“TROLLS”

You know what, I have bashed Dreamworks a couple of times, but they actually can produce some excellent animation. I have already mentioned how much I love the Kung Fu Panda films when I did my review of Kung Fu Panda 3 and I am really a big fan of the How to Train Your Dragon series. That being said, however, when Dreamworks are bad they are not really on form, I may like the 1st two Shrek films, but the last 2 really don’t sit well with me, especially the 3rd one where I can’t recall a single funny moment in, and Trolls really looked like it would be joining that list. The trailers looked horrendous, it also doesn’t help that the film has been executively produced by Justin Timberlake and looked like it would be just a big advertisement for his up-coming album. That being said, however, the film does have the same writing team that were behind Kung Fu Panda 2 & 3, however, you’ve also got to remember that those guys did Alvin and The Chipmunks Shipwrecked, so let’s face it, they are not always on form.

I am nothing if not fair and I did give this film a good go over and I must be honest, well, there wasn’t really that much else to review this week, it was either this, Inferno or Storks and frankly Inferno looked so dull that I wouldn’t really have that much to say and Storks, well, I had already cancelled that review so I could review Your Name last week, so why not go and see a colourful Dreamworks film with a mass of celebrity voice cast, who by the way all looked like they had been picked because they were popular rather than they were right for the role, but as I said, I am fair, so with the very high standard of animation that we have received in 2016, how does Troll fit in the mix?

The plot of the film is that the Trolls have hidden from the Bergen for 20 years, since the Bergen believe that eating Trolls is the only way that they can feel happy. The Bergen Chef (voiced by Christine Baranski) however has now found them after Princess Poppy, (played Anna Kendrick) throws a party that is way too loud and attracts the Bergen to their location. After several of her friends are captured she asks for help from Branch, (played by Justin Timberlake) and they must make their way to the Bergen village in order to save their friends.

I have seen a lot of animated films this year, some that have been amazing, some mediocre, and 2 that have been complete garbage. This is the 3rd one. Yes, it will shock you to hear this, but Trolls is really, really awful and it really stems down to its asinine plot. The plot sounds simple on paper but the structure of the story is so horrendous that the premise simply cannot work. What I have described is actually only really part of the plot. It then for some reason, spends a large portion of its time doing its version of Trolls Cinderella, trying to get the young Bergen King (voiced by Christopher Mintz-Plasse) with a Bergen named Bridget (played by Zoey Deschanel). This whole thing really reeks of the production staff interfering with the film and it feels like they were clearly trying to capitalize off the success of Disney’s recent Cinderella movie, and realized they couldn’t be sued by Disney since the story is in public domain. This isn’t even the worst part of the film. There is no consistency whatsoever and it can’t stick to its world’s rules. If the Bergen can’t feel happiness unless they eat a Troll, then why are they excited for the festival when they can eat Trolls!!. They showed a wide range of expressions and emotions, happiness has got to be in there, making this whole film feels amazingly stupid. The Bergen king is very young in the film, but he’s only about 10-12 at most and we see him at the beginning of the film when he is 5 years old, that doesn’t sound off, but you have to remember they make it very clear 20 years have passed in the time between the flashbacks and the current time that the film is taking place. Do the Bergen age a lot less than the Trolls? It’s never acknowledged and it stinks of lazy writing. There are all sorts of moments like this. The big problem with the plot is that it never sticks to one thing and does it, it never has much character consistency, none of the moments that are meant to be so called ‘emotional’ actually work because you don’t care at all about the characters, since they are all awful stereotypes or cut outs or at worse just catch phrase spewing idiots!!! None of them are at all funny, none of the jokes made me laugh. In fact there are a couple of adult jokes thrown in there that felt wildly out of place, I guarantee you, the parents are not laughing at this film, they have fallen asleep!. The whole thing is just dumb, dumb, dumb. It’s really done for kids and its really, horrendously put together. You want to know what my worst factor of this film is, it’s noise. This film is nothing but constant noise. There is never a moment where the film takes a break. It’s constantly on. There is so much colour, so much action, so many sound effects and songs and it’s just unbearable. It feels like it is constantly hitting you over the head with a rainbow coloured baseball bat. It doesn’t help that all the colours are incredibly bright and obnoxious, but the thing constantly feels like, if it ever stops to have a moment, it will lose the kids attention.

I remember Doug Walker made an interesting parallel like this in one of his reviews, it’s a case of playing a level of Super Mario Bros, do you want Mario to be constantly moving, or do you want him to stop, jump and see a lot of really good technical platforming. You want the latter, because that’s more interesting to look at. This is just a get them in, get them out, and make sure they spend a ton of money, especially considering that when I saw this at Odeon there were tons of special product deals there, including getting a drink with a Trolls straw and cup.

My big problem with the film is also the Soundtrack. I normally keep the Soundtrack to the last portion when I talk about the animation and the production but it’s such a big highlight of the film that I feel this needs to be talked about now. The Soundtrack is awful. Ok, I don’t mind songs in kids films, some of the Disney films actually do it quite well, see films like Aladdin and Hunchback of Notre Dame for that. Difference being, they actually wrote songs for this. This is a Juke Box musical. They are all covers of songs and much like the Alvin and the Chipmunks movies, they are mostly awful renditions of songs you would never want to hear by the original artists and of course with a few lyric changes because some of them have lyrics that are a bit risque, for the lack of a better term. The only difference between this and Alvin and the Chipmunks is they actually threw in a couple of songs that I like and ruined the hell out of them, including a terrible rendition of Clint Eastwood by Gorillaz and why the hell they thought it was a good idea to do a kids bop version of the Sound of Silence, I will never know, and just doing that alone is inexcusable and unforgiveable!!

You know what this film is like, you remember that song from that Simpsons episode, Sunshine, Lollipops and Rainbows, yes, well imagine a whole film like that. That is the plot of this film in a nutshell, it’s nothing but a kid’s sugar rush and I think the biggest problem I had with the film was its message. The film tries to go with, all you have to do is be happy and everyone has the ability to be happy inside. Justin Timberlake’s character is a massive pessimist who was a bit of welcome relief until he started getting happy as the film went on. His big moment when you find out why he is so pessimistic doesn’t nearly have any of the impact it should have. What’s more, he keeps spouting on that not everything is sunshine and rainbows, but by the end of the film, this is kind of the solution. You remember how Inside Out ended, where it gave that really mature message that ‘sometimes its ok to be sad, it’s how you get back up from it that counts’ yes, this feels like the opposite message, of, ‘stay permanently happy and things will always go your way’ and that to me was my biggest problem of the film, it’s too simplistic and I feel once again, I have to mention, the film feels like the film equivalent of junk food, nothing but empty calories.

As for the performances, well we are a by the numbers family film that aims at the lowest common denominator you can expect a ton of celebrity voices. The only ones who really leave any sort of impression are Justin Timberlake and Anna Kendrick, even though both of their characters were very annoying so I didn’t care for them. Apart from those two, the cast has clearly been chosen to be recognizable to both British and American audiences, hence why they have a lot of celebrities that are big in both countries, such as James Corden, Russell Brand, who barely gets anything to do and gets one of the worst characters to play, and that says a lot, and we even briefly get John Cleese who frankly feels wasted. The cast member who feels most out of place is definately Gwen Stefani, who really is here to just to add an extra famous name to the poster, she has no business being in this film and plays one of the most pointless roles. Overall the cast do a terrible job, but it’s not their fault since they are given awful lines and direction to work with. I didn’t even mention Christopher Mintz-Plasse and Zooey Deschanel who feels so underwhelming in their performances that they might as well have been replaced by professional voice actors to a similar or greater effect!

Well, if I am talking about production, well there isn’t much left really to talk about. I already mentioned this thing is basically a glorified advert for the Soundtrack, not surprising since Justin Timberlake is an Executive Producer on the film, I have already mentioned I hated the songs. But, let’s talk about the animation. As I said it is obnoxious with the amount of bright colours that are on screen, so much so, that I would recommend seeing the film in 3D even though I saw the 2D, since bright colours and tons of light suits 3D very well, but since I saw the 2D version, I felt that the bright colours really interfered with my enjoyment. It’s just all rainbow candy and I can’t stand that. Some studios work quite well with these colours. Recent Disney 3D films like Zootopia did very well with this, but at least they reigned it in. The Dream Eaters in Kingdom Hearts would be saying there is way too much colour on these things. Not to mention, that despite the fact that this is 3D animation from Dreamworks, it looks severely under the normal quality that they put out. This is especially evident considering that this is coming out in the same year as Kung Fu Panda 3 which I have already reviewed and those films had amazing animation. I really, really could not stand the amount of quick cuts and overly energetic scenes that were constantly in the movie. It doesn’t help that the movement looks awful just because it is way too energetic and I can’t keep up with it. It looks like a kid on a sugar rush!

The big question is though, is Trolls worse than Norm of the North, No. At least this film felt like it had some effort put into it. It has the same sort of idea of, do the kids 3D animated kids film formula and stick it out there that Norm of the North had. This one felt like some effort had been put into it, whereas Norm of the North feels like it was just made to make a buck! Does that make it a good film? Hell NO!! If it wasn’t for Norm of the North, Trolls would be the worst animated film I have seen this year. I really didn’t like this film and came out of the cinema extremely annoyed. The plot is all over the place, the characters were annoying and obnoxious, the voice acting was terrible, the writing is god awful, to such an extent, I didn’t even mention that the world has absolutely no concrete plan, since the writers couldn’t be bothered to think that up and the film has absolutely no climax whatsoever, it literally just ends, it couldn’t be bothered. The humour is never funny, and it’s just a lot of constant noise and movement, except for one sad moment(if you can even call it that), which was a welcome bit of relief after spending 1hr 30mins watching a film that was constantly on. I hated this film and I really never want to see it again. This is just a glorified advert for a terrible Soundtrack and if you want a terrible kid bops version of songs that were mostly awful in the first place, with a couple of exceptions, then you are welcome to it, but frankly, I am out, this film was painful.

No mini review this week, since I saw this the day after Your Name, and my goodness, was that a massive comedown.

“I can’t believe this was the end of the London Film Festival.”

“YOUR NAME”

Or, as it is known in its native Japan Kimi No Na Wa. Brought to us once again from Director Makoto Shinkai who also wrote the screenplay. This Anime has definitely created a massive buzz in a short space of time. It was at one the point the Number 1 on MyAnimeList.com and Anime Planet which recently got overtaken by A Silent Voice, but I would be hesitant to say that will probably stick. The film’s also, so far, the highest grossing film in Japan in 2016 and that’s including a lot of the major releases that I have reviewed this year. Now granted, Anime’s do sell bigger in Japan, Studio’s Ghibli’s dominance at the Box Office being a prime example of this, however, that is still no small accomplishment especially considering the abundance of Super Hero movies this year. Makoto Shinkai’s name may not be that familiar to people who are not up on Anime, but if you want a reference, he wrote and directed the screenplay for Garden of Words and also directed Five Centimeters Per Second. I am now a huge fan of these films, Garden of Words, which I actually watched in preparation for this review, is pretty good, all things considered. It had some good drama and decent writing and the animation was gorgeous, but I didn’t fully buy into it. Five Centimeters Per Second, which I saw ages ago, was a film that frankly, I’m not getting why it has such a fan base, to me it was a prime example of trying to fit too much in to too little time, with so many people working on the film, it felt like too many cooks had spoilt the broth. This could have easily been rectified and should have been a series, but as it stands, it’s a movie that doesn’t work for me, though I can understand why some people really enjoy it. So what’s the big difference that Your Name has to these other films. Well, for one thing, this is the first time he has made a feature length film, by the minimal criteria it takes to get a feature length film released in cinemas in Europe and America. Five Centimeters Per Second came in at just over an hour and Garden of Words only 46 minutes long, which qualify for cinema release in Japan. All things considered, I was hyped by the buzz and I actually got my tickets, rather luckily, when it played at the London Film Festival and it was even screened in the new Embankment Garden cinema which has been specially built for the 60th anniversary of the festival. With all that buzz it was clear that I was very hyped to see it. A bonus was I then found out I didn’t have to go a see a film earlier that day, it qualifies for a review since the film will receive a general release that will be licensed by all the Anime and will be in cinemas, mainly showcase cinemas, but others cinemas are going to be included on 24 November which is lucky, because I am on holiday at that time. So with me finally getting a review out before a movie is released, and hopefully I haven’t broken any embargo rules by doing so, is Your Name worth rushing to a cinema in November for, for its very limited release.

Your Name is the story of two people, one resident in Tokyo who are both high school students, Taki (played by Ryunosuke Kamiki) and Mitsuha (played by Mone Kamishiraishi). They have never met before but they suddenly have managed to swap bodies on random days. They keep diaries of each other’s actions on their smart phones in order to keep track of what the other is doing, and they have no idea how or why the switching is taking place, all we as the audience know, is that it is something to do with a comet that has flown close to Japan. The one day the swaps stop happening and Taki sets off to the countryside to find her but discovers that something awful has happened. I really don’t want to go any further than that because frankly this a film you should experience yourself. It’s one hell of a ride. Granted this is a very familiar setting to any Anime fans, after all, almost every Anime that comes out now is set in a high school and involves high school or middle school students. For some reason, Japanese writers want to write about Teenagers, however, at least they do a better job than most Western writers do at writing Teenagers. If there is one thing to say about this film, however, it’s that it is really going to set the Anime community on fire. This is a really good Anime movie.

In my screening, I was actually very fortunate to see a lot of people who didn’t look like they were regular Anime viewers, and that’s a good thing because I would like to see Anime get a large scale audience outside of Studio Ghibli films and if this film is the bar for it, then I am really glad, because this film is really very good. Why do I like this more than other films that Makoto Shinkai has done? Well there are two factors which I think are lacking in his previous two films, the first being, this film, unlike Five Centimeters Per Second, has a much better focus. The film really knows exactly what its plot is doing and the route it is going to take to get to its conclusion. Second of all, the characters, I really, really liked the main 2 characters, something that didn’t entirely work for me in Garden of Words. This film feels like Makoto Shinkai has listened to a lot of the criticism that has been thrown at his previous films and has really worked to improve himself. The film feels like a much better crafted story and as a result it means that we have a much more engaging film. The film also has a terrific sense of pace, the pacing is very well handled, if with a couple of hiccups and it feels like you are following these characters in what feels like a slice of life Anime with a slight paranormal edge to it. However, when the film changes focus it at least feels like it has earnt it.

The first half of the film is actually quite humorous and has a really nice charm to it. This wasn’t the most engaging part of the film, because I feel like I have seen a lot like this, but let’s face it, these are probably the sort of tropes that keep Anime fans coming back. There are these really nice characters with a relatable story and some humorous moments, but when the film got more serious and dark in the second half, it felt like it had earnt it, it also meant that those parts hit home a lot more because we had become accustomed to the characters and grown to like them so want to see them come out well, we want a happy ending, something that people who know about Makoto Shinkai’s previous films, will know is not a guarantee. I won’t go into too much detail about the second half of the film since it’s actually a decent plot twist which really shakes up the film in a way that makes the second half a brilliant experience. It adds a sense of depth and urgency to the film, something that I feel was desperately needed and made me want to see the characters come out well. It’s also apparent where the darker moments came from in the second half.

Makoto Shinkai was actually giving a Q & A session after my screening and he stated that one of the things that heavily inspired the darker moments of the film was several of the tragedies that had hit Japan over the years, most recently the 2012 Earthquake and that is very evident in the final product, even though those events aren’t specifically referenced.

If I go into any more detail, I fear I will ruin this film for you. One of the best factors is its two main characters, you really believe in these characters, I really liked them, you had fun with them and you want to see them come out on top.

Are there issues with the plot, yes, a couple. First being that a couple of the jumps feel a bit sporadic and I while it wasn’t an issue for me, I feel some audience members may struggle in telling who is doing what at what time, something I feel the dub might actually fix for people who speak English as their first language. That is not meant to be disrespectful for people with Japanese as a first language, I am just saying that people may not pick up on a lot of the nuance that the Japanese actors are giving these roles, again this is not a knock on their performances, which I thought were good. There is also something that is thrown in, in the second half, which I would be lying if I said I didn’t think was a bit of a Deus Ex Machina, but you know what, I was so wanting it to happen, that I didn’t care really and it didn’t bother me as a whole, but I thought I should mention it. Basically, I would like to call it Clannad syndrome, anyone who has seen Clannad and Clannad After Story will know what the hell I am on about!!

While I did feel like this film got an emotional reaction out of me, especially in its ending which I thought was really well done, I don’t think this Anime hit me in, for the lack of a better term, “the feels” the same way that like When Marnie Was There did, I’m not saying it didn’t manage this, I was really invested in the film, but it didn’t quite achieve the same degree. But you know what, those are minor nitpicks, I still really liked this story. It’s a wonderful story, a great allegory for long distance relationships and the desperation to save ones that you love. I really feel the story has to be experienced to understand half of what I have said.

As for the acting. I saw this film in its original language with sub-titles, there was no dub out at the time of writing this review, though as I mentioned Anime Limited has gained the license to the property for UK distribution and I suspect, given their ties with Funamation and by extent, now Crunchyroll, we could expect a distribution of the film in the UK and depending on whether Funatation want to:
a) license the film and
b) add a dub,
we will see how the film turns out. I will leave a comment below this review if this film ever does receive a dub, but as of this moment, I can only talk about the sub-title version. I think the actors deliver really good performances in this one. A couple of the characters aren’t in the film all that much so they don’t get too much time to shine, however, where the film really hangs, is the two lead characters. Both Ryunosuke Kamiki and Mone Kamishiraishi deliver some excellent performances and they really sell their characters. It’s a bit difficult to tell when they are inhabiting each other’s bodies since it’s more changes in the character’s movement and expression, something that is owed to the brilliant animation of the film, but that’s probably to my ear since English is my first language and I suspect many of the Japanese members of the audience at my screening got it a lot more than I did. Again, I will be interested to see how this is affected in a potential dub. The rest of the cast do deliver good performances however, and I feel the cast as a whole is pretty dam good.

The last thing to talk about is the production. Oh my god, the animation is great in this film. This may not be Ghibli standard animation and some people may think it to be a slight downgrade when compared to Garden of Words, however, I thought that one of the things about Garden of Words was that I felt the animation was so good it made hiccups in the plot more evident, it’s almost as if the animation was too good and it also made the whole thing feel a lot too photo realistic for its own good. While this one has very similar animation, I feel it is more reigned in and it’s definitely to the film’s benefit. I really, really, thought the animation was great, even stunning at times. The camera moves and pans around this animation brilliantly. The character designs are also very good, giving us characters that look familiar to Anime fans but at least feel somewhat distinctive enough. It’s not just good 2D hand drawn animation, there is also some good 3D animation added in there and even some really good rotoscope animation for a scene involving a ribbon ceremony early on that was made by filming Kabuki actors.

The strength of this film is the soundtrack. The soundtrack is really good for a lot of parts and again this soundtrack is a very familiar style to Anime fans. What also will be familiar, is the film’s opening, which to me was one of the most bizarre parts of the film because it feels more like it starting to be the opening to an Anime series more than it does a movie. It felt like the opening I had watched for one of my series on crunchy roll or a DVD than it did a film. I even contemplated in my head at one moment whether I would be skipping the intro or playing it every time, something that I had no point debating, but my head kind of went into auto pilot. Again nitpicks, I have to do it, I am a reviewer.

Your Name is a very, very, very good film.

The film gets released in the UK on 24 November and please go and see it if it is playing in your area. I will give you a link to the website on how to book tickets. http://YourNameTheMovie.co.uk

Makoto Shinkai said in his Q & A session that he has got a blank piece of paper and the only thing he is sure of is he is not going to make a family film but will probably do another film about Teenagers and growing up, something I wouldn’t mind him straying away from soon, but I will be very interested to see what he does next on the back of this film which has taken Japan and the rest of the world completely by surprise.

Well, now that we have talked about the first ever animated film to be nominated for Best Film of the London Film Festival Awards,
let’s do some mini reviews that I have seen since my last review.

Unfortunately since I have been at the London Film Festival, most of the films I have seen, I can’t talk about, those being The Red Turtle, which will get a review when it gets its general release next year, and I am already working on that one and Lion, a film that I’m not sure if I will review because I’m not sure how I feel about it at this point and I also want to see if it gets any Oscar nominations since I may end up talking about it if it does! I did, however, get the chance to see the new BFI production War on Everyone.

War on Everyone: Is a pretty decent cop comedy, all thing considered, even if it is about the 2 worst cops imaginable. You have got an interesting pair in Michael Pena and Alexander Skarsgard and the film has a really strong opening. The downside is that the strong opening wears out and the film slowly loses its energy before going to a really kind of dark ending which feels out of place, out of tone and incredibly unnecessary. It’s not a bad film, I am glad I saw it because it gave me a few laughs, but really, I can’t wholly recommend it. Not too bad.

Well, that was my week, hope yours was just as good.

Now it’s time to get ready for my next review. Join me on 28 October, 3 days before Halloween, when I will give you my review of the latest Dreamwork’s Animation, Trolls, oh and for the record there won’t be any mini reviews of Trolls since I saw the film a day after Your Name.

Thanks for reading my review. I hope you have enjoyed reading this review as much as I have enjoyed writing it, and I know this is the highest grossing film in Japan this year and may even break the top ten grossing films in Japan ever, but I really would like this film to do well whilst I am on holiday, so please do try and go see the film in November, Thank you very much.

Calvin – Nerd Consultant

“THE GIRL ON THE TRAIN”

If there is one thriller that has been talked about, seen on bookshelves all over the country, and that book that you have seen being read by most people on the beach on your Summer holidays, that would be ‘The Girl on the Train’, written by Paula Hawkins. The film has received a very heavy advertising campaign which tempted to bring in fans of the book, however, I must explain to fans of the book that there is no guarantee that this is a faithful adaptation, especially considering that unlike the successful ‘Gone Girl’, which the advertising campaign clearly suggests this film is attempting to capitalize on the success of, the screenplay for the film has not been written by the Author of the book, instead it is written by Erin Cressida Wilson, who doesn’t have too much to her name. The last screenplay for which she is accredited was the profoundly awful ‘Men, Women and Children’ a film that attempted to say that the Internet has turned us into ugly ill-informed ignorant people, incapable of real human emotion and contact, by the way, it is just as tacky as it sounds. It’s basically someone trying to do ‘Love Actually’ for the Internet. I am willing to give it the benefit of the doubt on this one because most of the poor nature of that film comes from director Jason Reitman who also had a writers credit on the film so I suspect had much more creative control.

The film version has been directed by Tate Taylor, a BAFTA nominated director for his 2011 film The Help, which also received a couple of Oscar nominations including Best Picture and included all the actress categories including 2 actresses from the same film being nominated in the same category, incidentally this is also the film that got Octavia Spencer her best supporting actress Oscar. The Help is a pretty decent film and I actually kind of enjoyed it but it just feels like one of those films that is aiming for an Oscar nomination and I think it does say something that the film was nominated for Best Picture, but Tate Taylor was not nominated for Best Director. The Academy has, though, got it wrong in the past because Ben Affleck wasn’t nominated for Best Director, despite the fact that Argo was nominated for and won Best Picture.

I was rather taken in by The Girl on the Train’s advertising campaign since the trailers gave away very little but I wanted to make sure this time that I did get the perspective of someone who had read the book to decide whether it’s a faithful adaptation and if the changes or admissions from the novel make any sense, so for that purpose I took advantage of the fact that it was a Wednesday release and bought the book for Dr Buchan when she was on her holiday and invited her along to the screening. So this film is going to be coming from two perspectives, my perspective of somebody who hasn’t read the book and Dr Buchan’s perspective of someone who has read the book. This is a rather interesting thought, and while we are on the subject, as a follow up to last week’s review of Miss Peregrines home for Peculiar Children, I have since spoken to Axia member Elspeth Bromiley, who has read the book and has now seen the film, and she hates the film, so I think the film has made a few changes from the book which won’t go down too well with fans of the book. Now, that was Miss Peregrine, so now let’s find out how The Girl on the Train did.

