Movie News: Adventure

Showing posts with label Adventure. Show all posts

Film Review: The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (2015)

It's always great to see artist evolving, even if this process alienates some of their old fans. Guy Ritchie is definitely prone to evolution, but it’s obvious that the same process for him takes place in phases. His first phase started in 1998 with the cult classic Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, after which he developed his contemporary London crime phase. The same had some good films and some average ones, but it nonetheless ended with RocknRolla in 2008.

After this, Ritchie moved the setting of his new phase backwards one century and developed two Sherlock Holmes films, which were both successful and impressive action flicks, having in mind the serious overuse of the original material in pop culture. Now, with The Man From U.N.C.L.E, the third phase of Guy Ritchie has begun and it brings style and substance on a completely new terrain for its director.

Sure, the film has nicely dressed, charming and witty main characters who are accustomed to guns, violence and far-fetched plans, but this time, it is all located in the 1960’s chic Europe, divided by the Cold War. In spite of their home agencies rivalry and feud, one US and one Soviet agent have to work together to stop a development of a diabolical plan that would place a nuclear weapon in hands of practically anyone.

The Man From U.N.C.L.E. is laden with style on all levels, from the costumes to the shots Guy Ritchie takes in a manner similar to 1960’s classics like the movie Point Blank. This can be seen in the way characters move both when it comes to their gestures and their positions in the frames. The film’s director was always willing to invest a lot of energy in the visual aesthetics of his works, but here, the idea is even more prominent and gripping. Yet, he manages to keep things unburdened by this, which is clearly shown in the quick and comic-like editing of the commando raid near the end of the movie, and the broken bike confrontation that quickly follows.

Here, Ritchie is ready to peel the onion of style and very effectively show the essence lying below it, where dangerous men are willing to kill for their mission, no questions asked. At the same time, like the ending segment of the boat sequence shows, the comedy essence is also never too far away. On a side note, with films like Spy and Kingsman: The Secret Service, it appears that the world is in a mini spy comedy Renaissance.

The cast of the film also works exceedingly well together. Henry Cavill looks like he was born to wear perfectly tailored suits and places inside of them a character that is the optimal combination of a slimeball and a kind of normal guy how was forced to work in the same area. Opposite of him, Armie Hammer as Illya continues to do his brand of characters (who are so serious that they are unintentionally funny) really well. The main female lead, Alicia Vikander, also does a nice job as Gaby, the East German car mechanics turned drafted spy.

As the movie glides through picturesque locations and the tension mounts, the audience is free to enjoy The Man From U.N.C.L.E. as a new take on the classic James Bond film, minus the retro science fiction gadgets. It never bores and never meanders from its set goal of being a fun and stylish action comedy. Because of it, I’m really looking forward to seeing what Ritchie will do with his upcoming Knights of the Roundtable: King Arthur.

Crowdfunding Push: Black Angel

Epic fantasy is something that is currently really popular in many formats, especially video games. But, at the same time, apart from Peter Jackson’s not so brilliant Hobbit trilogy and many fringe, sort of fantasy young adult adaptations of successful novels, there aren’t many movies that delve straight into this territory. Now, there is a crowdfunding campaign aimed at funding a film called Black Angler that is going for the full epic fantasy feel. The film’s Indiegogo page states:

Think Game of Thrones meets Valhalla Rising, Excalibur meets Lord of the Rings. A powerful tale of ancient Celtic magic and Nordic Paganism, it’ll be gritty, dirty and heroic – everything great fantasy should be. The story follows a knight as he journeys deep into the dark underworld with the daughter of a rival king, to meet the face of evil itself and fight the Black Angel in combat. Full of drama, action and heroism, pure light is pitted against eternal darkness and damnation.

The film will be created by Roger Christian, who worked on projects like the original Star Wars and Alien. With this experience, he plans to reimagine his short film by the same name made in 1980 into a full, feature-length epic adventure. The thing which I really like in Christian’s presentation is the vintage fantasy feel that many of its concept art pieces carry with them, but the project as a whole does not seem like a futile push to bring back the “good old times”. The recent Mad Max: Fury Road is a perfect example of how modern cinema definitely has a lot to learn from the semi-forgotten approaches of the previous decades, I’m certain that Black Angle can turn out to be a really good action adventure.

The film campaign started out really well and it’s currently close to 90% of its goal. Check out the film’s official Indiegogo page and see how you can help.

If you're looking for exposure for your film-related project, contact me right here.

Film Review - Mad Max: Fury Road

At one point in the Mad Max: Fury Road, a character calls bullets “anti-seeds” because you plant one and then watch something die. This is not a big part of the film, nor did its director George Miller put some special emphasis to this idea, which is delivered in less than 20 seconds and then never mentioned again.

But, as soon as I heard it, I thought to myself that this is a pretty interesting idea, but more importantly, one that I never heard before. It made sense instantly while, at the same time, it was very original and funny in a dark way. I had one of those “why didn’t I came up with that idea first?” moment. Its morbid, biting, and comical wisdom is like the entire film. In it, there is nothing spectacularly new or never seen before. But, as a whole, it’s an anti-thesis to the idea that big blockbuster films need to be stupid or made by Christopher Nolan.

