I'm Back... And So Is Disney!

I'm not going to declare a Disney Renaissance just yet. One movie just isn't enough. But! Disney's Frozen is a step in the right direction at last. I'll try to stay spoiler free in this review, but I can't make any promises. It's an incredible film that's deserving of all the praise its received so far, and this is coming from someone who saw the trailers and said “Oh. Disney's doing a Christmas movie.”

Frozen is a love story, but it's not a love story about a princess and a prince. It's the tragic love story of a sister suffering from oppressive fear and anxiety and her younger sister desperately trying to reach out to her to comfort her and help her through her illness. The movie builds this up in a number of striking images. The opening sequence during the parents funeral, where Elsa has hidden herself away in her room demonstrates a character afraid to face the world outside her room. The mantra that becomes a bit of a motif in the first two acts of the movie “conceal, don't feel” is a concept any sufferer from anxiety or depression, myself included, would be familiar with. The idea of hiding your emotions, bottling up what you're feeling so that other people aren't worried, is clearly something Elsa builds up for herself as a defence against the destructive potential of magical powers. This is aided by the connection between her magic and her emotions. When she's happy or feeling strong positive emotions, her magic is creative and even beautiful, as seen in the very famous “Let it Go” scene where she builds her ice palace, and the scene in the very beginning of the film where Elsa and Ana are playing, as well as in the very last scene, where Elsa builds an impromptu skating rink complete with beautiful ice sculptures in the fountains, in contrast to the wicked and twisted fountain she creates when she's first outed as a sorceress.

The movie plays a lot with typical Disney conventions, but never once feels hateful or disparaging of Disney in the way that Shrek did, and also manages to continue feeling like a Disney film. Although I have heard at least one reviewer criticize the animation, saying at times the main female characters felt too “doll-like” for him, I have to say that the animation in this film is incredible. The faces of Ana and Elsa are extremely expressive and engrossing. The men have less expressive faces, but as the main focus of the action is on Ana and Elsa I rarely noticed. The expressiveness of the two main character's faces really helps you to feel for the characters and helps you feel their ups and downs. In particular, Elsa's expressions demonstrate pain and fear extremely well, allowing for subtlety that's so rare in animated films. I also have to commend the animators on the way fabric and hair moves in this film. The dresses and capes let the movie feel dynamic and lively, and they flow realistically. In particular, the image where Elsa is feeling across the swiftly freezing fjord is striking and gorgeous, aiding in the over all epic feel of the film.

A large part of this emotional draw however comes from the cast. Olaf, voiced by Josh Gad, is a character I thought I was going to loathe but never quite gets to a point where he's annoying and instead manages to actually serve a purpose in the movie. Rather than using screaming and over-the-top wonky-bonkers comedy, he uses a quiet voice for his best lines. Kristen Bell brings an energy and a youthfulness to Ana, while still being a loveable and relatable character, a beautiful contrast to Idina Menzel's reserved, regal, and suffering Elsa. Kristoff, voiced by Jonathan Groff who is another alumni of Glee, does a good job as Kristoff, and has excellent comedic timing and plays off of Kristen Bell well.

That said, the film is by no means perfect. The first moment that I really disliked was the song “Fixer Upper” sung by the trolls. Unlike most of the songs, it does little to movie the story forward and feels largely like filler. While the scene itself serves some purpose, the role of the trolls feels like it either really needed to be condensed or expanded. For the most part they serve as McGuffin's to explain how Elsa's magic works, and the song felt pretty useless except for a few lines that could have also been delivered well in simple dialogue. This marks the beginning of what is largely a weak third act. There is one twist in this scene that I felt was pretty ridiculous and unearned. At this point, if you don't want spoilers, please turn away now.

Are the “no spoilers, plz” people gone? Good.

Prince Hans, it turns out, is evil. Not necessarily a bad thing, as it becomes necessary as part of the set up for the second big twist, but at the same time it felt unearned. The third act desperately tries to set up its climax, and that's where most of the weakness comes from. To quote Eudora Welty “The hardest thing ... is getting people in and out of rooms.” In this case, instead of getting people in and out of rooms, its getting them all onto the frozen fjord. But the pay off makes it all worth it, and the climax contains easily one of the most powerful images I have ever seen in an animated film, and a striking testament to the strength of love. Not romantic love, but the love of family and of siblings.

Frozen is a powerful movie, with gorgeous imagery, a strong moral that everyone can agree on that still manages to be delivered in a powerful way. 