The basic plot of Girl on the Train is a bit of an issue for me, because it’s not a very basic plot and to go into detail about it would be to spoil a lot of the big reveals, especially considering the trailer does not give away too much of all about the film’s plot. I want to keep this review spoiler free so on that basis I am only going to explain a basic plot.

Alcoholic Rachel (played by Emily Blunt) believes she is a witness to the disappearance of her ex-husband Tom’s (played by Justin Theroux) nanny Megan (played by Haley Bennett) however she is considered an unreliable witness and a possible suspect. With one reveal after another coming, it is very evident that these characters have a lot of back story to them and everything may not be as it seems. That is all I am going to say about the basic plot and if there is one comment I can really make to sum up this film in a nutshell, it’s this ‘it’s not Gone Girl’, as expected Gone Girl was a much better film that had a much better plot, much better reveal and a much more interesting ending. That does not diminish my enjoyment of Girl on the Train though, which I did find to be an enjoyable film. Now again I came in with the perspective of someone who hasn’t read the book, so the majority of what is said in this review will come from me. Dr Buchan who joined me on the film and has read the book, came to the conclusion that she found it to be a very excellent adaptation of the book and noticed a lot of subtle things that I hadn’t noticed in the viewing, but when I really thought on it, I actually said that I wasn’t sure that these things were established and that she maybe assumed them because she had read the book, however, I don’t wish to put words in her mouth nor do I wish to make those assumptions, in fact I am actually kind of interested to see this film again on a repeat viewing so I can come in from the perspective of having known all the twists and turns. The basic plot that I have made doesn’t really do it justice because it doesn’t really mention a lot of the characters that are featured. We have Tom’s new wife Anna who is set up to be one of the major characters, played by Rebecca Ferguson, Megan’s husband Scott, played by Luke Evans as well as Megan’s therapist Doctor Kamal Abdic, played by Edgar Ramirez. The way the characters are set up it’s almost set up to be a classic murder mystery, the same sort of interesting characters with all the various secrets to uncover, the only difference being, is that this is more set to be a Thriller and we are seeing the film from the perspective of the suspect rather than the perspective of a Detective.

The film has a basic plot structure with essentially there being three narrators, Rachel, Megan and Anna, that does lead to one of my issues with the film though, we will get into that later. Rachel takes up the majority of the film, though we do get a lot of Megan’s back story through various flashbacks which does aid the plot quite significantly. Believe me, this is a very intriguing plot, there are tons of twist and turns and the film constantly keeps you guessing. Despite the fact that we spend most of the time with Rachel, she could be an unreliable witness and the film sets up from the start the possibility that she herself could be responsible for Megan’s disappearance. Even though I did say I found it gripping, and I really did, I did kind of know where it was going. That’s not to say it’s a badly written plot far from it, the screenplay is actually very good, but the problem is that the film sets us way too many characters to be red herrings. You are constantly throwing scenarios in your head, but if you are used to seeing thrillers and murder mysteries like I am and know the way that writers work, you will start to eliminate a few of the possibilities and even if you don’t fully eliminate them, you will want to because if those scenarios turn out to be the case it would result in a massive anti-climax or the twist not making any sense. Fortunately the film doesn’t do either of these, the twist does kind of work, even if it does come slightly out of left field, though granted I would like to see this film again to see if I am incorrect on that one, and that last comment, I would like to say, should not be set in stone. According to Dr Buchan, fans of the book will be appeased by how closely it adheres to the book, the only major change being that the books setting has been moved from London to New York, despite the fact that Rachel is remaining as a British character. London and New York are very similar cities so it doesn’t really affect the setting too badly, and the change does make sense. Two of the main actors are British and I am glad the setting was changed to America to accommodate the other actors since I think they are very well cast and to have said no to them to keep the British identity would have been a great loss.

The film portrays Alcoholism excellently, so it does allow us to feel sympathetic towards Rachel, as a down and out character who is clinging on to any happiness or idea of love she might have had after her divorce from her husband after un-successful IVF treatment and him having since moved on to his second wife who has had a successful pregnancy. The whole thing kind of feels like the film is told from her perspective though as I mentioned, we do get a lot of Megan’s perspective. The problem with the perspective changes is that Anna is set up as a third narrator, which is a good idea because her perspective is rather interesting. The downside is, it doesn’t play a factor until the last third of the film, she is actually a bit on the sidelines for the opening, although she is thrown in as a potential suspect in the disappearance, since basically the opening of the film sets out that Megan basically managed to upset everyone around her up to that moment. Isn’t that amazing how that seems to happen in fiction all the time, just before you are murdered or disappear, you manage to upset everyone around you!! I will say, however, Anna is not a bad character, far from it she is actually rather interesting when you dive into her, I just think she should have stayed as a supporting character rather than the film trying to convince us she is a main character, this really is more Rachel and Megan’s story. In fact, the final line of the film doesn’t make sense for that reason among others which I can’t go into because of spoilers.

I think the big difference between this and Gone Girl is that it doesn’t balance its gender politics as well as Gone Girl did. Gone Girl made out that neither gender was superior to the other and that meant all things were on an even keel, this one tends to side with women over men quite a bit more hence why it’s been likened to a lifetime movie by several critics but I feel like the gender politics should have been a bit more even than they were, again, not going into spoilers with this one. The only other nit pic that I really have is that there is a whole factor of memory loss and memory gain which really comes and goes as the plot demands it rather than it slowly unfolding, not to say that this film is rather rushed in its pacing, in fact the pacing is quite good despite the fact that the film only has 1hr 52mins running time. I would say that these are all nit pics. The film is really gripping and a pretty good thriller and it’s really just me having the be fair as a reviewer that I am making these points. In truth, I really did enjoy a lot of this film and I came out of the film like my brain had to be taxed. I just wish that I had turned off my brain a little bit more because it meant I would have probably been more shocked by the plot twists and I would have stopped eliminating possibilities, because I am a smart alec!! I do believe this film has a few flaws in it but I think the plot however is good enough to sustain its audience and I really, really did like, for lack of a better term, the thrill of the chase. If you have read the book I think it will be rather interesting in how certain plot points are done and I would be interested to get your opinion on how the various twists and turns work and your opinion of how the film handled the plot, knowing the outcome. I would like to make a rule however, that no one places spoilers in the comments section until January 2017 because I want enough time for people to have seen this film having actually read the book and I don’t want to spoil it for those of you who haven’t, because I think going into it knowing virtually nothing can enhance your experience. Overall I think the plot works for both people who have read the book or not and I think the critics film’s reception has been rather unfounded on that basis.

As for the performances, most of them are brilliant. Especially Emily Blunt, why does this woman not have an Oscar already, she hasn’t even received a nomination for an Oscar for goodness sake!! I think she could easily be nominated for her performance alone in this film, she is a brilliant lead and does a brilliant portrayal of Alcoholism and a woman at her all time low and I applaud the film makers for putting this kind of character in, since most characters like this tend to be male and I think film makers and Television producers fear putting female characters like this in for fear of being called misogynistic, however, I find characters like this to be rather more inclusive. Hayley Bennet is also fantastic in this film as Megan and can trace several emotions including one scene involving a bathtub which is as far as I will go with that, which was one of the best scenes in the film for me. Rebecca Ferguson is not given as much to do throughout the film but when she is allowed to, she is brilliant as well. Justin Theroux is a bit of a mixed bag for me, I think he is actually quite good for the most part of the film, although there are a few moments that I felt he was a bit off, that being said, however, I think he does deliver an overall great performance. Luke Evans is an actor who I think is rather unlucky in his script selections as anyone who read my review of Dracula Untold will be aware, I am not really a person who thinks favorably of his acting, however, I think he delivers a pretty decent performance in this film, all things considered, although I don’t know what type of accent he was attempting to do here, he would have been better kept as a British character. Edgar Ramirez playing the therapist is actually a good understated role and I am really happy that he delivers here, because I think he is rather a yoyo actor, as in he will appear in a good film, then completely screw that up by appearing in a bad film. Take for example, this year, where he did a very good appearance in Joy, then appeared in the terrible Point Break. If you remember, I re-named it pointless break. Hopefully his upcoming film Gold will turn out to be a good film so he can end the year on a high. I would really keep an eye out for him because he is a genuinely good actor. Once again, I am talking about Allison Janney who plays the main detective in charge of the case who I think is really very good in this role, even if she a rather minor character. Laura Prepon doesn’t really get much to do this time round, so she didn’t really leave much of an impression and the same goes for Darren Goldstein, though he did leave a bit more of an impression, though I won’t go into details why. Overall, a dam good cast though I think the women in this film outshone the men in every fashion.

In talking about the technical, the one thing I’ve really got to praise is the film’s score, done by Danny Elfman who once again delivers another fantastic film score and I find it rather interesting because his most recent film scores have been rather understated, which he is continuing with this film. The sound editors and the cinematographers really deserve Oscar nominations on the back of this film. The sound editing is fantastic, really heightening the tension in several scenes and the editing is also brilliant and the cinematography really sells the scenes, and without these tense and intriguing moments would not have lived up as well as they did. Everyone in the technical department deserves a pat on the back.

Girl on the Train is a really intriguing thriller with lots of great characters and great moments, it just had a few niggle moments where it didn’t quite live up to its potential, but from second hand information, fans of the book will get a lot out of this film. I think that’s its problem though, it makes a better book than a film and it doesn’t quite escape those trappings in the medium transfer. It’s not what I would call a massively flawed film and I think a lot of the critics have been harsh on it, but it does have a few things to nit pic over. Still, if you like good thrillers and a good murder mystery plot, this is one I would recommend and I’m really interested to see if my opinion is affected upon a repeat viewing, though judging by the time of this film’s release, I won’t be able to re-watch it before I do my best and worst of the year list. Make no mistake, I would still recommend you see it, even if you haven’t read the book. So in other words it’s a really good interesting film, with a couple of tiny misses that slightly dampen the film as a whole.

Deep Water Horizon: This was a much better film than I was expecting, in fact I would recommend that you go and see it. The film is a disaster movie dealing with the 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico that lead to the worst oil disaster in US history. It’s a really, really, good disaster film that has some very good performances from actors like Mark Wahlberg, Kurt Russell and John bloody Malkovich and I am not editing that, because you can’t say his name without saying that because he is so damn awesome. The film’s biggest strength is that director Peter Bergh who, after watching this, you will never believe directed the abomination Battleship, really put the time and effort into understanding how oil rigs work and even went to an oil rig to learn it himself and as a result he makes some good technical information, without it being boring to the audience, plus his reliance on practical effects over CGI for the most of the film really pays off and makes everything feel more physical and have more weight to it. If I have to have a bit of a nit pic, I do think Mark Wahlberg is slightly mis-cast but I would really recommend you see it especially in cinemas. I saw it in an Imax screening and I think that’s the best way to experience it and I am not sure this film will play too well on DVD and NetFlix.

April and the Extraordinary World: I am going to be praising this one too, because I really enjoyed this. It’s a French animated film that has sadly gone directly to DVD over here, but it is really worth a watch. Based on a graphic novel of the same name, the best way of describing the film is ‘it’s a steam punk animated film’ that feels like a mix of Tintin and Studio Ghibli. I really enjoyed watching it, it had lovely moments, great characters and a decent plot. Plus the steam punk setting mixed with the really cool French animation lead to some really great imaginative moments, even of a couple of them felt like they were ripping of Howl’s Moving Castle. If you are a fan of Tintin or Studio Ghibli you owe it to yourself to watch this film and it’s another example of the brilliant standard that animated films have had this year. Bar a few exceptions which we will not name to avoid me going into full rage mode, incidentally despite an English dub has been produced for the American audience, the DVD copy that I had which was distributed by Studio Canal for European audience doesn’t offer a dub, so you will have to watch it in French with English sub titles, however I suspect anime fans who are used to watching subs won’t be bothered by this.

So that was my very brief and somewhat cryptic thoughts in parts on these three films, if you have any thoughts, please leave something in the comments section, and I am standing by my rule of no spoilers in the comment section please until 2017.

“MISS PERIGRINE’S HOME FOR PECULIAR CHILDREN”

I have already made clear my thoughts on Tim Burton when he is great he is one of the best directors that ever lived, and even when he is off the mark he seems to at least create something interesting and as I mentioned in my Big Eyes review, he has only really made 2 complete disasters, that being his adaptation of Alice in Wonderland and Planet of the Apes. So, it’s rather worrying for fans that he is going back to adaptations this year with his latest movie which is based upon a series of novels written by Ransom Riggs that the film shares the title with. Burton has been on pretty decent form lately, I really enjoyed his last film Big Eyes, but I think that was down to the fact that it was so against type for Burton that it made us see him in a whole new light. Judging by the trailers for this film, it looked like this would be a decent middle ground of the two. Lets face it, Burton is at his best when he has the perfect balance of style and substance which made him popular. His films miss the mark when he lets that style overtake the substance, however, for this adaptation the screenplay has not been written by the books Author, but by Jane Goldman who works as a collaborator with Matthew Bourne on Kick Ass and Kingsman The Secret Service, 2 films I absolutely loved. So I was really excited to learn she was working on this film, though I haven’t actually seen any film she has worked on where she hasn’t collaborated with Matthew Bourne. Now I haven’t actually read the books that this film is based on, though judging by the trailers, I probably should have, but Dr Buchan who is the Director of Axia has read the first book in the series, so when this eventually comes out on DVD, she will be giving her thoughts on it as an adaptation. Because I haven’t read the book, I will be judging the film purely on its own merits, so if I have a complaint about something it won’t be because it was or wasn’t included in the book, or a slight change from the book, it will be purely on what I see with the film. Has this been one of Burtons successful adaptations like Batman, Big Fish and Sweeney Tod, or is this one of his lame ducks, like Alice in Wonderland or Planet of the Apes.

Miss Perigrine’s Home for Peculiar Children is actually the story of Jake (played by Asa Butterfield) who comes home one night to discover that his grandfather Abe (played by Terence Stamp) has been killed and his eyes removed. His Therapist Dr Golan (played by Allison Janney) recommends that he follow the map left by his grandfather to his old children’s home in Wales. He travels there with his father Franklin (played by Chris O’Dowd) only to discover that the children’s home has been bombed and the eponymous Miss Peregrine is nowhere to be found, however, through some circumstances he discovers that the children and the home are kept in a time loop that only people with peculiar abilities can access. Through there he discovers the home has been kept in the permanent state of September 1943 and the home, overseen by Miss Perigrine (played by Eva Green) is the home for children with extraordinary abilities that the outside world is not familiar with. However, their peace is threatened by monsters called The Hollows led by the Barron (played by Samuel L Jackson).

The film is really aiming to be a film of rather universal appeal, which is definitely something I would agree with because I think there is a lot here for different age groups, something that I feel Tim Burton is very good at. If anyone is worried that his style has overtaken the substance of the film, thankfully, that is not the case. Burton is really an excellent choice for Director of this film because he really embraces the weird and wonderful nature of the origin story in a way that I feel other directors may have restrained on, whereas Burton goes all out with it. He absolutely embraces the mad cap nature of the story and its themes of embracing one’s peculiarities. There is a reason the film’s hashtag on twitter is ‘stay peculiar’. The film is an excellent allegory for various mental health issues and not in a way that feels so overtly prominent that they are throwing it straight in your face. The film also has a very distinctive cast of characters with all varying abilities, so as a result we can really tell the various members apart from one another, including the invisible boy, the boy with bee’s in his mouth, the girl who can make giant vegetables come out of the ground, the super strong one and the girl who has fire hands. That being said, as a result there are a lot of characters and while most films would have them fighting for screen time this film understands that they are not the main characters, they are the side characters so while they may not get too much development, they at least feel necessary to the plot and not just thrown in to make up the numbers. I did enjoy most of the characters, but not all of them. For example, one of the children is Enoch, played by Finlay MacMillan and his peculiarity is putting hearts into innate objects, which actually is an interesting concept, the problem is he is actually a rather dull character who seems to only exist to be an antagonist rather than by necessity to the plot, and even then he is not a complete antagonist and as a result, he comes off as a bit of a jerk. I would be fine with that if they kept him like that throughout the film, but he then has 180 turn in the second half that is so abrupt it feels like a switch was turned on!

It’s also rather bizarre I think, that for a film that is all about peculiar children Jake, who is our main lead can actually be rather generic when you really think about it, he is not that different to a lot of protagonists in children’s and young adult books, he is not a bad character in any stretch of the imagination in fact he serves his purpose as the lead quite well, it’s just he isn’t a character you haven’t seen before. The same goes for the main female lead Emma Bloom (played by Ella Purnell) who you have most likely seen in the trailers and on the posters as the girl in the lead shoes who floats.

I won’t give away exactly how, but let’s just say the film ‘has its cake and eats it’!!!

The other nitpick I have, which I was initially going to place into this category is the fact that there was a plot twist towards the third act of the film, which initially I thought came out of nowhere and didn’t leave enough clues to establish it, again, a good plot twist can come out of nowhere as long as there is something in there that allows repeat viewings for you to catch a little hint that the directors and writers left, fortunately, however, when I did think over it, there are a couple of hints to it, though I suspect these hints were a lot more prominent in the book. Which is something I could say about the entire film, I suspect a lot of these elements were a lot more prominent in the book, such as various character development, and various things about the world and setting, which are explained but not to absurd degrees. That being said, however, a good adaptation is not just in the films accuracy, as the Don mentioned in his review of Watchman, sometimes knowing what to cut and to change is necessary, hence why each of the Lord of the Rings films actually only really contained a third of each book, and if anyone puts anything in the comments section, I am going by that on second hand information because I haven’t actually read Lord of the Rings because I haven’t got 3 months of my life to set aside in order to read them!

This is where I feel being a reviewer is actually hindering me in giving my thoughts on the film, because in reality I’m making it sound like I am a lot harsher on the film than I really was. I did like this film. For one thing, they really nail the relationship between Jake and his grandfather, even though most of it is told in flashbacks. I am aware that a couple of characters have been cut from the film, though from what I have heard, this is to the film’s benefit because most of them don’t really serve much of a purpose. For example, Jake’s aunt is reduced to a cameo and his Uncle, who I am aware was in the book, is nowhere to be found. I also appreciated the fact that the film knew who the main characters were and who were the side characters and didn’t try to blur the line. I didn’t appreciate Jake’s father as a character since I felt that his character was slightly poor written, though not to a degree that I didn’t understand the character and from what I understand, he is like this in the book. They also don’t over play Judy Dench’s role in the film as another caretaker, Miss Avocet although having Judy Dench just a cameo should really be a crime. The film also has a tendency to have characters just exit the plot for no real reason, however, this is not to the film’s detriment since I thought the film’s pacing was pretty damn good and the film runs at just over 2 hours, plus for a film based on a book series, I am relieved that the film did not spend a ton of time sequel bating at the end. I also suspect these characters will get a lot more exploration into them in the sequels, if the film makes enough money at the Box Office to warrant it. Seriously, go and see it, I actually do want to see some sequels to this film, so please go out and see it.

Overall the plot is pretty good. Jane Goldman appears to have done a decent job adapting the book to the film and despite the fact that she is forced to carry a few elements from what I have heard, didn’t really work in the book, such as the godawful romances which really don’t work and really don’t display much chemistry between the characters, in fact one of them comes really far out of nowhere and seems to contradict things we saw earlier in the film, she does manage to adapt the film to be a decent story that I kind of liked, I just wish she had stuck the landing of the climax. Overall though, I can say I was thoroughly engaged with this film which is not something I can say for a lot of the films I saw in September and there wasn’t anything that completely ruined the film for me and I really relish seeing these characters explored further.

As for the cast, well, Asa Butterfield, who many of you will recognise playing the title role in the film Enders Game plays another decent role here. His American accent is actually quite good which is why I was initially interested that he was rumoured to be playing Spiderman at one point, that being said, I am quite glad that we got Tom Holland in the end because as we saw in Civil War, he was damn perfect for the role. Asa gives one hell of a brilliant performance once again, and that’s a great job considering he is a young actor and is happy to be on screen with a lot of giants of the industry. Eva Green also plays a very good Miss Perigrine, even though her part is written so a few of her actions probably make the situation a little bit worse than it need be, she plays the role pretty well and she plays a very nice mother figure, something that will come as a bit of a shock to anyone who saw her in Sin City 2. Samuel L Jackson really hams it up as the film’s villain, now we are not talking Jeremy Irons in Dungeons and Dragons hammy, but he is still having a ball, this is how his character should have been in The Spirit, but the less said about that godawful Frank Miller film, the better. Rupert Everett is rather good as the Ornithologist and Allison Janney does a decent job as Dr Golan. I really liked Terence Stamp as Abe who is probably in one of his best roles in years and considering his last two roles have been Burton films, I am hoping he turns up in some future projects with him. Chris O’Dowd is a rather interesting choice to play Jakes father, which again feels rather weird that the two title roles which are both American characters are being played by a British and Irish actor. While Asa Butterfield’s American accent is pretty good for most of the film, Chris’s one is rather ropey at times, though he does manage to nail if for most part, that being said, however, anyone who is used to his Irish accent from shows like Mock The Weak, will be rather take aback by it and for a while I actually thought his voice was dubbed in.

The kids are actually all pretty good, especially for young actors and it’s also a big deal considering they are having to work without knowing how they are going to look on camera since most of their peculiarities will be added as special effects later on down the line. For example, the kid with Bees in his mouth isn’t going to be able to see the Bees coming out of his mouth and there are other examples like the girl with an extra mouth in the back of her head who again is not going to know what that is going to look like until she sees it on screen. If there is one performance that I think could have been slightly better, its Finlay MacMillan as Enoch, who does a good job for the most part, but he comes off as a bit dull at times, especially thanks to his 180 turn half way through the film. Ella Purnell actually is given one of her best roles in ages in this film and actually delivers a pretty good performance. If there is one thing I had a complaint about, it’s that I’m not sure she is entirely aware of some of the effects on camera, she does, however, deliver one of her best performances in ages so I have to give credit where credit is due. I had written her off as an actress and she pulled it back for me. Overall the cast is pretty damn good, I have already mentioned Judy Dench who is basically an extended cameo, but she does a decent job, but that is because she is ‘Judy Dench’, the woman could act her way out of a rap battle in the toughest crowd.

Now time for the effects. The effects are pretty damn good. Some of the ideas are a bit lazy, like the Hollows look like they are a rip off of the Slender Man but the villains are given very devious designs and there are some good practical effects to help that out especially the blanky shot eyes and the almost untoned hair, goodness knows how long Samuel L Jackson had to spend in the make-up chair in the morning. The kids also get excellent designs and the costume department really stick to the time period well, most of the film taking place in 1943. The special effects also do a good job, bad effects would have screwed the film. The cinematography is also excellent in this film, producing some excellent result. I saw the film in 3D and its a bit of a mixed bag. The 3D is actually excellent in certain parts and I think Tim Burton knows how the shoot it, the problem is that several of the scenes take place in dark environments or at night, so as a result, the darkening effect that the glasses have, make those scenes harder to see. For that reason alone, I would recommend the 2D version. If you enjoy seeing 3D though, you will enjoy this one.

If there is one thing I can say about Miss Perigrines Home For Peculiar Children, it’s that I like it. Most of my knowledge of the book is coming from second hand information, so I really can’t judge it as an adaptation, but as it stands, it was pretty good. I had some good characters, good writing for the most part and it had some pretty good effects. It kind of fails at sticking to some of the rules it establishes and it has an ending that I didn’t feel completely worked, but as it stands, those are nit picks and I would really recommend seeing the film. I really hope it gets some sequels based on the rest of the books. This isn’t one of Tim Burton’s classics like Nightmare Before Christmas, Batman, Big Fish, Edward Scissorhands or Beetlejuice but it’s a good film nonetheless. It’s a nice film and I can really see it being a future Halloween classic.

I saw two other films this week, the Zombie movie The Girl With all the Gifts and I caught up on DVD with a film released earlier this year, Jane Austen’s Love and Friendship, based on the book, Miss Susan.

