Movie review rant 2013

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Hix said:
They're the ones selling 'em. Seventy in total.

:p

Hix
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Oh yeah? That's pretty fresh news then.

They were vintage a decade ago so it's long overdue.

I just found an article that was posted yesterday (Australian Defence Force to sell off thousands of vehicles and other war equipment | News.com.au) with some other gear on sale.

Anyone wants to buy a C130 Hercules that came into service in the 50s? (That's the big plane from the opening scene of 'The Dark Knight' Batman movie.) :D
 
Yup, that was the article I saw.

:p

Hix
 
JBZvolunteer said:
Les Miserables

Les Miserables is the film the musical fanatics have been preparing themselves for for months. In the end the film fell into the neutral category on how people fellt about it. Here is my take from when I saw it

Good
Eponine as played by Samantha Barks
Cosette as played by Amanda Seyfried
Marius as played by Eddie Redmayne
The song between Jean Valjean(Hugh Jackman) and the Bishop(Colm Wilkinson)
The Thenardiers and any scene starring them as played by Sacha Baron Cohen and Helena Bonham Carter
Javert as played by Russell Crowe
"At the End of the Day"
"Javerts Suicide"

Bad
Jean Valjean as played by Hugh Jackman
Fantine as played by Anne Hathaway(main problem was "I dreamed a dream")
Set Design
Gavroche's death
The Audience

The Good: Let me just say right off the bat that the young actors were really some of the stars of the show. They saw the grace of the characters as they were in the musical and saw no need to mix things up for the film. They allowed us musical fans to keep our sanity. The standout in the group musically was Amanda Seyfried as Cosette. She had the amazing ability to just float up there in the rafters. Also, her vibratto was the stuff of legends, it may make a normal moviegoer cringe in fear but the musical fans will bow down before her at the skill level she was showing. The young actors weren't the only ones who stood out though, Sacha Baron Cohen and Helena Bonham Carter were hilarrious as and the Thenadiers and were able to transfer their comedic skill into music quite well. The most controversial actor in the movie though was Russell Crowe as Javert, he in the end turned though out to be surprisingly good. His acting is what put him over the top in the end though. When watching him you didn't think "Russell Crowe is doing a really good job", you instead thought, "Javert is doing a really good job". This is a quality any actor should strive for. There were some scenes you also couldn't help but love. Anyone who likes action movies will love the scene where javert jumps off a bridge and falls a hundred feet to his death and musical fans will love the well done number "At the End of the Day" where Fantine loses her job as a rosary maker and you go on a tour of the town according to the lower and middle class. One of the most touching scenes is when the bishop played by the musical's first Jean Valjean Colm Wilkinson, hands over the silver candlesticks to Jean Valjean, when watching this scene it is almost as if a sense of warmth and hope wash over your body.

The Bad: The most looked forward to members of the cast were the biggest let down to me. Hugh Jackman tried to do way to much hidden messagery in his choice of singing style for my personal taste. Also Anne Hathaway I feel like tried to put to much of her own spin on "I dreamed a Dream" by making it sound to meek. It is in the brassiness of the classic Broadway performance that you get the wave of emotion that washes over you, her perfomance lacked this aspect. The set design and the scene of Gavroche's death really irked me. I could personally build a taller barricade in my basement then what they tried doing on England's largest indoor set. When they played off the barricade into Gavroche's death scene they made a big mistake when they allowed you to see the death, the emotion in the musical version of this comes from the fact that you yourself had to imagine his death. The biggest change when going from the musical to the movie version is in the audience. When you see the musical everyone sings along to songs such as "At the End of the Day" and "Do You Hear the People Sing" whereas, at the movie everyone is just sitting there in the theatre. This can make it into a very awkward moment.

Overall, I give Les Miserables a rating of 7/10 because I feel like everyone should see it but there will always be something to the movie which someone won't like.

