Random things on your mind..

[Alex99]

2 and a half men is alright in isolation, but Channel 9 have destroyed it by showing it 300 times a week.

So why watch every episode that is on?

Watch the new episodes and avoid watching the repeats. Pretty simple way of avoiding the repetition of the show.

 

[jo172]

2 and a half men would have to claim the title of the worst show on television.

But to say all American TV is crap is just folly. Take How I Met Your Mother, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, The Office, Parks and Recreation, Scrubs and Entourage as good, funny American telly

 

[Alex99]

2 and a half men would have to claim the title of the worst show on television.

But to say all American TV is crap is just folly. Take How I Met Your Mother, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, The Office, Parks and Recreation, Scrubs and Entourage as good, funny American telly

Clearly it’s not, simply for the enormous amounts of times it’s on. If it wasn’t any good, no one would watch it, if no one watched it – it would get axed.

 

[jo172]

Clearly it’s not, simply for the enormous amounts of times it’s on. If it wasn’t any good, no one would watch it, if no one watched it – it would get axed.

I reject the premise that good and popular are the same thing.

Take shows like The Sopranos, The West Wing, The Wire and Arrested Development, some of the best shows of the past decade which could never find an audience.

 

[Vader]

And what British comedy do you claim are funny?

Men Behaving Badly was funny – 10 years ago, Absolutely Fabulous? Yeah, na – not funny.

Little Britain was comedy gold in the first year and a half – now it’s just vulgar and grotesque toilet humour.

I must admit, there hasn't been a lot to laugh about even from the UK in the last 5 years. Right now the best they have to offer is probably Peep Show - and it's not terribly funny at all.

Most of the best British sitcoms are from the 70s-90s, as listed in many of the previous posts in this thread.

 

[Alex99]

I reject the premise that good and popular are the same thing.

Take shows like The Sopranos, The West Wing, The Wire and Arrested Development, some of the best shows of the past decade which could never find an audience.

I agree with that, ‘good’ and ‘popular’ is not the same thing, perfect example is that 7pm report. Crap show but many people seem to love it. Why?

But I disagree that 2 and ½ men is the worse show on TV.

I also agree it’s a shame that some shows cannot find an audience and get canned well before they are due.

 

[Alex99]

I must admit, there hasn't been a lot to laugh about even from the UK in the last 5 years. Right now the best they have to offer is probably Peep Show - and it's not terribly funny at all.

Most of the best British sitcoms are from the 70s-90s, as listed in many of the previous posts in this thread.

But does this have more to do with your dislike of the American culture than actually enjoying British humour? TV shows, American sport...just surmising but there seems to be a bit of a pattern occurring.

apologies if wrong.

 

[Vader]

But does this have more to do with your dislike of the American culture than actually enjoying British humour? TV shows, American sport...just surmising but there seems to be a bit of a pattern occurring.

apologies if wrong.

I don't think so, but I understand where you're coming from. No apology necessary.

In part, I think the yanks have a different sense of humour to the average Australian. We're more similar culturally to the poms, which probably has a lot to do with our history.

Presumably someone in the US thinks that 2 1/2 men is actually funny - it keeps getting renewed year after year, though the name is now pretty much wrong as the kid is all grown up. Then again, maybe it's just the star-power of Charlie Sheen?

I'm just a bit parochial when it comes to my sporting tastes - I grew up on Aussie Rules and it's definitely my first love. Living in Canberra I have Rugby League rammed down my throat by Ch Nein. State of Origin is good, though I always barrack for the refs, having no allegiance to either NSW or QLD, but I'd rather have my teeth pulled than watch a club level game. Soccer just sends me to sleep - there's something fundamentally wrong with a game where 0-0 is a legitimate scoreline (and the most common result) after 90 min of play. Yes, it's highly skilfull and tactical - but God it's boring!

I must confess that I've never spent much time watching Gridiron - but once again, I struggle to see how it can be exciting when 40 min of play is dragged out over almost 3 hours due to the constant stop-start nature of the game.

Basketball just doesn't excite me and never has, even at the height of the Air Jordan craze. Doesn't matter whether it's Australian or American, I just don't care for the sport.

Baseball is just what the yanks play because they're too dumb to understand cricket.

If it were the result of a cultural cringe, surely I'd like Australian comedies? The problem is that we haven't made any good ones in years. The last successful sitcom we made was Hey Dad, since then it's mostly been sketch comedy - and the last decent one of those was Fast Forward/Full Frontal. Australian comedy has been dead or dying for almost 20 years now.

