IllusionOfLife Reviews

Looper (2012)

The Best Time Travel Film I've Seen in Years

[10/10 · 4 October 2012]

Looper, starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Bruce Willis, and Emily Blunt is set in the year 2044 where time travel has not yet been invented, but 30 years from then it will be. In that future, crime syndicates have gained widespread power, but due to advances in technology, murder and disposal of bodies has become increasingly difficult. The solution they have found to this problem is hiring hit men in the past called Loopers to execute and dispose of the people the mob wants gone; sending them back in time, bound and gagged, to meet with the business end of a Looper's blunderbuss. The story follows Joe, a Looper who is leading an extravagant, but self-destructive life off the considerable paycheck he gets for his particular line of work. However, that all changes when one day the person who is sent to be killed happens to be himself, 30 years from now.

Let me just cut right to the chase, Looper is incredible. It's the kind of truly unique, smart, entertaining, well told, and exciting film that reaffirms why we love the movies in the first place. I had been hearing some really high praise for this film so I went in with high expectations yet I was still completely blown away. The film understands its themes, its settings, and its characters, and uses all of these elements to their fullest effect. It never cheats by betraying its own integrity, and because of that is able to craft the best time travel story I've seen in years. Time travel is always a tricky thing to tackle. The very nature of it comes prepackaged with messy paradoxes and inconsistencies, but writer/director Rian Johnson establishes very clearly his rules for time travel in a way that doesn't get bogged down in endless exposition. It trusts is audience to be smart enough to fill in the details and sets up only as much of the mechanics as are necessary for the story. Because of that, though this is the kind of movie that certain types of people will hate (mostly stupid kids on the internet pretending to be smart) because they'll focus on trying to pick out any logic flaws with the plot and utterly miss the point of the narrative. However, despite being based around a plot device as inherently messy and illogical as time travel it establishes its rules firmly and never deviates. If you dig deep enough you're sure to find holes in the plot, but the narrative is absolutely rock solid, and that's what really matters.

Every element of this film helps to sell the story. The future in Looper feels like a real place and each scene is full of little details that, while never highlighted, help ground the film and paint a more vivid picture of this world. The film also boasts a slew of excellent performances. Gordon-Levitt and Willis are the obvious standouts, brilliantly playing the same person separated by 30 years of life experience. It's somewhat incredible how they have managed to capture the duality of that relationship; the reality that while you may be the same person in the literal sense, age and experience fundamentally changes who you are. It's an interesting theme and the film handles it masterfully, illustrating how time can change a person's goals, their priorities, and the things they are willing to sacrifice. I do kind of wish, though, that they hadn't given Joseph Gordon-Levitt the Bruce Willis makeup, because at times it can be slightly distracting, and the performances are honestly good enough to sell that these two characters are the same person without the need for makeup. It's a small complaint, but it's about the most I can find fault with in this film. The performances from the secondary characters also shine quite a bit in their own right. Every character feels real and textured, and it all contributes to the reality of this world.

The film also impressed me by not taking the obvious route concepts like this tend to take; instead it charts its own unique territory, creating a truly memorable experience. In some alternate universe there's probably a version of this movie that does exactly what you'd expect a film like this to do, and it's probably a solid and entertaining film. However, by taking the story in a direction that is different and unexpected Looper is so much more effective. There were several times during the film where I marveled at the quality of the story telling, taking seemingly throwaway details and later using them to lead to genuinely smart and surprising developments. Nothing in the film is wasted. Expectations are turned on their heads, and just about every time you think you've figured out where the film is going it will either go a different direction or get there in a way that is surprising. Despite this, it still remains absolutely true to itself and every single twist or development has the feeling of unexpected inevitability that is so crucial yet so hard to achieve.

Looper is a fantastic film. It masterfully combines action, suspense, genuinely smart twists, and is all grounded by a compelling setting and a strong element of human emotion. It has jumped to the top of my favorite films of the year list, and is arguably one of the best time travel stories I've ever seen. I highly recommend this one. It is an absolute breath of fresh air and the kind of film that makes you fall in love with the movies all over again.

ParaNorman (2012)

Easily One of the Best Movies I've Seen This Year

[9/10 · 19 August 2012]

I came into ParaNorman with a sense of cautious optimism. I absolutely adore stop motion animation, and I genuinely fell in love with Coraline, LAIKA's previous effort, but the trailers for the film didn't capture my interest in the story in the way I hoped they would and this film also didn't have the benefit of being helmed by the brilliant Henry Selick (Nightmare Before Christmas, James and the Giant Peach, Coraline). That being said, I am extremely happy to report that ParaNorman absolutely delivers on every level you could hope for.

ParaNorman tells a story about a young boy named Norman who has the unusual ability to see and talk to the dead, an ability which has led him to be ostracized by the other members of his community, including his own family. The New England town in which he lives is famous for a historic witch execution, along with the legend of a curse that the witch put upon those who sentenced her to death. It turns out that the legend of the curse is true, and that Norman, with his ability to talk to the dead, is the only one who can prevent the curse from raising the dead. Unfortunately, Norman is unable to act fast enough and the Witch's curse begins to wreak havoc on the town.

ParaNorman is a film with many strengths. Stop motion animation is always a beautiful and fascinating process, and with new technological advances the filmmakers have been able to bring it to a level of detail and expression that are simply astounding. While the scope of the story may be smaller than something like Coraline or Nightmare Before Christmas, the scale of the stop motion sets for this town are truly incredible. The film absolutely immerses you in this world that feels like a living, breathing, place. As beautiful as the animation in Brave was, ParaNorman is easily the most visually impressive film I have seen this year.

As beautiful as the film is, it never falls into the trap of so many other animated films by simply being visual spectacle with no narrative soul. The story of the film is fun, intelligent, and heartfelt, and is supported by a great cast of characters. The odd kid who is misunderstood is a common trope in kids' movies, but what makes Norman stand out is that he's never mopey about it. He is ostracized, bullied, and rejected, but he's come to a kind of acceptance about the whole thing. He's certainly not happy about it, but at this point he's not trying to fit in, he's really just trying to keep his head down and get through the daily grind. This is part of what makes his relationship with the other characters in the film work so well. For instance Neil genuinely accepts Norman for who he is and it's obvious that this throws Norman for a loop and he doesn't really know how to interact with someone who "gets him." This is never spoken, but it plays out naturally through the performances of the characters.

As the narrative progresses it takes some really interesting turns, and at times is genuinely surprising and emotional. Without spoiling anything, I'll just say that a large part of the narrative revolves around assumptions and misunderstanding, and it brilliantly uses the audience's assumptions and expectations about the genre and its conventions against them.

It's also worth mentioning that this is one of the rare films which decidedly benefits from the addition of 3D. There's some fun play with perspective, and being able to see the dimension that exists in these sets adds a lot to the experience.

I genuinely loved ParaNorman and it's easily one of my favorite films this year. It's not a movie for everyone, but if any of the trailers gave you even a glimmer of interest I would definitely recommend checking this one out. LAIKA is certainly beginning to make a name for themselves in the animation scene and I'm really looking forward to whatever their next project will be. I think I still prefer Coraline which definitely benefited from the combination of Neil Gaiman's fantastic story and Henry Selick's experienced hand, but ParaNorman is a truly fantastic film and it's definitely worth a look.

A-

The Dark Knight Rises (2012)

An Admirable Effort That Can't Quite Stick the Landing

[8/10 · 20 July 2012]

If you look at Hollywood's long history of trilogies it seems like ending the series on a no- reservations high note is nearly impossible. The first film may spark interest and build a fan base, the second film may improve upon the first in every aspect, but then, once the third film comes along it seems most trilogies can never quite stick the landing. In fact, the only two trilogies I can think of in which every film is as good or better than the one before are Toy Story and The Lord of the Rings.

So what about The Dark Knight Rises? Does it join Toy Story and The Lord of the Rings or does it fall victim to the third movie curse and join the ranks of Return of the Jedi, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, and Spider-Man 3?

The answer, unfortunately, is the latter. Now let me be clear, this film is not bad, in fact it's actually quite enjoyable and ends up being a rather satisfying conclusion to Nolan's Bat-films, but there are a lot of areas where it fails to recapture the magic of its predecessors, particularly the second film which many people rightly call the best super hero film ever made.

The Dark Knight Rises feels like it's afraid of its own shadow. The legacy of the first two films looms so large over this one that it almost feels as if the film goes out of its way to be "bigger" and "more epic" in every way in order to live up to the incredibly unrealistic expectations people have for it, and its to the film's detriment. It kind of falls into the same trap as Iron Man 2, where there are just so many plates spinning all at the same time that it becomes overwhelming and slightly schizophrenic. At 165 minutes the film is very long, and in reality it probably could have been cut down and streamlined into a more efficient story if they had set aside the goal of being bigger than The Dark Knight. The plot of the movie is actually quite interesting; it has intriguing story beats, a compelling villain, a handful of excellent new heroes, and a great take on the final evolution of Batman's relationship to Gotham. The problem, however, is that the way the film is structured does a disservice to these interesting ideas. Too many characters are introduced early on that are essentially single-use plot devices, and by the time you actually start keeping track of who they are and what their motivations are they've essentially exhausted their usefulness to the plot and are discarded. Certain moments of plot revelation and character growth are handled in ways that are clunky and, in some cases, redundant, and although the basic story is easy enough to follow the details become so muddled and convoluted that it begins to distract from the narrative rather than add texture to it.

