Midway (2019) (1 Viewer)

[Aaron Silverman]

You're dating yourself, Travis!

He's among friends here.

I didn't know that Ridley Scott was doing a Battle of Britain movie. THAT could really be good!

 

[YANG]

https://www.facebook.com/honorthefew/

 

[Chris Will]

You're dating yourself, Travis!

I worked at one as well for 3 years. It was my second job ever, quit my grocery store job to join Suncoast. That was some fun times. We gave the theater managers in our mall discounts and they let us see movies for free.

Back before midnight movies were a thing, the theater employees would watch the new movies opening that week at midnight on Thursdays. They said it was to make sure the print was okay. They let us Suncoast folks come to those. We could have as much soda as we wanted as long as we brought our own cup and they always passed around a giant (I mean giant, like 3 feet tall) bag of the day's leftover popcorn to eat.

 

[YANG]

As expected, this is going to be an “object based dogfights over the head extravaganza” that offers alternative angle on Pearl Harbour attack which...

... Michael Bay had presented to us before...​

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

It looks very much of a piece with Pearl Harbor, which isn't entirely a bad thing. They're both beautiful to look at.

In more nuanced hands than Emmerich's, I'd love to see a movie about the Japanese intelligence failures and American intelligence triumph that led to the American victory at Midway, particularly:

• The Japanese believing the USS Yorktown to have been sunk.
• The Americans breaking JN-25.

 

[Scott McGillivray]

Ugh. The trailer looked just awful. The CG looked so...CG! I simply do not get invested in shows where it is all computer generated. I can go play a video game and be more involved. Game of Thrones had better looking CG! I know, maybe they still have work to do on it, but if they had actually had real planes doing stunts, I think it would look SO much better. Plus the physics would be more believable.
Did I mention this trailer looked awful?

 

[Tino]

It looks very much of a piece with Pearl Harbor, which isn't entirely a bad thing. They're both beautiful to look at.

In more nuanced hands than Emmerich's, I'd love to see a movie about the Japanese intelligence failures and American intelligence triumph that led to the American victory at Midway, particularly:

• The Japanese believing the USS Yorktown to have been sunk.
• The Americans breaking JN-25.

And not to mention the incredible amount of luck involved in finding the Japanese fleet.

 

[Tino]

I’m a sucker for WWII films so of course I’ll be seeing this.

The trailer looked interesting. Could go either way.

 

[dpippel]

Yeah, it just looks like Pearl Harbor with more CG stuff in the frame. That trailer smells like Emmerich through and through.

 

[benbess]

Looks like good trashy fun to me. I'll see it.

Will this be in IMAX 3D?

 

[Winston T. Boogie]

Ugh. The trailer looked just awful. The CG looked so...CG! I simply do not get invested in shows where it is all computer generated. I can go play a video game and be more involved. Game of Thrones had better looking CG! I know, maybe they still have work to do on it, but if they had actually had real planes doing stunts, I think it would look SO much better. Plus the physics would be more believable.
Did I mention this trailer looked awful?

Yes, I think that the CG aspect is a problem for those of us that are not gamers. I think video gamers better accept the look and feel of today's CG whereas to somebody like me, that does not play video games, it just looks horribly fake. I want to see real planes, real locations, not a video game and not those video game movements of the supposed camera shooting this.

I'm interested in this due to the subject matter but that trailer did not look promising.

 

[Tino]

I think video gamers better accept the look and feel of today's CG whereas to somebody like me, that does not play video games, it just looks horribly fake

I play video games all the time and do not agree with this statement at all.

To suggest that video gamers are willing to accept horribly fake cgi is absurd. Have you ever played a current 4K/HDR video game with Dolby Atmos? They are state of the art and spectacular. With movie quality cgi. If anything we gamers are more critical of poor cgi.

 

[DFurr]

I'll be buying BD of this one. I too am a sucker for WW2 movies. I had a 35mm print of the original Midway years ago but the BD looked so good I sold the print. I thought the 1976 version was well done for it's time. If you really like Navy war flicks, check out I Bombed Pearl Harbor. It's the Japanese version of Midway.

 

[Edwin-S]

Yes, I think that the CG aspect is a problem for those of us that are not gamers. I think video gamers better accept the look and feel of today's CG whereas to somebody like me, that does not play video games, it just looks horribly fake. I want to see real planes, real locations, not a video game and not those video game movements of the supposed camera shooting this.

I'm interested in this due to the subject matter but that trailer did not look promising.

You don't play video games, but suddenly you are qualified to comment on the quality of what they look like and what gamers will accept as far as quality CG goes. Seriously?

