Sunday, August 30, 2015

Fan4tastic Review

So, before I get into the review of the new Fantastic Four, I'm going to talk about a couple of things. First, the theater is empty, so this is going to be a new kind of review, one where I type my thoughts out while the film is playing. Dude at the counter told me I was the only one who had bought a ticket. I went back home and got my laptop.

Okay, so the movie starts out talking about Eli Manning. I can only assume that it is Ben Grimm. Not a bad tactic to get all of the football fans to love your movie, which we know they didn't, nobody did. So as the opening credits are playing, we see a young Reed Richards walking toward the front of the class which is hosted by... holy fuck it's Dan Castellaneta, the guy who voices Homer Simpson. Wait, don't you have to bring your parents with you to Career Day? Shit, I ain't writing this shit fast enough... Fantasticar! Also, that squinty eyed kid in the back is probably the Eli Manning kid, which means he's probably Ben. Yeah, he's Ben, but he's not the Eli Manning kid? Fuck Eli Manning. So Ben's brother does say "It's clobbering time"... lol. Ah shit, Reed's a thief, which means he and Ben will fall in love until Sue drives them apart and Ben falls for Johnny! The Fagtastic Four! I'm sorry, I couldn't resist. Anyways, at this point, the film is completely fine, nothing really wrong with it. Okay, so they're going to teleport, something, missed what it was because I was typing for you! Ah, it was a car! Now, just saying, if that kid at the beginning was talking about Eli Manning, why does Reed have a Super Nintendo? Why not a PS3/4 or hell, even a 2? Is his dad that cheap? And the dad's a dick too. When Reed says "NOW!" and Ben goes "HOOOOOH!". Wait, seven years later? Is Miles Teller playing a 14 year old? No way that kid was 13, maybe 10/11? So, Reed is 17/18 as played by Miles Teller? I'm feeling like Ben with this continuity: "HOOOOH!".

Okay, so they're still in high school... 5th grade... I can work this out... 17? 17! Maybe 16? But 17! Wait, wait, wait? Reed you launched the beta before the fucking alpha? Wait, Ben didn't bring the fucking car? What the fuck Ben? Also, Reed got disqualified for magic? Well, Criss Angel's on your side Reed! That kid calls him a dick? You got to watch some free Criss Angel! Fuck you kid! Also, black guy inbound. Reg E. Cathey and The Wire isn't on? Should I care? Also, hey Kate Mara! Woah Reg, way to just lay your life story on Reed. Okay, he was just talking about his own job (why should anyone care, in film, not the audience) and why is Ben still chewing and staring at Reg? Okay, how about those two introduce themselves to Reed and Ben before handing them random rocks? So, he tells where he's from, his daughter's name and hands Reed a fucking scholarship and doesn't give a fuck about Ben. Wait, though. He DOESN'T GIVE HIS FUCKING NAME! Hey New York, I guess Ben's all pissed now that Reed got the scholarship and he got jack shit, BECAUSE SINCE WHEN IS MECHANICS A PART OF ENGINEERING? Baxter Building looks cool. Did Reed make a forever gum for Ben or does he just take different strips all the time? Okay, no fucking scholarship for Ben confirmed! Why did he hold all of Reed's bags? To give him a swiss knife? Reed's an asshole. Did Kate Mara just get more blonde? Is she playing a 17 year old too? Isn't she like 35? Wow, Reed is awkward. Also, Sue and I have similar thoughts on music, except I analyze it through mathematics because fuck that stupid music language. Solresol. Yeah, fuck solresol. New resources? Planet in danger? Does... does... does... this movie take place during an energy crisis? Because as much as the media wants you to believe, we're not in an energy crisis, yet. So if von Doom isn't a hacker, why is he dressed like one? So this von Doom loves Sue as well? Aside from the intro, this movie seems to be just like the last first one. Oh hey Reed, someone supersized your machine! Reed almost created a black hole? It wouldn't have swallowed like some pornstar Sue, it would've crushed. Wait, so we've just explained Victor's entire situation, why do we go through it again? Didn't Victor have longer hair? So Victor's an asshole... hey that's actually great! Reed noooo! Your little accident leads to the Super Mario Bros movie! Don't go there! That was a good speech. Hey another black guy! It's Adonis Creed, I mean Johnny Storm! Johnny's dusting asses? Does he work as a maid? If so, why the car from SuperFast? Oh look, it starts late, he'll probably still win. Oh hey, Johnny Storm pulls a Paul Walker from The Fast & The Furious! Hey, Johnny is related to the first black guy! Perhaps I'd have known that if they gave the first black guy a fucking name! Well, did that one white guy call him Dr. Storm? Yeah, yeah, he did! But still! If I had just gone under that assumption I could've believed he was Johnny and - oh Johnny be in shit from pops! "I'm not wearing a lab coat." Way to stick it to the man Johnny. Shit, Johnny be looking like Drake and be making Hitler jokes. New paragraph, wait, I can make Hitler jokes too:
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/a9/3e/de/a93ede6fbbef495163fd95d3848f5b83.jpg
See, I can use memes too!