Machete directed by Robert Rodriguez

This movie is FANTASTIC. It gets a lot of flack for a lot of stupid reasons - it's goofy plotline, it's supposed political motivations (HAH!), it's grindhouse tone and the nudity (which isn't bad compared to most hollywood blockbusters), but for what it is, Machete is simply AMAZING.

Conceived originally as a joke trailer for the Grindhouse double feature (Death Proof and Planet Terror), it keeps up this tone and gives us a movie that is cheesy, violent, sexy and all around bad-ass. Danny Trejo commands the screen in this film, and every moment with him in it is fantastic. He fits the film's tone perfectly, and he immerses you into the genre immediately. The film's violence is so completely over the top (at one point, Machete spins in a circle and decapitates six people) that even my normally-squeamish wife was laughing along side my at the computer generated blood spurts and the decapitations.

This is definitely not a movie for small children, but it IS a movie that taps into the man-child inside all of us. Don't go in expecting some deep Quentin Tarantino film that's secretly some loaded political message. This is schlock for the sake of being schlock. It's the kind of movie that you just have to separate yourself from the stupidity of it, and just enjoy the ride.

Oblivion by Joseph Kosinkski

Yeah, I was pretty surprised when I found that out. After the way he butchered my favourite television franchise, I kind of lost a lot of respect for him as a director. And this is coming from someone who really enjoyed Lady In The Water, if only because the characters were so memorable.

Oblivion is not a bad movie. It's not a good movie, but it isn't bad either. I have to side more with Rotten Tomatoes, who gives it a 53% with 215 reviews. Bafflingly, IMDb gives it a 7/10 with over 150 thousand votes.

 I want to say it was 'visually stunning', but it really wasn't. It felt flat, sterile, and without much character to it, and the same can be said for Tom Cruise in this film, who seems to be riding the crazy-train in this movie. At least he's enjoying himself. The acting is well done, which is unsurprising since it's a cast populated by Hollywood A-Listers, but the same can't be said for the story or characters, who are all bog-standard sci-fi tropes. Which can be the most I can say about this film. It's a bog-standard sci-fi action film. Pretty typical summer fare, designed to cash in at the box office.

The "big twist" in this film isn't actually all that jarring, and is well integrated into the plot, although it does leave a weird after-taste in your mouth at the film's conclusion.

Overall, I'd have to say that this film commits the worst crime of all: It bored me. Not that the pacing was bad, the pacing was fine. It was just that the film is so typical sci-fi fare, that it just fell flat. The best sci-fi should say something about the human condition, but the message this film sends is so dull and trite, and the characters so uninteresting and unengaging, that we don't connect with them enough for the ending to have any impact.

Boogiepop and Others by Ryu Kaneda

What was I thinking when I rented this from the library?

It looked fascinating, and it most certainly was, but it was borderline culturally impenetrable from a western standpoint.

For those who don't know, Boogiepop is a series of Japanese Light Novels (a genre very similar to our Young Adult Fantasy genre) about a girl who turns into a Shinigami, a Japanese Angel of Death, who is bafflingly named Boogiepop for no adequately explained reason, at least within the confines of the film.

Note that I will be approaching this film review with the film as a standalone object.

Boogiepop and Others is a fascinating film, with some very interesting cuts in it. These cuts come off as a very jarring, as the soundtrack doesn't even fade out. The film opens with a series of short vignettes that give us a brief introduction to the various storylines we see later in the film.

Each storyline builds on the last, giving us a different piece of the picture of the various high school students attending the school that the movie centres around. The central conflict is that there are girls going missing, one girl named Nagi is being blamed for them and accused of being Boogiepop, when in fact it's a completely different girl who is Boogiepop. It's all very confusing.

And that's perhaps the worst crime of this movie is that you spend half of it with no idea what's going on, and when you finally do find out and everything makes sense, it's just not super-rewarding. That said, the movie does a great job developing it's more realistic characters. Unfortunately, this just makes the fantastical characters seem more unreal, with the notable exception of The Manticore and her boyfriend. Those two were freaking fantastic for the short time they were in the film. I've never seen such a deranged and yet believable couple in my life.

All in all, if you're a fan of Japanese stuff you'll probably love this movie. Otherwise, probably not worth your time.

Easy A, directed by Will Gluck

Easy A is a surprisingly good movie, and I would have to say is one of the most underrated comedies of 2010.

The cast is wonderfully amusing, and Amanda Bynes makes a wonderfully easy to hate villain, if a little bit under developed as a character.