Essentially, George Miller took the story of Mad Max 2 and made it into something perfectly crafted for the Millennials, but he did not cater to their short span of attention like AAA action films usually do. He also didn’t do what Nolan does and try to show them how shallow or self-centered they are by making even more shallow and self-centered films. Miller made a film that is relentless like a rabid dog and lost in oneself like an addict before an OD shot. In it, the action is not something that happens; it is the only thing that happens, but this does not rob the film of depth or meaning. Like the anti-seed idea, it’s cleverer that the audience, but the audience does not feel this in any negative way.

In fact, like Dredd 3D, it injects its sense of purpose through action, violence and machines breaking up and exploding. In an endless post-apocalyptic desert, a single man tries to run and escape a warrior society that captured him. On his path, he meets a woman called Imperator Furiosa driving a War Rig and looking to escape from the same society, carrying a precious cargo. The man does not care for her, but he will help her to make sure he stays alive. Film like The Rover show us how it can begin in the Australian outback. Films like this one shows us here it will end up.

In Mad Max: Fury Road there is no sugar coating and no attention grabbing. Like a face submerged in a bowl of water, there is only the now because the next breath might flood the lungs. In the desolate, savage and sand-covered space, the escape is not a plot device, but the plot itself. It does not want to stop and it can’t stop unless War Rigs occupants are victorious or dead. This film is like Transformers made by a person who does not care about the focus group feedback and producer cuts. It only needs to roll out and its tires have to dig deep into the ground because that is its only purpose. Stay moving, stay alive, and continue to watch. But it’s not serious about itself, or any of its characters. At the place and time where they exist, being alive is a transient category. All along, glorious cinematography and 3D effects paint the movie in every tone of the Ultraviolent specter. And then the film ends.

No one will fall asleep during this film. Some might leave it, but no one can ignore it. The same is true for the entire Hollywood industry, where a myth about the idea that blockbusters have to be only a certain type of film (I mentioned already the stupid vs. dark dichotomy). George Miller showed with Mad Max: Fury Road that gripping cinema only needs to grip you and its authors can choose among many ways it can do this. This film’s grip will leave on most people burn marks that will last for days.

Coming Soon - Mad Max: Fury Road

The critics who managed to see the film love it and all the footage and trailers we saw pointed to the same conclusion - Mad Max: Fury Road will be one hell of a film - from the violence to the beautiful cinematography and crazy action choreography, it's all here. It is coming out in a matter of days, so be ready to start planning to go and see it once it hits the theaters on May, 15.

To get into the mood (unless you want to stay pure until you see it on the big screen) here is Mad Max: Fury Road Official Retaliate Trailer.

Film Review - Kingsman: The Secret Service

This movie is best described as unexpected. This is true for several layers of it. On a global narrative level, it provides a plot about Eggsy, an ordinary yob from London, who one day gets drafted into Kingsman, a non-governmental, secret spy service.

His mentor is Harry Hart, his complete opposite - he is a gentleman from a bygone era and an individual who is determined to get the job done, even if that means repaying a man who saved his life almost 20 years ago. While he tries to mold Eggsy into spy material, Richmond Valentine, a hugely successful tech entrepreneur, dreams about saving the world in a way that seem to be leaving plenty of corpses in its wake. Soon enough, the Kingsman take notice.

Here, the regular elements of a fish-out-of-water and a tradition James Bond plot are mixed, but throughout the film, they are constantly reshuffled and dealt over and over again, which produces a really high level of engagement. The director of Kingsman: The Secret Service Matthew Vaughn guides the film as if he is influenced by both larger than life spy films and modern, edgy sitcoms (where things like fisting or anal sex jokes are not a big deal) which makes the plot development a process that just can’t be predicted. The comic elements of the film, especially their offbeat and adult nature, provide a lot of fun during the action scenes, but also when the action dies down.

But the thing about Kingsman: The Secret Service that really intrigues me is its embedded subversiveness. In it, heads of world leaders exploded in a beautiful, colorful explosions. The main villain works for humanity, even though his methods are horrific and he is exceedingly afraid of the sight of blood (and getting his hands bloody, all of which Samuel L. Jackson plays masterfully).

At one other moment, the same villain comments that the world does not even know the name of the Chinese secret spying agency, like it does with the USA or Russia, which is completely true in the real world as well - ask yourself what is the Chinese version of the CIA and what is it called? (a very weird but effective way of breaking the fourth wall).

Also, as Eggsy notices, he and other blue-collared individuals go into the Royal army so that they can act as cannon fodder for “posh bastards”. Here, the film makes quite a leap from the things that are expected from an action comedy and shows that super villains and the political elite actually have everything in common when it comes to ideology and global goals. The only difference is that politician in many countries (fortunately, in reality as well) simply can’t kill all those people they want to see dead.

While this idea is present, the film and Vaughn do not push it like some kind of an anarchist pamphlet. Continuing the great tradition of the British cinema, the subversiveness is not an element that is shown for a couple of minutes, when it gets its exposure and is then subsequently forgotten. Instead, it is interwoven in the very essence of the film, not as a clear motive that characters discus or are even aware of, but it is there constantly, blanketing the film like moss in a very ancient forest. It and other similar films that were made in the UK during the last half of the century are not created to tell us what to do, but to show us the hypocrisy and insanity of those who we elect to wield the biggest power over all of us. Think 22 Jump Street, but where the movie is not making fun of the contemporary pop culture, but is parodying the global decision makers and the horrific things which drive them deep down inside.

