alicublog's "UNMITIGATED GALT"

[james_davis_nicoll]

Nicked from womzilla

[As] much fun as it is to slag rotten movies, it is much better to be surprised by a good one, especially when you've reached the stage in life where two hours in front of a stinker sets you dreaming of the warm couch and leftover sesame chicken that you left back home. But it is my great regret to inform you that Atlas Shrugged: Part I is neither good nor good-bad, but bad-bad-bad-bad. I dreamed, not of sesame chicken, but of my own swift and merciful death, and that of the director, not necessarily in that order. It is not a pleasurable surprise, not a hoot, nor an outrage; it is Rand's granite crushed, reconstituted, and spread across the screen with steamrollers.

Comments

[seawasp]

I would like to say that this is a surprise... but it's not a surprise. There are ways to make an absolutely awesome movie out of _Atlas Shrugged_, but I do not think I'll ever see anyone TAKE any of those ways to do it.

[amberdine.livejournal.com]

At least it's not animated and in 3D.

[heron61.livejournal.com]

From what I've heard, it might well be far better animated. Animated films can look very good, and from what I've heard this one looks horrible. OTOH, 3D films are IMHO a blight upon the world and from the sound of it, making it 3D would actually have made it even worse.

[seawasp]

An animated Atlas Shrugged would be... interesting. And a few scenes would benefit from 3D (the first ride of the train on Rearden rails, etc.).

But it's the script and direction that would be HARD to do, and alas, I do not expect to see the proper talent ever applied to it.

(I'd say "if I had the money I'd do it", but not any more, I'd use that money to make movies of *MY* stuff)

[tandw.livejournal.com]

Was it here that I saw the amused speculation about what "Atlas Shrugged" would look like directed by Tim Burton and starring Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter as John Galt and Dagny Taggart?

[seawasp]

How about the Quentin Tarantino version with Uma Thurman as Dagny and Samuel L. Jackson as Rearden?

[tandw.livejournal.com]

"I have HAD IT with these [expletive deleted] rails on this [expletive deleted] train!"

(I know it wasn't a Tarantino film, but still.)

[kithrup.livejournal.com]

I'm so pleased there's no reason for me to be tempted to see it.

[heron61.livejournal.com]

I was initially worried that this movie would help popularize Rand's crazy ideas. Then, a couple of weeks ago, I saw both a review of someone moderately liberal who loathed the book, and a review by a Randite who loved the book - the two reviews were almost identical - both reviewers thought the movie was impressively dreadful in very similar ways (and in fact, in almost all ways). At that point, I ceased to worry. With luck, this film will convince a few people luckless enough to see it that Rand sucks.

[dewline.livejournal.com]

That just might bury the thing, then.

[derekl1963.livejournal.com]

Apropos of this... I saw on CNN the other day, a piece about a dating and social networking sire for Rand fans.

[poeticalpanther.livejournal.com]

Isn't it nice when the undatables segregate themselves for you? :D

[halfassured.livejournal.com]

On the upside, if it were good then he wouldn't have been able to use that pun.

[seawasp]

That's true. Well, actually, not. If you're hostile to Rand's ideas or the story itself, I could easily see using that same headline in grudging acknowledgement that someone had done it RIGHT.

[martinl-00.livejournal.com]

Some Japanese company should do it as a giant robot anime.

[bricklovinfreak.livejournal.com]

Isn't that basically what Code Geass was?