Live Blog: National Treasure (2004) featuring Matt Robinson

What's a Live Blog? Well, I decided to try something different and do a "live blog" entry. Basically, the idea is that I watch a movie and make comments during it and post them up here. (Think Live Tweeting)

This live blog entry was done with my good friend Matt Robinson who runs the blog: Red Flag Movie Productions. As he describes himself on his page "Writer, Filmmaker, Stand- Up Comedian. Lover of: films, comics, the 90's, women, travel, books and good food." He's one of my best friends and we have some of the best conversations not to mention he's hilarious. Here is a link to Matt's Blog: Red Flag Movie Productions make sure you check out his page, it's wonderful, nerdy and awesome.

So basically Matt and I recorded our complete audio commentary for the film and I was hoping to post it on here for your additional listening pleasure but was having trouble putting the file on my computer. :( Next time though, there will be a complete audio file for those willing to listen to our comments while you watch the movie yourself. Or... if you want to pay Matt and I a decent sum of money we will talk through a movie for you in person.... as long as you aren't creepy about it.

Ah the best line in movie history

Matt and I live blogged "National Treasure" because it truly is a national treasure of a movie. We carefully chose this film by constantly flipping a coin until we dwindled it down to a reasonable amount of movies to choose from. (Runners up included Frozen, Fantastic Four and Tomb Raider).

*J is me, Jenn and M stands for Matt

National Treasure

J: National Treasure

M: I actually haven’t seen this in a good amount of years

J: What year is this movie?

M: I remember watching this on VHS in high school… or maybe it was on DVD at this point. We didn’t have a dvd player at my house for a long time. We didn’t have cable until I was 17, my parents really wanted to remind us that we were working class.

J: Do you still have your VHS movies?

M: Of course, do you?

J: No, I’ve moved too many times…

M: 2004!

J: Wow 10 years, happy 10-year anniversary

M: This came out Nov. 19 2004. Almost 10 years to the day

Stable Boy: It's Jason Earles from Hannah Montana!

J: What if you were that stable boy who had to wake up in the middle of the night and drive someone in the rain to the white house?

M: You could’ve died of pneumonia

J: Right, there was not advanced medicine

In a deserted ice plain

J: Maybe they’re standing over Captain America

M: What a twist! I think we found something!

J: Still Disney

M: They could George Lucas all their old movies

"I've found something!"

M: It might be a treasure or a frozen hand… or The Mummy

M: Way to go Justin Bartha the henchman is smarter than you, why are you even on this team?

J: Most of this movie consists of them trying to escape from Sean Bean’s traps

M: Stock Footage!

National Archives Building, Also stock footage

J: Why don’t they just do a close up of the title of the building instead of having a title card?

M: I guess in movies they want to have a consistency. The pamphlet in the next scene actually says “National Archives Anniversary Gala”

J: Oh I wonder where they are!

Diane Kruger in her office, notice birth control diaphragm

J: Wow that one girl has really high eyebrows!

M: That’s what the cast department said they needed… look there’s Diane Kruger!

J: She’s talking on the phone she must be important

M: She’s wearing a suit

J: She gave him the finger too… not the middle finger, the one-minute finger

M: She’s WEARING that suit

J: He’s still creepy

M: I just don’t feel like what universe Diane is in she’s like yeah, Nic Cage

J: Look at all the images of woman power in her office

M: Yeah, Rosie the Riveter.

J: She’s a strong independent woman who don’t need no man!

M: Especially no treasure hunting man

M: Behind her it looks like her birth control diaphragm

J: She’s organized, you men can’t control me

Suits

M: His suit looks like the pattern they put on public buses

J: Is Justin Bartha wearing velvet?

M: He’s wearing a tie that’s the same color as his suit! That’s a fashion faux pas… dammit Riley.

J: Nic Cage looks sloppy

M: Why don’t you learn to wear a suit like Diane Kruger?

Outfit Number ??