I wonder if they'll say flame retardant or opt out for the more used resistant? Personally I prefer retardant and given that this movie is critic retardant I feel like they should use it. Also, Johnny said shit, they must say retardant! Very well done soundtrack during this scene where they're all working though. Very well done. Fuck you solresol or whatever the fuck it is. Hey Reed is bonding with Victor and they're eating takeout! Oh, and the power of montages brings Johnny into the mix as well! Michael B. Jordan is a great actor, though. Oh, and look, they cut from the montage to explain him coming into the mix to cut to another montage! FUCK YOU KINBERG! Also, fuck montages no matter how good the music. Kind of funny because I only make montages. Never mind. I love montages, I just don't love when they're split like that. It's okay for you to take a nap, Reed, we won't judge you. Hey look, Victor's jealous? Remember in the first film when Sue and Victor were actually pretty much engaged but then they just leaked, like ink, or Kid Ink. Quite being unprofessional Reed you asshole! So where's Ben in the middle of this? Applying for fucking Stony Brook? Reed you asshole! So is Harvey supposed to be a villain or something? Hey look a CGI monkey, that's where the budget went! Normal count? What happened to t-minus? So the monkey is on the Negative Zone, right? Does it become a supervillain too? Oh my God, that monkey lands on an alternate Earth and we get Tim Burton's The Planet of the Apes! "HOOOOH!" Origin of our species? Okay, so is this universe also going through an identity crisis? Aside from religion, Darwin already answered that question Dr. Storm. Hell, aside from being a shitty parent, you're also a shitty scientist. Awkward fist bump-pat-shake. Doom is an asshole, but that's supposed to be expected. So far, Kebbell's Dr. Doom isn't bad. It's not the crown prince of whatever country he's from, but he's still not bad. Better than Julian McMahon (FIIIIRED!) so far. Doom claims that the man behind the Apollo missions probably died penniless. Abe Silverstein did not die penniless. Could this be a dig at the way Marvel treated Jack Kriby, you know, the guy who created all of this? They're drunk, can they even comprehend Doom's speech? Now Reed is a stupid drunk, also an asshole. Oh hey Ben, how's Stony Brook, you know, the university you had to go into because you got no credit for helping build the machine that you helped build. Okay, so now Reed gives Ben credit when he wants him to come along... so why didn't Ben, a mechanic, get the fucking scholarship? I'd reckon he knows the machine better than anyone, so why wasn't he there before? I like this idea, though, of them sneaking and taking the mission. What I don't like, is Ben getting no credit at all and Sue not going on the mission. Them being drunk isn't really that big of a deal. The movie has been solid so far. Oh hey Ben, it's a mega version of the machine you helped build with your design just without you this time. Another montage? It's fine, though. As much as I said I didn't like montages I actually do, but just without annoying cuts in the middle of them. In fact, that was a problem of the original movie... that and the fact that the nurse wore a Halloween costume! I think Toby Kebbell would have made a better Thing. Did Kate Mara just get less blonde? It'd be funny if they went to Los Angeles and woke up to find themselves at Bryan Singer's pool parties. Nope, they're on another planet. CGI isn't as bad as people say. Did Doom just joygasm?  "Hey Victor come see this" "Energy is coming from there", not even a "no". Vic you just ignored him completely! Why didn't Jamie Bell change his accent for the role? Victor, energy cannot be alive. Energy is merely power, and thus measured in watts or joules/seconds. Way to piss the planet of Victor. Wow, what happened to Victor does make you feel bad, especially because at this point the movie has been done well. Consensus at this point: Although it has a few mistakes, mostly regarding Ben Grimm and Dr. ? Storm, Fant4astic is a decently done film up until the point Victor falls in green energy. Wait, so the exploding computer gives Sue her powers? So Ben gets pummeled by rocks and Johnny by fire, how does the computer change Sue? ex Machina that's why. This scene has very bad lighting. So Ben is now just a big cocoon? Area 57? Location Classified? It's a movie, just tell us where it is? And why 57? Did somebody accidentally hit the 7 instead of the 1? That's gross. Their survival in the last movie always confounded me. Those last two weren't bad movies, it's just they had the pleasure of being adapted from a comic book. After stuff like X2: X-Men United that Marvel bar was set very high, Tim Story had no chance. That voice isn't bad, but it's not what I expected. Reed leaving is pretty sad. Good movie so far, I'll say it again. Reed leaving Ben like that really hammers it in that he is an asshole. 1 year later? What the fuck? I knew this would happen, just not that abruptly... that feels very, very, very... awkward. I'll just assume this is where it all goes to hell and next paragraph.

