Reviews

Darke Reviews | The Giver (2014)

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From the acclaimed book – that I had never heard of until now. Though apparently it came out in my junior year of high school and was praised by fans and reviewers alike. I suppose one of the little joys in my life is what I did read isn’t often adapted. When it is, I know it will be done badly. There’s a meme that goes around “don’t judge a book by its movie.” This may be true. Actually it is very true. The same, however, can be said about the movies too. They deserve the same independent thought and treatment and criticality as any book. The important word there is, of course, independent. Judge each piece of art on it’s own merits.

So where does The Giver land?

Lets start with the story. Dystopian Utopia where we have reached an Orwellian nightmare of Harrison Bergeron and 1984. Everyone has their role in society. Everyone is equal. Everyone but a single role – The Receiver of Memory. See in order to create harmony the leaders of this new society rising from the ‘Ruin” erased all memory, all emotion, all individuality. See with that we can have peace.

Have you seen this movie before? Perhaps read it? Yes. Honestly, the movie does absolutely nothing original with the story. It contains all the same tropes we’ve seen since Vonnegut and Orwell wrote about them in their respective works. The loss of all that makes us human will deliver us unto a state of surviving without living. A near automaton like society of living, breathing, non-thinking, non-feeling entities. Sadly, I have not even reached spoiler territory as all of this is shown in the trailers.

First time writer, MIchael MItnick, is one of the two parties responsible for the script. Aiding him is another relative newcomer to the silver screen. Robert B. Weide. Weide, unlike MItnick, has some published writing work, mostly in the documentary field. Including one on Vonnegut, which explains much of what I see in this work  I cannot speak for Lois Lowry’s original material, but what I do see is: Equilibrium, Bergeron, Divergent, and 1984 put into a blender for a nice puree with this as a result. I don’t want to say it is bad, but it does nothing for me as a story. It does nothing new. It does nothing I haven’t really seen or experienced a dozen times before over the past decade of Dystopian futures. It doesn’t do anything I haven’t read in far better, far more controversial satires of society from Vonnegut and Orwell.

Some of my ambivalence must be laid on the feet, hands, and eyes of director Phillip Noyce. This director who has given us Patriot Games, Clear and Present Danger, and Salt probably gives his most mediocre attempt. The passion, the angles, the emotion is as missing from this as it is from the characters in the film. With the three films he gave us previously there were successful  tones of a society of acceptance and rebelliousness against certain governmental entities. This movie lacks all of that. I mean they rear their head, but they don’t MEAN anything. I hate to use the Caps like that but its hollow. I don’t know if its just that he doesn’t know how to do the same thing for teens and tweens as he does for adults or that the studio had too much of  a say in what to do with this to try to make it another Hunger Games.  I’d like to think it was the studio, but I really do not know. I just know this is is not his best work and I have come to expect more from some people.

The acting?

I am reasonably sure now Jeff Bridges takes every wise mentor role that comes along. Some more sane than others, this one lands on the more sane side of things with an ever increasing lack of audible understanding of what he is saying. Meryl Streep is the physical manifestation of authority in this one and may have lost a bet or had a child who loved the book. One of Bon Temp’s favorite vampires, Alexander Skarsgard, is completely forgettable in this and proof that while a good actor (and good looking) a mediocre script and boring character still cannot be saved. Katie Holmes is just as bland. I suppose that’s intentional, but why use real talent when you don’t want them to actually do anything requiring range? Unless their talents are required for minimalism – in which case, ok?

The three young characters are played by Odeya Rush (We Are What We Are), Cameron Monaghan (Vampire Academy), and Brenton Thwaites. Thwaites seems to be having an interesting year with important roles in Oculus, Maleficent, and The Signal. Having seen two of the three films I can say the boy is actually able to show some range and has a bit of unrefined talent. If he is given a shot, especially after what was expected of him in this – there could be something there. The other two are, much like the other actors given so little to work with that their performances are as flat as the rest of the film. Rush shows a little, but again it is so little and so simplistic I can’t say how well she did.

The camera work and colour options elected in the film were overall pretty good from a technical standpoint. The pacing is pretty decent and kept me interested and not nodding off. So where does that leave us?

TL;DR:

The movie is a solid meh. If the books are great as they say fantastic. The movie does absolutely nothing good or fascinating. There’s a dozen other films out in the past few years that hit all of these issues in a much more interesting and deep manner. It wants to be something but it ultimately fails.

A pair of teenage girls who were in the movie said they really liked it so that’s something I suppose.

I cannot recommend this film. If you want a dystopian teen movie go watch Divergent or Hunger Games (again)

Darke Reviews | Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2014)

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Wow was it hard to avoid reviews for this today! The skims that I saw as I scrolled through my news feed were not good. Even talk at work today indicated this wouldn’t be good. Now to preface this review there are some ground rules to understand where I come from on it.

1. I have not read the comic, but was aware of it when I watched the original cartoon.
2. I have watched the original cartoon, every episode. My favorite is the catwoman from channel 6.
3. I have watched a single video/AMV from *one* of the new reboots (2003 I think). It was epic. It was dark. It worked. Wish I could find it again.

So where does this movie fall in?

First thing is first. Remove the Nostalgia glasses. Acknowledge how bloody cheesy the original animated series was. If you think it was serious in any respect, I present you Hot Rodding Teenagers from Dimension X. A Giant Brain living inside the STOMACH of a robot. Beebop and Rocksteady. If you can now acknowledge how ridiculous some of this is, we can continue. That is to say nothing of the core concept. Teenage. Mutant. Ninja. Turtles. Trained. By. A Rat. If you can’t just skip the TL;DR right now.

