Beautiful Creatures (2013)

[Count Magnus 27]

I ran across this on SyFy this afternoon and was shocked not to find it listed here already.

 

This is some sort of utterly bewildering Twilight knock-off set in the deep South. The cast includes people like Emma Thompson, Viola Davis, Margo Martindale, and Jeremy Irons (there I go, saying three serious things and then a joke). It is bizarre, overwrought garbage with a thick coat of fake southern accents.

 

It would be perfect for HDTGM.

[sillstaw 414]

This came from that period of time when Hollywood looked at the success of "Twilight" and decided that what YA audiences clearly liked was supernatural romance, and made a bunch of ripoffs from other book franchises, none of which took off. Then they sort of caught on that it helps to choose books that are actually popular and well-known, thus launching "The Hunger Games" franchise... thus leading to Hollywood deciding YA audiences wanted dystopian stories, and doing much the same thing. You've got to love Hollywood's stubborn refusal to learn from its mistakes; at the very least, it'll keep us rolling in "HDTGM" candidates forever.

[PlanBFromOuterSpace 3138]

This came from that period of time when Hollywood looked at the success of "Twilight" and decided that what YA audiences clearly liked was supernatural romance, and made a bunch of ripoffs from other book franchises, none of which took off. Then they sort of caught on that it helps to choose books that are actually popular and well-known, thus launching "The Hunger Games" franchise... thus leading to Hollywood deciding YA audiences wanted dystopian stories, and doing much the same thing. You've got to love Hollywood's stubborn refusal to learn from its mistakes; at the very least, it'll keep us rolling in "HDTGM" candidates forever.

To make another comparison, I think that in terms of popularity, films like this and "Mortal Instruments" are to "Twilight" what "Eragon" was to "Lord of the Rings". So many of these franchise non-starters seem more concerned with convincing us that they're the start of something big than actually being a film that anyone wants to see in the first place.

[Count Magnus 27]

I know how much of an entitled, out of touch jerk this is going to make me sound like, but here goes. When my wife and I moved back in 2007, we decided to skip getting cable or satellite TV and just switch to streaming services. This caused us to become active seekers of video entertainment, rather than passive consumers of it.

 

The negative side of this is that we are always late to the party. We are a season behind the culture as a whole, since we're waiting for things to hit Netflix (obviously things are better with Amazon's streaming video). By the time we get to most things, any spoilers have already been spoiled, plotlines have been resolved, and everybody else has moved on.

 

But this set up also insulates us from most of the real dreck that's out there. I had no idea that this terrible movie existed, because it came and went while I was under an effective media blackout. In fact, while I knew on an intellectual basis that there was a long train of Twilight knock-offs put there, I had no experience with just how bad this stuff really is.

 

I still don't know if we made the right decision. I feel like there are huge blind spots in my engagement with the culture, but if stuff like Beautiful Creatures is what's behind that veil, maybe the trade off is worth it.

 

I realize all this doesn't add to the conversation, but I'm on the road, out of my time zone and not at the top of my game. Thanks for indulging me.

[taylor anne photo 11311]

Right when this came out in theaters I was still in college and my friends and I decided to illegally stream this (whoops) and get really stoned to watch it. If that can't make a movie better then I never want to know what it's like sober (also looking at you Dreamcatcher).

 

I never read the books but I was actually more interested in the concept than I have with any of the other supernatural romance movies (Twilight actually not included because those books came out right when I was exactly in it's demo so I ate that shit up until I hit 18 and it was like a veil had been lifted from over my eyes and I realized what I was actually reading was total trash). Plus this fucking amazing cast had me in the palm of it's greedy little hands.

 

If it had just been a movie about Jeremy Irons and Emma Thompson in this age old battle between good and evil I think there could have been something good about it. But instead we got two nameless leads with zero chemistry and a shit ton of awful accents. And this movie just perpetuates this crazy ass notion that inherently all women are evil and there is no escaping that. Wtf!?

