Reviews

Halo: Legends Review

2010-03-18T08:29:00.000-07:00

Why yes, I am a slave to this franchise. Now kindly shut the fuck up.

Following my review of Halo 3: ODST back in December I've been pretty disillusioned with the entertainment industry. I went to see all the big films that I had missed: Avatar, Where the Wild Things Are. And I didn't review them.

Why? My fury was somewhat spent on Halo. I found Avatar to be a pretty, fun, as and altogether enjoyable experience. It's not the masterpiece that everyone seems to think that it is; it's not as original as everyone thinks it is; it's okay. And normally that would anger me – but not now.

Where the Wild Things Are is a different story. I didn't review that because I didn't want to admit that it was my favourite film of the year.

So, now that I've finished excusing my absence, let me explain my review choice. I was running late for an unimportant lecture at university when I realised that I'd forgotten to bring a pen. Foolishly I went to my local supermarket, which for some reason stores the DVDs right next to the stationary. Now that I think on it, the booze is kept in clear view of the books too. Perhaps it's designed to trap me and me alone.

Paranoia aside, after selecting a pen which I have since lost, I just had to glance up at the DVDs. Nothing caught my eye in the best-sellers area – just a bunch of Hollywood garbage thrown together by literate monkeys – so I turned my attention to the less popular new releases.

That's when it happened. I glanced the name Halo and I didn't know whether to be afraid or uncontrollably happy. If the DVD was good it would catapult Halo back up into my esteem; if it was bad, I might need to see a psychiatrist. So I stood there, marvelling at the box art, suspended in time, figuring out if I could afford to pay £9.99 for something that would most likely just annoy me. It was fate. I was meant to buy it. It had to be.

So I like totally bought it.

And missed my seminar.

Shit happens.

As an aside: it was only when I got the disc home that I realised that it was an anthology of short films. Most of which are animated anime-style. Fuck's sake.

In all honesty I'm a bit stumped at how to review this. I've never been able to review any sort of collection before on this website. It's unfair to review an entire collection as a whole because each item in it is basically it's own product. Nor do I have time or patience enough to review every single item within the anthology. This does sort of put a stop to my reviewing process for this DVD – until I realised that Bungie tried to link all the films with a single bare plot thread, and that every film of this DVD is abysmal.

We open where Halo 3 left off and get a clear and long shot of the planet that Master Chief is currently orbiting around. But don't get your hopes up! The plot doesn't continue from here; it takes place in the form of flash backs! Making this scene ENTIRELY POINTLESS!

So Cortana (Master Chief's completely nude blue female companion – Avatar really wasn't that original was it? I mean when your soft-core porn scenes are stolen you're a bit boned) takes the front seat and tries to wake up the Chief despite his clear request that she should leave him alone. Failing this she proceeds to narrate to herself starting off our anthology with a 20 minute PowerPoint presentation. I really wish I was joking, but the first two films on this disk run to about ten minutes a piece and consist of nothing but continuous exposition over the top of images. It's not badly animated or anything; it's just mind-numbingly boring. Add on top of that the fact that any Halo fan already knows all of this, and that they completely ignore most of what actually happened in the games and it becomes painful to watch.

Actually this helps me flag up one of the main problems in the Halo continuity. During her narration Cortana mentions that the Halos kill Flood. In the first game it is specifically stated that the Halo rings do not kill Flood. Furthermore, in everything made after that game Bungie have stated that it does kill Flood. So which is it Bungie? I sincerely doubt that you're gonna retcon the first game, so does that mean the Halo 3's climax is fundamentally flawed? Does it?

Anyway, following these films we have more bullshit. Only one or two of the films suffer from bad animation, the rest a superbly done. Literally all of the dialogue is trite, self-referential bullshit which does nothing but grate on my nerves. The whole thing is voice-acted well enough, and the music is... the Halo music.

To sum up: it's terrible. The plots make no sense. Coherency has been thrown to the wind. And I sincerely doubt that it has been edited at all. This said, ODST is far, far worse, and this isn't the worst anthology I've seen either.

Still, don't buy it.

2/10

Disney's A Christmas Carol Review

2009-12-16T17:46:00.001-08:00

I'm going to be brutally honest now: I have very few feelings about Christmas. As a staunch socialist (nearing communist) and atheist both the capitalist and religious meanings of the holiday are completely lost on me. As far as I'm concerned the holiday is just the same as any other time I spend outside of university (formerly school). Except slightly colder.

With all this said it may come as a shock to know that I love the feeling about at Christmas. I love the idea of good-will to all men (and women of course), sharing, and holiday cheer. Even with my own experiences of Christmas consisting mainly of sitting around in my bedclothes and watching TV, there's something about the stories which gets me. As an example: it's the only time of the year that I can think Disney without immediately thinking Nazi afterwards. Oh wait -

I think I actually have to credit my enjoyment of a festive feeling to the media. Half because my own life is seemingly devoid of it, and half because TV and films are simply better at Christmas. And it's not only because of the production values. Simply put: the stories presented at Christmas all hit something shared within the human experience; that bizarre feeling of instantaneous excitement for an event (which ultimately disappoints). I would personally argue that The Snowman is the best example of this and no other films need apply, but apparently Disney disagree.

Nazi wankers.

A Christmas Carol sees Jim Carrey join the likes of Patrick Stewart (A Christmas Carol), Rowan Atkinson (Blackadder's A Christmas Carol), and even The Muppets (A Muppet Christmas Carol) in the plethora of TV adaptations of Dickens' famous book. Like all versions of the film, this one has a gimmick – it's 3D. Whilst I can honestly say that I'm not too much of a fan of 3D films, I don't mind admitting that it works here. If there's one thing Disney can do well it's animation.

As for the rest of the film, I'm going to dive straight into my nitpicking. And honestly there isn't too much to comment upon. As everyone over the age of a sperm cell knows the plot of this film it's probably only worth mentioning how it's represented here. Rather oddly the first twenty, or maybe even thirty minutes of the film are some of the bleakest sections of animation I have ever witnessed. The portrayal of Scrooge as a complete and utter bastard is so brutal and nigh on perfect that it becomes impossible to see how this film could have been made for children.

Then it all derails into a jaunty trip down Disney lane for a large period of time. Things move fast, colours splash all over the screen and children giggle. It's oh so wonderful.

As with any self-respecting mature male does when confronted with this sort of entertainment I tried to find my inner child and enjoy what I was presented. Finding him bitter and full of the ashes of failed promise I got bored and messed around with my 3D glasses for a bit. Just as I was about to switch off entirely something remarkable happened. Disney went back to being bleak. My inner ash child was contented and I continued to watch. Until it ended like every rendition of this story always does: with Scrooge becoming a happy, Christmas loving man. Rather abruptly I might add.

Other than the plot I can't find much to mention. The animation is fantastic, the voice acting is fine, and the musical score is Christmassy. I can only really say that I don't think anyone will enjoy all of this film. The beginning is too slow and bleak for children, the middle too quick and Disney-esque for adults, and the end too unbelievable. It's worth a watch I guess.

Fuck it: back to The Snowman.

6/10

Halo 3: ODST Review

2009-12-10T19:12:00.000-08:00

Dearest reader,

What follows is part review and part suicide note. As followers of my website, blog, or Twitter account will undoubtedly have picked up on, I'm having a pretty shit time at the moment. So, I decided to take a meagre portion of my student loan and buy something to cheer myself up. Given that Halo always used to cheer me up in my earlier teenage years and the cast of Firefly (possibly my favourite sci-fi of all time) are the voice actors for ODST I decided that it was a pretty safe bet. Heck, my friend Rory even came over to play the game through on co-op (legendary difficulty – we're manly men!) with me. We set aside a whole day for it.

I like to take a walk with whomever I happen to be with after absorbing any media product intensively. During these walks I like to talk about whatever I just played/watched/read/listened to a little bit whilst not fixating on the subject. After ODST there were very few words. Rory and I merely walked in near silence, letting out miserable sighs, the occasional swear word, and any phrasing of the sentence: 'what the fuck?'.

I feel that it may perhaps be perceived that I'm over-stating how badly this game affected me; I'm not. To make my point valid I feel I have to refer to the worst film I have ever seen: Revenge of the Nerds 2: Nerds in Paradise. Although Nerds 2 is completely devoid of humour, although I felt as if my mind were being torn apart by hundreds upon hundreds of tiny knives whilst watching it, although I wanted to die during every second of that putrid pile of shit, I still enjoyed it more than ODST. Why? BECAUSE LOGIC HAS NO PLACE IN HELL!

Alright, in-jokes aside, why is ODST as bad as I say it is? I admit that I actually enjoyed the game mildly the first time I played it through (on normal). The pacing seemed alright, I never got stuck in one area too long, and the marine statistics and weaponry actually seemed to make the game run smoother than Halo 3 itself. But it cost me £30, and I refuse to pay £30 for 6 hours of gameplay. I only took that crap for Portal because it was 6 hours of gaming heaven and you got three other games with it. And before you start: we don't talk about Mirror's Edge here any more.

On the game's second play through it starts to fall apart. When I say 'fall apart' I mean everything is boring after the first mission – which isn't too great. The detective angle that Bungie have played off as revolutionary for the series comes down to nothing more than running through mostly empty scenery whilst looking for a single object to the sound of shit music. It reminds me of those game world hubs that used to be in things like Spiro, and Crash Bandicoot. Except shit and far too drawn-out.

The rest of the game is similar to the same old Halo affair without ever approaching any level of fun. The combat drags after the first half hour, largely due to the fact that it's obvious Bungie have provided a single way to deal with each situation thus making even the larger sequences seem completely redundant. Then, once you hit the third, maybe the fourth hour of gameplay something hits you: ODST is the same fight copy and pasted about fifty times.

I paid £30 for five minutes of gameplay.

You may scoff at this criticism and say that all shooters are in effect exactly same thing done over, and over, and over again: you'd be completely right. The only difference between this game and other shooters is that other shooters try to hide how repetitive they are with set-pieces. ODST has precisely one set-piece, and it's shit. I would even go so far to say that ODST is more repetitive than World of Warcraft. At least with WoW you have to change what you click every few levels.

With this we come to the crux of the matter: the storyline. I can forgive anything for a good plot. As an example: The Da Vinci Code. It's an awfully constructed and written book, but I kept with it because the story was so interesting. ODST falls apart completely because of one reason and one reason only. That reason?

As far as I can tell, there is no plot.

As the Rookie (yes, they pulled another Master Chief esque character out of their arse) you do nothing but look for the other characters, and as the other characters you do nothing but shoot shit. There is a very desperate attempt to link everything in the game's last two missions, but it simply doesn't work.

It somehow seems that Bungie are trying desperately to remind the audience of Firefly. The characters are all similar to those in the the show, the dialogue is borderline Whedon (but I do mean in his Angel and Buffy years. Which are naught but a blight upon humanity), and there are numerous references to episodes very dear to my heart. The problem? THIS IS THE FUCKING HALOVERSE!

Forgive me for resulting to stereotypes, but I don't think the common Halo gamer is going to have heard of, or care about Firefly, Serenity, or any of the actors involved with them. So, they aren't going to be too happy when they see all these references changing EVERY FUCKING DYNAMIC ESTABLISHED WITHING THE GAME WORLD! Similarly, Firefly fans don't generally like Halo. And even if they do I imagine they'd much rather just watch the show than play through six hours of substandard science fiction for a scant few references. So, what about the multiplayer?

I must admit that I probably went into 'firefight' (sic.) with lower expectations than I should have done, but with a campaign that mid-numbing can you blame me? Basically the mode is just fights which bored you in the campaign lasting even longer, with less reason to continue playing them. If you're a really hardcore Halo fan then you might enjoy it. But I mean a really hardcore Halo fan. The kind who gets annoyed when people say the game is 'okay but not great'.

As for the second disc, I assume you all already own Halo 3? If you fit the description of a hardcore Halo fan shown above then your head probably exploded over the three exclusive maps already. Otherwise, there's just no fucking point. You may as well just throw your money in the bin.

And with this my fury has been vented unto the world and I can now go and quietly hang myself. I don't want to leave any personal messages to anyone – you're all wankers. I suppose I should probably say something poetic with myself passing. How does '0/10' sound?

0/10 – It'll do.

With spite: James.

(P.S. I'm not actually going to kill myself. It's a joke; mocking depression is obviously hilarious.)

Saw VI Review

2009-11-14T17:09:00.000-08:00

Before I start let me say that this review is completely pointless. About a year ago I reviewed the first film in this series, and to my surprise it wasn't too bad. Since then I've swallowed whatever remained of my dignity and watched all of the Saw films. As I expected, they get progressively worse and, like all franchise, seem completely pointless after the third film. And even telling you that is fucking pointless; wanna know why?

It's pointless because no matter what I say, no matter what anyone says, if you're reading a review of Saw VI on the internet then you are going to go and see it. Sequel syndrome will have set in and you'll be desperately trying to convince yourself that the plot will add up. You have to see how it ends now, even though you know it won't be at all interesting – or even make sense. It happens to the best of us.

Consumerist twats.

I don't even think there's any point in my explaining the plot: it's Saw, you already know what happens. The only difference is in the traps and over-all plot progression. So, in the spirit of the review, let's completely forget intellectual superiority to the film-makers and dive straight to the only part of this writing I can possibly pass off a genuine review. Here goes: the traps are meek and the plot doesn't go anywhere.

I just reviewed Saw VI.

Now that nuisance is out of the way I'm going to indulge myself in some critical catharsis (read Aristotle bitches) and pick-up on some of the finer elements of this film. I don't think that it would be at all unfair of my to say that when you go into see a Saw film you expect to feel slightly (more and more emphasis on slightly as time goes on) repulsed, mildly bored, and thoroughly underwhelmed. You do not expect to be politically challenged in any way. Well guys, guess what. Saw VI has political commentary!

When I say political commentary I don't mean to say that Saw VI has subtle references to problems within our society, or a sense of irony, heavens no! What I mean to say is that the film desperately tries to catch up with the rest of the artistic society by bashing capitalism. I by no means absolve myself from this school of thought (having written explicitly anti-capitalist essays), however it probably says a lot more about the state of the world when the basest forms of entertainment (gore porn, a.k.a. Saw) start to pick up on the idea that being a socialist is trendy. All political arguments aside, it's unreasonable to expect an audience to swallow an entire plot based upon subtext. Without spoiling the film (irony see?), the characters depicted as evil capitalist scum within Saw VI are by no means evil in real life. By forcing them through the hell created by Jigsaw for simply doing their jobs the film doesn't make us feel like they're getting some form of divine punishment for buying into capitalism. It just makes Jigsaw look like a dick.

In fact, this annoyed me so much that I think I'm going to introduce a new element to the reviews: Writing 101. Every time a writer fucks up so bad that it makes me feel like I could hit someone they will be signposted by a new rule – lest they be foolish enough to repeat the mistake. Today's rule?

#1 – Subtext is not plot.

In conclusion, Saw VI is exactly what you expect it to be with very, very bad political commentary stapled on. To give it credit, Saw VI is no-where near as bad as Saw V and I did somewhat enjoy the time I spent with it. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone beyond fans of the franchise, the bad acting alone can kill it for a new audience member. However, if you're a fan of the Saw series (and I'd recommend seeking mental help if this is the case) by all means go and see Saw VI. Not that you need me to tell you that, you've already gone.

I'm wasting my life, aren't I?

4/10

Zombieland Review

2009-10-24T18:45:00.000-07:00

Zombieland is advertised badly. Every advertisement I've seen for the film features the gimmick of the theme park in some way. The trailers all show a scene with zombies being crushed by a fairground ride, the poster displays the cast standing in front of a fairground, and even the title alludes to the setting. Why is this bad?

About ten minutes of the film is set there.

Advertising scruples aside, let's dive in shall we? The film revolves around Columbus' (Jesse Eisenberg) desperate attempt to survive in a zombie ridden America. Along the way he encounters the Twinkie obsessed cowboy Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson) and the two immoral sisters, Wichita and Little Rock (Emma Stone and Abigail Breslin respectively). Aside from this very little happens. The plot and comedy is mostly derived from the character's internal conflicts (an example of which would be Columbus' internal monologue, which is reminiscient of Scrubs – but with zombies), and the setting. Occasionally some gratuitous violence or a cameo is thrown in for good messure.

From the outset, a character based zombie comedy may not sound like such a great idea. It doesn't really play on the zombie film sub-genre itself for comedy (except in a very obvious social satire way), and it relies entirely on the ability of the script-writers. Whilst this has been pulled off before to amazing effect (see Shaun of the Dead), you'd be forgiven for doubting its appeal.

Fortunately, Zombieland has one feature which catapults you easily into the rest of the film: the protagonist. As already mentioned, large amounts of the story are told via Coloumbus' internal monologue. These sections not only provide succinct aids to the plot, but also help to create the most wonderfully identifiable and neurotic character I can remember in recent film history. Both the scripting and the acting are equally creditable for this, with some brilliant lines being delivered in a quite frankly perfect manner by Jesse Eisenberg. In fact, this character is so fantastically crafted that he is able to support the rest of the film on his shoulders one the few occasions it falls flat.

Not that it falls flat often. Each of the supporting characters is instantly likeable, and wonderfully scripted as well. Special credit must go to Woody Harrelson for his fantastic portrayal of Tallahassee, but the two girls are both fantastic as well. Past this, the action sequences are filmed with a perfect tone, the scripting is almost flawless and I can honestly say that I was never bored.

The one complaint I do have is that around the 40 minute mark the film slows down quite considerably. It speeds up again when a certain (and awesome) cameo comes into play, but a large section of the film feels quite stale compared to the rest. Luckily most of this sustained by our lead and what results is by no means bad film making. Its just outshone by what went before it and what happens after it.

To sum up, Zombieland is the only genuinely funny comedy I've seen in a long time. It has a few failings which make it fall short of the only other zombie comedy worth its salt (Shaun of the Dead) but it still managed to leave me feeling satisfied. Check it out.

9/10

RunMan: Race Around The World Review

2009-10-03T16:07:00.000-07:00

It's been pretty dark around here of late. From uploading my own poetry and short fiction – none of which have even the slightest shred of happiness in them – to studying William Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus for university, it's been a long time since I did anything happy. Coincidentally, it's also been a long time since I had any money. The cure to both of these dilemmas comes in the form of RunMan, a lovely little independently developed game which can be downloaded for free here.

Now that I've said it's free you all think my standards have dropped, that if some thing's free then it's not worthwhile. Well, I'll have you know that my standards haven't dropped; I'm not giving anything back to the community, the community can fuck-off. Just because this game is free does not mean that I'm going to conclude my review with some benign statement like “what have you got to lose?” If it's shit I'll call it.

It is free though. Just saying.

Anyway, moving on from the fact that this wonderful game is completely free; RunMan: Race Around The World centres around the character of RunMan as he... races around the world. Well, you gotta hand it to them: they know how to be consistent. And this is is a video-game, the plot isn't important! It's all about the gameplay, which is actually very good here.

The game is a simple two dimensional platformer, with the objectives of all platformers: get to the end of the level. Each “zone” is divided into several levels with a boss level at the end. This is massively helped by the game's level design, which is some of the best I've ever seen. Several features have been added to vary things, most noticeably the sprint which speeds the game up and keeps it interesting for experienced players. The one complaint I do have is that the boss stages are always exactly the same thing sped up slightly. It's a minor complaint, but still enough to bring you back to the real world.

However, it's the game's graphics and sound which really make it worthwhile. The art work is intentionally cartoony and badly drawn, colour is used far too much, and the overall effect is that of a children's cartoon book. It's fucking wonderful! Add in some music which you just wouldn't expect, and this game is guaranteed to put a smile on your face.

So, overall RunMan is an exceptionally well-made, fun, and simply joyous game. It harkens back to the days of gaming's infancy, provided tight level design, childish and amusing storytelling, and a look which is both wholly unique and all too familiar. The only complaints I can think to offer are the boss battles, and the game's length (clocking at roughly an hour and a half). Whilst there is some replay value (character unlocks etc.) it's not really all that worthwhile. Still, definitely worth a look.

And it's free.

8/10

District 9 Review

2009-09-20T15:25:00.000-07:00

District 9 is the first film that I've had to put thought into reviewing in a very long time. This can be accredited to two things: 1) District 9 is a difficult film to review, and 2) the other films that I have been reviewing lately fit nicely into certain criteria. I personally think that number two is more to blame; as complex as District 9 may pretend to be, it really isn't.

The film centres around Wikus van de Merwe (played by Sharlto Copley, the directors best friend) a field operative handling the relocation of ~~poor South Africans~~ Aliens. I realise that my joke wasn't that subtle, but when I'm dealing with a metaphor about as subtle as a brick to the face what do you expect?

So, as anyone with half a brain can deduce from the way that the film was advertised, this film isn't really about aliens; it's a half-baked metaphor about the apartheid in South Africa! And, as I guessed, this is it's main problem.

I don't know about you, but when a film tries to handle material as dark and miserable as the apartheid, I generally expect it to come to some form of moral conclusion. This isn't to say that District 9 completely shirks this responsibility, in fact it tries really hard to come up with something. However, when the film finished I felt that I hadn't been told anything beyond “people are dicks”, and in a film set in the real apartheid I could accept this. In a sci-fi I can't.

It may seem odd that I set my sights slightly higher for a work of fiction (especially science-fiction, a genre headed in public consciousness by George Lucas, a man who is clearly bat-shit insane), so allow me to explain myself. When you write, or film a serious work of fiction you immediately set yourself up to provided some form of message, any form of message. However, if working with a real life situation, you are not obliged to do so. Real life is messy, fiction is crafted.

It may seem like I hated this film, which I really didn't. Once the obnoxious nature of the “social commentary” on display here is dispensed with, District 9 proves itself to be an extremely enthralling sci-fi. The plot is tense, the characters interesting (especially the aliens), and the production values are extremely high. Overall, this may actually be my favourite science-fiction film since Serenity.

So, what is District 9 really? In my opinion, it's an extremely well crafted, and inventive film which aims far too high. In the hands of a more capable screenwriter, this could have possibly been one of my favourite films of all time. As it stands, it's still one of my favourite sci-fi films, and I highly recommend it. I would also recommend keeping an eye first time writer/director Neill Blomkamp, as with the technical expertise, dedication, and ambition he has show here he could well become one of the best film-makers in the business.

