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Interstellar - Spoiler-free review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
December 1st, 10:34 PM Well, since I didn't have any laundry to do tonight, I decided to go catch a late showing of Interstellar. So at the moment I'm sitting in an entirely empty IMAX theater, waiting for the 10:50 PM showing to start. And yes... I know I'm in for a three hour movie that I will keep me here until nearly 2 AM, but that's okay since my internal clock has been way off lately, and getting to sleep after 3 AM has become the norm. I'll admit to not having had much interest in seeing Interstellar, but I'm bored enough this evening to need some sort of entertainment, I've already seen Big Hero 6 (review coming soon), and I'm all caught up on anything of interest on my DVR. So here I am. Six minutes to go. I do have one observation before posting this and watching the film though - my iPhone 5S seems really tiny for typing on now. The new word-suggestion feature is really handy, but man, does it take up a lot of real estate. Apple needs to re-think some of their interface issues for those of us who don't own an iPhone 6 Jumbotron. Time to post this and shut off my phone for now - the lights are dimming (although I'm still the only one here). 3+ hours later... Another four people showed up during trailers - so we had a crowd! Woo hoo! The thing that puzzled me about Interstellar before seeing it, was the secrecy surrounding it. Whenever the cast showed up on talk shows or did media junkets, they weren't allowed to say anything about the film or show anything but the shortest (and vaguest) of clips. So naturally, I expected there to be some big, huge, amazing spoiler to the movie. You know... like Soylent Green being made of people, the Planet of the Apes actually being Earth, Darth Vader being Luke's father, that sort of thing. What? You didn't know any of that? Sorry... "Spoiler-free" only applies to movies that are reasonably current. Like within the last 30 years. On the one hand, I think the secrecy helped to build mystery about the movie and generate interest (although Interstellar had already been hyped for months), but on the other hand, since it doesn't really tell you anything about the movie - the tone of it, the characters, etc. - I found it difficult to really want to go see it, because I perceived it as being very-much like Gravity - an overly-serious, overly-long, overly-epic, better-see-it-in-IMAX-or-you'll-regret-it, self-proclaimed masterpiece of psuedo-realistic science fiction starring amicable but ultimately unbelievable-as-either-astronauts-or-scientists actors, that ultimately results in a visually impressive but flawed movie that doesn't make any sense once you think about it for more than a few minutes. At least, that was my assumption about Interstellar based on the trailers. But I was willing to give it the benefit of the doubt, since I don't drop $20 on a ticket and $13 on snacks just to go to a movie I don't think I have any chance of liking. If I wanted to waste that kind of money, there are plenty of other stupid things out there to buy. That said, Interstellar did turn out to be different - plot-wise - from Gravity. They are two completely different films. Gravity takes place (apparently) before the space shuttle program ended, while Interstellar takes place at some undetermined point in the near-ish future. Gravity, despite being completely preposterous, is more grounded in something resembling reality, while Interstellar embraces a much broader, fantastical approach to science fiction. More Space:1999 than Salvage 1, if you're looking for an obscure comparison. Yeah... I just equated Gravity with Salvage 1. Deal with it. Score: Andy Griffith 1, George Clooney 0. Anyway... Like its advertising campaign, Interstellar itself is often vague. It doesn't tell you when it's happening (you can infer that it's several decades from now), it doesn't tell you what exactly happened to Earth (there was a problem, and now everyone's in some sort of trouble), it implies that things are going to get worse for everyone on Earth really soon, but doesn't stick to that timeline or explain why, it never gives a clear background of the lead character and why he's uniquely suited to lead a mission into space (with apparently no training whatsoever), and it often either just broadly explains away major plot points or skips over them altogether, assuming the audience will somehow pick up on it. Generally, I was able to follow the movie okay, but there were a lot of missed opportunities to flesh-out some really interesting stories that would've only helped to make the movie and the plight of the people in it more compelling. As it was, with maybe the exception of Matthew McConaughey's character's daughter, I had a hard time connecting with, or caring about, anyone in the movie. Some of the characters were likable enough, but they all seemed very flat and one-dimensional. I had a really difficult time believing these were the brilliant scientists that they all supposedly were. Was that bad writing? Bad directing? Bad acting? I don't really know. Maybe there just wasn't enough setup in their backstories to make them seem believable. Especially when some of the most brilliant minds on the planet end up doing really stupid things. Certainly I didn't feel any real empathy for any of them, and when you couple that with the vagueness of the situation on Earth, it make it really difficult to become emotionally invested in what's going on. Predictability was another problem with the characters, and the film as well. You can see where certain parts of the film are going, just based on who was cast in which rolls, and what sort of music plays when they're on screen. Character moments that should be a surprise, aren't. Events are telegraphed way too far in advance, and I spent a lot of time just waiting for them to get around to the inevitable and hopefully move onto something else. Now then... about the science in the film. It felt like someone had been watching a few too many episodes of "Through the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman", without really paying attention. It's fine to throw around completely theoretical science concepts in a movie. Star Trek thrived off it. Star Wars never even bothered with it. But if you're going to attempt to ground a movie in something resembling reality, then you need to do a better job of explaining why things are happening that don't make any sense. Why transporters could never work doesn't matter in Star Trek - it's still explained well enough in the context of that world to be believable. It doesn't matter in Star Wars how hyperspace or lightsabers work - we just accept that they do because it fits that universe. But Interstellar establishes a particular level of scientific believability, and does a poor job of following through with it. The movie completely goes off the rails in the last act of the film, trying desperately to be something unique and thought-provoking, but only comes across as baffling and silly. Maybe the problem is that Interstellar has an identity crisis. It thinks it's trying to be original, but it's so completely derivative of so many other movies and science fiction stories, that it just can't. It's not a good enough movie to stand apart from everything it borrows shamelessly from: 2001, 2010, Contact, The Black Hole, Close Encounters, and more episodes of various TV series than I could ever hope to count. Maybe someone who had never seen any of those other films or episodes would have a completely different take on Interstellar. But for me, the comparisons were inevitable, and rarely favorable. From a production standpoint, it's a pretty amazing looking film. They certainly didn't cheap-out on the visual effects. There's one particular shot that really makes me wish someone would finally make a movie out of . Just not Christopher Nolan. As has been stated in other reviews, sound was another complaint I had about the film, too. There were some scenes where the sound effects were absolutely deafening, and others where dialog was completely drowned out by them. And yes - I understand that's more in keeping with reality. But here's the problem: it's a movie. If something pulls you out of the movie while you're watching it, and makes you think "That's too loud! I can't hear anything they're saying!" then it's failing as a movie, unless the the intent of the movie is to remind you that you're watching a movie. I don't think that was the idea behind Interstellar. There was one (and only one) shot in the movie where an abnormally loud sound was used effectively to have an impact on the audience, but the rest of the time just felt like the director was trying to be self-important and overwhelm the audience with the awesomeness of his own creation. Interstellar isn't what I'd call a boring film (and at nearly three hours, that's actually quite an accomplishment). But it isn't particularly engaging, either. I didn't really care what happened to anyone. To Earth. To the astronauts. The whole ending was silly, preposterous and pandering, and the movie felt like it was spending it's entire run time trying to be important. Like it wanted to grow up and be 2001: A Space Odyssey, but it never read the book. In the end, I guess my initial assumptions about the film were right. It is like Gravity. So, it gets the same score: 5/10 -
When I first heard that they were making a Han Solo solo movie, my first thought was, "Why?" I already knew what I wanted to know about the character. I didn't care about unanswered questions from his past. Sometimes, a character is more interesting because you don't know everything about them. Take Darth Vader, for instance. He was a much more interesting character before the prequels revealed that he was an annoying, cherubic urchin, who grew up to be a spoiled, whining, obnoxious emo-brat. The fact that the first Solo directors were fired and Ron Howard had to be brought in to effectively reshoot the whole movie didn't help assuage my lack of enthusiasm for the project. It's not that I think Howard is a bad director, but whenever you have to switch directors mid-stream, it tends to mean the film is in a lot more trouble than reshoots are going to fix. See for example The Good Dinosaur or Justice League. I don't mean go see the films themselves... I just meant see them as object lessons. Fer cryin' out loud - don't see the actual films. They're stinkers. But because it's Star Wars, I decided to go see Solo anyway. Much like James Bond, Star Trek and Pixar films, I have a long-standing tradition of seeing them in theaters. Except I never did go see Spectre. Or Star Trek Beyond. Or Cars 3. Or Finding Dory... I may need to re-think my traditions. Anyway, I went to see Solo last week, and it was... okay. That's it. Just okay. Not awful. But not really worth seeing, either. Again, this boils down to answering questions that didn't need answering. It's much more interesting in Star Wars when Han says, "Kid, I've flown from one side of this galaxy to the other, and I've seen a lot of strange stuff..." and leave it at that. That's cool. That's mysterious. Instead, we're told where he grew up, how he got his name, how he met Chewbacca, how he met Lando, got his blaster, acquired the Millennium Falcon, developed trust issues, and a host of other things that frankly, do nothing to improve the stature or mystique of his character. Instead, what we learn only diminishes the legend. We're told about how he became an amazing pilot, but we never once actually get to see it. It happens offscreen, between two scenes that are apparently years apart. They completely skipped over it. That would've been interesting. Maybe even fun. And you know those dice he had hanging in the Millennium Falcon? Well, they're here in this movie too. Prominently. But we're never told how he got them or what significance they are to him. But we do get to see the infamous Kessel Run, and it's a massive let-down. I always assumed it was a race, or a smuggler's run that carried huge bragging rights with it, but it's not. It's hard to describe it without spoilers, but it's basically just a stupid way of trying to explain away George's "12 parsecs" scripting mistake, 41 years later. Look - whatever George claims now, it wasn't a navigation challenge. Because during the conversation, Han Solo was talking about speed. Not navigation. Fast enough. Case closed. If you want to make it canonical instead of an outright scripting mistake, you could just say that Han Solo was so full of himself when he was bragging, he made a mistake, which then makes it a character moment that doesn't need correcting anyway. However you look at it, it's a question we didn't need answered, because anything we imagined the Kessel Run might have been, was better. We also find out why the Millennium Falcon ends up looking... different in Star Wars, than it does at the beginning of this film. Another question that didn't need to be answered. But hey - let's shoehorn that one in here, too. And while we're at it - why not an unexpected, pointless, fan-service cameo? Sure. We'll throw that in, too. Now, I suppose that I wouldn't be so apathetic about the movie, had the story been better, or the answers more interesting. But the fact is, they weren't. At best, this is the kind of B-grade story that would have been filler material in the old Marvel Star Wars comic books from the 70's and 80's. Or maybe one of the early paperback novels that came out during the original trilogy. But it's not movie-quality stuff. It's not even Clone Wars or Rebels TV level stuff. That said, the movie is well-enough made for what it is. The actors are fine. The special effects are fine. It's not badly made. There are even some fun moments in it. It's just unnecessary. As for the characters in the film, Donald Glover does a very passable Lando Calrissian. He's suave and charming, and seems to be having the most fun. His co-pilot L3-37 continues the Rogue One tradition of making the Droids more interesting than the humans. Woody Harrelson is fine in his role as Han's mentor (or sorts), although I couldn't tell you his character's name without looking it up. Paul Bettany is an adequate generic villain, again - totally forgetting his name. And there's a love interest played by someone, who is okay, if not memorable (again). Oddly enough, Chewbacca actually had some of the best moments in the film. He's also the easiest to readily accept as a younger version of himself, probably because his character doesn't have to be played by any particular actor (no offense, Peter). Which brings us to the main focus of this movie... Solo himself. Alden Ehrenreich is probably a fine actor. He does pretty well in this film. But not once did I think of him as Han Solo. He just... isn't. He's not Harrison Ford's Han Solo, anymore than Chris Pine is William Shatner's Captain Kirk. You can name them the same characters, but they're not the same. You can claim they're part of the same continuity, but they're not. Roger Moore's James Bond isn't the same as Sean Connery's. They're different characters. Even though they're supposed to be the same. And I just couldn't get past that. I accepted the character he was playing for who he was in this film, but there's just too much of a disconnect to think of him as the same Han Solo I've been familiar with since 1977. So this might just as well have been someone else entirely, and they could have named the movie something else, and it wouldn't have made any difference. And I guess that's the biggest problem of all. This film just doesn't make any difference. We know that all of those things mentioned above are going to happen. There are no real stakes here. No real surprises about this character. Nothing that fundamentally changes or impacts him. It's all completely inconsequential. So while not a bad film, Solo was the Star Wars film that really didn't need to be made. Disney needs to do better. (Hint: we don't need Obi-Wan Kenobi or Boba Fett films, either.) Solo gets a 5.5/10.
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From the "Better Late Than Never" department... I'm gradually catching up on some of my summer movies. I may not get to them all, but at a friend's insistence we went to see Mad Max: Fury Road last night. I wasn't sure what to expect going into it. Sure - some of the trailers looked kind of cool, and although The Road Warrior (aka Mad Max 2) is an absolutely excellent film, I never thought Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome was very good, and that was the last film of George Miller's that I'd seen. And then there were all of the problems and delays of getting this film off the ground, the non-involvement of Mel Gibson, plus, after The Dark Knight Rises, I wasn't much of a Tom Hardy fan, either. Despite the stellar reviews, I just had a hard time getting worked up for it. But I'm sure glad I went now. It's actually kind of hard to describe the film, so I'll throw out a few words that came to mind: visceral, palpable, physical, intense, adrenaline, exhausting, bonkers, nuts, insane... ...awesome. If you've ever seen The Road Warrior, you remember the final chase scene. So, picture that. Got it? Okay. Now, amp that up by a factor of ten (or twenty), and make it go on for two hours, with a few pauses here and there to catch your breath. That's kind-of what Mad Max: Fury Road is like. The movie opens fast, and accelerates from there. It runs pretty-much non-stop for quite awhile until it comes (literally) crashing to a halt, before gearing up to put the audience through the meat grinder all over again. And again. And again. And again. But here's the thing - if that's all the film was, so what? Lots of movies relentlessly assault your senses without delivering anything entertaining. Not so here. MM:FR is relentlessly entertaining. It's fun to watch. It's a thrill ride with peaks and valleys and lots and lots of fast downhill sections. It's replete with bizarre characters and amazing (and I don't use that word lightly) vehicles and absolutely astonishing stunts. And as weird (and this is about as weird as films get) as the characters are, you do end up caring about them. Even Max - who is cold and distant, and has all but lost his humanity. He has no reason left to care, but by his nature, he can't help but do so. Tom Hardy won me over as Max. He doesn't have the charisma that Mel Gibson did in the role, but maybe for this film, that's a good thing. He needs to stand in stark contrast to the insanity all around him. Charlize Theron was outstanding (and completely unrecognizable) in her role as Imperator Furiosa (and that's the least crazy name of pretty-much anyone in the film - seriously, just take a look at the IMDb page). Everyone else was equally amazing and incredibly bizarre. Pure entertainment for the sake of pure entertainment. The characters needed to be over-the-top though, in order to even stand a remote chance of competing with the astonishing stunt work in this film. The cars were real. The crashes were real. Some 90% of the effects were practical - not CG. Everything had the proper weight, impact, and sheer chaos that CG simply can't replicate. How they got through this film without killing anyone is beyond me. There were a couple of other things that really impressed me about the film. First, although a violent film, it didn't dwell on it gratuitously. The violence happens as violence often does - fast. Out of the corner of your eye. Intense, but not overly graphic. Even off-screen at times. Suggested, not relished in. Like a quick smack up the back of your head, not prying your eyes open and forcing you to stare. Secondly, was how remarkably well the action was directed, filmed and edited. Many (if not most) action films now rely on fast cuts to imply action. It's nearly impossible to really follow what's going on. That's bad filmmaking. Not so here. Not once, despite how fast everything moves, did I ever feel lost, confused or mis-directed. Everything was always, absolutely clear. But without ever losing its intensity. Hollywood - take notes. If I had any complaint about the film, is that some dialog was difficult to understand. Whether too quiet, or hurried, or muffled, some of it I just never picked up on. However, the important dialog was always understandable. The story was always clear. My friend may have summed it up best, when he said it's been decades since he saw a film that felt the way watching this one did. It was a rush. It was exciting. And it's what movies are supposed to be like. Mad Max: Fury Road gets an over-the-top 11/10. Go see it in a theater while you still can. It has to be seen on a big screen. It is absolutely nuts. And it's a masterpiece. And now... a mini-rant. Remember when I ranted about going to bad movie theaters, and how I found one that changed all of that? Well, I'm away from any ArcLight theaters at the moment, so I had to go to a Regal theater for the last two movies. The projection in them was actually fine, but something else wasn't. And I wasn't the only one who picked up on this... It was the popcorn. It was stale. Borderline rancid. Nowhere near "fresh". And as I was leaving the theater, I realized something else... you couldn't smell it being popped. Or hear it being popped. The smell of popcorn used to waft through movie theaters. The sound of the poppers ever-present. But now? I think it's all pre-popped. They're probably just dumping giant bags of stale pre-popped popcorn it into now-defunct poppers, and charging crazy-money for it. And it wasn't just for Ant-Man, but for Mad Max: Fury Road as well. Probably both from the same bag, days apart. Way to go Regal. Thanks for ruining yet another part of seeing the movies.
