Throwback Thursday: Ghost in the Shell (1995)

Runtime: 1hr 23min

Director: Mamoru Oshii

Release Date: 8th December 1995

Rating: 15 (UK), R (US)

After the release of the new Ghost in the Shell, today's Throwback Thursday takes on the original movie, and what my thoughts are on how it may have aged over time.

Image Source

Having never watched Ghost in the Shell (1995) before, I luckily managed to go into the movie with a completely clear opinion, untainted by any other judgement than the "8/10" that imdb users have deemed the film as deserving. What I found was a slightly over-hyped yet interesting film which was completely unique to anything I had seen before.

The movie's plot follows Motoko Kusanagi, a heavily augmented "section 9" officer who in the year of 2029 must attempt to stop "The Puppetmaster", a hacker capable of hacking into the minds of the augmented and turning them into political assassins. 

Not many films require much of a learning curve to get the gist of the plot like Ghost in the Shell (1995), which, while different to over-explained and obvious western films of today, is also a disadvantage since viewers may be unable to determine what is happening as they watch. 

The animation does seem a little dated, but the style gives the movie a coat of authenticity (remastered animated movies can look unnatural), and the voice cast had tendencies to turn monotone at times (yes, I watched/listened to the English dub), but the film did make up for this with its' interesting story.

The film doesn't spend a large amount of time to ensure the viewer is maintaining an understanding of the plot, and with the dialogue not serving much more purpose than to build character for the main two roles, the only real explanation given is the environment these characters are surrounded by - the presence of cyborgs with cybernetic advancements is never explained as such, but is simply a norm in the world; the trade-off for a lack of explanation is an immersion environment and this was arguably the right choice. 

As the film comes to a close, the climax is long awaited yet the ending is open-ended and offers little closure to the whole point of the movie. Ghost in the Shell (1995) does strive to be different sometimes even to the detriment of its' own storyline. 

6.5/10

Monthly Movie Merch

Here is my round-up of this months best movie merchandise..

..every boys' childhood dream of being a Power Ranger can now be realised with this epic Dragon Dagger Mini Kit from none other than Forbidden Planet! Just £7.99, it also comes with a quote book and some Power Rangers artwork - not a product to be missed. It's Morphin time!

..keeping up with the Disney hype, this cute Beauty & the Beast boxed vintage mug (£9.99) from Truffle Shuffle is great to add to the collection!

..Easter is but weeks away, so of course I had to include this fun Marvel Comics Milk Chocolate Easter Egg set (£13.99). Comes with some pretty cool Marvel character ear phones - a great Easter gift box for a superhero-lover.

..no Monthly Movie Merch would be complete without the inclusion of a Funko Pop; this months' choice is this kinda crazy-looking Kong: Skull Island King Kong figure - an interesting addition to this much-anticipated flick (£14.99).

..Red Bubble always have some great movie t-shirts for sale - this Ghost in the Shell tee is no exception! Just £17.40, it comes in various colours and sizes to suit all, and its' simplistic design doesn't make it merely look like tacky merch.

..why not prepare for Fast & Furious 8 with an incredibly long movie-night?! Get the full action-packed collection (movies 1 to 7) in this cool boxset for just £14.99.

He Said, She Said: Beauty & the Beast Review

Runtime: 2hr 9min

Director: Bill Condon

Release Date: 17th March 2017

Rating: PG (UK), PG (US)

Guest writer Natasha and I share our thoughts on this Disney classic turned live-action fairytale, starring Emma Watson and Dan Stevens.

Image Source

Plot Summary

We all know the story - a shallow Prince is cursed by an enchantress, leading to him taking captor beautiful book-worm Belle many years later. Add in an ensemble of talking furniture, a handsome 'hero' to come to Belle's rescue, and a village of idiots, and you have yourself a movie that implies it teaches you that beauty is more than just skin-deep, it is about what lies within. Taken from the original animated classic (which itself came from an 18th century fairy-tale), Beauty & the Beast is the latest live-action remake of old fairy stories.

He Said...