The narrative simply is not elegant in the same way that the first two films were. The second film particularly had a lot of ins-and-outs with shifting motivations, betrayals, deceptions, character revelations, etc. but despite these complexities of the plot, the narrative was told in a very elegant way; one thing flowed into another logically, and everything served to enhance the narrative rather than distract from it. Inception is another great example of this; despite all the complexities of the plot, the narrative was told in a way that was intuitive, fun for the audience to follow, and, as I've said, elegant.

Despite this, though, the movie still is a very enjoyable experience, and the things it does well it does *really* well. Anne Hathaway is fantastic as Selina Kyle (Catwoman, although none of the characters in the movie actually call her that) and she completely steals the show every time she's on screen, Joseph Gordon-Levitt's character, a Gotham City cop who grew up being inspired by the Batman is a great addition to the cast (and, in a lot of ways, is more the main character than Batman himself is this time around), and then you of course have the returning cast who are, as always, excellent. The action set pieces are exciting and the cinematography is great, particularly in the expanded IMAX format. As for arguably the most important thing this film had to do, concluding the story of Christopher Nolan's Batman, it does so in a way that is both fitting and satisfying. The film also, somewhat surprisingly, has more comic book fan service nods than I was expecting given the tone Nolan has gone for with this world. One of them in particular at the end of the film is a little bit too on the nose, but I can forgive it because the overall effect works.

This feels like the kind of movie that my opinion on will evolve with subsequent viewings, and I expect to either warm up to it a bit and forgive it for some of its narrative missteps or perhaps sour to it and see the structural issues as more glaring. At this point, though, I'm going to call it good, but not great. It's still definitely worth seeing, and I would try to catch it while its still playing in IMAX because Nolan and Director of Photography Wally Pfister are currently unmatched when it comes to using that format to its fullest potential. It may not have stuck the landing, but it was an admirable, if flawed attempt that still manages to be entertaining and satisfying as an overall experience.

B

The Amazing Spider-Man (2012)

Avoid This Film Like the Plague

[4/10 · 4 July 2012]

In 2002 Sam Raimi and Columbia Pictures made a movie like no one had ever seen before. Raimi's Spider-Man, at least in my opinion, was really the first super hero movie since Superman: The Movie to fully embrace and understand its source material. It perfectly captured both the joy of being Spider-Man and the tragedy of being Peter Parker; the gift and curse nature of that spider bite. In 2004 they topped the first film to make what I still consider to be one of the greatest super hero movies of all time. Spider-Man 3 had some serious missteps due in no small part to meddling by Sony, but there were still momentary glimmers of what made the first two films great.

When Disney acquired Marvel in 2009 and Sony wanted another Spider-Man movie in order to hold onto the rights to the character, they initially went to Raimi, however the same kind of studio meddling that hampered Spider-Man 3 was back for the proposed Spider-Man 4, and unwilling to put up with it again Raimi walked away. In the wake of Spider-Man 4 collapsing Sony announced plans to reboot the series, a desperate attempt to prevent the rights from reverting back to Marvel. They hired a younger, cheaper cast and a younger, cheaper director to head up the reboot. So here we are with the result of all these shenanigans.

How is the movie? Exactly as bad as you'd expect it to be given its troubled history. It's joyless, heartless, nonsensical, completely devoid of character or personality, and grossly betrays the very identity of its titular hero. Imagine you took the characters from Twilight, the tone from Batman Begins (without any of the compelling characters or interesting narrative), nonsensical plot threads from the Star Wars Prequels, threw it all in a blender and pushed purée and you can start to get an idea of what this movie is like. This is an origin story where almost nothing of consequence happens and every character in the film ends in exactly the same place they began. There's no character development, there's no compelling narrative, it's just a jumble of forgettable set pieces, empty dialogue, and a love story that is so unrelated to the rest of the film that it has no reason to exist. It's a shame because honestly the love story is the only thing in the movie that even kind of works which I imagine is because Marc Webb was the director of (500) Days of Summer.

The fact that this is a boring, forgettable film wouldn't be so terrible by itself, but it also feels the need to betray the very foundation of who Spider-Man is. I'm not sure if this was an ill- advised attempt to differentiate itself from the other films/comics or if the people involved just really don't understand Spider-Man (possibly a bit of both), but either way, this element is what tips the scale into the territory of truly awful. I usually try to avoid spoilers, but I can't get into why this movie is so bad without giving a few things away, so be warned, this next paragraph contains minor spoilers.

So there's this brand new, completely ham-fisted idea that Peter Parker's parents were involved in some crazy corporate conspiracy and that Peter's dad was friends/partners with Curt Connors (The Lizard). Their research is actually what creates Spider-Man in this film which completely robs the character of the important element of being a regular kid who happened to get these extraordinary powers due to a freak accident. Now Spider-Man is some pre-destined product of a conspiracy. On top of that, they completely throw out the whole "with great power comes great responsibility" lesson that is the entire point of who Spider-Man is! Seriously! This is as bad as doing a Batman story where the Waynes were killed in a freak industrial accident rather than gunned down in cold blood! It betrays the legacy of the character and completely ruins his whole purpose of being.

On top of completely betraying the character of Peter Parker/Spider-Man, the film also has no idea what to do with any of the other characters. Curt Connors is a nice guy who suddenly does a heel-face turn and becomes a megalomaniacal lunatic bent on world domination for absolutely no logical reason, Police Captain Stacey hates Spider-Man for no real reason other than the fact that they needed people to hate Spider-Man and didn't even want to attempt to recast J. Jonah Jameson (which is actually one of the only smart decisions they made in this film), and Ben Parker never connects on any meaningful level with Peter. The only person who is halfway decent is Emma Stone as Gwen Stacey, but they still can't manage to give her any kind of meaningful character development other than Peter Parker's smart/sassy girlfriend.

It's obvious that Sony wanted to try to capitalize on the success of Nolan's Batman films by making this "dark and gritty" but in the end, all they did was superficially suck all of the joy out of the story without having any kind of mature, contemplative, or emotionally resonant themes to make it worthwhile. Raimi's Spider-Man films were far more mature and emotionally resonant than this and they never sacrificed their sense of fun in order to achieve that. The characters were compelling, the relationships had weight, the story was exciting, and the whole experience was just fun. The Amazing Spider-Man, on the other hand has none of that, it's just a hollow film with hollow characters and a hollow story that has superficial trappings of "dark and gritty" draped over the top. This is a film that had no reason to be made and you as an audience member have no reason to see it. Avoid this one like the plague.

F

Brave (2012)

Best Disney-Branded Fairy Tale Since Beauty and the Beast

[9/10 · 23 June 2012]

While Pixar has had many many many fantastic successes, and nearly every movie they've made has been a bonafide masterpiece, it seems like most people, critics especially, tend to view the three movies Pixar released from 2007-2009 as being the best in their 26 year, 13 feature history. Those movies were Ratatouille, WALL•E, and Up; and they each featured high concept stories, deep and sophisticated themes, and, in many ways, spoke more to the grown-ups in the audience than they did to the kids while still being great movies for the entire family to enjoy together. These three films, which are arguably as close to perfect as any movie has ever come, combined with Pixar's nearly spotless history, unfortunately may have set the bar so high that no one, not even Pixar could ever hope to top it.

That brings us to Brave. Let me just be upfront in saying that Brave is a *really* good movie. It has fantastic and fully realized characters, it has a strong emotional core, it has great performances, it looks stunning, and it has an absolutely beautiful soundtrack. The story is set in a mythical version of Scotland, where Princess Merida is about to be betrothed to the first born son of one of the three other Lords of the kingdom, however, Merida is not ready for marriage and, in fact, would much rather be free to make her own way in the world than be bound by the traditions of her kingdom. After a heated argument with her mother she flees the kingdom and happens upon a witch who gives her a spell that will allow her to change her fate.

If a lot of this sounds familiar (and not just from the trailers of the film) you shouldn't be surprised as this essential formula is the basis to more fairy tales than you could count. However, where Brave succeeds is not in the creation of groundbreaking new ideas, but rather in the execution of telling a very classic story and bringing a new and fresh voice to it, much in the same way Disney did back in 1989 and 1991 with The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast. Unlike many fairy tales of recent years, it does not rely on the conventions of the "Disney Fairy Tale Musical" as a crutch, but instead finds a way to make it uniquely their own.