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Minions - Spoiler-free movie review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
Okay... I had no plans to see Minions, but when your impossibly adorable niece wants to go see a movie, how can you say "no"? Plus, I went to CalArts with one of the directors. So, we saw Minions. She loved it. For me, not so much. The Minions are fine in small doses as comedy relief, but their incomprehensible gibberish wears pretty thin after a few minutes (much less an entire feature). Also, the plot is really flimsy and contrived, and is just there to hang some jokes off of. Even that would be fine if the jokes were funny (see: "Airplane"), but they just weren't. There were a handful of cute moments, a few fun scenes, but they were all too few, too short, and too far-between. Minions made for a far better trailer than a movie. Also, the movie takes place in 1968, and all of the cultural and musical references go right over the heads of the target audience of little kids. Since the Minions all effectively act and talk in nearly the same way, it's hard to connect with any of the three main characters the movie focuses on. The main villain in the film isn't particularly menacing (or memorable), and the most interesting characters in the film (a family that picks up the hitch-hiking Minions) only appear for a short time, and don't really figure into the plot at all. I kept hoping for them to step in during the finale, but they were only there as spectators, and were completely wasted. Now, I should say Minions isn't a bad film, in that it's well animated, not offensively stupid, and is mercifully low on butt jokes and toilet humor. But that's the best that can be said about it, apart from it keeping my niece entertained for an afternoon (which in and of itself is well-worth nine bucks). I suppose for what's effectively a disposable kid's film, expecting any more than that is asking too much. And given that it's already exceeded $640 million worldwide, my opinion doesn't really matter anyway. It's easy to see how this movie came about. The Despicable Me films have grossed over $1.5 billion worldwide, and someone at Universal thought, "Hey, those Minions sure are popular - I bet a movie about them would be a huge hit!" They weren't wrong. But Minions still gets a 2/10. -
Doctor Strange - Spoiler-free movie review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
I needed some escapism the other night. I had already voted, so I was pretty-much done with the whole election thing at that point, and really didn't want to sit around and watch the returns on TV for the next several hours. So I decided to go out and see Doctor Strange. Even though I never followed the character back when I read comics, and really didn't care about the more mystical/fantastical aspects of the Marvel Universe, the trailers looked kind of cool. And Benedict Cumberbatch was quite good in The Imitation Game (not so much though in Star Trek Into Darkness). Plus, I thought it was really nice to see Gillian Anderson finding work again, and... What? Rachel McWho? Okay. Huh. Could've sworn they were the same person. Anyway... There weren't a whole lot of people at the theater. I should've expected that, really. So the audience reaction was more subdued than you get with a big crowd. I went to see it in a large Dolby Atmos equipped room, but in hindsight, I think I should've gone to see it in 3D. Generally, I don't like seeing 3D films (they're rarely worth the extra trouble of wearing another pair of glasses over my own), but some of the effects in this movie really cry out to be seen in 3D. And I think being in a smaller theater, sitting closer to the screen, would have made it a more immersive experience, which is what this film really needs. As it was, I often felt disconnected from the film, looking at it, thinking, "Hey... those effects look pretty cool!" rather than, "Wow! Take a look at the world we're in!" The film follows a brilliant surgeon - Stephen Strange - who loses his ability to operate, and goes on a quest to get his hands fixed. As he exhausts all possibilities, out of desperation, he finds himself in Kathmandu seeking the help of a mystic known only as The Ancient One. From there, he begins to discover how to tap into the energies of the multiverse to manipulate reality, cross into other dimensions, fight bad guys, and make tea. He also discovers that the Earth is under constant threat from other dimensions, and there's this secret group of protectors "The Sorcerer Superemes" who... no wait... I think that was the group Diana Ross was in. Maybe that should be "The Sorcerers Supreme"? Whatever. Anyway, they protect the Earth somehow from these cosmic baddies out there who want to steal our stuff and break our toys. So the film is about an arrogant, brilliant rich guy, who learns a valuable life lesson through a personal tragedy, gains fantastical new abilities, and becomes a selfless defender of those in need. And he has a goatee. Basically, Iron Man, with magic. Magic Man. But hey - if a formula works - why mess with success? Doctor Strange is an entertaining enough film. I went to escape for two hours, and for two hours I didn't think about the election once. So from that standpoint, it was a success. I enjoyed watching it - the acting performances were fine, and the special effects were really impressive... but I wouldn't call it a great film. For one thing, I never really empathized with the main character. In Iron Man, even though Tony Stark was a jerk, he was a charismatic, likable, entertaining jerk. And when he went through his tragedy - you were right there with him, and felt the loss and why it changed him. But Stephen Strange is just a little too... dull. And even his arrogance lacks substance, if that makes any sense. Yes, he's arrogant, but for the most part he seems like a nice guy, who is justifiably arrogant once in awhile because he's incredibly brilliant. You don't see a huge shift with him from being selfish to being selfless, because he's never really portrayed as all that selfish to begin with. Also, it's never really shown why he's so motivated to do what he does. Either as a surgeon, or afterwards. Yes, he wants to get his hands fixed - but his downfall and obsession with that was glossed over too quickly. There was some considerable amount of time that must have passed, but it all went by in a couple of quick scenes, and didn't have the sort of impact that it should have. We should have witnessed more of that part of the story, so we could empathize with him as his life was spiraling out of control, and journeyed with him, to see what he really lost. In one scene he was a wealthy, but broken surgeon still living in an upscale penthouse apartment, then a few scenes later he was walking the streets of Kathmandu looking like a homeless person. It all felt too rushed. Also, when he did begin learning magic, it was difficult to get a sense of how long he was actually at it. Weeks? Months? It didn't seem that long in the film, considering how fast he progressed. Again, a big chunk of his journey seemed to have been skipped over. His motivation for getting involved beyond his initial self-centered goals are never made clear either. Some of this is due to the time constraints of telling the obligatory "bad guys are coming to do bad things" story, but I think they could've made the film a bit longer to accommodate making his origin story more compelling. Or at least better understood. Speaking of bad guys, this is yet another Marvel film (to be fair though - it's not just Marvel) where the main bad guy (played by Mads Mikkelsen) is just there to forward the story, and isn't all that interesting. He's there, he does bad things, his motivation isn't all that clear, but they have to stop him, because someone has to be the bad guy this week, and it was his turn. Now, there's more to it than that, and there is a better payoff near the end of the film, but even then, we're really not told a whole lot about why this threat is, well... threatening us. Why Earth? Do we have a big target painted on us? It's pizza, right? We're the only planet in the universe to have created pizza, and now everyone wants some, but they don't want to have to tip the delivery guy to bring it all the way to another dimension. The rest of the supporting cast was pretty good - but not spectacular. Rachel McAdams was fine, but her character just seemed all-too ready to accept these bizarre things happening around her. Maybe after all of the other Marvel movie events (aliens attacking New York, etc), she's become a bit jaded to it all, but that's never alluded to in the movie. Tilda Swinton was okay as The Ancient One, but I felt her performance was a bit too flat at times, and that they probably could've gotten just about any other decent actor to play that role. Benedict Wong (as Wong, oddly enough) and Chiwetel Ejiofor (as Mordo) fared much better. Of the core characters, they were by far the most interesting. The real stars of this film though are the special effects. They're pretty impressive, and at times very unique. Unfortunately, most of the best ones were already spoiled in the trailers. But I guess that worked as intended, since that's why I went to see the movie. The problem with that though, was there really wasn't anything left to see. I was expecting more. I was expecting it to be a lot weirder than the trailers let on. And while there was a little more to discover in the movie, it was still a bit of a letdown. If you haven't seen many (or any) trailers for Doctor Strange - don't. Leave the good stuff for the theater. There are a couple of obligatory credits/post-credits scenes, so stick around for those. Plus, they get bonus points for using a harpsichord during the end credits music. Seemed appropriate. Overall, Doctor Strange isn't a bad film. It's a pretty-good one. It's certainly uneven in terms of the story and some of the characterizations, but there are some fun moments, some humor, and some pretty cool visual effects. It's also very clear this is opening up the whole Marvel Cinematic Universe to be much, much larger, and potentially much, much weirder. It's worth seeing, but I'd suggest seeing it in 3D. Doctor Who er... Strange gets a 7/10. -
I went and saw "Star Trek" Thursday night. And I'm a little disappointed. You see, I had some choice material already thought-up for my review. About the movie being an utter, unwatchable train-wreck. About how they'd screwed everything up, and the characters were all just vapid, Hollywood pretty-boys. I even had a great line about how Star Trek the movie was basically like an over-the-hill Hollywood starlet that had had one-too-many plastic surgeries, and you kind of felt bad for it because it had too much work done, looked all trampy and fake, and was still dumb as a fence post. And now I can't use it. Any of it. I had to start over from scratch. I'm a little disappointed about that. As much as I hate to admit it, Star Trek was actually a pretty-good film. Not bad, in fact. Flawed to be certain, but not the horrible, catastrophic disaster I was sort-of hoping for, in an admittedly sadistic way. (Bad reviews are always more fun to write.) But I'll admit it - I enjoyed the film more than I expected to. The characters, for the most part, were pretty well-written, and if not faithful to the originals, at least recognizable in their respective roles, and in some cases (Chekov, for example) actually improved (admittedly, for Checkov that wouldn't be too hard). The actors (whose names I don't recall - so I'm assuming they're all relative unknowns) did a pretty good job. The most annoying thing I found, oddly enough, were the instances where they were lifting lines directly from the original series. Dr. McCoy was the most frequent with at least one "I'm a doctor, not a (insert occupation here)!", and various insults aimed at Spock. It all seemed a bit too self-conscious, and it would have been better to just let the new characters figure out their own such phrases and moments, instead of having the "classics" down pat already. It all seemed rather forced and obvious, like "Hey, let's hit the audience over the head with this one now!" There were other obvious nods to the original series and movies, too. I don't think they were really necessary, but I suppose maybe they keep the Trekkies, Trekkers or (gack) Trekkans happy. I found them a bit distracting, since I found myself thinking "Oh hey... they took that from such-and-such film". One thing they did do well, is they kept the background characters (Sulu, Chekov, Uhura, and Scotty) basically where they belonged - in the background, as supporting characters. One of the problems Star Trek in general ran into, as that when the original series became a cult classic, the ancillary characters likewise achieved cult status - and they were never meant to. They were supposed to be perfunctory characters. Seat-fillers, essentially. And what happened over successive Star Treks is that the shows became over-populated with what should have been minor characters getting too much screen time, instead of focusing on the core relationships at the heart of each series. Here, however, they struck a good balance between using these characters, without them getting too much of the spotlight. Each of them got their moment, and that was enough. Generally, I thought the backstories were pretty good. Aside from that, they did a nice job of developing his backstory, and letting us into his world a little bit. Maybe spending a little more time on McCoy would have been good too, but he seemed to be the one most directly aping his original-series counterpart (which I found a bit distracting), so maybe it's just as well. Scotty, on the other hand, came off as kind of a goofball, How the sweaty-heck did that happen? The main villain (Nero) was decent. At least he's got motivation, if not much in the way of smarts. Certainly as far as Star Trek movie villains go, he was a far cry better than some of the ones they've had (although hardly in the league of someone like Khan). It would have been nice if they could have developed a villain to be an ongoing nemesis for the future. I think that's something Star Trek has sorely lacked in the movies. As for the plot... well, it was serviceable. And I think that's all it was meant to be. There were points in the film that were just absurd to the point of ridiculousness. Certainly, that could have been handled in a better way. Star Trek in the past has excelled at making techno-babble at least seem plausible. And of course, there were plot holes all over the place big enough to fly a starship through. Still, I was able to (mostly) suspend disbelief and eye-rolling enough to enjoy the ride for what it was: a pretty decent Star Trek-flavored sci-fi action movie, with just enough likable characters to keep my attention for the duration of it. What I really found annoying though, although there was mercifully not an over-abundance of it, were "shaky-cam" scenes. Particularly in space battles. Let me say this to all directors out there: THAT IS REALLY ANNOYING ON A BIG SCREEN! You create special effects and edit your films on relatively small monitors that aren't three stories tall and don't fill your entire field of vision. So stop assuming that just because it looks good on a desktop, that it won't be headache-inducing and impossible to watch in the theater! KNOCK IT OFF! This is exactly why Speed Racer didn't work (that, and really awful acting). Despite those problems however, and despite my best intentions, I actually did find myself enjoying the movie. Several times, I actually sat there and thought, "hey - I'm enjoying this". Although really, if the movie had been holding my attention all the way through, I shouldn't have actually been thinking that until after the movie. But whatever. I still have to give them credit for what I'd call a successful reboot of the series. I wasn't expecting any of that. I figured they'd use time travel to somehow go back and fix it. Well, that didn't happen. So hat's off for not taking the easy route. I think that was important because it made it "seem" as if anything could happen, In the end, me and the twelve other people in the theater all seemed to like it well enough. Maybe it would have been even better with a crowd, but there's something to be said for going to a 10:30 PM showing on a Thursday night. In the end, Star Trek gets a rather generous 7/10. Up next: Up
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Zootopia - Spoiler-free movie review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
Sometimes, working at CalArts is a good thing. Like on Thursday. Co-director Rich Moore (Wreck-It Ralph) held a screening and Q&A session for his latest Disney animated film - Zootopia - which opens in the U.S. Friday. So hey - free sneak preview! Now, I thought Wreck-It Ralph was excellent, so I was hoping for good things from Zootopia. As the first trailers trickled out for it, the film looked like it would be funny and well-animated, making for a nice, cartoony return to the "talking animals" genre for Disney. I wasn't really expecting more than that, but I was hoping it would at least be a good, funny, entertaining movie. And it was. But it was more than that. A lot more. Zootopia pointedly brings home some ideas in a way that fits perfectly in animation, much in the way the original Star Trek series did. By masking them in the genre, you're entertained, but never beat over the head with "a message". Nonetheless, these ideas do get through, and often in a more effective way because you become involved with and empathetic towards the characters, before you even fully understand why. If that sounds vague - that's my intent. Because I think that people will get different impressions from this film that will slot into their own experiences. For example, Rich Moore started off his introduction by recounting his time as a student at CalArts, and how the original Disney animators and early CalArts grads who were just achieving success at that time would come and lecture to his class, and how he realized that they were opening up the world of animation to him and his peers, and, in his words, "There was enough room at the table for everyone - even me." That message was not lost on the next generation of animators sitting in that theater on Thursday. There's room at the table for them too, as long as they persevere and never give up on their dreams. Perhaps that sounds a little cliché, but in the context of this movie, it's never treated that way. This movie has a very big heart, and a lot of emotional impact. It's one of the best animated films I've seen in years. This is the type of film you once expected Pixar to make. That said, I want one thing to be very clear - this is not an overly-serious movie. But it is an incredibly thoughtful one. Best of all, Zootopia is a funny movie. It's brilliantly funny at times, even poking some most-welcomed fun at Disney itself. While there were certainly emotionally impactful moments in the film, there is always balance. The humor worked on every level, too - visual, slapstick, satire, verbal - the film was packed with it. The two main characters - Judy Hopps (Ginnifer Goodwin) and Nick Wilde (Jason Bateman) - are excellent. Their personalities and relationships drive this film. They have meaningful, heartfelt stories that you want to watch unfold. And they're flawed, too. Genuinely so - sometimes without even realizing it themselves, leading to some truly poignant moments. As for the ancillary characters - there's not a weak one in the bunch. None of them felt throw-away or extraneous, nor overly important given their screen time. They were there to support the main characters, but they never take over the movie from them. The main characters are the focus, and unlike many Disney films, they are the strongest, most likable characters in the film. The film doesn't rely on wacky sidekicks to keep the film moving. (There are plenty of wonderful, funny characters in the film, but they don't overstay their welcome. They serve their purpose well, and get off the screen.) The main story of the film is about the two main characters. The main plot of the film that the characters are involved with is completely secondary. I was so engrossed in the characters, I effectively didn't really care about how the main plot turned out, except in how it impacted them. While the ramifications of their success or failure were large in scope, I was far more concerned with how it affected them personally. That's good writing. The animation is absolutely first-rate. This is what an animated film should be - telling a story in a way that's completely unique to the medium, with characters that can only exist in animation. Not something that could just as well be done in live action (or on ice). Again, this is what you would have once expected from Pixar. The animation runs the gamut from broad, physical humor to fast and furious action to the most subtle of emotions. All of it masterfully executed. Visually, the film looks just right. That may seem like an odd compliment, but what I mean by that is that even though the environments are huge, and varied, and detailed, and clever, and wonderfully designed - they fit the film. Unlike The Good Dinosaur where all of the emphasis was on hyper-realistic environments and Gummi-textured dinosaurs, in Zootopia - everything looks like it belongs. If it calls too much attention to itself, they're doing it wrong. Here, we're treated to an overview of the city at the beginning of the film to enjoy the spectacle of it, and from that point on - it just is. It's the city, and it's where the story happens. That is how you design an animated movie. Now, I should point out that I saw this in a theater packed full of animation students. And their responses to animated films tend to be heightened. For a truly good film, their responses are wildly enthusiastic. For bad films... well, I wouldn't want to be on the receiving end of it (they were laughing at The Good Dinosaur in all of the wrong places... not with it). With Zootopia, it was terrific fun to be in the room and hear the laughter and share the joy they had in watching it, and it was clear by some of the comments in the Q&A (as well as the standing ovation Rich Moore received after the film) that the movie emotionally resonated with them as well. Me too. Apart from a tacked-on end-credits song that didn't really do much for me (I should point out - this is mercifully not a musical), Zootopia is a thoroughly entertaining animated film, up there with the absolute best of the best. It's incredibly funny, genuinely thoughtful, exciting, thought-provoking, uplifting, and just plain fun. A rare combination, and it all works. Go see it. Twice. Buy extra popcorn. Bring the kids. Buy the Blu-ray when it comes out. Zootopia gets a 9.5/10. -