If you have embraced the insanity of the concept and all that comes with it; I present to you TMNT. As I have said this is based on a comic originally written and drawn by Peter Laird and Kevin Eastman, who did the opening title sequence. If they didn’t do it – someone who imitates their style did. This movie does bear the dreaded triple writing credit beyond that. Josh Appelbaum (Mission Impossible 4 (the good one), Alias), Andre Nemec (who has all the same credits as Appelbaum), and Evan Daugherty (Snow White and the Huntsman, Divergent). They *did* embrace the insanity. Their sin? (ok one of them) Too much human. Too little Turtle power. Their homage? I can’t count the number of callbacks to the original run I picked up on and laughed at (mostly alone).

What about Michael Bay? Well…he is only a producer. The Director here is Jonathan Leibesman. The same man who gave us Wrath of the Titans, an unwanted and yet somehow better sequel to an unwanted remake of a classic film. He also gave us Texas Chainsaw Massacre 50. No that’s not it’s actual title. It might as well be. To his favor he gave us one of the better alien invasion sci fi epics with Battle Los Angeles. Yes, it had problems with the camera work but as a film it worked. He does much the same, good and bad here, with TMNT. His camera work makes much of the action hard to take in, but what you do see appears to be epic looking and kind of awesome. Decent tension and ok pacing.

Acting? Oof. well, it wasn’t too bad actually. Megan Fox (Transformers, Jennifers Body), Will Arnett (Arrested Development, Monsters vs Aliens) get far too much screen time and most of it’s groan worthy – but they make it work.  I don’t know if its the writing or acting or both. Whoopi Goldberg was here for a paycheck or perhaps some debt to satan for Sister Act 2? Tony Shalhoub as Splinter? A bit jarring yes, but because it is a man of his talents it works. The brothers are fine. The personalities mostly realized with the usual focus on Mikey and Raph. Their voice actors, including Johnny Knoxville do just fine. William Fitchner makes everything he does better (Drive Angry is a perfect example) and brings the ham and cheese with him as he chews scenery in a way that even Jeremy Irons can appreciate.

Effects. I have heard many comments about how creepy they are. “The noses are weird.” “The teeth and animations are just off putting.” Meh I say. They weren’t that bad. They’re strangely more appropriate than what we had before so I guess I don’t mind them. Not all of the effects are clean and the CGI over practical is evident but I got to ignore that to see the Ninja Turtles on screen for the first time in 20 years and they *do* look better than we got in the previous films. Period. Sorry my opinion on this one.

I want to give the Villain a bit of a special talk. I had a guy behind me dissing the look of the new Shredder. My only retort – you have to make a guy who is supposed to be a walking cuisinart look threatening. Sorry it needs to be armor. It needs to be samurai like. It needs a lot of blades. A LOT of blades. Did they go a bit overboard on it? Eh maybe, but so be it. This is a movie where a man in ridiculous bladed armor had to take on four six foot turtles wielding dual katana’s, nunchaku, sai, and metal collapsible bo staff. Check your suspension of disbelief at the door.

TL;DR

I had a group of people behind me who hated it. The guy next to me, whom I asked, and his  lady loved it. They felt it captured the feeling of the original run. The person I saw it with felt the same.

I happen to agree with them.

It really brought the heart of the original comics and animated to film. It is very superficial, but lets face it most kids movies are folks. This *is* a movie for kids. There’s enough here for adults, especially all of the aforementioned callbacks, but it is a childrens movie. That grants it a lot of forgiveness from me.

What also grants it forgiveness? It was a fun little romp through my own childhood. It just kinda works

Final recommendations:
TMNT is better than most reviewers are giving it credit for. It is not for everyone, but if you have kids – its an absolute this weekend. The kids I saw leaving the theatre in their masks were running and tumbling and just enjoying themselves. What else is it supposed to do?

If you are an adult who wants to see it – take off the nostalgia glasses, sit back, and just try to enjoy it. You just might.

If you weren’t interested – neither this review nor the movie will change your opinion.

At the end of the day TMNT is kinda fun.

Cowabunga!

Darke Reviews | Into the Storm (2014)

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Missing a movie on premier night annoys me, especially when its due to illness. Still being in a lot of pain watching a movie I already have mixed feelings on doesn’t usually bode well for the films review. Sad fact, but being uncomfortable watching a film does have add bias. I really – really – debated this one.

I love the original (yes, thats intentional) Twister for all its flaws. It got me and a rag tag bunch of my friends decide to try to storm chase that summer. No we didn’t catch anything and we thought it would be a good idea at the time. I also didn’t want to like this because of how “real” they were trying to be with the storm. How not hollywood they were with some shots and how hollywood they were with others. I had friends in Joplin. I had friends in City of Heroes who would have to log off for tornado warnings. I have friends, people I care about deeply, still in Tornado alley. I follow the real deal here as well, and I cried last year when someone trying to make the world a better place by chasing, died with his son and partner. I never met him, but I understood him (Tim Samaras if you are so interested).

So I really wanted to hate this movie. I have plenty of reason (Hollywood and a hundred years of history) to hate it. So did I?

This is normally where I talk about the writer and director. The writer, John Swetnam, has little to his credit beyond Step Up All In. The director, Steven Quale, has little to his directing background beyond Final Destination 5. He has however, worked on numerous other films including being second unit director on Avatar. Neither of them do anything particularly new or different here worth commenting on. Ultimately their biggest success is not beating us over the head with environmentalism. It was a risk that the movie began to edge towards and changed it’s mind. Their second biggest success is writing children who felt like children. It was a touch cliche at times, but I at least felt like I was listening to and watching teenagers at the appropriate moments (mostly).

