Wednesday 10 November 2010

3D, is it the future of cinema or just a cash cow for the foreseeable future?



Hey all, Back again for the 2nd time in a 1 week, man I got to get out more. Going back on my last post about how bad the final installment of the saw series was bad and just plain ugly 3D, has brought me to take a look at the way 3D is dominating the cinema at the moment.

3D is a gimmick. I know this, you know this, hell even James Cameron has spoken out about how bad the recent flood of "3D" movies are. I put the 3D in " " because he is on about the recent trend of transfering 3D in post production.

The biggest casualty of this phenom, is Clash Of The Titans. One of the worst movies of the year in my opinion, and one of the worst throwing the 3D sign around. This movie is not 3D, it wasn't made in 3D and the process of 3D took them round a month. This is not the best way to do a 3D movie. Warner Bros. spent nearly $170 million on Clash, if they were throwing that type of money around, why didn't they just make the movie IN 3D? Now that would've been an experience.
Imagine if this scene in the movie, when Sam Worthington's character is on the flying horse, going in and out of the Krackens grasps, was filmed in 3D, like Avatar was, it would've been jaw dropping. But no, Warner Bros. just decided to do post 3D which is a movie killer.

This gets back to the last post of SAW3D, a movie that was made in 3D, and didn't even use it to it's advantages. Imagine how one of the traps would look, circular saws, hanging bodies etc coming towards you.

Out of the recent trend of movies that are in 3D, My favourite is Avatar, ovbiously this would be the top choice as it is the first actual 3D full length extravaganza experience. Yeah yeah it got the old pocahantas story, but it is told in a exciting way.



When the movie kicked in, it was a kick to the senses of what a 3D movie could be. When this scene, the first time that Jake is attracted by the plants and flowers and the tree of souls offspring, was just, wow.

Number 2 onwards is Resident Evil Afterlife and Monsters Vs Aliens. No story what so ever in these movies, but just pure fun. And in December we have Tron Legacy. Which will be a full on fun flick, which just looks amazing.

And from next year, we have nearly every single movie coming out in 3D. Let's just hope the powers that be, will actually learn that the only way to have a fun 3D movie, is to actually have a fun 3D movie, not convert it, but film it.




Cheers for the read,

Monday 8 November 2010

SAW series COP OUT

I've just seen the "Final chapter" of the Saw series, "SAW 3D", and in my opinion, is one of the worst in the series. I will will be going into spoiler terrority here, so if you don't want to know what happens, Then stop reading and go read something else.

The movie started out quite good with the opening trap in 3D. It was a very innovative way of not over using 3D but using it for the gruesome parts, EG blood and intestines flying at the screen. Then the movie started to take the downfall off using cliche after cliche and then ending with the worst cop out in the series.

First of all, bringing back DR GORDON from the first movie, was a really cool idea, 3 movies ago! The online forums was talking about this idea in 2006/07.

The game this movie round was also a bit crap, to put it nicely. Each trap wasn't thought out.

This is how I think the pre production meeting went.

INT. OFFICE - DAY

As the production team quickly flick through the finished pages of the current version of SAW 3D Kevin, the director, BURSTS through the door.

KEVIN:
Since you spoilt my chance of directing a decent flick in Paranormal activity 2, I am going to ruin your final chapter in this ludacris series of films, that should've ended after the 3rd!

The room goes deathly silent.

KEVIN:
I am going to use no imagination when me and the team are designing the traps! you want 3D, Well I'm going to give you spikes and sharp objects coming at you! No no no not flying at you, but moving YOU towards them! How amazing is that for 3D! And, for the big finally, were not going to do nothing! So you'll have to keep on making more of this movies and you won't hire me cause I'm going to wreck this baby!


The team jump out their seats, applauding and whooping.


END

There was a few moments when I thought, "Okay, this may get a bit better, or their toying with us for the big surprise twist",

SPOILER WARNING: Do not read on if you don't want to know what the "big surprise" is.








Right, since your still reading on, your either , A) you've seen it B) don't mind about spoilers or C) you don't give a shit.

Being the final chapter in a series which started off with a film that was being touted as the next SE7EN, with it's cracking thriller storyline, and very innovative editing, and a slight amount of gore, and has gradually gone down the more gore and gruesome way of film making, and up until saw IV has had pretty decent twists at the end, BUT nothing can top the twist in the first movie. When you found out that JOHN KRAMER (JIGSAW) was in the room with them the entire time as "The Corpse" was mind blowing. No one saw it coming.

The second and third movies had really good twists, but then when the writing was taking over by a team of writers from SAW IV onwards (who only got the gig cause they won a tv show, was a dumb idea).

They kind of had a good twist with SAW IV, but then kind of ran out of ideas. On to SAW 3D, the twist at the ending was a no shocker. Having JILL TUCK locked up in a police cell for her protection, but have HOFFMAN get to her anway, was a lame idea, atleast we FINALLY got to see what the reverse bear trap does to a human skull! Goodbye JILL!

