Busy Friday
Apr. 11th, 2003 11:12 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elfsSo, today we took the kids to see Piglet's Big Movie.
It's not a bad movie, as kid's films go. I have to make the same complaint about this one that I did about The Tigger Movie: threatening the characters with serious bodily harm and permanent destruction is simply not in the spirit of the original A.A. Milne series.
But it has a lot of Roo and Tigger and Rabbit and company, and it's not a terrible attempt. A worthwhile way to spend the afternoon with the kids, especially in a cool theater when it's becoming surprisingly warm outside. There is one moment when the blend of computer and traditional animation don't mesh well, and that's a scene of Owl in his rocking chair from a distance. The overmasking is so badly done it's like one of those bluescreen effects from the 80's, when you could see the outline around the actors. It's not more than 45 frames long, but it was startling to see something like that get past the editors.
It's still no Lilo & Stitch.
Kouryou-chan, Yamaarashi-chan and I were the second family in the theater. The first was a woman and her three kids, a girl and two boys, probably ages 7, 6, and 5, respectively. The mother looked up and said, "Oh, good. For a second I thought I was going to be the only one here." Then she gets up and leaves-- and she doesn't come back! For the whole movie she disappeared. The kids were on their own, and they must have been bored by it because they started running around and making noise. It fell to me to make them shut up and sit down. I was really annoyed. And when we left the theater, she was still nowhere to be found.
And what the fsck is up with Nightcrawler in the new X-Men film? Instead of fur, he's just blue-skinned, with these awful tattoos. I don't remember Kurt having tattoos! And I was a serious X-Men fan when Nightcrawler was around.
When I got home, the kids went to play in the backyard and Omaha pulled me into the bedroom for a surprise quickie. It was nice, but we tried this new lubricant called Maximus, and went it was over that stuff gave me the most terrible burning sensation in my urethra. There was no nonoxynol-9 in it, so it must have been one of the preservatives that I reacted to. It was excruciating.
We went out to a mid-range restaurant, The Keg, for dinner and the waiter actually spammed us. I couldn't believe it. I expect a waiter to make recommendations and tell us the special of the day, but this guy repeated word-for-word what the restaurant advertisement says without any editing or inflection. It was like something right out of one of those bad anti-consumerist novels like Jennifer Government or Everyone in Silico.
And the music was terrible. The lighting and menu were appropriate for a calm, somewhat expensive dinner, and the music was loud and straight out of a sports bar. Thumpy hip-hop and over-mixed Madonna do not make for a congenital dinner.
It's not a bad movie, as kid's films go. I have to make the same complaint about this one that I did about The Tigger Movie: threatening the characters with serious bodily harm and permanent destruction is simply not in the spirit of the original A.A. Milne series.
But it has a lot of Roo and Tigger and Rabbit and company, and it's not a terrible attempt. A worthwhile way to spend the afternoon with the kids, especially in a cool theater when it's becoming surprisingly warm outside. There is one moment when the blend of computer and traditional animation don't mesh well, and that's a scene of Owl in his rocking chair from a distance. The overmasking is so badly done it's like one of those bluescreen effects from the 80's, when you could see the outline around the actors. It's not more than 45 frames long, but it was startling to see something like that get past the editors.
It's still no Lilo & Stitch.
Kouryou-chan, Yamaarashi-chan and I were the second family in the theater. The first was a woman and her three kids, a girl and two boys, probably ages 7, 6, and 5, respectively. The mother looked up and said, "Oh, good. For a second I thought I was going to be the only one here." Then she gets up and leaves-- and she doesn't come back! For the whole movie she disappeared. The kids were on their own, and they must have been bored by it because they started running around and making noise. It fell to me to make them shut up and sit down. I was really annoyed. And when we left the theater, she was still nowhere to be found.
And what the fsck is up with Nightcrawler in the new X-Men film? Instead of fur, he's just blue-skinned, with these awful tattoos. I don't remember Kurt having tattoos! And I was a serious X-Men fan when Nightcrawler was around.
When I got home, the kids went to play in the backyard and Omaha pulled me into the bedroom for a surprise quickie. It was nice, but we tried this new lubricant called Maximus, and went it was over that stuff gave me the most terrible burning sensation in my urethra. There was no nonoxynol-9 in it, so it must have been one of the preservatives that I reacted to. It was excruciating.
We went out to a mid-range restaurant, The Keg, for dinner and the waiter actually spammed us. I couldn't believe it. I expect a waiter to make recommendations and tell us the special of the day, but this guy repeated word-for-word what the restaurant advertisement says without any editing or inflection. It was like something right out of one of those bad anti-consumerist novels like Jennifer Government or Everyone in Silico.
And the music was terrible. The lighting and menu were appropriate for a calm, somewhat expensive dinner, and the music was loud and straight out of a sports bar. Thumpy hip-hop and over-mixed Madonna do not make for a congenital dinner.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
The blue guy.
Date: 2003-04-11 11:22 pm (UTC)Re: The blue guy.
Date: 2003-04-12 01:18 am (UTC)I used to be a serious McCallum fan. Then again, I still have my X-Men 97->200 serials, including the Teen Titans crossover and the Avengers Annual penned by Michael Golden. And a copy of God Loves, Man Kills in the original plastic.
Re: The blue guy.
Date: 2003-04-12 01:54 pm (UTC)Re: The blue guy.
Date: 2003-04-12 01:59 pm (UTC)I have to say I could do without all the weird stuff they did to the char, but have to agree with the previous poster that I really like the actor they got for him... So, who knows, maybe he will redeam the bad things they did to him... I await the movie to find out! (Mmmmmmmmmm fuzzy elf....)
no subject
Date: 2003-04-12 12:24 am (UTC)OK, I know I am sensitised to this at the moment as my son has only recently been diagnosed, but ... did the guy make eye contact? Were his other interactions with you any more "normal"? It sounds as if he might have Asperger Syndrome? Just a thought ...
no subject
Date: 2003-04-12 01:13 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-04-13 03:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-04-12 12:38 am (UTC)Not a book I plan to read...
no subject
Date: 2003-04-12 01:49 am (UTC)As for music, it never hurts to ask... I remember being in a pizza place in a tourist trap of a town in Tennessee, and one of my companions requested a change in music (it was bad country twang).... in a few minutes, the dulcet sounds of Geddy Lee vocals met our appreciative ears, to which my friend exclaimed, "Rush! Oh, excellent!" The waiter's subsequent apologetic comment was something along the lines of, most of our clientele expects C&W...
Music issue
Date: 2003-04-12 10:20 am (UTC)Actually, I got a chance to have a chat with the manager myself. Apparently, they have a new music system installed, and they hadn't figured out how to work it to their satisfaction. It has a timing system, and plays music according to a preset schedule of when such and such music is supposed to play when. He (the manager) wanted to have soft jazz during the main dinner "hour", to which I heartily agreed.
This is a Keg we've been to a number of times (in Burien...the Westwood one in West Seattle closed a few years back) and this was the first time the music was so obtrusive. So, I don't think we'll boycott it quite yet...I'll wait and see if they get that music system working first.
You should have done something
Date: 2003-04-12 10:29 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-04-13 04:31 pm (UTC)