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Trying to watch lots of animated films while i have access to relatives' Netflix account.
Hotel Transylvania - 7.5/10 Rather fun character designs, with a nice premise, but the story is rather slight. Odd to see one of the writers being Peter Baynham (of Brass Eye/Alan Partridge writing/acting fame). Visually there's lots going on. Good for kids and adults shouldn't suffer too much, either.
Despicable Me 2 - 8/10 A very fun film. It sort of tails off in the last 20 minutes, i thought, but there's lots of great visual gags and it's very humorous, too.
Monster House - 3/10 Despite being a big fan of Community, i didn't warm to this Dan Harmon/Rob Schrab written tale. The animation style was the major problem. It had what was probably a very suitable wood-carved puppet feel to it and lots of autumnal colours, but the character designs themselves weren't very engaging and borderline a bit frightening (and i mean the kids not the monster house). The main story itself wasn't very interesting and after watching several other animated features it felt like a very small, claustrophobic film with some grating characters and a big, clumsy ending. Some nice voice work from Steve Buscemi.
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Pirates of the Caribbean: Dean Man's Chest 2/10 - Just a terribly convoluted script. Massively overlong. Tiresome. Double-crosses every 5 minutes. Very tiresome. Every seen is overlong. Just horrible excess in all departments. There's a few laughs to be had in the script and the actors seem to be enjoying themselves. Nice set, costume and creature design and a couple of nice themes in the score.
Riddick 2/10 - Straight to video sci-fi that comes across like an extended episode of a not very well written or funded TV show. No memorable characters, and every scene just looks like a set. The CGI looks mostly like CGI. The first 20 minutes is like a bizarre nature documentary as Riddick fights and befriends various creatures. Riddick does "cool" things that just seem like they were written by a 12 year old. Very poor dialogue and one-note characters without wit or charm. Some nice creature designs and a few future tech ideas in there, though.
The Three Stooges 7.5/10 - A very well cast film. The energy feels right and there's a lot of mania going on consistently throughout. I found it often amusing and the shenannigans and fighting between the three were well done, i thought. I didn't realise Sophia Vergara was so bouncy. Kids should like the slapstick.
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Pirates of the Caribbean: Dean Man's Chest 2/10 - Just a terribly convoluted script. Massively overlong. Tiresome. Double-crosses every 5 minutes. Very tiresome. Every seen is overlong. Just horrible excess in all departments. There's a few laughs to be had in the script and the actors seem to be enjoying themselves. Nice set, costume and creature design and a couple of nice themes in the score.
The first Pirates movie was a pleasant surprise. I really enjoyed it. I tried watching the other films in the series, but got bored quickly. Never seen them from beginning to end.
Yes, i was the same - i enjoyed 1 and only saw 2 once at the cinema from a bad seat and can't remember anything about it - i just wondered how the others were. not sure i'll bother with the rest. this one i started pausing when i left the room and after a bit i realised i could let the film run, do something, come back and the scene would still be going and i'd miss nothing. 
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Ghostbuster 2 7.8/10 I think this film gets a bad rap for all the decent stuff that's actually in it. There's a lot to enjoy, though it's clearly not as good as the original. It has quite a few quality moments than you might think and the initial set-up of where the Ghostbusters are now 5 years later is very well done, i thought. I do like Peter MacNichol as Janosh quite a bit. That's a fun turn. The overall story i didn't find very involving but the small moments and the interactions between the characters are where the most fun is to be had. Decent stuff.
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The Pirates 7/10 an aardman animation movie. Creative and with some nice moments and good voice acting.
Future War 7.5/10 A good bad film. Totally inept.
Ed Wood 9.5/10 A great film.
Ride Along 4.5/10 I don't mind Kevin hart or ice cube but the film itself was very straight forward and not that great or funny.
Prince of Persia 2/10 Criminally dull.
Angels and Demons 3.5/10 Bunkum and hokum. Could barely keep up with the gibberish revelations every five minutes but its watchable.
Star Wars: The Force Awakens 7.8/10 I think I enjoyed it more this time around, particularly the opening 40 minutes. I've started to like the score more too. I think I waßnt a fan of the IMAX experience.
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Posted: |
Apr 24, 2016 - 12:10 PM
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By: |
Solium
(Member)
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The Jungle Book (2016) 4-5
(Another one of my long winded reviews)
The Jungle Book breaks a long running mold in current family entertainment. I expected a typical jokey misadventure with endless one liners and a weak story. Instead what we have here is a straight up dramatic film which is takes its material rather seriously. There’s some humor for sure, but it’s limited and by no means the focus of the film.
Mowgli’s character was very well written. I loved how he used his ingenuity as a human in the animal kingdom. Not only for himself but for his extended family. While he honored the way of the wolves, and the jungle in particular, he showed he was a benefit to this society opposed to a liablitiy. This is perhaps the only time I’ve ever felt good about a human taking root in the animal world.
