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Posts Tagged ‘adventure’

Pirates!

Here it is, perhaps the newest movie to be reviewed so far. It just barely came out the three days before I am writing this, so I managed to see it on opening weekend (thanks LilPickle). But as with many sequels that appear from Hollywood, this movie is shrouded in disappointment. It still sports swashbuckling-a-plenty, and enormous amounts of fun and entertainment, but it really just seemed to lack. A lot of the attitude and so called “heart” of the first movie simply didn’t carry over to the sequel. Don’t get me wrong though, this movie was not bad. And certainly worth seeing and as soon as it comes to video I will be buying it. But it’s just simply not as good as the prior blockbuster smash. Directed by Gore Verbinski and still starring Johnny Depp and Keira Knightly and Orlando bloom (as well as many other names from the first that I was pleasantly surprised to see) this movie will certainly keep you entertained, even if you can barely understand what some of the characters are saying, and the quantity of action seems almost too excessive.

Plot

Captain Jack Sparrow sets out to discover a way to save his soul from the dreaded Davy Jones, to whom he owes a debt. Normally to do this he would use his compass that shows him what he wants the most, but it seems to not be working in this movie. So in order to save his soul, he uses William Turner (Orlando Bloom) as collateral with Davy Jones, and uses Elizabeth Swan to show him the way to a chest containing Davy Jones heart. Of course, nothing ever seems to work out for Captain Jack, and what seems a simple task quickly balloons into a full scale adventure, with no shortage of action. However, the plot is completely unresolved in this movie. Somehow in this movie’s 2 hours and 30 minutes of length, the filmmakers managed to only create questions in the plot, and leave you hanging horribly in the end of the movie with more question than when you entered the theater. And that really pisses me off. I like a good cliffhanger as much as the next person, but in my opinion, a cliffhanger should at least answer a few of your questions, and not leave you with more than when you came in.

Visual

Here the sequel is significantly better than the first movie. In the first, there were many places that the CGI was just less than the up-to-snuff standards common with current day filmmaking technology. But Dead Man’s Chest certainly does not leave you questioning the quality of CGI, even the giant squid scenes are so believable it almost looks like they used live action animals instead of CG. Davy Jones himself was a great deal of CG, as was his crew. And it was so well performed that you really barely notice what CG you can actually see. More key visuals along the same lines of the first movie are still present here, including a trip to the island of Tortuga, which is basically one big brawl all day and all night. Plus, the backgrounds in the islands and main lands are excellent, and you can’t believe even for a minute that you are sitting in the movie theater and not really there with the characters.

Audio

Here’s another point that this movie excels. Another excellent revision to an already fantastic theme song is key here. All through the movie they play a song nearly identical to the first movie, and just as the music in the first set the mood, so does the song here. In every scene it is employed, the main theme either increases the idea of the pirate’s life, or brings you down to the depths with Davy Jones himself. The sound effects are also excellent, but then again I did see it in the theater, so perhaps in the DVD format the sound effects won’t be quite as good, but I somehow doubt that when comparing with the sound effects present in the first DVD.

Acting

Johnny Depp is once again in very rare form, and is most excellent in this role just as in the first. I honestly don’t think that anyone else could be Captain Jack Sparrow with anywhere near the effectiveness of Depp. Keira Knightly is hot as hell just as before, although I was a little disappointed in her role here. Instead of the pure honest governor’s daughter she played in the first movie, here she plays a slightly trampy pirate-wanabe who just doesn’t have the same heart and soul as I was expecting based on the role in “Curse of the Black Pearl.” Also, it seemed like just about everyone was mumbling in this movie, some of the characters could barely be heard through their fancy “Old-English” speak. And the voodoo witch doctor Tia Dalma (Naomie Harris) has an accent so thick that you have to strain to try and understand her.

Summary

Lay off the action a little bit and spread on some more plot and character development and answer a few more questions before the cliffhanger, and this movie increases in quality three-fold. But as it is, there is just too much action and too little everything else. But again don’t get me wrong, I think the action (when it was properly planned) was beautifully executed and well performed. It just seemed like the swashbuckling was nonstop through the whole flick, leaving little time to sit back and breathe in the two and a half hour behemoth. So based on this, I simply cannot give this movie as good of a score as the prior movie received, so all in all I give Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest a visually stunning 3 Aaaaaarrrgh matey’s out of 5

Getting ready for Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest, we thought reviewing the first Pirates would be timely.

