Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

 Bromsy wrote:
Yeah, it really does highlight that people in America will only go see something out of their 'comfort zone' if it has a really big name director, star, or is an established franchise. Makes me sad in heart.

NO.
PR is a niche within a niche movie. This is fine, however the movie was made with a budget far outside the possibility of it making money.

1. That doesn't mean its a bad movie for its niche. It could be awesome.
2. That also doesn't mean that everyone who had no desire to see this move don't want to move beyond their comfort zone. Seriously, if you think that you need to re-evaluate your socialization. Just as I say, be what you want game what you want and don't worry about others, that goes the other way. You can't crow about what is effectively a kid's movie as some hidden nouveau gem.

I mean if we go that route my The Conjuring is beating your monster movie to death like Ultraman kicking a monster in the crotch.

Actually in film studies you can crow about it being a hidden nouveau gem. I've taken film studies classes. It's much like the philosophy department in that if you can make an argument for it you're right.

It's also not that hard to make an argument for.

It wouldn't be the first relatively creative movie that didn't fare well at the box office, and then when contrasted with the movies that typically do well at the post office I don't think it's much of a leap to say that the movie-going public completely deserves the garbage they keep buying tickets to see.

I don't blame the people making the movies, because hell, if the rubes want to shell out millions of dollars for a remake of a remake I say give it to them.

 Monster Rain wrote:
It's also not that hard to make an argument for.

It wouldn't be the first relatively creative movie that didn't fare well at the box office, and then when contrasted with the movies that typically do well at the post office I don't think it's much of a leap to say that the movie-going public completely deserves the garbage they keep buying tickets to see.

I don't blame the people making the movies, because hell, if the rubes want to shell out millions of dollars for a remake of a remake I say give it to them.

We often agree but not in this instance. You're arguing about rubes and garbage, but to do that you have to defend a movie about giant robots and monsters as high art. I'll repeat that, a movie about giant monsters and robots, as high art. I'll remind you the acting and dialgoue have been heavily panned. That just leaves the giant monsters and robots.

Nah, I'm not saying it's high art, but it's relatively creative and not a direct remake of anything.

That's the point I was making. To make a broader point I don't think that monsters and robots as the subject of a film automatically precludes it from being "high art".

 Monster Rain wrote:
Nah, I'm not saying it's high art, but it's relatively creative and not a direct remake of anything.

Its a remake of a ten thousand cheap ass Japanese giant monster movies in the 60s and 70s. EDIT: I probalby watched half of them.

That's the point I was making. I don't think that monsters and robots as the subject of a film automatically precludes it from being "high art", though.

Other than the effects what exactly is creative? Please be specific.

The lack of romance (especially physical) in a rather intimate relationship.
Especially for what most call an action movie.

It's funny that can be seen as creative, but . . . yea.

 Frazzled wrote:

 Monster Rain wrote:
Nah, I'm not saying it's high art, but it's relatively creative and not a direct remake of anything.

Its a remake of a ten thousand cheap ass Japanese giant monster movies in the 60s and 70s.

I wasn't specific enough there I see. What I should have said was something about it not being tied in with a specific franchise. All movies, well most movies can be classified by a specific genre. That doesn't necessarily detract from creativity.

 Frazzled wrote:

That's the point I was making. I don't think that monsters and robots as the subject of a film automatically precludes it from being "high art", though.

Other than the effects what exactly is creative? Please be specific.

I think the effects are sufficiently creative, as well as the cinematography. Granted I saw it in IMAX which may color my perception a bit, but the way some scenes were shot gave an amazing sense of scale that took some skill to pull off so effectively. The idea of "drift" was cool in that you become privy to all of your partner's thoughts and memories which is an idea that could be a movie in and of itself.

Which isn't to say that they didn't use a lot of action movie tropes throughout the film, but I got the distinct impression that a lot of the clichés were tongue-in-cheek as an homage to the film's genre.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 kirsanth wrote:
The lack of romance (especially physical) in a rather intimate relationship.
Especially for what most call an action movie.

It's funny that can be seen as creative, but . . . yea.

