I'll just sum it up as a noisy, soulless armpit of a movie.

Now, onto the score: I was disappointed that the K-Man dropped out, and was a little disturbed to hear that Graeme Revell's replacement score was written in ten days, but listening to it in the movie, I'd say it was okay, but nothing special. It sounds like a quickie score.

The soundtrack got incredibling annoying and distracting in many places. I don't know if that was Revell's fault or if many of the scenes I'm referring to had techno songs instead. There was one cue I thought was really good, when Lara & co. obtain the first half of the triangle. Other than that, it was not very memorable. I didn't notice any themes, either, although there were a few instruments that seemed to be associated with different characters or ideas.

quote:

---

When the hell will they learn?

---

When the majority stop paying to see trash like this, MI2 and many, many others...

I really like how Mission Impossible 2 was still called Mission Impossible even though there wasn't any spying going on.

quote:

---

Originally posted by Lancelot:
M:I-2was pretty decent as action movies go...

---

Sorry, Lance... I just can't let this one stand. I thought MI:2 was simply atrocious. Action movies need more than just ridiculous action... they, too, need characters we care about and a compelling story.

Some truly great action movies:

Raiders (of course, the greatest of them all...)
Empire Strikes Back (though not a traditional 'action' movie, it has some of the most amazingly balletic action sequences ever...)
Aliens
Terminator 2
Last of The Mohicans
The Matrix (thank God for this movie, the only truly great action movie in years...)

<shrug>

I'm not trying to be insulting, here--I mean, ok, you didn't care for it. Granted, John Woo knows how to cram-it-in for action sequences, (and it isn't my favorite John Woo--though I don't do favorites--but there was a story in there. A very old story, if you think about it....Do heroes make villains, or villains make heroes? (Does love make fools of us all...?)

Aaaah....no, I'll end here--I don't think I'll get into a debate here about the good and evils of M:I-2, because it'll turn into a "you've got bad taste" kind of arguement, when it really boils down to opinions, and at that point, it'll be majority vs. minority. And it's not that simple. <shrug>

quote:

---

Originally posted by Lancelot:
y'know...Michael Bay catches way too much flack around here...

---

How do you figure? I feel he has done more to ruin the American action movie than anyone since Sylvester Stallone.

And when I say "we", I am assuming that most everyone who goes to see a movie would want it to be as involving as possible. I do not subscribe to the "shut off your brain" philosophy of action movies. An action movie has the same chance as any movie to do what movies were meant to do in the first place... which is move people. I don't care how it does it as long as it does it. Example: Seven disturbed me. But it most definitely moved me.

I like a lot of John Woo's stuff... but Face/Off was in my opinion the only good thing he has made in the States.

I know it all comes down to a matter of taste, Lancelot. From the look of your posts, I suppose I just expect a lot more than spinning cars, unconvincing wire work, and Tom Cruise trying to look like an anime character for my eight bucks.

But of course, to each their own.

3, 1, 2, 4.... I dunno =P

I think a more accurate title for Mission: Impossible 2 would have been "SH*T"...

quote:

---

Originally posted by Lancelot:
y'know...Michael Bay catches way too much flack around here...

---

Good list of action/adventure movies you mentioned! Movies that are both intelligent and thrilling at the same time. I think the "leave your brain at home excuse" is being overused these days, and really there is no real excuse to give reason for over-violent plotless trash. It's funny, the scenes I love most in Matrix are the non action scenes, there really is a nice plot going on in that film.

I don't HATE MI2 in so many ways, just dislike it for ripping off the film Notorious in plot and simply taking advantage of the viewer by dealing out, what is common these days, style over content, and even it's style was dull and unoriginal to me, style seen and done far better in the past.

I can sit through movies like The Mummy, Armageddon and what have you. They're not high in my rankings because again I feel that they take advantage of the viewer, and also under-estimate the viewer's intelligence which I do not like.

The thing is though, a vast majority really do love these kind of movies, I'm not going to argue with those who do, I don't believe in swaying anothers opinion to meet my own, but again, it saddens me that studios can't at least make movies big budget that are both exciting and intelligent these days.

