Snyder needs someone to tell him a movie should have both character development and a cohesive plot in at most 2 hrs.
I'm done with him deferring blame for not being able to put together a clean narrative.
this post was submitted on 28 Dec 2023
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Watched this over the Christmas break. The best review I had read from someone else was from a post on Lemmy that said something to the effect of “if you set up a TV to play 10 generic sci-fi movies and just changed the channel between them allrandomly you’d end up with a film as cohesive as Rebel Moon.”
It gave me vibes of Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets but I suspect it won't be anywhere near as good as that film sadly
It was so bad that I'm curious if the director's cut could possibly have any actual character development or story in it.
spoiler
When the leader of the rebellion died in the attempted heroic scene and everyone was distraught and shocked, I was just think "Why do I care? He's said a couple of lines and been on screen for about 5 minutes.."
I actually said this out loud too. Literally asked “why do I care?”
I was already in a bad place though after the vagina wormhole.
And you have a great general reknown for his strategic abilities stuck in a gun fight. Horrible story telling.
I don't even understand how the characters even cared about each other. Even in the story it seems like they knew each other for like a couple days max.
5 minutes before he was clearly on his suicide mission I said, "I hope Ray Fishers character dies so he doesn't have to be part of this garbage for part 2"
Then he died in the most meaningless and rehashed way and I was glad for him.
The better experience is a film without Snyder. The Owls of Ga'Hoole is the only decent work in his (artistically) shitty career.
300 is good if you interpret the story as the oral history of the fight by the only survivor to recruit more spartans for a hopeless but ultimately existential fight.
300 is one of the ugliest and most pretentious film of the century: pectorals made in computer graphics, pompous advertising shooter direction (which is in fact Snyder's "cultural" background) and a completely idiotic use of slow motion like we've never seen before.
I can partly agree with you if we talk about the graphic novel but I still regretted purchasing that comic, a pro-fascist and forgettable work.
So I watched this last night. It is a pretty bad film, with the worst use of slow motion I think I have ever watched.
It feels very rushed in its plot, and the fizzles out instead of ending with a bang. Very few action scenes feel good, from bad camera angles and slow motion that highlights all the wrong things. I would also describe the film as a collection of nobody's, very little character growth and you spend almost the entire film playing Pokémon with them.
I don't recommend watching, and I would be surprised if a directors cut would make a difference.
I agree with all of this, the entire thing is inconsistent from the costuming for everybody to the accents to the slowmo to the character "development" to the sound effects for the lasers from guns to the world building with scifi and magic but also regular real world snow elk to the literal star wars shuttle crawl opening to blade runner but in the desert to the showing "good" characters because they're against sexual assault who then never show up again to characters who get backstory in the last 35 minutes of the movie after having been with them for 2 hours, to characters motivations directly contracting themselves. So many scenes of faces just looking, no words, no help, just watching...
The slowmo is so awful, from scenes that are inconsistent through themselves - full speed, 60%, 30%, back to 60%, move to the next scene *still at 60%. Later? Eh, these four action scenes just set a 70% slow. They are so exhausting it genuinely feels like a chore to sit through. Oh, but the final fight has no slowmo from what I can remember, so there is one scene at least that doesn't have it. The first half of the spider fight was okay outside of the racist music. Mostly everything else is literally just slowmo movement/shooting and closeup faces.
The movie is atrocious. I went into it with an open mind. I liked the self-indulgence for ZS:JL because it's DC and it was a vision brought back from tragedy.
This?? He couldn't get it right the first time that is on him. This is likely the most unoriginal, most predictable thing I have ever seen and the fact that there is a four hour version for part one is sad. I have never felt such disdain watching something. And honestly, that 4 hour cut could simply be Jimmy getting 45 minutes frolicking in a field getting his horns, an extended griffon flight sequence and 4 more added fight scenes with 2 dialogue scenes. Boom, 4 hours. I wish I even felt like this was being facetious.
I wanted to write a "the good" and "the bad" but... Genuinely, just watch James Gunns Suicide Squad instead. You'll feel more emotion, get a deeper sense of the characters with actual fucking pacing, there's actual set ups and payoffs that are meaningful instead of just... "Everything" and best of all you won't have to sit through Rebel Moon. Oh, and if you want a sense of good use of slowmo, watch some of the Rocky movies, or Creed. As a slowmo comparison only, although thematically these movies are so much more impactful.
