Passengers

Morten Tyldum’s last film The Imitation Game was a serious Oscars contender at the time, which makes it all the more weirder that his latest film Passengers seems to be stuck in Limbo - with not enough action and excitement to be a popcorn thriller and too-poor a story to be a quality drama-romance.

The colonial seeding-ship Avalon is transporting 5,000 colonists to the planet Homestead II, a 120 year journey that has the entire crew in long-term hibernation pods. After some strange happenings on the ship, two passengers are awoken 90 years early, seemingly due to pod-malfunctions. Mechanical engineer Jim Preston (Chris Pratt) and writer Aurora Lane (Jennifer Lawrence) find themselves alone on the ship, their only other mildly charismatic company the android bartender Arthur (Michael Sheen) and no way to go back to sleep in the Hibernation pods.

Passengers does seem genuinely confused about what it should be. Its opening act starts off as you might expect a classic sci-fi blockbuster of yesteryear to begin, establishing the confines of the location and building a sense of isolation. It uses montages effectively and manages to keep the foot on the pedal, but after a key decision made by one of the characters - something pretty unethical that should have help contour their character development, but is shrugged off by the film soon after - Passengers starts to go downhill fast. It becomes surprisingly slow and bland, and beyond the first act there are no real twists and turns in the story as you might have expected had you seen the trailer. The agonisingly average story just can’t deliver on the hype Passengers tried to build through an intense marketing campaign.

With obvious homages to several Kubrick films and a smattering of others, Passengers doesn’t really have a personality of its own, and whilst Pratt and Lawrence should be able to deliver oodles of chemistry on-screen, the second-rate screenplay drags their performances down immensely. There were also a handful of blatant overacting moments from Lawrence, whilst Pratt is much more timid (see: boring) than in his usual roles, although you can tell that they’re trying to do their best with the mediocre material they’re given. Indeed, the most frustrating thing about Passengers is that you can tell there could be a really dynamic, well-acted romance in there somewhere - a sort of Lost in Translation in Space - if it just stopped trying to add in all the hallmark sci-fi elements that it doesn’t have the complexity to pull off.

If Passengers does have one redeeming feature, it would be its visual composition. As glossy and beautiful as you would expect a $110 million film to look, it manages to keep a leash on its many CGI elements which blend in near-seamlessly with the live action work. Whilst it doesn’t have a unique style, it does at least manage to suspend disbelief when it comes to location, a challenge that many far higher profile films often fail. The helical design of the Avalon ship is surprisingly cool and is integrated into the action in a reasonably satisfying way. Though ultimately these attributes can’t undo the damage of a poorly written story - or even justify going to see the film - they were at least present when the rest of film collapsed on itself.

Passengers has an interesting enough premise, and could have been a lot better even with subtle tweaks to the order of the story, but ultimately it's let down by an uninspiring screenplay and dull-as-dishwater characters.

The Magnificent Seven

Seven Samurai is a classic film that has been reimagined in many different ways, as a western (The Magnificent Seven) and a space opera (Battle Beyond the Stars). Many movies, specifically westerns take elements from this movie, but never has it been so blatantly remade. Rather than follow the path of it's namesake, this new Magnificent Seven is a straight remake of Seven Samurai, even going so far to use a watered down version of the classic's screenplay.

The town of Rose Creek is being harassed by Bartholomew Bogue (Peter Sarsgaard), a businessman who intends on buying the whole town in order to mine it of all the gold it has. Desperate to save her town, Emma Cullen (Haley Bennett) leaves to look for protection. She comes across bounty hunter Sam Chisolm (Denzel Washington) who agrees to help but admits that they need more people. They gather a team that includes Faraday (Chris Pratt), a drunken Irishman hustler without the accent, Goodnight Robicheaux (Ethan Hawke), a former Confederate sharpshooter, his companion Billy Rocks (Byung-hun Lee), a Chinese immigrant who is a knife expert, Jack Horne (Vincent D'Onofrio), a mountain man, Vasquez (Manuel García-Rulfo), a Mexican outlaw, and Red Harvest (Martin Sensmeier), a young Comanche warrior who has been exiled from his tribe. Together this band returns to the town to square off against the forces assembled by Bogue.

