Escaping the string of high-temperature days out here in western Sydney this week, some friends and I went off to see the animated film, "Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa", sequel to the popular and successful "Madagascar".
Predictably, it was a clever mix of slapstick humour for the ankle-biters in the audience, and some clever parodies and homages to famous films and TV shows for the adults. Again we follow the misadventures of a lion, zebra, hippo and giraffe (and some manic penguins and a few monkeys). Last time they escaped Central Park Zoo and ended up, not in Africa but Madagascar. This time they try again for Africa.
Certain sequences were tips of the hat to films such as "West Side Story", "Lawrence of Arabia" and "Born Free", and classic TV's "The Twilight Zone" (William Shatner's oft-parodied "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" episode).
Voice actors Chris Rock (Marty the zebra) and Ben Stiller (Alex the lion) did a very funny promotional interview for this film on "Rove", a few months ago, and they mentioned how weird it was when their voices get dubbed into foreign languages, and yet they're still the headline stars who travel the world to discuss the film. Essentially they are promoting their names on the film poster! (Mind you, the fictional characters have inherited lots of quirky traits of all the cast. Melman the Giraffe is a close cousin to Ross of "Friends", thanks to the contributions of David Schwimmer.)
Some will say it wasn't as funny or fresh as the original, but for me it certainly pushed all the right buttons. Well worth a look. Escape... 2 the cinema.
Showing posts with label Rove. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rove. Show all posts
Monday, January 05, 2009
Sunday, October 12, 2008
Journey to the centre of the blog
I've just been watching tonight's episode of "Rove". Rove McManus finished the show with his "Things I love" segment, claiming to love blogging. For two reasons: he gets to be opinionated, and he can do it while wearing no pants.
Sounds good to me.
Over on the "Star Trek" bulletin boards, the avid Trek fans are still sweating over whether they are going to like, love or detest JJ Abrams' new "Star Trek" movie. One of the more reasonable fans said today, "If I can sit down for two hours and be entertained, then that movie is a success in my book."
Sounds good to me.
In fact, I just got back from seeing the remake/rejig of "Journey to the Center of the Earth 3D", starring the prolific and versatile Brendan Fraser. Hard on the heels of "The Mummy 3", it was just as silly, it had some great SPFX, some likable characters, typically breath-taking action sequences and some funny one-liners. And it was eye-popping 3D! The movie also paid respectful homage to the Jules Verne novel and the old 1959 movie version with James Mason and Pat Boone.
I'm sure "Journey to the Center of the Earth 3D" will sell plenty of licensed tie-in books, T-shirts and stickers, theme ride tickets, and it will probably even inspire some people to track down some Verne books from their local library.
I can imagine it has also polarized fans of Verne, Henry Levin (director of the first filmed version) and James Mason. But I had fun, so who cares?
If JJ does the same for "Star Trek XI", or better, with its source material, as Eric Brevig did for "Journey...", well, it sounds good to me.
Sunday's magic number: 94.0 - Sigh...
Sounds good to me.
Over on the "Star Trek" bulletin boards, the avid Trek fans are still sweating over whether they are going to like, love or detest JJ Abrams' new "Star Trek" movie. One of the more reasonable fans said today, "If I can sit down for two hours and be entertained, then that movie is a success in my book."
Sounds good to me.
In fact, I just got back from seeing the remake/rejig of "Journey to the Center of the Earth 3D", starring the prolific and versatile Brendan Fraser. Hard on the heels of "The Mummy 3", it was just as silly, it had some great SPFX, some likable characters, typically breath-taking action sequences and some funny one-liners. And it was eye-popping 3D! The movie also paid respectful homage to the Jules Verne novel and the old 1959 movie version with James Mason and Pat Boone.
I'm sure "Journey to the Center of the Earth 3D" will sell plenty of licensed tie-in books, T-shirts and stickers, theme ride tickets, and it will probably even inspire some people to track down some Verne books from their local library.
I can imagine it has also polarized fans of Verne, Henry Levin (director of the first filmed version) and James Mason. But I had fun, so who cares?
If JJ does the same for "Star Trek XI", or better, with its source material, as Eric Brevig did for "Journey...", well, it sounds good to me.
Sunday's magic number: 94.0 - Sigh...
Sunday, July 22, 2007
Love me like the world is ending
The power of television - and Youtube!
Aussie singer Ben Lee appeared on the "Rove in New York" special a few minutes ago, mentioning an incident concerning three naked skateboarders, which ended up getting his permit to shoot a music video in the Big Apple revoked! The premise for the clip was: if the world was about to end, what risky behaviour would people try? Ben Lee announced that the clip for the new song, "Love Me Like the World is Ending", was now available on Youtube, so I figured I'd see just how many people had raced to their computers. It sounded like the kind of stunt that would appeal to the "Rove" demographic.
By the time the site had finished loading, the clip had been viewed an amazing number of times (the counter seems stuck on 222), and had 50 comments, all made within the previous minute (and most mentioning that poor ol' Ben only seems to have traveled to the USA with one set of clothes! Perhaps that's why the skateboarders were nude?) A few seconds later, there were 81 comments and, by the time I'd saved the code for the clip, there were over 250. (Update: I've just finished editing this entry and it's up to 266.)
I guess "Rove" is rating well enough...
Aussie singer Ben Lee appeared on the "Rove in New York" special a few minutes ago, mentioning an incident concerning three naked skateboarders, which ended up getting his permit to shoot a music video in the Big Apple revoked! The premise for the clip was: if the world was about to end, what risky behaviour would people try? Ben Lee announced that the clip for the new song, "Love Me Like the World is Ending", was now available on Youtube, so I figured I'd see just how many people had raced to their computers. It sounded like the kind of stunt that would appeal to the "Rove" demographic.
By the time the site had finished loading, the clip had been viewed an amazing number of times (the counter seems stuck on 222), and had 50 comments, all made within the previous minute (and most mentioning that poor ol' Ben only seems to have traveled to the USA with one set of clothes! Perhaps that's why the skateboarders were nude?) A few seconds later, there were 81 comments and, by the time I'd saved the code for the clip, there were over 250. (Update: I've just finished editing this entry and it's up to 266.)
I guess "Rove" is rating well enough...
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