8/10

Taxi Driver Review

2009-09-18T17:04:00.000-07:00

As all regular readers of my reviews will know, I like to pride myself on being at height of film, television, video game, and literary snobbishness. Ergo, I hate admitting to lapse in my cultured image. Continuing with this theme, it gives me great displeasure to admit that I hadn't seen Taxi Driver (a film widely regarded as the height Robert De Niro's career, and one of Scorsese's best) until about two weeks ago.

Before you leap on the “oh, how could you” bandwagon I'd like to remind you that I've still read more than you ever will. And I mean ever.

I suppose I should probably provide some form of excuse for this gap in my film knowledge, and lacking any real form of justification for this error in my judgement I must fall back on the law to protect me. I only turned eighteen a little over a month ago. It has only just become legal for me to watch this film. To anyone who points out that I've reviewed certificate eighteen films before now, I have only this to say: I'm a hypocrite, shoot me.

Moving away from my own utter failure as a human being, a critic, and a consumer, Taxi Driver revolves around the life of Travis Bickle (Robert De Niro), a depressed young cab driver working in Manhattan. He becomes obsessed with a woman named Betsy (Cybill Shepard) and encounters several criminals on the job. The film depicts his descent into insanity.

It sounds like an extremely simple plot when all of the film techniques, and psycho-analytical character progression are stripped away, which is why the film leaves them in. The camera work on display here is astounding, building and maintaining a level of tension consistently throughout the film's plot. Similarly, the film's script and music all work towards creating a sense of dread. This is so effective that's it's almost suffocating.

Oddly, whilst this is the film's biggest achievement, it is also it's biggest flaw. The atmosphere of dread transcends the level of simple entertainment and becomes something entirely of it's own. The lack of moral clarity in anything shown on screen is simply too much to bear at times. The film itself made me feel sick. It's sadistic to the utmost level.

The acting is superb. De Niro gives the performance of his life as the disturbingly troubled Bickle, managing to make me both fear and sympathise with the character at all times in the film. Besides this the supporting cast are excellent, each managing to craft wholly real characters when given any screen time at all.

Ultimately, Taxi Driver is a landmark in cinéma. Not only is this the perfect example of how to develop and maintain an atmosphere of dread and tension, it also serves as an unending testament to Scorsese's ability as a director and De Niro's skills as an actor. However, it is not a film which is easy to sit through, and as such I feel that can only recommend this to people with a good ability in watching films.

10/10

Paprika Review

2009-09-06T18:58:00.001-07:00

As a rule all real animé is one of three types of insane (by “real animé” I mean everything that hasn't been Americanised). These are:

Bizarre – Absurd dialogue, bizarre character progression, and no real plot.
Perverted – Fan service through and through. Hentai belongs here.
Dark – Ranges from violent to borderline psychotic levels of violence.

The animé we are currently dealing with, a film named Paprika, slots nicely into the first category. Featuring lines like “I remember you from that time when I saved you from the tyrannical king, I would've talked if you hadn't turned into a bowl full of instant noodles,” this is by far the most bizarre animé that I have ever seen in my life.

So, the most logical question to ask is if this film has anything stringing the bizarre scenes together. The answer to said question is a tentative yes. The film's plot (and believe me when I say that I mean that in the widest possible sense) centres around the invention of a device which allows you to view your friends dream as your own. For some reason one of these devices falls into the hands of the evil chairman, who begins to enslave the populous in a dream world. It's wafer thin, has no real progression, and means absolutely nothing, but it does the job.

What job I hear you ask (not literally. Although it is 3am on a Monday. I really need to start writing these at a more practical time of day). Well, the entire point of the plot in this film is to string together the dream sequences, which are bat-shit insane. I can however forgive this, because they are fucking hilarious.

That, and the fact that we must always acknowledge my Revenge of the Nerds II: Nerds in Paradise review. Oh? You forgot that:

“LOGIC HAS NO PLACE IN HELL!”

It's good that I'm egotistical enough to pull this off.

Returning to Paprika, every dream sequence is immaculately scripted. Although the dialogue contributes nothing, to anything, anywhere, it never once failed to make me laugh. This was quite possibly the funniest film I've seen all year. Besides this, the film's soundtrack and art are awesome. Nothing else to it.

There's not much else you can say about a film like Paprika. It's bizarre, hilarious, and leaves you wondering what the hell just happened. I think that I enjoyed it.

7/10

The Grapes of Wrath (1940 film) review

2009-08-27T13:19:00.001-07:00

I'll admit it: when I first saw this film I hadn't read the book. (I have now). Something about Steinbeck's meticulous descriptions of everything put me off the novel. Which is odd considering that East of Eden is one of my favourite novels ever written, and Steinbeck is one of my favourite. I'm not sure what this admittance does to my credibility. Never mind, I wasn't too reliable anyway.

That admittance fucked me up.

The film, like the book, follows the journey of a poverty stricken family of share croppers from Oklahoma, named the Joads, as they desperately try to make their way to California in search of work. Very few changes have been made to the plot of the first act of the film, save the occasional adaptation of imagery or dialogue in order to fit the cinéma. However, the second act of the film has been changed almost completely.

Having been exposed to the film first, I found no problems with this. It was still enjoyable (to the extent that a film about poverty can be enjoyable), and the final scene did leave me satisfied. After reading the novel, my view of the film changed entirely. I can understand that the changes have been made to leave the audience with a sense of hope, rather than desolation, as well as in an attempt to avoid any issues of censorship; however, that does not excuse them.

By avoiding the more controversial messages held in Steinbeck's novel, the film somewhat misses the point of the book. When compared to Steinbeck's novel, the ending seems far too corny, and cliché. Some of the characters aren't given the development they need to become almost real people, and the sense of tragedy is lost. Furthermore, the omission of the peach imagery changes them focus of the film from the relationship between mankind and land, to mankind's interaction with itself exclusively.

Besides these edits, the film is exceptionally well-made. The acting is superb, with each character bouncing off of the others perfectly in conversation. In fact, the simple act of making the character's all seem different for each other is hard enough when using the word, that the difference between the way each character is portrayed is nothing short of astounding. Sound is used in sporadic brilliance. Whilst I don't much think that the music chosen fits the film very well, the use of background noise against speech creates an unusual, and quite terrifying atmosphere of desolation and loneliness.

The cinématography is the best that I have ever seen in a black and white film. Shadow is used to outstanding effect, and as the film draws on the contrast between light and day becomes ever more striking. Some of the landscape shots used are so breath-taking that I had to re-watch them. It's that good.

Overall, The Grapes of Wrath is an extremely hard film to review. The good bits are amazing, but the difference between the book and the film will probably leave anyone who's ever read the novel with a sense that they've been cheated. Still, a must for lovers of cinéma, if only to look at the technical expertise.

8/10

Franklyn Review

2009-08-17T16:45:00.000-07:00

Franklyn is a film about the mind. Although, you wouldn't think it from the way this thing has been advertised. In every trailer there is for this film they show a lot of footage of a Rorschachian character prancing around a huge Gothic city beating the shit out of guards. The actual film has about two minutes of that stuff in it. So if you were looking forward to some epic fight scenes just don't bother, you'll get nothing but disappointment. I should know, I was looking forward to it too.

So, if not an action film, what is Franklyn? It's a deep psychological thriller full of dialogue, written by the director. It's also contrived as hell.

The film's plot centres around four characters. The first is the aforementioned Rorschach look-a-like who is named Jonathan Priest, and resides in the fictional location of Meanwhile city. Meanwhile city is a bizarre satire on religion where each citizen must be part of a faith. Sadly, what could have been a nice metaphor, or even a cohesive story-telling device, is never expanded on.

The other characters within Franklyn all stem from well-worn stereotypes. The troubled artist, the lonely divorcee, and the troubled parent all form the brunt of the plot, and take up three quarters of Franklyn's runtime. Before you ask, the story lines barely have any new elements, barring Franklyn's conclusion. Which is nonsensical rubbish.

Other than plotting, script, and to a certain extent, direction, Franklyn is a fairly polished film. The acting is well done, and neatly edited, the film's special effects are at times breath-taking, and the sound is well-realised.

The saddest thing is, it would be easy to make this film a genuine classic. If the script was loosened slightly, the writer took himself a little less seriously, and the entire first act of the film was cut, Franklyn would be a neat little film. Nothing too pretentious, or obtrusive. However, that was not to be. As it stands Franklyn is a pretentious piece of garbage that wastes it's money shots on a half-interesting plot-line and misleads it's audience from the start. Don't bother with it.

4/10

Flight of the Conchords (Series 1 & 2) Review

2009-08-13T17:26:00.001-07:00

The Flight of the Conchords have been something of an underground favourite of mine for quite a while now. The comedy-folk duo, originally from New Zealand, have written and performed some of my favourite songs, including: The Humans are Dead, and Albi the Racist Dragon. Therefore, it came as an unnerving shock to me when I heard that the TV series under the same name had been cancelled. The reason? Apparently the second series was shit.

As such, I've decided to review both of the show's two seasons in one go. As with my last review (Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, Game of the Year edition) this review will be broken into sections. The first will concern the first series, the second will concern the second series.

If you actually need help understanding that, get the hell off my website.

Series One:

The first series is based around a fictionalised version of the band's rise to fame in New York. Already famous in New Zealand, Bret and Jermaine hire the completely inept manager Murray to aid them. The resulting comedy is extremely dry and aimed at an extremely specific audience. Whilst I found it extremely enjoyable (what with having sarcasm falling out of my eyeballs and all) I can guarantee that you'll hate it if you like anything with a laugh track shown on the ABC network. I mean that.

However, the show is comic gold in sections, most notably in the musical interludes. These are shown in the form of music videos, and more often than not provide the most laughs in the show. Despite the fact that these form the comic corner-stone of the show, they often contribute nothing to the plot and on occasions just seem stupid placed.

Overall, series one of Flight of the Conchords is a cult classic. Like it's main competition, The Mighty Boosh, it will appeal only to a small audience. Go for it if you enjoy reading my reviews.

8/10

Series Two:

As with series one, series two of Flight of the Conchords is based around the fictionalised rise to fame of the band under the same name. Again, as with series one, series two is an extremely dry comedy, aimed at an extremely specific audience. However, unlike series one, this series doesn't work very well.

The majority of episodes are comprised around the same formula as the first series, however, there is a key ingredient missing. Most of the songs are shit. Having decided to ditch the instantly classic cult comedy approach in favour of songs mostly based upon sexual innuendos, the Conchords have lost their comic identity. Whilst the overall effect may be appealing to a larger audience, when combined with the dryness of the talking scenes, the show appeals to no-one.

That's not to say that the series is without merit. One or two of the musical sequences had me laughing more than most of the last series (in particular, the Japanese karaoke scene is fantastic). However, on the whole, this series is disappointing. Buy it if you're a fan, not otherwise.

5/10

So children, what have we learned? Two things.

I need to stop reviewing two things at any one time.
I should stop answering my own questions.

No logical pun to end the review on...

Fuck off.

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (Game of the Year Edition) Review

2009-08-06T18:57:00.001-07:00

The first review I ever published online was my review of Oblivion. It scored full marks. You won't find the review online any more. It was terrible, derisive bullshit. In fact if you read Official Xbox Magazine's review of the game you'll get a better written and funnier version of my original review. So, why the re-write?

Because I don't have any money left to buy new things. (Hint, Hint.)

My opinion on the original game still stands. It is an excellent, and addictive game. The graphics still have the “holyshitthat'sfuckingamazing” effect today, the writing and voice acting is still absurdly good, and the gameplay is still intricate and expertly coded. However, I would now like to deviate from the opinion of my younger self and state that Oblivion is not a masterpiece. It has some flaws to account for, including: noticeable lag at higher levels, an insane difficulty curve and the bastardisation of the far more complex Morrowind gameplay system. If it were by itself I would probably give the game eight out of ten now.

Luckily the Game of the Year edition comes with the two largest expansion packs. Let's see if these can add anything. First up is Knights of the Nine.

Knights of the Nine is comprised of a new guild complete with guild hall, quests and new items. The plot revolves around an attack on a chapel, to say much more would give it away. It's peaks and troughs are badly spaced. Instead of beginning with a low and dragging you further into the plot, Knights of the Nine's plot starts badly and ends badly.

The quests offer a similar and completely lacklustre experience. Most revolve around simple item collection missions and the few that don't are entirely combat orientated. I will give the expansion credit for the items included within it. Each is a palatable reward.

Overall I would recommend Knights of the Nine to hardcore players of the main game. It adds about five hours more gameplay for those who simply can't get enough. However, on the basis that it adds nothing for the casual player to really enjoy my point score is going to stay at eight. Next: Shivering Isles.

Shivering Isles is massive. It contains new locations (masses of them), new characters, new side quests, a new story line and tons of new items. Set in the realm of Sheogorath (the daedric prince of madness) Shivering Isles focuses on the struggle of the realm against the knights of order. The plot plays out in all manner of directions and each plot twist is as interesting as the last. The expansion's plot actually bests that of the original game by far.

This obviously helps to keep the quests fresh. Ranging from running your own dungeon to taking drugs in order to stay alive, Shivering Isles is able to provide a constantly changing and always interesting gameplay environment. The pretext that the expansion is set within the realm of insanity allows the developers to implement strange gameplay devices on a whim.

Overall, Shivering Isles is better than the main game. It's quests and plot are genius. The items are all fitting for the difficulty curve, and the characters are all vibrant and full of life. It raises The Game of the Year Edition's score to a solid nine.

One point was dropped because of the increase in load times and the neglect given to bugs.

9/10

Control Review

2009-07-25T15:34:00.000-07:00

Joy Division are a good band. I don't know anybody who hasn't heard Love Will Tear Us Apart at least once. Whilst the back-up members are undoubtedly talented (as can be seen in New Order's albums) the main appeal of Joy Division, at least in my case, has always been the morose lyricist Ian Curtis. Ergo, Control, a biopic about said lyricist is quite an appealing prospect to me.

Most biopics have an awful habit of adding meaning to the material that they are portraying. Whilst the outcome of this is varies, with occasionally outstanding results (see The Assassination of Jesse James by the coward Robert Ford), most films that do this tend to suffer. In fact the majority of the biopic genre suffers from “Hollywood syndrome”, a strange affliction which favours action over accuracy.

This being said, Control is the best biopic I have ever seen in my entire life. Based on the biography of Curtis written by his ex-wife, the film is a heart-rending, entrancing and, above all else, accurate representation of Curtis' life. The script is airtight and never tries too hard. It never glamorises Curtis, instead a conscious decision has been made to show exactly how horrible he was to his wife whilst still showing that he has been massively misunderstood.

The casting is perfect. Sam Riley as Curtis is quite possibly some of the best casting I have ever seen. His performance is outstanding, capturing not only the mannerisms of his subject-matter, but also the atmosphere given off by his persona. The supporting cast are also fantastic, each manages to give a realistic and believable performance.

On the music side of things: the soundtrack is amazing. Other than simply featuring Joy Division songs, several other artists have been used to capture the atmosphere of the time, encapsulate the mood of any given scene and support the character development. Not only have appropriate songs been chosen, good songs have been chosen! Control's soundtrack is a rare gem.

In a daring move Control has been shot entirely in black and white, perhaps to mirror the mindset portrayed as Curtis'. This technique nevertheless supports the atmosphere intended for the film and creates a very closed environment when combined with the exquisite cinematography.

Overall, Control is a masterpiece. Not only does it tell the story of one of the most interesting musicians in recent history, it tells it right. The soundtrack alone is enough to make this film worth watching.

10/10

Revenge of the Nerds 2: Nerds in Paradise Review

2009-07-18T14:58:00.000-07:00

I've been putting this off for over a month. Not because I have to watch the film again: I don't. My review process involves me only watching a film once. Nor was I scared because I'm going to offend fans. None of the people using my website would find any of the Revenge of the Nerds (there a four) films at all funny. No, I was having trouble articulating my feelings for this monstrosity.

Believe me, it's horrific.

In theory I can end the review right here. Theory proven.

0/10

You won't let me though will you? You have to keep dragging me back in by reading these reviews. You're never content to leave me alone are you? I always have to justify my opinion to you. Well, I've got news for you.

I hate you.

For arguments sake: the above score is actually what I'm giving this film. The rest of the review will consist of why I think that. If it helps, try to think of this review as one of those films that starts with the end then spends the rest of it's runtime trying to justify why it did that. I hate that method: it rarely works well.

Revenge of the Nerds 2: Nerds in Paradise (released in 1987) is a sequel to the freak hit Revenge of the Nerds (released in 1984). The original film centres around the exploits of the Tri-Lambs, a group of nerds who fit every stereotype under the sun. Despite never having heard of it until I saw the sequel in a bargain bin, some research shows that Revenge of the Nerds was funny enough to be named Bravo's 91^st funniest film and is feature in a parody on Family Guy.

I have now lost all respect for Bravo and Family Guy.

Revenge of the Nerds 2: Nerds in Paradise is the same plot, in a different setting. The setting doesn't make sense though. That would by far too much to ask. Whereas in the first film the nerds were picked on at school for being nerdy, a perfectly normal occurrence (first hand experience), in the second film they get kicked out of a hotel for being nerds. Why? BECAUSE LOGIC HAS NO PLACE IN HELL!

The aforementioned “nerd hate” signifies one of the most sane plot points. Other, less sane, developments include: vaguely racist ambushes on the nerds with spears, kidnapping and abandonment, and finally, the discovery of a working tank in the middle of a desert island.

I could forgive all this if we had a likeable cast and some half-decent jokes. Instead what we get are characters based upon the worst clichés imaginable and jokes which not even the writer can have found funny. To illustrate my point: the nerds laugh at every joke in the film to show the audience that what they are experiencing is in fact meant to be humorous. Instead of an improved version of Japanese water torture.

This is actually the worst film I have ever seen. Films that are better than it include: The Man Who Saved The Earth, Battlefield Earth, Plan 9, Manos, Alone in the Dark, Catwoman and I know who killed me. The run-time on the back of the box states that Revenge of the Nerds 2: Nerds in Paradise is 85 minutes long. It felt like a life time. The price claims to be £2. In reality it cost me my faith in humanity.

Brick Review

2009-07-11T17:11:00.000-07:00

I've always been a massive fan of noir stories. The concept that all characters are merely stylised methods of driving home a completely ambiguous message makes me feel comfortable. As does the clichéd dialogue, the overly expository narration and the moody setting. In short: noir is the ultimate indulgence to me.

Second only to por... nothing.

So, enter Brick: an indie noir murder mystery film set within a school. The concept sounds a tiny bit bizarre but when you really think about it, everything fits. The detective is the school snitch and everything winds into place for a fun little comedy.

Only Brick isn't a comedy. It takes the basis formed in my above paragraph and makes it serious. The school snitch, Branden (Joseph Gordon-Levitt of Third rock from the Sun fame), finds his ex-girlfriend, Emily (Emilie de Ravin) dead. From there he sets out of a traditional tale of betrayal, lust and revenge.

The script, whilst lacking narration, is an expertly woven and unashamedly noir affair. It takes a while to learn to keep up with what the characters are actually saying, however, once this falls into place it's hard to see a flaw. Each character is as intricately woven as can be expected in this genre, each plot device feels natural and as the plot progressed I was completely engrossed.

As much as the film's success is due to writing, more is due to acting. In particular Joseph Gordon-Levitt delivers the most outstanding portrayal of a noir detective that I have ever seen. He even manages to pull of the stereotypical “hands in pockets” walk without making it seem stupid. The supporting cast are all outstanding. Each manages to nail the stereotype handed to them by the script whilst bring a level of credibility to the role.

The use of sound within the film is chilling. The music used to compliment dramatic moments is outstanding and the film's use of environmental sound is something almost unprecedented in the genre. Brick even manages to prove that not all noir has to be shot at night, in the rain.

So, overall Brick is the most expertly written, directed and acted noir film I have ever seen. Not only does it manage to incorporate almost all of the noir clichés expected in the genre, it also succeeds in elevating it past the stupidity expected. What lies as a result is a film which both conforms to and destroys expectations.

10/10

Dragonball: Evolution Review

2009-07-07T11:15:00.001-07:00

I’ve been putting this one off for a while, mostly because it’s an easy target. I actually saw this at the cinéma. I went with friends; we may as well have been the only people there. So, what is Dragonball: Evolution?

It’s a bastardised version of Dragonball. Kind of.

When I say Dragonball: Evolution is a bastardised version of Dragonball what I mean is that anything that made Dragonball at all unique has been taken away and shot. What we’ve been left with is a collection of names.

If you’re a fan of the series you’ll hate this film. It shouldn’t surprise you by now either. Hollywood has quite clearly demonstrated that it has a process by which it can destroy any source material, no matter how good. I like to call it youthicising.

Youthicising a franchise consists of adding popular actors, explosions, sex and rock music to every scene. No matter how frivolous. It’s based on the theory that the entirety of my generation is comprised of moronic adrenaline junkies.

Whilst that may be true, it’s still annoying.

So now that I’ve made it abundantly clear that Dragonball Evolution will be horrific for fans to watch, I’d like to say that it is equally horrific for newcomers. The script is riddled with inconsistencies, puns and over-blown action, the acting is hammy at best and the special effects are laughable.

I actually can’t think of a single good thing about it.

So, go see it if you like watching young actors make complete idiots of themselves. Or if you enjoy watching a respectable franchise get torn apart from the inside. Or if it’s raining.

0/10

Star Wars Episode 4: A New Hope Review

2009-06-30T17:50:00.000-07:00

For those of not in the know, I've been perusing this franchise with a strange and determined conviction for a while now. It all started last year, when The Force Unleashed smashed into my cranium faster than a speeding bullet. I got irrationally annoyed, paranoid some would say and then I started a crusade against Lucas' horror beyond horrors. Then time passed, good films came back into my life and I forgot about this silly feud.

Until now of course.

I have returned fresh from reviewing the fantastic and tragically cancelled Joss Whedon series Firefly and the mediocre Batman-in-space rip off Terminator: Salvation. I'm angrier than ever. Now that I have had the epiphany that all Firefly fans must eventually suffer. So, know that I mean only good when I say: Firefly died for your sins Lucas!

Let me explain. Thanks to the immense popularity of certain Science-Fiction franchises, specifically Star Wars and Star Trek, the popular view of the genre has become tweaked to stupidity. Once a breeding ground for the originality and insight seen in works like Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five, George Orwell's 1984 and Philip K. Dick's Do androids dream of electric sheep? the genre is now seen as something of mockery. In popular culture sci-fi is often seen as a breeding ground for the kind of pathetic, drooling adolescent morons seen only painfully unfunny comedies like Revenge of the Nerds (I'll get round to it).

