The Day The Earth Stood Still Review

The Day The Earth Stood Still is a remake of a 1951 science fiction film of the same name. The remake stars Keanu Reeves (The Matrix, Speed and Constantine) as Klaatu, an alien sent to earth for plot destroying reasons, and Jennifer Connelly (Hulk, Blood Diamond and Labyrinth) as Helen Benson, his unwitting and thoroughly retarded love interest who, conveniently, is a scientist and, perhaps not so conveniently has massive issues with her step-son (played by Jaden Smith of The Pursuit of Happiness and being Will Smith's son fame). The film cost $80,000,000 to make and is distributed and presumably funded by 20^th Century Fox, who's executives have quite clearly lost their tiny little minds!

Don't get me wrong, I loved the 1951 film, but who in their right mind would pay $80,000,000 for a remake of a film that nobody remembers? I'm going to be completely honest with you all and admit that there were only 37 other people in the cinema with me and every other film was sold out! No-one wanted to see this pile of shit. Everyone in that cinema had been hoping to catch the last showing of Quantum of Solace or the opening weekend of Twilight. People went to see Transporter 3, a film starring Jason Statham (War, The Bank Job and Death Race [Remake]) a man so bad at acting that he has acting doubles to deliver any lines with more than one vowel in them (that was joke by the way. Jason can do two vowels), over this.

Admittedly, I had avoided going to this film the week beforehand for fear that it would be sold out...

So, where to start? The plot? I did like the originals plot so it can't be too bad, right? Wrong. The plot of the remake centres around the same premise as the 1951 film, in that an alien, named Klaatu, comes to earth in order to decide whether the human race should live or die. This and the giant robot are the only similarities. There are so many inconceivably stupid plot devices to list and such little time, so I'll just cut to the chase: the ending is abysmal. Not only does Klaatu have no motivation to make the decision that he reaches, he in fact posses logical reason to go against himself. You could put it down to love but that would have required some romantic dialogue somewhere in the film.

It would also have required some chemistry between Reeves and Connelly, of which there is none. In fact Reeves gives his most wooden and pathetic performance ever caught on camera. I'm serious and if you doubt me watch about ten seconds of his performance here and then watch him deliver one line in anything else. Just in case you think that Reeves is actor, remember Speed? 'Cause he was in that and this performance is worse by far. It's that bad! He still manages to outshine the rest of the cast by miles. Pretty much everyone but Reeves has to think for a bout twenty seconds before delivering a line, even if the line is one word. I'm starting to think that acting doubles might not be a bad idea.

Never mind though, the $80,000,000 had to be spent on something and it sure as hell couldn't be the actors or the script. It had to go on some of the most awesome CGI ever, right? Wrong. I could do this CGI! I take A-level ICT and I could do better than this presumably expensive CGI. In flash. I have honestly never seen CGI this bad in a film produced in the last five years. It hurts to look at sometimes and it entirely defeats the point of the film anyway. The 1951 version created tension through clever and subtle use of admittedly awful props. The remake creates the sensation of being physically violated (in a bad way) through loud and obnoxious use of utterly dreadful CGI.

At the end of the film people cheered. They cheered because it was over. They cheered because Keanu Reeves' career is also obviously over. They cheered because their minds had been raped and they had lived to tell the tale. Most of all they cheered because they had united in their hate. I cried. I cried because it was over. I cried because Hollywood had destroyed one of my favourite cult classics. I cried because $80,000,000 had vanished from the face of the earth. Most of all I cried because this film broke me, in a way that no other film has in a long time. The timid optimism brought in by No Country For Old Men and The Dark Knight earlier this year is gone. The earth may not have stood still, but I did.

That was a corny ending for my review right? Right.

0/10

Star Wars Episode 2: Attack of the Clones Review (War on Star Wars Part Three)

I haven't really ranted properly in a while, perhaps I'm mellowing slightly, perhaps I'm becoming more conformist and dull or perhaps there just hasn't been a film bad enough to drag me down from the dizzying high I got when I watched The Dark Knight earlier this year. Who knows? More importantly, who cares?

Anyway, it is with this statement in mind that we must return to the War on Star Wars. We have now reached part three of this epic battle of unpaid lonely embittered internet critic versus popular franchise and can thus far summarise only that very people care what I think. It is with that fact in mind that I shall continue my just and righteous crusade, free of the inhibitions offered by popularity and recognition, by reviewing Star Wars Episode 2: Attack of the Clones.

