Warcraft: The Beginning (Trailer)

Renowned game creator Blizzard attempts to capitalise further on micro transactions using a method known as macro transactions, more commonly known as petty theft.

It may come as something of a shock, but you are perfectly entitled to judge most figurative books by their covers. Judge them by their cover art, author, by-line and their title. Throw the first rock. Judge lest ye be judged. Carry the fate of us all, little one. If this is indeed the will of the Council, then Gondor will see it done. Incorrectly reference biblical passages and tangentially quote other films if you have to, but never settle for mediocrity. Warcraft: The Beginning is a good place to start your newfound judgemental freedom.

Some tales have titles that will capture an audience’s attention without the need for fancy graphics or catchy by-lines. Some will mislead you unintentionally (see: Batman Vs. Superman or 10 Cloverfield Lane). Then there is this. Warcraft: The Beginning might just be the most mundane, redundant title of all time. Given it is the first and only film of the franchise it is pretty safe to assume that it is also the beginning of the story. Instead of providing insight or creating intrigue, the only thing this title informs the viewer of, is that there will be Warcraft: The Middle and Warcraft: The End. Of course filmmakers don’t see the world in such a logical manner, and as such will most likely name the subsequent films Warcraft: Divide and Conquer and finally Warcraft Thr33. At least the games followed a consistent, numerical naming pattern.    

AND MY AXE.

The trailer itself is boring. I watched it more times than I had hoped and, even now, could not give anything but a generic summary of events. Humans and Orcs must band together in some world ending crisis, but also not all humans trust Orcs and also there is some baby Shrek, like the one from Meet the Spartans (see: below). We already have a film for nerds, it’s called Captain America: Civil War, we don’t need another one. I don’t believe it a coincidence either, that this film comes out a full two years after The Hobbit films had concluded. Wouldn’t want to flood the market with too many awful films about Orcs, Humans and Dragons.

Watching this I found myself distracted by other more exciting trailers, i.e. Suicide Squad. Unlike Warcraft, Suicide Squad’s trailer does not give away important plot points/twists, effectively engages the audience through clever use of popular music with rhythmic cuts and an appropriate amount of humour to break the mounting tension. Will this mean that Suicide Squad will be a 10/10 amazing film? Probably not. Does its trailer excite an audience and generate hype? A resounding yes. Sure it exploits an audience’s weakness for nostalgia, but it takes the first step to cinematic success by at least seeming intriguing. Plus, it has Margot Robbie in short shorts.

Final Prediction: Remember that Eragon film? Most people erased it from memory immediately. This will be Eragon 2.0, or should I call it Eragon: A Quest Fulfilled.

The Purge: Election Year (Trailer)

In what could easily be described as a time traveler's warning against Trump's presidency, The Purge: Election Year explores rudimentary sociopolitical rules (such as don't kill each other) with mass homicide, torture and theft.

You may think this cleverly constructed byline is merely a facetious commentary on a fictional film, but I genuinely believe it to be true. Without delving too deeply into the murky waters that is Trump's political views, it is plain to see he at least wishes to 'Make America Great Again'. (Let's for a second ignore that he intends to do this in the most racist and bigoted manner possible). What does he want once this is accomplished?

While it may be a little embarrassing that this fictional system of government is quite possibly more humane and sensible than the future Trump driven country, let's put aside our tinfoil hats for a moment here. This trailer suffers from what I like to call Saw Syndrome. Not only is a lot of the film veiled with a pale green hue (see images below), it's primary plot devices are also being stretched quite thin after 3 movies. Correlations between the films are quite simple to draw given both of their tendencies towards masks, not to mention at one point a character kicks a tripwire which in turn triggers a large blade to swing, narrowly missing their face in both films.

In terms of narrative the trailer says it all. Corrupt politicians attempt to utilise the unconventional methods of 'the purge' to remove troublesome senator, only to be foiled by American 007 body guard man. Bad guys wear masks, good guys don't. Everyone lives happily ever after...until next year.

