Tomorrowland Review

I was psyched after seeing the original teaser trailer for Tomorrowland (2015); instantly teleporting to a different world with the touch of a pin was intriguing. I became even more excited when I heard it was directed and co-written by Brad Bird, the genius behind titles such as The Iron Giant, The Incredibles, Ratatouille, and even Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol. Tomorrowland is the latest Disney film inspired by a Disney theme park attraction. As was the case with its predecessors it won't inspire you to run off to ride the rides, but this one just might inspire you to try and change the world.

Whenever Casey Newton (Britt Robertson) touches a lapel pin with the letter T on it, she finds herself transported to another place somewhere in time and space called Tomorrowland, a city filled with huge robots, advanced technologies, and sleek buildings governed by David Nix (Hugh Laurie). The optimistic young woman recruits the help of former boy-genius scientist Frank Walker (George Clooney), who previously visited Tomorrowland, and years ago made a startling discovery about the future. Together with a Tomorrowland recruiter named Athena (Raffey Cassidy), the two adventurers set out to find the futuristic metropolis to uncover its mysterious secrets, as the fate of mankind hangs in the balance.

Good science fiction makes commentary on contemporary issues in a unique, metaphorical way.  One could argue that looking at how our science fiction stories have changed over the years is just as telling of our history and social issues than history books are. Awhile back, I read an article on Esquire.com that suggested that Star Trek: The Next Generation Was the Last Sci-Fi Show Hopeful About the Future. It took me awhile, but eventually I had to agree. Over the past several decades science fiction has become more and more bleak and pessimistic about the future, reflecting our attitudes about climate change, overpopulation, scarcity of recourses, international wars, and pollution. All of that is present in Tomorrowland, but as a warning of sorts. The prevailing theme is not one of doom and gloom, but is meant to wake the viewers from apathy, regain the sense of optimism for the future that we had in days past, and to make that bright future a reality. Since Tomorrowland is inspired by a Disney theme park, it was heavily influenced by Walt Disney's optimistic philosophy of innovation and utopia, such as his conceptual vision for the planned community known as EPCOT. By no means does Tomorrowland suggest that pollution, climate change, and other world issues are unimportant; it tells us these are very real problems and encourages us to act and improve the course of the future. This is probably the first science fiction story I've seen in a long time that is not only an optimistic vision of the future, but earnestly tries to instill a sense of optimism and responsibility within its audience. That alone makes Tomorrowland a breath of fresh air.

Brad Bird seems to like an artistic aesthetic that I can't think of a word for other than "retrofuturism", a blend of old-fashioned retro styles with futuristic technology: basically science fiction as it was fifty years or more in the past. Both The Iron Giant and The Incredibles featured a visual style that drew heavily from antique science fiction robots, classic James Bond movies, and vintage comic book super heroes. The Tomorrowland world that Casey sees is heavily influenced by this retrofuturism aesthetic and was a sheer delight to see. It shows us just enough to spark our imaginations and want to see more, but not enough to fully satisfy us with what we do get to see of Tomorrowland.

The theme and structure of Tomorrowland is a rejection of dark dystopia style sci-fi movies. The whole movie is kind of a big race to reach and save utopia. Yet for all of its insistence of diverging from the norm, it continually falls back into the pessimistic tropes of contemporary science fiction. Our heroes are regularly fleeing from mechanical men in suits who have a more than a passing resemblance to Agents in The Matrix movies. In fact, the big expositional dialogue just before the big fight at the end of Tomorrowland is remarkably similar to Agent Smith's exposition with Morpheus about how "humans are the virus." The exposition does get convoluted, but not to the point that viewers would likely fall too far behind. That's just one example, but there are several others. I respect the movie for what it was trying to do, that is be a unique and optimistic take on science fiction. They just didn't quite manage to do it without defaulting back to bleak futuristic sci-fi.