So in combat to this stereotype sci-fi began to dumb down. The result: Star Wars. In my enraged state I've decided to stop picking on the prequel trilogy which everyone knows is shit and decided to go straight for the heart of the series. So without further bullshiting, I'm reviewing Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope.

Originally entitled simply Star Wars (until Lucas, you know, ruined the series for even the fans) this film jump started the entire series. The plot centres around a young boy named Luke Skywalker who falls in line with a crazy old man named Obi-Wan Kenobi and several other warriors from the factory of idiotic naming to fight against the malicious Empire, which is led by a fearsome wheeze bag named Darth Vader. This film in particular focus entirely on Luke's attempt to rescue a girl with the stupidest hairdo in the universe, Princess Leia.

I would love to say that this story had at least some originality, but it doesn't. The plot follows a simple “save the princess” routine in space. The concept is flawed, the dialogue is camp and the acting is adequate.

The action sequences are where the film comes alive. The special effects are quite clearly the best available in 1977, the choreography is exquisite and the accompanying music score is spectacular. It almost makes up for the rest of the film. Almost.

So what else can I actually say about Episode 4? Not a whole lot really. It's an action film plain and simple. It isn't deserving of it's cult following or even the vastly superior sequel, The Empire Strikes Back. No decisive blow can be struck either way, it's all so average.

6/10

Terminator: Salvation Review

2009-06-27T16:48:00.000-07:00

Terminator has always been something of an enigma to me. Whilst I must admit that the first, second and, to a certain extent, third films are all entertaining and enjoyable films; the concept that technology is a threat to mankind has never seemed that profound to me.

It is true that with any new technology, social issues arise. That doesn’t mean that technology is an inherently bad thing. Take for example: the internet. Sure, it’s a festering pile of idiots, paedophiles and superegos but it… isn’t as bad as the atom bomb?

Alright, even if technology is bad, we already know. Every science fiction artist, writer and filmmaker ever has already made this abundantly clear to us. We don’t need Arnold Schwarzenegger to tell us that.

We need Bat- I mean Christian Bale to do it instead!

After Terminator 2 the series seemed done to most people; Terminator 3 killed it for anyone who thought otherwise. Yet here we are with Terminator: Salvation. Why?

The cash cow says “More!” that’s why.

The concept is that even after the best efforts of everyone from the previous films, the war with the Skynet has happened. Judgement day went down and only a few pockets of survivors are left to fight the malicious corporation. They are led by John Connor (Christian Bale), who as the expository text at the beginning of the film kindly informs us, many dismiss as a false prophet. Including me.

I don’t mean to take issue with the entire Terminator series but this concept just bugs me. Even if Connor is some form of chosen one, what the fuck can he actually do? He has no special powers, if not for convenient writing and impossible plot devices he could die as easily as anyone else in the series. I must admit that I was expecting some form of resolution on this point when I walked into see Salvation. The film is set when he’s supposed to be doing his thing after all. Of course that doesn’t happen. Instead what we’re given is two hours and fifteen minutes of loosely scripted filler. I wish I was joking but you can deduce the films plot from the trailer! There’s even a blatant “To be continued…” closing monologue.

The writing itself is pun laden and derivative. Trying far too hard to steal the famous one liners from previous films without giving a second thought to the context this dialogue is being used in. As to be expected action sequences are frequent and long. Although they become annoying at times, these are genuinely inventive and enjoyable, heightening pace and tension consistently towards the third act of the film.

Special effects are astounding, as is the use of sound, even if it is unnecessarily loud at times. I would also like to draw attention to the costume design which is some of the best I have ever seen in a science-fiction film. Ever.

Alright, I promised myself I’d save this until last: acting. Even though the credits say that Christian Bale is playing John Connor he wasn’t. He was playing Batman instead. I’m not joking; he does the voice and everything. I could stand the voice in Batman; it was terrible because it was meant to sound like someone covering their real voice. In Terminator it’s just silly.
It also got me thinking. Batman’s a prick, when played by Bale, Connor’s a prick when played by Bale, hell, even Howl is a prick when voiced by Bale. So, here’s a fun game: name a film where Christian Bale isn’t a prick.

I honestly can’t think of single one.

Aside from Bale, the cast perform moderately well. Most of them manage to carry scenes through to the conclusion as Bale gasps and wheezes through his dialogue like a man dressed up in a bat costume.

With a lung disease.

Overall, Terminator: Salvation is a good action film. It has good special effects, bad dialogue and Batman. What do you expect?

6/10

Firefly Review

2009-06-21T05:48:00.001-07:00

Firefly is a bizarre thing. Although it only lasted for one series, with a film (Serenity) later coming to fruition due to the outraged demands of fans; it is one of the most talked about and debated sci-fi television shows ever created. Why?

The full title is Joss Whedon's Firelfy. Joss Whedon wrote Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Let's get one thing straight: I hate Buffy the Vampire Slayer. The show spawned so many god-damn awful spin-off's and has such annoying fans that I can hate it without looking at it's own merits. The three episodes that I've actually watched were painful, narcissistic, borderline masochistic attempts to combine the genre of teen drama with supernatural.

Yeah, I said it: Buffy was shit.

Although, the one good thing I will say: Buffy's main flaw was it's concept. Not it's writing. Whedon was admittedly able to provide half decent character progression alongside reasonably successful horror and action sequences, and always quick-witted dialogue. So, if Firefly's concept is any good we might have a good series. Firefly's concept: Cowboys in space.

For fuck's sake.

As it turns out, this is less jarring than I initially thought. Once you get past the initial change from flying around space to riding horses and the show begins to pick up pace it becomes by far the least important element of the show. In fact, after seeing Buffy I was shocked to find that by the most interesting thing about Firefly was the characters.

You see, at the show's heart, it is a character drama. Each character within the cast is both deeply written, unique and perfectly portrayed. The main character, Malcolm Reynolds (Nathan Fillion) never stops being completely fascinating, as he drags the audience through moral dilemma after moral dilemma without ever letting them know enough about him to get tired of it.

The supporting characters are also excellent, as each character manages to consist of both believable interaction with the other members of the crew, and a concrete grounding in character development and moral direction. As with Fillion's portrayal of Reynolds each of the supporting actors manage to craft an exceptionally deft and witty interpretation of the character that they have been cast as. No-one ever becomes tiresome or annoying and special mention must go to Adam Baldwin (Full Metal Jacket, Angel) for his portrayal of the character Jayne Cobb as he steals the show no matter what.

However, Firefly's true strength ultimately lies with it's writing. All 14 of the episodes within the series are tightly woven and perfectly executed sci-fi adventures into the unknown. Whedon displays all the hallmarks of his previous endeavours: his charismatic wit, his exceptional character development and manages to make it perfect by getting rid of the one thing that made Buffy awful in my eyes: angst.

The use of sound and special effects within the series bring each episode to the point of masterpiece as they perfectly capture not only the atmosphere and tone of any given moment, but never seem out of place given the context of the entire plot: a drama about cowboys in space. No easy task.

So, after all of this I'm left wondering why Firefly was cancelled. Was it because Whedon wanted to return to Buffy? Was it because it cost too much? Was it because the show wasn't actually that good and I'm just an entity unto myself?

No, it's because no-one watches sci-fi any more. In the eye's of most people I've talked to sci-fi has outstayed it's welcome. Why? People associate it with Star Wars and Star Trek. I think it might be time for me to re-start a little fan-attack on something...

10/10

Night at the Museum 2 Review

2009-06-04T14:29:00.000-07:00

Information: I like to catch the latest showings of new films at the cinéma, it combines both my love of film and hatred of small children wonderfully.

Problem: Night at Museum 2 had the latest showing at the cinéma.

I guess I'm reviewing a film intended for small children, again. Fuck.

As it's name would imply, Night at the Museum 2 is a thoroughly unnecessary sequel to 2006's Night at Museum (Ben Stiller, Ricky Gervais and Steve Coogan) in which the exhibits in the American Museum of Natural History come to life in the dead of night. The original was a cute little concept, pulled off fairly well, which turned a massive profit. Sequel time!

So what can you expect from the sequel? The same film. Sure there a few differences here and there (example: Ben Stiller isn't confused at the beginning and the exhibits are. This leads to some quote-unquote “hilarious” role reversal sequences) but the premise is the same, the cast is mostly the same and the plot's same bar a gimmick or two.

Don't get me wrong: Night at the Museum 2 is definitely an improvement. The special effects are better, the script is funnier and the acting is better but it's missing originality. Gone are the thrills experienced when the exhibits came to life, gone is the sense of immediacy and danger created by the unknown and gone is the humour derived from simple everyday situations. I imagine, then again I have a mental age higher than 12.

So overall, Night at the Museum 2 is a very good children's film, provided the children watching it haven't seen the first film. They might get it mixed up with the DVD. When will Hollywood learn? We don't go to the cinéma to watch the same plots unfold with better special effects, as an audience we crave one thing and one thing only: originality.

I guess I'm being too hard on this film because I wanted to watch the new Star Trek film so I could hear dialogue I've heard one thousand times with prettier battles. I'm aware of the hypocrisy.

8/10

21st Century Breakdown Review

2009-05-11T13:25:00.000-07:00

This review is going to be shit. I know this for a fact and I felt I should share it with you. You want to know why this review is going to suck? Alright then.

Fact: I don’t understand music. Tempo, pitch and all that other crazy stuff is as mythical to me as a sustained erection… I mean a unicorn.

Or possibly something less phallic.

Nevertheless, I am going to write a review of Green Day’s 21^st Century Breakdown and you are going to read it.

Maybe one of us can do the title justice.

21^st Century Breakdown is a sort-of follow up to 2004’s American Idiot, an album widely regarded as both the turning point in Green Day’s career (the band’s previous hits relating almost exclusively to introspective, masturbation obsessed, energy drink fuelled nerd punks. Myself included) and one of the most important socio-political commentaries of recent years (if you consider 2004 recent). American Idiot infused powerful chords and musical grandeur with angry, cynical and rage driven lyrics to astounding effect. It was and still is one of my favourite albums.

Not too easy to live up to then.

Capitalising upon American Idiot’s success with a quick, masturbation fuelled release would have been the economically sound thing to do. Oddly Green Day didn’t do that, instead deciding to leave fans in the dark for five years and occasionally releasing half-hearted covers of Clash and John Lennon songs (‘I fought the law’ and ‘Working Class Hero’ for those wondering) whilst secretly working on a new album. The end result is eighteen tracks of narrative driven, politically motivated pop punk under the title 21^st Century Breakdown.

I must admit that I was sceptical about this album when I heard the single, ‘Know Your Enemy’, for the first time. It’s not a bad song but it has very little to say beyond “apathy is bad”, didn’t seem to contribute to any larger plot and seemed musically reminiscent of the Dookie era. Basically it was a regression into the tired and tested Green Day formula, which is by no means a bad thing, but hardly seems like a good thing after American Idiot.

Luckily the album isn’t a regression in any way, instead managing to carve a narrative on a par with some of the finest literature out there through it’s eighteen tracks. Unlike American Idiot, 21^st Century Breakdown doesn’t underplay Billie Joe’s now obvious intelligence in order to make itself accessible to the people his political agenda is targeting. Instead it makes you work to fully understand the narrative with clever, almost sardonic references to various cultural icons (for want of the most obvious example: if ‘Christian’s Inferno’ isn’t a direct reference to Dante’s epic allegory of the same name then the world has gone insane).

Thankfully, not only is the narrative a genuinely good concept, this time around Green Day have allowed themselves to do it justice with songs which match it’s grandeur musically. Unlike in pretty much every other Green Day album ever, the band no longer rely on loud songs juxtaposed against understated melodic nightmares (reference point: ‘Wake Me Up When September Ends’) instead opting to adopt a less progressive and generic album structure, and allowing each song to play it’s by itself and drawing it all together in the albums penultimate song: ‘American Eulogy’.

It would be an understatement to say that Green Day pushed themselves musically on this album. ‘21 Guns’ (my favourite song on the album) sees Billie Joe pushing his lyrical skills to the breaking point, ‘East Jesus Nowhere’ sounds more like The Clash than Green Day’s cover of ‘I fought the law’ did and every song in the album sounds fresh, interesting and genuinely like it’s part of a larger scheme. Apart from ‘Know Your Enemy’.

Which is really my only complaint; the single holds absolutely no purpose in the context or the rest of the album beyond a brief reference in ‘Restless Heart Syndrome’. It’s not like none of the other songs can serve as singles, indeed the album is literally designed so that you can skip tracks and still understand the overall message at the end. I can think of three tracks which would make better singles off the top of my head anyway: ’21 Guns’, ‘The Static Age’ and ‘East Jesus Nowhere’. I suppose I can forgive the inclusion of the song though, if only because it’ll draw in the Dookie crowd and teach them that political motivation did not make Green Day shit.

I think I’m done. That wasn’t so bad was it?

You bleeding much?

10/10

Twilight Review

2009-04-20T10:58:00.000-07:00

I hate Stephanie Meyer. Her writing is devoid of talent and yet somehow here I am, sitting down to review a film adaptation of her “novel” Twilight. So you know what I thought might be fun?

I thought it might be fun if I wrote this review in her style.

-Meyer stylistics activated-

I’d never given much thought to how my sanity would die – although I have enough reason to – one of those reasons being how often I interject my own sentences with meaningless filler text – but even if I had, I would not have imagined it like this.

It wasn’t raining when I put the DVD into the player. I didn’t see it as an omen – it was summer. It doesn’t rain often in summer.

It was awful, of course; I couldn’t deny that. Everything was shit: the acting, the script, the special effects. Even the idea. It was too shit – possibly the worst film I’d seen in over a month.

-Meyer stylistics de-activated-

Writing like that is killing me.

So what we actually get from the Twilight film isn’t actually as bad as I’ve just made it out to be. The acting isn’t shit all the way through and in particular the film’s two leads (Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson) manage to deliver fairly airtight performances when the flimsy pretext of their characters is taken into consideration.

Likewise the cinematography and direction on display here isn’t appalling. It manages to build a fairly creepy and foreboding universe which seems separate from that of the normal world whenever necessary with the use of some fairly impressive wide shots of the forest and repeated use of low angles. Sound is used effectively and the overall sensual effect of the film ranges from genuinely impressive to adequate.

I suppose my main complaint about the film lies with the plot and the script. Neither of these things are at all believable, coherent or even interesting. The plot progress with all the speed and elegance of an inbred snail, dialogue feels hammy (I’m aware that most of it is taken straight from the novel. That’s the problem!) and both scenes of plot and character progression may as well have the word “exposition” printed in large bold text for their entire duration.

Overall, Twilight isn’t dreadful. It’s easy on the eyes, sounds great and features some okayish acting at times. The only problem with the film can be attributed to poor writing, most of which can be attributed to Meyer’s writing. In other words, fans won’t be disappointed; they’re virtually getting the “novel” as a film. Anyone with common sense will be bored, sickened and sometimes even outraged; they’re virtually getting the “novel” as a film.

Oh, in case you were wondering: I only edited the text in my parody slightly. Most of it is taken from the novel directly.

5/10

There Will Be Blood Review

2009-03-31T15:03:00.001-07:00

I like this film's title. It promises something, makes me want to believe in the creative vision. Admittedly, I have a penis and the promise of blood seems to stir something within me which I can't control. Maybe someone without a penis would be better suited to review this...

Note to self: Stop trying to ruin career and/or manhood.

Anyway, There Will Be Blood centres around the characters of Daniel Plainview (charmingly portrayed by Daniel Day-Lewis) a self-centred and embittered silver prospector turned oilman and his son H.W (Dillon Freasier and Russell Harvard) as they attempt to drain the town of Little Boston of all of it's oil, much to the disgust of the local priest, Eli Sunday (Paul Dano). It sounds like a remarkably simple plot on the surface and many ways it is, the narrative seems to throw almost random events in at points simply to keep the plot flowing.

I wouldn't be so annoyed at this if I thought the film needed the extra sub-plots to build up to it's, admittedly fantastic, climax (The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford is one of my favourite films so I can hardly be accused of lacking patience) but it doesn't. Even if something as simple as the opening of the film had been cut (5-10 minutes without any dialogue) it would have trimmed enough off the film to keep it as a coherent and interesting narrative. Sadly this isn't the case.

Which is a real shame. All complaints about the plot aside, the overall impression left by the plot is flabbergasting. Everything is tied nicely together by an almost infallible script, the depth brought into a seeming defunct concept is awe inspiring and the nuances brought into the film are literally jaw dropping. It's just too long though.

The acting throughout the film is spectacular. In particular, Daniel Day-Lewis is perfectly cast in the lead role, playing the character flawlessly without any errors throughout the entire film. Similarly, co-star Paul Dano is outstanding as Eli Sunday, managing to pull off an interesting and disturbing vision of religion gone wrong.

Cinematically There Will Be Blood is and interesting and daring film if not an entirely successful one. The long periods of silence or harsh sound contrasting to the full blown roar of an occasional explosion or orchestral peak, coupled with the nice variation between artistic and carefully judged cinematography and experimental use cameras is always outstanding, if only hampered by length.

So, overall There Will Be Blood is an outstanding well put together and conceived film, rendered almost unwatchable thanks to it's overblown length and slow and unrelenting pacing. The one thing I will add is that there isn't actually that much blood, rendering my ill conceived penis joke useless as a closing line. Urm... I'll close your line?

Someone kill me.

8/10

Watchmen (Film) Review

2009-03-11T16:51:00.000-07:00

I'd like to think that my writing has matured over the last year or so. I no longer shirk at challenges or dive for cover when reviewing even the simplest of materials. In fact I've recently become so outspoken about my jaded cynicism that people have become afraid of talking about films around me in case they throw me into a rant.

I'm still terrified of reviewing Watchmen.

Why? To put it simply; I'm terrified of reviewing this film because there is no consensus. At all. Not that I tailor my reviews to fit the consensus, but when reviewing something that could have me killed by over one thousand rabid fans I like to know where they stand so I can prepare accordingly. Therefore the problem with Watchmen is that I don't what is going to happen to me, however it's likely that it will end with my death no matter what I say.

Ah to hell with it, I'm already owed a few stabbings for my opinions on Twilight. I'm not going to hide from a few Watchmen fans when there are armies of rabid eight year olds after me.

Watchmen is based upon the masterful graphic novel of the same name written by Alan Moore and drawn by Dave Gibbons (which is reviewed here) and given the graphic novel's immense fan base, reputation as the greatest graphic novel of all time and Alan Moore's firm opposition to a film adaptation, this film was always going to be fraught with difficulties. Difficulties known as fans.

So to combat the worries of the fans the “visionary” director of 300 Zack Snyder was hired onto the set. Everyone thought the film was going to be cancelled again (Watchmen has been in and out development for over 20 years now, at point Arnold Schwarzenegger [Terminator, Predator and Batman and Robin] was rumoured to play Dr. Manhattan. Fun fact time is now over) and no-one much cared any more.

Then the first trailer came out, people realised that the film was actually going to happen and the nerd rage started. People were actually bitching about this film from the trailer, me included embarrassingly enough. Is it any wonder I was scared to review this?

So, I went into the theatre expecting to hate this with a passion. I didn't like 300, I'd never heard of any of the actors and I was of the opinion that Alan Moore is always right. Always. What did I actually think?

It's perfect.

After the film began I calmed down. I saw that Snyder has pretty much adapted the comic panel for panel. I begin to enjoy the story and settle in a dazed haze of happiness. The changed ending doesn't bother me, it seems to make more sense. It's perfect in every way.

At first I was worried that this was just me having a huge geek out. I ask the people who came to cinema with me. They think it's perfect too.

I can't really offer much else in the way of critique. I admit that the soundtrack is hugely inappropriate at points and that the women playing silk spectre is awful but when put into this array of perfection it doesn't really matter. Besides the woman play Silk Spectre, the acting is outstanding (special mention must be given to [fill in later] for his portrayal of Rorschach) and when sound is used correctly it is amazing.

All right I'm done. Watchmen is perfect. All is right with the world. I don't even care if you kill me now.

10/10

Stardust Review

2009-03-03T14:51:00.001-08:00

I didn't want to buy Stardust at all. In fact I only bought it because I needed something which wouldn't make me physically sick to pad out my 3 for 2 offer. I wanted to watch it even less (not watching films I own is quite common for me. As an example: I own an unopened collection of all the Jurassic Park films. It has been unopened for four months now. I will never open it). In fact I only watched it to make the cynical little voices in my head shut up.

I'm building up a massive psychological case study on this website.

Anyway, Stardust is based on a Neil Gaiman novel of the same name and whilst I must admit that I'm not exactly a massive fan of Gaiman's (I was a little put off by American Gods and the army of people who seem to believe that he has never written a bad novel. Popularity is not becoming of someone with his style) I must admit that his storytelling does posses some originality. Stardust is, unfortunately, not subject to this admittance.

The plot revolves around...

The story begins with...

My usual approach to describing plot seems to be useless here (look I've used both of my sentence openings) so I think I'll try something else.

Yeah. That works.

I'm probably being too harsh, the plot isn't that hard to follow once you get past the astronomical number of plot holes. It's not even that badly written, it just has massive issues with tone and pace, often including comic moments in scenes which appear to be serious. Dialogue is a little ham-handed in place but it never becomes annoying (except for one scene. You'll know when you get there.) and action neatly placed within the narrative. The openings just a little hard to convey that's all.

As far as acting goes Stardust is outstandingly well furnished for something that delivers so little. With giants like Robert De Nero (The Godfather Part II, Taxi Driver and Raging Bull) on board I'd at least expect something passable from the majority of the actors. However, besides a few fleeting displays of brilliance from De Nero every line of dialogue delivered in Stardust seems forced, unrealistic and completely lacking of charisma due to this fact.

Overall, Stardust isn't appalling. I despise it but it isn't appalling. The semi-literate plot and dialogue alongside De Nero's performance make this a worthwhile rent if you need something to watch with your children or you're a huge Gaiman fan. No, those aren't compatible.

4/10

Be Kind Rewind Review

2009-02-18T08:47:00.000-08:00

Before I begin the review I have to pick on the film's title, which is really annoying me. It doesn't have adequate punctuation at all. At the very least there should be a comma between the word "Kind" and the word "Rewind", although a semi-colon would seem most appropriate. I know this isn't exactly relevant to the film or anything but I just had to get that off my chest. I'm done now. On with the review.

