Movie Details
| Title: | Rogue One: A Star Wars Story | |
| Director: | Gareth Edwards | |
| Year: | 2016 | |
| Genre: | Fantasy | |
| Times Seen: | 1 | |
| Last Seen: | 12.17.16 |
Other Movies Seen By This Director (2)
- Godzilla
- Monsters
| Date Viewed | Venue | Note |
| 12.17.16 | Bullock IMAX | Is this maybe the only movie I saw in a theater this year? ugh... Relatedly: Why does the Bullock only screen this in 3D? It was a pretty ideal theater-going experience except I had to wear dumb glasses that forced me to move my head to pick and choose where to focus. Also: The extended trailer for Dunkirk was great. I feel like anytime your musical score is made up of different clocks and timers, you could show a kettle on a stove and people would subconsciously start to feel anxious, but the actual footage shown was also great and gave a great sense of the dread and tension that the film will probably deal in. And the dogfighting footage scaled up to 70mm was downright amazing. You could see the ripple of the ocean and the glare of the sun and a tiny plane right in the middle as the horizon tilts and a little sparkly line appears with a BRRRAP of machine gun fire. Nolan is bringing it. I hope the movie follows suit, this footage was excellent. Now on to Rogue One: I really really liked it. It was pretty much everything I was hoping it would be. Yes, I could sometimes tell when the reshoots kicked in and I did miss a few notable shots from the various trailers, but for the most part I feel like the story never faltered or disappointed me, the ragtag group of soldiers on a mission were suitably ragtag and great, everyone got some good moments... once again Alan Tudyk kind of steals the movie, the battle sequences were stellar - at once fresh because of the scenery and totally calling back to the feeling of episode 4 - and the connective tissue that puts it between episodes 3 and 4 were mostly well done. I was surprised to see a few characters show up. Molly didn't notice the first CG character until I mentioned it at the end, so I guess that means it was well done. I couldn't help but notice it, but feel they did a good job. It was a little video-game-y at times, but that's also the writing a little bit. This is maybe the best space battle that we've had in a long time. Super thrilling. and man oh man that last scene was satisfying, like you finally get a taste of why that character has his reputation. I thought it was great. I feel like half the fun of making these movies would be coming up with new worlds based on where you want to shoot. I feel like we got to see quite a bit of the universe here. I think they did a wonderful job of matching the level of technology. All those old school 70s-era vector displays and cheap holograms fit seamlessly. gush gush gush. So I guess you could argue that this fits the men-on-a-mission genre pretty closely - to which I wouldn't argue - but watching a genre picture set in the Star Wars universe is EXACTLY what I wanted. It really opens the doors to tell any kind of story in the universe, even some side mission type stuff that doesn't have the weight or pressure of an "official" episode. I did feel like the changes in formula were very deliberate (especially the way the film opens), to which I'm a bit conflicted about, but if dilution of some of the formatting of the series like the score and the opening crawl is what I have to give up in order to see more facets of the universe then so be it. That said, I AM excited for Episode 8. Bring it on! |