I do talk a lot of bollocks sometimes, don't I?

Episode 2 is set ten years after the events of The Phantom Menace and the plot marks the beginning of the clone wars, one of the more ridiculous events to occur within Star Wars history. Whereas Episode 1 signalled the beginning of the end for Star Wars, in every single way and Episode 3 condemned the series, or at least the prequel trilogy, to depths of box office depravity, Episode 2 actually shows a brief respite from the swamps of Lucas' aged and decrepit mind in that it actually improves upon Episode 1. It's still a mess though.

The plot of Episode 2 revolves around the politics of the Star Wars universe, which wouldn't have necessarily been a bad idea if anyone had even the roughest idea of how democracy actually works within the republic. Admittedly there is a loose explanation of this within the film but it doesn't make sense, none of it makes sense. The entire system seems to revolve around electing the first person to offer an eloquent speech, which in retrospect seems like a system that America should employ immediately. No more Republicans, right?

I'm not going to talk about the crazy politics too much because it boils down to, big things are happening in high places and some people aren't happy about this so they try to assassinate Padmé, the one person who actually seems to understand the word democracy. What happens in between this plot set-up and the finale of the film is largely irrelevant and unfolds in a mess of hammy dialogue, bad acting and worse choreography.

As with Episode 3 no-one but Ewan McGregor can express more than one emotion on screen, Hayden Christensen is a flurry of angst and the word midichlorians pops up a few times. There are a couple of moments which intrigued me, like when Anakin goes to get revenge on the Tusken Raiders for killing his mother, but it's too badly scripted and acted to be credible.

I think I'm finally starting to figure out what is actually wrong with the prequel trilogy and it's not what I expected. It isn't the inclusion of retarded plot devices like midichlorians, or retarded characters like Jar Jar Binks; it's the lack of emotion. Episodes 1-3 should be about the rise and fall of Anakin Skywalker, his emotional turmoil through these times and his utter loss of himself leading to his transformation into Darth Vader. He should be a tortured and likeable character not an arrogant self-serving prick. The dialogue should be dark, not pun-laden and depressingly contrived. The blame doesn't rest entirely on Lucas' shoulders, Christensen is responsible as well.

3/10

Wanted Review

I never wanted to see Wanted. I also didn't want to open the review with a ridiculous pun, but sometimes the universe has a way of making everything slide in to place. Awkwardly. As for why I didn't want to see Wanted, it just looked stupid from the trailer. Angelina Jolie having the laws of physics bent around her? I'll admit that maybe a few penises have bent the laws of physics for that girl, but bullets damn well wouldn't (I'm just as confused about the sentiment contained within this sentence as you are).

As it stands my convictions against Wanted are wholly valid. It is quite simply the stupidest film I have seen since Snakes on a Plane, and it doesn't even realise it. The plot actually starts very well, as we follow an extremely likeable lead, Wesley Gibson (played by the utterly unappreciated James McAvoy), through the utterly depressing and futile nature of his life, all accompanied by a scathing and rude commentary which sounds some much like the inside of my brain it's scary. Then Wesley stumbles upon a cult of assassins who can bend the laws of physics and follow the orders of a magical loom that communicates in binary and I'm not even exaggerating.

The plot actually gets stupider. No-one ever questions why they follow the orders of a loom, how they got their powers, why they kill the people the loom tells them to (actually looked at briefly, given an awful and flimsy answer by an obviously insane person), or even how the people who started the fraternity (the aforementioned cult of assassins) understood binary, a code which quite simply wasn't available to cults of weavers (that's right, the assassins used to be weavers. Why? I have no idea) 1,000 years ago. The film simply ignores the fact that everything beyond the opening is completely stupid and utterly impossible.

Other than the vast majority of the film's plot Wanted is okay. It fits nicely into the category of “loud, obnoxious action films” which seems so popular with people who don't really appreciate good films. It has an awesome soundtrack, which fits perfectly with the film, it's shot fairly nicely and the acting is as good it gets in these kinds of films. Admittedly the dialogue is awful but when dealing with secret cults which follow the orders of a magical loom what do you expect?

All in all, it's a decent rental if you want a film you don't have to understand or care about. Although it could have been on a par with the first Matrix film if all the bollocks about the loom had been dropped (I may be a little obsessed with the stupidity of this plot device); the beginning shows masses of promise and the ending is wonderfully subversive, it's just all the middle bits which get in the way.

7/10