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Fun Stuff => ENJOY => Topic started by: gospel on 20 Dec 2009, 14:32

Title: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: gospel on 20 Dec 2009, 14:32
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FxKtZmQgxrI

I know it's 70m long, and the guy's voice can become a bit monotone. Nonetheless, the humor and editing is quite amusing. At the very least, his litmus test for character quality in a movie is the best I have ever seen.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: LeeC on 20 Dec 2009, 14:49
wow, Im almost through part 1 of 7 and I have to say, this guy is funny and is totally right.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: Alex C on 20 Dec 2009, 15:17
At the very least, his litmus test for character quality in a movie is the best I have ever seen.

It is pretty simple and ingenuous.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: Alex C on 20 Dec 2009, 15:28
I will say one thing though; the whole "the narrator is a creep" digressions aren't funny at all.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: evilbobthebob on 20 Dec 2009, 15:33
No, they aren't. His droning voice annoys me too. His points are correct, but don't really gain much from the way he goes about it.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: JD on 20 Dec 2009, 15:34
His droning voice annoys me
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: pilsner on 20 Dec 2009, 15:54
I love this.  The narrator sounds somewhat like Emo Phillips but 2 octaves lower.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: LeeC on 20 Dec 2009, 16:14
just watched the whole thing, he had some good points, others were like WTF? thats not really funny but I see your trying to break up the seriousness.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: David_Dovey on 20 Dec 2009, 19:02
I think the "narrator is a creep" stuff would've worked if they'd held back on letting it slip til well after Part 2.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: KvP on 20 Dec 2009, 19:45
Yeah it was kind of funny the first time and then they just played that one note again and again. And again.

Anyway, all this brings me back to the absolutely sublime list of Godzilla remake plotholes (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120685/goofs).
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: Christophe on 22 Dec 2009, 23:04
WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOUR FACE?
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: jhocking on 26 Dec 2009, 14:31
At the very least, his litmus test for character quality in a movie is the best I have ever seen.

Yeah, the character quality test at the end of part 1 is brilliant. Everything else is kinda dumb, but that alone is worth the price of admission (which is zero, after all.)
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: tricia kidd on 26 Dec 2009, 16:46
Yeah, the character quality test at the end of part 1 is brilliant. Everything else is kinda dumb

- protagonist analysis
- attempt to decipher just how insane the plot actually is
- analysis of lightsaber duels
- everything else

i thought it was brilliant, and i don't understand complaining about "the narrator is a creep" jokes because after part 2 it's barely mentioned at all.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: Alex C on 26 Dec 2009, 21:05
Uh, yeah, but in this case, "barely mentioning" includes a whimpering woman in the basement and the time he gassed a hooker as she tried to escape through the crawlspace. I have a pretty open minded sense of humor, and I enjoyed the clips, but overall I do think it's sort of weird that we now live in a world with people who don't seem to understand that rape jokes aren't automatically funny. I am probably projecting though; I play a lot of World of Warcraft and for some reason saying that a weapon "totally rapes" is now a positive thing on my server. It's a weird world.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: Tom on 26 Dec 2009, 22:18
Tricia kidd, do you ever not have your knickers in a knot?
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: tricia kidd on 27 Dec 2009, 00:56
Uh, yeah, but in this case, "barely mentioning" includes a whimpering woman in the basement and the time he gassed a hooker as she tried to escape through the crawlspace

the former is in part 2, the latter is in part 2 or 3.  after that, no mentions.  so my point stands.

tom, alex sounds way more like he has his knickers in a not.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VcFryjunIjw
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: JD on 27 Dec 2009, 01:06
Studies show Alex is actually pretty mellow, so I doubt his undies are knotted
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: KharBevNor on 27 Dec 2009, 05:26
Rape jokes are never funny.

