Dec 15 2008Audiences Pay for 'Day the Earth Stood Still'

"Australia - $4.3 million--still a disappointing take, but at least providing Hugh Jackman a great joke to use at the Oscars this year: "Hey, Australia didn't make anywhere near its massive budget back! Am I right?"

Well that's possible he might say that, but with SAG members voting January 2, if there's a strike, you can bet there won't be any Oscar show and not many people laughing. More reality TV? Anyone?

I saw a million freaking ads for the stupid space movie that had about 3 seconds of trailer, and a thing just as long at the end telling you that the Wolverine trailer was in front of it... so yeah, that's why people saw it.
..Hey! when's that trailer coming online??

If you're going to the Day the Earth Stood Still and you've seen the original, you're going to be devastatingly disappointed at the ending.

I certainly was. And in a world where we sit and watch Transformers for 2 and 1/2+ hours, why was Day the Earth Stood Still less than 2?

Ugh. So...SO disappointing.

The fact that TDTESS was less than 2 hours was the ONLY good thing about it. That old alien guy who said he loves humans obviously never saw a Hollywood remake.

Well, I'm being a little harsh... the endless product placement at least meant I could use that time slightly more productively to think of Christmas gift ideas (I decided to buy anything that didn't appear in or have any connection to this godawful mess of a preachy enviro-friendly sci-fi flick).

I personally didn't have many problems with the day the earth stood still.
Here's why. As soon as I saw the preview, I knew that it was going to be changed majorly, so I hoped somewhere in the back of my head that they would approach it like a sequel.
They did not, but I found that if you watch the movie, pretending that it's a return of Claatu to destroy us because we didn't listen to him the first time, it kind of works.
And people are too overly critical of remakes anyway. I know you love the old one, and in your mind you can still say, "The old one is better" and that's fine. But you have to know somewhere deep down that the producers are not going to risk their money on a faithful remake of an older movie. Everything has to be reinvented for the younger crowds, updated and flashier, or it doesn't get off the ground. Unfortunately most movie goers aren't intelligent enough for an intelligent plot, so it has to be dumbed down, filled with explosions to appease the cave men, and usually some nudity, and high speed chase scenes. See almost any Bruce Willis movie. (Except for twelve monkeys. I loved that one) Yes there were explosions, and even one scene that could be considered a car chase, but they didn't resort to a major sex scene with the star of the movie. (Thank god. Seeing Keanu's @$$ in the matrix trilogy was more than enough, thank you.)
My only large problem with this remake is toward the end. These bug-like nano-machine-looking things are swarming everywhere.. they eat through a mack truck and turn it to dust in about two seconds. Then they tear through buildings in seconds. but good old Claatu (Keanu) is running through it, and all that happens in twenty seconds is little holes start to appear in his clothing.
I could make some comments about the movies message, but it fell, most likely, on deaf ears anyway. Most of the people blocked it out because it was too much for them. But I think Agent Smith's rant about humans being a virus to this planet in the Matrix says it all. And that message is what really ruined this movie, because people don't want to hear it. Unfortunately, as this movie predicts, it will take us being on the edge of our own destruction before we change. And that, I think, is not as far away as we all like to believe.
I give it 3 and a half stars.