Cheers JJ. Feel free to show that to George as what he should have done in 1999.
Saturday, 19 December 2015
Sunday, 22 November 2015
Film Review - Hunger Games 4
Finally we get to the end of another over-length trilogy built on an under length book, and once again the whole thing makes no sense.
The premise is not quite as full of holes as the Divergent series. The story isn't as drawn out as the Harry Potters. The CGI is not as bad as the Hobbits. It is better acted than the Twilights. So all those seem like it won't be the worst series. And it certainly isn't but at the same time it is not a good series either.
The first 90 minutes or so is pretty much a match for the previous 3. Lots of set piece action scenes, minimal sensible story tying them together.
Another huge weapon cache in a military base under a mountain, completely undermining stated 'facts' from the first two stories. The two boyfriends suddenly sorting themselves out by one of them being good at his job, that skill being abused by someone else, completely outside his control, and somehow this makes everything his fault.
There is no explanation of how the rebel armies of the Districts, who we are repeatedly told are under-armed and outmanned by the existing Capitol forces manage to make any ground at all. How they do so against the ridiculous devastation of the defensive 'pods', is never even discussed. Some of the traps are so devastating that even our team of special forces superstars well behind the front line can't handle them without huge loss of life, so how are your average untrained farmers making any sort of progress?!
They finally come towards a point where they almost, nearly, just about, explain how and why the Hunger Games exist in the first place. Four movies after that explanation was really warranted.
Then they tack on not one, but two unnecessary endings. The credits could have rolled straight after the Presidential assassination. Job done, film finished, victory and democracy assured. They certainly should have rolled after the next 'real or not real?'. Happy ending for everyone. Instead they stick in a very strange scene, not just for it's meaningless tacky content but more so for the freaky CGI baby. It is weird. Up to this point the CGI has been fairly un-noticable, however ridiculous the effect that is being created it is still smoothly, but suddenly it is like they gave the office junior the job on this scene.
In the midst of that they throw in Woody Harrelson reading a letter from Plutarch which is obviously bodged in due to the death of Phillip Seymour Hoffman. Not only is that whole scene a mess but it ruins the whole tri/quadrilogy. Instead of the message that none of the President's ever really held the power, it was always in the hands of the media, we are treated to an apology and an excuse for why the alternative new President that the media has selected instead is somehow going to be 'better'.
It is certainly no worse than the previous 3 and it does at least finish off the story of the trilogy. I have rated each of the others as 5/10 and this one is no worse.
The premise is not quite as full of holes as the Divergent series. The story isn't as drawn out as the Harry Potters. The CGI is not as bad as the Hobbits. It is better acted than the Twilights. So all those seem like it won't be the worst series. And it certainly isn't but at the same time it is not a good series either.
The first 90 minutes or so is pretty much a match for the previous 3. Lots of set piece action scenes, minimal sensible story tying them together.
Another huge weapon cache in a military base under a mountain, completely undermining stated 'facts' from the first two stories. The two boyfriends suddenly sorting themselves out by one of them being good at his job, that skill being abused by someone else, completely outside his control, and somehow this makes everything his fault.
There is no explanation of how the rebel armies of the Districts, who we are repeatedly told are under-armed and outmanned by the existing Capitol forces manage to make any ground at all. How they do so against the ridiculous devastation of the defensive 'pods', is never even discussed. Some of the traps are so devastating that even our team of special forces superstars well behind the front line can't handle them without huge loss of life, so how are your average untrained farmers making any sort of progress?!
They finally come towards a point where they almost, nearly, just about, explain how and why the Hunger Games exist in the first place. Four movies after that explanation was really warranted.
Then they tack on not one, but two unnecessary endings. The credits could have rolled straight after the Presidential assassination. Job done, film finished, victory and democracy assured. They certainly should have rolled after the next 'real or not real?'. Happy ending for everyone. Instead they stick in a very strange scene, not just for it's meaningless tacky content but more so for the freaky CGI baby. It is weird. Up to this point the CGI has been fairly un-noticable, however ridiculous the effect that is being created it is still smoothly, but suddenly it is like they gave the office junior the job on this scene.
In the midst of that they throw in Woody Harrelson reading a letter from Plutarch which is obviously bodged in due to the death of Phillip Seymour Hoffman. Not only is that whole scene a mess but it ruins the whole tri/quadrilogy. Instead of the message that none of the President's ever really held the power, it was always in the hands of the media, we are treated to an apology and an excuse for why the alternative new President that the media has selected instead is somehow going to be 'better'.
It is certainly no worse than the previous 3 and it does at least finish off the story of the trilogy. I have rated each of the others as 5/10 and this one is no worse.
Wednesday, 28 October 2015
Film Review - SPECTRE
So this is going to be spoilers all the way, but since I am only going as far as the opening credits and much of that is in the trailer, I am not going to feel guilty about it. Also if you still choose to go and see the film after the slating I am going to give the first 4 minutes then it is your own fault.
So we start with a crowd scene in Mexico at a celebration of the dead that looks very much like a rip off of the New Orleans segments from Live and Let Die. Obvious bad guy in a white suit gets a tracking shot and as he passes in front of Bond, literally inches in front but more about that later, we switch directions and track with Bond. He and a hot brunette make their way through a dense crowd up a lift to her hotel room. A bit of smooching then he takes off his jacket to reveal a folded up rifle, steps out of her window and we follow him along a couple of balconies so he can spy on a room full of men, where our bad guy in the white suit appears.
OK, so far, so normal. Bond then sights on the guys in the room with a blue laser. Stupid, the reason red lasers are used is so that you can see where you are pointing them. We hear a bit of conversation from inside the room, without any explanation of how, I wonder if we are meant to figure out that the blue light is doing harmonic detection on the window? So one of the bad guys blows some cigar smoke, spots the laser light, and the shooting starts.
Still, with it. OK, so he shoots the first two bad guys cleanly. Then misses the guy in the white suit. Instead hitting a bomb in the middle of the room. The bomb takes out half that building, but the guy in the suit, who was still in the same room, walks away unmarked. That building then falls onto the building Bond is on and takes out a huge chunk of it. So he has to drop his rifle and jump. He then does a quick bit of Parcour to get down a couple of floors before falling onto a sofa which has conveniently survived intact exactly where he needs it, despite having had a building dropped on it.
Now that little bit I could write off as a silly joke. Things is that he has just dropped two buildings on a crowd, and not only are we meant to ignore the civilian casualties but when he starts chasing the guy in the suit again they are immediately back into 'normal' crowd, in less than a block. No-one seems to have even noticed the demolition work going on 30 yards away!
If your suspension of disbelief is still going then we have Bond chase the guy through the parade, while a helicopter is landed in the middle of a crowd and they both get in and continued fighting hand-to-hand. Punch the helicopter pilot a couple of times and he manages two barrel rolls (actually one barrel roll but they obviously had two good shots of that sequence and wanted to get value for money so they stick it in twice), then while Bond tries to choke him he loops the helicopter over the crowd before falling out of a locked door, allowing Bond to climb in the front and safely take control, inches before hitting the crowd. Although I have to wonder how many crowd members died under the two bodies he dropped on them.
So I had already given up by this point. Everything from here just got worse.
The gadgets were stupid super-tech, exactly right for situations that could never possibly be predicted. He had everything short of a Star Trek transporter, just when he needed it. I thought that post-Brosnan Bond was beyond this stupidity.
The bad guys are so stereo-typical that they are actually lifted straight from other films. The original Oddjob and Whisper were great but bringing back Dave Bautista as a straight copy of them, right down to the mutism is silly. And somehow they take Christoph Waltz (double supporting Oscar winner for playing bad guys!) and Andrew Scott (the brilliant Moriarty from Sherlock if you don't recognise the name) and somehow turn them into cheap B-movie villains is beyond me.
The story was written by someone with a dog. The only way that they can have approved that script is that they read it, green lit the project and then his dog ate all of the bits of that made sense in between the explosions.
I didn't hate the song. A lot of other people don't seem to like it. I don't mind it.
The torture scene with the drill/needle gadget? Which somehow releases all the clamps for no conceivable reason? I almost got up and walked out at that point.
I didn't hate the stunts and the fight scenes. I just don't think the links between them make any sense. And a few of them were just too Brosnan for words.
They seem to have decided that the supporting characters need to be moving forward with the franchise. I can't really see why after they haven't moved for the last 53 years, and neither has Bond for that matter. Anyway that resulted in chunks of wasted time while we follow all their arcs. Maybe the sensible bits of the story were cut to fit these in?
I tweeted before I even left the cinema that this was the Worst. Bond. Ever! I stand by that.
I have given it 4 out of 10. I still feel generous about that.
So we start with a crowd scene in Mexico at a celebration of the dead that looks very much like a rip off of the New Orleans segments from Live and Let Die. Obvious bad guy in a white suit gets a tracking shot and as he passes in front of Bond, literally inches in front but more about that later, we switch directions and track with Bond. He and a hot brunette make their way through a dense crowd up a lift to her hotel room. A bit of smooching then he takes off his jacket to reveal a folded up rifle, steps out of her window and we follow him along a couple of balconies so he can spy on a room full of men, where our bad guy in the white suit appears.
OK, so far, so normal. Bond then sights on the guys in the room with a blue laser. Stupid, the reason red lasers are used is so that you can see where you are pointing them. We hear a bit of conversation from inside the room, without any explanation of how, I wonder if we are meant to figure out that the blue light is doing harmonic detection on the window? So one of the bad guys blows some cigar smoke, spots the laser light, and the shooting starts.
Still, with it. OK, so he shoots the first two bad guys cleanly. Then misses the guy in the white suit. Instead hitting a bomb in the middle of the room. The bomb takes out half that building, but the guy in the suit, who was still in the same room, walks away unmarked. That building then falls onto the building Bond is on and takes out a huge chunk of it. So he has to drop his rifle and jump. He then does a quick bit of Parcour to get down a couple of floors before falling onto a sofa which has conveniently survived intact exactly where he needs it, despite having had a building dropped on it.
Now that little bit I could write off as a silly joke. Things is that he has just dropped two buildings on a crowd, and not only are we meant to ignore the civilian casualties but when he starts chasing the guy in the suit again they are immediately back into 'normal' crowd, in less than a block. No-one seems to have even noticed the demolition work going on 30 yards away!
If your suspension of disbelief is still going then we have Bond chase the guy through the parade, while a helicopter is landed in the middle of a crowd and they both get in and continued fighting hand-to-hand. Punch the helicopter pilot a couple of times and he manages two barrel rolls (actually one barrel roll but they obviously had two good shots of that sequence and wanted to get value for money so they stick it in twice), then while Bond tries to choke him he loops the helicopter over the crowd before falling out of a locked door, allowing Bond to climb in the front and safely take control, inches before hitting the crowd. Although I have to wonder how many crowd members died under the two bodies he dropped on them.
So I had already given up by this point. Everything from here just got worse.
The gadgets were stupid super-tech, exactly right for situations that could never possibly be predicted. He had everything short of a Star Trek transporter, just when he needed it. I thought that post-Brosnan Bond was beyond this stupidity.