On the other hand, don't wait. Watch it now and just see exactly how terrible it is. Maybe get really stoned or really drunk, watch it with someone who is familiar with Star Wars and its homages and prepare yourself for the rejected Star Wars story ZS presented to GL.
I'm not a hater, I'm not somebody who writes scathing reviews about movies because of stupid reasons, I generally like most movies even if they are bad. I generally like most things even if they're mediocre and predictable, if it's something done well it's got merit.
I cannot recommend this movie. After seeing it, I can't even see why anyone would want to see what 2 more hours even holds. At least 40% - being very generous - at least 40% of it would just be slowmo. It seems to contribute absolutely nothing of value and has absolutely no point to any of the decisions being anything. The entire thing is pointless drivel and I can't believe I ever thought it might be worth watching. I haven't called out so many sequence of events in a row since The Eternals (which I liked) but none of them were even meaningful or interesting. It was stupid shit like "oh she has a rope and fell, time to get it around and knock him down". All of the background fire lasers are individual streaks, there's no differentiation of weapons but there's apparently multiple different weapon pulse fire noises. Sounds of 3 and 5, but nope, all just individual bolts.
And oh my gosh, the stupid fucking. The amount of talk about sex, that test where women talking about a romance and it failing? 15 minutes in, not even kidding. The main character apparently sleeps around, so does everybody the whole farm town is just an orgy. There is more talk about sex than plot in this movie.
The plot by the way is runaway on a farm imperials appear and create an army after surviving an ambush and the heroes ride off into the sunset. And everything is A-OK.
There's no underlying theme. There's no attempt at trying to make claims about philosophy. There's no stitching of unique elements to create a fantasy world. It just babbles fake history at you and character repeat the fake history and we just get to accept that there's random fantasy creatures in scifi space settings while we get philosophy babbled at us - it's not positing ideas of making conversation with the audience, it's just "my robot sentience is from magic and I feel bad".
So yeah. I'm conflicted. On one hand, I don't think anyone should subject themselves to this. On the other hand, I think everyone needs to see this so that ZS never gets another job, or at least severely reduced creative input.
Anyway. If you do watch it, I highly recommend Suicide Squad right after. Because for every deep chasm that you will find from Rebel Moon, this movie actually delivers something impactful. There is meaningful development. The conflict feels real and organic, not contrived. Even these ridiculous fantasy her- er, villains are more likable, relatable, and give you actual edge when they make a decision with actual consequences.
All of Rocky including Creed is also a good contrast. I don't even watch boxing.
That "movie" was so awful I couldn't watch more than an hour of it. I can't imagine that extending it to three and a half hours will make it any better.
Same lmao. In the middle I just called it and everyone in the room was totally fine with that decision
For the justice league there was a different director. Why the hell wouldn't this movie, where he was the director, be the directors cut. Was there some kind of public split with netflix?
You should just watch it. It's fun to watch. It's not really deep, but there is lots of action and it looks great. There are 15 characters but only 3 are developed hero and 2 villians. Most of the characters have no effect on the film and could have been 100% cut out with no loss of plot.
I liked the worlds and the development of the main conflict. The action was on point and the main character was well acted.
You should not watch it, it's dreadfully boring. Just watch the trailer to see the big fancy world building cgi that is like a couple of shots.
The final cut of a movie is often not the directors cut. The director gives the studio their cut, and then studio executives get to do what they want. Good execs with good directors know not to fuck with a good thing. But if the movie the director hands in stinks or if some bad audience previews get execs scared all kinds of things can happen
Basically, this is why the idea of a directors cut even exists. Because what you see is rarely what the director handed in when they were done.
But this is streaming and Zach Snyder was hired on the premise that he delivers his vision. There is no studio jumping in to make cuts.
Studios view the movie as a product. This process has a physical requirement to consume it of 2 hours. The point of cuts is to have more screenings in one room rather than hiring 2 rooms to show the movie. That studio integrity is met with frustration when they keep a movie as the director intended and the theater has 4 screening per day because it's a 3 hour movie with 15 minutes between showings for cleaning.
Movie theaters are also putting pressure on the studio for short movies because they want people to move through the theater. Movie theaters don't care about what they show as long as it brings in bodies who will eat and drink concessions. The movies are the feed and people are the cattle to be processed as quickly as possible.
