Star Wars: The Force Awakens |OT| A New Hope

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It was.

If anyone hasn't read the Making of Star Wars book, go and read it now! It's practically mandatory reading if you are a Star Wars fan or just interested in moviemaking and film history. It also makes you wonder what George Lucas did in his youth to collect the sort of karma that followed that production. It's a wonder the film was ever made.
ANH is the definitive "saved in the edit" movie. Paul Hirsch, Marcia Lucas, Richard Chew, John Williams, Ben Burtt and the legion of ILM guys are owed heaps and heaps of credit.
 
No one involved with X-Men is working on any of these movies so I have no idea what's happening in this thread.
My point was you can get a yes man for movie three a la Brett Ratner or Richard Marquand to stick the landing because the tone and aesthetic already exists. Paint by numbers and such.
 
Even accounting for inflation, though, I still think the movie turned out as well as anyone reasonably could have hoped, and could be a player in an Oscar race that already was shaping up to be pretty unconventional before this latest twist. (See Mad Max: Fury Road, Creed, etc.)

Why? Because people inside and outside of the industry really want to love The Force Awakens — that's why anticipation has been so great that tracking suggests it could set a new record for opening weekend and achieve an enormous box-office gross. J.J. Abrams, in essentially rebooting Star Wars following three disappointing installments around the turn of the century, takes the franchise back to its roots in story, look and feel.

Frankly, I wouldn't be shocked if Abrams scores a best director nom. Indeed, much of the praise for the film after the premiere was reserved for him, and thanks to vocal champions like Steven Spielberg and Ava DuVernay, I could see enough members of the directors branch getting behind him to land him in the race.
Yas, get that acclaim, JJ. Let's hope the praise is universal.
 
My point was you can get a yes man for movie three a la Brett Ratner or Richard Marquand to stick the landing because the tone and aesthetic already exists. Paint by numbers and such.

But your point is inherently flawed because X3 is regarded by 99% of people as the worst X-Men film to date, meaning a yes man is not successful all the time even with solid groundwork.
 
It's kind of amazing that the movie doesn't completely fall apart in the first 30 minutes or so of the movie. You start off with that awesome Star Destroyer opening that sets a really good space action tone, and then the pacing of the movie basically comes to an absolute stop once the droids get on Tatooine and it doesn't really pick up at all until everyone gets to the Death Star.

Well, those pre titles James Bond movies are the same. Give the audience a hot right out the gate, then setup the real story.
 
Robots from the 90s were mostly trash, save for Iron Giant.

still the most boring ass movie I've ever seen in the cinema

Bicentennial-Man.jpeg


Its an in-joke with my family who saw it back in the day. Whenever we see something bad or boring, we rate it on the Bicentennial Man scale.
 
That's cool, consider my statement redacted.

No worries, when you have ViewtifulJC pretend like the hate is universal and it's weird hearing someone like the movie even though general consensus was positive, the reviews weren't too bad and it is one of the highest selling home releases (if people didn't like it in theaters would they buy it?)

I know he's just trying to get a rile, but I like to poke back :p
 
ANH is the definitive "saved in the edit" movie. Paul Hirsch, Marcia Lucas, Richard Chew, John Williams, Ben Burtt and the legion of ILM guys are owed heaps and heaps of credit.

Sure, but comes across as well is that George Lucas also knew what he was doing, and he really was a visionary, if such hyperbole words are allowed.

Then again, he also invented the midichlorians before the first film.
 
No worries, when you have ViewtifulJC and the usual suspects pretending like the hate is universal and it's weird hearing someone like the movie even though general consensus was positive, the reviews weren't too bad and it is one of the highest selling home releases (if people didn't like it in theaters would they buy it?)

I know he's just trying to get a rile, but I like to poke back :p

are we talking about JW or TPM here, for the record
 
So do we really have to listen to Trevorrow sucks Episode IX gonna suck until 2019 when it turns out to be good? Because if so that's annoying as all hell. None of you know how he'll do. It's kneejerk cynicism because you didn't like his dinosaur movie. I didn't like Brick or Looper but I'm not worried about VIII because it's a different thing and I trust that Rian, in conjunction with Kathleen and the others at Lucasfilm will ensure that it's good.

I think, based on the other big-franchise blockbuster he just released six months ago, people can make an educated guess about how well or not he'll do. It's not "kneejerk cynicism," it's evidence-based assumptions.

That said, I didn't like Brick or The Brothers Bloom at all, but loved Looper and Rian's Breaking Bad work, so who knows.
 
But your point is inherently flawed because X3 is regarded by 99% of people as the worst X-Men film to date, meaning a yes man is not successful all the time even with solid groundwork.

Thankfully it's an opinion! Although lol X3 is STILL the highest grossing X-Men movie to date domestically, beating out SUPERMAN RETURNS that summer. Yes I think the bean counters will tell you getting Ratner was a SOLID WIN!

Besides I know numerous people that think the first two X-movies aged horribly and the third movie gets points for being a live-action version of the cartoon.
 
Troll post? I think at worst it'll be mediocre.

Have you even read the tagged part? I'm keeping expectations low to not be disappointed.