The Martian - Spoiler-free movie review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
Continuing the trend of semi-reality-based science fiction epics set in the undefined yet not-too-distant future that give Neil deGrasse Tyson something to Tweet about, we have The Martian. Having never read the book, I only had a passing interest in seeing the movie, since from the trailers it looked to be little more than the middle film of a trilogy set between Gravity and Interstellar, explaining how Matt Damon got marooned on a distant planet (although how all of Mars gets sucked through a wormhole remains unexplained). But I did finally get around to seeing it the other week, and it was better than I expected. The Martian is about an astronaut stranded alone on Mars after a mission goes wrong. Fortunately, he happened to be the only scientist on the mission with the ideal skill set to survive, otherwise it probably would've been a much shorter movie. But if the astronaut Michael Peña played had been stranded instead, it probably would have been a much funnier movie, especially if he was doing his character from Ant-Man. That would've been awesome. Anyway, as Damon's character begins to figure out how to survive, he finds out that nothing is that easy when you're in a science fiction disaster movie, so even more things have to go wrong, and he has to figure out even more ways to stay alive. And that's pretty-much the whole movie: disaster, tension, solution, relief, repeat (see also: Irwin Allen). Plot-wise, The Martian lies somewhere between Apollo 13 and Gravity, but without the believability of the former, or the ridiculous preposterousness of the latter. Its biggest failing is that it suffers from predictably. Not in how things are going to turn out, but rather in the pacing of the film, so you can always tell when the next "bad thing" is about to happen. You just sort of wait for them to get on with it, get over with it, and move onto the next disaster. (Apparently though, the book had far more such moments, which probably would have pushed the movie into Airplane-like satire territory.) The plot isn't without other issues, such as some extremely convenient plot devices, and events which really stretch plausibility, even considering the space-disaster-movie genre. Much of what it would actually take to mount some of the missions seen in this film are completely glossed over, or compressed so much as to completely trivialize them. That aside, The Martian is still an enjoyable movie. Thanks mostly to Damon, it's well-acted, it's very well produced with first-rate effects and sets, and as long as you don't think about it too much, it's entertaining enough to kill a couple of hours (although the movie runs a full 24 minutes beyond that ). And while I'm sure proponents of a manned mission to Mars would likely celebrate this film, if anything it only points to just how unlikely that is to ever happen, since the well-funded, spacefaring NASA of this film is about as far removed from actual reality as is Space: 1999. Still, I enjoyed the spectacle of it all, and the craftsmanship put into this film alone almost makes it worth seeing on the big screen. After a while, you just sort of buy the fact that Matt Damon is an astronaut marooned on Mars, and that's what a good science fiction film should do. The Martian gets a respectable 6.5/10. But I can't help but wonder, with George Clooney and Matt Damon now having starred in a couple of these films... can an "Ocean's Eleven in Outer Space" be far behind? Because man, that's a film I'd pay a good 12 bucks to go see. Up next: Star Wars: The Force Awakens. I have tickets for 11PM tonight. -
Passengers - Spoiler-free movie review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
Titanic in space. 4.5/10 Okay... I was really tempted to just leave the review at that, but in all fairness, I suppose I could do a little better. Passengers is the fourth film in the Gravity / The Martian / Interstellar trilogy. Don't ask me how the math works, it just does. Sometime in the very distant future, Earth is a mess, and we're now colonizing other planets to mess them up too. So... add Wall-E to that list, since that's basically where the plot came from. Some of the ship interiors were lifted right out of Wall-E too. Plus spacewalking. And cute robots. Chris Pratt from Guardians of the Galaxy (which has nothing to do with this movie at all), plays some guy (I forget his name - but it's not Star Lord), who is one of 5000 passengers in suspended animation, taking a 120 year-long trip to another planet, because he wants to build things. Apparently, he grew up on an Earth, learning to be a guy who builds things, in a society that no longer needs people who builds things. Seems to me what he really needed was a better high school guidance counselor. Anyway, because in space things happen, he wakes up. 90 years early. Now at this point in the film, the story is pretty interesting. Pratt plays a very different character from Star Lord, which is good, because I kept thinking while watching the trailers, "So... he's going to be a wise-cracking smart-alec without a talking raccoon? What's the point?" But he isn't. He's a more toned-down, mature character, and he finds himself effectively marooned. He's too far from Earth to get help, the crew are all locked away in suspended animation, so he's stuck. Alone. And at some point, he has to make a critical decision about his situation. This is where the movie works best - as he's agonizing over this decision, while he desperately tries to stave off boredom and loneliness. Once he makes the decision, the movie still works for short time as another character enters the story (Jennifer Lawrence), but then it basically deteriorates into a chick-flick in space. And then it becomes a disaster movie in space, because random bad stuff has to happen, or there's nothing to artificially force the plot along. (Hence this being the fourth part of the aforementioned trilogy.) The special effects are pretty good, but you'd have to be making an indie film on a shoestring budget to not have good special effects anymore. Frankly, the whole film is kind of stupid. It seems the filmmakers tried to make the film scientifically plausible, but a lot of it just becomes silly. The lapses in logic are ridiculous. The motivations for people moving to another planet are never believable, given that they're effectively throwing their lives away. There are massive gaping plot holes throughout the movie, absurd situations abound, logic is nowhere to be seen, there's a completely unresolved and unsatisfying ending, and Jennifer Lawrence just becomes increasingly annoying as she gets her overacting "cry face" on. Ugh. This is Hollywood ham-fisted storytelling at its worst. I kept hoping there was going to be some sort of sinister plot or conspiracy behind everything that was happening (as implied by the trailers), but even that cliché was beyond the writers' abilities. If the movie had lived up to the promise of its first third, it would have been a much better film. Certainly, the production values were high enough. And they didn't spare any expense on casting. But this is one worth skipping. Wait for it to show up on TV if you're going to watch it. Just make sure you have something else on the DVR to flip over to. Passengers still gets a 4.5/10. -
Spider-Man: Homecoming - Spoiler-free review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
I finally got around to seeing Spider-Man: Homecoming a few days ago. I was debating whether or not to go see it because frankly, I'm a little tired of Spider-Man movies. Even though some of them had their moments, and Spider-Man himself was handled pretty well, it was Peter Parker who just never really clicked. For one thing, he was always way too old, and for another, he just wasn't very likable. Tobey Maguire played him like kind of an endlessly crying jerk, and Andrew Garfield was a tortured, twenty-something emo. So even though Marvel, and not Sony, handled the creative direction for Homecoming, and his cameo was well done in Captain America: Civil War, I was just kind of over the whole Spider-Man thing. But recently I had some time to kill, and a friend of mine hadn't seen it yet either, so we decided to check it out. And I'm glad I did - because this is how Spider-Man should've been done all along. Thomas Holland does a great job as Peter Parker, and this is really where the heart of the character has to be. That's what made him unique when Stan Lee created him - Spider-Man was a teenager first, and a superhero second, where previous teenage heroes were all just generic sidekicks. Peter has to figure it out and carry the burden by himself, and he's still just a kid. Holland comes across as not just a high schooler, but a young one at that. He doesn't know how to drive. He's awkward and uncertain. He makes mistakes that kids would make. Even as Spider-Man, he doesn't have things figured out yet. There's a great scene in the film where for the first time he has to get to the top of a very tall building. And it takes him a long time. It's difficult, tiring, and when he gets to the top, he's a bit freaked out because he's never been that high up before. He's not immediately swinging around effortlessly between skyscrapers. This is new for him, too. Homecoming does a great job of putting Peter Parker back in high school, and really developing him as the character behind Spider-Man, whereas in the previous movies it often felt like the two characters weren't always the same person. It's also refreshing to see Peter having to deal with high school stuff: making friends, sitting in classes, dealing with teachers, peer pressure, etc., all while trying to figure out who he is supposed to be as Spider-Man. He's not in college, trying to earn money from the Daily Bugle, or dating some overly-hot 20-something babe. This is a more naive, innocent Spider-Man, and while the movie is not an origin story (mercifully), we're still catching him very early on as he's making mistakes and dealing with the consequences of them. It's all good stuff, and it feels honest. It feels the way Spider-Man should. He doesn't always do the right thing, but he always wants to do the right thing. Now, one of the major weaknesses of recent superhero movies has been the villains. This is why Marvel keeps trotting Tom Hiddleston out as Loki over and over again, because he's so good at being bad. But Michael Keaton excels in this film. He's not out to rule the world, or destroy it, or be the baddest villain on the planet, or even be known as a villain. His motivations are much more grounded, believable, even understandable. His approach is smart. He doesn't make stupid mistakes, and doesn't tolerate them from subordinates. He fully believes he's doing the right thing, and has his own measure of honor. Yet he's incredibly menacing when he needs to be, and like many great movie villains, is so compelling you wouldn't mind rooting for him. He's easily one of the best superhero villains in many years, and gives me hope that Marvel is capable of reaching that level again in future films. The rest of the cast is excellent as well. Peter's high school friends (and rivals) are all very smartly cast, well acted, and nicely updated. And yes - they all seem like high school kids. Marisa Tomei does a great turn as Aunt May (and no - I don't miss the shriveled up octogenarian from the comics at all), and easily has the best line in the movie. Robert Downey Jr., is back as Tony Stark/Iron Man, but he doesn't dominate the movie or distract from Peter's story. He effectively serves as Peter's mentor, hoping to steer him along a better path than what he himself followed. His presence here makes sense, but anything more would be intrusive. Marvel seems to know this, as the next Spider-Man film reportedly won't have Iron Man in it. The writing throughout the film feels natural and honest to the characters. It doesn't seem too clever - Spider-Man can be funny at times, but he doesn't always have the perfect quip or witty retort. Holland at times reminded me of a young Michael J. Fox, which is a high compliment. There are some nice nods to Spider-Man's history too, including at least one pivotal scene lifted from a classic comic story. The tone of the film is incredibly well-balanced, but most importantly - it's fun. I really enjoyed watching the movie, but best of all, I cared about what happened to the characters. That said, it's not a perfect film as some of the special effects didn't fare too well. A number of the CG stunts felt decidedly fake, which is surprising considering how far that sort of technology has advanced. Also, the editing made it hard to follow some of the action during fight scenes. But for the most part, the action worked well, and again, it was still fun to watch. As an aside, it's a little difficult for me to separate out the movie from the theater that I saw it in. It's one of those theaters where you can order food while you watch the film, and while generally not a problem, near the end of the movie it became really annoying as the servers came around to hand out people's checks, and would inevitably disrupt the movie by either walking in front of you, or talking to you about your own bill. That sort of thing should wait until the end credits, or just be taken care of as people exit. But I still really enjoyed the movie anyway, so that speaks pretty highly of how good it was. Spider-Man is finally on track movie-wise. I'm really looking forward to his next solo films, provided Marvel can maintain control of them. The other Marvel films Sony is working on? Couldn't care less. Hopefully they'll learn they need Marvel's help to get these characters right. It worked here. Hopefully, they can make it work again. Spider-Man: Homecoming gets an 8.5/10 -
Tomorrowland - Spoiler-free movie review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
Okay.... if you read my last review, I was pretty-much done with going to the movies. So, yeah. About that... After that final disappointing trip to the theater, I began to realize something: going to the movies had become a chore. And it had been for quite some time, too. Besides the two trips to see Age of Ultron, I'd been to a string of bad screenings. Dim projection, bad sound, dirty screens, and just really poorly run theaters. Snacks were marginal - flat, diluted soda, stale popcorn with rancid "buttery-flavored topping", distracting bright green LED aisle lights (during the movie), annoying commercials before a seemingly endless parade of trailers (I lost count at eight during Age of Ultron), and ushers walking around the theater with flashlights while the movies were running. That was all commonplace. And that doesn't even take into account having to deal with obnoxious patrons who text or don't shut their phones off, idiot "vapers" who think puffing on e-cigs is somehow acceptable in a movie theater, or just waiting in long lines on busy nights in the vain hope of getting a decent seat. No wonder it became a chore. Even for movies I wanted to go see, I can't recall the last time I actually liked going to the theater to see them. Maybe seeing Tron: Legacy at a dedicated IMAX theater was it. Going to a theater was something that I had to do to see a movie, not something I enjoyed. It would be like if the only place you could get a pizza was Chuck E. Cheese's. You'd probably stop getting pizza. I would. But not all movie theaters are like that. I know this because I work with people who actually go to movies and enjoy them. There are good theaters in the area. There kind-of have to be - I live not all that far from Hollywood, and that's the self-proclaimed movie capital of the world, right? The trick is, where is the nearest one, and is it worth the drive? The ones I'd heard the most consistent reports about were the ArcLight theaters. The nearest one to me being in Sherman Oaks - about 18 miles from here, along the 405, which is one of the worst stretches of freeway in L.A. But if I avoid typical rush hour traffic, it's only about a 1/2 hour drive. So I decided rather than let my enjoyment of movies get snuffed out without so much as a fight, I'd give it one more shot. I'm glad I did. You can check out their website for details, but let me give you a few highlights about what ArcLight does that's so different (but really should be standard practice). It's all about the movies. ArcLight makes sure their theaters exceed THX standards for sound and projection. They make sure everything is working properly - and even have someone come into the theater right before the lights dim to chat up the crowd and let everyone know that their goal is to ensure that everything is going to be presented the best that it can. And it was - the picture was razor-sharp and bright. The screen was flawlessly clean. The sound (Dolby Atmos for this screening) was perfect. They have a "black box" approach to their theaters. This means no distractions. They are there to present the movie - not commercials. None. And they run minimal trailers. Just three when I was there. And when the theater goes dark - it goes dark. Aisle lights are kept to a necessary, but still safe, minimum. [*]It's all about