THESE FORUMS NOW CLOSED (read only)
Fun Stuff => ENJOY => Topic started by: TheFuriousWombat on 29 Dec 2006, 21:08
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i've wanted to see this movie more than any other for months. and now, on it's release date, i've discovered that it won't be playing at any theaters anywhere nearby. according to movietickets.com, nowhere within 40 miles. all i have to say is, "what the fuck?!?!?!"
why would such a critically acclaimed movie be getting such a limited release? and are there any plans for a wider release later on? i need to see this movie and i don't want to wait for the dvd months from now.
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I believe the wider release is on January 12th. At least, that's when it's opening at the theatre nearest me, and when I plan on seeing it.
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Oh man. I seriously can't wait for this movie.
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I saw it a few weeks ago at my local art gallery/cinema dealy. It's an AMAZING movie! Fucking brutal though, I nearly cried.
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argh it looks so good! i was all prepared to wait for the 29th when i thought it was getting a wide release. damn staggered releases!
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I've seen a couple previews but I dont remember if they gave anything away about the story. So what is it even supposed to be about? I just know I want the damn poster because its amazing.
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It is one of those films you do not want to know about because it is so awesome. ABSOLUTELY FUCKING AWESOME. It is one of my favourite films ever now. All you are gonna get as a description is "fairy tale for adults". And then an instruction to go watch it. NOW.
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Can't wait to see it! Hopefully it will come to the silly south!
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holy crap, i just saw it and it's frickin unbelievable! it was so damn good, easily the best movie i've seen all year and one of the best i've seen in much longer. pretty damn gruesome, yeh, but even if you don't have a strong stomach for that stuff it's worth sitting through. i didn't think it would be as good as it was. well, it was worth the wait and i'm glad they finally decided to release it on a wider scale
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Yeah it is awesome. Although it is completely fucking brutal.
I'd say being in Spanish made it better.
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I finally got to see this tonight, and it was spectacular. I pretty much cried at the end. I for sure will be buying this when it comes out on dvd.
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Wow. Just came back from a late-night screening. I'm going to be thinking about this movie for a long time.
Really interesting film, and towards the end I started to wonder how real any of the fantastical stuff was. I had a strange thought that maybe the whole point of the film was that all that stuff was a little girl's way of dealing with incredibly traumatic circumstances. That's kind of the way I'm leaning, though I haven't entirely convinced myself. I love the ambiguity of it all.
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why would such a critically acclaimed movie be getting such a limited release?
Welcome to modern cinema. Do you have your ticket for Saw IV?
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the economics of modern cinema make me want to cry
Garfield
Box Office: $75,253,404
Cheaper by the Dozen
Box Office: $138,507,634
Pan's Labyrinth:
Box Office: $4,834,269
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Don't worry. It'll make tons once it's an underground cult favorite.
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That's a nice dream you have there.
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Is there a faun in the dream?
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It really was an amazing movie. They had two totally different genres going on parallel, both of which were great on their own. Together they came together to pull off the whole escapism theme brilliantly.
The ads misrepresent the movie a bit. Like 70% of the movie takes place in the real world and focuses on the Spanish rebellion class conflict plot.
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I've only seen pieces of this film as part of my Film Studies group's Fantasy week, (so we watched the more fantastical bits) but it looks great and I'm hoping to borrow it from a friend. But having seen the end I agree with the explanation that she's dealing with a trauma. Seems the way the director was wanting it anyway.
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SPOILER ALERT!!
idk, it's ambiguous. explain how the mandrake root made the mother temporarily better, and when discovered and thrown on the flames it screamed. this wasn't just witnessed by ofelia i don't think. also, wasn't one of the doors she made with the chalk found by the rebels when they stormed the mill? she managed to escape from her locked room and this only seems plausible if she used to the chalk to make a new door. just b/c the captain didn't see the faun doesn't mean it wasn't there. he didn't believe so he didn't see it but that doesn't mean it didn't really exist, in my opinion. but i'm undecided really. it's very debatable...
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I love the ambiguity of it all.
Yeah, exactly. Without giving away too much I absolutely love the fairly unflinching execution of it all. At points I think maybe they went a little too over the top, showing certain things that weren't necessarily required for the story to progress, but then again these things added to the overall feel of discomfort that I realise they were shooting for. There was only really one moment near the end of the film (ring of horses) where I felt they backed off a little, but that doesn't mean I didn't inwardly cheer a little when they did.
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v371/est_xplosif/star.gif)(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v371/est_xplosif/star.gif)(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v371/est_xplosif/star.gif)(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v371/est_xplosif/star.gif)(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v371/est_xplosif/star.gif) [5/5]
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Amazing movie. Amazing. I cried, I laughed - totally brutal, but totally genius at the same time. An emotional roller coaster? I don't think I can explain how amazing this movie was without melting into a puddle of film critic cliches.
