The thread for movies that aren't going to get their own thread but are still in theaters

The Lego Movie 2 is a fun movie with jokes for older folks like myself as well as the kids. In the theater my friends and I were laughing at bits that no one else seemed to get (lots of deep cuts on comic book lore, insider baseball movie trivia, and so forth) but there were also bits that the kids just laughed their asses off at.

It doesn't pack quite the same oomph as the first movie, but a large part of that is the surprise of the first movie is impossible to recreate, and it's still got a cute message and a lot of great gags. Worth seeing if you liked the first one, definitely.

bnpederson wrote:

It doesn't pack quite the same oomph as the first movie, but a large part of that is the surprise of the first movie is impossible to recreate, and it's still got a cute message and a lot of great gags. Worth seeing if you liked the first one, definitely.

I definitely wasn’t expecting the message to be so political, but it was cool that they decided to go there in what is ostensibly a children’s movie.

My grand kids and I loved Lego Movie 2!

I watched Anime Cyborg Latina Girl tonight. I was there for the visuals and the action, and it delivered! Beautifully shot in native 3D with James Cameron's special super duper ultradimensional camera system, it looked great on a bright IMAX screen. The DP Bill Pope is a veteran of many comic book and sci-fi movies, so he was right in his element, and he made everything look good.

The plot was as silly as I expected, but Rosa Salazar did a fine job in the title role. The talents of Christoph Waltz were underutilized, and the pretty boy (Keean Johnson) was ... pretty, I guess. Jennifer Connelly and Mahershala Ali took supporting roles and made them shine. Ali was particularly fun to watch in a villainous dual role.

One thing I loved about the script was the

Spoiler:

pretty boy love interest Hugo getting fridged to develop Alita's character.

It's a fun Cameronesque romp, and above average for a Rodgriguez-helmed movie.

Um, spoilers on that one part, even if it's the same as the anime.

Oops, m'bad.

Saw Alita today. I think the eyes were a good stylistic choice. Many of the people in that world are partially or wholly cyborg. Alita is a total conversion - only her brain is still human. But despite that, she's the most humanlike of the cyborgs, so the uncanny valley face is a constant reminder that her body is completely cybernetic.

I watched Dragon Ball Super: Broly last night and it was an utter thrill ride. What a terrific movie that had me hyped throughout the entire spectacle.

I loved Gunmu! Gally is the original and still the most bad ass.
Oh, I'm sorry. I was talking about Battle Angel Alita

Seriously though it was great. I know Christoph Waltz is a great actor but I had concerns because Ido is my favorite. But he nailed it as did Alita and Hugo. (and all the stars that played the bad/neutral cyborgs)

I remember hearing a comment that Cameron didn't want to make or release it until CG could handle it and while I scoffed then, he was not wrong. There is a stark quality and quantity difference between Sonic-the-Hedghog-Yoda of the SW prequels and Gally/Alita.

It was a spectacle yet the heart was all there. It made me fall in love with Gally/Alita all over again. There were even some added/inserted touches (to the best of my recollection) that were right in line with the graphic novels.

Oh and imax 3d was definitely a perk. The depth was some of the best used I've seen in 3D. Oh and they did motorball serious justice.

Outside of the initial push of Robotech, this was the true formative manga alongside Five Star Stories. I saw bootleg videos of 2 episodes of Alita and the FSS movie in 1989. The manga I read when it was released in the US somewhere between 1993. I also have an iconic Alita t-shirt from 1998. (and a FSS tattoo on my back)

I never read or watched the original Alita, so I was going in pretty blind. That said, I thought the film was really good, despite Hugo being a limp dishrag of a character - Alita's youth made the blind crush on a cute douche with good hair make absolute sense, as did Rosa Salazar's performance. The fight scenes and action scenes were incredible, and Rodriguez and Cameron managed to pack more of them into a film than I've seen in ages.

Shoplifters was really good. The ending surprised me.

I also enjoyed Shoplitfters. Such a moving portrayal of family life. I also was surprised by the ending, and generally found myself confused about the tone of the movie at certain points. I wondered whether it was just a matter of not picking up on cultural and storytelling cues that are unique to Japanese film.

Tanglebones wrote:

I never read or watched the original Alita, so I was going in pretty blind. That said, I thought the film was really good, despite Hugo being a limp dishrag of a character - Alita's youth made the blind crush on a cute douche with good hair make absolute sense, as did Rosa Salazar's performance. The fight scenes and action scenes were incredible, and Rodriguez and Cameron managed to pack more of them into a film than I've seen in ages.

I think the character was written well, but the actor just didn't get it.

Spoiler:

For instance, the line "You're the most human person I've ever met," isn't supposed to be a blind love declaration. It was also supposed to be a ringing condemnation of every other person in Iron City. But the actor couldn't convey that double meaning into the line.