Because this movie leans so heavily on Seven Samurai it's really hard to reconcile that this movie is trying to be it's own thing. I know it sounds wanky to say that, but if you've seen that movie, you'll understand the parallels. Things like the introduction of characters (especially Billy Rocks' introduction which is lifted straight from Seven Samurai) or the training of the villagers are just so close to the original film. This seemed bizarre to me because the only connection it has to the original Magnificent Seven is the name and setting. Even though it's trying to be Seven Samurai, it manages to miss the mark by trying to be different. Straight away the movie starts with villainy to make sure that they know Bogue is the bad guy, but there's no gentle build up to it. And instead of having a town meeting to decide go for help, the character of Emma Cullen takes it upon herself to go look for help. Peter Sarsgaard's Bogue is one moustache twirl away from being the kind to tie a woman to the railroad and really does look like a discount Paul Giamatti. When it comes to the big battle at the end of the film, the stakes are dramatically lowered because the whole town takes part in it. This takes away from the whole underdog story. The movie also has a few historical problems. First off, the old west was nowhere near as clean as this. I don't mean that everything is super shiny and new, but it is far from the grittiness that we've come to expect from modern westerns like Deadwood, True Grit and Django Unchained. These days you have no excuse to muddy up you actors. Another minor failing I thought the film had was the lack of discussion around Chisolm obviously being a former slave. This movie takes place in the South in 1879. The Civil War would have been too recent an event to ignore and the film even says that Chisolm had been lynched at some point.

The Magnificent Seven isn't just a steaming mess though. It does have some good elements. The action is exactly the kind of thing you want to go see with this kind of movie, lots of old timey bullets, explosions and tomahawks. The chemistry between Chris Pratt and Manuel García-Rulfo is off the charts and just a joy to watch. Fun fact: when you can't put swear words in a movie, have the Mexican guy call everyone cabron (fucker in Spanish). Vincent D'Onofrio's choice of a squeaky whisper is hilarious and almost made me laugh every time he said something. Although I found it hard to believe that Ethan Hawke's former Confederate soldier would be friendly with Chisolm, the addition of his PTSD from the Civil War was a nice touch. The ending was a nice touch because it was more in keeping with it's source material than a conventional Hollywood ending.

This movie has quite a few ups and downs so it's quite hard to say whether or not I liked it. Within the first five minutes I thought I had written it off as a horrible movie, but it wasn't horrible. Instead it just hung in a strange limbo between good and bad. While the bad parts don't detract from the movie itself, they do serve as a distraction.

Jurassic World

So I've shown time and again that I am a huge fan of the Jurassic Park movies. I grew up as a dinosaur kid and the movies really did feed my desire to want to be a palaeontologist (I've since discovered that movies have impacted those desires and choices). The last movie in the series was a bit of a departure from the whole trying to build a dinosaur theme park. This movie sets that all back on track. 

In Jurassic World, the theme park has been running for quite a few years. It is headed by ambitious Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) whose estranged nephews Zach (Nick Robinson) and Gray (Ty Simpkins) are coming to stay for a week. Elsewhere on the island, Owen Grady (Chris Pratt), a Velociraptor expert has being training a team of raptors under the watchful eye of InGen head of security Vic Hoskins (Vincent D'Onofrio). Claire is also getting ready to reveal a new attraction in the park; the first genetically engineered dinosaur created by Dr Henry Wu (B.D. Wong), a process the park owner, Simon Masrani (Irrfan Khan), has come to oversee. As usual nothing goes to plan.

It is very enjoyable for me to see a functional Jurassic Park (or World in this case). The park has some super enjoyable attractions, such as the rides and attractions that John Hammond would have wanted. There is even a super cute petting zoo for the kids. Of course we get to see the complete destruction of all of this. The action that happens is really fun and completely ridiculous. At one stage a velociraptor is riding the back of a T.Rex and there are many other moments that are just mindblowingly exciting. There are also dozens of references back to the original film. Some are glaringly obvious (they visit the abandoned original Welcome Centre) and some of the imagery is reminiscent of shots from that one.

