Movie News - Poster Reveal: Maleficent

Several exciting things happened this week.  This was one of them:

I'm loving this new poster!  But even better, the first Trailer was also released this week!!  You can see that here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYemY3xFsB4

I can't wait to see Angelina Jolie as Maleficent!  What do you think? 

Movie News - OZ The Great and Powerful Posters

So, while the Elections and Hurricane Sandy were taking up all my attention, THIS HAPPENED:

I think all three of these posters are stunning - although the third is a bit busy for my taste, and both of the monkeys in the foreground are terrifying - but I think the second is the best of the lot.  The contrast between the gorgeous background and the frightening image of the witch and the growling tree in the foreground is absolutely amazing.  I also love the subtle reference to the red poppies and the yellow brick road.

I've been looking forward to seeing this movie for a while, but it has fallen off my radar with all the highly anticipated movies coming out in the next few months, so I'm glad that Disney is starting to ramp up the publicity on this one.

Are you looking forward to OZ The Great and Powerful?  What do you think of the three posters above and which one do you like best or least?

Movie Review - The Odd Life of Timothy Green

The Odd Life of Timothy Green (2012) * * * *
Director: Peter Hedges
Starring: Jennifer Garner, Joel Edgerton and CJ Adams

From IMDB:
"After receiving bad news from a fertility doctor, Cindy and Jim Green try to bury their dreams of having a child by writing out all the great traits their child would have and putting them in a box in the garden. During a freak storm in the middle of the night, they awake to find a boy named Timothy, with leaves growing from his ankles, standing in their kitchen calling them mom and dad. Cindy and Jim are thrown into the midst of parenthood and over the coming months, Timothy will teach them more than they could have imagined about being parents and raising a child, no matter how he comes into their lives."

My Thoughts:
I've adored Jennifer Garner for years and years, and so even though I didn't think I was particularly interested in what seems at first glance to be a kid's movie, when Bob said he wanted to see it I was more than willing.  But it turns out that The Odd Life of Timothy Green is a thoroughly adorable movie suitable for both children and adults.

The story starts off a little sad as the couple find out they can never have children of their own, and they return home to their mid-western small town home and begin to deal with their grief by making a list of every great and awesome quality that they would want their child to posses, and burying the list in a box in their vegetable garden.

When Timothy first arrives they aren't quite sure what to think, or what to do, and as they try to introduce Timothy to their friends and family while making everything seems totally normal are hysterically funny.  Before long they realize that Timothy is, one by one, fulfilling all of the items on their original list.  Meanwhile, Timothy begins to lose the strange leaves attached to his legs, a fact which he carefully hides from his new parents, who try so hard to protect Timothy and make his life awesome while struggling to not make the mistakes of their own parents..

I won't spoil the ending even though it was predictable from the very beginning of the film, but in spite of the film's predictability it was satisfying, fun, cute, adorable, and nearly perfect in all of its' sugary sweetness.  Great writing and good pacing make this a fun movie, suitable for all ages.  I give it 4 stars, and Bob loved it.

Have you seen The Odd Life of Timothy Green yet?  What did you think?

Movie Review - Brave

Brave (2012) * * * *
Director: Mark Andrews, Brenda Chapman, Steve Purcell
Starring: Kelly MacDonald, Billy Connolly and Emma Thompson

From IMDB:

"Set in Scotland in a rugged and mythical time, "Brave" features Merida, an aspiring archer and impetuous daughter of royalty. Merida makes a reckless choice that unleashes unintended peril and forces her to spring into action to set things right."

My Thoughts:
Over the years, Pixar has come to be known for their high standards of quality animation and story telling, and so Bob and I were totally looking forward to seeing Brave as soon as it was released.

For the most part, the movie is worthy of all the hype.  It's a good story that both kids and adults will love, and the plotting and writing are both fairly well done.

Warning - Spoilers Ahead!

Princess Merida and her mother are constantly at odds with each other about how the young girl should behave and live her life.  When Merida finds out that she is expected to marry one of the princes of the other three clans, she is horrified and determined to find a way around the law, and finally, after a huge fight where Merida takes her sword and slashes a tapestry her mother has been sewing - a family portrait - she runs away and encounters a witch.  She bargains for a magic spell to change her fate, but actually requests that the spell change her mother - which it does.  Into a very large and growly bear.  The pair flee the castle before anyone can kill this strange bear that is suddenly roaming the halls, and mother and daughter have to learn to communicate and understand each other for the first time in their lives.  But they don't have much time, because if they don't "mend their bond" before the second sunrise, mama will stay a bear forever.  Merida bravely rises to the occasion and fights to correct her mistake and saves the day, everyone learns a valuable lesson, and lives, presumably happily ever after.

