He’s Just Not That Into You.

Gigi is into Conor, who likes Anna, who likes Ben, who is married to Janine, who happens to be Gigi’s friend. They’re also friends with Beth who wants to marry her long-term partner, Ben’s friend Neil, but he doesn’t believe in marriage. Anna is a friend of Mary who works with, but has never actually seen, Conor.

Relationships can be confusing.

Enter Alex, Conor’s friend, to straighten things out and lay down the law.

“He’s just not that into you.”

… or at least he helps straighten things out until he starts making things more complicated…

Without spoiling the ending, that’s pretty much the whole plot. The film is much more about character development than plot development and as such it does a decent job.

It also plays out as a course in Love 101 and puts forward some interesting theories as to why the fairer sex goes after the bad boy type. Having never been a woman (wearing the underwear doesn’t count), it was difficult for Dave to fully judge the accuracy of such theories. Guys are generally far simpler.

Guy + bad girl = more sex.

Still, everything generally makes sense and it nice every once in a while to watch a movie without massive plot holes in every other scene.

If it sounds like your cup of tea then it almost certainly is.

Memento

Which is why this blog makes almost as little sense as one of Khany’s. This confusement has been recreated here for all you lucky readers.

He knows vaguely where he is going, but has no idea where he has been. The other reason its special is because it shows the whole film backwards to try to give you more of the confused feeling of Leonard.

Hell, why should you be allowed to, when the character living it has no idea? The point is you, as the viewer, are not suppose to know the “truth.”

After all, the movie is fake, regardless of which story you believe to be “true.” Although much debate rages on about what can be taken as fact and what can’t, the only fact available is that there are no facts. The movie is special not for the story it tells, but for the story it doesn’t.

*End Spoilers*

He is also told that his wife may not have died in the attacker. He is told that he actually killed the right man long ago, but he forgot. During the film Leonard kills two people, neither of them is the right man.

*SPOILERS*

As well as being difficult, it also proves to be fairly hazardous to those around him.

This is not an easy task for a man with no new memories.

With the attack being the last thing he remembers, his life becomes a mission to find and kill the attacker responsible. The film tells the tale of Leonard, a man who lost his ability to form short-term memories whilst confronting intruders who were raping his wife.

After just a 9 year delay he finally got round to it. Memento is rated as one of the best films of the new millennium and as such it was on Dave’s to watch list.

Where to start?

Surrogates

In the not too distant future the internet sensation 2nd Life has had a major upgrade. People are now able to sit at home hooked up to the computer which mentally controls a robot in the real world. They can feel all the usually sensations through this robot, though with considerably less pain. These robots are called our Surrogates.

The obvious question is why?

Well, your Surrogate is stronger, faster and sexier than you and if it gets hit by a car you can just get it fixed or replaced. As such, the use of Surrogates has reduced crime, with murder being unheard of and race crimes being even sillier than they already are. Such is their appeal that the vast majority of the human race (...which being an American film is just another word for "Americans" as it mentions very little about whats happening elsewhere...) now use them. The only people not using them are a small group who refuse to do so on moral grounds who have now been more or less banished from decent society.

Its an interesting scenario and an OK film which follows a fairly predicatable storyline to an obvious ending, but it passes the time if you have time to waste. And you get to see Bruce Willis do the Terminator thing.

Its only major flaw is that the world it creates is nothing like the world that would actually occur if we did get Surrogates.

Crime down? ... erm... no... two major factors that reduce crime are guilt and fear. Guilt of hurting others, fear of hurting yourself. Take those away and crime is going to soar.

I also love how little people seem to care about the less important crimes of Surrogates getting damaged. Have you seen how much people can care about a tiny scratch on a car? And how come everyone can even afford Surrogates? A state of the art robot more advanced than an actual human, you would think that would cost a pretty penny.

A world full of Surrogates would be far far more chaotic than it makes out. Even ignoring crime, Surrogates are more or less superhuman. How many people who woke up with superpowers would decide not to use them and continue normal day to day activities?

Why do people still use cars? Surely you can stick some wheels on your feet and off you go.

Why do people all still look like people? You can look however you want, where are all the original creations? Not even a few blue people or werewolves, or didn't anyone think an extra pair of hands might be useful?

It never explores the idea as much as it could have, instead sticking with the standard science vs nature and questions of how far is too far. Yet it still could have been a great film if they had just had Brucy take on Arnie.

That would have rocked.

Knowing

50 years ago a crazy little girl who hears voices wrote down a long list of numbers and placed them in a time capsule.

