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Reviews
Jagten (2012)
Beautiful
This movie is a must-see. Especially for people who haven't seen many films outside the western film industry. The concept is highly relevant to the way we suspect people, and how much suspicion can completely destroy someone's life. All the characters are acted and behave in an extremely believable way. The film is directed perfectly. It's a smart move to make extremely minimal use of music in a film like this because it allows the tension to arise simply from the events taking place in the film and the way the characters are reacting to them.
The main actor gives a heart-wrenching performance that manages to not only properly develop his growth as the events of the film slowly become more chaotic and tragic, but also resonates with the person watching (in this case me) because he behaves in the way we (normal timid citizens) would likely react to being accused of sexual abuse unjustly.
The brilliance in this film is that it manages to avoid vilifying anyone in this movie. Despite characters accusing Lucas (main character) of things he didn't do, they are portrayed as normal, good people who are trying to protect themselves and their families, rather than bullying the main character out of sadism which would make the plot cheesy.
It is extremely hard to separate fact and fiction with situations like this, so it is understandable that they would behave this way. This leaves us conflicted because while we sympathize with Lucas's character, there are no antagonists to shift blame on. More things need to be written this way, instead of drama movies constantly turning everything into a struggle between good and evil.
The movie is realistic, emotional, and beautifully made and I would recommend this to anyone who has an open mind and loves cinema.
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012)
Decent, but don't weigh it up to Lord of The Rings.
The feeling I got from leaving the cinema after watching this prequel was vaguely reminiscent of the feeling from watching the Star Wars prequels. The difference between those two experiences was that The Hobbit was not actually a bad movie. The reminiscence I felt was the same level of high expectation coming in, and the same level of morbid un-satisfaction I felt upon leaving the cinema three hours later.
To make it absolutely clear, it's not objectively bad. My distaste for it is entirely based on the source material it represents, not it's credibility as a stand-alone work of film production. The film is definitely enjoyable which is why I gave it a 6/10. To give credit where it's due, I will at first mention the things the movie does well.
The most obvious thing the film has going for it, is the visuals. While the CGI use is a bit overbearing (on which I will elaborate on when discussing the film's faults), the wide, sweeping landscape shots of the New Zealand setting warmly invite die-hard fans back into Middle Earth. I didn't see it in 48FPS so I reserve no right to talk about what most of the internet is relaying as a terrible idea, but it deserves mention that 48FPS is now an option.
You also get to witness some amazing set-pieces in Middle Earth that you had already seen in Lord of The Rings, but have now been reformatted for higher definition and quality.
There are some fairly decent performances from this cast. Martin Freeman pays a lot of respect to Tolkien's Bilbo Baggins from the book, and performs him as almost a reflection of audience reaction. He responds and behaves the way perhaps quite a few people in the audience would react in this crazy adventure he's been persuaded into. This makes the character relatable, but not intriguing.
However, the real star of the show is Andy Serkins. He only appears in one long scene, but his rendition of the wretched Gollum is even more frightening and riveting as it was in The Lord of The Rings.
Some of the fight scenes are enjoyable, and there is a reasonable amount of humor in the film. However, this concludes the list of things I liked.
To start off, splitting this story into three parts was a silly move (or brilliant if you view it from a business perspective.) The Lord of The Rings was collectively a 1112 page story that was so densely packed with content that the extended film editions barely came any close to accounting for it all. The Hobbit is 500 page story, dilute of complexity, in which a hobbit and a company of dwarfs embark on a quest. Splitting it into three installments causes serious padding and pacing issues. The parts of the movie that abuse this the most are the first 45 minutes and everything to do with Radagast the Brown.
The Hobbit has lost something that the LOTR trilogy used extremely well: realism. Even in a trilogy of fantastical races uniting against a tyrannical demon lord, the combat was believable, the armour was based off authentic medieval chain-mail design, and the supernatural elements were shrouded in subtlety. Although there were magic and creatures,there wasn't a great deal of it due to the focus on the series being the brotherhood between enemies in the face of war. Right from the prologue, The Hobbit missed this point. Everything looks so digital now, the dwarf kingdom was ludicrously designed, and the combat was so unrealistic the audience was likely to be torn between taking it seriously or not. Sometimes it was child friendly, sometimes it was horrifically violent. No wonder Martin Freeman always looks confused.
However, the biggest issue has to be the liberties taken with the source material, though I can't discuss those on this review. All in all, The Hobbit is a misguided attempt as a film following the incredible LOTR trilogy, but a success as a visual achievement and a piece of entertainment.
