Movies | the m0vie blog

Non-Review Review: Green Lantern – First Flight

Posted on December 7, 2010 by Darren

This post is part of the DCAU fortnight, a series of articles looking at the Warner Brothers animations featuring DC’s iconic selection of characters. This is one of the “stand-alone” animated movies produced by the creative team that gave us the television shows.

In case you weren’t aware, director Martin Campbell (the man who saved the Bond franchise twice – with both GoldenEye and Casino Royale) will be bringing a big screen adaptation of DC comic’s Green Lantern our way next summer. I am really looking forward to it, which might seem odd – Green Lantern has never really had the popular exposure that Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman or even Flash has had. Of course, that might be down to the fact that nobody has produced a television show based entirely around the character – hell, even Aquaman had that aborted Ving Rhames pilot and that fictional movie. So, it’s understandable if Green Lantern isn’t exactly lighting up the radar in the same way that, say, Kenneth Branagh’s Thor is. That said, if you’re looking to get a taste for the character, you could do a lot worse than checking out Green Lantern: First Flight.

Shoulda put a ring on it, indeed...

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: arts, bruce timm, christopher meloni, comic book, Comics, dc, dc animated universe, dc universe, dcau, geoff johns, green, green lantern, Green Lantern: First Flight, hal jordan, martin campbell, Movie, oa, sinestro, victor garber, yellow | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: Carriers

Posted on December 6, 2010 by Darren

At the end of the world, what do you take with you? It’s a question that underpins the vast majority of post-apocalyptic tales, wondering if our human could survive past the collapse of society. At its best, Carriers handles the question head-on, with refreshing frankness. Unfortunately, it tends to fluctuate rather unevenly – going for fairly straight-forward “gotcha!” scares and aping other far more successful movies in a fairly shallow manner. Carries isn’t the best piece of post-apocalyptic fiction in recent memory – nor is it even the best one produced in the past year. However, if you’re a fan of the genre, it provides a fairly decent amount of entertainment.

You wouldn't to sick them on you...

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: 28 days later, Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction, avian flu, bird flu, carriers, chris pine, christopher meloni, films, infection, infectious disease, Movies, non-review review, review | 2 Comments »

Non-Review Review: Batman – Under the Red Hood

Posted on December 6, 2010 by Darren

You did it! You found a way to win and everybody still loses!

– The Joker

The story of Batman, boiled down to its most essential elements, is a tragedy. He’s a character defined by hurt and loss – the suffering and failures he has endured while fighting simply to stay alive in an uncertain world. The reason that the animated Batman: Under the Red Hood works so well is because it manages to capture that observation perfectly in its relatively tight runtime. Over the course of the movie, Batman has several of his rather glaring failures touted out in front of him and – what’s more – faces the possibility that he may himself end up obsolete.

The joke’s on Batman…

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: a death in the family, animation, batman, batman: under the hood, batman: under the red hood, Black Mask, bruce greenwood, bruce timm, christian bale, comic books, dark knight, dc animated universe, dcau, dick grayson, film, Jason Todd, john dimaggio, joker, judd winick, kevin conroy, Red Hood, robin, superheroes, the joker, the red hood, under the hood, under the red hood | 2 Comments »

Non-Review Review: Meet the Parents

Posted on December 3, 2010 by Darren

Meet the Parents is a pleasant little film which works so well because it takes an awkward social experience that most of us have lived through – in this case meeting a partner’s parents – and turns it into a comedy of errors. It’s this smart little premise and the way that it plays off a familiar situation (with judicious application of the philosophy that “anything that can go wrong will“) that makes it so appealing – and perhaps explains the weaknesses of the movie’s sequel. Still, the original is an effective and charming comedy of manners which executes its premise well and, despite some difficulty balancing everything, manages to consistently entertain throughout.

DeNirest and Dearest...

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: awkward, ben stiller, Blythe Danner, comedy, comedy of manners, dustin hoffman, Jay Roach, Little Fockers, Meet the Parents, non-review review, Owen Wilson, review, robert deniro, social comedy | 2 Comments »

Blood on Film: Violence and Morality…

Posted on December 2, 2010 by Darren

I am always fascinated about discussions over violence in movies. Mostly because it’s one of those “hot button” issues which always comes up in some context or another and is typically portrayed as an argument with two extremes. This week, while promoting his new movie Faster, actor Billy Bob Thornton offered his own opinion of modern movie-making:

In our current state of affairs, especially in the entertainment business, we’re living in a time when we’re making — in my humble opinion — the worst movies in history.

They’re geared toward the video game-playing generation. And these video games, which I’m on my son about constantly, these games are people killing for fun, and I think traditionally in movies, there’s always been some kind of lesson in the violent movies.

In fairness, Thornton is a typically controversial figure (for example, recently alienating Canadian fans), but it’s an interesting idea to look at – the assumption that violence (and specifically how it is handled) can contribute to a movie’s quality (or lack thereof). Is he being just a little melodramatic?

Well, it is the second of December...

