Movie Review Round-Up #4 - Walt Disney, Tonto & Some Hobbits Save the Snow Queen

And here I thought I was done with movie reviews for a while - turns out my wife & I have seen quite a few moving pictures here lately, mainly because of the fact that we received a handful of gift cards to Regal Cinemas as Christmas gifts. (I was an AMC man growing up in Lancaster, SC - a city that exists in the shadows of Charlotte, NC - but Regal seems to dominate the theatrical landscape here in the midlands of South Carolina.) Therein lies a decent question to ponder: Would we have seen some of these films if we weren't able to get in for free? Going to the cinema is an expensive prospect seeing as how getting to a theater isn't exactly a 5 minute drive for us, unfortunately. Chances are we would have in the case of Frozen as both my wife and myself are suckers for anything with the Disney logo situated somewhere in the poster art. Similarly, Saving Mr. Banks was an almost automatic selection because you can't go wrong with Tom Hanks. He's essentially the Peyton Manning of Hollywood (Or maybe Peyton Manning is the Tom Hanks of professional football?) in that unless something extraordinarily unusual happens you can count on his performance alone being worth the price of admission.

Then we have The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey and The Lone Ranger, two titles we viewed at home. In the case of The Hobbit, I purchased it on Blu-ray right after it became available and it had been sitting on our entertainment center ever since (yes, that puts it there almost a solid calendar year). I can give no other justification for the delay than the fact I'd simply not taken the time to invest 3 hours of my time in the film. That and we both wanted to watch it so we could hopefully then go to the theater to see The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug. As for The Lone Ranger, it fell into that most bothersome category of movie, that being the sort of flick that you're watching because you're halfway expecting it to be horrible due to what others have said/written about it and you want to either verify or discredit those experiences for yourself.

As an aside to this introduction, I'll note that this turned into a very Disney-heavy Movie Review Round-Up as 3 of the 4 films I'll be talking about originated from the House of the Mouse. I have no real reasoning for pointing this out other than to brag on the fact that my wife & I will be going to Walt Disney World again in May, this time for the 2014 edition of Star Wars Weekends at Disney's Hollywood Studios!

Frozen

Based loosely on a Hans Christian Andersen story called The Snow Queen, Frozen follows the story of Elsa and Anna, a pair of Norwegian sisters born into royalty, the former of happening to have been cursed (as her parents would have her believe) with the power to manipulate ice. Unfortunately she has difficult in controlling these powers and inadvertently injures her younger sister with them while they were playing. Their parents seek out the aid of a troll king who is able to heal Anna, taking away her memories of Elsa's abilities in the process. 

The most glaring issues that Frozen contains, to me, are plot related. They're the kind of problems that children may or may not pick up on but as an adult they stick out like a patch of yellow snow on an otherwise brilliant drift. My biggest gripe is that there's no origin story given to Elsa's powers. We are never told where they come from or why she has them and Anna doesn't, we can only assume it's some sort of supposed curse that befalls an individual every once in a while. As I watched the film I kept saying to myself that she's more or less Ice Man from MARVEL's X-MEN comic books, only she never has the blessing of meeting her equivalent to Professor Xavier.

Therein lies the source of my X-MEN comparisons; Elsa's powers might otherwise be thought of as a mutation in another mythology, not far from that of a character like Iceman. The difference between the two being that Iceman was fortunate enough to be encouraged to hone his abilities by the likes of Professor Xavier and that Elsa's powers appear to be incredibly vast. She's not just controlling ice, she has the capacity to create sentient life - Olaf and the castle guardian are examples of this. The implications of that never get touched upon in this particular narrative, although that's perhaps too deep for what's supposed to be a kid's movie.

In the grand scheme of Disney films, Frozen ranks up there with Beauty and the Beast as well as The Little Mermaid in terms of being captivating stories featuring brilliant vocal performances both in terms of dialogue and in song. It really is a fantastic picture for kids of all ages - if you're an adult, just do yourself a favor by not doing what I did in trying to analyze the thing, nearly forgetting to be entertained in the process.

3.75/5 Professor Xaviers

Saving Mr. Banks

When Walt Disney sought the motion picture rights to Mary Poppins, he wound up confronting author P.L. Travers head on, a woman who was seemingly unwilling to let go of her creation for fear that Disney would tarnish what it meant - not so much to the world, but to Travers herself.

I will be blunt in saying that I am not typically one to watch a film that would be best categorized as a comedy-drama. Likewise, romantic comedies aren't generally my mason jar of sweet iced tea, if you catch my drift. (It's like listening to a Nickelback album - you already know what you're going to get when you turn the thing on because they're all more or less the same.) However, I will be blunt again in saying that a movie like this is worth watching regardless of what your personal tastes may dictate because of the players involved. The combination of Emma Thompson's emulation of P.L. Travers and Tom Hanks' portrayal of Walt Disney makes for a masterful mix of talent. When you throw in the likes of Paul Giamatti and Colin Farrell as accessories, it's fairly difficult to go wrong. They aren't heavy-handed or overbearing in trying to impersonate the individuals they're hoping to represent, rather they all succeed in breathing life into them.

