my profile | my password | search | faq & rules | forum home

» Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE   » Community   » Film Handlers' Movie Reviews   » Man On Fire (Page 1)

This topic comprises 2 pages: 1  2

Author Topic: Man On Fire Mark J. Marshall Film God Posts: 3188 From: New Castle, DE, USA Registered: Aug 2002 posted 04-23-2004 12:22 AM                    Dakota Fanning is IMHO one of the best child actors/actresses to come out of Hollywood in a long time. I predict she'll be up for an award soon. If not for this movie, soon. The story was good, and well told. Denzel Washington, whom I rarely like (although not because I think he's a bad actor - he's just never in a movie I care for it seems) was good too. But I do have one complaint. Enough with the goddamn shoddy camera work already! Jesus! Whip pan left - oops too far, back right, zoom in, focus, split image, flash... AH! Enough!! I'd give this movie four and half stars out of five, but I'm docking THREE AND A HALF for the freakin headache I have courtesy of the dumb ass director. 1 star out of 5. We actually have a reel with an unsteady picture but since so much of the movie is shot using a seizure cam, the folks who screened it before me failed to notice the bad reel.  |  IP: Logged Dennis Benjamin Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1445 From: Denton, MD Registered: Feb 2002 posted 04-23-2004 02:26 AM                        Hey - I liked this film. It had a "Seven" feel to it (concerning the camera work). 4 out of 5 stars Denzel does a great acting job. Christopher Walken's part could have been better.  |  IP: Logged Wolff King Morrow Master Film Handler Posts: 490 From: Denton, TX, USA Registered: Feb 2004 posted 04-23-2004 06:18 AM                        I was also slightly annoyed by the camera "effects" and found it actually took away from some scenes that the viewer would be focused and concentrated on. Other than that, this was an excellent movie!  |  IP: Logged Lance C. McFetridge Expert Film Handler Posts: 135 From: Penn Yan, New York Registered: Jul 99 posted 04-23-2004 12:45 PM                     I liked it and thought the camera effects added to the story.  |  IP: Logged Bobby Henderson "Ask me about Trajan." Posts: 10973 From: Lawton, OK, USA Registered: Apr 2001 posted 04-23-2004 09:08 PM                     I haven't seen the movie yet, but I did see an HBO "First Look" feature on it. The director and cinematographer used a really old, hand-crank film camera for a lot of the weird shots to speed up and slow down the action. Unfortunately, it also appears they did lots and lots and lots of that clichéd aperture jerking (y'know, where the image flashes way bright and then down dim, etc.). That's music video bullshit, and a very dated late 80's early 90's look to be quite frank about it. The story premise looks very interesting, so I may check out the show. I just hope I don't wind up hating it like I hated Tony Scott's way overly stylized "Spy Game." That movie went overboard with the herky-jerky camera shots, along with really stupid helicopter camera shot pans (closeup of Redford, closeup of Pitt, cut to circling shot from helicopter, repeat this sequence 8 times in 15 seconds, vomit).  |  IP: Logged Richard Greco Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1180 From: Plant City, FL Registered: Nov 2003 posted 04-23-2004 10:04 PM                     Definate 4 stars Dakota Fanning is superb in this. Denzel is good in anything he does. Christopher is amazing too. I liked it!!!  |  IP: Logged Mark J. Marshall Film God Posts: 3188 From: New Castle, DE, USA Registered: Aug 2002 posted 04-24-2004 12:58 AM                    quote: Dennis Benjamin It had a "Seven" feel to it Well over half of the shots had an "Opening Credits of Se7en" feel to them... which I thought was way too much. quote: I ... thought the camera effects added to the story I thought they added about as much as a severely flickering xenon bulb and a bad intermittent sprocket would add to the story.  |  IP: Logged Wolff King Morrow Master Film Handler Posts: 490 From: Denton, TX, USA Registered: Feb 2004 posted 04-24-2004 04:22 AM                        quote: Mark J. Marshall Well over half of the shots had an "Opening Credits of Se7en" feel to them... which I thought was way too much. Haha! Someone else using the "wordplay" my brother and I always laugh about! We've been referring to Seven as "Se7en" ever since we saw that title (because we though it was corny to use such wordplay). Another scab-picker is "5-ive". Lame...  |  IP: Logged Jeremy Fuentes Mmmm, Dr. Pepper! Posts: 1168 From: Corpus Christi, TX United States Registered: Jan 2004 posted 04-24-2004 10:43 PM                     Yeah,why do people do that 4our?  |  IP: Logged Lance C. McFetridge Expert Film Handler Posts: 135 From: Penn Yan, New York Registered: Jul 99 posted 04-25-2004 09:23 AM                     quote: Mark J. Marshall I thought they added about as much as a severely flickering xenon bulb and a bad intermittent sprocket would add to the story. Since I have never had either at my theatre, I can't compare it to that.  |  IP: Logged Peter Kerchinsky Master Film Handler Posts: 326 From: Seattle, WA, USA Registered: Jan 2002 posted 04-26-2004 04:57 AM                     Too damn long!  |  IP: Logged Pravin Ratnam Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 844 From: Atlanta, GA,USA Registered: Sep 2002 posted 04-30-2004 01:33 AM                     aaah, April has been my summer moviegoing season with all the action movies out in the last 5 weeks. Dawn of The Dead was a fine start to my spring and Man on Fire ends it. I found the movie watchable, but i left pretty pissed off at Tony Scott. He did an awful job directing this movie. Not only did he probably hire a trained chimp to use the camera, he also hired some trained monkey to include a jittery effect in the post production process in scenes where the camera wasn't shaky enough. And the use of those lightning like visual FX to denote some kind of mood was annoying. He overdid it. The pathetic thing is Tony Scott had a decent enough script to make an entertaining movie. He obviously is an insecure old man trying to be hip. Someone should tell him that the methods he overuses were trendy ... way back in 1995. I also hated the use of that Gladiator like song during the sad scenes. All I could visualize was Russel Crowe laying on the ground whenever that tune would come up with some lady singing in some foreign language. Other than that, I am a sucker for vigilante movies, so I kind of liked it.  |  IP: Logged Ken Lackner Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1907 From: Atlanta, GA, USA Registered: Sep 2001 posted 05-12-2004 11:38 PM                     Finally saw this one tonight and ended up walking out. But what I did see I did not like (which is why, obviously, I walked out). Comepletely agree about the horrible camera effects. The opening titles gave me a whopper of a headache. But I thought to myself, this is just the titles, I'm sure the whole movie won't be like this. I wish I could say I was wrong. Also thougth the movie was way too long. We know the girl is going to get kidnapped. Why did it take an hour just to get to that part? Agreed that Christopher Walken and Dakota Fanning did excellent jobs. They were the film's redeeming qualities.  |  IP: Logged Michael Schaffer "Where is the Boardwalk Hotel?" Posts: 4143 From: Boston, MA Registered: Apr 2002 posted 05-13-2004 12:43 AM                        SPOILER I didn`t understand why Denzel had to die in the end (except to make it more dramatic). He had The Voice`s brother and his (or his brothers?) pregnant girl, shouldn`t that be enough to make him give up the girl? How can parents name a child "Dakota"? That sounds like a cowboy name, like "Texas Johnson" or "Oklahoma Willie". Why do you give a child a place name? OK, "Dakota" is still better than, say, "Albuquerque" - the poor child with that name would have to spell it every single time the name is asked... [ 05-15-2004, 02:52 AM: Message edited by: Michael Schaffer ]  |  IP: Logged Bobby Henderson "Ask me about Trajan." Posts: 10973 From: Lawton, OK, USA Registered: Apr 2001 posted 05-13-2004 05:48 PM                     quote: Pravin Ratnam Someone should tell him that the methods he overuses were trendy ... way back in 1995. Actually, you would need to go back nearly another decade for the shots to be trendy. That aperture flash-edit thing is pure, tired schtick now. The effect was seen in music videos for REM and others back in the late 1980's. Same thing goes for a lot of the other grungy, stressed camera effects too. The thing which really annoys the hell out of me about Tony Scott's recent directorial efforts (and the same thing can be said about Michael Bay and a number of other all-style/no-substance "I-wanna-be-John-Woo" guys) is he tries to make a movie survive by all the over-stylization and little else. All the jittery, gimmicky camera shots take you right out of the movie. "Man On Fire" had a lot more potential going for it than what delivered. Sort of the same result as Scott's "Spy Game". IMHO, David Fincher is one guy who can do the flash and style thing correctly. He only seems to use it were it works "musically" with the feeling and rhythm of the shot and story point. Like Tony Scott, Fincher has directed TV commercials (as well as filmed lots of music videos), but I think David Fincher does more to pay attention to the movie as a whole rather than trying to make it feel like a 2 hour long movie trailer.  |  IP: Logged

All times are Central (GMT -6:00)

This topic comprises 2 pages: 1  2

Printer-friendly view of this topic

Hop To: Select a Forum: Category: Operations -------------------- Digital Cinema Forum Film Handlers' Forum Large Format Forum Ground Level Feature Info, Trailer Attachments & REAL Credit Offsets Category: Community -------------------- Film-Yak Film Handlers' Movie Reviews The Afterlife Bob Maar's Joke-A-Thon Category: Classified -------------------- Equipment and Supplies Wanted/For Sale Help Wanted/Seeking Employment Category: System -------------------- Software Beta Testing Forum

The Film-Tech Forums are designed for various members related to the cinema industry to express their opinions, viewpoints and testimonials on various products, services and events based upon speculation, personal knowledge and factual information through use, therefore all views represented here allow no liability upon the publishers of this web site and the owners of said views assume no liability for any ill will resulting from these postings. The posts made here are for educational as well as entertainment purposes and as such anyone viewing this portion of the website must accept these views as statements of the author of that opinion and agrees to release the authors from any and all liability.