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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: billy bob thornton, censorhsip, evil, film, freedom, good, media guardians, media watchdogs, morality, Movies, violence, violence on film | 1 Comment »

Non-Review Review: El Mariachi

Posted on December 2, 2010 by Darren

El Mariachi is the first film from director Robert Rodriguez. Although his first major success, Desperado, borrows heavily from the Mexican Western, there’s a certain playful exuberance which underpins his debut. It’s a very rough film – one which doesn’t quite have the shine of a finished major motion picture release – but there’s enough charm and wit bubbling away to carry the film over the line. It’s quirky and perhaps a little cheeky, but it’s also surprisingly respectful of the genre and of the films around it. It almost lacks the ridiculously gratuitous nature of his later efforts, though perhaps here he was restrained by a tiny budget.

An unconventional choice of instrument...

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: arts, desperado, el mariachi, film, Mexico, Movie, Movies, non-review review, Once Upon a Time in Mexico, review, robert rodriguez | Leave a comment »

Meme of the Moment: Cinema Code of Conduct

Posted on December 1, 2010 by Darren

Note: You can find the full list of participating blogs here. Kudos to all involved, and especially to CinemaScream for putting it together.

I feel somewhat humbled to open this post with an admission of a breach of blogging etiquette. Those who frequent the site might have noticed that I have been somewhat absent from the blogging world in the past few months – my postings are sporadic, cobbled together from a car ride or bus ride on an iPhone screen. I won’t dare to make a series of excuses about how things have gone upside down of late, or make reference to increasing commitments. We all have those, and yet most manage it far better. Anyway, I owe a sincere apology to CinemaScream – I agreed to take part in this rather ingenious (and thoroughly practical) meme, but it completely slipped my mind. So this post is somewhat more haphazard than usual. But only somewhat.

Basically, the Cinema Code of Conduct (as proposed by Mark Kermode and Simon Mayo) is intended to make going to the cinema a far more pleasant experience for those involved. In this era of mobile phones and iPods and such, it’s a rather wonderful idea to attempt to codify the behaviour that should be considered acceptable in modern cinemas. I really wish that a few major chains would consciously publicise the list to promote it among movie-goers. The ten items, included below, are not excessively harsh or intrusive – they are in fact relatively minor things which, if everybody did them, would make going to the cinema a much more enjoyable experience.

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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: arts, cinema, cinema code of conduct, cinema etiquette, cinemas, code of conduct, etiquette, film, films, iphone, IPod, mark kermode, meme, Movies, Simon Mayo, tony scott | 5 Comments »

The Princess is Dead, Long Live the Princess: Disney Won’t Be Letting Fairy Tales Live Happily Ever After…

Posted on December 1, 2010 by Darren

Apparently Disney are putting an end to the production of fairy tales, which is somewhat ironic for a studio which has an iconic fairytale castle as its distinctive corporate logo. I suppose it was sort of inevitable coming from a studio that was terrified of advertising Tangled as a “princess” movie. Disney board director John Lasseter explained the decision:

Today, among little girls especially, princesses and the romanticised ideal they represent – finding the man of your dreams – have a limited shelf life.

It’s very clever to couch his argument in what might be considered modern feminist terms – “finding the man of your dreams” is such a fifties aspiration for young girls, after all – but I’m not entirely sure I’m comfortable with what Disney plans to replace them with. I’ll admit that I am a relatively conservative individual – I just don’t like change – but there’s something unsettling about such a major refocus, and perhaps what it says about pop culture as a whole these days.

Okay, so maybe Disney needs to work on its female leads...

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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: animation, bratz, children, children's films, disney, disney films, disney movies, disney princesses, Fairy tale, film, John Lasseter, Los Angeles Times, mainstream, Movies, pixar, popular, princess, rapunzel, Southern Illinois University, tangled, the princess and the frog, The Walt Disney Company | 4 Comments »

Leslie Nielsen

Posted on November 30, 2010 by Darren

I am not going to attempt to write an obituary for the recently deceased actor Leslie Nielsen. Countless other bloggers, film critics and media writers have already published their own versions, many of which are undoubtedly far more eloquent than anything I could come up with. Like Dennis Hopper before him, I can’t claim to have encyclopedic knowledge of Nielsen’s incredibly long and distinguished career, nor can I suggest that his filmography is composed of nothing but masterpieces. However, he was always a performer who I respected and whose considerable talents seemed to be tempered with a desire never to take himself too seriously.

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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: airplane!, dennis hopper, forbidden planet, Leslie Nielsen, Police Squad!, Scary Movie 3, Spy Hard, The Naked Gun | 2 Comments »

Non-Review Review: Clerks

Posted on November 30, 2010 by Darren

There’s a sense of life experience in Clerks – the undeniable feeling that the people involved in the production have actually been in situations similar to those being portrayed here and are writing from experience. The directorial debut from Kevin Smith, the film has a very weird feeling to it. It is as if the script (the words and the setting) are very casual and natural, but the performers are undoubtedly conscious of the camera. It creates a weird dichotomy between the very colloquial script and the relatively stiff performances. That said, there’s a charm to the film, which never really pretends to be anything more than what it actually is, and sort of cheeky rebellion which makes it endearing.