Just watched "Kite Runner" tonight

Saw it on HD cable finally. What a GREAT movie! It's rare that a movie is moving enough that it makes me angry and pissed off to these extreme proportions. I'm sure my mood will improve soon, but this one is a MUST SEE in my opinion. I'm surprised it didn't cause more controversy and a bunch of radical err... "fundamentalists" aren't calling for the death of everyone involved in this film. And let me get this straight, it was a Chinese film? LOL Naw... I don't believe it.

the story is preposterous and contrived in the extreme. a bookish novelist becomes james bond and manages to escape afghanistan with a young boy w/o being stopped by customs agents either in afghanistan or any other country on his way back to america? yeah, right.

posters5, you're right. Best you stick with what you can relate to... like Spiderman 3 and Iron Man. Like who would believe you could cross into Pakistan with a simple bribe of American money! Next thing you know, movies like this will make people think that the actual Taliban and even Bin Laden himself can cross that border so easily!

As I said, best to stick to mainstream Hollywood dude, if it's all you understand.

About a year ago, I was visiting with the film editor of "The Kite Runner" (he's an old friend and former student) while he was putting the finishing touches on the movie. I couldn't help kidding him about my having read the book and finding it pretty melodramatic and far-fetched. I know it was a best-seller, but I told him I hoped he and Marc (Forster) were making it a little more believeable. Sometimes, a movie forcing more conciseness on a story line helps because by cutting out the whole last third of the novel, Marc and Matt really did make what I thought was a better movie than the book.

I was still torn about the film, though. There are parts of it that, as Skyhawk says, are gripping and touching and heart-wrenching. But the monumental series of coincidences that occur in the plot as the author tries to cram all of the pain and suffering of the Afghan people in the past thirty years into a single story does push its credibility.

Maybe "The Kite Runner" was good practice, however, for their current project, "Quantas of Australia," er "Quanta of Solisti," or "Quotient of ..." Well, the new Bond. They can exaggerate all they want there.

John

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[Post edited by John J. Puccio on Oct 17, 2008]

skyhawk,

i don't know why you accused me of being a hollywood fanboy. i hate overblown blockbusters and am one of the naysayers at dvdtown who pissed all over chris nolan's "batman begins" and "the dark knight".

do a little bit of research before you fire blindly. right now, you sound like george w. bush talking about WMDs in iraq.

skyhawk ,

I have known Eddie for quite some time. And I can say that you have misunderstood him. He is one person who deeply respects anything good that comes out from Asia and Middle east. He hates mainstream/blockbuster hollywood. Check out his reviews on 2 towers:LOTR and you will see what I mean. And yes I agree with Eddie "The Dark Knight" is overrated piece of crap ! doh ! And Iron Man sucks !

Kite Runner was brilliant! I loved the book, and thought the movie was a good adaptation. Event hough some stuff was missed or re-written. Like the tree in the brush, but whatever. I read the book over two years ago, and actually wondered if they were going to do a movie. Well sure enough they did. I really found Kite Runner a great modern story. It was heavily underrated. I bought the DVD the day it came out. I can't believe a video snob like Skyhawk waited till HD Cable movies came on the Rogers HD service... Truly sad...

I wasn't a big fan of Kite Runner either, but let's be honest. Eddie would only like it if it starred Matt Damon.

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[Post edited by posters5 on Oct 18, 2008]

Why all the fuss? It's a movie, it's a well photographed lie...plus, how many more coincidences than Spidey 3 can it have??

(BTW, it's already on my queue...)