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Cakebug Tranch

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Posts posted by Cakebug Tranch

  1. Posted

    I wish I was a fly on the wall on the day that John Leguizamo read this script and thought, "yes! This is the project for me!"

     

    Or the day that the kid from Percy Jackson read his script and said "yes! Referring to ammunition choices as 'gay' is exactly the right phrasing! No need to argue that one."

     

    Having read the perspectives of everyone else above, now I'm a little depressed that I quite enjoyed this one.

    • Like 2

  2. Posted

    I'm mostly mad at this movie because I haven't been able to shake 'I've Got You Under My Skin' for a week now. And for some reason my brain just hums the Bono version. I catch myself singing it at all hours. For such a great Cole Porter number, why must I automatically sing the worst version? (and, of course, the mental image is Dancing Dexter)

     

     

    maxresdefault.jpg

     

    • Like 3

  3. Posted

    So...I'm not finding Gamer even a little bit fun. I only got about 20 mins in, but I think I'm going to have to call it. Life's too short and I don't have the energy for this one. I'm sure the episode will be great though.

     

    But.. but... Dancing Dexter!

     

    Sigh. Yeah, I have to admit, waffle dipping whale man nearly broke it for me. What will we do without your insight?

    • Like 3

  5. Posted

    Just finished it .... wow, there is no mistaking who made this nutjob of a movie ... and for a movie that gets so much hate I liked it alot. I mean it's got some major faults but it was fun to watch ... I'm really looking forward to the episode ... I've got you under my skin ....

     

    I felt exactly the same way. It had so much 'Crank' in it I couldn't hate it. And I could watch Dexter's song and dance puppet scene for hours.

     

    What a wonderful mess.

    • Like 3

  6. Posted

    Let's talk about the gun phone. I am confident that the explanation for it is "Oxycontin," but it made no sense in the movie.

     

    Thomas Jane could read Damien Lewis' mind when Mr. Gray possessed Damien Lewis and was riding on the snowmobile, but then later Thomas Jane had to use a prop - John Wayne's gun, no less - to mentally create a telephone and telephone number for Damien Lewis to mentally call. But Damien Lewis was already cornered by Mr. Gray by the time Mr. Gray was on the snowmobile, so it makes no sense that they'd have to use a prop later. The various protagonists never had to use props or visualize props to mentally communicate with each other, so Thomas Jane's use of a gun to somehow talk to another one of the Dreamcatcher crew seemed wildly out of place in light of the rules for telepathy already set up in the movie.

     

    Oxycontin for the win, I guess.

     

    Yes, and I couldn't figure out why the fact that Thomas Jane says 'call me, Jonesy, buddy' from a car nowhere in range of Jonesy/Mr Grey would prompt Memory Warehouse Jonesy to pick up a phone and dial. Dial the gun. There were a few of these weird callbacks throughout: surely there's meaning in seeing the character who had raised the loaded gun to his head to kill himself in minute 2 of the film is now using another (unloaded) gun to have a conversation with someone who isn't there?

     

    And what about the matching 'dropping the toothpicks'/'dropping the worm burning matches' moments, both set up as a slow-motion 'nooooo' moment, but with the second one being completely undermined by him finding one that he didn't drop. The fact that they mimicked the shot made me think 'okay, falling pointy things is the equivalent here to The Godfather and oranges', but nope. Not to be.

    • Like 1

  7. Posted

    Finally watched last night, and listened to the podcast on the drive to work this morning. Shout out to my wife for suffering through the movie with me, although we disagreed on which we preferred more, this or 'Vampire Academy' (my vote is for this one).

     

    Most of what i had to say has been said because I'm coming in so late, but I wanted to check in regardless.

     

    My main beef (amongst all the other beefs) is similar to others already stated: if 'one worm can end the world', then what about all of the COUNTLESS hitchhikers that escape this shoddy quarantine? All those animals gambolling in front of the cabin - including off-hand references to the BEARS that saunter by - are going their separate ways. All of the 'Friends'-loving Amurricans in lockdown in Eyebrows Freeman's concentration camp? No, the three-star general comes by, kicks out the Blue Boys, and presumably lets them all go. And don't forget the ridiculous get out of jail free card Tom Sizemore plays - 'Oh, and some people who get infected turn out to be just fine'. What? When i teach playwriting students a fundamental issue I bring up again and again is don't position two characters who tell each other things they already know, just for the sake of the audience. I feel like this happened again and again - particularly in the 'I forgot about your crazy brain warehouse' scene that was mentioned on the podcast. There was so much needless exposition for so little payoff. The whole alien massacre: how MUCH money did that cost of their budget? And for what? Why not let Mr Grey be the only alien? Killing Mr Grey didn't solve much at all. What about other eggs? Other butt worms? Other Ripley carriers?