I'm sure that there are those who would look to discredit the historical accuracy of aspects to the plot of Saving Mr. Banks. I can't argue with such criticisms because my knowledge of the history behind this film is slim to none, although I will say that the dynamic tension leading up to the eventual reveal of Travers' reasoning for being so defensive in regard to Mary Poppins treatment by others is a real treat. It's a mixture of storytelling, acting, and editing that make it what it is - a movie that will tug at your heart yet still find a way to make you laugh.

4/5 Mouse Ear Hats

The Hobbit - An Unexpected Journey

Long before Frodo, Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli set off to destroy the ring of power before the dark lord Sauron could reclaim it, there was another mythical quest across Middle Earth involving elves, Hobbits, and sorcery - only this one involved a dragon and the struggle of a small band of dwarfs hoping to take back their homeland.

Based on J. R. R. Tolkien's classic novel, The Hobbit - An Unexpected Journey represents the first act of what will eventually be a trilogy of films.

I am a huge fan of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. I could watch those movies just about any day of the week and be just as entertained as I was the first time I saw them. The cast was so strong for that trio of pictures that I cannot think of anyone I would see replaced in the lineup with other actors. Unfortunately, the cast is one of the biggest problems I have with An Unexpected Journey but its also a reflection of the differences in this story versus that of the Lord of the Rings. There is no Aragorn/Viggo Mortensen here - what I mean by that is there's no primary hero clearly identified, even though some would argue that would be Martin Freeman as a younger version of Bilbo Baggins. (He may be the main character but he's not the charismatic center of the cast; perhaps I'm hoping for too much in expecting to see another similar warrior-type to what was had before.) Instead there's a whole bunch of potential leads none of whom we genuinely get that much of an opportunity with which to bond, and some of whom are almost unlikeable.

With this story, we have a crew of characters in the dwarfs who are almost always together. While they each appear unique in terms of their style, none of them truly have a chance to stick out from the rest aside from Thorin Oakenshield played by Richard Armitage. (I am not lying when I tell you that I could not recall a single one of the dwarf's names other than Oakenshield.) The problem with him is that he comes off as a giant prick right up until the end of the film. By that point, I had pretty well lost interest in anything he had to say; the sudden recovery seemed too forced, at least for me.

My wife & I watched An Unexpected Journey on Blu-ray at home and we're hoping to see the Desolation of Smaug before it leaves theaters. While I may not have enjoyed this film as much as I have some of director Peter Jackson's other offerings set in Middle Earth, I am looking forward to seeing what comes next as I hope the inclusion of Orlando Bloom who returns as Legolas will be a nice shot in the arm to invigorate the story.

3/5 The Preciouses

The Lone Ranger

The concept of a solitary sentinel fighting for justice isn't a novel one, especially not these days where it seems as though every superhero could be described as such. But where did that ideal begin? Probably with an actual member of society who was so inspired at some point in human history if you really want to try and nail it down, but in terms of popular culture the roots of such characters go back to one man, that being the Lone Ranger who first appeared on American airwaves back in 1933 and who has been an iconic figure ever since.

Unfortunately for modern audiences, the Lone Ranger's legacy isn't what it once was thanks to this mess of a film.

Disney and director Gore Verbinski had been on an amazing "winning" streak thanks to the overwhelming success of the Pirates of the Caribbean movies they assembled. With over $1 billion made at the box office, it seemed like the combination of Disney, Verbinski, and star Johnny Depp could do no wrong. Apparently all it took to break the streak was to have Depp play a Native American with a dead bird on his head.

In all honesty, the aesthetic choice of how to represent Tonto in this iteration of the Lone Ranger mythology is about the least troublesome aspect of the overall production. (Depp, to his credit, is his usual over-the-top self here; he's entertaining, I just wish the material he has to work with had been better.) The plot is so tremendously bloated and unnecessarily complex that it's at times difficult to follow but still horribly campy in what it tries to accomplish. To make matters worse, Armie Hammer is tasked with playing a heroic and vivacious action hero even though Armie Hammer has the personality of a loaf of white bread. Then to make matters even more worse, the action sequences are as over the top as any I've ever seen. They're not quite 28-mile-long-runway stupid (as was the case with Fast & Furious 6), but even so I cannot get out of my head how the state of movie-making seems to be that it's required to take anything plausible pertaining to action and throw it out the window.

I imagine the creative meetings for The Lone Ranger went something like this...

