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Oh, I certainly didn't want to sell THIRTEENTH WARRIOR short. It is a very fine score indeed, with terrific sound on the CD (and generous running time, too). The movie, though, is complete dreck, which is a shame; it's the kind of bad movie that suggests the really good movie that could have resulted had everyone bothered to get on the same page before they started filming. There are a lot of films out there, that after you watch them you think: There's a good movie in side that just trying to get out... but didn't. In the case of 13th, I think you are right, no one was on the same page with this... and even if they were, theywoudl have been clueless. It didn't know what it was about... so it just fumbled around excessively in all directions. ANd there was a lot of talent involved in the film. But it ALWAYS ALWAYS comes down to the script. The screenwriters of today are NOT geniuses (Ghost Ship, League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Underworld, Second Hand Lions, etc) ... they often write something directed toward a specific audience, and think they can get away from it. The writer/producer/creator of Gilmore Girls takes pride in her show's great writing and remarkably (often) obscure/hysterical references, saying if you write SMART you find a SMART audience.
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Some may think that I am blaspheming here, but I'm not really a big Michael Crichton fan. At all. I have found the books that I have read of his to be trite and silly, and, despite some great scores, films adapted from his books or that he has written and directed have usually left me cold. So perhaps the problem isn't with the screen adaptation, but with Eaters of the Dead, which was diverting but pretty unmemorable otherwise. His greatest success, Jurassic Park, is a film I find incredibly stupid, based upon a book that caused me to roll my eyes every two or three pages. Breathtaking effects for the time and a great score by John Williams, though...
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Some may think that I am blaspheming here, but I'm not really a big Michael Crichton fan. At all. I have found the books that I have read of his to be trite and silly, and, despite some great scores, films adapted from his books or that he has written and directed have usually left me cold. So perhaps the problem isn't with the screen adaptation, but with Eaters of the Dead, which was diverting but pretty unmemorable otherwise. I agree with Mr. Buckler here.... Jurrasic Park was just a reworking of Michael Crichton's West World, but with dinosaurs... I'm suprisied no one noticed that... but its success as a film caused all his other books to illuminate in the darkness that is Hollywood's money grubbing night- so they ran across The Eaters Of The Dead and thought they could make it too, into a film, and it hardly cuts it as a BOOK. It is just a reworking of an ancient historian's observations that, again, were at best obscure. Making an obscure film is... well... hell, Star Wars had more plot!
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It's not called fiction for nothing... But it can be called garbage for something. Story writing is trickerier than most think. Even fiction best have some structure and logic... not just aimless indulgence that leads no where... even a Road Runner cartoon has more plot.
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Posted: |
Jan 17, 2005 - 9:34 AM
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By: |
Olivier
(Member)
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Eaters of the Dead / The 13ty Warrior is not based on the sketchy memories of a historian. It is presented as the manuscript of Ibn Fadlan (the main character), just as the story of the whole affair of The Scarlet Letter is said in the prologue to have been found tied with the very "rag of scarlet cloth". AS I said above, EotD / T13W is actually a re-telling of Beowulf, which is the most ancient English text. SPOILERS Crichton rationalized everything: the ogre Grendel and his mother are replaced with Eaters of the Dead, fantastic creatures which turn out to be men in bear skins. The dragon Beowulf fights at the end becomes the fire dragon, ie hundreds of men bearing torches. I know there's more, but that is what I remember. END SPOILERS This approach added to the book & movie's interest, beyond the action on the surface. One thing I really liked in the movie, which you rarely, if ever, see, is the "Linguistics" montage, where Ibn Fadlan learns the Vikings' language: for once, different people don't magically happen to understand each other at once -- nice music, too.
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Posted: |
Jan 17, 2005 - 9:39 AM
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By: |
Thor
(Member)
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Well, the thing is - Anz - that most of these soundtracks were both several years ago, when I had a steady student loan "income" and spent all my spare money on CD's instead of clothes, social activity etc. Today, that is not the case, and I bought perhaps two handful of multimedia products for the entire 2004! Right now, I have a monthly income that barely covers the necessities. In any case, while this thread was mainly about the soundtrack, the worst thing about the FILM was the short-cut to avoid subtitles, which you Americans are so weary of. I did a thread called "American Fear of Subtitles?" below, exemplifying with just THE 13TH WARRIOR: http://www.filmscoremonthly.com/board/posts.asp?threadID=1118&forumID=1 So Olivier, the "linguistics" scene you describe is actually one of the scenes that I have the MOST problems with.
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Eaters of the Dead / The 13ty Warrior is not based on the sketchy memories of a historian. It is presented as the manuscript of Ibn Fadlan (the main character), just as the story of the whole affair of The Scarlet Letter is said in the prologue to have been found tied with the very "rag of scarlet cloth". AS I said above, EotD / T13W is actually a re-telling of Beowulf, which is the most ancient English text. SPOILERS Crichton rationalized everything: the ogre Grendel and his mother are replaced with Eaters of the Dead, fantastic creatures which turn out to be men in bear skins. The dragon Beowulf fights at the end becomes the fire dragon, ie hundreds of men bearing torches. I know there's more, but that is what I remember. END SPOILERS This approach added to the book & movie's interest, beyond the action on the surface. One thing I really liked in the movie, which you rarely, if ever, see, is the "Linguistics" montage, where Ibn Fadlan learns the Vikings' language: for once, different people don't magically happen to understand each other at once -- nice music, too. Who cares....
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Posted: |
Jan 17, 2005 - 3:28 PM
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By: |
Olivier
(Member)
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I got your pointn, Thor. However-- [quote]Then comes the hilarious camp fire-sequence, where Banderas is "listening" to the vikingstalk and gradually learning the language just by that. How is that for amazing! [/quote] He observes and listens to them for weeks, not just that particular evening, as they ride from wherever they met down south, all across Europe, back to Scandinavia. He has time enough to make out a few words and guess the broad meaning. Champollion had even less to begin with. I suppose such things as "meat", "eat", "good morning/hello", "look", ... may not be that difficult to infer. This may be somehwat exaggerated here, and it may fit the point you make in that other thread, but the fact is, they did try to avoid the "universal language" syndrome. An effort was made toward realism, in that respect, which I greatly appreciated.
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THE 13TH WARRIOR had a lot of potential as a movie, but the final product had about as much appeal as an elevator crash. What a waste. I mean, an Arab intellectual joining Vikings to fight cannibalistic pre-historic people, that's a nifty setup for a trippy B-movie. Though one can hardly call a movie this expensive a "B-movie". THE 13TH WARRIOR easily cost $150,000,000.-, which is ironic, because it doesn't look much better than, say, these ATOR movies, which probably cost no more than $1500.- (though they are much more fun). It could (and should) have been enjoyable. But it fell down flat and lifeless after only a few minutes. And stayed there. (You can almost hear it scream "Help! I have fallen and I can't get up!") Enjoy Goldsmith's terrific score and skip the movie.
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"...properly creative scoring." Please Explain this comment in more detail. This I have to hear. Rich
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