The cast here is really good. Naturally, George Clooney got the headline credits, but he's absent for most of the movie. The young Frank is played by Thomas Robinson in flashbacks, who looks remarkably like a young Clooney. If you're going to grow up to be a celebrity, Clooney is definitely a good choice. Britt Robertson has been raved about as the next up and coming actress, but I think most of the credit should go to Raffey Cassidy. She embodies a wonderfully complex character, has amazing chemistry with her co-stars, does most of her own stunts, has impeccable comedic timing, embodies the optimistic spirit of the film, and even steals scenes from Gorge daggum Clooney! She's only 12 and is amazing to say the least. Tomorrowland's cast is fantastic, but Cassidy is the most impressive in my opinion.

Lastly, I think I should comment on our main protagonist. It's fairly obvious that during development that the character of Casey was meant to be gender neutral; even the name can be male or female. The character was developed to be optimistic, enthusiastic about science and learning, and to be very intelligent. Holding to movie tropes, this has all the stereotypes of a boy character, yet Casey is a girl. She's clever, resourceful, and hopeful. She's not a warrior princess nor a fighter. She's not obsessed with boys and shopping. She's just trying to be a good person and make the world a better place where dreams can be achieved and science accessible to everyone. I think she's a great character that challenges Hollywood's concept of female characters, and she's a character whose values and opinions are worth instilling in our daughters. The only real slip up in this character is that for being so intelligent she doesn't always put the pieces together and often needs things explained to her. I would have liked it if she figured things out on her own a bit more, but I think this is a minor slip up and I don't think it has anything to do with the fact that she's a girl.

Tomorrowland tried very hard to buck the system of science fiction tropes, but doesn't quite manage to fully reject contemporary bleakness. By its nature, dystopian settings lend themselves to conflict, and conflict is what makes a good story. Utopias don't have conflicts with which to tell dynamic stories. But I very much appreciated the optimistic vision of the future that Tomorrowland was aiming for; that was quite refreshing. The cast is fantastic, the theme is interesting if inconclusive, the setting is fascinating, and visual effects are a splendor to behold. I feel like the movie could have had more story and less manic chase scenes, but it was decent for what it was. While I adore Brad Bird's work, this is probably my least favorite of the his films that I've seen. It gets preachy at times and displays a low opinion of the human race despite its forced hopefulness about how dreamers of the world are the ones who can save the future. I enjoyed Tomorrowland overall, but it's not something I'd go out of my way to see again. It's not a bad movie to take the family to see in the theaters, but it's worth the wait to rent.

Can you think of another movie in the last thirty years or so that has an optimistic vision of the future? Would you like to see science fiction like that? Comment below and let me know!

Jupiter Ascending Review

The Wachoswkis are known for some outstanding  films and a few bombs. The Matrix Trilogy is an example of great movie, a mediocre movie, and a dumb movie (in that order, in fact.) I really loved their work in Cloud Atlas, and I'm a fan of V for Vendetta. The trailer for their latest movie, Jupiter Ascending (2015), looked as riveting as any of their other works, but ended up being surprisingly dull and uninteresting.

 Jupiter Jones was born under a night sky, with signs predicting that she was destined for great things. Now grown, Jupiter (Mila Kunis) dreams of the stars but wakes up to the cold reality of a job cleaning other people's houses and an endless run of bad breaks. Only when Caine Wise (Channing Tatum), a genetically engineered ex-military hunter, arrives on Earth to track her down, does Jupiter begin to glimpse the fate that has been waiting for her all along - her genetic signature marks her as the next in line for an extraordinary inheritance that could alter the balance of the cosmos. But the children of House Abrasax, the most powerful of the alien dynasties, Balem (Eddie Redmayne), Kalique (Tuppence Middleton), and Titus (Douglas Booth), quarrel over the same inheritance and seek out Jupiter to help meet their own agendas.

I love a good sci-fi flick as much as the next geek. Good science fiction makes commentary on contemporary issues in a unique, metaphorical way. One could argue that looking at how our science fiction stories have changed over the years is just as telling of our history and social issues than history books are. Even a sci-fi/fantasy romp that intends to tell an action packed story rather than critique contemporary society is fun from time to time; the original Star Wars trilogy for example. I am truly not sure which end of the spectrum Jupiter Ascending was aiming for. It mostly revolves around the action, even if the context for said action is a bit nebulous. It seem to try to say something about indulgence and consumption, but never draws a thematic conclusion. In fact, the resource everyone is seeking is developed to be a precious commodity but seems to be a sustainable industry, questionable as it may be. Thematically, Jupiter Ascending simply doesn't seem to know where it is or where it's going.