I will defend MI:2 for the same reason. Johnj Woo is a visual artist. Even in Hong Kong, it's not like the subtitles add polot to his movies. They just look good and I'll go along with it. You can't walk into a theatre these days holding every film to the same standard. I know that when I see a Scorsese film, there is definitely going to be more meat on the bone than when I see a Speilberg film. Or definitely a Lucas film. Now when I see a Woo film I don't expect to be there for convincing realistic plot. I mean come on , FACE/OFF is about as ludicrious a concept as you can come up with. But it was executed in such a way that it was very successful and likable. For me MI:2 was the same way and quite a simplisticly stylish relief from Depalma's horrible convoluted mouse maze of betrayals in the original. How do you waste Jean Reno like that?

Anyway back to the thread. By this standard and the standard of one's already produced films, I make my judgement. Simon West made CON-AIR which I will admit it, I liked. I had fun at this movie, but TOMB RAIDER was garbage. It was nothing more than a special effects and Angelina Jolie stuntwork demo. It was poorly told and insulting to the audience. Near the end, Laura's father tells her that she cannot change time which is why they cannot physically be together. She concedes. Immediately after that moment she walks out and reverses the path of an actual bullet frozen in time. Now this is like giving the audience a wet willy. Come on. How insulting. "Oh, time has a different rule for bullets."

Oh, and I have this rule about movies. When the main actor is smirking (see Richard Gere) throughout a movie and amiably laughing at what seem to be inappropriate times, I chalk that up to the fact that even your main actor is not going for this. It's almost like a joke for them. And that's what it becomes for me. It takes me right out. An action hero can't know that they're an indestructable action hero.

I actually was glad I picked up the TOMB RAIDER soundtrack when it first came out. There is some good techno work being done on it spanning from Moby to the Chemical Brothers, especially a relatively unknown group called FLUKE who's song "Absurd", featured in the first part of the movie when Jolie battles the robot, is the song used on the GET CARTER trailer, which I had been looking for. But while the songs aren't bad, they were placed horribly in this movie.Revell's music seemed non-existant for me, because of the techno clutter and possibly because of his music. Forgettable mood music. Kamen should have scored the thing. Actually, maybe not, I would hate for him to have to tarnish his resume like that.

quote:

---

Originally posted by Lightborne:
Visually, he has some of the best looking stuff out there. Period. And, the visuals are important, as evidenced by the recurring use of "bullet time" in THE MATRIX, if you'd like to use that as your poison.

---

I remind you that Michael Bay had nothing to do with THE MATRIX; that was the Wachowski Brothers.

quote:

---

I will defend MI:2 for the same reason. Johnj Woo is a visual artist. Even in Hong Kong, it's not like the subtitles add polot to his movies. They just look good and I'll go along with it.

---

I strongly suggest you see BULLET IN THE HEAD - it's not a "visual" film, by your standards, and it's rather heavy on plot. (But it does have some notable action.) So to dismiss all of Woo's films as being "plotless" is just a poor choice. And subtitles NEVER add plot - they merely translate whatever plot exists so a foreign audience can follow along. Duh.

quote:

---

Immediately after that moment she walks out and reverses the path of an actual bullet frozen in time. Now this is like giving the audience a wet willy. Come on. How insulting. "Oh, time has a different rule for bullets."

---

Well, it was a knife - but I suppose that's a minor point. And it was more like her dad was warning her not to mess with time - but changing something that happened 2 minutes before is apparently "okay". (At least, that was a judgement call she made.)

quote:

---

Kamen should have scored the thing. Actually, maybe not, I would hate for him to have to tarnish his resume like that.

---

I think his resume was already tarnished from a few "choice projects" before he even came on board TOMB RAIDER.

Sure, Michael Bay can plan a shot, and he can yell at people when they don't get the timing right, but John Schwartzman is my hero when it comes to the visual aspects of Bay's movies. Same with Con Air... Simon West doesn't look like he can direct traffic, much less a compelling movie (not all his fault... the script by Scott Rosenberg was pure garbage). Thank David "Episode One & The Green Mile" Tattersall for how good that movie looked.