No one in this movie is in danger of winning an Oscar. Let’s be blunt here. This is a disaster flick. This is Twister brought up to the science and tech that we’ve learned in the near 20 years since Twister (has it really been that long?). Richard Armitage (The Hobbit) plays the tough but caring dad. Sarah Wayne Callies (Walking Dead) is the weather geek. Max Deacon (Not much to credit) and Nathan Cress (iCarly) play the rebellious but loyal teen siblings. Matt Walsh plays the  final stereotype of the man willing to do anything to get his shot. There are absolutely no surprises in any performance as they play their stereotypes to a T. Ultimately it means I don’t care if any of them live or die since there are no surprises in them, nothing to make them “more”. There’s really never a sense of true risk.

From am FX standpoint, we have Twister. Honestly, twister did some of the effects better 20 years ago. That is not good. Oh the damage to structures is good. Very realistic and uncomfortably so from anyone, like me, who has watched plenty of video from various storms tearing apart schools, hospitals, and other places people may be hiding. The plane sequence is as nonsensical in the final product as it is in the trailer and looks nearly as fake. Even the sound clips here are the metal equivalent of the Wilhelm Scream. Not good.

What is good? The impact of the storms. If the storms themselves aren’t the best, the actual damage path shown after, Some of the destruction we bear witness to, and the camera work. The movie is a riff on Found Footage. It’s all told through cameras, but apparently everyone has steady cam rigs which means every shot is clear, crisp, and not shaky. THIS IS GOOD. It allows the movie to be watchable. Had i had another Cloverfield, Paranormal Activity, or Earth to Echo here I think I’d have left. Its done. The use of steady cam allows this to be watchable.

TL;DR?

I don’t hate it. I found myself enjoying what they did.

There is ONE shot, one shot where the entire audience (bout 100 folk) gasped in amazement. For that the movie got brownie points. It got a reaction out of the audience – the entire audience. If you can do that, in a positive way, then your movie succeeds regardless of any opinion levied.

It’s not a great movie and I really don’t feel comfortable recommending it, but if you read my comment above – the movie still succeeds. It certainly is not as bad as I thought it would be. It’s a touch more respectful than I thought it would be (mostly. the Matt Walsh character is a far more jerkish version of Sean Casey).

If you really want to watch and appreciate chasing? Watch the Weather Channel – they have three different shows about it and they are far more educational and at times, even entertaining. They are about the real people doing the real work. I don’t need Hollywood when the real thing is very accessible to me.

So –
If you were at all interested – yeah go ahead. I don’t imagine you’ll hate it.
If you weren’t at all interested – give it a hard pass.
If you were the least bit curious, or after reading my review curious, matinee at BEST. Redbox/Netflix at worst.

Darke Reviews | Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)

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Oh I had expectations going into this one. I put this pretty much at the bottom of the list of Marvel Cinematic Universe I would enjoy. Why you ask? Well to be honest I have no love for awkward, uncomfortable, or slapstick comedy. I also have no love for some of the songs on Star Lords awesome mix #1 (You can see the Nerdist for the full list www.nerdist.com/2014/07/james-…. Spirit in the Sky and Hooked on a Feeling may be two of my most hated songs ever. Never liked them, never will. No real rational reason, they just don’t appeal to me and tend to get overplayed to my perception. This is what the trailers sold me. This is what I was expecting. I was really really not looking forward to this movie.

Some of my coworkers derided me for going into a movie with expectations such as these. That I should go in with a clear mind and thought on what the movie could potentially be. This is nigh impossible. I have avoided behind the scenes sites as much as possible these days to avoid the spoilers that I can, but trailers have a job to sell a movie. What they show sets expectations. Some movies defy them – Hercules last week. Some movies lie to you with them – such as the remake of Clash of the Titans. Some movies are failed by them – Lord of War. So where did Guardians of the Galaxy fall, with a trailer that in my opinion failed it.

-please note, this review is as always spoiler free, and my opinion on the trailer seems largely unique-

Obviously this one is based on a comic, one of which I have only passing familiarity. That is to say I know it exists. Director James Gunn (Slither, Super) is also one of the ones responsible for the script. Nicole Perlman has no listed writing credits before this, but has an announced Black Widow treatment in the works? Interesting. Writer Director as I’ve said before can be very good or very bad. It is rarely in the middle. Until today. The story here is a mandated origin story. They didn’t get a choice. You need to introduce a three meter walking tree, a talking racoon, a green assassin, and a blue guy with red tattoos; oh and the human male lead. There’s also a plot to introduce, villains, worlds, a galaxy of races. Now – do it in 2 hours. Good luck.

So while the plot is a bit of a hot mess, I can look past it because they were asked the near impossible in the 21st century. Star Trek, Star Wars, Stargate – all of these have built in fanbases and worlds we know that need little introduction for the average theatre goer. Even the newbie can be brought up to speed quickly with these franchises, this one is a tad more difficult. They do it as well as they possibly can and fairly well. Everyone gets a character moment on both sides of the coin. Just enough for you to get who they are and why they are. What their world view is. Some are treated better than others, and well quite honestly some aren’t treated as good as they should be or could be. I will get into that as I talk about the characters.