Present day, and the capsule is dug up, the numbers are looked at and it turns out they've predicted the dates and numbers of people dead in every major disaster since the time of writing... including 3 events that haven't happened yet...

Early on in the film, Nicholas Cage sets the sceen for the main debate, destiny vs randomness. He actually discusses the topic in a lecture he's giving, which must be one of the shortest lectures ever. Seriously, are lectures in America really that short? They never seem longer than 5 minutes in any films...

The film never really delivers a suitable answer to anything. Clearly favouring the destiny arguement from the use of the predicitions, it still comes across very random. The entire film is a rather large question mark. Themes are jumbled up in an ad hoc fashion. Christian ideas are presented throughout, enough to annoy any hardcore Non-Christians as well as any Christians, since they mostly presented completely out of context. The ending in particular will probably make only a very narrow band of people happy.

The main concept is interesting, but not anything original.

Dragon Ball Evolution

Dave felt sick. Physically sick.

Having a spare moment after work, and with nothing interesting on TV, Dave decided to watch a movie online and headed over to TVLinks to see what was available.

Dragon Ball Evolution. A new live action film of the popular Dragon Ball cartoon series. Having seen the trailer he was far from hopeful, but with nothing else to watch he decided to have a gander. Afterall, if it was Dragon Ball how bad could it be.

After 12 min 26 sec he hit the pause button and headed over to his blog to hurl.

'Oh dear lord no.'

True, he hadn't yet gave it a fair try, it could get better, but my word it sucks. It had gone so very far wrong in such a short amount of time, it seemed beyond any chance of repair.

1. Goku is a whiny teenager instead of an ultra innocent child.
2. Goku is complaining about not being able to use his powers to beat up school bullies?!?!?!
Goku doesn't even go to school! And he's the good guy!
3. Goku says to his grandad "Teach me something I can use. Teach me how to pick up girls"!!!!
No. No. No. Goku doesn't even know what a girl IS in the cartoons, he's never seen a girl, but even ignoring how completely different it is from the cartoons, who would ever ask their grandad to teach them to get chicks?

At this point ur less than 5 min into the film. The list just never seems to end.

Goku is in love with Chi Chi, who he goes to school with, but she's always surrounded by the cool kids, who Goku wants to beat up, but knows he shouldn't, so walks away. He sees her alone struggling to open her locker, so he uses his magic powers to open it, she's suddenly interested and not even slightly shocked. He gets invited to a party at "her house" and instantly says he'll be there, despite not being told where her house is and seemingly talking for the first time. At the party the bullies attack him, but he decides to be "cool" and just moves out of the way of each hit making them all beat each other up.

NO. NO. NO. NO. NO. NO.

Why must movies like this go deliberately out of their way to try and destroy a person's childhood memories?

So wrong.

Watchmen

Watchmen is a Comic Book created by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons, originally published as a twelve-month series from 1986 to 1987 and was later republished in graphic novel format.

As a stand alone story, not an ongoing plot such as the likes of Superman, Batman and Spiderman, it is arguably the most famous graphic novel of all time.

It was therefore pretty much guaranteed at least some success. But is it any good?

That depends on what you really like to see in a film. Which of the following is your cup of tea?

a) Comic book films
b) Unnessary gruesome violence
c) Softcore nudity
d) Dark humour
e) Unusual plot
f) All of the above
g) Other.

If you picked option g, give this one a miss. If, however, you chose option f, then by George you might just be in luck.

The comic book is about a bunch of guys who decide to dress up and fight bad-guys. Mostly they have no real super powers, they're just ordinary folk with a few screws lose trying to make the world a better place. Its the kind of thing that makes you pause for a moment and wonder why no one has ever REALLY tried that kind of thing. Oh sure, you're not going to, the idea is nuts and will end in almost certain death, but with all the billions of people in the world, why hasn't anyone?

Back to the book, there is one guy who does has some actual super powers due to the typical experiment one wrong senerio. Dr Manhattan. And boy does he have some powers. He can basically do ANYTHING. He does have some limitations, but these are few and far between. Teleport, blow stuff up, see through time, copy himself, alter matter... the list is a VERY long one.

The story is set in 1985. The world is on the brink of all out nuclear war. All the heroes, other than Dr Manhattan, have been outlawed. Dr Manhattan is legal because a) he has the ability to basically catch any missiles, chew them up and spit them out and is thus used by America as a deterant and b) how the hell u gonna outlaw a guy who can spit out nuclear missiles?

Out of the normal heroes, only one guy is really refusing the ban and staying active. Mr Hard-as-effin-nails-take-no-sh*t-seriously-damn-cool-messed-up-in-the-head Rorschach. So when a former hero ends up dead, its up to Rorschach to figure out why. And he aint gonna let nothing stand in his way.