I was so very ready to tear this film apart! A reboot of a classic - a common Hollywood cash-grab tactic - and it's starring the rather mediocre Emma Watson. I honestly believed this was going to be literally terrible, but I was pleasantly surprised by the talents of the supporting cast and the cinematography especially, with great music performance and wonderful direction, I clearly underestimated this flick. There was a specific scene where Belle walks and sings upon a hill in a blue dress; looking exactly like a Sound of Music rip-off, and plenty of the film was essentially a copy of the original - but this was a far better decision than going in a completely different direction. The film acts more as a homage to the original than a brand new take on the story, so the movie is simply a spectacle-added version of the beloved original Disney cartoon. The drawback to this is that a lack of originality can always be criticised, yet I can't see any other direction they could have taken the film - meaning it was doomed to be either slightly good or terrible from the start, it's just a relief this movie was in the slightly good category - the music had me humming as I left the cinema and the acting (even that of Emma Watson) wasn't half bad either! Overall, I can say I enjoyed the film, and that's the main thing that matters over originality, and I never thought I'd find myself saying that when my expectations were so low.

6.5/10

She Said..
Admittedly, I was prepared for my childhood Disney favourite to disappoint - despite an all-star cast and a tale as old as time, the live-action picture had me eye-rolling from trailer-day. Credit where credit is due, Beauty & the Beast was largely better than I had initially anticipated; magical atmospherics, reminiscent music and (at times) some brilliant acting (with particular nod to the supporting cast). However, I can't help but feel its' try-hard attempt at cinematic masterpiece fell short in spite of itself. The direction and choreography, while would have been seriously fantastic for a West End theatre production, did not translate nearly as well onto big screen. And while I'm all for writers prerogative, the certain elements of the story that were so unnecessarily changed made me kind of mad. Adding to my picture peeves, the 'real-life' furniture was aesthetically odd, Dan Stevens was almost forgotten about despite having the title-role, and Emma Thompson (who can all-too-often do no wrong in my eyes) really over-did it with her whole 'Eliza Doolittle' cockney accent. On the flip side, Emma Watson (who I find a bit hit or miss) shattered my misconceptions to deliver a rather wonderful depiction. Overall fairly good throughout - if slightly unremarkable. Fancy a watch anyway? Be my guest.

6.5/10

Review: Viceroy's House

Runtime: 1hr 46min
Director: Gurinda Chadha
Release Date: 3rd March 2017
Rating: 12A (UK) TBC (US)

It is a rare thing to be able to compliment a British historical drama on not showing a rose-tinted version of events - Viceroy's House deploys experienced acting and environmental charm to paint a harsh and realistic picture of events.

Image Source

From the trailer, Viceroy's House really did look like a comedy, rather than the drama it is supposed to be. It is lucky that the film did not go down this route; the partition of India caused displacement of millions, and hundreds of thousands of deaths, thus making a mockery out of this would not be the best move. 

There are some humourous moments attempted, some of which are successful, but these do not flow well into the rest of the film as well as one might think when taking the trailer into consideration. There are many inconsistent jumps between humourous and tragic moments throughout, with Lord Mountbatten (Hugh Bonneville) making wise cracks about the country he's supposed to be ruling, jumping to the news of a religious-incited riot in Calcutta, for example. 

Bonneville's role is perfect for his typecast, which isn't exactly a compliment since he essentially put no effort into the character; Gillian Anderson's accent as Lady Mountbatten was rather forced, and the inclusion of Jeet (Manish Dayal) and Aalia (Huma Qureshi) felt shoehorned in, and was missing key potential scenes to give their story depth. The acting overall was mediocre at best, and I did not find myself rooting for the love-story protagonists.

The movie's setting and environment was fantastic, costume design and atmosphere was near perfect as a whole, which is the greatest compliment I can give to this film; where the story and acting quality fall short of good or great, the ambiance was wonderful, and when the movie turns towards its' harsher side, the environment does still match the tone, with a crowded and dangerous atmosphere to counter-act the beautiful and picturesque scenes earlier in the film.

Image Source

The movie did seem to keep true to actual events, it is not like a British historical drama to manage to not paint Winston Churchill as a God among men. It is a shame there wasn't enough focus on the actual historical events, and concentrated on a half-finished love story during the progression of the movie.

There are some moments in the film where the characters are imposed into real footage and it looks terrible, but the cinematography is mostly acceptable - and that's what I can only describe the film as overall, simply acceptable; not terrible, but not great either.

5.5/10

Review: Toni Erdmann

Runtime: 2hr 42min
Director: Maren Ade
Release Date: 3rd February 2017
Rating: 15 (UK), R (US)

This Oscar-nominated German comedy may have gained favour amongst others, but failed to leave me captivated through its' depiction of politics, pranks and dysfunctional families.

Image Source

The film views a snapshot of the life of Winfried Conradi - a music teacher and life-long prankster who, upon the death of his beloved canine companion, decides to visit his estranged daughter (Ines Conradi, played by Sandra Hüller) in Bucharest for her birthday.. leading to her horror as an alter-ego - 'Toni Erdmann' - begins causing a nuisance at various events as he follows her around (in an attempt to both embarrass and connect with her).