I will refrain from giving an opinion until the film is released in it's entirety on July 4th (Independence Day you clever marketing people), so feel free to form your own opinions of the trailer in the meantime.

Captain America: Civil War

More accurately described as 'The Avengers: Group Conflict', this film highlights the human side of being superhuman. Turns out the super side is much more interesting. Starring every single B-List superhero.

There is no question why this film was made. Apart from the obvious profitability, it gives the PornHub servers a well-deserved break while millions of nerds masturbate for the full 2.5hr duration of the movie. Tissue sales must have doubled in this films first release week given the character cast given in this film. Even characters who obviously couldn’t or wouldn’t sign to this film are name dropped at least once. Ironman *rubrubrub* Spiderman*rubrubrubrub* Antman? *rub* Catguy?? *…* Black Widow *rubrubrubrubrubrub*. All in all, it makes for brilliant masturbatory material.

The issue here is that, believe it or not, this wasn’t made as a porn. It is supposed to be a story complete with narrative twists and turns. Instead we are presented with a full hour of relatively boring exposition setting up the precedent for the film which could easily be summarised in one sentence; a quorum of superheroes is divided when their actions are called into question after a series of terrorist attacks leave behind a trail of collateral damage. Basically Tony Stark and the worlds governments (both known for their heartless nature) grow a heart and feel that maybe thousands of innocent bystanders shouldn’t die as an indirect act of the Avengers, and rather as a direct act of terrorism. It is, in essence, stupid. 

Speaking of stupid, the top secret brainwash book is protected by a four-digit pin, during the introduction the villain is wearing a mask over a second mask, the head of school from Community plays the head of school of MIT, and Bucky is quoted saying “I’m not going to kill anyone” and then proceeds to collapse a man’s chest cavity with a brick. Think I’m done? Ironman’s sidekick Lt. James Rhodes survives a few thousand feet free fall in a suit which I can only imagine weighs a few hundred kilograms, a civil war is usually defined as “a war between citizens of the same country” yet this war contains a vast array of nationalities, the film title highlights Captain America as the subject and does everything to ignore him, and finally, somehow this film warranted an 8.4/10 on IMDB. 

It’s predictable, it’s slow to establish narrative, the narrative it finally develops feels contrived, the characters are mostly B-list and the continuous flash cutting during fight scenes gives me a headache. The worst part? I kind of liked it. It appeals to the inner nerd and the fight scene, while obviously there just to satisfy fans, is satisfying. But satisfactory is all this film gets with a 5/10 PornHub videos.

Term Life

A thieving father kidnaps his daughter to protect her from Mexican gangsters. It’s like Taken, but backwards and terrible. Starring that guy from Old School.

The advantage of making a film, as opposed to a book, is that you are allowed to show rather than tell. Term Life proceeds to ignore this fact and instead presents an hour and a half of pure narration. Of course this narration is essential, as it delivers 80% of the plot ...Did I say plot? I meant Rain Man-esque tips on how to rob bakeries, though these ‘tips’ are as mundane as “you need a way in and, more importantly, a way out”. Needless to say it’s not all as exciting hearing about what you could otherwise watch; it’s like having an annoying friend sitting beside you explaining every plot point.

When the film isn’t delivering its ear-load of weak plot, it provides a strange amount of broken family subtext. It’s an action film for middle aged, single fathers who miss their families and are still coming to terms the emotional hardship that divorce causes. The three main characters can be summarised as fatherly figure who has seen it all, actual father that is borderline autistic in terms of emotion, and angst-y teen daughter rebelling against the father that abandoned her. It’s like listening to an audio book on cliché character creation.

I will find you, and I will bore you.

Given that the film is delivered mostly verbally it also tends to move at something of a breakneck pace. A scene only takes as long as the narration takes to explain it, then it often jumps to an unrelated scene. It’s entertaining in the way that a burn might be, except burns heal and this film will never get better with age. With lines such as “Your Dad fills a lot of holes Kate”, and “my whole life I’ve been watching her” (spoken by the father about his daughter), who could resist a nice scalding third degree burn to the eyeballs.