The story seems haphazardly stuck together. There's lots of sci-fi stuff happening and I wasn't able to discern a reason for a lot of it. At its most basic elements, the story is fairly straightforward, but there's so much extra stuff going on peripherally to the main storyline that it becomes confusing and hard to follow. A lot of time is spent on subplot devices that have little or no effect on the bigger story. It ends up being sci-fi for the sake of being sci-fi, but it's a poorly written and developed sci-fi to the point that it resembles the campy old Flash Gordon movies.

I wasn't impressed with the cast either. The only other movie I've seen Mila Kunis in was Oz The Great and Powerful, and that was pretty bad, too. I've really liked Channing Tatum in most of his movies, but after seeing Jupiter Ascending, I'm convinced he's just good at playing Channing Tatum rather than being a decent character actor. I was most disappointed in Eddie Redmayne. He was up for an Oscar for Best Actor for his incredible performance in The Theory of Everything, but here it's as if all his acting skills fell out before they started shooting. He is a skilled actor, but doesn't seem cut out for action roles, or maybe he's just not good at playing a villain. I want to say that overall everyone just had poor material to work with, but most everyone really was bad in this movie.

Jupiter Ascending was not what I had hoped it would be. The story was a weak and befuddled narrative, the characters were shallow and uninteresting, the acting was bad, and the theme was confusing. I know The Wachoswkis and most of the cast can do better than this; and that made the movie all the more disappointing. The special effects were fantastic, and most fight scenes were not bad, but that's about where the good qualities of the movie end. It's sci-fi for the sake of sci-fi. Overall, I cannot recommend seeing Jupiter Ascending. The only way you'd enjoy it is if you're looking for a senseless action movie that doesn't require any thought on your end and if you enjoy special effects more than story or characters. If that's the case, I'd still wait until you can rent it. It's not worth the cost of a movie ticket.

What was a movie that you were particularly disappointed in? Comment below and tell me why!

Underworld Movie Review

When they are portrayed correctly, I like a good werewolf or vampire movie. They usually aren't portrayed very well. I've wanted to see Underworld (2003) for  awhile since it features both vampires and werewolves duking it out. About eleven years later I finally got around to it. I kind of liked it, but for the wrong reason.

Vampires and werewolves have been sworn enemies for hundreds of years, never seen by human eyes. Now fought in the present the conflict takes and unexpected turn. Selene (Kate Beckinsale), a beautiful vampire warrior, uncovers a Lycan/werewolf plot that could prove fatal for her entire race. She shadows a human, Michael Corvin (Scott Speedman), the Lycans' supposed target. Selene is unable to stop the Lycans in time and during a violent struggle, Michael is bitten by Lucian (Michael Sheen), the Lycan overlord, long thought to be dead. Michael will become a werewolf on the next full moon, but how does this fit into the Lycan's plans? Both sides must decide how to end the conflict and save their species as new and terrifying secrets unearth themselves and threatens the existence of both species.

The story here is not very complicated or terribly interesting. It's like, fight fight, fight, fight, "Oh, the Lycans are up to something," fight, fight, fight, fight, "Uh-oh, you're gonna be a werewolf," fight ,fight, fight, fight, "The Lycans have Michael! But why?" fight, fight, fight, fight. That could have been my summary paragraph; not much else happens beyond that until the last fifteen minutes or so. There are plenty of plot twists, but you can see most of them coming from a long way off. Even with a predictable and basic plot, the plot twists do their job well by keeping the audience guessing, even if the audience manages to guess the outcome sooner than the movie would probably like them to. The writing isn't bad in terms of plot development, but the story itself was sub-par at best.