Be Kind Rewind is the fourth film directed by Michel Gondry of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind fame and this is by far the nicest thing I have to say about it. It stars Jack Black (Kung Fu Panda, Tenacious D and The Pick of Destiny and School of Rock) and Mos Def (The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, The Woodsman and The Italian Job) the combination of which is exactly as annoying as it sounds. I'm the first to admit that I am massively opposed to Jack Black's career (with the exception of Kung Fu Panda) and that it is entirely a matter of personal opinion when I say that is performance is devoid of any comedic or artistic value. That's not going to stop me saying it though.

You should know enough about Black by now to anticipate exactly how he's going to act in this film and I going to assume that you also know whether you enjoy it or not by now, Mos Def on the other hand is somewhat of an enigma. Although he has provided both excellent comic (The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy) and dramatic (The Woodsman) performances in the past, in Be Kind Rewind his talents seem wasted. Whether it's down to an appalling stupid script (gimme a minute I'm getting there) or the inappropriate casting of Def as a straight man for Black (no-one should ever have to be a straight man for Black. Not now, not ever) his performance simply seems weak and I was having trouble finding him to be either amusing or interesting.

The plot and script are poorly conceived and appallingly executed. Jokes begin, mill around for a while and forget to have a punchline , very few (if any) plot issues get resolved and the entire film is proven to be entirely pointless at least five times. For the sake of example: the entire film's plot is built around the premise that Black and Def need to raise $60,000 in order to save the video store which Def works at. Although the shop will be relocated free of charge to a place where it would make more money (plot hole!) Def's character isn't happy with this as it would mean moving out of the building where his hero, Jazz musician "Fats" Waller was born. Later on in the film it turns out "Fats" was not born in the shop, rendering the entire film ENTIRELY POINTLESS! This is completely ignored by the script. I'm not going to ruin anything else, partially because I'm not allowed to under the critic oath but mainly because I can't. Nothing is resolved, the romance sub-plot is implied but never explored, the motivation behind most of the character' actions is hazy at best and the entire film is left completely open for interpretation at the end. People do not go to see comedies starring Jack Black in order to think!

I realize that I haven't even mentioned the film's main drawing power: the remakes. To put it simply, they aren't funny and you can find similar things on YouTube for free. What could have been an excellent opportunity for parody, either of the films being remade or the YouTube generation as a whole is completely wasted.

I appreciate Gondry trying, and given the premise and script for this film, the direction is as good as it can be (disregarding one infuriating moment at the end of the film). Fans of Gondry's unique visual style won't be disappointed and his use of music is -acceptable-.

Overall, the film is like so many comedies these days (oddly Jack Black stars in most): it has an interesting premise but failed to deliver due to an appalling script, over the top and/or redundant acting and unsatisfactory resolution. It is somewhat saved by Gondry's direction but sadly fails to overcome it's most glaring issue, Jack Bla- I mean bad scripting.

4/10

Dungeons and Dragons: Fourth Edition Review

2009-01-27T03:08:00.000-08:00

The Fourth Edition of Dungeons and Dragons has sparked a form of controversy among fans of the RPG. Many believe that the system is far too simple and dilutes the game for new-comers. An almost equal amount of player say that the system is more enjoyable to play because it doesn't take too long to set-up a game, these people are new to the game.

Let me explain: Dungeons and Dragons is meant to be complicated, as one of the RPG's that truly defined the way table-top games are played, and possibly the only RPG that anyone not applying to the culture's way of life has heard of, this game is meant to set the benchmark for the next generation of table-top games. By dumbing down this RPG Wizard's have made one of the stupidest mistakes in the history of the company, in dumbing down a Dungeons and Dragons game they have effectively dumbed down every western table-top RPG for the next 5 or so years. However, we aren't here to talk about that, we're here to talk about Fourth Edition as a stand-alone product and as a stand-alone product Fourth Edition is... alright.

The game utilises a D20 system similar to that of previous Dungeons and Dragons games although to say that it's anywhere near as polished as it's predecessors would be a lie. The focus this time around has been put entirely on combat (proof of this can be found in the fact that every character in the game can now use a healing surge in order to keep fighting) and as a consequence of this everything else has suffered.

RPing (role-playing to the less informed among you) may as well no longer exist as each character created tends to end up with exactly the same set of statistics as every other character in the party it has become difficult for players to craft interesting or quirky personas for their characters. The creation of scenarios for player’s to approach has been diluted and turned into a more “place x amount of creatures at point y” type of creation. And when it comes down to it, the system is sub-standard, repetitive and ultimately pointless.

In conclusion, Fourth Edition would be fine, if it wasn't DnD as it stands this is by far the series' most pathetic offering to date and any-one wanting to play a real RPG would be far better off getting 3.5.

4/10

Fallout 3 Review

2009-01-27T03:07:00.001-08:00

Fallout 3 is Bethseda's (the creators behind Oblivion and the rest of The Elder Scrolls series) attempt to revive the cult classic Fallout series. In Fallout 1 and 2 we as gamers were given a turn-based RPG based in a post-apocalyptic wasteland. I loved the original games' setting and atmosphere, although the gameplay never struck a chord with the trigger-happy child within me. Fallout 3 fixes this.

I'm going to say this at the beginning of the review, simply to get it out of the way: Fallout 3 is a masterpiece. Every single thing that Bethseda have attempt is polished to perfection, bar nothing.

However, with that said, fans of Fallout and Fallout 2 will hate this game. Where the first two games used an intricate turn-based style of combat, Fallout 3 uses a more hands on approach, with the option to use the VATs system for automated targeting. This method of combat works exceptionally well and will draw many new fans to the series; however the price for this is large. Old fans will feel alienated by this combat system.

The plot of Fallout unfolds in a fairly straight-forward easy to manage way, provides some interesting character development and wraps itself up with a slightly disappointing plot hole but that's not the point. Fallout is, and always has been, a comedy. Whilst extremely bleak in nature Fallout 3 is the funniest game to come out since the original games. Yes, that does include Portal.

Sound and visuals are, as per usual for a Bethseda project, suitably epic, harrowing or hilarious and voice acting has progressed from the scarily similar voicing of every character in Oblivion. So all in all, Fallout 3 is a masterpiece and whilst it my not hold the same allure to fans of the series as the first two games do, it is by far the best game to have come out of 2008.

9/10

Ice Age 2 Review

2009-01-19T16:18:00.001-08:00

Many a Sunday passes completely uneventfully for me. I'm not religious so I don't have to worship an abstract concept in a cold, dank building, I have no real “job” and my sixth-form, like most sixth-forms, is closed on Sundays and for some reason my friend's always seem to be trapped in horrid “family time” situations on Sundays. In fact most Sundays I simply end up lying on the couch flicking through all the crap available to me.

This Sunday I stumbled across Ice Age 2 whilst channel hopping. I contemplated my unrequited love for the first film, childish and lovable in it's nature, thoroughly enjoyable in it's intricacies. I pondered the need, or reasoning behind a sequel. I pressed the “OK” button. I'm an idiot.

Ice Age 2's plot returns to our heroes from the first film, Manny the mammoth, Sid the sloth, Diego the smilodon and the weird little squirrel thing, and introduces some new characters, Ellie the mammoth, and the opossums, Crash and Eddie. Whilst the older characters do retain some of the depth of characterisation created in the first film, the new additions to the cast of Ice Age are uninteresting and unfunny caricatures of every animated character seen in the last ten years. In an attempt to make these characters seem appealing to children, the writers have only succeeded in creating almost terrifyingly unrealistic personifications of “hip” or “cool” attitudes and destroyed the reason all animated movies exist in the first place, the ability to charm. To put it in simpler terms, it's like when Michael Jackson became white, without the child molestation.

Anyway, to return to the plot, it centres around the end of the Ice Age and Manny's romance with Ellie, whilst providing the ever-present “squirrel wants nut” gag which made the first film so quickly recognisable. Unfortunately this plot never flourishes into anything special, meaningful or touching like the first film did and ultimately fails to provide the numerous jokes that made Ice Age.

Animation and voice acting is superb throughout the film, with each cast member giving their utmost to bring the animation to life and each animator giving their utmost to bring the acting to life. The result is a pleasing mixture of sound and visual which almost makes up for the flaws in the script. Almost.

Overall, Ice Age 2 is an enjoyable film which, whilst failing to capitalise upon the originals sense of fun and meaning, provides enjoyment for all the family throughout it's running time.

7/10

Mirror's Edge Review

2009-01-04T16:15:00.000-08:00

I was looking forward to Mirror's Edge. I was looking forward to Mirror's Edge more than anything else released in the piss poor year of gaming known as 2008. I was looking forward to Mirror's Edge so much that the cosmos reached out and made it suck. We were promised an admittedly short, but utterly action packed innovative blast of a game which would question our very perception of movement. Shame they forgot to make it fun.

By now you can probably tell that I'm not too fond of Mirror's Edge, well there's one very simple reason for this: Mirror's Edge is NOT a video game! It may look like one, but it isn't. Mirror's Edge is a glorified tech demo.

Everything that was promised, bar the “game” bit, is delivered upon. It's exceptionally interesting to move around as Faith and experiment with different ways of viewing the city, of course it would probably be more interesting if it wasn't obvious that there is a pre-set path through each level with only slight variations upon the route being even vaguely plausible. Also, note my use of the word interesting because that's all this tech demo is. It sure as hell isn't fun. (Note the use of the phrase “tech demo” as a replacement for “game”.) You'd be forgiven for thinking that the city in which Faith resides had been built for free-runners. Nothing within it seems to be built in any logical way. Name one city which has ever had spring boards on the roof of skyscrapers. Apart from New York during the wall street crash.

Story-wise Mirror's Edge follows Faith as she tries desperately to prove her sisters innocence to the government who most probably set her up (if you don't see the immediate and MASSIVE plot hole then you need to leave. Now). The plot is told through the use of appalling animation, doesn't really progress beyond the inevitable ad quite frankly hasn't even been thought about by the game's writer. He probably thought the rest of the team were playing an elaborate practical joke and getting him to write dialogue for a tech demo.

So overall Mirror's Edge pisses me off. It's a tech demo and it could have been so much more, don't buy it, don't even rent it. In fact if you really must play this then you should just play the demo over and over again until you look like a hardened World of Warcraft player, a twat as they're more commonly referred to as.

4/10

The Day The Earth Stood Still Review

2008-12-26T17:58:00.000-08:00

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)

2008-12-14T14:20:00.001-08:00

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

2008-12-07T16:00:00.000-08:00

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

Call of Duty 5: World At War Review

2008-11-30T15:34:00.000-08:00

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare was one of the best games of last year, which is no mean feat when you consider that Bioshock and Halo 3 were released in the same year. CoD4 combined already intuitive combat with excellent level design, outstanding multiplayer and a modern setting in order to transform the Call of Duty series forever and what's more; it almost worked.

Sadly with the release of Call of Duty 5 the series makes a laborious march home to the war torn European landscape which is the second world war. Despite the fact that the game deals with parts of the war never before seen in a Call of Duty game (the conflict with the Japanese and the final Russian assault on Berlin) it's hard to ignore the apparent fact that the series has regressed. Gone is the mildly intriguing plot which held the last game together. Gone are the modern weapons and equipment. In with old and out with the new seems to be the strategy here and it shows.

Other than the games complete and utter lack of an intriguing storyline (everyone knows how WW2 ended), or compelling narrative (the plot now being told through overly dramatic cut scenes rather than players experiencing events themselves), the campaign seems to have kept most of what made CoD 4 great. The levels are still excellently designed with very few dull moments, guns are still satisfying and the games is still intuitive.

Multiplayer is where the game really manages to show itself off. The system from CoD 4 seems to have been taken and edited slightly to fit the old setting and everything works as it should. There are still very few games that can stand up to the Call of Duty series in terms of mulitplayer.

So, is CoD 5 better than it's predecessor? No. Not by a long shot. CoD 5 is a meagre offering in comparison. Whilst still an excellent shooter which any self-respecting PS3, or Xbox 360 owner should own (there are no self-respecting Wii owners, just for reference), the return to WW2 is a massive step back and whilst this might not affect the game's technological or gameplay qualities, it still seems to infest the game with an ill-omen of boredom.

7/10

No Country For Old Men Review

2008-11-16T15:16:00.001-08:00

The Coen brothers have been responsible for several of my favourite films. O' Brother Where Art Thou?, Miller's Crossing and The Ladykiller's (remake) are all in my top ten favourite films, so it may not come as a surprise when I say that I was really looking forward to No Country For Old Men. However, it will probably come as a surprise that I'm reviewing the film now, almost a year after it's release, and that I didn't see the film at the cinema, and that I only paid £5.99 for the standard edition of the DVD, well that's probably more of a reflection upon my financial situation than anything else. Just thought it was time that you guys realised how much of my blood, sweat and tears goes into these reviews. Not literally of course.

Now that utterly irrelevant, time wasting tangent is behind us I can begin to actually write about the film. The plot of the film can be summed up in three short sentences:

Man stumbles upon crime scene and large sum of money.
Man takes money and runs.
Psychopathic killer and cop pursue man.

The film does have a lot more to it than this, but that's roughly what the actual plot surmounts to, and it's by no means a bad thing. The fact that the plot doesn't need masses of time to be developed fully allows the Coen brothers time to develop tension. The lack of any character development beyond a want for money or justice allows the Coen brothers to elevate the dialogue and action within the film to levels dominated by subtext.

No Country For Old Men is an odd film. Whilst being exceptionally violent, and profoundly horrible, most of the physical violence is sudden and bizarrely unmoving. The plot of the film just ends, with no warning. The lack of any real sound track both creates massive of tension, and gives absolutely no release. The acting in No Country For Old Men is absolutely superb. Everyone gives their absolute best when performing, and with actors like Tommy Lee-Jones setting the standard for the rest of the cast, absolute best is simply outstanding.

To put it simply, No Country For Old Men doesn't feel like a film, it feels real. Which makes everything so much more terrifying. Whilst this film has masses of problems, most prominent being that the entire film is incredibly slow and all of it requires absolute attention, it managed to keep me consistently entertained, thoroughly wrecked my nerves and certainly gave me a lot to think about.

Finally, I'm sorry if this review seems a little disjointed and confused but No Country For Old Men really confused me. I liked it but I'm not really sure why.

8./10

Watchmen Review

2008-11-16T14:37:00.001-08:00

The media is a fickle fiend, most of the media we consume throughout the course of our lives is either depressingly average, or utter crap. However, on occasion, a media product so spectacular, meaningful and life affirming restores our faith as consumers and continues to fuel the media machine that we all know, hate and love. Watchmen is one of these products.

The comic's plot line centralises on a world in which superheroes, or “masked vigilantes”, have had their time in the limelight and become both inadequate to fight crime and criminals themselves. The story starts with the murder of The Comedian, a government controlled superhero and, through a combination of traditional comic book story-telling and lengthy text sections, advances through an expertly woven and uncompromising narrative, with a steady and unrelenting pace.

Everything about the comic's plot is absurdly well written, from the introduction of the characters, to the comics conclusion (which is such a shocking reflection upon the futility of humanity's actions that it had me thinking for weeks after I had finished reading the comic) Moore's writing is so complete and perfectly realised that I actually can't fault it at all. Watchmen has the depth of the greatest novels and the scope of the greatest films.

The artwork accompanying Moore's skilled writing captures the ethos and atmosphere of the comic perfectly and whilst there are a few issues with the consistency of certain character's appearances, it's rather difficult to care when the world of a comic is so expertly crafted.

The only flaw I can find in Watchmen is that it's ideas are exceptionally elevated and weighty for the genre, and those new to the comic book format will struggle with it's content. Indeed the comic makes it very clear for the beginning of the narrative that this is not a comic for weak readers with an up front, brutal murder.

All in all, Watchmen is the best comic book ever written and like all great pieces of literature, art or film, it is exceptionally dark, and sometimes difficult to cope with. I recommend becoming familiar with the comic book genre before embarking upon the reading of Watchmen, simply so you can finish this marvel of modern entertainment.

10/10

Fable 2 Review

2008-11-13T02:31:00.000-08:00

Peter Molyneux knows nothing about technology. More specifically he knows nothing about technologies limitations. With Fable he promised us a fully free roaming world, in which we as players would be able to do anything from killing Hobbes to raising a family. What we actually got was one of the most linear story-driven action RPGs ever, it was good but it wasn't what we were promised. With Fable 2 we are promised that Lionhead will not only deliver what they promised with Fable but they will also add new features like online multiplayer and trees that grow realistically (and let me be the first to say exactly how this feature is going to revolutionise the industry. It isn't).

My expectations for the game were immediately dashed when I found out that Lionhead were unable to deliver online multiplayer upon the games release. Whilst this feature will apparently be added by the time you read this review the lack of this feature upon immediate release only proves one fact. Peter Molyneux is a liar!

Other than online multiplayer and trees which grow realistically Fable 2's most talked about feature is emotion. Now you would be forgiven for asking exactly what this means, if anything. Does it mean that the disk has massive mood swings, or that a gas containing anti-depressants is released into the air during gameplay? Well the answer is simple, neither you moron! It means you, as a player, are meant to get emotionally attached to the characters.

Now I'm not sure if it's simply my misanthropic, emotionally retarded, narcissistic and profoundly unstable nature speaking when I say that I hate every single character in Fable 2, especially the ones you're meant to identify with. Every “living” being in Albion is retarded, and even the sound of Stephen Fry's (Jeeves and Wooster, A Bit of Fry and Laurie, QI, Stephen Fry in America, LittleBigPlanet, Blackadder, all right I admit it, I'm a fan of Stephen Fry but in all honesty, who isn't?) voice simply wasn't enough to prevent me from wanting to kill everything in sight!

This may in part be due to the flimsy excuse for a plot holding these characters together. You start the game as a child, more specifically an orphan in order to comply with code of generic fantasy storylines, whose sister is quickly and brutally murdered by the ever dubious Lord Lucien (wherever do they think of these names?) as he attempts to prevent himself from being killed in a manner prophesied by one of the ever vigilant blind girls who seem to litter Albion in the same way that rings of power litter Middle-Earth. The plot henceforth advances with the player making arbitrary choices between the insipid extremes of Good and Evil with ultimate goal never being advanced beyond the commonly known “stop the bad guy”. That's it. I'm not joking. This is your emotion.

Gameplay wise Fable 2 is basically Fable with larger environments and more social interaction, a feature made utterly pointless by my absolute hatred of Albion's inhabits. Graphically Fable 2 is a mixed bag, with some environments inspiring awe and others inspiring a big pile of blandness (really should have thought about that sentence).

I know it may seem that I hate Fable 2. I don't. I'm just bitterly disappointed. Fable 2 doesn't even entirely deliver upon Molyneux's promises for Fable. You'll be fine with this game if you don't listen to anything that he says, but otherwise you'll feel like me: profoundly ripped off. I really don't see the point in Fable 2, it would have been far easier and just as successful if Lionhead had released Fable HD.

7/10

Heroes (Season One) Review

2008-11-06T16:51:00.000-08:00

Heroes is horrendously popular and as result of this I missed it's original TV run. You see, I have an odd tendency to avoid popular television whenever possible, even if I like the idea behind a show. This is partially the result of my misanthropic nature, which invariably leads me to conclude that the vast majority of people are one hundred percent pants on head retarded, and partially due to the fact that I never have time to schedule around television. Which seems odd for someone so interested in the media.

In an attempt to break the mould and conform (shut up! I know it's an oxymoron) I picked up a copy of Heroes Season One, decided that my social life and education have already taken up enough of my time and watched the entire thing in as little time as possible. One thought stuck out in my mind upon the completion of disk 7: “Damnit, people other than me are right sometimes!”

Now that my overly long and utterly pointless introduction is out of the way we can begin. Heroes' storyline revolves around the lives of a bizarrely high amount of seemingly unrelated characters who discover that they posses immense power which manifests itself in various different abilities. As the plot progress the characters are slowly drawn together by a serious of cataclysmic events which helps them understand their powers, the nature of humanity and themselves a lot better and whilst this plot may seem overly clichéd and generic, I assure you, it is far from it.

My first worry was that with so many characters it's often exceptionally easy for writers to provide certain characters with less intriguing plot lines and less intelligent character development than other characters and whilst Heroes occasionally falls into this trap, by the the end of the series each of the characters' is equally interesting and believable being. In fact Heroes somehow manages to make the inclusion of so many characters a blessing, as with each character there is often an accompanying visual style and a different tone, so if you don't like a certain character, a certain visual style or a certain tone Heroes should manage to satisfy you with a different character, visual style and tone in the next scene.

The acting is superb across the board, with everyone doing their best to compliment each other's talents and compensate for each other's flaws. The music and art direction in Heroes are also outstanding, with both the music and visual style for each sequence or character suiting the moment perfectly.

All in all. I was wrong. Heroes is, whilst by no means a masterpiece, an excellently put together and enthralling ensemble of all forms of talent. I still hate popular culture though, if only for the continuation of my own narcissistic ego, or the preservation of my misanthopically fuelled existence.

I need a life.

9/10

Saw Review

2008-10-29T19:59:00.000-07:00

This may come as a shock to you, as it did to many of my friends but prior to preparing for this review I had never seen a single film in the Saw series. It just never really appealed to me. Everyone always talks of these films as if they're made entirely to gross people out, which has never struck me as good horror. Horror should be creepy, blood and gore isn't creepy it's just bloody and gruesome. However I decided that since Saw V is being released this Halloween I would give the series a try. Well, at least the first film.

The film's plot begins with two men waking up inside of a bathroom. They are chained to the walls and there is a corpse in the centre of the room. Through the use of flashbacks we as an audience are given the characters backgrounds and gradually told they have been captured by the infamous “Jigsaw”, a serial killer who uses traps made in a style that Batman's Joker (See The Killing Joke for an example of these “fun houses”) would be proud of in order to make his “victims” better themselves after they realise how precious life is.

Which would be a great plot set-up, unfortunately there is nothing else to the plot. At all. You never find out the identity of Jigsaw, the trap plays out like it's meant to and character development never really advances beyond the archetypes of “I'm dying”, “I need to save my family” or “Jigsaw told me to do it”. Although I must admit that there is a sort off sick pleasure in watching Jigsaw's trap work properly.