I have a few minor gripes with the movie. One is that there are way too many characters. They all are introduced rather quickly and we have to juggle where they all fit in. There is also not too much care given to the minor characters who we are teased with interested backstories but not developed at all. The characters I wanted to see to see more of were Masrani as he takes over the role of charming head and plays the character exactly the same as Richard Attenborough. Also Jake Johnson and Lauren Lapkus play park controllers that provide great comedic relief. B.D. Wong is the only actor to return from the original film, but his character is tarred as a bad guy, which is a shame because I have always loved Dr Henry Wu. A lot of people have also criticised the ridiculous ending, but I just laughed the entire time.

Chris Pratt continues to be the charming action movie lead and it really works to his benefit. He's serious demeanour also adds some variation. Bryce Dallas Howard acts well, but her character's clothing choices are questionable. I didn't even recognise Vincent D'Onofrio in his role and I feel so ashamed. Simpkins and Robinson are okay, but I felt as though their main purpose was just character motivation. Again Irrfan Khan provides some great moments.

All in all, Jurassic World is a lot of fun. It may not be scientifically accurate, but it's a fun ride. There are some romantic elements that are pointless. I thought that this movie would be a perfect opportunity to use something like this.

Chris Pratt could be Indiana Jones, maybe?

I don't know if it's the big amount of coffee that I've had, but this news has tickled me the right way. While this is only a rumour started by the Latino Review, a reputable source that throws out wild accusations about castings in big budget movies, usually those made by Disney, I am liking the idea of Chris Pratt stepping into the role of Indy. The franchise definitely needs a reboot after the highly disappointing Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

Previous reports by Variety journalist Justin Kroll had speculated that the likes of Bradley Cooper and Chris Hemsworth being up for the role, being action stars these are obvious choices. Then again, Disney might see Pratt as a bankable star, especially after the success of Guardians of the Galaxy. By the look of the trailers for Jurassic World, he may be able to make the jump from comedy to being an action star.

Tell us what you think of Chris Pratt playing Indiana Jones? He definitely would be able to play up some of the lighter parts of the character.

Guardians of the Galaxy

Before I get into the film itself, I have to just say that I'm absolutely sick to death of Marvel's releases. I used to really like their characters but with film after film, franchise after franchise, I feel that they've really diluted in quality and have over-saturated the market to the extent that I now don't want to see any more superhero movies, even from DC or any of their other competitors. Not to mention all the good that their hyper-budgets could do with smaller productions and better script treatments. Anyway, rant over. It's time to see how their latest release Guardians of the Galaxy stacks up!

In 1988, Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) is abducted from Earth, with only a Walkman and a present from his mother as possessions. 26 years later he steals a sought-after orb that lands him in prison, before he teams up with a tree-like humanoid (Vin Diesel), a genetically engineered raccoon (Bradley Cooper), an orphaned alien (Zoe Saldana) and a pissed off guy with tattoos (Dave Bautista) to escape, sell the orb and hunt down Ronan the Accuser.

The plot wasn't quite as convoluted as I was expecting, but was still as ridiculous as in most Marvel films. Having said that, it's really nice to have some fresh characters in the mix, instead of the constant rinse and repeat that we've become accustomed to. It's also great to have more of a pure sci-fi film from Marvel.

There's plenty of decent humour to keep it rolling along, although some of it is a bit cringe-worthy and there were also several jokes (such as the fact that Groot can only say "'I am Groot") that were repeated to death, which got tiring very quickly. But other than a few cliches here and there, and an ending that seemed to go on and on, the plot's really not that bad and is enough to keep you entertained throughout.

There's also nothing particularly wrong with the casts' performances but at the same time, they're nothing special. The only two characters which I actually enjoyed were Rocket (Bradley Cooper) and Peter Serafinowicz's character, Denarian Saal (mainly because it's Peter Serafinowicz), and they were basically the two biggest arseholes in the whole film.

Of course, with a budget of $170 million, it's going to have plenty of eye-candy, and trust me, you won't be disappointed. It's absolutely jam packed with explosions, lasers, spaceships and a CGI racoon, whether that makes up for all it's issues depends on what sort of sci-fi films you enjoy. If you're a fan of Michael Bay, this film will blow your mind with it's strong presence of plot!

