Escape to the Movies: Prince of Persia

Vitor Goncalves

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Daveman said:
I really liked it and I thought the prince of the movie matched the prince of the game so I don't really care if it's historically accurate or whatever. I'd figure the people wanting realism would be more pissed of with the whole rewinding time thing. (Also I thought the original Persians were Caucasian anyway, can't remember where I heard that)

SUSPEND YOUR DISBELIEF.

I thought it was lots of fun because the free-running scenes were better than anything Bourne ever did and the sword fighting was better than... lots of things.

Also I heard loads of people saying it's like an analogy for the real middle east with "weapons... that don't turn out to be there... and a war justified on their presence" but frankly I didn't feel that coming through at all.

But yeah, I felt they made a great movie without tarnishing the name of my favourite video game plot ever.
THAT SAID the thing about "destiny" at the beginning and end. Anyone else think it was a shittier version of the "time is an ocean in a storm" speech from the game?


Also "Moviebob" IF THAT IS YOUR REAL NAME, wtf is wrong with the ending? I fucking loved it. It had a hint of cheese, balanced out with awesome seasoned on top and it fit with the plot.
They could have been caucasian or at least they were much more whitish the the original Middle East habitants. Some scholars say they were a mix of people from Central Asia and mountain tribes of the Caucase, therefore potentially with a good share of caucasoid profile.
And personally all Iranian people that I know (except the ones from SW of the country) are very similar to gypsy/romani, who are definitely caucasian, and apparently had originated in the same area.
And in fact all tribes that invaded Europe making Rome fall came from nearby areas too.

As for the ending, only explanation for MovieBob to not like it is, he was expecting it to be different from the game ending. And actually MovieBob, it was, or were you sleeping?!
In the game the villain doesn't die and that's what allows plot for the rest of the SoT trilogy.
 

rddj623

"Breathe Deep, Seek Peace"
Sep 28, 2009
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Cool I'm gonna go see it with my girlfriend when I visit her a month or so. :)

I liked the end of Lost, but I didn't LOVE the end of Lost. I can see why they did it, and how it makes sense, and yadda yadda, but I was hoping for something that I would love at the end. So much set up, not alot of actual follow through. Will I buy season six on dvd, yes. Will I go back periodically and rewatch the entirety of it, yes. Will it remain one of my all time favorite series, yes. Could the end have been better, oh god yes! It wasn't horrible, but it wasn't great either. Not like the end of ST:TNG which I loved!
 

Chunko

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MovieBob said:
Prince of Persia

This week MovieBob takes a look at Alad...errr...I mean Prince of Persia.

For more from MovieBob, check out Intermission [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/columns/moviebob/7615-Stealing-From-the-Next-Generation].

Be sure to join Escape to the Movies Facebook Fan Page here [http://www.facebook.com/pages/Escape-to-the-Movies/374853431247].

Watch Video
Can someone tell me if this has any spoilers in it? (I haven't played the game).
 

mchoueiri

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I am looking forward to seeing it since I am a fan of the SOT story line and Think those are the best prince of persia games. Also one more thing screw lost that show sucks.
 

JFSOCC

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Max Payne was the first good movie based on a game.
Once again Bob managed to completely miss the point and act self-important while doing the point-missing thing.
Edit: And also make several factual errors.
 

Ericb

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The whitewashing thing really feels heavyhanded, though it does kinda weigh on the suspension of disbelief having so many people not looking quite middle-eastern around in a clearly middle-eastern setting.

But hey, it's still a Disney movie, so no surprises there.

And both Ben Kingsley and Gyllenhall are interesting actors.

... Bob, what about the Silent Hill movie? You could review the hell out of that one, eh?

RTR said:
So you didn't like the ending to Lost, eh?
Lol, MovieBob should really do a review about that, though I don't know if tv critique is his thing.

I didn't like it either, but was still worthwhile, there's too much quality there to write the entire series off on account of a cop out finale.

Some net critic said it best: "I still rather watch a good show with a bad ending than to watch a bad show."
 

howdyoldbuddyoldpal

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May 28, 2010
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Grand_Pamplemousse said:
Lost was just dragged out too long.

If any one watches British TV we just had an amazing series end, called Ashes to Ashes. The ending wasn't a cop out and it was actually really very good.
This is exactly what I was thinking. Also, I can't believe I thought the ending of Ashes to Ashes was sappy because a few characters say goodbye in the last 2 minutes. It was like the ending of resevoir dogs compared to Lost. And the ending made more sense, probably because the writers of Life on Mars knew how they were going to end it way back when they started and wrote the show accordingly, instead of the Lost method of writing, where you make it up as you go along.

Anyway, the Tomb Raider movies were good, weren't they? Where are they on the Transformers - Iron man scale?
 

