I'm not the only one! (review, rant, etc.)

So I just saw The Day Watch, the sequel to The Night Watch.  It was awesome, but I'll get to that in a minute.

So Yelena and I are trying to find info on the third movie.  There's surprisingly little on it, but Yelena wandered into Amazon.com and discovered that the books are for sale in English.  The funny part: scroll down to "Customers who looked at this item eventually bought. . . "  What do you see?  The Night Watch, Firefly, and the fantasy series by George R.R. Martin.  All stuff I like.

Amazon.com: Day Watch: Books: Sergei Lukyanenko

We should start a club or something.  And yes, I'm going to order the books.  The Night Watch just got translated into English a few weeks ago.  The Day Watch won't come out in English for another few months, and who knows about The Dusk Watch or The Final Watch.
Review: The Night Watch 2: The Day Watch

Three thumbs up!  (Me + Yelena + Sarah)

The problem with a sequel is that the concept is no longer new.  If a large part of a movie's appeal was its freshness and originality, then the sequel is doomed before the curtain even rises.

The solution: make the sequel fresh and original.  Give it a new plot, new ideas, and new characters.  But retain enough of the original so it doesn't feel like a new movie trying to ride on the old movie's coattails.

That's what The Day Watch does.  It picks up roughly where the old one left off: Anatoly's son has gone over to the Dark Ones, and they are scheming against him and the other Light Ones.  But now we have a beautiful blond who is Anatoly's apprentice Light One, and of course there are sparks.  And it turns out she's not just another Light One.

Let's also throw in the Chalk of Destiny.  That may seem like a corny cop-out to the fact that the bad guys have already won, but it's done in a sophisticated and clever way.

The acting is good, the direction and cinematography are fantastic, as are the special effects, sound effects, and music.  Yes, the sound deserves a separate mention: it's probably the best sound I've heard in a movie.  I'm just talking about simple things like crunching glass and a camera flash.  The sound adds a visceral element to the movie that sucks you in even more.

The plot is complex and sometimes confusing.  Toward the end, you get less and less of an idea what's going on.  But many European movies are like that; you're supposed to wait, you're supposed to think, and you're supposed to figure things out for yourself.  If you want to be spoon fed, go see an American movie.

Again, the genre is hard to peg.  It's been described as sci-fi, horror, and fantasy.  It's not really any of those things.  It's a modern-day apocolyptic thriller with many elements of fantasy and popular culture mixed in.

See it today.  Oh wait, you can't.  It hasn't come out in American theaters yet.  In fact, Fox (who bought the international distribution rights) hasn't even announced WHEN it'll come out; "probably some time in 2007."  It's already out on DVD in Russia, but there are no English subtitles. So how have I seen it?

Of course someone has ripped the Russian DVD and is sharing it online.  I will not tell you how to get it because I don't advocate piracy.  If you know, good for you.  If you don't, it's probably better that way.

But what about subtitles?  Well, someone got their hands on the original Russian script, and ran it through translation software.  Naturally this produced a crappy translation, but another fan took that and polished it up a bit, then put it into a subtitle format that could be read by DVD software.  This is also being shared online.

If you manage to get both files, use a DVD player program like PowerDVD or VLC, that lets you load both the movie and the subtitle file manually.  The translation is still bad in places, and it doesn't translate anything that is written on the screen (like signs) or words in languages other than Russian.  But it's enough that you understand what's going on.

Let me clarify something else: I'm not necessarily saying that I downloaded this movie illegally.  There are many different ways I could have seen this movie without committing any crime.  I'll leave that to your imagination.

Do I feel bad about having seen the movie a year before it even comes out?  Are you kidding?  The Russian version premiered January 1, 2006.  Here we are in mid-August and Fox won't even tell us when they'll release it here.  Shame on you, Fox.  I'm not waiting for you.
You know what's even worse?  Fox bought the rights to produce the third movie.  They're going to make it in English with new characters.  This is classic Fox: "Let's take something really cool and creative and fuck it up, or kill it entirely."  That's what they did with Firefly, Arrested Development, Family Guy, and now The Night Watch.  Who the hell is running that company?  Why are they still in business?  Where are they making all their money to buy up other people's work?  Why do consumers still support such a shitty company?  How can we make them wake up and realize they have these wonderful products that they should be honoring, not ruining?

Although, I'll probably still see The Day Watch when it comes out on the big screen.  It'll be worth it.