Rev Stan's film blog

Fifteen minute review: Sherlock Holmes Game of Shadows

Loved the first Sherlock Holmes movie for its cheeky fun and stylish action. There were gadgets galore and plenty of suspense. And it was an engaging and fun story.

On the posters for Game of Shadows it claims to be more fun, bigger and better, or words along those lines but it isn't. 

Firstly the plot is a little meandering and I'm not sure I cared enough, partly because I don't think the relationship between Holmes and Watson, which is central, is sufficiently re-established.

Robert Downey Jnr is doing the cheeky Holmes with bells on but the chimes just don't ring as joyfully as the first film. I suppose it is the Captain Jack Sparrow-syndrome. More of the same starts to wear a little thin after a while.

That isn't to say Game of Shadows isn't enjoyable. It's great to see Stephen Fry as Mycroft (and there is a lot of him to see). Jared Harris is also superb as the calmly evil Moriaty (he makes Holmes look like a bit of a buffoon at times).

It is quite fun, there is some nice tying up of plot points at the end, there are gadgets and fights and and the slow-mo action sequences but because it's all been done before it doesn't quite have the same wow-factor as the first film. (And we've since been spoilt with the BBC's rather superb Sherlock TV series.)

A pleasant enough couple of hours but I didn't walk out with a grin on my face like I did with the first film. Its going to just scrape into four star category with 60% from me. 

On IMDb it's got 78% with a Metacritic score of 49% and on Rotten Tomatoes it has a critic score of 59% and 85% of visitors gave it three and a half stars or higher.

 

Was Bridesmaids more Bridezilla?

The last film of director Paul Feig's I saw, Knocked Up, I thought was flawed in such a way as not to be a glowing recommendation for seeing a new film. But there has been so much media attention given to his new flick, Bridesmaids, and it being my week off with more time on my hands thought I'd go and see if the hype was justified.

Annie (Kristen Wiig who co-wrote) is nearly at rock bottom in her life. Her cake shop business has gone under in the recession,  her boyfriend left her, her fuck-buddy doesn't like her sleeping over and debts are mounting.

She is asked by her best friend Lillian (Maya Rudolph) to be her maid of honour. Lillian has a rag-tag group of bridesmaids all with their own ideas of how things should be organised but the group is dominated by Lillian's new friend, the beautiful, charming and rich Helen (Rose Byrne).

The short review for the longest film title: Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides 3D*

Wasn't going to go and see Pirates 4, they've gone downhill rapidly since the first. Then I was offered a free ticket to a private preview screening...

So what was it like? Well it is certainly more coherent than Pirates 3 but overall it is just mildly entertaining. The problem is that we've seen and heard it all before in the first three films: the fights, the escapes and the Jack Sparrow jokes, nothing is new.

OK so there are mermaids in this, which were very well done and probably the best bit and there is no wooden acting by Orlando Bloom but ultimately the story just feels pedestrian. It follows three different parties racing to find the fountain of youth - the Spanish, the British led by Barbosa (the ever wonderful Jeffrey Rush) and Black Beard who is forcing Cap'n Jack to navigate.

Ten minutes in I asked myself: "Would I care if the film projector broke now and I never got to see the rest of the film?" And the answer was "No". The story just feels like a loose structure on which to pin the aforementioned fights, escapes and Jack Sparrow jokes.

Love Johnny Depp but it's time for Cap'n Jack to hang up it hat. Please.

I'm giving it 38%, Rotten Tomatoes aggregated critics rating is 39% from 121 reviews with a surprisingly high user rating of 86% so perhaps it is one for the kids. Metacritic gives it a rating of 45% from 30 reviews but has yet to register a user rating.

Don't fooled into thinking that the film is as exciting as the trailers looks:

 

A popcorn movie I finally liked: Thor (and the gratuitous pic)

I warmed to Thor disproportionally to how much I warmed to 3D. In fact I didn't warm to 3D at all and continue to dislike it intensely but anyway that's another post, back to Thor.

