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Latino Review has an article up about Terminator and how the franchise is once again in limbo pending the full international box office returns.  Apparently it needs $300M to be considered somewhat successful and while it likely will hit that, it performed poorly domestically.

 

What annoys me is the belief by the studio that the creative decision to "go back" to scenes from the original Terminator was rejected by domestic fans and that the key might be to make Terminator films for the international audience (ie. blow em ups).  I think the best part of the movie was it's "Back to the Future" style return to the original...they just did too little of it and made the plot unnecessarily convoluted.

 

While the actors were all "fine", none stood out and none were remotely as "real" and gritty as the originals.  I also find their portrayal of Sarah Connor to be off...  this Sarah was the "same" 19 year old Sarah from the original film, except raised by a Terminator and taught survival skills...so to a degree she'd be more like the Sarah from T2, perhaps not as "crazy" since she didnt have a kid to compel her.  But they even had a scene where she puts on headphones and listens to 80's music while sort of dancing and bobbing around.  I thought that scene could have worked if it had meant something more than her finding her old walkman. 

 

Also, their "Borg Queening" of Skynet was a terrible decision.  I thought they repeated the mistakes of the Bad Robot Star Trek films by essentially saying nothing that happens matters because its just one of a million possible time lines.  Never tell your audience it doesnt matter.  More Back to the Future II style scenes would have been welcome.  Getting Robert Patrick should have been a must. 

 

The problem with the franchise is, its sort of hindered by its own storyline.  You either keep sending people back through time and preventing judgement day or you have to show us the world post judgement day...which they wont now since Terminator Salvation wasnt a success.  T3 showed us Judgement Day so again, how do you write yourself out of that box?

 

I love the Terminator franchise but they need Cameron back to make sense of it all.

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From Latino Review:

 

No doubt "Jurassic World" did take this year's summer box office by storm with over $1.5 billion globally.  Now Universal Pictures has said that there will be a sequel slated for June 22, 2018.

The sequel will see stars Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard return, along with Spielberg as executive producer. "Jurassic World’s" director, Colin Trevorrow will write the script for the film but not direct.

 

Hmmm...I have to say I enjoyed JW though it was no great shakes.  It was certainly not as good as JP was.  Where can they take a sequel?  The "make a bigger dinosaur than the last" is kind of wearing thin.  They can sell me a ticket right now if they announce Sam Neill is back.

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  • 2 months later...

Interesting Terminator news (or no news) via Latino Review:

 

Audiences were understandably skeptic when it was announced that "Terminator: Genisys" would kick off a brand new trilogy for the franchise. Between "Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines," and "Terminator Salvation," fans had grown to distrust the quality of the series. The actual release of "Terminator: Genisys" didn't do much to inspire confidence. With a 26% on Rotten Tomatoes, the film stands as the worst critically-received in the franchise, and with lackluster gross of $89 million, domestic audiences really seemed to have taken that bad word of mouth seriously.

 

But of course, we now live in a global world, and when the foreign box office receipts came in at over $350 million, it became clear that audiences were liking something about the film. Because of this fact, it was a bit surprising when David Ellison of Skydance Media said they were putting the franchise on indefinite hold. Now, it looks like that's not necessarily the case. 

 

At TheWrap's 6th Annual Media Leadership Conference, Skydance chief creative officer Dana Goldberg painted a slightly different picture for the future of the franchise.

"In terms of 'Terminator,' the worldwide market paid attention. And we're not taking the domestic number lightly necessarily. We're going to do a worldwide study and really talk to audiences about 'Terminator' and what they loved, and maybe what didn't work for them so that the next step we take with the franchise is the right one."

The panel mediator then went on to ask Goldberg if the planned trilogy--as well as the TV show--were still on the table.

"We've always said from the moment that we announced it that audiences are the only ones who get to decide  if you actually get to make the trilogy. It's really up to them…Do we intend to have a next step with 'Terminator?' Yes we do. We are not going to begin production at the beginning of next year, because it would be silly not to listen to what audiences have to say, and adjust accordingly."

So the franchise isn't quite on hold indefinitely, but is taking some extra time to do the necessary market research to ensure the success of the next installment. This is both hopeful and concerning news.

 

While it's great that the studio isn't planning on blindly continuing with what DIDN'T work, taking the time and money to do research seems like a potential dead end. When it comes to filmmaking, if you try too hard to cater to the mass audience's expectations, you're likely to end up with a bland product, devoid of any real character or defining traits. Essentially, you end up with something that no one has a problem with, but that no one really loves, either.

 

I'm no studio head, but were it up to me, I'd cut the budget to under $20 million, find a talented filmmaker with a unique vision, and base the next steps on that. Of course, going with a great film and a commercial film are two completely different things, so who's to say that would work out, either?

 

****I think what worked was Arnold and some of the nostalgia of the first two films.  They glazed over that, dismissed it really.  Making the machines have a leader (like the Borg Queen) was stupid.  Altering John Connor's path was stupid.  Using poor actors was stupid.

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Last movie I saw at the theater was "The Visit". The previews made it out to look so good and horror ish. Love horror movies, Gotta say, It was good but it was nothing like I expected it to be. Still enjoyed it  but... totally not what the previews made it out to be. The movie i saw prior to The Visit was Jurrasic World and i gotta say, i really enjoyed it. Solid movie for sure, I'm a pretty big dinosaur fan so yeah those movies definitely appeal to me, thought it was pretty good. 