Pixar has always had a knack for creating incredibly endearing and heartfelt characters who, despite being animated, feel just as alive as any other person in the theater, and Brave is certainly no exception. The leap from Belle to Merida is just as significant as the leap from Princess Aurora (Sleeping Beauty) to Ariel. She's a character that I think will resonate not just with young girls, but with many women, especially the ones that are at the threshold of adulthood, and the relationship between her and her mother is very poignant.

The story itself doesn't break any new ground, and if you've ever seen a fairy tale movie before you can call just about every plot beat a few minutes before they arrive, but that doesn't make the film any less effective because the execution is so spot-on. For the same reason you cry when the Beast dies despite the knowledge that, of course, he's going to come back to life you also are completely involved with the emotions and characters of Brave even though you probably already know how it's all going to turn out.

Despite all this, the fact that this isn't an absolute revolution in cinematic history means that it won't live up to the "Pixar legacy" in many people's minds. I, however, have always considered Pixar's legacy to be more about the emphasis on characters and honest emotions than about breaking new ground and doing the unexpected. Sure, that's an important part of what's made many of their past successes great, but in my book that is still secondary to simply telling a solid story with great characters and sincere emotions, and with perhaps the exception of Cars 2, Pixar has never once forsaken that legacy. It may not be the best movie Pixar has ever made, but Brave is still a great film, and in my opinion the best fairy tale that Disney has put their name on since 1991.

A-

The Hunger Games (2012)

Wishing I Had Seen the Movie First

[8/10 · 25 March 2012]

Typically when there's a movie I'm excited for that is based on a novel I will wait to see the film before I read the book in order to allow the filmmaker to tell me the story rather than get caught up in my own interpretations of it. The thing is, though, I wasn't excited for The Hunger Games. I had heard the book was great, but the marketing material looked as if it was geared mostly towards the Twilight crowd, of which I am most certainly not a member; so I went ahead and read the book. Now the book tells a compelling story with an interesting and timely political parallel, but it is not necessarily the most well-written thing I have ever read. Competent, but not excellent. However, what the book is is cinematic. The novel was absolutely begging to be made into a film and you could almost see author Suzanne Collins sending it off to publication and waiting by her phone for the film studios to start calling. As a filmmaker, and major film nerd, reading the book I started creating my own imaginary screenplay for the film and directing in my mind my version of The Hunger Games. The problem with this movie lies in the fact that it's not IllusionOfLife's The Hunger Games, it's Gary Ross' The Hunger Games.

As I mentioned, my biggest problem with the film was that it was not The Hunger Games movie that I would have directed, and while I know that sounds terribly pretentious of me, give me a second to explain. Due to the cinematic nature of the novel and the fact that as a filmmaker and a film fan I have certain sensibilities, there are things that I would have done differently while adapting the story, but that does not make them inherently better than what is in the film, just more aligned to my personal tastes. I regret now that I read the novel first because I think I would have appreciated the film much more from an objective perspective. That being said, Gary Ross does a great job adapting the material and, despite what the marketing campaign might have indicated, it doesn't fall into the trap of teenage melodrama that so many other similar films do. The love triangle that forms in the story is appropriately handled here and doesn't overtake the more important themes of the narrative.

The film has a very gritty and realistic feeling to it, and I know that those two words are buzz words that get thrown around a lot, often in the wrong context (Snow White and the Huntsman is neither gritty nor realistic, it's a big CG fantasy film that happens to have dark subject matter), here however, I mean it in the most literal sense. There are no big "money shots;" no grand, sweeping moments of spectacle; no massive visual effects set pieces; the whole thing is subdued in a way that I feel is very appropriate for the work. A lot of the camera work is hand held and intimate, and the score never attracts attention to itself and exists only to punctuate certain moments; listening to the score on iTunes would likely be boring, but it works perfectly in the context of the movie, often stepping out of the way in favor of complete silence when appropriate.

The performances were also fairly strong, which is something I was not expecting from this. There's a fairly low bar set for acting in similar films that are aimed at young adults and teenagers, but everyone did a good job in this film; even some of the casting decisions I wasn't sold on right away (Josh Hutcherson most notably) surprised me by taking on the role really well. It doesn't have the brilliance of something like the casting of the Harry Potter films, but few things do.

One thing the movie does cut significantly from the book is the lore and backstory, and I'm sure many fans of the novel will lose their minds over this, but it didn't bother me too much. Having too much of the movie dedicated to explaining the history of Panem would have taken time away from the core story and character development which arguably got trimmed too much already (I'll get to that in a moment). Not only that, but with the popularity of the book it's almost an absolute certainty that anyone seeing the film who hasn't already read the book will know someone who has, and conversations will inevitably be sparked about the lore of this world. There was just enough of the lore included to make sure the story at hand was in the proper context, but not too much that the film gets bogged down in the details.

My one legitimate complaint with this film, is that it rushes through some of the character development in order to keep moving the film along at a brisk pace. At 142 minutes the film is already pushing it for a mainstream blockbuster, but if they had taken some more time to really develop the relationships in the film (like that of Katniss and Rue or the dynamic that shifts between the two leads in the third act) I think it would have made for a stronger film.

The movie is an extremely well-made film and exceeded my expectations in many ways. It's not perfect, but I feel it does a good job of adapting the novel and setting up the trilogy. I also think that it is one that I'll appreciate more on repeat viewings as I'm able to set more and more of my personal vision aside and appreciate it more objectively than I do now.

B

John Carter (2012)

Worth a Second Look

[8/10 · 11 March 2012]

I must admit, I'm doing this a bit differently than normal. Typically I will review a movie immediately after my first viewing, but when I saw John Carter at midnight Friday morning I was not able to put a rating on it, let alone elaborate on my opinions of the work. Now that I've seen it a second time I feel I have a clearer perspective from which I can accurately review the film.

To bring you up to speed (because Disney's marketing department utterly failed in this area) John Carter is based on the novel A Princess of Mars, a book written in 1912 by Edgar Rice Burroughs (author of Tarzan) about an American Civil War soldier named John Carter who is mysteriously transported to Mars (or Barsoom, as its Martian inhabitants refer to it) where he gets caught up in a war between two of Barsoom's cities. Due to the lower gravitational pull on Mars, Carter is granted superhuman strength which Deja Thoris, princess of Helium (one of the warring cities) hopes he'll use to help defend her city from the Zodongans (the other warring city).

A Princess of Mars and the subsequent books in the Barsoom series went on to inspire, directly or indirectly, just about every single work of Science Fiction and Fantasy that has followed it. The movies that George Lucas borrowed from when making Star Wars borrowed heavily from these books, and John Carter is near the top of the laundry list of works James Cameron ripped off while making Avatar. For nearly 100 years people have been trying and failing to make a film based on these stories, then several years back Disney acquired the rights and gave the project to Pixar veteran and life-long John Carter fan Andrew Stanton.

In John Carter, Andrew Stanton crafts a good old-fashioned sci-fi adventure film full of interesting creatures, a deep mythology, and a fascinating world to house it all. Barsoom and its inhabitants are beautifully realized and despite the novel having been ripped off hundreds of times it still manages to feel interesting and unique. Stanton said that his goal in creating Barsoom was to treat it the same way he would treat a movie based on historical fact, recreating something that actually existed as opposed to going crazy with the visual style and I think this method worked really well. Barsoom feels like a very real and grounded place and the effects work is seamlessly integrated in to the environments to the point where it's difficult to tell what elements are practical sets and which are CG enhancements, not to mention the excellent motion capture and animation work done on the Tharks and other alien inhabitants.

There are several stand out action scenes in the film and Stanton proves himself as a more than competent action director, creating gripping and surprisingly brutal battles, and when the movie hits its stride it's a lot of fun. Unfortunately, there's a plot transition in the second act and during this time the film starts to feel a little bit bogged down by exposition, exposition that can be slightly hard to follow as it throws out terms like the Ninth Ray, Issus, Therns, etc. It almost feels as if Andrew Stanton tried to fit as much of the Barsoom mythology into one film as he could in case he did not get the opportunity to direct the two sequels he has planned for this film, and while it improves on a second viewing, the first time around it's a bit much to swallow.

Overall, though, the movie is quite fun and there's not a whole lot I can complain about. The exposition dump in the middle of the film is a bit tough to chew on and Taylor Kitsch's performance is slightly flat, but with a great supporting cast, a terrific female lead in Lynn Collin's Deja Thoris, and a satisfying payoff the movie ends on a high note. I think the reason it took me a second time viewing the film to really appreciate it was that I had set my expectations unrealistically high. Stanton's work at Pixar has made him one of my favorite filmmakers and that first night I wasn't going to be satisfied with anything less than a masterpiece on the level of WALL-E, but what I got was a very fun, if imperfect, sci-fi adventure film. I really do hope that he gets the opportunity to direct the sequels to this movie, because now that I've gotten a taste of it I would love to dive further into the world and mythology of Barsoom, and I don't want anyone else but Stanton as my guide for that journey.

B+

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (2011)

Lacks the Spark that Made the First Film Great

[7/10 · 21 December 2011]

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows was a bit of a disappointment. While by no means a bad movie, it just didn't have the spark of the original.

