Wrath of the Titans

"Perseus braves the treacherous underworld to rescue his father, Zeus, captured by his son, Ares, and brother Hades who unleash the ancient Titans upon the world." www.imdb.com

It's interesting when a movie gets remade and then it is decided to give it a sequel that never existed. However, Wrath of the Titans follows Clash of the Titans effortlessly. Done with the same style of story telling and special effects that gives it the feeling that it was waiting to be made and I wouldn't be surprised for more. I love when sequels keep the same actors, it makes the story easier to get into and follow when it has the same actors from the beginning. Although it is amusing that Perseus grew his hair longer for this movie, partly to show time had passed and to look more like the Perseus from the original version (he had it short out of respect for the look of the character in the original and to imply it wasn't a direct remake, which it really wasn't).

However because it was done with the same style of effects it had the same one big flaw that the main monster/villain took way too long to be shown. Just like the Kraken in Clash of the Titans, Kronos took too long to appear and it was hard to tell exactly what he looked like because there was too much going on around him. You get the general idea though.

I do find both titles, Clash of the Titans and Wrath of the Titans, to be a bit misleading. The titles suggest multiple Titans causing havoc on the world. But both movies really only have one or two Titans, they do have little minions though, but not so much the Titans. A bit misleading, but still very entertaining.

Zero Dark Thirty & SEAL Team 6

Both of these movies are about the HUNT and MURDER of Osama bin Laden.

The only thing I can say about the idea of these movies is that I am offended. I am offended because of how these movie portray Americans. I can't even sit through a whole commercial for these because they annoy me so much. First we HUNTED down bin Laden and MURDERED him. The word "justice" gets thrown around a lot, however Justice is suppose to be a trial by your peers and two sides of the story and a judgment based on the evidence presented. Someone decided to skip right to sentencing and execution. This wasn't Justice, this was REVENGE pure and simple.

And after all that was said and done, someone has decided that this could be sold as ENTERTAINMENT. Really? REALLY?!? I can't imagine anyone actually grabbing a bag a popcorn, popping these movies in and sitting back for a night of fun entertainment watching a man being killed because we felt we had the right to get revenge on someone who we felt had no right to attack the US first. The logic must be lost on me, but I am totally ok with feeling it is inappropriate to make entertainment out of the death of someone else just to make back the money that was put towards his murder.

The only logical end to "an eye for an eye" is everyone ends up blind. Just like the "Justice" that was delivered.

Planet of the Apes : Evolution vs Creationism

Growing up Planet of the Apes was one of my favorite movies and I still enjoy the original now. It had so many layers to the story that intrigued me even at a young age.

The first one was about taking care of our pets and making sure they stay healthy and safe, otherwise a plague may take them all away. So I was very concerned about the pets I had and wanted to keep them safe. But once all the "regular" types of pets died humans still felt the need to own an animal and have a pet. I thought this was kind of strange to be honest. Why was man so obsessed with owning another living creature?

So man decided to take primates as pets. But they could be more then pets. Because primates were closely related to humans and exhibited similar skill abilities it was decided that a good idea would be to teach the primates to do daily tasks so they can be more useful and more then just a pet. So the primates were clothed to appear more like humans as well, and were taught to go to the store and buy groceries, housecleaning, how to make a cocktail, how to cook. Later they were used as manual labor in the workforce. Given a variety of jobs. But all these tasks and all the training was slowly making them evolve into being more human.

That was what I felt was the main point of the Planet of the Apes movies, and if you watch all the originals in order it actually makes a full cycle of their evolution. The problem with evolution though is that sometimes there are unexpected outcomes. After so many years of being oppressed and used like slaves the primates become self-aware of their abilities and the fact that they could be used against their human owners. That is one inevitable outcome of evolution, revolution. The primates revolted and took the rights and freedoms they realized the humans had. They fought back and because this was unexpected they defeated the humans and therefore created the planet of the apes.

