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I was told that there were some people here who were into Kurt Wimmer's last movie Equilibrium. So I'm a little surprised that there hasn't yet been a topic on his new movie Ultraviolet.
I don't know if I'm going to see this one. The trailer looks like another Aeon Flux. I've seen Equilibrium, and it seems to me that Wimmer has a real talent for using the most worn-out, tired sci-fi cliches and playing them like he just had the most profound idea ever. First it's the Orwellian dystopia, and now it's the government-created super-soldier that is marked for termination.
At least Equilibrium had some reasonably creative and well-executed action ideas going along with the tired melodrama. If the trailers are anything to go by, Ultraviolet won't even have that. Milla Jovovich as an action hero in this movie looks about as convincing as when they got Hervé Villechaize to try to beat up Roger Moore in The Man With the Golden Gun.
So any Wimmer fans here want to defend the movie? Or does everyone else agree that this looks like a disaster in the making?
Posts: 563 | Registered: Feb 2006
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Oh, I'll be seeing it. I'll definitely be seeing it.
And I think it would sell a lot more tickets if they just went ahead and changed the title to 'Milla Jovovich's Stomach'.
Posts: 2267 | Registered: May 2005
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On the basis of watching what is widely regarded as her best movie ("The Fifth Element"), I say Milla Jovovich is not only nowhere the actress *or* action hero that Summer Glau is (the fight scenes in 5th Element where laughably bad), she's not even as pretty. This from a non-browncoat, too (though I thought Serenity was quite good).
Posts: 121 | Registered: Jan 2006
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I think that this Ultraviolet would be a waste of money that I don't have. I guess that makes my decision for me.
Posts: 46 | Registered: Apr 2005
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quote:Originally posted by password: On the basis of watching what is widely regarded as her best movie ("The Fifth Element"), I say Milla Jovovich is not only nowhere the actress *or* action hero that Summer Glau is (the fight scenes in 5th Element where laughably bad), she's not even as pretty. This from a non-browncoat, too (though I thought Serenity was quite good).
Still, I'm glad Summer didn't get cast in this. As bad as Milla's skillz look, I don't think better acting or fighting could save this movie. This could very well be a career killer, and I'd rather see it happen to Milla than Summer.
And about whether Milla is pretty or not, she's an interesting phenomenon. She can look like about 6 completely different people depending on how she's fixed up and photographed. Two of those people are stunningly gorgeous, a couple are decent looking, and the other two are absolutely hideous. She looks okay in the trailer, but I've seen better.
Posts: 563 | Registered: Feb 2006
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Equilibrium does, however, make a fantastic drinking game.
"Ok, Ok, every time he takes off his gloves, you take a shot."
The only problem is there are some places where we cut quickly to several scenes of him taking off his gloves, which makes it difficult to fill your glass in time.
Posts: 3243 | Registered: Apr 2002
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I loved Equilibrium, sure it was a rehash of Brave New World, and Fahrenheit 451, but that close quarters gunfight at the end kicked butt!
That being said, Ultraviolet looks incredibly stupid, and I probably won't see it until it comes out on video and I can rent it for half the price of a movie ticket...and take notes for future drinking games later.
Posts: 681 | Registered: Feb 2004
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By the way, Bob the Lawyer, try drinking to Episode III. I like to call it "Anakin, Master, Force" 1 shot, 2 shots, and 3 shots respectively.
Posts: 681 | Registered: Feb 2004
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Wow, Epictetus, and here I thought I was bad about inciting people to alcoholism! Do people survive that drinking game?
I may catch Ultraviolet if I'm bored some weekend, but it's not a must-see. Looks pretty stupid and the super-soldier description in the trailer sounds like "we're basically vampires but we don't want to say 'vampires' cuz that's been done to death." I really enjoyed Resident Evil. RE2, not so much. Haven't seen Equilibrium.
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I think me and my friends got about 30 minutes into it before what little common sense we had left caused us to stop. I don't recommend doing it, unless you want to pass out very, very quickly.
Posts: 681 | Registered: Feb 2004
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quote:Originally posted by Bob the Lawyer: Equilibrium does, however, make a fantastic drinking game.
"Ok, Ok, every time he takes off his gloves, you take a shot."
The only problem is there are some places where we cut quickly to several scenes of him taking off his gloves, which makes it difficult to fill your glass in time.
My enginneering friends developed a similar drinking game around the movie "The Core." Everytime something latantly unscientific happened, they took half a shot. They both passed out before the movie was half over, and neither touched alcohol again for about 6 months.
Posts: 4655 | Registered: Jan 2002
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wow, as an engineer I think I would have just passed out at the very thought of such a drinking game about The Core... Every time I saw previews of that movie even it just made me shudder.
Posts: 1038 | Registered: Feb 2006
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I had the same reaction at the end of the book The Hot Zone made a "bio-suit" out of trash bags.
And it was non-fiction, he supposedly really did that. He was fairly close to reality most of that book, although he was trying to use scare tactics, but the end showed how sensationalistic he was really trying to be. Posts: 15082 | Registered: Jul 2001
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Rottentomatoes is finally getting some reviews up. Here's my favorite quote so far:
quote: "Although it masquerades as a futuristic action-thriller, Ultraviolet functions best as a multi-million dollar commercial for Milla Jovovich's personal trainer."
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Cor saw it tonight . . . she reports: . . . good, strong female character, great costumes for her, cheesy dialogue, some good action sequences, some action impossible to follow, some good CGI, some special effects that look more like watching a cartoon than a movie. Assuming this is based on a comic book (?) the plot is difficult to follow without the backstory, until about halfway through the movie.
Posts: 13680 | Registered: Mar 2002
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quote:Originally posted by Bob the Lawyer: Equilibrium does, however, make a fantastic drinking game.
