Thread for Luc Besson's new comic book movie: Valerian

the irony is that besson made this film -- of one his very favourite comics as a youngster -- bcz he hired mézières for the fifth element and mézières said (something along the lines of) "why are you filming this PoS, you shd make something good, like oh for example valérian and laureline??"and now it's been made and it totally makes valérian and laureline seem crappier than the fifth element

(tho admittedly V&tCoaTP does look good)

(but *boy* does it cry out for thesping of the by-contrast stellar standards of bwillis and mjovovich)

(yes, mh, the second is my alternative unsinister explanation. the killbots did it: i prefer the all-harmonious-hippies-are-actually-manson version tho)

on a side note, I was mentioning to someone I was with at this film who said something about the Fifth Element's computer animation that that particular film actually used nearly exclusively practical effects, which lead me to dig this up: http://www.metafilter.com/165553/Leeloo-Dallas-Multipass#6952794

there are some very large copies of the matte paintings used for backgrounds and some bits that flesh out the film's backstory

Heard some crazy person say Chris Tucker ruined Fifth Element. I think he was by far the best thing about it.

i hated chris tucker in that movie and he totally ruined that movie for me.

i wasn't that big a fan of the movie before he showed up though.

^^^crazy person

Fifth Element sucks for so many reasons - Willis, Tucker, the dialogue/script - and it's only redeeming quality is all the Moebius design-work, which you can just get from his comics anyway.

^^^always wrong

if hating Besson is wrong, I don't wanna be right

cool bcz you're not right

The two problems in the fifth element are the opera / fight sequence and the premature death of gary oldman's character.

at least milla got to redeem herself with my beloved resident evil sextet of fine films.

sometimes you get a second chance in life to get something right.

and to be fair to bruce willis, after the fifth element came out he made over 50 movies and i saw some of them.

milla is tremendous in the messenger

I'm curious as to how long ago people last saw The Fifth Element - we all (including me) like to think we've been woke af forever, but it's pretty hard to watch Chris Tucker in it these days.

The rest of the film is great of course - Valerian is both very good and very bad, but frankly is worth it just for shaming everyone else who makes "3D" films.

I like Moebius but I don't like Fifth Element apart from Chris Tucker. Haven't seen it in a decade though.

I also get pretty hard watching Chris Tucker in Fifth Element.

Watched "Fifth Element" for the first time in years a few nights ago. It's tougher going nowadays let me tell ya. I know Moebius worked on the designs etc, but it seems incredibly cheesy now - and I adore Giraud/Moebius and never find him cheesy.

Jean-Claude Méziėres, aka the artist of Valérian & Laureline comics, also did designs for Fifth Element, and imo his influence is more obvious on it than Moebius', especially now that you can compare it to this movie, where Besson is directly adapting his concepts.

Whoops, I noticed Mark S said pretty much the same thing upthread, sorry about that.

Anyway, I watched this movie, agree with everyone who says the plot is corny and the dialogue feels completely unnatural, but the visuals are nice. I'm usually all for adaptations being they're own thing, but imo this movie sucks the most when it diverges furthest from the source material. In the comics Valérian and Laureline have an interesting love/hate/professional partnership/relationship that feels mature, but here that's reduced to adolescent bickering and oddly old-fashioned gender politics: Valérian's score list, his totally out-of-place proposal, Laureline becoming a damsel in distress that Valérian needs to save, even though in the comics is usually the other way around, etc.

All the glimpses of Alpha's various cultures (which are way too short, I would've rather preferred if the movie was just V & L taking a tour through the station rather the plot we got) and the scenes lifted straight from the comics, such as Laureline pushing her head inside the psychic jellyfish were cool, but the stuff Besson came up with himself, not so much... It's notable that the one major alien race which was not taken from the comics, the Pearls, are a Na'vi style cliché of the noble savage; the comics never depicted their various aliens races in such reductionist ways.