It's a great story, the animation is stunningly beautiful, and overall a great movie.  But I have a small problem with it.

Most of us, understandably, view movies with certain expectations, no matter how hard we try to ignore them.  And for months now, the Disney/Pixar PR machines have been selling this movie with a certain slant.  This is the first Pixar movie with a female lead.  The title is Brave. Previews relentlessly show us Merida waving a sword, out-shooting her suitors on the archery field, and confidently declaring that she will be shooting for HER OWN HAND, and that she wants to change her destiny.  In fact, the tagline on the poster is "Change your fate."

This created certain expectations in my mind of a free spirited princess, one more concerned with living her own life and not needing a prince, one who is able and willing to take care of herself.  She not singing about how "someday her prince will come," (in fact, she doesn't sing at all), and she doesn't need anyone to save her - she's better with a bow and arrow than any of her would-be suitors.

And mostly, this is the princess that we got.  It was exciting and refreshing to see the "princess stereotypes" so completely shattered, and someone that a new generation of young girls (and boys) will grow up with and look up to.

But as the movie draws near the end, Merida suddenly realizes that in order to "mend the bond" between her and her mother, she must retrieve the tapestry that she thoughtlessly slashed in two and sew it back together in order to break the spell and bring her family back together.

Yes, that's right.  In order to correct the the mistakes she's made and save both her family and the whole kingdom, the princess must:
1. forget about changing her fate;
2. accept her place;
3. and do her womanly duties and learn how to sew.

To me personally, this ending seemed completely contradictory to everything that had gone before in the story.  Yes, she is brave, and she does save the day, but only by being the good and dutiful daughter who knows her place and does her sewing.  I don't want to go so far as to say that it makes the movie anti-feminist, but it kinda felt a little disappointing to me.

Now - I must also point out that Bob didn't pick up on this sub-text at all, and neither did anyone else I've talked to who has seen the film.  So maybe it's just me, and maybe it's all in my head.  In spite of my slight disappointment, I still strongly enjoyed the movie, I'm giving it four stars, and I highly recommend the film.  It's a fun movie, and a great mother-daughter adventure story.

Have you seen the movie yet?  What did you think - do you agree with me, or am I imagining something that really isn't there?  Leave a comment and let me know!

Movie Review - Disneynature Chimpanzee

Disneynature Chimpanzee (2012) * * *
Directors: Alastair Fothergill, Mark Linfield
Narrator: Tim Allen

From IMDB:

"Oscar, a baby chimpanzee is enjoying his life with his mother in the jungles along the Ivory Coast. Without warning, young Oscar is tragically orphaned during an attack from a rival group of chimpanzees. Afterwards, he attempts to survive on his own, and to be accepted by the other chimps. But Oscar struggles, until he is surprising adopted by the Alpha Male of his group."

My Thoughts:
Bob had been really looking forward to seeing Chimpanzee.  He loves animal and nature films in general, and so was very excited to see the story of Oscar the Chimpanzee.  I was not excited, but he's been to plenty of my sci-fi films lately, so it was time for me to reciprocate.

Unfortunately, both of us left the theater slightly disappointed.

First off, let me say that the cinematography is stunningly beautiful!  This was somewhat to be expected, and in that respect the movie definitely does not disappoint - the movie is gorgeous.

What the film didn't do well was tell a good story.  The story of Oscar and his mother is cute, and the baby chimp is adorable, but after awhile, watching a tribe of chimpanzees wandering around the jungle eating gets boring.  So they tried to weave in a story about a rival gang of chimps who are trying to steal food from Oscar's tribe, and Oscar's mother dies as a result of the rival groups' attack, leaving Oscar to fend for himself.  But the way the directors piece the footage together, you don't actually know that a fight is happening if the narrator hadn't told you so.

I assume that the complete lack of animal violence was purposely done to keep the children in the theater happy (or their parents at least), but really, there was nothing in the film to show a fight of any kind.  If the narrator had described the other tribe coming over for a party it would have been just as believable.  The same is true towards the end of the film when the rival group launches a second "attack" on Oscar's tribe.  If there was no narrator to tell the audience that an attack was happening, no one would have guessed from the film footage.  It might have just been a single chimpanzee dancing in the jungle and pounding on a tree root - so thank goodness Tim Allen was there to convince me that a dangerous and violent battle was being fought!