The bad guys are so stereo-typical that they are actually lifted straight from other films. The original Oddjob and Whisper were great but bringing back Dave Bautista as a straight copy of them, right down to the mutism is silly. And somehow they take Christoph Waltz (double supporting Oscar winner for playing bad guys!) and Andrew Scott (the brilliant Moriarty from Sherlock if you don't recognise the name) and somehow turn them into cheap B-movie villains is beyond me.
The story was written by someone with a dog. The only way that they can have approved that script is that they read it, green lit the project and then his dog ate all of the bits of that made sense in between the explosions.
I didn't hate the song. A lot of other people don't seem to like it. I don't mind it.
The torture scene with the drill/needle gadget? Which somehow releases all the clamps for no conceivable reason? I almost got up and walked out at that point.
I didn't hate the stunts and the fight scenes. I just don't think the links between them make any sense. And a few of them were just too Brosnan for words.
They seem to have decided that the supporting characters need to be moving forward with the franchise. I can't really see why after they haven't moved for the last 53 years, and neither has Bond for that matter. Anyway that resulted in chunks of wasted time while we follow all their arcs. Maybe the sensible bits of the story were cut to fit these in?
I tweeted before I even left the cinema that this was the Worst. Bond. Ever! I stand by that.
I have given it 4 out of 10. I still feel generous about that.
Saturday, 17 October 2015
Film Review - The Program
Last minute decision to go and see this one.
It is a fairly average docudrama re-enactment of The Armstrong lie.
Ben Foster does a very good look-a-like job. So much so that they are able to cut in and out of historical footage of the man himself pretty seamlessly. Unfortunately, for the most part, his impression is not as accurate. Having seen several of the scenes in their real format the sheer confidence / arrogance of the man just doesn't come across.
Some of the cycling is a bit rubbish as well. Where they use original footage it is obviously going to be boring as they pull a few seconds out to a 20 day race. So instead they film their own with cyclists suddenly sprinting away from groups at minimal effort. American Flyers used the same filming techniques for cycle racing, but executed slightly better, 30 years ago. It is disappointing that modern film-makers can't do anything better.
The story itself is lacking as well. And this is really a bit strange because the material is there and they just seem to choose not to use it.
Betsy Andreu is glossed over in two tiny scenes. Wiggins attachment to Festina is never mentioned. Travis Tygart appears but never even gets named. Contador may actually be a dick, I am not a great fan myself, but he isn't as much of a dick as the film suggests. Ullrich is seen in cycling scenes but never mentioned. Landis' potential to benefit financially (in terms of multi-millions of dollars) from outing Armstrong is not mentioned. The moped courier is seen but never explained.
And those choices aren't all biased in favour of Lance. They also do a strange scene where a mechanic adjusts a cable tensioner on his bike that is made to look like it is some kind of mechanical cheating. They gloss over the fundamental changes of approach and tactics that US Postal made to the sport. Tyler Hamilton gets a passing mention as an ex-team-mate, but Hincapie never appears at all. They skip over the death of Casartelli, and the following stage win. They skip over his pre-dope World Champs win (unless you know enough about cycling to recognise the stripes).
So it is a strange telling of the story. Too sympathetic to the cheat, whilst too dismissive of some of the other great achievements. Almost as if the director was scared of portraying such a fantastical story that many of the audience might then consider unbelievable, at the same time forgetting that truth is stranger than fiction.
The director also seems to have misunderstood his audience. The core audience for this film are going to be people who know the story, so we know how outrageous some of it is. We have watched the real Walsh / Armstrong press conference. So playing it down for us was pointless. The other possible audience was people who don't know the story and want to be entertained, so why play down all the entertaining features?
It really is a poor film. A much better idea is to just go back and watch the Armstrong Lie and see the original footage in a purer documentary format.
Scores 5 out of 10. And I like cycling and knew what was going on. If you don't it is probably a 4.
It is a fairly average docudrama re-enactment of The Armstrong lie.
Ben Foster does a very good look-a-like job. So much so that they are able to cut in and out of historical footage of the man himself pretty seamlessly. Unfortunately, for the most part, his impression is not as accurate. Having seen several of the scenes in their real format the sheer confidence / arrogance of the man just doesn't come across.
Some of the cycling is a bit rubbish as well. Where they use original footage it is obviously going to be boring as they pull a few seconds out to a 20 day race. So instead they film their own with cyclists suddenly sprinting away from groups at minimal effort. American Flyers used the same filming techniques for cycle racing, but executed slightly better, 30 years ago. It is disappointing that modern film-makers can't do anything better.
The story itself is lacking as well. And this is really a bit strange because the material is there and they just seem to choose not to use it.
Betsy Andreu is glossed over in two tiny scenes. Wiggins attachment to Festina is never mentioned. Travis Tygart appears but never even gets named. Contador may actually be a dick, I am not a great fan myself, but he isn't as much of a dick as the film suggests. Ullrich is seen in cycling scenes but never mentioned. Landis' potential to benefit financially (in terms of multi-millions of dollars) from outing Armstrong is not mentioned. The moped courier is seen but never explained.
And those choices aren't all biased in favour of Lance. They also do a strange scene where a mechanic adjusts a cable tensioner on his bike that is made to look like it is some kind of mechanical cheating. They gloss over the fundamental changes of approach and tactics that US Postal made to the sport. Tyler Hamilton gets a passing mention as an ex-team-mate, but Hincapie never appears at all. They skip over the death of Casartelli, and the following stage win. They skip over his pre-dope World Champs win (unless you know enough about cycling to recognise the stripes).
So it is a strange telling of the story. Too sympathetic to the cheat, whilst too dismissive of some of the other great achievements. Almost as if the director was scared of portraying such a fantastical story that many of the audience might then consider unbelievable, at the same time forgetting that truth is stranger than fiction.
The director also seems to have misunderstood his audience. The core audience for this film are going to be people who know the story, so we know how outrageous some of it is. We have watched the real Walsh / Armstrong press conference. So playing it down for us was pointless. The other possible audience was people who don't know the story and want to be entertained, so why play down all the entertaining features?
It really is a poor film. A much better idea is to just go back and watch the Armstrong Lie and see the original footage in a purer documentary format.
Scores 5 out of 10. And I like cycling and knew what was going on. If you don't it is probably a 4.
Sunday, 11 October 2015
Film Review - Sicario
Bit rubbish really.
Sicario is billed as a thriller, but nothing thrilling happens and the supposed twist, isn't really a twist at all. The trailer also bills it as an action movie, which it tries to be in a couple of scenes, but doesn't really do enough of all round.
There is some overly graphic violence which makes little sense but does add significant shock value. There are some overly stereotyped Spec Ops soldiers, right down to the stupid beards.
Emily Blunt is fine in it. Benicia Del Toro, hmm ok. Josh Brolin, how does he keep getting work? And no-one else says more than a few lines.
There were half a dozen other films to see this week. This was almost certainly the wrong choice.
Overall 6 out of 10.
Sicario is billed as a thriller, but nothing thrilling happens and the supposed twist, isn't really a twist at all. The trailer also bills it as an action movie, which it tries to be in a couple of scenes, but doesn't really do enough of all round.
There is some overly graphic violence which makes little sense but does add significant shock value. There are some overly stereotyped Spec Ops soldiers, right down to the stupid beards.
Emily Blunt is fine in it. Benicia Del Toro, hmm ok. Josh Brolin, how does he keep getting work? And no-one else says more than a few lines.
There were half a dozen other films to see this week. This was almost certainly the wrong choice.
Overall 6 out of 10.
Saturday, 3 October 2015
Film Review - The Martian
Castaway 2: Left in Space. At least that much is given away in the trailer, and the book is famous enough that it is really hard to avoid knowing big chunks of the story going in. There are still some good surprises though.
The film is packed with famous faces, many of them making token appearances rather than actively contributing. They do make appearances though. This is somewhat helpful as it means we aren't treated to a straight Castaway rip-off with an hour or so of Matt Damon trying to do a Tom Hanks impression but are instead given a rounder story with some development of the other characters.
This does manage to distract a little from the main character. We see each of his exciting adventures and his solutions to each of the problems he is presented, but we don't actually see any development of his mental state. Several months of being completely stranded and then a year or so with no human contact, including 7 months living out of the back of a truck, never seem to take any toll on his mental health.
Ridley Scott's direction is competitive against some of his earlier work, although I caveat that as a single cinema viewing. I do wonder if the extensive CGI will hold up to repeated viewings.
There are plenty of other good things going on though. The 70's music is very fitting and that manages to survive despite the repeated internal referencing. Some of the humour that pops up allows the viewer to laugh along, despite the ridiculous seriousness of the situation there is a lightness.
There are some bugs. The JPL wunderkind scientist is a ridiculous stereotype who makes a seemingly inspired genius discovery which any first year mechanics student could have predicted and most second year's could have calculated. The hero astronauts taking 2 minutes to decide to go and save their friend, against the advice of a whole planet of experts is so 'Merican that it doesn't even warrant discussion. The Chinese decision to intervene is a nonsense Deus Ex Machina which is disappointing in a film which otherwise relies on relatively good science to solve complex problems.
Overall this is one of the better Sci-fi films that has been out in a long time. 9 out of 10.
Spoiler Alert: Sean Bean doesn't die! But they do make a very good scene out of his appearance in the film, fortunately the fact that he can barely contain his own laughter is covered well by the humorous nature of the scene.
Friday, 18 September 2015
Film Review - Straight Outta Compton
Forrest Gump meets CB4 in a docudrama biopic of the rap music scene. It is primarily told by following the group NWA from formation to the eventual death of one of their members, with the changes in society and rap culture around them interwoven with the personal narrative.
The actors initially look to have been selected based on their appearance and likeness to the real group, including casting O'Shea Jackson Jr to play his own father. Fortunately the actors also have the skills to fill out their roles. Through the end credits there is a montage of original footage of NWA and the likeness of the actors to their original portrayals is as close as you will get without CGI intervention.
Paul Giammati is the only big name on show and to be honest they would probably have been better served without him. His presence is often distracting from the story as you can get sucked into the almost documentary nature of the filming of all of the other characters, but he is too well known and that serves as a constant reminder that you are just watching a fictional retelling. His is also the least sympathetically portrayed character throughout the movie, probably due to the circumstances of the break-up of NWA and his current relationship (or lack of) with the movie producers.
There is an abundance of quality music through the film, (not all rap) but in some sections this does detract as they try to cram in as many tracks as they can they. This often results in a cut away from music so another short squirt of a track can be brought up, rather than fade it or let it play over the next scene. I think I might have made some very different sound-editting choices given the same material.
Overall another 7 out of 10 movie. Could easily have been an 8 or 9 with just a few minor improvements.
Friday, 11 September 2015
Film Review - Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials
Of all the teen adventure movies this is arguably the least bad. In fact it is even verging on quite good. There are some hints at future revelations that suggest the next (final?) episode in the series might have a massive and stupid twist in it. Even if they were to realise my fears the story so far has already eclipsed Twilight, consumed the Hunger Games, driven straight through Divergent, ... I couldn't even be bothered to think of one of those for the horrible Golden Compass.