The Girl With all the Gifts: This is an example of a film that doesn’t cross the finish line. It’s adapted from a book,whose author is also the screenplay writer, but he was writing the book and the screenplay at the same time. This was going to be an excellent film that I would highly recommend for most of the first half of the film, in fact the film has some excellent ideas and excellent concepts, especially with how much we are seeing of Zombie films, however, the ending completely screwed the film. Apparently it’s the same ending as the book, but a lot of the plot points to get to that ending were left out of the film. As a result it didn’t really make a lot of sense and it left me feeling confused. The second half screws the film over. If you are a Zombie fan then you should give this one a go, I’m just not going to completely recommend it, it’s one disappointing film.

Love and Friendship: This similarly has an issue. This is a film that was drastically oversold by the critics. It’s a film where very little to nothing happens. Kate Beckinsale tries her best with it but ultimately it’s a flawed film. There is very little that happens in the film and when things do start getting going, the film ends!!! Admittedly I am not the target audience for this film, I am not a fan of period dramas, especially the Jane Austen period dramas as I think they are often stuck in a formula that is tired and old and they don’t try to do anything contemporary with it, the trailer for this film alluded they were going to to that with this film, however, it doesn’t fully commit to that. The film is not really funny, not very interesting, I would skip it.

So what were your thoughts on any of the films I have talked about this week. Leave something in the comments section and I will try to reply to as many as I can.

Now it’s time to move on and I am going to be continuing with my reviews of book adaptations because on 14 October I will be giving my review of the film adaptation of the thriller that flew off bookshelves, The Girl On The Train.

Thanks for reading my review, I hope you have enjoyed reading it as much as I have enjoyed writing it. Embrace the Peculiar.

Calvin – Nerd Consultant

“THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN (2016)”

“Why the hell was Haliee Steinfeld who played Maddie Ross not nominated for best lead actress instead of nominated for best supporting actress, she is the main character in every scene, come on Academy”.

This, however, did not dampen my enthusiasm to go and see The Magnificent Seven. I actually really liked the look of the trailers. It looked like it was giving off the Guardians of the Galaxy vibes, helped by the fact that Chris Pratt was one of the actors featured heavily in the trailer. Plus, it looked like it was gonna be a lot of fun that was kind of devoid from a lot of the summer blockbusters that came out this year.

Now, for the purposes of this review, I did watch the original 1960 Magnificent Seven, and, I didn’t really like it. Don’t get me wrong, the first 40 minutes are actually pretty good, but there is a long portion of the film where it moves so slowly and we are just waiting for something to happen. It’s another example of a Western that has a good concept but hasn’t aged well and the only novelty really now in seeing it to see how young Yul Brynner looks, and Steve McQueen, who let’s face it, are the only recognisable people in the film and the only characters that you will actually remember since several of them feel under characterised although that’s probably because they are Yul Brynner and Steve McQueen.

This version has been directed by Antoine Fuqua who is not a director that you have probably heard of, but you will have heard of a lot of the films he has directed including Training Days, Olympus Has Fallen and the recent Equaliser remake and there is one thing that this guy is good at, it is taking old ideas and making them really work, with the exception of Olympus Has Fallen, because that film is really bad. So how did this director do at translating one of the most recognisable Western franchises ever?

Plot wise, this new version of The Magnificent Seven follows the 1960 version pretty closely. The town of Rose Creek is being terrorised by shady entrepreneur Bartholomew Bogue (played by Peter Sarsgaard). After he demands the land within 3 weeks and murders half a dozen people in town to make his point, widower Emma Cullen (played by Hayley Bennett) seeks out warrant officer Chisolm (played by Denzel Washington) who realises he cannot do the job alone. He recruits Josh Faraday (played by Chris Pratt), Geednight Robicheaux (played by Ethan Hawke) and his partner Billy Rocks (played by Byung-hun Lee) as well as hispanic fugitive Vasquez (played by Manuel Garcia-Rulfo) bounty hunter Jack Horne (played by Vincent D’Onofrio) and native american warrior Red Harvest (played Martin Sensmeier). It’s now up to these seven to defend the town from Bogue’s next assault, and he is coming with an army.

I made the comparison with Guardians of the Galaxy, mainly because it looked like it would be a fun genre piece that would inject a bit of fun back into the Western genre, as it stands, it does kind of achieve that. The first half of this film is actually very good, there is a lot of character set up but it certainly handles that a lot better than the 1960 film because it doesn’t take so long to get these characters introduced and their personalities are quite evident early on and their position and their contribution is made pretty clear pretty fast. The casting is also a very strong point. The seven are much more diverse this time around and as a result we identify them a lot quicker and easier. Although there have been some complaints about the lack of Hispanic actors considering the original dealt with an Hispanic village being attacked but personally I didn’t see a problem this time round since we do have an interesting and diverse cast as it is, especially considering that the native americans are actually played by Native American actors this time around, plus, how many other chances does Byung-hun Lee get to appear in a Western. The plot has also fixed the terrible pacing issues that the 1960 version had. The film moves at a much brisker pace mainly to suit the fact that it is serving a slow Western, this more takes the elements of a Western and makes it a modern action film, similar to what Django Unchained did. The film is an interesting Western romp, it really revels in Western cliché’s and set ups, we get everything from the Mexican stand offs, one of which is a very good mimic of a shot from the original film, the saloon fights, gun battles, horse riding off into the distance, you name it, it’s in this movie.

The majority of the film is genuinely kind of fun. The characters have very likeable personalities and they all have very good chemistry on screen so the bond feels genuine. It is very clear all the cast are having a very fun time on set and the energy does improve the film in several areas. The only major negative is the fact that there are a lot of characters in this film, probably a few too many. As a result a lot of people feel under characterised. I think fans of the original will be a bit disappointed that the townspeople are a lot more under characterised this time round which gives less reasons to care about them. My problem with the 1960 film was because there was so much time devoted to the town and the townspeople, it meant we lost a bit of the seven as a result. This time the trade off seems to be the other way round which is personally the way I preferred it. Of the seven though a couple of them do feel like they get the shaft. Vasquez doesn’t feel like he has much time devoted to him and Red Harvest feels really under utilised and really under characterised, he barely has anything to do in the film. I’m glad there is a leading role for a native American actor since there are very few roles for them in the current climate, but, outside of fight scenes there really is no purpose to him in the plot. The characters also appear to be fighting for screen time in the lead role, especially Chris Pratt and Denzel Washington, who the film keeps trying to shift back and forth as to who is the main character. In fact there are large portions of the film where the focus will be on one or the other and never quite hits a balance between the two of them until the very end. The characters are also not very innovative they are rather cliched. but in a good way, because it means we identify with them in their role in the group quick and well.

The film has clearly been pitched to the studio as a Western version of The Avengers and it actually feels similar to that film on a lot of levels, particularly in how the team comes together, in fact it feels very much like a superhero origin story, which is kind of how it falls apart in the last section of the film. Ok, first off, if there is one thing that really is a down grade from the 1960 movie, it’s the villain. This villain is so bland and forgettable, he doesn’t feel menacing or his presence never feels constant throughout the entire film. In fact apart from the massacre at the beginning and one scene in the middle he never really does anything that evil throughout most of the movie. He is just one step above the villain from Pocohontas he is just the greedy asshole who wants the land and gold. In fact there is even one line at the beginning of the film where he gets the kid to put his hand into a jar of dirt as a way of demonstrating he wants the land, I was half expecting him to break out into the song “mine, mine, mine” from Pocohontas. While the final fight scene is appropriately built up and played out, he doesn’t feel like he has much presence in it, in fact he is barely involved in the final fight up until the very last minute and even then he doesn’t really do much. Bad ass villain, he aint!!! Even his minions don’t get much to do. He has a native american minion who is a bad ass fighter and he has barely any time to do anything at all, he appears and has a fight with Red Harvest.

Also the second half has a much darker tone that doesn’t quite fit with the film that was set up prior to it. Granted anyone who has seen the original film probably can predict the darker tone to come but that doesn’t change the fact that it does kind of feel like it was messing with things in a way that wasn’t really necessary. They thankfully have dropped the romance plot which was really one of the worst parts of the original film but it doesn’t make up for it that what they have added to it has really changed the tone from the original so when they try to go back to that later on down the line it doesn’t feel like the two parts match. The film makers have clearly tried hard to appease fans of the 1960 version whilst also making it marketable to a younger audience that have been impressed by modern action films, particularly the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies. But those two demographics are such poles apart that I feel trying to aim for both of them doesn’t hit on a decent middle ground. Also the film doesn’t really juggle the sub-plots of the characters as well as a movie like Captain America Civil War does, granted I wouldn’t expect a film with this many characters to do that and normally I wouldn’t harp on about it too much, but Captain America Civil War really proved that you could have a film with a ton of characters and give them all a purpose. The second half also tries to give a lot of back story to the characters which really should have been given earlier on. There is one bit of a back story given in the final scene that really comes the hell out of nowhere and it is really out of place. It’s not been fore shadowed in any way, it wasn’t really built up at all and it comes the hell out of nowhere and adds nothing to the film, it’s generally dumbfounding. Antoine Fuqua in that sense has done what he has done with a lot of his films, which is he has very good ideas but he never quite gets to the finish line with his films and as a result the whole thing feels kind of depressing by the end and it also feel like not much was accomplished except a lot of bodies, and believe me, there are a lot of bodies by the end of this movie.

I don’t want to talk any more about my grievances with the film since I would have to go into spoilers in order to do it, but, believe me, there are a few elements of this film which feel quite predictable and believe me we are going to be getting into predictability in movies later on in this review when I talk about the other film I saw this week. All in all I thing the plot of Magnificent Seven starts out very strongly but doesn’t quite hit the finish line, but for what it’s worth, it is actually kind of fun.

As for the actors, all the supporting cast are rather so so. Peter Sarsgaard is really trying hard to be a managing bad ass villain but he is not given the material to work with so as a result he turns in a rather poor performance. Hayley Bennett is also trying her best but again her material isn’t amazing apart from stuff at the beginning of the film when she is a well written character so she is rather confined by her performance. It seems like they want to make her a bad ass independent kick ass girl stereo type character but they haven’t quite figured out how to do it. As for the Seven themselves the stand out performance is Chris Pratt who seems to inject a lot of fun into almost anything he is in and he is really starting to become one of my favourite actors at this point in time. Likewise, Vincent D’Onofrio really gets into his performance again, though granted, I will admit I’m not sure what kind of accent he is meant to be pulling throughout the film. Ethan Hawke seems like the guy who is having the most amount of fun playing a bad ass cowboy and what I am getting from interviews is that this is the kind of role he has wanted to play for a long time. Also Denzel Washington, despite the fact that he has worked with Antoine Fuqua quite a bit also really wanted in on the project because he has never done a Western and he also appears to have really thrown himself into the role though I do get a sense that he has borrowed a lot of his moves and mannerisms from Jamie Foxx from Django Unchained, that might be slightly racist on my part but it was very hard not to get Django Unchained flashbacks. Byung-hun Lee also really delivers in this film, it’s one of his best roles to date, I actually kind of liked him in this. Martin Sensmeier has really been the person who has been most screwed by this film, granted, I am very happy we have a Native American actor in this role but he is not given enough to do and as a result he kind of looks bored a lot of the time, mainly probably because he is just expected to stand there in the background. Last but not least, Manuel Garcia-Ruffo is also doing a fine performance despite the fact that he is not given enough material. The cast list works works pretty damn well and I genuinely enjoyed most of the performances in this film it’s just that there were not that many outside of the Seven.

The fight choreography in this film is actually pretty good, granted there are a couple of scenes that are shot way too close to cover up some of the faults, but the editing and cinematography in these scenes is actually pretty good and the sets are really great. They really captured that Western feel with these sets and the set pieces really suit the action pretty well, I think there are a few too many explosions and the film as a result is really tipped into a Michael Bay on that level! I am also glad the film is not afraid to put guns in this film, not everyone uses guns, for example Red Harvest uses bows, arrows and axes plus Billy Rocks is a knife specialist so we get to see a lot of that from him, but I am glad that despite the current climate that a Western film has not shied away from having the characters wield guns. Let’s fact it, in this environment, there were a lot of people wielding guns, it was a dangerous time and the film makers haven’t shied away from it. They also haven’t shied away from very realistic shootings, not as gory and wince inducing as a film like Green Room, but still not exactly light hearted despite the 12A rating.

The Magnificent Seven is a remake that almost worked completely, but it is held back by a few elements. The actors are pretty decent, the plot moves at a decent place and the action scenes are very good, plus it does a decent job juggling the characters even though a few don’t get the necessary screen time they need. The film is held back by a really weak villain and a second half that really doesn’t match the tone of the first. I prefer it to the 1960 version because it has a bit more fun and it has fixed a lot of the pacing issues and dropped a lot of the un-necessary sub plots from the original but I would be lying if I said I thought this was a great movie. The first half is genuinely fun and I did enjoy myself watching the film but I am not sure I can entirely recommend it, I don’t think there is enough for fans of the old film to latch on to and I think they will be disappointed by the newer elements bought into the film and I don’t think a younger audience will connect with it as the producers want them to. I suspect this film will find an audience and it is a decent attempt at a remake but I think it needed a little bit more. As it stands, it’s a pretty fun movie if you don’t think about it too much.

I was away at the Autism European Congress in Edinburgh for most of the week so as a result I did not get a change to see that many films between this and Blair Witch. I did clear up my schedule to see Bridget Jones Baby, though for the life of me I can’t figure out why.

Bridget Jones Baby is a film that could have been worse and it’s better than Edge of Reason, I will give it that. I wasn’t a massive fan of the original Bridget Jones Diary, but I at least admit that it was competently written and directed. This one on the other hand, is a real mess and it’s a real nothing movie, there is not much here. I went in with different expectations because our fellow Axia member Elspeth Bromiley had been to see the move and she felt it was excellent, well, I’m glad she saw it because this is the one occasion where I completely disagree with her. There is nothing to get me invested in this film, this is one of the most tired and predictable scripts I have seen all year. There are a couple of amusing moments, mainly Emma Thompson who coincidentally is one of the three screenwriters. That doesn’t change the fact that it is really not funny, and it’s just dull at this point, it’s such a bore to sit through. Nothing is left to chance. The performances are all pretty bizarre. There are some hipster characters that are so over the top and caricatures of themselves that they don’t feel real in any sense of the word. Much of the humour is really out of date including references to gangnam style, the pussy riot trials and that guy who was brought on the BBC to represent Apple despite the fact he was going in for a job interview. These jokes were past their sell by date years ago and it’s proof that the script has clearly been sitting in development hell for ages and has clearly come out at the wrong time. Nothing feels accomplished by the end of it and it was a complete waste of my time. I don’t even think fans of the original will get this one not to mention the characters are incredibly horrible and immature to each other. Colin Firth is one of the saving points, but that’s just because he is Colin Firth and I was kind of annoyed that he was in this because he has proven he has much better acting range than people give him credit for and this is something he can do in his sleep, but Patrick Dempsey really has no reason to be in this film and is a complete cardboard cut out, you could have easily reworked this film with several rewrites, but as it stands, it’s not worth it.

“Well, that’s my two cents for this week. If you have any comments on The Magnificent Seven, or Bridget Jones Baby, please leave something in the comments section, I will try to reply to as many as I can.”

“BLAIR WITCH (2016)”

If there is one film which owes its success to the Internet, it’s The Blair Witch Project. The original film was the first major example of viral marketing, using the Internet to spread the rumor’s that the footage that people were seeing was real, even IMDB having the actors as ‘missing, presumed dead’. In case you are wondering, they are all still alive, and have acted again, at least not in anything major, I think I saw one of them on Jay Leno’s programme. Now, whatever you think of Blair Witch and the effect it has had on horror, creating the POV found footage genre, something I have commented on and displayed my disdain for in the past, you can’t deny the film was a massive success, making back several times its measley budget. The original was directed by David Merrick and Eduard Sanchez whose IMDB page is actually kind of small, they haven’t actually done much since Blair Witch and despite the fact that the studios would always pine for a sequel to the massive hit, they didn’t really want to do one themselves. In fact they even said on record in a Mark kermmode documentary, which is still available on YouTube if you are ever curious, they would rather have someone else come and screw up their idea rather than do it themselves.

Which explains why Book of Shadows, Blair Witch 2 was a complete and utter dog of a movie with some of the worst characters in any horror movie ever and a plot twist which sounds good on paper but really doesn’t make any sense when you really think about it. Plus it doesn’t help the fact that it explained nothing about what is going on in the plot and the link to the original Blair Witch was tenuous at best. That being said, it was made a year later by Hacks. This film is coming out 17 years after the original and it is at least being directed by someone competent, Adam Wingard whose name doesn’t sound too familiar to most people, but he is someone to watch out for because I really liked his last film, the Dan Stevens vehicle ‘The Guest’. I would really recommend you track this down, it has some excellent performances from both Dan Stevens and Michael Monroe and the guy is going to be directing the upcoming Death Note, live action adaptation, so anyone who is curious about the guy in charge of that film, this is a good chance to see how he does directing a horror film.

For the record, I did watch the original Blair Witch Project in preparation for this film, obviously on quite short notice because this film was kept secret for the longest time. It was originally being labelled as ‘The Woods’ before there was a massive reveal at San Diego Comic Con, that it was in fact the new Blair Witch Film and you know what, as much as people like to slam Blair Witch now, you have to remember that it was a massive phenomenon at the time and I can definitely see why, it has kind of held up. What a lot of found footage films seem to forget is that you need to put restraints on their concept otherwise they run into the ground. Blair Witch knows not to show everything, so as a result we feel more of the fear as a result, because we fear the unknown. I will go into more detail about what I liked and disliked about the original Blair Witch later, but needless to say, despite my disdain for found footage gimmick, I think Blair Witch Project got it the most right and one of the few I like a lot.

Plot wise, it is very similar to the previous film, remember Heather from the first film, her younger brother James (played by James Allen McCune) discovers a video on YouTube of what is supposedly footage taken from the woods outside of the town, Burkittsville Maryland which he believes to be his sister. Along with his friend and documentary maker Lisa (played by Callie Hernandez) he sets out with his friends and a couple of local people that put the footage on line, in the hope of finding his sister, but the Blair Witch might not be as gone as first thought.

Ok, I want to talk about some positives for this film to start things off because I actually think there are some good things to talk about.

First, the acting is pretty average across the board. I normally set a section aside for the actors, but I don’t feel like anyone really stood out too much. Compared to the acting I have recently seen in horror films these actors are pretty average. Second, the film is actually competently directed and written for the most part, there are a couple of issues I have with the film, but I will get into them later. As usual I will refrain from any spoilers. My personal opinion, as a whole, the plot is ok. Yes, this is not that bad a film, not as bad as the trailers made it out to be! This one does feel like a spiritual success to the original Blair Witch Project and you can tell that Adam Wingard really payed attention to Blair Witch and did a very good job with the re-creation of it. Even some minor details feel very authentic, including a very good re-creation of the Hotel room that the teenagers spend the night in, which seems identical to the first film and even small details to the Witche’s house, and before you say that is a spoiler, they gave it away in the trailer. You can’t blame me for that one!!

If there is one thing to say about this films negative it was that way too much was given away in the trailer. The film only lasts for 1hr 20mins and the trailer gives too many moments away removing a lot of tension from many scenes. Another major negative is the quote on quote plot twists, there is one that kind of works and another that downright doesn’t make any sense whatsoever. In fact the latter one left me head scratching. That being said, however, while is does feel like it is treading beat for beat a lot of the earlier film, it at least does it in a decent way and they actually updated the film quite well. Granted, not all of it comes into play. There are a lot of different cameras and as a result I do wonder who is editing this footage altogether especially considering there is an early scene where we get some mixed in stop footage as well as footage from the original film’s ending. That being said, however, there are some decent gimmicks this time round. For example, they are not using cameras there is also the POV Ear cameras which give us a real first person view of the film, which reminded me quite heavily of the film ‘Hard Core Henry’ which I saw earlier this year, granted though, I really feel that the POV camera footage really provided some of the best scares for the movie. The real downside to it all is that some of these elements were brought in but never fully realized. For example, there is a drone that is introduced early on but it never really comes back into play later down the line. The other downside is, because the footage feels very edited it ruins a lot of the immersion that the original film had. The original film at least looked like raw footage which held credence to the idea that the footage was real. This one just looks all a bit too polished and choreographed.

The cinematography looks ok and allows for some decent scares, but I thought a lot of the scares looked cheaper this time around, whereas the original had a really slow build up and over time messed with your mind. This one goes to be a much more traditional horror film and whilst it is alright in that department, it comes with a lot of the same issues, including a lot of very stupid moments that get people killed and in fact the larger cast, I believe, is designed purely to have a larger body count this time around to facilitate those moments. There are an incredible amount of jump scares, which frankly of which frankly some are incredibly cheap and a lot of characters acting in ways that no human being ever would in history. The pervious film had no real jump scares and it was all the better for it. You remember when I talked about ‘Lights Out’ in my review of The Purge Election Year and I said what made that film was that the characters seemed intelligent, not so much here, they are not stupid for the most part, with a few exceptions withstanding, but man does this film feel like it is trying a little too hard to scare its audience. I think Adam Wingard has seen a lot of recent POV found footage films and has misunderstood that a lot of what those films have done have not really been to the benefit of those films and he has tried to inject that into Blair Witch and it hasn’t quite worked. That being said, however, there are some decent moments in this film. The mud tunnel scene which has been played in all the trailers is a fairly decently shot scene and has a good amount on tension, plus it was great to see those dolls back up and running and one scene had a very effective scare, plus the witches house kept me on the edge of my seat.

If there is one thing holding this film back it’s a lot of the tricks it tries. Whilst the cinematography is half decent, especially for a found footage film it’s not really perfect, though I would say that a lot of the scenes seem well done and choreographed, though the characters’ reactions to a lot of the scares didn’t seem as authentic this time around. I don’t think the directors have left them in the woods and started making noises in the distance like the last film, plus if they had done so, it wouldn’t have been as effective considering that it has been well publicized in other making of documentaries of the first film that that was one of the tricks used. Also, this film does one thing that the previous one never did, without giving anything away, I will say that this change is really a detriment to the film.

I’m probably making it sound like I really didn’t like this film, but in all honesty, I actually thought the film was ok. Maybe my standards are a bit too low, but it really does to me, seem like there was a lot more love and care put into this film. It didn’t feel like a cash grab which I was expecting it to be. The film makers seem to have done their research and whoever designed the sets for this film did an excellent job. To wrap things up, Blair Witch was a better film than I was expecting. There are some decent scares and some alright cinematography, the acting isn’t too bad, some of the effects are downright good and I daresay it feels like the film makers had a lot of love for the original film and wanted to put their spin on it, which I have got to commend them for. It’s not a perfect sell however, the film does suffer from a plot that has some plot holes and there are a couple of really stupid moments and this film tries to get away with a lot of horror tropes that didn’t benefit the film in the end and were entirely absent from the original Blair Witch for a reason.

Fans of the original should not pass this up. It is actually worth a watch at least once and if you are curious, I would definitely recommend you check it out. I won’t say rush to see it though I suspect it will have a lengthy run and will probably last until Halloween. You might wish to wait until it comes out on Netflix but I will say on any level, it’s definitely worth a watch.

I did, however, get to see Enter The Serpent on DVD which I only saw because of its Academy Award nomination and the fact that it has been Mark Kermmode’s favourite film of the year so far and it’s an example of a film which I feel has been competently written and directed, but I didn’t really enjoy it overall. I felt the film was a bit too hard for me, you know that film where you really have to concentrate and have to observe every little detail that is going on to appreciate it. Yes, it is a very taxing film and while I will admit it’s probably better than I am giving it credit for, it’s not a film I want to revisit any time soon. I think there is an audience for this film, I’m just not it.