Thats the book. How about the film?

It's more or less exactly the same. Sure there are parts missing, it was a pretty long comic, and the ending was altered, it was originally pretty weird, but don't worry it still is. But if your looking for a film of the book, you've come to the right place.

Rumours have it that it could have been very different. Apparently the original director wanted to bring the story up to date, replacing nuclear war with the "war on terror". Their are also rumours that Simon Pegg was due to be Rorschach.

Nothing wrong with Simon Pegg, funny guy, but Rorshcach?

No.

Thankfully that didn't happen. If you liked the book go watch it. If you didn't read the book, perhaps have a gander at it first, the film may be a little odd to a newbie.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Benjamin Button is an unusual individual, born with a curious abnormality. Hence the title.


Mr Button was born as an old man and grows younger with time. The reason behind this is never really explored, nor is it very important. The film begins with a clock maker who, after losing his son in WWI, makes a public clock which ticks backwards in hope that his son, and all the other lost sons, may one day come home. The clock was put up when Benjamin was born and taken down when he died, but is otherwise unconnected to Benjamin's life or the plot of the film.

The film tells the life story of Benjamin, as told by his diary and the woman he loved on her death bed. Born as WWI came to an end, his mother died in childbirth and his father rejected him as a monster. He spent his early years as an old man in an old folks home, under the care of his adopted mother. Everyone around him expecting him to die regrettably young.

But as the years went by he became younger, stronger, more full of life. Heck, he became a regular little Brad Pitt.

The film is based on a short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald published in 1922. It was adapted for the screen by Eric Roth. For those who don't recognise the name, this is the same writer behind the legendary Forest Gump.

Having the same writer has led many to comment on the similarities between the two films. Button, like Gump, begins life with little hope, but with a mixture of fate, chance and the love of his mother he goes on to see the world. Button, like Gump, meets the love of his life when they are both "young" and keeps falling in and out of a relationship throughout the film. They both end up as father's who aren't around to see their children grow. They both fight in a war. They both meet a crazy captain. They both lead extrodinary lives and star in great films.

Still, the comparision is unfair for Button. Seeing the film by itself is like finding a pretty decent bag for a very reasonable price. Beautiful design, good quality leather, everything you could hope for. Comparing the film to Forest Gump is like finding that your bag is an immitation of a bag worth ten times the amount. Suddenly your lovely bag is branded as a knock-off and loses some of its original shine.

Button is a good film, certainly worth a watch, but it's not Gump. Despite many many similarities, Button is lacking in two key ingredients. Innocence and sense.

Gump shows the world through the eyes of a man who never really stops being a child. He knows right from wrong, and although he's "not a smart man" he "knows what love is." This simple innocence gives the film a magical quality which makes it enjoyable to watch time and time again. Button, on the other hand, is a man who never really gets to be a child. The film is therefore harsher, more "grown up" perhaps, and uncomparible to Gump.

Declaring that a film lacks the "sense" of Forest Gump may seem a little odd, and may possibly not be the right word, but Button is certainly lacking. The following examples contain spoilers, so for those who haven't seen it, just trust what you've read so far and go watch the film.


Firstly, the daughter seems to know nothing of Benjamin or her mother. She doesn't know her mother used to be a dancer, it comes as a surprise, despite the fact that one clip shows her at 12 years of age in her mothers dance school, where her mother teaches dance.

She doesn't seem to know that her "dad" is not her real dad, despite the fact that her real dad left her after the age of one and, presumably, her new dad didn't come on the sceen for a few weeks/months. Sure she might have been too young to, say, remember what her dad looked like, but she must have had some memory of her dad suddenly changing into a different man.


Their is a major flaw in logic when it comes to Button ditching his family. He leaves because his daughter deserves a father who will grow old with her... wtf? Why? Because it's soo much more comforting to see your parents go old and grey than young and healthly? He leaves because his wife won't be able to look after them both. He won't actually be a kid for another 20 years, by which point the daughter could look out for herself anyway. This point is proved by the fact that the mother DOES end up looking after Benjamin anyway!! (The daughter at this point magically disappears. Also, her replacement dad grew old and died before this time anyway.) It just doesn't add up. Growing young is simply not a big disability, certainly not enough to ditch your wife and child over and still try to look like the good guy.

I can't be a father. 20 years from now I might be small and cute. You both deserve better.

It's guys like this that make Fathers for Justice need to work so hard to be heard.

Still, overall it is a nice film.