 

Never did see the new Terminator, just no interest there really.

 

As for upcoming movies, I have yet to see a preview for one that i would go see. Just doesn't seem to be too many interesting ones coming up. 

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Last movie I saw at the theater was "The Visit". The previews made it out to look so good and horror ish. Love horror movies, Gotta say, It was good but it was nothing like I expected it to be. Still enjoyed it  but... totally not what the previews made it out to be. The movie i saw prior to The Visit was Jurrasic World and i gotta say, i really enjoyed it. Solid movie for sure, I'm a pretty big dinosaur fan so yeah those movies definitely appeal to me, thought it was pretty good. 

 

Never did see the new Terminator, just no interest there really.

 

As for upcoming movies, I have yet to see a preview for one that i would go see. Just doesn't seem to be too many interesting ones coming up. 

I also enjoyed the Visit.  Didnt love it.  But enjoyed it.  Thought the outcome was a bit odd and sort of making fun of "elderly" to an extent.

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Saw Vacation in theatres and didn't LOVE it, but I laughed a couple times for sure....Chevy's still got it.

Chevy looked really bad.. He looks extremely bloated up.

 

Oh he's huge....that guy's on  borrowed time unless he changes lifestyle habits.....but man, he was probably the funniest part of that movie for me. His scene was epic.

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Saw Vacation in theatres and didn't LOVE it, but I laughed a couple times for sure....Chevy's still got it.

Chevy looked really bad.. He looks extremely bloated up.

 

Best part of the film to me was hearing Holiday Road again.  It wasnt bad but missed the heart of the originals.  I think 2-3 people were actually killed in the movie.  Weird.  Should have got Christy Brinkley driving the Ferrari again...

 

Movies like that need to be homages to the originals, not just making a new money and slapping on the name of a classic and hoping people come to see it.

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Watched The Intern this weekend with my wife.  If you're going on a date movie, it's pretty funny, there's quite a few "guy moments" in there that make it worth it.

 

Watched Jurassic World.  It was pretty good...except for the whole "taming" thing.  And the end was just lame.  And I won't go into it since I don't want to spoil it for those who haven't seen it.

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Watched Jurassic World.  It was pretty good...except for the whole "taming" thing.  And the end was just lame.  And I won't go into it since I don't want to spoil it for those who haven't seen it.

 

I watched it way back in the summer when it was first out, my thoughts were that it wasn't as bad as I was expecting (I expected the worst) but I felt that it was too needlessly bloody and violent for no reason. The rest of them weren't as gratuitous in the deaths. 

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Watched Jurassic World.  It was pretty good...except for the whole "taming" thing.  And the end was just lame.  And I won't go into it since I don't want to spoil it for those who haven't seen it.

 

I watched it way back in the summer when it was first out, my thoughts were that it wasn't as bad as I was expecting (I expected the worst) but I felt that it was too needlessly bloody and violent for no reason. The rest of them weren't as gratuitous in the deaths. 

 

Yeah same.  It kept me entertained and Chris Pratt did way better then I thought.

 

I was going to let my kids watch the movie, until I saw the killing scenes.  They were pretty brutal.  I'll stick to letting them watch other things until their a bit older I think.

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Speaking of kids watching movies, I watched Return of the Living Dead last night on DVD and decided to look it up online for some historical perspective, which got me reading about the original Night of the living Dead.  It came out before MPAA ratings and was debuted as matinee showings where many kids saw it (like 6-9 year olds) and were traumatized!

 

On a related note, in Return of the Living Dead, there is a 1-800 number on the side of the canisters that contain the dead from the first film that is a US Army Emergency number.  I called it last night and it connects to "America's hottest chat line".

 

There's your morning useless trivia.

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Latino Review:

 

J.J. Abrams has confirmed that he has the final cut of “Star Wars: The Force Awakens”. The long awaited installment has had a few bumps in the road behind the scenes, but Abrams’ enthusiasm during his Vanity Fair interview is contagious. Abrams reveals that Disney has shown nothing but respect for the brand throughout production.

 

Abrams states:

“they let us make the movie we wanted to make”

This comes as a huge relief to those who felt that the brand would be Disney-fied, but Abrams statement puts minds at ease.

Abrams added:

“I cannot say enough about how Bog Iger and Alan Horn have understood this thing that is now part of the Disney company. They’re not doing anything other than, I think, an incredibly smart thing, which is letting Kathleen Kennedy — who is a remarkable person and producer — run and lead Lucasfilm to a place where I think it wants to go.”

Despite Abrams gratitude toward Disney, there's word that he and Kennedy asked that the release date be pushed to May 4, 2016. This request came before and after Harrison Ford’s injury on set, but Disney turned it down. A May 4th release date would have been huge for fans, but I guess Disney is lost on the inside joke. None the less, fans are grateful that Disney took the back seat and let Abrams and Kennedy take the wheel on the project.

“Star Wars: The Force Awakens” is set to be released on December 18, 2015, with a running time of 136 minutes.

 

***Interesting.  There were rumors early on that JJ wasnt getting along with Kennedy over JJ being used to having carte blanche and KK not giving it to him.  Which, if anyone has seen the Star Trek movies can attest, is a great idea (not giving JJ full reign I mean).

 

May 4th release would have been cool but I can selfishly say the sooner the better...

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