Rob and I saw John Carter this afternoon. Rob’s read the books; I haven’t. I’m glad we had the chance to see it before the theaters stopped showing it. We did see it in 3D–all the early showings, at least here, are all 3D–and I thought it was similar to Phantom Menace, where the 3D enhanced and gave depth.
This doesn't even do it justice.
The movie is gorgeous. But that should be expected, since the director is the same guy who made Wall-E and Finding Nemo. And it was fun. Plenty of action, plenty of romance, and all of it evenly balanced. At least to me.
I am sad that the movie’s not doing that well, and that it seems like the theaters are doing almost everything they can to move it along and get rid of it. From one article I’ve read about John Carter’s marketing, it did poorly for several reasons. The highlights of that article–Andrew Stanton hadn’t made a live action movie before, and he was learning as he went so he didn’t have the flashy action scenes ready for trailers; the first teaser was slow and had no action, and another was all incoherent action.
It didn’t help that people saw the trailer and started saying that it was ripping off Star Wars, Avatar, and other movies. Except, ya know, the book John Carter is (mostly) based on, A Princess of Mars, was written in 1917. …Yeah. But then, I’ve also actually heard people say, about Lord of the Rings, “Look, they wrote a book based on the movie.”
The score also helped make the movie. Now, I want to own it. Plus, some of the track names amuse me–“The Blue Light Special,” “A Thern Warning.” Since the composer is Michael Giacchino, I’m not surprised. Some of the scores I’ve seen from him have track names like that.
So, if you haven’t seen the movie yet, go see it. And if you have? Go see it again. I would, but I need to write.