Who’s in the mood for an adventurous tale with swashbuckling galore? Because with this movie you’ll capture exactly that. Adventure in the time of pirates and when the British were still a powerful nation. As this movie is already several years old and the sequel is damn near in theaters already, I’m sure there’s not a single person to read this that hasn’t already seen this immensely popular Disney movie. But just in case, I shall proceed as normal (meaning I’m lazy and don’t want to change my template). Directed by Gore Verbinski and starring such huge names as Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, and Keira Knightly, this movie is quite appropriate for almost all ages and even entertains time and time again. Although it does have its flaws (such as occasional bad CGI and minor plot holes) it doesn’t fail to keep your attention for any length of time.

Plot

A very young Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightly) discovers a boy floating out in the Atlantic after a “shipwreck” and discovers a strange golden medallion around his neck, which she takes in order to prevent the boy from being killed as a pirate. Some many years later (while wearing a corset *boioioiioing*), she falls into the ocean and inadvertently signals a band of cursed pirates aboard a mystical ship who are searching for the same medallion. After being captured by the pirates and giving the fake last name of the man she secretly loves, Will Turner (Orlando Bloom), she is taken to an island where the pirates attempt a ritual to lift a terrible curse. In the meanwhile, Turner enlists the assistance of pirate Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) to attempt to save Elizabeth from a gruesome fate. It’s from here that the whole tale stems, leading from one exciting sword fight to another right until an epic battle between the undead pirates and the British navy.

Visual

Excellent cinematography is key to this movie, and although most of the camera angles are very mainstream, every camera angle is beautifully planned and very well executed. The only issue with the visuals is the occasionally poor CGI. The pirates of the Black Pearl (that’s the ship) are undead, and under the moonlight they are revealed for what they are, corpses. The corpses are excellently animated, and each one is completely different than the others. So it’s fairly obvious that a significant amount of funding was spend in the creation of these skeletons, but it looks like they skimped on other places of CGI because of this.

Audio

The music here is fantastic. It’s unique and fitting and actually helps bring the swashbuckling mood of the movie into reality. Although the music is nothing I would own, it is extremely enjoyable in the movie and really helps to set the proper mood. As for sound effects, they are quite excellent, but you will most likely need to have surround sound to truly get all the worth out of the effects.

Acting

This is where the movie really shines. Johnny Depp so perfectly portrays the slightly mad Captain Jack Sparrow that you can really believe it’s not even an actor but actually the character being portrayed. Orlando Bloom also does a very notable job in personifying the secret love interest, and is really quite the sword fighter here. Keira Knightly even does a very believable job (plus she has really nice tits).

Summary

Despite the slight flaws in the plot and less than great CGI in a few places, this movie does efficiently capture your attention and keep you entertained throughout the whole movie. I really enjoyed seeing a high quality pirate tale actually coming out of Hollywood, as most of the drivel they produce is unfit for the screen. So if you’re in the mood for swashbucklin-a-plenty, sit back and enjoy this movie’s well earned 4 out of 5.

Delightful

Here’s a movie that I forgot to review a long time ago, and one that is certainly due for it’s additional fifteen minutes in the spotlight (as if this review could be considered the spotlight, right?) I can only review this movie on the basis that it is quite possibly the best animated movie of all time. Right up there with Emperor’s New Groove (review coming soon, my minions).* Shrek really dazzles the audience with original humor, excellent voice over and even very believable animation, right from the very beginning of the movie to the very end. Plus it entails a wonderfully original love-story-adventure-quest plot that is not only easy to follow, but fun as well. Starring such huge names as Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy, John Lithgow, and Cameron Diaz, this 2001 film directed by Andrew Adamson and Vickey Jenson will astonish viewers of all ages.

*Editor’s note: you don’t have minions King, you ARE the minion.

Plot

Reclusive ogre Shrek goes on an epic quest to remove a spattering of fairy-tale creatures dumped onto his swamp by the evil dictator “king” Lord Farquad only to be sent on a further quest to retrieve the lass Farquad wishes to marry in order to become king. Damn that was a weird sentence. But anyway, after embarking on an additional quest to save the princess, Shrek finds himself hopelessly in love with the lovely Princess Fiona who hides a terrible secret. This love then balloons into a frantic situation and a slight plot twist right at the very end. And although the plot does seem slightly cliché every now and then, there is not a single point where it disappoints. Plus, right when you start thinking you know where the movie is going, something new comes along and changes it all. Most excellent plot development.

Visual

The CGI really made this movie fantastic. Although still obviously CG, it is so well developed that you can really see the time and effort the animators placed into every scene. The lighting is exceptional and really requires mention. From the breath of the fire-breathing dragon lighting up the castle walls to the sun setting over the kingdom of Duloc, every bit of light beautifully interacts with all other aspects of the particular scene.