I also saw Hell or High Water which I felt was a pretty dam good film. The performances across the film are excellent especially from Chris Pine who is giving the best performance of his career to date and I wouldn’t mind seeing him up for Best Actor at the next Oscars. That being said though, I didn’t find this film as enjoyable as other critics and I am not going to rush to revisit it, although I can highly recommend you check it out, because I think again it’s a good film. Special praise should also go to Ben Foster and Jeff Bridges who give amazing performances as well and I would also warn you that it is an incredibly violent film, especially towards the end.

“So what are your thoughts on Blair Witch and any of the films I have mentioned. Do you agree with me? I would really love to hear any comments, remember, I welcome all comments and I will try to reply to as many as I can.”

Time to move on to another film and it’s another 1st for the Axia Film Society. I am going to review a Western. Join me on 30 September where I will be giving my thoughts on the remake of The Magnificent 7.

Thanks a lot for reading my review. I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

I lost all my credibility in one review, just by saying I like Sword Art Online!!!

Calvin – Nerd Consultant

“KUBO AND THE TWO STRINGS”

We have just celebrated the 2nd Anniversary of the Axia Film Society and we are already having a first. This is the first time I have reviewed a stop motion animated film, I’m surprised it’s taken me this long to get round to doing it. Stop motion animation is an art form that was very popular back in the day with such hits as The Wallace and Gromit movies and The Nightmare Before Christmas but they have sort of fallen into decline in recent memory. I think this is largely down to the fact that Toy Story was such a success. It proved that with computer effects, you could do a lot with a lot more ease and it also allowed for a lot more fluidity in the movement of the characters. That’s not to say that stop motion died off, far from it but as computer technology got better and you could produce more computer generated 3D films with more ease and in less time, stop motion had less of a call for it and it is often reserved for 1 film a year, usually done by Aardman Animation who are well known for producing the Wallace and Gromit movies and the relatively recent The Pirates in an Adventure with Scientists which I highly recommend picking up, or they come from today’s studio Laica who really do seem to put a lot of effort into their stop motion films. Plus, getting a stop motion film done now almost guarantees you an Oscar nomination, so some studios still find it attractive to try and go for that one stop motion animated film, which would explain why The Box Trolls got a nomination for Best Animated Feature in the same year that The Lego movie didn’t! Seriously the only reason I think that film got an Oscar nomination over The Lego Movie is because it is stop motion, it is so mediocre in any other light. Laica have produced some really good stop motion films in the past, I particularly liked ParaNorman which is one of the most cleverly written family films of the decade so far. I was very pleased to find out that one of the screen play writers of this film was Chris Butler, who wrote the screen play for ParaNorman.

The film itself has been directed by Travis Knight who has worked on the animation department of several stop motion animation films including ParaNorman and The Box Trolls and also acted as a producer for both of those films, though this is his directorial debut. It is very clear from cast interviews that I have seen that there has clearly been a lot of effort put into the film, the film took 5 years to be animated because there was a lot of ambition behind the project. Personally I love the title and the trailers and the posters got me excited for it because it look like it would hark back to a lot of Anime influence and it reminded me a lot of Studio Ghibli films, particularly Princess Mononoke. Talking about it is all well and good, does Kubo and the Two Strings live up to its hype or has its ambition been its downfall?

As usual, quick plot synopsis. Kubo (played by Art Parkinson) has a tremendous skill for storytelling and magic, entraining his home village with his magic origami performances whilse also taking care of his mother keeping ever vigilant in order to hide from his grandfather the Moon King (played by Ralph Fiennes) and his 2 Aunts (both played by Rooney Mara), that is until Kubo stays out late one day trying to communicate with his father’s spirit. He is spotted by the sisters and his mother uses her magic to send him away, telling him the only way to defend himself is to get his father’s armour and sword, she also brings to life his Monkey toy (played by Charlize Theron), whose job is to protect him and get him to the Armour as fast as possible. They are later joined by a Samurai Beetle (played by Matthew McConaughey). Will Kubo’s quest be successful and what will it reveal about himself and his family?

Ok I am going to break tradition a little bit and instead of talking about the plot first, I am going to talk about the presentation, because really it is the star of the movie. The presentation of Kubo is unbelievable, the animation is stunning, this isn’t just one of the best looking animated films in a long while, this is one of the best looking stop animation films ever. As I mentioned the creative team spent 5 years animating this and it is very clear they put love, care and attention into every single frame. The backgrounds look gorgeous, there has clearly been some green screen effects put in place to make up for it but they come off seamlessly and as a result the animation makes the world feel fully developed. The movement in the characters is so fluid and brilliant, especially for the big fight scenes, which in stop motion, are incredibly difficult to do. The creators are clearly very proud of their work to such an extent they actually show during the credits the process of animating one of the key scenes of the film. The set pieces are all exciting and action packed as a result and the characters are designed brilliantly. This film just looks gorgeous and it’s especially amazing considering that large portions of the movie are set at night, which is often considered a bad decision to make in an animated film because it is often more difficult to animate. The film’s music score is also fantastic. As to be expected it is rather based on Japanese instruments and music especially considering a large majority of the film is based on Japanese mythology and the designs reflect that brilliantly. It will be especially evident to anyone who has been to rural and ancient parts of Japan. The film is just gorgeous to look at and I adored watching it for that reason.

I would also really recommend you stick around for the credits. Rather like the Kung Fu Panda movies there is some really great animation used in the credits as well as an excellent version of The Beatles song While My Guitar Gently Weeps covered by Regina Spektor. It actually rather annoyed me that people left before the credits had finished (all 6 other people, seriously Nine Lives had a bigger audience that’s just wrong). However, all of this would mean nothing if Kubo and the Two Strings didn’t have a really great story.

Fortunately, it really does. Kubo and the Two Strings tackles several themes of family, maturity, grief as well as several elements that I won’t go into for fear of spoiling the plot. This is a very different animated film to a lot of what is on the market. It treats its audience with a real sense of intelligence, there is a very interesting relationship between Kubo and his mother at the beginning of the film which I can’t recall seeing in an animated film, well from the Western world at least. There is also a very interesting relationship between Kubo, Monkey and Beetle which really makes the film. Kubo loses his family and he makes a new family with these two and their connection is what really sells the film’s plot. It’s just one of the great features about the film though. If there is one thing which is really great it’s the main character, Kubo is just a normal kid under very difficult circumstances. He is not a Mary Sue character, and he is never so childish that you don’t root for him. He is actually a very likeable character and he has an excellent back story. He does a cool job as a busker using his magic guitar to tell stories hence why the two strings is in the title, he plays a two stringed guitar that makes Origami come to life.

The film also creates some threatening villains. I like them. The villains do feel a threat to the main heroes along with the monsters that they face which are all brilliantly realized with brilliant design and execution. The quest, whilst a bit stereotypical feels like the classis Samurai film, the journey of one’s discovery. The film actually went in several directions that I wasn’t expecting and it has incredibly mature themes and it also has the genius to have the show don’t tell rule, in fact there are several really quiet moments in the film which is something that I absolutely loved, because if you have watched as many kids films as I have where the characters do not shut up for 5 seconds, you will seriously appreciate any film that realizes it doesn’t have to have its characters constantly talking and doing stuff.

There are also some tear jerking scenes in this film. It is very heartfelt and it only really works because you become invested in the characters which are all brilliantly realized. The narrative feels like they really trust their audience enough to not have to explain every single tiny detail and they let it flow naturally and speak for itself.

I will say though, it’s not perfect. I may have said that the villains feel threatening, but I also don’t quite get their motivation entirely, though it does have an interesting pay off that I wasn’t expecting in the climax, which by the way was fantastic. This film has an occasional need to put in a lot of plot conveniences, you know, something happens just because and the characters all seem to be in the right place. There are also a couple of plot twists that I didn’t see coming, but there was one that I really did see coming and I think most people will see it down the line. Honestly though those are real nit picks the plot is actually good especially for the level that a lot of family films have been playing at recently and I will be honest with you, the narrative kept me engaged. It’s a really good story and I think the story developers and the screen writers should get a pat on the back for it. I don’t want to talk too much about it because I think it’s best to just go in and experience it.

As for the performances, they are pretty damn good and some of them are genuinely unrecognizable, most notably Ralph Fiennes is particularly subtle in his performance as the Moon King and Rooney Mara is so against type, I seriously couldn’t believe it was her. Art Parkinson makes an excellent lead, Charlize Theron is great as usual, cast in a role that really suits her. Matthew McConaughey seems like he is having real fun in this film. Even some of the minor supporting roles are pretty good especially Brenda Vaccaro and despite the fact that George Takei is featured on a lot of the advertising his role is borderline cameo, he is not largely featured in the film, he is good though when he is on screen.

What more can I say, Kubo and the Two Strings is fantastic. It’s animated beautifully, the music score is fantastic, the characters are great, the narrative is really good and the script works well and manages to treat its audience with maturity and respect and gives us a very memorable plot. It does suffer from a couple of plot conveniences and the villains motivations could have been explained a bit better but it wasn’t enough to diminish the film for me. This one was such a joy to watch and I highly recommend you go out and see it.

I saw the film in 3D and I think it’s a bit of a mixed bag in that format and I wouldn’t assume it is essential, apart from a couple of scenes that are clearly shot with the 3D in mind, but honestly you can take it or leave it. If you have kids, take them to see it, it is an excellent film and judging by the trailers for the upcoming family films, this is the best one you will see for a while. This honestly has the potential to go down as one of the best stop motion films ever, right up there with ParaNorman and The Nightmare Before Christmas and Coraline.

Well with that out of the way, I will talk about the films I saw between this and Purge: Election Year. Well, I only have one this week and it’s Sausage Party.

Oh Sausage Party, you really were one of the big disappointments of this year. I went in to this film game for a laugh. I wanted this to be the R rated comedy that I would laugh out loud at every single joke and I didn’t. It’s a very typical Seth Rogan comedy which, if you read my review of Bad Neighbour’s 2, you already know my opinion on them. Some of the jokes do hit bullseye and are fantastic but a lot of them miss and I do thinks it’s too vulgar for its own good and then it weirdly tries to have a little extra meaning by having the whole thing have a commentary on the nature of religion and how it affects people. Guys I have come in to a film to see a foul mouthed and sausage If I wanted political commentary about society I would go and watch a Jonathon Pie video on YouTube. By no means bad and I did kind of enjoy the film for large parts, but it was not as good as I was expecting it to be. Bar a really un-recognisable performance from Edward Norton as Sammy Bagel Jr, yes I didn’t really like the pun either! Also incidentally, I will never be able to eat Hot Dogs the same again! That’s all down to that ending!!!

“So that’s it for another week. If you have an opinion on Kubo and the Two Strings or Sausage Party then please leave a comment in the comments section below.”

Next week I will be at the Edinburgh Conference, but I will go and see a film, so on 23 September I will be posting my review on the sequel (which no one asked for, but we have anyway) to Blair Witch.

Thanks for reading my review, I hoped you enjoyed reading it as much as I have enjoyed writing it and if you must blink, do it now, p.s. you will actually get that if you saw the movie!

Calvin – Nerd Consultant

“THE PURGE: ELECTION YEAR”

This year, we have received yet another entry in The Purge franchise, much to the enjoyment of those who enjoy the franchise and much to the disgust of everyone else. The Purge, for those of you who don’t know, has now become a series of films set in the not too distant future in which the economy has been increased and employment down to an all time low and crime is also at an all time low, because for 12 hours, during one night of the year in America, all crime is legal, including murder. I have a big problem with The Purge franchise and it’s precisely the reason that Nostalgia critic laid out in his review of the original film, it takes itself too seriously. The Purge could be an amazing dark comedy and a social satire, but the films want to take themselves so seriously that they act like this could be an actual thing. I’m sorry, I don’t buy that in a year’s time, because the original film stated the first Purge took place in 2017, we are going to suddenly have one night a year when all crime is legal, not to mention its social commentary on class structure and the 2nd amendment seemed really heavy handed and completely unsubtle. Now I may not have liked the first film at all with the exception of the character of Henry who was probably one of the hammiest performances I have ever seen in a long time and just had me in stitches anytime he was on screen, but I will admit The Purge Anarchy, its sequel which came out in 2014 was a marked improvement. Granted not much of an improvement, but at least it gave more of a personality to the franchise and tried to explore the world of The Purge and different people’s attitude towards it. It didn’t work in this instance at all, but at least I commend the attempt.

The series has been produced by Michael Bay and Jason Blum, though I think Bay has minimal to little involvement in the franchise as it doesn’t really mimic a lot of the tropes of films that he produces and feels more in line with Jason Blum whose main producing credits include The Paranormal Activity movies, which was how the first film was marketed and it is fairly evident the way the films are shot, they are making the most of the minimal budget and the fact that these films seem to be released annually, you get the sense that Jason Blum has the most control here. The film is once again, written and directed by James DeMonaco who only had one feature film prior to The Purge that he had directed, and it shows, he is definitely a much better writer than he is a director and The Purge films show a lot of his weaknesses.

The plot of The Purge: Election Year takes place a couple of years after the events of the first film. After her family is murdered 18 years ago in a previous Purge, Senator Charlie Roan (played by Elizabeth Mitchell) runs for president, her main opponent being the new founding fathers candidate Minister Edwidge Owens (played by Kyle Secor). The Senators main goal, ‘get The Purge to end’, the new founding fathers, however, take offence to this idea and with the help of the Minister, remove the exemption in The Purge, protecting political figures in order to use The Purge to assassinate her. However, there is one thing the new founding fathers did not count on, the Senators new head of security is Leo Barnes (played by Frank Grillo) and he is incredibly skilled at his job and uses his skills to keep the Senator safe from The Purge, after her house is raided by a Militia. Can Leo get the Senator to safety so that she can survive until the Election. If there is one thing to be said about The Purge: Election Year is that I think it is trying to solve a lot of criticisms that were launched against the first two films, but it actually ends up exacerbating them! I am serious, this film feels rushed! It’s very unremarkable and the major reason is the second film. It almost follows The Purge: Anarchy beat for beat. We are even doing the whole street level crime thing again, which was pretty well explored in the second film and it shows signs that the franchise is running out of things to explore.

You know what would have made a more interesting movie, have the family fathers bumping off people, that is an interesting idea, but have them actually target communities that are likely to vote for the Senator, that would be a much more interesting movie. Oh well, review the movie you got and not the one you wanted.

If you didn’t like The Purge films, this is not one to convert you. This has everything that was wrong with the previous films and more! Now, to be honest, despite the fact that I said it was a repeat of Purge: Anarchy, and that is not a good thing in any sense of the word. I may have said that Purge: Anarchy was a bit of a step up from the first Purge film, but I still did not like it, mainly because it had a problem that this one exacerbated, it preaches an anti-violence message, but it seems to revel in violence. The first film, for all its faults didn’t revel in the violent actions that took place, in fact it kind of held off on it for large portions of the film, this one is practically swimming in it and frankly it’s astounding how violent the film gets considering what the overall message of the film is. It’s not as hypocritical as a film like the Gerrard Butler film Gamer or the Stone Cold Steve Austin vehicle, The Condemned, but it still feels hypocritical which is kind of ironic considering that one of the lines that the Christian Purger’s have is ‘we are not hypocrites’.

The other problem with the film, it’s even less subtle about its political message than it used to be. This film isn’t subtle, it’s like a “sledgehammer to the face”. You know when you are stuck on a bus with a guy whose political views you agree with, but he won’t shut up about them and goes completely over the top about it. Yes, if that person was a movie, it would be this film.

The characters are clearly social commentaries against the parties with a very much pro-democratic message, the Senator obviously being a stand in for Hilary Clinton and despite what you are thinking, Minister Edwidge Owens is not a stand in for Donald Trump, he is actually a more of a Ted Cruz type figure, you know, the sort of politician who will come up with repugnant policies and justify it with their religious beliefs. The is also the commentary about racism (which is kind of ironic, because I think some of the dialogue is slightly racist) , poverty, health care reforms, none of it is subtle, and it is so annoying. It never gives you time to think for yourself. I agree with a lot of the ideas that the film makers want to spread the message on, but I don’t like them for trying to do that because it makes a lot of these ideas seem like they are being thought up by jackasses that are full of themselves.

That is the biggest problem with the film, it’s completely full of itself. These films are still taking themselves so seriously and I just can’t take it seriously. I don’t buy into any of it. I mentioned in the plot synopsis that the law protecting politicians has been lifted, well that is what was referred to in the emergency broadcast signals that signified the start of The Purge in the first two films has the Class 10 exemption, that Class 10 political figures were not to be harmed, well there is your problem. They never specified what that meant, so as a result it created a massive plot hole that they never bothered to explain. Getting rid of it is a good idea because it makes a lot of contradictions in the film, but it never should have been put in these films in the first place. What’s more the film never really addresses the nature of crime, once again, it just looks at it as violence and anarchy, it never addresses drug dealers, career, criminals, mental health issues, it’s all just pimped up rage and it’s just not that simple. As Film Brain points out when he reviewed the original film, ‘do serial killers just not kill anyone during the rest of the year and save it all for The Purge?’. Also how is the economy doing so well in this environment, if people are being killed and there are mass deaths on a yearly basis, how is that helping the economy in any way, shape or form? There are no new jobs being created because the only people getting killed are usually low income workers and the unemployed. The whole thing just gets sillier and sillier and by this point it feels like the franchise has completely fallen through. I haven’t even mentioned the characters or the main plot line or the survivalist plot line that is running through the film, as I said before, it’s basically a re-trace of Purge: Anarchy almost beat for beat.

The one thing I can give the film credit for is that the characters are more memorable and likeable in this film, for the most part, there are a couple I am not a fan of and most of them are really down to stereotypes, for example, the Deli owner Joe Dixon is basically a Black dad stereotype and Marcos is a Mexican immigrant stereo type and these characters, along with a few other decisions definitely show that Michael Bay has clearly had a lot more of an influence in this film than the previous two down to the ‘quote on quote’ sexy teenage Purges that despite the fact that they are being set up to be like Henry’s gang in the first film, don’t contribute much to the film and are bumped off pretty quickly.

The film also has to invent several factors to keep the plot going, the militia tracks down the group because one of the bullets that hits Leo at the beginning of the film has a tracer in it. When did they establish that in the previous films? It just feels like a massive plot convenience. In fact, there are several moments in the film where it feels like the reason that this happens is ‘because the plot says so’. There is also a moment later on in the film which is completely baffling but I can’t mention it for spoiler reasons. Not that there is much to spoil as the trailers that were released do give away most of the film, which also meant there was a severe lack of attention throughout the entire running time.

It’s just not that well put together. The script is frankly atrocious, there is some awful dialogue, especially for the Black characters who are given some of the worst lines to say in the entire film. Joe Dixon actually starts out as a really likeable character but he then turns into a massive stereotype of Black Americans and I completely lost any endearment I had towards him. The same went for Marcos, he started out quite interesting then lost my endearment half way through the film. In fact, that’s another problem. The characters all feel incredibly under-developed. They all allude to having chequered pasts, but they don’t get explored that much. The only ones we have a complete idea on are the Senator’s because her back story is given in a flash back at the beginning and Leo’s because it was given in the last film, and despite the fact that he is the only returning character in these entire films he feels unnecessary. You could easily have put another character in his place and it wouldn’t have made much of a difference. In fact, where have the Sanders family gone in these films? Spoiler alert for anyone who hasn’t seen any of the previous Purge films, Ethan Hawke was the only one who was killed off, basically because they couldn’t afford to pay for him in other films, but you could at least say what has happened to the wife and kids, they weren’t exactly named actors. If I didn’t know better, I would swear this film was written and directed by Michael Bay. It has all of his negativity to it and all the pretention of the other two films.

The scripts and the plot are frankly a complete mess, relying on the most strenuous of coincidences and convenience and it feels like there are even more plot conveniences in this than in Season 4 of Yu-gi-oh.

As for the actors, well none of them are giving good performances here. The only one I kind of liked was Frank Grillo though he doesn’t feel like he has much of a point to be there. I will say I enjoyed Mykelti Williamson who played Joe Dixon for most of the film, it’s just at the end he was given appalling lines of dialogue. The same deal for Joseph Julian Soria. Betty Gabriel gets an excellent chance to play a bad ass, except she only gets to play it for one scene and after that she is pretty bland and pointless. Fans of Lost will recognize Elizabeth Mitchell who is playing the Senator in the film and she would be all right if her character didn’t come across as incredibly preachy and incredibly annoying. There are no really hammy performances with the exception of Kyle Secor and Naeem Duren who also plays a reverend who play it so over the top you can’t help but laugh, not as good as Henry but damn is it funny I couldn’t stop laughing, you can’t expect me to take this seriously guys!!

As for the fight scenes, they are pretty hit and miss and the cinematography overall is kind of weird. These films are made with a bit of a budget, and I will say that Purge: Anarchy and this film both covered up their budget constraints rather well, however, you do notice at some points like with this film’s sheer reliance on close ups. There’s also that weird neon Halloween aesthetic that the film has which frankly looks like it is more designed to sell posters than be visually interesting for the plot. Because the whole thing is shot at night, the lighting goes from being pretty decent to atrocious. It suited the first film because it was basically meant to be a home invasion story, but we are out on the streets now, I think you can afford to buy a few extra lights! I will also say that the make-up effects on the militia and for most of the cast are decent as well, the make-up department does an excellent job on these films.

There aren’t many positives I can say for Purge: Election Year, it’s just bizarre that the franchise has gone on this long with a plot which was essentially a rip off of a Power Puff girl’s episode. I didn’t even mention the horrifically poor judged element of the murder tourism sub plot which involved people from other Countries in Europe coming to America to take part in the Purge, which feels like an astoundingly misguided anti-immigration message. Either that or the film makers were just saying don’t trust foreigners!

The Purge: Election Year is frankly a sign that the franchise is running low on steam, has got more pretentious and full of itself than it was before. The whole thing feels preachy and unnecessary. The film’s ending suggests that this will be the final film in the franchise with only real possibilities of going forward being prequels and frankly if this is the final one I will be really glad because this franchise has really run thin and its getting annoying now. The first film wasn’t any good, the second didn’t do much to improve and the third makes me wonder why sequels keep coming out for this. The acting is terrible, the dialogue is atrocious and the film goes from being shot well to incredibly poorly. If you liked the Purge films you will probably enjoy this one because it’s more of the same as what we got before, but if you are not a fan and are curious about the franchise, I wouldn’t recommend starting it. There are a lot better film series that deserve your time.

So, now to talk about what I saw between this and Swallows and Amazons. I saw; David Brent, Life on the Road, Nine Lives and Lights out.

David Brent, Life on the Road: In a word this is depressing. I wasn’t much of a fan of The Office, but at least I acknowledge that it had some good writing and it did have a decent ensemble cast. That’s the thing though, it had an ensemble cast, it wasn’t just David Brent by himself and that’s the biggest problem with this film. It’s just David Brent! The whole thing feels like an unpleasant experience, it’s not even that funny. I can feel an earnest effort was put in here, but it’s not for me. I don’t even think fans of The Office will get much of a kick out of it especially considering that Ricky Gervais seems to have weirdly written the character to have gone back a few levels in his development since the final episode of The Office. I would say, if you liked The Office, give it a go, but be warned, I just didn’t find it that funny with the exception of a few moments and a decent performance from British rap comedian Doc Brown.

Nine Lives: Oh my, this film sucks so much!! You think I didn’t like Purge: Election Year, yes, this is the worst film I have seen in this time period and I am fairly convinced it will be in my Worst of the year list. It was astoundingly awful!!! I honestly thought the trailer was a joke, I could not believe this was the real movie. It’s 2016 guys, no one wants to see a film where Kevin Spacey plays a cat. I am actually going to spoil the plot of this one, that’s how much I disliked it and don’t want people to go and see it. The film is awful with Kevin Spacey playing a ‘Richard Branson’ type of business man, who doesn’t spend much time with his family and as a result gets turned into a cat by Christopher Walken. He is an awful villain who is completely one dimensional. The effects are amazingly rubbish, that it looks like it was made in the 90’s, the cat noises were so annoying that I didn’t want to see my own cats when I got home because I was so sick of the mewing. The writing is awful including one of the characters having a suicide sub plot, yes I am not joking, there is a suicide sub plot at the end of the movie, this is a kid’s film? Isn’t it? The comedy is not funny and any time that an audience member laughed I felt like strangling them because it is not funny, it’s not big, it’s not clever and you are just encouraging it!!! It was so unpleasant an experience. It was only on for 1hr 20mins but felt more like 2hrs. This deserves a 7% on rotten tomatoes, the critics can’t even be bothered to give it a 1 out of 10. AVOID IT AT ALL COSTS, IT IS NOT FUNNY.

