Last night (Saturday, May 1st since I’m writing and posting this on Sunday May 2nd) I took the little one to see Océans. And in one respect, it was a huge disappointment. I’m not entirely certain what a bunch of fish swimming around and eating each other has to do with pulling off elaborate casino vault heists. George Clooney and Brad Pitt are nowhere to be found in this prequel to the original Oceans trilogy, which for the uninitiated were parts 11, 12, and 13 of the saga.
It seems there is a trend developing as of late in the ever pervasive Hollywood affinity for sequels, prequels, and remakes. This is to say that they are now making films that bear almost no resemblance to the original. A lot of people were really disappointed with Roland Emmerich’s 2012. While I really liked that movie — it takes as many opportunities as it can to blow shit up — I can see why some would be unhappy with it. Hal 9000 is nowhere to be found in that movie. It almost completely forgets the stuff that was done in 2010: The Year We Make Contact. At the end of that movie, Jupiter becomes a second star within the solar system. How fucking cool is that? The destruction in 2012 happens because of some solar winds or some shit like that. It would have made so much more sense to have this second star be the cause of all the destruction.
Seeing this new movie Océans, makes me long for what it was like way back in 2001 when Hollywood was still making movies that weren’t sequels, remakes, or based on Marvel comic book characters. Back then guys like Steven Spielberg and George Clooney could actually get together to make a completely original film like Oceans 11 with studio backing and get people to come see it. Nowadays, if Iron Man and Wolverine ain’t in it, or if it isn’t a remake of some old ass movie from the 80s, nobody cares.
If you can get past the fact that this has nothing to do with the Oceans OT and can stomach paying $9 for shit you could have watched on the Discovery Channel, Océans isn’t so bad. For one thing none of the animals talk. I’m okay with movies where animals talk, but if them not talking also means they ain’t singing that’s a win-win.
It’s pretty impressive how these underwater photographers are able to get these animals to perform. Whenever I take my video camera and just photograph people, I get lots of people (usually chicks) who put their hand up so as to obscure their 
face. I guess that’s the nice thing about filming dolphins, they don’t have hands. On the opposite end I get the douchebag who insists on sticking his mug in my camera and saying “Hi, mom” or some shit like that. I’m trying to capture reality and they’re fucking it up with their bullshit.
It’s also a good thing they got a different director for this particular prequel. There’s a couple of scenes where a diver is swimming alongside a shark and they’re all acting like they’re buddies. If Spielberg had directed it, you can be damn sure that shark would have eaten his ass. Okay so that might have been more entertaining, but every once in a while I like to see the people win.