Fortunately they have changed the story so much from the books that spoilers from readers are unlikely, and as the producers have done such a good job so far I have to sort of trust them not to mess up the next step.
Back to just this instalment. The handful of survivors from the first film carry on their adventure straight from the end of the first movie. Thomas, Newt, Teresa and Minho are supported by the forgettable Winston and Frypan (maybe forgettable because he has grown about a foot in the supposed 20 minute flight from the end of first film). Then they are joined by Eris, who seems slightly conveniently to be a huge instant fan of Thomas and they try to escape their new location.
Minho continues to be the actual star performer of the team. He is still the strongest, fastest, smartest, carries more gear, fights harder and always has the best hair. Even when he gets struck by lightning, or more accurately knocked out by an explosion caused by that lightning, he just gets up and charges on.
Teresa continues to be obviously two-faced but this gives some added interest to the new love triangle with Tom and Brenda. Unfortunately Kaya Scoledario may look fantastic, but she still can't run, and apparently the director has noticed this time. When she is in short range running shots he has tried to minimise her screen time, and in the wider shots he subs in a stunt woman or CGI. It is probably covered up that no-one else will even notice but it bugged me so much in the first film I was watching for it this time round.
The 28-days zombies that are introduced as victims of the "flare" virus are cgi-ed in as well for the most part. They are way too much like the 'I am Legend' version, in terms of both speed and looks.
The new characters that come in all serve their purpose, either with roles to play in this film for Janson, Eris, Brenda (really, future sci-fi character called Brenda?) and Jorge or as obvious set-ups for major roles in the next film for Vince, Sonya, et al. The only real distraction is when Alan Tudyk turns up for an uncredited role. He is much too heavyweight an actor for the role he plays, unless he is being lined up for a major return later in the series.
Overall it is worth a watch if you liked the first one. And again I am going to score this one 7 out of 10.
Fortunately they have changed the story so much from the books that spoilers from readers are unlikely, and as the producers have done such a good job so far I have to sort of trust them not to mess up the next step.
Back to just this instalment. The handful of survivors from the first film carry on their adventure straight from the end of the first movie. Thomas, Newt, Teresa and Minho are supported by the forgettable Winston and Frypan (maybe forgettable because he has grown about a foot in the supposed 20 minute flight from the end of first film). Then they are joined by Eris, who seems slightly conveniently to be a huge instant fan of Thomas and they try to escape their new location.
Minho continues to be the actual star performer of the team. He is still the strongest, fastest, smartest, carries more gear, fights harder and always has the best hair. Even when he gets struck by lightning, or more accurately knocked out by an explosion caused by that lightning, he just gets up and charges on.
Teresa continues to be obviously two-faced but this gives some added interest to the new love triangle with Tom and Brenda. Unfortunately Kaya Scoledario may look fantastic, but she still can't run, and apparently the director has noticed this time. When she is in short range running shots he has tried to minimise her screen time, and in the wider shots he subs in a stunt woman or CGI. It is probably covered up that no-one else will even notice but it bugged me so much in the first film I was watching for it this time round.
The 28-days zombies that are introduced as victims of the "flare" virus are cgi-ed in as well for the most part. They are way too much like the 'I am Legend' version, in terms of both speed and looks.
The new characters that come in all serve their purpose, either with roles to play in this film for Janson, Eris, Brenda (really, future sci-fi character called Brenda?) and Jorge or as obvious set-ups for major roles in the next film for Vince, Sonya, et al. The only real distraction is when Alan Tudyk turns up for an uncredited role. He is much too heavyweight an actor for the role he plays, unless he is being lined up for a major return later in the series.
Overall it is worth a watch if you liked the first one. And again I am going to score this one 7 out of 10.
Friday, 4 September 2015
Film Review - No Escape
I have to admit I wasn't really bothered about seeing this one. Owen Wilson doesn't really work for me in anything. The other options out this week weren't any more enticing though so we booked in to see it. Unfortunately then the other half wasn't feeling well so I had to sub-in a spare cinema buddy.
The story is actually pretty simple, and superbly effective in that simplicity. Family moves to new country, coup happens and foreigners become targets of the rebels, family has to escape.
As with pretty much every movie I have seen this year, and despite the simplicity of the story, there are some silly niggles. Top on that list was the Bond-villain-esque failures of the 'rebels' to just kill them. There are at least four times where it takes a fairly heavy suspension of disbelief as to how they survive. James Bond himself showing up to intervene at one point as an overwhelming deus ex-machina.
Each of those is easy enough to ignore though as the story charges along at a decent pace and gives you something new to worry about before you can think too much about the script hole. And worry is the key word there. It is a very emotional movie. You do feel for the family, you do get scared when they are in scary situations.
The most extreme violence is mostly done off-screen, but in such a way that you have no doubt as to what is going on. There are a whole host of good directing tricks here. I doubt I spotted them all but there are some last-second cutaways, some next room sound effects, a few blood-spattered murderers, and so on. In one example there a couple of big explosions, the second of which does much of the killing but by which time we are being treated to the shock-numbed sound effects from the first.
The slightly less extreme, and I am including beating a man to death with a table lamp and multiple shootings, are done in such a way as to be very realistic without being massively graphic. This mix of directing skills actually adds to the emotional strength of the film as you are left in the same position as the family often are, of knowing what is happening but not actually being able to see the details and your own fear and imagination filling in the gaps.
While I am on the writing / directing (both by John Erick Dowdle so I am giving him credit for all the tricks) I am also going to give out some bonus points for the mixture of languages and the way that is also used as a tool to limit the information given to the family, and the viewer. It is a really great trick, right up until he forgets to use it in the second last scene with the Vietnamese army.
All in, much better than expected 7 out of 10.
The story is actually pretty simple, and superbly effective in that simplicity. Family moves to new country, coup happens and foreigners become targets of the rebels, family has to escape.
As with pretty much every movie I have seen this year, and despite the simplicity of the story, there are some silly niggles. Top on that list was the Bond-villain-esque failures of the 'rebels' to just kill them. There are at least four times where it takes a fairly heavy suspension of disbelief as to how they survive. James Bond himself showing up to intervene at one point as an overwhelming deus ex-machina.
Each of those is easy enough to ignore though as the story charges along at a decent pace and gives you something new to worry about before you can think too much about the script hole. And worry is the key word there. It is a very emotional movie. You do feel for the family, you do get scared when they are in scary situations.
The most extreme violence is mostly done off-screen, but in such a way that you have no doubt as to what is going on. There are a whole host of good directing tricks here. I doubt I spotted them all but there are some last-second cutaways, some next room sound effects, a few blood-spattered murderers, and so on. In one example there a couple of big explosions, the second of which does much of the killing but by which time we are being treated to the shock-numbed sound effects from the first.
The slightly less extreme, and I am including beating a man to death with a table lamp and multiple shootings, are done in such a way as to be very realistic without being massively graphic. This mix of directing skills actually adds to the emotional strength of the film as you are left in the same position as the family often are, of knowing what is happening but not actually being able to see the details and your own fear and imagination filling in the gaps.
While I am on the writing / directing (both by John Erick Dowdle so I am giving him credit for all the tricks) I am also going to give out some bonus points for the mixture of languages and the way that is also used as a tool to limit the information given to the family, and the viewer. It is a really great trick, right up until he forgets to use it in the second last scene with the Vietnamese army.
All in, much better than expected 7 out of 10.
Monday, 31 August 2015
Film Review - Hitman 47
Last week's review of Vacation started with "I hate reboots. Almost as much as I hate remakes. And spoof movies (unless they have Mel Brooks or Leslie Nielsen involved) are generally the worst of all."
I should have reserved that for this week's reboot of the Hitman series.
I normally argue that you shouldn't try to remake or reboot a good film because it was done right the first time. The implication of that logic is that it is not a bad idea to reboot a poor movie as you could actually make a better movie than the original.
I should have reserved that for this week's reboot of the Hitman series.
I normally argue that you shouldn't try to remake or reboot a good film because it was done right the first time. The implication of that logic is that it is not a bad idea to reboot a poor movie as you could actually make a better movie than the original.
Friday, 28 August 2015
Film Review - Vacation
I hate reboots. Almost as much as I hate remakes. And spoof movies (unless they have Mel Brooks or Leslie Nielsen involved) are generally the worst of all. So Vacation looked at first sight to be a shocker that I really shouldn't bother with. The trailers looked quite funny though, and there was a clear self-reference to the originals that made me somewhat hopeful that it might be a half decent successor to the Chevy Chase originals.
In the end the worst thing about it was probably the forced appearance of Chase himself at the end of the movie. Almost, but not quite, rescued by the appearance of the original car.
Some of the jokes along the way were a bit puerile, some were just stupid, others were referential to the original. But most of them got laughs. The opening credits were funny and got the whole audience giggling away so when some of the weaker jokes came later the momentum continued through them and on to some of the better laughs.
Even the lowest and cheapest gags were at least throwbacks to the originals so when they didn't warrant laughs themselves they did get a smirk of nostalgia. There are even some really sneaky Easter Eggs for fans of the original.
Watching the original would probably be beneficial if you want to get the most out of the nostalgia value but it isn't really necessary.
And, I still want to know what the swastika button does.
In the end the worst thing about it was probably the forced appearance of Chase himself at the end of the movie. Almost, but not quite, rescued by the appearance of the original car.
Some of the jokes along the way were a bit puerile, some were just stupid, others were referential to the original. But most of them got laughs. The opening credits were funny and got the whole audience giggling away so when some of the weaker jokes came later the momentum continued through them and on to some of the better laughs.
Even the lowest and cheapest gags were at least throwbacks to the originals so when they didn't warrant laughs themselves they did get a smirk of nostalgia. There are even some really sneaky Easter Eggs for fans of the original.
Watching the original would probably be beneficial if you want to get the most out of the nostalgia value but it isn't really necessary.
And, I still want to know what the swastika button does.
Monday, 17 August 2015
Film Review - The Man from UNCLE
Up front, I hate Guy Ritchie, I dislike Henry Cavill, I am not a great fan of Armie Hammer and I can just about put up with Hugh Grant. And on the other hand I loved the original Man from U.N.C.L.E. tv series.
So I went in to this film with low expectations. I have to admit I was pleasantly surprised. I am not going to get carried away and suggest it is as good as the original series. I am certainly not going to forgive Guy Ritchie for his treatments of other franchises. This one I am going to give him some credit for.
The 60's styling is excellent. The consistency of the sets, clothing, cars, gadgets, decoration, phones, ... throughout the film really does hold up well. I didn't spot anything that didn't fit. No doubt, there are styling slip-ups somewhere, but I didn't catch any of them. Also there were a few of the action sections where the transitions from the original series were used.