     

    All I could think of throughout this was "within one year of this, Timothy Olyphant would become Seth Bullock." Based on this performance, that's some Keiser Soze shit.

     

    And my favourite bit was Damian Lewis's Mr Grey face. His voice was good too, but that insane smile. Jeebus.

    Damian-Lewis.jpg

    • Like 3

  10. Posted

    I preferred to think that the Duckie reference was a shout-out to Zoe Deutch's mother, who was the object of affection in 'Some Kind of Wonderful', another John Hughes script. Obtuse? Of course! It would have been way more blatant if she'd called Mia 'Watts', given their shared haircuts and better link to Mommy. And, of course, Zoe's dad directed SKOW. Surely that's it!

     

     

    That's totally not it.

     

    • Like 1

  11. Posted

     

    Well, I'm no better than you, because I was wondering the same thing (surprise). We learn that the Moroi carry out basic human functions - they breathe oxygen, they reproduce, and they "eat" blood. They get hungry if they go too long in between feedings. So I did some Googling and found that blood contains about 700 calories/L. An average adult would need to drink around 3 L per day. Besides calories, humans need to ingest other essential vitamins and minerals like vitamin C, since our bodies can't make it or store it. The average blood serum levels of vitamin C are around 5 mg/L. The World Health Organisation recommends at least 45 mg per day. So you’d need to drink 9 L of blood to avoid getting scurvy, which equals 6300 calories! That's an extra 4000 calories per day, or 1.46 million extra calories in a year, which equals to 417 pounds of fat per year!*

     

    On further Googling, it turns out that the 3 L per day requirement would give you 4.5 times your recommended dietary allowance of salt. So on top of the morbid obesity, these teens are probably suffering from hypertension. They are walking time bombs for cardiac events.

     

    This brings me to the original question. Do vampires poop? Yes. Yes they do. However, since they don't have any real fiber in their diet, their poops are likely black tarry messes (do not Google image search for melena). I hope they wipe the memories of the janitors at the academy.

     

    *(assuming a sedentary lifestyle and all extra calories get converted to adipose tissue)

     

    It's questions and answers like this which feel like the entire reason this podcast exists. Bravo.

    • Like 3

  12. Posted

     

    Off the top of my head, and I can only think of Masters of the Universe, but I'm sure there are more.

     

    Here's a few potentials: correct me if I'm wrong.

     

    The Last Airbender

    Battlefield Earth

    Green Lantern

    Wild Wild West?

    After Earth

    Jupiter Ascending? (incidentally, I was so sad hearing this episode that no one made the link that the title character shared exactly the same name as the main character from Alfred Hitchcock's 'Three Investigators' teen fiction series)

    Masters of the Universe

    The Phantom

    Stealth

    Vampire Academy

     

    A few of these have teasers like 'oh, I'm sure we'll meet again...', while others go out of their way to film extra stuff. I might be wrong on a few, but there's lots of hope invested here.

    • Like 3

  14. Posted

     

    I think the biggest question I have though is what was up with Ms. Karp? Like when she used compulsion on Rose, she made it seem like there's some horrible, deadly threat looming about that is worse than the Strigoi, and later in the videos we see she regrets not leaving with Rose and Lyssa. Then the movie reveals the biggest threat to be Victor, whose dastardly plan is equal to that of Mother Gothel in Tangled. Am I to believe that Karp turned herself into a Strigoi to avoid THAT lame excuse at villainy, or is there a deeper, twisted plot that is revealed later in the books?

     

    I felt a bit sad for the actress playing Ms. Karp. I feel like she was sold the opportunity to play a Big Bad in a teen vampire romance series and her big breakout opportunity was in movie two or three. So, bide your time in the first one, really come in guns blazing later. There'll be a sequel, don't worry, this is your big break. Look, we'll even shoot a teaser for the next film showing that you're planning an all-out assault on St Vlad's, and this will be your Battle of Hogwarts... I would love for someone to compile a list of best teasers for sequels that never happened in these awful movies. How many have there been in the HDTGM canon where the end is left open, testament to the optimism of human spirit? Anyone got any thoughts beyond this one and Stealth?

