For A Few Reviews More

Shrek The Third

September 16th, 2008 admin

2007
Starring: Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy, Cameron Diaz, Antonio Banderas, Julie Andrews, Justin Timberlake, Eric Idle, Ian McShane, Rupert Everett, John Cleese
Director: Chris Miller
Runtime: 92 Minutes
Distributor: Dreamworks
Rating: PG

The lovable, not so jolly green giant returns for a third outing to once again keep Pixar executives up at night sweating and the result is disappointingly something of a mixed bag. Breaking the record shattering opening weekend set by its predecessor, and primed for a Broadway spin off, this has been described by some as a “sequel made for the worst reasons.” Indeed, while many liked it – and there are things to like – this follow-on is ripe with doughnut syndrome; plenty of glaze and sugary sprinkles, but with a massive hole right through its middle

Fresh ideas have given way to stock formula and this installment feels rushed and somewhat flimsy. A lean running time is sometimes healthy, but here only serves as an attempt to get the viewer in an out before they catch a whiff of the strong stench of recycled material that with more time and effort could be and should be a lot stronger.

Akira

September 10th, 2008 admin

1988
Starring: Mitsuo Iwata, Nozumo Sasaika, Mami Koyamo, Taro Ishida
Director: Katsuhiro Otomo
Runtime: 124 Minutes
Distributor: MGM
Rating: R

Though it did not reach the big screen until 1988, this apocalyptic cyberpunk epic had existed for years, running in the form of a comic that had at the time of the movie exceeded more than 2000 pages. While the feature film adaptation is of course less dense and less detailed, it will still always be known as the film that built the bridge between Japanese anime and western audiences. Akira opened the floodgates for the huge anime craze that swept the west in the early nineties and paved the way for them to become a respectable cinematic art form.

The story is one of a bleak and terrifying future. In 1989 Tokyo is destroyed by a massive explosion of psionic energy emanating from the subject of a secret military project. Mistakenly thought by the governments of the world to be a nuclear blast, the incident triggers World War Three. Thirty years later on the ashes of complete devastation sits Neo Tokyo. Now a police state, gangs of delinquent youths on high-powered motorcycles wage war with both the authorities and each other. In the shadows, a growing terrorist organization attacks official buildings in an effort to destabilize the ineffectual government. But the military has not abandoned its experiments of psychic energy and paranoid Col. Shikishima has been using children with ESP to monitor the city. When a dissident raid sees one of them kidnapped from the facility, the child comes into contact with Tetsuo, a motorcycle thug. The encounter leaves Tetsuo with an imprint of psychic energy that quickly threatens to grow beyond anything that can be controlled and once again bring complete destruction to all of Neo Tokyo.

The Simpsons Movie

September 3rd, 2008 admin

2007
Starring: Dan Castellaneta, Julie Kavner, Nancy Cartwright, Yeardley Smith, Harry Shearer, Hank Azaria
Director: David Silverman
Runtime: 87 Minutes
Distributor: 20th Century Fox
Rating: PG-13

Going to see The Simpsons Movie is a little bit like being thirty and meeting up with your best friend from high school that you haven’t seen for years. You know that it will never be the same as it was, you are both completely different from the way you were and you want different things now. You shouldn’t really by rights still be friends anymore, but you continue to see them nonetheless out of respect for the history you share. Still, watching Ralph stand on top of the Fox logo, gleefully singing along and out of tune to the overblown orchestral introduction, we defy you not to feel a pang of nostalgia.

A movie idea for this most iconic of television families has been rolling around in development forever. Fox explained away the near twenty year wait as taking this long to make sure that they “really get it just right,” which is certainly a statement that demands something big to back it up. That and the fact that Fox has rounded up a team of writers considered by many to be the finest to ever work for the show, this is a movie so front loaded with hype that it was almost impossible to live up to the expectations. Unfortunately, it’s not much more than an above average Simpsons episode that is a little too long (even at less than 90 minutes) to sustain the funny.

Happy Feet

August 27th, 2008 admin

2006
Starring: Elijah Wood, Robin Williams, Brittany Murphy, Hugh Jackman, Nicole Kidman
Director: George Miller
Runtime: 108 Minutes
Distributor: Warner Bros
Rating: U

Based in no small part on the incredible success enjoyed by last years surprise smash hit March Of The Penguins, this animated Antarctic adventure comes from Australian outfit, Animal Logic. Like the documentary that was its inspiration, this tale is set around the mating season of a tribe of Emperor penguins and an accident that results in the films hero being a little, well, different. Dropped by his father whilst still an egg, Mumbles (Elijah Wood) is unlike the other penguins in that he is utterly unable to sing. As all penguins apparently have a “heart song” at the core of their soul, Mumbles is ridiculed for being tone deaf. Coupled with the fact that he is unable to control his feet properly, meaning he is given to spontaneous fits of dance, Mumbles life is a sad and lonely one indeed.

Unfortunately in order to tell such a heartbreaking, melancholic tale it might have been wise not to pick arguably the most physically expressionless animal on the face of the earth. As it is the stellar voice cast is almost completely negated by the fact that all of these birds look exactly the same. Add the various, and wholly unnecessary, fake accents and it very quickly becomes impossible to tell which character is which. The animation is absolutely first class, with our fluffy friends beautifully rendered in gloriously rich detail, but sadly with a model that seems to be capable of, at best, two different facial expressions it becomes very hard to get invested in anything happening on screen, and there really doesn’t seem to be very much of that anyway.

Ratatouille

August 22nd, 2008 admin

2007
Starring: Patton Qswalt, Ian Holm, Lou Romano, Brian Dennehy, Peter Sohn, Peter O Toole, Jeneane Garofalo
Director: Brad Bird
Runtime: 110 Minutes
Distributor: Disney
Rating: G

Pixar has been on a hot streak since the 12th of forever, with each hit it churns out averaging a half a billion dollars worldwide. So it’s not surprising if they have grown a little confident. But if ever there was a concept that was perhaps something of an overreach for the animation giant then this might just have been it. Toys and superheroes and racecars are going to obviously be a no brainier hit with the kiddies and have the parents cursing the company’s uncanny knack of whine factor amplification. Fine French dining combined with the least lovable of all the rodent family, rats, however, might just be pushing it. Can the studio really make anything they touch turn to magic? The answer is, kind of, yes.

In fact the Pixar animation has become so good that they feel comfortable enough to caricature themselves Corpse Bride style. It’s as stylish and slick as ever and if water is really considered to be one of the last great animation hurdles then on the strength of a sequence of mass rat exodus from an old woman’s cottage down a river, then consider it hurdled. Of course to get past the ick factor Pixar has slapped the cute on with a cement trowel. Remy the rat is so adorable with his giant pink snout and big droopy eyes as to be positively sickening, but it’s tempered with Patton Oswalt’s easy going vocals to make him a plucky and likable hero, as he constantly argues with his disapproving dad about the merits of humans and expanding the colony’s horizons.

Shrek The Third

Akira

The Simpsons Movie

Happy Feet

Ratatouille

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