Just - go watch it if you haven't.
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Saw it last Friday. Absolutely fantastic, best film I've seen in a while. Loved the ambiguity as well, so many little hints pointing in both directions. I plan on dragging some more friends to see it sometime soon.
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I am going to go see it tomorrow and I haven't been this excited about seeing a movie in a long time.
I heard it was very, very violent. Is this true?
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no, i wouldn't say so. there are some moments that are very brutal but as a whole there isn't much extreme violence. there are a couple gruesome bits of torture and a fair amount of gunshot deaths but as a whole the violence is a little exaggerated on forums. the parts that are violent are very intense though.
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The violence that is present is made all the more intense by the fact that it happens relatively rarely in the movie. With most "violent" films, the violence is constant, and you get used to it fairly fast. Here, you settle down after a bit of it, and then the violence returns, and it's kind of shocking every time.
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Dark Flame pretty much has it right. You just need to think about this movie as a fairy tale more in the lines of the Grimm's Fairy Tales. Speaking of Grimm's, I have to say that Pan's Labyrinth is what I wish the Terry Gilliam movie had turned out to be and I'm so glad someone got it right.
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I agree with Fiddler, Pan's seems to trounce previous Hollywood endeavors in blending fiction and reality- I in particular didn't find "The Brothers Grimm" to do its fairy tale background justice. These days, solid CGI work can't cover up cliches :wink:.
But seriously, I cannot wait to see Pan's in the theater <3 (my friends who were dubious about Pan's worth shall be pleasantly surprised... and I will be the smug one! PWAHAHA!).
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I nearly shit my pants when that weird fucking thing with the eyes in its hand started to move.
And it wasn't even that terrifying a creature, but its motionlessness, the soundtrack, and the eerie nature of everything in that place just came together perfectly and created a fantastic suspense scene.
LEARN SOMETHING FROM THIS, HOLLYWOOD.
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Wicked good movie. The ending was perfectly dark. I cannot say more without spoiling.
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This, I'm assuming, is an entire different movie than the one currently being discussed exactly four threads below this one?
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#5
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http://forums.questionablecontent.net/index.php/topic,14341.0.html
Ta-da!
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I finally saw it just a few minutes ago and GOD was it ever pertasterfulsum! (Perfect, fantastic, wonderful, awesome.)
The scene with the Pale Man was one of the best movie scenes I have yet to see.. I was actually creeped out, which is rare. Also, the dude getting his face smashed in by the bottle made me wince.
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Merged.
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wow, I missed the boat on that one.
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this was a glorious movie. i love the fact that...
spoilers
the entire thing could easily be just a fabrication of the girl's mind
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*MORE SPOILERS*
If so, then how could Vidal have seen the root that Ofelia had placed, and how could the root have affected Ofelia's mother so?
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YET MORE SPOILERS!
She could have gotten the root anywhere, and the mother was in a stressful situation - that could have affected her just as much as the root had.
If you think the magic was real, then that one "slip" where vidal was going through the labyrinth and saw Ofelia alone, when she imagined herself in the kingdom - now that's ambiguous!
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Its nominated for a shit lot of academy awards, including best foreign film, which it should bloody well win.
Seriously amazing film.
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it actually freaked me out...in a good way
afterward my friend and I were joking as a way to get rid of how freaked out we were
I absolutley loved this movie, I am glad that she picked it over Smokin' Aces
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YET MORE SPOILERS!
She could have gotten the root anywhere, and the mother was in a stressful situation - that could have affected her just as much as the root had.
If you think the magic was real, then that one "slip" where vidal was going through the labyrinth and saw Ofelia alone, when she imagined herself in the kingdom - now that's ambiguous!
Vidal cannot and does not deserve to see a creature that is completely of the Underworld.
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Awesome movie! The most intense part for me was
.SPOILIN.
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The thing with the eyes in its hands. It was like something out of a Silent Hill game or movie. I didn't really understand why the fairies wanted her to open the middle box though. Was that relevant?
How was the FX done on this movie? Was it just all makeup or some CGI... or what, because it looked amazing.
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YET MORE SPOILERS!
She could have gotten the root anywhere, and the mother was in a stressful situation - that could have affected her just as much as the root had.
If you think the magic was real, then that one "slip" where vidal was going through the labyrinth and saw Ofelia alone, when she imagined herself in the kingdom - now that's ambiguous!
Vidal cannot and does not deserve to see a creature that is completely of the Underworld.
MORE SPOILERS
Well, now you're just makin' up the rules. I could also say "Well, Ofelia has a history with mental disorders and is borderline/schizophrenic." That doesn't make it true though.
