Wargames

It’s amazing how well this movie has stood the test of time. I just saw it and it’s just as timely. Sure, the technology has changed, and the cold war is over… but the message of the movie is perhaps even more pertinent today. One thing didn’t make sense though – how did the computer voice suddenly “come on” at the end of the movie (when they’re all in the war room)? The voice was originally made with a little box in Lightman’s room… Ya, I know it makes the ending more dramatic. I just hate it when movies sacrifice common sense for dramatic effect. This movie does it another time too – when Ally Sheedy says they should “swim for it.”, then, “what kind of asshole grows up in Seattle and doesn’t know how to swim”. I guess it shows how Lightman has missed out on things due to his computer obsession and is now confronted with the possible “end of time”. But, Seattle has nothing to do with swimming. Puget Sound is so damn cold – nobody could swim a ferry route. (well, I heard that some guy did one, but he wore a wet suit or something).

 

Godzilla – 1998

Yes, I actually paid to see this. it’s about what I expected: monster destroys city, people kill monster. it has a good mix of all the usual Hollywood movie crap – a love angle, an annoying politician, a smart character that nobody will listen to, etc. there is nothing original about any part of this movie (even the camera angles were borrowed from somewhere). I’m getting a little sick of computer animated creatures too. even though the special effects were good, they didn’t break any new ground. the whole movie could have been a lot better… but I was expecting it to be pretty dumb, so I wasn’t disappointed. I just didn’t have anything better to do that day.

Glory

It’s hard to take a “story within a story” and make it a compelling drama. Glory did a decent job though. The big story was the Civil War, the story within was about the first all-black regiment to kick butt. Or… get their butt kicked… That raises an interesting question, are they “heroes” because they were slaughtered? or are they just poor discarded souls?