The acting is average at the best of times, though upon further investigation I found that it was produced by WWE, as in the remarkably popular wrestling organisation. How the pieces all fall into place. Oh also the title just straight up doesn’t make sense. Life Sentence, Life Term or Heisty, Heist, Heist Family Issues would all have been more relevant.

As an audio book this film might warrant a passing grade, but due to it’s poor structure, plot delivery via excessive narration and all round terrible acting it warrants a 3/10 divorce papers.

High-Rise

A delusional adventure in alcoholism, substance abuse, violence and sexual undertones. Wait that makes this sound interesting. How’s this instead? A building of people go mental for two hours in something resembling a psychological commentary. Starring Simon Peggs stunt double.

If pressed to describe this film in one word it would be ‘intriguing’. If pressed to describe it in two, then I would choose ‘depressingly intriguing’. Don’t confuse intrigue with good though. War, famine and plague are all intriguing but I would be hard pressed to call them good, unless of course they were unleashed upon the creators of this movie.

Now it's just some film I wish I didn't watch.

In the realms of ‘Being John Malkovich’ or ‘A Clockwork Orange’ comes High-Rise, as what I can only assume is some sort of psychological commentary on modern life, or work, or patriarchy, or something. Incredibly heavy on symbolism and foreshadowing, it does it’s best to promote interest through ambiguity. An hour into this ambiguous journey, however, and you might start feeling a yawn in the depths and a heaviness in the eyelids despite the numerous on screen murders and sex scenes. At one point they eat a horse and I barely noticed. In fact the major reason I made it to the end was the graphically upsetting imagery and boyish hope that it might all come to some amazing point. It may have as well, but two hours in I had given up caring and was just praying for the ‘and then he woke up’ ending.

And I bet you didn't believe me.

Going in to this film I had no idea what it was about. I knew it was based on a book by J.G.Ballard that I had intended to read, and I had read a sentence summary along the lines of ‘A building of people cope with an ever increasing amount of anarchy’. I half expected a zombie film based in a hotel building if I’m honest, and to be doubly honest I was a bit disappointed when it wasn’t. It is, instead, a story of an uprising against hierarchy, loosely following one man through the process. Tenants at points seem to be of hive-mind and know everything that happens within the walls, and at other times seem completely imperceptible to the daily coming and goings. The main characters motives are never really clear, and as one should expect from an arty film it ends with a child sitting on a throne of electronic devices, smoking a pipe and listening to a radio detailing the logistics of capitalism. Of course you don’t get it. It’s art.

In terms of filmic devices it is sound. Music plays a key role at points, the camera angles and scope do well to promote emotion within scenes, and the actors all do a pretty good job. Even the child actors pull this one off, though I suspect it’s mainly because their roles entailed screaming, yelling, throwing things and running about. Basically being a child 101.

High-Rise’s main entertaining factor is that it is two parts confusing and one part graphic. Combining these, however, doesn’t create the tasty, entertaining tale I had hoped for. Instead it is long, tedious and disappointing, though I’m sure all the arty types out there would disagree with me stating that I ‘just don’t get it’. They would be right of course, I don’t get it. I don’t want to get it. The only place I want to get it is away from me. I give it 3/10 dead dogs. Why dead dogs? To be intriguing. Depressingly so.

Triple 9

An American film highlighting their right to bear arms, blackmail, extort and murder without penalty. Starring Jesse from Breaking Bad, and Daryl from The Walking Dead.