Audio

The theme song is beyond catchy here, it’s actually contagious. You’ll find yourself humming the song for days afterwards. Even during the actual movie, the music never takes on a point where it seems to not fit. Every part of the music fits exactly the way it should into every scene. Even though most of the music is an adaptation of the same theme song, it is adapted so well you barely even notice it’s the same song.

Acting

Here is where the movie really shines–for an animated movie anyway. When I watch an animated movie, I don’t want to spend the entire flick trying to figure out the name of one of the actors doing the voice over. But I also don’t want to only think of that actor during the movie, I want the voice to seem fitting with the character that is being portrayed. This is where many animated movies go astray when they enlist huge name actors–it’s far to difficult to forget that someone had to voice that character. In Shrek, however, the huge name actors blend so beautifully into the character being acted out that you actually forget who is doing the acting and enjoy just the characters. Just the way it should be.

Script

I have to add this little extra part in here to give some props to the writers in this movie, they did such an excellent job on the script that it’s originality is sure to become the standard by which all animated movies should be created. The humor is outright fantastic, and the movie actually sports jokes and melodrama suited not only for the young children, but also even more so to adults. So congrats to the writers of Shrek, because they did such a great job that I actually broke my template for movie reviews. Kudos.

Summary

If you haven’t yet seen this movie, you must be a caveman, or perhaps Amish. But if you’re Amish then you shouldn’t be reading this review on a webpage then should you? So anyway, if you haven’t seen it then go buy it right now. Don’t rent it first, don’t borrow it, just go buy it. The re-watch-ability is excellent and I don’t know of a single person who doesn’t love this movie. So in conclusion, the plot is great, the script is stunning, the acting is perfect, and CGI is just the way it should be. So all in all is this movie really worth your time? Absolutely. Is it worth 5 stars? You better believe it.

5 “You didn’t slay the dragon?!?!?” out of 5

Adventures on the high seas without the scurvy! But we can’t guarantee that.

Arrrrgh!! Avast, ye land lubber! And other pirate talk! Been waiting to get your pillage on? Well this game has more than enough fun, so you don’t even need to get loaded to the gunwalls! (Look it up)

All pirates want revenge for something right? Well in your case, another pirate kidnapped your family when you were younger. And now that you are old enough, you set out with a pirate crew and a ship of your own, courtesy of a mutiny against your old captain. As the captain of your new sloop, you have to keep your crew happy so they don’t mutiny against you as well and dump you on an island. How do you keep pirates happy? Pillaging of course!

Through the course of your life (yes you age in this game) you will have the opportunity to attack any vessel you encounter, duel the captain of an opposing vessel, attack settlements of opposing nations, battle rude fiancés to win the approval of governors’ daughters, and of course dance with them. But first, the battles!

Naval battles are fantastic. Depending on what ship you are sailing, how many guns you have, how many crew, the wind conditions, and your sailing skills, the sea battles can either be exciting, or they can have you setting your sails at full and hoping you can outrun whoever is chasing you. Three different types of cannon shot can be used to take out crew, sails and masts, or just plain pummel the other ship (or yours). If you are more at home with a rapier in your hand you can close in on them a quick as possible and initiate a battle with the captain while your crews battle it out. After the smoke has cleared and you are (hopefully) the victor, sometimes the opposing crew will ask to join yours. You can also take all the loot that was onboard the other ship as well as choosing to either keep or sink that ship. Land battles are turn based fights with different types of pirates at your control. The number of crew you have and the number of soldiers defending a town are really important factors in deciding if you should attack, try to sneak into the town, or just sail away and find another port.

Dancing is something entirely different, altogether. (Dancing is something entirely different). It’s sort of like that annoying beeping little disc with four colors and goes by the name Simon. She gives you directions about what to do by pointing with her hands right before you do it. So you have to sit there and pay attention to her hands (at least you aren’t staring at her chest), and as soon as she is pointing you have to press the correct button in time with the music. If you don’t, you trip and embarrass her, and she doesn’t like that very much. If you are really smooth and she likes the way you dance at the end of the song, she will let you kiss her hand or twirl her around and look down her dress! (Ooooh!) And then she will give you some information either about a criminal that needs to be brought to justice or about your family. If you impress a girl enough times you may even get to marry her!

