Review: Noah

Noah

Darren Aronofsky is a film maker who has made some of my all time favourite films, _Requiem for a Dream_ and _The Fountain_ being two of them. His films are not always pleasant to watch but always leave a lasting impression. He’s able to craft a story and a message in such a way that resonate, and characters who are at once larger than life and relatable. _Noah_ is a good example of these skills, though maybe not the best he’s done.

I am just going to say this above the fold though: you should see this movie if you get a chance. I’m about to tell you that it’s good but not great but here’s the thing: we don’t see films like this much. This is a weird movie that takes a story held sacred by many (literally sacred, not Trekkies and Star Trek sacred) and re-imagines parts of it, changes others, and plays with the motivations and struggles of the lead character. It’s a big effects movie with creatures and animals and battle scenes but it’s not a tent pole action movie. TL;DR version, this movie represents a unique film maker taking a lot of chances and a studio taking a chance on him, this is the type of behaviour we need to support. Good? Good.

Now on to the review.

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Review: Divergent

Divergent

There’s a fine line that adaptations of novels have to walk. Leave too much in and you risk your movie becoming plodding and boring. take too much out and you risk dumbing down or losing a theme or moment or sub plot integral to that story. Nowhere is this more clear than with Young Adult novels. Because they are generally fairly easy to follow in the first place the smallest choice a director makes can have drastic consequences for the movie you are making.

Case in point, _Divergent_ is a movie that I am sure is based on a good book that discusses and explores interesting themes, but the movie itself glosses over all of this to tell a pretty by the numbers story about a girl in a not-that-dystopian future.

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Review: Veronica Mars

Veronica Mars

Just so this is out-of-the-way up front: I never watched the TV series _Veronica Mars_. I have pretty much zero context for the film other than that a lot of people really liked the show but then it as cancelled and then last year the makers of the show started a [KickStarter project](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/559914737/the-veronica-mars-movie-project) to make a movie. With a $2 Million goal they had modest hopes, but then they were funded to the tune of $5 million dollars from people in 21 countries, became the fastest kickstarter project to his $1 million and then $2 million, and now we have a movie. A movie which a lot of people have really been looking forward to but I have no context for.

So how does it stand up? Pretty well actually.

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Review: The Grand Budapest Hotel

Grand Budapest Hotel

Wes Anderson is a film maker with a distinct voice. He tells stories with emotional cores and often tells them using characters that don’t always seen to want to, or even know how to, express those emotions and sets them in a world that is just over the border into absurdity and littered with all kinds of fine detail, interesting colour palettes, and now stop motion.

Basically he crafts a whimsical world and then populates it with non-whimsical people.

In any event, The Grand Budapest Hotel may be his best film yet by virtue of the fact that it’s probably the most Wes-Anderson-y film he’s made to date, but in the best way possible.

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Review: 300: Rise of an Empire

300 Rise of an Empire

When the original _300_ came out I remember at first liking it but upon further viewings it became more and more problematic for me. See, Frank Miller is a right wing nut job and _300_ is, at best, a set of pretty 1 dimensional characters in a story that is hero worship of what is effectively a selfish and fascist society. _300: Rise of an Empire_ is interesting then in that in addition to having better developed characters (antagonists especially) acknowledges that fact and says _”that’s what they’re doing, that’s not really cool, but maybe we can use their machismo BS to our advantage”.

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Review: Non Stop

Non-Stop

Liam Neeson is a celebrated actor. He’s been in epic romances, costumed adventures, and important historical dramas. Lately though he’s carved out a niche for himself as a slightly older action star. There’s only one reason why this works: Liam Neeson is great. The movies he’s making are kind of dumb, heavy handed, and full of plot holes, but for some reason they just kinda work. _Taken_ is probably the first (and best) example of this. _Non-Stop_ is just the latest.

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Review: Need for Speed

Need for Speed

When Need For Speed opens next month you may read that one of the selling points is that all of the stunts are practical and not CG. That–to me– seems strange considering it’s an adaptation of the EA driving game series. One would think that fans of the game would have no problem at all with wildly improbable physics and unlikely crash scenarios that might have been less expensive to render in computers than with real cars and stunt drivers but lets give the makers credit: When it comes to cars and driving they deliver.

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Review: The Lego Movie

The Lego Movie

Sometimes you hear about a movie and you think “how are they going to do that?” because the concept is so weirdly specific or, as is the case with Lego, so enormously broad. I’m of the opinion that you can make a good movie out of anything though because, as it turns out, you totally can.