Agreed. In many cases, such as this example, it didn't exactly follow the standard Hollywood format.

 Frazzled wrote:
I I'll repeat that, a movie about giant monsters and robots, as high art.

Anything can be high art. There is no subject matter that is inherently low.

A movie about giant monsters and robots

Rented Tritium wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
I I'll repeat that, a movie about giant monsters and robots, as high art.

Anything can be high art. There is no subject matter that is inherently low.

Challenge accepted

 azazel the cat wrote:

Rented Tritium wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
I I'll repeat that, a movie about giant monsters and robots, as high art.

Anything can be high art. There is no subject matter that is inherently low.

Challenge accepted

I'm not sure if you're following my argument. "here is some trash" does not refute the idea that there is no inherently low subject matter.

 azazel the cat wrote:

Rented Tritium wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
I I'll repeat that, a movie about giant monsters and robots, as high art.

Anything can be high art. There is no subject matter that is inherently low.

Challenge accepted

He didn't say everything is high art, he said any subject has the potential to be. Pointing out an example of low art doesn't really negate the argument.

Pacific Rim is about as niche as Iron Man. Good movies doing poorly and bad movies doing well is not a new phenomena, and continues to prove the only real truth in film-making: audiences are fickle, and not to be trusted. Star Wars was a niche film as well, but still managed to make some money, as I understand it. Comic Book movies were niche as well, and are topping the charts at the moment. It really isn't all that niche either, to be honest, in this day and age. Antichrist or The Tree of Life, now those or much more niche.

I don't agree with this belief that a film has to be a high art work of Evangelion proportions to be good.

A film can be silly and low-brow whilst still being enjoyable and fun.

For an anime example, take Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. It has one of the stupidest, most utterly hare-brained, contrived, cliche-riddled and utterly daft plots ever. And yet it is amongst my top 5 favourite works of fiction, ever, because it is just so wondefully silly and over-the-top.

Whilst gimmicky awesomeness shouldn't always be used as the default alternative to a good plot, that doesn't mean that it can't ever be used as the main selling point of a movie-you just have to make sure that the gimmicky awesomeness is legitimately awesome. Ultimately this is why I love Pacific Rim-I can't pay attention to the plot holes because I'm too busy taking in the sheer awesomesauce.

The Nostalgia Critic did a very good video on this.

It was a bit of an experiment. It tapped into a genre that, aside from some animated series, has never exactly been enormous for American audiences.

In an industry that has lately been particularly wary of projects that don't have a 2 or 3 attached to them, it's something of a bold endeavor.

The creativity extends further in that while some similarities are impossible to avoid, they specifically set out to make their own thing, their own world. The Jaegers and Kaiju are both intended to be as unique as possible, with an outright avoidance of "oh, that's an homage to ____ and that's an homage to ______" that they could've run with.

Given GdT's involvement, it was also no shock that an immense amount of effort went into 'world building', developing a history and setting events in what felt, to me at least, like a realistic world (outside of robots and monsters that simply do not give a damn about your laws of physics). Hell, it was one of the few pieces of fiction I've seen that actually referenced its own genre (tied into the world building; toys, games, effects on religions, kids shows, etc).

This wasn't just something that was banged out in 3 months in an effort to rake in giant piles of money. You only need to see some of the 'behind the scenes' stuff to know a lot of care and attention to detail were present.

I really enjoyed Pacific Rim, enough that we saw it a second time, this time on IMAX 3D. Definitely worth the experience.

That said, I think it's been the most enjoyable movie this summer, but by no stretch has it been the _best_ movie this summer. Not even close.

heretic!

In unrelated news: the most adorable bit from behind the scenes:

http://i.imgur.com/3FBPTdJ.gif

That pretty much made my day.

Also, as with many other GdT films, a lot of work was done practically. Sure, there's CGI up the wazoo, but that set was actually rigged with hydraulics to jump, and for the trash bins to flatten as though they were actually being interacted with.

I've gotta say, I thought the actress they used for young Mako was fantastic.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8U16zCxCFM

2:15-3:00 or so shows off what I'm talking about.