the enjoyment. No ushers walking around during the show. The one usher came in, introduced the show (and was very engaging while doing so), and I never saw another one during the movie. No texting or cellphones allowed during the movie. Sure, other movie theaters encourage that, but it's actually respected here. Wider seats with more legroom and wider armrests (you don't feel like you're stuffed into a coach airline seat). The theater was clean. Noticeably so. They had a big crew go in there to take care of it - not just one or two kids with trash bags. Fresh popcorn with real butter. Seriously - real butter. I can't begin to tell you what a difference this makes. And every size of their popcorn comes in tubs - not those horrible bags everyone else uses. Their "small" soda is actually a small soda. Not 32 oz. Thank you for understanding that not everyone wants to drink an entire bucket of soda. They even have a café in the lobby, so you can eat before or after the show. I'll have to check that out sometime. [*]It's all about the customers. Every employee I encountered there - repeat - every employee was courteous and friendly. Not disaffected and bored. The guy at the snack counter was actually enthusiastic. Infectiously so. My enjoyment of the movie started even before I'd set foot in the theater! To ensure a minimum of disruptions - after the movie starts, nobody gets in. You snooze, you lose. (Yes - you can step out to use the bathroom and get back in, but otherwise - no.) And since they start on time, that means you'd better get there on time. They validate your parking. Parking at the Galleria is not free - but you get four hours' worth if you go to the ArcLight. And here's the kicker - reserved seating. I bought my ticket Saturday for a Sunday show, online, and got a fantastic seat. This means no waiting in lines. Sure, I was early so I had to wait for the crew to clean up after the previous screening, but I didn't have to fight for, or worry about a decent seat. This needs to be standard operating procedure everywhere. This was, by far, the best movie-going experience I've had in years. Maybe decades. I want to go back. I want to watch movies again, because here - it was actually about movies! I'd almost forgotten what that was like. So, with the theater sorted out, what was the movie like? Well... I'll admit I had about zero interest in seeing Tomorrowland. The commercials and trailers didn't really tell enough about the movie for me to get excited about it. There's a fine line in trailers between piquing an audience's interest, and spoiling the best parts of the film. Tomorrowland never achieved the former. Another hang-up I had with it was that it had George Clooney in it. Generally, Clooney usually plays the same character in every film - the affable, snarky, smarmy goofball. Like in Ocean's 11. And Ocean's 12. And Ocean's 13. And Gravity. But that was before I saw the film. And I'll also admit that the only reason I saw the film was because it was directed by Brad Bird. Brad's an alum of the program where I work (the movie is listed as an "A113 Production" in the opening credits), as well as the director of Iron Giant, The Incredibles, Ratatouille (two of Pixar's best films) and Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol (well, there's only so much you can do with Tom Cruise). Of course, just because someone is good at directing animation, doesn't mean they're bullet-proof when it comes to live action. So, let's get the 800-pound gorilla out of the way first. Or some such metaphor. George Clooney was not the problem here. He was fine. Or at least, not annoying. Let's just say he didn't stick out like a sore thumb and ruin the movie. In fact, the cast, across the board, was fine. Not special. Not great. But pretty good. The exception being Raffey Cassidy who, as the heart and soul of the film, was really a lot of fun to watch. Unfortunately, she wasn't really supposed to be the heart and soul of the film. Britt Robertson was. Although she too, was fine. Here's the problem with the film. And it comes from a line from within the film itself - where Robertson's character comes to a realization that she was promised one version of Tomorrowland, but that's not what she got. And it's not what we got either. I was actually enjoying the movie pretty well - until the characters got to Tomorrowland. Then it fell apart. The most interesting story about Tomorrowland is the one they didn't tell. We see glimpses of it, and hints of it, and what it was supposed to be. But we're not even sure if ever was that. We're told only the vaguest history of how it came to be, and what happened to it. Tomorrowland is what the movie trailers are about. It's the place the whole movie is supposed to be about. It builds to it... it teases it... then disappoints. To quote a line from a Peanuts strip, "the anticipation far exceeded the actual event". From that point on, the film degenerates rapidly into clichéd predictability. Everything is telegraphed so nothing is a surprise. Nobody's emotions really ring true. And frankly, the whole plot device that everything is hinging on and the solution for it could have been lifted from even the most pedestrian episodic sci-fi TV show or Saturday morning cartoon. The ending is completely unsatisfying because the threat of the movie never felt real. It was presented like, "for no apparent reason, all of this is going to happen". Well... there was a reason, actually. It was sledgehammered home in one hokey, overblown, self-righteous speech from the film's villain, in which humanity was deemed as a bunch of hateful, hopeless, war-mongering, environment-killing sadists, who deserved whatever their fate was. It was very haphazardly slapped into the movie, and just really didn't fit in with the tone of the rest of the film. And it's too bad, too. Because Tomorrowland looked like it could have been a fun place to explore and visit. But it didn't deliver that. In the end, Tomorrowland's biggest problem... was Tomorrowland. Maybe Brad should've taken Disney up on their offer to do that other film. Tomorrowland gets a 5/10, because half of the film was pretty good. But man... the theater was awesome. ArcLight gets a 9/10. -
Incredibles 2 - Spoiler-free review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
Hey look - another review! You'd almost think that a whole bunch of movies were being released at the same time of the year for some reason. Can't imagine why. The weather's beautiful outside today. Anyway... It's been fourteen years since The Incredibles was released. How long ago is that? Well, that's before this blog existed. That's a long time. Consequently, there's no review here for The Incredibles. But if I had to place it somewhere in Pixar's pantheon of animated features, I think it would probably be my favorite. The reason I say "probably", is because it's been around so long, it's lost some of its impact over that time. But I still do remember the first time I saw it, and I remember it being fun, exciting, funny, and, well... incredible. It was the first film in decades that gave me the same kind of rush that the speeder bike chase in Return of the Jedi had. Were I to guess, I probably would've scored The Incredibles a 9 or 10 out of 10. So that's a lot to live up to. And now, there's a sequel. When Pixar fully jumped on board the sequel train after being acquired by Disney, I was worried. Pixar had been at their best with original films. Sure, Toy Story 2 was great, but Pixar themselves had spent years railing against Disney wanting to make sequels of Pixar films. Ultimately though, we got sequels. And the question that begs to be asked is, was it worth not having an original Pixar film, every time they had to devote the studio to making a sequel instead? Well, the answers, as it turned out were yes. Then no. And no. And two more no's I didn't even bother seeing (Cars 3 and Finding Dory). Sure, they all made money, and soccer moms needing something to baby-sit their kids with for 90 minutes were more than happy to go see them. And Pixar's track record for original films isn't exactly spotless anymore, either. So I was worried when I heard they were doing another Incredibles film. The Incredibles is one of those films that's so good, you want to see a sequel. But it's such a perfect film on its own, it doesn't really need one. Back To The Future is another example of this. Back To The Future Part II has some clever ideas and some fun moments, but it's also disappointing in many respects, and neither sequel lives up to the first film. We would have been just fine without them. At worst, a bad sequel can actually tarnish your enjoyment of the original film. Even with Brad Bird back to direct, I was still worried. Bird's previous effort wasn't exactly one of my favorites, and I wondered if he could recapture the magic of the original, fourteen years later. Could he stay true to the characters, and make their story still interesting and relevant, despite 73 (count 'em) superhero films being released since the original? Fortunately, the answer is a pretty definitive "yes". I know... you can't really be "pretty definitive". It's either do or do not. There is no "pretty definitive". Incredibles 2 is a fun film. Let's get that out of the way, first. Superhero films should be fun. This one is. Helen (Elastigirl) takes center stage in this film, and we really get to see how formidable of a superhero she really is. We only caught glimpses of her abilities in the first movie, but here it's almost an Elastigirl solo film for a good chunk of the movie. And it works. It works so well, I kept thinking... "Hey, with the right director, a Fantastic Four movie could be really cool! Mr. Fantastic would be awesome!" Hopefully, Marvel can get that sorted out someday. Anyway, the Helen and Bob (Mr. Incredible) roles from the first movie are effectively reversed for Incredibles 2. Helen goes out superheroing, Bob stays at home with the kids. And then things happen, and... well, that's kind of where the "pretty definitive" part comes in. Incredibles 2 pretty-much follows a lot of the same plot points as the first film. Yes, things are switched around a bit, but overall it's a pretty predictable film. In some cases, a bit too much so. Oddly enough, the predictability didn't matter that much. In most films, it would be a problem. But with Incredibles 2, the emphasis is on the main characters - the Parrs. Everything else is in support of that. Even though on a larger scale things were predictable, and that may have reduced the overall impact of the plot of the film, it didn't diminish my enjoyment of it. The individual character moments, the family's interaction, action sequences, humor, and fight scenes (one in particular is my favorite superhero movie fight scene - ever), all pay off. Revisiting the Incredibles was a lot of fun. It picks up right where the last one left off, and feels like a perfectly natural extension of it. The technology used to create these films has grown by leaps and bounds, but the filmmakers resisted the urge to change the look of the film. Aesthetically, it fits right in with the original, but still takes full advantage of advances in CG software and hardware to add a little more texture here, a little more detail there, or smooth off some previously rough edges. It's subtle, but it manages to match the original, without looking dated. The voice cast is (mostly) back, except for Dash, who they had to recast since the original kid's voice is completely different now, and Rick Dicker, because the original voice for the character - Bud Luckey - passed away. Everything is amazingly seamless, considering how much time has passed. But CG doesn't age, and with the same director at the helm, the same composer and voice cast, there's continuity across the board. Probably more than most films, you could run this back-to-back with the original, and it would all just work. The characters all naturally just fall right back into place, and the chemistry between them is still there, as if this were made right after the original. They're just as likable (and often flawed) as before. I'd questioned Bird's plan to pick this film up without any time having passed, but it really works. Plus, we don't have to wonder about how characters got from where they were back then, to some completely different point now. We get to enjoy seeing them pick right up where we last knew them, and take off from there. We also get to see more of Jack-Jack and his developing (and unpredictable) powers. Some of this is hinted at in the trailers, and it looks cute there, but Jack-Jack really steals a lot of this movie, and has some of the absolutely funniest scenes throughout the film. Where the film is less successful is the villain. The villain is a significant step-down from Syndrome in the first movie. While the new villain (The Screenslaver) certainly has their motivations, they're lacking the same personal connection to the Parrs that Syndrome had. The Screenslaver also isn't as much fun as Syndrone was, but more of a typical, cookie-cutter, disposable, villain-of-the-week. Yes, the stakes are still high and all that, but the stakes are always high. That's a given. The villain should be more special. More engaging. More fun. Fortunately, the rest of the film and characters are fun enough to make up for that. Incredibles 2 is still a very fun ride, and one sequel I'm glad Pixar made. It doesn't have the originality, freshness or excitement of the original, but it's certainly a worthy successor, and it was great fun revisiting these characters again. Go see it with a big, buttery bucket of popcorn. Incredibles 2 gets an 8/10 A word of warning: if you're susceptible to flashing lights, be warned that there's a scene in the film that could cause some problems. I don't have issues with that sort of thing, but the flashing was so intense, I immediately thought, "Wow... I hope everyone's okay with this." If you want to go see the film, and want to know where it's going to happen: -
Avengers: Infinity War - Spoiler-free review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
Dang. I mean seriously... dang! I just got back from seeing Avengers: Infinity War, and I'll get to the review in a moment. But first - a rant. I try to avoid spoilers. And I hate websites that spoil movies. I wasn't planning to see Infinity War until later in the week, but felt I had to see it tonight if I had any chance of avoiding spoilers. Why? Well, because of idiots at websites and YouTube channels like IGN, Nerdist and Because Science. Yeah, that's right - I'm calling the lot of you out. Like you care. Spoiler-face. Because even if you think you're not spoiling movies, you are. Whenever you post an article or a video with a title like, "How does (so and so) do (so and so)?" or "Did (such and such) really just (such and such)?", even if you think you're being vague or speculative, the fact that you're still putting plot points into the titles of your articles or videos makes them spoilers. Anyone subscribing to your channels or perusing your website can not miss them. And yes, I get the fact that you're all desperate for readers and viewers so you'll post whatever click-bait you think you can get away with, but might I suggest that you title your articles and videos something more along the lines of: "(Movie title) Speculation: Potential Spoilers" so those of us who don't want anything spoiled in a movie don't feel like we have to shut the internet off completely until we can actually get out to see the film? Sheesh. End of rant. Or as Stan would say, 'nuff said. Now then, onto the movie. I'm going to keep this pretty short. Mainly because it's late. Also, I don't want to potentially risk giving anything away either. The question at hand is - does Infinity War live up to the hype? This has been cooking now for 10 years, so this movie has a lot to live up to. Age of Ultron didn't. Civil War didn't quite either. It seemed the more characters that got added to a movie, the more muddled a movie became. Infinity War, on the other hand, nailed it. It's kind of strange to see nearly every Marvel movie character in one film - but it really worked. It almost felt like watching several of the other movies all edited together. But only the good parts. Except they were parts you hadn't seen before. To be sure, there's a lot of ground to cover in this movie, and a lot of characters. And nearly everyone gets a moment to shine here or there. But it doesn't feel forced. Characters who aren't that critical to the story are present, but aren't shoehorned into the plot in order to give them their five minutes. Some are more in the background and that's how it should be. Keep the focus where it belongs. I'll give an example: Star Trek. The original series. In the original series, it was about Kirk, Spock and McCoy. Scotty, Uhura, Sulu and Checkov were supporting characters. And some episodes they got more to do, because there was time in that format. But when the movies rolled around, it often felt like they trotted out all of these supporting characters and gave them more to do, just because they now had fans. But in a two-hour movie, you don't always have the time to give everyone something to do. In ensemble films, finding this balance of who's important and who's not is critical. In Infinity War, the Russo brothers managed this expertly. It was great to see everyone again from the other films. And because we've seen them in their other films, even if some characters got less screen time here, it didn't feel like we were being short-changed. Unlike, say, Justice League. Infinity War starts with its foot on the gas and never lets up. If anything, it stomps on the gas harder, kicks in the supercharger, and then hits the nitrous. There is a ton of great superhero action in this movie. Frankly, I felt kind of exhausted by the end of it. But in a good way. This is how a blockbuster-epic-action-special-effects-superhero-movie-event should be. Gimme my popcorn money's worth! This is a dense movie. There is a lot of story, a lot of locations, a lot of characters, and a lot of things happening. It's pretty impressive that it all fits into 2 1/2 hours, and does so pretty organically. A lot of pieces get put together, and it's fun to see a lot of long-standing plot points finally coming to fruition. The characters are true to who they've been in previous movies. At the heart of the film you have heroes who we've gotten to know and care about over the last decade. If you liked them in other movies, you'll like them here. They don't do anything goofy like take a character who was super heroic and fearless in a solo movie, and turn them into a hopeless, lovestruck shut-in who hides away from society for 100 years because their boyfriend who she knew for two weeks blew up in a plane. Just sayin'. Infinity War delivers massively in the super hero action department. There are a ton of fan-pleasing moments throughout the film where you get to see some really cool stuff. And there's enough humor to lighten the tension once in a while, and remind you that Marvel doesn't take itself too seriously. We wouldn't want to get all morbid and gloomy, right? Now, being a comic book movie, I should point out that not everything always makes sense. You may just wonder, "Well, why doesn't so-and-so just do this?" And some things are a little convenient, for the sake of moving things where they need to go. But it's a comic book movie. Not a documentary. If you over-think it, you're missing the point. And besides, you can always explain away comic book plot holes with comic book "logic". There's one other important thing that needs to be touched on here - because it's the shortcoming of a number of Marvel movies: the villain. Where Marvel movies consistently shine is with their heroes. They're human, flawed, complex and relatable. This is what separated Marvel from everyone else. This is why Stan Lee is as significant to comic books as Walt Disney was to animation. But Marvel movies don't always bring their villains up to that level. They're usually still fun to watch because of the heroes, but the films are at their best when the villains are as equally interesting as the heroes. Up until now, Thanos has just been sitting on a chair, floating around, and not really doing anything. So the question was - would he make a worthwhile villain? Not just a powerful one - but an interesting one? Fortunately, the answer is pretty-much yes. Thanos is - by far - the most formidable opponent the Avengers have ever faced. He's a powerful opponent in every sense of the word. And as far as being interesting - he's that, too. Mostly. I think he still falls a little short in terms of really understanding why he's so motivated by what he's doing, but he's certainly motivated to do it. And like some of the best movie villains, he doesn't see what he's doing as being wrong. However, what he's doing is so wrong, it's hard to relate to him. But he's really cool to watch in a fight, and in a movie like this, that counts for a lot. For me, Avengers: Infinity War lives up to the hype. Of course, I just got out of the theater less than two hours ago, so I'm still on somewhat of an adrenaline rush from it. But you know what? This is a big, loud, action-packed, summer blockbuster, popcorn munching, superhero movie. Maybe my opinion of it will temper over time, but right now I had a lot of fun watching it. I cared about the characters. I had fun watching them. I totally bought the fan-service moments. I laughed, shouted, pumped my fist, gripped the arms of my chair (without even realizing it), and absolutely pounded down the popcorn. The movie is packed with surprises. Even with the spoilers I complained about earlier, there was so much else I never saw coming, that I'm still processing it. I rarely go to a movie twice, but for this one, I think it'd be well-worth it. Because it'd be fun. Go see it. Go see it before it gets spoiled for you. It's a lot of fun. It was totally satisfying. That's what a superhero movie should be. I can't wait to see what they pull out of the bag for the sequel. Avengers: Infinity War gets an adrenaline-assisted 10/10 (Okay... the review wasn't all that short. But it was relatively short.) -
