Review: Independence Day: Resurgence

The sequel that we were never sure would be coming, and now 20 years later we finally have it.

After being one of the biggest and most popular blockbusters of the 1990's, Roland Emmerich is back for most 'end of the world' action. I was certainly nervous after seeing the trailer as I could tell it was not only not going to be as good as its predecessor. But not be a good film in general.

For me Emmerich seems to have lost his touch of giving great action and memorable characters with quotable lines. He did well with The Day After Tomorrow in 2004, missed a great opportunity with '2012' five years later and just went pure silly with White House Down in 2013.

Maybe the 1990's and early 2000's was the right time for his films, and he's past it? I was obviously going into the film with low expectations. I must say, that they were met.

I was surprised to see the opening third go for character development and dialogue. I liked that they tried to give a fair amount of the film for that. But it was not working, and that is a huge fault on the writing department. It ended up being not engaging at all and I ended up not caring for hardly any of the humans characters and was rooting for aliens instead.

It got really messy half way through and I was really unsure how ridiculous they were going to go. However, there were moments that I thought were o.k. in the second half including one funny moment. The rest of the comedic moments I'm afraid were either childish or just did not work at all.
The big final act has some decent moments. But it did not do enough to win me over.

There are countless faults with this one. It's pretty messy in its structure, character development, and to be honest, everything else. There was no tension at all, and you don't feel the stakes and therefore I ended up not caring for how it was going to end. Even the visual effects were not that impressive. In fact, there was probably too much of it for a good amount of the film. You can tell everyone was behind a green screen instead of being on location.

All the performances were pretty forgettable. So I don't think they deserve a mention. There are some appearances of the original cast, which I guess was to nice to see.
One performance that I will mention is Brent Spiner's wacky character. He is back, which surprised me as I thought he died in the first one. Despite questioning his existence, his ridiculousness seemed to be one of the few things that I was clutching to, as his performance was not totally terrible.

I think to sum it up, was that it was trying too hard to be so much bigger and more then its premise, and it blew up in their face. What we ended up with a bit of a mess that looked as if they were making it up as they along.
I try to avoid seeing bad films at the cinema, and I'm afraid that is the worst film I have seen ever at a cinema. But I'm sure another re-make coming out soon could very well take that title away from them.

What is even worse is that they left it open for a third installment, and the premise they went with sounds completely ridiculous.

Rating: 6/10

Nostalgic Review: Independence Day

The year is 1996, I am seven years old at the time of its release and the world went crazy for this hugely popular blockbuster.

I remember seeing trailers for it and was intrigued by it. But I know I was never going to see it due to me being under age to see it, and it was something that my parents would never take me to see anyway.

The first time I saw it was when it came out on video, and it had the most awesome video front cover that we all know we stared it for hours with amazement.

It goes straight into the action, and the build-up to the ultimate destruction segment is great. You can really feel the tension and it makes you want to see how big these ships are and how destructive they can be. The slow introduction to seeing the ships is really quite haunting at times. It was almost how Steven Spielberg did the shark in Jaws.

With all this build-up, there needs to be a big pay off, and there certainly is one. So much so, that it has become etched in many peoples minds as one of the most memorable scenes in film history. There were even some imagery that felt quite haunting and reminded me of the original The Day The Earth Stood Still and the end of Close Encounters Of The Third Kind.
Seeing the world's most historic landmarks and cities get totally destroyed in a matter of minutes is really quite something to look at. Also, with it being made in the 90's, CGI was still in its infancy. So model shots were primarily used, and seeing that being put to good use made it look ever more realistic then any computer could do.

The second half gives us time for some nice character development that we do not see that often nowadays in over-the-top summer popcorn action flicks. It also has the infamous big speech before the big showdown. It is a great moment and also has the best moment by an extra in film ever. I hope you know which moment I mean.
With all put in place, they have now deserved to have an all-out action final act. It is totally worth it and becomes an overall fun and highly enjoyable experience.

