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Mulan - Drunk Monk - 10-27-2005
Yeah, ok, I watched it again with Tara for the bazillionth time. Tara is going as Mulan for Halloween. We got the official Disney costume for her. Anyway, reporting from viewing bazillion and one, I must say that it still holds up. Mulan is one of the last great Disney films - the pick of the litter of the last decade or so. HK, that hill charge gets me every time - I can just keep watching it over and over. Still haven't seen your name in the credits, tho - so many credits and I always forget to look. I'm much happier Tara chose Mulan over all the other Disney princesses (last year, she was just a generic princess).
As a side note, next year we are getting in bed with the mouse by coordinating a circuit championships for their martial arts championship. I was thinking it might be interesting to do a piece on Mulan for the mag or e-zine. I have access to the woman who was motion-captured for Mulan's fight sequences. Maybe with some reflections from an animator, I could cobble something together. Just thinking out loud now...
Whoa! - Haggis Killer - 10-27-2005
Steady there, partner. Nobody got mo-capped for Mulan animation. Filmed for reference, but not the other never-to-be-mentioned-again abomination.
Bleah! Leaves a bad taste on my fingers. There's a big schism about animation vs mc. Did you see Polar Expressionless? MC is purported to do the work of the animators, but it doesn't really. It's something different and not equal. For Mulan, there wasn't a digital version of her in the film anyway, so MC'ing a performance would have been wasted money. Not to say money wasn't wasted, just not wasted on that. 2D pencil animators, in particular, hate MC because it's only reality and 2D animation uses exaggeration of realism to convey performance and motion. Of course, computer animators hate MC even more, because Producers think it's a way of doing away with their jobs. It's not, but Producers have spent TONS of money mired in their besotted beliefs. Again, have you seen Polar Expressionless?
Rant off.
Yeah, I'm in the credits, but you have to look under the header "Additional Production Support". I was the Digital Production Manager for a shade under a year, and that didn't get me on the list for my actual job description. I had to remind the Producer that I'd done the job, and that's where they put me. I spent a lot of time making schedules for that downhill charge, by the way. It made me look like this:
:?
my bad - Drunk Monk - 10-27-2005
I didn't realize motion capture was such a specific term. Video referenced is what I wanted to say - see our cover story on Mimi Chan http://ezine.kungfumagazine.com/magazine/article.php?article=118.
To hate something "because it's only reality" is hilarious. You quirky animators. I did see Polar Express - didn't we discuss this in that old dead forum of ours? Anyway, Mulan is still fun and I can't wait to see Barbie 3-D.
More Polar Express - Greg_phpbb3_import1 - 10-27-2005
I didn't see it. It was the worst of both worlds. It looked like bad animation and they didn't build any sets. This way Zemeckis can piss off the film world and their kid brothers in the animation world. For Good measure, Tom Hanks did five of the roles.
He's got another one in the pipeline, I just can't recall it's name
Mulan - Drunk Monk - 01-05-2010
So China just put out a live version of Mulan starring one of my fav actresses, Vicky Zhao Wei. It's a sweeping period epic, the sort that China is specializing in right now: vast panoramic landscapes, ornate armor, battles with hundreds, if not thousands, of extras (extras are cheaper than CGI in China), artsy cinematography, mythic tales. If you haven't seen one of these yet, you really should. Now, I'm kind of numb to them. We last saw Zhao Wei in Painted Skin and Red Cliff, both of which she was a scene stealer extraordinaire. Here she was the lead.
In a nutshell, Mulan needed less crying and more ass kicking.
It's freakishly close to Disney's Mulan. The horse, her dad, some of her friends in the army, the almost busted bathing scene - there are lots of places where it's uncomfortably similar. The beginning and end were so much alike that I kept looking for Mushu and Cri-Kee. The middle is totally different. Mulan is outed much earlier, which is more loyal to the legend and works better (why can't those stupid soldier tell Mulan is a hot chick? She's even got eyeshadow on!) The Huns are wonderfully goth, decorated in bones and treachery. There's some great battle stuff, but not enough for my tastes (too much to share with Tara though). There's even the Huns on the ridge scene and an avalanche of sorts, although its actually a sirocco, but the effect is the same.
The film was a tad too Ashes of Time for me, too brooding, too many fade outs to white, which were glaringly harsh since most of the film is cast in earth tones with rich blue and purple costumes. I was hoping that it would go into some Mulan legends but no. There's this great legend of how Mulan defeats an army by tying lamps to goats and sending them on a mountain - the enemy is tricked into thinking Mulan's troops were scaling the mountain and expose themselves to her surprise attack. There are several great legends like this that remained unexplored. Instead, it dwells on how much is sucks to fight ruthless Mongol hordes that greatly outnumber your troops in the desert.
And Vicky, with her freakishly huge eyes, cries way too much. Mulan was not a crybaby. That so didn't work for me, even though I love Vicky and her big tearful eyes. She's way too weak for Mulan. As Mush would say, she spoils it all with her 'girly ways'. If you want to see Vicky as a powerful cross-dressing warrior, check out Red Cliff.
Note that my version only had Mandarin subtitles, and my Mandarin is super rusty, but I feel I got most of the story.
Re: Mulan - Greg_phpbb3_import1 - 01-05-2010
Yeah, my Mandarin is really rusty, too. If only it had been in Cantonese. Then I would so line up for this.
Time for you to collate all those Mulan myths into Mulan 2 for Disney.
Re: Mulan - Dr. Ivor Yeti - 01-06-2010
Or a French musical: Mulan Rouge...
Disney already did Mulan 2 - Drunk Monk - 01-06-2010
[youtube]7ad_yXQsfA0[/youtube]
it sucked so bad, they couldn't even get murphy back as mushu.
Re: Mulan - Greg_phpbb3_import1 - 01-06-2010
I guess we are going with Mulan Rouge then.
One more thing... - Drunk Monk - 01-06-2010
Jaycee Chan is in Mulan. Jaycee as in J.C. (Jackie Chan). He's actually really good in it. He was my favorite character of the film.
I thought I was headed into the Shaolin zone with the first of the year, but I seem to be taking this short detour into Jackie Chan land. :?
Re: Mulan - Greg_phpbb3_import1 - 01-06-2010
JC is a tease.