Chris Pratt (Parks and Recreation, Zero Dark Thirty) plays our noble space pirate. He’s Malcolm Reynolds but doesn’t quite have the easy going charm that Fillion does. This is probably intentional and if so it works, he is also the least interesting character in the movie. He is regularly upstaged by more colourful (literally) costars. The reigning champion of the film is Rocket. Yes. That’s right the Raccoon is the hands down winner of I want to watch him. Bradley Cooper (The Hangover, A-Team) voices the four legged menace to society and proves he has that kind of natural charisma that works if you see him on camera or not. Vin Diesel voices Groot, the aforementioned tree who is always fun to watch when he emotes or gives you an “I am Groot”. Dave Bautista of WWE fame, plays Drax the Destroyer. He doesn’t act a lot, but with the character he has thats a good thing. What he does is kick butt and be large and in charge. He is also one of the more humorous characters and as enjoyable in his dryness as Diesel is in his …quirkiness?

Sadly, Zoe Saldana does nothing particularly new here. Her Gamora is nearly the same character as Columbiana and Aisha (The Losers). Tough, beautiful, action girl. This isn’t horrific by any means. We need more like her. I just wish they had done more to break her from a stereotype. Script problems – not actress here. Additional script problems come in the form of the nemesis Nebula. Karen Gillan (Dr. Who and Occulus) gets our lovely blue alien. The entirety of act 1 – she is menacing and you believe her deadly. Something happens half way through act two where she loses this and seems to be a shadow of her former threat. This is compounded in what should be an epic fight between her and Gamora that just is…weaker than it should be. Script problems I cannot forgive there. Gillan, however, proved we need to see more of her in the cinema in the action, horror, and sci fi genre’s. She pulled off what could have been a difficult role and did it well. The story and script failed her. The director failed her. Lee Pace (Lord of the Rings/Hobbit, Halt and Catch Fire) is just never quite the threat he needs to be. I don’t know who to blame there, but it is. He exists. the threat exists, I just don’t get his menace if it is supposed to exist.

Visually, the movie is beautiful. The darkening of 3D hurts the film as it seems to have a focus on bright vibrant colours. They just get lost in the 3D. Everything else looks very clean and easy to watch. Rocket, Groot, the ships, the space stations, etc look great. Rocket especially. We aren’t quite talking Uncanny Valley here, but it’s superb.

Music. *sigh*. Yep still hate most of it, but it was no where near as prominent as I feared. They even used a song I like with the Runaways “Cherry Bomb”. A few times it works. Other times its backdrop. The Star Lord introduction works well enough to let you know who and what you are dealing with. This one falls to different strokes for different folks. I will never like the soundtrack, but if you do – enjoy! The score left a bit to be desired as it reminded me too much of Avengers.

TL;DR?

Alright here we go. Yep, the trailers failed this one for me.

It’s good. The movie is solid. It feels a bit pacing hurt at times, but its more entertaining than I thought it would be. It made me laugh at times. I enjoyed the action. I enjoyed the finale. The humor wasn’t AS bad as I thought it would be.

That said, there’s some language in this one. If you want to keep your kids from male anatomy or fecal matter (see I keep my reviews clean), then I wouldn’t take them to see it. If it doesn’t matter – then cool. Enjoy.

So there you go. Guardians of the Galaxy is a good, entertaining movie. Not the strongest of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but most definitely not the weakest.

Next week may be a double review with TMNT and Into the Storm. TMNT is absolute…the other. Eh see a post tomorrow on that

Darke Reviews | Hercules (2014)

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Two Hercules movies in one year. I have said since January this one with the Rock could not suck nearly as bad as the first one. If you missed my review for that (I haven’t figured out how to link to FB yet…) its in the review history here on Everything Except Shoes. It sucked. It sucked so bad. It may be one of the worst movies of the year. Not the worst, that may be Transformers 4 or Brick Mansions, but its up there (down there). Enough on the past. A wise monkey told me the past can hurt. Let’s move on.

The Rock, lets face it was born to play Hercules. Did he do it?

I promised in the Lucy review that there was a similarity that was diametrically opposed. The trailers are it. The trailers for Hercules ultimately were a failure and a blessing for the movie. It succeeded so successfully in hiding what the movie really is about. What story it tells that I had all the wrong expectations going in. This is both good and bad. It is very very good that they didn’t give anything away. So nice job guys. It’s bad in that it set up the wrong story in peoples minds. You will go in expecting one thing and will come out with another. That’s not usually a good thing as those expectations can be damaging if you really wanted one thing but got another that didn’t interest you. The movie, for me, works in that I went in expecting little but got more.

From a story standpoint, if you take The Losers, A Knights Tale, and King Arthur and put them in a blender. The resulting puree is this film. That should create some interesting visuals for those familiar with those films. It verges on my no spoiler territory a bit, but I’ll leave it to your imagination to figure out what that combination brings.

I think the director could have been anyone. Probably should have been too, but I have a sort of hate for Brett Ratner and his homophobia. Most sane people do, but that’s tied to his horrific films. If you remember X3? I am sorry. If you don’t remember it – count your blessings. He was the director called in and who made many of the decisions that nearly buried the X-Men franchise. He also gave us all the Rush Hour movies even as they grew less funny.

I’d love nothing more than to say he bombed here. Sadly I can’t. He didn’t. The action is decent. The camera shots are good. The overall production is good. Some of the FX were deplorable, but you can’t have it all. Well you can, just not with this movie.