 

[magtrev]

Not just comedy, entertainment in general (bar The Castle).

I've given up on Australian movies alltogether, I just refuse to see them. And locally produced content on TV I avoid like the plague

Where your sweeping statement on American content I can't help but disagree with, Australian TV deserves nothing less than outright ridicule accross the board.

 

[P.A.F.C]

I don't think so, but I understand where you're coming from. No apology necessary.

In part, I think the yanks have a different sense of humour to the average Australian. We're more similar culturally to the poms, which probably has a lot to do with our history.

Presumably someone in the US thinks that 2 1/2 men is actually funny - it keeps getting renewed year after year, though the name is now pretty much wrong as the kid is all grown up. Then again, maybe it's just the star-power of Charlie Sheen?

I'm just a bit parochial when it comes to my sporting tastes - I grew up on Aussie Rules and it's definitely my first love. Living in Canberra I have Rugby League rammed down my throat by Ch Nein. State of Origin is good, though I always barrack for the refs, having no allegiance to either NSW or QLD, but I'd rather have my teeth pulled than watch a club level game. Soccer just sends me to sleep - there's something fundamentally wrong with a game where 0-0 is a legitimate scoreline (and the most common result) after 90 min of play. Yes, it's highly skilfull and tactical - but God it's boring!

I must confess that I've never spent much time watching Gridiron - but once again, I struggle to see how it can be exciting when 40 min of play is dragged out over almost 3 hours due to the constant stop-start nature of the game.

Basketball just doesn't excite me and never has, even at the height of the Air Jordan craze. Doesn't matter whether it's Australian or American, I just don't care for the sport.

Baseball is just what the yanks play because they're too dumb to understand cricket.

If it were the result of a cultural cringe, surely I'd like Australian comedies? The problem is that we haven't made any good ones in years. The last successful sitcom we made was Hey Dad, since then it's mostly been sketch comedy - and the last decent one of those was Fast Forward/Full Frontal. Australian comedy has been dead or dying for almost 20 years now.

Plenty of good American comedies - Scrubs, United States of Tara, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, 30 Rock to name a few. Looking forward to Breaking Bad on ABC2 soon.

Good Aussie comedies are harder to find but are out there. We're very good at satire, We Can Be Heroes, The Games & Summer Heights High to name a few.

Not just comedy, entertainment in general (bar The Castle).

I've given up on Australian movies alltogether, I just refuse to see them. And locally produced content on TV I avoid like the plague

Where your sweeping statement on American content I can't help but disagree with, Australian TV deserves nothing less than outright ridicule accross the board.

There has been plenty of great Australian movies in the last 10 or so years. Most of my favourite films have probably been Australian. Candy, The Proposition, Last Ride, The Black Balloon, Little Fish and Samon & Delilah

 

[brucetiki]

Good Aussie comedies are harder to find but are out there. We're very good at satire, We Can Be Heroes, The Games & Summer Heights High to name a few.

There has been plenty of great Australian movies in the last 10 or so years. Most of my favourite films have probably been Australian. Candy, The Proposition, Last Ride, The Black Balloon, Little Fish and Samon & Delilah

Don't forget Kath and Kim is another good satire at our everyday lives.

As for great Australian films - they have been few and far between since The Dish in 2000.

 

[Alex99]

Not just comedy, entertainment in general (bar The Castle).

I've given up on Australian movies alltogether, I just refuse to see them. And locally produced content on TV I avoid like the plague

Where your sweeping statement on American content I can't help but disagree with, Australian TV deserves nothing less than outright ridicule accross the board.

This has a lot to do with what Vader was talking about.

Because the Australian humour is hard to translate to the bigger American and to a lesser degree European audiences, Australian moves have to be made on a much smaller budget. The Castle was huge in Australia but it bombed bit time in the states, they didn’t get it. They didn’t understand the humour.

Wolf Creek, Australian movies. Quinton Tarentino said it was one of the scariest movies he has seen. Made on a shoe string budget

We cannot make a $100 million dollar moves like they can in Hollywood, we don’t have that population to facilitate the expenditure. We cannot make it with the expectations of 50 million American paying good money to watch it at the cinema and then 25 million in Europe doing the same. Australian movies are made on a $1 to $2 million dollar budgets so 1.5 million Australian will watch it and then they make a small but modest profit.