The performances are pretty good as well. They are getting some stick on imdb for being wooden, but I felt that they were fitting with the characters and the original source material. Cavill was certainly a huge improvement on his Man of Steel performance. Armie Hammer does a decent job of keeping a straight face despite having most of the best jokes. Both are a little flat, but this matched with the original characters. Hugh Grant, when he does officially turn up, doesn't do particularly much. This does mean that he doesn't do anything wrong though.
The baddies are a bit flat. Again it is quite in-keeping with the TV series that they are just stereotyped villains. They could have benefitted from been a bit more rounded. Certainly the husband could have been fleshed out, or mashed together with the Nazi torturer to create a single complete character.
Meanwhile, if the spy story isn't holding your attention, you can always play 'spot the cameo' instead. David Beckham is the obvious one. Hugh Grant plays an identified character in the second half of the movie but you can also spot him a couple of times before he is introduced. On the more obscure you can also spot Chris Evans Ferrari California in a cameo at the race track. Unfortunately we don't get cameos from Robert Vaughn or David McCallum.
So I went in to this film with low expectations. I have to admit I was pleasantly surprised. I am not going to get carried away and suggest it is as good as the original series. I am certainly not going to forgive Guy Ritchie for his treatments of other franchises. This one I am going to give him some credit for.
The 60's styling is excellent. The consistency of the sets, clothing, cars, gadgets, decoration, phones, ... throughout the film really does hold up well. I didn't spot anything that didn't fit. No doubt, there are styling slip-ups somewhere, but I didn't catch any of them. Also there were a few of the action sections where the transitions from the original series were used.
The performances are pretty good as well. They are getting some stick on imdb for being wooden, but I felt that they were fitting with the characters and the original source material. Cavill was certainly a huge improvement on his Man of Steel performance. Armie Hammer does a decent job of keeping a straight face despite having most of the best jokes. Both are a little flat, but this matched with the original characters. Hugh Grant, when he does officially turn up, doesn't do particularly much. This does mean that he doesn't do anything wrong though.
The baddies are a bit flat. Again it is quite in-keeping with the TV series that they are just stereotyped villains. They could have benefitted from been a bit more rounded. Certainly the husband could have been fleshed out, or mashed together with the Nazi torturer to create a single complete character.
Meanwhile, if the spy story isn't holding your attention, you can always play 'spot the cameo' instead. David Beckham is the obvious one. Hugh Grant plays an identified character in the second half of the movie but you can also spot him a couple of times before he is introduced. On the more obscure you can also spot Chris Evans Ferrari California in a cameo at the race track. Unfortunately we don't get cameos from Robert Vaughn or David McCallum.
Thursday, 6 August 2015
Film Review - Fantastic Four
Fantastic?! Four?!
What an utter mess of a film.
I knew before going to see it that there were a lot of production problems as the movie was rushed out to fulfil some contractual clauses regarding who owns the rights to the characters. That is no excuse for this turgid mess.
Miles Teller and Kate Mara need to go back to their respective agents and fire them. At least Jamie Bell has the decency to hide behind CGI for the small sections of the movie where he bothers to show up.
Since I am on a bad film name binge this week, there are 5 of them, that much is obvious from the trailer. Also the Fantastic part just never happens. Hold on, while I go back to the trailer and scream about fraud. Most of the quotes in the three trailers are either not in the film, or are used completely out of context in the trailer.
I can completely understand why Stan Lee doesn't appear in the movie. He must be so utterly disgusted at what was done to his creations that he wanted to distance himself from it. That they need to squeeze in an adoption to justify their black character, and completely miss that "the Thing" is actually a metaphor for racial discrimination must be like a punch in the face to his original creative talent.
Shocking! 4 out of 10. And of those 4 points, one is a sympathy vote for Miles Teller that this follows his tour de force in Whiplash, and another is for Kate Mara in a superhero costume.
What an utter mess of a film.
I knew before going to see it that there were a lot of production problems as the movie was rushed out to fulfil some contractual clauses regarding who owns the rights to the characters. That is no excuse for this turgid mess.
Miles Teller and Kate Mara need to go back to their respective agents and fire them. At least Jamie Bell has the decency to hide behind CGI for the small sections of the movie where he bothers to show up.
Since I am on a bad film name binge this week, there are 5 of them, that much is obvious from the trailer. Also the Fantastic part just never happens. Hold on, while I go back to the trailer and scream about fraud. Most of the quotes in the three trailers are either not in the film, or are used completely out of context in the trailer.
I can completely understand why Stan Lee doesn't appear in the movie. He must be so utterly disgusted at what was done to his creations that he wanted to distance himself from it. That they need to squeeze in an adoption to justify their black character, and completely miss that "the Thing" is actually a metaphor for racial discrimination must be like a punch in the face to his original creative talent.
Shocking! 4 out of 10. And of those 4 points, one is a sympathy vote for Miles Teller that this follows his tour de force in Whiplash, and another is for Kate Mara in a superhero costume.
Wednesday, 5 August 2015
Film Review - Southpaw
southpaw
(ˈsaʊθˌpɔː)Jake Gylenhall
This bugged me throughout. There are obvious comparisons between this film and the Rocky series. So much so that the title suggests we are going to get the plot from Rocky II where he specifically trains to switch his lead to protect his weak eye. With Gylenhall and his funny eye on the payroll we are nicely set up for the same. Instead we get a single punch at the end claiming to be southpaw, but actually an misbalanced punch as he oversteps from a conventional stance.
Throw in a bit of Rocky with the rags to riches background. A bit of Rocky V with the financial problems. Add some Rocky Balboa with the dead wife. Have a problematic relationship with the kid throughout. All we are missing for the whole Rocky series is an appearance from Mr T. If we are doing a boxing film anyway, why not steal the one-eyed black character from Million Dollar Baby and get an Oscar winner in to play him.
So with that copycat nonsense out of the way we can get to the rest of the film. There are a lot of other problems. How he goes from being a multi-millionaire to living in a run-down rented shack, overnight, makes no sense. Why the courts withdraw custody is unclear. Where the babysitter is when he is out at his losing fight is completely missing. Headbutt a referee and get a ban of a year cut to under 4 months. Pay off boxing judges but still lose a close match on points. Always covered in wet blood and seeping wounds but never any scabs or scars.
The boxing scenes are not too bad. Gylenhall obviously put a lot of work into his physique. Just the story is so patchy that it becomes a distraction.
Overall 5 out of 10.
Throw in a bit of Rocky with the rags to riches background. A bit of Rocky V with the financial problems. Add some Rocky Balboa with the dead wife. Have a problematic relationship with the kid throughout. All we are missing for the whole Rocky series is an appearance from Mr T. If we are doing a boxing film anyway, why not steal the one-eyed black character from Million Dollar Baby and get an Oscar winner in to play him.
So with that copycat nonsense out of the way we can get to the rest of the film. There are a lot of other problems. How he goes from being a multi-millionaire to living in a run-down rented shack, overnight, makes no sense. Why the courts withdraw custody is unclear. Where the babysitter is when he is out at his losing fight is completely missing. Headbutt a referee and get a ban of a year cut to under 4 months. Pay off boxing judges but still lose a close match on points. Always covered in wet blood and seeping wounds but never any scabs or scars.
The boxing scenes are not too bad. Gylenhall obviously put a lot of work into his physique. Just the story is so patchy that it becomes a distraction.
Overall 5 out of 10.
Film Review - Mission Impossible Rogue Nation
I hate the Mission Impossible movies and it is important context to consider the previous 'efforts' in the series.
The first MI move seemed like a good idea. Take a classic 60's action series with clever spies who do amazing confidence tricks, add Tom Cruise, update for 1996 technology and off we go. Then they took the main hero of the 171 episode TV series, cast John Voight to play him, badly, and made him the bad guy. No amount of tricks and stunts and special effects was ever going to make up for taking such a chunk of franchise history and throwing it away. I am stunned that David Koepp still gets writing work. There must be an awful lot of Producers out there who think Carlito's Way is so great that all his other disasters are forgivable. They really are not!
The second MI movie now seemed like a bad idea but the first one made some money, so they bring in John Woo to direct and Anthony Hopkins to try and give it some weight, and manage to make an even more terrible movie than the first one!
Third time round, still cashing in, and they bring in JJ Abrams to direct it and add Phillip Seymour Hoffman for weight and Simon Pegg for laughs. Surely, this time, we get something worth watching? No, it manages to be even worse than the first two! JJ you should be ashamed that your name is on this.
Four, why am I even going to watch this? Adding Jeremy Renner and trying to make it funny and hiring one of the Pixar team to direct can't help, and yet somehow it does. This one is still bad, but it is the least bad of them all.
So now we get to the latest in the series, and the trailer looks terrible. Ridiculous stunts, bad Simon Pegg jokes, Alec Baldwin! I am four movies in to the series so giving up now would just be pointless.
I am on a bad-title binge this week (see Southpaw for more) so I am going to start with the stupidity of "Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation". There isn't actually a nation involved at all, never mind a rogue one. Even when this is crammed into both the trailer and the movie it is so clearly done for effect that the whole scene seems stupid.
There are still plenty of stupid bits. The whole underwater computer nonsense was a complete waste of time. An underwater computer hidden under a power plant? He can't take any metal in with him but he has a computer on his arm? Not that it matters because most air tanks are made from glass fibre these days anyway, so he could have just got hold of some non-metallic fittings and spent as long under the water as he wanted to. Two of them break in to the factory, when only one of them has to be there, and spend several minutes repositioning a massive gantry crane and none of the staff notice? Then he runs out of air, and isn't it suddenly handy that there were two of them...? I don't mind a bit of suspension of disbelief, but part of the allure of the original MI series was that they tried to minimise that by using tricks and good planning rather than this sort of nonsense.
While I am on "stupid", consider the Austrian policeman who has a truncheon that turns into a gun so that he can sneak it past security. Ignoring both the ability of someone disguised as a policeman to bypass security, and more obviously that Austrian police are armed anyway!
Despite the stupidity of some sections, the bulk of the film is actually fairly watchable.
Rebecca Ferguson steals the entire film. Every time she steps on the screen she puts the other cast in the shade. She also brings a sensible practicality to the ridiculous spy business as she repeatedly stops to take her high-heeled shoes off when she needs to run or fight.
The stunts and fights are generally pretty well done, even when they are stupid. The overall plot is passable when you ignore the silliest parts. Switch your brain off for a couple of hours and there are certainly worse things you could do with your time.
If they do make MI6, and the money men will be keen, I will probably go and see it was well.
Overall 7 out of 10.
The first MI move seemed like a good idea. Take a classic 60's action series with clever spies who do amazing confidence tricks, add Tom Cruise, update for 1996 technology and off we go. Then they took the main hero of the 171 episode TV series, cast John Voight to play him, badly, and made him the bad guy. No amount of tricks and stunts and special effects was ever going to make up for taking such a chunk of franchise history and throwing it away. I am stunned that David Koepp still gets writing work. There must be an awful lot of Producers out there who think Carlito's Way is so great that all his other disasters are forgivable. They really are not!
