For youngsters, the smooth graphics, rich voice cast, and traditional tale of the underdog realising his dreams through determination and self belief will probably make this quite an enjoyable experience – for adult viewers it’s a little too simplistic and flat to really engage with.
Theo (Ryan Reynolds) and Chet (Paul Giamatti) are ordinary garden snails, ordinary, that is, except for Theo’s ambition to one day race in the Indy 500. Fortune smiles on the intrepid young mollusk when a freak accident effectively turns him into a miniature F1 car, allowing him the chance to fight for what he’s always wanted. With Samuel L. Jackson, Michael Peña, Luis Guzmán, Bill Hader, Snoop Dogg, Maya Rudolph, Richard Jenkins, Ken Jeong and Michelle Rodriguez in support, and an upcoming spin-off children’s TV series on Netflix due at the end of this year.
A fairytale adventure story aimed at a young audience, but one that should still be fun and likeable for adults too. Justin lives in a medieval village where valorous knights have been banished from the realm thanks to a draconian series of bureaucratic laws, largely instigated by his lawmaker father and aimed at creating a more civilised kingdom, but in reality ruining everyone’s lives. Rather like living in modern day Britain. As it turns out, heroism runs in Justin’s veins as his grandfather was one of the bravest knights of all, and despite his father’s wishes that he enter into the law profession himself, he instead sets out to fulfill his childhood dream of becoming a knight and to perhaps win the affections of the local rich hottie in the process. On the way he will encounter villains and feisty barmaids, dour Scottish sword masters and war game playing monks and ultimately his faith in fighting for what is right will be put to the test. It’s a Spanish film (in English), indeed it opens with ‘Antonio Banderas presents’, with a pretty sterling voice cast including Banderas himself, Freddie Highmore, Saoirse Ronan, Mark Strong, James Cosmo, Alfred Molina and Julie Walters to name but a few. The animation is warm and has a unique feel to it, although the human faces look somewhat blood drained at times, and notwithstanding a few slightly irritating character moments, it’s a nice film. Should be fine for young children due to the lack of any real blood letting despite all the sword play. There’s also a nod to mechanical owl friend/pest Bubo in ‘Clash of the Titans’ (81) – but why just a nod? They should have recreated the entire character – who doesn’t want to go adventuring with a fully functioning owl automaton?
Fantasy fare with vampires, werewolves, demons and pretty girls – I’d be lying if I said I didn’t like this on some level, but it manages to be derivative of pretty much every other popular fantasy universe out there, and the fact that the author of the teenage fantasy book it’s based on, Cassandra Clare, began by writing fan fiction for Harry Potter and The Lord of the Rings comes as no surprise at all. The effects are good, but the story and dialogue leave a lot to be desired, especially when it comes to central character Clarissa Fray (Lily Collins mmm) who is more than hopeless as she discovers her ancestry and its place within the fraternity of ‘shadowhunters’ that stalk and kill demons lurking amongst mortals. It starts off well, with Lena Headey (double mmm) playing Clarissa’s mother and guardian, but it’s mostly downhill from there, with too much emphasis on a particularly limp love triangle which apes the Twilight trend of young girls leading multiple men on and causing general carnage around them, and lots of just silly moments, like managing to freeze a bunch of demons and then waiting until they unfroze to kill them, possible just to show off the CGI. Daft. Envisioned as the first in a franchise, also with Jamie Campbell Bower and Robert Sheehan as the male love interests, together with Jared Harris and Jonathan Rhys Meyers in support.
DO NOT GO AND SEE THIS FILM. Not unless, that is, you are aware of what it actually is. Disney have rather cynically released this knowing that people will assume it is another release from Disney Pixar, and whilst it is a spin off from their ‘Cars’ (06) film line, it is actually a creation of DisneyToon Studios, a wing of the Disney machine that normally produces straight to DVD releases. The only reason this has a theatrical release is the money they intend to make from the little trick they’re playing on the public.
The story is about as basic and rudimental as it can be – Dusty Crophopper is a crop duster who dreams of competing with the fastest planes around in a global competitive speed race, but will he overcome his own limitations and the laughter of his peers to realise his ambition? Will he indeed. For older audiences there is absolutely nothing here of any interest value. The animation is slick, and for the people it was made for, young kids, it may well be completely fine – in fact it may make a welcome change to see a Disney film aimed especially for them on the big screen. For everyone else, best give it a wide berth.
