Giving a look to Bradbury's film for the first time, Sound of Thunder, and... I'm impressed.
Far better than what I was led to believe from all the negative stuff I've read. So what if an 'L' train in Chicago in the year 2055 looks a little tacky. There's a whole city of traffic that looks effective enough. And many elsewheres. I can see where much money went into the computer graphics. A lot of good stuff. The story, tho different from Ray's, is still pretty gosh darn good.
I see it's doing a good rental business in local Hollywood Video stores. With the company that produced it going bankrupt during editing of the film, that likely had to do a lot with the limited release. Certainly did with the promotion of the film. Limited budget from the failing finances of the company.
I can see where Ray liked this film. I liked it as well. It's far better than you may think. I regret now I didn't get myself quickly to see this one at the theater.
14 February 2007, 01:21 AM
philnic
I have seen it twice now: once as a very quick viewing (with a fair bit of skipping), and once as a proper sit-down-and-watch-without-interruptions viewing.
I tend to agree with Nard, that it's not such a bad film after all. I do think it has some really lousy scientific concepts in it, and all that mumbo-jumbo about waves of time (which are depicted as travelling through space) has no internal logic or consistency.
Some of the special effects of characters walking through the streets with CGI cars behind them look very poor, but most of the dinosaur stuff and plot-related stuff looks OK (on a TV screen at least).
The section with the lion seems completely wrongheaded to me, tending to give the viewer the idea that this is a movie about DNA. Very misleading, and confusing.
I think the biggest weakness is the lack of any real characters. At least the short story has Eckels, a weasily, cowardly man who gets his comeuppance. The film lets Eckels off the hook and has someone else step on the butterfly.
On reflection, this is far from being the worst Bradbury adaptation, but it does throw away a lot of the great stuff in the original story.
(Where I live, people actually address men as "Chap" - as in "Excuse me, chap, could you tell me the time, please?" It's a regional dialect thing, and tends to be used only by older men.)
You’re a dear chap for saying so, philnic. Speaking of dialects:
Me Misses tells me the muffin boy has just been by and the “kittles just a-biling, and the cups and sarsers ready laid.”
16 February 2007, 06:58 AM
Braling II
Mrs. Walker, is it?
16 February 2007, 11:18 AM
Chapter 31
Braling II, Wow! You picked up on that? Very impressive. I couldn’t have done the same. I’ve read a lot of Dickens but have only just touched on Boz.
16 February 2007, 11:48 AM
Braling II
Chap, I have my sources! Besides, I think you and I have some common historical influences; after all, who remembers Crusader Rabbit?
16 February 2007, 05:05 PM
biplane1
Speaking of The Sound of Thunder I was flipping through one of the HBO channels the other evening and couldn't believe when I ran across the last ten minutes of Ray's movie.
CAn you imagine that--it has skipped Video and gone straight to HBO. And what I saw was not the best, I am afraid to say.
Did I mention this on anohther thread? Hmmmm! The Sound of Thunder
16 February 2007, 10:39 PM
Chapter 31
Who remembers Crusader Rabbit? Why, Clutch Cargo remembers.
16 February 2007, 10:44 PM
Braling II
...with Spinner and Paddlefoot! (That cartoon gave some kids nightmares - real mouths superimposed on barely animated faces...)
17 April 2008, 11:09 AM
Phil Knox
So, what came first, chicken or the egg? In this case, the Butterfly Effect, or A Sound of Thunder?