Movie Review - Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengence

I saw a making of for this movie before it released into the theatre.  They talked about how they were doing innovative shots with hand held cameras.  After having watched the film I would translate that to mean low budget.  The film is Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengence.

I am certainly glad I didn't watch this film in HD.  Everything I have seen in HD makes me a touch queasy when the camera moves, pans or tilts.  This camera in this film almost never stops moving.  There are entirely too many tight shots where the film would have benefited from having a stationary camera.

While the acting was pretty good overall, even for the relatively unknown actors in the film, the poor writing and shaky cameras made this film really feel much less like a sequel to the amazing first Ghost Rider film with Nicolas Cage and more like a B-Movie rip off.  While I will admit I liked some of the special effects in this film better, effects alone don't make a movie.  In fact given the overall poor quality of the script I'm surprised that Nicolas Cage even agreed to be in this film.

There was a really bad scene where you first see Ghost Rider.  He rides into the middle of a gang of bad guys and takes his sweet ass time getting off his motorcycle and stands there posing while the bad guys stare at him.  Perhaps you should, I don't know, kill them or something.  It gets worse, once he manages to get his hands on one of the bad guys he proceeds to do what appears to be the penance stare in this close up shot with the bad guy.  What it feels like is Ghost Rider's attempt to kill the guy with his bad breath.  The scene is just way too long, kudos to the actor playing the bad guy for his performance, however he should have died much sooner.  Not to mention if he was performing the penance stare his eyes never turned all ashen like in the first movie.

The film goes on in pretty much this same manner, there is no real transition between any of the scenes.  It feels like the location scout said, "Hey I found all these cool locations" and the writers said "hey, lets write a reason for them to go there into the story."  In the end I just wanted the film to be over.  Who cares if the bad guys wins just put me out of my misery.

Near the end of the film there is a chase scene just as the sun is starting to rise.  Of course you are expecting that the Ghost Rider will be banished by the light.  They film it all dramatic like the good guy are going to lose, yet  Ghost Rider walks out into the daylight and chases after the bad guy on his bike.  Did I miss something? I'm pretty sure that Ghost Rider cannot ride in the daylight.  They established this in the first film, and even hint at it in the beginning of this film.  Apparently shooting a cool scene is more important then sticking to the rules of your own universe.

If you are a sucker for super hero movies and you don't mind a sub par flick then this might just be for you.  While I did enjoy a few scenes, and there were a few special effects that were really well done, this is just a case where the sum of the parts does not make the whole great. 

I rate this film three smiley Mike heads, it wasn't great, but I have seen much worse films.  Perhaps you should watch this film first and then the original, you will be much less disappointed that way.

Movie review - The Dark Knight Rises

It has been six movies and over a month since my last post to my movie review blog.  I figured if the Dark Knight could rise, so could Baatezuu, to write a review for this film.  The movie of course is The Dark Knight Rises.

This film truly tells a story, it is not simply a bunch of spectacular action scenes tied together with a thin string like other superhero movies have been.  Like The Dark Knight before it this film feels much longer than it really is.  There is so much going on that you really feel like you are living through it with the characters.  This film however doesn't have the same creepy overtone that The Dark Knight seemed to have.  Christopher Nolan has done an amazing job throughout this trilogy making the mythos of Batman believable, and fresh.  The story really comes to life on screen for all of us to experience.

The acting is amazing, Christian Bale's performance as Bruce Wayne is phenomenal, he really brings an emotional pain to the character.  Christian's performance as Batman was pretty good as well.  This is a hard feat to accomplish too, others have tried in the past and only one has succeeded in playing both roles equally well.  Batman actually has more dialogue in this movie than any of the other films in this trilogy.

The always beautiful Anne Hathaway as Selina Kyle (Catwoman).  Not the person that I would have expected them to cast in this role; however she was amazing in her performance.  She brought a great strength to the character that was really needed to make her feel genuine.  She was the yin to Batman's yang, willing to do what he wasn't to get the job done.  Her moral flexibility certainly made Selina a much darker character then Batman was.  In the end of the film she felt much like the character of Han Solo in Star Wars.  Not used to playing as a team, and conflicted between doing what's right and saving herself.