[Cameron H. 23786]

Here's my experience with this movie:

 

I bought it at Target for 5 bucks with no prior knowledge of the film. I often have the attitude, "If it's good or bad, it's only a couple of bucks. Even if I just watch it once, I'm still getting my money's worth." I'm also one of those types of people who, every so often, just craves to see something "different." So, full disclosure, I didn't hate this movie. I'm not saying it's a good movie, and I have only watched it once, but for what it was, it entertained me. My biggest gripe was the dinner party scene, which I felt was tonally out of place from the rest of the movie. I liked that the male lead was a literature nerd who was desperate to get out of his small minded, hick town, and I felt that the girl's angst (unlike Bella's) was earned. For the most part, I felt they were treated as equals, unlike in Twilight where there is this pervading desperation that exudes from Bella in every fawning word she thinks about Edward. I also disagree with Taylor Anne that the message was, "inherently all women are evil." She was really neither good nor bad, she's just like any other teenager trying to figure out who she is going to be. She's asking herself, "Am I a good person or a bad person? Do I have any choice? How much of who I am is predicated on the people who raised me or whose blood is running through my veins? Is my life predestined or--even when it doesn't feel like it--do I have a choice? As it turns out, it's all of these things.

 

The funny postscript I have to this is, when I was checking out, the cashier told me how much she liked the movie and that the book was even better. (Another thing about me is that I absorb books like I absorb movies--good and bad.) So after I watched the movie, I went and bought the book. Holy crap! Now that thing is garbage--and I've read all four of the Twilight books! When you think back on this movie, if you can think of any moment that you thought to yourself, "Yeah, that part was alright..." forget it! It's not in the book. Literature nerd who wants to get out of his small town and see the world? Gone. Nope--in the book, he's just a Bella who just pines over this weird girl that just treats him like human garbage. It's also terribly written--and this cannot be stressed enough, that's coming from someone who voluntarily read four Twilight books!

 

Bottom line--although it is by no means a good movie, and is certainly worthy of the HDTGM treatment, I don't really think it's much worse than the other YA tripe that we're force fed. In fact, my theory as to why the movie didn't go so well is because it veered so far from the source material. I'm assuming it was already a successful book series with a ready built audience, and even though I would argue that the changes they made to the story vastly improved it, I'm sure people who liked the books were left scratching their heads.

[taylor anne photo 11311]

I also disagree with Taylor Anne that the message was, "inherently all women are evil." She was really neither good nor bad, she's just like any other teenager trying to figure out who she is going to be. She's asking herself, "Am I a good person or a bad person? Do I have any choice? How much of who I am is predicated on the people who raised me or whose blood is running through my veins? Is my life predestined or--even when it doesn't feel like it--do I have a choice? As it turns out, it's all of these things.

You're very right. It felt to me that leading up to that moment, though, they heavily implied that women were evil and it would be this love for a dude that brought goodness into her. Maybe the whole point was that she was learning for herself that that isn't true, but I was already so fed up with the movie that by that point I was like okay why did I do this to myself I'm just going to look at my phone and tune out for a bit. I for sure agree with you about the dinner scene but in my opinion none of the movie really flowed very well to me at all. I was constantly confused about character development (mostly just their developing relationships because it seemed one moment the girl didn't know this person and in the next scene she's telling them all of her secrets), and really even more confused about why the main guy was there 90% of the time. I'm glad the movie was better than the book, because honestly how many times can we ever say that, but that only furthers my questioning as to why the fuck this got made lol.

 

Maybe (probably not) I will give this another watch and see if I still feel the same way about it (probably).

[Cameron H. 23786]

Maybe (probably not) I will give this another watch and see if I still feel the same way about it (probably).

 

Oh, please don't do that to yourself. It's still a bad movie, I was just trying to say--comparatively--it's not that bad. It's still pretty bad.

 

I guess, for some weird reason, I've decided that this would be the week I'd jump on the forums and champion movies that I could not possibly give less of a crap about.

[SlidePocket 707]

It's being covered next week!

[Baron 8]

Just watched it, it is truly awful. The actress playing the girl Savannah is 30!

[Dsexauer 5]

I turned it off after 10 minutes and I usually power through. Should I try to push through or did anyone else have a similar experience?