Now, narration over a montage in a computer screen? No, I'd rather actually see time pass while these guys learn their powers. One year later was very bad. Johnny Storm flying seems oddly placed and that there could be better ways to show off his powers. See, we didn't need to see their powers in a video if we were just going to see it here again. We should've just seen their powers being used in, I guess a The Lion King-esque, sequence to show time pass. That would have been more appropriate. Either that or they all escape together and show a time lapse of their powers in eluding the military. Still not a bad film, but it's definitely not a good one either now. From a B film it has gone to C+. Now see, did the colour of the Human Torch's skin really matter if he was going to be orange regardless? Why show Ben if your just going to show us how many he has killed? Holy fuck they just told us his first name? It's Franklin! HEEYYY IT'S FRAAANKLIN! Did Kate Mara just get way more blonde again? Like total blonde. The problem with a film based off of Fantastic Four is you have to start at the origin, but if you do that, then you have to develop four leads, not just one. You can't choose one like Singer did Wolverine for X-Men, all need to be equals. Kate Mara just got less blonde. Also, once you've done that, sure you've built up a good story and all, but it has taken time and you've made something boring so far. So you can insert bits of action here and there but it will not all make sense. So you insert a villain. The thing is, not all Fantastic Four villains are good and those that are usually have intrinsic history with the team so you need to develop that as well. There is too much material for a film. Maybe an HBO show could work. Okay, so Reed can change his face like that? That's actually a good idea. Reed's homemade suit looks better than the professional ones. I get the cure for Ben, but I never actually get why these guys wanted cures. Superpowers are awesome! So Reed is going back, I feel like this is going to be a dropped subplot. Captain Nemo? Is there some symbolism behind that? I don't feel it and I've read The Mysterious Island and being Indian myself, I feel I would know. Anyways, misdirected symbolism. This is a pretty cool action sequence now. Started to feel reminiscent of the very first comic. That headbutt. What the fuck? No seriously, what the fuck was that? Holy fuck, no, the time lapse made this a 70% movie from an 80% one. That single headbutt makes this 55 % now. Ben's voice isn't that bad now, it sounded worse before, but, it's not too bad. Is it even Jaime Bell now, though? I mean aside from the mo-cap. Ben is completely justified in his actions. Is that single pod abandoned? Why even show it? You could have explained it later. Honestly, I have no doubt that if this movie had at least thirty more minutes after one year later to better flesh out the characters, this movie would have been much better. Oh, and no headbutt. That shit shouldn't even hurt a man made of rubber. "This is your chance" - fuck off Sue. Hey, as if we didn't see this thing before. "Made it ugly?" - really dude, that's an asshole thing to say. Source code? Did you write in C#, that's what I write in. Hey, it's a white Franklin Storm! So Johnny only just found out Reed is back. I feel like Trank could have made an amazing movie from the footage he shot, but just from pressure failed. I know what that feels like, but he is the director. He should own up and admit that this is his fault. Another launch and what are they doing? Okay, so different scientists are out there now. You can simply say that the landscape is now orange instead of green. Now, here is the thing. The director makes the movie. The studio can interfere but that is their right, this is their movie, it is simply the director who is making it. A man can commission a bridge, but only the engineer can make it work. The commissioner can change - hey Victor looks like a classic Dr. Doom! - what he wants in the bridge and the engineer should accommodate. The commissioner shouldn't make these changes halfway through, though, but if he does, the engineer accommodates. Yet they should make their plan beforehand and stick to that, as a show of faith so that the engineer does not get frustrated and make the bridge so everyone dies. Okay, if Ben thought he was ugly he should look at Doom and think: "Yeah, I got off lucky". I feel that the spacesuit should have just fused with his face, because I don't think he had body scarring. Why don't his lips move? Cool voice, though, Kebbell does great voices. Okay, this entire sequence is - he has telekinesis - shoddy. He just goes insane after they strap him up? Why not have him kill the astronauts who went to Planet Zero and come in guns ablaze instead of coming in, lying down and then doing this. The film feel incredibly rushed at this point. Doom's massacre moves this film up to 57 % though because this is fairly cool right now. I think Kebbell will do a great job in Kong: Skull Island. Oh hey Reed, running away again? Holy fuck Ben just said what I typed! 58 % for that boys! Oh hey Johnny, how about you look before you strike. Oh Dr. Storm's going to die. You're not a God Franklin, but Victor is. Earth is dying? But Franklin's dead. See, this is the thing, is this Earth slightly dystopian? Is there a resources problem. This has been hinted at several times, but never elaborated on. There is a severe lack of information. And Johnny bounced off the portal. This lack of information puts this down to 52 % because DC You. Portal ex machina. Yeah, no shit Reed, pulled your asshole ass in too. This is some fairly good CGI right now, but these guys aren't a team. They literally just reunited like three hours ago. There has only been interaction between Reed and Ben, Reed and Sue & Johnny and Sue. There should be hefty interaction between all four to make this work. Doom ripping trees right now and not having a fleshed out character can be easily summed up to villain ex machina, Marvel has gotten away with it several times. Just by focusing on the four, they could have had a sequel where they properly explored Doom even though they leave him mostly stock in this one. Hey Sue, cause that blast didn't work before, try it again, right? This action sequence isn't bad, but doesn't work right with the pacing of this film. "Why do we fall, Master Reed? So we can pick ourselves up again.". Okay, so Reed just beat him? Four great actors, one incredibly rushed movie. Hey, Victor knows how to pick himself up too! How does any of this hurt Reed? He's made out of rubber now! Way to channel that childhood anger Ben, you just killed another man, this time by disintegration. Wait? It's done? That's all it took? Johnny's contribution was meaningless and they just created a crater. Why not give these guys the Baxter Building? What is this cabin the woods? Who's this old guy? Central City, that's from the old comics I read from the library. Say that again? Go fuck yourself.

