I think I remember seeing this one back in the day randomly on TV. Now I'm seeing it air on FLIXe channel. It's inspiring for young middle school viewers. Some parts reminded me of myself when I was that young, how sometimes strict parents tend to be unsupportive of what we do, and being one of the best spellers in my class. While Akeelah's rhythm has to do with keeping time, my little thing that I did was count my fingers. My 6th grade class thought I was weird when I did that. So when the next big word came, and I didn't use my fingers due to previous embarrassment, I misspelled it; completely lost my rhythm. There's a lesson to be learned from that.
Anyway, there's a familiar cast here. Every time I see Laurence Fishburne, I kept thinking Morpheus from The Matrix (1999). I also remember Lee Thompson Young, who was Jett Jackson/Silverstone, and had sadly passed away some years ago. It's nice to see the soulful support Akeelah received from her neighborhood and community.loading replies
@tobyokoye2 Try asking your mom
This show/movie marks the beginning of a whole new way of watching shows and I'm really excited about it! They dabbled in this style with kid's shows prior, but this is the first aimed at adults... and I hope we see this style of show explode moving forward. My only complaint was that I hit a dead end several times and it had to circle back and forced me to re-watch portions which took away from the experience. Otherwise, I absolutely loved it!
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@wrecklessaboteur Probably not the first, but you might've missed the recent reboot of WarGames ala #WarGames
a pleasant origin story starr. John Lithgow as the main villain; hard to believe that John Carpenter was supposedly the original director but was rejected, I would've loved to see how it would turn out
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@jim222001 heh Kurt Russell finally got the role as Santa Claus in The Christmas Chronicles on Netflix though!
Good lord what an awful movie. 4/5th way through the movie, the only feelings I had were anger at how unbelievably stupid people were.
- Monkey walk straight into the armory, unnoticed, and kills 2 guys, then steal a few guns and leaves, somehow unnoticed
- Monkey leader gets publicly shot by an unseen shooter. His body had barely hit the ground before monkeys had declared war and attacked the human base. Nobody thought to check if he was alive?
- Later monkeys attack armory again, kill the 2 guards (2 guards!?) watching the freaking ARMORY and arm their entire monkey army. Nobody had noticed the other 2 guys being killed earlier?
- Humans have a tank. Phew! GG. Oh, except they drive the tank into a swarm of apes with the top hatch WIDE OPEN. Who could possibly have predicted that going wrong. Now the apes have a tank.
- More stupid shitWhat a waste of time.
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@hubro Yeah, I thought the tank scene was dumb too but there are some things to consider: The apes grow smarter and smarter by the day. The (human) military may or may not be aware of how fast the apes grow and learn. Meanwhile, the disease that is spreading, causes the infected human(s) to grow more and more primitively (or in your terms, "stupid"). So I hope that explains most if not all of the complaints you (and anyone else) have about the third film in the series. Personally, I thought this second film, DAWN, to be the best of the trilogy once I've seen them all and have a better understand of the stories told.
Brought some friends to see this one tonight; We liked it; thought it was alright, not great though. It's a neat update with some newer tech thrown in, more camera views, but even the latest technology won't do you any good in these woods. The many jump scares, shouting and screaming may be quite annoying.
Parts of Blair Witch (2016) remind me of other horrors such as Evil Dead (2013), The Descent (2005), REC (2007), and especially P.T. (the Silent Hills demo game from Konami). Of course, being directed by Adam Wingard, there's a resemblance to some of the shorts from the V/H/S series.loading replies
@roth I'm the type to go camping; I had camped up in the White Mountains a few times this summer to relax and enjoy the wilderness. You'd think the characters in this movie would know what to do once they become lost in the woods. They know well enough what to bring, and what not to bring to camp. My friends and I watched the original and the documentary to refresh our memories just before seeing the new one. It has not aged well, but something about the dated look of the original film gives it a sense of authenticity (full frame, grain, unprofessional handling of the camera, believable characters), whereas this new Blair Witch sort of lost quite a bit of that. I'm not saying that you should do a movie that purposely does shaky camera movements, but perhaps let someone (a cast member) who has no camera experience take camera for some parts of the film. I think that's what made the original The Blair Witch Project outstanding, because of accidental shots like the infamous shot of Heather's "ugly reality" face which was intended to be her full face but accidentally zoomed in to her nostrils and eyes. We didn't see much of that sympathy in Blair Witch, where the character would cry hopelessly in to the camera and say who they are and leave their information on film, like Heather did, in case someone else were to find the equipment. There just wasn't enough time for character development, or perhaps there were just too many characters to work with. The pacing seemed pretty good though, and gets more frantic towards the end. The glitchy electronic film effect must be the director's stylistic choice for transitions, but I think a simple fade-in/fade-out would've just been fine. Again those jump scares, they don't really work on me, probably for some other folks. They don't really add anything to the film here. Sound work on the cracking trees is nice, but loud, needed more distant-sounding ones to give it depth/atmosphere. A score is not needed in a film like this. I know the director Adam is also a composer, so he's trying to show off his skills. It's found footage style, come on, you think a spooky soundtrack would magically play in the air while crazy stuff is happening to you. The original did not have it, nor it needed one.
Overall it's a nice worthy sequel; it just didn't feel as "authentic" as the original. Although I'm glad that this sequel exists and that Lionsgate tried to do something with the property. Maybe they should've done this a little sooner when the internet was up and arms about Slenderman and all the creepypasta stuff were a viral thing. I hope the series continue somehow, perhaps in the form of comic books that tells an origin story of the Blair Witch.
Brought some friends to see this one tonight; We liked it; thought it was alright, not great though. It's a neat update with some newer tech thrown in, more camera views, but even the latest technology won't do you any good in these woods. The many jump scares, shouting and screaming may be quite annoying.
Parts of Blair Witch (2016) remind me of other horrors such as Evil Dead (2013), The Descent (2005), REC (2007), and especially P.T. (the Silent Hills demo game from Konami). Of course, being directed by Adam Wingard, there's a resemblance to some of the shorts from the V/H/S series.loading replies
@roth There's also a petition going around to push Lionsgate to release an extended version of the original The Blair Witch Project (1999) over at foundfootagecritic's website.
probably one of the scariest movies I have seen to date!
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@horrorfangirl666 well if this is one of the scariest for you, then wait til you see Ju-on: The Grudge series
Shadows in Lights Out
will surround you in the night
One must fight with light#HorrorHaikuesday
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@roth I didn't realize Teresa Palmer was in this; recall her in Sorcerer's Apprentice and Warm Bodies ♥ also saw a The Crow poster on the wall
Shadows in Lights Out
will surround you in the night
One must fight with light#HorrorHaikuesday
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@roth Good use of light & shadow in Lights Out. The fading in/out technique reminds me of one in The Grudge 2; been used a lot in later films
i understand why people not very like it.for me everything just fine except for costume.
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Actually, it was well perceived for its time. Have a look at the awards it had won and was nominated for, followed by 3 sequels. As for the costume, I prefer this one over the current one because the design and colors match the one in the comics.
