A Pinoy Blog About Nothing

Well, you know / It’ll be worldwide now.

Yup Nov. 5 at 10 pm. A couple of friends and I will be watching it when it opens because it should be fun to watch this trilogy unravel with the rest of the world (and because we’re just willing victims of marketers).

Speaking of the Matrix Revolutions, Tagline’s got their next Thursday Three up (yeah I know it’s a Sunday). (And check out the teaser poster for Spider-Man 2 while you’re there…)

1. Why is no one talking about the Matrix Revolutions?

I guess WB didn’t want to pour a-coupla-millions for the marketing push for Revolutions since, I think, Reloaded didn’t live up to expectations financially at the box office. That’s my take on the silence for most part on the usual media channels.

For the people going to the theaters, I guess Reloaded wasn’t just as interesting and ground-breaking as the first Matrix. People got bored and they couldn’t care less what happens in the third act. That’s a bad sign.

It was bad enough there wasn’t a good cliff-hanger ending like say, Agent Smith proclaim that he is actually (heavy breathing) Neo’s father. Or like the citizens of Zion, after being seiged by Sentinels were rescued by the timely arrival of reinforcements led by a certain wizard on a white horse…

For me, I’d like to believe producer Joel Silver that Reloaded was ‘just half a movie’ and that there will be a nice, tidy wrap-up in Revolutions. I really would like to see the Wachowski Brothers succeed. It’s that and I’m looking forward to more Monica Bellucci and seeing those giant mecha-like rigs do battle with the Sentinels.

Afterthought: I would really hate it if at the end of Revolutions, the screen goes dark and the words ‘Game Over’ appears and then Keanu-as-Neo walks away from the computer screen.

2. Is the only way you can do an old TV show as a spoof?

No I don’t believe so but I think it’s a decision to address the fans who kept complaining about changing their favorite TV shows (talking about American TV here). These TV shows belonged to a specific era and in order keep the flavor, you have to go campy and cheesy.

Jim Carrey as the Six-Million Dollar Man and the new Starsky and Hutch are going for the essence of those TV shows, the ones best remembered by the fans: the car, the clothes, 6MDM’s slow-mo sound effects. These are moments hence the need for camp.

However, I think Charlie’s Angels did a nice update on the old TV show without putting the girls in 70s outfits. Fiennes-Thurman’s The Avengers, in my humble opinion, was a good idea albeit the execution could’ve been better. They got the essence of the show and gave it a nice modern-day twist. My only complaint for that movie was that it felt so…antiseptic. I mean how can Thurman in a catsuit not provoke like Diana Rigg did as Emma Peel? (At very least, right?)

Then again I had hopes for the X-Files…

3. With Halloween coming, tomorrow, and a shite-load of horror movies released as well, ask yourselves - is it easy to make a scary movie that isn’t actually very good?

I have to say yes. Philippines cinema’s been doing it for years. I haven’t been scared of a Pinoy horror movie since…Panday. (Oh no! Another FPJ connection!)