Future releases [2]

Quite right too!

Personally, I prefer the endless possibilities of the fantasy genre, but a good sci-fi now and then certainly doesn't go amiss.
Hm.. what was the last good sci-fi movie I saw? It's been a while. Interstellar had some good things in it, but I wouldn't call it a very good movie.

I don't see that fantasy is more open than science fiction. Quite likely the opposite in fact because it's more locked into genre types such as wizards and warriors and medieval lifestyles etc. Science fiction has a few workshorse cliches like spaceships with faster than light travel, but after that it's pretty wide open.

Sci-fi is even more trapped within the confines of its genre.

Uh-uh. Try reading Poul Anderson's Polysotechnic League stories or Niven's Known Space or anything by Samual Delaney or Robert Zelazny to see just how far it can stretch.

Of course there's a large cross over genre of combined scifi and fantasy. Dune has elements of both.

Interstellar was utterly tedious until he blasted off into whereveritwas.

Good Omens the New Neil Gaiman/Terry Pratchett  tv series is due out think on Amazon Prime, its got David Tennant.  yay.

I haven't read the book, but may watch the show with my cousin. Can't go wrong with Tennant, anyway.

So long as Tennant is kept to comedic roles he's good. He's too spastic to play drama.

{{ His Hamlet was pretty good. Mind you there is an argument I think that Hamlet is a comedy, personally I have always thought it was mis-categorized as a drama and that its actually a black comedy.}}

That was really good.   I can't abide the classic tradition of proclaiming the Shakespearean soliliques with tremulous voice and trilling Rs.

I really liked that production; I watched it on DVD.

Claudius, as played by Patrick Stewart, is given a greater amount of grace than other versions that I've seen. He even has a kind of perverse redemption at the end: when handed the poisoned goblet by Hamlet, he considers it a moment before shrugging and tipping it back. It's a nice moment: the way that he accepts his fate. I prefer that he take the poison himself rather than be violently forced to drink it, as Claudius is in the Mel Gibson version, or to take it despairingly.

Oh and don't take this opportunity to start complaining about the Gibson version: that one has good parts too.

Tennant can play dramatic roles! He is great in the first series of Broadchurch.

{{{ The Gibson version has some good moments yes, but Gibson isn't one of them unfortunately, he is awful and sounds like he doesn't know what the words he is saying mean half the time. And for my liking they play up the possibly, maybe hinted at incestuous side to Hamlet and his mothers relationship to uncomfortable extremes.
Hamlet is a hard one to do on film though, not only because its wordy and not very actiony compared to say Macbeth, but like Macbeth it more than most has the main character talking directly to the audience. Something on film they (wrongly in my view) tend to ignore and act everything as if there is no audience.
For my money both Hamlet and Macbeth should be filmed like House of Cards (which ironically is itself a reworking of Macbeth).}}

Yeah I don't care for the Gibson/Close scene in the bedroom.

Speaking of Tennant, his son plays a small role in Tolkien. I saw it tonight.

You saw Tolkien and no review?  For shame.

I was surprised that for all its flaws I preferred the Gibson version to the Branaugh version.  In contrast to Henry V Branaugh is far too contemplative in Hamlet.

{{ He is also too old. But I would agree. I found his Hamlet sumptuous but empty. There are some great performances in it. Richard Briers Polonius is note perfect, as is Brian Blessed's Ghost. But it lacks energy where it should, its plodding where it should be introspective and its not funny when it should be. And the decision not to cut a line of the original text for film was also a mistake I think.

Still think the best version of Hamlet is Stoppard's Rosenstein and Guildenstern are Dead }}

I love that film, utter joy from start to finish. And no better scene than the "tennis" scene ! I never get tired of watching that film

Grr. Surrealist comedy. I don't warm easily to that sort of thing.

{{ I wouldn't call it surrealist, absurdist occasionally, philosophical definitely, funny? Absolutely. Brilliantly written and performed- a big favourite of mine anyway - like Az says 'utter joy from start to finish'. The word play is eloquent to the point of being obscene. This is one of those films I can watch over and over and it always seems fresh, even after I posted that I stuck on a few mins to check it played ok, ended up watching it again! }}

All of this is true, but I wouldn't call it "a version of Hamlet".

{{ Well it is sort of, in that if you have seen Hamlet then you know how this is going. It is, at core, the same story as Hamlet just from a completely different perspective. Or at the least it is set within the same story as Hamlet. And in fact rather presumes you are familiar enough from the start with Hamlet to know from the beginning how it ends for them, though granted the clues also in the title. }}

No, it's not any more a version of Hamlet than Inglorious Basterds can be called a version of Schindler's List. Loosely linked but entirely separate stories.

feel good movie, I think I need it.  

I like that they have an Indo-Brit lead, but don't seem to be making any big deal of it. That's PC done right.

{{ Yup that looks really good. Think I'll take the better half to see that.

And agreed Halfy- they are writing good characters, people, not races, makes all the difference. Written by Richard Curtis too- a classic middle-class, middle-aged white guy (also wrote the excellent Vincent and the Doctor I was just talking about on the Who thread! ) rather showing you dont actually need to hire a bunch of ethnic people to write a story with people from ethnic minorities in it, especially not unqualified ones who just fit the ethnic box- just get  good writers who can write people! }}

Its nice just to escape from Brexitloonery for a bit.