Writer: Okay, we've got an idea for a sequence where Ranger, Tonto, and some guys are fighting on a moving train.
Producer: That's not good enough.
Writer: What do you mean?
Producer: That's too simplistic, it needs more...More of everything.
Writer: Alright, what if the train is speeding out of control?
Producer: Not bad, still too vanilla though.
Writer: Um, how about the fight takes place on a speeding, out of control train that gets split into two sections and weaves back & forth between a pair of tracks causing the actors to have to do stunts that no human being could possibly survive or even logically perform?
Producer: Yeah, yeah...Add some explosions and a bridge, now we're talking!

If this movie had a giant mechanical spider it would be Wild, Wild West all over again. Disney had a real opportunity to make what could've been a great western, a real revenge tale involving classic characters. All it would've needed is a more serious tone and a better angle of how best to depict the origin of the Ranger. Instead we're left with this schlock-fest that has very few redeeming qualities.

1.5/5 Loaves of White Bread

Movie Review Round-Up #3 - Robots, Demons, and Mutants (Oh My!)

The 2013 Summer movie season is winding down, and I'd have to say that overall this one has been more or less middle of the road in terms of the quality of films I've had a chance to watch. To me, there just hasn't been anything out thus far that has been so epic in its presentation as to make it the definable movie of the season. That's not to say the movies I've seen so far have all stunk; far from it, as there have been several really good movies (Man of Steel, Despicable Me 2, and Star Trek Into Darkness) but nothing that's been absolutely great. There's been no Avengers or Dark Knight, is what I'm really getting at. Those are the kind of movies that make the bothersome task of going to the movies worthwhile for me seeing as how I can't bring myself to spend money on something like Grownups 2 or We're the Millers. That's the reason why I have Netflix, so that when I can't sleep I can watch something formulaic and repetitive that will put me down for a few more hours.

Pacific Rim

In the not-so-distant future, gigantic monsters from an alternate dimension have begun rising up out of the Pacific ocean using a gateway between their world and ours. Traditional machines of war prove to be ineffective against these great beasts called Kaijus, which is why the governments of the world begin building huge robotic avatars known as Jaegers to be piloted by 2-man teams. The Jaegers were effective initially but the Kaiju threat has grown worse and worse, and the Jaeger fleet has has all but been demolished. Down to a handful of Jaegers and pilots, humanity is making its last stand.

There's nothing about this movie I didn't love, quite frankly. It's robots and monsters fighting, how could every 13 year old boy (or a 33 year old man who still acts like a 13 year old boy a lot of the time) not get a kick out of this? There's more to it than that, though, as the stunning imagery and special effects (produced by the wizards at Industrial Light and Magic) are a great compliment to a well-rounded story featuring characters that are somewhat stock in terms of their construction but still unique.

The cast is lead by Charlie Hunnam (known mostly for his work in Sons of Anarchy) who plays Jaeger pilot Raleigh Beckett, a man haunted by the death of his brother who was killed when the two were engaged in combat with a Kaiju. Idris Elba takes the role of Stacker Pentecost who's the commander of what remains of the Jaeger program. He's assisted by Mako Maori, played by Japanese actress Rinko Kikuchi. Ron Perlman is involved here as well, taking the part of Hannibal Chau a black market dealer in Kaiju parts who's something of a snake oil salesman. Charlie Day rounds out the core group as Dr. Newton Geiszler, a scientist working the the Jaeger program on ways to find the Kaiju's weaknesses.

I can't not mention a young actress by the name of Mana Ashida, who appears as Mako when she was a child. I won't spoil the scenario here in case you haven't seen Pacific Rim. She's not on screen for very long but her performance was brilliant, as far as I'm concerned.

One of the biggest compliments I can pay director Guillermo del Toro for how he constructed this film is to say that there was never a point in time while I was watching Pacific Rim where I thought we truly had the upper hand. There's never a moment where you genuinely feel like mankind or the Jaegers are going to run completely rough-shot over the Kaiju, and that's significant because in so many action movies there never winds up being any sense of peril for the heroes. There's never a situation where you, as a viewer, stop and think "Wow, how the heck are they going to get out of this?" Pacific Rim makes you do that about half a dozen times, and the tension it builds is a great additive to the experience.

4/5 Robot Jox References

Elysium

Almost 150 years into the future, Earth has become so polluted and overpopulated that the most wealthy among the human race abandoned the planet, choosing instead to live on an orbiting space station called Elysium where there is no crime, no war, and no disease. Every day is a struggle for survival for the people who have no choice but to remain on Earth, as the criminals are almost as bad as the robotic infantry put in place to enforce the law.

Elysium's plot follows the plight of Max Da Costa, (Matt Damon) an ex-con living in the ruination that is what remains of Los Angeles looking to redeem himself by earning a living working in a factory that manufactures androids. He becomes exposed to a lethal dose of radiation while on the job - given only days to live, he's presented with the opportunity to get to Elysium and save himself. Little does he realize, at least initially, that he actually has a chance to save everyone.