The movie is absolutely carried by its cast. Dwayne Johnson WAS in fact born to play Hercules. He gives Will Smith a run for his money as the most charismatic man on the planet. He might even beat him after the insomnia solving After Earth. What surprised me is how much the supporting cast meets him on the battlefield of charm and entertainment. They elevate the film to the next level in a way Johnson hasn’t had his last few movies. Ian McShane (Kings, Deadwood, Death Race) is in full form and allows his eye brows as his own supporting actors. He is just fun in the yoda like role he has. The surprise humor is from Knights Tale and Dark City star Rufus Sewell. He must be following the Ian MCShane handbook, but just keeps bringing a bloody smile to my face.

I’d also like to commend Ingrid Bolso Berdal as Atalanta. She’s kinda awesome in the action sequences and is worth watching. I Hope she gets a good career in action movies going forward. She sold it and has some potential.

Now…story. It’s interesting, but so cliche’d its painful. CinemaSins will have a field day once he gets his hands on it. At one point the person I saw it with started singing “I’ll make a man out of you”, which was followed by me saying “Rohim, Ride!”. We even get a Han Solo moment at the bridge between Act II and III. It’s just wow in that moment.

Alright, TL;DR?

Hercules is a fun little romp. Its more entertaining than it has any real right to be and I am not 100% certain it’s not a fluke that it is. It’s formulaic as all Hades, but I am strangely comfortable with it. It doesn’t do too much new with its plot, but does some new things.

If you want to largely turn your brain off for an hour and a half and have time to kill go see this.

Kids? Eh 10 and up and you should be good.

This movie surprised me folks. It was just kinda fun.

Next week – I will see Guardians of the Galaxy.

Darke Reviews | Lucy (2014)

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Two films, two reviews, one night. Sleep is for the weak. Both reviews will have diametrically opposed commentary on one topic. Yet there are similarities in them as well. Let me get to a bit of color commentary on Lucy, I want to be able to get both reviews out before it gets too terribly late, even if most of you won’t read this for another 5 hours now.

Trailers. I promise one day I will get so mad at the trailers for movies I will do a Rant in the Darke. Today is not that day, but it’s oh so tempting. I would say easily 80% of the most intense scenes of Lucy are shown in the trailer. POssibly as low as 60 but thats pushing it. This annoys me. The movie offers no surprises in that regard. Hollywood fail folks. Trailers are designed to entice. Get you going “Oh I think I want to see what this is all about”, perhaps “That looks interesting, what happens in it.” It shouldn’t be after seeing the film going “I saw this why? The trailer showed so much.”

The trailer, however, did not show everything. For that I am partially thankful. I wish they had been more careful, but the question is what didn’t they show?

Luc Besson, you beautiful, sick fiend. Will you ever be satisfied? You directorial style is eternally refreshing and paced well for audiences across the globe. You waste no time in the movies 1:28 running time. The movie is absolutely as lean as it can be. Even with your oddly bizarre inserts during scenes which were jarring at first, but acceptable with the story you’re telling. When you introduced the world in 1990 to La Femme Nikita, then in 94 to Leon The Professional, and in 97 to the 5th Element you continued to push boundaries of action, women, and science fiction. Those are but some of the highlights of your directing career. They also inform your audience that not everything you see is what you get.

You also of course are a writer, with a tendency to be the sole writer upon a film. Thank you. You gave us Nikita, Leelu, and Leon. You brought Jet Li to Paris for Kiss of the Dragon and gave us Jason Statham’s driver in The Transporter. You gave us an introduction to David Belle in District B13. You gave us a man who has a special set of skills. Skills he’s honed over a long career and he does things when people are Taken. So many icons of modern action are at your hands.

The way you treat women is a fascinating study as well. They tend to be victim and powerful. They tend to, in your own habits of writing, start from the bottom and become something more. Something better. You do that with a belief in humanity that it can be more. That it can be good, even with the cynicism and pessimism of the worlds you create. For that, I thank you. You aren’t perfect and your initial treatment is…a bit uncomfortable at times, but your empowerment is to be commended.

Did you nail it again with Lucy?

Well. Yes, yes you did. The movie runs sickeningly lean. Too lean I think. There are scenes that could have used more meat to them. More depth, but I don’t think it what was what you were intending. The pacing is amazingly quick and yet easy to follow at the same time. Your casting is certainly not white washed and again I blame your brilliant european sensibilities for that. It wasn’t as xenophobic as I thought. It just was.

I think thats the secret to Lucy. It is. If you will pardon a bit of sacrilege, I am that I am. Not far off the mark. Everyone is who they are without apology or explanation. Bad guys are bad. Good guys are good. Scientists are scientists (that actually seem to want to do science). Lucy is Lucy.

What about that cast though is there anything to it? Well Scarlett Johansson actually carries the film. Her reaction to the events and how she passes through the world helps a lot. Is it a bit emotionless? Yes. Thats to her credit. If you watch her other films, even Widow has emotion as she does her thing. There’s something minimalist here that needs to be appreciated. Especially within the context of the story. The rest of the cast is good in what they do, but really the weight falls on Johansson and she doesn’t let it hold her down.

She did what I hoped and became a strong female character that carried a film on her own.

The movie does one other successful thing. If you remember my Transcendence review, it annoyed me to the point of rage on how it treated the advancement of the mind. This one? Not only embraces the possibility of that kind of enhancement. It takes that possibility on a date, gets drunk with it, and lets itself be taken advantage of by the possibilities it offers. I think they are in a deeply committed relationship now; or just committed. Hard to say.

TL;DR?

If you were interested in Lucy at all? SEE it. Please.
If you weren’t but now are curious – sound off below AFTER you see it with your thoughts for a chance to win tickets to another film.
If you like the game Mage the Ascension – SEE IT. You’ll be saying “‘fraking ‘genitors” the entire time.