The visuals in this game are great. Most computers will be able to make full use of their video card to show off the stunning 3D animations while sword fighting or dancing. The only thing that I find irritating about this whole game is that the video settings reset every time you exit the game. Audio quality is good, but there isn’t very much to listen to in the game. There is the background music as you sail around the Caribbean and when you enter ports, but there are no voice actors. Everyone seems to mumble or speak gibberish. The dancing obviously has music, but how hard is it to play a classical dancing melody without any effects?

But the gameplay itself is engaging enough to keep you coming back. As you get older your pirate gets slower and eventually you have to retire. Now the great thing is that every game is different. Your family, all the lost cities, the secret hiding places, they all move around from one game to the next so you never know where they will be. With several different eras to play in, the politics are different every time, as are the beginning conditions. With the option to attack anyone at any time, or to just be a trader and attack only pirates, there is no set way that the game ends. You could end up marooned on a desert island for the rest of your life, or you can retire a rich man with a beautiful wife and ten’s of thousand’s of acres of land. All things considered I give Pirates! 4 Treasure chests out of 5

Editor’s Note: one more “Hyargh matey” for good measure.

Pixar is at it again

Horsepower, speed, chrome, and skid marks. No, I’m not talking about King’s car, or his underwear for that matter. I’m talking about Pixar’s newest release, Cars. They packed the cast full of big name celebrities from the big screen, TV, radio, and several racing circuits. There are so many running Pixar jokes in this movie that I couldn’t even begin to count them all after only watching it once.

Plot

Have you seen Doc Hollywood? It’s fairly similar to that, but without all the people. It’s called Cars, get it? The movie follows Lightning McQueen (voice by Owen Wilson), a cocky rookie racecar on his way to California for the Piston Cup. On his way he gets lost one night because he can’t see where he is going, his headlights are only stickers. He ends up causing a lot of damage to this small town of Radiator Springs and is sentenced to community service by repairing the main road he tore up. After a while he begins to make friends with the locals and eventually makes it to his big race.

Visual

AMAZING. If Pixar were to leave out the cars and just show some short clips of the Radiator Springs area you would probably think it was real. People who really pay attention to the background will pick out car shapes in the mountains and the rock bluffs. The little VW Beetle bugs flying around in some of the scenes are hilarious, rather than contrails in the sky left from jets you can see clouds in the shape of tire tracks. Pixar quadrupled (that’s 4x for those of you who have trouble with big words) their processing power after making The Incredibles and they still spent an average of 17 hours rendering each frame of the movie. And it shows in the final product. The detail that they put into the cars, the buildings, and especially the scenery is amazing.

Audio

Lots of good stuff here, they have some good music that really helps set the mood for whatever might be happening at the time. Nothing really memorable about the music, but at least none of it seemed out of place. Lots of country and slow music to describe the old town of Radiator Springs and especially when Mater (Larry the Cable Guy) and Lightning go “Tractor Tipping.” And the music speeds up when Lightning gets back on the race track. The voice over acting matched seamlessly with the mouths on the cars so there are no problems there.

Acting

Woah, how many actors and celebrities can you fit into one movie? Owen Wilson, Larry the Cable Guy, Tony Shalhoub, George Carlin, John Ratzenberger (Isn’t he in every Pixar movie?), Michael Keaton, Richard & Mrs. Petty, Darrell Waltrip, Tom & Ray (Click & Clack from Car Talk) Magliozzi, Jay Leno, Michael Schumacher, and Mario Andretti just to name… more than a few. Pixar recognizes that John Ratzenberger is in every movie they have made, and they make a joke about it at the end of the movie while the credits are rolling. The only thing that struck me as odd through the whole movie was that the fire truck, Red, never said anything. And I didn’t find out until later why. The movie is dedicated to Joe Ranft who was the voice of Red, and the Peterbilt at the beginning of the movie, as well as being the Co-director of the movie, died in a car crash in August 2005. They had to cut Red’s lines because they didn’t want to replace him. The appearance of racing celebrities throughout the movie adds a touch of fun. I would have acted much the same way that Luigi and Guido did if Michael Schumacher showed up at my door too.

Summary

Great, fun movie. There are jokes for the entire family. Car lovers will find nearly every kind imaginable in the movie at one point or another. Mater’s signature voice adds the hillbilly humor everyone loves and will make you “Happier than a tornado in a trailer park.” There is a good lesson in the movie about friendship and respect too… somewhere. I was too busy laughing to notice. I give it 5 “Pit Stop?”s out of 5

Please kill me…

It’s been called the first killer app for the PSP, received by some as Game of Show for E3 2005, and been given high ratings on crappy “out of 10″ systems. Must’ve been a slow year for everyone else. The most fun I ever had playing Death Jr. was anytime Dead Guppy was on screen because I knew exactly how he felt. He was just playing dead in hopes the game would just leave him alone. I take it back, the instruction booklet was rather fun, too.

