viernes, 17 de abril de 2015

The magic of trailers has died...

by Alex Zavala
(@alekdome)

Yesterday was an exciting day for movie trailers. In the morning the second trailer for 'Star Wars The Force Awakens' came out, and it went viral faster than Ebola could ever dream of...

Later, at night, the first trailer for 'Batman v Superman',  that was supposed to premiere next Monday, inevitably "leaked". And I use the quotes, because come on... for all we know Zack Snyder leaked it himself... The fact that all trailers come out on the Internet first might sound like problem..... but it's not to the studios... Every time a trailer plays at the movie theatre, it costs money... so I'm assuming they are more than happy to have people watch it a million times on You Tube and advertise their movie for free.


As a movie fan, and as a Batman fan... there is no way to avoid this kind of temptation..... In the world of today, you know exactly when a trailer is going to be available, and you can watch it instantly, wherever you are. To me, this SUCKS!!!

I remember vividly this one time I went to the movies when I was about 10 years old, and the LucasFilm logo came up on screen... I was like hey!, that's the guy who did 'Star Wars'. Seconds later there were spaceships flying around, lightsabers buzzing, and stupid Jar Jar Binks being the annoying mistake he always was. That's right, there was a new 'Star Wars' movie coming out, and I knew nothing about it... and it was exciting!!


That kind of experience, nowadays, exists only in my mind (like Jack in Rose's). Because today, you know what movies are coming out 3 years in advance, and you watch the trailer online and knowingly.

 I have seen the 'Jurassic World' trailers a million times by now... and not once in theatres. The same thing happened with 'The Dark Knight Rises' when it was a bout to come out. There were like 4 trailers that I kept watching online and, at least in my third world country, in theatres they were still only playing the 30 second teaser that shows you nothing and that came out a year before.


The only trailers they play at the theatre now, are the crappy ones that would never go viral. How boring.


The maximum STUPIDITY and SHAMELESS marketing tactic is something that started a couple of years ago.... the infamous trailer's trailer. Since the studio knows you're going to watch it online, and they are happy that you are, a few days early they give you some crap like this:


Two seconds of footage followed by a: "watch the full trailer this Friday!"

How ridiculous is that!!!????

Anyway... I am going to keep on watching trailers online, first: because I'm only human, and second: because only the teasers make their way to Mexico lately. But I just wanted to blow some steam... and to those cinema experience ruiners out there, stay tuned, because soon I'll be ranting about watching new movies online.


'nough said...





jueves, 9 de abril de 2015

This year in film...

by Alex Zavala
(@alekdome)

Like anything in life, movies have good and bad years. Some are packed with awesome blockbusters and classics, others like 2007 SUCK with terrible "Spider-Man" and "Fantastic 4" sequels and a really bad "Transformers" movie (no matter what anyone says, the "Transformers" movies are awful).






Well, 2015 looks like it's going to be awesome!!!!

There was kind of a slow start with a "50 Shades of Grey" blockbuster that was bound to be terrible... and it was... and I didn't even see it. Then there was "Insurgent" which was exactly like "Divergent" which was exactly like "The Hunger Games"but not that cool.

But it's April now... and the first exciting movie of 2015 is around the corner..... no, it´s not "Furious 7" (that will surely be worse than "Transformers"), I'm talking about "Avengers: Age of Ultron".... These Avengers movies are just really cool... and Hulk is awesome.



By the time the "Avengers" run is over.. it will be summer, and with that comes one of the most anticipated movies of the last 14 years........ "Jurassic World" (I already did a post on this movie so check it out). Let me be clear, "Jurassic Park" is an absolute classic..... "The Lost World" is a fun movie.... "Jurassic Park 3" is quite bad....... so there's no real reason why this movie should be good.... but it's still really exciting to re-visit Isla Nublar. As I have said before, just please don't make the velociraptors be our friends (fuck; there´s a good chance that's what's going to happen).



Then there's "Terminator Genisys.... will it be good?.... maybe not....... will something actually happen?, as in, will we see John Connor end the war, instead of a robot going back in time once again... maybe not... But if there is one role (and I mean only one) that Schwarzenegger can play, it´s a big robot that can't speak good english. So I'm in.


To have a M:I movie on the same year as a 007 movie, is a pretty rare, but spectacular thing.
Except for the occasional 'mask parade' ("M:I 2") or huge death ray coming from space ("Die another Day"), these are two franchises that almost never disappoint, and I'm definitely excited about "Mission: Impossible Rogue Nation" and "Spectre".


The "Fantastic Four" reboot looks like it's gonna be good........ and I'm excited about "Mocking Jay Part 2".... that is, excited to see how it ends... because this recent practice of breaking movies in 2 is disgustingly annoying................ thanks Harry Potter.


All that awesomeness could make for a very good year, but, what really makes 2015 a special one, is the fact that "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" is coming out in december!!  Forget about having J.J. Abrams as the director (which is great), and forget about Luke, Leia and Han coming back....... just use 95% less CGI than George Lucas used on the prequel trilogy (you can use and immense amount of CGI and still not reach 5% of what he used) and I'll be satisfied.