If you don’t dig good sci fi or sci fi in general. Give it a pass.
If you don’t like or can’t accept quasi science in your sci fi – pass.
If your kids want to see it…I am …uncertain. Maybe 13+.

Lucy, much like Snowpiercer is the kind of movie we need. Yes, it needs more meat to its story, but it took risks. Good ones. They paid off for me.

I really enjoyed this and the thoughts the movie left me with. It had a message and a good one at that. Whats the message?

See it and find out. You tell me! I know what I got from it.

Darke Reviews | Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014)

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First let me apologize for not getting that Earth to Echo review out. I will make an attempt this evening, but first I want to talk to you about a sequel. Sequels notoriously have a curse for being less awesome than their predecessor. There are a handful in all of time that break that. Empire Strikes Back and Godfather II being two of the most prominent. August 5, 2011 saw the reboot of a franchise that was abused to the point it still causes flashbacks. Burtons version is at best an abomination and at worst a cinematic enema on the audience and good movie making.

But…enough of that 2011 we got Rise of the Planet of the Apes. This was a fantastic film very few people saw. It only opened to $54 million and went down hill from there. This was a crime. It had all the makings of a fantastic work. Good acting. Good editing. Good graphics. Good story. While not a flawless film, it is an amazing one that sadly only made $176 million domestically. It was enough though, enough for a sequel three years later. A sequel released this week.

Does it measure up?

So the movie picks up about a decade after the first ends, and this is me tap dancing to avoid spoilers. The Apes have their culture and humanity has its own. They live in ignorance of each other and sadly that ignorance is about to be shattered.

Lets talk acting first. Just give Andy Serkis an Oscar. Now. Don’t wait til January and don’t snub him again. If anyone and I mean anyone says you cannot act sufficiently through Mo-Cap or make up do me a favor and smack them in the face with a good open hand slap. Serkis is a genius. Nothing in his performance as Ceasar is lost or wasted. Every body language pose, posture, and shift is there for us. His  face is a map to raw emotion. What words there that exist are used so sparingly forcing the man to do so much more through sign and expression. You always know what he is feeling, what he is thinking with barely a syllable uttered. This is acting. This is what others need to aspire to when they do motion capture. Peter Jackson has just had someone set the bar higher.

Nearly everyone else is passable against the magnificence that is Ceasar. Jason Clarke, a man usually relegated to secondary or tertiary roles in film and TV brings an A game many doubted he had. This isn’t the man from White House Down, Zero Dark Thirty or the Great Gatsby. This is a potential headliner still in need of some refinement but one who holds his own remarkably well. Its a hard task to carry the weight of the human centerpiece on your shoulders in this movie and he seems up to it. He even proves a great counterpoint to Gary flippin Oldman.

Sadly he is the only human who has a really well defined personality or chance to show it. Everyone else is a stereotype of some kind or somehow useless. I didn’t even know Keri Russells character name. Oldman too is a stereotype, but one you can empathize with. He takes a note from his own playbook and brings it back to the subtle for the most part. Ok subtle for Oldman. This is a very Gordon like performance for him. When the cracks show in the veneer of control is when you see what he is and it works.

The Apes on the other hand are the stars. Everything Transformers gets wrong in this space, THIS movie gets right. None of the actors are particularly well known and are never actually seen. Each performance as an Ape is nuanced. Everything that Serkis delivers is brought to the game by the other actors. He set a bar and they reached for it and were largely successful in doing so. Its magic.

It’s the uncanny valley.

If you aren’t familiar with the term, it is -generally – the point in which human likeness in something unreal becomes so close to real we grow uncomfortable. This movie tips the balance. The graphics work is so near perfect in every detail its hard to believe we are not looking at actors in make up at times. Reality and computers have come closer than ever and are nearly…nearly flawless in execution within this film. Nothing to date comes close to how real the Apes appear.

Add to that particularly inspired design choices. Brilliant even. The use of sign language over voice speech by the apes was the act of an ingenious mind. Animal behaviorists will have a field day on the accuracy of the movements and actions of the ape society. Research was done. Effort was put into place. It paid off. These are details many would not realize are there, but I’ve lived with a vet tech for a decade and a half now. We’ve discussed these things, studied them for games, and have a basic above average understanding. Trust me when I say it is well done in this space.

TL;DR?

Ok so. I referenced the Godfather II and Empire Strikes back earlier. Yes this movie is in the same calibre as them. It IS that good. The only true suffering is in the pacing. The bridge between act II and III is just too long and drawn out. Aside from that it is an excellent film we SHOULD be going to see.

Just like Snowpiercer the week before, these are the movies we need to be giving our money to. These are the movies we need made.

Yes, you should see Dawn of the Planet of the Apes.

But Jess should we see it in 3D? – ok no. 3D adds nothing but ticket price.

Go see it in 2D and enjoy it for all its worth. Tell hollywood with your wallet where we need to have movies made. Good stories, acting, plots, and effects are rolled into one.

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, while an homage to Conquest of the Planet of the Apes, shines in its specialness and could – if we are lucky – be the dawn of a new era of movies.

Darke Reviews | Snowpiercer (2014)

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What you haven’t heard of this one? S’okay most folks haven’t. It has been travelling the indie circuit for awhile without a true mainstream release. This is due, in large part to the conflict between the writer director and one of the production companies. When I start going through the cast though, you will probably be scratching your head wondering why this didn’t get a main release. Part of the argument was that the director did not want to shave time from the movie.

Was he right?