Unlike rape.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: Alex C on 27 Dec 2009, 08:34
Yeah, I'm not really upset or deeply offended here. I just didn't find what they did funny or interesting in this case. Humor is subjective-- maybe with a different delivery I could have found some of it funny. The rape van gag on Always Sunny In Philadelphia usually get a laugh out of me, for example. Frequency also hits me as a bit of red herring here; my opinion of those moments of the review still stand, even if they didn't happen often enough to ruin the whole clip.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: tricia kidd on 27 Dec 2009, 10:22
fair enough.

but now i'm wondering what you think about saying a band or song "totally slays".  wouldn't that be worse than "totally rapes"?  i mean i'd rather be raped than killed i'm pretty sure.  and yet i've never heard of anyone being all "man it's not cool to talk about heavy metal music totally slaying".
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: Alex C on 27 Dec 2009, 13:17
People don't couch it in those terms, but I think it'd be pretty hard to argue that there is nobody out there who disapproves of the lyrical content in heavy metal or even the way the fans communicate and dress.

Now, one thing that this movie review and many heavy metal bands have in common is that for the most part they're just cheerfully wallowing in their own style of camp (for lack of a better word) and parody as often as not. Schlock is often their stock and trade, after all, and I don't honestly have a problem with this nor am I really a big fan of censorship. It'd take some real mental contortions to really argue that any of this stuff genuinely endorses violence and I'm just not a fan of the mind crime concept in general.

But with all that said, it's still possible to come across as unfunny and clumsy when dealing with a subject, and some subjects are trickier to tackle than others simply because they're not things we normally think of as enjoyable. Rape is one of those subjects that's a bit harder for me to just put aside, I guess.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: Christophe on 27 Dec 2009, 17:06
WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOUR FACE?
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: jhocking on 28 Dec 2009, 16:13
- analysis of lightsaber duels

Oh yeah this part was pretty great too, I forgot that.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: Ikrik on 05 Jan 2010, 03:29
Great at parts...but really, the narrator as a creep has completely turned me off of it.  Jokes about rape and murdering prostitutes are not funny or tasteful and the way it was delivered it was especially distasteful.  It seemed like he could have easily gone the "bitter old guy" or "50 year old never been kissed" guy route way better.  Considering the angle he played had absolutely no leaning on what his review was saying made it much more disturbing.

But the review itself was absolutely terrific.  Lightsaber battles especially.  I've noticed it happen a lot more in like Sanjuro and Yojimbo where it's less about the swords and more about the characters but I've never transferred that thinking over to Star Wars.  I wish that he would have brought up the fact that the technology they have in Phantom Menace and the new trilogy in general is that the technology (in the movies) far surpasses that in the originals. 

->tricia kidd

You would rather be raped than killed? The choice between being killed and being raped is, to me, an incredibly easy decision.  Being killed, even painfully is an ending event.  You're killed and it's over. I'm a dude and watching something like that scene in Irreversible with Monica Bellucci terrifies the living crap out of me.  Violent rape, to me, is such a terrifying thing to imagine because knowing who I am, I would have an insanely hard time ever going outside, ever meeting new people, actually ever rebuilding my life.  I would rather be lit on fire 1000 times than be raped.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: Alex C on 05 Jan 2010, 10:25
That's kind of screwed up.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: tricia kidd on 05 Jan 2010, 13:16
seriously.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: KvP on 05 Jan 2010, 13:19
Why is this discussion even taking place?
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: Alex C on 05 Jan 2010, 13:53
The shitty thing is that I feel somewhat responsible for bringing it up first. Like I said, I wasn't even really offended; I just didn't think the "this piece of toast told me to kill my wife; Hang on a second, the feds are here," stuff should have made it past editing.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: DavidGrohl on 07 Jan 2010, 11:21
  I thought it was hilarious, personally.  Maybe that makes me a bad person? 

It's part of making the reviewer seem like a stereotypical creepy crazy Star Wars nerd.
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: tricia kidd on 07 Jan 2010, 12:13
oh hell yes. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkxQ6HYDwIA)
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: Christophe on 07 Jan 2010, 12:24
WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOUR FACE?
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: David_Dovey on 08 Jan 2010, 08:03
ha ha ha i get it that is a thing the guy said in the thing
Title: Re: Star Wars: The Phantom Menace Review
Post by: LeeC on 08 Jan 2010, 08:41
oh hell yes. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkxQ6HYDwIA)
that was pretty funny.
so was this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7fwKYVkwMo&feature=related)