M: How many outfit changes did she just go through?

J: 3 at least

M: BTW I just remember this scene of some guy checking out Diane Kruger’s backside and I just remember my mom saying don’t do that to women

J: More stock footage

M: I like how they have Sean Bean after the Watergate footage because you know… Watergate

M: Wow Diane Kruger’s in another outfit already

J: She’s the only woman in this movie

Party people

M: Someone needs to make a gif of Nic Cage trying to avoid Diane Kruger as someone trying to avoid an ex

J: I feel like you could just print out a copy of the declaration on the internet, why would you spend $35 on a replica?

Legit food truck

J: Don’t stop and talk to her at the van? Just hop in the back and drive off. He was chillin in the van… she’s in high heels, it takes her a while to get him

M: To be fair it is Diane Kruger

J: There is something on the side of Sean Bean’s van!

M: This was before food trucks were even in vogue; they are so ahead of the curve

M: It’s even topically themed for the mall, they’re geniuses

M: Olympus!

J: Greek food maybe?

M: That sounds good

J: I wonder if they stole it, that’s a legit food truck

M: Yeah, there’s a pot and everything

Ben's dad assumes she's pregnant. Check out this sexual chemistry

M: Why was that his first thought? Is she pregnant?

J: Why would that get him in trouble?

M: Right, aw man I knocked this girl up.

J: You’re a grown adult; you’re not a teenager

M: If I went to my parents and said I knocked up Diane Kruger they would say, who? Then, nice but wrong

M: Jon Voight had a whole pizza for himself

J: He hadn’t touched it while he was watching Jeopardy

M: He was having a “treat yo self" day

Dat Robe

M: I need to invest in a robe

J: Jon Voight rocks it

M: I feel like you have to make at least 40,000 a year to get a robe

Clues!

M: Their sexual tension created a clue

J: That should be their tagline, they did it for America

M: Aren’t you proud of me?!

PS Harvey Keitel is in this movie

M: Disney threw in a PG thing about Gates sleeping with a lot of women, it doesn’t even make sense for his character. Diane Kruger is like, yeah I’ve banged people in my office before. I mean she does keep her birth control on the wall

J: Gotta keep it safe

M: I can’t miss a day, it’s happening so much now

New Clothes are a must when out on the run

J: Is this her 5^th outfit now?

M: No, 7^th?

J: Are we only half way through the movie?

M: I feel like Quentin Tarantino saw this film and saw her feet and said I’m hiring her for Inglorious Bastards

J: These people look like they’re dressed in the 90s

Being a detective

M: Gates using a gate! I thought the other guy would’ve used the gun to blow up the door but no…

M: Ooo! Now Gates' trapped by a gate!

Mid Chase scene

J: Climbing opened staircases never makes sense to me when escaping from people with guns

M: They always miss, they always hit the rails

M: History teachers and archeologists are always badasses

Once Diane Kruger is safe she tells Nic to "hang on"

J: Why does the person who’s safe always say, “hang on” to the person falling? They aren’t doing anything to help so like shut up!

M: This is a great hideout for an all guys club

Entering the treasure room

M: Wouldn’t it be funny if they went in there and it was just a McDonalds? They were looking for treasure but what they found was something greater, it was a different kind of gold. Look at these golden fresh cut fries! On a sesame seed bun!

J: $1 for any size soft drink

M: National Treasure 3: The search for the last Roy Rogers in America

“The Declaration of Independence is not a bargaining chip”

M: Diane Kruger just got so turned on by that line

Sean Bean and his crew

J:  I don’t think that’s how that works, that someone else can just go to prison in his place?

M: Well I think that when the feds ask who’s the criminal? It’s Sean Bean and his crew. I mean Nic found the treasure so he’s fine.

M: Of course when Sean Bean doesn’t die it’s actually a win

Final Outfits.... "I drew you a map"

J: ...to my vagina

M: It’s totally a map to her vagina

M: All that money and they still can’t dress well

J: All of them!