But this evolution was key to the story. Even the remake kept the idea of evolution. It gave the primates a bit more attitude though. It also created a more action-packed, aggressive militant-state movie which was contrary to the civil, mild-mannered, science and politically led society of the original movie. This could however be one direction the revolt of the original movie could have taken, but it really doesn't lend well to a storyline. The original movie really captured the idea of the human thirst for knowledge and the constant need to question the world around them. All animals have aggression and an ability to attack another species, or their own. But it seems that to be human is to question. And the original movies emphasized the evolution towards human by making science the leading force of society.

i am clearly against remakes. Most of my blogs will probably repeat this statement. But one thing that is even more annoying then simply remaking a movie is to pretend that you're not. The 2011 version tries to get away with this. And I do understand that because technically it has a different title it therefore doesn’t have to be the same movie. But I doubt anyone believes it isn't a remake.

***WARNING: SPOILERS***

Rise of the Planet of the Apes completely throws the concept of evolution out the window and replaces it with a science experiment that backfires. Instead of the slow process of the primates learning to be more human and adapting to their surrounding slowly and through changing, they are simply made smart. And this sudden intelligence means they have all the skills and abilities of a human. They don't have the time to learn to appreciate this change and what it means for their species. This story is all about aggression and fighting oppression. This one is more like the 2001 version. The primates create a militant state because all they do is smash and break and harm and run away. There is no evolution to understand their place in the world. They just want to take it over.

The premise if this movie falls into a category that is basically an entire genre of movies from the 80's and early 90's of animals who are smarter then they should be and what they do with that. There are many movies about primates who are smart and do what humans do: primates playing baseball, primates going into space, etc. There is even a whole collection of other smart animal movies. This is not new. So in addition to completely changing the premise of a movie it is clearly remaking it is also copying ideas that have already been repeatedly done. Where is the vision?

Probably the biggest part of the original 1968, and even the 2001 version of the movie is that you don't really see the big picture until the big reveal at the end. And you don't even have much time to adjust before the credits begin to roll. You're suppose to be following along and accepting this reality and what's going on and then suddenly the reveal makes you think about what you just saw. You are forced to suddenly question everything that just happened and how you felt about it and what it could possibly really mean. There is no question or reveal in the 2011 version. All that is revealed is new special effects to make you believe something is actually happening. I really can't think of anything else to say about it.

Friday the 13th: Bad Luck Strikes Twice



I've always been interested in the realities of movies. I liked movies that I could accept the reality of and believe it might actually be able to happen. All movies have some kind of a reality that can be grasped and accepted. Well, almost all movies. The one movie that, even as a child, never fully created a reality for me was Friday the 13th. I was forced to only watch that movie for entertainment purposes, which it was but there was always something lacking.

***WARNING: SPOILERS***

The reason I could never grasp or accept the reality of Friday the 13th was because there is too big of an unexplained hole in the premise. According to the original 1980 version Jason Voorhees drowned in 1957 (appearing to be around 10 or 11 years old, so for the sake of this blog I will assume he is that age), his mother avenged his death in 1958. This is where we fall into the hole in the plot. Twenty years later Mrs. Voorhees must avenge Jason's death again. This time she comes up against a camp counselor who puts up a fight. Mrs. Voorhees doesn't survive the night. Jason seems to have witnessed the death of his mother, therefore triggering the thirst for psychotic vengeance that he inherited from his mother. If that confused you at all then it means you are actually paying attention. Jason now must avenge his mother who died while avenging his death.

The only way that this is "explained" is that she developed a split personality and one of them is Jason at the age she assumed he died. Therefore she abandoned him to Crystal Lake and the woods surrounding it. But since he later kills a bunch of people he clearly did not die. He somehow took care of himself, later it is shown that he built himself a cozy little shack out in the woods. So he does grow up and is about 30 when he starts killing people. If Jason had in fact drowned and came back to life to kill he would have stayed the same age and would be a child running around Crystal Lake wielding all sorts of sharp objects.

This gap in time and space makes the story of Friday the 13th an impossible reality to accept beyond entertainment purposes. And I do admit that I find it very entertaining.

The 2009 version of the movie completely disregards the existence of any movie having been previously made. The reality has been completely rewritten. This "reality" claims that Mrs. Voorhees was killed while Jason was still a child and he watched it and then waited 20 years to start killing. Oddly enough this time shift isn't any more believable than the original. The reason for this is because the mother still went crazy and doesn't realize her son is alive and she should take care of him instead of avenging some fictional death. Although this version doesn't play it out quite as thoroughly as the original.