Lights Out: This has been one of the big surprises of the year. I fully expected not to be impressed by this movie because of the trailers, but if it wasn’t for The Witch, I would say this has been the best horror film of the year (so far). It is very well written. It is based on a short film which you can get on YouTube and I would recommend you do that, but the film makers actually took the original concept and did a decent job with it. I am not going to say it’s a perfect film, there are quite a few plot holes, and inconsistencies and there are a few moments that made me scratch my head, but, my god it is so refreshing to see a horror film where the character’s act intelligently. Seriously this is one of the few horror films where the characters make some decisions that in other horror films they don’t even consider making, there were even characters I had expected to live in the end of the movie that died and characters I expected to die lived at the end. If you are a horror fan, it is a seriously good watch, it’s a good mix of psychological horror and some decent jump scares, that being said, it is reliant on said jump scares, so it isn’t perfect. I still maintain The Witch is the best horror film of the year and even the decade, but Lights Out definitely deserves your attention.

By the time this review goes out I will be in Europe on personal business.

This is the 2nd Anniversary of the Axia Film Society, so thanks for celebrating this with me.

Thank you so much for reading my reviews for the last 2 years.

Come back on 16 September, when Axia will be at the European Autism Conference in Edinburgh, where we will be reviewing stop motion animation film Kubo and the two Strings.

Thanks for reading my review, I hope you have enjoyed reading it as much as I have enjoyed writing it. Maybe I should now get an Axia Film Society Hoodie.

Calvin – Nerd Consultant

“SWALLOWS AND AMAZONS”

Ok, let’s get the full disclosure out of the way first, I have not read the book Swallows and Amazons and I have never seen any of the previous adaptations of the story so this will be a very fresh perspective that I will be giving to this film and I am going to be judging it completely on its own merits. I would severely welcome anyone who has seen any of the previous adaptations or read the book, their opinion on this film. I would love to get an idea of what people who enjoyed the story think of it.

Swallows and Amazons is a trailer that I saw quite a lot, which let’s face it, when you go to the cinema as much as I do, you are going to see the same trailers, quite a lot. To be honest, it looked just like your standard British Summer film that everyone is going to feel good about and you are probably going to end up seeing it at Christmas because BBC will be showing it and there’s nothing else on except some weird Ant and Dec special which you won’t watch, because everyone in the room isn’t drunk enough yet to watch!! This was getting quite a bit of a buzz I was getting some interesting critical response to it and there wasn’t much else out this week, except the David Brent movie, and I am not really a fan of The Office, and thankfully this film won the vote. Anyone who wants my opinion on David Brent: Life on the Road, check my next review where I will give my brief thoughts on it there.

The other thing that made me feel this film was worth a watch was that there was a very good cast list for this film, including Harry Enfield, Rafe Spall, Andrew Scott, Kelly Macdonald, this is a cast that basically says ‘give me a BAFTA nomination’.

The film has been directed by Phillippa Lowthorpe in her feature film debut as a director, having only previously directed TV work, including several episodes of Call The Midwife and its 2012 Christmas special. The screenplay has been written by Andrea Gibb, her first screenplay in 10 years but I haven’t actually seen Nina’s Heavenly Delight or Dear Frankie, so I don’t really have an opinion of her writing. It is rather clear that she is using this as her comeback since she has also not been an actress for 10 years either. Now if this is a good adaptation, what it should do, is, take someone like me who has no experience of the story and make me want to go out and learn more and read the book to see the differences, a bad adaptation will turn you off completely to the story. So, let me give you my thoughts on how I think Swallows and Amazons did.

If you are unfamiliar with the plot of Swallows and Amazons like I am I will give you a brief plot summary. Set in Summer of 1935, Mrs Walker (played by Kelly Macdonald) takes her children John, Roger, Susan and Tatty (played by Dane Hughes, Bobby McCulloch, Orla Hill and Teddie-Rose Malleson-Allen respectively) on holiday to the Lake District. The four wish to sail to an Island and after the housekeeper Mr Jackson (played by Harry Enfield) lends them his boat The Swallow, they sail there for a camping trip. They are confronted there by a pair of pirates called The Amazons (played by Hannah Jayne Thorp and Seren Hawkes) and war over the ownership of the Island. Meanwhile they are also coming into conflict with a mysterious owner of a houseboat, named Captain Flint (played by Rafe Spall) who is being pursued by a mysterious man (played by Andrew Scott). What is the secret behind Captain Flint? And how will this Summer affect their lives overall?

The answer to that question is simple, none, none whatsoever, but I will get into more detail about that later.

I am going to start off by putting this straight. I think Swallows and Amazons has an audience. It’s just not me. I would actually recommend you go and see the film if you are at all curious because I think there is an audience for this film, it just isn’t me. I actually think this is a pretty bad film, but then if it is a loyal adaptation then I think it’s a pretty poor source material as well. But again, that’s probably my personal taste. If you are aware of my personal tastes and have similar to me, then you probably won’t like this film either.

Anyone who read my review of ‘When Marnie Was There’ will remember I described it as being that genre of that ‘one unforgettable Summer film’, you know the ones I am on about, a film where a character goes away for the Summer and it changes their life. Another example can include that episode of the Simpsons, Summer of 4 featuring 2, or another theatrical release, which I recommend, The Way Way Back, bit shout out to Elspeth Bromeley for recommending that film, it’s actually very good. You know what all those films have in common, which this film doesn’t have, character development! I am not joking, there is zero character development in this film. All the characters feel like they start the film in exactly the same way they end the film and that is a big problem for me because it led to the biggest problem I had with the film. I found it dull and boring. This is one of the most boring films I have watched all year, I was completely on auto pilot in the cinema.

I am not surprised that the woman who has directed this, has not done any theatrical work as it doesn’t play theatrically at all. It feels more like a 2 or 3 part mini-series that would play on the BBC. The comparison not being entirely inapt due to the fact that this is a BBC film’s production. The film’s other problem is that is has no international appeal. It will certainly get a European release because it is being distributed by Studio Canal and apparently there is a planned US release, but there is no official release date at this time, probably due to the BBC having trouble finding a distributor for the film at this point. Even so, I don’t think it will play very well in America because it is simply too British in a sense. Yes, I will go with that one, it is simply too English in every sense of the word. When I asked Dr Buchan about this Swallows and Amazons she described is as being one of the most middle class things she had ever seen in her life and I think that is absolutely right. This film is so genteel that it doesn’t risk doing anything really exciting because it so does not want to offend its audience.

The film is clearly aimed at a family market probably a similar audience to that which watched The Chronicles of Narnia films, however, I can see kids being bored by this film and I don’t think there’s that much even for the adults, because this isn’t the sort of film that will make you feel nostalgic. It might have worked if it was an audience that grew up in the time period, which is why the last film came out in the 1970’s and would have had that effect, but I don’t think it’s going to instill nostalgia in anyone. That being said there were quite a few older women and at least one granddad with his grandson in the theatre when I went to see it, so I might not be entirely off.

Let’s get into the other sub-plot. The Rafe Spall sub-plot. I say Rafe Spall rather than his character name because he doesn’t feel like he is playing much of a character in this film and giving him a very unconvincing fake moustache isn’t exactly throwing me off! His whole thing is a spy thriller edge with Andrew Scott’s character trying to acquire the information out of him and bring him back alive. I am certain this is something that has been bought over from the book but that doesn’t change the fact that it feels incredibly out of place and out of tone with the rest of the film. I was watching a bunch of kids sailing across a river, why the hell was I suddenly watching Tinker, Tailor, Soldier Spy! Not to mention this whole thing feels like a sub plot for most of the film with the exception of the final act, and even then when it finally comes back into play it feel rather abrupt and unnecessary. I made a point that there was no character development and I was right, these characters are so bland and forgettable, there is nothing to them. You can do these sort of half narrative structured films just darting back and forth between plots, Studio Ghibli does this very successfully, see films like Kiki’s Delivery Service for example, but the point is, with that film Kiki was a nice, likeable engaging character and the side characters were fun and interesting, so we liked to spend a few days in their lives. These characters, however, are so dull and genteel that if I were stuck with them at a Wedding, I would look for any excuse to move to another table. I felt like I was watching someone’s old holiday video that they were all really proud of, and you are begging for it to end because you don’t care about their holiday!!! It’s just weird. The kids don’t develop much throughout the entire film. There is the whole thing that this is their first holiday without their father being there but he becomes a massive misnomer throughout the rest of the film with the exception of the fact that one of the kids losing the older brother’s knife that his father gave him. ( It was a different time people, you could give your kids knives then). That also proves that the source material hasn’t aged very well, in the sense of, this is the type of film I would see in the 1960’s, unsurprisingly the last major adaptation was out in the 1970’s which would also fit the audience for this film. It is also clear that quite a bit has been cut from the source material.

Now Swallows and Amazons is not a long book in a relative sense, it comes in at just over 500 pages long, but the film last 1hr 46mins. That shows, because the pacing in this film is horrendous at points, especially at the beginning where there is a ton of rushed exposition. There are also several aspects of the film that are built up, but don’t really go on for long and a lot of scenes feel like they should go on for a lot longer and I get a sense that they tried to half adapt the source material. A fine example of this is the Carnival that takes place part way through the film which was foreshown at the beginning of the film but is a minor blotch on everything by the end of the film, we barely see anything of it and I am pretty sure lots of scenes of the Carnival were cut from the final product. I would say that several character feel rather under-developed, but that would imply that there was an attempt to develop them in the first place. We never get much sense of the community, we never get sense of the environment and the entire things just feels really under whelming. This feels like the kind of film and book you would be given at school, because an out of touch English teacher thought it was a great work, when actually it is incredibly irrelevant. There is no conflict really in the film so much. The whole rivalry between The Swallows and the Amazons is sorted really quickly, the kids are never really in that much peril, even in the final act and the whole thing raps up pretty quickly and efficiently, there are very little ramifications for anything that actually happens in the film and the whole thing left me feeling hollow and like I had wasted my entire afternoon. I could have watched more episodes of Fairy Tail, what am I doing in a cinema, paying to watch this pretentious rubbish?

I’d like to talk about the performances, but frankly I don’t think it’s really worth talking about, there aren’t many good ones in there. I suppose Rafe Spall is at least trying his best and I will admit Jessica Hynes and Harry Enfield really get into their roles, but they are well talented comedians, so that is not surprising. The kids are really bad actors, none of them are giving very good performances, but then again, their parts are poorly written so maybe then it’s not entirely their fault. Kelly Macdonald is trying her best, but again she is not given much to do and she feels like a misnomer throughout the entire film. I feel so sorry for Andrew Scott,he is a genuinely talented actor, but with the exception of ‘Pride’ everything he has done since Sherlock has been one disaster after another. Take my advice mate, either make sure Moriarty comes back to life in the next season of Sherlock, though I don’t see how that would happen, or for the love of god, fire your agent, they are not giving you good advice. You are a very talented actor man! I want to like you.

Now that I have all the dull performances out of the way, let’s get into the cinematography. I actually think this film would have been much better animated because at least then we would have got some interesting visuals, as it stands, this film doesn’t really look great, it doesn’t even look like a movie. It looks like it should have been on TV at Christmas in 3 episodes, 1 Christmas day, 1 Boxing day and the last one New Year’s Eve. You probably could even do it in two episodes, I still would have given up after the first. It’s a shame too, because when BBC films put their minds to it, it can take TV production crews and make them look theatrical, even talented film makers can really do that. Alfred Hitchcock famously shot Psycho with a TV crew, mainly because Universal Studios didn’t believe in the project and basically did it to cut costs, funny how things work out. While there is great care taken with some of the shots and they are trying to make the Lake District look good, it just feels like they are trying way too hard to make some of these scenes look more exciting than they really are. I found some of the editing in this film really bizarre as well. If there is one positive I can take from the film, it’s that the production design looks like it fits the time period. This looks like it takes place in the 1930’s and the costume design is pretty good and I wouldn’t mind seeing it being nominated for a BAFTA in that category, that being said, though, I wouldn’t like it to win because several films have had much better costume designs this year.

Last, but not least, I would like to say that the film’s score is pretty good. The overall music score is decent and it fits the tone of the film pretty well. But, sadly, that will not save it.

This is one of the dullest films I have seen in 2016, it is so boring. It’s pretentious, it’s under-developed and I am really annoyed that this has such a high score on rotten tomatoes. It is clearly an example of the critics liking the pretentious movie to feel like they are better than us. Oh, don’t lie, you know it happens. The characters are under-developed, the performances are not that great and there is very little conflict, it feels so boring and genteel that it will not offend anyone, at the same time it will not excite anyone. I do think there is an audience for it but they should have marketed this more as a film for an older audience, in a similar way that The Best Marigold Hotel was because I don’t think this will play too well for kids, despite the fact that all the trailers and adverts I saw before this film, were all aimed at children. I am surprised the film has a US date and I will be interested to see how it plays when it gets out there but frankly I really don’t care to ever see this film again. Really, this was so BORING. Feel free to like it though.

Despite the fact that there has been quite a bit of time since the release of Suicide Squad and Swallows and Amazons, I actually didn’t see that much in the intervening time period. I have 4 films to talk about, The Shallows, Pete’s Dragon, Nerve and The Little Prince.

The Shallows. How do I put this, I think many critics have summed it up pretty well by saying it’s basically 127hrs meets Jaws. It’s actually not a bad Shark movie all things considered. There are some decent shots, the CGI of the Shark looks pretty good and Blake Reilly tries her best with the material she is given. Though, there is a lot of bullshit and dumb moments that I didn’t buy into and despite the fact that the film runs at a brisk 127 minutes, it still felt very padded and felt like it could have been done in an hour. I can still kind of recommend it. The early portions feel like the writers and directors did their research on shark behavior, it’s just too bad that in the latter half it basically becomes another movie monster. Stick with it though because it has the most hilarious Shark death ever.

Pete’s Dragon. Disney’s latest live action remake of one of their classic animated films. Now I don’t think this is better than Jungle Book which I have previously reviewed, but like Jungle Book I did think I preferred this to the original movie. However, that doesn’t mean to say I completely loved the film. I just thought it was ok. The big problem is that it is way too predictable and gives you no surprises whatsoever. It kind of feels like one of those environmental films I watched in the 1990’s where even then I knew exactly where it was going, not helped by the fact that Karl Urban plays a really unsubtle villain. I will say though, the CGI of the dragon is very good and the relationship between the boy and the Dragon is the best part of the film, so it’s worth a watch if you have got kids.

Nerve. I was genuinely excited to see this film because it has a very interesting concept and it’s rather interesting that it has coincidentally come out around a similar time that Pokemon Go has become popular, though obviously that is a complete coincidence. Nerve is a great film, provided you don’t think about it in any way whatsoever. The second you do, this is so stupid. The whole point of the film is that it never explains half of what is going on, so as a result we have little or no idea. It’s also really unsubtle in its whole commentary on young people’s use of the internet, including YouTube, GEO cashing and trolling and Facebook. The whole concept of being forced to do dares online for money is actually an interesting idea, but they never really expand upon it and there are a couple of moments which are way too far-fetched and as a result sink the movie. I will say the ending, despite being incredibly abrupt and anti-climatic and didn’t answer half the lingering questions I had left over was at least a lot better than the messages from Friend Request and the god awful Unfriended. But it still did not work and this film annoyed the hell out of me because too many people gave this film a pass. No, it’s a bad film, really stupid and I am going to go against the critical consensus on this one, this is probably one where everyone else likes it and I think it is rubbish for 2016.

The Little Prince. This is a French animated film developed by Netflix that unfortunately has not received a theatrical release over here yet, so if you want to see this you will have to have a Netflix account. I mainly watched this because a lot of the sites are predicting which way the Oscars will go suggests that this film will receive an Oscar nomination for Best Animated Feature, and I wouldn’t be upset if it did. I actually think so far, this has been the best film of August because it was a really nice, charming movie. It has a lovely blend of really good computer generated 3D and beautiful stop motion animation. Honestly this is like a really lovely blend of Pixar, The Nightmare Before Christmas and Studio Ghibli. The cast are terrific, the English dub cast are terrific too and I kind of liked the message of the film even if it is hammered in a bit too much. Also I think the film is a little too long. There are 40 minutes added on that could easily have been done in 20 and feels like a completely different film and I would be lying if I said that didn’t bother me. As family films go I really recommend it if you have a Netflix account. It’s worth a watch.

“So what were your thoughts on Swallows and Amazons or any of the films I have mentioned today. Did you agree with me? Please leave a comment, I welcome all opinions, I am especially interested to hear if you have Swallows and Amazons and your comments about it.”

So, what’s next on the agenda. It’s going to be on Thursday next week because I am in Europe on business again. Make sure you join me on 1 September where I will be giving my thoughts on The Purge Election Year. Also, if you are a fan of The Office I will be giving my brief thoughts on Life On The Road, also Kevin Spacey’s Nine Lives and Lights Out.

Thanks for reading my review, I hoped you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. Yes I am aware that Nine lives has 7% on rotten tomatoes, that’s why I am seeing it, I need to know if it’s really that bad.

Calvin – Nerd Consultant

“BATMAN: THE KILLING JOKE”

If there is one film that producer Bruce Tim has been trying to get going since DC went almost completely animated, it’s The Killing Joke and why not it’s one of the most iconic Batman stories ever written, although it could be argued that it’s more of a Joker story, but we will get more into that when I discuss the plot. The problem has been a lot of red tape, as you would expect. The Killing Joke was a very violent and very controversial book when it came out due to some of the things it depicted in the book, and again we will go more into that later, and as a result Warner Bros were often rather sceptical about doing it. However, considering that DC’s fortunes have been rather mixed in recent memory, though I would argue that there comics are starting to get better, Warner Bros finally gave Bruce Tim the go ahead to make the film and what’s more, he was allowed to make it R rated. That meant he could go all out with the film, getting fans more hyped. What’s more he also managed to get the brilliant double team together again, Kevin Conroy as Batman and Mark Hamill as the Joker. Where do I sign up for this film?

It is directed by Sam Liu, who also directed the recently reviewed Justice League Vs Teen Titans as well as several other DC animated films which I would highly recommend. The script was penned by comic writer Brian Azzarello, as far as I am aware, this is his first screenplay, aside from one of the shorts he wrote for Batman Gotham Night. Azzarello is a decent writer, I have never read a comic series he has been writing on that I have fully enjoyed, for example, I am pretty sure he did his best but his Wonder Woman series in the new 52 was a bit off and I am not really a fan of many of his other series, though he is currently co-writing a Batman story and I use the term co- writing in the loosest of terms, Dark Night 3 The Master Race with Frank Miller and if I were to discuss my thoughts on Dark Night now we would be here all day and would go completely off topic, so let’s move on.

The other factor in this film is that it is based on an Alan Moore comic, which as usual, means, his name has not been attached to the project and almost certainly he will bitch about it in an article when some interviewer asks him about it. Alan Moore has never been a fan of the Hollywood industry, particularly with how his comics have been adapted into films. He famously decided that the only film based on his comics that ever had his name on was the disastrous adaptation of League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and between that and what he believed to be the poor handling that Witchowski’s gave to his script for V for Vendetta, he swore that no one would every get his name on any of his adaptations which has still stood because Watchman did not have his name and he even turned down the royalty he was about to receive for that film. I am glad that Alan Moore sticks to his principles, but I think he has been stubborn in the fact that he still complains about V for Vendetta and he doesn’t want to watch Watchman, both of which I think are decent adaptations of his work. In fact V for Vendetta is probably one of my favourite films ever and while it may be different to the comic, I still enjoy it. So will Alan Moore have a very good reason to dislike The Killing Joke or will the first DC animated movie to get a release in cinemas since Batman Mask of the Phantasm be worth the wait that everyone has had.

I am certain that a lot of people reading this review are fairly certain of the plot of Batman The Killing Joke, but just to make sure that everyone is on the same page I will give a brief plot synopsis and it will still remain a non spoiler review, which as I get in to I think fans of the comic will want me to keep it that way.

The Joker (played by Mark Hamill) has once again escaped from Arkham asylum and once again, Batman (played by Kevin Conroy) has to pursue him to stop whatever scheme he is planning this time. The Joker, after buying a Carnival approaches the house of commissioner Gordon (played by Ray Wise) and proceeds to shoot and paralyse his daughter Barbara Gordon aka Batgirl (played by Tara Strong) and take Commissioner Gordon back to his fun fare of horrors (I couldn’t make it up, even if I tried) with the sole purpose of breaking him down. The race is now on for Batman to not only rescue Commissioner Gordon but also retain his sanity. Just for the record, I have read the comic The Killing Joke so I will be judging this film as an adaption as well as a film on it’s own merits. That being said, I’m not certain that fans of the comic will be entirely happy with this adaptation and I can’t say I’m entirely happy myself. For example, there is a whole prologue section of the film about Batman and Batgirl trying to take down a new mob boss in town and it’s not like this is a small segment of the film, this goes on for 30 minutes, that is a long time considering that unlike most of the DC animated films that go straight to DVD, this has received a theatrical release, it still is only 77 minutes long. Coming in only at the bare minimum time to warrant a theatrical release, that means that half of the time is took up with stuff that wasn’t in the comic! However, while this section does feel like a portion of a lost script for an abandoned Batgirl movie, it’s not too bad, it’s actually quite good in parts and I understand the purpose of it. I get the sense that Brian Azzarello wanted us to relate more to Barbara Gordon and have her have more of a character before she is inevitably shot. In the original comic she felt more like a plot device than a character, so I actually think this, in some ways, actually benefits the film, that being said, however, a few, how shall I say, iffy decisions in this section, including which I am pretty sure fans are already aware of at this point but nevertheless it demands being mentioned, things get a bit Adult for the lack of a better term and I think it may annoy a few people. My personal thoughts, in case you have got the hint of what I am on about and have seen the film, my opinion of it is that I am not a fan of it because I think it messes up the dynamic of the characters. While I do believe the segment does go on a little to long I do believe it gives the Barbara Gordon character time to shine and I am glad we get to see some of the iconic Batgirl in an animated film at last. When we finally get into the Killing Joke adaptation, it is absolutely fantastic. I will say with the first section compared to the second section, Brian Azzarello is a better writer when he is kept on a leash and doesn’t have the ability to go off too much on his own path, that being said he does give a few good additions to the film.

The Killing Joke is a very short graphic novel, you can probably read the whole thing in about 40 minutes. I first read it on a flight to Miami and it barely killed any time whatsoever. He doesn’t just pad out the running time with that, there are also a few scenes with extra action than was in the comic and a few of the action scenes tend to go on a bit longer than you would expect, plus extra scenes added in. Personally I think the film should have been smarter with what it cut and how it expanded on the graphic novel. The additions don’t harm the adaptation however and do feel like they expand on the source material but also take something away from it. The action feels necessary to justify the film. The original comic was more of a character piece and despite the fact that a lot of additions have been made to the film version, the character piece is still there. We get several flashbacks to a possible back story for the Joker and we also get one of the most devious Joker plans ever. You can really tell that both Tim Burton and Christopher Nolan were heavily inspired by this story because the Joker in this story heavily resembles both the Jack Nicholson literation and the Keith Ledger version from the Dark Knight. In fact the plot of this film was very similar to the Dark Knight in the sense of the Joker doesn’t really have a plan to make riches or get one over on Batman, he just wants to make a point to society, being that everyone is just as insane as him and all it takes is just one bad day and everyone will be just like him, so you might as well go mad. This is where the film really gets to sink its teeth into the source material. This is a sadistic film with some really horrific imagery. The R rating allows the film to go all out in the way we had hoped and as a result really delivers the terrifying, almost disturbing story that Alan Moore created and it is very much in the spirit of the original comic. I felt the comic really underplayed Batman and it was at the expense of the fact that the Joker got the majority of the focus. I think the film balances out the two better and it doesn’t feel like Batman is playing second fiddle to the Joker. If I did have one complaint about the narrative it’s that despite the fact that Barbara Gordon is built up big time at the beginning, she goes back to being the plot device that she was in the comic. Granted we would see the impact this would have on her in future comics, but this is a stand alone film, we are not going to get to see any more. We do get some closure in a post credit scene, however, I think it’s another minor point of complaint and it’s really a nit pick because it’s a part of the source material that they had to adapt and I would be lying if I said the initial prologue hadn’t aided this plot well.

