Movie Reviews 2.0

I've just watched Avengers last night. It was a fun movie. Not as good as the first one, but that might have to do with the enemy. Btw, I was entertained more with Furious 7 than this. The problem with Avengers 2 is that the ending isn't as satisfying and for me the best fight happened in the middle of the movie.
 
Same here. That massive action set piece at the end of act 1 completely over shadowed the protracted Agent Smith-esque smackdown at the end. That said, I thought the way James Spader's Ultron character frequently outmatched Tony Stark in battles of wit and snark was quite delightful. Very memorable villain. Come to think of it, it's probably the first Marvel movie that put any sort of great emphasis on the villain character. Once agaion it's also impressive how Wheedon manages to somehow not short change any of the ludicrously many principal characters without ever really slowing the movie down while making it all look effortless. This is an exceptionally breezy 2.5 hour movie for the most part. Really couldn't be any further away from Chris Nolan's last couple of dour longer-equals-better clunkers. The running time is well earned.

Well worth a watch, even if the sense of wonder is more than a little lessened by the fact that Avengers 1 pulled off most of the same feats a couple of years ago.
 
Loki was/is just a wonderful character. Not just because of the performance itself, but even the fact that he has a human face conveys emotions that a robot just can't, as much wit and funny one-liners you give him. I think Whedon did the best he could with what he had to work with.
 
I also liked Loki. I just never really took him as a serious threat. Heck, I don't think the film makers did either. He was always a tool for someone or something else and generally in way over his head. That is not a bad thing. However, having a villain who poses a serious threat all by himself is just as viable. And as far as emotionality goes, I actually think they took it too far by giving Ultron humanoid lips.
 
Couple of movies I watched recently

Trancendance: Johnny Depp's brain gets copied to a computer because somebody doesn't like him developing a "God" AI an decides to kill him. Depp is evil, then he's not and then he might not have really been Depp at all except that he was. Or something like that. He and his wife end up killing themselves because the world doesn't understand them but not before Depp releases nanobots all over the globe that make the world a nice and happy place.

Don't mind the spoilers, I just saved you two hours of your life. It is not a good movie.

A most wanted man: Piece of shit, don't bother watching. Poor acting, unlikeable characters and everything moves soooo slooooow. I managed to put up with this movie for 90 minutes before turning it off deciding that starting at a wall would be more fun than watching this.

Big Hero Six: Watch it! Lots of fun.

Lego movie: Everything is awesome!!!!


Besides being awesome, the CGI is the best I've ever seen. The movie looks exactly how the world would look if everything was made out of lego.

The equalizer: Solid action movie with Denzel Washington.

American Hustle: It's about two con-men (man and woman) that end up having to work for the FBI. Really enjoyable movie and I like the 70/80's setting. For some reason that makes movies feel much more fun than most modern movies where everybody is using tons of gadgets to get stuff done instead of telling a good story.

The Hobbit 3: Now I wasn't sure if I was going to like this movie as I thought the previous 2 were pretty meh but I actually did enjoy this one quite a lot. Probably because its 2.5 hours packed full of action.

Interstaller: Another movie I wasn't sure whether I would like it or not because of all the hype going on (I didn't read much about the movie itself before watching) but it is a very good movie. Spent the whole movie waiting for those robots to screw somebody over :LOL:

The movie had a very "contact" (Jody Foster, 1997) vibe to me, which is good because I really like that movie as well. The only thing I didn't like that much (same as with contact) was the ending. Seemed a bit too far out of reach for my liking but really enjoyed it apart from that.


 
Seen Ex Machina recently. Brilliant movie. Really hard to talk about it without giving too much away. I'd say the less you know about it the better. Probably best to avoid the trailers too. All I'm gonna say is that works just as much as a smart and layered drama as it does as a tense techno thriller that elegantly twists and turns without ever feeling forced. Every plot point is earned and logical. A concise script doesn't need Deus Ex Machina. It's like an M. Knight Shayamalan movie if the guy hadn't crawled up his own asshole and lost it a long time ago. It also looks bloody marvellous, sports 3 brilliant central performances (which is all central performances in this case) and even manages to be genuinely creepy at times. It's a hard sci-fi movie with a brain, yet thankfully devoid of the air of pretentiousness that's usually part and parcel with these kinds of films. (for the record: I thought Interstellar was a muddled, overlong mess and dull as fuck)

It's an Alex Garland movie through and through, proving he's just as apt a helmsman as he's a writer. Wonderful directorial debut. Gonna be hard to top for me this year. Between the two A.I.-centric movies in theaters right now, Ex Machina is far and away the better one.
 
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Super interesting news: Martin Freeman has just been signed for a role in CA3 Civil War. I'm totally not familiar enough with the universe to make any guesses about the character, but the guy is an amazingly good actor, so it's definitely a very good thing. Also, with Cumberbatch as Strange, one can only hope that Marvel has some plans to bring them together eventually ;)
 
Only the scenes with the live actors. Animal Logic went to incredible lengths to do the job right, they even had subsurface scattering on the blocks and all.
 
Laa-Yosh said:
Only the scenes with the live actors. Animal Logic went to incredible lengths to do the job right, they even had subsurface scattering on the blocks and all.
Click to expand...

Doing the job right would mean doing the job with actual Lego. It is called "The Lego Movie", not "The CG Movie".
 
tuna said:
Doing the job right would mean doing the job with actual Lego. It is called "The Lego Movie", not "The CG Movie".
Click to expand...
I've gotta agree, they took the easy way out. Whats next, the new stopmotion(*) Wallace and Gromit film

(*)some(**) parts may be CGI
(**) by some we mean the whole film except for the title sequence
 
You mean the Lego movie? The CG was in no way the easy way out at all!!! It took an incredibly painstaking effort to create that world, and the results are completely amazing - the fact that a lot of people don't even realize the extent of the CG work should be a testament to that. This movie is one of the best examples of how to use this technology IMHO.
 
Laa-Yosh said:
Super interesting news: Martin Freeman has just been signed for a role in CA3 Civil War. I'm totally not familiar enough with the universe to make any guesses about the character, but the guy is an amazingly good actor, so it's definitely a very good thing. Also, with Cumberbatch as Strange, one can only hope that Marvel has some plans to bring them together eventually ;)
Click to expand...
Civil War is turning into Avengers 2.5. They've now confirmed that all of the latest Avengers team are appearing, half of the old team, probably Spiderman, Ant Man and a bunch of others. Given the size of the cast I'm wondering if they will actually be able to fit much Cap character development in.
 
London-boy said:
Well with some of the scenes in the movie, it would have been pretty much impossible to do it all with real Lego.
Click to expand...
true parts may have to be reworked, the reason they used CGI is due to it being easier and a hell of a lot quicker aka Cheaper and at the end of the day executives are gonna choose the cash over the authenticity
 
I doubt the decision to go CG was based on evilgreedy CEO bastards who wanted more money.

BTW I followed the link in you sig and ended up playing macluvin for 20 minutes but I can't spread my cheeseburgers past the 5th level!
 
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