Troy, 28 Days Later, Ben Affleck, and a Friend of my Dad

[swordmage]

Being the slightly odd person I am, this was drafted while watching 28 Days Later. Possibly not the best of ideas, but when one's little sister isn't around to freak out, you take what time you have.

At any rate, I saw Troy today with my dad. The little internal purist screams, but the rest of me is pretty happy.

First-The happy, happy, joy, joy bits
-Overall casting-wonderful. Eric Bana was great, same with Sean bean and Peter O'Toole.
-The costumes and other bits, like weaponry-very well done. Same with the sets.
-The Trojan Horse. Am I the only one who really beleives that thing was constucted in less then 12 days? So goddamned great/wonderful/perfect...!
-The cinematography/filming was beautiful and had some amazing scenes
-The CGI. Warriors and ships had me grinning.

Second-The "Umm, okaAay?" factors
-Orlando Bloom-looked like a girl at (quite a few) times. Don't tell me otherwise.
-Brad Pitt-I think he was a little, well, off. i mean, he was good, but there was just something lacking.
-The Paris/Menelaus duel-Grrr. Just, plain, Grrr.
-The pacing could have been a little better.

Third-The purist speaks
-Making a 10 year war (at least seemingly) into less then a month
-Clytemnestra
-The reason the Greeks went to Troy. You can keep it canon without having the gods involved. Merely explain the pack Helen's father got out of the Greek kings when he married her off.
-Paris/Helen. *sulks*
-Lack of gods

Now, onto 28 Days Later.
Generally, horror has never been my genre of choice for films. However, this one came with rave reviews from friends and family with opinions I trust. The film had a few elements of Margaret Atwood's latest (and very good) novel Oryx and Crake (disease killing off humans, few survivors), but was really good. Suspenseful, and well done. Surprisingly, I enjoyed it quite a bit.

Now, onto the Ben Affleck story.

An old friend of my dad's is a blackjack dealer in Vegas. Ben Affleck (actor, formerly half on the "Bennifer" horror) is an avid poker player. Now, apparently (at least at this particular casino) the tips the dealers receive are split between all the other dealers at the end of a shift. (Makes sense to me, after all, those dealing price tables get better tips then those at the cheap ones.) So anyway, one night ben came into this casino. Apparently, he had something like $5000 with him. So he sits down, plays poker, and ends up with about $200000. Now, what's a big-time actor going to do if he wins big? Tip the dealer (and therefore all on that shift) close to everything he won that night. So, we're looking at over $150000 to be dealt out among the dealers (no pun intended). I just thought that was really cool.

Also, saw Love, Actually for the third time. *sniff* I love it. I love it. I love it.

That's all for now, folks!!

Comments

[inkpuddle.livejournal.com]

*sniffles* Love Actually. To be redundant, I love it. :)

And I have to agree with you about most of Troy. My purist got a little huffy about Briseis whacking Agamemnon. Not that I didn't bounce because he got killed off, I was just irritated that Clytemnestra didn't get to do the job herself. And did it seem like that they decided to mush Briseis and Cassandra into one person? Cause I got that distinct impression. And Eric Bana was just--lovely. There's nothing really I can say to that. I knew he was going to die--honestly, who doesn't?--but I really didn't want him to. I was on edge through the fight scene, muttering to myself that Hector needed to kick Achilles's ass all up and down that big ol' open space. :D

Sorry, didn't mean to go into my own movie analysis. *winks* Liked the movie overall though. Had a very in depth mythology discussion with my friends afterward. hehe

[swordmage.livejournal.com]

Hell, I've been analyzing it since before it came out with my godfather. He's a Latin teacher at my school, and has bravely put up with my wailing over the lack of Clytemnestra.

By the way, I friended you. If that's not a problem.

[inkpuddle.livejournal.com]

Not at all. I love friends. :D