M: All of them

J: She looks like a librarian

M: I have money now I don’t need to show my cleavage

Well, there you have it, some of our commentary while watching National Treasure. Hope you enjoyed it!

The Maze Runner (2014)

I've been slacking lately with blog posts but here's a quick one about the most recent movie I saw in theaters, The Maze Runner directed by Wes Ball.

The Maze Runner Poster. That's a big uphill trek right there

I really wanted to read The Maze Runner before the movie came out but alas didn't have the time to get past the first two chapters. So at least I was somewhat familiar with the first 10 minutes of the movie but it was nice to have everything else be a surprise. The story follows Thomas as he is deposited into a miniature community of teenage boys ranging from about 14 to maybe 18. Thomas wakes up in an elevator with no memories of who he is or where he came from. When the elevator stops, Thomas finds a bunch of boys and their make-do living situation (think abandoned Boys Scouts stuck in the woods for three years and having to adapt without any adults). I bet it smells awesome there.

The Lost Boys...

It actually doesn't seem all that bad of a place until Thomas notices they are surrounded on all sides by huge iron walls and one of them has an opening. Naturally Thomas is curious and learns that they are in the center of a maze. The basic idea is that there are a few boys in their camp who run the maze every day while it's daytime to map it and find a way out. At night, however, there are beasts who kill anyone in their path. Luckily at night the iron gates shut and the boys are safe in their camp. Of course when Thomas comes he stirs things up, wants to be a maze runner, tries to help find a way out yada yada yada I won't spoil the ending.

The Maze

Forest Temple from Zelda

When Thomas is in the maze it felt very much like the Forest Temple from Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. I was having major flashbacks. However, after stewing with this film for a few days I actually liked it. It was a fun plot and the characters were interesting, albeit somewhat dumb with some of their rash under pressure decision making skills. I really like the character of Minho and Alby although some of the characters in the background felt very much like extras from "Lost" in the sense of being there but not being active then killed and disappear and you don't really notice. But, it was entertaining and a good "escapist" film, literally and figuratively. It made me want to go and read the books so I can continue the series as this film didn't really feel like a satisfying conclusion since it really wasn't an ending.

Wait this isn't a promo from Lost?!

Yeah, that was a down side when it didn't really "end" but was clearly the end of a part 1 in a series. Hopefully they continue it, I thought it was pretty well done. I didn't think it was expanded upon for this world enough as a solo movie and that bothered me. I suppose they wanted to save some of those details for the next installment but a 5 minute wrap up at the end about why they are doing those things by someone who recorded a video on a screen felt like lazy filmmaking to me. Isn't the saying show don't tell?

Book Cover

If you read the book before seeing the movie, what did you think of it? I'm curious to see how it compared. I recommend seeing this movie if you like this type of genre.

The Giver... Book vs. Movie

I wanted to re-read "The Giver" before the film came out in order to compare the most recent book to film adaptation appropriately.

Didn't we all read "The Giver" in grade school? I'm pretty sure that I glossed over it and pretended that I actually read this because while going through it again recently it was like reading an entirely new book. I figure, I'll start with my thoughts on the book. PS did you know that this was a series?

THERE WILL BE SPOILERS FOR THE BOOK AND MOVIE SO BE WARNED!

"The Giver" BOOK

Jonas is a sweet, innocent twelve year old who takes the rules completely literal in everything he does. Actually, that is what all of the citizens in this town do. It's a perfected, stress-free, worry-free, pain-free, color-free, depth-free closed off environment without weather or hills that Jonas lives in. The book is told from third person but still describes Jonas' thoughts, I.E. "Jonas thought it was strange that The Giver was separated from the community". Annoying. Just write it in first person, Lois. Sheesh.

The Giver book cover. I don't get the trees?

