Post 35

Last night, I saw Stardust. I really enjoyed it not just because it was a fun movie but because it was like nothing I've ever seen before. In fact, it was like nothing I've ever seen in a way that nothing I've ever seen was like nothing I've ever seen--if that makes any sense at all....

Did I mention I stayed up till 2:30 last night?

Anyway, Stardust was a good movie for a first date--nice, low key movie--so I was happy with it. It's interesting, though, in that I can't remember the last movie I saw in which more people died--maybe one of the Jurassic Park sequels--and yet I also can't seem to come up with a movie that I enjoyed death scenes in more. And I don't mean in the, "Yes! That guy so deserved to die! Ah! Catharsis! Yes!" It was more like, "Oh man! That guy died, too! That's so funny!" And then the whole thing with the ghosts--ah, it's just--death was never so entertaining.
But, I am Schmetterling, so I have to bring up a couple of qualms with consistency: 1) the witch should have gotten way old and gross after making that inn, and 2) Yvaine was not very consistent in when and how much she glowed; had I directed the movie, I would have had a lot more fun with, "Okay, now have her glowing a lot, now a little, now not at all, now just ever so slightly, now a lot again, now none, now a heckuva a lot, now only a little."
I thought the same thing when I first saw the first Pirates movie. That scene where they're all fighting in the cave, sometimes Barbosa's hat casts a shadow over his face, but it remains a skull. How cool would it have been if the patches of his face that were in shadow were fleshy while the rest of him was bony? C'mon, SFX crew! Get on that thang!
Anyway....
As far as writing goes, Stardust made a very believable story overall. I think the unicorn's name was Deus ex Machina, but she hurt as much as she helped, so that was okay with me. Really the only thing I couldn't swallow was Triston learning all that swordplay in a day or two on a pirate ship when, earlier in the movie, we learned from Humphrey that they had been in fencing classes together and Triston just couldn't get it. Of course, maybe his expedited learning had to do with the flower--didn't think of that. That's actually very plausible. I doubt that that's what the writers had in mind, but I'll pretend they did.
Were I really anal, I'd probably point out that there is no way Humphrey and Victoria would have come to the crowning ceremony, but I'm kind of a fan of curtain-call style endings--probably my drama background playing with my biases--so I can forgive and even enjoy that.

Overall, a really high quality feel-good movie, which I hope means a lot coming from the guy who repeated purports to hate feel-good things.
That is all.