Tuesday, July 27, 2010

UPDATE: The Avengers


This is the Updated list based off the the info from Comic Con 2010. See the video over at /film

Founding Members


Ant-Man (Dr. Henry "Hank" Jonathan Pym):
Contenders:Adrien Brody, Nathan Fillion, Wishes: Michael C. Hall
Hulk (Dr. Robert Bruce Banner): Mark Ruffalo
Iron Man (Anthony "Tony" Stark): Robert Downey Jr.
Thor (Dr. Donald Blake) :
Chris Hemsworth
Wasp (Janet van "Dyne" Pym ): Contenders:
Eva Longoria Parker Wishes: Natalie Portman, Alyssa Milano, Mila Kunis


Recruits


Black Widow (Natalia Alianovna Romanova) : Scarlett Johansson
Captain America (Steven Rogers): Chris Evans

Hawkeye (Clinton Francis Barton) :
Jeremy Renner
Nick Fury: Samuel L. Jackson

Directores

Top 5 All Time Favorite Directors/Filmmakers

1. Tim Burton
2. David Fincher
3. Christopher Nolan
4. Robert Rodríguez
5. M. Night Shyamalan

Top 5 All Time Favorite Indie Directors/Filmmakers

1. Wes Anderson
2. Darren Aronofsky
3. Jason Reitman
4. Steven Soderbergh
5. Gus Van Sant

Top 5 All Time Favorite Blockbuster Directors/Filmmakers

1. James Cameron
2. Peter Jackson
3. George Lucas
4. Steven Spielberg
5. Robert Zemeckis

Top 5 All Time Favorite "Nerdy" Directors/Filmmakers

1. J.J Abrams
2. Kevin Smith
3. Zack Snyder
4. Matthew Vaughn
5. Andy and Larry Wachowski

Thursday, July 22, 2010

Review: Inception

IMDb

Title: Inception
Distributor: Legendary Pictures (Warner Bros. Pictures)
Director: Christopher Nolan
Writer(s): Christopher Nolan (written by))
Staring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ellen Page, Tom Hardy, Ken Watanabe, Dileep Rao, Cillian Murphy, Tom Berenger, Marion Cotillard
MPAA Rating: Rated PG-13 for sequences of violence and action throughout.
Running Time: 148 min
Synopsis: In a world where technology exists to enter the human mind through dream invasion, a highly skilled thief is given a final chance at redemption which involves executing his toughest job till date, Inception.

What Others Are Saying?


Rotten Tomatoes: T-Meter:
86% (Fresh), Top Critics: 78% (Fresh), RT Community: 93% (Fresh)
Metacritic: Critics: 75 out of 100, Users: 8.5 out of 10
MRQE Metric: 84: (53.9% A, 31.4% B,
12.6% C, 0.0% D, and 0.0% F)
Yahoo Movies: Critics: B+ Users: A-

My Review

This review comes to you after watching the film twice. I heard that one needs to watch it at least three times to get the full vision of the film. I leaning towards the idea that you do need many viewings to pick up on subtle details you didn't see the first time. With that being said here is my review...

Source Material: Original
screenplay

Entertaining Value:

  • Action Elements: This film isn't the next summer blockbuster action film with said action heroism. Even thought its not the action film of the summer, it does have a lot of great action sequences
  • Comedy Elements: Its not a comedy by far, but it has some cleaver one liners to lighten up the mood a bit.
  • Dramatic Elements: Personally, I think the dramatic moments were great. I liked how the different relationships between each character played out on screen.
  • Sci-Fi / Fantasy Elements: The world built by Noland is awesome. Personally I think the use of partial fx and vfx is flawless, or at least basically flawless.

Cinematic Value:

  • Acting and Dialogue: A-: Let state that for most people Leonardo DiCaprio is either the best actor on the plant or they hate him with a passion, it seem the middle ground is few and far between. I say that because I am one of the few that make up the middle ground, for me he is hit or miss, in Inception he is a hit. I also like the other castings. Both Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Ellen Page have made a pretty good career already, this film is defiantly going to strengthen them.
  • Art Direction: A+: I cant believe how many loction they used on this film, one more beautiful than the next. Even the studio sets where good.
  • Cinematography: A+: I think Christopher Nolan has a cinematographers mind when he makes his films cause he pull off innovative camera shots, Inception is no exception. This film had a rich color plate and awesome effects, I will talk about that latter.
  • Direction: A: Christopher Nolan is by far in my top five directors of all time, maybe even tom three. With that being said he delivers once again. This film is pushing three hours, I never once looked at my watch to see how much longer do we have. From what I have read on this film up to this point it seems, most say the biggest fault is its lengthen, and that they should cut some stuff out, but I disagree.
  • Editing: A: The cuts between reality and dream states mix perfectly, by the time you get to the end of the film you second guess yourself on what was real and what was a dream, which I think was done on purpose. Can you say brilliant?
  • Screenplay: A: What can I say the concepts in this film are very interesting and mostly true. I basically would say the same for the screenplay as I do for editing.
  • Sound and Music: A+: The score adds emotions to the film like it should. In some parts of the film I felt more excited because of the score.
  • VFX: A+: The blend of partial fx and vfx is flawless, or at least basically flawless. I said this above but its true. The only time you know a computer was used was when laws of physics where broken.

