Movie Reviews!!

"The Animatrix"

After seeing the trailers for "The Animatrix" on my "Matrix Reloaded" soundtrack I decided I must get this DVD. It is well worth the purchase. My absolutely only disappointment was that the menu interface was nothing like the website or any other of the "Matrix" series promotional materials.

I will give a brief comment on each of the nine mini films on the disk. Each deserves their own little slot, because they are all very good cinema.

Final Flight of the Osiris

This is the film that sets up "Matrix Reloaded." The Osiris is the ship that discovered the Sentinel army. If you hadn't figured it out, the ship never makes it back to Zion. The film is done in absolutely beautiful CG animation and begins with what has got to be the sexiest sword fight ever (above). The ending? If you're really sensitive at movies, you'll cry.

The Second Renaissance Parts I & II

These are done like a documentary from the Zion library. They were really disturbing in the classical anime style. Lots of violence and blood and just disturbing scenes. If you're squeamish, you probably don't want to watch. However, it tells you EXACTLY what happened when the machines revolted. I can understand why they did, but their retaliation chills me. There were points until then when I almost felt sorry for the machines. Almost.

Kid's Story

Wondered what was up with that random kid who followed Neo around like a puppy dog in Zion? This explains it. And, it's a mind blower. The animation is the jumpy/sketchy kind, not my favorite, but the story is well worth sitting through. If Neo weren't already the one, I'd have laid my bets on Kid. And his skateboarding rocked!

Program

Absolutely beautiful. And disturbing. I had wondered what medieval Japan had to do with the Matrix, but it was a simulation. And the psychological parts of this are just not fair. I don't blame her for how she reacted. I would have punched him, too.

World Record

Upsetting. This was one of those where the Agents win at the expense of an extraordinary person. I left this one not able to decide if I wanted him to wake up or not. He was probably better off not waking. Probably. And it had one of those typical anime endings where you leave the film thinking, "What just happened?"

Beyond

A fun little one that takes place entirely in the Matrix. There is a house that is a 'glitch.' Everyone thinks it's haunted, but it's just an amazing and magical place that a bunch of kids discover. They have such genuine wonder and joy in it. And then the agents move in. So sad.

A Detective Story

Very "Cowboy Bebop" styled. A detective is hired to find Trinity. He does a pretty good job, too. Just too bad that the Agents got him first and he was bugged. I just thought it was really cool to see Trinity animated. I like Trinity, can you tell?

Matriculated

This one was a lot of the animators showing off. Beautifully done. Through an odd combination of play, puzzles and flirting, a group of humans are giving machines personalities and convincing them to join their side. The end is so sad, though. I never thought I'd feel sorry for a machine. not after "Second Renaissance"

"Chicago"

"Chicago" is a definite must see!!! Catherine Zeta Jones, Renee Zellweger, and Ricahrd Gere are ALL amazing, and it's quite rare that I like the entire cast for a movie. As a student of theatre, I am particularly thrilled at the way in which the song and dance numbers were portrayed. There was no attempt to hide the fact that these were entirely out of place in the somber and serious situations. Each one was a full out, not shots pulled, show stopping number done with all the theatricality you could wish. As much as I usually love Catherine Zeta Jones, Richard Gere's performance far outshines hers. He is just, so obviously enjoying playing his character, and did an excellent job. However, Best performance in my opinion goes to Queen Latifah as "Mama." That role had the possibility of being very flat and relatively uninteresting, but I found myself sitting up and paying closer attention whenever "Mama" came on the screen. She was that intriguing. And her number, "When You're Good to Mama, Mama's Good to You" was beyond amazing. "Yes!" for big, sexy women! This movie is VERY worth seeing. Go, see it. NOW! what are you doing still sitting here? Go!

"The Emperor's New Groove"

"The Hunchback of Notre Dame"

In the category of animation, and now owned on DVD (yay) is Disney's "The Hunchback of Notre Dame." This is one of me favorite Disney Animations of all time. I love the character of Esmerelda (Demi Moore), and am quite like her. She takes on and wins a fight against ten of the city guard! Of course, that's the coolest thing she does all movie....
Now, the movie is based only very loosely on the Victor Hugo novel. Esmerelda is a much more sympathetic character, Quasimodo is not deaf, and Frollo is a Judge rather than a churchman. Spoiler: No one dies in the end (who doesn't deserve it) And it's been a while since I read it, but I don't think the estemable Mr. Hugo had talking gargoyles in his novel, either.
The art of animation was very high in this Disney film. My favorite scenes as far as the animation goes are the final Battle and the song "Hellfire." The flames? Are so beautifully done! And I think that Esmerelda is actually the Disney woman animated closest to the way real women's bodies are shaped.
Esmerelda as a character is pretty flat. Innocent gypsy woman, wrongly accused and discriminated against, Captain Pheobus (Kevin Kline) is pretty dull, too. Actually he's so boring he kind of pisses me off. Quasimodo has more definition as a character, even comes up with some sarcasm which is welcome from the innocence of Esmerelda and Pheobus. My vote for best character is Clopin (Paul Kandel) the leader of the gypsies. He is at points, kind, cruel, just plain scary, pissed, affectionate, and he's just so damn amusing!
Also, this is not a children's movie!!!!! If your child is younger than ten, don't let them watch it! I know it's Disney, and it's supposed to be relatively wholesome entertainment, but there are moments in the movie that are just plain scary. There's a song, "Hellfire" (my favorite) that is about lust. There's hate and evil and prejudice and really dark stuff. I repeat, not a kids movie. If you're over then, though, go ahead and enjoy! It's really good!