Then the ending starts. After HOFFMAN kills JILL, he returns to his hideout, burns the entire thing down and then we see him get jumped by three people wearing the PIG MASK. We don't see two of the faces, but the one who takes his mask off, it's no other than DR GORDON.

it then goes through the entire series in flashbacks, say DR GORDON has been helping JIGSAW all the time, because he saw'd his own foot off and that he showed he had what it takes. I mean COME ON!!! when SAW II was released, EVERYONE was saying that the limping guy in the camera footage at the beginning was DR GORDON, Did these guys just look up on the web and say "Whoa! we can use that and say we came up with that, and it was our whole plan all along!"

After we see the flashback footage, were then back in the Bathroom from the first film, it began there, so it might aswell end there, right?

DR GORDON then leaves HOFFMAN, chained up and has thrown the hacksaw into the tunnel, Then says GAME OVER and closes the door leaving HOFFMAN to waste away like ADAM.

This was the worst way they could end this series of movies. I mean you had a really good thriller/horror trilogy then decided to make more just so you can make money. If you were really considering to make 4 more, then you should've actually mapped out a story that could've flowed from one another to a massive twist ending in SAW VII ( now 3D)

Like having JOHN KRAMER ( JIGSAW ) actually be a pawn in someone elses game. A higher power so to speak. Maybe just leave it like an episode of Inspector gadget, where all you see is a hand turn off a bank of video monitors, who has been watching every single game played out, but never show who was watching the monitors, leave it to the audience to make up their own mind or who it was.

It was just a major let down for a series that started so promising for 3 movies, then just fell like the nightmare, Halloween and Friday 13th series'.

Well thats my short analysis of the SAW series started out great, and how much of a let down the final movies were.

I just hope they leave it now, and not make anymore. But leaving HOFFMAN alive and DR GORDON the living heir to JIGSAW'S legacy, leaves it open for more trash to make money off.

LIONSGATE, if you do decide to make another 1 or 3, Give me a shout and i'll show you how to make a trilogy that will live up, or even surpass the original trilogy.


This has been a production from DANIEL T WOOD, up and coming screenwriter who loves the movies and wants entertaining and sometime's a thought provoking experience, WHICH I DELIVER in my scripts.

Thursday 2 September 2010

Scripts in progress.

Well it's been a while since I've been on here. Been busy trying to get my work seen, aswell as actually working to pay the bills :-( life really does suck when your not doing the things you love.

1st thing, I've just recently seen the Edgar Wright directed, SCOTT PILGRIM VS THE WORLD. My opinion? Totally amazingly, awesomest (is that a word?) most surreal movie event this year! The movie rocked my senses until my face was aching from smiling and laughing.

Right, main reason for this blog, at this momment in time, I am looking for people to read my wor, give me feedback etc. I'm working on a trilogy of B movie styles called BAD JESUS. If you want to know more, drop me a line at dannywood86@hotmail.co.uk

Just completed my 4th draft of my 2nd story in the Dark World trilogy. I got a thing going on at the mo with trilogies. Some reason I like trilogies and think movies work better in this format. Especially if you got tons of back story or ideas floating around and not enough room in your first story.


Woody out

Wednesday 28 April 2010

Free Speech for the dumb!

Revolution Muslims, a small extremist group out of New York city, which is now under the guidance of an idiot called, Abu TalHah Al-Amrikee. Man that is a long ass name. Let's shorten it and call him Muhammed.

Muhammed has been making threats to Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the creators of South Park, for supposedly making fun of their "Prophet" Muhammed. Now this is just childish from this guy and in my opinion just doing cheap publicity for his extreme website, and it's worked. Look at me, I'm writing a blog about it!

Well now the shit has hit the fan. Everywhere you look people are against this man. Every muslim asks why are they portrayed as terrorists, bad people etc. Well this guy is there spokesperson.

Congratufuckinglations Muslim religion, this guy has just made you the biggest hate figure on the planet. Now I know not all Muslims are like this, I have a few friends who are believe in this faith, and I'm not against them, I have nothing against religion, but People like this muhammed, is making people think that you are terrorists, your are how we see you in movies.

This group is not a true believer in religion, they are making the religion how they want to see it. They are twisting the book to their needs.

I've also found out that the address and phone number on their site is a foney, goes to show how brave they are.

You know what, this is going into a full blown rant now.

All these extremists say they are doing it for allah, blah blah, and they are proud of doing it, then why cover their faces when they kill someone? Why use a mask to cover your face? Because your nothing but scared boys. Not men, Boys. Using women and children to kill people is wrong, your god would be very disappointed in you all. You know what, in your "great" book, it does not condone violence upon anyone.

Right, that's the end of this one.