Short review: John Carter

Director: Andrew Stanton
(2012)

In retrospect, it’s easy to see where Andrew Stanton’s John Carter went wrong. The budget was huge, the trailers drab and the name was totally unappealing. Yet even after the box office dust (or lack of) has settled, it’s become even more apparent that it’s simply a subpar film. Our titular hero John Carter (Taylor Kitsch) gets teleported to mars from civil war America and gets caught up in a Martian conflict while he tries to get back to earth. Despite a colossal budget and John’s ability to jump higher and throw farther (due to the different atmosphere) the action scenes are sorely lacking in both quality and quantity. Warships explode and soldiers die, but it’s all so very dull. The bloated running time, poor story, mediocre performances and special effects put the nails in the coffin of this underwhelming, muddled mess.

4

Short review: Alice in Wonderland (2010)

Director: Tim Burton
(2010)

From the kooky Tim Burton comes another take on the famous and beloved Book by Lewis Carroll. Yet despite his trademark artistic style, Alice in Wonderland lacks the enjoyment that has been so prevalent in his other works. The moment Alice (Mia Wasikowska) plunges into Wonderland an abundance of CGI takes over, making the entire film seem hollow and fake. This onslaught of visuals is constant, leaving Wasikowska and co to do their best acting with a green wall. What's worse is the film totally lacks any bite, dilemmas are resolved within minutes causing Alice’s trek through this alien world seem banal. Depp and Bonham Carter are lacklustre, with only Hathaway giving anything close to a solid performance. Throughout Alice says she wants to wake up form this dream, and for most of the 108 minutes I really wish she would.

It’s a Wonderful Life review

George Bailey: What is it you want, Mary? What do you want? You want the moon? Just say the word and I'll throw a lasso around it and pull it down. Hey. That's a pretty good idea. I'll give you the moon, Mary. 

Director: Frank Capra
(1946)

Since I purchased the Blu Ray of It’s a Wonderful Life last year, it’s safe to say that I’m going to get my moneys worth out of it. Like many folk, I intend, and so far have managed to watch it every Christmas without fail. The reasons for this are simple, It’s a Wonderful Life is both an excellent film and quite easily the greatest Christmas film of all time.

The film opens with a multitude of establishing shots of the town of Bedford falls. While many films would be content with a single shot to establish the scene, Director Frank Capra does so with such subtle, yet deliberate intent. This small American town is the home of quite possibly the most selfless man ever committed to celluloid, George Bailey (James Stewart). A man with an ambition to travel the world, we witness his life in a framed narrative being narrated by angels who are educating fellow angel Clarence (Henry Travers) on George’s life. He’s a man pushed to his very limit, contemplating suicide to help his business and family survive after his dim-witted uncle Billy (Thomas Mitchell) loses 8,000 dollars of the company’s cash. We see George grow up, how he saved his brother’s life and Boss’s (H.B Warner) career, his relationships and backbone in standing up to the evil and cold hearted Mr Potter (Lionel Barrymore), a greedy villain who wishes to take over Bedford falls and make everyone's lives a misery, all to make his pockets richer.

It’s without a doubt that the love for IAWL comes from its endearing sentiment. While such a claim is often viewed as criticism to a film, Capra imbues his masterpiece with genuine honesty and emotion. No moment is ever forced, and as sweet as it is, the reaction it draws from its audience is refreshingly real. This is coupled with a slew of unforgettable scenes are scattered throughout the film. The high school graduation dance, the run of the bank and the proceeding dinner, the appearance of Georges guardian angel, the empowering, cynicism melting ending; ask ten different people what their favourite scene is and getting 10 different answers is very much a guarantee.

It’s a Wonderful Life is a film of 2 distinct parts. The first is the meatiest, we view George’s life and the affect that he has on his loved ones and on the residents of Bedford Falls. This is in no small part thanks to James Stewart’s excellent performance. He captures the character perfectly, making every emotion and action that George does feel wholly authentic. When walking future wife Mary (Donna Reed) home from her graduation dance, George asks earnestly “What is it you want, Mary? What do you want? You want the moon? Just say the word and I'll throw a lasso around it and pull it down. Hey. That's a pretty good idea. I'll give you the moon, Mary” and we believe him for every word of it.