Edit: also, from another forum, regarding the Hong Kong fight:

 Forar wrote:
In unrelated news: the most adorable bit from behind the scenes:

http://i.imgur.com/3FBPTdJ.gif

All of my D'aaaawwwwwwwwwww.

Also, am I the only one who was reminded of Rei Ayanami by Mako?

Rented Tritium wrote:

 azazel the cat wrote:

Rented Tritium wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
I I'll repeat that, a movie about giant monsters and robots, as high art.

Anything can be high art. There is no subject matter that is inherently low.

Challenge accepted

I'm not sure if you're following my argument. "here is some trash" does not refute the idea that there is no inherently low subject matter.

My point was meant to be that any art that actively seeks to find the bottom of the barrel cannot ever be anything but 'low' art; as 'high' art is the very antithesis of its aim.

Any medium can be high art, sure. But you didn't say that. You said anything.


EDIT: so perhaps I failed to follow your argument thoroughly.

 Squigsquasher wrote:

 Forar wrote:
In unrelated news: the most adorable bit from behind the scenes:

http://i.imgur.com/3FBPTdJ.gif

All of my D'aaaawwwwwwwwwww.

Also, am I the only one who was reminded of Rei Ayanami by Mako?

I think it's just a fan theory, but I've heard it suggested that between the blue blood of the Kaiju and the blue hair, it's not intended as a fashion statement.

It's war paint.

Also, am I the only one who was reminded of Rei Ayanami by Mako?

*Shudders* I'd hope so. I don't want even anything even 1% that level of creepy near my rah-rah "Go Humanity' movie.

I think it's just a fan theory, but I've heard it suggested that between the blue blood of the Kaiju and the blue hair, it's not intended as a fashion statement.

It's war paint.

It's actually supposed to be representative of the coat she wore during the attack when she was a little girl, as a way of remembering. We've got Word of God on that one.

Is there a reason Frazz is still in here banging that particular drum of his?

Also, I never knew that Canadians and Texans just hated having a good time at the movies...

 Forar wrote:

 Squigsquasher wrote:

 Forar wrote:
In unrelated news: the most adorable bit from behind the scenes:

http://i.imgur.com/3FBPTdJ.gif

All of my D'aaaawwwwwwwwwww.

Also, am I the only one who was reminded of Rei Ayanami by Mako?

I think it's just a fan theory, but I've heard it suggested that between the blue blood of the Kaiju and the blue hair, it's not intended as a fashion statement.

It's war paint.

Mako has 99,9% too much emotion for this to be likely anyway.

 Alpharius wrote:
Is there a reason Frazz is still in here banging that particular drum of his?

I'm about 99% convinced that it's some sort of performance art/sociological experiment.

 Soladrin wrote:

 Forar wrote:

 Squigsquasher wrote:

 Forar wrote:
In unrelated news: the most adorable bit from behind the scenes:

http://i.imgur.com/3FBPTdJ.gif

All of my D'aaaawwwwwwwwwww.

Also, am I the only one who was reminded of Rei Ayanami by Mako?

I think it's just a fan theory, but I've heard it suggested that between the blue blood of the Kaiju and the blue hair, it's not intended as a fashion statement.

It's war paint.

Mako has 99,9% too much emotion for this to be likely anyway.

Good point. I think Rei's reaction to being chased by a Kaiju would simply be "Oh. That's interesting".

 Alpharius wrote:
Is there a reason Frazz is still in here banging that particular drum of his?

Also, I never knew that Canadians and Texans just hated having a good time at the movies...

What drum is that? I've said it may be a cronking good action pic. I'm just responding to claims its not making $8 bazillion dollars is because people's are boors or snotty or some such argument. Its like a No True Dorksman argument writ large.

Grown Ups 2 made more money than Pacific Rim.

I rest my case. This is a quote from what probably is my favorite review of that film.

Among the slackest, laziest, least movie-like movies released by a major studio in the last decade, “Grown Ups 2” is perhaps the closest Hollywood has yet come to making “Ow! My Balls!” seem like a plausible future project.