The main character of Olive, played by Emma Stone, is easy to relate to and we really care about her as she goes through the struggle of at first embracing her sordid reputation, then becoming hurt by all the negative attention it gets her. She's a very funny and sarcastic character, but can also show real emotions and bring us on her journey with her.

I do wish we saw a little more of her love interest, Todd. He shows up a few times in the film, but the film never really lingers on him long enough to give us an idea of his and Olive's relationship, other than we know they once almost kissed in 8^th grade. The same goes for Olive's best friend Bree, who does have an important role in the movie (she's the one who Olive first lies to) but aside from a few angry glances and cross words, we don't really see her personality other than being loud and boisterous.

In the end, though, this film is really about Olive, and she carries the film extremely well. If you're looking for something to watch on a friday night, you can't really go wrong with this movie.

Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn, plus series Overview

Alright, everyone.

I've finally done it.

This is Breaking Dawn.

With every one of these movies, I further questioned my decisions. This one was no different, but it did do a few things right.

For one, I loved the cast of side characters. I really wish we got to spend more time with them. Seriously, it's like the only uninteresting characters in these movies are Edward, Bella, and Jacob. And Carlisle a bit, he's kinda dull. But everyone else has things like internal conflicts and interesting back stories and, like... personalities. Seriously, half of the side characters could carry an entire show all on their own. What the heck are they doing as side characters?

Also, the action sequence was great. There was no over-use of shaky cam, so we were able to follow the action. Lots of cool kill shots and beat-em-up action.

But that also brings me to the two things that bothered me the most. Not just with the movies, but with the books as well.

And I can't NOT talk about them.

Magic. And Dreams.

There is a massive genre shift in the series at this point. I mean yes, we've had it established that vampires get super-powers, and that's fine. But these were almost all restricted to things like psychic powers. Like Dakota Fanning (I can't be bothered to look up her character name) can cause pain with a look, Alice can see the future based on decisions people have made, Bella can shield her mind. Awesome, that all makes sense. Even shock-touch lady I can get behind. I didn't see it the way this director did as lightning bolts shooting across her fingers. I always saw it more as a toned-down version of Dakota Fanning's power, but there's something to be said for Artistic License, at this director tried to make everything mesh tone-wise.

But then we're introduced to a character named, disgustingly to me, Benjamin. He can control the classical elements.

WHAT?

Seriously, WHAT? Am I watching Twilight or Avatar: The Last Airbender?Seriously? I mean, you couldn't give him the ability to use Telekinesis or something, it's specifically controlling the four elements? Really?

How could Stephanie Meyer write that and not think “This may be waxing a teensey bit fanficy.”

I just, can't even... I mean, seriously people? Seriously?

But that's not the only problem here.

The other big problem is Dreams. Specifically, “It was all a dream.”

Our big climactic battle, where Carlisle and Jasper and a bunch of wolves and other vampires die, is all a dream just so we can have one big happy ending.

Listen up. I don't want one big happy ending. Let there be consequences. Unless you don't think it's appropriate in a book directed at teenagers for characters to die. If J.K. Rowling taught us anything, killing characters is a terrible idea. I mean it doesn't help to build tension or give a conflict a sense of real risk at all. Gosh.

That said, these movies weren't that bad. I've seen Adam Sandler movies that were way worse than this and probably had twice the budget. That said, I've seen movies with probably a third of the budget of this that were much, much better.

Overall, this series of movies had a lot of potential, sadly most of that potential is limited to side characters, small genuine moments, and stories that never get explored. I think that's the Twilight franchise's greatest crime. Who cares about the mythology of Vampires and Werewolves that they spit all over? No vampire or werewolf movie doesn't change the mythology and the rules to fit their needs. No, the biggest crime of this series isn't that. It's that there was some real potential, and it gets squandered.

Would I watch this series again? Probably not, but I can at least understand why some people do like it as much as they do. I think it suffers the most from staying too true to the books. While I think the romance angle could have really worked for this series, they really needed to overhaul the love interests to make it work. Edward, Bella and Jacob's entire relationships are so contrived and end so stupidly neatly that it really bothers me. Further more, the shows could have really benefited from exploring some of the characters and side stories that are ignored both in the books and in these movies.

You're not missing much if you pass by The Twilight Saga, but it's interesting to see something that became quite the cultural phenomenon and brought vampires into the mainstream in a very big way.

The Twilight Saga: Eclipse

Boy oh boy! Looks like I have another one of these done for you guys!

