Delectable tea or deadly poison?

[sovay]

Rabbit, rabbit. In re M. Night Shyamalan's The Last Airbender (2010), which opens today:

The first fatal decision was to make a live-action film out of material that was born to be anime. The animation of the Nickelodeon TV series drew on the bright colors and "clear line" style of such masters as Miyazaki, and was a pleasure to observe . . . After the miscalculation of making the movie as live action, there remained the challenge of casting it. Shyamalan has failed. His first inexplicable mistake was to change the races of the leading characters; on television Aang was clearly Asian, and so were Katara and Sokka, with perhaps Mongolian and Inuit genes. Here they're all whites. This casting makes no sense because (1) It's a distraction for fans of the hugely popular TV series, and (2) all three actors are pretty bad.

Thank you, Roger Ebert.

Now go and watch the original.

Comments

[spatch]

Rabbits rabbits! (and here I thought my father and I only did that. We prefer to use the plural, though. "Rabbit rabbit" is reserved for when you're sitting at the campfire and the smoke is blowing in your face.)

I had no idea the critical reaction to this film would be so vehemently abrasive. I thought the thing just looked mediocre. But man, Ebert's in fine form with this bad review. He probably won't the only critic to use something like this in his review, but closing with "...the hope that the title proves prophetic" is a brilliant over-the-shoulder kiss-off.

Someday I ought to drag out the argument or theory or assertion that Ebert is the Damon Runyon of this generation or century or whatever time period we choose.(Maybe one was not so prolific with the short story as the other, but them's quibbles.) I am too tired to present the full details, but it really gets good when you learn that throat cancer also robbed Damon Runyon of his voice, and that he too communicated solely through the written word for the last few years of his life.

[alankria.livejournal.com]

It's quite baffling, on a business sense alone, why someone would take a hugely successful formula and... hack it to pieces. It's also sad.

Apparently it's extra fail-y on gender too.

Shyamalan antidote?

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

I've recommended this elsewhere to the afflicted, but why settle for an unintentional travesty when a much funnier one already exists?

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

That review was great! Glad to hear a mainstream voice getting on his case for the casting failures--and it's great justice that the film stinks, to boot.

[stargatedragon.livejournal.com]

*facepalm*

We'll probably go see the movie if only to be informed when we say how bad it is.

As soon as they announced a live-action film both the hubby and I groaned. Why mess with a faboo animated show, especially when you're not known for doing anything with/for children?

*sighs*

[larryhammer]

Ah -- when Ebert gets his ranty pants on, he really gets entertaining. The fine art of verbal flensing knives.

---L.

[martianmooncrab.livejournal.com]

I was standing in a bookstore one day, and this sweet young thing came up and asked the bookseller if there really was a book made out of the movie Coraline, and if they knew anything about it, or if it was just a rumor.

I never underestimate the audience.

[nineweaving.livejournal.com]

"Really, I’ve got winking-Jesus postcards that look better."

Heh.

Nine

[stinger78.livejournal.com]

I for one can't understand why directors/producers think it's a good idea to go from the much more flexible medium of animation to film. (All right, I admit it; I can understand--they want to cash in. But that doesn't make me feel any better about their butchering something I enjoy.) And soon I'll have Keanu Reeves as Spike Spiegel and I may just throw up in my mouth a little bit.