I'm sorry that your only reply to my review was a personal attack
It's not personal, it's strictly business :]
That's a poor way to go about defending this movie.
Is it really, when the entire film, from the set design, to the Cinematography and the acting clearly gives off the vibe of being a cross between an homage and a live action cartoon, being one step away from Dick Tracy. It is clearly more stylized and a fictionalization than a docudrama account of the bootlegging era. With its colourful visuals and stylistic gimmicks, it's a hard-boiled, pulp comic book movie come to life. It is operatic and grandiose as well, very loud and bloody. But that is typical De Palma when you watch his films.
retaining the "copy of a copy" feel you bring up. See 'The Good German'
The Good German isn't really a copy of a copy though. It's more of just a singular copy, updating film noir for the 21st century. Untouchables juggles various influences and comes out a mish mash of different ideas and styles. Which is, imo, what makes it unique.
Predators did not aspire to be anything more than a sci fi / fantasy / action flick and in that respect it succeeded well. Within it's fiction it clung to its rules, was consistent and over the years I've never grown tired of it. It might not have had the moral messages of Schindler's List but it did the job it set out to do. In comparison The Untouchables is a pretentious film that only pretentious folk seem to have fond memories about.
How is Untouchables any different? It set it to be a simple good vs evil story, and that is what it accomplished. Good triumphs: the end. Pretentiousness is the last thing on my mind when I watch this film. It's about as basic as an action/thriller as you can get. Even the screenplay is unusually pared down for Mamet. All the characters are laid out in black and white terms. The bad guys are stereotypically slimy gangsters, and the good guys are fuzzy and likable. It's about as straightforward and unpretentious as I could imagine a crime epic being. Is it a great movie? No, but it think it's at least a good one and is wel made in many respects, even if it's not to everyone's tastes.
As for Predators... You rewatch it, one notices the inconsistencies, and how it's a really lame direct to DVD remake dressed up as a sequel. God what a POS!!! I like to be entertained by bad movies too, but I give them the rating they deserve. Personal choice, but oh well.
You don't seem to have anything to say about the bad acting and the bad story except to bring up 'postmodern simulacrum' again. That's disingenuous and suggests all spaghetti western movies of the 60s were equally wooden, had bad acting or suffered from the same shortcomings. Not in my opinion.
I see what people say, particularly Roger Ebert, about the hammy acting on De Niro's part. But the more I watch it, the I understand it was clearly directed to be this way. The performance is larger than life, theatrical, and scenery chewing. It's both funny and entertaining to watch. Frankly, I wish all "bad acting" was this good. What exactly did you expect from what a basically amounts to a violent fairy tale? Laurence Olivier?
It's like watching any of Leone's westerns. You notice the stilted acting and clearly dubbed lines, and the fact that everything is fake for being clearly shot in Italy or Spain somehwere. But you don't let that bother you, because judging a film from a narrow frame of reference doesn't allow you to be taken along by the illusion.
That's the primary reason why the best 'true story' films depart significantly from real life.
Well so does this film depart from any sense of realism, apart from the violence. And I think this approach works well enough.
You seem enamored by the names behind the picture
Are you kidding? I am more enamored with Costner blowing away baddies one handed with his Winchester. It rocks my socks every time.
~ I'm a 21st century man and I don't wanna be here.
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