2) That doesn't mean that I don't think that films such Terminator 2 and Face/Off aren't some of the best overall movies--(not merely pigeonholed as "action" movies)--out there.

3) So, ultimately, what am I guilty of? Not conforming to critics' half-wit analysis? For defying popular opinion?

You think I like self-ostracizing myself, here? I wish that I could just go along with all of you, and slap each other on the back and say "Yeah, Michael Bay's movies suck", and be "part of the gang" here, but I can't.

I don't think that way, and I don't watch movies that way, waiting to pick them apart, and then hold them up against the (possibly greater) films of the past and say "nah--not nearly as good."

I think that a lot of film fans here--the ones that take the time to write--are paranoid that then next movie that comes along is going to set some kind of precedent for the way movies should be made, and the only thing that really establishes prescedent these days is money. Horror Movie A does well one day, the next you've got Horror Movie B, C, and A2: The Sequel. Same with Standard Romantic Comedy, and High-Explosion Content Action Movie.

Not all movies can be made for a noble cause, guys.

So, do movies get made for the wrong reason? (Like Tomb Raider?) Oh, I'll guess "yes.") Someone says, "wow, look at how much money this video game is making--it's not even a movie, but it's a pop phenomenon! we've gotta do a movie!", so, in hopes of captializing on what seems to be a lucrative icon, the movie Tomb Raider gets made, with all the bells and whistles that go along with the "$$$" gleam in producers' eyes.

<shrug> Like it or hate it. Me, I've never even played Tomb Raider beyond an in-store demo...personally, I'm an Indiana Jones fan.

So, when can this fault be corrected? Like with X-Men...? With the Rise and/or Fall of Batman, the pressure's out there to get Comic Book-hero movies made....When you get a director like Singer, who's trying to take something seriously. He doesn't load it down with annoyingly out-of-place songs, he doesn't cut it all in MTV style editing....(Ok, for the collector crowd, there's the action figures and playsets, but it's wholly forgivable, for the sake of a good movie.) And, let's face it, The Shadow and The Phantom were of about the same cheesiness caliber, but they were still fun movies, and relatively well made, (except for that really odd deus-ex-machina-segue about 10 minutes into The Shadow)...considering they could have gone the way of Batman & Robin...(i.e., same plot, shinier costume.)

So, basically, yeah, I'm sure there's a lot of studio pressure on directors like Woo, and Bay, et. al., but I think they're working hard to maintain their creative vision. At least they don't end up with hack-job studio cuts. (...the "too-many-editors-spoil-the-soup" syndrome.)

quote:

---

Originally posted by Lancelot:
...I, too, am a staunch defender of Michael Bay and John Woo, and Renny Harlin (75% of the time), and John McTiernan, Robert Rodriguez, Luc Besson.... And a lot of other stuff that gets labeled too lazily as "sh*t"...

---

Whoa whoa whoa... no one set their sights against people like John Woo, Robert Rodriguez, or John McTiernan. Who is labeling them as 'sh*t' here...? (Okay, so I like some of Woo's films more than others... and so do you.) You've just spread the argument waaaaay too thin in my book. I was targeting the Michael Bay aesthetic, which is an unmistakeable style prevalent in movies like Armageddon, Con Air, and Gone In Sixty Seconds to name a few.

quote:

---

I wish that I could just go along with all of you, and slap each other on the back and say "Yeah, Michael Bay's movies suck", and be "part of the gang" here, but I can't.

---

I don't know about anyone else here, but when I post I am speaking my opinions alone. No one is ganging up on anyone. If there is an imbalance of con vs. pro opinions, well, hey... that's no one's problem. This is not a calculated attack, Lancelot. Just a whole bunch of separate opinions coming together under one Message Board.

quote:

---

I don't think that way, and I don't watch movies that way, waiting to pick them apart...