The premise of the film - though not riveting - sounds decent enough; a moving father/daughter tale with some jokes lodged in there. The screenplay, though well-written and humorous at times, came across (perhaps purposefully-) awkward and dull - somewhat lacking in that natural fluidity that many alternative comedies manage to achieve. This could be, in part, due to its' long-winded (almost 3 hour) screen-time (not many pictures can pull that off!).

Sandra Hüller was actually rather good in her role - though I struggled to want to reach her entry to the film as it started so slowly I could happily have nodded off. Once in full swing, Toni Erdmann was actually quite nicely paced, showing well how irritating, over-bearing and infuriating Winfried makes his daughter (bad-dad dancing doesn't cut it!) who, though softens to him toward the closing credits, really doesn't want her father to be a part of her world.

My main compliment here is that it is unashamedly silly whilst contributing some underlining moving, melancholic elements - something popular this season at cinemas (think Manchester by the Sea). Dutch director, Maren Ade, may well have been caught up in the ridiculousness and satire of her whole creation though - which sometimes worked but at other times were left stale.

Image Source

Some fairly good characters and fairly good dialogue, this tragedy/comedy caught me off guard with its' seemingly-uncharacteristically serious elements - as Ines begins to let down her defences, I felt that so did I.

Though perhaps a controversial opinion, I can't really say I would give Toni Erdmann the time of day again; not a tragic effort but one best left at one time only viewing. Although I appreciate a foreign language film generating a bit of buzz, and liked their attempt at bringing things back to basics, I couldn't vouch for it past 'it's not bad'.

6/10

Movie Marathon Monday: The Fast & the Furious

Fast 8 (The Fate of the Furious) is set to meet our 2017 need for speed; Vin & Dwayne take over our screens once more in the latest instalment out 12th April. As ready as I'll ever be, I decided to take on the task of rewatching the entire franchise of full films before its' impending release.

The Fast & Furious Series

The Fast and the Furious (2001)

2 Fast 2 Furious (2003)

The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift (2006)
Fast & Furious (2009)

Fast Five (2011)
Fast & Furious 6 (2013)
Furious 7 (2015)

Runtime: 13hr 41min

Image Source

Plot

Although each film has its's own individual plot, the basic premise is fast cars, hot women and some beautiful scenery - coupled with plenty of chases, races and law-breaking.

Why watch it?

Get caught up in the beer-drinking, car-racing, mean streets of Los Angeles and beyond. Despite not being the most well-written or aesthetically-pleasing, most of the films within the marathon are largely entertaining if you like turbo-charged thrill-rides combined with a lavish lifestyle (or if you are a Vin Diesel fan: because, let's face it, he makes the movies).

High Points
The first ever drag race in the original movie. Dom's crash (and preceding drag race) in The Fast & the Furious. Dom v Hobbs (Fast Five), and the vault heist. The highway tank action in Fast & Furious 6. 

Low Points
2 Fast 2 Furious - I'm surprised they ever got past this to make it to a third. Aspects of Tokyo Drift. Plenty of terrible cameos.

Fun Fact

The whole premise of the franchise was thought up after an article entitled 'Racer X' was published in 1998, focusing on the illegal street-racing scene.

Review: Kong - Skull Island

Runtime: 1hr 58min
Director: Jordan Vogt-Roberts
Release Date: 9th March 2017
Rating: 12A (UK), PG-13 (US)

Better than expected, a not-too-shabby attempt at yet another (insert eye-roll here) King Kong picture, starring Tom Hiddleston, John C. Reilly and the beloved Samuel L. Jackson.

Image Source

Predominantly set in 1973, the flick follows a purpose-built team of soldiers, scientists and stragglers as they head for the undiscovered Skull Island in search of the unknown. Here they stumble upon a beast trapped on the island known as Kong - a potentially misjudged anti-hero.

Highly-anticipated by many, this sequel was - in my mind - always going to be either a complete masterpiece or bucketful of disappointment. To my surprise(/delight/sadness), it turned out to be neither. Whilst on the most part I would praise its' solid cinematography (some beautiful landscape and action shots), as well as Kongs' expert-use of CGI throughout, these couldn't save it from what appeared to me a watered-down premise with fortune-cookie-cliches being pulled out of a hat and inserted into every appropriate crevice.