Assassin's Creed: Revelations (2011)
Where it all went wrong.
Throughout the last five years, I have been a longstanding fan of the Assassins Creed series. I thought Assassins Creed 2 was the best game of that year, I loved Brotherhood just as much, and although I never played the original I watched a Let's Play and enjoyed it. Revelations is where it all went wrong. All my expectations for this title (stemmed from the massive promotion of the game) were violently cut short when I finally played it. The game is a pointless entry to the series, with zero improvements over it's predecessor, Brotherhood, as well as multiple flawed concepts that completely detract from the experience that we usually have with these games.
Let's start with the setting. For the majority of the run time, you'll be playing in Constantinople instead of Rome like in the previous installment (still in the early 16th century though.) The theory supporting this idea was good, because as Constantinople was considered the international market superpower at the time, the player would be able to see and interact with many different cultures of the world, and the city would be full of life. But what we got instead, was a city which functioned almost exactly like Brotherhood in terms of travel, supporting factions, and income system (which is actually a lot worse, but we'll get to that). The city is completely monochromatic (everything's brown for some reason), and it's nowhere near as large or environmentally diverse as Rome, making exploration boring and pointless. As for the various cultures, you see a few, but you can't interact with them anyway making them pretty much wallpaper. The most amount of interaction you have with the setting is when random assassins try to kill you for a quick time event that takes a second. This city is in no way better than Rome, it adds nothing new, in fact it detracts in terms of size because it's the smallest setting in the series.
Now for the flawed concepts. Assassins creed revelations does try to add a few features to the system, VERY FEW. The ones they added are pointless though. The hook blade only allows you to travel on zip-lines, it's the only reason you remember you have it. It adds nothing new to combat except a few counter animations. They also a bomb system where you can mix different bombs from multiple recipes which all do different things for either stealth or combat. This would be great if it wasn't BROKEN. Often when you use the cherry bomb, it alerts enemies to your direction, instead of diverting them away. The other bombs are useless, and have awkward aiming mechanics. The assassins recruit system is still there, and it's better now because you have to do missions with recruits to elevate their rank, making them more personal. But throughout the main storyline there will be little opportunity or purpose in using them, making them a wasted investment. Speaking of that, there is also no point in purchasing weapons and armor. Money takes a long time to accumulate, and the weapons you have at the start are enough to carry you through the whole game. Especially since the game is very short. I finished the main story mode in one day, which I find insulting given the cost of the game. But how do you purchase weapons and armor you ask? I'm about to discuss the worst part of this lazy game.
The den system. This irritated me so much, it made me rush through the game to finish it early. Every time you renovate a building you increase your templar awareness, which eventually puts one of your dens at risk of being taken over. You heard that correctly, THE GAME PUNISHES YOU FOR DOING THE RIGHT THING. But it gets worse. You protect the den with this "tower- defense" mini game, which is the single worst idea I've ever seen in this series. You magically spawn units to defend against an unfairly powerful templar squad that attempt to break down the den. It's not so much about strategy, as it is about frantically spawning things in desperation, as the enemy barely gives you any time to recover units before attacking again. It's so annoying having to play this thing over and over every-time I want to renovate buildings, so I didn't want to earn money. Wish I could've earned back the money I paid for the game.
The combat system is still satisfying, but underwhelming due to nothing new. It's still standing around and waiting for enemies to attack, and then countering. Unless you fight the Janniseries, who are unfairly tough since the game never explains how to fight them. The graphics aren't bad, but aren't good for a 2011 title.
The story is downright terrible. I won't give away any spoilers, but in this game's story you find out nothing new, it doesn't answer the big question everyone had after seeing the ending of Brotherhood, and it's full of characters who, in comparison to the beautifully written and unique Italian characters of the last two games, feel one-note and awfully boring. Nothing happens that is relevant, it's filled with plot holes, the Altair missions are reasonably interesting but very rare, and the Desmond part of the game is boring. You ponder through an awkward first-person mode, with platforming puzzles that look like a parody of portal 2, while Desmond recounts extraneous information about his upbringing, which leads to nothing. The story in the game is so irrelevant, non-conclusive, it feels like you can skip it and play AC3 straight after brotherhood. You should do, because this game is the least memorable in the series. That is the most objective statement in this review, because two years after this game was released (and after AC3), no one ever talks about this anymore. I have to much time on my hands.