Widgets and Foobars

So the Grim Reaper’s (aka Death) son DJ goes on a field trip with his strange group of classmates to the Museum of Supernatural History. Him and his friends sneak off when DJ’s sweetheart Pandora tries to open an un-openable box. To impress her, DJ cracks it open with his scythe, but gets everyone’s souls stolen by the Necromancer inside. Proof that girls are wicked. So DJ sets out to return everything to normal so his dad never finds out what happened. You’ll run around button mashing to find soul fragments, weapon widgets, health and ammo while fighting off demons-a-plenty. Combo attacks with your scythe and a fairly large collection of weapons will help you get there. Just be careful you don’t lose your own soul by playing this game, I hear replacements are tricky to find.

So your Death’s son, how can you lose?

Well you’ve already lost some cash if you purchased this game. Inside the game, however, the camera is your worst enemy, followed closely by bad controls, and then demons spawning in behind you after you just cleared that area. It claims you can move any direction with the analog stick and the camera will automatically move to give you the “best view of the action,” but I think the people who wrote the book never played it. Target locking doesn’t help either, but I think they thought you’d never have any enemies off screen according to that last statement. Which further doesn’t make any sense when THEY ALREADY DECIDED TO CHEAPLY SPAWN IN DEMONS BEHIND YOU. You do best when you resort to button mashing with the infinite ammo pistols and keep running. And yes, you die when your health meter falls (don’t ask me how it makes sense). I’m flustered by how terrible it actually is.

Maybe it’s because YOU suck LilPickle

The back of the box has a bulleted list with one of the features being “jump on hard-to-reach platforms utilizing DJ’s iconic scythe…” Why don’t they just say, “good luck with the camera while you have to do wall jumps at least 4 times in a row up a narrow crevice in a wall while the demons at the top of it shoot you and you can’t shoot back because target locking doesn’t apply for anything off screen.” I guess they didn’t say that because the box is only so big. It’s not just the interface that sucks though. The whole game works based on how many hits in a row you can do without stopping. So to keep things chaining, you can destroy objects in the level like fences, garbage cans, meat globs, whatever. This introduces two problems though: you end up trying to destroy everything by always mashing the O button, and it interferes with the target locking with the enemies you DO have on screen (causing you to mash the O button twice as fast and hard). Bottom line–button mashing sucks.

Come on, its good exercise

So is having a seizure. Actually, that might be more fun than this game too. My complaints don’t stop there though. Both audio design and animation are terrible. Sequences sound unprofessional or as if they were the initial test readings done by the programmers just to fill in the blanks. And I feel mean for saying this (I’m as shocked as you are), but the animation in the sequences looked like an amateur did it and no one had the heart to tell the guy it sucked. Even the frame rate was disgusted by it and had to leave the room. Maybe it’s a good thing the dialog in each level is just a text box rather than voice acting.

So you’re saying there’s a chance…

No Harry, this hole is un-dig-out-able. Unlocks to improve weapons or get new combos or something (I can’t remember because I’m trying to rid this game from my mind) are too little too late. Levels are decently made, but can be frustrating at times. Music is better than the dialog, but still dull. Death Jr. tries its hand at humor too, but hardly gets more than a giggle. Dead Guppy is by far the coolest and funniest character. I wish he could get his own spin-off game. Death Jr. has no multiplayer, isn’t replayable, and most importantly ISN’T FUN… but at least it isn’t glitchy and bugged.  2 wall jumps short yet again out of 5

Pixar just can’t make bad movies!

What? An animated flick? Who the hell do I think I am? wait…I think I’m a movie reviewer dude, and I think I know who I am. Right. Moving on. Here’s a bit of a break from the norm, with a review of the movie The Incredibles. A creation of Disney in conjunction with Pixar, this box office smash hit cartoon dealie was more than entertaining. It was just flat out fun. And anyone who has read my previous articles knows that I don’t really review a movie based on its “fun” factor. But after seeing this flick, I was persuaded that movies really can be fun. It stars such people as my favorite actor of all time Jason Lee as the bad guy and Samuel L. Jackson (what movie isn’t this guy in?) as a kind of sidekick. Unfortunately, I didn’t really recognize the other actors and actresses, but more on that later. This movie is exceptionally well done and is more a work of art than a movie.

