Monday, June 17, 2013

Review - Man of Steel

With wall-to-wall action that moves faster than a locomotive, Man of Steel reinvigorates a wealth of Superman mythos for a new generation, but is far from an unqualified success. The pairing of producer Christopher Nolan and director Zach Snyder is a bit of an anomaly given their very different directorial styles, but if nothing else, Man of Steel certainly gives you a lot bang for your buck.

The script, scribed by Nolan's Dark Knight co-writer David Goyer, covers not only the already well known origin story of an alien baby who escapes the destruction of his home planet and is raised by a kindly Kansas couple, but also the saga of the man of steel's quest for self-enlightenment and his run-in with his Kryptonian enemy General Zod. That's an awful lot of material to cram into one movie – enough perhaps for two movies, one could argue.

Sunday, May 19, 2013

Review - Star Trek Into Darkness

After an auspicious blastoff in 2009, J.J. Abrams keeps the success of his Star Trek reboot burning strong with Star Trek Into Darkness, a slick summer actioner that takes off at warp speed and rarely lets up.
All the cast members from the original are back in fine form (including Abrams' nettlesome blue lens flares): Chris Pine as Kirk, Zachary Quinto as Spock, Zoe Saldana as Uhura, Simon Pegg as Scotty, Karl Urban as 'Bones' McCoy, John Cho as Sulu, Anton Yelchin as Chekov, and Bruce Greenwood as Cpt. Pike. All of them excelled in 2009's origin story, but with their characters now firmly established, the writing team of Damon Lindelof, Roberto Orci, and Alex Kurtzman devote more time to developing the spiky but loving Kirk-Spock dynamic that is very much the heart of the franchise. Personifying the conflicting philosophies between logic and instinct, these two foils make this one of the more thematically compelling popcorn flicks you're likely to see this summer, at least whenever it takes the time to stop and breathe.

Tuesday, May 14, 2013

Review - The Great Gatsby

When Baz Luhrmann announced that he was adapting the American literary classic The Great Gatsby, anticipation and skepticism abounded in equal measure. Would the Aussie auteur's in-your-face-stylistics be the right fit for the F. Scott Fitzgerald's subtext and symbolism? An unexpected schedule change that shifted its release date from the thick of last year's awards season to a less crowded May 2013 slot only heightened the nervous curiosity. The production became enshrouded in as many rumours and unsure whisperings as the mysterious titular antihero of the novel itself.
At first it appears as though Luhrmann might be adopting a style more conducive to his source material. In a opening that recalls Citizen Kane, we push on a flashing green light – just one of the story's many recurring symbolic motifs – before meeting our narrator; Nick Colloway (Tobey Maguire), a baby-faced but disillusioned Wall Street pencil pusher now confined to a sanitarium where he recounts his experiences with a wealthy and elusive tycoon named Gatsby (Leonardo DiCaprio).

Saturday, May 4, 2013

Review - Iron Man 3

Some quick thoughts on Iron Man 3:

Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) is a “piping hot mess”. His words, not mine. Suffering severe anxiety and PTSD over last summer's alien attack in The Avengers, he takes comfort in tinkering with his small army of mechanical suits after hours, while his harried sweetheart Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow in fine form) worries alone.

Thursday, May 2, 2013

Oscar Predix - May 2013

This will be superfluous to those who were following my prediction updates throughout April, but for the record, here are my early predictions in full (no different than what you currently see on the sidebar).

Picture
August: Osage County
Captain Phillips
The Counselor
Foxcatcher
Gravity
Inside Llewyn Davis
Labor Day
The Monuments Men
Saving Mr. Banks
The Wolf of Wall Street


Director
George Clooney - The Monuments Men
Alfonso Cuaron - Gravity
Paul Greengrass - Captain Phillips
Bennett Miller - Foxcatcher
Martin Scorsese - The Wolf of Wall Street

Actor
Steve Carell - Foxcatcher
Leonardo DiCaprio - The Wolf of Wall Street
Tom Hanks - Captain Phillips or Saving Mr Banks
Matthew McConaughey - Dallas Buyers Club
Forest Whitaker - The Butler

Actress
Sandra Bullock - Gravity
Meryl Streep - August: Osage County
Emma Thompson - Saving Mr. Banks
Naomi Watts - Diana
Kate Winslet - Labor Day

Supporting Actor
Josh Brolin - Labor Day
Michael Fassbender - Twelve Years a Slave
John Goodman - Inside Llewyn Davis or The Monuments Men
Joaquin Phoenix - Lowlife
Mark Ruffalo - Foxcatcher