Let’s talk about him. South Korean director Joon-ho Bong is the man behind the camera. He has done nothing that most folks stateside have seen, with the exception of The Host (no not that one, the other one). You’ve probably seen it on Netflix if your queue looks like mine. I cannot talk about his body of work or influences as regrettably I haven’t explored south korean cinema as much as I perhaps should. What I do have to say is that he was a brave man to go toe to toe with  low budget schlock powerhouses The Weinstein’s at what was once Miramax. He would not compromise and for that alone he deserves praise. His direction as well in the film were above par.

Did the script support him?

I certainly hope so as he is one of the writers. This is one of those films that breaks the normal rules of writers. You have three writing credits for source material, one for screen story and two for screen play. That’s right, this one is based on a French graphic novel Le Transperceneige first published back in 1982. so fair credit to Jacques Lob,  Benjamin Legrand, and Jean-Marc Rochette for providing inspiration. Joon-ho Bong gets both the screen story credit and a screenplay credit. The screen play is shared with Kelly Masterson, a playwright who apparently (per IMDB) was in seminary before going into theatre. In short no one in the writing is someone you’ve heard of.

In long (er); I hope we do hear more. The plot revolves around a classist society living on a train after the end of life as we know it. In a, not so subtle, jab at global warming our solution was “Ice-9” more or less. The world froze. People hid on this miracle train and the entirety of humanity is stuck on this mobile platform. Some folks just aren’t happy with their lot in life and want more than they have. He who controls the spice…er engine controls the world.

The cast is what pulls this together though. Chris (Captain America) Evans plays Curtis, our charismatic leader and main character. Much of the film, rightly, is focused on him with appearances by Tilda (Only Lovers Left Alive, Narnia) Swinton, John (188 acting credits) Hurt, Jamie (Turn, Jumper) Bell, Octavia (The Help) Spencer, and others. Evans, to be blunt, is incredible. There’s no Captain America here. There’s no Johnny Storm. There is a very troubled man who has a drive that only gets stronger the longer the movie goes on. Every expression, decision, and action he takes is made compelling by his performance. Everyone else is good, but he is incredible.

Two additional actors, Kang-ho Song and Ah-sung Ko, both formerly of The Host (2006 version) also should be mentioned. Neither are known state side except by a certain group of cinephiles. I’ve actually seen Kang-Ho Song in a vampire movie called Thirst. He’s good and I want to see more of him.

From a technical standpoint the movie doesn’t have to do too much heavy lifting. A few model shots of the train enhanced by CGI cover the bulk of the digital work. Make up and costuming are solid as well.

There will be those that compare this to other films in the dystopian future genre. That is inescapable. What this has different than them? Balls. Pure Balls. It is a brave film that had it truly been made stateside would not have gone in directions this went. So, back to the original question, was he right?

TL;DR

Yes, yes he was. The movie has very little fat on it and there is not much of its two hour running time that could be sacrificed. It would have lessened the film to do so.

Should you rush out to see this one? well…yes and no.

Someone I hope to call a  friend one day, Doug Walker, recently gave his own video review of the movie from last week that should not be named. He talks about how safe it is. How  gullible we are for giving it $100m. ( NSFW – thatguywiththeglasses.com/vide… ). He’s right. Movies like that get attention, ticket sales, and hollywood attention.

Movies like Snowpiercer? They deserve it. They take risks. They give us something we haven’t quite seen before. We need more of this and less of that.

So should you go see it? Yes, yes if you want to support films that deserve your money and deserve recognition.

Should you see it? No. The film is technically an action film and a violent one at that; but it has enough of a cerebral element and tonal quality to it that it is not right for all audiences.

I do recommend this movie. I liked it, but it’s not for everyone.

Darke Reviews | Transformers Age of Extinction (2014)

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Where do I begin? Lets start with me for a moment. I am able to go to movies alone. It sucks. I can entertain myself just fine. went through Transformers (1986) while waiting. I miss having someone to talk to. It’s also nice to be able to get a drink and not worry about your stuff. I was literally surrounded by college age ‘bro’s’ talking about illegal shark fishing, abusing police power, and all the other things I thought were just a stereotype. I watched as nearly half a dozen people just ignored the 50 people in line behind them and just slipped in because they were too cool. Their words, not mine. I am constantly amazed by the stupidity of people to talk about things loud enough for strangers to hear.

Stupidity makes a good segue into this review. In this 4th installment of the Transformers franchise, does Michael Bay redeem himself? The franchise? My faith in Hollywood? My faith in American Audiences?

Short answer, nope. Trust me when I tell you I want to violate my rules and give spoilers – just to vent about how much this movie irritated me on every conceivable level. The sad thing is the film itself didn’t actually make me angry. The film itself left me at a colossal – MEH. I couldn’t muster a single emotion watching this and oh how I wanted to.

Ehren Kruger, the writer of the last two TF movies has reached a new level of suck. I don’t know how much is him or how much is Michael Bay. Lets see, sexually objectifying a character who is 17 years old. Trying to justify her being in a relationship in the dumbest law name I have heard of (it’s seriously called Romeo & Juliet). Low angle shots. Everyone is sweaty, dirty, and in orange light. Classic Bay. Rotating cameras during action sequences. Camera cuts so quick you might as well just close your eyes for all you are getting out of it.

I don’t think Kruger/Bay realize we didn’t like Transformers for the humans. I don’t know anyone who has watched any Gen of the cartoon and gone “wow…that human is my favorite character. I want more humans and their lives on this show about giant robots.”