The point of Sherlock Holmes has always been the fact that he really doesn't care about much other than solving his latest mystery. That's why he has no friends aside from Watson, what few romantic relations he's had have always been a bit screwed up, and he's addicted to drugs. While the first movie didn't quite capture those elements to the degree that they could have been (see the TV series House if you want the best version of Sherlock Holmes ever put to screen) they were still present and the film understood Holme's character. This movie doesn't understand Holmes. It tries to play him off as a heroic figure, which was never the point. Holmes doesn't solve crime out of moral obligation or a sense of heroism, he does it for the thrill of solving a new mystery, it's a game for him and one of the few things he truly enjoys.

The story this time around was solemn and heavy-handed and didn't allow itself to be fun like the first film was; the mystery was not very compelling and, in fact, hard to follow for most of the movie; but perhaps the biggest issue in the film was the wasted presence of one of literature's most well-known villains. Professor Moriarty, while played very well by Jared Harris, was a let down as a villain. Until the end of the movie, his conflict with Holmes didn't feel like two of the greatest minds of all time locked in a battle of wits. You weren't even really sure why this guy was supposed to be a villain outside of the fact that the movie told you he is.

I noticed that this time around there was a different writing team for the film which makes sense because the flaws in the movie felt like they came from the screenplay. The cast was just as good as last time, the direction was fine, but the focus of the story just wasn't there. I would definitely give this film another watch and suspect I'll appreciate it more the second time, but I can't recommend seeing it in theaters. Pick it up at Redbox when it comes out on Blu-Ray. In the mean time, go see Mission: Impossible or The Muppets again.

C+

Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (2011)

Brad Bird Puts Other Action Directors to Shame

[9/10 · 16 December 2011]

I'll admit it, I've never been hugely passionate about the Mission: Impossible series (in fact, until I re-watched the movies this week I hardly remembered them), and when I first heard that a fourth Mission: Impossible was in the works I couldn't have been less interested. That is until I read the words "Brad Bird has signed to direct." Those six words instantly rocketed this film up to the top of my most anticipated list, and his live action debut does not disappoint. Not one single bit.

The Mission: Impossible series has had a bit of a rocky past. The first film is a decent spy thriller with a clever twist, the second movie is borderline self-parody with it's over-the-top antics, and the third movie was the previous high point of the series with exciting action blended with strong characterization. With each new installment a new director has brought a new element to the series, and the element that Brad Bird brings to M:I-GP is scope. Massive, exciting, jaw-dropping scope. This is easily the biggest, boldest, and most ambitious Mission: Impossible film to date, and as far as I can recall at the moment, the biggest, boldest, most ambitious action film in general since Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End.

Brad Bird handles his first live action film like an old pro and puts many other "veteran" action directors to shame. The pacing is impeccable, moving seamlessly from massive action spectacles to more downplayed character moments without ever losing momentum; the action is big without being silly; and the action sequences are breathtakingly shot and choreographed and constantly leave you picking your jaw up off the ground. The marketing has really played up the scene in Dubai in which Ethan Hunt scales the Burj Khalifa (the tallest building in the world) from the outside, and I began to worry that the scene wouldn't live up to all the hype. It does. Especially in the expanded IMAX aspect ratio, this scene is an absolute masterwork in tension, and while this may be the high point of the action in the film, the other sequences stand nearly as tall. From a chase scene during a sandstorm, to a fist fight dodging loading and unloading cars in a parking garage the action is fast-paced, hard- hitting, and fun.

This is Brad Bird we're talking about, though, and so he's not content with putting contemporary action directors to shame, he also makes sure that the story and characters get their proper focus and time to shine. The story of this movie never reaches the emotional heights of Bird's previous works like Ratatouille or The Iron Giant, but this type of movie really doesn't call for that. The story hearkens back to Cold War tensions and old-school spy scenarios while still feeling modern and fresh. It's the perfect pairing of classic storytelling with modern polish and style. As for the cast of characters, everyone in this movie is great. The previous movies have all focused the attention on Ethan Hunt, and while Hunt is definitely still the "lead" in this movie, the ensemble cast is much more important than they've ever been before with each member of the team getting almost equal screen time and a strong sense of purpose propelling the story. Simon Pegg steals the show with his brilliant comedic timing, but Paula Patton and Jeremy Renner both give strong, multi-faceted performances, and their characters are invaluable to the film. The villain this time around is not quite as memorable as Philip Seymour Hoffman's character from M:i:III, but the story is much more focused on the IMF team this time around and having a major heavy like that probably would have made the focus of the film uneven.

Brad Bird has already proved himself to be a brilliant filmmaker with three of the best films of the last decade, but for anyone foolish enough to think he couldn't handle live action just as well Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol should drive the point home. Bird handles the movie with the grace and assuredness of someone who has been making films like this for years. This is one of the year's best films and one of the best action movies I've seen in quite a while. I definitely recommend this movie, and also encourage you to see it in IMAX. While nothing I have seen in the format so far has quite matched the level of awesome that was The Dark Knight in IMAX, M:I-GP uses the format very well and the action scenes that take advantage of the full aspect ratio are incredible to behold.

Now, let's just hope the execs at Warner Bros. take note of this and give Brad Bird the budget he needs to make 1906. That's a movie that I cannot wait to see green lit.

A

The Muppets (2011)

The Most Sensational, Inspirational, Celebrational, Muppetational

[10/10 · 23 November 2011]

The Muppets is essentially flawless. I know this is a weird way to start a review, but I feel I should just forego formalities and cut to the chase. This year has been a fairly disappointing year for movies, but The Muppets just about makes up for it all by itself. It's an absolutely life-affirming tribute to beloved characters and memories that should have never been allowed to fade into obscurity, and if you care at all about movies you need to see this, as soon as possible.

Jason Segel, along with co-writer Nicholas Stoller and director James Bobin have made a film that is just absolutely bursting at the seams with affection towards the Muppets, and that love and passion has instantly rocketed this movie to the very top of the list when it comes to long history of Muppet shows, movies, and even viral videos. The film is one of the funniest movies I've seen in a long time and accomplishes this without being crass or cynical; it's smart, witty, and most importantly, completely heartfelt. Jason Segel with his obvious and undying love for the Muppets is, by all accounts, the most deserving person to be given creative control of the Muppets since Jim Henson himself.

The original Muppet Movie will always be a timeless classic, and it's charm and legacy will likely never be topped by another Muppet movie. However, The Muppets is the closest it has ever come, and, due to the timeliness and poignancy of the story, I would argue that right at this moment it is more relevant and moving than even the 1979 classic. I was unable to stop smiling during the entire running time of the movie, even while tears were coming to my eyes.

I know I'm not really reviewing the movie right now, and I'm more just beaming about how much I loved it, but really, I feel it would be a disservice to go into details about this movie. Simply put, you need to see it, and if you don't you're robbing yourself of a truly extraordinary film experience. This is the most sensational, inspirational, celebrational, Muppetational movie of the year. Go see it. Right now. I mean it, go buy tickets for this weekend, and you can thank me later.

A+

Cowboys & Aliens (2011)

I Was Hoping For Much More

[7/10 · 29 July 2011]

Ugh, this is one of those reviews I hate writing; critiquing something that's neither very good, nor particularly bad is hard, and that's where Cowboys & Aliens stands.

The film starts off well enough, there's some really great build up to both the mystery and to the central conflict; the opening scenes are everything I was hoping from this film. There are some great performances by Daniel Craig, Harrison Ford, and several other actors, and the classic Western vibe with a strange sci-fi twist works really well here. However, after the first act things start to slowly lose momentum.

The narrative is fairly straight forward, and doesn't really have too many interesting twists and turns, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. On the same token, none of the characters really connected with me and the film never gave me a reason to care about them or their motivations. Again, neither of these things are particularly fatal in their own right, I've seen plenty of enjoyable movies that have either a simple narrative or characters who aren't properly fleshed out, but the problem here is that you have both issues simultaneously. It's hard to get caught up in the story because it's mostly straight forward and predictable, and it's hard to get emotionally invested in the characters because the film never gives them the time to connect with each other, much less the audience. As a result things just happen on screen for about two hours, and none of it is necessarily bad in any way, in fact it's sometimes quite entertaining, but as a viewer I was never given any reason to care about any of it and so it just ended up feeling hollow.

And that's about all I really have to say. I know this is shorter than my first weekend reviews typically are, but I really don't have a lot to say about this movie, because I really don't feel like it gave me a lot. With the exception of the First Act nothing made me intrigued or emotionally invested or even particularly excited. I had high hopes for this movie, between a great cast, a great director, and an interesting and unique concept I thought this was sure to be one of the surefire home runs of the summer, but instead it's just severely underwhelming. Not bad, but not particularly good either, go see Captain America or Harry Potter instead (or Winnie the Pooh, if you can find a theater that's still playing it, I can't get over how clueless Disney was with the release date on that one, but I digress).