There isn't actually that much gore in Saw. The film tries very hard to create tension by hinting at the violence that could happen, and attempting to make Jigsaw a formidable figure and on some levels it achieves these things. There are one or two genuinely scary scenes, sadly they're often overshadowed by the predictability of the traps or the fact that Jigsaw is a rip off of The Joker in every single way possible.

Don't get me wrong Saw is enjoyable, if only to marvel at how well people manage to rip off Batman, it just isn't scary. The hint that something gory is going to happen isn't enough to make me stay up all night with the lights on, one particaularly gruesome scene won't haunt me forever, to put it simply horror needs to be creepy! This can only be achieved through the use of long haired children!

I'm going to go watch Japanese horror and sulk now.

7/10

Star Wars Episode 3: Revenge of the Sith Review (War on Star Wars Part Two)

2008-10-26T15:50:00.000-07:00

Among fans Revenge of the Sith is often considered to be the worst film set in the Star Wars universe, which has always seemed to be an unfair judgement to me when The Star Wars Christmas Special, Caravan of Courage and Ewoks: The Battle for Endor (don't worry reviews of these are coming) are still all technically Star Wars films. It seems to me that Revenge of the Sith is simply the worst Star Wars film in the saga (consisting of Episodes I-VI), which is still an amazing feat...

The main problem with Revenge of the Sith is quite simple: only one person in the entire film can act at all. Don't get me wrong this film has a lot of other problems, bad scripting, bad CGI and George Lucas to name but a few, and whilst they couldn't really have been overlooked if the acting was up to scratch, they might have been tolerated by some of Lucas' more retarded fans.

However must be given when due and therefore credit most definitely must be given to Ewan McGregor (Trainspotting) for being the only vaguely competent actor present within the entire film. To put it simply compared to the rest of the performances on show in this film, Ewan McGregor's Obi-Wan is comparable to Al Pacino's Michael Corleone, that's only comparatively speaking however. In reality Mcgregor only ever actually flexes his acting muscle once within the film, and even then it's half-heartedly which should give you a vague idea of how everyone else manages.

By far the worst performance in the film comes from Hayden Christensen (Jumper) as Anakin Skywalker, our infamous co-lead. To put it simply Christensen's performance consists of pausing to look moody in between the delivery of lines no matter what context they are meant to be in, screeching and crying as much as it is humanly possible to and speaking as monotonously as possible. In short he is the living personification of emo.

The script is simply appalling. Every single character in the film acts as a living, breathing expository device, dialogue is laden with puns and overly dramatic expressions of melancholy, and character development is given the depth of three lines at most. Love scenes are embarrassing, often consisting of Padmé and Anakin gazing at each other with equally retard expressions whilst telling each other how attractive they are repeatedly. Married people do not talk like that!

The action sequences in the film are the highlights, however they are still abysmal. CGI flies over each sequence with little purpose or direction, Lightsaber's seemingly explode when they hit each other and actor's perform badly choreographed fights which look like elaborately staged renditions of Strictly Come Dancing.

To put it simply the film is a mess. It isn't the worst film I've ever seen. It isn't even the worst Star Wars film I've ever seen but it's still bad. Very bad.

3/10

Soul Calibur 4 Review

2008-10-24T16:17:00.000-07:00

Despite the obvious misspelling of the word calibre in the series' title (just because it's intentional doesn't make it okay) the Soul Calibur games have always been my favourites within the beat-em-up genre. No other games within the same premise offer the same accessible depth as the Soul Calibur games do, no other games within the same genre have produced such a mastery of story-telling and customisation moving hand in hand and no other games in the genre where fists reign have given you the option to wield a giant sausage whip.

Soul Calibur 4 is set... somewhere within the Soul Calibur universe, at... some point in time and this is sadly the games main flaw. As a player you should always have a want, nay a need of motivation (even within a beat-em-up) and the fact that SC4 (I feel sickened about the fact that I just abbreviated) fails, from the beginning of the game, to give you as a gamer any context or character development in order to justify, or even motivate you to play the game from beginning until end, makes the entire experience a rather lacklustre one.

The plot advances from this seemingly empty void that the developers had dared to call a beginning, by the manner of text screens which mean nothing. No, seriously these text screens literally mean nothing. They give you no details about your next fight, you characters background or even the world surrounding you (for that matter, WHERE IS SOUL CALIBUR SET?). In fact the game reduces it's entire experience to one simple phrase, “beat the shit out of the other guy”.

Now because of the genre it could be argued that this simple ethos is perfectly valid way in which to develop the game and in some ways it is. The actual gameplay is some of the most stream-lined seen in the beat-em-up world in recent years. Controls are simplified as to keep the game accessible for new players, as per usual one button is allocated to a horizontal attack, one to a vertical attack, one to a kick, and one to a block. Whilst this might seem overly simple at first you'll soon realise that depending on your characters speed, direction and previous moves, these simplistic controls can be changed and utilised to devastating effect.

The graphics on show here are spectacular, even for a current generation game. Literally everything is eye-candy from character models to backgrounds everything is beautiful. It's not until you realise that environments can break, that can fully appreciate just how beautiful this game is. Sound is also amazing with battle sounds always capturing the moment in it's utmost and background music setting the tone majestically.

To sum up, Soul Calibur 4 is an excellent game which only suffers because of it's complete lack of disregard for the storyline. If your a die-hare Soul Calibur fan you'll be mildly disappointed. Otherwise this is an excellent fighting game which simply must be tried.

9/10

The Thirteen and a Half Lives of Captain Bluebear Review

2008-10-15T16:24:00.001-07:00

The Thirteen and a Half Lives of Captain Bluebear (by Walter Moers) is one of the most bizarre things I have ever read, almost on a parallel with Flann O' Briens The Third Policeman, in which a man has an explicit sexual relationship with a bicycle. For those of you in the dark The Thirteen and a Half Lives of Captain Bluebear is a novelization of the adventures of one Moers' more successful television characters, Bluebear, a blue seafaring bear who tells tales of the adventures he has had throughout the course of his life, or lives.

The novel itself takes the reader across the fictional country of Zamonia whilst following the first seventeen and a half of Bluebear's twenty seven lives. Along his travels Bluebear encounters the bizarre locals of Zamonia, including Minipirates, Nocturnomaths and beings from the 2364^th dimension. If this all sound a little bizarre don't worry, it's meant to.

Moers uses a deceptively simple writing style throughout the course of the novel and whilst this might make many critics think that Bluebear is a children's novel, I actually think that it makes the story flow a lot better, keeping a light and funny atmosphere consistently throughout the entire novel. When coupled with Moers' fantastic Seussian cartoons the novel begins to take on the feel of a combination of graphic novel and full blown prose, which is by no means a bad thing.

The fact the Moers use a style similar to that of a graphic novel through me off at first, but upon actually reading the novel I realised that Bluebear is actually one of the best comedy novels I have ever read. The style is light enough to keep casual readers interested and the jokes are funny enough to keep heavy readers happy.

I honestly wasn't sure what I was going to think of this book, at first the Tolkien-esque map at the front of the novel lead me to believe that Moers was going to try and create a massively complex and multi-layered world, then I realised he was just making a joke and I began to enjoy the novel. Whilst Bluebear might not be a masterpiece of fiction it is certainly worth a look, and if like me Moers' whimsical writing style manages to draw you in then I can guarantee that he'll quickly become one of your favourite authors and Bluebear one of your favourite novels.

9/10

The Force Unleashed Review (War on Star Wars Part One)

2008-10-15T15:43:00.000-07:00

The Force Unleashed has the power to either erase all of George Lucas' mistakes or single-handedly destroy everything that is, and has ever been, good in the Star Wars universe. Why you ask? The Force Unleashed serves as a connection between the two Star Wars trilogies, meaning that one of three things can happen:

The demons contained within Episodes I through to III can poison the very heart of the Star Wars saga and kill the beast.
The presumed angelic symphony of greatness contained within the first three films (IV through to VI) can seep over into the newer trilogy and drown out Lucas' insanity.
The game could be profoundly average and drown the series in a river of mediocrity.

Considering that this game has the potential to either save the saga or destroy it in one fell swoop, it seems a good place start my War on Star Wars, does it not?

The plot of The Force Unleashed concerns us with Darth Vader's secret apprentice, a man named Starkiller (presumably because the original name factory had run out), the beginning of the Rebel Alliance and an overly clichéd struggle between good and evil. At first I was sceptical that this plot could even work in relation to the rest of the saga (considering Starkiller isn't mentioned in any of the films and he's quite obviously meant to be important), but I must admit that it wasn't awful.

Everything works out as it should in relation to the rest of the saga (if you take the choices which the developers want you to) and the plot unfolds as a swath of fairly well developed cut scenes (Starkiller actually looks real sometimes), clichés and purely expository dialogue. I suppose you could say that the plot is an average, run of the mill, Star Wars “epic”. I can forgive the fact that I didn't care at all about any of the characters because the word “midichlorians” isn't used once within the game.

Gameplay wise The Force Unleashed uses a rather familiar “hack and slash” formula combined with some force based “puzzle” sections and platforming. The game pretends to have some, albeit pretentious, depth by including a levelling system which boils down to “put all your points into health and force powers!”, which I can't really fault it for. All in all the gameplay is average, an enjoyable romp if you find time over the weekend. Just steer clear of the Wii and PS2 versions.

So, is George Lucas once more a shining god in the realm of action films? No. Have all of his mistakes been erased? No. Is he an insane freak who insists on ramming this “midchlorian” crap down our necks? Yes, but that's neither here nor there. Are we drowning in mediocrity? Yes.

6/10

Tropic Thunder Review

2008-10-10T10:35:00.001-07:00

I honestly had no idea what to expect from Tropic Thunder when I went into the cinema. I've always had mixed opinions of Ben Stiller (Meet the Parents), Jack Black (School of Rock) and Robert Downey Jr. (Iron Man), and a combination of all three seemed like it could only turn out in two ways: the funniest comedy ever made or a gigantic flop worthy of Uwe Boll (Postal). The end result therefore surprised me massively when it managed to avoid both of these expectations.

The end result is not the best comedy ever, simply because it lacks mainstream appeal. To put it simply Tropic Thunder is a film for people who watch, love and understand films. There was not a single moment that I wasn't laughing whilst watching this film, and the first ten minutes are probably the funniest minutes of cinema I have ever seen in my life. Regrettably the people whom I went to see Tropic Thunder with are the kind of people I want this review to apply to, and they didn't find the film even nearly as hilarious as I did.

Whilst Tropic Thunder offers some fairly accomplished jokes for the mainstream (Ben Stiller wearing a panda as a hat, don't worry it'll make sense... sort off) the majority of the jokes on display here are extremely clever and loving spoofs of some of the most beloved films, performances and actors ever to grace our screens (including a loving tribute to Heath Ledger's infamous method acting, obvious tributes to apocalypse now and a spoof of Eddie Murphy which just screams “please sue us!”) and it seemed a little to subtle for most of the audience.

The performances are superb across the board, with veterans Stiller and Downey Jr. in particular giving two of the funniest and most intelligent performances that I have ever seen. The direction is outstanding, especially considering that this is Stiller's first time directing and in spoofing some of the finest films of all time, he is setting himself a tall order.

On occasion the brilliance of this film did dwindle quite considerably, in particular the action sequences and gay jokes, which are both perfect examples of Hollywood dumbing down it's ideas in order to please the brain addled morons I like to call “the general public”. Thankfully the overall film doesn't suffer too much because of it, often because Stiller manages to fairly intelligently spoof some of the best action sequences ever made (who knew a spoof of Saving Private Ryans D-day scene could be funny?).

All in all, go see Tropic Thunder. If you love films then you'll love it, if you like films then you'll like it and if you hate films then what the hell are you doing reading film reviews on the internet?

8/10

Another Cinderella Story Review

2008-09-23T08:23:00.000-07:00

Yes, I am reviewing a chick flick. Yes, I am a dude. Yes, I was forced to do this. Got it? Good. Now that unpleasantness is out of the way, we can begin.

Another Cinderella Story is the sequel to A Cinderella Story, an insipid take on the classic story of Cinderella. I’m not really sure why anyone needed any of Cinderella Story films in the first, what with them consisting of over the top dance routines, bad singing and lame acting, but then again, no film with a level of complexity below that of Apocalypse Now! is really seen as necessary by me now.

So what can I say about Another Cinderella Story? It’s plot follows “teen-heart throb” (also know as “queer in the making”) Joey Parker (“played” by Andrew Seeley) as he tries to find his perfect woman, Mary (“played” by Selena Gomez) in an odd world in which child labour is still okay, teachers seem to flock towards “teen heart-throbs” just as much as children and black people conform to stereotypes and give themselves stupid names like “the funk”. Oh wait, I forgot this was set in America.

Anyway as the plot progresses the film forgets that it was trying to rip off Cinderella and gradually becomes a common feel-good dance movie, without the feel-good part. The scripting is awful, and pun-laden dialogue or “hip-hop” speech is throw at the audience as often as possible, the acting on display is as much as can be expected from a professional dancer and the guy from one tree hill. The soundtrack is as insipid as it is infuriating, with all of the songs sounding like Boyzone on steroids.

I’ve got to give the film some praise though. Not because of it’s content in anyway, but because of it’s cinematography, which has some genuinely inventive shots.

All in all, this film sucks. It’s an unnecessary sequel to an unnecessary film, but it doesn’t really matter anyway because no-one really expects anything from a film entitled Another Cinderella Story and there will be a million other clones of this film which fare much better at the box office because they can afford to have Miley Cyrus in them. See? I’m down with the kids.

Someone shoot me.

4/10

Metal Gear Solid 4 Review

2008-09-17T16:16:00.000-07:00

The more observant among you have probably noticed my mentions of the Metal Gear series in other reviews and what with me saying things like “I often put the controller down during cut-scenes (because you never know just Metal Gear-ish a game is gonna be these days)” you would be forgiven for thinking that I loathe the series. Especially the cut scenes. Well it’s about time you learnt that simply because something seems to be true, it doesn’t make it so.

I do not loathe the Metal Gear series. I enjoyed Metal Gear, Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake and Metal Gear Solid yet the series got a little too… preachy, stupid and boring for me later on. For those of you who say that Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty was a good game I have one word for you and that word is Raiden. For those of you who believe Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater was a great game I can name one glaring flaw for you, the “Heal” and “Hunger” systems, both of which didn’t work very well and became annoying.

I’m guessing that by now many of you are assuming that I’m going to say that Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is a bad game which follows the trend set by MGS2 and MGS3. Well you’re wrong, again. MGS4 isn’t a bad game.

Last time we saw Snake (and by Snake I mean Solid Snake, not Liquid, Solidus, or Naked Snake) was at the end of MGS2 when he was getting all preachy to Raiden about love, reality and human compassion in possibly one of the most lifeless representations of a city ever created, and since then he hasn’t aged well. The plot of the game sends the player on a journey all around the world as they attempt to stop Ocelot from taking over the world’s militia using the SOP system. Along this journey Snake must come to terms with his own mortality and learn some harsh truths about war and how the world at large is run. Sounds clever right? Wrong.

The main problem with the plot is that Kojima (the series’ director, also known as the man who believes hands can posses people) spends most of his time trying to come up with reasonable explanations for things he wrote into previous Metal Gear games, most of which is so unexplainable he has to resort to the tried and tested excuse “nanobots did it”. Not only does this lose him credibility and take the player as far out of the experience as humanly possible, but it also forces the player to notice some of the gigantic plot holes created by Kojima in the past.

Now I know this has been said before, but Kojima’s cut scenes are too long, by about an hour each. I was trying to avoid making this statement because it seems like such a generic statement about the Metal Gear series, but when the player is forced to watch a little girl cook eggs repeatedly, I started to think that maybe it was a valid complaint.

However if you, as an individual can stand Kojima's famously lengthy method of story telling, then the plot here does touch upon some truly important issues, including an advanced commentary of video game culture, the threat of nuclear war, and invasion of privacy. Ultimately Kojima does manage to wrap up the series in the most credible manner possible when his previous plot holes are taken into consideration.

The game play contained within the game is a mixed bag. With controls better suited for stealth game play, and a game consisting primarily of combat, the game does feel slightly cluttered at times. However when MGS4 is good, it is one of the best games I have ever played, with surprises running smoothly alongside predictable Metal Gear AI and stealth sections offering some of the tensest and most enthralling game play I have ever encountered.

Sound is the typical Metal Gear affair, which is not bad by any stretch of the imagination but does get a little tiresome after awhile. The graphics are the jaw dropping symphony of images that one would expect from a next generation game.

MGS4 isn't bad. It isn't everything that people say it is, but it isn't bad. Basically it's a game for the fans, including everything that fans enjoyed from the previous games, everything requested from online forums and cutting out the crap. As a stand alone game it isn't the best, but as a conclusion to the Metal Gear series it excels.

8/10

The Assassination of Jesse James by the coward Robert Ford Review

2008-09-10T16:27:00.000-07:00

I want this film to be good. Not only because if I can give it a positive review, and keep in line with other critics (apparently this film is a “masterpiece”) it might help to cover up the out burst of cynicism and contempt toward a fellow critic featured in last weeks review of Eulogy, but also because I paid £12.99 for the collector's edition (complete with a booklet which quotes the last line of the film...) of The Assassination of Jesse James by the coward Robert Ford and I want to feel like I've spent my money well.

The Assassination of Jesse James by the coward Robert Ford follows the story of the infamous outlaw Jesse James, and his assassin Robert Ford so there isn't much point in commenting on it. I must confess that before I saw this film I knew nothing of Jesse James beyond the fact that he was an infamous outlaw and Robert Ford killed him. Not good going for an ex-history student with an interest in outlaws...

The one thing I will say about the film's plot is that the script is immaculate after the first ten minutes, which consist of mostly garbled and slurred speech about nothing. Although when the train robbery sequence begins, the film becomes as good as the hype claims. The script tightens, characters become realistic, as opposed to vague and annoying, Brad Pitt becomes a credible actor, anything is possible!

Sound is used to incredible effect within the film, heightening tension consistently until the end of the film, which brings the audience crashing back to earth with a depressingly undramatic, and terrifyingly poignant climax.

The acting is spectacular across the board. Even Brad Pitt, whom I hold a personal loathing towards, manages to produce one of the best performances I have ever seen, with his Jesse James becoming one of the most complete anarchaic psychopaths ever portrayed on screen, second only to Heath Ledger's portrayal of the Joker in The Dark Knight. However it is Casey Affleck who steals the show, with his portrayal drawing comparisons to Al Pacino's Michael Corleone for obvious reasons.

This film is almost a masterpiece, and if it wasn't for those crucial 10 minutes at the beginning of the film which aren't necessary, interesting, or even logical then this film would go down as one of the best I have ever seen, comfortably behind The Godfather, and The Dark Knight, but as it stands this film is merely amazing, not transcendent.

9/10

Eulogy Review

2008-09-03T15:22:00.000-07:00

Eulogy puts “the fun in funeral” apparently. I assume that this quote, which can be found upon the back of this film's DVD box, is meant to imply that that Eulogy is an amusing film, but some further language analysis reveals just how stupid this quote is.

First off I would like you to swallow your immediate distaste that has risen from reading the quote and focus purely on the language. The word funeral is pronounced “fune-er-al” and not “fun-er-al”, so if we look at this quote objectively, it appears to imply that Eulogy puts a sound, which previously was not featured in the word funeral, into the word funeral; making the word sound something like “fune-fun-er-al”. I assume.

Sorry about that. The success of other critics frustrates me, as do the quotes featured upon the back of DVD boxes, and sentences implying that funerals are fun.

So, I assume that you've realised that Eulogy is meant to be a comedy by now. The job of a comedy is to make you laugh and forget the worries of the world, correct? Even most dark comedy is so far detached from the real world that it still makes you forget your problems, and laugh at the absurdity of the characters. Eulogy achieves this, at times.

In the times when Eulogy manages to actually be funny, it is impeccable. The acting and the script are perfect, sharp, and witty, however when Eulogy isn't funny, it is awful. The witty dialogue turns into drawn out sequences of people getting stoned, which could only be funny to people who are stoned, and the acting turns to an unintelligible, yet star studded, mess.

Basically Eulogy is a hit and miss comedy, like Little Britain, The League of Gentlemen, and most dark comedy. I would recommend it 'cause it puts the fun in "fune-fun-er-al".

Shut up, I'm allowed to be bitter.

7/10

Hellboy 2 Review

2008-08-30T16:26:00.000-07:00

[This was originally going to be entered in a competition, hence the word count of 300. Sadly I missed the deadline by a day, due to stupidity.]

Hellboy was a bad film. It was loud, obnoxious, and stupid – basically it possessed all the characteristics of a summer blockbuster. This being said I went into Hellboy 2 with mixed expectations. The effects look very good, and the world looks fully crafted this time around. Sadly, this is where my praise comes to a halt.

The script is the centre of my concerns, it simply isn't consistent enough. A pun laden superhero film script, or a script with potent subtext and relevance in the real world would have been fine. Both of these have a place within the superhero genre (See The Dark Knight if you disagree with the latter point), however when they are combined; bad things happen.

The script genuinely tries to introduce deadly serious concepts like genocide, and the loss of innocence at various points in the film, however the film simply isn't brave enough to push these ideas to their full potential, and often reverts to obsessing over the intricacies of puns. Puns about genocide just aren't funny.

The acting in Hellboy 2 is as good as it possibly can be. Each of the actors show incredible talent when given the chance. Unfortunately the script is so laden with puns and spontaneous character development (the worst character for this is Krauss, who switches his viewpoint on Hellboy at the end of the film for no reason at all) that no amount of talent can fix it.

Ultimately Hellboy 2 is disappointing because it shows a wealth of acting and directorial talent, hampered only by the script, which shows potential but becomes loud, obnoxious, and stupid. I would say that Hellboy 2 is a good summer blockbuster, however there are far better films on offer at this point in time.

6/10

World of Warcraft Review

2008-08-24T15:20:00.000-07:00

This review is going to be difficult for me. I always liked Blizzard and the Warcraft games; DotA is my favourite mod, and I listen to Basshunter (a little too much), and now I have to tear down one of the most acclaimed games to ever come from Blizzard. That's right; WoW is going down.

Now you may wonder if I can possibly bring anything new to the table. Well my answer is short and sweet: no, I can't, but your still going to read this. You see those of you who enjoy WoW will read this because you want someone to confirm that it is “TEH BEST GAME EVAR!!1!” and those of you who don't enjoy WoW just want to know that there are critics out there who agree with you. Basically you're looking for validation.