Creating a movie that combines these ideas with awesome and gruesome action scenes and jokes about a Scandinavian Princess who promises Eggsy to have anal sex with his (the finest moment of the entire Kingsman: Secret Service movie) is actually a very impressive feat.

Film Review: Last Knights (2015)

One of the things that really produced a whole lot of problems for Last Knights is everything about it apart from the film itself. First of all, it has a horrible title, which sounds really similar to First Knight, Last Samurai and anything else that is “last” and includes men wielding some kind of swords. Then, it poster features Clive Oven and Morgan Freeman looking all serious while riders do serious stuff behind (or in front) of them.

Finally, the film’s trailer and synopsis suggest a variation of the 47-Ronin story, which was all done before and never lead to stellar results. When I saw this, I immediately thought that the film is trying to imitate, at least on the surface, those much more famous films, like B-production movies often do.

So, there is no doubt that the casing of this product isn’t much. But, this film is no B-production ripoff. Thanks to the cinematic gods of irony, the movie Last Knights is actually really good. First of all, its dialogs are brilliantly written. The film carries a basic story about a discredited feudal lord whose knights, mainly their commander Raiden, get without a retainer, their jobs, and their honor. Of course, an evil and corrupt official is behind all of this and Raiden does not seem like a guy who lets go of stuff easily.

In spite of the cartoonish plot, Michael Konyves and Dove Sussman wrote the film like a Shakespearian play, minus the archaic language that I always loathed (I’m not a big on any Shakespeare cinematic retelling projects). In Last Knights, everything is deadly serious and larger than a small planet. The plots and schemes are deceptive and cruel while (some) knights are loyal to their grave. Best of all, the plot is placed in an undefined, mostly medieval setting, where names, accents and skin colors are totally mixed up, while the main weapon of choice is a redesigned Katana blade (with a Katan’s tip and a European style straight blade).

All this is used by films director Kazuaki Kiriya as a fantastic setup for an action film, which Last Knights basically is. With an awesome chassis, Kiriya aptly puts in an action fueled engine that runs the entire contraption. The second half of the film, where things really take off, provides an excellent medieval cinematic fun with is both rewarding and engaging. From the start to the finish, its diverse cast of known and slightly less known actors does a solid one for this timeless fantasy.

Like with the movie Chappie, in the case of the Last Knights film I also expected something which I ended up getting, but the packaging and the key ingredients (which I knew and recognized from the start) blended up so well that both films left me very impressed.

Film Review: Jupiter Ascending (2015)

Copyright: Warner Bros. Pictures

In many ways, this movie is similar to Kim Jong-un. Sure, he looks clumsy, fat and has a weird haircut that makes him look even fatter, so it’s really easy to make fun of him (unless you’re living in North Korea or working in Sony).

Jupiter Ascending, just like the chubby Kim, also practically begs to be ridiculed. It is also dumb and over the top in its decisions, probably thanks to a hugely inflated sense of self-worth which is most likely present in both entities.

But, unlike the petit dictator, Jupiter Ascending is not malicious. In the cinematic reference space, for me this means that it does not practice any form of false advertisement. It presents itself just like it truly is and does not use any tricks during its entire length that would show otherwise. In fact, it is a fairy tale, like the ones Lana and Andy Wachowski use to make when they forever changed the movie industry with the Matrix (the first movie, not the horrid series that followed, not counting Animatrix).

Here as well, the audience is introduced to an ordinary woman called Jupiter, who works as a cleaning lady in Chicago. But one day, she is swept away by a flying boots-wearing alien hunk that is there to save her from assassins and bounty hunters from outer space. This begins a huge adventure, sweeping the galaxy and covering many exotic and foreign places.

The Jupiter Ascending film is a space opera in its truest sense. Granted, it is not a masterfully crafted space opera like Guardians of the Galaxy, but it still provides beautiful images and action packed romance story. Sure, it’s characters are flat and the plot is silly, but who goes looking for deep-impacting drama in a film that features skating anti-gravity boots that make it “easy to go down, and hard to go up”? While many of its details could be improved, the main purpose of the film is crystal clear and readable from the first moment when Mila Kunis, who plays Jupiter, falls into the bulky arms of Channing Tatum.

Actually, I’m really glad to see that Lana and Andy Wachowski chose to continue to make films like this. While it might seem that they are going in the direction everyone else is taking by creating popcorn blockbusters (or at least trying to), the opposite is true. Films like Interstellar do not only bring with it absolutely no essence whatsoever (where they are exactly like Jupiter Ascending), but actually produce a strange, negative narrative dampening field, where a movie like that can be declared a masterpiece, although it would be more suitable as a Scientology instructional video on black holes and feeling good about dead parents. In works like the Interstellar I believe true stupidity lies, and that is the one that masks itself in higher knowledge and spiritual presence. I’m afraid that we’ll begin to see more and more films like that, which terrifies me.

Jupiter Ascending is not the smartest film in the world, but it does not hide anything about itself and honesty is always a great thing in art, even if it is soaked in science fiction pulp and undeveloped teenage fantasies.