Finally, this film has one of the best endings of any of the other DC animated films I have seen. It’s fantastic, to such an extent that the director really lets this scene play out entirely. In fact there is no music for a large portion of the credits. That’s how much Sam Liu believed this ending was. Plus we get some of the best back and forths between Batman and the Joker. The one thing that makes this film, it is the dialogue. Much of the dialogue has been lifted from the comic and are direct quotes, though obviously some bits and pieces have been added here and there. The dialogue is still great from the comic and I even think some of the additional scenes work well, though I do feel that Alan Moore’s writing style doesn’t mix entirely well with Brian Azzarello’s and as a result some of Alan Moore’s lines feel slightly out of place, mainly around Batman’s dialogue. I think Brian Azzarello writes Batman slightly different to Alan Moore. The plot was fantastic in the comic and it’s really well done here, despite my complaints this is still one hell of a well written plot. I even get how well Commissioner Gordon was written as well as some of the other side characters that feel like they were given some love and care, even if a couple of then are a bit under used.

What really makes the film stick is the performances. Kevin Conroy frankly, is Batman. No actor has managed to outdo him in this role and I don’t think any actor will. The man, frankly, has earned his bragging rights on this one. Likewise, Mark Hamill, is the Joker, and not only is this one of the best written Jokers, it is also one of the best performances of his career. He really sells the terrifying nature of the character and really complements the source material perfectly. Tara Strong who seems to be darting back and forth between various DC characters makes an excellent Barbara Gordon and an excellent Batgirl in this one and I would argue that the film would have sunk if this role had been mis-cast. Incidentally Ray Wise who is more well known in America due to his profile on television plays is an excellent Commissioner Gordon, I don’t think he’s the best actor to play the role, but he damn well delivers the part in this film and I really liked him. There are other supporting players in here but none of them left as much of an impression since those four characters get the most time and effort. I did enjoy the performance of Mauray Sterling as new mob boss Paris, but what really sells it is the Conroy and Hamill performances which really make the film.

As for the action. Well it’s a DC animated film. Once again it’s absolutely fantastic. While most of them are tacked on to keep up the running time they are at least done very well. They are fast paced, have excellent cuts and we are allowed to see the full physics of the scene, which I feel is missing heavily from several action films. It hadn’t helped that the day before I saw this film I saw Jason Bourne which I felt had some action scenes that had been very poorly edited. As for the animation, well The Killing Joke was illustrated by Brian Boland who as I mentioned in previous animated film reviews, most of the films try to replicate the artist of the original comic, in this instance, however, I get a sense that the film is really trying to give its own sort of animation at times, although they have still borrowed heavily from Brian Boland’s original art. Several of the scenes of the comic are brought to life in loving detail. The designs of Batman and the Joker are also very close to the comic. I think the animation is great in this film. It’s lovely and fluid and really delivers on the horrific imagery of the comic. It definitely deserves some kudos, although I didn’t see this film at the cinema as I was out of the Country when it was released, I do think it will have worked in the cinema for all of you who did go to see it at there.

Batman The Killing Joke is one of the best DC animated films to date if you look purely at the second half and overall it’s a mixed bag. It has padded out its source material slightly and I would be lying if I didn’t say that there were parts of this film that bothered me and the flow of the narrative is terrible but I think overall it’s a really great Batman film. Especially if you judge it on its own merits. The animation is great, the fight scenes are good, the dialogue is absolutely fantastic and it tells one of the most iconic Batman stories very well. I don’t think it will do too well at the Box Office considering that it’s coming off the heels of Deadpool which is another R rated comic adaptation, I think people are still in awe of that film, but I think the comparison between the two is a bad idea. Compared to the other DC animated films however it’s not the best of the year but I still think you should add this to your collection. If you like Batman you definitely need to watch it and I would definitely recommend it to anyone who liked the Dark Knight, just don’t buy it for your kids, this is not their Batman movie.

So what are your thoughts on The Killing Joke. Was it the adaptation you wanted it to be or did you feel there were some issues with it? Please leave some comments if you have an opinion. I welcome all opinions, good or bad. I would just love to hear what you thought about it.

If you want to know what is coming up next week, then check out my review of Suicide Squad, it is announced there.

Thanks for reading my review, I hope you have enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. Please read my Suicide Squad review.

Calvin – Nerd Consultant

“SUICIDE SQUAD”

The DC Cinematic Universe is back with its 3rd entry in its franchise. Now if I’m honest, I am not the hugest Suicide Squad fan. I read a lot of the comics, I have read most of their new 52 stuff up until New Suicide Squad got boring and repetitive especially only having one excellent story arc, and even then there were some problems with that. I am currently reading the current Suicide Squad book though I am keeping my options open as to whether I am going to continue reading it. DC is clearly counting on this to be a massive success because they have made it one of their twice monthly issues which has been reserved for characters like Superman, Batman, Green Lantern, Green Arrow and Wonder Woman and this could come back to haunt them, because if the film is not a success it may not lead people to buy the comic. The film is also coming off the back of Batman V Superman which I recently reviewed for the site and as of when I wrote this review I still had not seen the extended cut so I can’t give an opinion on it just yet. If the worst comes to the worst you will see it in my best and worst films of 2016 list. With Batman V Superman being a rather polarizing film it means that Suicide Squad is coming off of one of the biggest flops for DC, but whichever way you judge it, Batman V Superman was not a success and I thought that film was ok. I kind of liked the look of the trailers for Suicide Squad, though my cynical head said, this is just DC trying to get a 2nd team so they can compete with Marvel which now has 2 movie teams with Avengers and Guardians of the Galaxy. It also seems like a really quick way to introduce a ton of villains to the DC Cinematic Universe. The trailers do look really good though and I am impressed by some of the casting.

The film is directed by David Ayer who is a decent director and I thought he could do some good work with this material. Now I saw this after coming back from a music festival so I wasn’t at my freshest seeing this and I really wanted something good to come from it, since I do believe a good Cinematic Universe is possible, the problem is that Zach Snyder is the producer of this film and I am wondering how much control he has had over it. I am certain that most people are aware of the ending of Batman V Superman, but to keep everyone in the loop, I am going to make sure this not only a spoiler free review of Suicide Squad, but I will do my best to not give away any spoilers of Batman V Superman.

The basic plot of Suicide Squad is that it takes place shortly after the events of Batman V Superman with the government feeling the pressure following the end of that movie and the new potential metahuman threat. After a city is taken over by the enchantress (played by Carla Delevinge), Amanda Waller (played by Viola Davis) assembles Task Force X a group of prisoners with special abilities and skills to go in on suicide missions for the government and if they get caught, it’s their own fault, they are thrown under the bus. The team consists of Deadshot (played by Will Smith), Harley Quinn (played by Margot Robbie), Killer Croc (played by Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje), Captain Boomerang (played by Jai Courtney) and El Diablo (played by Jay Hernandez). They are now led by Rick Flag (played by Joel Kinnaman), but there is another problem on the rise. The Joker (played by Jared Leto), having got wind of the operation has assembled his team to get Harley Quinn back and the two sides are heading for a clash.

Suicide Squad is basically another entry in the DC Cinematic Universe, it has a lot of strengths and a lot of weaknesses, however, out of all the three films so far Suicide Squad has the least amount of weaknesses. Yes, I am just as surprised as you are, I read the rotten tomatoes score, this film has 26% at the time of writing this review and I don’t think it deserves that whatsoever, this is a much better film than a 26%. I would like to remind you that Grimsby still has 38%!! I’m going to start with the positives as there are a lot of positives in this film. For a start, the costume designs are fantastic. The cinematography is also great plus the humour and characters are actually pretty good and so is the humour. I will go into more detail about that later and there are a ton of cool moments. Like Batman v Superman there are some really good ideas here, however, much like Batman v Superman they don’t take those good ideas and run with them and it feels like the film is half concerned with what it’s trying to be. Suicide Squads biggest strength, however, is it is not as ambitious as Batman v Superman. That being said it does suffer from the same problem given the lack of back story in the Cinematic Universe at this point so as a result the first half of the film where it introduces the team and various characters, all, who have not appeared in films prior to this feels very slow and truncated. The first half of this film moves at a snail’s pace. As a result, it just kills the momentum, the film seriously makes up for it in the 2nd half but it almost feels too little too late. I do admit I was drawn to these characters a lot more than I was to a lot of the characters in Batman v Superman but I’m just not feeling it. That the same for this whole film I wanted to love it and I knew there were some good things on screen, but I didn’t love it and I wanted to love this film!

The biggest issue is with the villains. Anyone who complains about the Marvel Cinematic Universe villains again, I will point them to this movie, these villains are bland and forgettable. Enchantress is built up as a member of the squad in the trailer’s but she acts purely as the villain this time along with her brother who looks like a left over effect from God’s of Egypt, who is played by rapper Common, but the biggest disappointment is definitely The Joker. Now the trailers and my plot synopsis and the trailers make it sound like the Joker is going to be much more in the film than he really is. He is barely in the movie! As a result he doesn’t leave much of an impression, which is a shame because Jared Leto is trying his best and it’s not entirely his fault. I suspect there are a lot more scenes of him that were meant to go in the final product and we will see that when we get the ultimate cut, but it feels, once again, like another case of Warner Bros not knowing what to cut and what to leave in. So now, as a result, the trailers feel like a lie! I will say I never really felt the spirit of the Joker with this version, it’s there at points and some scenes are absolutely fantastic, but they feel few and far between and as a result The Joker feels rather pointless. This is a borderline cameo! I may have said that I liked the 2nd half of the film for the most part, but I still feel, overall, it is a bit of a truncated mess. Granted, not as much as Batman v Superman, this film is smarter and has a free flowing plot, it just doesn’t quite work as a whole. It never reaches the high standard it needs to. The other issue is with the ending of the film. The film’s ending feels like a massive cop out. It also feels like it is building too much for a sequel that hasn’t even been announced yet. Granted, I think the film should earn its keep with its critics and audiences yet before it gets a sequel, I am just getting a bit bored with how many films that are sequel bating right now.

Don’t get me wrong, Suicide Squad still has a ton of merits. The characters are very endearing at times, especially Will Smith’s Deadshot, who I liked a lot more than I expected to. Harley Quinn is really cool and the spirit of her character is completely in the film, and despite the fact that he is bit of a plot device more than a character, I did kind of like El Diablo. As proved with the audience I went with, general movie goers and a general audience won’t be able to predict where this film is going. Comic fans will. If you are at all familiar with Suicide Squad, you will know where this film is going. The film actually feels rather similar to Batman Assault on Arkham, which was essentially an animated Suicide Squad film, but I think that film did a much better job than this version. The one thing that stands out, however, is that when it does get the team dynamic down its is really damn good and there were a ton of really cool moments, it just feels like a bit of a slog to get there and a couple of characters feel more like plot devices. Anyone who is familiar with Comics knows that not everyone is going to make it out alive, especially in a film called Suicide Squad. I won’t reveal who actually gets killed but let’s just say, one of them is very, very obvious. Also a couple of characters feel a bit added on. Katana, for example, feels completely like she has been added there to build up the numbers. I will give the film credit, it doesn’t try to build up too many future movies, although we do get the first experience that one of the main heroes is going to be in future films and we get more build-up of the Justice League movie, oh and stick around for the credits, because this time there actually is a post credit scene, plus there is actually a cool closing credit sequence. Overall, it’s an ok plot, but that plot should have been a lot better than it was.

As for the performances, there are quite a few standouts actually. The writing may not have been brilliant in this film but some of the actors really try to do their best with it. The best performances, by far however, are Margot Robbie as Harley Quinn and Viola Davis as Amanda Waller, who both get their characters down perfectly. Will Smith was slightly better than I thought, but then again, it’s Will Smith, the guy is the king of cool. The only thing I can say though is that it is just another Will Smith performance, he has not entirely embodied Deadshot, better than I thought it would be, but it doesn’t entirely work. Jared Leto is trying his best as the Joker, and I think he could play an amazing Joker, I just think he needs a better film to do it in and I’m not just saying that cause he’s in the shadow of Heath Ledger’s Joker. There are no real weak performances in the film. The only one who doesn’t leave much of an impression is Common, who I didn’t even realise was in the film until the closing credits. The actors are pretty good for the most part and I think the performances are what can really sell what is a quite shakily written film.

Right, now let’s get to the action scenes, because actually, the action scenes are pretty damn good in this film. Some of them are shot pretty poorly towards the end but for the most part they are pretty well choreographed and very well edited. The martial arts are all well choreographed, there are some excellent scenes and some of them are very exciting, plus the camera work means that we get to see most of what is actually happening and you can tell what is going on. The downside, though is, some of the scenes at the end miss the point entirely and we get some really awful ones at the end. Not that they break the film, but I would be amiss if I didn’t mention it.

I saw the film in 2D and despite the fact that I didn’t see the 3D, I wouldn’t recommend that format. The film is shot in the dark half of the time and the darkening effect of the glasses would definitely ruin the 3D. The CGI and the special effects in general are pretty good and the character designs are actually fantastic. I wasn’t really feeling the Latino sort of Gangster joke that they had going on but I think Jared Leto makes the best out of it and really suits the character as a result. Killer Croc is also looking fantastic, he resembles closely his incarnation in the Arkham Assylum video game series. Deadshot is looking pretty close to his character counterpart in the comics and Harley Quinn’s re-design is pretty good though they get a few of her classic iconic designs in there is well which is very much appreciated. The cinematography in this film is absolutely fantastic, this has some excellent camera work and excellent sound editing. That’s what I really appreciate about this film because it feels like there was a real effort to make something good here.

Suicide Squad is a film that I think is ok. Not good, not bad, just ok. I think it had a lot of good points and a lot of bad points though I am not sure which one outweighs the other. I have very similar thoughts to this as I do to Batman v Superman. The real strengths, however, are Harley Quinn and Amander Waller who I think were both perfectly captured in this film. It doesn’t spend too much time building up The Justice League movie and told its own plot in a decent way, it just missed the mark on a few occasions, most notably in the fact that there was not nearly enough of the Joker in this film, despite how he had been built up in trailers. If you are a fan of the comics, I would say give it a go although I would sooner recommend seeing Batman Assault on Arkham which is a film that did a much better job with the Suicide Squad. General movie goers and fans of Batman v Superman should probably check it out although I would urge a word of caution, this film is rated 15 for a reason, this is not a film for little kids. It’s other big weakness is the fact that the film is incredibly slow initially and doesn’t pick up the pace until the last minute mark and it still doesn’t feel like there is much back story to this DC Universe, but I think that will be fixed in time.

I didn’t see any other films in between this and Finding Dory so I will skip that part.

“So what are your thoughts on Suicide Squad, did you agree with me or do you have a different view?”

We have one more review left for August. Come back on 26 August where I will be giving my review of the latest adaptation of Swallows and Amazons.

Thanks for reading my review, I hope you have enjoyed reading it as much as I have enjoyed writing it and go read my review of Batman The Killing Joke now, if you haven’t already done so.

Calvin – Nerd Consultant

“FINDING DORY”

Pixar was back on a roll last year when they released Inside Out which earned them yet another Best Animated picture Oscar, granted it went downhill a bit with The Good Dinosaur, but I still thought that was a decent movie, as anyone who read my review will attest to, but the one thing I commented on in that review is that it was rather interesting that these were the first 2 original Pixar films in the last several years with the previous years entries from the studio being sequels to their previous films. They all had something in common, with the exception of the Toy Story sequels, they all sucked! Seriously, not one of these ever got it completely right, or actually even close.

Ok, first off, we have had a sequel to Cars and 2 spin offs to it, why? Cars is widely regarded as the worst Pixar movie, why would you want to follow up on that! Then we have Monsters University, which was a prequel to Monsters Inc. and it also sucked, mainly because, unlike the original film, there was absolutely no imagination to it, it’s just your typical College buddy movie, that’s it, I could just have easily watched Animal House, I don’t need to see Pixar do that. Pixar also announced that two of their next few films will be sequels to previous entries. One of them, which will be coming out in 2019 will be Incredibles 2, one Pixar film I actually wanted to get a sequel because I felt that that series of films had enough to work with and expand upon and I am really looking forward to seeing it and the other one is today’s film, finding Dory, a sequel to the mega hit Finding Nemo. I really remember going to see Finding Nemo in the cinema and it blowing my expectations even for the age I was at the time, I was about 12 or 13, I can’t remember, it came out in 2003. Though I will say that I didn’t think Finding Nemo needed a sequel, I thought it was concluded, it was a pretty set story, the characters developed I wasn’t sure there were many places for it to go, so I was disappointed to hear that this sequel was coming out. Also, Dory is a side character and I didn’t think pushing her to be the main character was the best idea. Those were my initial thoughts, but that being said, the trailers look great and since this film was released a month earlier in America, I was hearing really great things about it so my expectations went up for seeing the film.

The film has been co-written and co-directed by Andrew Stanton, the director of the original Finding Nemo who has also directed Wall-E and this is first directing job since the disastrous flop John Carter, incidentally the film is also co-directed by Angus MacLane who directed the Toy Story shorts that followed on from Toy Story 3, which I won’t claim to have seen, but I have heard good things about. So I thought the film was in good hands and I also heard a lot of interviews with Stanton talking about how passionately he felt about the project and how he wanted to go back to the world and finish off a few ideas he hadn’t managed to get in the first film, let’s see if that was all worth it.

The plot of Finding Dory takes place a year after the events of Finding Nemo. Dory (played by Ellen DeGeneres) is suddenly starting to remember that she lost her parents due to her short term memory problems and now wants to set out to find them. Having remembered that they are probably in California she sets off with Marlin and Nemo (played by Albert Brooks and Hayden Rolence). They are picked up out of an Aquarium where Dory meets an Octopus named Hank (played by Ed O’Neill) and together they set out to explore the Aquarium to find Dory’s missing parents. Ok, if you are going in with the mindset that this is going to be a carbon copy of Finding Nemo, leave that mindset at the door, this film has a plot and identity of its own. I would still, however, recommend that you watch Finding Nemo again before you watch this film. This film does succeed where other Pixar films have done in the past, there is a very good main character, lots of decent jokes, a plethora of colourful side characters with a lot of quirks and the plot is very strong, having a good mix of drama and comedy. It does sound like a good mix, and for the most part it really works, it’s a really nice, fun, family film. The plot runs at a decent smooth pace and I can’t complain about its pacing or story telling, the dialogue is pretty good delivering decent lines and despite my apprehension, Dory a good main character. There’s not a lot to complain about with this film, in fact many of the running jokes from the previous film that I thought they were going to run to death in the sequel are that absent, the ‘just keep swimming’ song is only in the film once, thank goodness and there are very little references to the previous movie, in fact many of the characters, like Nigel the Pelican and the fish from the Dentist’s tank are entirely absent from the film, which I am rather grateful for because frankly there is nothing more to do with these characters. The only characters that briefly make a re-appearance are the Manta Ray teacher whose name I can’t remember and Crash the Turtle and again that is one of the weaker parts of the film because it is basically the same joke as last time, Marlin doesn’t like riding at high speed.

The biggest problem that I have is despite the fact that they actually have some really good side characters including a Whale Shark called Destiny (played by Kaitlin Olson) and a Beluga Whale called Bailey (played by Ty Burrell), I don’t think people will grab onto these side characters, for the lack of a better term, the same way they did in the previous film. They do have out there eccentric personalities, but not to the same degree I think the first film did, though clearly judging by his time in the film and the marketing Hank is clearly intended to be the main supporting character of the film. He was in all the posters, in all the trailers and outside Dory he probably gets the most screen time in the film. The problem with this though is that he just doesn’t have much of a character. It’s not a bad character per-say but it’s very clear that Pixar was counting on him being a big hit and I don’t think he will be. His character arc is rather artificial and doesn’t really feel like it comes full circle, it’s just kind of there because he needs a supporting character. Likewise the sheer number of supporting characters isn’t an issue, there are no more than there was in Finding Nemo, the difference between this and Finding Nemo is that I think Finding Nemo did a better balancing act with the main characters and the side characters and it felt like everyone had a reason to be there. In this one, it doesn’t quite work out, only because it’s detracting from one of the characters in the worst way possible, mainly Marlin and Nemo, they really don’t have that much of a reason to be here other than brand recognition, they don’t contribute all that much to the plot and not much of a character arc. on fact Marlin has kind of gone back slightly between films, he’s not the same neurotic character he was in the first film, but it’s hard to ignore a lot about it. The film also wisely ditches the Ocean setting for an Aquarium setting. The first film did pretty much everything that could be done with the Ocean setting so the change is very welcome and allows for a new variety of jokes and plot points. It also gives a reason for there to be human characters around, although none of them have faces, or at least not many of them do, so there’s no real human characters per se. Those are most of my nit picky issues.

What do I like about this film?

There’s not much to talk about with the cast. The cast feels more celebrity orientated than the previous film and with the Aquarium being set in California, it does mean that there is a lot more of an American cast whereas the previous cast were largely Australian, though I suspect the California setting was also put in place to gain a product placement for the famous Monteray Bay Aquarium that must have fallen through or not be in the film’s budget for whatever reason. As to be expected, Ellen DeGeneres is the best performance in the film, she really throws her all into playing Dory and she hasn’t detracted between films. Albert Brooks is still pretty good as Marlin and I think he delivers what he needs to do in order to give a good performance, but I think his part isn’t as well written as the first film. Likewise, Hayden Rolence is still pretty good as Nemo. I really liked Kaitlin Olson as Destiny and she gets some very funny deliveries. The performance that I was rather surprised didn’t make me laugh though was Ty Burrell of Modern Family Fame, who incidentally is the most recognisable voice in the cast list since he is just basically playing a Whale version of Phil from Modern Family, though he does get a few funny lines to do with him discovering his echo location. There are also a couple of weird small roles and cameos. Idris Elba and Dominic West both play a pair of Sea Lions and get a couple of funny lines every so often and the latter of which I didn’t realise was in the film until I checked IMDB and there is a really weird cameo of Sigourney Weaver playing herself as a voice over welcoming people to the Aquarium, but mind you, her presence in playing herself is one of the funniest parts of this whole film. We also get some scenes with Dory’s parents in flashback who are played by Diane Keaton and Eugene Levy, again they deliver really good performances and I wasn’t aware it was them, which is rather surprising considering I am a bit of a Eugene Levy fan. Incidentally, while I am on the subject, I think Idris Elba and Margo Robbie are competing to see who can appear in the most films this year! Don’t those two ever sleep! Incidentally, great cast, and none of the performances really sink it. I think the best performance is Ellen DeGeneres, though Ed O’Neill is putting his effort in as well as Hank and you can really tell he puts his all into it. The cast also really deliver on the funny lines and I will be honest, I laughed a lot when I was in the cinema.

As for the animation, well here is where things get a bit tricky. I would have liked the animation to have been updated a bit, but that being said, I still think the animation in Finding Nemo holds up which is why it doesn’t appear that things have changed much in the 13 years between films, incidentally this is evident by the fact that one of the early scenes of the film is actually a direct scene lifted from Finding Nemo which has only received a few retro active updates. The Aquarium setting, really suits this animation style and it still works. The character designs still look pretty good and they deliver very good facial expressions which is kind of difficult to do on fish when you really think about it, even harder on an Octopus without making it look like squiggly diddley. If there is one thing that has gone down in the animation, it’s the human characters. The uncanny valley is definitely an effect with some of these guys. Luckily we don’t see that many of them, so it’s not really that important.