Underworld was painfully stylized. It had a very artificial color palette; lots of black and light blues, with the very occasional and contrasting bright red for the blood. It seemed to me like the actors were striking artificial poses and posturing to the point that it resembled a sexy cologne commercial, especially with the black leather catsuits and unreal color and artificial backgrounds. Everyone was overacting in an almost exaggerated way, and the lack of character development made it difficult to care about any of the characters. It looks like they were trying to emulate The Matrix with the leather bodysuits, trench coats, sunglasses, and slow-motion action but failed to be anywhere near as good.

Unfortunately the vampires weren't very vampire-y, and the werewolves weren't very werewolf-y. The vampires possess the superhuman physical prowess commonly seen in pop culture, but none of the mystical weaknesses of mythical vampires; crosses, holy water, garlic, stakes, etc. The werewolves have a pretty impressive transformation process, but the end result is pretty lame. They resemble gorillas with canine snouts and claws. This is the only time I've seen werewolves considered immortal like vampires are. Even when they were CGI animated, they still resembled men in rubber monster suits. That was probably the most disappointing part of the movie for me.

What I thought was most interesting about Underworld wasn't actually part of the movie itself. As I was watching it, I kept thinking of a couple of games by White Wolf, Inc. called Werewolf: The Apocalypse and Vampire: The Masquerade; storytelling role playing games both set in the World of Darkness setting. As it turned out, White Wolf, Inc. filed a lawsuit against Lakeshore Entertainment Studio for seventeen counts of copyright infringement and claimed over eighty points of unique similarity between White Wolf's game systems and the movie. White Wolf was granted an expedited hearing and the lawsuit ended in a confidential settlement. Seriously, that was what was most interesting about the movie to me, and it wasn't even a part of the movie. Underworld did earn a few points with me only because it resembled a game I like to play. Neat as that is, it doesn't say much for the movie itself.

Underworld is not the most creative, memorable, good movie by any metric. The acting is forced and exaggerated, the blocking looks like it was designed by a modeling runway director, the colors look out of place and unreal, the story was weak, and I didn't particularly like the vampires and werewolves. It is good for being an over-the-top action movie with magical guns that never run out of ammunition. This movie did earn a few points for resembling a couple of role playing games that I enjoyed, but that was about it. Don't bother with Underworld unless you really want to see a crazy action movie that asks you to take its credibility beyond a movie's normal threshold. If you do play Werewolf: The Apocalypse and Vampire: The Masquerade, you'll probably get just a little bit more out of it. That alone bumped my assessment of the movie from "meh" to "eh, okay."

What's the best movie werewolf you've seen? Not the best werewolf movie, but the movie werewolf that looks the best. Comment below and tell me about it!

Enthiran Movie Review

A couple of years ago I saw a YouTube video about some crazy action scenes from a movie made in India. Several segments looked like they were trying to imitate visual effects from a number of big budget American movies. Recently I found the movie where these clips were from. It seems to have two titles depending on the language version; Enthiran (2010) if the language is Tamil or Robot when it is in Hindi.

Dr. Vasi (Rajnikanth) invents a super-powerful robot in his own image named Chitti (also played by Rajnikanth). The Artificial Intelligence Research and Development Institute (AIRD), the scientific body that must approve the robot, declines it based on its not having emotions and the ability to make rational judgment. A spontaneous bolt of lightning that hits Chitti evokes emotions in the robot, and he is seemingly ready for integration into the human world. But Chitti falls in love with Dr. Vasi's fiancée, Sana (Aishwarya Rai Bachchan), and turns on his creator. Vasi's mentor, Dr. Bohra (Danny Denzongpa), has been trying for years to construct a functional robot for military purposes. After Vasi's success with Chitti, Bohra seeks out Chitti to turn him into a killing machine.

  Before I get into the review, I have to make a disclaimer. I'm not well-versed in Indian cinema; I don't think I've seen an entire Bollywood movie before Enthiran. I also don't speak Tamil, so I had to watch a subtitled copy of Enthiran and it didn't display the most nuanced grasp of the English language. I therefore don't feel like I have grounds to criticize the dialogue as I'm sure things have been lost in translation.

