ROBUST discussion

http://lifeandstuffclaudine.blogspot....

Ok, so here's what I thought of John Carter, the movie.

When I originally saw the trailer during Star Wars Phantom Menace, I thought to myself Oh cool, another CGI flop fest where the book (which I have yet to read funnily enough) will be tossed in the garbage in favour of updating it for more modern times. Of course I also thought that having some eye candy to watch in the form of Taylor Kitsch (OMG THAT BODY! THOSE MUSCLES!) wouldn't be bad either. So off we went, my friend T and I, on Saturday afternoon to spend a few hours in Fantasy Land drooling over some hot bod.

The storyline was great, John Carter, a man from the US Civil War era, finds himself magically transported to Mars where a princess of Helium needs his help in evading marriage to the enemy of her people. Along the way John Carter realises he has superhuman agility (he jumps really high and far due to the difference in gravity between Jarsoom (Earth) and Barsoom (Mars) and has brilliant fighting skills),meets the Tharks, helps the princess and falls in love. While the CGI was brilliant, it didn't detract from the storyline at all and while the movie plot does deviate from the book (according to Wikipedia), it doesn't deviate too much. The acting was good, not great enough to be nominated for an Oscar mind you but still good enough to spend 2 hours sitting in a cinema not wishing you were somewhere else.

The one thing that I found most pleasant was that I didn't have to suffer through long periods of trying to figure out any slang, work my way through any swearing and use of bad English. It was just sublime to sit there and let the English language flow out from the screen, adding to the overall enjoyment of the movie. If old fashioned sci-fi with no swearing and bad language is your thing, go see the movie. Or else you could just drool at the screen. Taylor Kitsch isn't bad looking, at all.

(Not to be confused with the 2009 movie Princess of Mars starring Antonio Sabato Jnr (shudders in horror).)

My wife and I saw this last night. I don't know why this movie got such bad buzz in many quarters. It's not THE BEST MOVIE EVER, but it was a darn fun sci-fi adventure romp.

Amusing (but understandable) way the movie is different than the book: In the book, nobody on Mars wore clothes and made fun of JC for having some. :p

I happened to stumble across the Tracy Lords (rolling eyes) version myself. What a dog that was.

I've seen a LOT of really, really bad movies this year.

I agree, John Carter was worthy of Disney, and well worth watching. The CGI was very nice - and the updates actually didn't bother me.

I'm still reading the books - great fun, but not fit for a long marathon of reading.

I agree with you guys. It's not a bad movie at all. Not a classic, but honestly, nothing wrong with it other than that the plot was unimaginative. I don't have a clue why it was such a colossal flop. I was annoyed only that I had to pay a 3-D price when there was absolutely nothing 3-D about the visuals.

Claudine, you liked Taylor Kitsch. Well, Lynn Collins looks good, too. The fact that she didn't appear like a stick-thin model does not detract from her screen presence.

Surely nobody is born called Kitsch. Is the choice of Kitsch as a screen name a reflection on American education or insularity?

Taylor Kitsch is Canadian. ;)

Though a search on the Internet confirms that Kitsch is a legitimate surname, though not very common. It may even be his real name (though I didn't check hard). If it is, I'm kind of surprised he didn't go with something different.

This makes me think about other people with unfortunate last names. I used to know a guy with the last name Whiner.

He lived up to his name.

When I was in tech school (post- basic AF training), many not-so-witty sergeants thought it was tremendously funny to mock me with such lame insults as, "I guess you're beardless now, aren't you, Beard?"

Random tangent: From talking with my friends in all branches, it seems like TIs/RDIs/drill sergeants in basic training apparently just think memorizing the first half of Full Metal Jacket is all they need to be "tough." (Well that and lots and lots of cursing at you and your other standard issue insult-your-manhood stuff).

I remember deflating both impressed-by-basic Airman and soldier friends of mine by relating that several insults they were delivered in basic were not made up by their respective TIs/drill sergeants but lifted wholesale from Full Metal Jacket.