The Revenant Review

Leonardo DiCaprio is a phenomenal actor who puts forth extraordinary effort in his acting and ends up delivering a particularly high-quality performance. It's no secret he's striving for an Oscar award, and remarkable as many of his performances have been, he has yet to earn that particular award. In his latest film, The Revenant (2015), the whole movie is anchored in DiCaprio's 200% commitment to his performance. It's a good movie with a stellar cast, but not something that's going to stick with you very long afterwards.

While exploring the uncharted wilderness in 1823, legendary frontiersman Hugh Glass (Leonardo DiCaprio) sustains injuries from a brutal bear attack. When his hunting team leaves him for dead, Glass must utilize his survival skills to find a way back home, guided by sheer will and the love of his family. Grief-stricken and fueled by vengeance, Glass treks through the wintry terrain to track down John Fitzgerald (Tom Hardy), the former confidant who betrayed and abandoned him.

For a movie set in the uncharted American frontier, there were a number of British and Irish actors portraying American characters. Tom Hardy, Will Poulter, and Domhnall Gleeson all played prominent roles in The Revenant with remarkably spot on accents. Of these three actors, I thought Tom Hardy was most impressive. I didn't even realize it was Tom Hardy until the end credits started rolling. He has this thick accent that I can only describe as being "southern," nebulous as that term might be to describe an accent. He also had a thick mop of hair and a scraggly beard hiding most of his face. His acting and makeup was so well done that I did not realize it was Tom Hardy at all. Domhnall Gleeson is becoming a favorite of mine. He's known for playing Bill Weasley in the Harry Potter movies, Phil in Unbroken, and recently General Hux in Star Wars: The Force Awakens. He's a solid a actor who delivers great performances. Will Poulter has appeared in The Maze Runner and The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. He's still fairly new to the big screen, but does a fine job here juxtaposed with some big name talents.

Leonardo DiCaprio's skill and passion for acting is very much evident here. He depicts intense emotions as he portrays Hugh Glass enduring trial after trial and struggling to keep alive in a harsh, unforgiving frozen wilderness. He's grief-stricken and fueled by vengeance, and it shows in every little thing Glass does, from begging a Native American he encounters for some food to stave off starvation, to rescuing a girl from being raped by frontiersmen. DiCaprio imbues his character with an intensity that is simply remarkable to watch.

Director Alejandro G. Iñárritu takes DiCaprio's performance and makes it even better with some truly magnificent camera work. This is the first Iñárritu film I've  ever seen, and his mastery of capturing beautiful imagery is beyond compare. Even with some of the grotesque scenes, it still looks beautifully done. The Revenant captures some truly gorgeous shots of the wilderness, forests, and frozen tundra. The way shots were set up was very artistic without a sense of self-importance. There weren't many shots that didn't look like a work of art. The Revenant was a beautiful movie to watch.

Having said all that, it took me a while to determine if I actually liked it. The story within the movie was pretty simple. There's a set up which was interesting, a remarkably long middle full of Hugh Glass trying to not die, and a conclusion that wasn't very straightforward. I daresay The Revenant could have been much shorter and still achieved the story it set out to tell. There were many moments where Glass was simply walking or staring off wistfully into the distance. Yes, these moments looked good, but made the movie drag significantly in terms of story. I don't want to say it was slow moving, because there was so much to visually take in. But the story progressed at a snail's pace at times, even if it was beautiful to watch. It wasn't until well after the movie ended that it occurred to me that The Revenant was more about the experience than the narrative. It was about the experience Hugh Glass had trying to survive after being mauled by a bear and left for dead, not the story of how he survived. It's also about our experience of witnessing this beautifully constructed film, not the film telling us a deep or meaningful story. It's likely the movie won't appeal to some audiences because of how drawn out the story ends up being, but that by no means is to suggest that it is a poor movie.

The Revenant is a starkly beautiful as it is uncompromisingly harsh. There is a phenomenal cast delivering well made characters, and a highly skilled director showing us some remarkably beautiful scenery and capturing it in the most visually stunning way. The story here is not the point, and is in fact a very simple story. The Revenant is about the experience, not the story. I do think that The Revenant is worth seeing if you are not too put off by the violent and occasionally gory images and the aforementioned sexual assault that give it its R rating. There is a chance you may find it too "artistic" if you value story over visual delivery. I'm glad I saw it, but it's not something I'd go out of my way to see a second time.

Is there a role that you think Leonardo DiCaprio deserved an Oscar for? Comment below and tell me about it!