Enthiran is more than a wacky viral video, it's the most expensive and highest grossing film in Indian history. This is like the Avatar of Indian Cinema. There are tons of practical special effects and CGI animation, the likes of which have not been seen in Indian cinema before. Enthiran has a star-studded cast; Rajnikanth is often billed in his movies as "SUPERSTAR Rajni," and is the second highest paid actor in Asia after Jackie Chan. Aishwarya Rai is a former Miss India and Miss World pageant winner, and is often credited to be "most beautiful woman in the world." Enthiran is a big deal, yet Western audiences will primarily be familiar with it through a 10-minute YouTube clip that they chuckled at and forgot about.

The CGI and special effects are impressive on the one hand, but still looks a bit like the quality of CGI work that appears in a direct to DVD movie here in the United States. They also seem to try to mimic some American movie effects. Before his "skin" is put on, Chitti resembles the robots in I, Robot. There are dozens of identical robots swarming in attack similar to Agent Smith in The Matrix Reloaded. There's an exciting train fight scene similar to the one in Spider-Man 2. Chitti gets shot in the eye, imitating Schwarzenegger's iconic Terminator look. There's some subtle nods to The Incredible Hulk and Iron Man effects, and even a big Transformers type giant robot attack. These are the types of over-the-top action scenes that were showcased in the YouTube video, but I can assure you that seeing Enthiran in its entirety gives it a lot more context and credibility within its world setting. If nothing else, seeing the whole movie will give you some more CGI craziness to enjoy.

There's going to be a lot of cultural gaps between Indian and American cinema that's going to give Western viewers a sense of scurrility when watching Enthiran. The movie focuses a whole lot in the chaste romance between Vasi and Sana. It was almost weird seeing such chastity between romantic partners in a big movie like this; even the villain was intent on marrying Sana before daring to have sex with her. There's a scene where Chitti rescues a young woman from a burning building. She's naked from taking a bath and her body is blurred out. For some reason having your life saved while not fully dressed is deeply shameful. I didn't understand that; yeah, I'd rather have clothes on, but I'd be more concerned about dying. It's just an example of cultural gaps that didn't quite make sense to me.

Another part of Enthiran that I thought was surreal was the periodic music video breaks. When I was in theater we did a Broadway musical once and had an Indian man in the audience. He thought it was unusual to have the characters break into song while remaining in character. He explained to us that in Indian theater (and I have to assume movies by extension) the actors go out of character to sing, get back into character, and continue with the story. There were about three or four points during Enthiran where the story simply stops and suddenly Rajinikanth and Rai are in a completely different location  and they are dancing and singing about love and romance. That scene ends and we return to the story. They act like music video segues but the songs are only loosely related to what's happening in the story. They drag on for at least five minutes and really disrupt the pacing of the movie. They are really neat to watch, though; they feature beautiful cinematography, sets, and music. I have yet to hear contemporary Indian music that I don't enjoy.

Enthiran is a very long movie, about three hours. This is pretty normal for Indian movies, but if you don't take a break and pause during the intermission, your butt will be asleep well before the end credits. There is so much crammed into Enthiran that chances are you will find something to enjoy, be it the glitzy music videos, the over the top action, special effects, or the out of sorts Three Stooges-style slapstick humor. There's certainly some weird scenes, like when Chitti has a conversation with a mosquito, and the movie sets itself up for sarcastic quips and riffing. If you don't particularly enjoy foreign films, I'd stay away from this one. It's lengthy, somewhat demanding (in keeping up with subtitles), and has a modest pay-off. If you do enjoy Bollywood films, elaborate costumes and dance numbers, killer robots, and physical humor gags, Enthiran is something not to be missed.

Here's the YouTube clip so you can see some of the over the top action sequences:

What's the strangest foreign film you've ever seen? Was it still good? Comment below and tell me all about it!

Cloud Atlas Movie Review

It’s not often that a truly ambitious movie hits theaters. It’s also pretty rare when a movie that focuses on theme more than story or narrative remains very interesting. Lana and Tom Wachowski (who directed The Matrix) wrote and directed this innovative piece of cinema with the help of Tom Tykwer and brought us an enigmatic movie called Cloud Atlas (2012).