Don't get me wrong - I'm not trying to advocate that children's films should be more violent!  But they should be somewhat truthful, in my opinion.

My other complaint with the film was the narration by Tim Allen.  It was disjointed and awkward, and felt in places as if random sentences had been strung together by someone with no writing experience at all.  Some of them didn't even make sense, especially compared to the action happening on-screen.  There were also too many juvenile and unsuccessful attempts at humor, including a really bad "Tool Time" reference.  However, the movie is fairly short at only 78 minutes, so we didn't have to endure Tim Allen's inappropriate jokes for long.

I think that we've come to expect a really high level of quality from anything that Disney has a hand in, and so we both just felt slightly disappointed with this film.  However, I'm fairly confident is asserting that children under 10 will love it, so it still gets three stars from me, even though I didn't care for it much.

On the plus side though, the next time I want Bob to go see a sci-fi movie with me that he's not crazy about seeing, I'll be able to say, "You owe me - I sat through that whole Chimpanzee with you."

Have you seen Chimpanzee?  What'd you think?  Let me know in the comments!

Movie Review - John Carter

John Carter (2012) * * * * *
Director: Andrew Stanton
Stars: Taylor Kitsch, Lynn Collins and Willem Dafoe

From IMDB:
"Transplanted to Mars, a Civil War vet discovers a lush planet inhabited by 12-foot tall barbarians. Finding himself a prisoner of these creatures, he escapes, only to encounter a princess who is in desperate need of a savior."

My Thoughts:
John Carter, as you already know if you pay any attention to the media in general, has some problems.  It was ridiculously expensive to make, has a stupid name that doesn't mean anything (don't even get me started on that), and Disney's marketing machine totally dropped the ball when it came to producing trailers and advertisements that actually told people what the movie was about.  In fact, most of them didn't make any sense unless you ALREADY knew what the movie was going to be about!   Then on top of all that, half the critics didn't care for the movie for mostly frivolous reasons and predicted that no one would go see it, which then became a self-fulfilling prophecy.  Even the critics who did like the movie predicted that it would flop, simply because the people who would normally go see a movie like John Carter had no idea that it was the kind of movie that they would like - because trailers that are a montage of someone jumping super-high tells NOTHING about the story!  Which is all Disney's marketing machine showed us, thereby fulfilling that earlier prophecy.  Still with me?

Here's the deal - John Carter was AN AMAZING MOVIE, Y'ALL!  There, I said it!  It's a really, really, really good movie, and if you like Sci-Fi, or Fantasy, or Planetary Romance, or Action-Adventure, then you're probably going to like John Carter.  Even though it is a stupid name for a movie.

If you have read "A Princess of Mars," which the movie is based on, you'll notice that there are a few differences. The movie is very faithful to the spirit and feeling of the book, and to most of the major events of the book, while the few things that the movies changed, left out, or added, all made the story stronger, tighter, and more engaging.

However, knowledge of the original novel is not necessary to follow the storyline.  I've read several reviews where individuals who hadn't read the book claimed they couldn't keep track of what was going on, what everyone's name was, and who the bad guys were.  My only response to that is that if the viewer is of at least average intelligence, he or she should have no trouble following the plot, even if they  haven't read the book.  Bob saw the movie with me, and he hasn't read the book, and he followed along just fine.  It's just not that complicated - so some reviewers should just stop being haters.

The special effects are incredible, which is to be expected, and while I've seen some people complain about the 3D, I thought it worked well.  It's got great pacing and writing.  Add to that the surprisingly good acting, some well-placed humor, and a female lead who is most definitely NOT the "fainting-damsel-in-distress," (Hooray for strong female characters!) and it all adds up to a really fun adventure.

Simply put, in my opinion, this movie is great like Star Wars was great when it first came out.  And for the disapproving reviewers who have complained that John Carter is a derivative rip-off of Star Wars, I would like to once again point out that Edgar Rice Burroughs dreamed up air-speeders and floating warships quite a few decades before George Lucas did, and John Carter was dueling aliens with swords long before Luke Skywalker.

So please, stop listening to the reviews who claim they "couldn't follow the plot."  Go see the movie yourself, and I'm guessing you'll enjoy it.  I give John Carter 5 stars for being a great, fun, and all-around good movie.  What more could you ask for?  So go see John Carter, even if it does have a stupid name.  Bob liked it, and I think you will too.

Agree?  Disagree?  Leave a comment and tell me what you think!