November 20 , 2009 is Finally Here!

The movie version of New Moon is in wide release, and I just got home from the Nordstrom screening. Chris Weitz did a great job, and I am content. Of course, I plan to see this in theater again, and I know next time I will scrutinize less. It also may help not to sit near someone who makes loud commentary throughout the movie. Mostly she said "wow" and it pretty much ruined the effect of a pack of wolves stalking a vampire.

Now, about the movie (stop reading if you want to judge the movie for yourself).

I thought Melissa Rosenberg captured the essence of the book well, and I am happy with what was and was not included. As I mentioned earlier, Chris Weitz did an excellent job, and the special effects did not disappoint. Even Seth, who does not care for CGI, thought the wolves were awesome.

Side note: Seth prefers Jacob to Edward now that he has experienced New Moon. This is something my youngest sister will be happy about, but I am not so thrilled.

The fight scenes are better than I expected, and I especially enjoyed the addition of the row between Felix and Edward. Thumbs up on making the Cullens all look more like the Cullens of my imagination. Thumbs down on the silly moment that flashes through Alice's mind when she shows Aro the vampire future of Bella and Edward. Thumbs up if it was meant to poke fun at the Robsession (something I would not put past the director given the razzing that went on at Comic-Con). Selfishly, I would love to see the post production team pay more attention to small details like making Alice's eyes black when she comes back to Forks. But then again it would only be something for the fans of the book, and would probably fail to add substance to the storyline.

Though this was the most difficult of the four books for me to get through, I thought the movie was much lighter in feeling than Twilight. It was still awful when Edward left, but the general feeling of the movie was not as angsty, and there were so many more laughs which helped to foil the depressing moments. I wonder how I will be able to wait for my trip home to see this again.

Final thoughts are reserved for the event itself: The Nordstrom event was well organized, and since all 14 screens were taken over by New Moon, we somehow ended up in a theater with an older age group. This made a huge difference in keeping the screaming down, which is a big plus.

It's November!

I think I went to sleep my one night in the beginning of October, slept a restless, stressful sleep, and awoke to find that it is now November. Everything has been busy, busy, busy.

The good thing about all the busy is that I forgot to be antsy about the release date for New Moon. This weekend, that changed. I caught bits of the trailer during the World Series and some football games, and that brought all the excitement back.

That's when I got fidgety and my mind started buzzing. I started to wonder, "How will see New Moon on November 20? Is it sold out already? Can I really stand all the screaming? Would Seth go with me? Probably not. But then maybe he would. Should I try to go to LA and see it with friends down there? Seth did mention that he would rather pay for me to fly down there than to have to see it with me..." Luckily I happened upon a promo at Nordstrom's Brass Plum.

Basically, you spend some money and you get a pass to a screening on November 19. So, I took care of some early Christmas shopping, and I got two tickets to see New Moon one night early. Somehow I even got Seth to be my plus one.

I think it will be relatively controlled since it is limited by the number of seats they have in the theater. Hopefully it's not too crazy of a night, but I will still be prepared for high-pitched screaming and loads of teenie boppers.

Comic-Con 2009

When someone asks “Where are you going on your vacation?” and you say “Oh...to Comic-Con,” be prepared for laughter and “geek,” or “dork,” in response. Really though, Comic-Con isn’t just about comic books and geeks anymore. In recent years it has morphed into a pop-culture phenomena, and this year, it was bigger than ever.

Between July 22 and 26, about 125,000 people invaded the San Diego Convention Center for the Con. Every single day, and every single pass sold out. In fact, if you tried to buy a four-day pass in April, you were out of luck.

Luckily, my sister and I bought our four-day passes in February. I should admit now that our main reason for going was Twilight; and before this year, neither of us had never been to Comic-Con. I should also be thankful now that this is an unpopular blog so I don’t have to worry about veteran attendee ire over the vampire-fan convergence. But, like I said, the Con is also about pop culture, and it truly isn’t for your average geek anymore. Now it includes the general population, and the teenie boppers.