Black Panther - Spoiler-free review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
I wasn't planning to go see Black Panther. During the time I actively collected comics ('84 - '91), I really don't recall seeing the Black Panther very much - and I bought a lot of comics back then. He may have appeared in some of the Avengers stories, but I don't really remember. All I do remember was thinking, "Sheesh... he looks a lot like Batman." At any rate, I had no real familiarity with the character. Not until the movie Captain America: Civil War anyway. Also, I was getting kind of burned out on superhero movies. Even though Justice League wasn't a Marvel film, that one was kind of the last straw. It was just dreary, boring and overblown, and I didn't care about any of the characters in it. Even Wonder Woman, who had been great in her own solo film, was completely wasted in it. Plus, with Avengers: Infinity War and Ant-Man and The Wasp coming out, there are already enough superhero movies to go see this year (and that doesn't include: Deadpool 2, Incredibles 2, Aquaman, and how ever many others I'll probably just end up renting or watching on Netflix). So, I figured I'd just skip it. But I kept hearing good things about it. And it kept lighting up the box office. And I haven't seen a movie in several months. And I was bored last week. So I went to see it. And much to my surprise, it was really, really good. Once in awhile, with films like Captain America: The Winter Soldier or Ant-Man, Marvel steps back from their big epic stories, and brings their superheroes back down to a more personal, human level. We get to see the people behind the heroes. This is what Stan Lee did that was so different from the typical superheroes of the early 60's. This is in Marvel's DNA, and they have rich character histories to draw from for their movies. When they do it right, it works really well. And with Black Panther, they did it right. First, they did a great job bringing us into the world and history of the fictional country Wakanda. They had to lay a lot of groundwork in the movie, but it never seemed to get bogged down or overburdened by it. Nor did it feel superficial. They hit just the right notes introducing us to its culture, its conflicts, its history and its leaders. It was all very organic and accessible. So with the stage set, the characters had a proper backdrop for their stories and personalities to shine - and shine they did. Chadwick Boseman's T'Challa made for a very compelling lead character. One that had burdens to carry, flaws to overcome, truths to confront, lessons to learn, and an opportunity to grow and develop as a leader and as a man. Michael B. Jordan as Killmonger provided for one of the best and most complex villains in the Marvel Cinematic Universe to date. He was a much more sympathetic and tragic character than we typically get in superhero movies, and his backstory made his motivations for what he was doing hard to dismiss as just being another "bad guy". The entire cast is first-rate, really. There are some powerful moments in this movie, and incredibly unique and memorable characters throughout. The Dora Milaje (Wakanda's all-female special forces) are particularly memorable, formidable, and just plain fun to watch. There are certainly some great action sequences in the film, but what really made the film work were the personal stories and relationships - why they were doing what they were doing, and how those choices impacted themselves and others. I cared about these characters, and what happened to them. For characters I knew nothing about, that's no small feat. It's how movies should work. I hope DC is taking notes. For that matter, I hope Marvel is taking notes too. Keep the stories about the people - not the events. Certainly, Black Panther has its fair share of superhero movie tropes: super-strength concoctions, inexplicable techno-gadgets, and a few all-too-convenient plot twists, but it gets far more right than it does wrong. If I had one complaint about the movie, it's that the Wakandan technology was a bit... convenient. Vibranium, apparently, can do anything from healing wounds, to materializing costumes out of thin air, to making julienne fries (okay... maybe not that last one, or at least not on screen ). It's just a catchall cure-all. But hey - it is a comic book movie, so there will be some of that. Black Panther is a smart superhero film, and a unique one. If you didn't know this was part of the Marvel Universe, these characters and their world could easily stand on their own. It's beautifully filmed (at times with stunning scenery), with an excellent, immersive soundtrack, and best of all, it has heart. A lot of heart. It's well-worth seeing while it's still in theaters. Black Panther gets a 9/10. And now, a mini-rant: Usually, I drive about 25 minutes down to the Arclight theater in Sherman Oaks to see movies. But since this was a spur-of-the-moment thing, I went back to the local Edwards theater. I'd written about the problems I've had with them before. Twice. And yet again - it was disappointing. While not as awful as previous visits, there were still two glaring problems with the presentation: 1) The movie was framed wrong. The projector was set up wrong and the screen was masked wrong. How do I know? Because the subtitles shown when characters were speaking in Wakandan were half cut-off at the bottom. Subtitles should be fully onscreen with some margin below them. Filmmakers never put subtitles at the very bottom edge of the screen, because of the risk of them being partially obscured by masking or screen curvature. Yet even with that safety margin, these were still cut off. There were also a number of scenes I recognized from the trailer that were cropped way too much. So clearly, the theater just wasn't paying attention. 2) The other glaring issue was literally glaring: the aisle lights are bright green and red LEDs. And I mean bright. Ridiculously so. Yes - you need aisle lights for safety, but other theaters manage to get away with darker lights. Even if they just got rid of the green ones, that would help since the green cuts through darkness like a laser pointer. Wearing glasses only makes it worse, because then you're picking up reflections, too. I'll write them to let them know, but they won't fix anything. They'll probably just send me some free tickets which I won't use anyway, because I'm going back to the Arclight. -
X-Men: Apocalypse - Spoiler-free movie review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
Well... I had completely lost any interest in seeing this movie after being completely underwhelmed by the trailers. But I was really bored yesterday evening, so I decided to go. I thought the last X-Men movie was good, and I'd finally rented Deadpool the other week, and thought that was pretty good, too. So maybe Fox was going to do okay with this movie. As an aside, how faithful Deadpool was to the comic, I couldn't tell you. He came along after I had stopped reading comics. His movie was entertaining enough, although Ryan Reynolds gets pretty annoying after awhile, even if the relentless barrage of one-liners are part of Deadpool's character. Personally, I could have done without a pretty good chunk of the R-rated material in the film. Yes, I know that's supposed to be part of the character, but I didn't feel that it was all that necessary in order to make the film good. Some of it just felt gratuitous in order to get their coveted R-rating. Also, as with most comic book movies, if you think about the plot too much, it just doesn't make sense. But overall, the writing was pretty good, the action scenes were well done, and I thought it was worth the price of a rental. One thing that really didn't work though, was Colossus. As a fully CG character - he just looked like a big toy. Completely cartoony and fake. More fake than . Plus, they played him as such a humorless straight-man, that there was nothing appealing left about his character (and yes - I know he was just a supporting character here, but they could have made him at least a little interesting). If I'd reviewed it in the theater, I probably would have given it a 7/10. But it wasn't a film that needed to be seen in the theater. Although apparently, I'm in the minority there. So then, onto the Apocalypse. Wow... if I had a dollar for every time I've said that. Now, the very first thing that struck me as the movie started, as they went through this looonnng CG opening title, is that it really would have been awesome if when the title "Apocalypse" came on screen, that they misspelled it "Alpocalypse" and then "Weird Al" would have popped into frame, goofily waving, and saying "Hey everybody!" That would've been awesome. But they didn't do it. But I defy you not to think about it now, if you go see the film. Anyway... X-Men: Apocalypse certainly isn't the best film in the X-Men franchise, but it's also far from the worst. How you define the X-Men franchise is another matter though. Is this the third film (since they rebooted the series), the second film (since the timeline was altered) or the sixth X-Men film overall, or the ninth film featuring X-Men? Well, it doesn't matter, because the X-movies' continuity is just as hopelessly shot now as it is in the comic books, so just throw out everything that went on before this one, and you'll be better off. They do reference X-Men: First Class and X-Men: Days of Future Past here, so in all likelihood, this is #3. Which is kind of amusing in a way, because at one point in the movie the characters make a reference to "third films" which was intended to be a dig at X-Men: The Last Stand, but sort of inadvertently applies to this film. Whoops. Once you just kind of throw away the original three X-Men movies, and X-Men Origins: Wolverine, then you can just take it as a new timeline, featuring the same characters, but with a different future. Sort of like J.J. Abram's Star Trek, but without all of the lens flares and shaky-cam. And more scientific plausibility. I actually enjoyed X-Men: Apocalypse. Much more than I expected to. Is it on the same level as Marvel's Marvel movies? Nope. But Bryan Singer has nonetheless managed to create a unique world of superheroes that works anyway. It has its own feel, which is different, but consistent unto itself. Still, I couldn't help but think at times, "How much better would this be if Marvel were making it?" But let's start with what I liked about the film. First, the characters we're familiar with from the previous two movies are back, and continue to work pretty well. James McAvoy as Xavier has some good moments, although it isn't until near the end of the film that I started buying him more as the classic Professor X. Michael Fassbender as Magneto is particularly good in the film, although the circumstances that cause him to make the choices he does are very ham-handedly written and directed. You can predict what's coming, and it's all too contrived. Evan Peters is back as Quicksilver and basically steals the movie again with another super-speed sequence that shows just how amazing superpowers could be. Unfortunately, they don't do enough of that in the film. But I'll get back to that. Jennifer Lawrence is back as Mystique, although she's under-utilized here relative to the previous X-movies, and some others return as well, but they're more perfunctory than anything. Beast is still too smurfy-looking. He should be darker blue so he doesn't look so much like bad makeup and fake fur. There are quite a few new characters added, or rather, new origins to characters from the original three movies. Cyclops, Jean Grey and Nightcrawler are the most effective new introductions in the movie, and have some of the best moments. They aren't a team yet - but you can see them starting to work together and build the bonds that will lead to them becoming the X-Men. I thought that Cyclops and Jean Grey's developing relationship, although somewhat brief, was nicely handled, and showed why they have the closeness that they had in the comics. Also, their powers were the best handled ones in the movie, being the most faithful to the comics, and showing their abilities well (in addition to Quicksilver, of course). They were the most pleasant surprises of the movie. There's also a scene - one scene - in the movie which X-Men fans have been waiting for since the first X-Men movie, that we never got. Well - we get it here, and it was worth the wait. Finally. It's one of the things that made this movie work for me, and actually makes me want to see the next film. Spoiler ahead (don't say I didn't warn you): That said, the movie certainly isn't without its problems. As I mentioned, the set up for Magento's story is very cliché in a contrived, predictable, comic-booky sort-of way. There are other new characters introduced (or promised), which never pay off. Some are just not well utilized at all (Storm, Psylocke, Angel), their backstories are completely glossed over, their powers are never explained (admittedly, Angel is pretty obvious), and they're just there to fill up supporting roles that could have been done by any character. Another - Jubilee - who is featured prominently in advertising, is never even mentioned by name, never uses her powers, and is only there for... I don't have any idea, actually. Marketing? Apocalypse's powers are never really explained either, although they appear to have something to do with manipulating dirt. Oh, and he can supercharge other mutants. Or help them unlock their full potential. Or something. But he can't do mind control. We know that, because they remind us of that repeatedly. But that doesn't explain why the characters who become his four "horsemen" - actually decide to follow him. Seriously. That's never explained. Does having their powers supercharged somehow affect their judgement? Were they all just a bunch of really angry jerks looking for a reason to destroy humanity? It just doesn't make any sense. And then there's the villain. He's formidable, or rather, his followers are. But he's just not... dynamic. Or charismatic. This should be someone where you watch him, and you see the convictions of his reasoning. You should have some sort of connection to him - whether positive or negative. The best movie villains are like that. And while Apocalypse has his reasons for what he does, he just doesn't seem to be all that into it. Destroy the world to save it, only the strong survive, you know, that whole thing. James Bond's villains did that all the time. But the best ones were the ones where the villains had personalities that were fun to watch. Here... not so much. He's menacing, deadly, powerful... but not interesting. He's just sort of there. Only at the very end does he start to come alive. Not the best makeup, either. The way Apocalypse is released into the modern world is patently ridiculous, too. He apparently has had a devoted group of followers worshipping him for millennia, yet he effectively gets released from his captivity by accident. Ugh. I hate lazy, sloppy writing like that. Speaking of lazy writing, some of the plot of the movie is quite predictable, too. There are unexpected moments, but not really unexpected outcomes. The movie treads some all-too familiar ground (although to be fair, so do comic books). For a fair amount of the movie, you're just waiting for the inevitable to happen. Also, the movie is set in 1983, for no apparent reason. Maybe it's to let us know 10 years have passed, and things are apparently somehow better now for mutants, but it never really goes into anything that has actually happened over the last 10 years. And apparently, nobody has aged. For that matter, nobody has aged since 1962. (Okay, to be fair - they've aged five years.) There's really no reason to set the movie in any particular year, really. They would have been better off not even mentioning it. Although it is kind of cool that I went to high school at the exact same time as Cyclops, and if only my mutant ability to overstate the obvious had manifested itself then instead of 2005, I could have become an X-Man! That would've been sweet. I bet I totally could've been on the team. Superheroes are always overstating the obvious. I'd fit right in! "Look out! We're all in terrible danger!" "Here come the Sentinels!" "Wolverine is in a bad mood again!" Yeah. I totally could've done that. Although I would've been the guy to die in, like, the second issue. And everyone would've been sad for maybe two or three pages, and then I'd just be a footnote on some article listing all of the X-Men ever. Right there with Thunderbird. So I guess it's just as well. Besides, the name I'd have wanted to use is apparently already taken. Where was I? Oh right... the movie. Anyway, I went into X-Men: Apocalypse with low expectations, or rather, no expectations, and I came away from it pleasantly surprised and well-enough entertained. While not among the best superhero movies, it was still a pretty-good one, it still had some fun moments, and I didn't leave feeling like I'd completely wasted my evening or had the memories of my favorite superheroes completely ruined. I think the best thing X-Men: Apocalypse managed to do though, is to finish rebooting the franchise. At the end, they leave the characters in a place where I want to see what happens to them next. We're ready to start up again. And with some of the groundwork they laid here... it looks like this time they might get it right. X-Men: Apocalypse gets a 7.1/10. (I know... I'm splitting hairs with the score. But I gave Man of Steel a 7/10, and this is better. One of these days, I need to revise my movie scores.) -
Star Wars: The Last Jedi -- Addressing the Backlash
Rhindle the Dragon posted a blog entry in Memoirs of a Novelty Account