The acting standard as a whole is admittedly not bad - I have to give particular nod to Samuel L Jackson for finally producing a well played-out character (seriously, name me a role he's played well since Django Unchained and I'll be a monkey's uncle) - but I can't particularly criticise much of the performances throughout. Toby Kebbell (yes, that guy that's been in everything recently that you never remember the name of) and Brie Larson were probably the most bland - with Tom Hiddleston outshining most of his fellow cast members.

The fight scenes were indeed the most entertaining part - well-timed, well thought-out and, at times, epic! Other than a slight overuse of slow-motion features, and a couple of ridiculous shots, I honestly quite enjoyed seeing not only the fights with Kong himself but the other internal exchanges (no spoilers, I promised!).

Also, entirely blameless of the creators, but yet another movie this season with the insertion of JFK, Vietnam and 60's culture was really not needed (sorry guys!). Despite this, it redeemed itself slightly with some fairly enjoyable music throwbacks. Alongside these were plenty of well-utilised sound-effects and editing that I found rather enjoyable (a complete renunciation from the script).

Image Source

I was pleasantly surprised to find Kong: Skull Island didn't leave me wanting 2 hours of my life back; that said, given the choice I wouldn't waste another two rewatching it. Okay to pass the time, Kong exists. If you're after something more worthwhile, perhaps skip this and shove on Predator (terribly brilliant) or Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus (brilliantly terrible).

6/10

Review: Fences

Runtime: 2hr 19min
Director: Denzel Washington
Release Date: 10th February 2017
Rating: 12A (UK), PG-13 (USA)

Style really does take priority over substance for Denzels' one-man-band; a whole lot of fuss for a film quite ordinary.

Image Source

Fences in many ways mimics a 1989 film, Do the Right Thing, which essentially tells a tale of life, with no intentions to over-dramatise or show a Hollywood filter over events. The idea of Fences is paved with good intentions - it is not a cash-grab like past Denzel Washington movies have been, and the plot does flow at a consistent rate. That consistent rate in question happens to be, however, a sluggishly slow rate.

The movie seems to make a big fuss out of every little event that occurs; the opening of the film is a twenty minute conversation between Troy (Washington), his wife Rose (Viola Davis) and his best friend, Jim Bono (Stephen Henderson), with little context or connection to the rest of the film, with no other purpose than to make the characters appear more relatable - but this scene was far too drawn out to be a Tarantino-esque dialogue masterpiece.

Despite these attempts, Troy is not a relatable character at all either, in fact most of the decisions he makes throughout the movie are completely unreasonable and yet as the main character he is painted out to be the moral authority. The idea of excusing him for his actions simply because he is from a troubled background with many difficult situations to deal with at once, is not how the movie should deal with his character. A character can only be excused for their unrelatable actions if their reasons for their actions are relatable, which in this case, they are not. 

Troy was played well  by Washington, and most actors did a great job as a whole. Viola Davis was excellent in her role, and was essentially perfectly cast; Cory (Jovan Adepo) was good as Troy and Rose's son, attempting to impress his father constantly, and the emotions he conveyed whenever Troy would do something he disagreed with were authentic and natural as a performance.

The problem Fences has is that it doesn't really go anywhere. The film has great actors, and environment for those characters to be in, but no opportunity to make a fantastic film out of a worthy script, which has some lines which even repeat during the movie.

Image Source

Fences does not really have a premise, there isn't a moral of the story and it appears like the film was put together as an idea before the script was even written to be able to simulate 'real life' action and conversation, but there was no need for all of this self-celebratory pretentious style which made the movie irritating to watch.

I never found myself engrossed in the plot at all, and I couldn't recommend this since I barely found myself caring about how events would unfold or what would happen to the characters.

5.5/10

Review: The Great Wall

Runtime: 1hr 43min
Director: Yimou Zhang
Release Date: 17th February 2017
Rating: 12A (UK), PG-13 (US)

An attempt at a bombastic creature-feature resulting in a pathetic excuse for a film, with little bother for pacing or any form of decent storytelling, The Great Wall does not keep up with modern-day CGI or acting quality in the slightest.

Basing a movie around one type of enemy; that being one creature in this film, is entirely dependent on whether that monster poses a threat to the protagonists at all. Creating a creature which appears threatening or terrifying is not a simple task, the likes of a huge franchise like Alien took an entire movie to build the Xenomorph into the icon it is today - and The Great Wall does not manage this. At all. 