So basically I'm going to lay my phat reviewer beats (far, far too much Basshunter) down on this game and you're going to pay absolutely no attention and think whatever you want to. This is an exercise in futility. Understood?

WoW is an MMORPG and because of this its gameplay boils down to: go to a certain place, kill some stuff until your powerful enough to go to the next place, so you can kill some more stuff to get to the next place... you get the picture. I personally find this a mind-numbingly dull experience, especially when the fact that the player isn't rewarded with anything more than becoming a generic action hero at the end of the process is taken into consideration. I mean at least with Final Fantasy there is a plot (of sorts).

I suppose I could take all of this in stride if the other aspects of the game were any good, but they aren't. The graphics are awful, and believe me when I say that this is still a valid point because Blizzard are still updating the game frequently (more on this later). Everything looks like some form of cartoon mush – to the extent that I have difficulty telling what the difference between an Orc and a Dwarf is. I know this may seem like a minor thing when the game highlights enemies in giant red circles for all the world to see, but it's just shoddy art design – something which the Warcraft universe has never suffered from before-hand.

Sound is used in the game to appalling effect, with most battle sounds coming from the “generic sword strike” school of gaming, and all music sounding like Beethoven having a stroke. I suppose my main problem with this is that none of the sound effects help to draw me into the game, they pull me out of it and hit me in the ears for ever even thinking of being immersed in the game.

However the presentation isn't all awful, most of it is, but not all. There is admittedly a varied amount of scenery, most of which is distinctive and unique, which it has to be because of the game world's sheer size. Players do need to know where they are (looking at you Morrowind).

Speaking of players, has anyone but me noticed how annoying everyone in WoW is? For example, a simple walk through Goldshire (the human starting area) can result in about 5 duel requests from level 70s with nothing to do, followed by hours of flaming if you choose to decline. I mean come on, if you've got nothing to do but pick on lower level players for fun – turn off the game! Assuming you still know that WoW is a game.

I know that every MMO game has to have a certain number of creepy people who do nothing else playing it, but the amount of level 70's simply standing around in WoW is phenomenal! I suppose this is why I'm really getting at WoW, it is far too popular, and Blizzard will just not let it die. Patches are released every month or so (they often do nothing other than make the game more unbalanced), which leads me to believe that WoW isn't actually a finished project, or Blizzard are really good at milking the cash cow.

I know that WoW being popular shouldn't affect its score, but it does. The gameplay itself is only average at best, the graphics quite clearly aren't good enough, and the sound is truly awful at times – but WoW would still be passable if it wasn't for it's fan base. In truth the game should have died a couple of years ago. There are far better MMO's out there, to name one: EVE Online, which has more depth and strategy in its first 20 minutes than WoW does in all of the game.

Ultimately this review matters to no-one but me. Those of you who support the game will pick up on any of the positive things I've mentioned (or alternatively flame me to death), and those of you who hate WoW will pick up on the negative. Think whatever you want, one lousy critic doesn't matter right?

5/10 – WoW is average, yet horribly overated.

P.S. - To any annoyed WoW fans out there, please spam the following email address (bytesmedia@live.co.uk) and leave it at that.

Alone in the Dark review

2008-08-14T09:36:00.000-07:00

The Alone in the Dark series has often been referred to as the very pinnacle of puzzle-based survival-horror gaming, which admittedly sounds a bit stupid because the genre has two hyphenated words used to accurately describe it; but the point still stands that the Alone in the Dark games used to be brilliant.

This game has received an unprecedented, and somewhat unfathomable amount of bad press, which seems a little unfair, well at least if you base your judgement on the preview videos. The game begins with Edward Carnby (minus bitching moustache) waking up in a hotel room full of men (Oh come on, how couldn't he be gay?), apparently situated in New York. Why he was there, or why these men have the most fake accents I have ever heard is left to the player's imagination. I think Carnby probably hired some [Insert ANY Nationality here, I haven't got a clue] prostitutes, who just happened to enjoy bondage and guns a little to much. Oh and the bad accents are a result of the developers spending the budget on McDonalds food.

What immediately struck me about this sequence was that the game instructed me to click the right thumb stick in order to make Carnby blink. Am I going to be doing this often? Is it necessary? I usually put the controller down during opening cinematics (because you never have any idea how Metal Gear-ish games are going to be these days) so this feature does absolutely nothing but annoy me. Why the right thumb stick anyway? Isn't that usually used for aiming? This doesn't bode well for the rest of the game, does it?

The plot of the game is mind-numbingly stupid anyway. Basically it results to using every single cliché that has ever been made in regards to Gothic plots involving the devil (It isn't a spoiler, if you can't figure out that Lucifer was going to rear his ugly head then you might need to go back to school), except the most important one. There is no final confrontation in this game, it just finishes. Admittedly there are two “endings” but neither of them actually provide a conclusion to the game. I can't decide whether they wanted to leave it open for a sequel and missed the mark a bit, or they simply ran out of money before the game was finished. Either way they messed it up horribly.

Everything about the game play in this game is completely broken. The controls are terrible upto the point of the game being unplayable. In first person view you don't turn any where near quickly enough (even on the highest sensitivity), and in third person you can't turn without steering Carnby into a ditch. The melee combat is awful due to the fact that hits takes far too long to line up, and even longer to perform. The driving controls aren't even worth mentioning.

In regards to the combat within the game, unless you have a source of fire with you or near you, you can't win! It's IMPOSSIBLE! Will someone please explain to me why tapping an enemy with anything will set their entire body on fire instantaneously but hitting them in the head with a battle axe with as much force as humanly possible does nothing? It makes no sense whatsoever. Not only is it stupid, it also proves that the fire physics, the crowning glory of this game, are completely broken. I mean think about it, if a fire will not spread in a museum no matter what you do, but an entire person can light on fire instantaneously from the tap of any flaming object, then surely the entire idea of fire spreading realistically is complete bullshit!
Even if I did believe that the fire physics actually work, then I would still be annoyed, because to accomplish anything; you NEED fire! It's the equivalent of Valve using the puzzle with the see-saw and the breeze blocks, FOR THE ENTIRE GAME!

The driving sections of Alone in the Dark are the most appalling thing ever created by man, the nuke pails in comparison. You spend at least half of these sequences either dead or dying, even if you do nothing wrong! For example: I was driving along a road with absolutely no obstacles, when for no reason I can think of my car catapulted itself into the stratosphere! What's worse than this happening once, is the fact that it happens CONSTANTLY!

Even the inventory system is horrible. First off it's done in real time, which means that every time you want to get an item out you have risk being mauled to death, by every single creature within a five mile radius, because some how they always seem to attack you when your lamenting about the fact that the items you need to combine are always in slots on opposite sides of the jacket. Secondly it looks stupid, and Carnby ends up looking like a flasher. Finally, if Carnby is holding open the jacket with BOTH hands how the hell does he get items, telekinesis?

This game is a crime against human-kind, there is nothing you can say to defend without looking like an idiot. Nothing works as it's intended to, the plot is the equivalent of George Lucas pitching a horror film (minus the magnetic aliens) and worst of all it doesn't even finish. I mean even the tag line sucks. “They told us that Central Park was for us, they lied” what the hell are you talking about? Who told us? Why did they need to? Why would they lie? All questions you'd expect the game to answer right? Wrong! The game does nothing but confuse you more. The reality of this game is that I still have about four pages worth of ranting to go through, I haven't even touched upon the puzzles or the script, but I don't need to, all I need to say is that even masochists will hate this game.

0/10

Kung Fu Panda Review

2008-08-07T16:47:00.000-07:00

The title says everything doesn't it? I mean how much can I possibly write about a film entitled “Kung Fu Panda”? There can't really be any subtext in this film, there's no chance of this bringing you enlightenment and changing your life, and as far I can see no real reason to laugh after you've gotten over the initial concept. However I suppose that I'd better give this a fair review, otherwise all the Jack Black fans (a joke in itself) out there will come tear me to pieces.

The plot of the film follows the panda Bo (Jack Black), as he trains to become the Dragon Warrior, a Kung Fu master capable of killing the evil snow leopard Tai Lung (also a master of Kung Fu), all of which makes perfect sense when put in the context of this film. Now I assume that any reasonable adult will, upon hearing the plot of this film transcribed in the manner that I just have, assume that Kung Fu Panda is both non-educational and morally bankrupt. Let me assure them that neither statement is true, and that Kung Fu Panda offers both the wholesome morals that any children's film should, and a beginner's guide to the teachings of the philosophys behind the martial art of Kung Fu. All in all the plot manages to hold up against my scrutiny. It's quite well scripted, features some amusing scenes, and has a genuine moral undertone.

The animation in Kung Fu Panda is nothing less than what you would expect from a film by Dreamworks (a jaw dropping symphony of colour and technical accuracy, a dream work (excuse the horrible, horrible pun) if you will), and neither is the voice acting. I was actually astounded at how good Jack Black (Be Kind Rewind, School of Rock, and Tenacious D: The Pick of Destiny) was in this film; mainly because he was so unlike himself. Not to discount the other voice actors in the film, who all give good performances.

Ultimately I'm fairly uninformed about the genre that this film slides into, being slightly to old to care about it anymore. I suppose I'd recommend it as it will certainly keep children happy, and it isn't to difficult for older audiences to sit through. However if you are of an age older than ten, and have no reason to go and see this film other than mild curiosity, I'd recommend that you go and see The Dark Knight instead, even if you've already seen it.

7/10

The Dark Knight Review

2008-08-01T17:11:00.000-07:00

Batman Begins was one of the most successful superhero based films of recent years. It was dark, edgy, and yet still retained the light-hearted nature often associated with the superhero film genre. I wasn't that fond of it. I've always been a fan of Gothic Batman, there's something that appeals to me about insane mortals fighting in an entirely psychotic manner, so it may say more about me than about Batman Begins when I say that the film wasn't dark or complex enough for me. That being said lets move onto my review of The Dark Knight.

The plot of The Dark Knight is set almost directly after Batman Begins and centres on the conflict between The Joker (portrayed by Heath Ledger – I'll get to it don't worry) and Batman (Christian Bale). The script for the film, written by the film's director, Christopher Nolan (Memento, The Prestige and Batman Begins) and his brother Jonathan Nolan (The Prestige, Memento) is immaculate. Although the film becomes incredibly complex, throwing various twists and turns which often shock the audience to it's core, and the subtext of the film is incredibly detailed and meaningful, not a single line ever feels out of place or obscure; unless of course it's meant to be.

The plot itself is an adrenaline fuelled masterpiece which sweeps the audience up within a tidal wave of complex character development, meaningful subtext and speeches, and breath-taking action sequences (greatly improved since Batman Begins); and doesn't let go until days after you've seen the film.

The acting throughout the film is superb. Top spot goes to the unforgettable portrayal of The Joker by Heath Ledger (I'm Not There, Candy, The Brother's Grimm), which has quickly become my favourite representation of The Joker, my favourite villain. It's a marvel to watch this performance, whether watching Joker tell one of several stories about how he got his scars, or simply watching how the man moves. Ledger's portrayal is complete, faultless, dark, disturbing, funny, and perfect all at the same time, Ledger effectively becomes The Joker. It truly is a tragedy that Ledger died prematurely earlier this year.

In regards to the other performances within The Dark Knight, they're mostly almost as good as Ledger's. Bale (The Prestige, Batman Begins, 3:10 to Yuma) is my favourite Batman out of any other in popular culture, not only is his performance deep, dark, and profoundly disturbed, but he also allows himself to be pushed out of the lime light by fellow actors, something a good Batman should always aspire to. Aaron Eckhart (The Black Dahlia, Thank You For Smoking) also gives a truly deep, and dark portrayal of Harvey Dent, again never breaking character or becoming unbelievable.

Gary Oldman (Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Batman Begins, Bram Stoker's Dracula) gives yet another brilliant performance as Commissioner Gordon, a character who was side-lined in Batman Begins and has now been fully and brilliantly realised. Michael Caine (Batman Begins, The Prestige, The Actors), and Morgan Freeman (Batman Begins, The Shawshank Redemption) both give exceptional performances as supporting cast members. Now we come to the one and only criticism that I have of this film, Maggie Gyllenhaal (Donnie Darko, Sherrybaby), or the Rachel Dawes character if you will.

It's not that Gyllenhaal gives an awful performance (although she is intensely annoying when she speaks for some reason), or indeed that a love interest is a bad idea for a Batman storyline, I just think that she doesn't really fit into the cast or the film, until she is expressly needed for advancing the Batman, and Harvey Dent characters. Luckily Gyllenhaal does the best that anyone could with the role, and her screen time is mercifully kept to a minimum.

The cinematography and general feel of the film is outstanding. The entire film has a sort of dark, gritty tinge to every frame, which not only looks beautiful, but also helps to set the scene and raise tension hugely. The costume design is also immaculate, again most of the attention will be focused on Ledger; but he does play The Joker so it is fair. Music, and sound are used fantastically throughout the film; often helping to bring tension to an absolute boil, until a grim and satisfyingly violent moment often allows a brief moment of relaxation (which I found very odd), before The Joker speaks again.

Ultimately this film is a Masterpiece, it isn't perfect, but nothing is or ever will be. Everything about the film is smooth and brilliantly realised, and although there are a few issues with casting and realism; this film reminds me of why I go to the cinema. I go for the message; and this film's message is both true and necessary. The Dark Knight has earned it's score, and shall go down with Francis Ford Coppola's The Godfather as one of the greatest films of all time.

10/10

Grand Theft Auto 4 Review

2008-07-30T17:01:00.000-07:00

Grand Theft Auto 4 Review

GTA 4 broke my 360! I say this statement in a mix of fear and pain, and yet I refuse to hold grudges against game for it. Instead I’ll hold grudges against this game for creating controversy and unrivalled praise that it doesn’t deserve. I’ll hold grudges against it for acting as a tutorial for the majority of the game, and I’ll hold grudges against it for giving the player the illusion of choice!

I’m going to start with the plot, a plot which has previously been called “genuinely engrossing” and “compelling”, and is neither of these. Having said that many of you can anticipate my opinion of the plot and I’m happy to say your all wrong! Grand Theft Auto 4’s plot certainly isn’t devoid of merit, indeed at points in the game I found that I had become genuinely attached to certain characters and found events I couldn’t control truly upsetting. Here lies my main problem with the games plot.

The game tries so hard to create the perfect plot, including elements such as romance which the player can pursue if they wish to. Unfortunately the games plot is set almost in stone (with a few minor choices that give a choice between money or instant and violent gratification), and characters that I didn’t spend to much time with were often integral to the plot. This often left me with a feeling akin to “who cares” and the game somewhat lost my respect because of this.

I have many problems with the plot of the game yet one of the main ones was it’s pacing, which often involves the player performing menial tasks in order to play an (often outstanding) climax mission, after completing these missions the player then has to complete more menial tasks. The main problem with this is the fact that the game barely rewards the player for completing these missions until the huge cash reward which is often available for completing the “climax mission”, and in a game where money does little more than allow a player to purchase weapons, ammo, and health in order to be able to complete more menial mission, this seems a little stupid.

Another problem with this method of storytelling is that the bank robbery mission, which occurs halfway through the game, is the most exciting and brilliantly realised mission available within the game, which in turn leaves no motivation for the player to continue the games storyline until the end mission. Now, whilst we're on the topic of the games final mission, I intend to rant about it (see my next paragraph).

I came to the final missions of the game expecting a shoot-out which would excel the bank mission in every single way, a driving section comparable to finest moments in any driving game, and a bitter-sweet ending to the plot, which by this point was confusing and broken. I sort off got one of these things, the endings bitter-sweet. The shooting section of the mission is all-right, a bit bland, but it's okay. The driving section of the mission is annoying, and uses boats (boats are bad in GTA 4).

To sum-up the plot is no mean feat, considering it's not finished, and never will be on the PS3 (this doesn't really effect me though, considering I own a copy of the 360 game), but if I absolutely had to, say if I was cornered by several angry Wii owners, I would say that it's okay, but nothing compared a good film or to a lesser extent the Metal Gear series. Needless to say any argument I may have in this area is useless, as everyone, their mother, and their pets now owns at least five copies of the game, and beholds the plot as the Goliath of God.

Now to the game play, which I have mixed feelings about; sort of like a retarded squirrel regarding a pile of nuts. I like the lock-on feature, as it works well the majority of the time (100% of the time being an unachievable goal) and genuinely helped me to find and kill people who were shooting me. I liked the guns, and I support the decision to take out about 50% of the guns from previous games. But the entire shooting section of the game is completely ruined by the cover system, which often embeds Niko in walls and refuses to let him go, and occasionally caused him to stand on top of the thing I was ducking behind.

Even on the few occasions that I did manage to separate Niko from the wall he had thrown himself head first at, he then proceeded to attach himself to a piece of cover directly behind him, and expose his entire back to every enemy in the area. This led me to the conclusion that Niko has all the survival instincts of a rabbit in a monster truck rally held at night.

A lot of people have been talking about how the driving in the game handles a lot more realistically, it doesn't really; most of the cars handle like one of two things:

Good cars: Handle like a cheetah on speed.
Bad cars: Handle like a slug on pot.

If you learn which cars fit into these categories you'll be fine. Basically these rules define the driving of the game, and prove that any claims that the driving is realistic; profoundly wrong.
I have one other major problem with the way that driving has been implemented into the game, and that is the selection of vehicles available in the game. Okay lets take a look at all the classes available in San Andreas:

1. Cars
2. Motorbikes
3. Pedal bikes
4. Boats
5. Helicopters
6. Tanks
7. Jet planes
8. Trucks
9. Golf carts etc.
10. Jeeps

Now lets take a look at the vehicle classes available in GTA 4:

1. Cars
2. Motorbikes
3. Boat
4. Helicopters
5. Trucks
6. Golf carts etc.

So on closer inspection we've revealed that four whole vehicle classes have been removed from the game. Now I don't know about you, but when I hear that a new GTA game is going to be released I immediately begin to think about what vehicle types Rockstar could add to the game. This time I was expecting hot-air balloons, submarines, and loads of other weird and wonderful transport systems – and reality we aren't even allowed to drive tanks, a benchmark of the series!

Don't get me wrong, I understand that Rockstar are trying to take the series in a new, realistic direction and it's unrealistic to assume that Niko, an uneducated thug, already knows how to pilot every vehicle under the sun; but when realism gets in the way of the tried and tested formula which has made the series fun, then I don't see the point. Recently I've been having the very same gripe with a lot of games, and I'm starting to wish that the games industry as a whole
would stop trading fun for realism or artistic direction.

Right, before you (well at least those of you who can form a grammatically correct sentence) start spamming my inbox with complaints about how things like realism, artistic development and complex plots are advancing the industry, not only as a form of entertainment but also an art form, please allow a chance to explain myself. I whole-heartedly agree the aforementioned argument, but only up to the point where these things (realism, artistic development and complex plots) don't stop the product from being entertaining. For the purpose of an example, lets take a look at the Metal Gear series.

Hideo Kojima, the director of the series, has created in the Metal Gear and Metal Gear Solid games one of the most complete, complex, and meaningful video game plots ever; and as a result of this the Metal Gear series as a whole has suffered. The game play is often overlooked, complete understanding of all prior events in the series is often mandatory, and only the few hardcore fans (myself included) of the series remain able to sit through the often feature length cut-scenes. So whilst the Metal Gear series undoubtedly has an accomplished plot, and remarkable art direction; it does not qualify as an excellent video-game, because at times it is dull to it's target audience.

So anyway, back to GTA 4. I'm going to sum-up now because nothing I say about this game is going to do anything other than mildly amuse you. The plot's okay, the gameplay's underwhelming for the series, and the graphics are all right for the current generation of consoles. Ultimately get the game if you want a slightly less wacky GTA.

7/10

Life on Mars Review

2008-07-23T17:50:00.000-07:00

Life on Mars is a BAFTA award winning drama starring John Simm and Philip Glenister as detectives in 1973 (or possibly 2006 in Simm's case). The drama spans two seasons which I have decided to review in one review.

I was expecting to hate Life on Mars before I began to watch it; this was mainly due to the fact that I don't generally enjoy serialised dramas, and partly due to the BBC's inability to create dramas which aren't aimed at upper middle class morons with a love of us simple country folk and our jolly music (I'm lower middle class or at the high end of the working class scale).

But everyone should admit it when they're wrong, and I was horribly wrong, because Life on Mars is the best drama that I have ever seen, and to explain why I'm going to have to spoil a small amount of the plot for you good people.

Simm plays Sam Tyler, a detective working in 2006, until his life is turned upside down when gets hit by a car and wakes up in 1973. The audience are led to believe that Sam is in a coma throughout his period in 1973 by the use of voices which Sam can hear in his head and other strange occurrences which no-one but Sam picks up on. This is an extraordinarily clever device which never confirms that Sam is in a coma but merely hints at it.

Whilst in 1973 Sam works as a DI (Detective Inspector) under DCI hunt (played by Glenister). Hunt is the most complex and interesting character ever written into a serialized TV drama and Glenister performs the part perfectly. In fact, all of the acting on displayed in Life on Mars is brilliant, with absolutely outstanding performances from Simm and Glenister who are undeniably the leads.

Life on Mars' real strength lies in its ability to hold a viewer's interest until the very end and beyond that. The finale of the programme is spectacular; not only is it a more-than-satisfactory ending to an excellent series, it manages to single itself out as one of the best pieces television (get that television, not just drama) ever shot; it's thought provoking, meaningful, and gripping. Best of all the last episode challenges everything you know about Life on Mars, and leaves you still challenging it.

Okay so I was horribly wrong about this drama, but I refuse to accept the majority of dramas as acceptable. Life on Mars is a rare jewel, a diamond in the rough and something that is now sacred to me. Which is why I shan't be following up this review with a review of the Life on Mars spin off, Ashes to Ashes, as I previously intended.

9/10

Hancock Review

2008-07-23T17:45:00.001-07:00

Hancock is an odd, and somewhat messy film, which I went to see purely because The Dark Knight hasn't been released yet. Let me say that I had no prior knowledge of the film,except that it features Will Smith (Men in Black, I Am Legend) playing an alcoholic superhero, who is obviously quite bad at his job, and that the film is apparently a comedy.