There is a lot of cool stuff going on in this movie from a technical standpoint. You've got ships capable of space flight, futuristic weapons, humanoid robots with fluid movements, and soldiers equipped with powered exoskeletons. What's more, it all looks great - especially Elysium itself. The problem is that there's not enough emotional substance of characterization behind it all. You wind up with a visually compelling piece of work that doesn't leave any impact on the audience.

The realm of science fiction can be a dark place and there are plenty of films that do a great job of making a case for a less than likeable character becoming a heroic figure, but Elysium spends too much time trying to make the audience care about a guy who, quite frankly, has few redeeming qualities. Much of Elysium's plot centers around Max's effort to save himself after he gets irradiated. Up until the moment he's injured we've not gotten any sort of context that makes him into a likeable or sympathetic person. He's been a thug since he was a child; not a Robin Hood sort of thug, either. He's not even an effective anti-hero because when he's presented with the opportunity to save the dying daughter of a woman he loves (and has loved since childhood) he's still primarily concerned with getting himself into a med-bay (you could make the argument that he's trying to get the agents of Elysium who are chasing him away from her home, but I doubt that's his true inspiration for fleeing). Not until it dawns on him that he more than likely isn't going to survive this journey does his cause shift to aiding the little girl, and by then it's too little too late to make a difference in the mind of a viewer.

I loved District 9 for the fact that it was an amazing piece of allegory that gave a rather stunning perspective on apartheid in South Africa. Blomkamp has tried again to make his audience care about a cultural phenomenon using allegorical means, this time shedding light on the concept of healthcare becoming something only the richest among us can obtain. It's a painful truth, but the fact of the matter is that Elysium comes across as being very heavy handed in its message, almost to the point of being preachy. I'm not disagreeing with the message, mind you, I'm merely of the opinion that politics and entertainment don't always make for the best bedfellows.

And is it me, or is it a little bit ironic that Blomkamp made a movie involving a ring-shaped world considering he was supposed to have directed a movie based on the HALO video games?

3/5 Guilty Sparks

Evil Dead

The lazy critic in me enjoys reviewing movies like Evil Dead, simply because of the fact that recapping their plot doesn't require much effort.

This is your classic "kids go into the woods and get terrorized by some demonic beast until all but maybe 1 or 2 of them are alive" type of movie. It's been done to the point of becoming formulaic, and in the case of Evil Dead it's a gimmick that feels even more redundant seeing as how this is a re-make. What's more, it's a re-make of what has to be one of the campiest horror films ever made, that being director Sam Raimi's Evil Dead which was released in 1981 (it's the movie that introduced Bruce Campbell to the world, though, so it's still awesome). The 2013 edition attempts to ramp up the experience by shedding the inadvertent silliness that was so abundant in the original, instead opting for good old blood and guts horror.

The plot of this incarnation of Evil Dead is based around a group of kids in their late teens or early 20s who've all come out to a remote cabin in the woods in order to have an intervention with one of their friends, a girl who's developed an addiction to heroin. It turns out that the cabin has been used for a variety of activities related to the occult and Satanic rituals, so of course when one of the characters finds a book that's wrapped in barbed wire and heavy plastic he immediately begins reading the thing. He winds up unleashing a demonic entity that inhabits the girl they were trying to help, thus setting off a rather nasty slew of events for all involved.

If you're a fan of practical special effects, those being the kind that rely on prostheses and make-up as opposed to computer generated imagery, you'll enjoy the effort put into this film. I have to say it's refreshing to see this sort of thing. Artists can do amazing things with CGI, it's true, but CGI is too clean looking in my opinion for a movie like this. It needs to be dirty, gory, and sick. You just can't get that out of CGI.

2/5 Bifrucated Tongues

The Wolverine

The Wolverine serves as a follow-up to X-Men: Origins - Wolverine and X-Men: The Last Stand, this time peeling back the history of Logan as it relates to the occasions during his long and tumultuous life where he found himself in Japan. According to this mythology, Logan was a POW being held near Nagasaki and was present when the Fat Man atomic bomb was dropped. He was able to save a man named Yashida, one of his captors, from the blast. Fast forward to present day - Wolverine has done his best to drop off the grid as he's haunted by memories and dreams of his lost love, Jean Grey, choosing to live the life of a hermit in the Canadian wilderness. His seclusion is interrupted when he's found by a young woman named Yukio who has come to bring him back to Japan as Yashida is dying of cancer and wants to thank Logan for saving him all those years ago. It turns out that Yashida knows of Logan's pain and offers him the one thing he has never thought possible - a noble death.

