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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: July 9th, 2023

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  • I don’t believe Heinlein ever wrote a sequel to Starship Troopers, though certainly the “military science fiction” genre owes a lot to that book.

    Ed Neumeier (who wrote Robocop and the 97 movie) however, wrote and directed the 2 live action film sequels. The second is, from memory, God awful and not worth a watch. The third is ALSO God awful as I recall, but it has the advantage of going pretty big with its ideas, so there’s a bit of zany fun to be had. Plus, despite it being one of the defining features of the book, it’s also the first time (I think) power armor makes an appearance in the film franchise. Casper van Dien’s star had fallen sufficiently by that point too, so he also reprises his role as Rico, which is another point in its favor.

    There also a handful of computer animated movies and a TV series that I believe originated in Japan. They are about on par, quality wise, with the CGI Resident Evil movies. Depending on your tastes, that could either be a mild endorsement or a resounding condemnation.


  • Man, I literally wound up listening to that entire playlist last night after I posted the comment. I’ve only seen the film once, probably a decade or more in the past at this point, so I really only had the overall impression of the score in my head. It’s even better than I remember it.

    Also, I put together that Nyman also composed the score to Gattaca, which is another very stirring soundtrack. I can hear elements it in the more traditional portions of Ravenous.


  • I can’t answer what my favorite is per se, but two of the most memorable scores I can think of are for Swiss Army Man and Ravenous.

    I believe Daniels tapped the band Manchester Orchestra to do the music for Swiss Army Man. For whatever reason, they chose to have Paul Dano and Daniel Radcliffe sing on the soundtrack and the lyrics are usually just narrating what is happening on screen. case in point. It’s a lot of fun.

    Equally avant-garde, but substantially more “challenging”, shall we say, the score for Ravenous is very striking and idiosyncratic, as befitting the film it’s accompanying. Also written by a popular musician, in part at any rate. Michael Nyman, the second composer, said Damon Albarn (of Blur and, later, The Gorillaz) wrote about 60% of the tracks and he composed the remainder. Several of the tracks were performed by people who had never played their assigned instruments before in their lives, to create a deliberately off-putting soundscape. Others are traditional period marching songs befitting the frontier America setting. Some are based around electronic loops and samples. And others are very traditional, pleasant (if ominous) orchestra pieces. It’s really a wild listen. Check it out for yourself.


  • Idk if you’re seriously asking, but, as someone who doesn’t even have a casual interest in motorsports, I’ll answer:

    1. I like Brad Pitt
    2. I like the archetypical structure of sports movies
    3. The director did the new Top Gun, and I thought that the plane action in that was well-done, so I imagine the driving portions here will be equally thrilling.

    Like, yeah it’s a niche sport, but look at Moneyball, another highly specific sports movie starring Brad Pitt. Hell, that movie is as much about statistics and sports finance as it is about baseball, and I still think it’s the best “sports” movie of the past 25 years. And I have even LESS interest in baseball than I do Formula 1.