Rating: 7/10
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I saw this the other day, and was very impressed! I have never seen the musical, and knew essentially nothing about the storyline, but I thought it was very well told on the big screen. I thought Anne Hathaway, Russell Crowe, Sacha Baron Cohen & Helena Bonham Carter were excellent, with everyone else pretty good, except Hugh Jackman who wasn't the best singer.

My only quibble is that the second act, with the new generation, didn't build up any affection for the new characters, which made the clearly extremely sad ending a bit less emotional, because I didn't really care about some of them. Everything else was pretty awesome though, definitely recommend it (if its still out where you are :D).

Rating: 8/10
 
zooboy28 said:
Have any of you Aussies seen the Kath and Kim movie? It doesn't look like it is going to be released here unfortunately, so will have to wait for the D-Voi-Dee of that too.
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PAT said:
And I've heard a few bad things from people that have actually seen it and I don't want to ruin what I remember about the show.
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I finally got around to seeing this filum, as it was available on the in-room movie service in the hotel we stayed in on my recent trip to Wellington. The film isn't as good as the TV show was (as one would expect) but it is very funny and worth watching.

The basic premise is Kath wins a trip (via her wart-off treatment) to Italy, and elects to take Kim and Sharon, where they cause havoc in a small Spanish principality, ending in a royal wedding which is televised globally, attracting the attention of husbands Kel and Brett. These guys, plus a few notable recurring characters (Prue & Trude, Marion, Cujo) were very funny, but the new European characters weren't the best and let the film down.

Good excuse for a reunion, and some excellent puns, double entendres and malapropisms make for a fun watch.

Rating: 7/10
 
Wait... Borat, Ali G, and Bruno were in Les Miserables? Then again, so were Maximus, Wolverine, Cat Woman, and The Red Queen. Not bad!
 
The Impossible

Absolutely Brilliant. Totally engaging. And great special effects.

For anyone unaware of this movie, it's about the 2004 Boxing Day Tsunami. It is the true story of one family who were at the swimming pool of their Khao Lak (Thailand) resort when the tsunami crashed through the hotel grounds, and the subsequent story of how the family became separated and eventually found each other again.

Although the family was spanish, in the movie they are British (for languages sake I presume). But Maria Belon, the woman at the centre of the story, worked closely with Naomi Watts during the entire filming. Watts gave a wonderful performance and is certainly deserving of her Oscar Nomination, and Tom Holland deserves the accolades he has received for his portrayal of Watts' son.

Not the kind of movie I normally see, but I'm so very glad I did.

8.5/10

:p

Hix
 
Hotel Transylvania

Here's another animated film review for those attempting to relive their youth :D

Hotel Transylvania is both the title and the actual setting of this film, which takes place within a resort sanctuary run by Dracula, where monsters of all types can come to get away from the evil humans. The story centers on Dracula's daughter's coming-of-age 118th birthday bash, attended by werewolves, mummies, Frankenstein and a vast array of other creepy creatures. And its actually a pretty good story, with a solid plot and good pace. The potential for a great film is definitely there.

Unfortunately, the animation style screams "cheap", and I certainly didn't appreciate it much. Further, despite some clever physical gags, there are very few jokes aimed at adults, which makes this movie a bit bland. The few songs included are also pretty terrible.

So despite an excellent premise, story, characters and voices (probably the best Adam Sandker flick in 10 years), Hotel Transylvania is aimed at kids and there is little to appeal to adults - it certainly doesn't have the ability to impress both groups as Pixar and Dreamworks hits have done. Passable DVD to watch on a quiet night, or maybe on a plane.

