DARK SHADOWS - A flawed, but highly enjoyable film (at least to me).

The flaws mainly come from the plotting and narrative. Many of the characters are underwritten, and pretty one-note in their personality. The film's central plot concerns a wealthy nobleman's son named Barnabus Collins (Johnny Depp) falling to a witch's curse, when he rejects her love for another woman. The scorned witch puts his love under a spell, causing her to commit suicide. When Barnabus tries to take his own life as well, the witch casts a spell turning him into a vampire, and then turns the entire town against him, which results in him being sealed in a coffin and buried for almost 200 years.

When Barnabus is unearthed by a construction crew in 1972, he heads to his former mansion home, and finds it's inhabited by his current family descendents, who are an eccentric, if not underwritten and underdeveloped, bunch. (It's sad to see the talented young Chloe Moretz, who plays the isolated teenage daughter in the current family, given so little to do, and mainly pushed in the background in a lot of her scenes.) He also finds that the witch who initially cursed him (Eva Green, having a lot of fun with her vampish femme fatalle role) is still around, and pretty much owns the entire town, as she's built a corporate empire. There is a subplot about Barnabus meeting a woman who greatly resembles his tragic love from 200 years ago, which is supposed to provide the heart of the film. But, the character of the woman is so underwritten, and their scenes together so few, it never really works the way it should.

So, what does work about this movie? The fact that this is the first Tim Burton movie in a long time that actually felt like a Tim Burton movie to me. This is Burton at his most unconventional, and he's obviously having a blast here. The movie shares the same sense of naughty fun as Beetlejuice. The sets and costume are gorgeous, as is the music. The score by Elfman is one of his better (and more subtle) ones in a while, and the selection of 70s and 60s pop and rock songs that accompany scenes are really wonderfully used. Really great use of music all around.

Like a lot of Burton films, I admired the technical achievements, more than the story being told. The story could work, but the characters would have to be a lot stronger to make us care about them. (The climax, while enjoyable and technically impressive, has a lot of sloppily inserted plot revelations that seem to come out of nowhere.) What saves this movie is how off-beat and dark it is, its bizarre sense of humor, and the fact that everyone involved seems to be having a blast up on the screen, and it carries through to the audience.

It's not classic Burton, but it's the closest we've gotten to it in a long time. In other words, I'll take this over Alice in Wonderland any day of the week.

Full review to come.

The Avengers - I really wonder what movie Keiichi saw. This is probably the most fun I've had in a movie theater in over a year. Robert Downey Jr., Chris Evans, and whoever took over as Bruce Banner (didn't catch the name in the credits) flowed perfectly together; although some of the exposition scenes did go on a bit long, I didn't mind as long as they kept talking. The action worked far better than it had any right to with that much CGI required - it ran the risk of being the new Van Helsing, and it didn't, which is a noteworthy achievement.

The biggest achievement? Somehow, I didn't manage to get out to the theater for Thor or Captain America... and I still understood the entire movie.

Not that it was perfect, though. Some of the dialogue (particularly in the Germany scene) was far preachier than it needed to be to get the point across. And as with every Joss Whedon script, Joss couldn't resist sinking to his cheapest, most unnecessary trope... though at least he had the grace to lampshade the "shameless emotional exploitation" factor.

Still, we are in a golden age of superhero movies, and I deeply enjoyed this one.

Favorite moment: "That guy is playing Galaga - don't think we can't see you..." End of the scene, that line pays off. (It ties with another moment, but that would be a spoiler.)

The same movie you apparently did. A very fun, but somewhat flawed movie.

Minotaur - Out of all the Greek heroes out there, it's Theseus whose exploits most lend themselves out to horror films (trapped in a labyrinth with a monster, fighting a killer who used to force people into a bed of a certain size, and another murderer who tied people to trees and tore them to pieces). So when the DTV monster-of-the-week started combing Greek mythology for inspiration, "Theseus and the Minotaur" was a no-brainer. While the names are changed, the basic story structure of the myth is retained. Tony Todd plays an incestuous priest/king who forces a village to pay tribute of 8 "youths" each year to feed the minotaur in the labyrinth beneath his palace, which his mother had given birth to. The son of the villain elder, Theo, goes to the palce to save village. Cue Theo and the other "tributes" (a varied bunch, including a religious girl, a b***, a mute girl, the sidekick, the spurned girl, the rival) running around the labyrinth, bickering, and being killed one by one. There's a whole lot of gore on display here. Unfortunately, the monster is more of a giant mutated bull rather than a half-man, half-bull creature.