Hugh Jackman has made the role of Wolverine his defining work, and he continues to be the linchpin of the entire X-Men film franchise. How many other actors can say they've been able to successfully carry an entire series? (Certain media outlets are claiming Fox has offered him $100 million to continue on with the character in 4 more movies - that sounds like a lot of money until you consider how much cash he and the other merry mutants have raked in for the company.) The work he's done with this character is quite marvelous (See what I did there? X-Men, comics, MARVEL, marvelous?) and I highly doubt the series would be where it is if not for his charismatic abilities to make Logan the sympathetic warrior that he is.

Therein lies one of my problems with this movie. It is incredibly overbearing in trying to convey Wolverine as being in this epic state of depression. That's an understandable move - he wound up having to kill the woman he loved, for crying out loud, he's got a reason to be sad. Add to that the fact that he spends a majority of the film having to deal with being in a compromising position thanks to his healing abilities being suppressed, and you've got a version of Wolverine that's just not Wolverine for lack of a better way of putting it.

What I'm getting at is I don't like emo Wolverine. I like feral, berserker Wolverine. Chaos is just more entertaining, I guess.

I will be forthright in saying that, in hindsight, this movie feels a lot like nothing more than a transitional piece meant to bridge a gap left between X-Men: The Last Stand and the coming X-Men: Days of Future Past. I didn't dislike it, I simply don't think this was that big of a moment in the grand scheme of things. That said, Fox could've simply had Jackman suit up for the post-credits Easter egg scene, put that out around Comic Con or some other similar event, and been done with it.

3/5 Bone Claws

Movie Review Round-Up - A Furiously Tangled Trek Into the Oblivion of Iron Man 3

It's summer time which means it's also movie time, and for that reason it's one of my favorite times of year. I could do without the heat and humidity seeing as how it tends to turn me from being a big, hairy beast into a big, hairy sweaty beast with questionable hygiene. It's 138 degrees outside this time of year and there are bugs whereas in any given theater it's 70 degrees and there are nachos readily available. Sure, there are annoying little kids and their unqualified and ineffective parents to deal with (sadly I've had experiences in theaters that have left me questioning how some adults have lived as long as they have and wanting to punch a child), but is it any wonder why I'd sooner stay inside and watch movies?

Star Trek Into Darkness

Picking up where JJ Abrams' reboot of the classic Star Trek mythology left off, Into Darkness sees Kirk (Chris Pine), Spock (Zachary Quinto), and their cohorts plunged into battle with a foe that is both mysterious and familiar. Through perceived acts of terror, this villain reveals that Star Fleet has realized a threat exists in the form of the Klingons and that scientific exploration is no longer the sole purpose of their operations.

Pine and Quinto are the obvious headliners of this movie but for my money Benedict Cumberbatch is the true star. His portrayal of Khan is absolutely brilliant - he has an amazing voice, which is a lot like that of Jeremy Irons only somehow more visceral in its delivery. Like all great villains, he has charisma to rival that of his protagonist counterparts. Combine that with the fact that his character's back story involves a legitimate effort at revenge and you can see why there are points in this that I was genuinely pulling for Khan instead of the crew of the Enterprise.

Longtime Trek fans will quickly realize that the plot of Into Darkness is something of a re-hashing of 1982's Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. This take on Khan is more relevant to today's audiences as the concept of a character seeking vengeance on an assumed political or government entity is certainly identifiable.

One of few issues I have with the movie is the finale of Into Darkness in that it tidies up a bit too well. There was an effort to send everyone home happy here, or so it seems. That and the fact that there are still parts of the Enterprise's interior that look altogether too much like a boiler room are all that bothered me. I'm looking forward to seeing where this new Trek is headed, even though it may be a while before we see another one since Abrams' focus is now on a different universe, one far, far away from this.

/5 Tribles

Iron Man 3

The world has changed for Tony Stark (Robert Downey, Jr.) since his encounter with other-worldly beings in The Avengers. He's a man so distraught with fear over being unable to protect the one person he cares for more than life itself (Pepper Potts/Gwyneth Paltrow), he's dedicated his every waking moment to advancing his Iron Man armory by building dozens of specialized configurations. Try as he might to use what he knows to satiate his fears, they're realized when Stark encounters an international terrorist known as the Mandarin.

I don't get Stark as a haunted man who's suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, even though it's a topical subject that's gotten a lot of attention now that so many members of our Armed Forces are returning home from combat with symptoms of PTSD. Downey is still the only person I ever want to see play Tony Stark, I just think the well is running dry on Iron Man now that he's done his job in serving as a conduit for The Avengers to assemble. What's more, the relationships that exist between these characters doesn't feel as fluid as it has in the past.

