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Long Zhi Gu: Jingling Wangzuo (2016)
Nice if you don't wonder too much
A somewhat interesting movie of animation, visually well done. But sadly both the scenario and the characters are full of stereotypes, and without real complexity. A lot of scenes will make you smile, but a bunch of others, and especially the most important in the story and in the action, will totally make you sigh in despair because of their incredibility.
You can surely live without watching it, but it's still a quite nice entertainment where you just shouldn't ask yourself too many questions on the scenario and characters to find it OK enough.
Blade Runner 2049 (2017)
A cinematographic experience
It's always hard to come after a movie which is regarded as a masterpiece. But this one succeeds and is a very memorable cinematographic experience, both visceral and intellectual. The visuals and the score create a really remarkable atmosphere, much in the spirit of the original film. The actors are quite good, and the story and suspense are somewhat simple but efficient.
I found some scenes are quite long and could have been easily shortened without really lessen their quality and impact. So of course, it's not the greatest movie ever, but this film is totally worth it. It's a piece of art as Denis Villeneuve is getting us used to.
The Dark Tower (2017)
Not that bad
Of course, it's a pale adaptation of Stephen King's rich books and their quite expansive universe. But it's not as bad as most of the critics and reviews tend to say it is. This is obviously not a masterpiece, and it's far from being one of the best movies of the year, but there are and were much worse out on the screens. I would say this film is within the average of what is done nowadays.
It doesn't really surprise the spectator in its visual, its suspense and scenario, and most of the characters are underdeveloped on screen, giving us the feeling it could have taken a little more time to make it better. Also, the end looked quite too easy in my opinion (as much of the scenario in fact). But the main characters are still charismatic and well interpreted. The visuals and photography are correct. And even if I admit I let out some sighs for a couple of scenes, overall it remains a nice entertainment which doesn't hurt to watch.
Fury (2014)
Another film showing how hard and violent war is
Following the daily route of a tank crew during the last months of WWII in Germany, showing both the humanism and heroism of its members, this movie does its very best to immerse us in all the horror, the dirt, the sweat and the blood that soldiers had to endure back then, even at the relative shelter of a Sherman. It shows violence without qualms, and succeeds in creating a memorable rendering for the viewer, well helped by several tense action scene and a total immersion, comforting the viewer that it all seems real.
But in fact it contrasts with the historic reality and all the credibility of the events bound to it, which are indeed quite forgotten for the sake of the tense and bad-ass looking scenes. Germans' tanks and their anti-tank artillery are less accurate and effective than they really were, allowing American soldiers and tanks to take the advantage in situations where they might have not, situations they probably wouldn't have engaged that way in the first place in reality, knowing both their own strength and weakness and those of German units, and preferring not taking such useless risks, especially at that time near the end of the war. So the exceptional is standardized, and a handful of Americans hold a suicidal position against a regiment of hundreds of Nazis, butchering many of them. It could have been greater if the Germans looked less like a herd of wildebeest willing to rush in number and more like soldiers willing to defeat or simply survive their enemy to fight at least another day. In fact the context of this whole last stand lacks credibility, why the hell these Americans would sacrifice their life to hold a position against all odds, whereas Germany is collapsing, invaded from everywhere by Allies and Soviets, and this German armed group is not in position to change a damn thing about it, in fact such a German force would have most likely entrenched itself on a defensive position to ambush the enemy at that time of the war, rather than the opposite.
Anyway the film is made of good quality, with a good immersion, tense and convincing actors who compensate the more artificial and less credible stakes of the scenario, to give you a quite memorable viewing.