Rating: 6/10
 
zooboy28 said:
So despite an excellent premise, story, characters and voices (probably the best Adam Sandker flick in 10 years), Hotel Transylvania is aimed at kids and there is little to appeal to adults
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What's wrong with movies meant for kids? Children are people too. And considering that 99.5% of movies are geared toward teens and adults, there's no room for you to complain.
 
cleusk said:
What's wrong with movies meant for kids? Children are people too. And considering that 99.5% of movies are geared toward teens and adults, there's no room for you to complain.
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I never said there was anything wrong with movies meant for kids. What I said was, unlike some movies meant for kids which have incorporated adult jokes to great success (e.g. Shrek, Ice Age, Madagascar, etc.), Hotel Transylvania didn't have any jokes or other aspects aimed at adults, which made it less enjoyable for adults. I would also say that kids movies make up significantly more than 0.5% of films, and that a review is the perfect place to complain.
 
DavidBrown said:
Has anybody seen "Cloud Atlas"? I found it rather sublime and mind-bending. It is six interlocking stories ranging in time from 1850 in the South Pacific to the 25th century with stops in 1931 England, 1973 San Francisco, 2012 England, and 2144 Korea. It bombed at the U.S. box office, but I suspect that it may become a classic once it finds an audience on DVD, Netflix, etc. - or maybe not.

It has elements reminiscent of "Master and Commander", "Shaft", "Star Trek", "The Matrix", "The China Syndrome", "Forest Gump", and possibly many other films that people will find, but mixed together in a novel and epic fusion. It is 3 hours long, but was the rare film that I actually wanted to keep going.
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I saw this movie recently. We stopped it after 1 hour of it basically going nowhere and being simply confusing. My wife then watched Wreck I Ralph, and as an homage to DavidBrown, I continued to watch Cloud Atlas on my computer.

I found the movie quite hard to follow. Indeed, I thought that the stories were interwoven, but the link was quite tenuous, other than them using the same actors to play different characters in all time periods.

I couldn't figure out what the point of the movie was - was it supposed to be a drama, or an action, or a sci-fi? It failed in each category, and consequently will not appeal to fans of those genres.

Three hours is an inordinate amount of time for a movie to go nowhere. I think that David wanted it to keep going because after three hours he felt that the story was incomplete.

Rating: 5/10
 
Tan Dun's Martial Arts Trilogy

Tan Dun is one of the world's most renowned 'Chinese' composers (he is of Chinese descent but moved to America in the 80s), having won both a Grammy and an Academy Award for his musical score for the movie 'Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon'. I had the pleasure of seeing his 'Martial Arts Trilogy' production, in conjunction with the
, a few weeks ago.

The 'trilogy' consists of the three wuxia movies that Tan Dun composed the musical score for:
1. Wo hu cang long (2000) - IMDb (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon)
2. Ying xiong (2002) - IMDb (Hero)
3. Ye yan (2006) - IMDb (The Banquet)

I always regretted that I never saw 'Hero' on the big screen, as it is indeed my favourite movie of all time. However, it was worth the wait because in this production, the symphony orchestra played the soundtrack live while key scenes from the movie were projected on the big screen behind them (well, more like four split screens - see attached photo from the nose-bleed seats we were in). Indeed, the same was done for the soundtrack for 'Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon' and 'The Banquet'.

If you have seen these movies, then you know that they are all tragedies, in that the main characters all die or commit suicide at the end. The musical score reflected the mood of all three movies, and I must say, I, along with most of the audience, was on the verge of tears for most of the production. I came out of the hall feeling thrilled, but very depressed, as the music was just mournful. It was like watching a documentary on the massacre of elephants with no happy ending to say that conservationists are now doing a great job of saving them from poachers.

The Melbourne Symphony Orchestra was absolutely fantastic. I was fortunate to lay eyes on a Stradivarius violin in Oxford's Ashmolean Museum, but this was the first time that I actually heard one being played. I am no classical music expert, but I assure you that you can definitely hear the difference in sound quality between that violin and the one your high-school orchestra has/had. We were also fortunate to hear some of the world's best musicians play the piano,
, and the
.

