"Oh Benson, you are so free of the ravishes of intelligence" ^ I like that line. I use it on people I know. Well, anyway, I decided to sit down and watch this film today to see if it's worthy of a re-purchase in the future, in the Blu-Ray format. If I didn't watch it today, I would have probably made the mistake of just going ahead and buying it again because I like films of the Sci-Fi fantasy genre. But, as movies get older and older, and we've watched them several times over the past 20 plus years, we begin to realize that we know every next scene, and we learn that it wasn't as great as when we were unprepared for the next scene. This movie has some great dark mid-eval scenery, but Terry Gilliam is famous for that. I still appreciated Terry Gilliam's work at this time, because he is surely extremely strange and bizarre to me lately ("Tideland", "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas", "12 Monkeys"). Not like his earlier Monty Python days where I appreciate a single step or two into the strange and bizarre. He's way weird to me know.
Anyway, "Time Bandits" is a semi-child fantasy that gets less interesting every time I watch it again, so I doubt that I will be repurchasing this as a Blu-Ray DVD in the future because, although I'd like to see it in a more realistic visual high definition experience, it's still the strange story that Terry Gilliam wrote back then. My favorite scene in the film is in chapter 17 when they were in the cage and they cut string from the support rope of the suspended cage and made a few ropes to make an interesting, well calculated, escape from the suspended cage. But, when we get nearer to the end of the film, we gotta wonder, did Terry Gilliam have this whole story written before he started filming, or did he just start adding things because he came to a stand-still of where to go next?
He probably thought, "Let me think here, just to throw something bizarre and off-the-wall here, let me have Randall bust through the wall with a Sherman tank from the 1940's. Let me see what that suggests to me so that I can finally work on an end to this movie sometime within the next 15 minutes or so. I'm out of ideas about how to keep this story interesting so let me try to slap things together so I can get this semi-bored audience on their way home soon."
I guess what I'm saying here is the story was sort of interesting when it started, but it started to lose it's charm when "Evil" got the map and now they must work on a reclamation and a conclusion.
Anyway, this is probably a movie that I have on DVD that would probably look great on Blu-ray Hi-Definition, but it is certainly not one of the first Blu-Ray discs that I would run out and buy. I made an expense vow that I plan to stick to. I will only replace my absolute favorite movies (which are about 60 of my 500+ movies) at any price under $30. But, anything else that I already have on DVD that's not incredibly fantastic, I will only buy the new Blu-ray version if it's $9.99 or less. I have to initiate a discipline for myself so I don't go wasting my money on replacing movies that I'll just watch again, once more maybe, and then have it just sit on my DVD shelf as a part of a proud collection that may never be watched again anytime soon.
I'm definitely going to be very selective of how I buy Blu-Ray discs. I've bought just 8 in the past year and I still don't have a Blu-Ray disc player. I'm just not that anxious to buy a Blu-ray disc player although I know I've bought some Blu-Ray discs where I'd like to someday see a better quality picture of a film that I truly enjoy.. When I eventually own about 25 or 30 Blu-Ray discs, I may then go out and buy my first Blu-Ray disc player. I must maintain discipline on my Blu-Ray disc expenses! It's very important that I live this way for my movie library. Because, before you know it, they will eventually come out with something better than Blu-ray, like 1500p resolution. You know, that's not too far-fetched to imagine. Blu-Ray is simply not the end to improved video quality. I hope you all know that.
"I am the Supreme Being, I'm not entirely dim." That's another great line from this movie.
rather disappointing, but has its moments ^ For what it's worth, this is kid slapstick sci-fi. My son (10) was definitely able to go with it and found a lot of the antics very funny. Unfortunately, I simply wasn't able to let myself believe for the time that I watched it, but instead looked at it as a canned set piece made up by someone.
That being said, there are lots of Gilliam adds in many details that makes this special and worth seeing. My son and I laughed at the way the giant scraped his enormous posterior on the ground. THe character cameos are also hilarious, from Sean Connery as the blithely doomed Agamemnon to Iain Holm's self-obsessed Napoleon.
However, I doubt this will become a favorite in our household. Recommended.
A Wild Ride and a Lot of Fun ^ That's it. A great movie! Roshomon it ain't but it is DEFINITELY worth the price and the time spent viewing it. I guarantee you will watch it more than once.
Funny ^ I hadnt seen this movie in ages. Still had me rolling on the floor laughing. Even kept the kids quite
TIME BANDITS ^ IF YOU LIKED THE MOVIE MANY MANY YEARS AGO, THEN IT'S GOOD TO HAVE. I PERSONALLY THINK IT'S CHEESY BUT MY HUSBAND LOVES IT...
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