Rock of Ages (2012)
Generally boring film, with a great score, but a lot of misdirection.
The good: -Great score, the songs are particularly enjoyable editions of classic rock songs. -Attractive cast (mostly). -Promiscuous -Appearances from highly esteemed celebrities: Bryan Cranston, Alec Baldwin, Russell Brand, Mary J Blige.
The bad: -Awfully cliché love story between the main couple, as well as they're both extremely unlikable stereotypes (he's a paper-deep pretty boy with no personality, she's an annoying recently graduated popular girl, with a painfully shrill voice and also barely any known personality traits apart from "I want to be big and famous") stereotypical depictions of romance have a generally stronger emphasis, than actual character connection. -Horrible acting from two main actors. -Bad character development, with characters falling in love for weird or sometimes, no reasons. -Script is awful, with really awkward dialogue, and cheesy lines. -Bryan Cranston is barely used, despite being the most talented actor in this production. -They introduce a second plot-point with Catherine Zeta-Jones's character leading a mob of anti-rock protesters, to try to shut down the rock gigs that take place in the movie. The problem here, is that this plot-point has such a rare presence in the movie. It appears at the beginning of the film, and at the end, and when it does, it holds no effect on the overall story, and it's poorly conceived. It just wastes the screen time. -Scenes between the songs are GUT-WRENCHINGLY painful. The dialogue is so immature, and the story never goes anywhere. -Lip-syncing can be hilariously obvious at times. -The movie tries to be funny, but instead of laughing at the dumb jokes, you'll be laughing at the general awkwardness of their choice of moments for the musical numbers.
Final verdict: Rock of Ages is a generic attempt at combing hardcore music and a love story together, however it is poorly conceived that you would be much better of buying the albums that these songs came in, and get something enjoyable (which you might as well do, because the score is overt plagiarism). A generally mediocre film, and very, very boring.
Man of Steel (2013)
Ignore the critics, it's actually a good movie.
Very, very minor spoilers. Man of steel is an extremely solid superhero origin story. The trailers do project an image of a much better movie, but the film does not disappoint given what it is. To make it absolutely clear, this is very much a Zac Snyder film not a Christopher Nolan film, and therefore it absolutely should not be compared with the work of an entirely different director. However, the movie is not by any means as bad as sucker punch, nor as simplistic as 300. Instead it is a highly enjoyable blockbuster film, which perfectly handles the challenge of paying respect to DC comics lore and adding something new to the equation.
For starters, Henry Cavill suited the role of Superman perfectly. He had the right look, and was able to portray the struggle of Clark Kent to grow as a man and a hero very well. His relationship with his father, Jonathan Kent (played by Kevin Costner) is the emotional core of the film. The flashbacks we see of his life as a child dealing with his powers is done very well, though in a non-linear style. Kevin Costner was also gave of a strong performance yet subtle, he was exactly who he needed to be.
Russell Crowe performed very well, his character Jor-El was charismatic and inspiring. Amy Adams performed well. There's not much more to be said about the acting since this kind of film usually doesn't require Oscar-level performances, but it did have a negative side. Michael Shannon as Zod. I personally could not stand him. He delivered his lines as if he was reading them off a book, and when he tried to use emotion it looked bland and cheesy. If you just saw Benedict Cumberpatch's performance in the new star trek, don't expect a villain anywhere near as good as that.
The story starts of reasonably slow for the first half which is mainly attributed to character development, but the second half is filled with non-stop action. The action and special effects were absolutely breathtaking, and you could see where Zac Snyder's trademark talents were starting to come through. The movie was visually fantastic, and unlike in superman returns we actually see him fight this time, instead of him just picking up an island and taking a bullet in the eye.
Some other things I liked were: the way that Krypton matched the version in the comics, Faora's bad-ass fight scenes, Perry White, the well-developed romance between Clark and Louis, the fact that Henry Cavill seems to be the only one playing superman who bothered to lift some weights before putting a tight suit to avoid looking like he was rocking up at comic-con. Some things I didn't like: Zod, the tentacle scene (no, not that.), and some major potholes (but I didn't expect there not to be)
Superman and Superman 2 were both solid movies, but outdated by today's standards. 3 and 4 were absolutely cheesy and awful. Returns was boring and disappointing. This is the only superman movie that provided me with a worthwhile experience. It had a strong main actor, well developed adaptations from the comics, beautiful effects, and it was very interesting to see the way Clark Kent grows as a hero brought to live-action cinema. I'm excited to see where it goes next.