I hate to say this - IM3 is my least favorite of the Iron Man franchise. There was a lot of fanfare about Shane Black (who's best known for having created the Lethal Weapon series) coming aboard to take the helm once Jon Favreau decided not to return as director after having lead the first two films, but I don't think Black's writing or directorial style have improved matters. If anything, he's managed to take the canon a few steps backwards. IM3 has too many moving parts that aren't that interesting. This is particularly disappointing because there's a decent chance this is the last dedicated Iron Man film starring Downey, Jr.

/5 Shellheads

Tangled


Tangled is Disney's interpretation of the Grimm fairy tale Rapunzel, and like many of the Disney translations this story has been modified to make it more consumable for younger audiences. By that I mean it has a happier ending where evil has been vanquished and good prevails, as opposed to almost everyone involved dying a horribly tragic death. But what else should we expect? This is Disney, after all.

Rapunzel (Mandy Moore) is in her late teens here and, like most girls her age, she's beginning to feel the urge to strike out on her own. In Rapunzel's case, her need is more legitimate than most seeing as how she's been held captive under the pretense that the outside world is a terribly dangerous place by the woman she thinks is her mother, Gothel (Donna Murphy), in a tower where the only other being she has contact with is her pet chameleon Pascal. Her desire to flee is enabled when a bungling burglar (Flynn Rider/Zachary Levi) finds his way into the tower. He inadvertently sets off a series of events that not only gets Rapunzel out of the tower but reveals her true identity as well.

I think a lot of people are under the impression that Disney and Pixar are the same entity but in watching Tangled I can tell you that a number of differences can be spotted. The style of animation, most notably, but what stands out the most is the writing. I'm of the opinion that Pixar's films are some of the best written movies, animated or otherwise, you'll ever see. I'm not saying that material like Tangled isn't penned well but the fact that this is an adaptation versus a novel concept does hurt it somewhat as there's already a "tower" in place from the start which confines where these characters can go.

There's not an overwhelming sense of star power here, and I appreciate that. It seems like a lot of A-list Hollywood talent do an animated feature for the heck of it. Here, you have a main character voiced by Mandy Moore, a singer and actress who's more than capable of handling the musical elements while also breathing life into Rapunzel. Zachary Levi does a great job with Rider as he's not only the comedic center of the film but also a character with a number of dramatic scenes as well. Donna Murphy is yet another evil pseudo-mother in the annals of Disney mythology; she doesn't have that much to hang her hat on as the character isn't as involved as some of their other villainous matriarchs have been.

This may seem odd but my two favorite characters from Tangled are ones that have no actual lines: Pascal the chameleon and Maximus the horse. Seriously, they're fantastic - I'd probably watch an "Adventures of Pascal & Maximus" if it ever happened.

 /5 Frying Pans

Fast & Furious 6


I have to apologize to anyone who's a fan of this series because I don't particularly see the need to spend a whole lot of time reviewing this movie. When you are talking about a franchise that's on it's sixth iteration, it stands to reason that the movies have become paint-by-number in terms of their assembly and that's exactly the case here. There are criminals, there are cops, there are fast cars, and a whole heaping helping of absurdity to tie it together.

Vin Diesel and essentially all the other original members of the Fast & Furious cast have returned. Their characters have more or less sunk into lives of hiding in order to stave off heat from various international crime fighting organizations, but as it turns out it's those same groups that were hunting them that now need their help. There's a new bad guy in town, one with a similar penchant for being fast and furious about it, and there's apparently no better team to throw at this new threat than an aging group of street racers.

I'm one to talk when it comes to criticizing movies and TV shows where an ability to suspend what's plausible in this realm of existence is necessary, seeing as how that's more or less everything that I watch. Be that as it may, Fast & Furious 6 has a number of scenes where you have to take everything you've ever learned about physics and the durability of the human body and throw it out the window. More than that, you have to take it and light it on fire with kerosene - it's that crazy, and it's that distracting. For example, if Fast & Furious 6 is to be believed, there exists a runway somewhere in Europe that is approximately 300 miles long.

Don't worry, they're already working on Fast & Furious 7 which will add Jason Statham to the cast.

/5 Vin Diesels

Oblivion

In the not so distant future, humanity has fled planet Earth as a result of the rock we once called home having been ravaged by an alien race (who went so far as to blow up the moon, just for good measure) that sought to annihilate our species and strip-mine the globe of any useful resources. We were somehow able to overcome the odds and defeat the invaders but we did so at the cost of losing what once was our home world as Earth is too far gone to remain habitable. Now only a few humans remain on Earth, support crews in place to oversee a mining operation to provide fuel for the colonizing effort on one of Saturn's moons (where the survivors of our kind are holed up) and protect it from attacks by alien survivors, now known as Scavs (short for "scavengers").