I tend to write a lot of negative things about films. Call it human nature but I find it very easy to criticise rather than compliment. It may shock you then that I don’t have a great deal of negative things to say about this film. Sure it’s a little ‘Americany’ with its negligent gun laws and tinfoil hat corruptness, but overall it was entertaining, which is more than I can say about a lot of new films. I worry that the only reason I did find it entertaining, is that I hadn’t heard/seen this story before; it is a completely new intellectual property, and not a reboot, revamp, re-release, sequel or prequel. Regardless it is no fun to read something positive, so I’ll try my best to pick this one to pieces.

"I'll never let go..of my right to bear arms

This film starts out strong with a good mix of action, character development and plot introduction. It builds a clear understanding of the villain and protagonist group, defines their motives and includes explosions. I.E. everything you want in an action film. The protagonists in this case are corrupt police officers and drug fiends which makes for an interesting conflict of emotion, but not every story needs to be good overcoming evil and it sure is nice to feel something in a cinema other than disappointment. Then things go a little awry when a second antagonist is introduced, then an entire gang of them and another protagonist. Also it turns out some of the ‘good guys’ are doing bad things for good reasons (family), and some are doing bad things for bad reasons (money/power) and the only good guy doing it for good reasons is made out like he’s a bad guy. It’s all just very confusing, and I found it difficult to pick a character to stand beside. To further complicate matters not too much happens, there really isn’t a clear goal after the first heist, but there is boobs and surely that counts for something.

Triple 9 manages to pull it all together for a brief period at the climax where an unexpected plot twist occurs, only to have it all fall apart at the ending. Put simply the ending of this film is that everyone dies. Good, bad or neutral no one is spared, which hopefully makes it difficult for them to write a sequel consequently sparking some actual thought. Given it’s inability to captivate during the final third, an audience might be drawn from their stupor to ponder the films finer points. Like, for example, how much murder paperwork this office must do on a daily basis or how every character seems to be corrupted in some manner and most particularly how Aaron Paul managed to play Jesse Pinkman, and Norman Reedus as Daryl Dixon in an unrelated franchise. Also the weird Jewish villain subtext and undertone. Oh how the mind does wander.

Aside from the ending, Triple 9 is fairly solid. There are a few questionable plot points such as the enormous amount of corruptness in this particular district, and a lot of emotionally void, point blank murder that is just overlooked, but maybe that’s just America doing it’s thing. It’s strong opening makes up for its weak ending, and as such I give it 7 guns out of 10.

The Divergent Series: Allegiant

The Divergent Games - Scorch Hunger is the ninth instalment of the popular series whereupon, as in the other films, skilled teenagers attempt to break the shackles of an oppressive and separatist society by climbing a wall and joining the resistance. Relationships, integrity and pure physical strength are put to the test in this blockbuster. The characters undergo some testing also. Starring the villain from Far Cry 3, Katniss and Peter.

It’s mid April! The flowers are blooming, the trees are singing, parents are singing because their children are in school again, and cinemas are playing the same 10 awful films as last month because it is not economically viable to run new blockbusters. For someone looking for a movie to watch, it makes life difficult. When your choice is between garbage (Grimsby) and trash (My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2), you may as well gouge your eyes out quickly and save yourself two hours of your life. For anyone that may think this is an exaggeration I have a counter argument prepared.

I know what you are thinking. That girl from Sabrina got chubby. Also I would expect you experienced an internal (and quite possible external) groan for two and a half minutes like I did. I don’t think the dictionary has enough synonyms for ‘terrible’ to describe that steaming pile, but awful, dreadful, appalling, horrific, atrocious and ghastly will have to suffice. Regardless a choice must be made, and in this weeks game of Russian roulette for eyeballs, the wheel landed on rubbish.

Strip away the questionable acting, predictable plot events, poorly constructed characters and the fact that you are expected to watch another 2 of these (with another on it’s way), Allegiant remains a pretty bad film. And here you were expecting me to write nice things for a change.