The second MI movie now seemed like a bad idea but the first one made some money, so they bring in John Woo to direct and Anthony Hopkins to try and give it some weight, and manage to make an even more terrible movie than the first one!
Third time round, still cashing in, and they bring in JJ Abrams to direct it and add Phillip Seymour Hoffman for weight and Simon Pegg for laughs. Surely, this time, we get something worth watching? No, it manages to be even worse than the first two! JJ you should be ashamed that your name is on this.
Four, why am I even going to watch this? Adding Jeremy Renner and trying to make it funny and hiring one of the Pixar team to direct can't help, and yet somehow it does. This one is still bad, but it is the least bad of them all.
So now we get to the latest in the series, and the trailer looks terrible. Ridiculous stunts, bad Simon Pegg jokes, Alec Baldwin! I am four movies in to the series so giving up now would just be pointless.
I am on a bad-title binge this week (see Southpaw for more) so I am going to start with the stupidity of "Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation". There isn't actually a nation involved at all, never mind a rogue one. Even when this is crammed into both the trailer and the movie it is so clearly done for effect that the whole scene seems stupid.
There are still plenty of stupid bits. The whole underwater computer nonsense was a complete waste of time. An underwater computer hidden under a power plant? He can't take any metal in with him but he has a computer on his arm? Not that it matters because most air tanks are made from glass fibre these days anyway, so he could have just got hold of some non-metallic fittings and spent as long under the water as he wanted to. Two of them break in to the factory, when only one of them has to be there, and spend several minutes repositioning a massive gantry crane and none of the staff notice? Then he runs out of air, and isn't it suddenly handy that there were two of them...? I don't mind a bit of suspension of disbelief, but part of the allure of the original MI series was that they tried to minimise that by using tricks and good planning rather than this sort of nonsense.
While I am on "stupid", consider the Austrian policeman who has a truncheon that turns into a gun so that he can sneak it past security. Ignoring both the ability of someone disguised as a policeman to bypass security, and more obviously that Austrian police are armed anyway!
Despite the stupidity of some sections, the bulk of the film is actually fairly watchable.
Rebecca Ferguson steals the entire film. Every time she steps on the screen she puts the other cast in the shade. She also brings a sensible practicality to the ridiculous spy business as she repeatedly stops to take her high-heeled shoes off when she needs to run or fight.
The stunts and fights are generally pretty well done, even when they are stupid. The overall plot is passable when you ignore the silliest parts. Switch your brain off for a couple of hours and there are certainly worse things you could do with your time.
If they do make MI6, and the money men will be keen, I will probably go and see it was well.
Overall 7 out of 10.
Wednesday, 29 July 2015
Film Review - Maggie
Arnie vs Zombies. Someone sees you that movie idea and you already know exactly what you are going to get. And I suspect that is why this movie has such a poor IMDB rating. A lot of people have seen the trailer and thought, 'Hmm, Arnie in a zombie movie, I bet the slow dramatic trailer is just a front for a load of explosions and Arnie chasing monsters. Let's go!'
However, this is actually one of the least fraudulent trailers doing the rounds this year. It is a zombie film, and it has Arnie in it. It is slow zombie film (both in terms of slow zombies and slow pacing), and it is a character-driven dramatic piece. This is much more the Fault in Our Stars than Walking Dead. The young girl is simply dying from a different disease.
Arnie can act. He always could to some degree, even his original Terminator is not a simple role. This is the first time he manages to really show his acting skills without hiding behind intense action or quirky comedy scenes. When you consider that his screen time is almost entirely shared with Oscar Nominee Abigail Breslin and Golden Globe Nominee Joely Richardson and he is not only comfortable in that company but is often the best actor on the screen.
There are a few glitches in the story but they are small enough to be ignored or are covered by background mentions. There are some flashes of the scary violent zombie film that could have been, but they are minimal.
The 'twist' at the end is not entirely a surprise, but is also not completely predictable.
Overall 7 out of 10 and I think this may be a slight under-score because it comes hot on the heels of 'Ant-Man' and 'Inside Out' and I couldn't bring myself to give either of them a 9.
However, this is actually one of the least fraudulent trailers doing the rounds this year. It is a zombie film, and it has Arnie in it. It is slow zombie film (both in terms of slow zombies and slow pacing), and it is a character-driven dramatic piece. This is much more the Fault in Our Stars than Walking Dead. The young girl is simply dying from a different disease.
Arnie can act. He always could to some degree, even his original Terminator is not a simple role. This is the first time he manages to really show his acting skills without hiding behind intense action or quirky comedy scenes. When you consider that his screen time is almost entirely shared with Oscar Nominee Abigail Breslin and Golden Globe Nominee Joely Richardson and he is not only comfortable in that company but is often the best actor on the screen.
There are a few glitches in the story but they are small enough to be ignored or are covered by background mentions. There are some flashes of the scary violent zombie film that could have been, but they are minimal.
The 'twist' at the end is not entirely a surprise, but is also not completely predictable.
Overall 7 out of 10 and I think this may be a slight under-score because it comes hot on the heels of 'Ant-Man' and 'Inside Out' and I couldn't bring myself to give either of them a 9.
Tuesday, 28 July 2015
Film Review - Inside Out
One of the basic rules of cinema in the 21st century is that if you are an adult going to watch a cartoon, make sure you go to watch a Pixar cartoon. (And stay for the after credits scenes!).
Once again Pixar deliver.
The premise is simple enough, anthropomorphise the basic emotions in a pre-teen head, subject them to a traumatic event in their live and off we go.
There are some segues that could have been kept for sequels or left out entirely, the abstract thought section being the obvious one. There are also some ideas that are thrown away and could have gone much bigger. When they spill the boxes of facts and opinions and then just throw them back in together with the line "these are so hard to tell apart" that line shouldn't have just been thrown away.
As always with Pixar, they will poke around in your emotions, and they have no qualms about digging around in emotionally deep areas and even killing off well-developed characters to advance the plot.
They also have no fear of putting in risqué jokes at levels they can be sure that children and many adults won't understand. The joke about all the 'bears' wandering around San Francisco is so subtle that I had to explain afterwards why I nearly wet myself when no-one else in the cinema was laughing.
Well worth a trip to see this one.
Overall 8 out of 10.
Once again Pixar deliver.
The premise is simple enough, anthropomorphise the basic emotions in a pre-teen head, subject them to a traumatic event in their live and off we go.
There are some segues that could have been kept for sequels or left out entirely, the abstract thought section being the obvious one. There are also some ideas that are thrown away and could have gone much bigger. When they spill the boxes of facts and opinions and then just throw them back in together with the line "these are so hard to tell apart" that line shouldn't have just been thrown away.
As always with Pixar, they will poke around in your emotions, and they have no qualms about digging around in emotionally deep areas and even killing off well-developed characters to advance the plot.
They also have no fear of putting in risqué jokes at levels they can be sure that children and many adults won't understand. The joke about all the 'bears' wandering around San Francisco is so subtle that I had to explain afterwards why I nearly wet myself when no-one else in the cinema was laughing.
Well worth a trip to see this one.
Overall 8 out of 10.
Tuesday, 21 July 2015
Film Review - Self/Less
This is quite a good idea for a story and there is a decent amount of work put into the execution. The scenery, clothing and general demeanour of the uber-rich in particular are fantastically executed. The idea behind the story is clever enough, a slight twist on the basic questions of immortality and what would you be willing to give to extend your own life.
Ryan Reynolds doesn't bother to do much of an impression of Ben Kingsley so it doesn't have the same age-swapping or body-swapping qualities of Face/Off or Big or Vice Versa or even Looper. Kingsley sets the character up as being a fairly nasty, win-at-all-costs, narcissist who is willing to destroy the lives around him out of pettiness. Reynolds doesn't carry any of this across so his 'journey' to a nicer personality is pretty much instantaneous.
Ultimately though the downfall of this film is that it is much too predictable.
What should be intriguing little twists, are actually obvious long before they arrive. That takes it's toll as before half way you start to wonder when things will happen rather than what will happen.
It is worth a watch if you have nothing better to do some afternoon but I wouldn't recommend going out of your way for it.
Rating 6 out of 10.
Film Review - Ant-Man
Another Marvel movie. I didn't have particularly high expectations for this one though. I am not a particular fan of any of the major cast members. Michael Douglas is hit or miss. Paul Rudd is too often the butt of jokes rather than the instigator. Evangeline Lilly ok, I like her, but WTF is with that horrid bob? And the list goes on. Even when they draft in an existing Avenger they pick my least favourite when they draft in the Falcon for a couple of scenes. And biggest disappointment of all was watching a Stan Lee interview about 6 weeks ago where he said he was unfortunately too ill to travel to make a cameo appearance.
That same Stan Lee interview did give me some hope though, as he said that this was the first time since the origin of the character that he felt the shrinking superhero had been properly brought to life.
I needn't have worried though. Paul Fiege continues to develop the Marvel universe by somehow adding completely unique characters to their world in new and interesting ways, while tying the whole universe together.
Michael Douglas is far from his spectacular best, but is further from his worst in a solid journeyman role fairly distinct from his normal fayre. Paul Rudd is pretty good, he manages a good mixture of jokes at his own expense without taking any of the respect away from the character. Evangeline Lilly is ... no I just can't get away from being distracted by the horrid haircut, really the hairstylist on this movie needs a slap. And the rest of the supporting cast are pretty standard. The surprise appearances from Hayley Atwell and John Slattery alongside a younger (possibly CGI-ed but very clean) Michael Douglas added to both the Marvel Universe completeness and the appeal of the movie.
The story itself is a fairly simple Marvel origin tale to get the character up and running in time to slip him into the upcoming Civil War and Infinity War storylines.
I think I missed all the subtle easter eggs on the first viewing, but I caught all the blatant ones. I may have to go again before it leaves the cinema to see if I can pick some of them out.
Overall 8 out of 10.
That same Stan Lee interview did give me some hope though, as he said that this was the first time since the origin of the character that he felt the shrinking superhero had been properly brought to life.
I needn't have worried though. Paul Fiege continues to develop the Marvel universe by somehow adding completely unique characters to their world in new and interesting ways, while tying the whole universe together.
Michael Douglas is far from his spectacular best, but is further from his worst in a solid journeyman role fairly distinct from his normal fayre. Paul Rudd is pretty good, he manages a good mixture of jokes at his own expense without taking any of the respect away from the character. Evangeline Lilly is ... no I just can't get away from being distracted by the horrid haircut, really the hairstylist on this movie needs a slap. And the rest of the supporting cast are pretty standard. The surprise appearances from Hayley Atwell and John Slattery alongside a younger (possibly CGI-ed but very clean) Michael Douglas added to both the Marvel Universe completeness and the appeal of the movie.
The story itself is a fairly simple Marvel origin tale to get the character up and running in time to slip him into the upcoming Civil War and Infinity War storylines.
I think I missed all the subtle easter eggs on the first viewing, but I caught all the blatant ones. I may have to go again before it leaves the cinema to see if I can pick some of them out.
Overall 8 out of 10.
