crashfrog responds to me:
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Remember, he was being besieged by the town because he was a graverobber, not because he was doing "unnatural experiments."
Irrelevant. I'm not saying F didn't stich him together from dead bodies. I'm saying he stiched him together, and added a secret ingredient.
Why? Where does that come from? Nobody in the entire movie ever behaves as if there were.
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you seem to think you know the exact process that F used to prepare the monster, in it's entirety.
Incorrect. Instead, I am only going along with what is presented.
Frank is never shown adding a "secret ingredient." But even if we assume that he did, nobody behaves as if he did. Therefore, what support is there for the claim that there is some "secret ingredient"?
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How else could you know that the monster's body doesn't contain a secret ingredient?
Because Frank is not shown adding any and nobody behaves as if there were.
[avoidance of the question deleted for space]
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You can assume anything that the audience can reasonably be expected to bring to the table due to their cultural heritage.
Sure. The minds behind this movie rightfully assumed that the audience would bring to the table their knowledge that the hero of an action movie can do impossible things, when the time is right.
That has nothing to do with the horses, which are mere mortals as Anna explicitly points out. They are dragging a perfectly ordinary carriage as shown by its falling apart.
And yet somehow a set of normal, though very fast, horses manage to leap a gorge, having the carriage they're dragging land on the edge and not shatter.
If these horses are so dag-gummed special, why the hell don't the townsfolk use them to their advantage?
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But for some reason, you and the reviewer didn't think you were expected to bring the same cultural heritage to the table.
Incorrect. We just think it is not "cultural heritage" to abandon logic for CGI.
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What I said was that nothing in the movie reflected the need of the monster other than people saying that the monster was needed.
That, and the fact that they were proven right
Merely saying it is not sufficient. They have to act like it matters, too. None of them did. If the monster was so important, why didn't Drac create his own? Why wasn't there a more concerted effort to find the one that existed?
You can say the gun is loaded all you want, but if you keep pulling the trigger and no bullets ever come out, then it is illogical to have it suddenly spit out a hail of bullets at a dramatic point.
The mere fact that they were proven right only compounds the problem. Nobody behaves as if there is a "special ingredient" until they have painted themselves into a corner and cannot escape without it.
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If I tell you "hey, it's raining outside" and you go outside and get wet, what the hell else do you need?
The actual getting wet part. It doesn't count if we merely say I'm wet all the while behaving as if I'm bone dry. If I take my shirt off and wring it and nothing comes out, I can't put it back on and then have it be used as a conductor of electricity because of its sopping wet disposition. It wasn't wet. I didn't act like it was. Merely saying it is doesn't make it so.
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What I can't understand is why you only apply that arrogance to action movies. Or do you?
Oh god, no. Plenty of other genres have completely idiotic plot twists.
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Do you go up to presentations of Carmen and demand that they sing in English because you vetoed the expectation that you be able to understand French?
Of course not. That would be illogical.
Instead, I wonder why the hell
Romeo and Juliet ends over and over and over again. We just saw what happened and then the Watchman comes along to say what had happened and then Friar Laurence tells what we already knew and then Balthasar adds his bit and then the Page. My god, how many times does this play need to end?
The Lord of the Rings? I counted at least six.
Two Gentlemen of Verona is filled with illogic. Valentine heads to the docks to go to Milan from Verona. There's one problem, though: Milan is inland. Why is anybody trying to get to Milan via ship? It is quite clear that
Two Gents is an early play of Shakespeare's. It is filled with contradictions and factual errors. Ever notice that there are two characters named "Eglamour"? One is in Verona, potential suitor to Julia (never seen, but mentioned). Later on, Silvia is helped in her search for Valentine by Eglamour. Are they the same guy?
Have you read or seen
Two Gents? The play just abruptly ends. Proteus has abandoned Julia, kidnapped Silvia, nearly rapes her (and I mean that in a modern context, not the poetic sense) and has to be pulled off her by Valentine. Valentine says to Proteus, "O time most accurst, 'Mongst all foes that a friend should be the worst!"
Proteus then says literally 32 words and Valentine immediately forgives him. Huh?
And how to explain this outburst of Julia's when, disguised as Sebastian, she meets Silvia:
Madam, please you peruse this letter.--
Pardon me, madam; I have unadvised
Deliver'd you a paper that I should not:
This is the letter to your ladyship.
Huh? What's the point of this? Julia gives Silvia a letter only to take it back and give another letter? Silvia never looks at it, its contents are never revealed, and it serves no purpose. Why is it even there?
In the latest text of
Chess, which I was just in, Anatoly tells the embassy that he has no children. He then spends a year away from his wife and then is asked about his wife and family. Where did this "family" come from?
In fact, the American and later versions of
Chess are completely screwed up because they kept the song lyrics...which were written for a different plot. In the original plot, Freddie quits chess completely and returns to Bangkok as a sports commentator covering the latest world championship. That's why he says in "One Night in Bangkok": "Thank god I'm only watching the game. Controlling it." In the American and later versions, Freddie loses the championship in Merano and returns to Bangkok as the challenger, set to play against Anatoly. He's "only watching the game"? No, he isn't. He's in the thick of it.
My own character had nothing but nonsense during "Endgame." In the original, he has brought out a new Soviet challenger to Anatoly and he sings, "How straightforward the game when one has trust in one's player. And how great the relief working for one who believes in loyalty, heritage, true to his kind come what may." This makes perfect sense as Anatoly defected after winning and this new guy is described as a "machine." He has no wife, no distractions. The only thing he cares about is chess.
But in the American version, he delivers that to Walter, with whom he has had no contact beyond a single sentence at the beginning of the show where he insults Walter ("I'm afraid we have no equivalent member of our delegation with your particular talents, Mr. de Courcey...whatever they may be.")
What the hell is he talking to Walter for? He can't be talking about Anatoly since he doesn't embody those traits. He can't be empathizing with Walter because Freddie dumped him back in the first act...not to mention that if the next thing he says is directed at Walter, its yet another insult ("It's the weak who accept tawdry untruths about freedom. Prostituting themselves chasing a spurious starlight. Trinkets in airports sufficient to lead them astray.") Where the hell is this coming from?
There's a reason that
Chess ran for over three yeas in its original London production but only two months in New York when they changed the plot.
There are plenty of plays that don't make any sense and falter because of it.
Saving Private Ryan? I was with right up until the last two words spoken by Tom Hanks at the very end. "Earn it."
Excuse me? This kid, who could have walked away, decided to stay because the mission was more important than he was and nearly gets himself killed in the process of holding the bridge. He has the unmitigated gall to question the kid's devotion? Hanks has bitched and moaned for three hours of film about how this kid he's going to save had better be worth it. He dares to crush his soul with his dying breath? I'm sorry, but no. A potentially wonderful movie completely ruined by a single illogical act right at the very end.
Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!
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