Alita and Hugo's dysfunctional relationship is why his death was ultimately predestined in a heroic story. He's a character made to be fridged.

As a work, Alita: Battle Angel is better and more true to the manga, in my opinion, than the anime OVAs. It does have limitations because it's a movie and because it's PG-13. There's less of an edge to the body horror. But it would be way more than enough for 13 year olds.

Watched Alita - I kinda oscillated between loving it and rolling my eyes. It's a total mess on a structural level, and Mr Love Interest is just blandly pretty and doesn't have what it takes to sell the character turns. But Rosa Salazar is a great lead, it has a ton of heart, and some really gnarly cyborg violence sooooo -- a wavering thumbs up.

I worried Alita wasn't coming to my local cinema pub--it's my first choice for any movie, but it's especially good for sci-fi of dubious quality featuring a female lead--but huzzah, I just checked their site and it starts Friday.

I got curious and checked Alita on Box Office Mojo. The news is not great. It did lead the weekend, but it was the worst President's Day weekend for movies in 15 years. Ouch. It also beat estimates, but it's not on a profitable track.

Fox's Alita: Battle Angel topped the weekend box office with ease, outperforming expectations and delivering an estimated $27.8 million over the three-day weekend with expectations to hit over $33 million for the four-day weekend. The result would push the film's five-day cume over $41 million, well ahead of the $30 million expectations for the film heading into the weekend. Of course, despite the film's over-performance, it still carries a lofty $170 million price tag with sources suggesting it needs to gross $500-550 million globally to break even, which, at this point, looks nearly impossible.

This is disappointing for me, because I kinda wanted to see a sequel, if they could bring the same level of glitz and action. I'll keep an eye on it next weekend. Maybe I'll go back for a second viewing. I'm a big fan of eye candy, even with a weak plot (think Jupiter Ascending :D). Alita delivers super eye candy.

Planning to see Alita tomorrow. Jupiter Ascending is great junk food, and I've seen several people now compare Alita to it, so I'm all in.

No, no, no. I didn't mind Jupiter Ascending that much but Alita is a far superior movie!
Don't forget any comparisons (really? there are similarities other than eye candy and a female lead?) between the two are involving stories 30 years apart.

fangblackbone wrote:

(really? there are similarities other than eye candy and a female lead?)

Both flopped at the box office.

IMAGE(http://yosemitesamquotes.com/wp-content/uploads/Yosemite-Sam-Bugs-Bunny.jpg)

One was a story about a young woman discovering she comes from a storied past and is destined for greater things and the other... oh.

One is a maid that realizes she is a space princess that owns the earth.
The other is a cyborg badass that realizes she is THE cyborg badass of which all cyborg badasses owe their heritage.

$41 million over the holiday weekend is pretty lousy, unfortunately.

The comparison was more to do with the general type of b-tier sci-fi that's charming to enjoy if you like that sort of thing, rather than a direct comparison between the two.

Maybe some spoiler tags would be handy there.

Alita was indeed the kind of highly glossy production paired with good cheese I was looking for. Recommended!

Those comparisons to Jupiter Ascending don't bode well to me. I thought Jupiter was truly lame.

Spider-Verse took Best Animated Film at the Oscars.... very well-deserved. That was the only award I personally cared about, and I'm glad it went to the right place.

I found Alita to be, frankly, a true delight. And then the reveal of the literal last 10 seconds of the movie happened, I turned to my friend and said "I don't think I've ever wanted a sequel more in my life."

I think that if it's only going to be three movies, and if there's going to be a sequel, the sequel would need to focus on the Terraforming Wars - who Alita used to be.

They could end it at the conclusion of the Nova plotline. In which case the second movie would mainly revolve around motorball.
I am not sure there needs to be 7 movies (one for each book) because there is a lot of "wandering in the desert" so to speak.
I guess there could be 4 with the next one being motorball/Nova and the other 2 telling the terraforming wars plot. That would probably be the best ratio of brevity without sacrificing too much depth.

We will probably get another movie but beyond that is anyone's guess based on the relatively poor performance of this first movie.

edit: scratch what I said. It appears that my memory has failed me and scrambled things I read 20 years ago. I guess there are 9 manga (in the original series) with the released movie representing the first 2 books. The motorball plot is the next 2. The next 3 is desert, Zapan and barjack.

The final 2 I am spoilering because my memory is hazy. But they definitely need to do at least 4 movies.

Spoiler:

I thought that the reveal that the citizens of Zalem had chips for brains was much earlier. And the conclusion is that Gally gets regenerated to a human in a flower at the top of the space station right? It looks like I haven't read Lost Order or the other manga.