It's all very predictable: Thor (Chris Hemsworth) is desperate to become King but his father doesn't think he's ready, that he's too hot-headed and arrogant, plunging in, hammer twirling, without thinking through the consequences fully.

Of course he learns the hard way having been stripped of his all powerful hammer and banished to earth for accidentally starting a war leaving his dodgy brother to step into his shoes.

Yes there is a lot of CGI and a lot of ridiculous fighting but there is also a nice-ish love story between Thor and a human girl he meets played by Natalie Portman. I also like the amusing mix of comic book fantasy and 'real world' as the two collide.

It is strict popcorn fun with the added bonus that Hemsworth actually made me say, almost out loud, 'Oo hello' when he took his top off.

I'm giving it 62%. On Rotten Tomatoes it gets 94% from the critics and 84% of visitors liked it. It hasn't been released in the US yet so no rating on Metacritic.

 

Hollywood fairytales part 2: Beastly or 'oh dear'

This is a film I wouldn't normally touch with a barge pole but I have this fascination with Alex Pettyfer* and the terrible film choices he seems to be making. He's on my list of car crash cinema stars (with Robert Pattinson) mainly because I live in the hope that his intelligence will match his looks and he'll spot a decent project and learn to act properly.

But before I launch into a Kermodian tirade about how terrible Beastly is as a film (and it isn't great) I want to preface it by saying that I actually enjoyed it more than Red Riding Hood.

Popcorn movie time: I Am Number Four

I confess: I was going to go and see Howl but having had a run of seeing more serious films owing to it being Oscar season, I decided at the last minute I just wanted some chewing gum for the eyes.

I'd seen a trailer for I Am Number Four which pretty much gives you the story and it is an interesting concept so plumped for that.

A small group of fugitive aliens are hiding out on earth from the Mogadorian's who took over their planet.

The Mogadorian's are hunting them down one by one, in order and Alex Pettyfer plays, John, or Number Four. He feels the death of his counterparts and so knows he is next on the hit list. He lives a semi nomadic lifestyle with his protector (Timothy Oliphant) moving from place to place and never setting down roots or getting too close to anyone in order to 'stay off the grid'.

When they arrive in Paradise, Ohio, John quickly falls for local girl Sarah (Dianna Agron) and starts drawing attention to himself as his true alien powers begin to show.

It takes its time setting up the story, establishing that John feel alone, isolated and frustrated with his lot and the action doesn't really kick in until about two thirds of the way through when John is forced into a confrontation with the local jocks and the Mogadorian's start to close in. Which is fine as some action flicks can rely a little too heavily on the action.

Pettyfer isn't the best actor but he pulls off hansom and troubled well enough. And it all skips along in a mildly entertaining way, spoiled only by the occasional Hollywood cliche moment (our protagonist and co-alien's silhouette's walking out of the burning embers of the final battle) and the extreme 'alieness' of said battle which seems strangely at odds with the more subtle teen angst/romance of the rest of the film.

I Am Number Four is the first in a planned six book series and I'd give the next film a go if it gets taken up.

It gets 55% from me, on UK Rotten Tomatoes it gets a thumbs down with 31% based on 130 reviews but visitor to the site seemed to like it giving it  70%. Meanwhile Metacritic has a similar imbalance with critics giving it 30% and the average site user giving it 6.1 out of 10.

 

Ready for a reboot: Tron Legacy 3D

All I can remember about the first Tron film is futuristic cars making sharp 90 degree turns and I admit that my main motive for seeing Tron Legacy is that I just fancied a pre-Christmas, mindless popcorn movie.

And at least this was made in 3D so it's not as uncomfortable as watching something retro-fitted - although I still don't see what it actually added. Tron Legacy is a visually stunning film all black and white with splashes of neon. Perhaps it's just the amateur photographer in me but I just love the reflections in all those shiny surfaces.

