Category: action

The Revenant Review

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the-revenant-us-teaser-posterThe Revenant is a feat of strength, a relentless story of pure willpower. Almost all of it is filmed in the wild, with natural lighting. The violence is in a way too realistic to actually be realistic, if that can be understood. By the end I was exhausted. In fact I was silently pleading with the movie to end at least ten minutes before it did. I was quite literally squirming in my seat. Despite this, there is no denying it is an incredible production worthy of recommendation.

Below contains minor spoilers.

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Avengers: Age of Ultron (spoiler-ish review)

On By filmrollerIn action, dice roll: 5, review1 Comment

avengers-age-of-ultronThe Marvel Cinematic Universe is steadily becoming comic-levels of complicated. It’s come to the point where I feel every review should begin with a synopsis of where we are in the timeline. Right now, it’s enough to say that we are post-Winter Soldier by some months. This review does assume you’ve seen pretty much everything that’s out (though I’m not going to spoil Daredevil for you).

The team is hunting down Loki’s staff, which we last saw being played with in a Hydra research facility. We have to assume Thor came back to Midgard with Odin!Loki’s blessing, which begs the question – did Loki as Odin order Thor to retrieve it? Probably. The reason he needs it become clear, and fans have already suspected it. But before it can be returned to Asgard the Avengers have to deal with the artificial intelligence that spawns from Tony’s tinkering: Ultron.

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Sin City: A Dame to Kill For

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sincity2It’s been nearly a decade since Miller and Rodriguez took a trip down to Sin City together. As it turns out, the only reason to revisit the place is for a dose of nostalgia. 

Sin City: A Dame to Kill For is a prequel and sequel, and can not be watched on its own, I would argue. It has probably been a few years since last I saw Sin City, so even I got my timeline mixed up. The main thing is, a lot of our characters are back, and the main baddie is still Senator Roake. The new Dame to kill for referenced in the title is played by Eva Green. She is an archetype femme fatal, who likes to screw with people both for power, and just for fun. Another new storyline is the one with Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who plays a poker player trying to go up against Roake. 

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X-Men: Days of Future Past

On By filmrollerIn action, dice roll: 5, reviewLeave a comment

rs_634x939-140324091106-634.jennifer-lawrence-x-men.ls.32414It’s strange to me to think that there are seven X-Men movies. It certainly doesn’t feel that way, and I think that has to do with the quality. Even though I wasn’t against The Wolverine when it came out, I’ve found it has very little re-watch potential. The same can be said for First Class, even though part of me knows that’s blasphemy. All that said, the X-Men movie franchise has not, as far as I can tell, been in any danger of stopping.

X-Men: Days of Future Past feels like new ground and back-to-basics at the same time, and I think that’s what makes this, in my mind, the most rewatchable X-Men movie since the original. Like all superhero movies, I enjoyed the hell of out it for the pure spectacle alone, problems and all.

The film starts in the near future, where mutants are hunted to the point of extinction with super Destroyer-like Sentinels. Professor X and Magneto have put aside their differences in a last ditch effort to save their kind. They send Wolverine back in time to the 70s to convince their younger selves to change the future.

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Godzilla Review

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GodzillaPoster2014The trailer for Godzilla (2014) gave me actual shivers. I’ve never been a Godzilla fan, but I think I understood his potential, even while being misled by the fun but generic monster movie of 1998. When I saw the first image, I think I finally understood why hardcore fans referred to the previous Hollywood version as Godzilla In Name Only. The iconic profile, obscured in debris fog, made my anticipation rise to fanboy-levels, even though I have never seen an original Godzilla film.

You do not want to go into this movie spoiled. This film has one of the few trailers, and marketing campaigns, that hasn’t ruined anything. Suffice it to say, it’s a film about Godzilla, and there might be something else lurking around. The humans in the movie are just as important, however, if not more. You have Bryan Cranston as a nuclear engineer, with Aaron Taylor-Johnson playing his son, who is married to Elizabeth Olsen. Fun fact: they’ll be playing brother and sister, Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch, in the next Avenger movie, hopefully with a different kind of chemistry.

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Divergent – One in the crowd

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Divergent-posterYet another movie based on a bestselling young adult novel. Can this one set itself apart? I was willing to let a lot slide, considering the message in this film is fairly harmless. But after discussing the film with someone who had read the book, I realised this wasn’t just a case of poor adaptation.

The story’s concept is “what if the world worked according to this random rule”, peppered with characters and general melodrama. This type of story is something I see a lot of in fanfiction. They often sound lame and contrived, but it’s all in good fun, and is (when done well) an experiment to explore other aspects of the characters and relationships of existing franchises. When movies get made out of these “what if” scenarios, you’re almost always in for a long intro with a lot of reading and/or voice-over exposition. Divergent is no exception.

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The Amazing Spider-Man 2 Review

On By filmrollerIn action, dice roll: 5, radio review2 Comments

The-Amazing-Spider-Man-2-New-Poster-spider-man-35222096-1024-1421I was really excited to see this sequel, mostly because I was one of the few people on the internet who liked the first one.

Maybe I exaggerate my dislike for the “originals”, as I know I saw them all in theatres and didn’t really have much to say about them (except the third one). In hindsight I find myself with a bad taste in my mouth every time I see the Goblin’s stupid mask, or Doc Oc’s puppy-like psychic metal puppets. I won’t say The Amazing Spider-Man was perfect, but to me it was an improvement even when it just retreaded the previous films’ steps.

Spoilers for the ending of the last film!

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Aronofsky’s Noah Short Review

On By filmrollerIn action, dice roll: 4, drama, fantasy, radio reviewLeave a comment

noah-posterI remember actually enjoying certain Biblical stories as a child. My favourite was an illustrated version of Samson, which I guess technically makes him my first superhero. Hollywood once knew why the Bible was perfect for the screen, and Aronofsky is apparently the one to remind them, which he undeniably does.

The traditional story of Noah is adapted and embellished in the film, titled simply Noah. The trailer hints at a lot of the additions, but I still wasn’t prepared for how original the story looked. The rock-angels are probably the biggest surprise. Fallen angels who turn to stone upon impact, they now wander the earth being bitter about their decision to help humanity. Noah and his family are far more complex than I expected as well. This isn’t so much a story about saving the animals or surviving the flood, it’s about one man’s struggle with interpreting the Creator’s will, how his family deal with his conviction, and humanity’s capacity for good.

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