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a bad entry on why hollywood is bad.
written: 4:26 p.m. on Tuesday, May. 24, 2005

I think I must be the only person in the world who's not watching Star Wars Episode Three Revenge of the Sith Whatever A Sith Is. In fact, I must be the only sane person in the world who thinks that Star Wars is stupid. I've never seen a single Star Wars movie, only snippets here and there when I ventured into the living room where my family was watching it, and I don't ever intend to.

Now, people may ask, "But Yelen, how would you know that a movie is stupid if you've never seen it? How can you say a movie sucks if you haven't even watched it?" Any ordinary person would be slain for being so presumptuous, but it just so happens that I am not an ordinary person, hur hur, and thus, it is my prerogative to say what I please about a movie and whether or not I've wasted money on it is not an issue.

We all know that Hollywood produces trash on an all too-regular basis. Their take on 'movies' is akin to assembled goods rolling along a conveyor belt in a minimum-wage factory in India/Cambodia/China/et al: utterly unoriginal, shamelessly rehashed, wholly recycled and thus blatantly homogenous. This became more evident when I saw the trailer for Kingdom of Heaven and was struck dumb by how similar it was to Gladiator in terms of cinematography and direction; in fact, I would've sworn that they were re-releasing Gladiator if it weren't for the too-obvious discrepancy between the two movies, ie. Russell Crowe Is So Not Orlando Bloom And Vice Versa. One can argue that I am making a stupid remark because the two movies were directed (and possibly produced) by the same Ridley Scott, but even so, I think there's a huge difference between maintaining a style and becoming formulaic - Kingdom of Heaven smacked too much of the latter.

And anyway, although I didn't completely adore Gladiator, there's no way in hell that Kingdom of Heaven can ever be better than Gladiator because KOF does not have Joaquin Phoenix in it. Ha, ha.

Heavyweight blockbusters are boring. They become all the same after a while: introduce hero, hero leads a humble life, something happens to hero that causes great suffering and angst, hero sets out to seek revenge, hero wins, everyone is happy, the end. Throw some bombastic special effects, bad dialogue, cliche background strings swelling with heartfelt emotions and irritating sentimentality, and the requisite box office darling leading actor (strictly actor, never actress) into the mix and there you have it, a blockbuster. The only thing original about The Matrix was that it was The Matrix, but Hollywood and its stupid Assembly Line decided to ruin it by spawning the two pieces of celluloid trash, The Matrix Two and The Matrix Three. Who the hell cares what they're called?

And then we have soppy period romances like Pearl Harbour and Cold Mountain that purported to be set against a historical backdrop but we all know that that's merely an excuse for Hollywood to make more money out of unsuspecting and guileless movie-goers by taking a cliche romance story that can be found in every romance novels available out there and plonking it into World War II America and the Civil War or whatever historical period that Cold Mountain is supposed to be set in. (That was an awfully long sentence.) Hollywood thought that it was being original when Steven Spielberg made The Terminal, supposedly based on a true story (fucked if I'd ever believe that) but hello, Tom HanksxCatherine Zeta-Jones=Predictable and Banal Hollywood Shit-Romance. How do I know this? Because I've seen it all already in every movie that had a good premise tragically ruined by Hollywood's sickening penchant for throwing an off-tangent romance into the equation for kicks. And because everything is all the same in Hollywood, it means that romance is the same in movies, no matter what the movie is supposed to be about.

Prove me wrong. I'd like very much for that to happen.

Now, back to Star Wars. George Lucas is probably a genius but I couldn't care less. To put it plainly, I don't get it. At all. What's the big deal? The light sabres (sp) just look damn stupid to me, as does practically everything about the whole series. I suppose this has something to do with me being a non-fan of science fiction and fantasy but even so, I loved the Lord of the Rings trilogy so I don't think it's me.

Oh, whatever. This entry is probably as bad as the Star Wars thing and crappy Hollywood movies and I'm too tired to think so this shall be it.

before sunrise // before sunset

Previously:
- - Tuesday, Aug. 29, 2017
I'm moving. - Sunday, Jul. 11, 2010
In all honesty - Tuesday, Jul. 06, 2010
What I want for my birthday... - Sunday, Jul. 04, 2010
On Roger's behalf. - Friday, Jul. 02, 2010