The second part begins upon the arrival of George’s angel Clarence just moments from George attempting to end his life. Through an act of god we’re whisked off to an alternate reality where George never existed, with George being shown the affect that he has had on the lives of others. While those who complain that IAWL devolves into overtly religious preaching about the sanctity of life have a strong argument, it’s almost entirely nullified by how truly effective these scenes are. While said religious tones are very obvious, Capra doesn’t try to ram these beliefs down the throat of his audience, thus allowing the film to be loved even by the staunchest of atheists. 

By the time the emotional and touching ending roles around the films niggling flaws, most notably the sloppy editing, can be overlooked. It’s a Wonderful Life is undoubtedly the greatest Christmas film of all time, and considering its near universal appeal, one of the best films ever as well.

Twilight review

Isabella Swan: Will you tell me the truth? 
Edward Cullen: No, probably not. 
Edward Cullen: I'd rather hear your theories. 
Isabella Swan: I have considered radioactive spiders and kryptonite. 
Edward Cullen: All superhero stuff right? But what if I'm not the hero? What if I am the bad guy? 

Director: Catherine Hardwicke
(2008)

It’s hard to go into a popular and commercially successful film with an open mind. After legions of teenage girls call it the ‘best movie evar’ and consider it the second coming of Jesus, its difficult to take said film seriously. With my best efforts, I completed my first viewing of Twilight, a film shamelessly engineered to hoover up money from its easily manipulated target audience.

The story is a simple and relatable one, a major reason why twilight is the success that it is today, a multibillion dollar franchise. Our protagonist, Bella (Kristen Stewart showing all one of her facial expressions) is an average girl, burdened with the hardship of moving schools from Arizona to Washington to live with her father. Soon she falls for Edward Cullen, a mysterious and impossibly attractive student who, as it turns out, is a vampire. Bella and Edward begin a relationship that not only endangers her, but also both their families.

As a romance, Twilight sucks. The pairing of Bella and Edward possesses no chemistry, a fatal flaw that can be attributed to both the terrible script and the dire acting. Edward is a poorly written character, hormonal to the point of having mood swings that effortlessly shatter any character development. Pattison has a degree of talent lurking under this shoddy character, but director Catherine Hardwicke completely fails to coax it out. The first half of the film involves Edward being nice to Bella, followed by being a total dick to her in the next shot. A prime example of the abysmal chemistry between the pair is when they get put together in biology. There’s no tension, romance or even awkwardness, just bad acting and writing.

Kristen Stewart is indescribably bad in the lead role, almost effortlessly ruining every scene she’s in. It may be a shock to her, but perpetually pouting, face devoid of emotion and mouth slightly parted doesn’t constitute as acting. Especially when it was her attempt at showing happiness. She was passable in Adventureland (2009, just a year later) but here she is abhorrent. The rest of the cast don’t fare much better, from her friendship group of stereotypes, her almost equally expressionless father (Billy Burke) to Jacob (Taylor Lautner), another teen idol with little in the way of actual talent. In all honesty the best character is the Washington countryside itself, a stunning collection of emerald greens and muted browns that still portrays emotion better than the entire cast.

This insipid storyline drags on for far longer than it should, until Bella’s scent is caught by the more malicious Vampires in the region, and must flee with the rest of the Cullen family to safety. The barely cooked romance is temporarily disposed of in favour of an interesting escape; the family splits into groups in an attempt to lure these antagonists away from Edward's new love. This burst of adrenaline is the undoubted highlight of the film, although this is still ruined by a final fight that has some hideous special effects. These hideous visuals match the quality of the rest of the film; cheesy and unimaginative.

With so little in the way of redeeming qualities, it’s truly perplexing as to why it’s garnered so much success. Any teenager who wants to watch good fantasy films needs to look no further than Harry Potter, and the yearly release of trashy RomComs still offer more emotion and heart than this insipid mess. If terrible acting and laughable writing is your thing, Twilight may well be the film for you.

