Did you miss me? Hard to believe it’s been nearly two years since my last post, but full-time grad school plus teaching has taken over my life. Happily, I have reached the end of my obligation to full-time coursework, now I can take my time and finish strong. Another year, at least, but not another year away from FlixView.
In my absence the embedded trailer links in my last post have vanished, and incessant spam has forced me to disable the comment function. My profile still has an active gmail address which you are welcome to use if you have comments or questions.
I couldn’t avoid the omnipresent 30-second spots for Super 8, saturation campaigns are tough to live up to, but those 30 seconds at least didn’t give too much away. I was ready for a popcorn movie, I can’t even remember the last time I saw anything in a theater, and I suspect Super 8 will prove to be a crowd-pleasing money maker.
I was a teenager in the 1970s when Super 8 is set, and I made some movies with my dad’s super-8 camera, so J.J. Abrams’ script and taught direction had me at hello. The romance held up for the first 90 minutes or so, as Abrams and Executive Producer Steven Spielberg paid loving homage to the suburban teenage fantasies of that period. As Matt Patches points out on Film School Rejects, Super 8 often feels more like one of Spielberg’s own movies from the period than anything else, including Abram’s best work.
I don’t want to necessitate a spoiler alert, so all I’ll say about the gradual loss of momentum in the final act is that I wanted to turn Michael Giacchino’s score off, especially during the last sequence before the closing credits. I remember having a similar reaction to Abram’s otherwise astonishingly good Star Trek reboot, so it’s not fair to blame the tone on Spielberg. The production design is outstanding, although the camera work is occasionally distracting. But I ate my popcorn and it was good.
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