2012 Wont Happen

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That's interesting. I had assumed that, as a pg-13 movie made by Disney out of a videogame that, in my mind, should have been rated R and done by anyone but Disney would be bad. It seems like it was pretty good then.
 

Xombiebubble

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Generally in cinema, characters speaking in british accents while not being british is to signify that they are speaking a foreign language.
 

Badassassin

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Jan 16, 2010
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The thing about the british accent is that... THEY ALL HAVE BRITISH ACCENTS IN THE GAME! except for 2008 when they all sounded like whiny "american 20 somethings enjoying a frappacino" to quote yahtzee. so no big deal there for me. but i haven't seen it yet so I guess I will as long as it's not ruining my favorite game franchise
 

Tharwen

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May 7, 2009
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Is it just the US that spells the adjective form of 'climax' with that second 'c', or can I just not spell?

Also: Woohoo, a good game movie!
 

JS ibanez

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Jan 12, 2010
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Overall I was pretty impressed. It was actually rather enjoyable. If you've played assassins creed and prince of persia you'll appreciate the film alot more as it gives little nods here and there and shows you all the good parts of those games. Which is basically what I wanted from the film.
 

CK76

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Sep 25, 2009
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Is it is not terrible I am happy, love that game series so a competent film is fine by me.
 

zelda2fanboy

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Technically, all the Dharma Initiative stuff was integral to Lost because
it could be argued that the sideways reality seen in the last season was created by the detonation of a bomb in the 1970s that permanently altered history in thousands of seen and unseen ways. Hence all the character differences, the numerous people still alive, and Michael and Walt not being there. Well, that and Walt is no longer an 8 year old in real life. The point is that they hyped up the religious/friendship element to make it seem more ambiguous.
 

dunnace

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I suppose that climatic moment we all want will come from a movie of a game that actually warrants a movie. Something like MGS or Bioshock, games with textured plots. Of course both those games would need about 4 hours to tell just one of their stories but still.
 

BatOtaku13

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oh come on the lost ending was brilliant! (i'm not being sarcastic in any way) if they had explained everything on the island, people would have just bitched about that ending too. besides, lost has always at its heart been about the emotional journey of its characters who just happen to be on an island where a smoke monster and an immortal have a duel of ideologies and time travel.

oh yeah, and the POP movie i was shocked actually being legitimately good. the only real issue i had with it was the princess character being given absolutely nothing to do besides telling jake "we must go here to secure the dagger," a million different times.
 

Ian S

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Aug 31, 2009
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Probably going to go see it. From your review, it looks like it was going to be as good as I thought it was going to be.

I just don't understand one thing, Bob. On one hand you don't seem to mind that the movie's a throwback to stuff like 7th Voyage of Sinbad, The Thief of Baghdad, or Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, and seemed to enjoy it, yet later you seem to fault it for the very same reason. It's confusing to have someone alternately praise and damn a film for the same reason.

RE: the "whitewashing." Don't care. Like others have said, it's a fantasy film, ergo it shouldn't really be striving for historic authenticity. I'm pretty happy with the casting and could care less if they were Persian or not.

As for the whole English accent thing, personally I believe the reason they chose to do that was simply because Hollywood thinks for some reason that if you're doing a period piece that isn't set in the U.S., having everyone go around speaking with an English accent somehow makes it seem "classy." Also because everyone in the PoP games also spoke with an English accent.

As to Lost: Don't care about that either and glad I didn't see it. I'm one of those people that was initially interested in it and stuck with it for the first few seasons, but the glacial pacing and the constant flashbacks annoyed me, and when it looked as if the writers were just pulling stuff out of their asses and didn't look like they had a coherent overall plan for the show, I just gave up on it. I had a feeling the finale would probably end up something like this and piss off a lot of people who had invested in the show, and it looks like I was right. I gave up on the rebooted Battlestar Galactica for similar reasons (specifically when they started referencing "All Along the Watchtower). And after having heard how the finale on that turned out, I was glad I jumped ship on that too. There's a point when a show stops being entertaining and starts getting pretentious and too caught up in itself, and it looks like that's what happened with both shows.

BTW, still waiting for your take on The Human Centipede, Bob. I'll tell you I finally found the courage to see it last weekend, and yes it is as sick, twisted and disturbing as the trailer made it out to be. But on the whole, I can't really completely dismiss it. Like you did with Jackie Earle Haley in Nightmare on Elm Street, I have to kind of isolate the performances of the two main actors Dieter Laser and Ashley Williams as they were great, even if the movie itself was the vilest thing ever committed to celluloid. But I'd be interested in hearing your opinion of it.
 

RMcD94

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Nov 25, 2009
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I think I'll be watching it. I thought I posted in the last comments about the English flag, but apparently I didn't. I'm Scottish and I'm annoyed by it.