MEMOIRS OF A NOVELTY ACCOUNT VOL. III, ISSUE I I wanted to use this entry to state my opinion on The Last Jedi and the recent backlash. I want it to be known that: 1. I am a huge Star Wars fan 2. I, too, dislike what Disney is doing to Star Wars 3. But I LIKED The Force Awakens 4. And I LIKE the prequels 5. And I LIKED this movie. People should stop romanticizing Star Wars so much that nothing new is allowed to be tried. Star Wars has never been a masterpiece (except for maybe Empire Strikes Back) and should not be held to such high standards. It has always had glaring flaws in either writing, directing, or acting, but we love it just the same. Why? Because it's space samurai fighting with laser swords! It's awesome! I believe that people will grow to like this movie. The Last Jedi has not killed Star Wars -- if anything, The Phantom Menace did that. Episode VIII was competently directed, visually beautiful, and emotionally resonant, even if it had some questionable writing and awkward scenes. There were many good moments, like the flashbacks with Luke and Ben Solo, and the quiet parts where the director let John Williams' brilliant score shine through. I hate what Disney is doing to Star Wars in that the movies (and other media) are starting to feel more like an industry than an art. That's OK -- Disney is under investigation for monopoly and things might get better in the future. At least, I hope they will. Whatever your opinion is, just remember to take it easy, and have a happy new year.- 4 comments
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Star Wars: The Last Jedi - Spoiler-free review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
I got out to see Star Wars: The Last Jedi a couple of nights ago. But before we get to the review… two things: 1) Remember my rant a few years ago about how awful movie theaters are? And later how I found movie theaters that corrected those problems? Well, to see any movie now, much less a Star Wars film, I'm really particular about where I see it. Since I'm in Seattle at the moment, I'd hoped to go to the Cinerama again, where I saw Star Wars: The Force Awakens. However, we found an alternative, and much to my surprise… it was at a theater chain. In this case: AMC/Loews. And while I think most AMC/Loews theaters are still little more than wallpapered outhouses, this one had something special going for it: one of their screening rooms had been turned into a Dolby Cinema. So, what does that mean? Well, first, it's new. That means it hasn't been trashed yet. The screen is new, and clean. The seats are new. The floors aren't a sticky mess. But better than that - it's fully equipped with the latest Dolby projection and audio systems. So that means there's a better-than-average chance that the picture and sound may be somewhat correct (in this case, both were excellent). Plus, the seating is vastly improved. The old seats have been removed and the theater completely restructured with fully adjustable, electrically-controlled leather* recliners. Big and comfy, with tons of legroom. Plus, the rows are tiered in such a way that the theater is much steeper, and each row has a knee wall in front of it, giving uninterrupted sight-lines throughout the room. *(probably not actual leather) And better still - the seats are reserved. No waiting in line with the huddled masses in order to maybe find a decent seat. We ordered online a few days in advance, and were able to score some excellent seats for a midday showing. The downside? Well, it's more expensive. A lot more. By the time you add in "convenience" fees**, it's almost $20 per ticket. For a movie. A popcorn and a drink added another $15. So… yeah. Crazy expensive. Plus, the bathrooms still stink like an open sewer. **(does this mean they owe me a refund for all of the times it was inconvenient to see a movie there?) But ultimately, for me, since I don't see that many movies, and presentation makes a huge difference in my enjoyment of a movie, it was worth the extra money. So if they have a Dolby Cinema in your area, you might check it out. Especially if you have to sit through 24 minutes of trailers. 24! A quarter of my popcorn was already gone by the time the movie started. But if they don't have a Dolby Cinema, avoid AMC/Loews like the plague. Seriously, their other theaters are toilets. They aren't like toilets, I think they actually are toilets. 2) As I was getting ready to see The Last Jedi, I thought back to Return of the Jedi. What did the title mean? Who was the returning Jedi? Was it Anakin Skywalker returning as the Jedi he had once been? Was it Luke Skywalker returning, now as a Jedi? Was it plural - the Jedi as an order returning in the person of Luke Skywalker? Beats me. I'm still not sure. Just some food for thought. There's no such ambiguity in Star Wars: The Last Jedi though - by the end of the film, what The Last Jedi means is pretty clearly explained. So, on with the review! Cue the Spoiler-free Review theme music! (For the sake of variety, this time it's by the Archies, for no particular reason.) Actually, you ought to hear Micky Dolenz's version from his solo album Remember. Totally different take on it. Oh right. The review. So, first things first - I enjoyed The Last Jedi. I know there are some fans out there who outright hated it, but I'm not in that camp. Much of it was a lot of fun, which is what a Star Wars film should be. There wasn't anything that I really disliked about it, although there were some things I was disappointed in. But I thought it was better than The Force Awakens, although a lot of that is because The Last Jedi wasn't just a rehash of the original Star Wars. Carrie Fisher has a more significant role in the movie, and her presence in Episode IX will be sorely missed. Mark Hamill actually gets to speak this time, and does several other things as well! He easily has the strongest performance in the movie, and this movie is as much about Luke Skywalker as any of the newer characters. In fact, pretty-much everyone has an expanded role in the film (save for Captain Phasma, who does a little more this time around, but really is becoming something of a punchline), but therein lies one of the problems of The Last Jedi: it's a long film. A bit too long. While Rian Johnson does a good job of keeping the film and its different plots moving along, there's a bit too much of it. Most notably, the side quest with Finn and Rose is entirely unnecessary. It's kind of a throw-away B-story - something that would be more suited to an old Marvel Star Wars comic book, rather than taking up so much time here. The Last Jedi would have been a sleeker, more streamlined, and possibly more effective story without it. Parts of their story are fun, but a lot of it feels like "We better give Finn something to do - since he doesn't fit in anywhere else". There's also a significant amount of fan service in The Last Jedi - scenes that were added in just to please the audience - with a number of overt homages to The Empire Strikes Back. While those can be fun, I tend to find them distracting since they remind you that you're watching a movie, rather than just letting you sit there and enjoy the new movie for what it is. Also, I felt some of the humor was a little too… familiar. Not in terms of it being recycled, but in terms of it feeling like contemporary, pop-culture humor. Star Wars humor (when it worked best) was always kept in the context of the Star Wars universe, and felt natural. Some of the humor in this film felt forced (pun not intended), or overused. The Porgs were completely unnecessary, but they didn't bother me all that much, since they didn't have as much screen time as I feared, given all of the marketing hype surrounding them. There were a couple of scenes with BB-8 though that were just too over-the-top, and seemed like they'd be more at home in a HISHE parody, than the actual film. As for those disappointments I mentioned - there are a couple of significant plot points that weren't handled very well. I'll expand on those a little here, plus add another. Please use Spoiler tags if responding to these: Again, I'm not in the "I hate The Last Jedi" camp. I fully get that some people hate it, but as far as I'm concerned, everything except The Empire Strikes Back has failed to some degree or other to live up to the original Star Wars. Return of the Jedi was a massive disappointment to me (30+ years later, I still refer to it as a big, Muppety, Ewok turd). The less said about the Prequel Trilogy, the better. And while The Force Awakens was overall a good movie, it was too derivative, and had too many of J.J. Arbrams' trademark technology McGuffins. Rogue One was a solid piece of Star Wars storytelling entertainment, although again, not without its problems. That's basically where I'd put The Last Jedi. I didn't have any issues with how the characters were handled. I didn't have any preconceived ideas about how Luke Skywalker should or should not have acted. I went to the movie to find out what had happened to him - not watch online fanboy theories play out. I never read any of the non-movie books (save for Splinter of the Mind's Eye, and a couple of the early Han Solo books). None of the Expanded Universe matters to me, so I had no alternate histories for this film to live up to. I'm sure they're good stories - but I don't expect them to be canon any more than the Marvel Star Wars comics that I collected as a kid. I just enjoyed them for what they were. I generally liked the performances in the Last Jedi, the notable exception being Snoke, who looked even more fake here than in The Force Awakens. Mark Hamill brought great emotion to Luke, and a depth we'd never seen before. Carrie Fisher seemed far more at home in The Last Jedi, and really shone brightly as the heart and soul of the Resistance, and her final scenes are a poignant reminder of what will be missed about her. Daisy Ridley was solid again as Rey, and Adam Driver still makes for an interesting, conflicted Kylo Ren As mentioned before, I felt that the Finn and Rose side story was largely throwaway, but they did a serviceable job with the material they were given. The other characters in the film are fine - again, mostly serviceable. Nothing bad, but nothing they're going to be handing Oscars out for, either. But they should really stop trying to make the Poe Dameron thing happen. I just don't get the appeal. Not really a strong, lead character in my opinion, and someone they wasted entirely too much screen time on. The action sequences in the film were solid - although there were a few scenes lifted a little too directly out of The Empire Strikes Back. Stop with the homages already, and come up with something new, please. The special effects were all up to the best of modern standards, except, as already mentioned, Snoke. He never looked convincing, he walked badly (like bad CG animation, not like he was limping or something), and I didn't think much of Andy Serkis' acting, either. He seemed very flat, and never truly menacing. Also, Chewbacca looked a little odd at times. I know Peter Mayhew is no longer in the mask, but I'm wondering if they were attempting some CG trickery or had changed something significant about his face, because his mouth didn't look quite right. Where The Last Jedi actually worked best for me were the scenes with Luke coming to terms with his own past. Again - I went to this film to find out what had happened to him. Mark Hamill might not have agreed with the direction of Luke's character for this film, but that didn't stop him from doing a powerful acting job with it. We already know the Jedi were flawed and often made mistakes out of hubris - especially in the prequels. Even Obi-Wan turned out to be somewhat of a jerk with his "certain point-of-view". So Luke having some conflict in his own past shouldn't be that surprising - Jedi or not, he's still human. I think that makes him even more compelling. I enjoyed seeing Mark Hamill back as Luke Skywalker, and really delivering a performance worthy of the character. I spent decades assuming we'd never get to see Hamill back again as Luke. So I'm glad we finally got that. And if it wasn't what people were expecting - well, maybe sometimes that's a good thing. I get pretty tired of going to see movies where I can predict everything that's going to happen. Some people may be unhappy with Star Wars being in the hands of Disney now - but remember what happened when it was in Lucas' hands? Remember Jar-Jar? Li'l Anakin? Teen angst Anakin? That absolutely awful dialog between him and Padme? And remember that Star Wars was effectively dead as a movie franchise when George had finished Episode III? Star Wars will never be everything everyone wants it to be, anymore than Star Trek will ever be everything everyone wants it to be. It can't measure up to peoples' nostalgia, memories or expectations. Overall, The Last Jedi was fun movie. For me. That's all I needed out of it. Anything beyond that is a bonus. And it was way, way better than the prequels... and a certain Muppety, Ewok Turd. No movie is perfect, and I doubt any Star Wars movie will ever live up to fan expectations. The Last Jedi didn't meet all of mine either, but neither was it predictable. Nor was it bad. Long? Yes. Incomplete? Sure. But I'm satisfied that seeing it was time well spent. I had fun. I really enjoyed watching Luke's story play out. I'd recommend it. It's a good popcorn flick. And a little bit more. What I'm not looking forward to, is that J.J. Abrams will be back for Episode IX. Ugh. He'll probably introduce trans-galactic-hyper-underwear for traveling millions of lightyears without needing a spaceship. Or he'll bring in a race of time traveling, Force-weilding space Leprechauns. The last thing Star Wars needs is time travel. Can you imagine the mess that would cause? Star Wars: The Last Jedi probably should get about a 7.5/10, but in order to score it higher than The Force Awakens or Rogue One, I'll have to give it an 8.2/10. Yeah… that's probably being inconsistent with peoples' expectations. I'm sure someone will just absolutely hate this review because of that. (After writing this, I read this review at Slashfilm. I think it actually addresses some of my own complaints very well, and has a good perspective on the film.) -
Justice League - Spoiler-free review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
Okay. Justice League is finally here. Now, I wasn't a big fan of Man of Steel. Or Batman v Superman. Or The Dark Knight Rises. Or Green Lantern. This isn't a Marvel vs. DC thing. The comic book characters I liked. I grew up with them. This was DC just not understanding how to take those great characters and translate them well to the big screen. The heroes just weren't likable. The villains were forgettable. The films were a dreary chore to sit through. I didn't care about the heroes, or what they were doing. DC had a long way to go. They redeemed themselves big-time this summer with Wonder Woman. Finally! A DC character brought to the screen with a likable personality, and wit, and charisma! Things were looking up! (The villain was still stupid - but hey, one step at a time.) So that brings us to Justice League. Zack Snyder (who was responsible for a lot of the morose tone of recent DC films) stepped down due to a family tragedy, and Joss Whedon was brought in to finish the film. Now, Whedon did a great job on The Avengers. But not so much on Avengers: Age of Ultron. The latter film was a bit of a disjointed mess, and the characters never really got the screen time they needed to develop into compelling characters. And fundamentally, that was the problem I had with Justice League. Well, one of them, anyway. So let's get this review started! (play Spoiler-free review theme music here) Ahhh... that's great stuff! I especially love the part where it goes da-da-da... da-da-da-dummm! Classic. What - you're not hearing it on your end? Plays just fine here. Huh. Well, it's Mars - Bringer of War from Holst's "The Planets". About 3:51 into it. Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic. I'm sure there are other great recordings out there, but I like Bernstein's tempo and interpretation. Actually, his tempo is really close to Holst's own. Pretty amazing they have recordings of him conducting that. Some conductors just go way too slow with it for some reason. You can really hear where John Williams lifted a lot of his ideas for Star Wars from. I wonder if Lucas used that as a temp track while editing the film together? I'm sure I could find that on the internet somewhere. I may even have it in the Making of Star Wars book. I should look for it. Great book. Anyway... onto the review. Where to start? Well, let's start with Batman. Batman is one of the coolest superheroes, period. But here - he's just... bland. Oh sure, there are a few fight scenes where what he's doing is cool, but as Bruce Wayne, or whenever Batman is saying pretty-much anything, Ben Affleck delivers the line like someone who's sitting in a dentist's chair, completely shot full of novocaine. He's numb. He's expressionless. Any attempt at humor, or any emotion for that matter, feels forced and falls flat. He seems bored. Batman is... dull. Batman should be anything but dull. He should be exciting. Scary. Unhinged. Something. Frankly, the rumors of Affleck leaving the role don't bother me a bit. Where's the world's greatest detective? Where's the great strategist? He just kind of meanders around in this film, and things happen. It doesn't feel like he's driving the plot and situations forward. He's the de facto leader of the Justice League, but doesn't really lead. And Batman relies way too much on his Bat-military-equipment-that-he-somehow-acquired. What's up with all of the machine guns and missiles? I guess if he didn't have all that stuff, he'd be so hopelessly outmatched he'd have nothing to do. But that's not a character weakness - that's bad writing. In comparison, Captain America is always outclassed super-power wise, yet he manages to hold his own in combat and lead a team more powerful than himself. They really need to fix this before the next Bat movie. Okay... but what of Wonder Woman? Well, she's still charismatic, and formidable, and has some great moments on screen, but they really messed up her character arc. I'm still completely unclear on where's she's been since the end of World War I. The end of Wonder Woman's solo film seemed to imply she was ready to go out there and help humanity. That did nothing to help her character, and if anything, weakened it. That's just lazy, sloppy, stupid writing. There were better ways of answering the question of why Batman had never heard of her before now. Aside from that, she was still fun to watch. But they've got some 'splainin' to do in Wonder Woman 2 to sort this mess out. How about the rest? Aquaman was a lot fun to watch... in an almost Thor: Ragnarok sort-of way. But I couldn't figure out why he was so goofy. He's like a surfer dude version of Aquaman. For an Atlantean and self-proclaimed loaner, I had a hard time figuring out where he picked up such a casual use of human colloquialisms. Maybe I'd have understood that approach better if they'd done his solo movie before Justice League. I honestly have no idea what his backstory was supposed to be. Also, his powers are very unclear. Or maybe underutilized. Besides swimming, he doesn't do much "watery" stuff in the movie. In most of the battles, he's just a really strong dude jumping around, punching things, and carrying a magic (?) trident around (which is also never explained). He just didn't get the screen time needed to really be developed. There were bits of dialog in the film that supposedly told more - but it went by so fast, and was so choppily edited, it just never clicked. That said, I'd like to see more of Aquaman. Learn his history. See him really in his element. But we should've seen that first. Maybe that's part of the problem here... maybe the directors were so fully aware of who the characters were, because this film (and solo projects) have been in development for so long, that they forgot that the audience didn't know all of that stuff. Cyborg really got the short end of the stick, backstory-wise. His