    • Like 3

  15. Posted

    Finally got a chance to watch this movie and listen to the ep! What a ride!

     

    First of all, this movie was extra depressing as it reminded me of all the things I hated about high school, minus vampires and magic of course.

     

    But I do have some questions.

     

    What is the Moroi and Dhampir society? I know nothing of the books, but going from the movie all we have is... a high school and a church. Which is amazingly important enough that the QUEEN OF MOROI gives special assemblies to. The students react with an almost eye-rolling response to the horns signaling she's about to give a speech, so it seems like a common thing. The auditorium is full of teenagers. The queen, the current top ruler of all 12 Moroi royal families, proceeds to call up a teenaged princess and degrade her in front of the whole student body, an incredibly petty motion for someone who is ruling over TWELVE ROYAL FAMILIES. Doesn't she have better things to do? It sets forth this feeling that the world of Moroi and Dhampir doesn't exist beyond St. Vlad's Academy, when that's obviously not the case. Where's the rest of the society? What do they do? Do they know their queen is visiting a high school for the sole purpose of degrading a 17 year old girl (twice)?

     

    The... ignorance of the students in regards to the outside world is bizarre. Though I believe it was stated that the school has its own version of internet and possibly social media and they have computers and other technology. It's like pop culture and connections to the outside world are banned, but to what purpose? Obviously there are times where they interact with the outside world (i.e. mall trip), but why cut the kids off from things that might benefit them once they graduate from the academy? Maybe they're like the Amish in a way, I don't know. It seems unnecessary.

     

     

     

    Agreed to all of this. I don't understand where the queen lives. Is she visiting especially to make this announcement, or does she live at the school? I assume the former, but then when a fanfare is played to announce her arrival (which, in my mind right now, sounds exactly like the 'Would You Rather?' theme), everyone says, 'Oh, the queen's here'. Ho hum. And in the very next shot you have the entire student body all perfectly assembled, watching with what can't be described as reverence, but maybe... tolerance? It's essentially just an incredibly well-ordered impromptu student assembly designed to mock the last member of one of these houses everyone's supposed to be ruled by. I guess the other books tell us about the other houses but really, why complicate things so much in this film? Twelve? What happens when the queen dies? Will Lissa be the queen? Or some other member of another royal family? Is Lissa's blood speech enough to get her the job? Stay tuned!

     

    Also, when Rose tells Modern Family that she's going shopping, MF jumps and says 'oh please, you know how much I love shopping', or something to that effect. HOW does she know that? She's a shut-in Amish kid who doesn't know about hashtags and licks walls. And when they go to the mall, there's no rumspringa sense of 'what is this place? look at that thing!', it's just, oh yeah, we're teens at a random urban mall that's somehow in striking distance of rural Montana.

    • Like 3

  16. Posted

     

    Why is it called "Vampire Academy"? Because "Moroi Academy" isn't going to fly off the shelves. It doesn't matter that within the book vampire is a bad word. You have to sell units!

    Yeah, that's what I figured. But it's so misleading! And pointless! Why go out of their way to distance themselves from the V word then? Just say 'yeah we're vampires, but here's more details that the stories got wrong. And here's our Academy. Etc.'

    • Like 1

  21. Posted

    Throughout the movie, Dimitri is constantly telling the audience that Rose is nothing more than a "novice"--that she's not a true Guardian. We even see this for ourselves when we first meet Ducky as the first thing he does (besides tell a group of his peers that "Dimitri is a God") is totally hand Rose her ass. At this point, the movie is pretty much telling us that, due to her yearlong absence, her fighting skills have atrophied to the point that even Ducky, a student who was (maybe) at best her equal at Dhampir-ing, has now far outpaced her skills. Furthermore, based on the running gag of Rose trying to catch Dimitri off guard, we are shown that Rose's innate battle instincts tell her that the best way to catch your opponent unaware is to yell for a full ten second as you charge slowly at them and jump on their back like a goddamn Muppet.

     

     

    dabney-coleman-and-animal-in-the-muppets-take-manhattan-580x419.jpg

     

     

    I only bring all this up to point out how gloriously inept the Guardians she takes out at the beginning must have been. Not only do they immediately give themselves away, but about five, fully trained, adult Dhampirs let an untested and out of practice teenager kick all of their sorry asses. They would have been better off having Ducky bring them in.