"The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen"

In the category of Action-Adventure-Sci-Fi is "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen" or LXG as it has been shortened. Staring Sean Connery as Allan Quartermain. Big guns, neat characters, odd locations. Sounds fun, right?
Do not go see this movie. I don't care who you are. Whether you know everything about the League and have read all the original source material, you're a big Sean Connery fan or you don't know a thing and don't much care, it doesn't matter. Don't go see the movie. The more you know, the more you'll be disappointed.

Firstly, they changed all the characters. None of them are quite what they were in the Graphic novel and definitely not what they were in the literary sources. This is not a pretty movie. None of the characters with the possible exception of Tom Sawyer (Shane West) are at all sympathetic. And at times they're just downright repugnant. For example, when Mina Harker (Peta Wilson) reveals her true nature as a vampire, we're not talking suave, cool, sexy vampires like we're used to seeing in movies. We're talking evil, out of control, blood all over the face, leaping on necks and terrifying everyone in the room vampires. Victorian vampires, the monsters hiding in a shell of normalcy.

Big boo-boos: The Nautilus captained by Captain Nemo (Naseeruddin Shah) is, by my rough estimation, half the size of Manhattan. It manages to navigate the Thames, the canals of Venice and some river in Asia that leads all the way to Mongolia. What! And Mina is not even supposed to be a vampire. Mr. Hyde (Jason Flemyng) is way too nice. He's still a (slightly) scary jerk, but he's supposed to be a terrifying psychopath. And at the end, there are two fresh graves. I'm not saying who dies (maybe? what was up with that closing shot? That was the worst 'this character might not be dead' scene I've ever seen!) but there were TWO fresh graves where there should only have been one. My only thought is that is was supposed to be that person's already dead relative, but they've been dead for ages. But the movie just didn't make sense anyway, so I don't know why that's bugging me.

High points of the movies (precious few):
Best line: "Vampire lady's got us covered." Allan Quartermain
Best character: Tom Sawyer, who isn't even in the original league.
Best moment: Dorian Gray (Stuart Townsend) just got shot about a million times with a machine gun (yes, machine gun in Victorian London, deal) and doesn't die. Random bad guys says, "What are you?" Dorian stabs him and says, in the most foppish manner imaginable, "I'm complicated."
Best fight: Mina Harker vs. Dorian Gray. Two immortals battling it out. Highlander, anyone?

So, for those of you who would still like to know something about the movie, I would suggest reading (yes, reading, *gasp!* What a novel concept!) the original Victorian source material and then picking up the graphic novel. The entries below even have links to the text online.
Captain Nemo (Naseeruddin Shah) and the Nataulus come from Jules Verne's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. (1870)
Tom Sawyer (Shane West) was of course from Mark Twain's The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. (1876)
The character of Allan Quartermain (Sean Connery) appears in H. Rider Haggard's King Solomon's Mines. (1885)
Henry Jekyll and Edward Hyde (Jason Flemyng) can be found in Robert Louis Stevenson's Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. (1886)
Dorian Gray (Stuart Townsend) con be found in Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray. (1891)
James Moriarty (Richard Roxburgh) (perhaps the most famous villain ever) is from Arthur Conan Doyle's The Final Problem (1893) and his mask and alias allude to Gaston Leroux's The Phantom of the Opera. (1911)
The character of Mina Harker (Peta Wilson) is from Bram Stoker's Dracula. (1897)
The character of Rodney Skinner (Tony Curran) was supposed to be Hawley Griffin from H.G. Wells The Invisible Man. (1897)

"Lilo & Stitch"

"Lilo and Stitch" is a very cute movie, and, for once, a Disney movie where the main thrust isn't a burgeoning romance. This is an excellent fairy tale for the 21st century. Lilo and her sister Nani are a broken family, their parents having died in a car crash some years ago. Nani is the older sister and is trying to play the role of mother. Lilo, her little sister, is a very maladjusted little girl who is desperately lonely and wishes for the nicest angel in heaven to come be her friend. Instead she gets the destructive and dangerous Stitch, an alien genetic experiment programmed to destroy. But being in this broken home begins to have an influence on Stitch, and when the manure hits the rotating blades he uses his "special gifts" to save his new home. Just a warning, Stitch is not as cute and cuddly as the previews make him out to be, at least not at the beginning. But it ends up happily ever after (of course, it's Disney) in a strange way. Let's just say no one's family is as strange as the one Nani and Lilo end up in, though perhaps none are as happy, either! Definitely worth seeing.

"Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring"

"The Matrix: Reloaded"

I've been eagerly awaiting this movie since the first one came out, and, for the most part, I was not disappointed. A few negative things I realized over the course of watching this movie: Keanu Reeves cannot act (but we already knew this), Carrie-Anne moss is not the most beautiful woman in the world (but she is damn sexay in black vinyl!), and there was a bit too much random philosophizing. Aside from that it was pretty much a grand movie. While it was a little tricky to keep track of what was real and what was not, at points, you learned a lot more about Zion and the way it runs, as well as a hell of a lot more about how the Matrix works. The Machines are not in as complete control as you think! I was slightly disappointed that many of the effects that were done with camera tricks and other semi-conventional methods in the first movie were delegated into digital animation in the second. Digital, while very accurate right now, still misses some of the rawness of real human motion. Neo doing his 'superman thing' is one of the most amazing and beautiful things I've ever seen on film and I wish they put more of Neo-vision in the film. It was very interesting. Other really cool visuals: Laurence Fishburne with a katana and kicking ass with it, the evil twins, the fight in the mansion and the end image of the love scene between Trinity and Neo. She ends up completely wrapped around him and it is completely touching. Also, go get the sound track, now. It rocks!
Two final thoughts: Why, after what Neo finds out do they believe what anyone in the Matrix tells them, and what in all holy fuck was that last thing Neo did? ACK. I'm confused!
Oh, and if you hadn't already heard, it ends in a cliffhanger. Guess we'll all have to wait!

Also, the soundtrack kick ass!!! Get it! And there's extra stuff on the second disk. Plug it into your computer and see what I mean. Go on. You afraid the agents will find you?

"The Mummy Returns"

Before I even start, let me state for the record that this is a bad movie. Cinematically, there is nothing redeeming about it. Plotwise, it's too neat. There is no depth to it, whatsoever.
Now that that is out of the way, I can happily say that I love this movie!!! I think it has to do with the relationship between Rick O'Connel (Brendan Fraser) and Evelyn (Rachel Weisz). They've been married for ten years, since the last movie. But they're still very much in love, and its so obvious. And I think they're great parents. As Rick says, Alex (Freddie Boath) is "Smarter than you (Evey) and tougher than me." And it's really true. If I ever have kids, I want them to be like Alex.
Now, as I said, the plot isn't much, but it sets up for some great action scenes and you get to see a lot more of Ardeth Bey (Oded Fehr). He's not quite as cool in this movie as in "The Mummy" but I died laughing and couldn't stop for at least five minutes when he grinned at the camera and said, "This was my first bus ride." What a hottie. And, he can use a sword!
This is really just the ultimate role-players movie. The characters aren't two dimensional, very stereotypical, archetypical, almost. It makes it very easy to love or hate characters. Except at the very end. I actually ended up feeling sorry for Imhotep (Arnold Vosloo). You realize that he didn't start out evil and wanting to destroy (or rule) the world. He was just in love. With the wrong woman. And made some bad choices. Who hasn't done that? I mean, really! Pity that Anck-Su-Namun (Patricia Velazquez) doesn't love him as much as Evelyn loves Rick. Even a little tragic.
So, to sum up this inane rambling (I gotta stop writing these on an empty stomach) it's a bad movie. Know this when you go in, and you'll have a great time. Ignore the fact that it's bad and enjoy the special effects and jokes and cool fight scenes! Six out of ten, redeemed by high production values.