Anyway, like the last visually stunning, shot in 3D film I saw (Avatar) the plot is fairly slim and predictable. Digital world Tron's original creator, Kevin Flynn, disappears ones night leaving his son Sam an orphan. When the grown up Sam (Garrett Hedlund) goes to investigate the origins of a pager message from his father's now abandoned former office he inadvertently ends up inside the digital world his father created.

(I) Love (Jake Gyllenhaal) and Other Drugs

Saw this at a preview screening at the lovely Clapham Picture House last Sunday and once again Mr Gyllenhaal made me giggle like a love-struck 14-year-old.

He's still looking buff, not quite as pumped up as he did in Prince of Persia but perfect for a bit of bod exposure, of which there is plenty in this rom-com. He plays Jamie, a pharmaceutical company sales rep and womaniser who could charm his way into a nun's habit.

But of course this is a rom-com so there has to be a dose of cliche and he meets his match in the form of Maggie (Anne Hathaway) who sees through his charm. Of course Jamie falls for Maggie (and that isn't a spoiler because it's in the trailer, which is linked below) but the twist is that she suffers from early onset Parkinson's Disease.

The first half of the film has the majority of the laughs the second spends more time tugging at the heart strings as Jamie struggles to come to terms with Maggie's incurable illness and Maggie is at first mistrustful of his motives for wanting to be with her and then reluctant to 'trap' him into a future caring for her as her illness progresses.

OK so it's not going to win any Oscar's like Gyllenhaal and Hathaway's last outing together, Brokeback Mountain but it is a funny and charming popcorn movie and Jake is gorgeous *sighs*.  It gets four stars from me.

Obviously not everyone is as smitten with Mr G as I am, on Rotten Tomatoes UK it's aggregated 48% from 130 reviews. On Metacritic it's fared a little better and is rated at 55%

You can sigh at Jake in the trailer here

Narnia: Voyage of the Yawn Treader

You have to feel a little bit sorry for this third instalment in the Chronicles of Narnia coming out when Harry Potter 7a (as they like to call it on Wittertainment) is still riding high in the movie charts. Next to the bespectacled wizard, CS Lewis' stories show their age although the influence on JK Rowlings books is stark.

Both carry at their heart the battle between good and evil; the problem with Narnia, and in particularly the Dawn Treader, is that the story comes across as overly moralistic and the religious metaphors lack any subtlety.

A further problem with Dawn Treader is that its central story thread just feels, well a little lacklustre. In the Lion the Witch and The Wardrobe there was the excitement of discovering Narnia and freeing it from the icy grip of the White Witch. Prince Caspian had a wronged handsome prince fighting to get what was rightfully his back.

The story of Dawn Treader sees some characters we've never heard about before have disappeared into the mist. Literally. So Prince Caspian and the two youngest Pevensie children, Edmund and Lucy, accompanied by a reluctant cousin Eustace decide to go and find them.

What follows is a predictable and linnear narrative. When we are told that the mist will bring to the fore a person's darkest fears (inspiration for deatheaters anyone?) you can easily tick off the list of the effects it is going to have on each of the central characters. That Eustace starts out as an obnoxious, albeit quite an amusing, brat and will have some sort of epiphany turning him into a hero too is obvious.

Scott Pilgrim vs the hype

Much anticipated Scott Pilgrim vs the World arrived in cinema's last week and I was very much in the mood for something light and mindlessly entertaining, something to fill the gap left by Kick Ass.

So the story is a simple one. Scott Pilgrim (Michael Cera playing the sort of role in which he is quickly becoming typecast*) fancies hair-colour changing Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) but in order to carry on dating her he must defeat her seven evil ex's.

It's a love story punctuated by fight scenes of a comic-book style complete with some Batman-esque 'word-effects'. From the opening with the Universal Studios logo done in the very old blocky computer-game style to the villains disintegrating into a pile of coins, director and co-screen writer Edgar Wright's tongue is firmly in his cheek.

Such touches that give the film it's quirky computer game/comic book feel could quickly become annoying but they are imaginative and amusingly done.

And it is stuffed  with some really funny lines and great, larger than life characters - I particularly like Kieran Culkin as Scott's gossipy, gay room mate.