I must mention the use of comedy, as it is done really well. That perfect mix of emotion for the loss of life and lightheartedness of the human spirit gives the film a wonderful feel-good factor and therefore the re-watchability.

The performances are unexpectedly good for a film like this. Jeff Goldlbum is a great lead, as is Bill Pullman as the President.
Some saw Bad Boys as the one Will Smith branched out from being a TV star to a movie star. But for a lot, it was this one. His supporting role as a trash-talking fighter pilot stole the show for many. There are countless supporting and minor roles that are worth a mention, such as Judd Hirsch, Robert Loggia, Randy Quaid and Margaret Colin.
It was great seeing 90's actors such as Harvey Feierstein, James Redbhorn, James Duval, Lisa Jakub, Brett Spiner and Harry Connick Jnr. again in a film. We definitely need more of them. Or maybe the 90's was their time, nothing more.

The reason that there are so many performance to mention, is mainly thanks to the writing. You can tell that they gave time to develop them and give them a fair amount of screen-time to be seen as well-rounded characters. That has become a constant missing ingredient with many recent big budget summer films.

From a technical standpoint, director Roland Emmerich's team did a grand job. The general look and tone of it was perfect for this genre. The design of the spaceships and creatures were great. The model designs for me still work today compared to the visual effects that I'm afraid to do quite dated for the most part. Thankfully it's party piece scene still works and for me is timeless.

While it's not a challenging watch, quite flawed when you break it down and not being exactly award-winning (except for it winning the Oscar for best visual effects), it is a fun watch that never fails on repeat viewings.
The action is great, it is a lot of more tense and scary then I remember, the characters are memorable with multiple quotes that are still fondly remembered and used today.
I was also astonished to see that the duration was 2hrs 25mins. It really flies by every time.

Seeing this makes me nervous for the long awaited sequel even more as I can see it putting a dampener on one of the most popular films of the 1990's.

Rating: 7/10

Review: The Secret Life Of Pets

With the animation genre in such a golden age, more and more studios are starting to drop their name into the mix.

The latest one is Illumination Entertainment. After starting really well with Despicable Me, it has seemed to have made ok flicks such as Hop, The Lorax, Despicable Me 2 and Minions.

Now we have what many people are hyping as their best feature since Despicable Me, in the form The Secret Life Of Pets. The marketing has been pretty good and trailer suggests a good time at the cinema.

For me, I was pretty satisfied with what I saw. The first third of the film was its strongest part. It was introducing the characters well, there were some solid laughs and they were setting up the story nicely. However the longer the film went on, the slightly sillier it was getting. It was starting to lose its feet, and the gags were getting a bit too much. Thankfully, it was not that bad at all on the whole. It was still moving a long nicely, the characters were being solidly developed and the story rounded off pretty well. I think it might have peaked too soon and everything else felt inferior.

The voice performances were good. Jenny Slate continues to do well in her voice work and I felt she gave the strongest performance. Kevin Hart played his character really well, and had some nice laughs. Louis C.K. was well cast as the lead and gave us a character you could root for. The rest did their job well. They were not good enough to be memorable, but not bad enough to be negatively criticised.

On the technical side, the animation looked really nice and fitted the tone well. The action was entertaining if not a bit over the top at times. The character designs were strong, and I can see them being sold well as merchandise.

Overall, some of it felt disappointing. But on the whole I had a fairly good time watching this. It is definitely the studio's best film since Despicable Me. But with so many other animation studios delivering much stronger films at the moment, this could be forgotten sooner than you think. This might not do as well in the box office as originally expected. Especially a new Pixar film on the way.

There is also a short before the main film, and it features the studios most famous characters. It was o.k. But nowhere near as strong as Pixar's shorts.

Rating: 7/10

Review: Tale Of Tales

The first I heard of this was from last year's Cannes Film Festival.
Since then, it has been doing the rounds of various European Film Festivals for over a year now, as well as going on general release in several countries.