The reptilians that are known as the Tao Tei in the film are not threatening at all, their presence in the film is so prolific, they behave more like rodents rather than any form of adversary for the protagonists. The first attack upon the wall is within the first 30 minutes from tens of thousands of the Tao Tei (so this isn't a spoiler at all), and they all simply retreat because Matt Damon manages to kill one of the beasts, despite the fact it appears as if they are beating the humans.

The greatest threat to the Nameless Order (the army and defenders of the Great Wall) is Ballard (Willem Dafoe), who is only interested in deserting the wall to save his own life, and that seems to be conveyed as the worst crime anyone could ever commit and is worth far more focus and screentime than any monster that could be a 'real' threat.

The acting and character writing in the film is on par with films like Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones or Star Trek: Nemesis. Matt Damon and Pedro Pascal's characters are supposed to be best of friends even if they seem to disagree with each other consistently throughout the film on whether it is worth staying to defend the wall with the Nameless Order, which implies that William (Matt Damon's Character) believes that his contribution among an army of tens of thousands will make a measurable difference.

The only decent performance is that of Willem Dafoe, who does the best job he can with what role he has been given - which honestly isn't a great deal. The portrayal of General Lin (Tian Jing) is not unique at all, and Matt Damon didn't really play a character at all. Ideally, the film would have had a main character with some form of relationship with any other character and would show some actual emotion rather than murdering monsters and pretending to do the 'honourable' thing by staying and fighting them, all whilst being praised as a hero for literally managing to kill one beast alone.

The truth is that this movie does not make sense, the ending is as unsatisfying as anything that came before it, and the only parts of the movie that look visually impressive in the slightest are the shots of the wall from afar, which are plentiful by the end of the film. There is some obsession with using slow motion to a ridiculous extent mid-action to the point that it is jarring to watch at times in this movie, and the pacing is so basic that the film is repetitive by the end and it's only just over 90 minutes long!

 

To spend this much money on creating a movie like this is basically laughable, and the intent to blend Eastern and Western film isn't a success here at all; purely an eastern-influenced, poor-quality Hollywood picture. I'm certain it is very much possible to merge influences from genres and cultures both east and west, but this pitiful film certainly feels forced.

I could not recommend this laughably-rushed movie to anyone, and frankly I wouldn't watch it again if you paid me. Essentially a boring, badly-delivered joke with barely enough substance to even call itself a movie.

 1.5/10

Review: The Founder

Runtime: 1hr 55min
Director: John Lee Hancock
Release Date: 17th February 2017
Rating: 12A (UK), PG-13 (USA)

Despite high quality performances among seasoned acting veterans, The Founder is a missed opportunity in biographical cinema.

Image Source

The Founder is a movie which tells a story of the creation of the McDonald's restaurant chain and how it came to be, following Ray Kroc (Michael Keaton) and his acquisition of the brand from the McDonald brothers (John Carroll Lynch & Nick Offerman).

What this movie holds to its' advantage is that the portrayals of the main characters do not water down their personalities, Ray Kroc is shown to be opportunistic and devious without apology; Dick McDonald is calculating and uptight, and Mac McDonald is conveyed as too forgiving. The screenplay for these characters played to the actor's talents; Nick Offerman was particularly entertaining in his role, but the main cast's performances could not save this semi-biographical script.

The movie has some interesting cinematography, one particular scene has the McDonald brothers explaining the creation of their restaurant, with cutaway shots going through the events being explained whilst simultaneously being described by the brothers; not to mention that they finish off each other's sentences in a slick manner. All of this adds to an alluring start, but really its' all just style over substance.

Besides the atypical camerawork and skillful performances, The Founder does not have much left to offer. The way the story flows is far from perfect, focussing on Kroc much more than necessary which pushed aside the credible supporting cast, which could have likely told a more accurate plot with greater inclusion of the McDonald brothers. 

The movie suffers from being in the middle ground, not taking enough risks to be credible as a great movie, but playing it safe enough so that the film isn't terrible either. There is not much that can even be said about The Founder other than that it has interesting moments and good acting, but I could never say that I didn't find my attention wavering during the picture.

The trailer of the movie does give away most of the important events during the film, I left the cinema getting exactly what I expected; a mediocre-to-good biopic with decent costume design for the era, and not a great focus on attention to detail or actually making the film more interesting than the bare minimum.

Image Source

If I was asked if I could recommend this film, I would only be able to do so if you're interested in biographical movies as a whole; the movie does project the characters in a realistic light but the story that they are placed in is far from perfect or interesting.

The Founder hired the right people for the acting jobs, but from the man who directed acclaimed biographical drama The Blind Side, this could have been much more than just a vanilla motion picture.

6/10