There were suggestions in either direction - is it real? (the fact that the fairies, around everyone else, were insects, but she still called them fairies) is it fake? (the chalk on the wall when she is trying to escape her room)
I think it's up to the viewer to decide, and I decided that the girl gets the cut in the end.
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I realize the ambiguity. I was half-being a smartass. You raise some good points though. Good work.
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Saw it today after great leagues of effort (which failed) to get a girl to go see it with me.
Deh. Nowhere near the level of quality as this thread would have you believe, personally.
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I realize the ambiguity. I was half-being a smartass. You raise some good points though. Good work.
[/quote
Still being half a smartass? I can't tell.
They should come up with a punctuation point for those using sarcasm/irony and it should be highly sarcastic ironic.
I know it's always good work, though, to take threads rull serious, so I guess I'll stop being a tard either way.
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being the fairy tale fanatic i am, i absolutely LOVED this movie. the faun looked amazing. the ambiguity of the story was played off very well. even though it was quite graphic at points, it lets the viewer understand just how awful those people were. i will definitely be buying this.
and this isn't really a spoiler, but the thing with the eyes in the hands FREAKED ME OUT. ugh. they really matched his appearence with what he was.
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This movie was pretty good. I have to say it blew me away. I didn't think that the winter season was going to offer anything better than The Prestige, but I was wrong. It offered TWO movies that were better, and one of them was Pan's Labyrinth.
The other one, which I actually thought was far superior to Pan's Labyrinth, was The Children of Men. One of my favorite Michael Caine performances to date, solid performances by Clive Owen, Julainne Moore and Chiwitel Ejiofor (one of my new favorite performers), and a great premise. Amazing use of special effects to get the little details down instead of big special flashy effects, and some of the most amazing sets I have seen in any movie. (There is a seven minute shot following the characters through the bombed out streets of the future. No cuts, no computers - they built the whole goddamn city.) And personally, I thought it was a better film than Pan's Labyrinth.
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Awesome movie! The most intense part for me was
.SPOILIN.
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The thing with the eyes in its hands. It was like something out of a Silent Hill game or movie. I didn't really understand why the fairies wanted her to open the middle box though. Was that relevant?
How was the FX done on this movie? Was it just all makeup or some CGI... or what, because it looked amazing.
I'd say that the fairies told her to open the middle box as a test. If she was the real princess, she'd know that it was the left one.
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Either that, or the fairies ain't what they're cracked up to be.
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Well Doug Jones, who played the Faun and the Pale Man, was entirely donned in make-up for his scenes, like he was as Abe Sapien (Hellboy).
As far as the box choice goes, my teacher brought up a good point in that if she had chosen the middle box, sacrifice may have not been necessary to achieve her goal. I like your point better, though, GUN.
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Maybe, except we'll never know what was in the middle box. Or the right one. Maybe the key wouldn't/didn't fit and that's why she chose the left.
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I like my explanation. It requires a bare minimum of over-analysis.
Over-analysis makes me tired. Go with the flow, kids!
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Maybe she was supposed to put the key in the fourth door that only faerie princesses can see. I didn't see one in the movie, but then, I am not a faerie princess.
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Maybe the reason why Pan's Labyrinth isn't seeing wide release, is that Americans do not want to think about Franco.
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I would be genuinely surprised if most Americans knew who Franco was.
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And that, partly, is my point. It is like we ignored Spain, I can't help but imagine the whole country went on vacation. No one translates Spanish fiction from the mid 20th century, few movies from that period are available in the States, its not like the country had done nothing for arts and entertainment it just does make it here. And this strikes me as very very cryptic.
Who made the decision to isolate Spain? All I can see coming from this is bad education about another country. pun intended.
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ZOMBIE-FYING AN OLD THREAD!
FInally got the chance to see this movie last night...holy crap, I think it might be one of the best movie's I've seen in ages. Just gorgeous the whole way through.
I kept waiting for the Faun to turn out to be a bad guy though...
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I think it is awesome how the father had his own romantic fairy tale he was trying to live. Only for it die with him too. For me it shows how even adults have their own myths and security blankets, while they might be different from a child's myths and security blankets perhaps no more or less valid than a child's.
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I kept waiting for the Faun to turn out to be a bad guy though...
Good, I wasn't the only one, then.
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Yeah, me too...I totally thought he was/should have been a bad guy.
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I thought he was good up until Mercedes said her mother never said to trust fauns and then he got a bit more aggressive and made me doubt him. Which I didn't want to do, because he looked freaking amazing.
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Well it didnt help that he spoke all mean
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But, then again, she did disobey the rules!
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My favorite part was the conversation they had about the tablet.
"That's you, and that's me!"
