Posts Tagged ‘District 9’
3 items.
As you’ve probably heard, District 9 comes out this weekend. Personally, I’m very excited to see it if for no other reason than to watch a science fiction movie with a little more on its mind than the next great space battle or awesome explosion.
Don’t get my wrong – space battles and explosions are great. But that’s also what action movies are for. Whatever happened to good sci-fi movies that twisted the screws a little bit or made us consider the human condition? Between District 9 and Moon, 2009 is shaping up to be a very good year for the genre.
I’m going to try and squeeze in an early matinee of District 9 this morning before rushing to meet Cami for a showing of The Time Traveler’s Wife immediately after. It’s going to be hard, but I think I can do it.
District 9 is showing at the theater that is closest to my house at 11:10 AM. The movie is 111 minutes long. So, with trailers, that means I’ll be getting out of the movie between 1:00 and 1:15 PM.
My in-laws are watching Henry today and Cami is taking the afternoon off to have lunch with her folks and Henry where they live about 20 minutes away.
After I watch District 9, I’m going to try to meet Cami at a different theater in town where her parents live to watch The Time Traveler’s Wife. That movie starts at 1:45.
So, barring no complications, I’m going to be cutting it pretty close. But if we pull it off, it will be awesome.
What’s better is that there is an outside chance Cami and I will be seeing The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard on Sunday afternoon when my parents come over to watch Henry for a couple of hours. I talked Cami into seeing it after I showed her the Will Ferrell sky-diving clip with language and images entirely NOT safe for work.
Now I know to you all of this movie-watching might sound like negligent parenting. Not the case. Cami and I are just looking to spend a little time with each other after I was in Chicago last weekend and she was in Minneapolis the weekend before that. It just so happens that there are a bunch of awesome movies coming out this weekend, so we’re choosing to take advantage of that.
I’m kind of psyched for this little experiment. I haven’t seen 3 movies in one weekend in… I can’t remember how long. Fun!
What about you guys? Which movie are you most psyched to see this weekend? What are the odds of you seeing more than one? Leave your comments below and have a great weekend!
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Lesse… take a little Independence Day, toss in some Michael Bay gung-ho, pro-military sentiment and sprinkle it with a dash of alien tech from District 9 and it looks like you’ve got the next big, dumb summer blockbuster on your hands!
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I’m not exactly what kind of point I’m trying to make with my observation about Battle: Los Angeles. After doing a quick visual inventory, I think a lot of people came to the same conclusions about it being an Independence Day / Black Hawk Down / District 9 mash-up. For most people, that doesn’t matter.
In truth, I talked to a lot of people who saw Battle: Los Angeles over the weekend and freely acknowledge where it liberally borrows from other sources but they admit being entertained by it all the same.
I don’t know. Maybe it is good. Usually Aaron Eckhart in a movie is a sign of pedigree. Michelle Rodriguez, on the other hand? Well, that kind of neutralizes things a little.
To me, Battle: Los Angeles looks like a more expensive version of that turkey of a movie Skyline, that came out last November. Bigger names, more explosions and a little more polish in the FX department.
One thing is for sure… people REALLY want to see Los Angeles destroyed by an alien invasion. I guess in a post 9/11 world, disaster movies set in New York City are still verboten.
Did you see Battle: Los Angeles over the weekend? If so, be thinking about the comments you’d like to share below in a little bit. But first, some business…
On Saturday, I posted an idea to the Theater Hopper Facebook page about potentially hosting some kind of “show” using Netflix streaming. If you don’t have the service, essentially Netflix allows you and a group of your friends to watch the same movie at the same time.
Logistically, I didn’t know how it works. I don’t know for certain if Netflix will allow people who use different formats of their service – be it X-Box 360, the PS3, Nintendo’s Wii or web-enabled Blu-ray players – to all meet in the same digital space. I also don’t know how many people can view the same movie at the same time.
But the idea proved to be a popular one. Many people expressed immediate interest. So I think it’s worth exploring.
I was told by one user that Netflix DOES discriminate by platform and limits the viewing party by 6 to 8 people. So that means if you have a PS3, you’ll unfortunately be left out of the loop because that’s a piece of technology that I don’t have.
However, I *do* have an X-Box 360 and a Wii. So, if I end up doing some kind of viewing party, it’ll be through one of those two interfaces.
Since the viewing party will be limited, I’m not sure how I will pick and choose which people can participate. I imagine there will be some kind of sign-up form announcing the date and time and it will be first come, first served. If someone drops out or doesn’t show up, I would probably take to Twitter or Facebook to let people know there’s an opening.
I guess what’s really holding me back from pulling the trigger on this is figuring out what the show will actually be. I mean, it’s pretty much impossible NOT do to a direct rip-off of Mystery Science Theater 3000. How do I do a show like this without drawing a direct comparison and (ultimately) failing?
Because let me tell you right now – there will be NO preparation beforehand. Any comments I would make during the film would be completely off the cuff and probably more annoying than funny.
And that’s the other thing… How do you pick a movie that’s entertaining to watch, but not so engrossing that people get annoyed with you butting in every few minutes?
Like I said, I’m not entirely sure what the logistics look like. But I think the idea has merit and people seem interested, so I thought I would bat it around for a little bit and see what everyone else’s thoughts were.
Leave your comments about the Netflix part idea (or Battle: Los Angeles) below. I’d love to hear what you have to say!
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