The masterful comedian best known for his slew of 80s and early 90s spoof movies, back when spoof movies meant something. Everything from Airplane, the pitch perfect Naked Gun trilogy and Spy Hard, to his later work in the Scary Movies, Nielsen did comedy with class...and like no other.
He was taken to the hospital with pnemonia,
and it was said that he passed away peacefully in his sleep.
I cannot say enough about him, he was the standout definition of legendary.
Unique, brilliant, warm, charming.
He once said "doing nothing is very hard to do because you never know when your finished."
I agree with those words of wisdom.
I shall drink to you, good sir, and have a Naked Gun Marathon sometime this week!
I promise.
Now, if you please, a moment of silence, and respect...for Leslie Nielsen.
Im going to take a break from my regular format today to talk about something important.
I’ve made it official.
Laughtracks are a fundamental step in the wrong direction for comedy.
Let me be the first to say it, Quote me: LAUGH TRACKS ARE TO COMEDY WHAT AUTO TUNE IS TO MUSIC.
It is now solely used to disguise unsightly blemishes and lazy/terrible comedic writing.
It is NO LONGER necessary.
Only a FEW rare exceptions to this rule, (Fresh Prince, Seinfeld, early Friends) and it’s because the shows were a product of a time where EVERY show had a laugh track. But even Larry David was aware of this major shift in comedic writing and jumped the terribly lame Laugh Track ship.
I had read somewhere that when added together, the approximate 21minute epiode has an average of 4 mintues of laugh track.
FOUR FUCKING MINUTES are taken up by pauses in dialogue and story telling just to hear the audience laugh.
For you non screenwriters, thats FOUR PAGES of a script taken up by (Audience Laughs).
There is, however another exception to the rule: talk shows, (Daily Show, Colbert Report, Conan) Talk shows can get away with it because of the very delicate nature of the formula which uses audience participation to actually MAKE the material funnier. Colbert wouldn’t be as appealing if every joke was followed with empty silence (hence the reason a lot of amateur “comedy” podcasts seem flat on YouTube) The live studio audience on a talk show gives an air of life to the format and it works fine.
BUT NOT FOR SCRIPTED STORY BASED COMEDY...NOT ANYMORE...
By putting in a laugh track - You are TELLING the viewing audience, how they are suppose to REACT and when they are suppose to react that way. It's cheating, plain and simple. It's like when a horror movies startles you using a loud bang or thud in the MUSIC, causing you to jump...It's just not good writing. (one of the reasons I really enjoyed Paranomal Activity was its ability to scare me without cheap tricks, startling music)
Look, many of my friends have tried for years to get me into How I met your mother, because I am a HUGE fan of both Jason Segel and Neil Patrick Harris...but i Just CAN'T...Ive tried....I cannot get past the horribly distracting laugh track. (also the lead male actor, whats his face?).
Laugh tracks are archaic, plain and simple, they are a product of a time when shows were filmed infront of a live audience, to bolster popularity and a sense of media community. Single settings shows would feature all the events in just one or two rooms, (Living Room/Kitchen) and the stories would evolve in those locations (Fresh Prince, Brady Bunch, Married with Children, Seinfeld, Friends) These shows were completely successful with this format because it was a PRODUCT of their time.
Now a days, when you hear laughter on a show, it's derived from a separate soundtrack with the artificial sound of audience laughter, inserted over top of the dialog in post-production.
(For all you trivia buffs, the first show to use this artificial CANNED laughter was the sitcom The Hank McCune Show, 1950s)
Take a look at the solid trend of successful comedy shows, Emmy winners in comedy for the last 5-6 years (30 Rock, The Office, Modern Family). No Laugh Track
But then there's The Big Bang Theory...and with that...I rest my case.
Watch this video someone made of what the writing of BIG BANG THEORY actually sounds like without the CANNED LAUGHTER! (Here's a fun game, see if you can spot the joke.)
(Did you spot it? The joke was that some people are gay! Hilarity Ensues!)
And just to end off on a fun note, here's a scene from the Wire, with laugh track added, VERY FUNNY, (Just goes to show how powerfully a laugh track can alter the atmosphere).