origin is all-but completely skipped over. Maybe it was too dark? Too long? He's relevant to the story (in a very significant way), but he's there more as a necessary plot device than a really engaging character. There are scenes where we start to get a little insight into him, but then the movie pulls back for whatever reason. It's like they didn't know what sort of personality to give him, so they played it safe and gave him none. Maybe this was intentional because he lost so much humanity - but if so, show us the humanity he's lost. Maybe this was due to the change in directors and they had different visions for him. But it was certainly a missed opportunity. Also - I really disliked the design of his cybernetic parts. Too cluttered, overly-busy and Michael Bay Transformers-like. Detail for the sake of detail, not functionality. And the CG, especially around his face, generally looked pretty bad. Sometimes it looks like they replaced some or all of his face, and it just had that creepy uncanny valley vibe to it. Flash, on the other hand, comes across great. He's a lot of fun to watch, and has a really engaging, likable personality. I don't know if he has any more screen time than the others, but it's certainly much better utilized. A large part of that comes down to Ezra Miller, who absolutely knocks it out of the park. He's likable and believable (although his origin is all-but completely skipped over as well). He's easily the best character in the film, and hopefully we'll get to see more of him soon. I don't recall enough of the Flash from when I read comics to know how on-point his Barry Allen is with that of the comics, but really, it doesn't matter all that much. This Flash is the star of this movie. Maybe that's in part because super-speed is just a lot of fun when it's done right. Let's see... is that it for the League? Well, the original posters said "Unite the Seven"... so we're still two short. Wendy, Marvin and Wonder Dog would leave us with eight, so it wasn't them. And this might be considered a spoiler, but it wasn't the Wonder Twins, either. "Form of - a bucket of water!" That would've been awesome. Even as a joke. But nope... So with the heroes not faring all that well, how about the villain? Disposable. Generic. Boring. Inconsequential. Uninteresting. Bad CG. Completely lacking in any compelling characteristics. I have no idea, nor do I care, who even played him, because nothing of whoever it was showed through the final character onscreen. Should I go on? Nope. Not worth it. He was just a plot device to for the Justice League to assemble go All-In. Nothing more. Maybe he'll tie into another movie featuring the more-powerful (and hopefully more-interesting) Darkseid, but I'll just say one more thing about him - how can you have a villain named Steppenwolf without even having one reference somewhere, anywhere, to Born to be Wild? Seriously. Aquaman should've been all over that. Okay - heroes were a mixed bag. The villain was useless. How about the overall plot? It's nothing we haven't seen before. But that would be okay if the characters who were on the journey were compelling, and if compelling things happened to them. If we had genuine concern for them, or the Earth, or something. But that just didn't happen. There were no stakes or consequences that really felt like we'd be losing something, if the heroes lost. Well, was it fun to watch? Was the action good? The special effects worthwhile? At times. There were some fun popcorn-munching scenes here and there. Aquaman seemed to be having the most fun. Wonder Woman and Flash have the best action scenes. But a lot of it we'd already seen before in other superhero movies, and I kept having flashbacks to other films where the same thing had been done, and usually better. As for the special effects, they were... okay. The problem with most films now, is that the special effects are all kind-of at the same level. So unless the events of the film wow you, the special effects just... won't. And while there were some impressive effects and sequences in the movie, for the most part, I just didn't care about what was going on. Justice League feels like DC is playing catch-up to Marvel. But they didn't lay a proper foundation. They should've developed the characters in their solo films, and built up the mythos of the DC universe first, before throwing us into a larger, cosmic, high-consequence, team-centered story. As it is - this felt like a truncated, badly edited version of something that was supposed to be much bigger. It feels like half of the movie is missing. It runs just two hours, which is unusually short for a superhero movie - especially one that's supposed to be a tentpole film for an entire cinematic universe. Maybe this was due to the change in directors. Maybe the studio wanted to shift the tone of the original film too much. Maybe they wanted to get this out the door before Marvel's Infinity War comes out next year. Whatever the cause, they should have taken their time. Instead, Justice League feels disjointed and lacking its own identity. It's not morose and dreary, it's just... kind of boring. Justice League goes only Half-In, with a 5/10. -
I actually got to see Pixar's Coco at a sneak preview at work a couple of weeks ago, but couldn't write anything about it until the movie was in theaters. (I work at CalArts in the Character Animation Program, for those that haven't been following along.) It was an interesting screening, because Disney had what I could only describe as their Secret Service on hand to make sure nobody recorded anything or took pictures. Several dark-suited individuals (I don't recall but I'm almost sure they had to be wearing sunglasses), stood in the front corners of the theater with very stern looking expressions on their faces. There were numerous signs that we had to put up in the theater about not recording or spoiling anything about the movie, including threats of fines and other fun legal action. Although I guess since I only write Spoiler-free reviews... I probably technically could've gotten away with writing this review sooner. But it probably wouldn't have been worth the risk of getting my . I wonder though - were those really Disney Secret Service? Or did they just use cast members from Disneyland who wanted a little overtime? For all I know, they're usually dressed up as Chip 'n' Dale or Snow White. The other reason the screening was interesting, is because we were watching the movie in a theater full of animation nerds. So if a movie is really good, then the reaction will be really enthusiastic. On the other hand, if the movie is a stinker, then the reactions can be... brutal (which in their own way can be entertaining). Since The Good Dinosaur, I haven't bothered with Pixar. I skipped Finding Dory and Cars 3, because the former just looked like a rehash of Finding Nemo, and Cars 2 was just too awful to give that franchise another chance. I almost skipped Coco too. None of the trailers or commercials appealed to me at all. But I decided that Pixar had more hits than misses, and besides, I was effectively getting paid to watch it. So why not? It's... research. Yeah. That's it. Unfortunately - I didn't think Coco was very good. The main problem I had with it was that it was just too predictable - to the point of being trite. The basic premise has been done to death: kid wants to pursue music, but his family doesn't want him to. Kid pursues music anyway. Family finds out. Stuff happens. You can figure it out from there. Coco isn't even the first animated film this year to have this exact same story, either. Now, it's not all that uncommon to have the same basic premise as other films, but even within its details, Coco was too predictable. There are a couple of supposed plot "twists" that are meant to surprise the audience. But the film telegraphs them so early, they should come as no surprise to anyone by the time they're revealed. They certainly didn't surprise me - I sat there for some 20 minutes waiting for the movie to just get on with it already. I should point out that during a couple of these "reveals", the audience I was with reacted as the studio hoped they would, with vocal shock and awe. But someone I talked to with afterwards wasn't entirely sure that wasn't sarcasm. I honestly don't know. Maybe they were making fun of the obvious. Or maybe they just aren't familiar enough yet with recycled film clichés to recognize the obvious. Even though the story is all-too-familiar, what should have made this film more original was that the story takes place within the context of Mexico's Día de Muertos (Day of the Dead). And although there are story points and visual elements unique to that, Coco is now the second animated film within the last few years based in that setting. The other problem that I had was that the main character was just so generic, that by the end of the movie, I'd forgotten his name. And no - it isn't Coco. That's another character in the film. In fact, it's a secondary character in the film. But due to advertising, the name Coco was so burned into my brain before ever seeing the film, I never really paid attention to what the main character's name actually was. The fact that he was called by a nickname during part of the movie didn't help, either. Now, I want to make it clear that Coco isn't a bad film. The animation is really well done. There's a dog in particular that's a great deal of fun to watch, that reminds me of Scrat from the Ice Age films. (Maybe too much, since it doesn't really fit with the rest of the film's style... as if Pixar were saying, "Look! We can do wacky, too!") There are some genuinely funny moments here and there, and a couple of heartfelt ones. But given the film's predictability, there's never a sense of real menace, or urgency, or consequence. There are some scenes that are visually impressive, but nothing that really "wowed" me like the best Pixar films used to do. Even when we visit the Land of the Dead, so much of it still looks like the real world, it becomes kind-if boring. Overall, the film is... competent. Professionally made and visually polished, but nothing I'd go out of my way to see. That said, Coco has been getting rave reviews. Maybe people are just really glad it's not another sequel (or The Good Dinosaur). Maybe I'm just jaded. But I didn't connect with Coco. I sat there, distantly, fully aware I was watching a movie. But never losing myself in it. In the end, I think Coco is just so-so. Want to go-go? I'd say no-no. It gets a 5/10.
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Thor: Ragnarok - Spoiler-free review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
It's been a few months since I've reviewed any movies. I did get out to see Dunkirk after Spider-Man: Homecoming, but never wrote up a review for it. In short - I thought it was really well done. Very different from a typical war movie, and well worth seeing on a big screen. But since it's out of theaters now... I don't think you'd get the same sort of visceral impact when watching it at home. So... never mind. Anyway... as if I hadn't seen enough superhero films this year already, last week I got out to see Thor: Ragnarok. When it was first announced by Marvel as part of their film plans, it sounded like a dreary subject for a film - with Ragnarok supposedly bringing about the end of the universe. Yay...? And the previous two Thor films were just... okay. In fact, I never bothered seeing the second one in a theater. But it became pretty apparent from the early trailers that Ragnarok wasn't going to take itself all that seriously. Plus, it was borrowing elements from the Planet Hulk comic storyline, looked to have some pretty epic action scenes in it, and the trailers featured Led Zeppelin and cool 70's flying logos. Can't go wrong there! Or... can you? Nope. At least not this time. Thor: Ragarok was awesome. It's really a comedy - probably the most overtly comedic take on comic book movies since the first Guardians of the Galaxy. And that's a good thing. I've always felt that above everything else, comic book movies should be fun. Not necessarily always funny, but fun. You should enjoy the ride - and this was a great ride. While there have been some hints at humor in Thor's character in previous Marvel films, they just take it over the top here. Chris Hemsworth is clearly enjoying himself. At times it seems to be a pretty significant shift in his character, but I just prefer to think of it as Thor loosening up and letting us see a side to him that's usually repressed. Either that, or Ultron punched him in the head too many times, and he's a bit loopy now. Either works. This isn't just the Thor Comedy Hour, however. The film is replete with great character moments from a really excellent cast. Tom Hiddleston is back as Loki, and while his character is pretty predictable by now - he's always entertaining to watch. But while he's certainly a part of the story, this is effectively a two-for-one buddy-movie featuring Thor and Hulk, and Thor and Bruce Banner. And the two are not the same. Hulk is different this time around - being less of just a rage monster and developing more into a character, unique from just the angry half of Bruce Banner. Mark Ruffalo returns as a disheveled, slightly baffled Bruce Banner, way more out of his element than he's ever been. Meanwhile, Hulk now feels at home more than he ever has. It's a nice twist from where we've been before. Jeff Goldblum is perfectly cast as the Grandmaster (it's really hard to imagine anyone else in that role), and one of the standouts is a scene-stealing character named Korg, voiced by director Taika Waititi. Most notable though, is Cate Blanchett as Hela. She's the best Marvel villain to come along since, well... Loki. Blanchett absolutely relishes in chewing up the scenery. She's bad. She knows it. And she loves it. She's terrific fun to watch - almost as much an evil villain as she is bordering on a satire of one. Villains need to be fun to watch, and she is. She's also incredibly formidable. And like the best villains, she thinks what she's doing is perfectly justified and has some pretty solid motivations for her actions. Plus, she looks cool. The action sequences are all first-rate, and for the first time we really get to see how powerful Thor can be. Frankly... it makes you wonder why he'd even need the other Avengers. The special effects are solid throughout - although there are a few places where you can tell they re-composited some scenes and the lighting isn't quite right (you'll recognize them immediately from the trailer). Hulk works very well throughout the film, although he's more effective when he's smashing than when he's sitting and talking. They don't quite have subtle acting down yet, but it doesn't detract from the film - he never feels as weirdly fake as he did in his first two solo movies. As an aside, I'd strongly recommend avoiding the online clips/commercials of the Hulk/Thor fight - those clips end up spoiling a lot of that whole sequence. It would've been more fun to watch that had I not seen any of those clips. Plot-wise, well... does it matter? The story is basically there to put the characters in situations where these big, epic action sequences can take place. That's what this movie is about. That said, there are some bigger consequences than that to come out of the story, so it's not entirely fluff. In fact, one of the criticisms I've read about the movie is that there are certain scenes that some people felt were treated too comedically. While I can see what they're talking about, my response is, "Lighten up. It's a comic book movie." Oh, and Mark Mothersbaugh wrote the music. There's some killer Tron-like 80's style synth stuff in there. Can't go wrong with that, either. I'm really tempted to pick this one up on CD. Thor: Ragnarok was a lot of fun. There was great action, and the writing was genuinely funny. There are a lot of in-jokes, Easter eggs, and some much-welcomed self-effacing humor (including a couple of scenes that were just flat-out parodies of Marvel and Disney itself). There's more than enough to keep any diehard Marvel fan still-framing their way through the Blu-ray when it comes out. Yes, it's goofy, but it kind-of needs to be. If you step back and look at it - the whole concept is completely ridiculous. Many comic books are anyway, especially when they start venturing into the cosmos. Thor: Ragnarok embraces that ridiculousness, and just revels in it. Much like Guardians of the Galaxy did before it. When Marvel first announced some of their upcoming movies, I had wondered how they were going to fit Thor, Doctor Strange, Guardians of the Galaxy, the Avengers, Ant-Man and everything else together into Avengers: Infinity War and make it cohesive, when it's all so diverse and at times, just plain weird. But this movie proves it can be done. They've set up their universe and its rules very well. Somehow... it manages to work. Thor: Ragnarok gets an 8/10. Check it out. Up next: Justice League and Coco. -
Wonder Woman - Spoiler-free review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
Well, DC finally got one right! That's pretty-much all you wanted to know, right? We're done here? No? Okay. Fine... we'll do the review thing. By far, the best character in Batman v. Superman was Wonder Woman. She was the only one who looked like she was having any fun. Whether her limited screen time would translate well to a feature film was the big question. Fortunately, it did. Gal Gadot carries this movie. As she should, being Wonder Woman and all that. She does a great job in the film exuding strength, vulnerability, intelligence and naivety. Those sound like contradictions, but there's a definite fish-out-of-water element to the film. Fully in charge in her familiar surroundings, out of her element away from them. Her take on Wonder Woman is charming, funny, powerful, compassionate and optimistic. And pretty-much drop-dead gorgeous, too. But man... I would not want to get on her bad side. Ouch. Wonder Woman is what a comic book film should be - fun! Yes, there are definitely some serious moments (the film takes place during World War I, after all), but it never becomes morose or gloomy. In the midst of what was a horrible war, Wonder Woman literally shines as a beacon of hope. (Taking notes, Superman?) Chris Pine (as Steve Trevor) is much more likable here than in any of the Star Trek movies (perhaps because he only has to live up to Lyle Waggoner and not William Shatner), and does a good job for the most part, although at times his chemistry with Gadot is a little hit-and-miss. Generally though, he works well, and has several nice scenes in the film. Lucy Davis as his secretary Etta is a joy to watch, but is pretty under-utilized. But maybe that's for the best, given the film's 2 hour 21 minute run time. For what it's worth though, it didn't feel like a long film. The rest of the supporting cast are solid as well, with no real clinkers in the group, but no real show-stealers either. The villains don't shine as much as they should though, with very few scenery-chewing moments for them to relish. That seems to be par for the course with superhero films though (save for a few exceptions). Getting the right balance of charismatic and crazy is a tough challenge. The action scenes throughout the movie are first rate, although the final battle gets away from the more exciting close-quarters, hand-to-hand action of most of the film, and into more over-the-top superhero stuff. Yes Hollywood... we get that you can do destruction. For my money, the fights earlier in the film were much more engaging, because they were on a much more human scale. The movie does a great job visually of capturing the time and environment of WWI, as well as Wonder Woman's home of Themis... Themas... Paradise Island. The special effects are generally first rate, although there are some scenes involving vintage aircraft that look pretty bad for some reason. The period of the film does bring up gripe #1 though: Wonder Woman's theme music. Right at the outset of a terrific fight scene where she's kicking some serious butt (reminiscent of Batman's similar scene in BvS), her theme song - first heard in BvS - starts wailing away, on a blaring, electric guitar. This is supposed to be 1917. It immediately ripped me right out of the movie. The theme itself musically is fine, it was just the treatment of it that bothered me. They should have gone full-orchestra with it. It would have been just as (if not more) powerful, and would have fit within the movie much, much better. (Admittedly... would've been a whole lot more distracting. Gotta love those lyrics though. They should've at least put it in over the end credits...) My #2 gripe has to do with the ambiguity left at the end of the film. A lot of questions remain unanswered, although the most annoying for me was: just what are Wonder Woman's powers, anyway? They're ill-defined in the movie, and at times seem contradictory. I'm assuming we'll find out some of this in Justice League. Or the sequel. Or not. Also... just what had she been doing since WWI, anyway? That's never explained. Anyway.... The overall plot is pretty good. It's a comic book movie, and an origin story, so you're going to have to expect certain things to happen, and a lot of backstory to be covered. Fortunately, Wonder Woman's (Diana's) childhood scenes are really well done and the actress playing her as a kid (Lilly Aspell) is great fun to watch. That said, gripe #3 is that some of the film is a bit reminiscent of Captain America: The First Avenger. Being set during a World War, some of that may be unavoidable, but there are some parallels that are too similar. There's also a bit of the first Thor movie in there as well, although that's not as prevalent as I expected it to be. Still, my complaints are pretty minor, especially relative to the last several DC films, and some Marvel films as well. Wonder Woman is a great character who gets her due in this movie. Gal Gadot does her justice (pun not intended) in a terrific, well acted performance, and she's the very heart of a really good film. It's fun, entertaining, and best of all - hopeful. Well worth seeing. Check it out. Wonder Woman gets an 8.5/10. And you don't need to stay through the end credits... there are no extra scenes. But I did because I paid $15.75 to go see it, and I'm watching every frame I paid for. -
