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Paul W.S. Anderson

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How...or should I say why is he working in Hollywood today? The only thing that he has been involved in that was halfway decent was the 1st half of Event Horizon (director) before the movie completely fell apart. Why does he keep getting jobs? And why do they mention his name in trailers/previews/etc like that's a good thing?
 

=W=

Member
Because Hollywood, much like everyone else, thinks your opinion is worthless. Especially when his movies make money.
 

ElyrionX

Member
Because mainstream is stupid......

Even the Paul Anderson haters pay to watch his goddamn films because of the underlying license.
 

Screaming_Gremlin

My QB is a Dick and my coach is a Nutt
ElyrionX said:
Because mainstream is stupid......

Even the Paul Anderson haters pay to watch his goddamn films because of the underlying license.

There is some truth to that. I went to go watch AVP even though I knew it would suck. I just pray he doesn't get involved any other other franchises I like.
 
Because there are far worse directors out there and all the good directors are busy working on what they want to not what the studios want them to.
 

FoneBone

Member
ElyrionX said:
Because mainstream is stupid......

Even the Paul Anderson haters pay to watch his goddamn films because of the underlying license.
You might have a point. I thought AVP sucked, and I'd still pay to see AVP2.

What's really screwed up is a lot of the people I'me meeting at college thing AVP was a good movie. This saddens me.
 

cvxfreak

Member
Maybe he doesn't suck as much as we all think.

I only saw the RE movies, and liked them both to a certain extent)
 

DarienA

The black man everyone at Activision can agree on
Because Paul's movies consistently turn profits... haters must simply deal.
 
Warm Machine said:
Because there are far worse directors out there and all the good directors are busy working on what they want to not what the studios want them to.

There's your answer.

In Hollywood you have your Tarrantinos, Spielbergs, Scorseses, etc. Then there's another set of directors that are kinda there just to get the job done. They don't have a very noticable style, but they will get a movie done and out to the public.

Another huge thing you should realize is that it's extremely unfair to blame a movie for being bad just on the director. That's absolutely ridiculous considering how many people are involved in a film.
 

FoneBone

Member
Idle Will Kill said:
Another huge thing you should realize is that it's extremely unfair to blame a movie for being bad just on the director. That's absolutely ridiculous considering how many people are involved in a film.
Maybe if Anderson didn't keep writing his own movies...
 
Idle Will Kill said:
There's your answer.

In Hollywood you have your Tarrantinos, Spielbergs, Scorseses, etc. Then there's another set of directors that are kinda there just to get the job done. They don't have a very noticable style, but they will get a movie done and out to the public.

Another huge thing you should realize is that it's extremely unfair to blame a movie for being bad just on the director. That's absolutely ridiculous considering how many people are involved in a film.


Paul W S Anderson is notorious for writing and directing the crap he releases. Thats alot of the "creative" work that he shoulders. I use the term "creative" as loosely as possible
 

FoneBone

Member
In my opinion, Anderson is a technically competent director who simply doesn't have any originality. And he can't write, either.
 

KingGondo

Banned
Idle Will Kill said:
Another huge thing you should realize is that it's extremely unfair to blame a movie for being bad just on the director. That's absolutely ridiculous considering how many people are involved in a film.

But when a director frequently attaches his name to utter shit, it becomes more and more difficult to not assign blame to the main man in charge.
 

COCKLES

being watched
FoneBone said:
In my opinion, Anderson is a technically competent director who simply doesn't have any originality. And he can't write, either.

I agree totally. But he *does* know how to put some nice shots together.

I don't think AVP was as terrible as all the internet jump-on-Harry-Knowles-cock-bandwagon fanboys would make you believe. It has some really nice shots. The opening which tailgates the end of ALIENS where the Alien Queen crest image is actually the orbiting space station was superb - the film has 3 or 4 really nice scenes and images...which lets face it was 3 or 4 more then either Alien 3* or Alien 4 had.

I kinda feel Shane Serlano has got off scott-free with AVP. He made a lot of changes to the script (original was set in Eygpt if I remember correctly), including some sub-plots.

I rate them ALIENS > ALIEN >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> AVP > ALIEN 3 >>>>>>> AR.

*please Alien fanboys, can we stop this recent anti AVP dirge that I've been reading on the net recently. That the new 20 mins of Alien 3 turn the film from crap into an instant classic? No they don't. Alien 3 was a disaster when it hits cinemas and it's still a disaster with 20 extra mins. I've rather watch AVP tenfold then suffer Alien 3 ever again.
 