Now in the summer of 2016, it is finally being shown in the UK. I remember being highly intrigued by the trailer. Not only did it look absolutely gorgeous. But it looked to be about fairy tales, and that certainly made me want to check this out. Despite the makers being pretty much all Italian, the cast was quite mainstream for a film that does have that European feel to it.

Fairy tales have always fascinated me. Despite us getting told about them as kids, the actual fairy tale seems to always have a gruesome ending. This particular film looked like it would be the latter. If executed well, this gamble of checking it out could pay off for me.

Well, I ended up being pretty overwhelmed by this dark, twisted, yet magical tale that you get with every fairy tale.

I have to say that if you know how fairy tales/folklore work and like them for that, then this is the perfect film to watch. You can really feel that touch of fantasy mixing in with love and obsession, which is what you get with pretty much every fairy tale.

Director Matteo Garrone and his team have put together three stories that loosely intertwine throughout the film, a bit like Pulp Fiction. You dip into each story instead of telling each one individually, which for me was the right thing to do. All show various portrayals of how love and obsession are the same thing and that it can make you do things without caring about the consequences.

It might not fit in with the fantasy films that you know. It is more medieval fantasy and can also be 'old-wives' tales that eventually get blown out of proportion over various generations. A good example for comparison is something like King George and how he slayed the dragon.

The performances were pretty solid on the whole. The big stand-outs for me were Shirley Henderson, Hayley Carmichael and Bebe Cave, as well as the always good Toby Jones. It was great to see Salma Hayek not only in a film that is not an Adam Sandler comedy, but a film with a lot of craftsmanship and her performance being a highlight. Definitely her best performance since Frida. Vincent Cassel played a nice supporting role, as well as Christian and Jonah Lees and Guillaume Delauney.

From a technical standpoint, everything is so well crafted. From the gorgeous cinematography, to the impressive costume design, the lovely choice of locations and the charming score by Alexandre Desplat. All of that just made me pretty overwhelmed by not just how it was made, but how it was executed.
Even some of the small amounts of visual effects seemed to blend well into the live action. Bit it seemed that they preferred to use practical effects and animatronics in scenes you would usually see CGI in them. That certainly gives this film some more positives from me.

From initially thinking I would be impressed with the visuals and confused by the story, ended up really enjoying it. So much so, that I would happily own it once it is out on DVD.
I don't think anything will prepare for this strange story. But like I said, if you understand the true nature of fairy tales and enjoy that part of it. Then you will get the most out of it. It is certainly an acquired taste, and I ended liking so much of it. Also, the the 2hrs 13mins duration completely flew by. I never once check the time, and that hardly ever happens.
It is a pretty impressive piece of work that will sadly not be watched by enough people. Check it out if you can and at least give it a chance.

Rating: 8/10

Review: When Marnie Was There

Following the retirement of director Hayao Miyazaki, Studio Ghibli has since gone into a state of hiatus. Whether they will return with a new set of ideas or stop making movies entirely, we don't know yet.

What we have is another feature that is finally getting released in the UK after two years since getting its first release anywhere in the world.

If this is their last film, the pressure was certainly on director Hiromasa Yonebayashi (who also directed Arrietty) to send them off on a high note. However after seeing this, we could possibly have seen their best possible replacement for Miyazaki.

I went into this film completely cold and knew nothing about it apart what I saw on the poster. As you see that iconic blue logo, you know you are in safe hands. You get instantly reminded on how gorgeous the animation is. But with many Ghibli classics, the story manages to match the animation.

As we start to understand the premise, the development starts to challenge and the theories begin to arise. Despite my complex predictions as to how this tale would end. It ended up being something a lot more simplistic and yet the emotions are still high once the credits start to roll for possible the final time.

While Ghibli's most popular films involve fantasy, there are the few actual dramas that critics and fans rank as high as their highly imaginative counterparts.
This strong story certainly makes you think of the possibilities. That and the very interesting characters kept my interest till the very end to see what these links these mysterious events to our main characters. By the end, I felt I could relate to the story well. I can see this story relate to pretty much everyone.