EDIT: This movie is able to fit in a big darn explosion AND an "it's not dead" moment.

The thing with Uma Thurman and Ralph Fiennes and Sean Connery trying to take over the world and evil teddy bears or something. I just don't get the sudden renewed interest in that film.

Torchwood

I just finished up both seasons of Torchwood and the mini-series. Here are a random collection of thoughts.

1. The characters are not consistent.
2. Some of the Plot Elements seem to use "It's in the Script" motivations
3. Captain Jack is not as fun as he was on Dr. Who. In fact, he's not fun at all, more depressing.
4. Everyone comes across as amatuerish and idiotic, especially people who are military/government types.

Here be spoilers!

1. They kill off the most problematic characters in the final season. Still not enough to save the show apparently.
2. This series has very few happy endings and has an incredibly bleak view of what happens after you die.
3. The series is an interesting counter-point to Dr. Who, because their is no Doctor to save the day. Just a bunch of incredibly flawed people. Therefore, most of the solutions are also incredibly flawed.

In the final analysis, I can't recommend watching this.

The only Torchwood I've ever watched was Miracle Day, which had a great premise. But after...I think it was episode three?...when the team is in the middle of this global disaster, and they've just uncovered a huge conspiracy, and halfway through the episode everybody just takes a break so they can go get laid, I decided that Torchwood and I were never going to get along.

I watched a bit of Torchwood and found it to be pretty dire. Russell Davies' Doctor Who scripts were generally pretty nonsensical and unimaginative, but at least they had a certain energy and goodheartedness to them. Torchwood strips that out in the name of being "ADULT" and "EDGY". As pointed out, Captain Jack goes from being awesome and fun on Doctor Who to being a dour grump on Torchwood. It's a crummy show...

...Except, for some bizarre reason, "Children of Earth" (the miniseries that makes up the de facto third season) is really, really good. I have no idea what made Davies decide he was going to put in an effort on that one and not the rest of the show, but it paid off, as it very occasionally did on Who (like the episode "Midnight"). From everything I've heard about Davies he's kind of lazy and tends to slap things together at the last minute, plus he hates being criticized even when he needs to hear it, which is a crying shame because it's clear there's a good writer lurking in there somewhere. If only he'd discipline himself.

To clear up any confusion, there are four "seasons" of Torchwood, which as far as I know is on open-ended hiatus with no reason not to expect it to come back. S1-2 were actually called "Series 1" and "Series 2," traditional BBC series that ran thirteen (I think) episodes each. The third set of shows was a five-episode story subtitled Children of Earth. The fourth set of shows were a US/UK co-production that aired on Starz, subtitled Miracle Day.

I had a lot of fun with Torchwood overall. At its worst it overdoes the WE ARE BEING DARK AND EDGY thing with excessive bleakness and promiscuity, but at its best it mixes the fast-paced freewheeling action of Doctor Who with a healthy dose of melancholy, and throws in just enough moments of real tenderness (for example, Gwen and Rhys). The show seemed to have gotten comfortable in its skin by sometime near the end of Series 1, and by Series 2 the cast had become an actual group of people with whom it was pleasurable to spend some time. COE is a minor masterpiece. I haven't seen MD and don't know anything about it.

And yeah, in retrospect it maybe seems obvious that by his very nature, Captain Jack makes a better sidekick than a lead, but I'm not sure how far in advance they knew how much Torchwood's companion show would continue to move towards more and more emphasis on the Doctor's solitude and loneliness post-Eccleston.

One for the Money - SHUT!! UP!! I was just thoroughly entertained by a Katherine Heigl movie! And not because it sucked less than everything else since Knocked Up. It was actually good.

NO!! I AM NOT ON CRACK!
It was good!

I have to disagree a bit here. The set-up is really good in this episode and everything is cracking along nicely until the big reveal.

Here be Spoilers...

The aliens are addicted to some chemicals the Human children produce.

Once this important plot point is discovered, it should shift the whole dynamic; but instead it changes nothing. Why should it change the whole dynamic? Because the aliens no longer can follow through on there threat of total annihilation. The bargaining leverage should shift from the Aliens to the Humans.... but it doesn't. Instead, everything carries on as normal.