The team (producers Disney and Jerry Bruckheimer, director Gore Verbinksi, and lead actor Johhny Depp) that brought ‘The Pirates of the Caribbean’ to astounding commercial success, reunite for the first big screen outing in a generation of one of televisions most loved and iconic characters, but this time around they are without the charms of Keira Knightley. The result? A disaster, portended to cost producers Disney a monetary cascade of millions. Well, I think we can safely say where the real talent lay on Pirates ….
It’s an odd undertaking to say the least. I’ve never seen a single episode of ‘The Lone Ranger’, nor am I even familiar with basic character motivations, other than the eponymous central character being the masked vigilante of the western genre (it is perhaps the continuing rise of the superhero film that originally inspired interest in this endeavour) and his accompaniment by his equally renowned Indian sidekick Tonto. In fact, I’m probably more familiar with The Milky Bar kid, who was doubtless based on him, so I had no real preconceptions going in, and yet it is abundantly clear where they got this one wrong.
In the first instance the filmmakers have made the cardinal sin of forgetting who their target audience were – in this case families, whilst trying to appeal to a much wider adult audience at the same time, much like Pirates did. But young children should absolutely not be taken to see this film. The first two thirds are a fairly gritty, dark western, with especially brutal murder and executions and the central characters visiting a brothel à la the continuation of adult themes (they do not themselves partake, at least). A family friendly western like ‘Maverick’ (94), also a TV adaptation, is a good example of how to get the balance right, but that is not to say this part of the film is bad, far from it, there are a lot of nice touches – especially with regards to the cinematography and the atmosphere (it was shot on location in New Mexico, Utah and Colorado, although I suspect a grainy colour scheme may have been applied to a lot of it in post production, which, if accurate, was entirely unnecessary).
Additionally, Johnny Depp as Tonto is fantastic – going into the screening my biggest concerns were about his portrayal, as it looked in the trailers just like the basic replication of the previous formula and his Jack Sparrow character, but I was impressed throughout by the originality he brought to Tonto, whilst still remaining the playful Depp we are familiar with. Then, however, the final third of the film is delivered as what we expected the whole thing to be, farcical and light hearted, over the top action sequences and Disney gooeyness whilst the William Tell overture plays, which ironically completely destroys the decent western that had been built up so far. Deepening the film’s woes, they annihilate the characters at the same time – up until this point The Lone Ranger has steadfastly refused to kill anyone, instead demanding on principal that he will bring them to justice. In the final third he pretty much gives up on that idea by trying to shoot someone, but he can’t as he is out of ammo, and the silly chase sequences continue. What on Earth? Your central character either stands for something, or he doesn’t, you can’t just casually throw away the core concept of his very being, but at the same time fudge it so he doesn’t actually kill anybody. It’s outrageously pathetic (see the {very well researched, if I do say so myself} Tintin review for more very similar casual character destruction).
Armie Hammer plays the ranger himself, and he is ok in the role, but is a far cry from being inspiring, and it is very clear that Tonto is the more central character, was it the same in the series? I very much doubt it. Indeed, Tonto is billed first in the credits, though he does appear onscreen first too as the film opens with the Indian as an old man, looking like a sun wizened version of Alice Cooper, approached by a young child who will get his life story in exchange for some peanuts – and why in the name of heaven is the blooming child crunching away at the peanuts?! It’s incredibly annoying! Bad enough with every second row featuring some fat bastard with half a truck full of popcorn, grrrrrr!
The camaraderie between ranger and Indian works to some degree, and the supporting acting is fine from the likes of Ruth Wilson, Helena Bonham Carter, Tom Wilkinson, William Fichtner and Barry Pepper. If you stay through the end credits, they last a really long time and whilst they are playing we can see in the background Tonto as an old man again, walking torturously slowly, and yet as fast as he’s able, into the western landscape. It’s incredibly sad, and unlike anything you’re likely to have seen before. It sums up the entire film, a legitimate artistic touch, and yet one completely wrong for this film (the whole movie is also bloody long for families to sit through).
I couldn’t resist this – ‘Hi Ho Silver’ from Scottish singer/songwriter Jim Diamond and written in memory of his father (also used as the theme tune for ‘Boon’)
The sequel to 2010’s ‘Percy Jackson & The lightning Thief’ sees most of the cast return for the next adventure, although Anthony Head has replaced Pierce Brosnan as Chiron the centaur. It’s based on the novel by Rick Riordan, part of a five book series focusing on main character Percy Jackson, the half human son of Poseidon, and his adventures with best buds Grover, a satyr, and Annabeth, the half human daughter of Athena (each played by Logan Lerman, Brandon T. Jackson and Alexandra Daddario {Texas Chainsaw 3D} respectively). This time around, the intrepid trio must make their way to ‘The Sea of Monsters’, which in human terms is just the Bermuda Triangle, to find the Golden Fleece of myth, apparently significantly relocated since Jason quested for it in the Black Sea millennia ago, as only the Fleece’s regenerative powers can save the tree that protects Camp Half-Blood from the poison it is infected with. But the dastardly devil who infected said tree (just like in the Harry Potter series, it is in fact the same bad guy from the previous instalment) also intends on using the Fleece – to ‘revive’ Kronos, father of the gods and ruler of all before his children usurped and murdered him.