The theaters want a shorter movie and the studio wants a shorter movie, so really the only person who can hold up the idea of a long movie is the director with the promise the movie will guarantee repeat viewings despite the smaller number of screenings. And Zach Snyder can't make that promise.
His movies are the narrative equivalent of a Michael Bay movie - except Bay has better narrative and understands how to build tension. Snyder is incapable of making a low budget movie about genuine people. He is only talented when picking the color of blaster shots. His characters are trash. His plots are boring. His camera work nearly incomprehensible. There is no amount of work he can do to make his original cut work because there is nothing of substance that was cut out.
Streaming studios are still studios, and they act the exact same. Yes, there is a studio jumping in to make cuts. Of course they are. The man is saying there is a director's cut.
Usually I’d agree with you, but Snyder said in interviews that there weren’t any demands from the studio for cuts. He just wants to make an R rated version and Netflix likes the publicity from having a Snyder cut. It worked for DC, so they use it as an advertisement to generate buzz around the movie.
Batman v Superman also had a "Director's Cut" in the form of the Ultimate Edition, with additional scenes/context that weren't suitable for the theatrical release due to length. Now that one wasn't a radically difference movie, but it seems to be a recurring struggle Snyder has lately.
I don't think another cut will help things.
I don't see any mention of the awful backstory monologueing. with all the other crap mentioned here, honestly just skip it. don't even hope for directors cut to fix anything
Yes, I would wait. It can't get any worse.
I mean it's a movie. Who knows how you will enjoy it in the first place and who knows how a future version of the movie will turn out compared to the original?
Unless it's an obvious dumpster fire with 0% reviews go and see it for yourself and form your own opinion.
I guess I'm wondering if people think it's worth a watch in its current form
The current version is not a good movie at all. It's a Stat Wars knockoff with a boring story and the visual effects that aren't that great.
I've read that Snyder claims the directors cut is completely different, it'll be R-rated, extra violent, etc etc. I really don't see how making it R-rated is going to fix the problems it has. I'm not much of a fan of Snyder though, so I guess you should take my opinion with a grain of salt.
It seems like I am the only person on lemmy.world to actually enjoy this movie. It's not 'art' but that doesn't mean it's bad.
It's just a setup for the second movie. Personally I enjoyed it but I came in with low expectations. I agree with others CG was weak and too much slow mo but w/e I want sci-fi.
I realise it's a dumb question
No it's perfectly reasonable to ask for opinions, didn't mean to sound harsh, just don't rely too much on other people's opinions.
If I read 10 times that a movie has a specific issue then I will automatically look for this while watching and ruin my own experience.
I wouldn't watch it again, but given that I'd already decided to do fuck all with my evening and veg out on Netflix I'm not as angry as most of you. It was dumb. I'll probably watch part 2 in pieces if I watch it
I'm so bored by the over stylised slow mo. It got so tedious once the action started. The backdrops looked cool but the green screen wasn't even done well. Between the shitty green screen, indigent slow mo and overall lack of cohesive story it was impossible to get immersed. The plot was just a hodgepodge of fellowship of the ring pokemon team building of a bunch of nobodies who of course had to been and Haw before joining up reluctantly. At least in justice league the Flash went against this trope and it was one of the better scenes in that shitty film.
Between this atrocity, the latest marvel offerings, the latest Indiana Jones, and the latest Avatar I'm wondering if my film palate is too discerning these days or are big films just getting shittier? Everything is somehow overwrought yet derivative. The last thing I watched that was ambitious that I remember blowing me away was the Watchmen series
Dial of Destiny sucked. Check out Invincible on Prime.
Ooohh. Yeah. Invincible is great
Between this atrocity, the latest marvel offerings, the latest Indiana Jones, and the latest Avatar I'm wondering if my film palate is too discerning these days or are big films just getting shittier? Everything is somehow overwrought yet derivative. The last thing I watched that was ambitious that I remember blowing me away was the Watchmen series
I feel this too, I’m so sick of unoriginal continuations of existing IP. I’ve been enjoying A24 movies and shows though, Beef and EEAAO absolutely blew me away. I also loved Pearl and Frankenstein's Monster's Monster, Frankenstein. I love their metamodern style.
Edit: not A24, but Barry was also fantastic. Plot points that you expect to be dragged out over 1-2 seasons are resolved quickly, because the show has a dense, concise story to tell and doesn't waste time.
