Miscellaneous Movie Musings the Sequel

[flippyshark]

During my middle and high school years, I spent quite a bit of time making dumb Super8 mm films with my friends, so I was eager to see JJ Abrams new release, Super 8. A few comments, guaranteed spoiler free:

- It will remind you of a lot of other movies, but it does find its own genial vibe. And it gets the whole Super 8 Filmmaker thing just right. (Ah, Super 8 Filmmaker magazine. I used to have a subscription.)

- Though I enjoyed it, I don't get why Abrams insists on that silly lens flare that creates a horizontal line across the screen. It seems to be a trademark, but it's kinda annoying. He should ditch it.

- Apart from that, Super 8 gets most things right. It's a summer movie that places its focus on an engaging bunch of young characters, and the genre element is a distant second place. (So much so that when it eventually comes to the fore, it's a little underwhelming.) The slow build-up to the weird events was nicely played, even if the destination wasn't anything terribly new.

- It has the best end credits bonus I've seen in quite a while.

I will add one quibble that probably isn't even quite a spoiler, but I'll treat it as such anyway.

Spoiler:

If your movie has a missing dog element, you must actually show the dog (or dogs) returning. It isn't enough to just have some dialogue where someone says "We found your dog." Honestly!