Short review: The Nightmare Before Christmas

Director: Henry Selick
(1993)

While directed by Henry Selick, Tim Burton is often seen as the driving force behind this quirky stop motion animation from Disney. Following Jack Skellington, King of Halloween town as becomes bored of celebrating his spooky holiday and instead decides to celebrate Christmas instead. Cue a good willed takeover from ‘Sandy Claws’ as Jack gets the residents of Halloween town to make toys for children, which turn out horrific due to their scary nature. The film is stuffed with songs, used to add exposition to events without the need for excessive dialogue. The tunes are solid, but some tarnish the experience somewhat by dragging the pacing to a near standstill. This charming tale is amplified by some stunning animation and set design giving the entire production a dark charm that's almost unrepeatable. It lacks substance, but remains fun nonetheless.

Short review: Troll Hunter

Director: André Øvredal
(2011)

Troll Hunter is yet another found footage film, right down to the ‘this is real!’ opening title. A film crew follows a man through Norway believing he’s behind the recent bear killings. Turns out, he’s hunting trolls. From here Troll hunter wants to be a cross between the Blair Witch Project and Cloverfield, but doesn’t quite succeed. This failure can be attributed to a lack of excitement in its troll related scenes. These scenes lack both tension and entertainment; the vigorous camera shake and choppy editing don’t help proceedings. Things are worsened by showing too much of the trolls. Instead of glimpses here and there, the first encounter is an outright reveal, killing any mystery behind these intriguing beasts.

When it comes down to it, troll hunter is a shallow affair. Lovers of found footage films should check it out, but there are far better alternatives. 

Beasts of the southern wild review

Hushpuppy: In a million years, when kids go to school, they gonna know: Once there was a Hushpuppy, and she lived with her daddy in The Bathtub. 

Director: Behn Zietlin
(2012)

Since an incredibly positive word of mouth had erupted earlier this year, I became especially excited to watch Beasts of the Southern Wild. Its story, setting and themes were something I simply had to see, making an immediate trip to the local arthouse cinema. 90 minutes later I left feeling incredibly deflated. Beasts isn’t a bad film, but it frequently shows glimpse of pure brilliance that Behn Zeitlin and his crew simply fail to capitalise upon.

After a phenomenal opening parade, we learn that the bayou community the Bathtub is likely to be flooded as the polar ice caps melt. Our main character is Hushpuppy (Quvenzhané Wallis), a 6 year old girl who lives with her loving yet abusive father, Wink (Dwight Henry). What begins at a snappy pace soon runs out of steam though, and Beasts of the Southern Wild relies solely on its gorgeous location, dreamy voiceover and knockout performances from its leads.

 But what a knockout these performances are. Quvenzhané Wallis was amazingly only 6 years old during filming, yet she washes over the film with her wide eyed brilliance, more so than any storm could ever hope to achieve. The same can be said for her onscreen father Wink (Dwight Henry) also an amateur actor, found by Zeitlin due to his crew frequenting Henry’s bakery. He gives a very stark, real character, harbouring great love for hushpuppy but supplying it with a heavy dose of brutality. Most notably, he makes her live alone, his own way of morphing her into a self sufficient being in the event that he’s no longer around. Something that is bound to happen after he returns wearing hospital apparel, much to Hushpuppy's amusement. While Hushpuppy tries to make sense of the world that rages on around her, prehistoric monsters called Aurochs have awoken from the melted ice, and are stampeding towards the Bathtub. While a very interesting idea, these titular beasts are a wasted opportunity. After being built up throughout the film, Hushpuppy's encounter with them squanders of one of Beasts more magical aspects. If they weren’t in the film, events would be exactly the same.

Beasts is yet another film that suffers from some needlessly shaky camerawork. While it does allow us to become more intimate with Hushpuppy and her perception of the world, it also becomes immensely annoying. When the film’s opening establishing shot is the equivalent of a plastic bag being blown around in the wind, something clearly isn’t right. It isn’t nausea inducing like say, The Hunger Games, but it’s far from perfect.