Speaking of giant robots. I could tell you maybe five names of the ones in this. Five. One because they kept uttering it every chance they could. Two because it was Prime and Bumblebee. The other Autobots? No clue. Decepticons? Forget it. NONE except two had names and there are A LOT of Decepticons. So we are back to faceless, nameless robots fighting more faceless, nameless robots in jerky, fireworks filled camera frames. Even the Dinobots (you saw them in the trailer, that isn’t a spoiler) are hard to identify.

I know you don’t go to Michael Bay for deep character development. You also don’t go to him to be simultaneously confused and bored. At this point I also think he is trying to be intentionally offensive. Stereotypes everywhere to their extreme. One character called Lucky Charms the entire film.

Characters, thats a generous word. We have Mark Wahlberg trying to prove he can still do action, but this was not the right movie for him. Stanley Tucci and Kelsey Grammer clearly lost a bet. we have the return of the most boring actress in Hollywood, Nicola Peltz (Katara in M Nights Airbender). She has gotten better since then, but only by a little.

I really think Bay is deliberately trying to insult us as an audience with how bad this movie is. I think he is going to sit in his mansion as the checks roll in with a smug look on his face knowing he is going to make money hand over fist with this THREE HOUR waste of celluloid. so that brings me to

TL;DR

DO NOT SEE THIS. Go see How to Train Your Dragon 2, Maleficent, X-Men, Godzilla, anything but this.

DO NOT LET YOUR FRIENDS SEE IT.

DO NOT LET YOUR CHILDREN SEE IT.

This movie is garbage. Bay really is trying to flip american audiences the bird and call it a movie. Audiences are going to pay and the studio will regrettably make a 5th one.

Stop them. Don’t see it. Spread the word. Do not let others see it.

When I wasn’t angry. I was bored. When I wasn’t feeling insulted I was feeling bored. 3 hours. 3 bloody hours.

Michael Bay must be stopped. No matter the cost.

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Darke Reviews | How to Train Your Dragon 2 (2014)

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If I recall correctly, How to Train Your Dragon was one of the first films I did a review on when I began writing reviews again a few years back. I stopped again and started hard core last year. Things that I remember from the review was that my ex and I were some of the only people in theatres in week two of its release and that weeks three and four it picked up even more steam. If you don’t know how rare that is that a movie gets MORE popular the longer it goes, well that just means you are a normal individual who isn’t obsessed with movies. I remember showing people the DVD long after and the general consensus is “I wish I had seen it in theatres”. This is a chance to fix that – sort of.

So how did they do on the sequel?

Well, to be perfectly honest and still spoiler free. They held to sequel rules. If you have a big bad, you need a bigger bad. Check. Call backs to the first film. Check. Take it a bit darker in certain beats? Check. Character Growth? eh…not so much.

This is one of those rare cases where being both Writer and Director works. Dean DeBlois, who gave us the original How to Train and Lilo & Stitch returns in both writing and directing roles. I can see the writing that gave us Lilo & stitch here. I can see the writing that gave us the first How to Train here. I can also see only a slight bit of experience and growth. When the first film became both critically and financially successful ($217mm) in 2010 the sequel was inevitable. I can see that he had a lot of ideas and tried to get some of them in, but not all of them worked.

He did avoid some serious pitfalls most teen characters with a romance in the first movie fall into. THANK YOU. Sorry that verges into spoiler territory, but it was needed. The movie plot wise also does just a few too many call backs to the original in near entire rehashes of some scenes. None of the characters seem to have learned much in the time between movies. Sure they aged, sure they got better at what they do, but did they grow? Eh, not really.

But damn, did they remember how to fly! One of the things of beauty in the first film is the flying sequences as Hiccup and Toothless become friends and partners. They take to the skies in all three dimensions and bring you along the way with the camera in a way that really does bring you with them. Its beautiful, it is magical and it is whimsical. It is magnificent in every sense of the word and they remembered how to do it. They also got better at it. Some of the sequences were just amazingly beautiful that I started to cry from it. The sky dance (not a spoiler) is breathtakingly gorgeous. This is the movies greatest success.

The return of the entire cast of the first is also a success. Everyone reprises their roles from the first as if they have never left. Sadly they don’t get a lot of screen time but the movie wisely doesn’t make more of certain characters since  they have become more famous over the past four years. Adding to the cast is Djimon Hounsou as Drago and Kit Harington as Eret. Finally Jon Snow knows something! Apparently it’s dragons. The irony is not lost on me.

The music is also as engaging as it was in the first. With…one exception. There’s a trend in certain movies to stick a song with vocals over a scene rather than use a score. It’s particularly virulent in childrens movies. The first movie avoided this, sadly this one doesn’t. The song isn’t bad, don’t get me wrong. It has a very Owl City vibe, but I would have preferred the musical queue to be pure music rather than an actual song. It took me out of the moment just enough that it was, to me a bad call.

TL;DR?

The movie made me laugh. Made me cry. Made me smile. Made me catch my breath. What else should a movie do? Some movies are designed to be art appreciated for that. Others are designed to be entertainment. This movie is both artistically beautiful in a literal sense and entertaining.

I know that there were children in the audience you didn’t hear move an inch or utter a word that wasn’t a squeal of joy. What else should there be?

Really nothing. The movie is good. Really good. A few missteps keep it from being great, but I wholeheartedly recommend this film.  I recommend becoming lost in it and enjoying what it delivers.

I also recommend 3D if you can take it. Not required, but it does certainly enhance the movie.

If you go to see a movie this weekend or next, go learn How to Train Your Dragon again. You won’t regret it. This is *the* movie to see with family, friends, children over the next few weeks.