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throughthelookingglass
Minister of the Sacraments of Jabootu
USA
47 Posts |
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Ericb
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
648 Posts |
 Posted - 02/15/2008 : 03:51:31 AM
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quote:
am genuinely unable to tell if this site is serious or not. I just. Can't. Tell.
In the age of the internet it's often hard to tell what's real and what's parody. Just think of Time Cube and Fixed Earth:
http://www.timecube.com/
http://www.fixedearth.com/
"I reserve the right to look as well as be boring." - Robert Fripp |
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BradH812
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
1294 Posts |
Posted - 02/15/2008 : 05:44:22 AM
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Oh, I have no trouble believing this crap is legit, unfortunately. I ran across a "reviewer" by the name of Louis Proyect a few years ago. I was shaking my head in disbelief while reading his review of Saving Private Ryan, laughing at his calling it "patriotic pap" and wondering what he meant when he dropped the term "CPer" several times. Then I saw the name of his website: The Marxism Mailing List. Yep, "CPer" was his way of saying "capitalist pig". Saw a couple more of his reviews, and they were further examples of head-shaking and jaw-dropping; it seems the guy doesn't like anything that isn't preachy or didactic enough.
But this is what you get when you see people who have way too much time on their hands and not a lick of talent or sense. (Okay, we spend our time discussing bad movies, but at least we have fun doing it.) You don't know whether to laugh or cry at someone like this.
By the way, Foywonder, I'm gonna have to get that idea of merging this site with Capalert out of my mind, fast, before my brain exp
BOOM!!!
(Well, there I go again.) |
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CDiehl
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
361 Posts |
Posted - 02/15/2008 : 11:43:46 AM
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Then, the aliens and what's left of humanity peacefully coexist.
Yes, but not in the way this person imagines. "What's left of humanity" would be enslaved by the aliens, who used their naive beliefs against them, used them as muscle to dispose of everyone who could offer resistance, then screwed them over. Now, that would make an interesting story.
You know Grand Funk, don't you? The wild, shirtless lyrics of Mark Farner? The bong-rattling bass of Mel Schacher? The ... adequate drumwork of Don Brewer? |
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Neville
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
Spain
1590 Posts |
Posted - 02/15/2008 : 3:46:33 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by CDiehl
quote:
Then, the aliens and what's left of humanity peacefully coexist.
Yes, but not in the way this person imagines. "What's left of humanity" would be enslaved by the aliens, who used their naive beliefs against them, used them as muscle to dispose of everyone who could offer resistance, then screwed them over. Now, that would make an interesting story.
You know, like in Battlefield Earth? LOL. Don't worry, someday some gifted filmmakers will take that concept seriously.
As for ID4, I can say people around here didn't like not the film nor the politics. Before you cock your guns, let me explain: we're as patriotic as the next one, and we don't like to see our countries play second bananas in films, even if it is together with the world's main superpower.
Not that we take all sci-fi that seriously, but until ID4 most American alien invasion movies treated as a local phenomenon. One of the few interesting points in ID4 is that it treated the alien invasion as a global phenomenon. As such, we expected the rest of the countries to have more protagonism.
When it didn't turn out that way, critics took it as an evidence of jingoism. Had they done their homework, watching the previous Emmerich / Devlin movies, they would have decided it was a) another proof of the incompetence of the filmmakers and b) an obvious attempt on their behalf to please American audiences, as Devlin & Emmerich are European and wanted the movie to be a smash hit in the U.S.
And this is all of my time I'm spending in this subject. |
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CDiehl
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
361 Posts |
Posted - 02/15/2008 : 8:51:40 PM
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You know, like in Battlefield Earth? LOL.
Obviously, this in no way resembles Battlefield Earth. My idea is that the aliens send groups of special-ops personnel, similar to the Green Berets, to make contact with radical political and religious groups all over the world, offering them support and materiel in order to pursue violence against their governments. They feign support for their various ideologies, but they just need these people to sow chaos all over the world. After a while, a second group of spec-ops show up and ally with the governments of the world, offering them technology in order to dominate the world. Together, these two groups turn the whole human race against each other, Once everything has gone to hell, then the invasion happens. The alien military shows up, takes out the belligerents, one at a time, then enslaves the survivors once the leaders and military are gone.