Tom Cruise leads the cast of Oblivion as he plays Jack, a character who is a mechanic but also a soldier, tasked with maintaining a batch of automated mining platforms and a squadron of airborne drones that protect them from Scav attacks. Imagine Ethan Hunt from the Mission: Impossible series but with more knowledge of engines than international espionage. He's flanked by Victoria (Andrea Riseborough), whose role in the operation is similar to that of technical advisor and overwatch, meaning she's Jack's eyes and ears when he's out in the wasteland.

Visually speaking, Oblivion shares much with director Joseph Kosinski's only other film, that being TRON: Legacy. That's not a complaint as I loved Legacy and I can't wait to see what Kosinski does with the announced sequel to that film.

I don't feel like I can justifiably get into discussing the remainder of the cast because, to put it quite simply, there's a whole lot of ways I could spoil the plot and I don't have enough cleverness within me to skirt the material without blatantly stating what happens. That said, I will tell you that while there are a number of twists to this story the sum of the entire thing is very derivative. There are elements of films like Moon, Terminator, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Independence Day, and a sprinkling of classic Twilight Zone episodes. It's not a bad mix of inspiration as sci-fi goes these days but the more the movie goes on the more imitative it seems to become.

/5 evil super computers

Movie Review - GI Joe: Retaliation

Like pretty much every other little boy who had the distinct privilege of having been born in the 1980s (a truly epic decade in terms of cultural and technological advancements), I played with Hasbro's GI Joe toys and I truly loved them. To me, they were awesome - I found them so appealing because they combined cutting edge military technology and exciting possibilities for battlefield carnage thanks to the assortment of vehicles & weapons available to both the heroic GI Joes and the villainous forces of Cobra. I would stage battles routinely, both indoors and out; truth be told, I had a sandbox in my Grandparents back yard and I would quite often have burial ceremonies for fallen combatants after the war of the day had concluded. (PRO-TIP: Don't bury GI Joe figures in wet sand, it ruins the joints.) I went so far as to get characters from other series involved in the mix. I know I wasn't the first kid to have He-Man fighting side by side with Snake Eyes or to wonder what would happen if Star Scream hooked up with Baroness.

Okay, that last one might have been a bit weird (not to mention physically impossible), but the point of that opening paragraph was to say that the GI Joe toys were a big part of my childhood. It goes without saying that the live-action GI Joe movies are of significant interest to me, if for no other reason than the fact that they project the kind of nostalgic sensations that are, fittingly enough, generally reserved for hero worship. Throw in some of the most well-known action stars in the modern era of movie-making with a whole bunch of explosions and you've got the makings for a fine afternoon of cinema - or, as is the case with GI Joe: Retaliation, an entertaining but ultimately mindless and rather disjointed movie that doesn't live up to the expectations of little boys like me who've gotten older but haven't necessarily grown up yet.

Set not too long after the events of its predecessor, GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra, Retaliation's plot picks up with the world of the Joes mirroring that of our own. Occurrences in countries like Pakistan and North Korea are creating instability in different regions and the Joes are doing what they do best - fighting under the flag of the United States as a group of highly trained and outfitted soldiers using special tactics and covert techniques to prevent dangerous munitions from getting into the hands of the enemies of freedom. Trouble rears it's ugly head when Zartan (Arnold Vosloo), a Cobra operative masquerading as the President of the US since the actual President (Jonathan Pryce) was kidnapped during The of Rise of Cobra, begins setting into motion a plan that will set free Cobra Commander from a suspended animation prison and completely decimate the Joes. Having been set loose by Storm Shadow (Byung-hun Lee) and Firefly (Ray Stevenson), Cobra Commander lashes out with a diabolical strategy to simultaneously disarm the world's nuclear powers and destroy them using a series of satellites serving as weapon platforms equipped with armaments capable of laying waste to entire cities. With minimal resources and personnel, the surviving Joes - Roadblock (Dwayne Johnson), Lady Jaye (Adrianne Palicki), Flint (D.J. Cotrona) and Snake Eyes (Ray Park) - must fight back to reclaim America and, in fact, the rest of the world from the evil clutches of Cobra.

I can't talk about Retaliation without mentioning the fact that it sat on a shelf in a somewhat completed state for almost a year before finally being released in theaters. Originally, this movie was supposed to have debuted in June of 2012 but it was delayed by Paramount Pictures as they saw fit to convert the film to 3D and also re-shoot part of the thing in order to increase Channing Tatum's involvement. I fail to understand the benefit of either of these moves. As a moviegoer, 3D does nothing for me - I still see it as a gimmick designed to bilk people out of a few extra bucks at the box office. And regarding Tatum, ladies, please don't kid yourselves - he's not naked in this one. For that matter, he's barely in the movie at all. That's not necessarily a bad thing as I was growing tired of his portrayal of Duke as the cocky high school quarterback by the point in time that he gets blown up (darn, my spoiler alert button appears to be malfunctioning).