Comic-Con is amazing and crazy. There are an unbelievable amount of people moving through the convention center: pushing their way through to pick-up swag, straining to see the latest toys, getting pictures of costumed attendees, etc. It also smells. There is a lot of body odor and not enough deodorant. You can easily forget that part though, because Comic-Con is multiple sensory overload.

The big name studios (Warner Bros., Fox, Disney to name a few) and major comic book players (DC, Marvel and more) have huge booths filled with displays, merchandise to consider and autograph opportunities. Besides the giant corporate areas for movies and comics, there are sections for gaming, manga, comic distributors, and merchandise opportunities galore. Then you spot a Stormtrooper; oh wait it’s Princess Leia; now it’s Naruto; what is this steampunk thing; look a battle-worn Stormtropper; I think I see Slave Leia; oooh Spiderman; another Stormtrooper…you see? Sensory overload.

Beyond the exhibit hall, requiring hours of patience, are panel sessions. Fans get sneak previews and question/answer sessions with the stars, directors and producers of their favorite sci-fi and/or superhero movies and TV shows. The great thing about the panel sessions? They don’t clear the rooms. The horrible thing about the panel sessions? They don’t clear the rooms.

If you want to see a panel that’s not until 1:45 p.m., plan to camp out in your seat, or hopefully move up if people vacate. But, if you are there for something Twilight related, especially something that includes Rob Pattinson et al, then don’t hold your breath and hope for people to leave.

The New Moon Panel
On day one of Comic-Con, my sister and I arrived at the convention center at 6:00 a.m. Thanks to a parking mistake, we saw the line for the New Moon panel. The sun was barely up, and there were already hundreds of people in line. It turned out that you could sleepover—something we thought you couldn’t do (or maybe we just hoped you couldn’t because we really didn’t want to sleep on concrete). Eventually it was apparent that people were holding places in line and instead of hundreds of people ahead of us, there were thousands. By the time Hall H opened, it was 10:30 a.m., and we were seated in the middle of this 6,500 seat hall. But, we were in.

Thanks to the Con’s practice of not clearing rooms, we saw the Disney 3D panel (A Christmas Carol, Alice in Wonderland and Tron Legacy), another 3D showcase panel (not that great) and a surprise appearance by Johnny Depp (Alice in Wonderland). When Chris Weitz, Rob Pattinson, Taylor Lautner, Kristen Stewart and Ashley Greene walked onstage for New Moon, it made the hours of waiting and the extremely early morning totally worth it. Interestingly, the screaming was not that bad, and even more surprisingly, everyone kept to their seats. The movie clip they debuted was awesome (Jacob teaches Bella to ride her motorcycle, and she starts having her Edward hallucinations), and at the end of the panel they treated us to another clip (Bella and Alice race to Volterra in the yellow Porsche, and Bella races through the city to stop Edward…clip ends right as Edward takes a step toward the sunlight). It was cool seeing the cast, but honestly, some of them have a hard time with interviews and questions. All in all, it was a fantastic experience. And yes, I would do it again (even if while standing in line, I said never again will I do something like this for Twilight).

The Coraline Panel
The other panel on my list was Coraline. I just wanted to see Neil Gaiman. He is one of my favorite authors, and because of my Forks trip I missed a wonderful opportunity to attend one of his events in San Francisco. This panel was a lot easier to get into, and I had prime seating. For me, the only drawback was that the director, Henry Selick (The Nightmare Before Christmas and James and the Giant Peach), has a huge following so many of the questions were directed to him. That being said, I thoroughly enjoyed learning about the making of Coraline, and that night I went out and bought the DVD.

In addition to holding a panel discussion, there was an autograph opportunity for Coraline. However, it was a lottery drawing that took place right around the same time that you had to stand in line to get into the panel. Lucky me, my sister was willing to stand in line for the lottery, and even luckier, she got the ticket. The only problem was that they then put a wristband on her (one that could not be easily removed), so only she could stand in line for the autograph. It all turned out okay in the end. Even though I didn’t get a chance to meet Neil Gaiman, he was graciously willing to sign two items. I let my sister keep the autographed Coraline print (signed by Teri Hatcher, Neil Gaiman, Henry Selick and David) and my copy of Good Omens was also signed by Neil himself.