Anyway, everyone in this community is assigned a "position" to be trained in when they reach Year Twelve. Some are teachers, some are doctors, some take care of the old, etc. Also, if any of the new babies that are born are "imperfect" as in too small or are a twin they are "released"... yeah like released from existing. (PS if it's a twin, the smaller twin gets the boot. Cruel.) This community feels like the best way for them to keep this perfect society is to have harsh rules that are heavily enforced with people who have no memories of the "real world" (our world, with pain and love and suffering) because the simple life creates a worry free balance. Everyone knows exactly what to expect from their lives and because they don't know any better they are satisfied with being part of the community and doing their jobs and never having to worry about anything.

Additional book cover. TAYLOR SWIFT Q&A! OMG!

So we follow Jonas, his family life is very normal. Then during this super important ceremony, Jonas is chosen as the new Receiver of Memories. He will be trained by The Giver to be his replacement. Jonas' job is a very important one where he alone holds all the memories from the past of the "real world" and when the community elders need advice on something they come to him for guidance. So basically he alone has to hold all of the suffering and pain and joy and color in the world because this community doesn't want any of that nonsense. Poor Jonas feels this burden and learns the truth about what the community does to "imperfect" new children as well as the old (Yeah, they kill them too). So Jonas makes a plan to run away with all these memories in his head because once he leaves, the memories will be released to everyone in the community. He and The Giver believe that this is the best way to bring about change and help the community to become a more normalized society that doesn't just want perfection but a place that will have real truth with it.

Jonas has to tell his sex dream to his family at breakfast. No I'm not kidding.

In the end Jonas runs away, they search for him, don't catch him and the ending is vague about what actually happens. Jonas kidnaps a small baby named Gabriel because Gabriel was to be released and Jonas didn't want to let him die because Gabriel was special. So they run away together. Jonas carries the 1 year old child with him. They almost died in the snow at the end, some say that they DID die and thats how the story ends. If you take it literally then Jonas and Gabriel make it to "Elsewhere" (Heaven?) and see warmth and music and love ahead. That's the end of the book.

The most frustrating part about reading this for me was that I cared more about what happened in the community after he left. Once all those memories returned what happened? Maybe it talks about it in the other books of this series or perhaps in the movie.

These kids are supposed to be 12 in the book...

"The Giver" MOVIE

I am not going to get into explaining the story again because it's the same as the book. My immediate thought when leaving this film was that I felt that it was lacking. The book works because it has an underlying depth to it but the movie is filled with very little below the surface. The stakes weren't high enough, I didn't really care that much if the communities got all their memories back. It would change their sameness and then everything would go back to how it was, which is what we know as present day. So why should I care whether Jonas passes the "Boundary of Memories" or whatever they call it?

The Giver Movie Poster. Bodiless floating heads.
Also, these kids are about 18 years old in the movie.

Why it works: Well it's more visually interesting than the book has the ability to be. We get to see the memories that Jonas receives and follow on his journey as he learns about war, love and being different. But therein lies the problem, WE already know about war, love and being different. None of this is news to us and there's not really much more to this movie than the memories. Jeff Bridges is great to watch and is the only character who isn't as bland as the community these people are forced to live in. Meryl Streep added some much needed conflict to the story but she could've been more aggressive about her actions. When they are hunting for Jonas in one scene she sees him on a screen but doesn't say anything to anyone. I couldn't understand. Was she just curious to see what he would do next or does she not have as much power as she claims to?

The way this film is shot gives a lot to the movie, actually. As Jonas learns about color the color slowly comes back to the movie and when Jonas leaves, the color disappears again. It was definitely one of the better aspects of this movie. As I mentioned, most of these characters are BOOOORING, it's such a big cast that I was expecting scenes with more tension and emotional depth, even in the lack of emotion that most of these people were feeling. It felt like the movie Lucy when she no longer felt emotions and her performance fell flat (to me) so it goes with this ENTIRE movie. Another good part was Fiona's character standing up for herself at the end saying that she did feel warmth and emotions that Jonas tried to share with her. Good for you, girlfriend.