Sunday, 5 July 2015
Film Review - Terminator Genisys
Another of this years big budget summer blockbusters. Another risky reboot? (I haven't really liked anything since T2 but I haven't really hated them either). Last week we went to watch the original Terminator movie, that turned out to be a great choice as the refresher meant that many of the really great bits of the new movie were linked back to the original.
Some spoilers included.
There are a couple of bugs that I didn't like and I am going to start with them. The helicopter chase, I hated. The CGI was poor and the whole idea of a helicopter chase and the stunt flying involved was well beyond the acceptable limits of suspension of disbelief. It is purely a directorial choice to spend his CGI money, when they could just as easily have driven down the street. They should just have stripped out that entire scene.
My other minor bug was the forward time jump. There is no need for it. Their original plan is to go 13 years forward, that is well within the realms of just waiting and planning and even acting early so why would you build a risky time machine rather than just spend your effort hiding and preparing. Their revised plan is to go 33 years forward. OK, so that would make her 53(?) and gives future terminators a lot of chance to hunt her down, but compared to the supposed risks of jumping forward it still doesn't really seem like the best strategic choice, and it is dedicated on having already built a time machine for the smaller jump.
There are also some paradoxes that were really getting out of hand and are not solved by the trick of alternate timelines. John Connor (Terminator version) shouldn't be able to time travel as his external cellular structure isn't living tissue. This is how they kill him so how did he survive a time jump already? And why didn't the dozen future tech marines kill him and Matt Smith anyway? He then apparently writes much of the complex code for Skynet, who programmed him, that loop gets a bit silly. Think about it too much and this is starting to turn into the Bill and Ted Bogus Journey ending. Whoever eventually wins the war can set up whatever tricks they want to.
On to the positives though, and there are plenty of them. The future sections are pretty faithful to the originals. The 1984 section is fantastically done, to the point that I was struggling to tell which bits were reshoots and which bits were just remastered and digitally updated. I suspect it was all reshot, but with such fabulous attention to detail that even seeing the original last week left me unsure as to whether they were.
The 2017 section has some subtle messages about how people are addicted to their phones and are sleepwalking into being indirectly ruled by machines anyway. And the writing as a whole is very good. The quirky paradox problems noted above excepted.
Arnie himself is excellent throughout. Playing both the 1984 and 2017 versions perfectly. Turning almost half of his lines into potential future catchphrases. Producing some of the funniest moments in the movie, almost by accident. Fighting himself! Fighting a helicopter?! He will be back, and I suspect in a more arced story this time as the role he plays in this film is definitely non-standard for a Terminator and that gives them room to develop.
And the rest of the cast are better than expected. I didn't expect much from Jai Courtney or Jason Clarke. I don't like either of them. But they are solid enough in their roles. Emilia Clarke is a lot better than I expected, and not having the ridiculous Game of Thrones blonde wig on meant that I wasn't distracted looking for he pet dragon to turn up. JK Simmons does a decent job with what little he is allowed to do, I expect him back for a larger role in the next instalment. And we will see more of Matt Smith as well, but if you watched until after the credits you already knew he will be back.
It isn't perfect, but it is the best of the Terminator sequels.
8.49 out of 10. (Just a teeny bit short of scoring enough to round to 9 out of 10, if the directors cut gets rid of the helicopters it is a 9).
Some spoilers included.
There are a couple of bugs that I didn't like and I am going to start with them. The helicopter chase, I hated. The CGI was poor and the whole idea of a helicopter chase and the stunt flying involved was well beyond the acceptable limits of suspension of disbelief. It is purely a directorial choice to spend his CGI money, when they could just as easily have driven down the street. They should just have stripped out that entire scene.
My other minor bug was the forward time jump. There is no need for it. Their original plan is to go 13 years forward, that is well within the realms of just waiting and planning and even acting early so why would you build a risky time machine rather than just spend your effort hiding and preparing. Their revised plan is to go 33 years forward. OK, so that would make her 53(?) and gives future terminators a lot of chance to hunt her down, but compared to the supposed risks of jumping forward it still doesn't really seem like the best strategic choice, and it is dedicated on having already built a time machine for the smaller jump.
There are also some paradoxes that were really getting out of hand and are not solved by the trick of alternate timelines. John Connor (Terminator version) shouldn't be able to time travel as his external cellular structure isn't living tissue. This is how they kill him so how did he survive a time jump already? And why didn't the dozen future tech marines kill him and Matt Smith anyway? He then apparently writes much of the complex code for Skynet, who programmed him, that loop gets a bit silly. Think about it too much and this is starting to turn into the Bill and Ted Bogus Journey ending. Whoever eventually wins the war can set up whatever tricks they want to.
On to the positives though, and there are plenty of them. The future sections are pretty faithful to the originals. The 1984 section is fantastically done, to the point that I was struggling to tell which bits were reshoots and which bits were just remastered and digitally updated. I suspect it was all reshot, but with such fabulous attention to detail that even seeing the original last week left me unsure as to whether they were.
The 2017 section has some subtle messages about how people are addicted to their phones and are sleepwalking into being indirectly ruled by machines anyway. And the writing as a whole is very good. The quirky paradox problems noted above excepted.
Arnie himself is excellent throughout. Playing both the 1984 and 2017 versions perfectly. Turning almost half of his lines into potential future catchphrases. Producing some of the funniest moments in the movie, almost by accident. Fighting himself! Fighting a helicopter?! He will be back, and I suspect in a more arced story this time as the role he plays in this film is definitely non-standard for a Terminator and that gives them room to develop.
And the rest of the cast are better than expected. I didn't expect much from Jai Courtney or Jason Clarke. I don't like either of them. But they are solid enough in their roles. Emilia Clarke is a lot better than I expected, and not having the ridiculous Game of Thrones blonde wig on meant that I wasn't distracted looking for he pet dragon to turn up. JK Simmons does a decent job with what little he is allowed to do, I expect him back for a larger role in the next instalment. And we will see more of Matt Smith as well, but if you watched until after the credits you already knew he will be back.
It isn't perfect, but it is the best of the Terminator sequels.
8.49 out of 10. (Just a teeny bit short of scoring enough to round to 9 out of 10, if the directors cut gets rid of the helicopters it is a 9).
Sunday, 28 June 2015
Film Review - Minions
No spoilers this time.
I was fairly keen for this one.
I like the Despicable Me series and I think the minions were a nailed on case for a spin off.
One of the problems with this movie is that they have tried to use the Minions language as a tool. Bits of it you can actually understand, sometimes it steals just enough French to make sense, sometimes Spanish, often it is just a funny sounding noun that doesn't quite fit. Then they use the other characters for exposition, which means everyone around them is spending time trying to explain what is going on, rather than just get on with it.
The other major issue I have is limiting it to just following the three minions. Part of why they work is their sheer number and the interchangeability of them all. That means you can do silly crowd activities like their special 'banana' videos or you can have them all dress up differently or act stupidly, without it reflecting on a single minion personality. Picking three of them means they have to have individual personalities.
The plot is also a bit patchy, the villain, just isn't very villainous, the best bits are all in the trailer, New York and Orlando and London are all wasted as locations. The historic sections are all in the trailers and the 60s are wasted as well, I do wonder if the date was chosen just for the one useful pay off in the last scene and no-one thought to sit down and consider what else they could include.
It was just a little bit average all round.
Overall 6 out of 10.
I was fairly keen for this one.
I like the Despicable Me series and I think the minions were a nailed on case for a spin off.
One of the problems with this movie is that they have tried to use the Minions language as a tool. Bits of it you can actually understand, sometimes it steals just enough French to make sense, sometimes Spanish, often it is just a funny sounding noun that doesn't quite fit. Then they use the other characters for exposition, which means everyone around them is spending time trying to explain what is going on, rather than just get on with it.
The other major issue I have is limiting it to just following the three minions. Part of why they work is their sheer number and the interchangeability of them all. That means you can do silly crowd activities like their special 'banana' videos or you can have them all dress up differently or act stupidly, without it reflecting on a single minion personality. Picking three of them means they have to have individual personalities.
The plot is also a bit patchy, the villain, just isn't very villainous, the best bits are all in the trailer, New York and Orlando and London are all wasted as locations. The historic sections are all in the trailers and the 60s are wasted as well, I do wonder if the date was chosen just for the one useful pay off in the last scene and no-one thought to sit down and consider what else they could include.
It was just a little bit average all round.
Overall 6 out of 10.
Thursday, 11 June 2015
Film Reviews - Spy and San Andreas
I am going to squeeze two reviews into a single post mostly because they were so terrible they don't deserve a whole post each.
San Andreas is a standard outing for Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson. Lots of action, lots of CGI, stupid story so full of stupid holes and bad characters. Alexandra Daddario provides a fairly efficient distraction, particularly in her bikini at the start and then doing her Lara Croft swimming impression near the end. If you don't understand that reference, I am not going to explain it to you.
4 out of 10.
Spy is a Melissa McCarthy / Paul Feig vanity project. A third rate James Bond spoof with very little going for it. Some notable names throw their hand in at trying to save it. Jason Statham has some funny lines, but also a lot of crap to wade through. Miranda has her first Hollywood film role but is basically just in as a foil for all the lines that weren't funny enough to give to McCarthy.
4 out of 10.
Film Review - Jurassic World
I was really looking forward to this one, about a year ago. Then the trailers took the edge off that interest as they gave away too much of the plot and the effects, and none of it was particularly good. All they should have done for a trailer was to show the first 45 seconds of the actual film.
In hindsight the trailers are even more annoying as bits of the trailer (Vincent D'Onofrio shouting about the lack of boats, guns etc) are not even in the final cut of the film!
The whole of the rest of the movie is just a bit of a let down. I didn't really care if the kids got eaten, they were dicks. I didn't really care if she got eaten, she is a heartless snob with no personal skills. I might have been upset if Chris Pratt got eaten, but more because I like Chris Pratt than because I liked his character. The one trick pony Mososaurus was so predictable as Deus Ex Machina that it was a total let down.
Then there are all the soldiers. The amateur park rangers who are armed with non-lethal weapons manage to score hits all over the place but the I-Rex is apparently immune to their weapons. So why are they carrying them? The professionals they then helicopter in with the heavy weapons have all the shooting skills of your average storm-trooper and the tactical skills of a mouse in a room full of traps.
Then there are just the basic stupid failures. You know what happened in the previous parks. You have the technology to tag and track every dinosaur. Why does that tag not have at least a tranquilliser, and more sensibly a small fatal poison in it that you can trigger to kill a single rogue dinosaur? Why aren't the walls alarmed? Why don't they check the tag location BEFORE they go into the cage?!
And the story holes just get worse: They have sold thousands of advanced tickets. They have built a massive specialist research enclosure. They have grown the thing to full size over several months. They have even sold the sponsorship rights to it. But at no point has the dinosaur training expert heard anything about it?
The few good bits come from the references to the original. Returning to the old site, the computerised gene character on the videos, some of the original dinosaurs on the holo-images, the Jurassic Park t-shirt*, letting out the original T-Rex at the end. Those bits are all good but purely from a nostalgia perspective. None of them actually add to the story.
