesome readers but I’m sure you’ve spotted some things about this blog that you like the best or particularly don’t like at all. Do you have any suggestions on how Rama’s SCREEN can better itself? What do you think it lacks? What do you think needs improving and what do you think is worth keeping cause it works just fine? Think of this as a mini survey.
Feel free to share your opinions in the comment section. Don’t worry about being nice, I can take criticism,.. just don’t drop F-bombs if you don’t have to, ok?

Some say Jingle All The Way was the worst Holiday/Christmas movie of all time. I don’t know if I agree with that opinion because the sense of urgency was fun and entertaining to watch, plus it was hard not to like anything that the late great Phil Hartman was a part of.
Holiday movies have been making their way into theaters in the first week of November instead of after Thanksgiving weekend. I feel like Thanksgiving doesn’t seem to be appreciated anymore, Christmas decoration and music are all over Starbucks and not a turkey talk was around. But then again, there’s no such thing as a Thanksgiving movie, is there?

So Holiday movies are usually synonymous with Christmas. Speaking of which, those Home Alone 3 and 4 were dreadful, I never even liked any of Tim Allen’s Santa Clause movies. And what’s up with Vince Vaughn visiting this genre just one year apart from each other? (Fred Claus and Four Christmases)

What about retelling old classic like the 1994 remake of Miracle On 34th Street?
After nearly one month since its release, Robert Zemeckis‘ A CHRISTMAS CAROL in 3D sadly only earned $96 Million domestically. The movie was made with a budget of about $175 Million.

Is it easier to pick out the worst Holiday films because Hollywood never seem to get it right?
Remember Surviving Christmas or Christmas With The Cranks or Deck The Halls?
I think It’s A Wonderful Life is an endearing classic, but re-running it every year might turn it into the most irritating.
What’s the worst Holiday movie you’ve ever seen?

Here’s a big rumor from today, via Slashfilm, the website SpoilerTV noticed a peculiar casting call for SPIDER-MAN 4 involving a toddler…

2 or 3 year old boy to play 2 year old, Caucasian with RED HAIR, an adorable toddler with an engaging personality, on set experience preferred. IDENTICAL TWINS ONLY

Red Hair… Mary Jane (Kirsten Dunst) has red hair right? Does this mean Peter Parker have a son? Or is he Harry Osborn’s son?
Wait, will we see Peter and Mary as lovy dubby couple with a kid or is Mary a single mom keeping the kid a secret from Parker?
Or maybe this… toddler.. will have connection whatsoever to Peter at all?
Let your imagination run wild, how do you think the story might play out?