Despite being full of post Katrina imagery of homes flooded and retaken by nature, Beasts is not an allegory to that shocking storm of 2005. The residents of the bathtub could have abandoned their homes, but chose to stay and wait out the floods. It’s clear that they love where they live, an emotion that shines through strongest when aid workers from the other side of the divisional levee force them into care centres. This marks the worst 20 minutes of the film, gone is the beautiful yet ravaged countryside and instead we get to look at the sterile walls of a treatment centre. Its excruciating to bear and the lacklustre escape by the people of the bathtub is relieving.

After a good hour of nothingness in the bathtub and treatment centre, Hushpuppy decides to search for her mother. There’s no build-up to this quest; her and her friends just jump into the sea and swim outwards as far as they can, aiming for the light that sparkles in the distance. It’s doesn’t mesh with the rest of the narrative, but at this point any event that drives the plot forward is relieving. The next scene is wonderful however, and is what the film should have been like for the entirety of its running time. It’s emotional, taught, beautiful and mystical, coupled with amazing music and camerawork.

In all honesty, I'm disappointed with Beasts of the Southern Wild. Failing to deliver little over sublime acting and incredible beauty, it left me with a rather bitter taste in my mouth. At its best it’s a good film, emulating Malick while retaining its own sense of identity. At its worst it glorifies poverty with its limp story and dead in the water plot. While others witnessed a film equivalent of a force of nature, all I saw was the calm before the storm.

The lovely bones review

Susie Salmon: My name is Salmon, like the fish. First name: Susie. I was 14 years old, when I was murdered, on December 6, 1973.

Director: Peter Jackson
(2009)

Peter Jackson. Fran Walsh. Stanly Tucci, Sariose Ronan, Mark Wahlberg, Rachel Weisz. From the names listed above, the lovely bones seems like it could be a great film. It’s based on a popular book. Who better to craft the film adaptation of a popular book that peter Jackson and Fran Walsh? They did, after all, turn Tolkien’s lord of the rings books into money making, Oscar dominating masterpieces. Despite this abundance of talent, the lovely bones is absolutely trash, and is a perfect example that a good cast and crew doesn’t equal a good film.

The film stars the usually excellent Sariose Ronan as Suzie salmon, a young girl who is brutally murdered by her neighbor. She narrates the majority of the film from the afterlife as her loved ones grieve her murder. This is as detailed as a plot summary can become; the lovely bones is exceedingly thin on the ground. It trades in good narrative and development for characters who mope around and lots of CGI. The first person narration is ample opportunity to give the film some material but instead comes across as very self indulgent. Everything that Susie narrated is meaningless trash and is undoubtedly the worst use of narration I've ever encountered in a film. A fine example of this nonsensical drivel is “My name is Salmon, like the fish. First name: Susie”. If there was ever a quote to sum up the quality of a film, it’s this.

For its first half, the lovely bones is a drag. Characters are paper thin and little important actually occurs in this time. The only redeeming features are in the form of some pretty visual effects shots and the performance of Stanley Tucci’s Mr. Harvey, the films antagonist. The afterlife in which Susie spends most of the film is really quite beautiful, and coupled with some strong cinematography, makes for some pleasant eye candy. Tucci is the films real redeeming feature though, offering a creepy and disturbing character. His intricate actions and unsettling demeanour add considerable tension to the film; he’s the glimmer of light at the end of a very dark tunnel.

Still, Tucci can’t prop up all of the film though it’s overly long run time which is made worse by the constant narration and completely disjointed plot arcs. Susie frolics around the afterlife spouting nonsense while her family grieves her loss. While she does this, the films somber atmosphere is ruined by the character of Suzie’s grandmother. Its only months after Suzie's  murder, but Jackson feels the need to give the film comedic relief in the form of a terribly unfunny montage of drinking liquor and smoking cigarettes. It’s moments like this when the lovely bones shows its true colours; a cheap, lazy, misdirected mess. Even Sariose Ronan was poor, a surprise considering the talent that this young actress possesses.

The lovely bones stumbles to its conclusion, rounding a bad story with a generic and soppy ending. Its manipulation is cheap and transparent, it fails to bring the tears because Jackson has done such a bad job of making us care for these characters, anyone who sees this film for what it actually is will just be glad it’s finished.