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Wednesday 30 December 2009

Step Up

I really enjoy watching dance films and I wish they made more of them. But just like any film they still have to be good. Step Up is.

The story won't exactly blow you away and is pretty average. The dancing on the other hand is pretty good. It mixes street dancing with more disaplined dance styles, including ballet. A lot of the dancing is just small snippets apart from the end routine which is very good. The daning in the fim doesn't measure up to the likes of "The Cell Block Tango" from Chicago, or "Le Tango De Roxanne" from Moulin Rouge, but then it is a different style of dancing to those films. If it did want to measure up then I think that it would need to have been shot slightly differently. It wasn't shot badly, it just didn't have that "umf" that Chicago and Moulin Rouge had. Nevertheless, Step Up is still worth watching if you are into your dance movies. But if you're not then I wouldn't worry about catching this one.

7/10

Saturday 26 December 2009

About Last Night

Made in 1986 this film is still very watchable. A great little romantic comedy and a great little story. A story that gets better with age.

7/10

Wednesday 23 December 2009

Troy

The first time I watched this I quite enjoyed it. The second time I still enjoyed it but found many problems with the film.

First off the visual effects are starting to date a bit. But hey that's not the films fault. The editing is on the other hand. There are over a dosen scenes throughout the film, where if there are just two people talking to each other then it just cuts back and forth between two shots. A bit of variety would be nice, as when it lasts for like a minute it just become uncomfortable.

Brad Pitt. He's a very good actor, but in this movie he is just alright. His accent is just weird though. I can't work out whether or not he is trying to do an English accent or not, because everyone else in the film has one. The English accent ain't one of Brad's strong points though as whilst he didn't have a heavy American accent like he normally does, he didn't sound English either. Most of the rest of the acting is very good though and the film does have a very good cast.

The music works very well also, especially considering it was composed in about 3 weeks.

Even though the film did have it's bad points I still found it quite enjoyable.

7/10

Saturday 19 December 2009

Where The Wild Things Are

Technically this film is amazing and is really well made. However, I didn't find the story or the characters all the great.

Obviously the film is based on a book which many people will be fans of, and if you're one of them then you'll probably love the film because you'll love the story and characters.

However, for me, it just didn't do it. When the film took a slight dark twist towards the end I really started to like it, but then it went good again and it lost me again.

I found the film too moral, it's about a rebellious kid who runs away and stumbles upon this place with the strange creatures on it. The kid becomes great friends with the creatures until one of the creatures goes out of control in the same way that he was out of control. He then sees his behaviour from his mums point of view and so becomes a good little boy.

Probably one for the kids, but the story was too flat for it to offer me anything.

Wednesday 16 December 2009

A Serious Man

To put it simply, I didn't like this film. But then I'm not a fan of the Coen brothers. The only other full film of theirs that I've seen is Burn After Reading which I didn't like. Other than that I've only seen clips from some of their other films (e.g. No Country For Old Men) and not really liked what I've seen.

But A Serious Man is just very strange, I thought I understood what was going on through most of it, and then it just went really weird and I was suddenly majorly confused and didn't know what the hell was going on. It wasn't weird, Lynch weird, it was just weird, weird weird.

And I was actually in denial when the credits came up because I thought it was some kind of weird thing where they have the credits halfway through the film. Turned out it wasn't and that it actually was the end of the film.

Overall I just didn't get it or like it in any way, shape or form.

Saturday 12 December 2009

The Twilight Saga: New Moon

First off you've got to have seen the first film in order to see this film. I found Twilight to be pretty average, it wasn't amazingly good, and it wasn't amazingly bad. With The Twilight Saga: New Moon I found it averagely better than Twilight.

It did feel a little too long, but if you loved Twilight then you'll love this. If you didn't then you won't.

As a film it is much better than Twilight and I actually really liked the way some of the scenes were filmed. However, for me the best bit was the beginning of the end credits, when Alexandre Desplat's score just beautifully took the stage for me. Desplat has done some amazing scores so I might have to check his score for The Twilight Saga: New Moon out. But as for the film, I won't be getting the DVD.

Wednesday 9 December 2009

The Lord Of The Rings: The Fellowship Of The Ring

The first part in an epic trilogy. The Lord Of The Rings: The Fellowship Of The Ring is a stunning piece of film making that is sure to entertain. A great cast with great costumes, amazing visual effects, camera work, lighting, music, directing, etc. It would be hard not to get pulled into the world Peter Jackson has realised.

8/10

Saturday 5 December 2009

Pulse

I've seen enough shitty 'teen' horrors, so it was nice to watch a horror that actually takes itself seriously. It was a little slow throughout, but it definitely had a bit of the scare element which is kind of what makes a horror a horror.

I find some horrors are funnier than they are scary, Pulse manages to do it the right way round and I didn't laugh once. Was I scared? Maybe just a little!

6/10

Wednesday 2 December 2009

Corpse Bride

Like The Nightmare Before Christmas this film is stop-motion animated. However, the animation and character design don't compare to the standards of The Nightmare Before Christmas, and neither do the songs.

This film contains five songs written by Danny Elfman. Whilst not as good as those from The Nightmare Before Christmas they are still very good and it's worth buying the soundtrack if you're a fan of Elfman.

Corpse Bride is more of a kids film really. Although if you're not a kid but are still a fan of Tim Burton then I'd still recommend watching it as I quite enjoyed it. The story is very original and the music is beautiful.

However, if you've not seen The Nightmare Before Christmas then I'd watch that instead.

7/10