Overall a disappointing 6 out of 10.
*Actually that one is a let down as it is over-played. As is Larry the character as a whole who is just in there as meaningless comic relief.
In hindsight the trailers are even more annoying as bits of the trailer (Vincent D'Onofrio shouting about the lack of boats, guns etc) are not even in the final cut of the film!
The whole of the rest of the movie is just a bit of a let down. I didn't really care if the kids got eaten, they were dicks. I didn't really care if she got eaten, she is a heartless snob with no personal skills. I might have been upset if Chris Pratt got eaten, but more because I like Chris Pratt than because I liked his character. The one trick pony Mososaurus was so predictable as Deus Ex Machina that it was a total let down.
Then there are all the soldiers. The amateur park rangers who are armed with non-lethal weapons manage to score hits all over the place but the I-Rex is apparently immune to their weapons. So why are they carrying them? The professionals they then helicopter in with the heavy weapons have all the shooting skills of your average storm-trooper and the tactical skills of a mouse in a room full of traps.
Then there are just the basic stupid failures. You know what happened in the previous parks. You have the technology to tag and track every dinosaur. Why does that tag not have at least a tranquilliser, and more sensibly a small fatal poison in it that you can trigger to kill a single rogue dinosaur? Why aren't the walls alarmed? Why don't they check the tag location BEFORE they go into the cage?!
And the story holes just get worse: They have sold thousands of advanced tickets. They have built a massive specialist research enclosure. They have grown the thing to full size over several months. They have even sold the sponsorship rights to it. But at no point has the dinosaur training expert heard anything about it?
The few good bits come from the references to the original. Returning to the old site, the computerised gene character on the videos, some of the original dinosaurs on the holo-images, the Jurassic Park t-shirt*, letting out the original T-Rex at the end. Those bits are all good but purely from a nostalgia perspective. None of them actually add to the story.
Overall a disappointing 6 out of 10.
*Actually that one is a let down as it is over-played. As is Larry the character as a whole who is just in there as meaningless comic relief.
Wednesday, 27 May 2015
Film Review - Tomorrowland
Possibly some accidental spoilers in here but most are in the trailer so I am going to call this one as safe to read before watching.
Tomorrowland is a decent scifi-for-kids effort.
There are the usual Disney problems. A teen being played by a 25 year old. Too many crowd shots where people just stand around looking lost while someone lectures at them. Some fairly major holes in the story. Some blatant advertising, for Disney, Coke, Chevrolet, ... but obviously they couldn't get Wilkinson or Gillette onboard so Clooney looks like a homeless bum throughout.
There is a pointless segue to the eiffel tower which seems purely to spend the special effects budget on turning a recognisable landmark into a rocket, and yet 'Home' managed to do that same trick much better two months ago.
It is very preachy to the point that you almost forgive the bad guy when he explains how he has only really given up on mankind since we have given up on ourselves.
There are still plenty of good things though.
Top of the list is Raffey Cassidy as Athena. She steals scenes left, right and centre. Near the end you think this might be due to Clooney and Laurie having the skill to work in the spaces around her but actually she pretty much owns the film in the first half hour, long before either of them show up.
The androids with the fake smiles are extremely creepy but in a way that isn't going to terrify children.
A lot of the other futuristic gadgets and toys are well executed, if unrealistic. And in order to smooth them out the special effects throughout the whole film are pretty seamless. I especially liked the super-powered fire extinguisher which is given a lot less credit than it deserves.
It has been unfortunate to come out close to some better targeted fayre. The special effects and storyline aren't going to drag any men away from the awesome Mad Max reboot. Clooney's scruffy old man look and his recent marriage will be costing them any of the female viewers that would have gone primarily to drool over him so they are all off to watch Pitch Perfect. And you could take kids to any film at the minute and the highlight of their day is going to be the Minions trailer instead of the main movie.
Overall 6 out of 10.
Tomorrowland is a decent scifi-for-kids effort.
There are the usual Disney problems. A teen being played by a 25 year old. Too many crowd shots where people just stand around looking lost while someone lectures at them. Some fairly major holes in the story. Some blatant advertising, for Disney, Coke, Chevrolet, ... but obviously they couldn't get Wilkinson or Gillette onboard so Clooney looks like a homeless bum throughout.
There is a pointless segue to the eiffel tower which seems purely to spend the special effects budget on turning a recognisable landmark into a rocket, and yet 'Home' managed to do that same trick much better two months ago.
It is very preachy to the point that you almost forgive the bad guy when he explains how he has only really given up on mankind since we have given up on ourselves.
There are still plenty of good things though.
Top of the list is Raffey Cassidy as Athena. She steals scenes left, right and centre. Near the end you think this might be due to Clooney and Laurie having the skill to work in the spaces around her but actually she pretty much owns the film in the first half hour, long before either of them show up.
The androids with the fake smiles are extremely creepy but in a way that isn't going to terrify children.
A lot of the other futuristic gadgets and toys are well executed, if unrealistic. And in order to smooth them out the special effects throughout the whole film are pretty seamless. I especially liked the super-powered fire extinguisher which is given a lot less credit than it deserves.
It has been unfortunate to come out close to some better targeted fayre. The special effects and storyline aren't going to drag any men away from the awesome Mad Max reboot. Clooney's scruffy old man look and his recent marriage will be costing them any of the female viewers that would have gone primarily to drool over him so they are all off to watch Pitch Perfect. And you could take kids to any film at the minute and the highlight of their day is going to be the Minions trailer instead of the main movie.
Overall 6 out of 10.
Saturday, 16 May 2015
Film Review - Mad Max: Fury Road
I wanted to love Pitch Perfect 2 but not as much as I wanted to love the new Mad Max movie. Third movie of the week, Unlimited card paying for itself this month.
This is loaded with spoilers, if you haven't seen it yet, don't read any further.
I am going to start with the bad, because there is some.
The story is a bit sketchy. It only makes sense on the most superficial level. There are much bigger holes than the previous versions around bullets and fuel and food and generally how to survive the nuclear apocalypse.
Tom Hardy maybe says 20 lines in the film, but manages to go through about 10 different accents. South African, Australian, 'Bane', Welsh,....
Next level down, the flashbacks that Max has through the film aren't explained. The internet has tried to claim that they are of his daughter, but this doesn't match with the canon of the movies where his child is killed as a baby. So I prefer the explanation that we are missing a story somewhere and that we might cover this in a future movie.
The superhot 'wives' are all made up like they just walked off a fashion shoot. And this is further exaggerated beyond any sense of realism when you consider the Zoe Kravitz is the 'ugly' one of the 5 of them. Even after they start running around the dessert dodging flamethrowers and jumping between vehicles there is never a hair out of place.
And from there we are onto the good bits.
The cinematography is amazing. The colours in the night scenes especially show off the directors skills. And some of the visions, which owe an awful lot to Terry Gilliam, are fantastically portrayed. The travelling rockband giving an excuse for ebb and flow of the thumping soundtrack during the chase scenes is borderline genius.
The stunts are absolutely incredible. The film is 2 hours long and maybe 1hr 45 of that is basically a massively long car chase / battle. The CGI is minimal and that is pretty obvious. I really hope the sic-fi directors of the future watch this and are reminded how much better the effects look if you actually do them.
Charlize Theron is brilliant. The one-armed thing is a bit weird but it works well enough in the context of the story. She is the real lead here. She steals every scene from Tom Hardy, even when she is dying.
The language is very clever. There are a lot of jargon terms used but they are mostly self-explanatory and easy enough to keep up with.
The iconic car! The last of the V8 Interceptors is back, and it comes and goes throughout the movie. But you are always given a couple of quick shots to spot it before Max points out that it is his car.
And all of the other cars and trucks are fantastic. The effort that the mechanical team have gone to in making this film is clear from the start and continues through the whole movie. Every vehicle has a huge amount of personalisation to reflect the driver.
What isn't shown! There is a section in the night where Max wanders off in the darkness and returns later with someone else blood on him. And we simply don't see what he did. But that in itself makes it even more clear about how vicious max is willing to be in pursuit of his redemption. He is willing to do things so far beyond acceptable that we can't be shown them in a film where someone else has their face ripped off!
To be frank I loved it. Can't wait for the next one.
Overall I am going to give it 9 out of 10.
This is loaded with spoilers, if you haven't seen it yet, don't read any further.
I am going to start with the bad, because there is some.
The story is a bit sketchy. It only makes sense on the most superficial level. There are much bigger holes than the previous versions around bullets and fuel and food and generally how to survive the nuclear apocalypse.
Tom Hardy maybe says 20 lines in the film, but manages to go through about 10 different accents. South African, Australian, 'Bane', Welsh,....
Next level down, the flashbacks that Max has through the film aren't explained. The internet has tried to claim that they are of his daughter, but this doesn't match with the canon of the movies where his child is killed as a baby. So I prefer the explanation that we are missing a story somewhere and that we might cover this in a future movie.
The superhot 'wives' are all made up like they just walked off a fashion shoot. And this is further exaggerated beyond any sense of realism when you consider the Zoe Kravitz is the 'ugly' one of the 5 of them. Even after they start running around the dessert dodging flamethrowers and jumping between vehicles there is never a hair out of place.
And from there we are onto the good bits.
The cinematography is amazing. The colours in the night scenes especially show off the directors skills. And some of the visions, which owe an awful lot to Terry Gilliam, are fantastically portrayed. The travelling rockband giving an excuse for ebb and flow of the thumping soundtrack during the chase scenes is borderline genius.
The stunts are absolutely incredible. The film is 2 hours long and maybe 1hr 45 of that is basically a massively long car chase / battle. The CGI is minimal and that is pretty obvious. I really hope the sic-fi directors of the future watch this and are reminded how much better the effects look if you actually do them.
Charlize Theron is brilliant. The one-armed thing is a bit weird but it works well enough in the context of the story. She is the real lead here. She steals every scene from Tom Hardy, even when she is dying.
The language is very clever. There are a lot of jargon terms used but they are mostly self-explanatory and easy enough to keep up with.
The iconic car! The last of the V8 Interceptors is back, and it comes and goes throughout the movie. But you are always given a couple of quick shots to spot it before Max points out that it is his car.
And all of the other cars and trucks are fantastic. The effort that the mechanical team have gone to in making this film is clear from the start and continues through the whole movie. Every vehicle has a huge amount of personalisation to reflect the driver.
What isn't shown! There is a section in the night where Max wanders off in the darkness and returns later with someone else blood on him. And we simply don't see what he did. But that in itself makes it even more clear about how vicious max is willing to be in pursuit of his redemption. He is willing to do things so far beyond acceptable that we can't be shown them in a film where someone else has their face ripped off!
To be frank I loved it. Can't wait for the next one.
Overall I am going to give it 9 out of 10.
Film Review - Pitch Perfect 2
Second film of the week. But not the last.
I loved Pitch Perfect. I even reviewed it on imdb at the time. Here is a link to that review but not sure if it will work properly if you aren't signed in as me.