Excellent post, Tuomas

the fifth element is on uk tv right now and as usual as i am watching it

mool tee pass

this is coming out on on-demand in November.

About the usual turnaround.

where's the demand though

it's on

will def watch if netflix gets it

Watched it on the plane ride home last night. Branching off from what Tuomas said upthread, it does feel like the original comic was just copy/pasted over a dumb tech vs. noble savage / cosmic wizard trope. I had never invested much time in the comic but I always liked what I read. Still I ended up liking this more than The Fifth Element, but I can't help but feel that this was missed opportunity.

Good lord what a mess. There is so much too look at, but it just feels like a bunch of really imaginative, disconnected shorts, with no stakes at all.

I feel like this is the inevitable result of letting a desire to make a film cook for way too long, without ever having an idea of the overall story the film should tell. It really made me think about how many little choices made The Fifth Element work despite itself - casting choices above all, but having a memorable soundtrack and actual jokes meant a lot. Here you have Dane DeHaan as Spaceman Spicoli, who is as dull as they come, a completely wasted turn by Delevingne who deserves much better opportunities imho, and then a bunch of other throwaway performances by famous people who were probably expensive.

The whole shortcut / chase sequence, that looked so cool in the previews, is kind of when you realize the decently entertaining first act was a ruse and you've already seen almost everything the movie has to offer. I don't care what happens to Valerian, nobody is chasing him, hell, the people he's chasing aren't even shooting at him! And the whole reason is because his asshole commander, who is obviously the villain, has been kidnapped and he is duty bound to give chase. In a different movie, then, Valerian is that nameless, dogged cop who our heroes can't seem to lose until some random accident takes out his car or they manage to speed across the tracks just in front of an oncoming coal train. I don't care about that cop.

But he was two days away from retirement etc etc. MENDOZAAAAAAA

But he survives! To return as the guy who argues with the smarter, more attractive cop, about why the heroes can’t be saved from their asshole boss, because reasons.

Why all the put-on accents? I feel like John Goodman and Herbie Hancock are the only people who mostly just sound like themselves. Clive Owen might not be doing an “accent” but he’s being stentorian the whole time so it’s as if

And if we’re going to have an obvious villain like that why fix what was never broken? Have a pasty guy with mock prosthetics ramble and rave like Jerry Falwell. It just works!

a completely wasted turn by Delevingne who deserves much better opportunities imho

What?!? The less I see of her the happier I will be. Intensely irritating.

Looks like you win this round, then

I think it could've been better if Rihanna and Delevigne had swapped roles.

Glad I'm not the only person that thought that...

The women were not the problem with this movie.

You could imagine a thousand planets’ worth of different casting decisions for all the female parts in this movie and none of them could address the issue of the title character being written as a schmo and played by Derp DuHuur

Also if you wanna be woke about Rihanna movies let’s get down about BATTLESHIP already, now there’s a completely underrated future cult classic and I’m not even kidding.

that was stated to me in person during the week fyi now im curious

Don't be, it's a load of USA! USA! shit.

it's fascinating sci-fi and raises important questions about what first contact might actually be like, while celebrating the overwhelming naval supremacy of a bunch of people who would literally never be caught dead in the US Navy, much less make it through basic

the casting in retrospect is truly amazing, and that's before you even get to all the other truly bizarre decisions that got tossed into the stone soup. I'd make one of my stock bullet lists here but it would just spoil things and this is one case where I don't want to

This wasn't (entirely) terrible! Mashup of Barbarella, Avatar and Star Wars, and I frankly think it did the Native American and/or Vietnam metaphor better than Avatar (tho with some wobbling).

OTOH you have our dewy ex-model leads beating up Clive Owen. (Cara Delevingne sells the sub-Thin Man badinage better than DeHaan, and don't get me started on his pseudo-deep voice; Christian Bale, you have much to answer for.)

I enjoyed the trio of approximately Semitic anteater hustlers cuz that's the kind of unwoke guy I am.

(btw this is the first Besson film i've watched)