Yes, the story really is that shit. Not only that, but reviving Kronos was also the central plot for 2012’s ‘Wrath of the Titans’. Indeed, the villain here had only to not poison the protective tree, and thus not also send the heroes off after the Fleece, to be able to track down the object of his desire in a pleasant and unhurried manner. However, the story could be forgiven its various sillinesses, were it not for most of the rest of the film misfiring too. Percy has hero doubts/daddy issues as Poseidon won’t talk to him (perhaps so they wouldn’t have to pay an actor to play him again) and realises he has a brother, courtesy of the god of the oceans having his way with a nymph (if it’s anything like the real Greek myths, this means he raped her), the result of which, bizarrely, is a half human, half cyclops called Tyson, that everyone picks on. For families and youngsters the adventure and very crude and obvious character development is probably fine, and may indeed even prove suitably entertaining, but for anyone older this is not going to hold their attention for very long.
The special effects are also a let down in several key areas, perhaps nowhere more so than in the animation of Tyson’s solitary eye, which at no point really looks convincing. The concept of Greek mythology in a modern day setting isn’t really so bad, but it’s just delivered in a sort of lame ‘Scooby Doo’ manner, and much like the other modern day bastardisations of one of the most fundamental literary resources of western civilisation (of which, 2011’s ‘Immortals’ is by far and away the worst example) it scrambles to fit in all of the most extreme characters from the source material. It’s crazy, and completely unnecessary – the myths have so much scope within them that you would never in a million years run out of stories to tell and epic films to create. Much better to focus on the small scale, build some characters up and then throw them into historical context, modern day or ancient, combined with one or two detailed elements from mythology. Indeed, here, for the son of Poseidon, Jackson certainly forgets to use his powers an awful lot, not to mention his staring into space digesting the scene while he really should be, Olympus forbid, doing something heroic.
A couple of nice touches exist – Nathan Fillion appears as Hermes and bemoans the death of an unfairly cancelled TV show (he was the captain, Mal, of the ship Serenity on Joss Whedon’s cancelled masterpiece ‘Firefly’ of course) and when they end up on an abandoned but still operating fairground ride, two of them start humming ‘It’s a small world’, which is the song that plays incessantly on the rides of the same name at Disneyland (The Red Dragon was once on the Paris version of this when it broke down, but THE SINGING CONTINUED. For quite some time. I suspect foul play by sick minded teen operators). This is an adaptation of the second book in the series, so the assumption has to be they were hoping to milk the franchise and get all five of them out there, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they decided to curtail it at three, and just mash the best bits of the final three books together.
Another flawed and humdrum X-Men film. It’s the latest one to focus entirely on central character Logan, a.k.a. Wolverine, from the franchise, following in the footsteps of the previous films and his own personal outing ‘X-Men Origins: Wolverine’ (09). The action takes place in a modern day time frame, after the events of ‘X-Men : The Last Stand’ (06), with Logan trying to come to terms with losing Jean Grey and, well, killing her. This essentially forms the very loose character justification for the film, but in reality it seems to simply serve as an excuse to feature the return of Famke Janssen in dream sequences sporting various nighties and proffering us a number of different views of her cleavage. The overall character arc from the beginning of the film through to the end is sufficiently insufficient to wonder if there was really any point to making it at all.
Not to mention one of the few things of any actual consequence that does happen is pretty annoying in terms of what it leaves the character with, especially if you really like Wolverine, as is the case for The Red Dragon. All of the secondary characters are two dimensional at best, as Logan gets caught up in an entirely dismal and predictable family feud in Japan, that sees him inevitably step up to save the damsel in distress – but will she help him forget Famke Janssen’s cleavage, and rediscover his joie de vivre? Well, not if baddie mutant Viper (Svetlana Khodchenkova) has anything to do with it – a fairly bad ass villain who is given no history or real flesh whatsoever, even Gargamel in ‘The Smurfs’ (11) has more onscreen presence, and it’s a complete waste of both the actress and the character. We also see our hero team up with Mariko (Tao Okamoto), whom we are supposed to believe is another mutant, but we actually doubt it – so poorly are her powers depicted to us. Indeed, one of the human characters seems a much better candidate for super hero abilities with his seeming inability to miss with his bow and arrow, much like Hawkeye in ‘Avengers Assemble’ (12).
