Change Your Image
holleratyourbutler
Ratings
Most Recently Rated
Reviews
Gekijôban Saiko Pasu (2015)
Masterpiece
consider this movie an epilogue to the prior 2 season of the TV series. It explores the consequences of actions taken by certain character in those past two series and is ultimately a nice companion piece.
I've heard it said that this movie does not provide resolution to what came before but I disagree. The show is more than just about events, it is about the message the show has been trying to get across and it does this perfectly. 'People need democracy, they should not have a system of governance IMPOSED upon them'.
The film gives resolution to Gino character who was sorely underused in in season 2. The music, the animation, the writing was all top quality. A masterpiece.
The Wolverine (2013)
'Everyone You Love Will Die'
..these are the words James mangold wrote on the back of the scripts for 'the wolverine'. Lofty, heavy subject matter indeed. Did he deliver on this? I Think so.
Before I review this I want to stress that before you go and watch the film, do not expect to see an x-men film, or an x-men origins: wolverine sequel. It has references to canon established no doubt but this is THE WOLVERINE, singular. Got it? right.
I was quite surprised while I was watching this film, as a big fan of Asian cinema and the neo noir stuff they've been doing in Korean cinema for a little while, I found this settle into its aesthetic quite quickly and stands up there (cinematographically, is that a word?) with some of the best. Fair enough, mangold is trying to ape what has come before but he does it with some reverence and the tone is consistent throughout. That is until the final act, which I won't spoil.
THE WOLVERINE is more a character drama, a fish out of water story but also one of healing and redemption. Logan (played by Hugh Jackman) really is the focus here and is far and away the best thing in this movie.
In one scene that takes place in a Yukon bar, it is no more evident that james mangold has delivered on the 'simmering berserker rage' aspect of the character. There is so much intensity and nuance in Jackman's performance that you actually feel the stakes, that when pushed, wolverine is not a nice guy to be around. This permeated through the entire film and made it a fairly serious piece although it has its share of laughs but just enough levity to remind you of the wolverine we all know and love.
The film seeks to answer the question of what makes an, for all intent and purposes 'immortal' want to keep going. Does that person want to keep on going? Is immortality a curse? While the exploration of this isn't as deep as you'd expect, it is handled admirable enough with Logan as the subject matter. The film also (for comic book fans) explores how wolverine is defined by the women in his life. We all know the beauty and the beast aspect to his sorry tale but what if beauty dies, must he continue to seek out more beauty to temper his soul?
This films shows enormous restraint, but is also ballsy. Don't go into it expecting just wall to wall mindless CGI action, explosion, witty one liners or cities being destroyed. It's a gritty, deeply explored character drama and what some people will call boring, I would call cultural ignorance.
While I agree Asian cinema and culture is not everyones cup of tea, you have to be able to appreciate or at least tolerate it to really understand the films finer points, the sober mood & aesthetic. A third of the film was entirely in Japanese, with a predominantly Japanese cast. In some parts they consciously did not subtitle the dialogue so that the audience were as lost in this culture as Logan was. Do the studio even want to make money from this as a summer tent-pole movie? FOX actually showed some balls taking on this flick and given their history, they can only be commended for taking this risk.
Though not as good as batman begins, that feeling you got after you finished watching it and felt they nailed the 'essence' of batman from the comics, well that's the feeling I got after watching 'The Wolverine'.
The only flaw in the film was its final act. It is jarring to say the least only because what came before was of such high quality. It is handled as well as it can be but you cant help but think the studio did not compromise completely and to appeal to the mainstream demanded a more formulaic and familiar end set piece.
Supporting characters particularly the predominantly Japanese cast (with the exception of will yun lee who is of Chinese descent) were all handled well. Will yun lee's character 'Harada' seemed like there was a lot more to him and it would have been nice if he took a more prominent role but I can see how that would have taken away from Logan's spotlight. Many props to hiroyuki sanada, his nuance and intensity was also on show here I only wish there was more of him because it was refreshing to see him as an antagonist for a change. I really liked the character yukio (another character from the comics) in this film, beyond her performance her outfit is of note as it was very well thought out to fit with the aesthetic of the film without seemign ridiculous, she was very much an anime like punk character which I think was intentional look given to her, taking her savvy streetwise backstory into consideration.
James Mangold was correct when he said this movie was a Japanese noir movie with summer tent-pole action. There was absolutely no lies told about this movie, the trailer was pretty damn honest. Well, except for the fact we have to wait for the DVD/blu ray to see extended action sequences that were alluded to in the trailers but not shown in the film (i'm looking at you ninja scene)!
X: First Class (2011)
Not flawless, but pretty damn close...A wonderfully refreshing comic book movie which resets the bar
There's so much i can go into but i'll keep it concise.