Plot

The movie follows the lives of a family of underground superheroes after a series of lawsuits forces the government to conceal the identities and stop the super activity of superheroes. This particular family’s father, Bob Parr (Mr. Incredible) played by Craig T. Nelson longs for the “glory days” when he could save lives and be loved and cherished by the whole nation. After losing his job at an insurance company, Mr. Incredible gladly takes on a job for big bucks on a remote island where he can once again use his powers. Unbeknownst to him, however, he is working for someone whose sole purpose is to kill all supers and become a super hero himself. After “killing” Mr. Incredible, Syndrome played by Jason Lee, sends a gigantic robot to the city and attempts to disable it. After realizing he is unable to become the hero he wants to be, Syndrome is foiled by his own robot, which is now destroying the whole city. It is then up to the Incredibles (that’s the whole family, not just Mr. Incredible) to vanquish the evil. And so on. I won’t delve in any more, because I don’t want to ruin the ending.

Visual

All CGI, all the time. But it really works. I know I’ve left a few animated movies thinking how crappy the graphics seemed, but this flick pulled it all off very well. Now, I’m sure you’ve all seem some Pixar movie, so I’m sure you know the quality of graphics they produce. But this movie even exceeds all previous work. It’s not quite perfectly lifelike, but it’s close enough to make you believe it could be real. Plus, a lot the visuals took on a very “James Bond” kind of feel that I found quite exhilarating. I really can’t stress enough the uniqueness of these visuals, I actually left the theater wanting more. I wanted to see more of the movie, I wanted more James Bond bad guy secret hideouts and beautiful CGI.

Audio

A great theme song, and even better special effect sounds. I found myself humming the theme song for the whole day afterward, and occasionally it gets stuck in my head still. The song fit the movie perfectly, and almost helped the believability of the flick. It actually helped it seem like a Superman meets James Bond movie, but with better acting, plot, sound effects, and originality.

Acting

Yeah, I know it’s animated, and that there really isn’t a whole lot of acting required with voicing-over, but I was pleasantly surprised with the acting quality here. Every part of each voice-over is incredibly (pun intended) believable. You could almost catch yourself thinking the characters are real thanks to this. It really helped make the whole movie seem more like a live action movie than an animated flick. As for the acting quality of the actors I had never heard of? I could almost say that they are better than even the ones I have heard of. Truly impressive.

Summary

I would strongly recommend this movie to any person of all ages. From that six year old obnoxious cousin you have to baby-sit for the weekend while her parents are in Vegas, to the ninety year old that you sit with on Thursday mornings to make him feel loved again. But it also works for everything in between. This is the kind of movie that my parents would watch and enjoy (for those who don’t know, I help them to watch movies that won’t make them mad…and that’s pretty damn tough to do). So as the first review of an aminated movie, I’m proud to rate this one exceptionally high. If you haven’t seen this one yet, you should go do that. Just spend the buck or two to rent it. You’ll like it, I promise. Yes, do my bidding, excellent. Right, anyway. 5 out of 5

The Burton-ized remake

Just for clarification, this is the NEW version of the movie, not the old version. This is the version that editor-in-chief LilPickle refuses to watch. But little does he (and many other people) realize this version is far superior to the prior vintage musical. And no, before you ask, this is NOT a musical. Music does play an important role in this updated flick, but at no point do you have to sit and endure the new version of “Cheer up Charlie,” which is most good because that song blew my left nut. In fact, the only singing you have to endure here is the all new and very creative Oompa Loompa songs. Directed by the acclaimed Tim Burton and starring Johnny Depp, this delightful romp actually makes dark movies fun again. But before you go saying things like “King, it’s supposed to be a light, airy movie,” I say shut your piehole for a sec and check this out: the movie is based off a book, and the book took on a very dark theme. This movie was far truer to the original story than the 1971 flick.

Plot

Reclusive chocolatier Willy Wonka (Johnny Depp) realizes that he is getting old and must assign an heir to his factory, and since he has no family to speak of, he sends out five golden tickets in a world-wide lottery. After much hope and several candy bars, a very poor lad by the name of Charlie Bucket (Freddie Highmore) discovers a golden ticket. He and his grandfather are then to be taken on a tour of the enormous Willy Wonka Chocolate Factory. But you probably all knew that anyway. The plot here is vaguely similar to the original movie. Also, the same characters still exist with the same mannerisms (although they are updated to current day standards). In the end, the same offer to Charlie still exists, but it’s here that the filmmakers took a slightly different path by remaining truer to the book. Charlie actually denies the offer for the factory at first because Willy Wonka does not want Charlie to ever see his family again. But after some time, Wonka realizes the error of his ways and allows Charlie’s family to come live in the factory and everyone lives happily ever after and so on. One other key plot difference between this and the original flick, is that the new one no longer utilizes the whole “everlasting gobstopper” thing, where the competition guy tries to bribe the children who go on the tour to bring him the gobstopper. Tim Burton wisely chose to leave that out of this movie.