Having said all that, I did enjoy seeing Wolverine back on the big screen, and Hugh Jackman vigorously embodies, with all his growling testosterone, the part he was born to play. All in all, it feels like a very, very standard comic book story, one that on the page probably wouldn’t achieve anything greater than wetting your appetite for more, but on the big screen the lackluster story can barely be concealed (ironically, the Japanese story arc in the comics is one of the best received ones). The visuals of Japan, whilst not spectacular, are certainly very beautiful, to Iranian cinematographer Amir Mokri and director James Mangold’s credit (who previously directed Jackman in ‘Kate & Leopold’, opposite Meg Ryan and Sabretooth actor Liev Schreiber, in 2001), and indeed showcasing Japan is probably the film’s biggest success. Mangold is capable of better than this, and bar a few moments of involving action, he and the cast deserved a much better script.
There is an after credits scene that you most definitely have to wait for (it plays after the initial credits, not after the full sequence so the wait is a short one), though I have very mixed feelings about what is revealed there too …..
Despite the low rating, the action in this film is pretty darn good, it’s just that the story is both ridiculous and predictable, and the characters and acting largely follow suit. Set in the immediate future, humanity finds itself under constant threat of attack from alien invaders (the Kaiju), alas not from space above, but from the depths of the Pacific Ocean, wherein lies a previously dormant portal to another dimension. Every six months or so an aquatic behemoth comes through the portal and attacks, Godzilla style, a seemingly random coastal city. Our most obvious solution to this crises is to build enormous robotic warriors to fight the beasties with, each one controlled from within its head by two mentally linked humans whose consciences merge, which allows the story to digress down various emotional tangents.
There are multiple immediate problems with this of course, such as any real explanation as to why our current military capabilities aren’t enough to take down the enemy, or why since we know their point of origin it isn’t mined to high heaven. The robots themselves, or Jaegers as they call them (German for hunters), despite having huge plasma guns and an array of missile explosives, seemed to favour running up and smacking the aliens in the face as their weapon of choice, which naturally allows for the possibility for them to be, well, eaten. The chain of command in their outfit is at best flimsy, and at several times it’s easier to be against the protagonists than behind them.
An oddity that manages to be quite enjoyable and yet at the same time determinedly difficult to really like, it’s from director Guillermo del Toro and has very much the same feel and pace to it as his 2008 film ‘Hellboy II’. This, and del Toro’s continued determination to stick to real sets and props as much as possible, together with the visual effects, are the films strongest assets. It’s a real shame that, as is often the case, a money laden blockbuster is critically let down by basic conceptual errors and a hackneyed screenplay. If you like the look of the trailer, then this might still be worth a go on the big screen – watch out for the Optimus Prime lookalike truck that is no doubt deliberately crushed at one point, and there is a very brief post credits scene too.
This is a pretty major disappointment for what was hoped to be the reboot to the Superman franchise. Helmed by Zack Snyder, whose previous films are often much more notable for their special effects than their ability to engage the audience with the story or characters {‘Watchmen’ (09) and ‘Sucker Punch’ (11), for example}, his Superman suffers from this same central problem – it feels like we’re watching a series of storyboards put together without any thought whatsoever as to what goes between them, or even why some of them are there in the first place, other than as excuses for more explosions. This is a big surprise, given the screenplay is from David S. Goyer, based on a story from himself and Christopher Nolan, both hot off the success of their Dark Knight trilogy, though it is certainly fair to say plot holes abounded in the escapades of their Batman, but Nolan’s skill behind the camera made them much more palatable than Snyder is able to do here.
Even the director’s normal artistic and stylistic flair looks here to be very much aping the work of others – in particular J.J.Abrams’ success with the recent Star Trek films, including his trademark lens flares and the way the camera will hover above the action and then zoom in or out abruptly before a cut, particularly noticeable with ‘Man of Steel’s intro section where we see the birth of Superman, or Kal-El, on his home planet of Krypton. With ‘Star Trek – Into Darkness’ released just a few weeks ago, featuring the line ‘Looks like we have a superman onboard’ at one point, one wonders if this was an acknowledgment of the fact – perhaps the two directors are good friends? Although these same visuals are one of the film’s redeeming features, their unoriginality is a little disappointing from Snyder, indeed the story itself has shades of many recent blockbusters that have gone before it – the changes to the backstory of Clark Kent’s foster parents echoes Spiderman’s relationship with uncle Ben, the present threat of alien invasion mirrors the one that raked in millions at the box office for last year’s ‘Avengers Assemble’, and so on.