Supporting Actress
Amy Adams - American Hustle
Cate Blanchett - The Monuments Men
Sally Hawkins - Blue Jasmine
Catherine Keener - Captain Phillips
Margo Martindale - August: Osage County

Original Screenplay
Captain Phillips
The Counselor
Foxcatcher
Fruitvale
Gravity


Adapted Screenplay
August: Osage County
Before Midnight
Labor Day
The Monuments Men
The Wolf of Wall Street


Editing
Captain Phillips
The Counselor
Gravity
The Monuments Men
The Wolf of Wall Street


Cinematography
Gravity
The Great Gatsby
Inside Llewyn Davis
The Monuments Men
The Wolf of Wall Street


Art Direction
The Great Gatsby
The Hobbit
The Monuments Men
Oz the Great and Powerful
Saving Mr. Banks


Costume Design
Diana
Grace of Monaco
The Great Gatsby
The Monuments Men
Twelve Years a Slave


Original Score
The Counselor
Gravity
Man of Steel
The Monuments Men
The Wolf of Wall Street


Original Song
Frozen
Inside Llewyn Davis
Monsters Univeristy


Sound Mixing
Gravity
Inside Llewyn Davis
The Monuments Men
Star Trek Into Darkness
The Wolf of Wall Street


Sound Editing
Captain Phillips
Gravity
The Lone Ranger
The Monuments Men
Star Trek Into Darkness


Visual Effects
Gravity
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
Iron Man 3
Pacific Rim
Star Trek Into Darkness


Makeup
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom
Star Trek Into Darkness


Animated Feature
Epic
Ernest & Celestine
Frozen
Monsters University
Turbo

Sunday, April 28, 2013

Early Oscar predictions - Part 5

Here are the last four categories I have to run down before finalizing my early predictions: Score, Song, Sound Mixing, and Sound Editing.

Sunday, April 21, 2013

Early Oscar predictions - Part 4

Today's post is a short one, just looking at some of the possibilities in Production Design, Costume Design, and Makeup & Hairstyling. Next week we'll finish up the early predictions with a look at the aural craft categories.

Sunday, April 14, 2013

Early Oscar predictions - Part 3

We're taking a look at Best Animated Feature and three of the visual craft categories this week; Cinematography, Editing, and Effects. Next week we'll complete the visual crafts with Production Design, Costume Design, and Makeup.

Best Animated Feature
Another unrequested Pixar sequel (well, prequel) doesn't have me all that titillated, but the steadily increasing quality of Disney's output these last few years has me excited for their upcoming musical fantasy Frozen, based on Hans Christian Andersen's The Snow Queen. If Pixar and Dreamworks disappoint, that might also open the doors to GKIDS' art house titles, which this year includes 2012 Cannes entry Ernest & Celestine.

Sunday, April 7, 2013

Early Oscar predictions - Part 2

My early predictions continue with Best Supporting Actor, Supporting Actress, Original Screenplay, and Adapted Screenplay. Next week I'll start looking at some of the visual craft categories.

Best Supporting Actor
Always hard to get a read on the supporting categories because a lot of contenders stem from large ensembles out of which it's hard to detect the standout without seeing the film. The Monuments Men, for instance, boasts a starry cast, but who (if any) will get the most attention. I'm taking a chance on John Goodman (also starring in Inside Llewyn Davis this year) given his career trajectory of late; featured in the last two Best Picture winners, among several other awards films... how long can it be before his first career nomination? And for which film will it be?

You could make a similar case for Michael Fassbender, who probably came close to his first nomination for Steve McQueen's Shame. He's teaming again with McQueen for Twelve Years a Salve. Perhaps an American period drama is more to the Academy's liking?

Saturday, April 6, 2013

A few thoughts on Jurassic Park 3D

I have a bit of a love/hate relationship of 3D re-releases. On the one hand, I'm more often unimpressed with 3D movies in general, and go out of my way to avoid them unless I've read that the extra dimension is actually an additive experience. On the other, no 3D conversion can turn a good movie bad, and the temptation of revisiting old favourites on the big screen is often all the convincing I need.


To wit, I give you Steven Spielberg's Jurassic Park, a sci-fi spectacle with which I fell in love growing up as it became commonplace on VHS and television, but had never gotten the opportunity to see in a theatre. At the tender age of five, I was far too young to go see it in the summer of '93. Naturally, I was eager to finally behold the film's Oscar-winning sound design and groundbreaking effects in their proper theatrical format. I was not disappointed. Jurassic Park 3D proved to be a perfect post-Oscars palette cleanser at the outset of a long awards off-season.