Film Review: Black Sea (2014)

If submarine movies taught us anything, it is that the bottom of a sea is a great place to die in many different and colorful ways. Starting with drowning, exploding and suffocating, there is no doubt that submarines in films usually present steel coffins in which people rarely experience anything nice.

Black Sea brings about a similar idea, but places it outside of a military context. In its plot, there is no World War II or even a Cold War. Instead, the film takes place in the present day, where a washed out (pun not intended) salvage submarine captain called Robinson loses his job and then accepts a shady offer of taking a boat to the bottom of the Black sea near the Georgian coast, where allegedly a German U-boat sub has lain since 1941, full of dead German submariners, but also 2 tons of gold bars.

Robinson agrees, takes a crew of Westerners and Russians and sails to the location, where he needs to get the gold, but also dodge the Russian Navy. In no time at all, the whole idea of how all subs are submariner’s coffins begins to take its familiar form.

Directed by Kevin Macdonald, the Black Sea movie brings about an interesting twist to this genre, while it also manages to create something of a sub-genre that can be called a civilian salvage underwater thriller. With a good cast lead by Jude Law, but also by the very impressive Ben Mendelsohn and Scoot McNairy, translating this script into a film was not a huge challenge. Like in his recent film How I Live Now, Macdonald is apt in presenting a simple plot in a fresh way.

Here as well, while the story does have many plot holes and adventure tropes (like the moment where Captain Robinson brings along a completely unskilled young man on the mission, mainly out of pity), the overall dynamic of the film leaves the viewer interested in the characters on a very basic level. Also, Macdonald steers clear of overplaying dramatic segments which could have easily sunk this film (it’s easy to make sea-related puns when writing about submarine films).

The best thing about the Black Sea movie is the fact that it brings a focused thriller full of hard-boiled submariner-type characters, free of any unnecessary cinematic noise. Like the narratively completely different Maps to the Stars, this film pulls the viewers in and keeps them near all the way to the end.

Film Review: Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)

Guardians of the Galaxy movie is a merciless beast. It mainly targets the generation that fondly remembers the 80’s, but does this in a sort of haze. In this memory mist, things like cool cartoons and funky music are present, while things like chemical attacks of Iran-Iraq war are inconspicuously missing.

This comes from the fact that this nostalgia is being sold to people who were kids in that weird decade, or just leaving their true childhood. Those born in the early 70’s have nothing to do in this historical fantasy, mainly because they most likely didn’t play with spike-hair trolls or weren’t that amazed when they got their first Walkman in 1986.

In many other aspects, the film is coldly calculated to please its demographics. It plays on its own absurdity and lack of fame when it comes to popular culture (not many have heard about characters like Rocket before 2014) and its distance from much bigger franchise series made by Marvel. On the other hand, it dumps names, places and characters seemingly without any sense of tact, even to those viewers who are not familiar with the wider universe (who are the majority). But, with much cunning and no apparent strain, it is feeding every part of the demographics, like a great Pixar film, giving chunks to kids, teenagers and adults alike.

Guardians of the Galaxy is simply an unhateable film. Its director James Gunn is a much bigger scholar of Hollywood than anyone could imagine just a few years ago when he made art like Super, a movie that is both small and risky. He is so sly in this manner that he even opens the film with a kid losing his mother to cancer, following by an out-of-space dance routine to a catchy pop tune. This is seemingly strange, but under the surface, Gunn is obviously one of those people who can listen to corporate metrics about the audience and then cram some unexpected things in there to improve the test viewer scores.

On the other side of the lens, Guardians of the Galaxy cast was also predefined. Only one among them who was designed to stand out was Chris Pratt as Peter Quill or Star Lord. Everyone else is CGI constructed or wearing so much make up that they character could be interpreted by any actor in the world. This was a chance for Pratt and Gunn to take a huge chunk out of that blockbuster pie and they did it with a samurai sword.

Still, unlike the similar but god-afoul Interstellar, this corporate child is fun to watch. It doesn’t preach and it doesn’t bore, which is very nice to see. While it is definitely a merciless corporate product of market share expansion into new comic book asset waters, it’s still very enjoyable.

Film Review: The Maze Runner (2014)

Wes Ball, who directed this movie, plays his first cards with a lot of style, and also some guts. He doesn’t go the way I expected him to, opening his film with some kind of an info dump. He stripped away almost everything, and opted for presenting a completely bare, almost raw experience.

A young man wakes up in a middle of a field called the Glade, surrounded by boys of different age. He lost all of his memories, but immediately recognizes that others are organized in Lord of the Flies kind of society, but only this one lives in relative harmony.

The only problem is that they are surrounded by huge walls, and the only way out of this place is through the Maze, an incredible, constantly changing structure that is full of dangerous creatures.

With this minimal verbal setting, the film drives on, basing itself on experience, not knowledge. The audience gets to find out new things along with the main character Thomas, which feels very organic. This is how he gradually learns the power balance in the Glade, shared between a teenage version of hawks, doves and owls archetypes, which differ in their approach to social structure and governance. But at the same time, all strive for the exploration of the Maze and hope to find a way out.

