Sephiroth
Wade Wilson
Surviving
Posts: 29,316
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Post by Sephiroth on Feb 15, 2013 21:18:00 GMT -5
For some reason I had a hankering to watch this movie and pulled my dvd out. It remains a favorite of mine, and I hope of many others here. I actually far prefer the movie over the comics/graphic novel that inspired it; the comics were unique for their time in how graphic the violence was, and they did have their dramatic, even beautiful moments, but overall Eric is a far less easy character to sympathize with; there is practically no element of kindness or love in him in the comics, despite how mournful he was shown to be at times. James O'Barr has said he considers Eric a Christ-like figure, but in the comics it feels as if his whole philosophy is no remorse and no forgiveness, not exaclty what I believe Jesus would have endorsed. In the movie, however, Eric is a much easier character to sympathize with and root for. I feel the changes they made served the overall plot extremely well, and it made the story far easier to follow.
Inevitably, this whole movie has an eerie feel because of the tragic loss of Brandon Lee. Much like with Heath Ledger as the Joker, every single scene is so much more vivid because you are almost literally watching a ghost. Lee really threw himself into the part, and I really do believe that if things had not turned out as they had this would have been the breakout role for him. O'Barr and Lee's family have all expressed that they feel he would have been tremendously proud of how it all turned out. I only wish he were still here to tell us that.
MODIFIDED: two extra notes about the movie I find interesting-James O'Barr partially modeled Eric after Iggy Pop, and at his request Iggy was supposed to play the role of "Fun Boy" in the movie, but had to pull out due to other commitments, so instead they just got an actor who looked about as close as they could find. Also, in the comic there are a couple of scenes involving a skeleton dressed up like a cowboy that taunts Eric over his pain-in the film there were supposed to be a couple of scenes where Eric would be confronted by the "skull cowboy," but they were ultimately dropped from the final cut for being "too distracting." Good choice in my opinion, because they are kind of out of the left field compared to the rest of the movie.
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Post by crowwreak was WRONG on Feb 15, 2013 21:31:33 GMT -5
There's a reason I picked this name
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Post by mjolnir on Feb 15, 2013 21:33:31 GMT -5
Great comic, great movie. The ones that followed are hit or miss, but the original is terrific.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Feb 15, 2013 21:42:19 GMT -5
One of my favourite movies of all time.
And Michael Wincott is such a smooth villan..I imagine once I succeed in taking over world I will be just like him...without the whole being impaled on a gargoyle thing.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Feb 16, 2013 0:10:33 GMT -5
There a reason why I have a crow tattoo on my arm. I'm a huge fan of bruce and brandon lee and the crow, along with the Nightmare before christmas, are probably my favorite movies of all.
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Post by The Summer of Muskrat XVII on Feb 16, 2013 1:11:25 GMT -5
Absolutely love the flick, definitely a personal favourite
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Post by Caglar13 on Feb 16, 2013 1:31:32 GMT -5
The first dvd I owned. Great movie, great soundtrack. One of my all time favorites.
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Glitch
Grimlock
Not Going To Die; Childs, we're goin' out to give Blair the test. If he tries to make it back here and we're not with him... burn him.
Watching you.
Posts: 12,787
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Post by Glitch on Feb 16, 2013 3:45:01 GMT -5
First R rated movie I went to(I was 11 and was forced to go). Since I knew who Brandon Lee was, I was disappointed there weren't any martial arts(again I was 11). Over the years I started to appreciate the movie more. I even wore the face paint on Halloween.
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Post by Mighty Attack Tribble on Feb 16, 2013 6:48:33 GMT -5
I'd still rank it as my favourite film, and my favourite soundtrack and score. First DVD I ever bought, and probably the only film I can genuinely say I've watched more than 100 times.
While I do love the comic book, you hit the nail on the head about how unsympathetic Eric is as a character. While you can argue there is a lot of justification in his actions, there's a lot of unnecessary bloodshed on his part - Gideon, for example.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Feb 16, 2013 7:00:26 GMT -5
One of my favourite films. I was about 14 or 15 when I first saw it, just at the right level of angst that it was almost perfect to me. Obviously I've grown up quite a bit in the last 10 years, but it's still one of my favourites. The sequels... not so much.
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theryno665
Grimlock
wants a title underneath the stars
Kinda Homeless
Posts: 13,571
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Post by theryno665 on Feb 16, 2013 9:29:04 GMT -5
The first dvd I owned. Great movie, great soundtrack. One of my all time favorites. The soundtrack was one of the first tapes I owned. And I lost it. Even though I could just get it on CD now or something, I'm still mad that I never found it again.
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Sephiroth
Wade Wilson
Surviving
Posts: 29,316
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Post by Sephiroth on Feb 16, 2013 9:51:17 GMT -5
I'd still rank it as my favourite film, and my favourite soundtrack and score. First DVD I ever bought, and probably the only film I can genuinely say I've watched more than 100 times. While I do love the comic book, you hit the nail on the head about how unsympathetic Eric is as a character. While you can argue there is a lot of justification in his actions, there's a lot of unnecessary bloodshed on his part - Gideon, for example. I read a book about comics in the 80's and 90's once, and there was a short chapter about The Crow. O'Barr stated that he actually had not originally intended to show why Eric was going after these thugs-he wanted to leave it ambiguous. But as he went along he felt Eric was so downright cruel at times that he HAD to show the audience what happened to help them understand. I think by showing the events in chronological order, it made Eric easier to sympthize with in the film-you understood from the get-go why he was doing what he does. O'Barr also mentioned that he felt Brandon Lee brought more humor to the character, especially a more physical kind of comedy. This was also a good move, because the comic has few moments of levity and displays of Eric actually being a nice guy-the movie expanded on that and it made him far more likeable. Expanding the role of some of the background characters, like the little girl, and the positive effect Eric has on them was also a good idea because it made him seem a bit more like a hero instead of just a vengeful ghost. And on an amusing note, in the book O'Barr also stated that he was working on the comics right when the first Batman movie hti theaters-and the movie's popularity caused him many problems. He noted that he was unable to get black in for the covers of the original issues because comic book publishers were heavily geared toward Batman, and so black ink was hard to get a hold of-he ended up having to use "midnight blue" instead, and he stated that when The Crow movie proved successful he hoped he was doing the same thing to Batman.
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