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Movies, Podcast

The SportsAlcohol.com Podcast: Avatar 2 and the Films of James Cameron

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Jesse
Jesse
Jesse is a cofounder of SportsAlcohol.com even though he doesn't care for sports or alcohol. His favorite movie is Ron Howard's The Paper. I think. This is what happens when you don't write your own bio. I know for sure likes pie.
Jesse
Latest posts by Jesse (see all)

Avatar is back! Everybody brace for cultural impact! James Cameron’s special-effects extravaganza Avatar: The Way of Water has finally made it to movie theaters — in fact, it’s now topped the domestic box office for seven weekends in a row, garnered a Best Picture nomination, and raked in over $2 billion worldwide. In light of this stunning failure to attract any kind of substantial audience or acclaim, your SportsAlcohol.com crew hopped in their submersible and did a deep-dive podcast on the films of James Cameron, in all their water-y, tech-y, earnest glory. The Avatars, the Terminators, the Aliens, the various boats and choppers and motion-captured Na’vi… they’re all here in this two-hour-plus extravaganza that is still shorter than the runtime of Avatar: The Way of Water. Discussion points include high frame rate, 3-D, sending Bill Paxton to explore the real Titanic, the names of characters in Avatar, Cameron’s facility with sequels and what sets the Avatar follow apart, Titanic opening-night memories, and more. Jesse, Marisa, Jeremy, Nathaniel, and Jeff are your guides through the floating mountains of Pandora and beyond! And if you feel the need to do some penance following this epic appreciation of megablockbuster entertainment, we did do a podcast about a bunch of recent indie movies!

We are now up to SIX (6) different ways to listen to a SportsAlcohol podcast:

Lists, Movies

The Top 10 Best Computer-Generated Sequences in Movies of the Past 25 Years

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Paavan
Paavan
Paavan is an English lit student studying in Toronto. His photography is great. He is so young I'm jealous. He also deactivates his twitter account all the time, which I really respect.
Paavan
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I was watching a documentary about the making of Toy Story a few days ago and was struck by the fact that photorealistic computer effects have been part of filmmaking for almost 30 years now. In this somewhat nostalgic mood, I found myself thinking about my favorite ways that filmmakers have used CG imagery; some explorations of the ideological implications of these then-new artificialities, but mostly just neat ways to wow the audience. I’ve written this list so I can talk about some sequences that I find interesting; their ranking here is arbitrary.

Some notes before we begin: I’m defining a ”computer-generated sequence” based on a vague threshold of how much of it uses computer generated imagery. Sadly, this means that something like the T-Rex attack from Jurassic Park or the T-1000 ambush from Terminator 2 don’t quite count.

I’ll also add that, because of the new enormous cost of creating CG imagery, the list is unfortunately homogenous: Mostly filmmakers working from within Hollywood, and as a result, mostly white and male. Sadly, we can’t look to modern studios to fix this issue of representation; on the rare occasion that women and/or people of color are hired for these movies, they’re not always allowed to direct their own set pieces. As this technology gets easier for those with lighter pockets to use, I predict that things will change in the new decade, and that we will see even more indie filmmakers telling interesting stories with CG.

Lastly, and most crucially, I ask readers that they watch the video clips attached to every piece so that they can appreciate the formal choices that I have highlighted with my writing here.
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