Okay, it's over. Honestly, the main problem with this movie, is that it tries to follow a strange three act narrative that doesn't work. Like I said, because of this, the lack of information is severe. There is no real theme present. It is constantly shifting. There should be more information. Why is Earth dying? There needed to be at least thirty minutes more in this film to see the characters develop. The only team interaction we really see beyond a fight scene is that last minute when they are deciding the name. That last scene is what the thirty minutes in this film should have been like. It goes from point A to C while missing B. This could have been a good film, not great, but good and entitled to a sequel. Now, though... no. Like I said, 52 % is what this gets from me.

Thursday, August 6, 2015

Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation Review

I want to watch Fant4stic, I had high hopes for it and expected that it would probably be good. Yet it seems like every MCU fanboy's dream of the movie bombing spectacularly everywhere but the box office, where I still expect it will do well, has come true. I wanted the film to do good just so those guys would be disappointed. Yet I still want to watch it. After the first batch of reviews, which sucked, came out I began to feel fearful for other movies. Of course, Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation quickly restored my faith in cinema, but more on that later. Every supposed report from an insider that the film was in trouble seems to have been true to a degree. Yet the worst part, the reviews indicate great acting and amazing first act as well. Apparently, though, the short runtime makes it so that the second act is so mangled that the third act cannot breathe and ruins what we thought of the first act. Yeah, but I still want to see it. Yet it scared me about backstage reports. Remember when people were saying that Tobey Maguire might win an Oscar for Pawn Sacrifice, I was excited. Except a new backstage report from an insider is saying that apparently he was too method in his acting and that the rough cut was horrible. It cites Star Magazine for this but doesn't include the link. Also, remember, this film was finished for a while, it's just that the price they were selling it to distributors was too high or something. It has several good reviews already out and only one negative. Could mean something, could be nothing. Hopefully it is nothing, because that movie seems fantastic, but we all know what that means. Oh, and it says Maguire was an asshole on set, but I thought we all knew that.

Now, on to the review. It has been a long time since I saw a film in the Mission: Impossible series. I remember a little bit of the third one, the beginning, you know, where that chick dies, her funeral and Ethan Hunt dumping ice or something. The rest is a blur. I remember a diner scene in the first one. I don't remember the second one and for some reason, all I remember of the last one is the prison escape scene in the beginning. I remember them all being fairly good, though and reading that Tom Cruise nearly killed himself filming this. So I was expecting this to be good as well.

Yeah, it was good. We get great acting from Tom Cruise, but do we really expect any less? We get great acting from everyone but the villain. Sean Harris has a horrible whiney weasley voice in this that just throws his character off. It would be best if he spoke much less than he did, because he does have a presence, which he eradicates every time he talks. Now, director Chirstopher McQuarrie has not directed much, but check out his films he has worked with Tom Cruise a lot. This film, Jack Reacher, Valkyrie and the Edge of Tomorrow. So understandably we know that the direction is going to be great because of the clear chemistry between the director and the lead actor. Here is the thing, though. This movie is great because it hits every beat we expect it to hit. The good guy is disavowed, but his former employers cannot catch him. His former friend calls in another friend to help him and they have an "if you're lying" moment. Heroine offers to run away with the hero. Good guy's friend seemingly leaves him and betrays him to try and help him only for it to be a ruse. There are a lot of cliches in this film, but they all work. Why? We expect them to happen, which is why they usually don't happen, or the producers try to circumvent them with some stupid plan. No, having this cliches happen actually ties into the film's theme and that is great. This movie is great, watch it.

8/10 - watch this film over Fant4astic, but I still want to watch that movie even though I have now seen what it should have been.