Redefinition

As I sit here procrastinating instead of studying I'm looking through imdb.com for the next movies to look out for. Well well, it reminds me of the other night when BSA (Borneo students association - A students society that's great for social events) had organised a movie gathering to see Step up 2 the streets. Now I'm usually a fan of seeing anything with dance in it, but people that know me know that my movies have to have decent if not a good storyline and/or script. Upon seeing that the opening scene had bboying footage from "the freshest kids" (a documentary about breaking), I thought that it wouldn't be as bad as I thought it would. Important moral: NEVER, EVER judge a book from the first few pages, fuck the cover.

The acting itself wasn't that bad, but fucking shit, the script was probably the CHEESIEST thing I ever had to sit through. I was considering impaling myself after hearing the word "the streets" used like it was some holy beacon of all that is cool. I thought the dancing itself was pretty good, I saw some bboying and popping, which were all decent in terms of creativity and execution, but I didn't see much done to the music. The storyline itself I actually didn't mind too much, rather the script made me feel like covering my ears but it did have its moments such as "awwww he got da key!!!" and "I like you teeth! Thanks, I like your accent! What accent? I hevv no accent!".

Now, to those that tell me to watch these kind of movies (You got served, step up 1 + 2, stomp the yard etc.) just for its dancing, allow me to extrapolate the concept further for you. As Matt Damon once said on an interview for rove, he didn't want to be known as an "action star" but rather a star that could do action. His reasoning was because an "action star" will come on do a few takes of dialogue and proceed to do "action"... sounds very much like porn doesn't it? That's right people, he likened action to porn. As well as I can remember, this is how he worded it "you go up there, you talk for a few lines and then you do your "action" parts". So there you have it, action, dance and porn movies have a big thing in common: they're all designed to be aesthetically pleasing to their viewers, just their target viewers differ greatly.

Another thing I've noticed: 50 of the imdb bottom 100 (50%) were made in 2000 or after whereas 50 of the top 250 (20%) were made after 2000. So it's not just me, plenty of other people think that movies that have been made in the last few years are rather poor. Though, going to the cinemas isn't really just for the movie itself, but rather a social situation. Much like BSA movie night, the movie itself was average - mediocre at best and nothing extraordinary was shown but it was getting out and talking to people that was great.