Post by JangoB on Oct 11, 2019 11:48:58 GMT
A lot of people are now lamenting Ang Lee's decision to take on this long-in-development basic script but let's be fair - his interest in technology is not a recent thing. Yes, Lee is known is a wonderful character director with a strong and honest emotional sensibility but he's also been experimenting with some pretty hi-tech stuff since the early 2000s. He likes a techno challenge: "Hulk", "Life of Pi", "Billy Lynn" and now this. It's pretty obvious that he chose this script because he wanted to flex his muscles with the high frame rate and the CGI and do it with the most universal and simple story possible so that this time folks would actually go see it (as opposed to the unfairly forgotten "Billy Lynn"). What disappointed me was that Lee failed to make the film interesting from a character standpoint, and that's something that, in my opinion, he never failed to do in the past. Even with "Hulk", which was an interesting mixed bag of a movie, it was clear that Lee was actually trying to reach for a deeper connection to Bruce Banner's inner turmoil than any other Hulk movies have done since. So it's curious that here the material is not about character development and character exploration, and is all about characters trying to get from point A to point B to point C with some action in between.
With that in mind, I don't think the film deserves this bashing that it's been getting. Yes, the script is pretty basic and there ain't much of human interest to it. But it works well as a technological showcase and as a piece of entertainment...it works okay. I never thought that Ang Lee would be doing films with Jerry Bruckheimer but the idea itself is actually intriguing to me. It's not as exciting and energetic as your upper-tier Bruckheimer flick but I think it's an interesting addition to his oeuvre.
Obviously the main reason to see this is the HFR thing and thankfully now a lot of people have a chance to experience something that is at least close to Lee's ultimate vision. I saw it in 60 FPS and in 3D and while the 3D thing is still something that is just unnecessary, the HFR to me was actually pretty amazing. I'm not sure it's the future of cinema as Lee feels but as one of the options for the future? I'm all in for it. Critics complaining that it looks like your TV's motion smoothing are just silly - the TV function is way creakier and phonier while this film was actually filmed that way and the result looked damn good to me. Especially during the action sequences which I wish there were more of. Dunno how you folks are gonna feel about it (and btw, definitely go see it with the high frame rate because I don't see much point in seeing it in the regular 24 FPS format since it wasn't intended to be this way and the point will be missed) but I found the HFR thing to be an incredible fit with the action in this movie. Lee smartly keeps the action on ground level and doesn't really have any huge setpieces - it's mostly fighting between two or three characters or low-key shootups. But the HFR makes the action scenes truly exciting, more visceral and more real. The primary purpose of the format is to make the wall between cinema and reality much thinner and I think the format does accomplish that nicely. The fights simply have more impact because they look more real and they become more fun because of that. And the bigger action setpieces were awesome too. It's not the most eye-pleasing movie Lee's made but there are some very good shots that take advantage of the HFR, especially one long take with Will Smith driving a bike through the streets of Cartagena. You feel truly there. Again, it's a shame that the material wasn't better because it could've been a terrific movie. Unfortunately it ends up being an okay movie with some terrific new techno.
As far as the young Will Smith thing is concerned, for me the work of the CGI artists was pretty amazing. The only scene in which young Smith looks kinda fake was the very last one but other than that? Pretty seamless. Folks needs to remember that it ain't just simply de-aging - it's a fully digital human being based on Smith's performance capture. Which is an enourmous challenge in and of itself. It's twice more challenging because of the HFR since it makes everything look more real so the responsibility of creating a totally real-looking digital human grows even higher. And I think they really pulled it off, apart from the last scene. It's pretty incredible stuff.
So yeah, the movie itself is okay and unfortunately less special than it should've been. But its technogolical experiments and achivements did leave a strong impression on me. And who can blame Lee for wanting to make a safe and basic script with Will Smith after his last techno-thing flopped so badly?
With that in mind, I don't think the film deserves this bashing that it's been getting. Yes, the script is pretty basic and there ain't much of human interest to it. But it works well as a technological showcase and as a piece of entertainment...it works okay. I never thought that Ang Lee would be doing films with Jerry Bruckheimer but the idea itself is actually intriguing to me. It's not as exciting and energetic as your upper-tier Bruckheimer flick but I think it's an interesting addition to his oeuvre.
Obviously the main reason to see this is the HFR thing and thankfully now a lot of people have a chance to experience something that is at least close to Lee's ultimate vision. I saw it in 60 FPS and in 3D and while the 3D thing is still something that is just unnecessary, the HFR to me was actually pretty amazing. I'm not sure it's the future of cinema as Lee feels but as one of the options for the future? I'm all in for it. Critics complaining that it looks like your TV's motion smoothing are just silly - the TV function is way creakier and phonier while this film was actually filmed that way and the result looked damn good to me. Especially during the action sequences which I wish there were more of. Dunno how you folks are gonna feel about it (and btw, definitely go see it with the high frame rate because I don't see much point in seeing it in the regular 24 FPS format since it wasn't intended to be this way and the point will be missed) but I found the HFR thing to be an incredible fit with the action in this movie. Lee smartly keeps the action on ground level and doesn't really have any huge setpieces - it's mostly fighting between two or three characters or low-key shootups. But the HFR makes the action scenes truly exciting, more visceral and more real. The primary purpose of the format is to make the wall between cinema and reality much thinner and I think the format does accomplish that nicely. The fights simply have more impact because they look more real and they become more fun because of that. And the bigger action setpieces were awesome too. It's not the most eye-pleasing movie Lee's made but there are some very good shots that take advantage of the HFR, especially one long take with Will Smith driving a bike through the streets of Cartagena. You feel truly there. Again, it's a shame that the material wasn't better because it could've been a terrific movie. Unfortunately it ends up being an okay movie with some terrific new techno.
As far as the young Will Smith thing is concerned, for me the work of the CGI artists was pretty amazing. The only scene in which young Smith looks kinda fake was the very last one but other than that? Pretty seamless. Folks needs to remember that it ain't just simply de-aging - it's a fully digital human being based on Smith's performance capture. Which is an enourmous challenge in and of itself. It's twice more challenging because of the HFR since it makes everything look more real so the responsibility of creating a totally real-looking digital human grows even higher. And I think they really pulled it off, apart from the last scene. It's pretty incredible stuff.
So yeah, the movie itself is okay and unfortunately less special than it should've been. But its technogolical experiments and achivements did leave a strong impression on me. And who can blame Lee for wanting to make a safe and basic script with Will Smith after his last techno-thing flopped so badly?