Visual

Quite stunning. Key visuals include the dirty, leaning shanty that the Bucket family lives in, the snow-covered town bustling with people, the huge, mysterious factory, and so on. It is quite easy to buy into the visuals’ hook, line and sinker here–and that’s all before entering the factory. The factory itself is filled with awe-inspiring CGI and even real creations of candy and chocolate. Everything in the factory is made to look straight from the pages of the original book, and the execution is absolutely flawless. Another signature visual is the use of only one Oompa Loompa (Deep Roy) and using CGI to recreate Oompa Loompas in the hundreds. But, this is no cheesy effect. Deep Roy actually acted out several different movements per scene, and all were added together to create each scene. Perfectly executed.

Audio

I can’t stress enough how happy I am that “Cheer up Charlie” did not make it into the update. God I hated that song. Plus, all the Oompa Loompa songs are catchy and original, and none of them sound the same. This really helps make a different feel for the movie: it doesn’t quite seem so rehearsed, instead it really seems much more on-the-spot. As for sound effects, nothing truly stunning to speak of, but all was done very tastefully and noting seemed out of place.

Acting

Everything in this section was quite spot-on. Johnny Depp perfectly played the reclusive chocolate king. From the flashbacks to the confused looks, everything about Willy Wonka was fantastically executed by Depp. As for the other actors, they all gave remarkable performances, but I think you’d have to watch the movie to truly respect the performances.

Summary

For all you people who refuse to open their minds to this movie, you’re all jerks. This movie rocked. And I say that from a professional standpoint of course (I don’t see your movie reviews on websites, do I?). So here’s the final word: unclench that butthole a bit and go rent this movie. I’m sure blockbuster will have a copy or twelve, and I highly doubt my review is going to make twelve people in every major city go to blockbuster and rent this movie. Anyway, I do need to summarize and say that this movie was a far superior update from the old vintage seventies flick with Gene Wilder. Even if you don’t believe everything I said prior to this point, I very strongly recommend this movie to people of all ages. It’s worth your time, I promise. Oh and LilPickle? I expect you to borrow this movie any day now…*

5 Squirrels’ nuts out of 5

*Editor’s Note: …And I expect one of these days I’ll get a review from you that we can agree on its star rating, but that doesn’t mean either will happen. I just want to clarify that I refuse to watch Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory ever again, and because of that, I don’t want to watch this version. It’s like a mouse hitting the shock button the first time and later being told it was changed to the food release button–I still won’t risk getting shocked when the old food release button continues to work. Damn scientists.

A fun game that most people can enjoy, just not me

Good games for the PSP are hard to come by these days. So when I played Daxter I was hoping for the best. I heard many PSPers excited about Daxter and even read many reviews praising this game (I’m so ashamed I needed other people’s opinions to review this). What did I find when I played it? I think all those gamers have forgotten what an excellent game is.

I can’t be too critical of it though. This review may be biased because I prefer shooting things dead rather than jumping on their heads as in platformers. And I can’t really say I’m a fan of the Jak & Daxter games. But I swear I gave it a good whirl, and I did have fun at times.

So what is a game with a naughty ottsel about? Well, you escape the baddies by the hair’s length on your tail, but your friend Jak doesn’t. So you make it your mission to free him… by temp working as an exterminator, of course. You’ll fly-swat and spray-gun your way through a number of levels until the story finally catches up with you. The charm of this game comes from the characters. Who knew ottsels were so witty and spunky? Fun minigames (all of them timing, Simon Says style) provide solid entertainment after a long day’s bug killing, but sadly, they lose their flavor quickly even with the hilarious movie rip-offs. Other segments have you chasing down some monster insect or gunning for your driver; we’ve seen it all before.

Audio design and visuals are light and pleasant as expected for a ESRB rated E platformer. Further, Daxter has the best controls I’ve seen on the PSP yet, making this a great game for anyone to just pick up and play. Secrets and unlockable extras help keep this game from sitting on a shelf, plus the multiplayer functionality adds to its greatness. But I was disappointed with how un-driven I was to play Daxter. I never crave it and probably won’t work to get my perfectionist side’s 100% completion. The multiplayer bug battles seem like a flimsy, unfinished game of rock-paper-scissors where your rock is a pebble, your paper is riddled with holes, and your scissors are “special”. Every problem I have with this game I’m sure is just personal taste, so hardcore gamers may want to save their money for Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops instead. There was so much charm and pleasantness coming from my PSP I had to play Doom for a while to regain normality. This sort of thing just isn’t my game, but children and light gamers may find it irresistible.