The newer version also has Jason more active then he ever was before. Although I guess technically there was no "before" so he could do whatever he wanted. So it is fine that he runs more then before, chasing people more then before. And now he seems to enjoy kidnapping people who resemble his mother. There really is no logic in that one.

This retelling, reality altering version didn't take the story anywhere. Didn't improve it. Didn't exactly make it worse. It still had the same hole in it, they just stitched a new story around it.

Remaking a movie like Friday the 13^th isn’t an easy task because everyone wants to get right to Jason and his killing spree. However the first movie has a different story and is the set up for Jason, so it is required. So this is technically a remake of Friday the 13^th II.

Friday the 13th is one of my top three favorite horror movie series. I just have to jump over the hole in the story and dive into the horror of Crystal Lake.

A Nightmare on Elm Street: Continued

I forgot to point out another big difference between the two versions of the movie. The Freddy Krueger characters in each movie are so very drastically different that it is hard to believe it is based on the same character.

The Freddy Krueger in the original version had such "life" to him. He greatly enjoyed the game of cat and mouse with his victims. He thrived on the chase and building the fear in his victim. The slash was the inevitiable end, but the torment and torutre that led up to it was Freddy's real joy.The scare was more satifying then the kill.

Freddy looked evil too. He looked like being burned had transformed him into something more then a traditional villain. He was more than a man with an agenda, he was Evil. There was a demonic presence to him.

The new Freddy Krueger was just an angry vengeful psycho. He just wanted the kids dead, the scare was a bonus for him.

This Freddy just looked like a burn victim. There was nothing unique about him. His voice was more gruff and angry. He was just a mad man, not a madman.

The worn old hat and the red and green sweater, and of course the glove, were not enough to make the new character as believable as the old one. Anyone can put on the costume, but there is only one "real" Freddy Krueger.

A Nightmare on Elm Street: Freddy Vs. Freddy



When I was a kid A Nightmare on Elm Street would always scare me, but i just couldn't stop watching it. I would have terrible nightmares of Freddy Krueger coming after me and my friends and having to try to survive. I'd often wake up in sweat and tears and scared of closing my eyes again. I still watch them with excitement, thankfully though the fear and nightmares no longer accompany the movie viewing.

When I saw they were remaking the movie I was very skeptical. My skepticism was completely justified after seeing it. I understand that in order to put your own mark on a movie you have to change it a little so it is updated and has a unique spin. However I feel those that chose to remake A Nightmare on Elm Street did a horrible job and totally offended the movie franchise with their new storyline.

In the original story of A Nightmare on Elm Street Freddy Krueger liked killing children, that's all. He simply killed children. In number 6, Freddy's Dead, they kind of explain why. He killed children, the parents of those children pressed charges and he ended up getting away with it. So the parents did what any protective parent in the movies do, they hunted him down and burned him alive. To get his revenge he started killing their children again but in their dreams now. However, this time he waited until they were in high school to get his revenge (that never made much sense to me, but I let it slide because the movie would be truly horrifying if all those slashings and slicing-and-dicings scenes actually had children in them).

The new version ((WARNING-Spoiler if you haven't seen it)) turned Freddy into a child-molester who got caught and was getting revenge on the children who told on him. This is a totally unacceptable storyline. It takes away the phsychotic nature of the original Freddy Krueger. He had knives on his fingers!! How was he suppose to be able to molest anyone? It just doesn't work.

The new version aslo implies he preferred to molest and kill little girls. I'm assuming this is because of all the scenes that had the little girls in white dresses singing the Freddy Krueger song throughout all the Nightmare on Elm Street movies. However the combined victims in all the orginal movies adds up to at least 25 male victims and 9 female victims. The assumptions of preferring little girls is invalid. Plus if he enjoyed killing girls so much I doubt it would be girls who always defeated him in every movie.

This is my idea regarding the little girls in white dresses in the original movies. What is the most common image of an angel? Typically a beautiful blonde female in a white robe/dress. Now translate that into an angel for children: a little blonde girl in a white dress. Those girls were guardian angels, appearing only to the ones who would end up defeating Krueger in the end. That's why there were always little girls in the movies. It was a warning to the hero that something bad was going to happen soon and to warn them about Freddy Krueger. The little girls weren't his victims.

Remakes on principle are inferior then the originals because they are trying to be a copy of something that was already made. And any changes to the story are going to effect how it is recieved by the audience.