Let's take a look at the over-drawn, extra-long melodrama that is Eclipse!

First off, one things that has consistently surprised me about these movies is that they handle those little awkward moments quite well, and you can really start to see some of the very real talent that David Slade has as a director in these small moments. There was real potential for a very heart-felt coming of age story here, but it's kind of drowned by the unbelievable and confusing paranormal love triangle that serves as the movies focus.

Also, where the heck were all the human characters in this movie? I mean, it's nice that we're finally starting to learn some stuff about where the Cullens come from, but  the human friends that Bella had in the first movie have now come to serve as little more than back drops to the Vampire vs Werewolf melodrama.

Jackson Rathbone, the man who played Jasper Hale in this movie, is actually quite a good actor and I would have liked to see more of him.

Idea for a spin off: A movie that's all about Alice and Jasper, easily the two most interesting characters in this entire freaking franchise, and the two play off each other fairly well. Seriously, everyone else can go die in a hole, lets just make a movie about those two.

I'll digress for a moment and confess that with each passing film, it's becoming more and more difficult to say anything good about these movies. I think I'm suffering from a serious case of Twilight Overdose at this point. But, there's still two more movies to go so there's no way to back off now.

Since the last two movies are two parts of a two parter, I'm going to tackle them both in the same review.

Until next time, my followers!

See you in Breaking Dawn!

Twilight Saga: New Moon Retrospective

Alright everyone! Here it goes!

Let's review NEW MOON.

As last time, I won't be doing a negative review of the movie. Yes, it is a bad movie, but I want to try and get people to take a look at this film in a new light.

I actually really liked the montage after Edward leaves, involving the time-lapse tracking shot and the e-mails to Alice. It was a good way of drawing us into the film, passing by a significant period of time without just saying “6 months later...” Also, I noticed that Kristen Stewart and Taylor Lautner have way better chemistry than Stewart and Pattinson. This is mostly on part of Taylor Lautner, who is a pretty decent actor and is good for his role as Jacob. I like Robert Pattinson as an actor, but he just didn't sell his part as Edward very well. I think this mostly comes from getting stuck with the cool icy “Blue” of their not-so-subtle Red vs Blue love triangle (come on, Jacob is even a red wolf, and Edward almost always wears blue or black... lame).

The Face Punch scene was appropriately awkward. This is of course the scene where Wolfboy and Token Human boy go to see a movie with Bella. I kinda want to see the Face Punch movie, though. Guess I'm stuck with Paranormal Love Triangle: The Movie for now.

As an interesting note (neither positive nor negative): There's some definite signs of Mormon influence, namely the scrap booking theme, and the idea that no good people go to hell (regardless of religious belief).

My biggest grief is that it looks like she lightly taps her head on the rock when she passes out, rather than a storm surge knocking her out, which I could have bought much easier. I think that was the intention, it just wasn't really well demonstrated. Which is a shame, because the cinematography and story telling is actually pretty good in this movie, despite what they had to work with.

Alice is great in this movie. She demonstrates why exactly she has some character depth, and the actress shows more than one emotion, and unlike most characters who can fit into the “Manic Pixie Dream Girl” archetype, she isn't an unbelievable character.

Also, is just me or does Michael Welch look a bit like Wil Wheaton? Also, what the heck is a guy named Mike doing playing a guy named Mike? I remember Mike vaguely from the books, but it's almost like the casting director asked “Hey, is your name Mike? Yeah? Then you're cast.”

Ah well, it was a fun movie in the same way the last one was. There's some moments I chuckled at, others I snoozed through, but overall I might watch this again if I'm snowed in and I have literally nothing else to watch.

That said, if you want to really see something funny, go check out this reading from the spoof book Awoken by Serra Elinsen!

The Twilight Saga: Twilight

Okay, this is it everybody. It's time.

I just finished watching Twilight with my wife. Full disclosure, I've read all of the Twilight books and enjoyed them for what they were, a vapid romance about teenagers and one of them happens to be a vampire. I've only ever seen the first movie before now, so partly out of curiosity, and partly because I figured it'd be fun to do a review of all the movies, I've finally decided I'm going to sit down and try to watch all of the Twilight films.

