Miscellaneous Movie Musings the Sequel

[Alex]

It all depends on how they come alive.

Admittedly, I don't have high hopes for it, but it isn't an idea without some potential.

Though one thing I'd take pause with is that, as hard as it is to believe, most people have never actually been to Disneyland and so deep familiarity can't really be assumed for the good gags.

[innerSpaceman]

Sorry, SM, Teacups is based on a movie, based on a book.


Ok, which is better - Immortal Beloved based on the true story of Beethovan with a tiny bit of conjecture as to the riddle of his death letter mystery

-OR-

Amadeus - based on, well, almost pure fiction about Mozart?



I ask because I just saw Immortal Beloved for the first time, really liked it - but was much more charmed by Amadeus. It bugs me a bit, though, that my naive trust is abused because when I watch a movie about a famous historical figure, I assume it's mostly true - with the usual exceptions for dramatic license.

I mean, certainly everyone knew going in that something like Shakespeare in Love was a totally fictional account featuring historical characters. But was I completely clueless not to realize Amadeus was pretty much the same thing?

In any event, I liked learning about Beethovan's life through this movie better than I liked learning little about Mozart's life through the Oscar-winning Milos Forman pic. Oh, and I enjoy Beethovan's music better than Mozart's, too.


Of course, Gary Oldman's Beethovan was kind of a creep, and Thomas Hulce's Mozart was a ton of immature fun. So there's that.

[Alex]

Unless it is an area I know reasonably well independently I just treat biographical and historical films as completely fictional.

If it requires a patina of reality to be entertaining then, frankly, it fails as a movie in my opinion.

To an extent this is even true of documentaries. I assume that there is not intentional distortion but unless I'm familiar with things I assume that the filmmaker could be so unintentionally distorting things as to be a useful document, but it can still be an entertaining film.

[innerSpaceman]

I'm much more moved by true stories. I don't much mind if things have a dramatic slant, even in a documentary, but I will be much more involved in a story if I believe it somewhat really happened.

Maybe that's just me. But it's why I like A Night to Remember better than The Poseidon Adventure (and why mixing real with bullsh!t so blithely in Titanic really bugs me).

[Alex]

I'm sure it isn't just you, but since I'm mostly unfamiliar with the factual basis, for example, it matters not at all to me whether The King's Speech and The Social Network are 100% factual or 100% fiction.

Now, that wouldn't be the case if I were familiar with them, not because I think the movie needs to be factual when I know about it, it is just that when I know the altered facts it distracts me from the movie to be wondering why they changed such and such (could be for good reasons, bad reasons, or just sloppiness).

So for that reason, it is probably best not to put Pearl Harbor on Midway for you World War II movie, but if I don't know, I wouldn't care.

[innerSpaceman]

I think my curse is knowing a little bit about a lot of things, and a lot of stuff about very few things.

For instance, I didn't know enough about Mozart (and still don't) to know how vigorously Amadeus was pulling my leg. But I know enough about Facebook to wonder if The Social Network will bug me when I finally see it.

Hey, I know ZERO about the subject matter of The King's Speech, but I still have near zero desire to see it - even though I'm sure not to be bugged by inaccuracies. Too bad.

[Alex]

There's very little Facebook (if you mean the actual web site) in the movie.

[LSPoorEeyorick]

Too bad about your feelings toward King's Speech, iSm. Some people here may not care for it, but it was definitely my favorite film of the year.

[innerSpaceman]

I'll Netflix it.

[SzczerbiakManiac]

Originally Posted by innerSpaceman

Sorry, SM, Teacups is based on a movie, based on a book.

I was just trying to think of what would be the silliest ride to "come alive" and couldn't come up with anything better.