You know Grand Funk, don't you? The wild, shirtless lyrics of Mark Farner? The bong-rattling bass of Mel Schacher? The ... adequate drumwork of Don Brewer? |
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BradH812
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
1294 Posts |
Posted - 02/15/2008 : 9:57:03 PM
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| CD, that kinda sounds like an expansion on the Twilight Zone episode "The Monsters Are Due On Maple Street". That's not a knock, mind you. I think a story like that could work very well, if only Hollywood would have the balls to produce it. |
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Sardu
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
1126 Posts |
Posted - 02/15/2008 : 10:35:11 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by CDiehl
Obviously, this in no way resembles Battlefield Earth. My idea is that the aliens send groups of special-ops personnel, similar to the Green Berets, to make contact with radical political and religious groups all over the world, offering them support and materiel in order to pursue violence against their governments. They feign support for their various ideologies, but they just need these people to sow chaos all over the world. After a while, a second group of spec-ops show up and ally with the governments of the world, offering them technology in order to dominate the world. Together, these two groups turn the whole human race against each other, Once everything has gone to hell, then the invasion happens. The alien military shows up, takes out the belligerents, one at a time, then enslaves the survivors once the leaders and military are gone.
Interesting, because it implies that the aliens don't have the strength or numbers to do the job entirely on their own and that Earth theoretically has the strength to beat the aliens if it can organize against the external enemy. Before it's too late of course. Lots to explore there...
"Meeting you makes me want to be a real noodle cook"
--Tampopo |
Edited by - Sardu on 02/15/2008 10:35:32 PM |
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Neville
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
Spain
1590 Posts |
Posted - 02/16/2008 : 04:01:07 AM
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I stand corrected, then. Sounds interesting, but a bit too political for my taste. All that about the aliens using every disident group in the world, I mean.
The rest of it, though, has a cool end-of-the-world vibe. I'd like to see that. In a movie screen, of course. |
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Terrahawk
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
644 Posts |
Posted - 02/16/2008 : 06:56:06 AM
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Actually, I think it implies that the aliens understand that even if they have overwhelming force, humanity might still have the capability of making the planet useless for their purposes through the use of nuclear, biological, or chemical weapons. Sowing dissension minimizes that possibility.
With regards to ID4 being American centric, I will only say that if you watch the films from most countries, they are the ones saving the world while at best paying lip service to either the UN or some other multinational organization. I'm fine with that.
- Si desea pulse 2 para español, encontrar un país diferente. - |
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Neville
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
Spain
1590 Posts |
Posted - 02/16/2008 : 08:05:24 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by Terrahawk
With regards to ID4 being American centric, I will only say that if you watch the films from most countries, they are the ones saving the world while at best paying lip service to either the UN or some other multinational organization. I'm fine with that.
Yeah, you're probably right about that. Problem is, 90% of the movies we consume (and by "we" I mean Spain) are American, and sometimes their American-centrism, (specially if it is delivered in broad strokes, as in ID4 or Armageddon) becomes rather tiresome.
As for the other 10% of movies, they're usually arthouse films, and as such they rarely involve alien invasions or world-in-danger scenarios. The closest I can imagine of one of these movies done the European way would be The invasion. |
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Ericb
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
648 Posts |
Posted - 02/16/2008 : 09:49:56 AM
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There were a couple of instances in old Godzilla films where the Japanese called the Americans in for the heavy lifting.
"I reserve the right to look as well as be boring." - Robert Fripp |
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Ericb
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
648 Posts |
Posted - 02/16/2008 : 09:51:17 AM
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Though I'm not sure if that was the case in the original Japanese versions.
"I reserve the right to look as well as be boring." - Robert Fripp |
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CDiehl
Holy Cardinal and Five Star General of the Righteous Knighthood of Jabootu
USA
361 Posts |
Posted - 02/16/2008 : 8:11:27 PM
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Interesting, because it implies that the aliens don't have the strength or numbers to do the job entirely on their own and that Earth theoretically has the strength to beat the aliens if it can organize against the external enemy.
Well, it's not so much that they don't have the strength to take over on their own, as they don't want to do it. They figure, why risk their own people when they can get humans to do most of the work for them? By the time the aliens send their main force in, the world is in absolute chaos, and they're coming in to waste the depleted forces of all the various sides.
quote:
Actually, I think it implies that the aliens understand that even if they have overwhelming force, humanity might still have the capability of making the planet useless for their purposes through the use of nuclear, biological, or chemical weapons. Sowing dissension minimizes that possibility.
Not what I was thinking of, but it's a good idea. Perhaps the aliens discourage humans from using WMDs, and the tech they provide renders WMDs obsolete anyhow.
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Sounds interesting, but a bit too political for my taste. All that about the aliens using every disident group in the world, I mean.
I should have been clearer. By "radical" I meant every extremist group, right, left or otherwise. I should have written "political extremist" instead since "radical" implies extreme left-wing. I must admit, from reading the quote that started my idea off, I thought the image of someone like the person who wrote it being executed by the aliens he thought were helping him was an amusing image. I didn't want to make it political, and I realized quickly that the aliens would give extreme right-wingers the same treatment.
You know Grand Funk, don't you? The wild, shirtless lyrics of Mark Farner? The bong-rattling bass of Mel Schacher? The ... adequate drumwork of Don Brewer? |
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