Played by convincing young actors, primarily Dylan O'Brien as Thomas, but also Thomas Brodie-Sangster and Will Poulter, The Maze Runner movies keeps its traction for almost its entire duration. Because of this, it manages to come off as a serious film, clear of many young adult tropes that saturate films like those in the Hunger Game series.

While The Maze Runner 2014 is basically built on the same teenage angst-leaden material, it strips it down to a much emptier space, where it’s easier to be drawn into the story, and where there are also fewer deterrents like shabby romance subplots. Instead, Ball chose to focus on camaraderie and friendship, which is very refreshing. In this aspect Maze Runner is even more successful than Ender's Game, a film that was supposed to be mostly about a boy's dedication to his friends. The only substantial flaw in this adventure film is its corporate designed ending, which jams a generic Sci-Fi explanation (using, ironically, an info dump method) into an emotional and violent outburst, resulting in an overflow of sappy feelings which Ball so successfully avoided up to that point.

This marketing-research powered mud pie of an ending is additionally enhanced with an idiotic order for the audience to come back to the movie theaters because there is a second part coming our way. In it, a character pronounces a line straight from early James Bond villain textbook, which was designed (I guess) to intrigue the audience and keep it guessing, but fails to do everything except seem silly. This extremely sour cherry on the top of that mud pie really spoiled my solid experience of the film, even more because it was a completely unnecessary move.

Without that crippling last 10 minutes, Maze Runner could have made the best young adult adaptation of 2014.

Film Review: The Lego Movie

Lego bricks (and everything else in their cardboard boxes) are a brilliant toy. Apart from being very fun, it is also one of the truly unbound creative activities that kids can get into from a very early age. It’s only fitting that one of the finest toys in the world received one of the best children’s films probably since Wall-E.

The Lego Movie makes use of the fantastic opportunity to take advantage of the companies’ copyright rules, which make many characters from popular culture available and license free in the Lego universe. That is why this adventure includes characters like Superman, Han Solo, Green Lantern, Gandalf and Wonder Woman, while Batman fills one of the leading roles.

In its story, an ordinary Lego construction worker called Emmet, one day gets a call from destiny, and is placed in the situation where only he can stop an incredible danger from destroying his world, but also many other Lego worlds.

He teams up with a band of other Lego characters to put a stop to the plans conceived by an evil wizard Vitruvius, who plans to use his super weapon Kragle.

What comes after that is an awesome adventure, just like the movie’s theme song suggests. Because of that in this movie, yes, everything really is awesome. Emmet and his gang go through amazing scenery, including the Wild West and much stranger lands, while looking for a way to defeat Vitruvius. Here, the 3D tech presents in full glory all the Lego-based gimmicks used in the film. At the same time, all the A-list voice actors do an excellent job, complimenting the colorful characters perfectly.

The Lego Movie Batman is especially interesting as a character, because the script made him both a butt of many jokes and the real hero everyone needs in more than one moment. Will Arnett, who provided his voice, is a brilliant comic when it comes to delivery, even if it’s only in audio.

Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, who wrote and directed the film, did a really solid job of not just creating a kid’s movie that doesn’t try to rip off Pixar in some sense, but by also wrapping their story in a real life environment. Their comic talent, which they recently showed in their 22 Jump Street is undeniable, but with The Lego Movie, they also show a more sensitive side. This sensibility is perfectly capable of transmitting subtle emotions like a boy’s longing for his father’s affection and attention.

The Lego Movie DVD release (it was released on Digital HD in May and on Blu-ray in June this year, making it already available) will probably cement this film as one of those classics to which several generations of children will come back to, putting it in the same category as The Goonies.

Kids around the world will know the entire movie by heart, but they will still probably enjoy watching it, because it will pick them up for a great adventure every time.

Film Review: Dust of War (2013)

Dust of War is an action adventure that works perfectly in concept. In a distant future, an alien invasion decimated our planet, and now, warring tribes fight over dominance while the mostly unseen, yet much feared alien masters pull the strings. A girl called Ellie is the key for the salvation of the entire humanity, but she is being held in a camp controlled by a ruthless warlord. Two mercenaries are sent on a covert mission to save her from a very unpleasant future, and give man a fighting chance.

Andrew Kightlinger, a veteran of several short features, directed Dust of War as his first feature length film. It’s obvious that Kightlinger worked diligently on the screenplay and polished it to action perfection. Every known and needed element is present in this film, starting with the damsel in distress.

Also, almost every imaginable post-apocalyptic character is in the script, and even the main antagonist called the General has two separate henchmen lieutenants that slowly build up their unique brand of evilness, and are bound to perish in two distinct but gruesome ways. Able, the main mercenary is quiet and lethal, while his older, cynical partner is everything but quiet. There is even a Native American tracker in the film!

When the gang frees their target, they set off on a journey across the deserted lands of the broken US. Here, Kightlinger tried to move the film towards a more atmospheric piece, using long shot of the beautiful but strangely barren lands of South Dakota. This approach works to a point, but the thing that is hampering it is the abundance of characters who in one way or the other break the visual aesthetics. Usually when most of them open their mouths to produce one-liners, the contemplating nature of the film is quickly lost. It seems to me that only Tony Todd found a way to blend into this subtle atmosphere of gentle decay and destruction.