The Experience
Comic-Con is one of those things that should be experienced by everyone at least once. You just have to get over the crowds and the smell. It really seems like the studios do their best to treat fans to something special, before the viral video hits YouTube and while movies like Alice in Wonderland or New Moon are still in production. The whole thing really is enormous, and while it gets bigger every year, I have heard that the convention center is at capacity. I hope the Con figures out how to handle the Twilight craze, because there are two more movies yet to come, and it is a bit out of control. Plus, the veteran Comic-Con people are not happy with the rabid vampire fans—everywhere we went we heard varying forms of “dumb Twilight”. Regardless of your interest in the different genres of comics, Comic-Con is something you don’t want to miss. If you are in the right place at the right time you might hear people dressed in costume, from different movies, speaking in character to one another. I missed out on this, but hopefully I hear this sort of talk next year. My sister and I already bought our four-day passes for Comic-Con 2010.

New Moon

Between moving, work and out-of-town adventures, it has been difficult to keep up with all the Twilight related news out there. Lucky for me, things have slowed down a little this week, so I have time to peruse through some spoiler photos from the New Moon set! Thank you to the Twilight Lexicon for your regular and much-loved blog posts.

For my fellow Twilight peeps, these are pictures from Italy, right when Bella has run through the fountain and has found HIM. If you don't want to look and can somehow make it through the next six months without an Edward fix, then don't visit Pop Sugar. If you are like me and can't wait for November 20, 2009, then definitely visit Pop Sugar. This is a time-suck you won't regret.

Enjoy!

How to Be

The thing is, no one ever tells you how to be in your mid-20s. The usual recipe is you go off to college, you graduate, you get a job, you get married, you have kids. The part that no one tells you about is how to be when you come to a stop at the job part; and now you're stuck because marriage is nowhere in sight, and neither are the kids. I was a little lost in my mid-20s for exactly this reason. I had a degree and a good job, but no marriage prospects, and definitely no children. Eventually, I figured it out and got a lot more comfortable with myself and my direction, but it was a frustrating time.

Tonight I saw a movie that captured all the confusion, frustration and lost feeling I had in my mid-20s. The movie is How to Be, directed by Oliver Irving and starring Robert Pattinson. Of course, now I feel the need to admit that I was never quite as lost as the main character, Art; and my parents gave me a more than satisfactory upbringing, but still, I could empathize with the poor guy.

Initially I wasn't sure if I liked the movie because I felt like Art was too awkward, but then I realized that it was supposed to be that way. It is easy to see the Art is supposed to be awkward and uncomfortable to say the least, but for a lay-person in the film world, it is not easy to see that there's more to it than just the acting. It was Oliver Irving who added to the feeling--his choices in at times in lighting or at other times with the camera lens, combined with Art (the character) made the movie work.

Next, I have to admit that I didn't get there entirely on my own. I saw this at the California Independent Film Festival in Livermore tonight, and after the screening, Joe Hastings (composer) and Oliver Irving participated in a question-answer session. Oliver graciously answered questions and shared a lot of the behind-the-scenes information you rarely get to hear. I found it pretty cool that he shared tidbits like how he used a wide angle lens to create a certain effect when Art visits his childhood room; the bed size was an accident; scenes where actors play music and/or sing are entirely real, except for one guy; homage is paid to other movies through costuming or set design; etc.

Oliver Irving did a good thing when he made this movie. Not only did he give us a movie capturing the 20-something experience, but he made a true, independent film. It's quirky and low-budget, and that is an important movie-going experience. Plus, you get to watch this only via the film festival circuit before it releases on DVD. I highly recommend film festivals. This was my first one, and I loved every moment. The question-answer session led to some interesting insight, and the people there asked intelligent questions; their obvious knowledge and love of films improved my appreciation for this movie.

So, if you love independent films, go see How to Be. If you love British-anything, go see How to Be. If you love the comedies that make you think while you laugh, go see How to Be. By the way, the soundtrack is interesting too, and that is coming out on April 28. But please, don't order your copy through the How to Be website because I want more of a chance to have get one of the 250 autographed posters.