     

    Also, a bit off topic, but just a quick tip for the lovelorn, if you ever finding yourself referring to the rival of your love's affections as "a God," you might as well just go ahead and throw in the towel. That's a big fat "GAME OVER," bro.

     

    Yes! All of this! She says 'it takes five of our best to take down one of their worst', and the one at the beginning she 'freezes' in front of, that appears like a Big Bad but is ultimately just a nameless peon, is the first Stragoi she has ever seen. Like, what? Surely in all her years they've run across a couple from time to time? And is St Vlad's somehow magically protected from Stragoi like Hogwart's is from the Death Eaters (for most of the time), or Camp Halfblood is from Monsters (we really need a decent Percy Jackson reboot)? They are all pretty relaxed for a group under constant threat: and whose enemies live in the cave up the way. Particularly since any malcontent Moroi just needs to suck on a fanboy feedbag for a minute too long and they'll turn into an embedded incendiary device that none of the students are equipped to fight. Even Modern Family was tough to put down, and she's tiny. Gah, this movie.

    • Like 2

  22. Posted

    Late to the Vampire Party but finally got to the movie, then caught the podcast yesterday. Sweet merciful Vlad, that was a mess.

     

    There's so much to say and so much of it has already been said above - a few things that really tickled me...

     

    - While I was saddened to see Gabriel Byrne in this thing - it took me a few seconds to thankfully realise he hadn't aged that much, it was just makeup - I liked the reminder of the 'benevolent figure who turns out to be a bad guy' twist in The Usual Suspects. Yes, I know Dean Keaton wasn't Keiser Soze but there's a moment where Verbal Kint makes us believe he is, and the reveal in this reminded me of that. I had some memory of Vampire Gabriel wearing a fedora at some point but I can't find an image online. Maybe that was what made me think of it.

    - Aisling Bea's impersonation of Dimitry's 'learn English by being in a movie' was the highlight of the week for me, although are we agreed that she made a mistake assuming Dimitry (Bobo long-hair Ashton Kutcher to me) was 16,000 years old? Yep.

    - How about the on-the-nose-ism of the credits track 'Bela Lugosi's dead'? Maybe vampire movies generated feedbag fanboys to bridge between Cameron's Bram Stoker theory and Anne Rice?

    - The book's called 'Vampire Academy', as is the film. Yet in the movie, Lissa says 'Don't use the V word' (or words to that effect). Usually 'vampire' is thrown around by Rose, in a way that she is either clueless about its offence (not likely) or is trying to be offensive (jerk move). Maybe the title to the first book was a marketing decision, and it just stuck? They make it clear that 'vampires' are fictional creatures; Moroi and Stragoi only resemble vampires in certain ways. SO WHY IS IT CALLED VAMPIRE ACADEMY?

    - Favourite line (and new post signature): They may call Dimitri a god... but I'm an atheist. An atheist with a big-ass gun."

     

    I'm sure there's more, but I have to go teach. Will check back in later. So much to say about this thing.

     

    Also: this was the first HDTGM film my wife has watched with me, bemusedly. I'm happy to say, three days later, our marriage appears intact. There were moments during this thing that I truly wondered. And then Rose punched Mia in the face, my wife laughed out loud, and i settled in.

    • Like 4

  23. Posted

    Nudging this one up again, based entirely on the stylised 'LS' logo that they somehow thought was a good idea to generate.

     

    lost-space-all-new.jpg

     

    Kind of like they did with Independence Day ('ID4'), so they kids could say in the playground:

    1 "hey, you wanna play LS?"

    2 "yeah!"

    1 "I'm Matt LeBlanc"

    2 "No fair, you always get to be Matt LeBlanc when we play LS!"

    1 "I love LS"

    2 "Me too, Timmy. Me too"

    • Like 1

  25. Posted

    Bumping this up after remembering Krull in the pinball thread. I was introduced to this film by a friend who truly, truly loved it, but I made the mistake of watching it alone, rather than having him to guide me. Big mistake.

     

    My favourite part: British actress Lysette Anthony got her voice dubbed over to appeal to the American audience (who are apparently so eager to hear something familiar that they'll forgive poor ADR that would give Hercules in New York a run for its money). Apparently Lysette has fallen on hard times now: let's blame the dubbing of Krull.

    • Like 2
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