Jeremy by Pearl Jam
Pearl Jam · Song · 2004
Month: July 2023
Watched with the kids (8/11). Taken a while to convince them they won’t be terrified. They thought Captain Jack was funny and they actually made sense of the plot! Success.
★★★½
Immediately after the events of The Desolation of Smaug, Bilbo and the dwarves try to defend Erebor's mountain of treasure from others who claim it: the men of the ruined Laketown and the elves of Mirkwood. Meanwhile an army of Orcs led by Azog the Defiler is marching on Erebor, fueled by the rise of the dark lord Sauron. Dwarves, elves and men must unite, and the hope for Middle-Earth falls into Bilbo's hands.
Watched with my youngest (8). She found this much more confusing than the previous films, with random armies appearing out of nowhere.
For my money… I get that you want your character deaths to have a bit of meaning, rather than being essentially a footnote as they are in the books, but wow this is laboured.
★★½
Watched with my youngest (8). She liked it but wanted to know why the Eagles didn’t just fly them to the mountain.
[insert “wormtongue – a just question” meme]
★★★
We watched the first Pirates of the Caribbean with the kids (8/11) and they liked it, so we watched this. And they spent the whole time saying, “wait, what’s going on? Why’s he doing that?”
We had to have a chat about how some films look good, have fun things in them, but make zero sense, even by their own rules.
★★½
David Housden · Song · 2012
Where Are You? by David Housden
nervous_testpilot · Song · 2012
Schism by nervous_testpilot
Does anyone else despair when even Microsoft’s own apps default to C:\Windows\System32 in the file dialogue?
A prequel to the first two Underworld films, this fantasy explains the origins of the feud between the Vampires and the Lycans. Aided by his secret love, Sonja, courageous Lucian leads the Lycans in battle against brutal Vampire king Viktor. Determined to break the king's enslavement of his people, Lucian faces off against the Death Dealer army in a bid for Lycan independence.
This is an exceptionally odd film. I probably let the gap between watching part 2 and this, part 3, get a little large but that wasn’t the end of the world. As I recall, I think this basically fleshed out the big reveals from the end of part 2?
And it’s weird because, in a franchise where previously a big draw was Kate Beckinsale in very tight leather/pvc, this is really a Romeo and Juliet tale of forbidden love. But with vampires and werewolves. The vampires aren’t even all that vampiric.
And it does it competently. I’m not sure there is much more to say than that. It’s a solid three stars across the board. I don’t think it’s fair to say a film is bad because it lacks any real ambition. If you have any investment in the “universe” I think it’s worth the admission fee. It cost $35m and made $91m at the box office, so plenty of others agreed.
★★★