C+

Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)

Best Marvel Studios Film to Date

[9/10 · 23 July 2011]

Full Disclosure: I have yet to see Thor, so when I say Captain America: The First Avenger is, in my opinion, the best Marvel Studios film to date, it is without Thor being taken into consideration. That being said, with all I've heard about Thor, I'm not inclined to believe it tops Captain America.

So yes, Captain America is the best Marvel Studios film to date (and by Marvel Studios I'm specifically referring to everything after Iron Man, although, this film is better than 90% of the Marvel films that came out prior to 2008 as well). It's a wonderfully old-school action film that tonally feels akin to the likes of Raiders of the Lost Ark and Last Crusade, the performances are top notch, and it's just loads of fun from beginning to end.

One of the things that most impressed me about this film was the character of Captain America himself. The character can essentially be summed up in two words: good guy. In many cases having a lead character with such a one-note personality could be a detriment to the film and could come off as corny or boring (much like Superman in Superman Returns), but here, it miraculously works. And it doesn't *just* work, Steve Rogers, despite his lack of dimensionality is really the driving force of the whole film who you root for and empathize with. He never comes across as anything less than believable, and I think a large part of this stems from the way that Joe Johnston and company portray him from the get go. As the film starts, Steve Rogers is the epitome of underdog; he is scrawny, down on his luck, and unable to accomplish the thing he most desires. The film sets the character up in such a way that the audience connects with him as the underdog and that connection lasts even after he becomes Captain America, the biggest, toughest, guy on the battlefield. He still reads as the same character because his core goodness doesn't change. It's the rare case where a character without any kind of traditional arc is actually the right choice for the film, and Chris Evans' performance absolutely makes this character.

The first half of the movie, by itself, is better than just about everything else that has come out this year (excluding Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows). After that point though, the film starts to hit a minor case of the Second Act sag, where I started to feel a bit of action overload with no real pressing plot issues. However, this is resolved fairly quickly and the climax of the film works really well, and leads ultimately to a fantastic ending.

Another element of this film that works very well is the integration of the Avengers continuity. Many people have complained that since the Avengers initiative was announced at the end of the first Iron Man that many of the Marvel films have suffered, to an extent, by trying to force continuity between the different characters into every film, Iron Man 2 was the worst example of this. However, Captain America works wonderfully in that none of the Avengers continuity elements feel intrusive or forced, it all fits very naturally into the narrative, and, in fact, would have actually hurt the movie if it had not been present. This is the way I wish the rest of the films had been handled, because this film, more than any other, has made me excited for seeing The Avengers next May.

There's also some fantastic fan-service in this film, and even though I've never really been a comic book nerd (I'm a nerd, by all accounts, but I've never fit into that variety) it still had me grinning from ear to ear.

My biggest complaint with this film, aside from the aforementioned Second Act sag, would be the character of Red Skull. Like Captain America, Red Skull is very two-dimensional, but it doesn't play as well as it does for our hero. Red Skull just was not a particularly compelling villain, and while it's not necessarily damaging to the film, it's one of the few dull elements that, when compared to everything else, stands out a bit.

We may have had to wait a while, but 2011 has finally started to turn up in terms of excellent movies this month. Captain America is an amazing summer blockbuster with great talent both in front of and behind the camera. The cast from Chris Evans to Tommy Lee Jones to Hayley Atwell give great performances, the writing from Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely is great, and it's all headed with wonderful direction from Joe Johnston. I definitely recommend this film.

A-

X: First Class (2011)

Come for the Charles and Erik Story, Stay for not Much Else.

[8/10 · 9 July 2011]

I have some mixed feelings about X-Men: First Class. Going into it I had heard a lot of great things, comments ranging from it being by far the best X-Men film to being on par with The Dark Knight. In the end, though, I found it to be kind of a mixed bag. As a character study between Charles Xavier and Erik Lehnsherr it's brilliant. While they never quite match the iconic performances of Sir Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen, James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender do a wonderful job portraying these characters and really sell the friendship between them. This movie, on its own, establishes a stronger friendship and more poignant separation of two friends than all three Star Wars prequels did. The scenes between Charles and Erik are where this movie truly shines.

Unfortunately, the rest of the film is a bit weak and forgettable. None of the other characters were particularly strong or memorable (with perhaps the exception of Mystique) and the whole plot tied into the Cuban Missile Crisis felt contrived. I also never once bought Kevin Bacon as the villain. I was also somewhat annoyed by the ham-fistedness of the Mutants=Gay subtext. Yes, I understand that that has always been an element of the series, but it has always been inferred using broad strokes and could be applied to any number of minority issues from racism, sexism, homophobia, etc. Using buzzword phrases like "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" and "Mutant Pride" felt very forced, and the signposting lacked the class of the original Brian Singer films.

So was this film the best of the X-Men series? No, that honor belongs to X2: X-Men United. Is it the best Marvel Comics film? Nope, that'd be Spider-Man 2. How about a film on the caliber of The Dark Knight? Not even close. However, it was a good movie, and the excellent character study between Charles and Erik is worth the price of admission alone.

B

Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011)

Exceeded My Expectations

[8/10 · 29 June 2011]

To say my expectations going into Transformers: Dark of the Moon were low would be a tremendous understatement. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen was so embarrassingly bad I could hardly fathom it; but I ended up going to the new movie against my better judgement, primarily because I wanted to see the trailer for Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol up on the big screen (which did not disappoint by the way, Brad Bird's live action debut looks amazing). To my surprise, though, Dark of the Moon was not terrible, and all things considered was actually pretty good.

So when it comes to critiquing a Michael Bay film, you can't really treat it like anything else. There's a certain level of expectation that comes with one of his movies, and that involves a lot of explosions, and not a lot of plot. And when it comes to explosions, giant robots, and epic action sequences, this movie does not disappoint, however, for a Michael Bay film, Dark of the Moon is surprisingly talky and I'm still not sure whether or not that's a good thing. The first two acts of the film contain relatively few big action set pieces, and mostly attempts to set the stage for everything that happens in the film's final act. On one hand I appreciate that this film actually attempts to tell a story rather than Revenge of the Fallen's method of "look, here's robots fighting in China for no reason! Ooh, and now they're fighting in Egypt for no reason!" but on the other hand the film kind of drags at times in the first two acts because none of the characters are particularly compelling. Normally I would not criticize a film for spending more time on story and characters than on eye candy, and I do commend the filmmakers for telling a coherent story this time around, but they could have easily trimmed some time from the first two acts and focused more on the battle for Earth between the Autobots and Decepticons.

When we finally do get to the good stuff in the final act, the action and the scale is certainly epic, but parts of it feel hollow. What we're seeing is cool, but none of it carries any weight; what should be a rousing finale to a series rings a bit flat because there was not a proper build up to it. Yes, this movie spent a long time setting up the finale, and they did it as well as they could, but for the kind of impact they were clearly going for the series needs to build up to it from the get go. This is my biggest problem with the film, it's not the shallow characters, the massive plot holes, or the annoying comic relief characters; those are all par for the course with a movie like this. My biggest complaint is that Transformers did not have the ambition or the foresight to build any sort of arc into the trilogy. Almost nothing from the first two films has any impact on the events of this film (the second film is particularly overlooked). This does not feel like Transformers 3, it feels like Transformers: Yeah, We Did Another One. When you make a trilogy like this, it's essential to have a narrative that ties them together. The reason Return of the King is so powerful as a conclusion because the rest of The Lord of the Rings builds up to it, the same goes for the Star Wars trilogy, even the Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy creates an arc for its story and its characters so that the ending feels like the culmination of everything, not just another ending of another movie. In my opinion, that is the biggest area where Transformers: Dark of the Moon fails, that it does not build on any established narrative, but instead goes in an entirely new direction and therefore feels less satisfying than it could have. Again, though, this is Michael Bay's Transformers, so to expect that kind of foresight to go into it is a bit silly. So let's shift gears and focus on some things I did like.

This movie, has far less embarrassingly juvenile humor than either of the previous films (THANK GOD!). Oh, there's still some in there, but we don't have anything as facepalm worthy as masturbation jokes, Bumblebee peeing on John Turturro, Mudflap and Skids, or "I'm underneath the enemy's...scrotum." Outside of the juvenile humor though, there are some things are actually legitimately funny John Malkovich has a fun, albeit brief, role in the film, and Shia LeBeouf has some great interaction with a character played by Patrick Dempsey. I was also impressed that there were one or two plot twists in this film that actually managed to surprise me. It was nothing super heady, but the script was at least intelligent enough to keep you on your toes, even if just a little bit. And of course the visual effects work by ILM was amazing, and is a shoe-in for the VFX Oscar this year.

So all in all Transformers: Dark of the Moon was an enjoyable film. It vastly exceeded my expectations based on what we got with the last film, and while not as satisfying as it could have been still had plenty of cool action sequences and fun moments. If you liked the first Transformers at all I would recommend it, if not, than this isn't going to change your opinion on the series at all.

B-

Inglourious Basterds (2009)

One of the Best of the Year

[10/10 · 27 June 2011]

Inglourious Basterds Rating: B

WARNING: Review may contain minor spoilers but I promise not to include anything you can't already see in the trailers.