ManaByte said:
Paul W.S. Anderson is Uwe Boll with a budget.

Not even in the same league. Uwe Boll is akin to directors of straight to video sci-fi movies shot on cheap sound stages with 2 lights.

Paul Anderson is much more visual and creative than that...though not near the top league in either aspect.

His big problem is his lack of subtlety, his inability to build tension, and his lack of pace. His stories always seem to rush to the "cool" stuff at the expense of character development or tension.

As well, sometimes hit shots just have no motivation behind them. What is the reason of showing face huggers flying through the air in slow motion? Is it to see how poetic and cool they look at that speed? Play that in normal motion and you've got a shot, do what he did and you illict a groan. A film like the Matrix can get away with it because the world and the story is designed around the principle of being able to do things that would otherwise be impossible so the shot feeds the story.

His writing is also very contrived. Every piece of AVP fits together in a ridiculously convenient fashion to feed a plot about a temple under the ice where aliens and predators can fight. Work your way through the story and you can see why each and every decision was made. It is like he wrote a dream list of things from other movies he wanted and then wrote crazy explantions as to why they would fit together. The only reason why that temple is under the ice to begin with is because he thought archeologists would have found it by now if it weren't. What is the answer...either don't have a fucking pyramid as a setting (though that would change the chariots of the gods angle of the Predators) or have the pyramid recently uncovered in the jungles of Mexico by a group of archaeologists and trust the audience won't call bullshit (But that would invalidate the whaling station type setting taken from The Thing and he wouldn't be able to take the team coming together scene from Jurassic Park including the helicopter ride)....but it can't be Mexico because the Aliens might escape into civilization so it has to be remote so it has to be antartica...see it is just a dumb concept that is creating a cyclical story that has to be plot filled!

Regardless, as much as I think Soldier is one of the dumbest movies of all time his other films are reasonably entertaining and show some spark of creativity from time to time.

I'd rather sit through another Anderson film that any of these guys next work....

Steve De Souza
Mark A.Z. Dippé
Steve Barron
John R. Leonetti
Stephen Hopkins
Uwe Boll
Andy Morahan
Christian Duguay
 

DarienA

The black man everyone at Activision can agree on
Warm Machine said:
I'd rather sit through another Anderson film that any of these guys next work....

Steve De Souza

This man speaks the truth!
 
COCKLES said:
I agree totally. But he *does* know how to put some nice shots together.

It has some really nice shots. The opening which tailgates the end of ALIENS where the Alien Queen crest image is actually the orbiting space station was superb

Alien 3 was a disaster when it hits cinemas and it's still a disaster with 20 extra mins.

Anderson does know how to pull shots together from time to time but that Alien Queen satellite design was completely contrived! What the hell are the chances that someone would design a satellite that would have panels that looked identical to the Queen? It is like in Event Horizon where the Warp Room had killer spikes everywhere. Who the hell at NASA approved that design? It is a visual that defies the reality of a situation to force a point and that is all it exists for.

Alien 3 is a far better film in ANY capacity than AVP was and I enjoyed AVP.
 

COCKLES

being watched
Warm Machine said:
Anderson does know how to pull shots together from time to time but that Alien Queen satellite design was completely contrived! What the hell are the chances that someone would design a satellite that would have panels that looked identical to the Queen? It is like in Event Horizon where the Warp Room had killer spikes everywhere. Who the hell at NASA approved that design? It is a visual that defies the reality of a situation to force a point and that is all it exists for.

Alien 3 is a far better film in ANY capacity than AVP was and I enjoyed AVP.

Er...it's not designed to look like it is it? It's a ruse shot...you think your seeing an Alien through the ether (which immediately brings about memories of ALIENS ending), but is actually a space station. Just a more visually arresting method of introducing the station orbiting earth and the subsequant scenes.
 

refreshZ

Member
COCKLES said:
I've rather watch AVP tenfold then suffer Alien 3 ever again.

lol.gif


Jesus X your opinion sucks.
 
The AVP movie we got would have been a better film if...

The female lead actually fell to her death in the pit and left the Italian guy to deal with the Predator and remaining Aliens. This would have gone against who we thought from the opening reel who would live and die and would flip the Alien film expectation of the woman surviving at the end back on us.
 

COCKLES

being watched
refreshZ said:
lol.gif


Jesus X your opinion sucks.