Parents and overbearing politicians can have peace-of-mind, too: I thoroughly tested this game and found no drinking of hot caffeinated beverages made from a particular variety of bean. I certainly don’t want mass controversy over a 10+ game jumping to an 18+ game considering how much a 17+ to 18+ game twisted everyone’s panties (didn’t anyone ever consider the fact that GTA: SA was already a mature rated title? Apparently not even the politicians and parents weren’t “mature” enough to play that game). Really people, stop with the squabbling and finger pointing and take responsibility for your own damn kids. Thus concludes my rant–back to the review. Where was I?

Daxter doesn’t redefine the genre, but it does everything flawlessly. So after adjusting my biased score, I’m immediately finding myself a violent, dirty, hooker-murder simulator.

4 cute overload vomits out of 5

A landmark in filmmaking, too bad it’s not as good as we remember.

Okay courageous readers, here’s something new for you. The first review of a movie based very stongly on a book. Due to the complexity of the original Michael Crichton book, I kind of have to look at this review in a different manner. This was both a good movie, and a crappy movie. By that I mean in comparison to the book. If you look at the book and compare directly to the movie, the movie sucked. However, if you look solely at the movie, it was a pretty damn good movie. Since most of my readers are likely more interested in the movie alone, I will focus purely on the latter. Just the movie. Directed by Steven Spielberg and starring Sam Neil, Jeff Goldblum, and Samuel L. Jackson (how many movies is he in anyway?), this movie is truly a landmark in filmaking as it was one of the first movies to have animals created in CGI.

Plot

Entreprenuer John Hammond (Richard Attenborough) discovers a way to clone dinosours by using the DNA extracted from the petrified remains of mostiquitos trapped in amber. After cloning many species and stuffing them on an island as a type of amusement park, he enlists the help of palentologist Alan Grant (Sam Neil), Paleobotonist Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern), and mathmatician Ian Malcom (Jeff Goldblum) to help convince the investers that his park is safe. However, Hammond does not realize that park worker Dennis Nedry (Wayne Night) has other plans for the precious park, and attempts to steal embryos of the animals to sell to a competing company. After Nedry turns off security in the park, all hell breaks loose trapping Grant in the park with two children when the dinosaurs are loose and hungry for the hunt. Based on the Michael Crichton book of the same name, the plot follows fairly closely to the book, and only misses on a few small points.

Visual

The CGI is really very impressive considering that this movie was made in 1993, right at the beginning of CGI in movies. In fact, there are only a few points where you are able to distinguish the computer animated marvels from the animatronic; and those points are easy to overlook if you let the movie draw you in. Nothing really special in the way of cinematography, but it’s a Spielberg so each shot is well planned and captures exactly what it’s meant to. Just nothing creative and new from the camera angles.

Audio

Great theme song and decent music are key in this movie, as are the sound effects. However, in the way of sound effects, it is WAY too easy to pick out the individual animal sounds from the dino roars. I catch myself thinking “who let an elephant in here?” or “add some tiger to some dolphin and we’ve got a cool growling sound, that works.” That is my main complaint with this movie. If the dino roars were believable and not just a mash-up of current-day animal sounds, I think the movie would be a lot better off.

Acting

Meh. I’ve seen better. But I’ve seen a lot worse too. The acting either seems too flat or too forced. The actors don’t really seem to work to create the believability that a movie involving dinosaurs needs to be effective. But, they don’t really suck either. There are certain points where the acting is mostly believable, but those points almost always involve the minor details instead of the major. But, maybe I’m just being overly critical.

Summary

I really enjoy this movie each time I watch it. Back in the days before I had ADD I used to be a huge fan of Crichton, so naturaly I enjoy the movies based off of his books (except Timeline, god did that movie suck my swollen left nut). The only unfortunate thing about this flick is the mash-up of animal sounds for the roaring and growling sounds of the dinos, and the flat/forced acting. I do think Spielberg could have done better with both of those, but I will give props for the astoundingly smooth CGI, even for the old-school. All in all, this movie is more entertaining than high quality. It’s fun, but doesn’t really make you think. And sometimes we all need to be entertained and not made to think, right? So even though this 1993 movie disappoints in a few aspects, I give it a very stong 3 growling dolphins out of 5