Inglourious Basterds is a story set in a fictionalized version of World War II involving an attempt by two different parties to kill members of the German command including Adolf Hitler himself. One of the parties is the Basterds, a group of Jewish American soldiers who pride themselves in "killin' Nazis."

From the trailers I came into Inglourious Basterds expecting an ultra-violent Nazi-killing action movie with a bit of dark humor, but the movie was not what I thought it would be. It was a much more complex story than that broken up into five different chapters (only 3 of which included the Basterds). Part of me is happy that it was more complex than what I was expecting but the parts with the Basterds, especially Brad Pitt's character were so entertaining that another part of me wishes that it was the focus of the whole movie. Regardless, Quentin Tarantino did a great job with the story and when the credits rolled at the end of the movie and I looked at my watch I couldn't believe that 2 and a half hours had gone by, the writing was just so tight that it didn't give you time to focus on the reality of the passing time.

I never used to be a huge fan of Brad Pitt but recently I've started to like him a lot more, and this movie was a brilliant role for him. His character, the Tenessee-born Lt. Aldo Raine, was absolutely the best part of this movie, his performance was constantly hilarious and there were a few scenes where I was in tears I was laughing so hard. It's not something that the Academy will recognize, but from a comedy standpoint it's one of the best performances I've seen in a long time.

As I mentioned before the pacing of this movie was very good. It had your classic Quentin Tarantino goofiness, but it also had great moments of suspense, and great human drama. The way Tarantino handles his films shows a master at work, whether you like his works or not, they just have such tight direction that the audience is completely removed from their own world without realizing it.

This was not Tarantino's best movie but it was very well done, my only complaints are that I wish there was more focus on the Basterds, which I thought were the best part of the movie, and there's a scene at the end that, although satisfying to see, broke the fourth wall because of it's historical inaccuracy. But I would definitely recommend it, even if you don't like Tarantino, Brad Pitt is just too funny to miss.

SECOND TAKE: A

This movie is brilliant, one of the best of the year definitely. The storytelling, the writing, the direction, the performances, EVERYTHING is spot on. I think the reason a rated it lower before was that I was expecting the whole movie to be in the same vein as the second and fourth chapters and I was disappointed that it was not. However, the Basterds are only part of the brilliance of the movie, and the other chapters are just as fantastic as the ones focusing on the Basterds. Chapter One for instance was an absolute Tour de Force tension building and brilliant writing. This movie is not to be missed.

9 (I) (2009)

Doesn't Live Up To Its Premise.

[7/10 · 27 June 2011]

9 Rating: C

9, set in an alternate time line, takes place shortly after the events of World War II. A machine that was initially created for good ends up being abused by corrupt human leaders and eventually strikes back destroying all of humanity. However, a lone scientist creates a group of sentient rag dolls (dubbed Stitch-Punks by Shane Acker) to carry on one last shred of hope for the future. 9 is the final Stitch-Punk created by The Scientist.

So I must say I was pretty excited for 9 when I stumbled across the teaser at apple.com way back at the beginning of the year; it looked like a very unique concept with cool action and an interesting animation style. I then found the original short film on YouTube, and also loosely followed the teaser site 9experiment.com (which I recommend going to before seeing the movie, at the very least read through The Scientist's journal, it'll give you some interesting insight into the back story). Anyway the movie finally came out and I was definitely curious to see how it would be handled.

Unfortunately, it was not as good as either the trailers or the original short film. Don't get me wrong, there were a lot of cool aspects to the movie and I think Shane Acker made a good start at expanding the story from the short film but unfortunately the way the story played out it felt more like they were working from an outline rather than a finished script. All the plot elements were good and fit together well but none really went deeper than the surface level here's what's happening. If this had been merely a longer short film (30-40 min) it would have been brilliant, but for a feature length film the story felt a little bit thin. I was also a little disappointed that this movie kind of invalidated the short film and there were definitely some decisions made in the story of the short film that I wished had been carried over to how the final film was made.

Another thing that was disappointing was the reliance on dialogue, especially since the voice acting was at worst mediocre, and at best kinda good. The original short film was done using only the animation as the performance, and while I understand that there needed to be some dialogue I think that the story should have been told on a strictly visual level in most places. There were a few moments that had the potential to be akin to Pixar's level of artistry but were ruined by unnecessary speaking.

On the positive note, the film was refreshingly unique, both in story and art direction. The story may not have been properly fleshed out but at it's core the story had a great concept. The staging of the animation was probably the strongest point of the movie, Shane Acker shows amazing potential as a director and the film had moments that bordered on pure cinematic art, again only held back by an over-abundance of dialogue or lack of time spent on the particular moment.

It's a shame Shane Acker chose this as his first feature length piece because I feel that it would have been better for the movie if he had waited until he had a little more experience before he tackled 9. He most certainly shows potential as a filmmaker, however I think this story was beyond his level at this time. I will definitely be watching out for his future works and, although it would be unlikely, I would be very excited if he decided in the future to rework the film, using the film that was released now as sort of the foundation and building from there.

Iron Man 2 (2010)

Too Much 'Avengers' Not Enough 'Iron Man'

[8/10 · 27 June 2011]

Iron Man 2 Rating: C+

So I think Iron Man 2 is going to be one of those movies that I need a repeat viewing to really appreciate, but I'll give you what impressions I got from my first viewing.

Iron Man 2 felt like the screenwriters couldn't choose between two ideas so, instead, decided to throw them both into one movie. Both ideas had the potential to be really good, but the movie felt a bit disjointed with the two major plot lines feeling underdeveloped and separate rather than feeling unified and working together as a whole. Basically, Iron Man 2 focused on two things: Tony Stark's struggle to get himself out of a self-destructive pattern, and a rival inventor, Justin Hammer, who is trying to steal the spotlight from Tony. There were attempts to tie the two stories together, and they worked to some extent, but in the end it just didn't really cut it.

I think that a big part of the problem is that the two plot threads were completely separated out in the context of the movie. Rather than playing the two elements off each other the film was segmented into large blocks of each story. For about 45-minutes you'd see Stark's personal struggles then suddenly we'd jump back to Justin Hammer and Whiplash and you'd go "oh yeah, these guys are in the movie too."

Which brings me to another point: Whiplash. Whiplash has to be the most tacked on villain I've ever seen. It seems like the biggest reason for him to be in the film was to provide a super battle for the climax (which ended up being disappointing in and of itself). They set up an interesting premise in the beginning of the film which would have made for a very interesting story and villain, but after the first act of the movie those motives disappeared and Whiplash became a very minor and bland background villain.

I might just be talking out of ignorance here since I've never read the comics myself, but to my knowledge it seems that Iron Man in general had pretty bland villains, and this may be a problem with the films. The first Iron Man movie was great but the villain was underdeveloped and extremely two-dimensional. This film had two villains and neither seemed to really cut it. The character of Tony Stark is very interesting, however, the villains in the series so far have been mediocre at best, no Jokers or Dr. Octopuses here.

I feel like I'm meandering with this review, but in my defense it's 3 in the morning while I'm writing this. I did enjoy the movie, the stories that were told were told fairly well, especially the parts that focused more on Tony Stark, and the acting was great as it was in the first one, however this film was disappointing due to some sillier plot devices than the first as well as stories that felt disconnected rather than unified. I think the film would have been better served by taking one of those core ideas and expanding on that rather than having the mismatch of plot threads that exist now.

Iron Man 2 was by no means a bad movie, just disappointing when compared to the first.

Also, stay through the credits when you see the film, this is a Marvel film after all.

Toy Story 3 (2010)

An Unnecessary Sequel that More than Justifies its Necessity.

[10/10 · 27 June 2011]

Over the past fifteen years Pixar has consistently made not only the best animated films, but some of the best films of the last decade and a half, period. All their movies are great but my absolute favorites are: Ratatouille and Finding Nemo (tied for first), WALLE and Toy Story 2 (tied for second), and A Bug's Life and Up (tied for third). Make no mistake, the others that did not make this list are all excellent movies (yes, even Cars), but those six that I mentioned are the best of the best. So how does Toy Story 3 stack up?

Well before I answer that question I'd like to talk for a moment about one of the two movies in my second place slot: Toy Story 2. Toy Story 2 was a movie that was riddled with production problems from the beginning; it started as a direct-to-video project headed up by two less-than-experienced directors, then when the decision was made to make it a theatrical release, the story was not where it needed to be so, with less than a year until release date Pixar started over from scratch. Despite all of that Toy Story 2 not only was a good sequel, it was actually better than the first, and to this day stands as an example of one of Pixar's very best films. Not only that, but it's ending was perfect, it was satisfying, it was big, and it felt very final. Nothing else needed to come after Toy Story 2, and in many ways, nothing should have. However, here we are, 11 years later with a second sequel: Toy Story 3.