Dwayne Johnson is the real star here although with a line-up this big he's got a lot of other players competing with him for screen time. Roadblock is a good role for him as it fits and plays to his abilities, but there's not enough substance here to give him something worth hanging his hat on. Despite his many acting gigs, Johnson is still waiting for the part that makes him an icon, in my opinion. He hasn't yet found his Terminator or Die Hard, is what I'm getting at, but even so he's plenty capable of being entertaining.

On another note, me being the pro wrestling fan that I am it still feels odd to have to refer to him as Dwayne Johnson and not The Rock - even Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson is weird, although not as bad.

As for the rest of the cast, Bruce Willis is the most recognizable face and definitely the one with the most credentials. His part here is that of the grizzled veteran who knows better than to stand down even though he's been long since taken out of active duty. For all intents and purposes, Ray Stevenson is the most prolific villain in Retaliation but that's mostly due to the fact that his cohorts are all wearing masks of some sort or another. I'm a fan of Stevenson's, even though he's definitely not a household name. If you're into zombie movies or gritty horror mixed with sci-fi, find a copy of a film Stevenson starred in called Outpost - I think you'll be glad you did.

Speaking of actors in masks, Ray Park reprises the role of Snake Eyes in Retaliation, a part which sees him donning a full helmet as was the case with the character originally in the cartoon series. Park is best known for his work as Darth Maul in Star Wars - Episode I: The Phantom Menace and also for having played Toad in Bryan Singer's X-Men. He's the type of actor who doesn't receive much fanfare (stuntmen rarely get the respect they deserve), and unfortunately Snake Eyes doesn't get much to do here. There's a major sequence in which he participates but it didn't have any sort of impact upon me. It's an example of a scene that should really grab you by the seat of your pants yet manages to feel mostly flat because of it being rushed and poorly plotted.

D.J. Cotrona is more or less here to fill out a part as his work with Flint isn't at all distinctive, but I blame the script for that more than I do him as an actor; he can only do what's on the page, after all. Adrianne Palicki adds some much-needed femininity to the core group of surviving Joes, however there's not a whole lot of effort put into establishing her character outside of a rather typical "girl who wanted to work hard to prove she could do it" back story. Palicki, if you weren't aware, was cast to play the title part in a Wonder Woman TV series for which NBC filmed a pilot episode but never went further than that.

Shame to see that costume go to waste.

For me, the plot of this film and the writing behind it is a big part of why Retaliation is ultimately rather dull. (Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick penned the script; they had a hit in the form of Zombieland but that magic isn't anywhere to be found in Retaliation.) This is the sort of thing that happens when you're dealing with a story that is trying to include 10 or more primary characters packed into a movie that's not even 2 hours long. You can't establish emotional connectivity and get everything else in, so what gets sacrificed? The emotional connections, I'm sad to say. Oh, Duke died? Go figure! (Spoiler Alert Button Status: still malfunctioning.) It winds up being action and explosions for the sake of having action and explosions, not because there's any substantive reasoning for either. Maybe I'm off my rocker for expecting more out of this material, but I persist in the thought that even something as silly as a kids cartoon can be converted into a piece of work suitable for all audiences that manages to have heart and logic included.

One of my biggest pet peeves about an action movie like Retaliation is the music, specifically the lack of anything resembling recognizable, thematic scoring. Consider classic action heroes and their musical accompaniment. Superman has theme music. Indiana Jones has theme music. James Bond has theme music. Harry Potter has theme music. Hell, for that matter, Forrest Gump has theme music. Why then do the GI Joes not get theme music? The closest thing I heard to a consistent piece of music herein was something that cropped up a couple times in battle sequences which, to my ears, sounded a whole heck of a lot like Rammstein's "Reise Reise". That doesn't pass muster for a true theme, though, not in my book. A theme should be bombastic, consistent, and immediately recognizable - the sounds I point out weren't any of that. I know it would be corny but I'd have sufficed for a revamped version of one of the themes from the GI Joe cartoons - something, anything to add to the ambiance of the movie.

 

GI Joe: Retaliation isn't a terrible movie by any means although I'd say it certainly does fall into the category of mindless Summer-time action flicks. I've read some criticisms of Retaliation wherein the writer opines that this movie is better than GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra. Personally, I liked The Rise of Cobra better. With all the technology and gear flying around in addition to the colorful personalities involved, it just felt more like a true GI Joe story whereas Retaliation comes across as being GI Joe interpreted through the eyes of someone who's played a bit too much Call of Duty.

Knowing what I know now, would I pay money to see it again? Probably not, and I certainly wouldn't pony up the extra $4-$5 for the 3D "experience". This is the kind of movie that I would more often than not reserve for an occasion where I'm browsing Netflix at 6 AM on a Saturday because I can't sleep and need something to kill time until my wife is up and around.