Plus, the aliens never prove they can influence anything beyond what happened in the one, pre-set location. Something which simple counter-measures were able to thwart. Essentially, it was clear that the aliens were full of hot air, and just bluffing. Yet the government and other smart people carry-on as normal. It snapped my ability to suspend disbelief and took me out of the mini-series.

For the record, I don't think I saw Miracle Day stuff. I streamed two seasons and the mini-series.

Around The World In Eighty Days - The David Niven one, not the goofy comedy one from a few years back.

It's sometimes depressing to watch a Best Picture winner from the bygone days, even moreso than a lot of current Best Picture winners. This is just a big pile of sets, costumes, extras, and scenery. Empty spectacle. One scene in particular, a parade in San Francisco during an election, is just pointless. Tons and tons of actors and horses and marching bands and whatnot, and it doesn't have anything to do with anything. It's not a film so much as a gigantic demo reel for Todd-AO.

Cantinflas was supposed to be one of the world's great comedians, but they give him next to nothing to do here. Actually, he's in a ton of scenes, but mostly as an excuse to go "hey, look at this huge-ass set we built! Look at all these Indians whooping!" But apparently, a lot of his comedy involved Spanish wordplay, impossible to translate into English, so that makes some sense.

Still, the costumes are pretty. And I'm the type of film fan who likes playing "spot the cameo," and brother does this film have a lot of them. And I'll admit one line made me laugh out loud: "Gentlemen, this calls for a subdued celebration!"

The Avengers - Not sure I liked this as much as other people, but I loved it nevertheless. Finally, a superhero movie that emphasizes simple, straightforward fun.

One of the criticisms levied at the recent Jackie Chan version (from at least two different mainstream critics) was its lack of big star cameos. That always struck me as being a stupid, shallow criticism for a movie. Besides, the action was pretty fun by late-period Jackie standards and, when you think about it, the cameos are impressive (albeit some of them by Jade Screen standards): Superkicker Ken Lo, Daniel Wu (who's now a very respected actor in Hong Kong), Maggie Q (who has a solid career on both sides of the globe), the legendary Sammo Hung, Kathy Bates, Ahnold, the Wilson brothers, Karen Mok as an anachronistic female Goth Chinese general, etc.

THE DICTATOR - Sacha Baron Cohen steps away from his "mockumentary" approach of his past films, Borat and Bruno, and the result is quite mixed - Some very big laughs scattered throughout, surrounded by long periods of middling disappointment, where the movie repeats the same jokes over and over, or uses unfunny gross out humor (a woman with arm pit hair).

Cohen plays Aladeen, the cruel dictator of the Middle Eastern country of Wadiya. In his spare time, he enjoys executing his enemies (and friends), having sex with Hollywood celebrities, and playing a terrorism simulator on his Wii video game console. In an effort to hide his nuclear ambitions, he makes a visit to America, to try to convince the people that his nuclear reactors are being built for good, instead of for mass destruction. However, he discovers too late that the trip was actually a set up by his scheming Uncle (Ben Kingsley), who wants to replace Aladeen with a dim-witted goat herder look-alike (Cohen again), and start a democracy in their country, so that he can open up oil ties with other countries.

Aladeen has his beard shaved off, so no one recognizes him as the dictator. Homeless and alone in New York, he befriends a feminist who runs an organic food store (Anna Faris), and must adjust to life as a poor imigrant working in her store, while he plots to find a way to stop his Uncle's plans, so that he can continue oppressing his people.

The Dictator does have some very big laughs (especially during the first 10 minutes, where we tour his country and learn about his rule), but they are surrounded by long stretches that just aren't as funny. Likewise, the movie's attempts at shock humor come across as desperate, rather than, well, shocking. I can picture a very smart and sharp satire being made out of this idea, but the movie is often played broadly, almost like a live action cartoon at times.

The movie also smacks of being heavily edited and tampered with. this is evidenced by the fact that the running time barely hits 80 minutes, there are a number of deleted and alternate scenes played during the end credits, and some jokes from the trailer did not make it to the final film.

Definitely not a bad movie, but one that could have and should have been a lot better.

Full review to come either tonight or tomorrow.

yeah, but these are MAINSTREAM critics. Expecting them to recognise anyone who isn't regularly in American movies/TV is unreasonable. Thus; respected actor Daniel Wu is no substitute for ZOMG KHLOE KARDASHIAN!

Just one of the reasons I think, by and large, critics are a shower of c**ts.