I watched Charlie and Boots and Beautiful Kate on the weekend, both were very good. Neither of them will win an Academy award or some industry awards but for a small time Australian film, they were good. We may not have the same budget as American, but we have just as talented actors and film makers.

 

[Vader]

Plenty of good American comedies - Scrubs, United States of Tara, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, 30 Rock to name a few. Looking forward to Breaking Bad on ABC2 soon.

Good Aussie comedies are harder to find but are out there. We're very good at satire, We Can Be Heroes, The Games & Summer Heights High to name a few.

There has been plenty of great Australian movies in the last 10 or so years. Most of my favourite films have probably been Australian. Candy, The Proposition, Last Ride, The Black Balloon, Little Fish and Samon & Delilah

I'll give you Scrubs and The Games. Chris Lilley's humour doesn't appeal to me, so I'm not into We Can Be Heroes or Summer Heights High (though the ratings figures indicates that plenty of Australians disagree with me).

I'm with magtrev. Australian movies, comedies or otherwise, are uniformly awful. I have a policy of never watching an Australian movie with a budget of less than US$20M. Low budget Aussie films are just awful, mostly arthouse crap which only appeals to the Sydney yuppy types who actually make them. Its no surprise that they almost all lose money at the box office, having cost only $1-2M to make in the first place. Even some of those which DO have a higher budget turn out to be turgid messes - just look at Australia for an example.

Australian TV is in marginally better shape, not good but better. The first Underbelly series was quite good, though the 2nd didn't go anywhere close to maintaining the standard. As cop shows go, City Homicide isn't bad either. The problem is that the networks can't afford the same production qualities as their US opponents, because they just don't have the same budgets - unless they can pre-sell the show to other networks overseas.

 

[brucetiki]

I'm with magtrev. Australian movies, comedies or otherwise, are uniformly awful. I have a policy of never watching an Australian movie with a budget of less than US$20M. Low budget Aussie films are just awful, mostly arthouse crap which only appeals to the Sydney yuppy types who actually make them. Its no surprise that they almost all lose money at the box office, having cost only $1-2M to make in the first place. Even some of those which DO have a higher budget turn out to be turgid messes - just look at Australia for an example.

I saw Australia with a free ticket - IMO it was Legally Blonde meets Crocodile Dundee...

 

[Vader]

Don't forget Kath and Kim is another good satire at our everyday lives.

As for great Australian films - they have been few and far between since The Dish in 2000.

K&K doesn't do anything for me - but once again, I'm happy to admit that I'm outvoted by the general public.

Because the Australian humour is hard to translate to the bigger American and to a lesser degree European audiences, Australian moves have to be made on a much smaller budget. The Castle was huge in Australia but it bombed bit time in the states, they didn’t get it. They didn’t understand the humour.

Sadly, it's not just Australian comedic movies. It's the whole of the Australian movie industry. In part it's because they can't afford the production qualities. In part it's because they choose to tell the wrong stories - too many of them are made for the high-brow arts community, but are completely lacking in appeal to the wider community. Think "Jindabyne" and "Somersault".

Wolf Creek, Australian movies. Quinton Tarentino said it was one of the scariest movies he has seen. Made on a shoe string budget

I was just going to mention Wolf Creek. I'm not normally into horror movies, but that one is definitely as standout as an Australian success story.

We cannot make a $100 million dollar moves like they can in Hollywood, we don’t have that population to facilitate the expenditure. We cannot make it with the expectations of 50 million American paying good money to watch it at the cinema and then 25 million in Europe doing the same. Australian movies are made on a $1 to $2 million dollar budgets so 1.5 million Australian will watch it and then they make a small but modest profit.

Australian movies are considered to be successful if they make $3M at the box office, most make less than $1M. In comparison, a Hollywood blockbuster is a failure if it fails to take $20M here. Avatar has just taken the all-time box office record by passing the $60M mark. In terms of bums on seats, The Sound of Music still holds the record, followed by Crocodile Dundee.

Let's assume that the average Australian low-budget movie makes around $1.5M in ticket sales over the duration of its (inevitably short) run at the cinemas. Assuming an average of $10 per ticket (less than Hoyts, Greater Union and Dendy sell them), that's 150,000 people going to see the movie, out of a population of over 20 million. Even then, that's not enough for the movie to turn a profit, noting that the cinema chain would be taking a sizable cut of that $1.5M turnover.