(LET ME KNOW YOUR THOUGHTS! VIA FACEBOOK! AGREE, DISAGREE?)
Imagine you woke up...not knowing where you are...who you are...or what...
you've done...and you look just like Adrian Brody...dun dun dun!
This movie actually looks kinda cool, as of right now, I'm hooked enough to want to learn more.
And I DON'T CARE what people say, I'm a big Adrian Brody fan, I think he's a fantastic fucking actor!
Okay, So maybe this film, Wrecked, DOES just seem like another movie in the line of psychological thrillers that MIGHT fall flat towards the third act and still make profit due to a conflictingly vague trailer.
But maybe not...I mean hey, I don't see Shaymalon's name (Typo, I don't care) anywhere, which is a good start. And it sort of seems to have a cool premise, (memory loss, wrecked car, dead man in back seat, gun in hand, trapped). Nice! Check out this trailer here, promising?
It also sort of reminds me of that once forgotten movie...Unknown, (with Jim Caviezel) about a group of people trapped in a warehouse, with no memory...and one of them is...a liar! I never saw that movie though...was it good? Can anyone let me know their thoughts about it?
But the point is, these memory loss, or mind fuck movies, seem to be a pretty big hit with the general public, people like being outwitted. It challenges us, makes us see things from a different perspective. We are intrigued with the idea of being taken for a ride, and playing the fool, and are generally disappointed when we have figured out the twist, trick or gimmick too soon.
One golden rule in film making: be one step ahead of your audience. Seems simple enough.
I have compiled a list of some of the most successful MindFuck movies, (What constitutes as mindfuck here, is any psychological thriller (maybe with a twist) that not only takes you for a ride but bends you perception of reality, society and the world around you, even after the movie is done. I've made top ten lists before, but that ALMOST ALWAYS leads to people saying "no, blank shoulda been number 3, and how could you POSSIBLY but blank before blank". So here's my list, in alphabetical order.
Let me know what you think (on my facebook [since comments seem to be not working yet]).
12 Monkeys (1995)
2001 A Space Odyssey (1968)
American Psycho (2000)
Being John Malkovich (1999)
Donnie Darko (2001)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
eXistenZ (1999)
Fight Club (1999)
Frailty (2001)
Jacob's Ladder (1990)
Lost Highway (1997)
Memento (2000)
Mulholland Drive (2001)
Naked Lunch (1991)
Oldboy (2003)
One Hour Photo (2002)
Pi (1998)
Primer (2004)
Requiem For a Dream (2000)
Scanners (1981)
Session 9 (2001)
The Game (1997)
The Machinist (2004)
The Matrix (1999)
The Others (2001)
The Prestige (2006)
The Sixth Sense (1999)
Total Recall (1990)
Unbreakable (2000)
Vanilla Sky (2001)
Videodrome (1983)
Well...that's it for now, What have I forgotten? Left out? Let me know on Facebook!
As a screenwriter, I am often asked the impossible question “What’s your favorite movie?”
When asking other film buffs, I tend to revise the question to “What are SOME OF your favourite movies?”
I think there are just too many flawless gems out there to narrow down your choice to just one.
There are, however, a handful of films that I think deserve a top ten spot (in some cases a top 5 spot), that I would go as far as to say “It’s in my top ten list of favourite movies, of the last decade”. Because even top ten movies of the last decade are incomparable to say, North by Northwest or Citizen Kane.
Alas, I digress.Getting straight to the point, Edgar Wright’s Shaun of the Dead, is one of the best movies (top five) of the last ten years, if not twenty.
But I’m not here to talk about SOTD, so if you haven’t seen it, stop reading and go watch it.
The truth is, if you are in any way, shape or form, a nerd or a film buff, you will undoubtedly know of/worship the Wright/Pegg/Frost films known as either The Blood and Ice Cream Trilogy, or Cornetto Trilogy. Named after the Cornetto Ice Creams that are eaten in every movie. (A Play on Krzysztof Kieslowski's Three Colours Trilogy).