There is such a strong cast of supporting characters in this film.  Their stellar performances really draws you into the film and make you feel like you are apart of the city.  My short list of amazing actors is as follows; Gary Oldman as Commissioner Gordan; Tom Hardy as Bane; Morgan Freeman as Lucius Fox; Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Blake; and Michael Caine as Alfred.  The actors in this list were simply fabulous at portraying their characters in a believable and realistic fashion.  The emotion they put into their roles was well worth watching.

Unlike the last time we saw Bane on the big screen, this character was very much a proper villain.  Plotting, scheming, and even outsmarting Batman along the way.  This film really does the character of Bane justice on the big screen.

The costumes of course were amazing.  I was perhaps most impressed with that of Selina Kyle's cat burglar costume.  You can tell that much thought was put into its creation.  Sexy but functional, it was never too revealing but every part seemed to serve a purpose, right down to her heels that she was wearing.  She had goggles on that when flipped back on top of her head looked very much like cat ears.  I found this to be a very clever trick of the costume.  Considering this trilogy has seemed to completely rethink things like the Batman costume and vehicles this only seems fitting for Catwoman.

This film has seemed to really expand on the events of the last two movies in a truly unexpected way.  This really neatly tied up the story arc while simultaneously leaving things open for the imagination to wander in new directions.  Christopher Nolan is a true master of his art, having co-authored the screenplay with his brother Jonathan Nolan, produced, and directed this film.

I rate this film five out of five smiley Mike heads.  If you are at all interested in superhero movies, or if you simply like a good action movie, then this one is for you.

Movie review - Fire & Ice The Dragon Chronicles

What a piece of crap this was.  Even as a made for TV movie this was a smelly piece of cow pie.  The movie of course is Fire & Ice The Dragon Chronicles.

It was grand in vision and light on delivery.  If one watches closely you can almost see a great movie hiding somewhere in the implausible scenes, bad acting, and poor writing. 

Even with some good actors the writing is so bad they cannot save the film.  There are two fairly well know actors in this movie.  First is Arnold Vosloo who played the mummy from the film of the same name with Brendan Fraser.  Arnold plays King Augustin in this film.  Augustin is a fair and noble king, he is also the father of our main character Princess Luisa.

Secondly we have John Rhys-Davies whom I will forever remember as the professor from the 90's TV show "Sliders."  John plays Sangimel in this film, Sangimel is the mentor of our main hero Gabriel.

Now that I have mentioned the good lets put the last piece of negative bread on this reverse compliment sandwich shall we.

Let's see, where shall we start.  The princess, she keeps sneaking out and no one ever seems to know where she is, why, because they have no f'ing guards.  This castle they live in has no guards to speak of and no real defences.

On to the dragons, how can you screw up dragons you say?  Make them look like giant sky going manta rays with dragon heads?  Hey that would be something that no one has seen before, lets do that.  No, don't do that.  The only redeeming value to the dragons is the fact that the fire and ice effects are done magnificently.

The sky battle between the two is very confusing though.  The scene keeps cutting to them fighting and to the so called heroes running around like chickens with their heads cut off trying to go somewhere.  To safety, to the bad guys, to another movie with a better plot?

Another problem with this movie is that you never really get a sense of where the actors are.  By this I mean they seem to keep going from one place to another but you are never quite sure why they are going in the first place.

Having said all of this I have to rate this film two somewhat smiley Mike heads.  Sadly I have seen worse films, the array of movies at Family Video still amazes me.  They have both good and bad alike.  The fun of finding the gems among the rubbish keeps me going back though.

Movie review - Attack the Block

Tonight's movie was a bit of an interesting Sci-Fi adventure.  The movie is Attack the Block.

This film was a telling of aliens in a metropolitan setting.  I was really expecting a goofy cheesy movie with not much substance; although this film had many serious aspects.  The film had drug dealers, muggings, violent killings, and lots of bloody gore.

Attack the Block follows the lives of several people in a London city block.  We start the movie following Sam (Jodie Whittaker). Sam is walking down the street when she meets up with a gang of kids.  This gang is led by Moses, (John Boyega), they then mug Sam. Sam gets knocked to the ground and while she is down notices something streaking toward them in the sky, then it crashes into the car next to them.  Sam takes this opportunity to escape her muggers.  We quickly find out that the object is an alien and is jumps onto Moses and scratches his face.  Pissed, Moses leads the gang to hunt down and kill the alien. This is where the film starts to get really get moving.