The Maze Runner Review

Upon seeing the trailer for The Maze Runner (2014) I became really interested in seeing it. The trailer said it was based on a novel, so I looked up the book to learn more about it. As it so happens, this is yet another dystopian survivalist movie based on a Young Adult book trilogy. I've read the Maze Runner trilogy now and taking the books into consideration, the movie did a pretty good job.

Thomas (Dylan O'Brian) wakes up in an elevator, remembering nothing but his own name. He emerges into a world of about 60 teen boys who have learned to survive in a completely enclosed environment, subsisting on their own agriculture and supplies lead by Alby (Aml Ameen) with Newt (Thomas Brodie-Sangster) second in command. A new boy arrives every 30 days. The original group has been in "The Glade" for three years, trying to find a way to escape through the Maze that surrounds their living space. The Maze changes daily and at night is crawling with nightmarish creatures called Grievers. The boys have begun to give up hope. Thomas's curiosity spawns some optimism among the boys except for Gally (Will Poulter) who was suspicious of Thomas from the start. With a fellow Maze Runner Minho (Ki Hong Lee) to help, Thomas sets out to solve the Maze. But then a comatose girl named Teresa (Kaya Scodelario) arrives on the elevator with a strange note, and their world begins to change.

The nature of this story doesn't lend itself to deep characters; every single one of the boys (and Teresa, for that matter) have amnesia. None of them know anything about themselves apart from their first name. This keeps all of these characters from having a complex past to prompt present behaviors. Sure, they have their shticks, but that's pretty much the only thing that defines each of the characters. Thomas is very curious, but seems to be the only one out of 60 boys who have no idea why they are there. Thomas is also a heroic go-getter, but the fact that he's the main hero of the story practically requires that quality of him. Why is he like this? We don't know, and neither does Thomas.

One of my biggest complaints about the books is that the "why" never seems to be addressed in much detail. Thomas wants to know what's going on and the other "Gladers" either tell him they don't know, wouldn't give him a straight answer, or told him it didn't matter. This happened so much throughout the trilogy that by the time I'd finished the last book I still only had a vague idea as to why any of the insane plot actually happened. For the movie, they did explain a little more of the bigger picture at the very end than the book did. This made it slightly more satisfying, but still wide open for a sequel. The other irritating thing the book did was spam the reader with fictional slang used in place of actual profanity. While it was present in the movie, it was used significantly less than it was in the book, thank heavens. Other changes were relatively minor and were reasonably left out in the interest of time.

Teresa is pretty much the only female character in the movie. She plays a pretty important role in the book, but her character is so watered down and made so negligible, I have to wonder why she was included in the movie at all. She wasn't even included as an obligatory love interest; she seems to be there only to cause the boys to roll their eyes when she acts irrational. Teresa isn't even portrayed by a good actress; she's almost like a budget Kristen Stewart.

There is an unexpected moment of theme development shortly before the climax of the movie. It's a short scene where Thomas, Teresa, Newt, and a couple others are talking amongst themselves. They decide that past experiences aren't indicative of future experiences. They also talk about how the present is all that matters; they could stay there, worry, and panic about whether or not their misfortunes will come again, or they could ignore past wrongdoings and focus on what they can do about it right now. Who they were isn't nearly as important as who they are now. This was great and gave the characters a chance to show what makes them tick, it gave some thematic depth to the story, and moved the plot forward as they decide to take action. The movie really needed more moments like this. It was a great scene.

The book focused more on finding clues to solve the elaborate puzzle of The Maze, whereas the movie focuses more on the action while running around in The Maze. There are a LOT of scenes where Thomas is having to squeeze through walls that are closing in to crush him. It's enough to make anyone feel claustrophobic. The action is well choreographed. With shifting walls and Greivers attacking from various directions the action scenes could easily have become disorienting and confusing. But the shots were strung together in such a way that we're able to keep up with the action. The action scenes do lend themselves to some violent imagery. But just as things are about to get brutal, it cuts to another shot or something obscures our view of what could be a grisly scene. It remains safely within its PG-13 rating; I wouldn't worry about showing this to preteens if they really wanted to watch it.

The Maze Runner was better than the book it is based on, but that's not saying a whole lot; I didn't care for the books much. It's almost like The Hunger Games meets Pac-Man. The characters are shallow, some to the point that I wonder why they were included at all. The story is vague and leaves most of the questions it raises unanswered. The visual effects and action were quite good. All in all, it ends up being a decent popcorn flick; good special effects and action, but hardly anything else. This is a renter at most; young teens will probably love it, but anyone else should probably borrow a copy from a friend if you want to see it badly enough.

I've not given the last couple of YA novel movies very good reviews. Apart from The Hunger Games they follow a standardized formula and end up being uninteresting. Do you know of any YA novels out there that breaks the mold and are really good reads? Comment below and let me know!