This is a well written story that takes us on a highly interesting and well-rounded story. The pacing is suitably light which gives us time to try and work things out. I definitely got a lot out of it, and if this is their latest feature, then it felt like a fitting and emotional possible farewell.
With the story being lead by two female protagonists, this could do well. It's most certainly too girly to put off the male fans of the studio from enjoying this. It is very mature in its story-telling and the topics it covers. If I had to compare this with previous features, then I would say I got similar feelings from it after seeing From Up On Poppy Hill or Whisper Of The Heart.

If it is being shown near you, then I highly recommend you go and see this. It could end up being a rare treat as we may never see Studio Ghibli on the big screen again. With this studio being known by many as the Disney of the east, I really hope they return soon. They make their Western brothers seem very ordinary. Not just in the art of their animation. But in their powerful story-telling as well.

Rating: 8/10

Review: The Nice Guys

With 2016 showing signs of releasing films that we don't see that often continues to prove my point as we now have The Nice Guys. A buddy cup comedy, this time with Russell Crowe and Ryan Gosling at the helm.

I was certainly interested in it, and the fact that Shane Black was directing pretty much sealed it for me in terms of wanting to watch it. With his contribution in writing for the Lethal Weapon franchise and directing Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, I was pretty confident that we would get something similar, especially in the witty dialogue.

Well I certainly got what I expected, and yet I saw a lot that was very refreshing to see. From the opening credits, you have that 70's vibe in you straight away with the style of music being played. There was also a film-noir tone to it which certainly delighted me, as that is a genre I have been wanting to return to modern-day cinema.
By the end of it, I was enjoying the ride that this film was taking me and felt pretty satisfied with the pay-off.

If you have liked Shane Black's previous material, then you will certainly be entertained by this. It's very Kiss Kiss Bang Bang and Lethal Weapon, with bits that reminded me of Rush Hour as well.

The writing is the strongest part of the film. It is on point, original and what you expect with any Shane Black film. There were lots of memorable quotes which caused many laugh out loud moments. There were so many that even after the screening, my brain kept reminding me of some that I missed out on initially and I had a little chuckle to myself when leaving the cinema.

Your two leads Russell Crow and Ryan Gosling have great chemistry and really sell the film well as this comedic duo. They this generations Mel Gibson and Danny Glover. However, the real star is Angourie Rice. It takes a while for her to become a memorable character, but by the second half we really see her shine and in the end becomes the scene-stealer of the entire film.
One minor role that I have to mention was Kim Basinger. I had no idea she was cast in this. It was really nice to see her in a big film again. I don't think I've seen her since 8 Mile, which was in 2002.

Another positive to mention is the action. The style feelt vintage and yet refreshing to see. It felt very 80's despite it being set in the 70's. In regards to the 1977 setting. It is almost a character in itself. The landscape, the costumes people are wearing, the music and TV you see really drops you into that period perfectly. Even the camera style and editing almost felt nostalgic.

While I liked it a lot, I think this one looks like it will be do better on multiple viewing, just so you can get all the gags. It also took a while for me to properly warm to. I was enjoying it. But the good stuff just was not captivating me a lot on the initial viewing. The only time I felt fully invested was when we got into the final act. I'm not sure if it was because it has been a while since I have seen a buddy cop film with a film-noir tone to it.

It is certainly the type of film that you just do not see anymore and I am glad people still make them every now and again. Whilst there is so much crap that I thankfully avoid. The mainstream audience don't. I really hope this finds a fan-base in the big multiplexes and gets some well deserved box office takings.
However, I will say that some of the younger cinema-goers might not get all the jokes as a fair amount are references to the 70's, preferably American 70's.
It deserves to be seen on the big screen as we need more films like this on an yearly basis. In an age where franchises and cinematic universes are the big cash grab. We need to support the original ideas that work and deserve some love. 2016 has certainly given us some, and the mainstream audience need to be brave enough and discover something new, and The Nice Guys is the newest find.

Rating: 7/10