All that said, the young actor playing Mowgli was clearly learning his craft and his acting skills are a bit stilted. But after awhile I got into his performance and in some ways his unevenness was a benefit to his character’s conflicted journey. The live action actor was a spot on twin of his animated counterpart. While Mowgi inadvertently creates a “man made” disaster during the climax, he also takes the initiative in resolving the crisis, and minimizes the damage the best he could.
It crushes me to say this, but they totally missed the mark with Baloo. Bill Murray always putting in 10 percent was just a horrible choice for the role. The relationship between Mowgli and Baloo was far more endearing in the animated film. How they didn’t get John Goodman for the role of Baloo is beyond me. I did like how Baloo was a bit of a con-artist though and a punchline in the trailer was much funnier in the film because it was actually earned. But what should have been the most entertaining character in the film was a complete bore.
King Louie was “transformed” into a giant ape for no particular reason. (Not quite sure if he was as big as King Kong, maybe closer to Mighty Joe Young) I initially rolled my eyes with this needless change, but it’s something I got over and his size and force did in the end add a dramatic edge to his character especially during the chase sequence. His abrupt singing performance was jarring ,and probably the most cringe worthy moment in the film. In fact neither classic song from the animated film, “The Bare Necessities” or “I Wan’a Be Like You,” are well performed in the film unfortunately.
There’s some beautifully choreographed sequences which made the film a delight to watch, even during quieter character building scenes. The film over all was well storyboarded, though the action scenes were a bit lacking. I think they were afraid to take it to the next level in fear of scaring the younger audiences. I wish those sequences were more dramatically intense.
My biggest issue remains with the CGI which I thought was pretty weak at times. Kaa, Bagheera and Khan are just poorly rendered and animated. Especially their faces. Which leads me to another awkward thing. Talking animals. If the film was more cartoony I could get into talking animals, but they spent so much effort in creating a realistic world, it took some time getting used to. The saving grace was the strong vocal performances, which I thought were outstanding, other than Bill Murray’s.
The score at times was sweeping and beautiful and it certainly added a lot of emotional weight. I however found some of the action music rather simplistic and generic. Sadly the music was dialed to far back in the audio mix. Very frustrating, but typical in today's films.
It's a fine effort that falls short of being an epic.
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Nice epic review, Solium.
Compulsion - 7.5/10 - Bradford Dillman is great in this, as is everyone else. I liked Orson's prosthetic nose, too.
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Posted: |
Apr 29, 2016 - 6:22 AM
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By: |
Tall Guy
(Member)
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Novocento 9.5/10
In my quest to pick up more blurays of Morricone-scored films I picked this up for fifteen quid in HMV. Spread over two discs, this five hour-plus film is brutal, beautiful, indulgent and brilliant. I watched it in Italian with English subtitles, and of course this meant that strange voices were emanating from De Niro, Depardieu and Sutherland. I sampled the English version and will watch that next time around. There’s some casual discomfort meted out to animals which I always cringe at, soft git that I am, and Bertolucci pleasures himself perhaps too much with the broad-brush political ideas portrayed throughout. However, as a sustained spectacle, it’s hard to think of anything that comes close to it apart from Once Upon a Time in America or Ben-Hur. Not bad company. However, Novocento has more mindless violence than the former, and more nudity than the latter.
I’ve known the score for a long time, and in fact prefer it as displayed in the film, as it isn’t on its own one of my favourite Morricones. In context, it helps to emphasize the gap between the noble, salt-of-the-earth peasantry and the spoilt, cowardly land-owners, who use the blackshirts (superbly and appallingly led by the stupendous Donald Sutherland) as enforcers. Hearing the suspense music in situ was actually a revelation. It comes with a good quality 48-page booklet as well, which I’ve only skimmed so far.
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High-Rise 5.8/10 Ben Wheatley films usually grow on me after a cold first impression. This will probably be the case. It's a fine looking film and Tom Hiddleston is very good, I thought. It's a really tough book to adapt and I'm not sure anyone could do it and make it a truly great film. The characters are all horrible people, especially in the book. Laing is less so as a character in this. Some nice montages let Clint Manaell's great score shine and it's very effective in the film.
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Rise of the planet of the apes 7.5/10 a solidly entertains film. The effects never fully had me convinced and I kept falling out of the film but I thought it was well-paced and quite emotional and Franco was decent and Pinto was lovely.
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Dawn of the Planet of the Apes 8/10 a solidly entertaining film with some great effects and I enjoyed the story. Nice score, too. If they get the third film right it'll be a solid trilogy.
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tg - nudity and violence in novocento? can i borrow it???! ha ha.
still some scarily high scores on here for very average movies, boys! 
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