And what would you know? It's fantastic! A first time director took a movie that had absolutely no reason for existence and made a film that justifies it's value as an addition to one of the most beloved film franchises of all time. It was hilariously funny, deeply moving, and full of characters that feel like real people despite being computer models of plastic toys (basically everything you've come to expect from Pixar). From the brilliant opening scene to the emotional conclusion, this was one excellent movie. However, though great, it still didn't quite match the mastery of Pixar's best films and it didn't quite top Toy Story 2 as best of the franchise.

The biggest downside of this movie was that the second act moved too quickly and things were too easy and predictable. After the brilliant reveal of Stinky Pete the Prospector as the villain in Toy Story 2, the mystery surrounding the villain in this movie wasn't nearly as hard to solve and was answered as soon as it started making you question yourself. Second acts are typically the weakest parts of movies due to what's known as the second act sag, where the story takes too long transitioning from introduction to climax. This movie, though, seemed to overcompensate a little bit in that regard by resolving plot points too quickly and without enough effort. On one hand the second act was easily the funniest part of the film, but the story was at its thinnest during that part.

Aside from that one complaint, though, Toy Story 3 was an excellent film. I grinned like an idiot through the whole first act, I laughed hysterically through the second act, and, to quote director Lee Unkrich's favorite response to the film, in the third act "a tear made it past my beard." While this movie was not a film that necessarily needed to be made, I'm very glad that it was. It had everything that a good film needs, and aside from a slightly thin second act it was firing on all cylinders. Pixar has once again beaten the odds and created a truly remarkable film that defies all expectations, it may not be a perfect film, but considering how rare it is for a second sequel to be decent, let alone good, the fact that first time director Lee Unkrich was able to make a truly great second sequel to a fifteen year old film is an amazing accomplishment, the Academy might as well just give him his Oscar now and save some time because he definitely deserves it.

Rating: A+

Inception (2010)

Unique, Exciting, and Incredible

[10/10 · 27 June 2011]

I will warn you that my thoughts on this film are incomplete because I have only had a chance to see it once thus far. This movie demands multiple viewings and without that experience I don't feel equipped to write an accurate review, but I will do my best.

Inception is a masterwork of creative cinema, and a tour de force of director Christopher Nolan's mastery of the craft of creating films that engage the audience on every level. If this film has a flaw, it's that it's too intelligent, too inventive, and too different for your average moviegoer to be able to fully appreciate.

As a pure film experience, I don't feel that Inception is as finely tuned or well polished as The Dark Knight. However, the concept that is being presented and the sheer imagination that Nolan has created and shared with the audience is something truly special that defies explanation. This is almost without question the single most imaginative and inventive film of the 21st Century thus far, and among the top most creative of all time. Chris Nolan is truly the most gifted filmmaker of our time. I'm afraid this will simply be too new for the Academy to appreciate, but Nolan absolutely deserves every Oscar they can nominate him for.

I knew this film would be a great movie, but I wasn't prepared for just how much this would exceed anything that has come before. I know, I'm going around in circles and saying the same thing, but this film cannot be explained and must be experienced. I would be doing you a disservice to try and put it into text. Simply put, go see this movie, as soon as you can, as many times as you can, and be prepared to change the way you think about what a film can be.

Rating: A+

Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010)

The Ultimate Nerd Film

[9/10 · 27 June 2011]

There's two aspects you'll want to consider when seeing this movie: Number 1, did you play video games in the '80s and/or '90s? And number 2, are you a nerd?

If you answered no to either of those questions you'll still enjoy the movie, and you'll likely laugh throughout the film, but just know, you aren't the target audience. This movie is layered from top to bottom with wonderful references and gags that just fills a shameless nerd, like myself, with pure, unadulterated glee. Literally from the opening titles of this film I was laughing, and when I wasn't laughing I was grinning like an idiot. There were several times when I was laughing so hard that I could no longer see or hear the movie.

The only flaw with this film is that it was perhaps too funny, and that you were laughing too much that the emotion behind the love story never really sank all the way in. However, the sheer amount of humor in this movie makes it a very minor issue.

This is likely the last, best movie that's coming out until November of this year so go see it, please? This movie really deserves to be much higher up in box office scores than it currently is, so go help it out. I think you'll have a good time, besides, what else are you going to do? Give more money to James Cameron's ego project with the Avatar re-release?

Rating: A-

The Social Network (2010)

Not What I Expected, but in the Best Possible Way

[10/10 · 27 June 2011]

When I first heard the concept for The Social Network I rolled my eyes. "The Facebook Movie" is what they were calling it, and what many are still calling it; a nickname that gives the impression that this is nothing more than Hollywood cashing in on a fad. I mean really, a movie about facebook? What a joke. However, this is not "The Facebook Movie;" sure there may be a bit of cashing in on a fad, but that's mostly just being cynical.

What this movie is is a well written, beautifully shot film, featuring great performances, and led by wonderful direction from David Fincher. The film tells the story of Mark Zuckerberg and the process he went through creating and eventually defending facebook. The film jumps back and forth between two time lines and does a great job building suspense by showing you the consequences of actions that you aren't yet aware of. There's no real twist to the movie, but the film constantly keeps you guessing by referring to events that haven't been revealed to the audience yet through the structure of the narrative. Fincher and Aaron Sorkin (the writer) did a fantastic job putting this film together, both the writing and the direction are impeccable and they are able to tell the story at a mile a minute without leaving the audience confused in the wake of the rapid fire dialogue and the abrupt changes of time line.

There was some great cinematography in the film utilizing dynamic use of focus to center in on what's really important to the moment, and even using some trick photography techniques like tilt-shift. While everything is set in the real world, in close to present day, the film has a distinct visual style because of it's use of photography.

Also, I have to mention that the acting was great as well. Every character felt completely natural in their roles and while dialogue was a big part of the film, the subtleties of facial expression and physical acting were not forgotten. I can't pick out just one performance that stood out because they were all great, but Andrew Garfield, Jesse Eisenberg, and Justin Timberlake shine the most because they had the most prominent roles.

My only complaints with the film are minor; we all know that sex, drugs, and alcohol are part of the stereotypical college image, but in a way I think that making the party image so prominent in this story it may have taken away from some of the grounded reality of the film and even lessened the impact of certain scenes near the end. Also for once I want to see a movie based on true events not conform to the cliché of using "and they went on to..." paragraphs of text at the end of the film to wrap up the loose ends. We payed to see a movie, so if it's important enough to the story to mention show us, don't tell us, otherwise we're perfectly capable of reading the Wikipedia page ourselves.

The Social Network was one of the better movies this year; that's not a great honor considering there haven't been that many great movies to choose from so far this year, but the movie was good regardless. There's nothing terribly groundbreaking and if you look back in a few years on the films that came out in 2010 you're much more likely to remember Toy Story 3 or Inception than this, but despite that, it's still a good movie with great performances, great writing, and a great cast. Definitely worth going to see (besides, it's not like anything else good is coming out in October).

Rating: A-

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 (2010)

Somewhat Rushed, but Overall Good

[8/10 · 27 June 2011]

WARNING: Typically I keep my reviews spoiler free, but because I will be comparing the film with the book and because just about everyone has either read the book or knows what happens by other means there will be SPOILERS in this review. So for the five of you out there who are not familiar with the story leave now.

Alright, so as per usual, I re-read the book before seeing the film so that I could compare the two together and see each ones own strengths and weaknesses. And I will say there are some really good things about Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1. The main trio have definitely matured as actors and really are wonderful in this movie; Deathly Hallows was perhaps the book that most deeply explored the relationship between Harry, Ron, and Hermione and I am happy to say that the strong relationship they had in the book was very well replicated on screen. For better or for worse the Harry Potter films have always had impeccable casting, and though there are few new characters, this film certainly is no exception. While reading the book again I realized just how much these actors have become the embodiment of the characters from Rowling's novels, and they are completely inseparable in my mind. The entire cast is excellent in this film, and anyone who dares remake these movies in the future will have an overwhelming challenge trying to find a cast as perfect as this.

Unfortunately, I can't praise the pacing of this movie nearly as much. When re-reading the book this time, knowing the story would be broken into two parts I tried to imagine where the split would take place, and I decided that the most logical break would be after Ron returns, he and Harry retrieve Gryffindor's sword, and the two of them destroy the locket. If they had built it up it could have been a really powerful climax for the first half, it would have settled the conflict of Ron's departure before the split, and it fits neatly just about half way through the book. Several chapters further, there is the sequence in which Voldemort steals the Elder Wand from Dumbledore, and I knew that would make for an irresistible cliff-hanger, however, that happens about two thirds of the way through the story causing a slight problem. Unfortunately, the draw of a cliff-hanger ending proved too great and the story was split at the latter, meaning that in order to cover all of the many important bases in the first two thirds of the book, things had to be rushed.

There was nothing in particular that was left out that I thought damaged the movie in any way, but rather certain important character moments were not given the proper time or attention to really help emphasize the emotions and situations of these characters. For example, Hermione's emotion over Ron's departure felt slightly brushed over, and her anger at his return came and went in an instant. In a story like this where the development of characters is the single most important thing, I was disappointed that a lot of that development was rushed through in order to hit the major plot points leading up to the cliff- hanger.