I saw the film in 3D and you know what, for once, it was actually kind of good for a change. There are a few scenes that are decently shot for the 3D format and the animation style really makes certain objects appear in the foreground and background really well, plus it gives an extra amount of depth, no pun intended, to several of the shots. I don’t think it is essential to see it in 3D though I do think a few of the shots will look kind of jerky if you see the film flat. If you can afford to see it in 3D then do so, it’s worth the extra expense.

Finding Dory can best be summed up as a good sequel. It’s very nice, charming and it’s a good afternoon out with the family. It’s not the best family film I have seen this year, it’s not the best animated film I have seen this year, but I still enjoyed myself. There are some very good jokes, the animation hasn’t received too much of an update, but still works and the characters are still nice and really likeable. The plot is very good and has a nice running character arc for its main character, though it’s slightly at the expense of the side characters and the performances are all round pretty decent. The hope going in was that this would be more Toy Story 3 than Cars 2 and they are absolutely right. It’s definitely one of the better sequels that Pixar has brought out. I still don’t think it’s as good as Toy Story 3 and I would be lying if I said that I thought this would be in my best films of 2016, but you know what, considering I saw this a week after Ice Age Collision Course, frankly, this was a breath of fresh air. Take the family to see this and if you can, watch Finding Nemo before doing so and if you liked Finding Nemo you will enjoy Finding Dory.

Now time to discuss what films I saw between this and Ghostbusters. We have more than I was expecting this week, though this was down to the fact that there were a few extra screenings that I wasn’t aware were happening, so I took advantage of this.

The films I saw this week included, Ice Age Collision Course, The BFG, Star Trek Beyond and Jason Bourne. I did go and see RWBY Volume 2 in cinemas but I am not going to count that one because it’s not a film and more of an entire season being shown in one go, though I am absolutely in love with the series and I would recommend you go out and buy all 3 seasons on Blu Ray, you can watch them on YouTube if you don’t want to purchase them and also on roosterteeth.com and you will gain them some money on the ad revenue.

Let’s start with “Ice Age Collision Course”, I already briefly alluded to that in my summary of Finding Dory. Ice Age Collision Course is a terrible movie. There is nothing more to explore with these characters, in fact most of the characters are just there out of necessity than actual reason to be in the plot. There are too many comic relief characters the Scrat the squirrel bits, which I normally find really funny aren’t funny anymore because they made the unbelievable idiotic decision to send him into space, I AM NOT JOKING. The lines aren’t funny either and the cast list is unbelievably stupid including Jesse J for some reason, who by the way, can’t act. The animation is still not great and the thing is just constant noise and things going on, it never lets up for 5 minutes, it’s made worse by the fact that it is so unnecessary. This should have gone straight to Netflix and I could have ignored it. Avoid at all costs and for goodness sake, we are 5 movies in at this point. Let this franchise end!!! By the way, anyone reading this expecting it to be part of my worst films of 2016 list, don’t count on it, Norm of the North was still way worse and that’s the only thing that saves it from that list.

“The BFG” was really good. It’s a nice, charming film and it’s Steven Spiellberg at his best. Mark Rylance does an excellent motion capture performance that does an excellent job taking over from David Jason’s who previously occupied the role and while there is not that much to it and it does kind of pad out the source material it’s a really nice charming family film that everyone can enjoy. This is the kind of film that should be played at Christmas because every one of the family will get something out of it and I had a smile on my face after seeing it and I laughed a lot more than I was expecting to and this film even got me to laugh at ‘fart’ jokes and that is damn near impossible for me. It there is one thing holding it back, the Roald Dahl enthusiast will claim that it’s not an incredible animation. Considering this is my favourite Roald Dahl book I really thought it knew what to take out, what to add and what to change to fit the 2 hr running time. It’s really worth a watch, check it out.

“Star Trek Beyond” was much better than I was expecting it to be too. I actually re-watched both of the previous JJ Abrahams films prior to seeing this and while I was expecting it to be a rather dull filler film, it is actually pretty dam good. I think the biggest strength of the film is the writing to which one of the co-writers is Simon Pegg and I think people forget what a decent writer he is. I have heard a lot of Star Trek fans complain that is not within the spirit of the original show, but I really think they should get over themselves because as it is, it really works and frankly I thought it was very good. I do admit, though, that I am not a huge Star Trek fan and I can get where the Star Trek fans are coming from, but as a good summer blockbuster, I think it really works. I certainly liked it more than Into Darkness which I felt spent way too much time trying to replicate scenes from Wrath of Khan instead of being its own thing. This one for the first time felt like a simple, good, Star Trek film which is what I wanted. Once again special props to Zachary Quinto as Spock and Karl Urban as Bones, both of whom are, once again, the best part of these films.

Finally, “Jason Bourne”. If you liked the Bourne films you are probably going to be disappointed with this one. It’s not a bad film, it’s a pretty decent action film aided by a fantastic performance once again by Alicia Vikander who I think now has become one of those actresses I will want to see in anything she is in because she delivers an excellent performance every time. It’s just really a paint by numbers action film, not something I would have said about any of the other Bourne films. Granted I think it’s better than Bourne Legacy, but I think the franchise could have concluded with the Bourne Ultimatum. There isn’t much to explore with Jason Bourne’s character. Now it’s not to the same degree as the Ice Age films but, still, I don’t really feel like there was much too shed light on in this film and if anything it feels rather unnecessary. Given that the original director has returned to direct the film, it’s still well worked and I would say that those action scenes are worth the price of admission alone and I am not saying it’s a bad film, but the other films did a much better job with this premise and more unfolded like spy novels more than action films. This one feels much more like an action film and that is coming from someone who wasn’t much of a fan of the Bourne films to begin with.

“So what are your thoughts of Finding Dory or any of the other films I have mentioned. Please leave a comment. I welcome all opinions. Did I get them right or not?”

You can also submit your own content by visiting our how to submit section. We would love to get some extra reviews in and expand the society.

Remember, our post-diagnostic support group meeting is in a few days and I am going to be doing a Pokemon Go session with anyone who wants to join in. I am looking forward to it as I haven’t played the game in Crewe and I am hoping I won’t have to catch the same Pokemon over and over again.

Next week we are getting a DC double bill. I will be reviewing 2 films based on stories about the Joker. So I will be giving my rather late thoughts on “Suicide Squad” and DC’s latest animated movie “Batman The Killing Joke”.

Thanks for reading my review. I hoped you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it and I’m going to the aquarium to look for some water Pokémon.

Calvin – Nerd Consultant

“GHOSTBUSTERS (2016)”

Now, if like me, you grew up in the early to mid 1990’s, you probably didn’t grow up with Ghostbusters but still caught the tail end of the Ghostbusters craze. Nevertheless, I loved that movie, I even liked the sequel which a lot of people don’t have that much fond affection for but to me it was up to the same standard of the original and it has clearly stood the test of time since Ghostbusters has become a large part of the geek culture to such an extent that the demands for a Ghostbusters 3 were rampant for years and years and of course Hollywood knew they were on a winner and tried to get one out, too bad that Ghostbusters 3 went through so much development hell that it never received a release. It went back and forth between various writers and directors and it’s been juggled around for ages and of course a full reunion of the original cast became impossible recently due to the sad death of Harold Reymuss. That left the franchise with an open vacancy, luckily, director Paul Feig stepped up to the plate, you may recognise his name as he has directed films like Bridesmaids, The Heat and Spy which I reviewed last year, but then of course the internet went into an uproar when it was revealed that the Ghostbusters were going to be, shock, ALL WOMEN and my thoughts were it was a good idea. I thought any change to the cast was going to be a potential disaster, but I thought that starting afresh like this made a lot more sense and the fact that Paul Feig was directing also made a lot of sense. The man is very good at doing female driven comedies as I made evident in my Spy review. You couldn’t convince half of the fans though and everyone was writing this film off before they had even seen it and of course, now, I am very professional, so I did not write this film off until I saw the first trailer, which looked really awful and the second one didn’t do him any favours too and that was the point where I started to think that maybe this wasn’t going to work out and that’s not because the Ghostbusters were all women, the trailers just made the jokes look awful and really forced.

Now I sent a Tweet earlier this year saying that I believed that Batman V Superman would be the highest grossing film of the year and that Ghostbusters was going to be the biggest flop and judging by the Box Office when I was on holiday that one really bit me on the bum but of course the film came out both in America and the UK whilst I was on holiday so it was almost impossible to avoid reviews and reactions and I will go more into detail about that in the actual review, but needles to say I didn’t go into it entirely blind to peoples opinions of this film, though I did make sure not to watch any reviews on YouTube or read any reviews in publications. So when all is said and done, is this a Ghostbusters that matches up to the original?

The plot of this new Ghostbusters stems from a series of paranormal events taking place across New York City and is investigated by Abby Yates (played by Melissa McCarthy) and her partner Jillian Holtzmann (played by Kate McKinnon). Abby unwittingly ropes in her childhood friend and former partner in Ghost Studies Dr Erin Gilbert (played by Kristen Wiig) and are later joined by subway worker Patty Tolan (played by Leslie Jones). The Ghostbusters discover that there is a plan to open a Vortex in New York which will then unleash several ghosts across the City and cause an Armageddon type event. Can this new team save New York before it’s too late. The first day that it came out in the UK was the first day that reviews were relaxed and the critics were actually rather polite to it, it got a Rotten Tomatoes score of 79%, and a Metacritic score of 60, but the IMDB rating was down to a low 3.8 out of 10 which suggested that fans were not happy with the final product. My thoughts, that’s were things get a bit tricky. Ghostbusters was probably on the films that I felt was one of the hardest films I have had to get a grip on because I’m not really a fan of it. It’s not a very good film, but it’s not terrible, it’s a mixed film. If I had to say anything I would say that it leans more towards bad than good, but I wouldn’t say it’s a disaster there are some good ideas and good performances here.

I will start with some of the positives, because there are a lot more positives in this film than negatives. The first being the comedians are all well cast in their parts and are bringing their A game to the film overall. There are also some decent jokes and some moments even feel that they harken back very spiritually to the original Ghostbusters film. There is just one problem, these moments are few and brief. The film makers really want you to remember the original, however, I think this is going to backfire on them as the constant references get a bit tiresome. We can have two versions of the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man, The Slimer makes an appearance, there are all sorts of mini gags and cameo from original cast members including all three of the surviving Ghostbusters whose cameos vary in degrees of time they appear on screen, Bill Murray getting the most to do, and if you didn’t know the Ghostbusters theme song when you went into the movie, you will know it by the end because they never stop playing it and the covers vary from passable to in one case, downright awful. I think the major problem with these is that it actually makes you wonder why you aren’t watching the original movie since all of these things were done much better there!! It’s not really what I would call loving references, it’s more, see, this is a Ghostbusters movie! It suggests that the film makers don’t have enough confidence in the material to try anything new. That isn’t to say there isn’t any new and creative ideas in this film, it’s just they are few and far between. The villain’s plot, while decent is a very similar to a lot of modern Blockbuster plots, in fact the whole of this film feels like it’s playing to be a massive popcorn blockbuster in a way that I never got from the original and it’s very clear that Hollywood wants to make big bucks off of this given the sheer amount of limited edition products that have been put on sale such as the Ekto Cooler Fizzy drink in America as well as the vast amount of product placements in the film which feel incredibly blatant at times, including a staggeringly unsubtle amount of Pringles which feels like it’s on the tail end of an advert on daytime television and a 7/11 logo appearing on screen for a gag that really fails. It’s times like this that make you realise what a real damaging effect product placements are having on modern blockbusters. Granted we are nowhere near the sheer scale of product placements that the Bond films have. The humour is also written to be much more over the top and eccentric, which let’s face it, the first one had a lot of that, but unfortunately they have missed a lot of the subtle humour that the original had and I don’t think the 4 comedians playing the role had the same amount of chemistry on screen as Murray, Ackroyd and Reymus. There is also a ton of weird cameos although I feel that most of them will go over the heads of a British audience who aren’t familiar with American celebrities. I think the only one who will stand out for the British audience is Ozzy Osbourne in a very bizarre cameo who looked like he just wandered onto set one day.

The action scenes are a bit over the top, but that’s become to be expected with modern blockbusters and I was glad that they were there because I feel like this was necessary for the update, however, it still doesn’t feel incredibly within the spirit of the original and that’s the biggest sin of this film and it’s one of the major indictments I am going to hold over it. The writing feels a lot more desperate, and I get a sense that the writers and directors felt like they were being backed into a corner and didn’t really know what to do, although I think this is more out of love for the original and fear of disappointing a fan base and I can respect them for that. I get a sense that everyone was trying their hardest but it doesn’t quite work overall. It doesn’t matter if the car looks the same, the weapons look the same and the effects are very similar, it just doesn’t feel quite the same. I will say, however, this film is not devoid of amusing moments and there are some really funny moments in the film. The funniest scenes going easily to Chris Hemsworth whose comedic part in this has been greatly under-rated in the trailers. I was rather impressed by Leslie Jones in her role who is easily the funniest of the four women. I also thought that one of the other big faults of this film was that the climax feels like a really big rip off of the Avengers climax, not helped by the fact that both films take place in New York. Now granted it’s not as blatantly obvious as it was in the recent Ninja Turtles film that I reviewed but it wasn’t exactly impossible to spot the similarities and I was just saying in my head ‘it’s the Avengers, it’s the Avengers, I have basically paid to watch the Avengers again’!! It also doesn’t help that the end credits go on forever and keep being interrupted by a few after gags that were clearly written during the production, but they couldn’t find a place to put them in the plot, so they just stuck them on the end. Oh, and the villain, played by Neil Casey isn’t that interesting either and he also feels like an afterthought.

That being said, Neil Casey does give a decent performance and gets a funny line every so often and his casting along with a lot of the main casting is another part that harkens back to the original with the majority cast members being Saturday Night Live alumni??, including Kristen Wiig who does a decent performance. Melissa McCarthy who once again is working with Paul Feig and I am convinced we are going to be making jokes about him casting her the same way we make jokes about Tim Burton casting Johnny Depp. She delivers a really good performance once again and proves that she is a genuinely talented comedian, which makes me wonder what is going on when she appears in films like The Boss. Kate McKinnon is alright, but I think she is the weakest of the four main actresses in the film. The best of the main actresses, as I mentioned is Leslie Jones who is really funny in parts of the film, it’s a shame then that she is not given as much to do by the writers since I am fairly certain that Kristen Wiig and Melissa McCarthy are meant to be playing the main characters. The best performance overall by far is Chris Hemsworth who is playing the dumb receptionist Kevin, who is given some fantastic lines and gags, including a decent running gag about wearing glasses with no lenses in them because he couldn’t be bothered to clean them and as a result high jinxes Sue and that’s not even the half of it. It’s very clear that Chris Hemsworth is having real fun in his role and he does a really good job considering he is cast against type in this film. Even when he is possessed by a Ghost and has to change personality part way through the film he does a dam good job of that too, honestly I feel ashamed to say that in a female driven comedy, the best comedic performance, is coming from a man. The cameos, however are not brilliant and the majority of them are cameos if not extended cameos. Bill Murray, despite the fact that he is given the most to do out of the three surviving Ghostbusters that have cameos in this film looks incredibly bored and feels like he is just there because he was offered a ton of money to be on set. The same goes for Dan Ackroyd who gets a really lame joke and I would dam near say that Ernie Hudson has got the smallest part because of the comments he made after it was announced that the 4 Ghostbusters were going to be women. The other cameos, again as I mentioned earlier will not be that well know to British audiences with the exceptions of Ozzy Osborne and Charles Dance who asserts to be a figure similar to Walter Peck in the original but has is dispersed with very quickly, again it feels like he just turned up on set and they wrote a part for him. The cast are not bad, they are trying their best, but are not given much to work with.

The effects, they are ok, they are actually half decent and I do not have many complaints about them. The CGI is alright and I will say that things like the Ekto 1 and the Proton Packs were all well made and I do like some of the attention to detail. I also thought that the Ghosts had some cool designs that worked pretty well, however, in the latter part when the film turns to an action romp, they are dispensed with so quickly that we are not allowed to appreciate some of those designs. I also feel like this is a film that is really insistent on not showing us everything that is going on during an action scene. There were some terrible cuts in the editing that I saw during the film, including a couple that broke continuity. I felt like bringing out the continuity meme done by former Channel Awesome contributor Phelous. My other big problem is that I saw the film in 2D and it seemed very evident that a lot of the effects were intended for the 3D version. Some of which will seem rather distracting in the latter format, including a couple of the shots that were specifically made for the trailer. If you can, I would say, see the film in 3D because it is very clear that the cinematographers and the effects people intended 3D as the best format to see it in, however, the 2D version is still fine, it’s just slightly distracting at points.

Ghostbusters is average, at best, and that is not what I want to say when I see a Ghostbusters movie, I want something great. The first two are great, I will stand by that. There is a reason these films got into geek culture as much as they did. It was down to clever writing, some good comedy and some really cool performances. This film tries to do all that, whilst referencing the original as much as possible, but I feel it backfires. Everyone is trying their hardest but it still doesn’t quite work and the negatives feel like they really out weight the positives. There were some decent comedic performances in the film, the major one being Chris Hemsworth, who finally appears in a comedy where he is actually allowed to be funny. This film would feel a massive disappointment if I hadn’t half written off the film on the trailers alone, but I at least went in giving this film a shot and I can’t act like I am not disappointed on some level. This film doesn’t suck, but it’s not good. It’s not going to make my worst of 2016 list, but I wish this film was better. The ending semi baits for a sequel, and I am fairly certain this will come, but I suspect this film will make a lot of money, especially from the female audience, judging by my screening where the majority of people in the cinema were young to middle age women, however, there needs to be improvement before the next film, though I will say that I think we can get a good film out of this Ghostbusters cast because they can be amusing at times. Oh, and if you go to a cinema performance of this, make sure you are not surrounded by the same audience that I had in my cinema who would not shut up!!!

Well normally I talk at this time about other films I have seen between my reviews, but this was the first film that I have seen since returning from my Holiday and despite the fact that I did see two films that I missed initially in cinemas from this year that I caught up with on DVD, those being art house film A Bigger Splash and police action thriller Triple 9 because they both were so boring that I just didn’t care.

I will pass comment on the 4 films I did see before I left for the Med. Starting with Kevin Hart comedy Central Intelligence, which despite the fact that I have mentioned my disdain for Kevin Hart several times, I have to admit this was a surprisingly decent comedy and that is mainly aided by his chemistry with The Rock, who also gets some incredibly funny moments in the film. The only time it fails is when it tries to have too much of a plot which doesn’t quite work, but they could have done a hell of a lot worse and it’s one of the biggest surprises of the year for me, because I also wrote this film off on its trailers. Oh, and I am calling him The Rock, I don’t care that he is going around calling himself Dwayne Johnson all the time, he is always going to be The Rock to me!

Absolutely Fabulous The Movie, could be on my worst of the year list. It’s another stifling example of a British television show turning up on the big screen trying to capture the Inbetweeners movie’s massive Box Office success and rather unlike that film, it’s a truncating mess, it can never pick a plot and stick with it. The comedy is all over the place. If you think the cameos in Ghostbusters are weird and don’t work, try the cameos in Ab Fab the movie, it all feels like the plot is being made to facilitate the cameos rather than the cameos being made to facilitate the plot. There are some bafflingly weird ones, which if I mentioned all of them, we would be here for a long time, and I don’t have enough time for that. I will say at least that Joanna Lumley is good at getting back to her role as Patsy and is easily the funniest person in the cast. Though special props to Rebel Wilson who delivers a decent cameo.

The Legend of Tarzan. I was hoping to review this if I had time, however, that being said, this isn’t that great a Tarzan film and I think people that are unfamiliar with the extended novels of Tarzan might be a bit surprised to find that they are not getting a Tarzan origin story with this film. It’s got some decent action, some decent performances but I don’t think they got into the psychology of Tarzan well enough. I also felt they tried too hard to turn Tarzan into a super hero movie, not that is necessarily a bad thing, but it you are going to do that it’s got to be well executed.

Finally, I want to talk about the latest Anime film that has been released on DVD and Blu Ray, Expelled from Paradise. It’s a 3D anime which I am not really of fan of usually because I think the animation looks a bit jittery and the characters don’t move and act as fluidly as they do in traditional hand drawn anime, but that being said, it’s the best example I have seen of it so far. It does have all those qualities and is easily recognisable as an anime. I can’t seriously recommend it since the plot is not that great or original, but it is a very enjoyable movie and anime fans should try it at least once. I can see why this did well at the Scotland loves Anime festival.

“So do you have any thoughts on Ghostbusters or any of the other films I have mentioned. Leave a comment below if you do, I welcome all opinions, good or bad and everyone is welcome to leave one. They can be brief or complicated, I would love to hear them.”

I know I haven’t been back that long, having only got two reviews out, but I am taking another week off to attend a music festival in Germany, but I will be back for most of August. My next review will be 12 August, where I will be reviewing Pixar sequel “Finding Dory”. Also I will be going over the films that I see between. Including my brief thoughts on the latest Ice Age film, The BFG and the latest Star Trek film, so if you are interested in any of those, you will want to read that review as well.

Thanks for reading my review. I hope you have enjoyed reading it as much as I have enjoyed writing it, and who you gonna call – ‘a better writer’!!!

Calvin – Nerd Consultant

“JUSTICE LEAGUE VS TEEN TITANS”

The next film in the new DC animated Universe, although really calling it new at this point is rather rich, considering we are now 3 years into it and once again it is directed by Sam Liu, though this time the writing credits go to Bryan Q Miller and Alan Burnett who of course wrote the Batman animated series which is still considered one of the best series ever made. This has been one highly anticipated movie, probably more so than the actual Justice League movie that Warner Bros is producing right now. This is the first animated production for Teen Titans in a long time that isn’t Teen Titans so the less said about that dumb heap of a show, the better. Like many young people of the mid 2000’s I loved the Teen Titan’s animated series, it really was fantastic and I am a huge fan of them in comic form too though I haven’t actually read any of their recent series (the main reason being that I hated the awful crossover event The Culling and wanted nothing more to do with the book afterwards, see Linkara’s review of the event the first part of which I left a link to at the bottom), though I will be reading it when the new series starts in the Autumn. If you want my thoughts on that I’ll probably mention it on my twitter page. Fans, loved the idea of it but then I thought of an interesting point, why is Justice League here? I think there is enough of a fandom for the Teen Titans considering their long history and various incarnations and on just the TV show alone, I think you could have sold a DVD with just the Teen Titan especially considering the last 2 Justice League animated movies were not received with much flair. Though at the time of this film coming out in the UK we are at a bit of a crossroads with DC, on the one hand, DC’s re-birth hasn’t proven to be amazingly successful but it is giving a lot of optimism to comic fans, at the same time DC’s cinematic Universe is in real turmoil. Whatever your opinion of Batman v Superman was, it has been an unmitigated failure having not done well with the critics, rather unfairly in my opinion, and its success at the Box Office has proven to be a failure as well, considering it had a massive drop on the 2nd weekend. Even more so than Joel Schumakker’s Batman and Robin, not to mention that Suicide Squad has had to go in for re-shoots, though reports from test screenings suggested that it has benefited the movie, though I wouldn’t take too much from that because they said the same for Batman v Superman and let’s face it, there were a lot of issues with that movie and the director of the Flash movie has walked off making him the 2nd director to walk off a DC movie and the Aquaman director looks set to leave as well. DC needs a push, big time and their animated movies have often been the thing to push them over the edge. But, is this movie going to do the same, will this movie really be the edge that they need or are we all going to have to wait for the upcoming Killing Joke film which fans are a lot more excited about and it has been built up big time, especially considering it will be the first of the DC animated films to get an R rating. So, with all that being said, is this a DC animated film to be held alongside the classics and a good revival of the Teen Titans or is this another Justice League failure that you should just skip and go straight to the Killing Joke? By the way, spoiler warning for the post credit scene of Justice League Throne of Atlantis that I alluded to in my review of that movie!