Story/Script - absolute stroke of genius setting this tale to the backdrop of the Cuban missile crisis and civil rights movement. Intertwining the mutant tales with real history really upped the stakes. This is also perhaps the first film where there was little character development for most of the x-men and yet I still rooted for them because as character actors they were so grounded in reality (powers aside) and convincing. Havok, darwin, angel, banshee, mystique (particularly her) all fulfilled their character roles flawlessly but I would've liked to see more explanations for the characters pain (particularly havok). It gets a 10 from me regardless because it wasn't a deal breaker. Azazel and riptide definitely deserved more dialogue and exposition although what they lacked in that they more than made up for in their actions, some of the most bad ass action sequences involved them.
Performances - By far the highlight were James mccavoy and Michael fassbender (professor X and magneto respectively). Magneto brought much gravitas and angst to his role while professor x was instantly likable the minute he was on screen. Jennifer Lawrence gave the best female performance as mystique. Rose Byrne fell just shy of the mark, although he performance was consistent throughout. The biggest surprise and dark horse of this film however was definitely Kevin bacon, who played the smooth, suave but maniacal Sebastian shaw (leader of the hellfire club). He was almost a cookie cutter bond villain but it's all in the performance. Setting it to the backdrop of a potential third world war gave his plan more real world connotations and it was quite scary how close to real world 'new world order' conspiracies it mirrored.
There are subtle real world conspiracy mirrors in this film that the average person wouldn't pick up on IE) Jews having been persecuted becoming no better than the Nazi with superiority complexes much like zionists in israel and the u.s today...
Direction - the direction was flawless, director Matthew Vaughn is the master of juggling an ensemble cast and pacing (when you also consider he only had 9 months to shoot this film). Cinematogrpahy was off the chain and one particular sequence involving Azazel was by far the most impressive cinematic action sequence i've ever seen in a pg-13 film (and it was brutal to boot) Very little I can fault this movie on, I thoroughly enjoyed it, it had everything I could've wanted out of a comic book movie. Small niggle was 'beast' and his prosthetics which would make his eye looked crossed, it was a slight annoyance but in context it wasn't a 'deal breaker' either. It just reminded me I was watching a comic book movie again... :)
Thor (2011)
Underwhelming, Poorly Paced But Definitely Had It's Moments...
Thor wasn't a bad film, there was definitely a brilliant film in there somewhere but poor pacing, bad editing and marvel studios obsession with trying to shoehorn in avenger references ultimately left me feeling underwhelmed and somewhat disappointed.
To keep this simple i'll start with the characters/actor, then the plot and finally the directing.
Characters - Thor in my opinion was perfectly cast, hems-worth not only looks the part but acted the part. He played cocky, vulnerable, angry all perfectly well and it was a treat to see him on screen and see him develop across the duration of the film (all to brief).
Loki stole the show by a long shot although I didn't quite feel they captured entirely the mischievous nature of his character. Hiddleston gave the best performance by a mile and you could genuinely feel his pain and anguish and it was hard not to root for his cause, he was just a boy looking for the acceptance and respect of his father.
Odin played by Hopkins carried scenes with the most gravitas, i got chills when he hissed at Loki and banished Thor,in fact any scene he was in would always get a smile from me. Hopkins is by far my favourite and most resilient actor working today.
The biggest let down of this film was Natalie port man, she has acting chops but unfortunately she didn't show them here, i couldn't really fully believe her character.
As for the rest of the cast they were mostly forgettable, with idris Elba's character shining through the most but he was criminally underutilised. Stellan skaarsgard should be given a tip of the hat, he played his character brilliantly and was very likable but nothing astounding here. Let it also be said that Kat dennings character was totally pointless and very irritating. She bought no humour to the film even though she was supposed to.
The plot was on of the high points for me, this film wasn't a story of good vs evil to save the world, it was a story of two boys both fighting for th affection and adoration of their father one which touched me, and i can say it was different to what i was used to.
The film was directed brilliantly and you can tell branagh was inspired bu del toro and snyder in scene in asgard and Dunham/ice giant locations. For his first foray into high budget films this was an admirable effort. I don't know who's to blame but i was really disappointed with the pacing of this film and it was definitely cut to keep it;s running time below 2 hours which is a shame because this truly could have been epic. The action scenes were fantastic which is why its such a shame that everything else was so cut so half arsed, rushed and poorly paced.
Asgard could've felt more populated, the scenes of Thor on earth were quite bland and uninspiring and i cant say i really felt anything hems worth and portmans relationship.
All in all its a brilliant summer romp but i recommend you Don't see it in 3d, because the 3d is rubbish.
7/10