Storywise, the biggest let down is that precious little of it makes any sense at all. They try to explain Clark’s powers using physics, and the fact that our sun’s radiation and the gravity on Earth is different from those experienced on Krypton. Nonsense. He can FLY for goodness sake. At one point his foster father Jonathan, played by Kevin Costner {still reeling from ‘Waterworld’ almost twenty years ago now}, suggests he perhaps should have let a bunch of children die rather than risk revealing his identity. There just seems to be no real thought or intelligence in the script at all, to the point where come the end you’re thinking, ‘O, of course that character shows up here out of the blue miraculously in time for the kissy kissy drama shot’. Are Goyer and Nolan trying to sabotage a rival superhero outfit to their own?
The acting is generally fine, and leading man Henry Cavill does well and could easily reprise the role if they find a different team to work on it (I believe Snyder has been given the tentative go ahead for the next one – he may have to reboot his reboot), though to be fair he doesn’t really have to do a tremendous amount of acting. The fight sequences do start to make the film a bit more interesting, but it’s not long before they begin to drag, degenerating into the same super-powered stunt repeated again and again, ultimately leaving the movie bland, flat, silly, and completely devoid of any real character. Amy Adams, Diane Lane, Michael Shannon and Laurence Fishburne appear in support. {Look out for the name on some of the chemical trucks toward the end – also, perhaps the most promising aspect of the entire film is that this is planned as a prelude to a ‘Justice League’ team up of several of DC Comics’ super heroes (again, no doubt spurred on by the success of rivals Marvel, with their ‘Avenger’s Assemble’ box office smash). It will be very interesting indeed to see who makes it into the League (Batman is a DC character, in case you didn’t know, but usually only dabbled infrequently with the League)}
A ridiculous story matched by ridiculous acting. Planned as a trilogy that will now most certainly not be happening, this film never really gets past the main problem of knowing that Will Smith has cast his real life fourteen year old son to play the son of his central character onscreen and, although I do feel a degree of pity for Jaden Smith’s situation here, his son’s acting ability simply isn’t where it needs to be for a huge blockbuster like this. This issue is compounded by Will Smith himself actually having come up with the story (though not the screenplay), and it’s hopelessly contrived to allow the character his son plays to conquer his fears and in effect become a man. His heart was likely in the right place, and it has the feel of Mr Smith senior trying to pass the acting gauntlet onto Mr Smith junior, but it absolutely needed a better script.
Set in the future after we’ve destroyed our planet by abusing its resources, although this is actually nonsense as the two central characters end up on a crash landed ship (wherein the entirety of the ship’s crew have conveniently otherwise perished) that warps back to Earth (this is not a spoiler by the way), and it is displayed as abundantly full of vegetation and megafauna. There’s a volcano, if that is supposed to denote global warming, but we do actually have volcanoes at the moment Mr Smith (admittedly, it is set one thousand years after we left for pastures new, but hardly enough time for every species on Earth to more than double in size, especially in their supposedly resources limited environment).
Anyway, Will’s legs are also conveniently broken, or as his character puts it ‘Both my legs are broken. One of them really badly.’, hmm yes, which thus forces his young mini me to go on a trip through the perilous forest to find the tail of the crashed vessel with the emergency distress beacon. And therein an enormous problem with the story rears its ugly head – since there are only two of them it is abundantly obvious that young Mr Smith is in fact not going to be annihilated by the several things that he encounters which will, of course, try to annihilate him. Though he does pretty much ask for it by smacking a baboon in the face with a rock for no apparent reason. Fortunately, he is so super fit, despite Earth’s gravity being stronger than on his home planet, he is able to outrun an entire pack of angry baboons in their native forest. Did. Not. See. That. Coming. Sarcasm.
O there’s an alien bad guy that may or may not have survived the crash too, see the above line, all that being said, some of the visuals and cinematography are quite good. Indeed, the production design on the spaceship is interesting, with an aesthetic that appears to be a hybrid of an old sailing ship and a beehive/organic structure on the interior, and a more Star Trek esque hull on the outside. With the start of the final credits and the revelation that the director is M. Night Shyamalan (his name was removed from trailers after they performed badly) there was a moment of, ‘O, of course, it all makes sense now’, as there was one part when our young hero looked as if he were going to try to outrun the weather as well as the baboons, and one couldn’t help but think of Shyamalan’s ‘The Happening’ (08) when Mark Wahlberg and co did actually try to outrun the wind and the airborne evil that came with it, and here we find similar veins of trashy nonsense throughout the story. There are a lot of good films out at the moment, don’t waste your time and money on this.