---

I give every movie I watch a chance to make an impression on me. Some of my favorite films of all are movies I never thought I would like in the first place. You are assuming quote a bit about the way I think about movies, and I don't really appreciate it.

quote:

---

Not all movies can be made for a noble cause, guys.

---

You're right. But that is no reason to not try.

quote:

---

At least they don't end up with hack-job studio cuts. (...the "too-many-editors-spoil-the-soup" syndrome.)

---

Oh they don't, do they? I'd love to see John Woo's preferred cut of MI:2, before Paramount made him cut down in the intensity to garner a PG-13 rating. I'd also love to see how he would have made the movie in the first place if he didn't have 800 lb. gorilla Tom Cruise telling him how to direct (as if he didn't know how). And these are just the stories we have all heard about, which means there are most certainly worse ones that shall remain untold by all but the closest of friends.

I don't bash Bay because it is cool, or chic, or in vogue. For God's sake, it isn't in vogue! People are eating his movies up left and right! I target Bay's style of movies because it has in my opinion negatively influenced the growth of action adventure movies in the States.

Ok...if I follow this correctly:
a) Michael Bay makes movie.
b) Michael Bay makes money.
c) Other directors copy Michael Bay.
d) Other directors make money.

You're against Michael Bay for doing that "whatever-it-is-he-does." (e.g., bad script, bad editing, bad music.) You're against other directors for imitating Bay... Which sort of compounds the anti-Bay sentiment, because Bay is batting 1000 as far as box office financial success goes. Though--and you'd think this would be the teller--he seems to be batting 0 for critical success. (But when was the last time a Bruckheimer movie got a kind word out of the majority of professional critics?)

Which sort of confuses me...because who are we really upset with? Audiences? Producers? Or are we upset with Directors that aren't doing their own thing, making the movie they want, Producers/Critics/Audiences be damned? (Maybe this all falls back to Thalberg?)

Movies....are they financial machines, or are they art? Are they both? Is playing in Hollywood like playing the stock market?

I really loved The Last Action Hero--it was a terrific concept, terrific script, it was carried out really decently. The movie bombed, in the wake of Jurassic Park. There was a great article written about it a year or two ago in Shakespeare Quarterly (of all places!)

But nowadays, can you go to a studio and say, "I'm inspired by movies like Cutthroat Island and The Last Action Hero, and I want you to make my action movie"...?

In the words of the (even-still) controversial Jar-Jar: "no, not really, no."

I love a good adventure movie and I actually had hope for this one because Angelina Jolie is a pretty good actress. Even my 14 year old daughter who likes that sort of thing thought the film was stupid. I mean at least they could have made it fun like The Mummy Returns. Made a good pocorn flick out of it.

Unlike some people who hang out here I have no problem with people who find the movie good. We all have different tastes in things and what one person finds fun and and entertaining another may find dull and disappointing. Sure I've done my share of bashing but I try to stay clear of insulting people just because they like something I don't. Plus I find as you get older you tend to out grow certain things you used to like (although I still love listening to heavy metal music much to my kids dismay ). There is probably a chance that some of the younger members on this board may not feel the same way about certain composers and movies as they get older. Thats not trying to be insulting just a fact of life. Alot of the movies that were made for teens when I was one do not appeal to me anymore.

Of course Tomb Raider scored $48.2 million at the box office this weekend so go figure.

While we are on the subject of what people find entertaining I was watching The Patriot today and having watched Gladiator last week for the first time it makes we wonder why The Patriot wasn't received as well as Gladiator was. I mean you could have easily switched both movies for Best Picture at the Oscars. I dunno maybe because Mel Gibson did the same performance in Braveheart.
I guess it just shows that people have different likes than others.

Oh well that's my rant for now.

I remind you that Michael Bay had nothing to do with THE MATRIX; that was the Wachowski Brothers.