Cloud Atlas is an exploration of how the actions of individual lives impact one another in the past, present, and future, as one soul is shaped from a killer into a hero, and an act of kindness ripples across the centuries to inspire a revolution. Everything is connected: an 1849 diary of an ocean voyage across the Pacific; letters from a composer to his friend; a thriller about a murder at a nuclear power plant; a farce about a publisher in a nursing home; a rebellious clone in futuristic Korea; and the tale of a tribe living in post-apocalyptic Hawaii, far in the future. Each member of the cast ensemble appears in multiple roles as the different stories move through time.

Cloud Atlas is an impossible movie to summarize; that really was the best way to condense it. There are a total of six stories being told; they are interrelated and interwoven stories that span centuries. The stories have a chronology to them with a unique setting and set of characters. The stories are all told simultaneously, switching back and forth between each story. Usually the transition between the stories is logical, such as switching rapidly back and forth between two stories that both have chase scenes. Other times the transition is less logical, such as a suspenseful moment being interrupted by a calmer scene in another story, then returning to the suspenseful scene.

This makes the movie somewhat disorienting at times, but really makes you think about what the feeling, theme, and idea the movie is trying to communicate. According to David Mitchell (the author of the novel Cloud Atlas was based on), the movie is structured “as a sort of pointillist mosaic: We stay in each of the six worlds just long enough for the hook to be sunk in, and from then on the film darts from world to world at the speed of a plate-spinner, revisiting each narrative for long enough to propel it forward.”

A sizeable cast is used for Cloud Atlas. The cast includes Jim Sturgess, Tom Hanks, David Gyasi, Bae Doona, Hugo Weaving, Jim Broadbent, Hugh Grant, Keith David, Susan Sarandon, Halle Berry, and Ben Whishaw. Listing the characters that these actors play in Cloud Atlas would take a lot of space. Each actor is in each of the six stories, but playing different characters in each one. In so doing, the movie explores the concepts of reincarnation and how our actions have far reaching effects in a way that I have never seen in a movie before. It was fascinating to see how different souls kept finding each other in different lives.

The actors, Tom Hanks in particular, act very differently between stories as they play different characters. Sometimes they are depicted as different ethnicities and sometimes even different genders. Seeing Hugo Weaving dressed as a very convincing female nurse was a bit odd. But so was seeing Jim Sturgess with a makeup job that made him look Korean. The makeup jobs weren’t always convincing, but it did get the point across.

The art direction was absolutely stunning. Camera techniques were captivating, the sets and costumes were stunning, the special effects were spectacular, and even the color pallet and designs were different from story to story; it was simply fascinating to watch! Some of the stories were more action based, while others were more calm and emotional, but they were presented in such a way that really draws you in. Cloud Atlas hooks you right from the beginning and doesn’t let go.

Cloud Atlas is very artistic, somewhat abstract, and a very unconventional means of structuring a movie. Because it’s so artistically complex and unlike anything else out there, I could very easily see some viewers not enjoying it. I even saw some audience members at the theater I attended leave before the movie was over. Cloud Atlas took a non-traditional narrative, impressionistic, and even a poetic approach. There was meaningfully implemented profanity, and sex scenes. That is to say it wasn’t simply junk thrown in to give it a higher rating. I didn’t find it offensive, but it’s still not something to show young viewers.

Cloud Atlas was incredible. It was fascinating to watch, captivating, and really makes you think. At two hours and forty-five minutes it’s a very long movie, but not once did I feel bored. I felt like I was viewing some mesmerizing abstract art. And like any abstract art, Cloud Atlas will not appeal to everyone. If you see it and really enjoy it, I can sympathize. If you see it and are completely confused or even hate it, I can totally understand your reasoning. I don’t expect Cloud Atlas to make much in the box office; I don’t think it will appeal to most viewers because it’s so unusual. But I enjoyed it, and I want to see it again to try to understand more of what this film is trying to say. If Cloud Atlas sounds like something you might enjoy, I recommend seeing it, possibly twice. If it sounds too strange for you, then it probably is and I’d avoid it. Nevertheless, I think I would like to own a copy of this on Blu-Ray. It’s such an intriguing work of cinematic art.

Have you ever seen an experimental film? What did you think about it? Did you like it? Did you hate it? Comment below and let me know!