Now, I could repeat the same arguments about how terrible this movie is that you've all heard a thousand times, but that would be easy and I hate life so instead I'm going to do something different. Taking a nod from Maven of the Eventide, I'm going to try and find some good in this movie. Why? Because if you want to have people rip on twilight, you can go just about anywhere. I mean, it's a bad movie. There's no disputing that, but given what they had to work with it's not surprising. The books were bad even though they were an easy read, so the actors, screenwriter, and director only had so much they could do to try and salvage it. Although, the more I keep hearing about the original twilight adaptation the more I wish I had been sitting there watching that movie instead of what we got.

Still, there were a few good points in this movie. I really thought the music was done well in this film, and there are definitely some points in the score that I really enjoy, even if the Muse song in the baseball scene is kind of annoying. I also thought the few moments where the character Alice, played by Ashley Greene, was on screen were always fun. Particularly, I enjoyed the scene in the ballet studio where Alice gets some of Bella's blood on her hands and she has a little moment where she looks like she's about to chow down for some cardboard stew. There's a reason why Alice is listed as one of Maven's best female vampires, and that little character moment is one of them. Alice is one of my favorite characters in the books, so I'm looking forward to where they take her.

But lets be honest. Did I enjoy this movie?

Well, yeah. It's silly, and there's some utterly ridiculous moments in it. It's good for a lark, and is a bit of silly fun. The only thing that really pains me about it is that there was some real potential for some wonderful subplots that get ignored. I'd love to see how Bella's relationship with her father develops, or see more Alice. Actually, I'd take more Alice just for anything. She's a blast, and one of the only characters who has any real depth to her, despite having almost no screen time in this first film.

Anyways, tune in next time for New Moon!

The World's End, directed by Edgar Wright

The third film in the so-named "Cornetto Trilogy", with the other two being Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead, The World's End is a fun film, but not without it's flaws.

It has the same fun tone as the previous two films, with what I feel is strong cinematography, fun references to ongoing, and enough changes that people who have see Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead will be able to appreciate them.

One of the biggest changes is the switch between Simon Pegg and Nick Frost's characters. Where Simon Pegg normally plays the no-nonsense straight man, in this movie that role is taken on by Nick Frost, with Pegg playing a man-child who can't let go of his teen years, and whose been going through some rough times, and Frost plays his former best friend and the two have had a falling out.

My biggest problem with this movie is that it feels like two movies, and each film could have been strong on its own, but being put together they fall kind of weak. The first film is about a man who is trying to recapture his teen years, and bringing his band back together for one last hurrah. The other is a film about a small rural town in England being silently invaded by robotic replicants. While Wright does a good job of keeping the tone of the film steady, it doesn't make the shift between the two acts any less jarring or feel any less forced. Despite the jarring shift, however, the film does a fairly good job of keeping the ball rolling up until the weak climax of the film, which was a disappointment for me as I've thoroughly enjoyed both of the other entries in the trilogy. I won't spoil anything, but if you've seen the movie you no doubt know exactly what I mean about the climax of the film.

That said, it's a good movie to see on the big screen and I strongly encourage everyone to go and see it. If nothing else, the acting and the action sequences alone make the film worth seeing.

Andre van Heerden's Deceived (Not that you know who that is...)

So, just watched Deceived by Cloud 10 pictures (the people who made Left Behind). Well, it wasn't... great. Wasn't exactly bad either. 

I don't mind films with religious storylines at all, and if done right these movies can be really good. But this film crosses the line from a compelling story about a person whose lost his faith and then finds it again, to a film that is preachy and overbearing.

The movie is made-for-TV quality and seems like something that would get broadcast on the Christian Life Network or some sort of evangelical Christian version of Space. That said, it wasn't that bad. Honestly if they just cut down the diatribes and showed us way more than just spilled exposition all over our laps, it wouldn't have been a half bad sci-fi story with some religious underpinnings. The main problems come from the complete lack of characterization for the supporting cast, making their eventual possessions much less noticeable. We don't really get a chance to know much about them before they turn 'evil', so it becomes tough to really understand what the big change was.

Judd Nelson saves this film. He plays the main character, a technician named Jack, and he's the only one who really sells his character. The other actors were definitely trying, they just lacked Judd's skill. My biggest issue was not in how Jack was played, but in how everyone talks about Jack as being a "geek" and unattractive. This was made in 2002, people, geeks weren't that uncommon back then! Also, I don't care how geeky he is, Jack was not an unattractive character!

If you recognize the name Judd Nelson, that's because this is the guy who played John Bender in the Breakfast Club in 1985, and he was also in St. Elmo's Fire. 

Overall? It had flaws, definitely. But if you can find it for cheap somewhere, might be worth picking up for a corny movie night.