The plot of Justice League vs Teen Titans starts about a year after the events of Justice League Throne of Atlantis. After a botched mission of the Justice League caused by insubordination from Damian Wayne aka Robin (played by Stuart Allan), Batman (played by Jason O’Mara) sends Damian off for extra training with the Titans in the hopes of him learning to work with a team and gaining some social skills, the team consisting of Jamie Reyes aka Blue Beetle (played by Jake T. Austin), Garfield Logan aka Beast Boy (played by Brando Soo Hoo), Raven (played by Taissa Farmiga) and the leader, Koriand’r aka Starfire (played by Kari Wahlgren). But there are bigger things on the horizon. The Justice League are investigating a demon called Trigon (played by Jon Bernthal) who is attempting to get into our world after being sealed away and his followers have possessed Superman to help them do it, but he also wants to use Raven in order to do it. Can the Titans and the League get past their differences and work together to stop Trigon from an unholy invasion?

Let’s start off by saying this title is a real misnomer there are very little actual clashes between the Justice League and the Teen Titans and they are all over very quickly and are very one sided, in fact in one case, to an absurd degree and one of the fights ends in a way that I didn’t really buy into and I am suspecting that the blockbuster buster will have a go at it when he gets round to doing his honest review of the DC animated films of the year. Nevertheless, don’t think of this as being a sequel to Justice League Throne of Atlantis, for one thing, not all of the Justice League is here, for some inexplicable reason, Green Lantern, Shazam and Aquaman, who are all established members of the team by the end of Throne of Atlantis, are nowhere to be seen oh and the only link really is Lex Luther forming a legion of doom at the beginning of the film, so basically, that entire post credit scene at the end of Throne of Atlantis amounted to that, a 5 minute fight scene, joy oh joy, oh and the post credit scene doesn’t really link to much since Orm, the villain of Throne of Atlantis is nowhere to be seen, so, yes, that entire post credit scene was pointless!! I will be honest, the stuff to do with the Justice League is entirely tacked on and they don’t feel like they contribute anything really to the plot, except to be an antagonistical force for the Titans and even then that’s only brief which feels very weird considering this film is called Justice League vs Teen Titans and unlike Batman V Superman and Captain America Civil War, there is no real build up to these fights so they just feel rather tacked on, which is a shame because this often is a debate amongst DC fans very similar to how Marvel fans debate who would win in a fight between The Avengers and X Men, and there is a comic about that, but it sucks so let’s not go into it.

I’m probably, at the minute, making it sound like I didn’t like this film, no, I actually did like this film overall and there is one reason for that, The Titans, this is the best thing to have involved the Titans in a really long time. The group has an excellent dynamic even if I do think that Beast Boy and Blue Beetle kind of fulfil the same role though Beast Boy is slightly more easy going and the powers make up some interesting fight scenes and some interesting team work, the only member of the team to not have powers, being Robin. We finally get a decent representation of Starfire, since DC comics have done everything to destroy her in the last 5 years, having her be the maternal member of the group and the leader and by the way, how long has it been since we had a female leader of a Superhero team that doesn’t entirely consist of women, how refreshing is that. Damian may have gone backwards a bit in his development, but he does get a decent character arc which is capped off by an excellent fight scene at the end of the film which I dare not spoil, but really my favorite character in the film and the one who gets the most development is Raven whose connection to Trigon is really well done. We do get a bit of exposition from the people who haven’t read the Trigon arc or seen the adaptation of Trigon’s arc in the Teen Titans animated series, which by the way was better than this film, but that had an entire season to build up to it so I don’t suppose that’s a very fair comparison. In this film she is depicted as being a runaway teenager and the product of an abusive household, which adds to the realistic dynamic of the team. Speaking of the animated series, anyone who is familiar with that series will get most of the team, in fact most casual DC fans and casual fans of comics will get most of the members, since all 5 of the Team Titans in that series are represented here, though it’s a different division of Robin and Cyborg isn’t on the team for the entire film, which I know will be disappointing, but hell, the writers of this one actually remember that Cyborg was a member of Teen Titans for most of DC’s history and is not just a young member of the Justice League. So yes the stuff with the Titans is great, I loved the dynamic, I loved the bonding exercise they went through which basically involved them all going to the carnival, which, again feels very similar to the comics and the animated series and I loved the individual character arcs for them.

The film does struggle to play the balancing act and doesn’t do as good a job as Captain America Civil War, but the balancing act is only really marred by the fact that we have to get the Justice League in here and that is the biggest weakness of the film. The Justice League, there is no real reason for them to be here at all. You could have made this an entire Teen Titans movie and it would have been better for it. I have already mentioned that the Teen Titans have popularity, the comic has been around for decades and the animated series was very popular, why is it so difficult for DC to acknowledge that history. In fact, DC, next year, make an animated sequel to this with just The Titans. I think fans of the original Trigon arc story will be divided on this one since it was a very long story line that had to be condensed down into a 1hr 20min movie, and not even that because 5 minutes of this feel were credits, but you know what, I think they did a pretty decent job.

The pacing in this film is once again great. The DC animated films manage to take a short running time and make it seem a lot longer than it really is and this film is no exception. There is no real build up, however, to the clashes with the Justice League and the final battles of the film like they don’t have much build up either, we kind of go straight to them. I am also glad that this film managed to have a sense of humour, for goodness sake, that really has been missing from the DC animated films in recent memory, and it’s not tacked on humor trying to compete with Marvel right now, it’s actually well done. I can praise this film a lot, but I can’t ignore the fact that this film does have a few issues and it doesn’t quite hit it out of the ball park. I think I liked it more than Batman Bad Blood which I reviewed earlier this year, mainly because, unlike that film, it didn’t have a ton of potential that felt wasted, but I would be lying if I said I thought the film was wholly successful.

I think DC have created something that they can take and run with, but it will just be the question of if they will actually do it. This film really did manage to get me to care about the characters. I loved the climax and I was really pleased that there wasn’t a Starfire in this one that was overly sexualized, ok they tried to get a bit in there, but trust me, after seeing the first issue of Red hood and the Outlaws, anything at this stage is a step up. As for the actors, well, I am not going to go into too much detail with the Justice League, especially considering they barely do much in the film and I am really a fan of them, the only one I will say is Shemar Moore who is playing Cyborg once again is at his best in this film and does a much better job than he did in Justice League War and Throne of Atlantis. Jerry O’Connell, I am not really buying as Superman, but I am really getting in to Jason O’Mara’s Batman, it’s too bad that he actually doesn’t get to do much in the film and is pretty much taken out of it in several stages. I really do enjoy Rosario Dawson as Wonder Woman, but she again, is not really given much to do. Now, let’s move on to the Titans themselves because they have got some excellent actors in place for this one. Stuart Allan is perfectly cast once again as Damian Wayne, this kid was born to play this part and I really liked Jake T. Austin as Blue Beetle though I would have liked it if they had given him more Hispanic mannerisms to his performance, especially considering that Blue Beetle is one of the few Hispanic Superhero’s around at the minute. Kari Wahlgren is perfect as Starfire, while she doesn’t quite match up to Hayden Walch, I still think she is pretty decent, I think she does a really good job in the role and really makes both a believable mother figure and leader of the team and is one of the best performances in the entire film. The best performance by far though is Taissa Farmiga who plays Raven who really knocks it out of the park, once again, it is a bit difficult to get over a new voice playing the character after being played well by Tara Strong, but I really enjoyed her performance. Brandon Soo Hoo as Beast Boy is the only one who I am not entirely keen on, it’s not his fault, he is actually pretty good in the role and is a good replacement to play the character, it’s just Greg Cipes was pretty much near perfect, but I am not going to hold that against him. John Berthnal was pretty good as Trigon and he makes a really good villain, there are tons of great menace to his voice. Other than that, most are really cameos and I am not really a fan of Chistopher Gorham as The Flash especially considering what a good job Grant Gustin is doing on the CW series. I can finally talk about Steve Blum being cast as Lex Luthor, which feels really weird considering he is the voice of Wolverine in the animated Marvel cartoons, what’s even weirder though is that he plays Toymaster in the beginning and I couldn’t tell, well done there. Good cast, but as was to be expected, the standout performances come from the Titans who also get the best written parts.

The animation is one thing I would really like to talk about. Once again it is fantastic and has kept up the good standard that the previous films had. Once again, I won’t go into too much detail, I have already mentioned that, like the previous ones , it’s based on Jim Lee’s art style so you know you are going to get a good looking film, though one thing I have noticed from these films is that the costumes feel rather samey. They also have weird lines drawn into them in various places and feel rather angular at times. Raven’s kind of really stands out for that reason since it seems to be trying to replicate her costume from the Teen Titans animated series. I know that’s a nit pic, but it is just something I have noticed. The fight scenes are fantastic, once again DC animated films show what you can do with animated fight scenes and these are really good, showing off all the different character’s abilities to an excellent degree. They are excellently choreographed and drawn.

If there is something else I want to praise about this film, it is the film’s score, which has been composed by Frederik Wiedmann who has done an excellent job on this one. As for the rest of the soundtrack, I really hated the pop songs that were inserted in there. I’m certain there is a deal there for some band that I have never heard of that is pretty big in America and gets played on the Radio every so often that I am missing out on but I really didn’t enjoy them and they kind of jarred with it, though I didn’t mind the J Pop song too much that played during Beast Boy and Robin’s game of dance dance revolution and yes, seriously, that does actually happen in the film and actually I don’t mind it because I think it ties in very well to what makes a really good Titan story, that being the idea of balancing normal teenage life with these on-going crises. In other words, learning to have ‘down time’ and to bond as a team. The best Teen Titan stories tend to be good allegories for what young people genuinely go for and being depicted how the villains act and that’s what makes the Titans one of the most human teams out there and is what gives them their appeal, and that’s what this film does really well.

Justice League vs Teen Titans is a film that is really good at times, but it falls short at the finish line, and that is mainly down to the fact that the Justice League really doesn’t have a reason to be here, there are a couple of moments that make you scratch your head and its climax feels slightly rushed, however, it was actually an enjoyable film and I can’t fault it for what it got right and that’s get the Titans right and that’s great for me because I’ve felt jarred about the Teen Titans for years now and I am glad I have got something to fall back upon. It’s not a perfect movie, in fact I have already labeled my issues, but as a DC animated film, I thought it was pretty good, I can really recommend it to fans of Titans. Justice League fans should keep clear, there are better films than this you can pick up and I would say it’s an alternative to the DC Cinematic Universe right now. I’m not going to say that this film is better than Deadpool or Captain America Civil War, far from it, those were much better comic films and I had a lot less to complain about those films if you have read my reviews. I wouldn’t call this a film to skip.

The DC animated films will be back later this year with Batman the Killing Joke and I think you should pick that one up as well, but don’t miss this one. The characters are pretty good, the plot’s pretty good, the character arcs are pretty good, the animation is good, the fight scenes are great and I think the positives kind of outweigh the negatives, it’s just the negatives feel rather jarring. You could save your money and wait for this one to have a price drop, there’s no rush to see it, save your money for Killing Joke as I suspect that is going to be brilliant.

What are your thoughts on Justice League vs Teen Titans, did I get it right or do you completely agree/disagree with me. Please leave a comment in the comments section, I welcome all opinions. Also what are your thoughts on the DC animated films and the DC live action films that are coming out at the minute? Are DC in trouble at this point in time of is there some hope left?

Thanks for reading my review, hope it was good read.

Calvin – Nerd Consultant

“INDEPENDENCE DAY: RESURGENCE”

I remember a while back, I saw a documentary, I can’t remember exactly what it was about, but I think it was about the Top 50 Box Office Successes in UK cinemas and the documentary got to Independence Day, a film which to all intents and purposes a massive success with audiences. The critics weren’t too thrilled with it overall, if you want proof of that, go look up Cisco and Everts review, but a couple of pundits talking on the documentary said that 9/11 would kill off this type of film making because it wouldn’t be fun to see famous landmarks being destroyed any more.  Well I think somebody should tell Hollywood that because it seems in recent memory we have seen nothing but that.  If global terrorism killed off apocalyptic destruction in blockbusters then it only did so for a very short amount of time and at the forefront of all this has been Roland Emmerich.  Professionally, I don’t like this man, I like his politics and I am glad he is promoting gay rights and other things like that, but his films are just terrible at the best of times.  They always have amazing trailers and set up, but they never stick the landing.  Even Independence Day, which most people like, I am not a big fan of.  I remember it coming out and wanting to see it, but I was too young and when I finally got round to seeing it, I wasn’t much of a fan of it .  But you have to look at this guy’s other films, he made the godawful 1998 Godzilla, there is the really stupid film Anonymous that gives the Shakespeare authorship question, which has less historical accuracy than an episode of Desperate Romantics (a drama about the Pre-Raphelites).  Then to top it all off, he did the film 2012, which for my money is one of the dumbest blockbusters of the decade so far and one of the prime examples of CGI gone too far and his ideas of effects by showing tons of apocalyptic destruction and cities and landmarks being destroyed is having such a poisonous effect on blockbusters in general.  Look at Man Of Steele, for example, the first part wasn’t too bad, but the second we are down to the massive destruction element, it lost all its soul and really ruined Superman.  Then you see London get destroyed half the time, I mean, then you see a film like San Andreas which was clearly cloning Roland Emmerich’s style, to such an extent that I didn’t realise until I was doing my research on the film that it wasn’t a Roland Emmerich film and if you want more evidence about why that film sucked so much, check out my Worst Films of 2015 list, I gave it an honourable mention.  

This belated sequel, which has taken 20 years since the previous film came out is once again directed by Roland Emmerich and if there’s one bad sign to look for with this film, it is that Roland has not allowed any press screening for critics, which means, like me, they didn’t get to see the film until it officially came out, which means there were tons of press in my screening.  Needless to say, I have mentioned in the past that this is a bad sign, especially with blockbusters, since this is mostly reserved for horror films and comedies.  There is also the factor, what is the point!  The first film was 20 years ago!!  You haven’t struck while the iron is hot, the fan base has moved on!  Who is the audience for this film?  Nevertheless, I did give this film a fair stab and I did re-watch Independence Day in preparation for this review and my opinion has not really softened towards it. It’s not incredibly awful, but it is really dumb and the writing is tremendously stupid, I will say though the effects have held up rather decently, or a few of them have.  So how did Independence Day: Resurgence really stack up now that blockbusters have moved on quite a bit?

Resurgence takes place 20 years after the events of Independence Day.  The world has moved on, technology has advanced seriously fast, due to harvesting alien technology from the previous war and the world is in a good state of peace, however, what the humans did not know is that the captured aliens had been sending a distress signal out and now a new queen alien is approaching with the intention of drilling a hole into the earth’s core and destroing the human race once and for all.  

I actually saw Independence Day Resurgence on the same day that I voted in the EU Referendum (I voted to Remain if anyone is curious) which was the day it was released, which as Alex Brooker pointed out on the Last Leg is surprisingly aptly timed.  I am assuming this one is going to fail at the Box Office because there was barely anyone in my screening and I don’t really get who the audience will be for this film as I mentioned earlier, and really this film deserves to bomb because this feel like a really cynical cash grab.  Now I am a rather cynical person, but I do like a good popcorn blockbuster, because when they are good, they are really fun and enjoyable, the downside is when you get people like Roland Emmerich, who just put a film out for a quick buck and studios tend to like them because they don’t have to put as much effort into them and they make back their money.  Independence Day works because it has the brand recognition, and really, this feels like a re-make of Independence Day, and I am not even joking!  There are several scenes that look shot for shot.  Now I know I didn’t go nuts for this when I reviewed Star Wars the Force Awakens, but that’s because that at least felt like something new.  This feels like the exact same movie!!  The only exception was really the ending because we got an action scene that looked like it wasn’t out of the original film, everything feels re-enacted.  The Presidents triumphant speech to the masses, the various sub plots feel rather similar, including the Scientist who is played by Data from Star Trek working on some tech that is going to beat the aliens once and for all.  The only big difference this time round is that there aren’t as many stereo types on show because of obvious reasons, for example, Randy Quaid isn’t around to play the red neck stereotype and the best friend stereotype got killed off in the first film and believe me, that’s all the best friend stereotype ever exists to be in films.  Even the aliens don’t really do much different, the only difference this time is that instead of blasting the landmarks with laser beams, they use gravity based weapons to destroy cities, which, by the way, you’ll never guess, London gets it again!! Seriously I am surprised that anyone actually lives in London considering how many times it has been destroyed in film blockbusters, is there some subtle message being delivered here that I am not aware of!!  The aliens also have a drill weapon drilling into the earths core and believe me that creates a scenario that makes science cry with how dumb it gets by the end.

You may have noticed in my plot synopsis that I didn’t mention a single character.  That’s because they feel even more useless than last time.  They are all kind of fitting into a certain role, but this time they are just bland.  The only one who is vaguely interesting is the returning Judd Hirsch who at least gets a funny line every so often and is mildly entertaining.  I did really like the bad ass African warlord alien hunter who really should have been in the film a lot more than he was who was excellently played by Deobia Oparei even though he is basically in there to be the African stereo type.  Surprisingly quite a few cast members return to reprise their roles, including Bill Pullman, Vivica A. Fox and Brent Spiner but the biggest one who contributes the most is Jeff Goldblum.  Will Smith hasn’t shown up, but that was probably because he is busy with Suicide Squad, we will see how good a decision that was in a month (though he must have made a bit of dosh for his likeness with the poorly photo shopped portrait in the White House at the beginning).  You would have thought the character who was his son would be taking his place in the film, but actually it is more Liam Hemsworth (you will recognize from The Hunger Games films) who takes that role.  Seriously Liam Hemsworth is basically playing a white Will Smith in this film, his character is exactly the same, except, as I am sure he has been told, is not as cool as Will Smith.  Will Smith’s on screen son isn’t that interesting either, he is really dull and boring, he gets a bit of a subplot with Liam Hemsworth but it’s not interesting and it never really goes anywhere.  The same goes for Maika Monroe who is now playing the daughter of the president from the previous film.  

It’s just a really boring pointless film, the characters feel really dull and I am completely disconnected from them.  In the first film the characters may have all been raging stereotypes, bordering on the offensive, but at least they were interesting and you remember them, this lot are dull, dull, dull.  Even the returning characters like Jeff Goldblum’s David Levinson and Bill Pullman’s former President Whitmore, who by the way, does the exact same thing in this film that he did in the last film only this time we enjoy it.  There were some interesting action scenes towards the end of the film because those scenes at least felt different from the original Independence Day.  The rest of it is just the same plot, it’s still dumb, the government are still written to look like idiots, everyone is a one dimensional character, the only difference is that this time Roland isn’t having any fun with it or running with it, so as a result no one is having any fun.  It’s a film that will just come and go and I was watching it feeling like I was just going through the motions.  The film even has the gall to end on a hook for a sequel which sounds even more ridiculous than the two films which precede it, just NO!!

As for the performances, they are all passable, that’s it.  I’m not going to say much more about them.  The one who disappointed me most was Maika Monroe an actress who I believe has immense talent, as proven by her roles in The Guest and It Follows, but she has really sold herself short this year in this and the previously reviewed The 5th Wave.  Honestly, this girl need to fire her agent and get back on track.  I’ve heard that she is going to be in 4 more films that are going to receive their initial screening this year so hopefully she will get back on track because I really think the is an unsung talent.  Goodness me, don’t you ever sleep girl?  If you have seen one Jeff Goldblum performance, you have seen them all, he is not doing anything different much here.  I have already said that Liam Hemsworth is basically playing a white Will Smith.  Bill Pullman is pretty good for the most part, even though he is basically resigned to the same dialogue in this film.  William Fichtner isn’t using enough of his talent and I didn’t care about the rest of the performances, but I did think that Jessie T Usher should have given a more interesting performance than he did.  What can I say?  This is it.  I didn’t care much about this cast, I thought they were all slumming it, the only 2 who give good performances are Judd Hirsch and Brent Spiner.  But that’s just because they are Judd Hirsch and Brent Spiner and they are even memorable in terrible films.

As for the effects, well there’s a problem for you.  The original Independence Day was like Top Gun being inserted into a Sci Fi film.  This one is pure Sci Fi, so as a result, the entire film is a complete CGI fest.  As if Roland Emmerich didn’t already use CGI enough in his previous films like, The Day After Tomorrow, 10,000 BC, 2012, the list goes on.  As usual with this heavy reliance on CGI the whole thing doesn’t feel very real.  The design of the fight planes looks really off and as a result the whole carnage doesn’t feel very real because we don’t have those amazing practical effects that made the first film so good, oh, and Roland, just because you point out that these films seem to rely on landmarks being destroyed, doesn’t make it any less of a cliché.  The fight scenes are at least well shot, they don’t have too much shaky cam and it’s pretty easy to tell what is going on, but because of the sheer amount of fakish looking CGI you feel detached from the whole film.  I’m glad they actually didn’t use any new technology because it would have created a massive plot hole with the government after all this time not using any new technology at all, but it did create a bit of a detaching experience and you can really feel the green screens in a lot of places.

I saw the film in 3D and I really recommend you don’t see it in that format.  The 3D wasn’t even that noticeable it’s very much a 2.5D which was evident when I took of my glasses briefly and noticed that the film wasn’t even that out of focus.  Also several of the scenes are in dark environments like space or inside the mother ship and those scenes are even more difficult to see thanks to the darkening effect of the glasses.  If you have a choice, I would definitely seek out the 2D version.

Roland Emmerich, the other day, posted an article saying that he couldn’t get into the Marvel films because he thought they were ridiculous, yes, now that really is the pot calling the kettle black, because at least Marvel films are blockbusters that don’t feel like they are pandering to the studio executives and the masses.  This one is pointless!  This whole film feels pointless, it’s an over CGI’d re-make of Independence Day disguising itself as a sequel with little flair, little originality and is bland and dull.  The effects aren’t that good, the acting isn’t that good, the characters are boring and apart from the end, it feels like a shot for shot re-make of Independence Day done by people who that have played too much of the Halo Games.  Roland Emmerich is yet another director who has been proven over the years to have been a barely competent director who just happened to get lucky by coming out with Independence Day when he did because it was the right film for the right audience at the right time.  This film I don’t think will match any of those.  It’s a film 20 years in the making and it wasn’t worth it and please do not make the Independence Day 3 that you alluded to in the final scene, because that sounded even more ridiculous. What can I say it’s just a dumb, dull film.  It has all the same problems that the first film had but it’s decided to stop having fun and character so there’s no investment for anyone.

Right, only one more film to talk about because I only saw 1 other film between this and The Secret Life of Pets and that was Long Way North, or as it is known in its native France, Tout en haut du monde.  I guarantee none of you saw this film since it was only played in select cinemas for 1 weekend.  I managed to catch it, and you know what, it’s really good.  This was a nice, charming animated film with some great characters and a really great subplot but the real star of it was the animation, which makes the whole thing look like a beautiful oil painting that has come to life and really gets across the nature of the settings.  It’s a lovely animated film and I would really recommend it to people that like Studio Ghibli films.  It doesn’t stand too high in my estimations since the plot is too kind of simplistic and I would say that I thought a couple of the English dub actors, because my screening was in the English dub, were not perfectly matched with their characters which is something I would like to compare when I watch it in the French language version after it comes out on DVD.  Nevertheless I really liked this film, it just happened to come out a week after the previously reviewed When Marnie Was There so it was never going to quite win me over, but I really recommend it.  It comes out on DVD on 10th October, give it a try.  If you are still unsure about it, check out the trailer on YouTube and you will see my point on the animation front.

“So what are your thoughts on Independence Day: Resurgence or Long Way North?”

Well, you got this review a day early because I start my Holiday tomorrow.  Don’t worry I am only away for one week, so I will be back on 22 July, because before I left, I watched and quickly reviewed the newest DC animated film Justice League Vs Teen Titans. and at the end of July I will be reviewing Ghostbusters.

Thanks for reading my review, I hope you have enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

You know what, sometimes you don’t need a sequel, or want one.

Calvin – Nerd Consultant