The SMH site has a weekly blog called "Who We Are" which frequently lists the highest grossing movies in Australia. They used to do a weekly update on the cinema takings for the week, though I haven't seen that appear in quite a while.

 

[Vader]

I saw Australia with a free ticket - IMO it was Legally Blonde meets Crocodile Dundee...

If you saw it on a free ticket, then you paid too much. It's truly awful, a bad movie made worse due to the political agenda being driven down the viewer's throats.

Watching the love scenes between Jackman and Kidman, I couldn't help but think - "don't do it man - don't degrade yourself like that". I felt dirty just watching, I can't imagine how bad he must have felt having to do a sex scene with Nicole.

 

[Symesy15]

Just looked at the fun facts on the players profiles - some answers are hilarious, e.g Brad Moran's answer to "something people would be surprised to know about you?" "I'm actually a woman?" - although that's not all surprising given his choice of clothing

I didn't know Brett Burton was a twin! I knew Knights had a twin brother..wonder if Burton's twin is a brother or sister..

Oh and apparently Rory Sloane is Batman

 

[WALL-e]

Well we know Stabreagous has plenty of ‘Batmans’ over him……

 

[ringo200]

Plenty of good American comedies - Scrubs, United States of Tara, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, 30 Rock to name a few. Looking forward to Breaking Bad on ABC2 soon.

Good Aussie comedies are harder to find but are out there. We're very good at satire, We Can Be Heroes, The Games & Summer Heights High to name a few.

There has been plenty of great Australian movies in the last 10 or so years. Most of my favourite films have probably been Australian. Candy, The Proposition, Last Ride, The Black Balloon, Little Fish and Samon & Delilah

Always Sunny is a very good American comedy, the first few times I watched it, it confused the hell out of me but once you start to understand the characters its hilarious.

The Black Balloon was a pretty good movie too, parts of it are very hard to watch.

 

[brucetiki]

Why does 7TWO decide to delay the start of shows by 10 minutes so they can put in pointless fillers such as video clips

 

[Vader]

Why does 7TWO decide to delay the start of shows by 10 minutes so they can put in pointless fillers such as video clips

Not sure why they do it on 7Two, but on their main channel they do it to prevent people from turning over to watch something (starting on time) on another channel. They figure you'll stick with the show you've been watching for the last 50 min, rather than changing channels - and once you've missed the first 10 min of the other show then you're not going to bother changing channels to catch the rest.

 

[P.A.F.C]

Don't forget Kath and Kim is another good satire at our everyday lives.

As for great Australian films - they have been few and far between since The Dish in 2000.

Yep, another good example.

I'm with magtrev. Australian movies, comedies or otherwise, are uniformly awful. I have a policy of never watching an Australian movie with a budget of less than US$20M. Low budget Aussie films are just awful, mostly arthouse crap which only appeals to the Sydney yuppy types who actually make them. Its no surprise that they almost all lose money at the box office, having cost only $1-2M to make in the first place. Even some of those which DO have a higher budget turn out to be turgid messes - just look at Australia for an example.

I can understand why people dislike Australian movies, but I love them.

It's a bit rich to label them as 'arthouse crap' or 'high brow'. Many are character dramas, which focus on relationships but they generally tell good stories and don't need to have special hollywood effects.

Couldn't care less how much my favourite movies made at the box office. Avatar was one of the worst movies i've seen in a while and it's setting all sorts of records at the moment.

 

[Vader]

Couldn't care less how much my favourite movies made at the box office. Avatar was one of the worst movies i've seen in a while and it's setting all sorts of records at the moment.

The Vatican might have got a bagging for saying it - but they were dead right. It's visually spectacular, but dead ordinary and derivative storyline. Not to mention the ending which was telegraphed before the film was even half way through.

 

[jo172]

The Vatican might have got a bagging for saying it - but they were dead right. It's visually spectacular, but dead ordinary and derivative storyline. Not to mention the ending which was telegraphed before the film was even half way through.

South Park had it completely right, it's Dancing with Smurfs!

 

[jo172]

Just looked at the fun facts on the players profiles - some answers are hilarious, e.g Brad Moran's answer to "something people would be surprised to know about you?" "I'm actually a woman?" - although that's not all surprising given his choice of clothing

I didn't know Brett Burton was a twin! I knew Knights had a twin brother..wonder if Burton's twin is a brother or sister..

Oh and apparently Rory Sloane is Batman

What people wouldn't know about you: I am fluent in five languages

I call Bullshit!