The follow-up was never going to be as good. I can list on one hand the film sequels that are even competitive with their originals and none of them are musical comedy. I am also going to give the film itself a little leeway as I was sat next to two women who talked all the way through the film and it was all I could do not to
I love Anna Kendrick. She is good in parts of this film, normally when she is being left to act more serious sections between the gags but inkeeping with her grown-up character seems disconnected from most of the slapstick and disapproving of some of the other jokes. The lead in this version seems to fall more on Rebel Wilson's 'Fat Amy'. I suspect that if this makes money that the next version is more likely to be a Fat Amy spin off with a possible Kendrick cameo than a pure sequel. Hailee Stanfield is surely in the movie for her name (or as a transition character for future films) rather than for her actual contribution.
And most of the rest of the characters you just don't see enough of to even take note.
How you cast Katey Sagal in your movie and then give her half of a short scene and a 5 second back of the stage cameo near the end of the movie really confuses me.
John Michael Higgins I loved in the first movie, but in this one he is turned into a serious misogynist, and his lines are more cringeworthy than funny. Elizabeth Banks sitting next to him with a fake smile on and failing to counter his comments doesn't sit well either.
Das Sound Machine, are the real stand out performers this time round. Not only do their actual performances steal the screen every time but their off-stage performances are hilarious. Their smack talk is really well written but the delivery is exceptional.
So I realise that I am not saying a lot of positive things about the movie. I did quite enjoy some parts of it. The hipster intern and his relationship with the producer were funny. Clay Matthews and the Green Bay Packers were a novel cameo (but that joke isn't going to travel outside the US apart from a few sports fans). The 'new' song is much too close to the tune for Titanium which is used heavily in the first film.
Overall 7 out of 10.
I loved Pitch Perfect. I even reviewed it on imdb at the time. Here is a link to that review but not sure if it will work properly if you aren't signed in as me.
The follow-up was never going to be as good. I can list on one hand the film sequels that are even competitive with their originals and none of them are musical comedy. I am also going to give the film itself a little leeway as I was sat next to two women who talked all the way through the film and it was all I could do not to
I love Anna Kendrick. She is good in parts of this film, normally when she is being left to act more serious sections between the gags but inkeeping with her grown-up character seems disconnected from most of the slapstick and disapproving of some of the other jokes. The lead in this version seems to fall more on Rebel Wilson's 'Fat Amy'. I suspect that if this makes money that the next version is more likely to be a Fat Amy spin off with a possible Kendrick cameo than a pure sequel. Hailee Stanfield is surely in the movie for her name (or as a transition character for future films) rather than for her actual contribution.
And most of the rest of the characters you just don't see enough of to even take note.
How you cast Katey Sagal in your movie and then give her half of a short scene and a 5 second back of the stage cameo near the end of the movie really confuses me.
John Michael Higgins I loved in the first movie, but in this one he is turned into a serious misogynist, and his lines are more cringeworthy than funny. Elizabeth Banks sitting next to him with a fake smile on and failing to counter his comments doesn't sit well either.
Das Sound Machine, are the real stand out performers this time round. Not only do their actual performances steal the screen every time but their off-stage performances are hilarious. Their smack talk is really well written but the delivery is exceptional.
So I realise that I am not saying a lot of positive things about the movie. I did quite enjoy some parts of it. The hipster intern and his relationship with the producer were funny. Clay Matthews and the Green Bay Packers were a novel cameo (but that joke isn't going to travel outside the US apart from a few sports fans). The 'new' song is much too close to the tune for Titanium which is used heavily in the first film.
Overall 7 out of 10.
Wednesday, 13 May 2015
Film Review - Spooks: The Greater Good
Since this film is based on a TV series it is no huge surprise that it feels like a made-for-TV movie. They rope in Kit Harrington from Game of Thrones to be the star, and then he is undermined a little by Peter Firth as not only the carryover from the TV show but also the gravitas and suspense of the whole piece. And then the rest of the cast are entirely forgettable TV actors, including a couple of girls who are TV-series-hot, but not movie-hot, increasing the TV-movie feel.
They do a decent job of glossing over the series by giving minimal details when they are required without going to any extensive backstory. At the same time though they do occasionally rely on some little bits of series knowledge. In particular one character shows up, is never introduced, and does a job which you only understand if you have seen him in the TV series.
The actual film is solid enough. The story has some holes but it keeps moving along quickly enough and the characters just accept the gaps in the same way they accept some of the exposition pieces so the viewer is encouraged to just dismiss them as well.
Overall rating 5 out of 10.
They do a decent job of glossing over the series by giving minimal details when they are required without going to any extensive backstory. At the same time though they do occasionally rely on some little bits of series knowledge. In particular one character shows up, is never introduced, and does a job which you only understand if you have seen him in the TV series.
The actual film is solid enough. The story has some holes but it keeps moving along quickly enough and the characters just accept the gaps in the same way they accept some of the exposition pieces so the viewer is encouraged to just dismiss them as well.
Overall rating 5 out of 10.
Sunday, 26 April 2015
Film Review - Avengers: Age of Ultron (Edited after second viewing)
After the decent but overly predictable Fast and Furious 7 the summer blockbusters have properly arrived.
First up in what should be a monster summer of huge actions movies is the latest adventure in the Marvel universe, Avengers: Age of Ultron.
To be honest I am not really looking forward to the new Superman vs Batman (I can't stand Zack Snyder's style) or Star Wars (Lucas has killed his golden goose in my heart). I am ambivalent about the reboots for Jurassic Park and Mad Max as well, but I am hoping Chris Pratt and Tom Hardy can rescue them. So this was keyed up to be the highlight to start a summer of potential disaster blockbusters with Spectre awaiting at the far end.
I had tried to avoid some of the spoilers that were rife on the internet before I got to the film, but still I knew who was coming, from the trailers and from the cast list. And then knowing the title, and some of the characters comic book history also meant that I either knew or could predict large chunks of the plot.
The big guns are all back, and most of the minor characters are squeezed in for minor appearances while others (2 incidental girlfriends and the secretly undead Phil Coulson) are dropped but referenced. This does lead to a bit of wandering around by the script to try and get to useful everyone that has been built into the previous 10 Marvel films.
The references to future films are in as well, and not just in the post-credit scene (the single extra scene this time rather than two was a bit of a let down). Some of these set up scenes are a bit of a distraction as are some of the scenes where the individual Avengers have to chase little sections of their own story to justify their appearances.
Spoilers from here:
Stan Lee has a 'real' part this time with a few lines and a purpose rather than just turning up with a one liner.
Paul Bettany's graduation from the disembodied voice of Jarvis to the full-bodied Vision is as fantastic as expected. He mixes the humour and action effortlessly despite being given a secondary character to play with. (His replacement as the iron man computer voice Friday was disappointing though).
And Elizabeth Olsen does a solid but uninspiring job as Scarlet Witch. Although she is helped out by a couple of natty outfits and some clever shooting angles of her cleavage, she never really gets enough to show what she can add.
Aaron Taylor Johnson though is something of a disaster. He is outclassed every time he is on screen and barely provides a decent foil for Jeremy Renner and Elizabeth Olsen to work with. It is no great loss when he is killed off.
The section in the middle where they all head of to Hawkeye's house is good for his character development, but otherwise it is just a real detour that doesn't make sense.
The ending with the 'New Avengers' is a bit of a let down as well. They are not nearly in the same class as the originals and I do hope that they don't try and spin them out into a new movie on their own.
It isn't as good as the first Avengers movie, but it is still a perfectly watchable action adventure and it keeps the bigger Marvel picture ticking along nicely.
Overall 8 out of 10.
First up in what should be a monster summer of huge actions movies is the latest adventure in the Marvel universe, Avengers: Age of Ultron.
To be honest I am not really looking forward to the new Superman vs Batman (I can't stand Zack Snyder's style) or Star Wars (Lucas has killed his golden goose in my heart). I am ambivalent about the reboots for Jurassic Park and Mad Max as well, but I am hoping Chris Pratt and Tom Hardy can rescue them. So this was keyed up to be the highlight to start a summer of potential disaster blockbusters with Spectre awaiting at the far end.
I had tried to avoid some of the spoilers that were rife on the internet before I got to the film, but still I knew who was coming, from the trailers and from the cast list. And then knowing the title, and some of the characters comic book history also meant that I either knew or could predict large chunks of the plot.
The big guns are all back, and most of the minor characters are squeezed in for minor appearances while others (2 incidental girlfriends and the secretly undead Phil Coulson) are dropped but referenced. This does lead to a bit of wandering around by the script to try and get to useful everyone that has been built into the previous 10 Marvel films.
The references to future films are in as well, and not just in the post-credit scene (the single extra scene this time rather than two was a bit of a let down). Some of these set up scenes are a bit of a distraction as are some of the scenes where the individual Avengers have to chase little sections of their own story to justify their appearances.
Spoilers from here:
Stan Lee has a 'real' part this time with a few lines and a purpose rather than just turning up with a one liner.
Paul Bettany's graduation from the disembodied voice of Jarvis to the full-bodied Vision is as fantastic as expected. He mixes the humour and action effortlessly despite being given a secondary character to play with. (His replacement as the iron man computer voice Friday was disappointing though).
And Elizabeth Olsen does a solid but uninspiring job as Scarlet Witch. Although she is helped out by a couple of natty outfits and some clever shooting angles of her cleavage, she never really gets enough to show what she can add.
Aaron Taylor Johnson though is something of a disaster. He is outclassed every time he is on screen and barely provides a decent foil for Jeremy Renner and Elizabeth Olsen to work with. It is no great loss when he is killed off.
The section in the middle where they all head of to Hawkeye's house is good for his character development, but otherwise it is just a real detour that doesn't make sense.
The ending with the 'New Avengers' is a bit of a let down as well. They are not nearly in the same class as the originals and I do hope that they don't try and spin them out into a new movie on their own.
It isn't as good as the first Avengers movie, but it is still a perfectly watchable action adventure and it keeps the bigger Marvel picture ticking along nicely.
Overall 8 out of 10.
Friday, 24 April 2015
Weird advertising - Lynx / Axe
Lynx / Axe have a simple but effective advertising strategy which is basically - 'use our product and hot girls will flock to you'.
This is their new advert for their 'black' range:
http://www.tvadmusic.co.uk/2015/03/lynx-black-bring-the-quiet/
I get the idea that the new version of their product is understated and subtle and matching that with a slow and calm version of a song is part of their branding, but really it just doesn't work for anyone who knows the original track. Once you figure out what it should sound like (it took me a while because it is such a mangled version of the original that you have to fish it out purely by the lyrics) it just grates on your soul.
This track has to rank pretty near the top of the list of weirdest covers ever attempted. The ad companies seem to think if they copy Joh Lewis and take a familiar old song and play it slowly and acoustic that it will automatically be cool. Doesn't really work when you clash the lyrics and meaning of the original with the style of the new arrangement.
For anyone who doesn't realise what the original was like you can find a version here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZY03tEIDKA
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