Well it's good if you want 2 hours of crap POV shots, boring bald prisoners shouting 'wanker' and the worst FX in the entire series. The Alien doesn't even have it's backspines...and no don't excuse that flaw because the Alien comes out of a dog. And worst of all, it's just so deadly dull.
 
COCKLES said:
Well it's good if you want 2 hours of crap POV shots, boring bald prisoners shouting 'wanker' and the worst FX in the entire series. The Alien doesn't even have it's backspines...and no don't excuse that flaw because the Alien comes out of a dog. And worst of all, it's just so deadly dull.

Giger didn't like the backspines so he removed them from his designs and so did the effects designers who worked on the creature.

The movie has the some of the best cinematography and composition of any of the films rivaling Alien. I would say it also has the best character dialouge and acting out of any of the films. Yes the actual Rod Puppet matting looks terrible but the suit effects are fantastic. The musical score is as good or better than any of the previous films as well. The opening version of Agnus Dei is unbelievable as is the final Adagio. Thankfully the movie actually has the right atmosphere and mood unlike Resurrection which is just a comic book farce.

If it were any other creature feature people would be going mad over it but as it is an Alien film people bash the hell out of it. It isn't the follow up to the series I particularily wanted but as a movie unto itself it is excellent.
 

COCKLES

being watched
Warm Machine said:
Giger didn't like the backspines so he removed them from his designs and so did the effects designers who worked on the creature.

The movie has the some of the best cinematography and composition of any of the films rivaling Alien. I would say it also has the best character dialouge and acting out of any of the films. Yes the actual Rod Puppet matting looks terrible but the suit effects are fantastic. The musical score is as good or better than any of the previous films as well. The opening version of Agnus Dei is unbelievable as is the final Adagio. Thankfully the movie actually has the right atmosphere and mood unlike Resurrection which is just a comic book farce.

If it were any other creature feature people would be going mad over it but as it is an Alien film people bash the hell out of it. It isn't the follow up to the series I particularily wanted but as a movie unto itself it is excellent.

I agree the soundtrack is fantastic...even if it isn't very ALIENish. I just found it deadly dull...and oh so contrived, the whole 'nothing works' angle really began to grate and by the end it looks as if Fincher loses interest with POV shot after POV shot.

As for the back pipes, well even Fincher arrived on set and asked where they were and Woodruff and co made some new ones and glued them on but they kept flopping around so they have to remove them again.

Alien 3 is defined by the sloppy opening moment for me...typical Friday the 13th sequel beginning with the egg, the cryogenic tubes that look nothing like the ones in the Sulaco in Aliens and an EEV built like a brick that would quite obviously fall like one if it entered an atmosphere...which it does conveinatly killing off Hicks and Newt. I was pissed, James Cameron was pissed, everyone was pissed over that little gem.

Stan Winston defined the sequel for me. "A sequel should give you everything you saw before, but also something new". Alien 3 gives you less then you saw in Alien & Aliens and nothing new bar Dog Alien. While AR was total shit on paper (sorry Joss), at least he tried to give us a new chilling version of the Alien...shame Jenuet fucked it up.
 
D

Deleted member 1235

Unconfirmed Member
does an alien take on features of it's host critter? I can't remember the dog alien thing... I don't remember Alien 3 very well at all, although I do remember liking the "alien cam" I'm sure it was better than AVP though.

2 of the predators were just piss weak, Bishop wasn't explained at all and the whole alien spear/shield thing was cheesy as.
 

Dead

well not really...yet
Whats with the AVP defense? How can any Alien fan stand up for this dreck? As if these franchises werent sullied enough, AVP is an even further tarnish. Theres nothing redeemable about it, its a complete failure in almost every sense and an utter embarassment. Alien 3 and Resurection are masterpieces compared to it. Inane storytelling and an utter disregard for the films that preceeded it, jesus I thought Anderson was a fan of these movies, so then why did he single handedly rape these 2 franchises in one shot.

Im utterly amazed that some people defend this shit.
 

COCKLES

being watched
DeadStar said:
Whats with the AVP defense? How can any Alien fan stand up for this dreck? As if these franchises werent sullied enough, AVP is an even further tarnish. Theres nothing redeemable about it, its a complete failure in almost every sense and an utter embarassment. Alien 3 and Resurection are masterpieces compared to it. Inane storytelling and an utter disregard for the films that preceeded it, jesus I thought Anderson was a fan of these movies, so then why did he single handedly rape these 2 franchises in one shot.