Seeing the movies come to life on the big screen with new versions of the soundtrack in perfect timing with the scenes, was a mind-blowing experience. If this production ever comes to your city, and you are a fan of classical Western and Chinese music, then you can't miss this. If you are a fan of the wuxia genre of martial arts films, then you will enjoy experiencing the movies being brought to life with a live orchestra. Be warned though: you will feel extremely sad when it's all over. (Come on, tell me you don't feel like crying listening to
.)

If you have never seen any of the three movies, then please do: 'Hero' is the best of the three. :)

Rating: 9.9/10
 

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A Good Day to Die Hard
If you enjoyed the other Die Hards, you'll love this. Big blockbuster action movie with big explosions, great special effects, big car chase (it looks like they destroyed half the cars in Moscow), and ends up somewhere you wouldn't expect. And still with the same humour that we encountered in the first Die Hard 25 years ago.

10/10
:p

Hix
 
Hix said:
A Good Day to Die Hard
If you enjoyed the other Die Hards, you'll love this. Big blockbuster action movie with big explosions, great special effects, big car chase (it looks like they destroyed half the cars in Moscow), and ends up somewhere you wouldn't expect. And still with the same humour that we encountered in the first Die Hard 25 years ago.

10/10
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the Die Hard movies have got worse and worse. The first one was fantastic edge-of-your-seat action-movie-brilliance. The second one was very good too but not as good as the first. The third one was dreadful (I have heard they actually used a modified script which was originally supposed to be Lethal Weapon 4, and that's why Samuel L Jackson is in it [in the Danny Glover role]). The fourth was...I mean, seriously? - a comedy sidekick??!

The latest installment isn't too bad though. Not anywhere near the level of the first one or even the second one, but certainly above the third and fourth ones so that's something.

The main problem I have with the later Die Hard movies is that they basically turned McClane into a superhero. In the first two movies he was just a guy in the wrong place at the wrong time (see what I did there?), thinking on the run and doing what he had to do. In the later movies he was apparently indestructable. I guess even the Laws of Physics don't want to mess with John McClane!!

I wouldn't rate Die Hard 5 as a 10 out of 10. Maybe a 7, and that's only because it's so much better than movie number 4. I'm still trying to get the stupidity of the "destroying a helicopter with a car" out of my head.
 
Hix said:
A Good Day to Die Hard
If you enjoyed the other Die Hards, you'll love this.
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And if you didn't? :)

I've not seen a good, new action movie in a long time. Either my taste is changing or they're getting too reliant on special effects and explosions.
 
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Chlidonias said:
the Die Hard movies have got worse and worse. The first one was fantastic edge-of-your-seat action-movie-brilliance. The second one was very good too but not as good as the first. The third one was dreadful (I have heard they actually used a modified script which was originally supposed to be Lethal Weapon 4, and that's why Samuel L Jackson is in it [in the Danny Glover role]). The fourth was...I mean, seriously? - a comedy sidekick??!

The latest installment isn't too bad though. Not anywhere near the level of the first one or even the second one, but certainly above the third and fourth ones so that's something.

The main problem I have with the later Die Hard movies is that they basically turned McClane into a superhero. In the first two movies he was just a guy in the wrong place at the wrong time (see what I did there?), thinking on the run and doing what he had to do. In the later movies he was apparently indestructable. I guess even the Laws of Physics don't want to mess with John McClane!!

I wouldn't rate Die Hard 5 as a 10 out of 10. Maybe a 7, and that's only because it's so much better than movie number 4. I'm still trying to get the stupidity of the "destroying a helicopter with a car" out of my head.
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I am a big fan of all the Die Hard movies, although I'm not as fond of #3 as the rest. I saw Die Hard 5 last night (its just opened in Australia, but it opened five weeks ago in NZ) and thought it was pretty awesome, definitely worth watching. The car chase was the highlight for me, and I was impressed that they didn't draw out the climax as much as they usually do in these sort of movies.

Rating: 7.5/10
 
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