On the bright side, though, there were some truly amazing moments in this film: the trip to Godric's Hollow, the opening scene showing Hermione altering her parents memory and the emotion reflected later in altering the Death Eater's, and the beautifully handled scene depicting Dobby's death and burial.

For those who claimed the two part film was nothing more than a cynical cash-grab for Warner Bros. this film should prove them wrong; if they had tried to fit the entirety of the Year 7 in one two-and-a-half hour film it would have been terrible. As it stands, though, Part 1 was a good movie despite being somewhat rushed. The silver lining of the split being where it is, is that they will have much more time to really pack the second part with all the emotion it requires. I'm looking forward, anxiously, to July when I'll be able to look at both parts as a whole.

Rating: B+

Tangled (2010)

Good but Not as Great as I was Hoping

[8/10 · 27 June 2011]

So my journey to Tangled was a long and confusing emotional roller coaster. As a life-long fan of both Disney Animation and Glen Keane I was excited by the prospect of Mr. Keane directing Disney's grand return to the fairy tale, but as time went on Disney gave us a a change of directors, a terrible name change from Rapunzel to Tangled, and a god-awful marketing campaign to try to attract the boys who apparently stayed away from The Princess and the Frog. All this news really disappointed me and crushed a lot of my hopes for Disney's grand return to the glory days of animation. Eventually though, the reviews started coming back positive and I returned to a state of cautious optimism. Now I've seen the movie and I can finally tell you my feelings once and for all.

Tangled, is a good movie, but unfortunately, like Disney's last attempt to bring back "classic Disney Animation" (The Princess and the Frog) it was a bit too much of a mixed bag to really be great. The animation and art style in the movie are gorgeous; the landscapes really feel like a dimensional paintings and Glen Keane's attempt to bring the fluidity and warmth of hand drawn animation to CG was definitely successful (though I do feel, especially after seeing some of the hand-drawn character concepts, that the movie might have stood out a bit more if it had been hand-animated).

The first act of the movie starts off fairly promising until we arrive at the first song, this is definitely one of Disney's, and Alan Menken's, weakest musicals. Especially in the beginning of the film, the songs don't really feel like an integrated and important part of the story telling, but rather an annoying distraction from it. The beginning of the movie does, however, do a good job of setting up the characters, including my personal favorite: Flynn Rider, voiced by Chuck's Zachary Levi. Flynn is such a brilliant character, because unlike most fairy tale heroes, he realizes just how bizarre everything going on really is. It's a great modern twist that doesn't feel too Shrek-ish.

In the second and third acts things vastly improve, this is when it really starts to feel like it can maybe stand on the same shelf next to the likes of Beauty and the Beast and The Little Mermaid. As the relationship of Flynn and Rapunzel grows, we also get some great moments from the film's primary villain all leading toward an exciting, if somewhat predictable conclusion. In the midst of this ending, however the writers pull a very disappointing (and cliché) Deus ex machina plot device which, at least in my opinion, invalidated a lot of the emotion of the ending.

Disney has said that Tangled is to be the last fairy tale that the company produces for the foreseeable future, and as disappointing as that sounds on paper, I can't help but feel that it's the right decision for the company at this point. Unfortunately while watching Tangled, you can't help but compare it to the great Disney animated fairy tales like Sleeping Beauty and Beauty and the Beast. Until Disney can do something to really reinvent the genre like The Little Mermaid did, staying away from fairy tales is the best thing they can do. Part of Pixar's success is that they have been consistently doing what no one else in animation has done. Tangled was enjoyable, and I'm certainly glad I saw it, but it unfortunately pales in comparison to other animated films like How to Train Your Dragon and Toy Story 3 and doesn't live up to the precedent set by Disney's previous fairy tales.

Rating: B

Tron: Legacy (2010)

Most Fun I've had at the Movies in Ages

[9/10 · 27 June 2011]

So I could make this really short and simply say 'screw the critics, go see this movie NOW!' but you came here to read a review, so let's do it.

I had always known of the original TRON's existence and it's significance to visual effects today, but before this year I had always just dismissed it as a relic of the decade before I was born and never thought twice of it. However, that all changed when Disney released the initial test footage for TRON: Legacy (then tentatively titled TR2N). That piqued my interest significantly, and combined with an excellent Viral Campaign/Alternate Reality Game leading up to the film I was persuaded to give the original TRON a shot. What I found was a film with a weak script and visuals that had not aged well, but more importantly, there was also a fantastic and interesting concept that unfortunately had not been properly refined.

TRON: Legacy goes a long way towards realizing Steven Lisberger's fantastic concept into something that is not only an interesting idea, but also an incredibly fun ride. But even by making TRON more accessible to a wide audience, it never disrespects the original; if you loved the original film you will appreciate the fact that the movie isn't a clean sweep that tries to pave over the original, it is truly a sequel to TRON and works very well on that level. It also works for new comers as well. There's plenty of fan service, but the movie will never make you feel out-of-the-loop. If you've never seen TRON, don't hesitate to see this film, you'll enjoy it whether you've seen TRON or not (although I do encourage you to give the original TRON a shot, if only for it's historical significance).

As a pure sci-fi/action movie TRON: Legacy is fast, intense, and visually incredible; it's akin to riding a really great roller coaster, you may not take very much away from it emotionally or intellectually, but you'll want to come back to it again and again. Let's be honest, though, if you are expecting a movie that's going to be as surprising and intellectually stimulating as Inception or a movie as emotionally resonant as Toy Story 3 your expectations clearly aren't in touch with the real world.

So on the subject of 'out of touch' let's address some of the common critic's complaints, shall we? Number 1: "The plot/script/story is silly." With even the most basic understanding of what TRON is, you know you're watching a movie about a man who has been trapped in a computer system for twenty years, and in said computer system there are sky scrapers and motorcycles that shoot walls made of light out the back. You should know full well where to set your suspension of disbelief, and what to expect out of a story like this.

Number 2: "There's too much jargon in the film/I don't understand what they're saying." Come on now, we live in a day and age where everyone *has* to be a techie on some level. The "jargon" in this movie, is, in most cases, terms that most people should understand these days, and the more complex stuff is explained well enough within the context of the story that you don't have to understand the technical terms that it refers to, you can just understand its correlation to the plot.

Number 3: "The performances are wooden." This one's going to be more a matter of opinion, but, while no one was going for an Oscar here, I thought the performances were suitable for the film. I believed each of the characters the entire time, and I never once cringed at line delivery. Again, know where to set your expectations; if you're expecting Jeff Bridges to give another Crazy Heart caliber performance your expectations are too high, however, he's quite a bit better in this than he was in the original TRON, or, more recently, Iron Man.

This film is pure popcorn sci-fi/adventure. It's a film that has fantastic visual effects, great action scenes, and a whole lot of fun thrown in. It's not pretentious, it's not trying to be something it's not (unlike a certain James Cameron film from last year); it knows exactly what it is, and if you can allow it to simply be that, it's a great movie that won't disappoint. It has the sci-fi/adventure feel of J.J. Abram's Star Trek, mixed with the pure sense of fun found in Pirates of the Caribbean, and it's all tied together by the rather remarkable concept introduced in the first TRON.

I highly recommend this movie, and I definitely encourage you to see this film in IMAX 3D. The 3D effects certainly shine more brightly (both literally and figuratively) with the IMAX technology, and the nearly 45 minutes of the film shot in IMAX are spectacular to behold. It's pricier to see it this way, but if ever there was a movie that demands it, it's this one. Don't wait until Blu-Ray and DVD, don't download it from a torrent, go see this movie in IMAX 3D because it's certainly the best way to experience it.

Rating: A-

Green Lantern (2011)

A Flawed First Attempt

[6/10 · 27 June 2011]

Green Lantern rides that fine line between just good enough to call it decent and bad. On one hand it sets up the characters really well and lays the ground work for what could be a really great movie, but on the other hand the story goes off in too many different directions and doesn't allow enough time to give any of them a proper telling. It feels all at once reluctant to show you too much of Oa and the Green Lantern Corps lest your average non-nerd movie goer get confused, but at the same time asks you to accept a bizarre non-traditional villain without a lot of clear set up or focus.

There are a lot of things to like about Green Lantern; there's some good action, cool set pieces, and Ryan Reynolds does a wonderful job as Hal Jordan, but there are just as many, if not more, issues with the movie that hold it back from being good. The biggest of these issues is a story that doesn't feel coherent or intuitive. You can almost see each of the film's four writers fighting for their personal favorite character to have screen time in the film at the expense of a consistent story.

Green Lantern can essentially be summed up as wasted potential. There's enough good elements in this that I hope they continue the series rather than starting over from the ground up with a reboot, however, if this series is going to succeed in the same genre as The Dark Knight, Iron Man, Spider-Man 2, and The Incredibles; Green Lantern 2 really needs to step up its game and take this series to its full potential.

Rating: C-