Still super excited though, as this is going to be my first Star Wars movie I'm gonna watch in theater. ('97 born, so only 8 years old as III hit)
 
Sure, but comes across as well is that George Lucas also knew what he was doing, and he really was a visionary, if such hyperbole words are allowed.

Then again, he also invented the midichlorians before the first film.

"I get by with a little help from my friends"
 
Thankfully it's an opinion! Although lol X3 is STILL the highest grossing X-Men movie to date domestically, beating out SUPERMAN RETURNS that summer. Yes I think the bean counters will tell you getting Ratner was a SOLID WIN!

Besides I know numerous people that think the first two X-movies aged horribly and the third movie gets points for being a live-action version of the cartoon.

Box office numbers can make for a successful film, sure, but not a good film. No will here will question whether Episode IX will absolutely kill it at the BO, but rather if it will be a good film in the process of all that.
 
Box office numbers can make for a successful film, sure, but not a good film. No will here will question whether Episode IX will absolutely kill it at the BO, but rather if it will be a good film in the process of all that.

Considering the directing of Jurassic World was great (it was the story that suffered) I don't see any reason why IX would be a bad film.
 
I think, based on the other big-franchise blocker he just released six months ago, people can make an educated guess about well or not he'll do. It's not "kneejerk cynicism," it's evidence-based assumptions.

I don't really think you can. A movie is made by many people and there are different writers. People seemed to have the biggest issues with the script which again was written by four people and went through hell. Whatever Trevorrow did on Jurassic World isn't necessarily going to transfer over to Star Wars, it's just not that simple as so many variables are mightily in play.

Martin Campbell made Casino Royale, as well as some of the worst movies I've ever seen like Vertical Limit. So I'm not so sure you can really make an educated guess because that would require so much more knowledge and foresight than any of us here have. You can not like Jurassic World and you can even hate his directing and yet it still doesn't pave a locked path by any means toward whether or not IX will be good or bad.
 
Considering the directing of Jurassic World was great (it was the story that suffered) I don't see any reason why IX would be a bad film.

I didn't think it was great, seemed like any other big budget blockbuster to me. I also really dislike the entirety of the movie though so I know I'm not looking at it objectively.
 
Yes I think the bean counters will tell you getting Ratner was a SOLID WIN!

Yeah? I think it's rather more likely that X3 stood on the shoulders of its predecessors. As a film, its quality arguably took the air out of the franchise and went on to negatively impact the bankability of the next couple of installments.
 
Still super excited though, as this is going to be my first Star Wars movie I'm gonna watch in theater. ('97 born, so only 8 years old as III hit)
Same here. Was 13 when ROTS cam out, and I had no interest in Star Wars back then. Can't wait to see this new movie in theaters
 
Trevorrow manages to craft a hugely entertaining and successful blockbuster (which, note, was a reboot of a 20 year old moribund franchise), but HE'S the guy some folks are worried about.
 
I don't really think you can. A movie is made by many people and there are different writers. People seemed to have the biggest issues with the script which again was written by four people and went through hell. Whatever Trevorrow did on Jurassic World isn't necessarily going to transfer over to Star Wars, it's just not that simple as so many variables are mightily in play.

Martin Campbell made Casino Royale, as well as some of the worst movies I've ever seen like Vertical Limit. So I'm not so sure you can really make an educated guess because that would require so much more knowledge and foresight than any of us here have. You can not like Jurassic World and you can even hate his directing and yet it still doesn't pave a locked path by any means toward whether or not IX will be good or bad.

lol, it really is not that big an effort. Using a director's past films to make educated guesses about how well he or she will fare on their future work isn't a 100 percent science, but it's often a pretty good predictor, and has been for, like, almost 100 years.

But you're right that other people do come into play and can filter out a director's weaknesses or highlight his strengths. And if Episode IX is being co-written by Rian Johnson (which isn't confirmed, but he did write the treatment and Kennedy mentioned that IX will be a very collaborative effort between Rian and Trevorrow) then I have more hope for how Trevorrow will handle that movie despite not liking JW much at all.

Trevorrow manages to craft a hugely entertaining and successful blockbuster (which, note, was a reboot of a 20 year old moribund franchise), but HE'S the guy some folks are worried about.

Well I liked MI3, Looper, and both Star Treks way more than JW, so...yes?
 
Trevorrow manages to craft a hugely entertaining and successful blockbuster (which, note, was a reboot of a 20 year old moribund franchise), but HE'S the guy some folks are worried about.

Working off a 10 year old dev hell Frankenstein script. I think he did damn well with what he was given.
 
I would rather have a interesting conversation about the movie.
Why can't a movie with universal praise (Or near-universal, since no movie actually gets universal praise) have an interesting conversation about it?

Interesting conversation doesn't have to just pertain to whether a movie is good or not.
 
I meant your comment about "universal praise"
Hoping for universal praise = hoping the movie is so good everyone likes it.

You want there to be people who hate it just so you can have an "interesting conversation"?

A lot of your posts in this thread make it seem like you want the movie to be bad.
 
So quick recap of early impressions: mostly positive. The negatives being it is too much like Star Wars and the story may not be up to par.

I am pretty happy to hear no complaints (so far) about the acting, stupid characters, or any of the other big problems of the prequels.
 
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