"Ok, Ok, every time he takes off his gloves, you take a shot."
The only problem is there are some places where we cut quickly to several scenes of him taking off his gloves, which makes it difficult to fill your glass in time.
My enginneering friends developed a similar drinking game around the movie "The Core." Everytime something latantly unscientific happened, they took half a shot. They both passed out before the movie was half over, and neither touched alcohol again for about 6 months.
That would be something like classicists and "Troy" - every time they only f*&# up the mythology a little, it's one shot. When Menelaus or Big Ajax or Agamemnon dies at the COMPLETE wrong time or Achilles is in the Trojan Horse or Paris and Helen escape together or Paris randomly runs into Aeneas... finish the fracking bottle so that you don't remember the movie in the morning Posts: 3932 | Registered: Sep 1999
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I saw it tonight. It is a trainwreck of every futuristic, dytopian, female martial arts, vampire, cliche-ridden, action-flick wannabe, with stilted dialog and murky special effects there is.
Other than that it was ok.
Milla Jojovich was "hot" in an always viewed through a vaseline-covered lens sort of way. In other words, if you are near-sighted and forget your glasses, you won't notice during this film.
Other than that, it was , um, "stylish". Someone wanna tell me what all the bales of cotten were doing around the "ministry"? Or were they crushed junkyard cars? I couldn't tell. (It was the damn vaseline thing again.) Or maybe my contacts were dried out. Posts: 6394 | Registered: Dec 1999
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My brother found several episodes of an intended TV series of Ultraviolet that got cancelled before Fox ever broadcast a single scene. I think it got airplay in France from what he was telling me. Anyway, from what he saw, it sounded at least mildly interesting. I probably won't bother with bigscreen (partly because of childcare issues and partly because I'd like to get more first-person feedback)
Posts: 4515 | Registered: Jul 2004
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This movie took away about 2 hours of my life that I can never get back! In those two hours even I could have written a better screenplay.
I'm an engineer by trade and I've made it a point a long, long time ago to never compare movie physics to actual physical possiblities. My willingness to suspend my disbelief for movies and TV is usually very strong, so I really don't need to participate in any drinking games based on violation of the currently understood laws of phyics to ease the suffering of bad hollywood flicks. Besides, my liver couldn't take it and I don't like treating alcohol like the fifth food group anymore. But I do wish I could of had something to dull the excruciating pain I felt while watching this movie. Maybe a couple shots of grain alcohol-wait, just make that rubbing alcohol. Just put me out of my misery now!
Why didn't I like this movie... I'm no critic, so don't expect fine detailed observations. Just a few general thoughts...
Some of the CG action sequences looked very cheaply done. I'm not sure if that was the intent, and that they tried to pass it off as the "style" of the film, but to me it just seemed like they ran out of money to put the sequences through a final rendering.
If I had any clue that this was going to contain vampire elements, I would of just watched Underworld Evolution again. It would of been worth my SEVEN DOLLAR MATINEE CHARGE! (Ok so i went to an upscale movie theater after taking a half day off of work--I mean even I can treat myself nice sometimes, right?)
I still don't really understand why the kid was going to die, and why he lives again. Or really why they needed to create him in the first place. Nor did I ever really care.
But It was kind of spooky seeing him in the suitcase though. FLATSPACE TECHNOLOGY, indeed (takes shot)
VOICE OVERS SUUUUUUUUUUCK!!! Especially for exposition.
The gun-kata stuff was a cool novelty for Equilibrium, which I loved visually by the way.But I've grown sick of it just like the Matrix style battle sequences. Please stop it! A message to bad guys... if you are chasing a superstrong, well-known, paramilitary, anti-hero killing machine and they coax you and your comrades into encircling him or her completely with an unobstructed view and you have your weapons drawn. DO NOT FIRE YOUR WEAPON!!!
Milla, Milla, Milla. I can't take another movie of her as a action star. How about a good drama or warm romantic comedy just to shake things up. I don't really like those type of movies, but I would support it just to see her get some range.
I don't mean to go on a rant here, but...
I wish writers or directors, or writer+directors or whoever else green lights this kind of crap would stop thinking of cool action sequences they would like to film, and then think "Well, how can I build a story around this?" Just film the damn scene! Actually get a couple other high profile directors and filmamkers to partner with you who can write equally appalling stories and dialogue, and have them film any other visually entertaining action sequence that they been salivating to stick in film and put it ALL IN ONE MOVIE!!! Call it the "Best Action Scenes Ever Conceived!!" Two hours of working stiff security guards and rent a cops working for fascist regimes and totalitarian dictator goverments meeting their end at the hands of superior fighting, deadly accurate, incredibly lucky superhero types through guns, explosions, vehicle crashs, and martial arts would be great!!! At least I would know what I am getting in to. I don't mind mindless movie violence and explosions, just stop trying to couch it with bad plot, bad character development, and bad dialogue. I mean that only makes me antsy and longing for the movie to hurry up to the next action sequence.
I'll step off my soapbox now. THANK YOU FOR LISTENING. ==================================================
quote:Originally posted by Narnia: Porter, it did destroy her career.
Technically speaking, did she have a career to destroy?</snark>
Personally, I think she's an extraordinarily wooden actress who gets jobs because the men casting her think she's hawt. I'm one of those people who doesn't understand the attraction at all. *shrug* To each his own.
I had an ex once who was obsessed with her a whole freakin' bunch; I got dragged to see Fifth Element an absurd number of times. Later, my husband further cemented his place in my heart by referring to her as "Twiggy." Posts: 4077 | Registered: Jun 2003
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If you want to watch something about vampires called Ultraviolet, can I suggest the excellent 1998 UK TV series: http://tinyurl.com/nxo9oPosts: 11 | Registered: Mar 2006
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