The biggest problems of the film can be found on micro and macro level. The gang travels without water or change of clothes, but in spite of this, Ellie keeps her makeup in perfect condition. Also, her trousers remain crispy clean, even though she is captured and mishandled several times. The protagonist use weapons from Second World War, like M1 Garand rifles, while their uniforms come from the Civil War era. This was probably due to the fact that these props were available to the crew, but the film doesn’t even try to somehow incorporate this in the storyline.

The macro problem is the setup of this post-apocalyptic universe. Who are the aliens, do they even appear in the film or do they use human subjects in armor to carry out their bidding, and what is Ellie supposed to do are all questions which remain a mystery. Even if the authors were aiming for a sequel, these things shouldn’t be left in the open to slowly die in the imagination of the viewers.

Dust of War is a film that was a product of great ambition. Andrew Kightlinger and many of the actors really did the best job they could, but I would like to see more planning and a stronger Q and A process go into the director’s next movie. In that case, I am certain that a far better piece of cinema can be created.

Film Review: Godzilla (2014)

This is a movie which I get, and at the same time I am left wondering if I truly get in the way its creator shaped it. A few years back, Gareth Edwards directed Monsters, a monsters flick, which really wasn’t about monsters at all. In the same fashion Godzilla 2014 really isn’t about Godzilla.

Somehow, I think that this movie is mostly about large-scale things that happen behind actors back, way beyond in the distance. This feeling of “destruction is so large that even those miles away are affected” is interesting, and Edwards really didn’t want to get rid of it (it was present in Monsters too, but everybody thought it was due to a small budget). In this film, he can show whatever he wants, but he still decided to hold back on destruction as long as possible. Godzilla 2014 can even be called a destruction tease.

The story of the film is full of people who just about manage to do something before everything gets annihilated by ancient monsters. Its characters are fluid, and their tasks get filled in when they arrive at a certain place. For example, Aaron Taylor-Johnson character Ford starts out as a loving father and a husband, then he is an angry son who turns into a reluctant explorer, then a bomb technician, a random child protector and savior, followed by a railway scout and finally he transforms into a special forces member.

The logic behind this is very loose and the script just follows what the monsters are doing. Simultaneously, it’s not anything like monster vs. robot porn like Pacific Rim was.

Of course, its fragile development turns into a classical monster film in the end, and this brings a resolution of sorts. Here, Godzilla and evil monsters from the ancient history battle in Power Rangers style, destroying buildings left and right. He even gets a plasma breath superpower from thin air. Only Tommy and the other Rangers are nowhere to be seen.

I try to understand my own expectations for this film.

Did I want to see Pacific Rim 2? No, the original was just fine.

Did I want to see a better version of the Japanese monster than the previous horrible movie from 1998 where we hopefully saw Matthew Broderick and Roland Emmerich in the same film for the last time? Yes, yes and yes, and Godzilla 2014 really is a lot better, especially when things get blown away in 3D.

Did the film have any of the magic seen in Monsters? It had, but just a little.

It turns out that this was enough for me no to be disappointed.

Film Review: The Monuments Men

This wasn't the way to make a war film, or any other kind of film. The Monuments Men just doesn’t know how to connect the audience with its characters or its topic, although George Clooney tries desperately to do this. But, he does it by the old Hollywood playbook, first by introducing a merry band of men that are to form an Allied unit in the last stage of the 2.

World war, tasked with the protection of cultural treasures of Western Europe. Then Clooney, playing the lead character and directing at the same time (when you’re good looking you can do anything), further develops his Dirty Dozen Artists and Museum Curators, giving us the French guy, the Matt Damon guy, the Funny guy and the Cynical guy to somehow bind us to them.

This doesn’t work. There are too many of them, and it doesn’t matter that Bill Murray and John Goodman play them, they aren’t relevant enough to become important. Even worse, Clooney sends some of them to a secret mission in the German occupied France, and naturally this adds to the incoherence of the film.

Throughout the movie there is this sense of following the real history (Monuments Men did really exist in the WW2), and using things that belong in a mediocre war film from the seventies. The soundtrack includes a lot of whistling, everybody is more than enthusiastic to go into the front lines (even those who are fat and/or old) and the Soviets seem a little bit like Nazis 2.0.

Also, I have a feeling that at a three-man team took care of Clooney’s mustache, and that this part of the superstar’s facial hair probably had a nickname like The Champ. Small adventures, some tragic, other heartwarming or funny, continue while the Monuments Men are on the trail of a big art loot that was taken by the retreating Germans.

The film drags on in this fashion. The script wasn’t convincing enough to make me truly care about any of the art that is present in the film. Instead of focusing on one piece, things like the Ghent Altarpiece or Madonna of Bruges get thrown in, and soon the number of art pieces is as big as the cast. Add to this the idea that millions were killed in the same time, and it’s pretty hard to be emotionally invested in paintings, even with a powerful speech on this topic delivered by Clooney and his spectacular mustache in the beginning of the film.

The whole topic was better suited for a documentary film. Instead, the result is a dramatization on a large budget that produces almost no emotional investment. Let’s just hope that Clooney doesn’t shave off his glorious mustache, because in that case, the whole Monuments Men project would be in vain.