+100 for Barry, that show was too good and underrated. I don't know if I'll find a show as great as that for a while, but thankful Fargo is still on.
As far as A24, I think Robert Eggers' 'The Lighthouse' and Ari Aster's 'Beau Is Afraid' are my favorites.
Another weird movie I enjoyed recently is Triangle of Sadness (2022). Oh and 'Enemy' (2013) was so artistic, I think. Also 'The Banshees of Inisherin' (2022), what a movie.
Boots Riley's debut film and TV show, Sorry to Bother You and I'm a Virgo, respectively, were amazing as well.
I haven't seen the 'X' films or Frankenstein's (...) but I will have to now.
I found the new Avatar lacklustre as well. Dune wasn't my thing either. Big hopes for the Jak and Daxter film but that's mostly because I hope it will spawn a new game. Enjoying the fifth season of the TV show 'Fargo' airing at the moment which is mostly consistently good.
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I'll be honest, it was fine. Not as "bad" as I kept hearing.
It's meh. The VFX were good enough. The story needs tons of improvement. The visuals are definitely Snydery.
I await the Snyder Cut.
Rounding out my viewing of this snooze fest, there is no way a directors cut can save this film, and certainly adding more time isn't going to improve it. Dull characters, uninspired environments, generic spacecraft, I'm really struggling to understand how this much time and money can be invested into something so mediocre.
As someone who generally likes Snyder’s movies but didn’t particularly care for Rebel Moon, it’s hard to say. The movie is both too long and too short. It’s too long in that the middle of the film drags and there are unnecessary scenes that definitely should have been cut (such as most of the scenes with the soldiers at the beginning of the film and the ending of the bird scene.) It’s too short in that most of the characters feel undeveloped and it’s hard to get emotionally invested in the climax.
I feel like some of the fight scenes, particularly an early one involving an axe, could use the extra blood effects from the R cut. It just felt really bland with cutaway clean kills, and kind of undermines the movie’s gritty tone with more fantasy violence. Later fights in the movie use more fantasy elements (like laser weapons) and these are fine without the blood effects.
Reportedly the R cut will have at least 40 extra minutes, which may really help flesh out the plot. I’d especially like it if the scene where Kora recites her character bio to the camera is cut and replaced with scenes showing us all those things, but that’s unlikely. More likely, some characters will be more fleshed out, but also a bunch of extraneous stuff will be added as well. Neither will likely fix the underlying core of the film that’s essentially Seven Samurai meets Star Wars, but does neither particularly well.
If you are going to watch it, I would probably wait for the extended cut, though it’s hard to tell whether there will be much, if any, improvement.
So it's overly long and misuses its time. Wow.
That’s Zach Snyder in general. The only way to really watch his films are extended cuts, because the theatrical cuts tend to cut out all the exposition and focus on the core of the movie. But the core of the movie doesn’t make much sense without the exposition. The result is an overlong movie that feels like it should be shorter, but nothing can really be trimmed because the film tried to do too much. BvS is a prime example of this.
I think the guy gets way too many ideas in his head and has trouble telling a single, focused story with them.
It had more slow motion scenes than an Indian action movie. Shallow and cliché dialogue ripping off from the star wars universe. Snyder was plastered all over the credits. If this isn't his cut then take the damn name off the credits. No matter how you cut it it'll have the same actors, storyline, dialogue depth and in-your-face visuals. Snyder really is a subtle and sophisticated guy.
I must be one of the few people who quite likes Snyder's work. Yes it's stylistic-heavy but in terms of Rebel Moon, given it was supposed to be a Star Wars movie, they'd clearly relied on being able to use Star Wars lore in place of some character development. And then, also consider this release has been heavily chopped to be kid-friendly. It was OK. I'll certainly be watching the directors cut and I suspect it'll be as good as the Justice League cut, which was really good.
I thought it was alright but I'd wait til the sequel or however many movies they're making are done. Netflix likes to cancel shit in the middle. They're doing the 7 samurais thing which I dig but I don't want to watch half of it and then they pull the rug out.
By releasing a "Snyder Cut" every time, aren't they saying he either can't put a decent movie together or that the studio doesn't trust him to? Lame gimmick that makes them all look bad.
If I watch a version, I'm going to watch whichever is shortest. Sprawling, slow meandering stories aren't my thing and knowing Snyder, most of the extra length will be in unnecessary slow-mo shots.