This trip from England made a huge impact initially with the TV Series Spaced, a comedy knows for a barrage of homages to other films, a geek-like affinity to classic action, adventure and comedy films loaded with references to popular culture. Seen here:
Go on Youtube and watch more clips, Channel 4 won't let me embed more clips.
From there came the aforementioned Shaun of the Dead. And the slightly less palatable, yet still wonderful Hot Fuzz.
Now, if you’re a fan of the Blood and Ice Cream trilogy, then of course you know and are patiently waiting The World’s End, the third film in the line which seems to be a homage to Sci Fi Genre, (apparently they’re favourite genre).
Yesterday when I went on IMDB, I nearly lost my shit, when I saw this.
But get it right, PAUL is NOT the next in line of the Cornetto trilogy. Although it has that subtle look and feel, it’s in fact not an Edgar Wright film, and thus, doesn’t count. The film's director is actually Greg Mottola, (Superbad, Undeclared, Arrested Development)
But the trailor actually looks pretty damn good.
The alien looks cartoon enough to seem to fit the tone of the film, without seeming overly cheesy.
There’s also a stellar cast that looks like it will be a great accompaniment to Pegg and Frost (I would watch Jason Bateman in gay porn).( Also, They just put Sigourney Weaver in EVERY movie that has to do with aliens now, I can think of about seven off the top of my head)
It is almost universally agreed upon by most of the world that Seth Rogen is past his prime in the ripened fruit world of comedy, but I’m willing to accept him as voice over work for the time being, so it’s not bad at all.
So Paul, there you have it...what are your thoughts?
Lastly, the alien looks a LOT like Roger from American Dad, no?
In my younger and more vulnerable years, I remember trying to attend a screening of Scream 2 with my cousin. Underage, we tried to sneak in, but the plan backfired, and were forced to see the all too forgettable Mr Magoo... (with Leslie Nielsen).
Anyways, times have changed, sorta, and Scream has sort of taken a back seat to horror films, recently, but not for long. Almost a decade later, Scream has released it's next film in it's sequence, choosing to adopt, the all too tiring, number embedded title, of SCRE4M. Which is a huge jump since SCR3AM, or SC2AM. (The worst being 5nal Destination)
So what does this movie have in store? Well, the "teaser" trailer was releases this week. Have a look:
This time, and I quote "the kill has got to be, like, way more extreme"....uh huh....okay.
Also we are told that "the unexpected is the new cliche", well so is the decade long revival of a dead franchise for profit...Wes.
The trailer gives me the hint, that we're beating the same horse, except the horse died over ten years ago, and we grew tired of beating it, so we left and went home and cooked dinner, banged the wife, raised a family, then almost randomly, decided to run back up to that horse and kick it one more time in the stomach, before heading home.
There is a moment where we see a woman take off her shirt to reveal a bra...suggesting that at some point a woman will take off her shirt to reveal a bra.
The guys who made this trailer want you to want to go see the movie because you like boobs, not because you like movies...and it will work.
You also see a shot of an iphone, to let you know that the makers are "hip" and "with it" and up to date on all the latest technologies these kids are fiddling around with these days.
The core three are back...Cambell, Arquette and Cox-Arquette.
With a few new, familiar faces. Hayden Panettiere is there, which is good because then we can watch teenagers acting sexual without the guilt of actually watching a teenager get sexual. Kristen Bell is there playing older Hayden Panettiere,
I think it's about time Wes Craven stops mentioning that he's the Master of Suspense in all his movies. They use this mantra now in movies that he has almost nothing to do with. I swear, the guy SNEEZES on a film, and they say "from the Master of Suspense".
Fine, he directed this movie, so he can say whatever he wants, and YES, the guy created Kruger, fine, but to say that you're the mater of suspense in 2010 is like the old man down the block that reminds you of the time the he was second string quarter back for the Chicago Bears back in 1950...it still won't stop a flaming bag of shit from appearing on a doorstep or two.
Anyways, so it's 2010, new decade, new era, new scream...great...expect a lot of Ipod and YouTube jokes.
Did I mention that you will probably see a bra...because you like boobs?