I'm quite aware of that, Dan. But if you paid attention to my argument at hand, I was making the point that obviously visual style is important even in the precious MATRIX . I know Bay didn't do this film. I was refuting any attack that visuals are not important, which, by the way, I believe, accounted for the popularity of the movie. While it was good, it was not genius. It was basically TERMINATOR reworked with computers substituting for the machine armies. The Wachowski's BOUND is a much better movie in my opinion.

size=1></BLOCKQUOTE>
So to dismiss all of Woo's films as being "plotless" is just a poor choice. And subtitles NEVER add plot - they merely translate whatever plot exists so a foreign audience can follow along. Duh.

By no means did I imply that ALL of Woo's movies are plotless. Most of them though have a simple plot that is enhanced by his visual style. My point at this juncture is that I believe many film critics like yourself tend to hide behind foreign films believing "if I like them then I truly am a film expert." Everything with subtitles is not great. They make **** in foreign countries, too. Subtitles are not a substitute or excuse to consider a film great or more noteworthy. That was my point!!

Well, it was a knife - but I suppose that's a minor point. And it was more like her dad was warning her not to mess with time - but changing something that happened 2 minutes before is apparently "okay". (At least, that was a judgement call she made.)

Okay, you're right. It was a knife , not a bullet. I apologize. It could've been an artichoke for all I care. It does not dismiss, yet again, the point I was making, the ridiculousness of this contradiction. I guess I'm not understanding the disagreement here. I stated that Laura's father indeed says," You cannot change time" . That is why they cannot be together. Thus, since her father was dead and her boyfriend had just died at the hands of the enemy, this could not be reversed because it had already happend, let alone physically changing the direction of a travelling object that had already occurred in itself.

I think his resume was already tarnished from a few "choice projects" before he even came on board TOMB RAIDER.

Such as?

As a side note, I am well aware of how important a cinematographer is. I know who John Schwartzman is, John Toll, Bob Richardson, Darious Khondji. But if we're talking directors, I think a director is vital because they are framing the shots with the D.P.s They know how to work with them . And sometimes directors, directors who know visually what they are doing, pick up the camera like Michael Bay and get the shot they want or "help out". Robert Rodriguez does this, as well. As do a slew of other directors. It can be attributed to the director for ultimately "allowing" these images to happen. A good director collaborates with a D.P. who most of the time will physically take the shot, light it effectively and move the camera sufficiently, but a director is at the helm and realizes the images of the film, by directing the crew, as well as the talent.

If you knew half the stories I have heard (from reliable sources) about directors like Michael Bay and producers like Jerry Bruckheimer, you would not be so quick to lionize them. Believe me. They are by-and-large complete scumbags who have zero compunction about taking credit for other people's hard work.

It's okay, though. I suppose we need to create our little film gods and bow before them, even though a more collaborative craft does not exist, in my opinion.

quote:

---

Originally posted by Lightborne:
My point at this juncture is that I believe many film critics like yourself tend to hide behind foreign films believing "if I like them then I truly am a film expert."

---

?? Film critics like myself? I challenge you to find a film critique of mine where I hide behind a foreign film. Seriously. I've seen a lot of foriegn crap, so I don't know where you get that idea.

quote:

---

I think his resume was already tarnished from a few "choice projects" before he even came on board TOMB RAIDER.

Such as?

---

How about NOTHING BUT TROUBLE, HUDSON HAWK, and JACK? (As a few examples.)

Kamen's reputation/repetoire speaks for itself. (You left out The Last Action Hero....Even Jerry Goldsmith did King Solomon's Mines.)

quote:

---

Originally posted by SBD:
So, I'm guessing that none of you liked the movie? At all?

---

Well, I just got back from seeing the film. I must admit, I liked it much more than I thought I would. Though, it wasn't what I was expecting it to be, at the same time. As for Revell's music, I really liked it. It is just hard to tell what was his contribution and what is the "techno songs" that are on the soundtrack. That said, I will be getting a copy of the score, possibly even the songtrack album as well.

Hey, what can I say! Being a fan of Red Dwarf means automatically liking what ever films it's stars happen to be in. In this case, Chris Barrie (AKA Rimmer) as Lara Croft's butler!

Regards,
Sean Robert Abbey