At the end of the day, it's a big-budget blockbuster with tonnes of special effects that look fantastic and jokes that will keep you watching. I quite enjoyed this but it still doesn't change my stance on Marvel.

New 'Guardians of the Galaxy' Stills

After the release of new trailers for Guardians of the Galaxy over the weekend, Marvel has provided Empire Magazine with exclusive stills from the set of the film. Guardians of the Galaxy is slated for release in the next couple of months, depending where you live. What do you think of the new stills? Do they tantalize your interest in the film? Head to the Empire article link below to see all of them.

Source: Empire Online

The Lego Movie

The Lego Movie takes the family film to a whole new level. Not only is it fantastically self-aware and satirical, it has jokes that will please the whole family. Back this up with a huge and amazing cast, as well as a great soundtrack by Devo's Mark Mothersbaugh with songs that will get stuck in your head long after you finish watching.

The story centres on Emmet (Chris Pratt), a regular construction worker who loves to fit in and follow the rules. One day after his shift finishes, Emmet gets entangled in a plot to destroy the world by the evil villain and president Lord Business (Will Ferrell), who plans to use a relic known as Kragle (which turns out to be Krazy Glue missing some letters). Emmet is mistaken to be the Special and taken by Wyldstyle (Elizabeth Banks) to the blind wizard Vitruvius (Morgan Freeman), who tells Emmet that he is the chosen one to take down Lord Business.

The best jokes in this film come mainly from the movie's characters self awareness that they live in a world made of Lego. Emmet cannot build things without an instruction manual of which there are several big ones in the construction yard (the kind that come with all Lego sets). There are also references to many famous Lego sets of the past 40 years, including the famous Classic Space line of the early 80s.

Also there are a great number of parodical and satirical jokes. Some of these are references to real first world problems (# not included) such as exorbitant prices for cups of coffee. Others are very funny in-jokes aimed at the film industry, such as the relationship between Superman, voiced by Channing Tatum, and Green Lantern, voiced by Jonah Hill (both Tatum and Hill starred in 21 Jump Street).

There are also a great number of cameos aside from the two aforementioned. These include Shaquille O'Neal, Will Forte, Liam Neeson, Will Arnett as Batman and one of my favourite actors (if you read my blog regularly, you'll be well acquainted with my affinity for) Charlie Day.

The animation in the film is also amazing. It is done in a way that looks like it is stop-motion capturing whilst still being computer generated. Apart from some real objects that appear in the film, everything is made of actual Lego pieces that come in the sets. Toward the end of the film there are some life action scenes that work really well and don't interrupt the flow when they cut back to the animation.

Verdict: A really funny and smart film that will appeal to everyone.

Delivery Man

Sometimes a movie comes along that is marketed as a movie of one genre, but really works better in another genre. A great example of this is Kevin James' Here Comes the Boom, it looks like a comedy, but it works better as a light hearted drama. The same could be said of Vince Vaughn's latest film, Delivery Man.

Perennial slacker Dave Wozniak (Vince Vaughn) works as a truck driver for his family's butcher business. He owes $80 000 to some thugs and his girlfriend (Cobie Smulders) is pregnant. Just when life seems like it could get any worse, he finds out that he is the biological father of 533 children from a mix up at a sperm clinic that he donated to 23 years earlier. 142 of the children have filed a class action suit to discover the identity of 'Starbuck', the alias he used. Through his lawyer, Brett (Chris Pratt), David gets the profiles of these children and follows them around, committing random acts of kindness.

Unlike previous Vince Vaughn movies, Delivery Man doesn't just rely on comedic situations. At it's core, there are some really touching themes to do with family and parenting and these themes are extremely uplifting.

Vince Vaughn worked really well as David Wozniak. His charm that he brings to other roles, works exceptionally well here. Chris Pratt (Parks and Recreation) is hilarious as David's best friend and lawyer.

What confuses me about this film however, is that it is a remake of a 2011 Canadian film Starbuck, which was directed and written by the same director as this film, Ken Scott. To me this seems a little redundant, but as I have seen the original, I can't really pass judgement.

Verdict: Overall a funny and heartwarming film about parenthood. A must see for anyone with 533 children.