The film opens with a fairly generic chase sequence which confirms the above statement in all of three minutes and serves as one of the four major action sequences, and whilst the sequences has the feeling of Spiderman scene and less of the directing ability, it has two saving features:

The script: This sequence, and indeed all of the film up until the main plot reveal (more on this later), is superbly scripted and features some of the funniest and wittiest dialogue I've seen in a cinema for a very long time.

Will Smith: I often hold Independence Day against Smith (despite the fact that I know it was all Emmerich's fault) but I do know that he is in fact a very good actor, particularly suited for comedy roles (Men in Black I and II), but still able to pull of some semblance of a serious role (I Am Legend, and to a far smaller extent The Pursuit of Happiness); and it is in the role of Hancock that Smith's talent hits me. He pulls of each line and gesture with a wave of charisma that lesser actors would never be able to achieve. Indeed in some places Smith carries the film.
After this sequence's conclusion Hancock spends most of it's time mocking the superhero film genre, Will Smith, anyone who takes these sorts of films seriously and organised crime, whilst occasionally, and regrettably, attempting to carve itself a memorable plot from false hopes, lost dreams, and candy floss. The film continues in this direction, making absolutely no progress in the plot department, and yet still managing to be both witty and likeable, until the major plot twist, which hit everyone in the cinema like a ton of bricks; made of acid.

SPOILER ALERT!

Brace yourself. This plot twist isn't easy to take in, and it ruins what has been otherwise a fairly breezy little comedy which I would have actually recommended. Are you ready? Okay then. Hancock is an alien. Yeah that's right, you read it right, Hancock is an alien! Almost as big of a disappointment as Indiana Jones and the Aliens the Kingdom of the Crystal skulls, isn't it?

Oh, and get this – another character whom I haven't mentioned thus far is not only also an alien, but apparently Hancock's wife. Hancock can't remember any of this because he has amnesia from the last time his wife beat him up.

NO MORE SPOILERS!

Anyway the main problem with this plot twist is that because it's so absurd, unexpected and downright stupid, the film feels that it has to explain itself, a lot. Now I'm all for reasonable and fathomable explanations to Sci-Fi plot devices, but only when they are presented in small, manageable chunks, and the rest of the plot can function alongside these explanations. Unfortunately Hancock completely fails to function as a result of these explanations, and the explanations don't make any sense either.

So, to sum up, Hancock is an extremely broken and disjointed film, which whilst being fairly funny and well scripted up until the halfway point, crumples under the weight of a simple plot twist which would have made the writers of Doctor Who blush.

6/10

Epic Movie Review

2008-07-23T17:39:00.001-07:00

All right before we begin let me say that I'm trying not to hold grudges any more, I find that it clouds my judgement and makes my reviews seem tacky. There are only four people exempt from this rule, they are: Uwe Boll (House of the Dead, Bloodrayne, Alone in the Dark), Roland Emmerich (Independence Day, The Day After Tomorrow), and the two Scary Movie writers still going (Jason Friedberg, Aaron Seltzer), these people are purveyors of filth and I will relentlessly pound their movies into the ground no matter what.

The [Insert adjective here] movie series has been going since 2000 and for the love of god I have NO idea why, I'll admit Scary movie had some good jokes, but everything since that film has caused me severe brain damage. You want me to explain why? Okay then here's an example of a common [Insert adjective here] movie joke:

Character One: I sure hope nothing terrible happens.

[Character one rounds the corner and green sludge spews from somewhere.]

Character One: Ewwww... it smells like poo.

[A masked maniac appears from no-where and a coloured person immediately starts making out with him, you know because it's bawdy humour so racism is funny (Disclaimer: The reviewer doesn't think that). After five minutes of making out, character one goes on to vomit on people for the next five minutes. A naked Paris Hylton lookalike runs across the set.]

There you go I've “written” an [Insert adjective here] movie script, and I'm not joking; that is it! That's all that happens; ever! If anyone reading this has ever laughed at any of the jokes in an [Insert adjective here] movie then they can go, I refuse to review for morons.

Epic movie's storyline can be sumed up within a paragraph. Four orphans taken from separate films (The Da Vinci Code, Nacho Libre, Xmen and Snakes on a plane) win tickets to go to a chocolate factory, where they discover a wardrobe that leads to the world of Gnarnia, which they have to save, after saving Gnarnia they get killed and Borat appears to say “Is Nice!”. THE END

Okay, how many of the movies “spoofed” are “epic”? Lets have a more in depth look at this:

The Da Vinci Code – I'm not entirely sure I would class this as an “epic” movie, although I'll be fair, I can sort of see where they're coming from.

Nacho Libre – Question: How do you spoof a comedy? Answer: You don't, this is only here so we can here the word nacho shouted really loudly and laugh with nostalgia... unfortunatley for A and J, I hated Nacho Libre.

Xmen – I sort of get this, although it would seem more suitable for Superhero Movie (out now for the more sucidal among you)

Snakes on a plane – Oh come on this film was meant to be a piss-take, so it's only in here because it's easy prey, and so everyone can have a nice laugh at SLJ.

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory – This is in no way an epic movie, and again it was only picked because it's easy prey, and to make fun of Depp because every one needs to do that.

Pirates of the Caribbean – They really like taking the piss out of Depp don't they? Maybe he had a deal with them but then Burton gave him a call. I doubt it but it might explain this meaningless prejudice.

Borat – This is only here so Borat can say “Is nice” quite a lot. It's not an epic movie and A & J don't even spoof it! I'm gonna take a chance and say the target audience of Epic Movie enjoyed Borat, but I didn't so the novelty of the this is completely lost on me. While I'm going I may as well try to explain why I didn't like Borat, so here goes. I didn't like Borat because it was a racist pile of shit, I couldn't even sit through it at the cinema! I even complained and go tickets to a film of my choice, which I waste on Click... turns out cinemas don't respond kindly to you asking for more free tickets.

All right now that's done I can move onto acting... if that's what you can call it. I can't tell whether the acting is bad or if the actor s have just given up trying to make anything in this film at all funny. Most of the time the actors simply stand there not speaking whilst not much happens, and when they do speak it's awkward and annoying.

I realise I've run out of things to say so I'm going to sum up. Epic movie is awful, truly terrible, but it doesn't matter what I think because it sells despite any of the bad press I'm glad to say that everyone in the journalistic world has given it. Just bear it in mind that the next time you go to see an [insert adjective here] movie I'll be waiting in the back with a shotgun to shoot anyone who laughs.

0/10

Futurama: Bender's Big Score Review

2008-07-23T17:35:00.000-07:00

I loved Futurama, it was (at least in my opinion) one of the wittiest and best written comedies ever conceived, and in my opinion beats The Simpsons in every way possible. I had to stop myself from stabbing everyone in the Fox network when it was cancelled in 2003. Now after 6 years Futurama is back, and it's better than ever.

There's really not that much to say about this film due to the fact that it's a well conceived comedy which doesn't once show itself up. The jokes in this film are a true return to form for the series and everything fits perfectly. The voice acting and animation on display here is outstanding, and to be quite there's nothing left to say other than: it's Futurama go and buy it, NOW!

Unfortunately my reviewer sense is telling me that I'm going to have to pad up some space now, so I'm going to mention the fact that the DVD is packed with extras that will make fans of the series wet themselves with excitement, including a full length episode of “Everybody loves Hipnotoad” and some more Al Gore stuff.

All right I've covered the film and the extras what else can pad this out with? Not much. I could talk about the joke about “Family Guy” (another superb show) or the fact that three sequels are to follow this film, but I won't because the bottom line is that this film is brilliant, and anyone who liked the series should buy it.

9/10

Cloverfield Review

2008-04-01T12:43:00.000-07:00

Surprising I hadn’t heard of Cloverfield until very recently. I had somehow managed to avoid the viral advertising and the speculation that inevitably rose from it. This is hugely beneficial from the point of a review, as I’m completely unbiased to the film.Cloverfield has been described as “a cross between: Godzilla, 9/11 and the Blair-witch project” by quite a few of my friends. In theory this could make the best action movie ever, it could be the most jaw-dropping and cinematically shallow production ever created. Indeed it could even be good.

The film opens with the sound of the monsters footsteps getting closer, and then quickly moves onto telling us that the footage that we’re about to be shown was found in the area formerly known as central park. I do have a minor problem with this already, if the footage was found in the area formerly known as central park, and the military or whatever know that the area was central park, why isn’t it still called central park?

We are then treated to the first camera work featured in the film, which is truly difficult to watch. Indeed it’s so bad that three people leave the cinema and never return. In this footage we are introduced to Rob and his girlfriend Beth, who are both jackasses who I don’t care about.

The film then cuts to Rob’s surprise goodbye party, where we are gradual introduced to some more jackasses who I don’t care about, including the man who will be filming the rest of the film, Hud. Hud’s defining characteristics are that he says dude a lot, screams “Oh my god!” whenever anything happens and films everything badly, much like everyone else in the film.

After we’re introduced to Hud, we get to meet more jackasses, who are all identical and who incidentally I DON’T CARE ABOUT! It is then revealed that Beth has broken up with Rob ‘cause she’s a bitch, she leaves and the film continues along on its horribly boring path. I wouldn’t mind if these sequences didn’t take up a third of the films runtime and the camera wasn’t practically thrown around all the time.

After 30 minutes of quite possibly unscripted behaviour, we hear a really, really loud bang and all the lights go out. I sit up out of my cocoon of despair, take care to notice that another 4 people have left and begin to watch the film. Our “heroes” and begin to watch the film. Our “heroes” make their way up to the roof, and watch the gigantic explosion in the distance. Wait a minute, the monster explodes?

Anyway the explosion sends rubble scattering everywhere, which would be quite frankly boring if it wasn’t filmed this way, but when filmed this ways it’s... mundane. Seriously is this all the film has? I was expecting something that would keep me on the edge of my seat, but I’ve watched about a third of this and I feel like I’ve been here for days.Anyway our heroes run down onto the street, which considering that the roofs are blowing up is probably not too bad an idea, actually it’s the most intelligent things our heroes have done so far, and I wouldn’t keep your hopes up for later on...

When our heroes finally make it onto the street, they stand around and film stuff, that is until the statue of liberty’s head almost crushes them! Alright I admit it that was impressive, but it’s got to be a high point right?

Anyway after this occurrence our heroes stand around and film stuff again... Oh and there’s a little bit of cultural irony here, Hud films a film of the head! The irony of it all! I hate Abrams (the director, apparently, although I really don’t think he did anything at all) now. More people leave the cinema, I don’t because I’ve seen worse.

Did I mention the huge clouds of billowing smoke in the sky, probably coming from the exploding thingies? It’s all very 9/11ish and it’s full of subtext which doesn’t really mean anything. To be totally honest I’m not even sure Abrams knows what subtext is, this is the man who created Lost a television show so stupid that it features polar bears on a tropical island, in fact on second thought I’m not even sure Abrams knows what 9/11 is.

Anyway the “plot” continues on as our “heroes” attempt to get out of New York via the bridge, which destroyed by a gigantic tail, which looks quite cool and for some reason makes the main character decide to go and get Beth back, which makes absolutely no sense. The cinema is almost empty me, my friends and few similar groups are all that remain.

The “characters” then try to get to Beth’s apartment, and to cut a long story short Cloverfield results in the most action packed, and tense monster movie ever filmed, all due to the camera gimmick. Cloverfield has millions of problems the most glaring of these are that: · It means nothing.· It’s not acted.· The film avoids doling out horror movie stereotypes by making all the characters the same person.· It’s not scripted.Yet despite all this Cloverfield is still the best monster movie ever. It’s tense, surprisingly dramatic, quite scary, and actually very mysterious.

6/10 (Note: Possibly a 7 if you don’t give a shit about subtext.)

P.S. [SPOILER] For all of you who want the end of the story told from my perspective, and speculations for the sequel, look down.·

Plot ending: All the annoying wankers die, and the monster escapes, all in all a really happy ending.·

Sequel: Not much else happens, J.J.Abrams pretends to understand politics, and there might be polar bears in New York. Who knows? More to the point who cares anymore?

Juno Review

2008-04-01T12:40:00.000-07:00

Juno has been praised as one of the wittiest and funniest comedies of 2007, despite it being one of four comedies that tackled the subject of unwanted pregnancy in the same year. Okay so nothing’s going to justify the fact that I’m watching a movie with “chick flick” written all over it, but I simply had to find out why this is so much better than similar films right?

The film starts with a sort cartoon version of Juno (Ellen Page) walking down the street, drinking Sunny D to some truly horrific music. My main problem with this is the sheer length of this section, well that and the music which is now eating away at my brain and trying to destroy any sign of intelligence in the audience.

Now I’m going to stop going on about the music because if I ever even remember it again I may have to kill myself. Anyway after about 5 minutes of insipid music and credits we finally get some dialogue, basically Juno needs a pregnancy test, but she’s so violent towards the shop-keeper that I’m not surprised that he doesn’t smash her head in with the cash machine, and bearing in mind this is Juno’s first line I think I’ve established her as my least favourite character since Al Murray became the Landlord.

I really can’t blame Page for representing the character this way since the dialogue is in fact horrible, and I know I may be being a bit harsh here, but when a film gets more recognition than four others for doing absolutely NOTHING new; it’s my job to tear the shit out of it.

So yeah turns out Juno’s pregnant, and we’re all meant to feel sorry for this insipid moron? She’s not even dating the guy she slept with, so if you ask me it’s a lot more credible to your personality if you laugh at the girl, I did.

Having said that I laughed at the girl I feel that I must point out that the movie didn’t make me laugh, I’m just mean. I feel that I must also say that I didn’t laugh at any other point in this film, because every single joke featured in this film is entirely focused on the Myspace generation, and whilst belonging to that generation, I feel nothing for it. I’ve actually refused to buy a laptop based on the fact that it had a Myspace wallpaper pre-installed.

Okay so I’ve whined enough now to talk about Juno’s good points, which are in retrospect Ellen Page. Despite having been given an awful character Page kindly asserts herself as an excellent actress and brighted up my day, a little.

Other than Page Juno is essentially every bad romantic comedy ever to grace our screens, with the poop jokes taken out and the bad mannered, unintelligent Myspace age people shoved in. Oh and the music’s terrible.

3/10

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barbet of Fleet Street Review

2008-04-01T12:31:00.001-07:00

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street was originally a musical written and directed by Stephen Sondheim, it was a minimalist production, and has been universally praised. Last year Tim Burton announced that he would be adapting the musical into a film and that Johnny Depp would be starring as the murderous barber. This sent the billions of 12 year old, Pirates of the Caribbean influenced Depp fan-girls into quivers of excitement.

The bad news for them is that this film is an 18, everywhere, and considering that the murderous Mr. Todd and his accomplice Mrs. Lovett (Helena Bonham Carter) kill, cook and sell the numerous unfortunate victims that wander into Sweeney’s shop, this isn’t at all surprising. The violence presented in this film is horrific, to the extent that it’s comical. Those who can’t handle gore or black humour should stay well away from this film.

The plot opens with an extremely dark credit sequence, in which animated blood shows us the path that Sweeney’s victims take, while this is well animated and accompanied by an appropriate score, the entire thing felt like the opening to a Marvel movie (Spiderman etc. For those not in the know), which is somewhat confusing.

We then cut to the first musical number (this is still a musical despite how it’s been advertised) in which a young sailor and a suitably dark Mr. Todd argue in about London in song. I’m not normally a fan of musicals but the songs in this film are seamlessly integrated into the dialogue, to the extent that at times I couldn’t tell whether the actors were singing or not, and if a musical number does break out, it contains more plot progression than about half an hour’s worth of dialogue.

The musical aspect of the film is a huge strength to both the director (Tim Burton, as previously mentioned) and the actors, as neither suffer from the need to be realistic and can accomplish incredibly surreal sequences, an area Burton excels in.

About midway through the first song, the camera pans outwards to reveal Sweeney’s London, a view which should assure everyone in the audience that Burton is a master of gothic film, and that this is the spiritual successor to Sleepy Hollow. Then Burton does something very clever with colour.

In a flashback sequence Burton reveals that Todd was once named Benjamin Barker but was torn away from his family, by a judge (Alan Rickman) who coveted his wife, and then sentenced to jail for 15 years. In this scene Burton also proves that he can work very well with colour and friendly atmospheres. We are also introduced to the positively chilling Beadle Bamford (Timothy Spall).

We then cut back to the miserable and gothic landscape that is so often associated with Burton, the contrast between the two environments is stunning and yet nothing seems out of place, such is the magic that Burton weaves.

Todd soon finds himself in the pie shop below his old barber shop. This is when we are introduced to Mrs. Lovett, who is on a par with Todd as being the most disturbing, perplexing, ruthless and yet likeable characters in the film.

The acting from everyone in the film is far above par, yet that seen from Depp and Carter is outstanding. Depp can say more with a single look than most actors can manage with a line of dialogue, and Carter’s portrayal of Mrs. Lovett’s twisted love of Todd is truly disturbing.

Yet the true strength of the acting is due to Burton’s decision not to demonise either character, even as Todd murders and sells anyone he encounters, and Lovett encourages his demented rage, they remain better than those who they pursue, even if only slightly. It would’ve been so easy for Burton to fall into the trap of not having a main character, yet he doesn’t as both Todd and Lovett, remain identifiable characters driven by human emotions.

The plot takes a large amount of time to get to the first murder, which is born out of necessity. The murder itself is quick but bloody. Gallons of blood pour from the first victim, and Depp smiles maliciously all the way through it, if anything were to put a fan-girl off Depp this is it.

After the first throat is slit the film progresses at a breakneck pace to its inevitable and bloody end, not much is left to the imagination, and anything that is, is completely justifiable from an artistic and tasteful stand-point. Everything is presented, filmed, acted and sung beautifully. This is a diamond in Burton’s crown.

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barbet of Fleet Street is so close to being a masterpiece it’s painful to criticize it; the one thing that holds it back is its genre. It’s to arty for the blood crowd and to bloody for the art crowd, it takes a mixture of both to enjoy this film. Yet one thing is certain, Stephen Sondheim’s musical has been fully realised here, and this is Burtons crowning achievement. It’s bloody, satirical realism has implications to this day, and Burton has most definitely grown up and found his place in the world.

9/10

Call of Duty 4 Review

2007-12-20T10:15:00.000-08:00

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare

Genre: Shooter
R.R.P: £40 - £50
Age Rating: 15
Release Date: Out Now
Publisher: Activsion
Developer: Infinity Ward
Format: Xbox 360, PS3, PC.

The Call of Duty series has undergone a huge change with its latest incarnation not only has the developer of COD 1, and 2 returned in order to make us all forget COD 3, the game's setting has moved from the ever familiar WW2 Europe, to the a slightly more risky setting.

Also unlike previous games the plot is complete fiction, which "regretabley" enables me to tear it to shreads, right? Well no actually it dosen't, the plot although fictional is entirely concievable, so much so that on occaision I almost forgot that I wasn't fighting in Iraq (Oops! Infinity Ward insist that the game dosen't bear any similaritys, oppurtunity missed really.) until a slightly concievable plot device kills one of my characters (Oops! I'm on a role today!) and I'm sent back to my main man, who brilliantly (I think) is part of the English special forces, the SAS.

The plot does have some memorable moments, but all this is really irrelavant in a Call of Duty game. The single player campaign shouldn't take you more than 10 hours even on the hardest difficulty, although those 10 hours are possibly some of the most tense in gaming history.

Gameplay wise Call of Duty 4 hasn't really changed. Everything works as you would expect it to, for those new to the series the COD games are all about getting a clean, professional kill; whether that means nailing the headshot or knifing guys in the head is entirely upto the player. I don't like talking about graphics nowadays, what with every looking better than reality, but I feel it's fair to mention that Call of Duty 4 is beautiful.

Ultimatley no-one is going to buy COD 4 for the single player, and those aiming for hours of online fun will not be disapointed, as COD 4's multiplayer mode is incredibly moreish. This mainly due to amount of unlockables on offer, after each kill, the player gains EXP, this contributs to his/her level, and once leveled up new equipment is unlocked. This is complemented by the challenge system, which dares you to do things like jump off buildings etc. while rewarding you with exp. On top of this weapons can be leveled by getting a certain number of kills or headshots, this rewards you with exp and scopes, colour schemes etc. There are 55 levels in total, but once level 55 is reached the player can decided to use prestige mode which sets them back to level 1, but rewards them with a pretty icon... addictive?

CoD 4 is an outstanding release which rewards constant play with items and more play. It won't be game of the year, but it's certainly close.

9/10

The Golden Compass Review

2007-12-09T13:20:00.000-08:00

The Golden Compass

Genre: Action & Fantasy
Age Rating: PG
Release Date: Out Now
Format: Film

"His Dark Materials" is one of the most succesful fantasy series in exsistance, even I must admit that it is one of the best trilogys I have ever had the pleasure to. The depth and charisma displayed when discribing even the dullest of the things is incredible. The books come close to Tolkien's Middle Earth in depth yet never suffer from the over description, or overly complicated language that made LOTR such a torment to read.

So of course it was inevitable that Hollywood would get its evil life draining claws into Pullman's world, and of course it was inevitable that they would change it so that some things were deemed inoffensive and unconfusing to the American public in paricular. The magisterium has been changed so that it no longer represents the chatholic church within Pullman's world, and without giving to much away I must say that if the Hollywood demons wish to continue making movies based on "His Dark Materials" this will cause some huge problems later.

Originally I had a few issues with the cast, I still do but not in the places I thought. Dakota Blue Richards was what I originally thought of as bad casting, yet she manages to give a very good performance an is never once annoying or out of place. Now I must say I originally thought that Daniel Craig (James Bond in the Casino Royale remake) as Lord Asriel, and Ian McKellen (Gandalf) as Iorek Byrnison was very good casting yet both of them sound out of place. Daniel Craig has quite an American accent and Lord Asriel is british, thats part of his character, and its damn important, and McKellen has an old booming voice yet it dosen't suit Byrnison, mainly because he's a bear. No matter how you look at it big names aren't always perfect for the part.

Cinematically the film is outstanding rivaling LOTR in special affects, landscape shots and generally breath taking beauty. Yet this has obviously been the focus of the film, and it shouldn't have been, Lyra's struggle both emotionally and physically should. LOTR was great because of the acting and the script, not because of the special effects, this is why it was seperated from Harry Potter which focused upon special effects sadly "The Golden Compass" has fallen into the "Potter trap".