Film Review: Ender's Game

The first thing that comes to my mind when I think about this movie is one word - clogged. Everything about this film, and the atmosphere that surrounded it almost since it entered preproduction was strangely overbearing and dense as plutonium.

The novel Ender’s Game was an instant science fiction classic. Its author, Orson Scott Card is a galactic jackass who opposes same-sex marriage and views homosexuality though his religiously colored glasses, painted mostly in the colour “judge everybody”. Also, he apparently thinks that Barak Obama is high on the evil scale and discredits the research on global warming, although he sees it as “asking for the other opinion”. In essence, Card seems like the kind of guy that has a problem with a lot of kinds of people he never actually met. When the movie got out, some people called for a boycott because of Card’s judgmental views. Before the film even got to the theatres, the noise around it started to grow.

In spite of the Card’s jackassness, his novel is fantastic. In it he presented a story about a boy named Ender, who is in training to become one of humanities military leaders in the war against a bug-like aliens who, by the way, started it first! Several decades prior to the events of the movie/novel, an unsuspecting Earth is hit by their invasion fleet and nearly conquered or destroyed. In Ender’s time, humanity is preparing for another and possibly final showdown with the alien scum.

Gavin Hood accepted the opportunity to direct this film, and he did give it his best. But, like the atmosphere, this film is clogged in every aspect. From the start, Ender is a military cadet that doesn’t fit in. His altercation with a fellow student gets him suspended, but at the same time, gets him promoted to a space station where the next chapter of his training begins. And a lot more stuff also begins, all at the same time, from Enders personal journey right to the survival of humanity and the future of the unknown alien race.

The dialogues in this film never end. We get a break from talking just for a few seconds when the camera makes a panning motion around the space station. During mock battles when Ender and other cadets train, we still hear continuous conversations, arguments and every other form of verbal communications, because so much information has to be presented to the audience. Ender, played convincingly by Asa Butterfield, doesn’t stop throughout the film, and he is always doing something intensely. It doesn’t matter if it’s crying, training, debating, fighting or pleading. Every second in his life is a matter of intergalactic life of death, and this is simply an unsustainable premise.

This premise, however flawed, came from the right place. Hood and his writers tried to capture everything in the novel, and this was a fool’s errand. So many things take place in the course of 114 minutes that it’s not possible to connect with Ender, and even less possible to get to know and understand his mentors Colonel Hyrum Graff and Mazer Rackham (played by fantastic Harrison Ford and Ben Kingsley). Both are excellent in their roles, but it doesn’t make a difference because they pop in and out of the story all the time. And I couldn’t perceive them as relevant just because they were intended to be that.

If Wolf of the Wall Street got 3 hours, Hood had to fight harder for more time too. And I bet he did, but there were mostly like serious men in serious suits who told him that the targeted demographic doesn’t like films that are longer than 2 hours.

So much money and talent were invested in Ender's Game that I couldn’t say it’s bad. But at the same time it’s cold as outer space, and left me feeling similar. Unfortunately, I believe that the controversy surrounding Card will outlive the film itself.

Film Review: All Is Lost

All Is Lost is a terrific film. It’s original and different, a kind of film that tries to form its own world and not just imitate the real one.

The director J. C. Chandor did something very bold when he decided to venture into the realm of non-verbal storytelling. This film has no dialogue and only a brief monologue at the beginning. The film’s only character, an elderly sailor on a private yacht, utters a handful of words from the beginning to the end: a short and unanswered SOS call and a muttered curse here and there. He is nameless, and doesn’t have any background story that fills in the audience about his life or the decisions that brought him to the middle of the Indian Ocean.

In one moment, his boat is damaged and the cabin, along with his communications equipment, flooded. After the incident, his struggle to stay alive begins in its full glory and desperation.

Robert Redford left me, quite adequately, completely speechless. His interpretation of a man lost at sea is astounding. He seems calm and composed, and never gets out of ideas. Even when he is on the edge of losing it, he manages to stay alive, even if that means only a couple of hours. Enormous waves pick up and drop his boat like a toy, but he never gets disconnected from his surroundings, and thus, from his invisible safety line to life. Redford brings this unnamed, determined man to the screen very naturally, and soon become him completely. When I saw the film, I didn’t remember any other character he played in his long career. He was just that man in the sailboat.

I’m not sure in what condition has Chandor made All Is Lost, but a lot of scenes are brilliantly filmed. The space where the movie takes place is incredibly confined (a small sailboat and an even smaller inflatable life raft), but the director manages to literally turn all of that upside down on several occasions, when the waves briefly sink or flip the boat. His underwater shots, where colors blend and light changes, also add to the stunning beauty of the film.

But even in spite of the great actor and a very creative director, a man named Alex Ebert is the person who for me wrapped and tied All Is Lost in one of the finest movies I recently saw. Ebert made the soundtrack for the film, and his tunes are incredibly in sync with the unfolding story. The soundtrack covers the journey of the lost sailor, and follows his ordeal, but always underlines his solitude.

In a world full of words, All Is Lost brings to its audience an ocean of beautiful pictures and sounds that represent raw human emotions. As I said, it’s a terrific film.