While it is nice to have clarity in a film, perhaps instead of making character roles incredibly obvious to the point of lament it would be sensible to add some to the overall plot. What you will take away from this film is that all bad guys wear white suits (and their goons, rugged vests with popped collars and buzz cut mohawks), and all good guys look like they are fresh from Sunday school, complete with perfect teeth and hair. Simply put Allegiant tries way too hard to make you care about characters, and in doing so will make you not care about them at all. To emphasise this point, shortly into the film one of the main character dies (see picture below). In a good film an audience might feel a tear well up in the corner of their eyes, and perhaps go so far as to release a small exasperation. I saw this death coming though, and instead I pointed at the screen, exclaimed “DEAD” and counted down from 3 (she died on 2). Then, as is becoming quite common in films, all the characters forget about their fallen companion and continue on their merry way.

Even in still frame you can just tell she gon' die.

Before even reaching production this film was already losing points, based solely on its very existence. Firstly this film has been made before. Eight times if you were wondering. Whether it be the Hunger Games series, the Maze Runner series or the preceding two films, Allegiant is more of the same. Protagonist joins rebel group and against all odds overthrows the oppressive government system, and along the way manage to find love against all odds. It is like action film meets teen romance novel; like Twilight meets Die Hard, but with worse acting and more obvious antagonists (which is an impressive feat). The second issue is while the immediate plot of the film is glaringly obvious (climb a wall to see what’s on the other side), the overall plot of the series is lost on anyone smart enough to have avoided watching the first two.

Poor acting, predictable plot, crummy characters. I'm getting bored just writing about it.
3/10 chubby Sabrinas.

The Jungle Book

A kids film guaranteed to give children everywhere heart-warming nightmares. Starring still-quite-obviously-CGI animals and the kid version of Slumdog Millionaire.

You were the chosen one Mowgli.

Why do you make a film? To tell a story.
Why do you make a film that already exists? To capitalise on the human emotion of nostalgia without having to waste any effort on creating a story. To make money.

To quote an earlier post I have made “Nostalgia means sales, sales means money, and money means investment into the inevitable Lion King or Aladdin live action remakes”. Unsurprising then, that the folks over at Disney have chosen to reproduce The Jungle Book. This film adds nothing to the original, except some terrifying CGI animals and an ending quite different from the original.

Spoiler Alert: Actual ending screenshot.

The film is not badly made, however, and manages to stick fairly closely to the original plot. All the characters are there, the filmic techniques are sound, and I even got to relive my childhood singing ‘The Bear Necessities’. While the child actor should of been chosen on acting skill rather than resemblance to Mowgli, the voice actors were all well chosen and scripted. They were probably all pretty expensive too. I wonder how Disney continues to afford them.

There is no doubt that The Jungle Book is a children’s film. It is the story of a boy, learning to live in a world where he doesn’t belong. How strange it is then, that this remake contains realistic animal fights intermingled with high suspense scenes, put there as if to hold the intrigue of an adult. An adult that went to see the film because it reminds them of a simpler time. An adult that has money.

Would I recommend this film? If you have seen the original Jungle Book (i.e. had a childhood), then no. There’s no point. Unlike a book where a second reading might give you further insight into characters, this film will only give you further insight into how many times Disney can swindle you (in case you can’t read in between the lines, this film was a massive cash grab). If you haven’t seen the original, still no. Go watch the original.

I give this one 4/5 Disney remakes that are probably already in production.

P.S. Since Disney wants to save on energy by not writing originals, so will I. This review now applies to all Disney remakes including, but not limited to, Tarzan, Snow White, Cinderella, Peter Pan and Bambi.

10 Cloverfield Lane

War of the Worlds meets Saw in this thriller, horror, mystery, science fiction, war film that has nothing to do with the original Cloverfield. Starring that guy from Roseanne and that girl from ScottPilgrim Vs the World.

There is not much to say about this film. It follows a fairly simple plot, has decent characters arcs and ends in a predictable but satisfactory way. I was surprised to find, then, that once the credits rolled I felt disappointed and not entirely sure why. After putting some thought to it, I came to the conclusion that this film was mediocre for a handful of small reasons.