Overall: A:You may need to see a couple of time to fully understand it but it a a great movie. In my opinion a movie that make you think and discuse the film after words is a great film, which this film does. I recommend that you see this one in theaters, even with the ridiculous prices.

Friday, July 2, 2010

Review: The Last Airbender

IMDb

Title: The Last Airbender
Distributor: Nickelodeon Movies (Paramount Pictures)
Director: M. Night Shyamalan
Writer(s): M. Night Shyamalan (written by)
Staring: Noah Ringer, Dev Patel, Nicola Peltz,Jackson Rathbone, Shaun Toub, Aasif Mandvi, Cliff Curtis, Seychelle Gabriel
MPAA Rating: Rated PG for fantasy action violence.
Running Time: 103 min
Synopsis: The story follows the adventures of Aang, a young successor to a long line of Avatars, who must put his childhood ways aside and stop the Fire Nation from enslaving the Water, Earth and Air nations.

What Others Are Saying?


Rotten Tomatoes: T-Meter:
09% (Rotten), Top Critics: 07% (Rotten), RT Community: 65% (Fresh)
Metacritic: Critics: 20 out of 100, Users: 2.8 out of 10
MRQE Metric: 37: (23.0% A, 15.3% B,
15.3% C, 15.3% D, and 30.7% F)
Yahoo Movies: Critics: D+ Users: C+

My Review

Source Material: Based on
Nickelodeon's Avatar: The Last Airbender.

Entertaining Value:

  • Action Elements: The showcasing of the different martial arts forms was great, there could have been more, but as an action film it not too bad.
  • Comedy Elements: Sokka character bring a lot of slap stick and physical comedy in the television version while the film had some, it was missing quite a bit.
  • Dramatic Elements: Can you say epic fail, most of the failure comes from bad acting.
  • Sci-Fi / Fantasy Elements: Elemental Bending, and other Asian culture/ folklore, descend visual effects.

Cinematic Value:

  • Acting and Dialogue: C-: The acting well, wasn't that great. I think most of the bad acting comes from the fact the cast was young in there careers. Out of the "child" actors the only ones I recognized was Jackson Rathbone, known for portraying Jasper Hale in The Twilight Saga, and Dev Patel from Slumdog Millionaire. The adult actors also only did okay, the best acting came from Shaun Toub who play Iroh. To top it all off the best acting in the entire movie came from the girl who played Princess Yue, Seychelle Gabriel. So we have established the acting wasn't the greatest well neither was the dialog, exhibit A, “We need to show them that we believe in our beliefs as much as they believe in their beliefs” There were many lines like this one, were one word would get repeated.
  • Art Direction: B-: Awesome location, with beautiful sites for the different nations.
  • Cinematography: B-: There were some really cool scenes that capture the different martial arts showcased in this film. Some of the scene brought me back to The Matirx days.
  • Direction: C: M. Night Shyamalan is one of the director in my top five favorites directors. I know people will raze me for liking him and his films, cause the general public started to jump ship after The Village and even more so with the Happening. Now with The Last Airbender, it seems the only people on the ship are M. Night Shyamalan and minute amount of fans. I think he did a good job directing the movie but the film didn't turn out that good.
  • Editing: D+: Very slow pacing, the 103 min movie felt a lot longer. the cut between scenes seemed a bit random, and out of place. I thought there were to many montage type of scenes.
  • Screenplay: C-: The mythology and story from the television show is great, some where along the line it was ruined. Personally I thought the story had too much childish behavior written into. Aang is spouse to be a bit childish but full grown adults, WTF. Seriously, this is one of the lines from an adult, "Those kids where earthbending and hitting us with small rocks in the head, that hurts. These words were uttered in a winy manner, just like a child. I do understand that the film was mad for kids but it doesn't have to be that extreme
  • Sound and Music: C: Midorcer like everything else.
  • VFX: B-: Probably, the best thing about this movie.

Overall: C-:Fan will be disappointed to some level cause it doesn't live to to the television show.