Movie: Interstellar - major spoilers

[Riverwind (imported)]

Tell us what you really think Gareth, hold nothing back...spit it out.

LOL

As I have said before, if you read the Hobbit, which I think we all did at some point and you take the movies 2 out on 1 on the way, don't confuse one with the other, only the names are the same to protect the guilty.

The second movie stands as a good movie, not to be confused with anything that happened in the book we all read so long ago. One does not translate to the other except in Peter Jackson's mind.

But as a movie, it was a good movie, just don't get hung up on "was it like the book, or was it anything like the book, Ok some of the names were the same as the book and some of the things in the movie loosely translates to the book in spots, doesn't happen often or for long.

However, if you compare the Hobbit part 2 with 2001, 2 wins hands down so I guess it depends on what you are comparing it to as 2001 was dead boring, the best and only half way good part was HAL and like all counter hero's he died but it was a good death.

River

[Slammr (imported)]

I agree with River here about the Hobbit. We're talking about two different things, a book, and a movie that just happens to have the same name as the book. It's a movie. Why should it follow the book exactly? I just saw the third movie, and it was one of my best movie experiences of the year, an exciting, entertaining, action filled movie. It fulfilled my reason for seeing a movie on the big screen, IMAX, in this case. I even stayed around for the second showing to see the first part of it again. If you want to grouse about how it's not like the book, fine. I read the book about 30 something years ago, and as I remember it, the book wasn't nearly as good as the movie was.

In my opinion, the third movie was the best. Each was better than the one preceding it.

[Paolo]

Bring me Peter Jackson's severed genitals AND head on a silver platter.

[Riverwind (imported)]

I guess its down to purest and non-purest, the only movie I have ever watched that was like the book was Shogun a TV mini series that took several weeks to show but even that had a couple things they changed because it made sense to do so.

I know there have been a couple others like 2001 which was written after the movie to match the movie but books are books, it leaves you with your imagination to fill in the blanks, (unless its Mitchner) and movies which must fill in the imagination for you. They are two different forms of entertainment and don't except one to match the other, if you try you will be disappointed. Having said that there are some movies that do follow the book not everything but they get it mostly right as in not changing the story line, where you can read the book and watch the movie and realize you were seeing/reading the same thing that's a win win. As for the Hobbit movies, I don't even remember the first one, it was not memorable, the second one was great and I can't wait to see the third one, as for the book, who cares.

River

[gareth19 (imported)]

I guess its down to purest and non-purest, the only movie I have ever watched that was like the book was Shogun a TV mini series that took several weeks to show but even that had a couple things they changed because it made sense to do so.

I know there have been a couple others like 2001 which was written after the movie to match the movie but books are books, it leaves you with your imagination to fill in the blanks, (unless its Mitchner) and movies which must fill in the imagination for you. They are two different forms of entertainment and don't except one to match the other, if you try you will be disappointed. Having said that there are some movies that do follow the book not everything but they get it mostly right as in not changing the story line, where you can read the book and watch the movie and realize you were seeing/reading the same thing that's a win win. As for the Hobbit movies, I don't even remember the first one, it was not memorable, the second one was great and I can't wait to see the third one, as for the book, who cares.

River

Of course books and movies are two entirely different media. Even so carefully crafted a movie as the Maltese Falcon differs in many respects from the book, but like the book, John Huston's Maltese Falcon is a work of art. Twilight, on the other hand is a piece of shit whether in print or on the silver screen. The fact that the actress playing Bella doesn't come close to having Bella's self-described creamy complexion and red hair is irrelevant; both Bellas are insufferable twits and none of characters compel interest. Of Hobbit-Two, Jackson's Thorin Oakenshield's maudlin yearning for his lost homeland also makes for an whiny, uncompelling figure, the Bella Swann of MiddleEarth. Jackson's characterization of the dwarves is based on the same modern "victim studies" mentality, and Thorin's whiny self-proclaimed victim status is both unheroic (Tolkien's Aragorn, an exiled king never whines about his hard lot or what he has lost) and all too reminiscent of Nazi lebensraum arguments. Moreover, Tolkien's Thorin is basically motivated by covetousness and undone by the motif of the rash promise which allows Tolkien's hero Bilbo to claim the arkenstone and so use it as a bargaining piece to secure a truce between men and dwarves. In Jackson's telling, Bilbo instead of peacemaker returns to the status as yet another item in Thorin's list of hardships that he has to put up with.

You are right that the dragon is an impressive bit of animation, and in the hands of a competent film-maker, it might have been used effectively, but to do that, the film would have had to concentrate on Tolkien's hero, Bilbo, who has the actual interview with Smaug. Once again, by concentrating his attention on the peripheral character of Thorin, Jackson has made a muddle of the whole thing. The movie interview lacks the terror of the book interview because Bilbo has been reduced in interest and Bilbo's observation of Smaug's weakness goes nowhere. Thorin does not battle the dragon and rather than the greatest of calamities Smaug becomes another of the annoyances poor victimized Thorin must put up with to regain his cherished homeland.

Because regaining the dwarvish kingdom is not integral to the story, Thorin's death is ultimately pointless. He doesn't regain the homeland nor does he make its attainment possible for the next generation (like Moses looking upon the Promised Land he can never enter). The story that Jackson has ultimately crafted about Thorin is a failure. He dies in the end without his homeland and with the arkenstone, but at the cost of conceding part of the treasure to men. The character that has been foisted off on him by Jackson is different from Tolkien's self-important snob, but far less compelling. Tolkien's Thorin at least learned humility on his journey and had to make compromises; Jackson's Thorin hasn't learned anything and hasn't gained anything. Considered not as a cinemagraphic reading of Tolkien's book but as a work in its own right, Jackson's Hobbit Trilogy is its own artistic failure.

[Riverwind (imported)]

I think you missed our point, forget the book forget that the book was ever written. Now look at the movie as just that, a movie. Does it do what a movie should do, entertain you. Yes it does that,so from that point of view the movie is a great success. You all are trying to tie the movie back to the book which is an error, they are not the same.

River