Jeff Bridges gives this movie more emotion than anyone else does.

Since I've already segued into it anyway.... Why it doesn't work: Well the emotionless characters for one thing, it works in the book as it's written in third person and we feel like observers learning about this town. In the movie we are in Jonas' head (but not consistently) when it's necessary for a voiceover. This brings us directly into Jonas' world, which is great for a movie, but everything here is the same so it's pretty dull and uninteresting. Taylor Swift's character of Rosemary is in the movie for one scene that's about 2 minutes long. Whether you take that as a good thing or a bad thing is a personal choice. I felt that she was hyped way too much to be such a small part of this movie.

Also she has brown hair and isn't very recognizable but she does play piano...

Jeff Bridges is the only one with a few humorous lines thrown in for good measure but in the theater I saw this movie in, no one even laughed at all except for me giving a few sympathy snorts. A for effort. I just wanted more in the movie, it wasn't extreme enough to come close to The Hunger Games or Divergent, which it tried too hard to copy in many ways. Literally, there's a title card in the beginning of The Giver that say something like, "After the devastating and destructing Raid, the Communities were formed with sameness to bring peace and order to society." First of all, what the hell is "The Raid" because that sounds much more interesting than this entire movie's premise. Two how did you build a livable, sustainable, climate controlled environment above the clouds. Three, The Hunger Games called, they want their opening title card back. And Four, what am I supposed to take away from this movie? That the past is important and memories define us? Okay, well I already knew that and didn't need this movie to tell me.

Jonas tries to "force" memories into Fiona. It doesn't work literally or figuratively.

They attempted to boost the romance between Jonas and Fiona. It was awkward because she doesn't feel emotions but when he convinces her to stop taking her injections she is a better character and feels "love" for Jonas too. Jonas' friend Asher seems to come off as jealous but never does or says anything about it, maybe he's just a wuss. Or again, he's too bland to feel emotions. At least he has a redeemable quality at the end by letting Jonas and Gabriel escape and he lies to the Chief Elder. Wait, I thought he was bred not to lie, did he stop taking his injections too? This is never discussed. Maybe it's just that Jonas is impactful and changes people. This would a much more interesting story if it was more about these people's emotions trying to break out from being controlled. I'd rather watch that movie than this one about memories.

They end the movie somewhat vaguely like the book. It does show the community getting the memories and that's cool to see but Jonas' ending is even more strange in the film. In the end of the book it's likely that Jonas has died and thus releasing the memories back to the community. Then he sees the sled and the house and the music and he's dead, blah blah. In the movie, it shows the physical action of him passing the boundary shield (similar to the Other's fence against the smoke monster in Lost) and this shield is what holds in the memories, once Jonas passes it (as the Receiver of Memories) all the memories are released back to everyone in the communities (yes plural, there's a map that shows three separate communities). Then he sees the sled and the house and music. Maybe he still dies? I don't care enough to dwell on it.

Brenton Twaites was nice to look at though, so points there.

So overall, this book to movie adaptation is not bad. It is about 80% true to the book (no idea what scale that percentage comes from, I just picked a number) but adds more "sci-fi" elements likes drones and injections and hologram technologies that try to tell us that this is taking place in the future. The holograms were pretty lame for futuristic technology. They were more like Star Wars technology than Iron Man. Did I like the book? Sure, it wasn't bad. Did I like the movie? Not really, it wasn't that captivating for me. I couldn't relate to emotionless characters and therefore it didn't entice me to want to stick with this world. Luckily the movie is only about 90 minutes.

Did I like the book more or less after seeing the movie? Less. The book is better but not something that I want to go back and read again any time soon. There's not much that was left out and not much more depth to the story, which is something they should've added for a movie adaptation. I love me some Jeff Bridges and I really like all the actors in this movie but if the story had more to it, especially originality, than it probably would've gotten some better reviews.

See it at your own risk, might be more of a "wait for DVD" film though.