"Pirates of the Caribbean"

"Pirates" is a great adventure ride! Made a damn good movie, too, with lots of memorable quotes, most of them coming from Capt. Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp). The beginning is a little harsh. The attack on Port Royale is very graphic and while there is no blood (we are talking Disney here) there are lots of explosions and burning, screaming and general running around chaos. And the pirates get kinda scary.
While I didn't think that I would like Will Turner (Orlando Bloom) much from the trailers, he is actually a fairly likable character, though I think he angsts over Elizabeth Swan (Keira ?Knightly) and the identity of his father as a pirate too much. I found Captain Sparrow much more appealing. He was a pirate. He knows he's a pirate. He doesn't have a problem with being a pirate. (He's also damn crazy and fucking charismatic as hell!) Will had shades of Star Wars going on ("Luke, I am your father." "Noooooooooooooooooo!") when he found out his dad's chosen profession.
The pirates themselves are quite cool, though we seem to have shades of bad-guy-horde-stupidity going on at times. And the special effects that turn them skeletal are REALLY well done. The transitions in the moonlight and whatnot are very believable, and there is one scene, where Elizabeth first finds out about the curse, that is pretty terrifying.
The latter parts of the movie can get pretty confusing, as it gets difficult to tell which group is attacking which other group and who's helping who and all that rot. Here's an easy way to help keep track. Jack? Is on Jack's side. All he wants is his boat back. Norrington (Jack Davenport) wants Elizabeth. Will wants Elizabeth. Elizabeth wants Will. Things get a little dicey when she offers her hand in marriage to Norrington if he'll go save Will. I think she whored herself to save his life, but I always hate it when women in movies use tactics like that.
And the very ending? There's where we start to get into the Disney Cheese (tm). All I'll say is that I sure as hell hope Will skips town, because there's nothing keeping Norrington from changing his mind.
Oh, and stick around until the end of the credits. There's some stuff at the end. Damn daemon monkey.

"Queen of the Damned"

"Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones"

In the category of Science Fiction is the latest Star Wars. First thing I want to say is that you finally get to see why Yoda is the shit! He kicks some ass!!!! The rest, is pretty much what you would expect. The action scenes are AWESOME, but the time in between is pretty dull. Ewen McGregor is pretty cool, but the shaggy look just doesn't work for him. Samuel L. Jackson is, well, Samuel L. Jackson. He rocks, and he's got a purple light saber. Jar-Jar Binks is mercifully almost absent, but he does have a stirring (for him) speech in the Senate during Senator Amidala's absence. Too bad he's handing control right over to the Dark Side. Go Jar-Jar. Christopher Lee is excellent as the evil Count Dooku (dumb name), but he's had some practice recently, with the whole being Sauramon thing. I kept wanting him to start talking about Gandalf and the One Ring. Besides that, you meet the young Boba Fett and see just why he's so evil. Oh, and they brought back the original music, and use it as GREAT foreshadowing. I thoroughly approve. Some lines were pretty bad in the irony vein, or just plain dumb puns. And the whole Anikin-Amidala romance takes up WAY too much of the movie. We all know they get together (unless you've been living under a rock for the past twenty years), so I say, "Less romance, more light sabers!" Besides that, I know nothing I'm going to say is going to change your mind as to whether you plan on seeing it or not, so I'll just say that I think it's worth seeing.

"The Three Musketeers"

In the category of Comedy-Adventure, which I just claimed off the $10 DVD rack at Wal-Mart is "The Three Musketeers" by Walt Disney. I know that the movie is ten years old, but I would just like to say that I had forgotten how good this movie is!! Especially in comparison to "The Musketeer" from 2001, which sucked large donkey balls!
There are many reasons why this movie is fabulous. First is that the production values are very high. Costumes, props and scenery are all very nice, and you can tell that a great deal of effort was put into them to make them so. No shoddy workmanship there, but then again, it is a Disney movie. Second is that the main four characters are VERY charismatic. I'd marry Porthos if I could get him to stay still long enough; or, Hells, just follow him out to sea. Fun! But, seriously, while they are VERY broadly sketched as far as actual text is concerned, I think the actors portraying them do a fine job of fleshing them out.
I am particularly fond of the scene where Porthos and Aramis are attempting to teach D'Artagnan the "arts of wenching." As an actual wench, I would like to say that I would probably take pity on D'Artagnan and let him sweep me off my feet, anyway, just for the good first effort. He is a bit young and innocent looking though. I actually got disturbed at points when he killed someone. It just didn't seem right.
The sword fight scenes are exciting, but not the best I've ever seen. Definitely not the worst, though, either. I think they have just the right amount of cheese to them. You can only nearly get knocked off some high place while sword fighting so many times before it becomes passé'. They went to the edge on some of the extreme scenes (the fat, ugly guy in the dungeons?) but I don't think they ever quite made that leap into Cheeze-Wiz Canyon. Okay, except when Aramis gets saved from the Cardinal's bullet by his cross. (I would just like to interject that Tim Curry is AMAZING as Cardinal Richelieu.)
I had forgotten the sad part with Athos and the Countess d'Winter, but it just makes the happy ending to the movie so much better that it is a LITTLE bittersweet. And, I would love to see a whole horde of Musketeers rushing past me yelling in the fun of the chase. I might just join in!

"All for one, and one for all!"

"The Time Machine"