The aliens in the film were very different from your standard movie aliens.  The gang actually makes reference to this in one scene.  They are in the park following hunting down a new alien when they spot it.  Someone says they see its eyes, we see though that this is really his teeth glowing in the dark.  The aliens were really well thought out and had a motive for their actions.

They primarily cast the movie with amateur actors and kids from the streets to adding a sense realism.  The director really wanted to portray what it was really like being on the streets today.  The acting is phenomenal, professional actors could not have played these parts any better.

Special effects were also really well done and helped to establish some drama in the scene; however the effects were never overdone.

In the end I really enjoyed this film.  Being that it was a low budget movie that did some really big things.  I would recommend it to anyone who likes Sci-Fi movies that have a few lighthearted elements.

I rate this film four smiley Mike heads, for its inventiveness and creativity.

Movie Review - Mirror Mirror

This was one very creative and inspired movie.  The film is Mirror Mirror.  A wonderful retelling of the classic.  A bit more realistic than Disney's version ever way.

Let me just start with the costumes, I am very close to someone who has done costumes for theatre and she would be very happy by this movie.  The costumes are extremely elaborate, very well designed and constructed, I can only imagine the bolts of fabric in each and every dress.  For anyone who loves period pieces simply for the costumes than stop reading this and go watch it now.

Here is a link to the video review.  My first ever post to youtube.com

http://youtu.be/XJmPo2tpxJc

For those of you who wish to know a bit more about the movie I will continue.  The acting is superb and the story is fresh.  No more do we see the girl being rescued by the prince in shining armor.  One of my favorite parts of the movie is when Snow White finds the dwarves and they teach her to be a thief/bandit.  Snow gets tough and learns some really useful things.

As for the dwarves, they are very much what you would think of as dwarves in any tabletop role playing game.  They are not singing dancing folk like in the Disney tale, not these dwarves.  They are more like Robin Hood and his not so merry men.  They introduce them in a very dramatic way which allows for Snow to meet up with Prince Allcot.

Prince Allcot is played by Armie Hammer.  The prince actually has faults which makes him that much more endearing to Snow White when she first meets him.  Armie has the charisma in the role of Prince Allcot as one would expect however he also is a bit unsure of himself.  Armie brings a certain naiveté to this role as well.

 Snow White is played very aptly by Lily Collins.  Lily brings a certain strength as well as a naiveté to the role of Snow White.  You really get the feeling that Snow is growing up as you watch this film.  I think the fact that both characters are so untraveled of the world they make a perfect couple.

There are several other wonderful performances in this film as well.  One of my favorites of course Nathan Lane as Brighton the Queen's right hand man.  He is very much the bumbling idiot with a heart.  His role parallels that of Kronk in "The Emperor's New Groove."  He is asked to get rid of Snow White but instead he lets her go in the woods where she finds the dwarves.


The special effects are every bit what you would expect of a film of this magnitude.  There is a great scene when the Queen visits her special chamber and walks right through a mirror but comes out of a lake and onto a pier.  It is very much like the scene in "Labyrinth" where Davie Bowie walk up and around the edge of the platform that Sarah is standing on.  It was very well done and fun to watch.

For anyone who likes fantasy movies then you will very much enjoy this film.  It has sword fights, magic, beautiful costumes, great acting, there is nothing bad about this movie.

I rate this film five out of five smiley Mike heads for its fresh look at a much overdone classic.

Movie Review - Skyline

This is not the typical type of move that I would rent.  I remembered seeing the previews and I was a bit intrigued.  The movie is Skyline.

I can say that I was pleasantly surprised by this film.  From reading the back cover of the movie box it seemed very much like a horror film; however it really feels like much more of an action/sci-fi movie.

I tend to get really invested in films when I watch them, so I don't really like movies that have a ton of suspenseful scenes in a dark environment.  While this movie has a few of those scenes they are shot with a sense of curiosity as opposed to a sense of dread, like most horror movies.

The movie follows two main characters with a small set of supporting characters.  The two main characters are Jarrod, and Elaine who are on a vacation in Los Angeles.  They are staying with a close friend who has hit it big in the entertainment industry and lives in a penthouse apartment in the heart of the city.  This apartment serves as the setting for most of the film as we watch as the aliens start to attack.

The aliens in this film are particularly creepy.  They feed on human body parts, particularly our brains to get the energy they need to continue life and to heal themselves.  I suppose this makes them a touch like zombies since they both feed on our brains.  They give off a weird blue light that hypnotises us to come to them where they snatch us up and rip out our brains.