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 - Spoiler-free review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
I really enjoyed the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie. Probably in part because I had absolutely no preconceived idea of what it would be about, or who the characters were, or anything about it, really. But now, they've actually got something to live up to, since the movie's been on TV a dozen times (and I've watched it besides that on Blu-ray and iTunes), the characters are well-established personalities (having their own animated TV series and ), and there's been a huge build-up to the sequel. So... is it any good? Well, I have no idea. I have tickets for a 9:00 PM showing tonight. But I'll be back afterwards with a Spoiler-free review of it. Stay tuned! (Sometime later...) So, where was I? Oh, right. Was it any good? Yep - it was! I went out of my way to avoid spoilers (really... that shouldn't come as a surprise). Even knowing who some of the new characters were going into the movie, I didn't know how they were going to figure into the plot, so most of it came as a surprise. The movie was refreshingly short on predictability. Revisiting the main characters could have been tough to pull off well. Recapturing lightning striking the same place in a bottle twice isn't easy. Or something. But I was really pleased that James Gunn managed to pull it of so well. It was like visiting with old friends that hadn't turned into jerks or gotten weird since the last time you saw them. They've had some time together since the events of the first movie, so there's an interplay and camaraderie between them now that's fun to watch. It seems natural, having been built off of what we knew about the characters from the first film. There's also a depth to it, as these characters have clearly come to care about and rely upon each other. Other characters from the first film are folded back into the mix, and we get additional insight into them and their relationships as well. By the end of the film, I found myself more attached to and empathetic with these characters than most of the other movie superhero teams out there. They mention they're like a family, and that rings true. It's interesting that the most bizarre, mismatched, alien characters in the Marvel Cinematic Universe feel the most human. Speaking of bizarre, Marvel continues to push into their more fantastical, cosmic territory here. More so even than in Doctor Strange. But oddly enough, it works. They establish the movie's universe and its rules, and they stick to it. I think that's the key to believable fantasy - don't break the rules that have been set up (something J.J. Abrams didn't do with his Star Trek movies - red matter and trans-galactic transporter backpack, I'm looking at you). The new characters in the film (played by Kurt Russell and Pom Klementieff) fit right into this weird universe, and into the weird family dynamic of the Guardians of the Galaxy. Ultimately, this story is about family. Maybe that's why the movie works so well. It's especially impressive since some of the characters exist only in CG. I never thought of Rocket or Groot as CG while watching this film - just as characters. Contrast that with Rogue One, where all I could think about whenever CG Tarkin came on screen was how fake he looked. Now, I don't know if everyone is going to buy into GotG2's cosmic weirdness or not. But I read a lot of comics back when I was into collecting, and as long as the stories and characters were compelling, it didn't really matter how weird they were. The same thing applied here - I was able to shut off my brain and just go and enjoy a really solid, fun comic book movie. The movie had a lot of heart - surprisingly so. There were some genuinely moving moments in it for many of the characters. Of course, in keeping with the first film, it had epic space battles and action scenes, as well as a lot of humor and pop culture references. And of course the requisite cameos ranging from obscure Marvel characters to... well, that would be telling . From beginning to end, I found the movie to be terrifically entertaining. My only complaint about the movie was one particular scene that reminded me of some of the ridiculous cartoonishness of Green Lantern. I understood their desire to make the reference (since it was mentioned earlier in the film), but it really brought the movie to a grinding halt for a few seconds. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 is a rare movie that not only lives up to the original, but honors the original by staying true to the characters, building on their relationships, and letting us get to know them better. It was terrific fun, and I highly recommend it. And stay through the credits. There are quite a few extra scenes in there, and the credits themselves are fun to watch, too. Plus, the music is cool. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 gets a 9/10. Check it out. Get an extra-large popcorn. (Of course, after writing all of this, I was thinking I could've just written "I am Groot" a whole bunch of times and made that the review. But I'm pretty sure that's been done already.) -
Arrival - Spoiler-free movie review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
Even though it had... appeared? ...been released? ...shown up? ...landed? No... that's not the word I'm looking for... Anyway, even though Arrival first came out in movie theaters back in November, it took me until a little over a week ago to finally see it. Much to my surprise, there were still quite a few theaters (in the Seattle area) showing it, and there were actually more people in the theater seeing Arrival, than when I'd seen Passengers a few days before, despite Passengers being a much newer film. But after seeing both films, it was pretty clear why. Arrival is a really good science fiction film. Passengers was not. Arrival centers on (spoiler alert) - an arrival. I know... didn't see that coming, right? In this case, it's the arrival of a dozen huge alien spaceships that look kind of like coffee beans, that take position in a dozen seemingly random points around the Earth, and proceed to just sit there. That brings up the central question of the movie - what are they doing here? And to figure that out, they bring in linguistics expert Louise Banks, played by Amy Adams. As she begins to unravel the mystery of the aliens, more of her story is revealed, and... that's all I'm going to tell you. You know, "spoiler-free" and all that. Arrival is a different science fiction film than what I've seen in awhile. Much more thought provoking that the typical fare. No gratuitous action sequences. It's entirely Earth-bound. It takes place in the present time. We don't have any unbelievably advanced technology of our own, and the means through which we have to learn to communicate with the aliens in the film is refreshingly simple and grounded in reality. Amy Adams is outstanding in this film, and while I don't really know what constitutes an Oscar-worthy performance, she certainly should be getting some sort of accolades for this. The movie revolves around her story, and she makes the whole film work. The rest of the supporting cast is also very good, including Jeremy Renner as a scientist also trying to unravel the same puzzle, but really, Adams is the heart and soul of the film. Although it would've been interesting to hear the two of them talking behind the scenes about what it's like working on . "Yeah, and then, since I don't have any super-powers, someone had to step in and rescue me and keep me from dying." "Really? Me too. Happens all the time." Anyway... Even though Arrival isn't an action film, there's plenty of tension in the movie, and I was captivated by the film the whole way through. There are certainly some familiar elements from other films - Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Contact, 2001: A Space Odyssey, but it never feels derivative. The tone is very different from those other films, as is the approach to telling the story. You have to be paying attention, and in the end, figure some things out without being beaten over the head with the answers. Yep - you may have to do some thinking with this one. As for the trailers, I'd suggest you don't watch them. I hadn't seen any of the theatrical trailers until after seeing the movie, which is good because the trailers don't reflect the actual tone of the film at all. They're edited to make the movie seem faster and more action-y than it is (or should be), and the longer of the two trailers gives away a lot of the critical events of the film. The was all I had seen, and did a good job of interesting me enough in seeing the movie, without giving anything away. I suspect that Paramount didn't know how they were going to market this film, so they tried to make it seem more like Independence Day, and it certainly isn't that. If you can still find Arrival in the theaters, I'd highly recommend seeing it. It was a refreshing break from the typical loud, action-packed, special effects heavy, blockbuster sci-fi epics. There are certainly special effects in Arrival, and while they're excellent, they're understated. They aren't the focus of the film - they're there to support it. My only real complaint about the film is that there's some forced drama that's added to push the story along, and while it does add some additional tension, it was a little too ham-fisted in its execution. But that's a minor quibble. This story is about character, and communication, and I found the film to be engaging, entertaining, and highly compelling. As far as movies about aliens are concerned, this one has an incredible amount of humanity in it. Well worth seeing. Check it out if you can. Arrival gets an 8.5/10. -
Rogue One - A Spoiler-free Movie Review
Nathan Strum posted a blog entry in (Insert stupid Blog name here)
I got the chance to see Rogue One: A Star Wars Story on Thursday night (okay - technically Friday morning) thanks to a friend of mine who invited me to a screening at Disney Feature Animation. Nothing like seeing a Star Wars movie in a room full of nerds. I'll try to keep this brief, because it's 3 AM and I'm really, really tired. Oh, and so it doesn't get all wordy and boring. That too. I'd been looking forward to Rogue One (and avoiding spoilers) because the trailers looked really cool, and the characters, as brief as they're featured in the trailers, already seemed interesting and different. Plus, not being an "episode" it would give Star Wars to stretch out into different storytelling territory. I felt that The Clone Wars and Rebels animated series did (and do) that really well. But would it translate to the big screen? In short - yes. In fact it felt very much like Rebels, since Rogue One also takes place just prior to the original Star Wars (no... I'm not calling it Episode IV) and deals with the burgeoning Rebel Alliance. Hey... I think that's the first time I've used "burgeoning" in my blog. Cool. Oh right, brevity. Now, I should mention that I saw it in 3D. I don't really recommend it, because while the 3D in the film is generally pretty good, it took me about 20 minutes before my eyes were dialed into it and just accepted it as "normal". Your mileage may vary. But I don't think it adds anything to the film, and at times is actually a little distracting because you become aware they're intentionally sticking something in the foreground. But if you do see it in 3D, during the end credits, flip your 3D glasses upside-down. It inverts the depth-of-field, and puts the credits behind the stars. It's cool! Seriously! Probably shouldn't do it during the film though. So how was the movie itself? Well, I enjoyed it quite a bit. Was it "jump out of your seats, flailing your arms and cheering like a crazy person" awesome? Well, no. But it was really good. And a lot of fun to watch. Mostly. The lead characters are excellent, and a bit different than what we've come to expect from typical Star Wars good guys. They're noticeably a bit rougher around the edges, and clearly, they have to be. It's not a happy time in the galaxy. The lead actors - Felicity Jones as Jyn Erso and Diego Luna as Cassian Andor, do a great job of carrying the movie. They bring great depth and likability to their characters. Alan Tudyk as K-2SO does a great turn as a droid with a distinct and fun personality. Unlike C-3PO (especially Episode II) or those idiotic prequel Battle droids, he doesn't wear out his welcome as comedy relief. But the standouts for me were Donnie Yen as Chirrut Îmwe and Wen Jiang as Baze Malbus. They're supporting characters that nearly steal the film. They're terrific fun to watch together, and it'd be great to see them featured in their own dedicated story (probably coming soon from Marvel Comics). The Imperial characters don't fare quite so well, since they're just there to be bad guys, and that's basically all they do. And while it shouldn't come as a surprise, There are plenty of callbacks to the original Star Wars movie, which makes sense, but at times it gets to be a bit gratuitous. Without giving too much away, if you're familiar enough with the original movie, you won't have any problem recognizing certain... elements. In fact, I had trouble trying to ignore them after awhile. And speaking of callbacks, my single biggest gripes with the film are Apart from my aforementioned gripes, the majority of special effects throughout the film are excellent, with the exception of some of the CGI aliens, which look like CGI aliens, and might have been better served by practical effects. The action scenes are first-rate though. There are some terrific battles in this movie, and while the space battles are on a larger scale than the original Star Wars, they still looked like they could have been part of that era. There are a couple of weaknesses in the film that really jumped out at me, however. One of the lead characters, who starts off uninterested in the whole Rebellion, does one of the quickest character turns I've ever seen in a movie, and seemingly in the span of one sentence becomes the Rebels' biggest cheerleader. I kept thinking, "Wait... did I miss a scene?" Maybe seeing it again would make it clearer to me. The other is predictability. And it's a problem the movie simply can't avoid. It was designed into the film, because of when it takes place, and what must take place. If you know Star Wars, you know what they have to do. What keeps you interested is how they do it, but even that has a little bit of a problem in that it's a bit too reminiscent of other film tropes. Hey... I think that might be the first time I've used "tropes" in my blog, too. Funny, I would've thought I would've used that already because it's a good, you know... um... trope. And while there are some other parts of the movie that are also nitpickyable (pretty sure I've used that word before...), the cool moments and compelling characters far outweigh them. It's a different Star Wars story to be sure, but it's a good one. Perfect? Nope. Flawed? Somewhat. But better than the prequels, and I'd put it above Return of the Jedi, too (I've said it before - not a fan). It's about on par with The Force Awakens. Interesting new characters, a few too many callbacks, fun but flawed. But since it has the real Death Star in it, and not a shoddy J. J. Abrams copy, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story gets an 8.1/10. But see it in 2D. If God had intended us to see movies in 3D, we'd have been born with polarized eyeballs. And please use Spoiler tags where appropriate in the comments. Thanks! -
Hello everyone, I am new to posting a blog here so I decided to give it a try, please leave a comment. I have done an experiment with friends during the whole month of December 2016. We gradually made a list of memorable movies released before 1985. Memorable movies are famous for good and bad reasons such as iconic scenes, innovations. The list grew up to over 130 movies and surprisingly none of us, as individuals, saw at least half of these movies. Do I really know my cinema classics? Is it possible to see all these movies? I have made a second list (see below) limited to titles with less than 15 characters (including spaces and symbols if any). With this restriction, the list sure is incomplete and still some titles seem not really memorable in my humble opinion. What do you think? Which ones surely are famous memorable movies? Which ones are missing respecting the restrictions (less than 15 characters and before 1985)? Please leave a comment. ^_^ LIST of MEMORABLE MOVIES released BEFORE 1985 with LESS THAN 15 CHARACTERS (SPACES AND SYMBOLS INCLUDED) 1921 The Kid 1922 Nosferatu 1927 Metropolis 1931 City Lights 1931 Frankenstein 1933 King Kong 1936 Modern Times 1940 Pinocchio 1941 Dumbo 1941 Citizen Kane 1942 Casablanca 1942 Bambi 1953 The Wild One 1959 Ben-Hur 1960 Psycho 1961 Yojimbo 1962 Lolita 1964 Goldfinger 1964 Mary Poppins 1964 Fantomas 1967 Cool Hand Luke 1968 The love bug 1970 M*A*S*H 1971 The Big Boss 1971 Daisy Town 1971 Dirty Harry 1972 The God Father 1973 Magnum Force 1973 The Exorcist 1974 Female Trouble 1975 Jaws 1975 Rollerball 1976 The Enforcer 1976 Rocky 1976 Taxi Driver 1976 King Kong 1977 Crime Busters 1977 Star Wars 1978 Halloween 1978 Grease 1979 Alien 1979 Mad Max 1979 Apocalypse Now 1980 Super Fuzz 1980 Fame 1980 Airplane! 1980 The Shining 1980 Xanadu 1980 Brubaker 1981 Excalibur 1981 Mad Max 2 1982 The Thing 1982 Blade Runner 1982 Tron 1982 Annie 1983 Octopussy 1983 Videodrome 1983 Scarface 1983 Flashdance 1983 WarGames 1983 James Bond 007 1984 Don Camillo 1984 Amadeus 1984 Ghostbusters 1984 Footloose 1984 Starman 1984 Gremlins 1984 Dune 1984 The Terminator 1984 Police Academy Total: 70 titles