Im utterly amazed that some people defend this shit.

From a movie point of view the Alien / Predator simply don't belong in the same universe. Predator was a comic book movie, with characters that could only exist in a comic book, Alien / Aliens had far more believable rounded characters. Bringing them together is something that could only exist in a comic book throwaway setting. I expected comic book cheese and that's what I got.

Alien 3 has no excuse...following on from one of the greatest movies ever made - every Alien fan deserved better then that piece of utter shit. I've never been so disappointed in my entire life in a movie then when I went to the cinema to see A3. I was heartbroken. A completely unambitious piece of crap. The fact that the only country it did well in was France speaks volumes.

AVP is a mess, but at least Anderson manged to write in a few visually pleasing scenes as well as jettisoning the 'spaceship / space station look'. All Alien 3 has is boring, whining prisoners running around like headless chickens in yet more metallic, dark steamy corridors while chased by a feeble puppet Alien that looks like it escaped from a bad 70's episode of Dr Who.

If FOX was to revive the Alien franchise, just set ALIEN 5 right after ALIENS. Just forget Alien 3 ever existed and have the Sulaco on it's way back to Earth...
 

Dead

well not really...yet
COCKLES said:
From a movie point of view the Alien / Predator simply don't belong in the same universe. Predator was a comic book movie, with characters that could only exist in a comic book, Alien / Aliens had far more believable rounded characters. Bringing them together is something that could only exist in a comic book throwaway setting. I expected comic book cheese and that's what I got.

Alien 3 has no excuse...following on from one of the greatest movies ever made - every Alien fan deserved better then that piece of utter shit. I've never been so disappointed in my entire life in a movie then when I went to the cinema to see A3. I was heartbroken. A completely unambitious piece of crap. The fact that the only country it did well in was France speaks volumes.

AVP is a mess, but at least Anderson manged to write in a few visually pleasing scenes as well as jettisoning the 'spaceship / space station look'. All Alien 3 has is boring, whining prisoners running around like headless chickens in yet more metallic, dark steamy corridors while chased by a feeble puppet Alien that looks like it escaped from a bad 70's episode of Dr Who.

If FOX was to revive the Alien franchise, just set ALIEN 5 right after ALIENS. Just forget Alien 3 ever existed and have the Sulaco on it's way back to Earth...
yes because a movie doing well in france must mean it sucks, we all know french cinema is the bane of filmmaking and nothing ever good came out of there.....oh wait. Its only the complete fucking opposite..
 

COCKLES

being watched
XS+ said:
David Twohy should've directed AVP imo..

You ever read Twohy's Alien 3 script? He's a pretty decent writer. Chronicles is a good testiment to what happens when a director is given too much money - his usual quality is much better, especially his earlier direct-to-video efforts.

173 INT. COLD-CORE CHAMBER

Packard holds in the doorvay. Where are the lights? She moves inside
to look for controls -- and the door behind her seals, thrusting us
into an even deeper dark.

She waits for her eyes to adjust. Only RESPIRATOR SOUNDS. Finally
Packard can read her thermo-gauge. Minus-400.

Small blinks of machinery become visible. Packard edges to the lights
and leans her helmet closer. Some kind of bio-readouts? She touches
the panel. A light springs on to illuminate...

The Alien.

Packard recoils the width of the room, smashing into more controls. A
second light flares on to reveal...

Another Alien.

Packard lurches to the door. Gloved hands grope for the unlock-lever.
It's not there. BREATHING comes in worthless snatches -- she's
suffocating under an avalanche of fear. All she can find is a key-
plate, a fucking key-plate.

Packard wheels back around and braces for the attack. Instead...

The Aliens haven't moved. Both are encased in glass. Dormant.

Packard forces calm on herself. Finds the key attached to the suit.
Opens the door -- and leaves it open without exiting. Some stabilizing
BREATHS. Now she heads back for a closer look.

The room is a gallery of Aliens. An army of Aliens. All behind glass.

Dreading it, Packard activates more case lights. Each Alien is
slightly different: One is silvery instead of black, a chameleon that
blends with its background. Another, the Brute Alien, shows a stockier
strain, its exoskeleton toughened with thorns. Another is a Siamese,
fused to a partner. Another is a complete abomination, as if mutated
with thalidomide.

There are more. But Packard doesn't have more nerve.
 
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