 

[Edwin-S]

This movie looks like it is going to be terrible, but the aircraft CGI isn't the problem. I mean how many airworthy SBD Dauntless, Hellcat F4Fs, B25 Mitchell's, Japanese Zeros and Kates are left in the World. CG is the only way to pull off large scale battles like the one that occurred at Midway.

And, please, do not use Dunkirk as an example because Nolan's use of a few real boats to depict a huge operation looked small time in the finished product.

 

[Winston T. Boogie]

You don't play video games, but suddenly you are qualified to comment on the quality of what they look like and what gamers will accept as far as quality CG goes. Seriously?

I'm not qualified to express anybody's opinion about anything except my own. For the record I have seen plenty of video games and I know plenty of people love them. I can see why they would, they seem very entertaining. My point is the movement in CG environments, including the way the supposed camera moves that is shooting what is happening (not just the objects that are moving, be they planes or whatever), tends to break all logical bonds with actual gravity and physics.

There is nothing wrong with this, in that a movie is an artificial environment and so there is no reason to adhere to any set of "rules" including gravity and physics...but I am saying it takes me out of a film. I grew up watching pictures before there was all this CGI and so when I see it much of the time things just look wrong.

My guess is that when people have grown up with CG in games and in films, it does not bother them the way it does me because they are used to/accepting of that look. I am also sure that somebody used to CG that has lived with it a long time also would have opinions on what is better or worse looking CGI...whereas I tend not to enjoy most of it.

I'm not saying it is all bad and I can and have accepted it as a stylized look to tell a story. In 300, for example, I enjoyed it as the comic book style of the story. In a film like Midway where they are using it to achieve the battle sequences and to give you a sense of scale...I don't like it.

 

[Winston T. Boogie]

This movie looks like it is going to be terrible, but the aircraft CGI isn't the problem. I mean how many airworthy SBD Dauntless, Hellcat F4Fs, B25 Mitchell's, Japanese Zeros and Kates are left in the World. CG is the only way to pull off large scale battles like the one that occurred at Midway.

And, please, do not use Dunkirk as an example because Nolan's use of a few real boats to depict a huge operation looked small time in the finished product.

I honestly don't expect them to assemble an entire Navy nor fleet of aircraft to recreate the battle of Midway. I also thought Dunkirk was a wonderful film and did have greater impact, on me anyway, due to how he shot it.

 

[TravisR]

I also thought Dunkirk was a wonderful film and did have greater impact, on me anyway, due to how he shot it.

Given the prevalence of CG & the difficulty of getting real period boats & planes, I just assumed that Dunkirk had great CG. I was surprised and very impressed to see how much of it was practical when I saw the behind the scenes stuff.

 

[Winston T. Boogie]

To suggest that video gamers are willing to accept horribly fake cgi is absurd.

I was not suggesting that. All I was saying was that somebody exposed to a lot of CG probably is much more used to it. I don't really have an opinion on what is good CGI and what is bad. I look at it as a tool. I think if it used to enhance a scene or is used in a background or subtle manner it can be great. When the entire scene becomes CG and I become aware that there is no way on this earth that a camera could move with the objects in the frame the way it is moving...then I am not a fan.

Here's the thing, in a video game you are typically moving a character through an environment and as you do so the perspective is often constantly altering to show you different aspects of the surroundings. They don't really think about is this how a person with a camera would be capable of shooting the environment because that's not at all the point in the game. They want you to have these wild and interesting views of the environment they have created. That really works for a game, I think.

I don't absorb a movie the same way. I am admitting that my failure to enjoy or accept CG is based upon what I grew up experiencing in motion pictures. It's not a failure of the people that enjoy CGI, it is my failure.

If I am being critical of anyone, I am being critical of myself for not being able to enjoy it. I expect you or Edwin would be better judges for rating how good or bad the CGI is.

Look, basically as Edwin states, when a filmmaker sets out to make a film on the scale of something like the battle of Midway, they are going to have to make some choices on how they will accomplish that. CGI is the easiest solution.

Hey, the new Scorsese picture is going to be absolutely loaded with CGI and we'll see how that works. Hopefully, it works because a good third of the picture features the characters de-aged.

 

[Edwin-S]

In a film like Midway where they are using it to achieve the battle sequences and to give you a sense of scale...I don't like it.

CGI is the only way to give a sense of scale of battle In a film like this one is going to be. Dunkirk was good as a film but Nolan's use of a few boats did not, in any way, give a proper sense of the scale of the actual evacuation.

Edit: The only reason Nolan's film worked without CG is because he chose to focus on the micro level (characters) of the event rather than on the macro level (grand strategy).