Firstly, the film title. Following in ‘Batman VS Superman’s footsteps, the title misleads you. A sane person would think it has anything to do with the original Cloverfield film (which is basically sci fi Blair Witch Project). A sane person would be wrong. It shares no characters (aside from the monster that appears 5 minutes from the end), no cinematic techniques, pacing or plot lines. It may as well have been called 10 Elm Street for all the connections that it made. Of course Hollywood knows sequels sell better than new intellectual property, so despite any correlation, we get this. While you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, you probably should name it after its contents.

Let's play a game Michelle. It's called 'never give a
straight answer to simple questions'.

This movie is the jack of all trades, master of none in terms of genre. While based during/ after what is portrayed as a war it lacks any scene containing a battle, so the war genre definitely falls short. It could be considered science fiction, but only for the last 10 minutes when an alien actually gets some screen time. It is somewhat a mystery whether John Goodman’s character is good or crazy, though this is spoiled halfway through the film. The only horror is the fact that no character gives straight answers to simple questions, and thrillers are generally thrilling. By trying so hard to satisfy all genres, it fails to meet any single one. Simply put, it lacks direction.

While the plot is quite concise and simple, it also lacks any real villain. The audience is introduced to Howard (John Goodman) as something of a monster but grows to accept him in an odd Nightingale effect sort of way. The threat of the elements outside the bunker are also made apparent, but it is quite difficult to be afraid of a silent killer Earth. It turns out Howard was being a good (though a little maniacal) guy and nothings wrong with the climate outside. We are introduced to the real villain, the aliens in the last 5 minutes. It is worth mentioning too that the plot is oddly twisted at times in order to create suspense or intrigue. Michelle awakes to being locked to a pipe, only to be given the key in the same scene. She is shown all weaknesses of the bunkers security, only to be banned from exploiting any of them. She is introduced to an image of Howard’s missing daughter, only to be provided with convenient evidence that she was abducted by Howard. It’s like riding in a pot holed road in a car without suspension, and by the end you are sick of hitting your head on the roof.

10 Cloverfield Lane contains the components to be a good, even great film, but lacks the sense of purpose to connect the dots. While it may deliver some intriguing characters and plot points, any attempt at suspense/mystery feels forced and always falls short given the lack of any real antagonist. In all honesty I didn’t want another Cloverfield film, but this...sequel?.. leaves a bland taste. I give it 4/10 Saw dolls.

The Jungle Book (Trailer)

I am seeing this in cinemas tomorrow and in an effort to save time writing later, I will attempt to list some issues now and see how accurate past Justin is.

My first thought after watching this trailer was nostalgic. 'Ahh' I thought, 'Now this brings back some good memories'. Which is good because this is ultimately what the folks over at Disney were aiming for. Well good for Disney at least. Nostalgia means sales, sales means money, and money means investment into the inevitable Lion King or Aladdin  live action remakes. I am, however, a firm believer in not fixing what is not broken and feel I might just grow tired of this one pretty quickly.

The second thought to cross my mind was 'wow, that is a lot of CGI and green screen'. Now the animated original is easily forgiven for not being realistic in imagery. It's animated and made in 1967, so fair enough it might be a little dated. Still it holds up pretty well in terms on animation, and the remastered re-release holds up even better. What concerns me is what percentage of this film will be entirely CGI animals fighting. While I have faith in the abilities in those genius' over at Disney, I also think that maybe they are biting off a bit much to chew. I worry nostalgia won't be enough to pull this one up into beyond half scores, purely based on immersive qualities.

The overall impression I have is one of concern, though also boyish hope. As much as I worry that this film will butcher the original plot and screenplay, I also have a little boy inside longing to sing along to 'Bear Necessities'. What will ruin this film is if they deviate too far from the original story, invent new antagonists in an effort to make it more interesting or prolong animal fight scenes to the point of obscurity. I guess you will find out on Saturday 16th when the full review goes live.