"But what about the baby? Who's that?"
"Uh. . ."
Yeah, he was totally sinister.
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Yeah but you know what was awesome? When the evil guy told the rebels to give his son his watch so he could be evil like his daddy and they were all like, NO, dude, you suck, and then shot him. In the FACE.
In other words, the stepdad scared me a lot more than the faun. The faun was a bit iffy, but he did not smash some guy's face in with a wine bottle for, well, telling the truth.
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That part made me cringe a lot. And after Mercedes cut his cheek and he was sewing it shut... The sound of it alone (I was definately looking away) was making my stomach turn.
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Whether they used prosthetics or whatever, the sewing of the cheek-wound was definitely very well-done.
And the bottle scene.. uurgghh. I super-cringed.
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SPOILERS, DUHR.
Having been 5 days since seeing Pan's Labyrinth, I'm still trying to piece together why I am so in love with this movie.
The Pale Man was the most amazing horror sequence I've ever witnessed across any media, bar none, although I found Ofelia's greed a bit odd, especially considering the scary-ass monster sitting at the table next to her. When he came to life and started chomping on fairy-faces, she seemed to recoil from the fact that anything could harm her or her friends, which might support the idea that it was her own fantasy world. While I thought the Pale Man's stance, with his hands up by his face, was almost silly, I couldn't help but feel all-the-more drawn in, and the paintings that Ofelia saw as she scanned the dining room only added to this perverted fairy tale. I certainly agree that he (it?) reminded me of a Silent Hill monster, but the entire scene was pulled off ten times better than any similar Hollywood experience.
The Faun still gives me shivers. I never fully trusted his character during the movie, nor did I after the ending, but perhaps that's to be expected. If he was waiting so long for Ofelia to waltz by, I imagine he had reason to be as impatient (and indeed, as straightforward) as he was. When she had an "accident", he was perhaps rightly outraged, as she could have been built up in his mind as the perfect ruler. Can anyone tell me why the movie is called "Pan's Labyrinth", when his name is never mentioned throughout the film? EDIT: So I wiki'd the name origin, and it stems from the faun-like Greek god Pan. Go figure.
As a side note, does anyone know if there's an official soundtrack? Some of these songs make me want to cry like a little girl.
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Available on iTunes.
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So, I saw the movie a few days ago and here's what I think.
Holy God were the special effects well done. From the cheek being sewn shut to the bottle in the face to getting shot to hell at the end, everything was amazingly well done and the movie deserved its Oscar for Best Cinematography (Well, it deserved Best Foreign Language Film, too, but hey.). I thought the movie was beautiful and the soundtrack was really very good.
HOWEVER.
I left the theater enjoying the movie, but wishing there had been MORE to it. The two storylines were so completely seperate that it disheartened me. The girl's storyline could have been its own movie, the war story could have been its own movie, and both would probably have had more focus and worked better than the mash-up they had. It felt to me as if two different people wrote two different stories and then they stuck 'em together at the same time. I would have absolutely LOVED this movie if it had combined the elements of fantasy and reality a little more effectively. As it is all you get is the scene with the root being tossed in the fire and the ending. And even the ending only kind of.
Having just seen Science of Sleep a week earlier, a movie that SO effectively blended fantasy and reality, maybe my expectations were too high. I really enjoyed Pan's Labyrinth, but I just felt it wasn't as good as it could have been, especially with such a unique visual style, presence, atmosphere and set of ideas.
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I agree with that it deserved 3+ awards, Children of Men should have had best cinematography without a shadow of a doubt. I'm really kind of upset about it.
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Melodic, the title refers to the god Pan from Greek mythology. He is a god of nature and is in the form of a FAUN (wink wink nudge nudge). The faun is actually sometimes called Pan in cast listings of the movie.
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I just saw Pan's Labyrinth last night and it was one of the best movies I've seen at theatres in ages. The art style was gorgeous, the story was brilliant and the actors were immaculate. I highly recommend seeing this movie in theatres if you can.
SPOILER
That Pale Man was one of the coolest monsters I've ever seen. And the tension in that room before she ate the grapes was so masterfully done. Those paintings of the babys being murdered and the pile of childrens shoes were so horrifying and such a great touch.
Best $5 I ever spent :)
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Children of Men should have had best cinematography without a shadow of a doubt. I'm really kind of upset about it.
I couldn't agree more and I was shocked that it didn't win. Pan deserved the best foreign film win but I would contest that it did not have the best cinemotography at all. COM was amazingly done and some of the shots were simply mind blowing.
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thats just my problem. pan's was cool looking but from a cinematic viewpoint the filming was nothing more than standard. children of men had some of the most incredibly put togethe scenes, especially all of the one shots, of which there were many many many.