The special effects in this film were amazing.  They really nailed it with most of the action scenes; although there was one scene that irritated me with a fighter jet bounced over the two main characters on the roof.  Why is it we much have this scene in all of the action movies now.  I am no expert but I'm pretty sure that cars/jets do not bounce when they hit the ground.  Especially not high enough to skip over the main characters while they remain unscathed.

The acting was pretty good in this movie as well.  There were a few scenes when the main characters felt a bit wooden.  They delivered their lines well but it was unclear what emotion they were portraying.  Perhaps it was because of the alien situation of the predicament they found themselves in.

Overall if you are a fan of action/suspense films then this movie is for you.  I especially loved the ending, it left you with a bit of hope for the human species.  The whole film was written very well.  It felt very realistic for a film of its type.  The film kept me guessing all the way up to the end.  As my readers should be aware of by now that an ending makes or breaks a film for me.

I rate this film four out of five smiley Mike heads.  Being that this is not my typical type of film and the acting was a bit stiff at times I rated it a bit lower than I might have otherwise.

Movie Review - Tower Heist

This movie is like almost like an Ocean's Eleven but with a load of crazy silliness mixed together with a little bit of heart.  The movie is Tower Heist, starting Ben Stiller, Matthew Broderick, and Eddie Murphy.

Josh Kovaks (Ben Stiller) is at the top of his game managing The Tower, a prestigious apartment complex in New York City.  Very quickly though his world gets turned upside down.  Josh is talking with Arthur Shaw (Alan Alda) a big time investment broker in the beginning of the movie.  Josh and Arthur are fairly close given that Arthur lives in the building and Josh takes care of his every need.  Josh sees Arthur being stuffed into the back of a work truck and springs into action locking down The Tower.  Josh then personally chases down the truck when he is clotheslined by Special Agent Claire Denham (Téa Leoni) and the van is stopped by the FBI.  This is where we find out that Arthur Shaw is wanted for fraud and has defrauded all of his investors of their money.

The plot thickens when we find out that Josh had asked Arthur Shaw to invest the  pension funds of all the workers at The Tower.  Feeling personally responsible for this Josh hatches a scheme, why not steal the running money that he has stashed in his apartment.  He is pretty sure he knows where the safe is but he needs a team to pull off the job.  This is where the movie really starts to get interesting.  Josh recruits the biggest bunch of misfits that you could imagine to steal 20 million from a high profile target who is being protected by the FBI.

Ben Stiller does an amazing job in this film.  In the beginning of the film he is an overly professional guy who takes nothing personally and lives to server the residents of building.  Once his tough exterior starts to chip away you then get to see the real character underneath.  He could care less about the residents and completely about the staff who he has sworn to settle up with.  The transformation is pretty cool when you are watching it.

Alan Alda is fantastic as the hyper intelligent cold calculating prick Arthur Shaw.  His portrayal of the character make you really want to see him get it in the end.  The fact that he can elicit such an emotional response proves that he is a great actor.

Matthew Broderick is simply amazing in this role of Mr. Fitzhugh the out of work down on his luck stressed out financial manager.  In the film they mention he worked at Goldman Sachs handling their money.  He is very smart but also incredibly afraid of everything.

Eddie Murphy preforms a very exuberant dirty handed bad guy as Slide.  The way that Eddie manages to bring a little bit of humor to the role is excellent.  There is a great scene when Josh and Slide meet for the first time that had me laughing because of the way Stiller and Murphy work together.

The special effects were really well done.  It's not real obvious but there are certainly many scenes with special effects in them.  You can tell that they really put the extra money if for this one.  There is a scene where Mr. Fitzhugh is hanging off a building and it looks very believable.

All of the costumes are very appropriate for each character.  I would expect this of any movie that I watch.  There is a very wide variety of costumes to cover in the movie as well.  You have Shaw, rich and pretentious, Slide streetwise thug, Mr. Fitzhugh, business casual, and Josh who goes from expensive suits to causal dress.  It was all put together quite well.

The dialog always seemed very natural and not forced.  This shows a good writer at the helm of the ship.  When they can pull off this casual competence with the dialog it makes for a better film.

I rate this film five out of five smiley Mike heads.  It has humor, style, imagination, and action.  What's not to like, I highly suggest this film to anyone.  It seems like the producers actually cared when they created this film, and it shows.