The Lego Movie is one of the best movies you are going to see this year. Bold words for the first week of February I grant you but it’s true. Run, don’t walk, to your nearest theatre with your best friends and watch as all the freedom of imagination you had as a kid is projected on screen. It’s seriously amazing.

I’m going to talk a little bit about why I loved this movie now but that’s going to entail some slight spoilers so my recommendation is that you stop reading and go watch. Ok? Ok.

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Review: Nidhogg (PC)

Nidhogg

If games are dancing, then *Nidhogg* is the Argentinian Tango. Grace and blood, attacks and parries, personal space being fiercely invaded time and time again. Swift moves sometimes sliding into long-held pauses with heartbeat percussion as underscore. The name for developer Messhof’s newly-released fencing-come-LSD-trip comes from a huge dragon featured in Norse mythology, whose primary interest was the chewing of both life-trees and on the bodies of the unfit for eternity.

And once this game has you, there couldn’t be a more apt title.

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Review: 47 Ronin

47-ronin-posters-featured

Japan is a beautiful country. I know that even though I’ve never actually set foot on its soil. Thousands of years of myth and steadfast tradition has long enthralled the more relaxed Western cultures, and cinema has always revelled in the deep cultures of its picturesque history. Modern filmic takes like the animated *Spirited Away* go into great detail to bring their Japanese worlds to life, and often this can result in deep, complicated and slow-burning plots that weave through character and mystery.

Unfortunately, *47 Ronin* is what happens when someone called Carl watches a Japanese samurai classic and thinks “you know, this could be more *accessible*.”

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Review: Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues

Anchorman 2

_Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy_ was released in 2004 and, very generally, people I know tend to either love it or hate it. I fell pretty squarely in the “_love it_ camp but in reflection I could have easily gone the other way. You see _Anchorman_ was originally going to have a lot more going on. In fact there were so many different takes and removed sub plots that they were eventually assembled into a whole other film titled “_Wake Up, Ron Burgundy: The Lost Movie_”.

Most of _Wake Up_ isn’t good and it’s easy to see why none of it was included in _Anchorman_.

I am telling you all of this because I really feel like _Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues_ could really have done with a bunch of stuff cut out.

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Review: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

The Hobbit Desolation of Smaug

Peter Jackson is an interesting film maker. A background in indie films, specifically indie horror films, he was raised to the top of the A-List when he successfully pulled off adapting J.R.R. Tolkien’s _The Lord of the Rings_ trilogy to the big screen. Those movies are not perfect by any stretch but the books were so rich and full of detail that the theatrical releases actually felt like they were lacking despite being a combined length of over 9 hours.

Now we’re on the second part of his adaptation of _The Hobbit_, the book that preceded the epic trilogy that was _The Lord of the Rings_. That book however is actually pretty short and while it has enough detail to serve the story’s purpose it has nowhere near the depth or scope that the later trilogy does.

Herein lies one of the problems with _The Desolation of Smaug_: You can’t turn a 300 page book into 9 hours of movie without padding the story, and Jackson has padded the story so much, and messed up the pacing so much, that while I don’t think it’s a bad film I also don’t think it’s a great one.

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Review: Out of the Furnace

Out of the Furnace

Out of the Furnace is a movie that, on paper, looks like it should be amazing. Christian Bale, Forest Whitaker, Sam Shepard, Casey Affleck, Woody Harrelson, and Zoe Saldana are all talented actors and Scott Cooper’s previous film, _Crazy Heart_ was a solid effort which earned it’s lead actor an Academy Award.

That’s on paper though. Unfortunately if you’ve seen [a trailer for _Out of the Furnace_](https://awesomefriday.ca/2013/10/out-of-the-furnace-second-trailer-poster-its-definitely-awards-season/) then you will not be surprised by anything that happens in the movie. In fact, even if you haven’t seen the trailer you won’t be surprised by anything that happens in the movie.

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Review: Frozen

Frozen

There’s two things I can tell you right off the bat about Frozen. First, contrary to what the marketing would have you believe, it isn’t a movie about a snowman and a reindeer. Second, it is in facta Disney Princess movie.

What’s interesting about these two facts is that I have no idea _why_ they marketed so heavily on the snowman and the reindeer because it’s actually a _really_ good Disney Princess movie. More than that it’s actually just a really good movie.

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