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David gave Dave the original Day The Earth Stood Still on DVD for his birthday and we watched it last night. Annoyingly, I found it difficult to judge the film on its own merits, as I was constantly comparing it to the recent re-make, which I saw only a couple of weeks ago.
The most obvious difference was in scale - in the remake, the ship and the robot are much, much bigger, the military response is massively increased, the sense of worldwide effect is much greater, etc. However, in the remake, Klaatu never addresses a large number of people to deliver his message - in the original he refuses to explain himself to just one person, but in the remake Jennifer Connelly is entrusted with spreading the word to the world. The orinial Klaatu is much more human - he blends in much more, and demonstrates a much greater range of emotion and easier understanding of the people of Earth. Also, the over-riding theme is different - rather than the environmental focus of our damage to the planet, Klaatu is warning us about our violence towards other races in the original, I guess reflecting the differing issues of the time.
I think the most shocking thing about the original, though, is just how bad a mother Mrs Benson proves herself to be! Klaatu turns up at the boarding house, claiming his name is Carpenter and explaining nothing whatsoever of his origins or purpose - and the very next day, Mrs Benson entrusts her son to him so that she can go off on a jolly with her horrible boyfriend!!
Then, tonight, we watched Bobby, which I think is the best film I've seen in quite some time. I've just scanned back through my LJ and I had to go as far as April last year before I had to stop and think seriously about whether films I'd reviewed were as good. It's an ensemble piece with certainly the best (and most interesting) cast I've ever seen gathered in one place - Anthony Hopkins, Martin Sheen, Helen Hunt, William H Macy, Christian Slater, Laurence Fishburne, Elijah Wood, Shia La Beouf, Lindsay Lohan, Emilio Estevez, Sharon Stone, Demi Moore, David Krumholz, Joshua Jackson, the list goes on... It tells the story of various groups of people who were at The Ambassador Hotel the night Bobby Kennedy was assassinated, and it's amazingly well put together.
As Dave said, none of the characters have very much screen time, as there are so many of them (there are about nine separate stories), but by the end of the film, you feel as if you know every single one of them really well. This is probably because there is very little plot to speak of - it's all about characterisation, demonstrating who these people are, so that you care about them at the point of tragedy, which is what gives the climactic event its power. The hope surrounding the potential election of Kennedy is palpable right across the board of characters, from his campaign staff, to rich democractic supporters, to the busboys in the hotel kitchen. I don't think there was one weak performance in the entire film, and it all slotted together seamlessly to make up an intricate picture of one evening. Excellent film.
The most obvious difference was in scale - in the remake, the ship and the robot are much, much bigger, the military response is massively increased, the sense of worldwide effect is much greater, etc. However, in the remake, Klaatu never addresses a large number of people to deliver his message - in the original he refuses to explain himself to just one person, but in the remake Jennifer Connelly is entrusted with spreading the word to the world. The orinial Klaatu is much more human - he blends in much more, and demonstrates a much greater range of emotion and easier understanding of the people of Earth. Also, the over-riding theme is different - rather than the environmental focus of our damage to the planet, Klaatu is warning us about our violence towards other races in the original, I guess reflecting the differing issues of the time.
I think the most shocking thing about the original, though, is just how bad a mother Mrs Benson proves herself to be! Klaatu turns up at the boarding house, claiming his name is Carpenter and explaining nothing whatsoever of his origins or purpose - and the very next day, Mrs Benson entrusts her son to him so that she can go off on a jolly with her horrible boyfriend!!
Then, tonight, we watched Bobby, which I think is the best film I've seen in quite some time. I've just scanned back through my LJ and I had to go as far as April last year before I had to stop and think seriously about whether films I'd reviewed were as good. It's an ensemble piece with certainly the best (and most interesting) cast I've ever seen gathered in one place - Anthony Hopkins, Martin Sheen, Helen Hunt, William H Macy, Christian Slater, Laurence Fishburne, Elijah Wood, Shia La Beouf, Lindsay Lohan, Emilio Estevez, Sharon Stone, Demi Moore, David Krumholz, Joshua Jackson, the list goes on... It tells the story of various groups of people who were at The Ambassador Hotel the night Bobby Kennedy was assassinated, and it's amazingly well put together.
As Dave said, none of the characters have very much screen time, as there are so many of them (there are about nine separate stories), but by the end of the film, you feel as if you know every single one of them really well. This is probably because there is very little plot to speak of - it's all about characterisation, demonstrating who these people are, so that you care about them at the point of tragedy, which is what gives the climactic event its power. The hope surrounding the potential election of Kennedy is palpable right across the board of characters, from his campaign staff, to rich democractic supporters, to the busboys in the hotel kitchen. I don't think there was one weak performance in the entire film, and it all slotted together seamlessly to make up an intricate picture of one evening. Excellent film.