Zero Dark Thirty

First off, this is not a propaganda movie for the US, glorifying their operation to kill Osama bin Laden. It does tell the story, but it also shows the pain felt by both sides and that it wasn't just some clean in and out operation.

The story picks up two years after 9/11, with a young CIA operative (Jessica Chastain) is witnessing her first interrogation of a detainee at the hands of her new colleague Dan (Jason Clarke). Her character, Maya, has just been transferred to the US embassy in Pakistan, tasked with finding information about top al-Qaeda personnel. The detainee that they are interrogating has links to Saudi terrorists. They soon trick him into divulging information about Abu Ahmed, an old acquaintance, who, through information they can piece together from other detainees, is the courier between bin Laden and Abu Farraj al-Libbi, a ranking officer within al-Qaeda.

Many years later, Maya is able to set up a meet with the detained Abu Farraj, only to find that he is hiding the existence of Ahmed, which Maya interprets as Ahmed being a person of extreme interest. Her senior officer at the embassy (Kyle Chandler), believes Maya should focusing on bringing in known terrorists and be trying to find out where the next global attack will be, so that they can protect the homeland.

Over the next couple of years a lot of things happen in Maya's life. She survives a bombing at the Islamabad Marriott Hotel, her friend Dan is reassigned to Washington and her friend and co-worker Jessica is killed in a botched attempt to try and bring in one of bin Laden's inner circle that she had been spearheading. Whilst trying to find any information on Abu Ahmed, Maya comes across an interview with a detainee who says that he personally buried the man they know as Ahmed, his real name being Habib Sayeed, all the way back in 2001. This seems to have defeated Maya, until a junior officer in her office finds information from the Moroccan intelligence community saying that that man that was buried was actually the brother of the courier. His name is Ibrihim Sayeed and they are able to trace his phone number with the help of Dan. Before Maya can go anywhere with this information, she is attacked coming out of her home by insurgents and subsequently sent back to Washington.

Once they find Sayeed, the operatives are able to trace him to a compound in Abbotabad in Pakistan. Through continued surveillance, Maya soon believes that bin Laden himself is residing within the compound. This belief is not shared by her seniors, who deliberate on the risk of sending in a team to take out the occupants. The CIA chief (James Gandolfini) soon decides that sending in a team to the compound would be beneficial, as whoever this mystery man is, it would be a good idea to take him out.

So Maya is sent to Afghanistan, where she is to oversee the mission to the compound. A SEAL team is put together and with the latest in stealth helicopter technology, they fly into Abbotabad to assault the compound. One of the helicopters loses power and crash lands within the walls of the compound. The team goes in and obliterates the three men who are in there, including Osama bin Laden, whose body they take with them. They also take any hard drives and intel that they can get their hands on. Once they are back at base, the team is welcomed with open arms by everyone, whilst Maya is left to contemplate what she is to do with her life now that her goal that she has been working on for a decade is completed.

Katheryn Bigelow has put together a movie that pulls no punches. Whilst it's hard to tell what actually happened in the events leading up to the operation at the end of the movie, most of the events revolve around real bombings and the detaining of real life individuals. The casting of the movie is amazing.  None of the actors have huge star power, so they are believable in the roles that they play. Jessica Chastain is brilliant as Maya and you can really see that following through with this mission means everything to her. Jennifer Ehle is great as Maya's friend Jessica who really wants to show her friend that she wants to do her best on this mission. Mark Strong plays Maya's boss in Washington and really wants to believe that bin Laden is in Pakistan.

I found the torture scenes at the beginning to be confronting, but that is how matters were handled and it is a brutal and honest truth. The water-boarding scenes, in particular, were pretty full on. The mission at the end is shown to be a far from clean mission, resulting in the loss of a state of the art helicopter and civilian casualties that should have been avoided.

The film opens with a black screen where we hear the various radio chatter that happen on 9/11, including one iconic 911 call from one of the towers. The film also has news footage from various attacks throughout the decade, as well as press conferences from both George W. Bush and Barack Obama. These give insight into the world that was happening around the events of the film.

Verdict: Spanning almost a decade, this film shows that the events leading up to the death of Osama bin Laden were not as easy as some might of thought. Although I was not a huge fan of The Hurt Locker, I think Katheryn Bigelow has done a much better job this time around.