Film Review: Hammer of the Gods

To be honest, I didn’t expect much from this film. The trailer I saw a few months back looked like something I saw many times, starting with The 13th Warrior, and right up to the History Channel’s Vikings. But, Hammer of the Gods managed to sunrise me. It’s a low budget movie, it’s all action and adventure, but done in a very smooth manner.

It looks to me that Farren Blackburn, the director, alongside Matthew Read who wrote this movie, did a lot of research on the subject of modern depiction of the Viking culture. They made a simple plot, in which a young Nordic prince named Steinar arrives in England in 871, as a vanguard of a relief army, sent to help his embattled father, king Bagsecg. Steinar finds his ruler and parent on his death bed. Mortally wounded, the king orders his son to find his long banished older brother, and thus, find the new king.

His men urge him to stay in camp and fight for the right of kingship, but Steinar chooses to follow his father’s wishes. He, accompanied by a small band of soldiers, begins his journey into lawless lands full of Saxon enemies and possibly something worse. There, somewhere, his feared brother lives in exile.

Blackburn and Read condensed into the plot a lot of the things that marked the most memorable Viking films and TV shows in recent years. The cinematography, as well as the unchained violence, reminded me of Valhalla Rising. Barren hills, misty meadows and stone caverns were captured in the same bleak, but rich style as the ones that can be seen in the film Nicolas Winding Refn directed.

The other strong suit of the film is its attempt to be as historically accurate. Real historical figures like Ivar the Boneless are present in the film. One of the members of Steinar’s band is an improvised scholar of Nordic belief systems, and often talks about runes, the light of the Moon and other ideas that were relevant to the common man in that part of the world. Also, when Steinar is briefed about the state of his father’s wounds, his brother informs him that his abdomen was hurt, and that they tested the state of him by giving him strongly flavored foods to eat. Later that day, his belly began to smell of garlic, and the other prince declares that there is no chance of recovery if his guts are pierced - talk about dark ages abdominal diagnostics!

Small touches like this one add a lot to the believability of Blackburn’s world of Nordic marauders in England, and shows how seriously they took their job while writing and building the movie. Because of them I was a lot more lenient on the action scenes, which aren’t exactly top notch, but aren’t either silly or unintentionally funny. A lot of characters are standard people we see in action films, especially those that involve Steinar’s band of warriors. Here, we also see a guy that fights with a war hammer, one that fights with two curved blades, and etc.

For me, all action/adventure shortcomings were absolved in the final part of the film. Steinars contact with his brother Hakan for me was very unexpected, and interesting, both narratively and in terms of visual style. The renegade prince is played by Elliot Cowan, and in his fifteen minutes on the screen he brings just the right amount of impressiveness, mystery and oddness. Through him and his interaction with Steinar, who is already in that point well known and understood by the audience, the movie successfully wrapped everything up, adding to it some of the Refn’s weirdness. By it, Blackburn showed that he didn’t imagine this film as just another cheap and forgettable action flick.

Hammer of the Gods is an entertaining film with two things that often may seem irreconcilable: Viking bloodshed and a clever story.

Film Review: Captain Phillips

In the entrance sequence of Captain Phillips, we witness a conversation between a wife and a husband. The husband is a maritime captain, and his wife is escorting him to an airport, from where he will set out to his next voyage. During their drive, they talk about how the world has changed and who their children will have a rough time in their adulthood.

For me, this was an awful way to open the film. The conversation tells us nothing about Phillips, or his wife. They sound as if they are practicing the lines from the beginning of an SNL sketch, right before one of them declares that she or he wants to join the circus or something ludicrous like that. There is no emotion that rings true, except perhaps a hint of subdued boredom from a decades long marriage. Tom Hanks, who plays Phillips, presents the same thing in this role – something seen and done many times by him, combined with an ever-present feeling of tiredness. The real is described by some of his crew as reckless, but here all of that was condensed into unintended bravery. Because the movie didn’t want to get political, I guess.I wondered to myself in that moment: if Paul Greengras, the director of this film had so much trouble presenting a regular middle-aged man from the US, how on Earth will he depict the Somali pirates?

The answer to that question is simple – he didn’t. Somalis that try to hijack the ship captained by Phillips are total stranger. Apart from their habit of chewing khat and vague references to their long vanished fishing lifestyle, the film steers clear of their motives or basic personalities. To be honest, they aren’t vilified, but in glances, we see them as ruthless, then childish, then scared, then crazy or indifferent. This may seem like a variety of human traits, but it actually manages to present an extremely hazy picture. I don’t feel like it was left to the viewer to decide who they actually are, but more likely, it had been deemed as unimportant. The pirates are just there, like a bad storm on the open sea.

On the other side of the action, there is the crew and their captain, supported by the American and British navies, equipped with enough firepower to sink the Spanish armada. Here, Greengras shows his military command and control fetish, and he dazzles the audience with the images of operating rooms, warship bridges and other battle stations. Navy people call other navy people, orders are given and someone is always counting down to something. This is where he obviously feels like home, and it’s not surprising after so many years in the Born films.

The problem is that even here I felt no suspense and no thrills. This film is a live-action, big budget documentary with Tom Hanks in the main role. After it, unlike after watching A Hijacking which left me intrigued and concerned, I felt mildly amused. Like its portrait of Somali pirates, Captain Phillips presents to its audience an emotional blank.