Characters should always be the focus of "epic" films, as those who do focus upon characters have been hailed as some of the greatest films of all time. LOTR should have been inferior to this film in every respect, time has passed making special effects even better, Pullman makes a point with his novels (a point which will apparently offend the church if made into a film), and Lyra's naive outlook upon battles she cannot possibly win should have made this film brilliant, instead Hollywood's magic pulls down Pullman's ruining all that could have been.

6/10 - Unfortunatley a sure fire hit this christmas.

Assassin's Creed Review

2007-11-19T13:27:00.000-08:00

Assassin's Creed

Genre: Action/Adventure
R.R.P: £40 - £50
Age Rating: 15
Release Date: Out Now
Publisher: Ubisoft
Developer: Ubisoft Montreal
Format: Xbox 360, PS3

Welcome to the Third Crusade, the setting of Assassin's Creed and home to some of the most retarded guards in exsistance. I'm serious they're on par, if not dumber, than MGS 2's guards of "What was that just now?" ilk. Now anyone who reads my reviews knows that I generally don't open with a rant, but I just had to get that of my chest, I'll be normal now.

Assassin's plot (dare I call it that) has been quoted within the range of "Deep and meaningful" to "complete and utter bull", I tend to agree with the latter. Altair is one of the most unimaginative characters in exsistance, and lines such as "You kidnapped me! I don't even know you!" kinda finish the guy off. I'm sure that any great story teller will assure that it's a bad move to reveal the main plot twist at the beginning of the narrative, Assasins Creed ignores this and therefore nothing is gripping, mysterious or anything else!

Plot and AI aside, the game holds up fairly well. The graphics are lush, with cities brimming with life, and burning in the sun. Indeed Assassin's graphics are among the best I've ever seen, with the games only noticable graphical flaws being clipping and decent facial animation. The occaisional weak patch of graphics occur in between assasination but other than that the game is beautiful and runs without lag.

Combat works well, but could have been tougher. As guards only attack one at a time and rarely employ any tactics other than circling the player, you can happily resort to counter attacks and take on thousands of guards at the same time. This would be an excellent point to explain the controls, if they were easy to explain, all you need to know is that they are perfect and intuitive.

Finally climbing, which is what Assassins Creed is all about really. Altair can climb on anything, and more importantly he actually climbs on it! His feet actually touch everything they're meant to, as do his hands. Although this is astounding and all it should have been done years ago. Having said that I do Ubisoft for doing it.

Unfortunatly Assassin's good points end here. Missions follow an incredibly repetitive structure where the player gathers information by pickpocketing, eaves dropping, interogations and on occasion doing favours for informants (the more bizarre of these being the collection of flags), an then undertakes the assasination. Unfortunatley thats all there is to do, which begs me to ask the question, why give us the sandbox? My first answer would be to kill indiscriminantly, but killing civilians hurts you, meaning the sandbox world completely and utterly bemuses me.

7/10 - Assassin's Creed isn't exactly special, but it remains buyable or at the very least rentable.

The Orange Box Review

2007-11-08T14:56:00.000-08:00

The Orange Box

Format: PC, Xbox 360, PS3.
R.R.P: £40
Release Date: Out Now (360, PC), 16th November (PS3)
Publisher: Valve
Developer: Valve
Genre: First Person Action
Rating: Teen-Mature

The Orange Box is a shrine to all that Valve have achieved, and to be quite frank theres acctually very little to say. In the days leading upto the games release I admit that I did spend at least 4 hours pondering upon what I was going to say, and if I would be able to avoid re-iterating myself.

Half-Life 2 and Episode One have already paved there way into the mind of gamers, so I've (sagely) decided not to talk about them. Instead I'm going to talk about new content, which is here in droves.

Episode Two starts off where Episode One left off and is byfar the best game in the Half-Life series, this is mainly due to the inclusion of new enviroments. In previous games dark, dank corridors made up the majority of game time and while they are still present in Episode Two Valve have decided to let players run free in the lush land of White Forest.

As the plot progresses some rather interesting things arise, including some rather strange hints as to how G-man and the combine may be stopped. As each event unfolds the gameplay becomes more and more intense untilit culminates in the defense of the White Forest missile silo from the unstoppable Combine forces.

In short Episode Two is fantastic. I know move on to the most interesting part of the package; Portal. Portal is a first person puzzle game in which players use a "portal gun" to shoot portals into the level. These Portal can instantly transport the player around the map, whilst applying the gravitation force before entry. Example if you fall into a Portal from a hieght you will fire out another with the same velocity.

This is a relatively simple idea which gets taken to stupid lengths, and ultimatley prepares Valves physics engine for Half-Life 3 (which may or may not happen, I have NO information!) which is not a bad thing as Portal still manages to be one of the most enjoyable games I have ever played.

All this goodness is bundled up with Team Fortress 2, which offers a Battlefront style of gameplay modes, involving taking key points. While it is a solid Multiplayer game it fails to stand upto the likes of Halo and is by far the weakest part of the Package.

In all The Orange Box is one of the most solid expieriances out there at the moment and is proof that Halo mania can be beaten (In the way that I stopped playing Halo but this is by no means better than it). Whilst offering a solid single player experiance it offers a meagre multiplayer one.

9/10

The Day After Tomorrow Review

2007-10-16T11:40:00.000-07:00

The Day After Tomorrow is often thought of as one of the most politically motivated films to come out of Hollywood. The film follows the story of several loosely connected and badly defined characters as they battle for survival against an Ice Age brought about by global warming.

Many political activists who wish to conserve the environment have attached themselves to the film and advertise it as an accurate interpretation of what will happen if we continue to poison the atmosphere with carbon dioxide; unfortunately, it is obvious from the way that the film has been advertised and shot that it simply wants to be an action movie, which confuses the process somewhat.

The film starts with a standard mix of grand music and rolling landscape (you can’t go wrong with a tried and tested formula); the landscape in question being the North Pole. After the opening credits have finished we are greeted with the sight of three environmentalists working at a small camp in the centre of the North Pole, which then breaks in half! Badly acted panic ensues.

This scene is actually more confusing than anything else, as one of the environmentalists leaps onto the land that has broken off, simply to save some equipment. Furthermore the scene serves no purpose other than to show off fancy special effects, camera angles, and inform the audience that they are watching a film about global warming – thanks, everyone really needed you to explain that to them, in fact, explain it again, in case anyone missed the previews.

Unfortunately the director (Emmerich) seems to think that his audience actually does need a second explanation and abruptly we cut to the United States Senate where a climatologist named Jack Hall is trying to persuade the government to do something useful about global warming. The film then descends into lazy dialogue, awful editing (each cut is so fast you’ll get whiplash) and frankly terrible acting (courtesy of Dennis Quaid), until we get to the first storm sequence, which is actually quite good.

This is when it dawns on you; Emmerich really just wanted to make an action film but instead bullied himself into making a serious film. The special effects are outstanding; parts of the city are destroyed and hurled at each other in a cataclysmic wave of destruction, crushing everything in their path. This is accompanied with nigh on perfect sound effects and an amazing musical score.

We then cut to Jack’s family, who are unsurprisingly worried about him, except his son, Sam (Jake Gyllenhaal) who appears to be more worried about how he’s going to get to New York, so he can impress his potential girlfriend, Laura (Emmy Rossum) with his abilities in Mathematics…

The relationship between Sam and his father is obviously a strained one, yet it is never fully realized as the characters spend the majority of the film apart. This is a shame as there is so much potential in the film and if this core relationship was developed, the experience would be infinitely more satisfying.

Sam gets to New York via a plane which almost gets hit by lightning (are planes even allowed up in storms?), revealing also that he’s afraid of heights; a truly horrible “romance” sequence between Sam and Laura is forced into being by Emmerich. The scene is least emotional love scene ever made; there is absolutely no connection between the actors whatsoever.

This is where the film’s main problem lies. Every part of The Day after Tomorrow could have been an emotional, nerve-racking and genuinely terrifying experience, but Emmerich obviously didn’t envision what he advertised, or else he got lost in production. All that matters, however, is that you won’t feel a thing towards any of the characters, because humans don’t sit around in dangerous situations they panic!

When the plane lands in New York (the main set piece for the film) it is revealed that the storm is headed for the city, and everyone in the United States must go to Mexico to be safe from the storm. Why Mexico remains untouched by global warming is never explained at all, but the difficult relationship with Mexico and the U.S.A could have been an interesting plot point. Unfortunately, once again, this is never expanded upon.

Sam realizes that it would be incredibly dangerous to race the storm to Mexico and stays in New York Library (he conveniently reaches the library just as the storm hits New York, you know like every action movie hero that has ever been threatened by anything). Unfortunately, Jack (the climatologist) doesn’t realize it is in fact suicide to go to New York now, and “heroically” risks his life for Sam.

In a way, The Day after Tomorrow reminds me of an old western, as it’s obvious that Jack won’t die as he is “the all-American hero”, akin to Clint Eastwood. This leads me to the evident patriotism within the film. Essentially The Day after Tomorrow’s message is that America will always triumph and any disaster brought on by emission of Carbon Dioxide isn’t the country’s fault and will be forgiven, contrasting to the “this is where we are going” message provided by every aspect of advertising for the film.

Another problem with The Day after Tomorrow is the constant use of completely impossible plot devices. For example, towards the end of the film a ship full of wolves holds the only medicine that is capable of curing a leg wound. This not only takes the audience even further away from any emotional plot that the film may have, but it also loses any sense of realism that the film could have had otherwise. The plot ends well for all of the main characters and has absolutely no long term effects on America, which discards any message given (except the patriotic one, because taking that away would have catastrophic affects).

By now it should be apparent that the entire budget was spent on special effects and sound, as both the acting and the script is appalling. It appears that Emmerich was simply relying on his cast to act well and attract attention; they don’t. In fact most of the actors are so bad they either aren’t trying or can’t act. Add in some unintentionally hilarious lines such as; “Step aside, my Father’s a climatologist” and the film starts to feel more like a comedy than a serious look at what might happen if we carry on in our current trends.

The Day after tomorrow is actually a very shallow film which doesn’t comment on our own stupidity as a race. It entirely neglects the fact that global warming is brought on by human means, and that it is something we can control. The film is a completely nonsensical mix of American disaster movie, unintentional comedy, tear-jerker and action movie. Ultimately it’s this genre confusion that destroys it.

Halo 3 Review

2007-10-03T12:55:00.000-07:00

Halo 3

Publisher: Microsoft
Developer: Bungie
Price: Legendary Edition - £70, Collectors Edition - £45, Standard Edition - £35
Play while listening to: The in-game music.
Previous Games by the Developer: Marathon Trilogy, Myth, Halo 1 and 2.
Genre: FPS
Platform(s): Xbox 360
Release Date: Out Now

I know I'm a little late with this, thats because I 've been petrified to write this review ever since the game came into my hands last week. If I'm to harsh I'll have hordes of Microsoft fanboys/girls coming after me. If I'm to soft I'll have hordes of Nintendo and Sony Fanboys/girls after me. This is one of the rare occaisions where reviewing becomes an art form (Thats gonna bite me in the arse. Screw up count: 1).

Instead of reviewing Halo 3 as an entire package I've decided to split it into segments to avoid the possible 10/10, these mini reviews are as follows; Campaign, Multiplayer, and Forge + Saved Films. Let us begin.

Campaign

Halo: Combat Evolved made its name with its astounding campaign and plotline, Halo 2's campaign was equally outstanding yet many gamers hated it due to the inclusion of the Arbiter, who took them away from the Master Chief although adding alot in terms of plot and gameplay. Halo 3's campaign is very much the same as the other two games in terms of gameplay, but takes the plot back to its roots with the player being Chief and only Chief (except in co-op).

Unfortunatley this leaves the Elites split from the Covenant, and the ensuing civil war slightly in the dark as the Master Chief runs through the nine levels obliterating the Covenant forces; as he does. Although this is all well and good, I felt kind of annoyed at the lack of an Elite plotline, and although I support Bungies Desicion in not making us play as the Arbiter, I still think they should have openly continued the plotline, rather than allying all of the Elites with Humanity, which just feels wierd.

Other than this one small gripe with the plot I have a gripe with one of the levels, this being the second to last one. The level feels more like a plot device than anything else with gameplay constantly brought to a screeching halt for a lot of dialouge (Which isn't a bad thing as the dialouge of Halo 3 is outstandingly written and performed), which dosen't really compliment the style of Halo.

Other than these gripes Halo 3's campaign is effetively more of the same, but improved upon tenfold. The events within the game do "Finish the Fight" but also leave room for more adventures. As with every Halo Campaign the features complement each other fantastically.

Campaign Score: 9/10

Multiplayer

Multiplayer is another area that Bunige has conquered with utmost vigour and judging from the fact that Halo 2 is STILL being played on live, I don't think that they can screw up Halo 3's MP. Well they haven't, Muliplayer is as fresh as ever, with both new game modes and maps avialable in abundance.

Theres not actually that much to say a bout multiplayer, with all the new things being either un-noticeable or available within the campaign, all I can really say is that this is why Xbox Live exsists.

Multiplayer score: 9/10 (It wears thin after a week or so)

Forge and Saved Films

The two newbies to the Halo-verse, are both interesting and fairly new. I'll begin with my favourite; Saved Films.

Although watching playbacks of your own gameplay should be a fairly easy feature to implement, it has never been done before in any video game ever. So Bungie have pioneered yet another outstanding feature, but with saved films in Halo 3, everything is perfect. The footage isn't edit by Bungie at all, so effectively you can see any glitches (and thanks to file share, publish them) from any angle, at any speed, or you could simply use it to look at the (occaisionally orgasmic) enviroments.

Forge I'm not so keen on as it takes a huge amount of time to be able to use effectively and doesn't let you design your own maps, just edit Bungies. Although Map editing in real time, with battles going on around you may sound incredibly cool, its acctually very frustrating as your "monitor" is constantly shot out of the air and other players tend to spawn objects on top of yours. Not Bungies best idea.

Forge and Saved Films Score: 9/10

Overall

Halo 3 when reviewed as an entire package is enevitabley a 10/10, one would think unfortunatley after a week or so it wears thin, the campaign matches that of the first game but the game should be t a progression it isn't, its the same! The multiplayer is unrivaled on the 360 in todays market and saved films should be a standard feature from now on.

Although Halo 3 is almost assuradley Game of the Year, I hope something beats it.

9/10

Must Buy!

Revisiting the Halo Universe: Halo 2 Review

2007-09-11T13:31:00.000-07:00

Halo 2

Genre: FPS
Price: Variable
Format: Xbox, and PC
Version Reviewed: Xbox
Release Date: Out Now

A game that followed the immensely popular Halo would never live upto the fans epections no matter how spectacularly it followed the original. Unfortunatley Halo 2's only problm is the fact that fans will always remember Halo far to fondly, and expect miricales with Bunige.

Bungie already revolutionised the FPS genre with the first Halo, they couldn't do it twice in the same series could they? Well, no, but they did bring alot of new features to what was, by that time, a tried and tested formula. Halo 2 takes everything that made up Halo, kicks most of the crap out and leaves the gamer with one of the most impressive games ever.

Halo 2's campaign has often been criticised of being tacky and rushed, this is due to the fact that no-one really liked the Arbiter, because Master Chief is awesome. This is an unfair attitude to take as the Arbiter adds quite alot to the games story, and campaign gameplay.

The actual campaign is superbly constructed, and I'm glad to say that Halo's main campaign problem has been solved and no enviroments are repeated in gameplay, at all. Halo 2's campaign has, however, changed in structure, massively.

The first Halo gave the player the feeling that they were part of something much bigger, in Halo 2 the player is part of something much bigger. Players are no longer confined to the corridors that littered the first campaign, and huge enviroments, littered with Covenant, sprawl before the player. Unfotunately the player dosen't ever stray to far from the beaten path.

This gives way to a far more hectic type of gameplay, with multitudes of enemys fighting your allys ,and later your enemys. Plasma flys everywhere, grenades bounce around and explode at your feet, Elites declare there undying hatred towards you, Brutes roar, and Grunts scream in fear and agony. This is far from a bad thing, makes the player feel like this is a real battle which they can influence, and other than a few gliches here and there it feels great.

That dosen't mean that the campaign is without flaws. The huge battlefields can simply be quickly moved across, without any form of combat, when this happens the game is unsure exactly as to where the player is within the game and forgets to spawn some further enemys, this is fairly importatn because it is possible to skip whole levels at once in some areas of the game.

The Multiplayer of the first game was brilliant, but Halo 2 has put it online, made it almost fair and improved it infinetly. Indeed if it wasn't for the fact that in the majority of gametypes everyone spawns with a dual-wieldable weapon therefore negating the need for any form of melee or grenade, the multiplayer would be perfect.

Conclusion

Although Halo 2 has some major problems, over 90% of Xbox Live users can't all be wrong. 9/10

Revisiting the Halo universe: Halo: Combat Evolved Review.

2007-09-10T11:40:00.000-07:00

Halo: Combat Evolved

Price: £30 (Originally), £10 (New), £1-5(Second Hand)
Age Rating: M for Mature or 16+
Previous Score: 10/10
Release Date: Out Now
Format: Xbox and PC
Format Reviewed: Xbox
Genre: FPS

Halo recieved a huge amount of good press when it was first released 5 years ago and rightly so. It introduced a large amount of new ideas and influenced every First Person Shooter that followed it, but has it stood the test of time?

The first cutscene plays, I decide to watch it simply for nostalgias sake, after the cutscene has finished I leap straight into the fight. Thats when it hits me Halo has aged, but not in a bad way. It uses the same control shceme as games that follow it, but it feels better. It uses a shield system like millions of obvious followers, but it has a better way of doing it, Halo is simply perfect to handle.

After I have made my way through the small corridors that make up the body of the first level (The Pillar of Autumn for those aren't Halo versed), the second level dispells most of the doubts I had. Everything fits, the AI works so fluently, the Covenant are as interesting to simply watch (and listen to, see next paragraph) as they were 5 years ago. The combat AI never ceases to astound with enemies using high ground, standing firm and fleeing for there lives whenever appropriate.

Then the music cuts in and I begin to notice that game music and dialouge can both be good, at the same time! The Grunts scream, Elites roar, and Jackals... urm... what do they do? Everytime the first chord from that classic Halo tune is struck I drift off to a wonderful place... The music is perfect.

Although by now it may seem that I may be showering praise upon the game, unfotunately Halo is far from perfect. By the Library the game begins to dwindle slightly, with the fast paced action becoming fun in short bursts. After the Library an entire map is repeated, despite having some of the best outdoor sections in the game, replaying the corridors within the level is a bit annoying.

The multiplayer can still entertain but when compared to the wealth of releases that have fairly equal Multiplayer modes, with Xbox Live, it can and will be missed, although if you have friends (real ones) then it is fun for an hour or so.

Obviously time has passed since Halo so the Graphics aren't top range anymore, but Halo can still astound the player with the variation of colours and textures. Halo is a colourful game, but it manages to not seem garish, although to use a brilliant phrase, compared to other shooters it looks like it "has been vomitted on by rainbows".

Conclusion

Although Halo has aged considerabley over the last five years thus rendering it imperfect, certain areas of the game hit unparraleled hieghts, it has become a timeless classic. 9/10

Bioshock Review

2007-09-01T13:51:00.000-07:00

Version Reviewed: 360
Release Date: Out Now
Price: Normal- £40
Special Edition Tin - £45
Box set- £50

Welcome to Rapture

After a gap of around 8 years since "System Shock 2", everyone in the gaming world was expecting something special from Irrational games' newest release "Bioshock". After one run through of the games storyline I feel I am ready to review!

"They told me I was special..."

First off let me say that Bioshock takes around 16 hours to finish on normal, and that if your not prepared to invest that much time in the game before games like "Heavenly Sword", "Halo 3" and, "Assasin's Creed" hit the stores next month then don't bother. If the time span seems far to short then you'de be better off with the other major release this month "Blue Dragon" which apparently takes around 100 hours (in human time) to complete.

If you can get past that welcome to the review. The game starts with your character landing near a tower in a plane crash, what ensues is probably one of the most breathing taking action cutscenes ever devised as you take your first descent into Rapture. When you arive in Rapture, it's fairly ovious that the city has taken a turn for the worst. Corpses lie strew across the streets of Rapture in an abundance, graffiti protesting to every manner of crime commit by the government.

The first character you meet in Rapture is Atlas he serves as your guide for the majority of the game. This is where the game comes into its own, while having outstanding gameplay and graphics it is the dialog and voice acting hat has made Rapture into a living, breathing world. Ranging from friendly Irish men quipping whenever the need arises to the blood-curdling roars of the Big Daddy, the voice acting in Bioshock only ever improves.

"...They were right."

Yet it is only when the plot reachs the middle of the game do you start to feel truely a part of Rapture. You have aquired enough Plasmids (Basically spells, they are sustained by EVE, and aquired with ADAM) to take on tougher enemys successfully, you no-longer feel sickend by the Little Sisters, or thier grotesque protectors, and life is good, then the onslaught begins.

Any thoughts you had of Ammo lasting you long enough to get to the next Ammo Bandito Machine should be gone by now because by the time you aquire the Grenade laucher, the seemingly insatiable lake of money and ammo will have run dry. You will begin to scavenge anywhere possible for money, you will start to remind yourself of the Splicers you have come to loathe and you will feel sickend by yourself.

When you have reached this stage of depravitey you will begin your never ending hunt for ADAM. ADAM is the substance that keeps the wheels of Rapture moving (It lets you buy plasmids) and it can only be aquired by "Exorcising" the Little Sisters, to do this you will have to kill the Big Daddys. This may seem like an overly daunting task at first, but then you realise, three grenades and it's over.

Bioshock begins to take a turn for the worse...

Damnit

When you have reached the games major plot twist (about 14 hours into the game), Bioshock begins to feel less frantic, less monumental and at times tedious. Only three missions follow the plot twist but they are the least innovative, most tedious and hardest in the game. The first of these three is a simple "collection" mission where you collect parts which enable you to become... something (I know what it is I just don't want to ruin it).

The second is an escort mission, which while giving you an insight into one of the most compelling relationships in the game, is filled with some of the most annoying dialogue in the game (the only dialogue I have heard to be repeated at all I might add), tedious gameplay, and an overly dissapointing enemy layout (predict and you'll be right 50% of the time). The third is an overly predictable boss fight.

The boss fight is followed by a cutscene to end the story, this cutscene is variable depending on the choices you've made in the game, yet both endings are overly ambitious and unsatisfying compared to the rest of the plot (which is compelling, and provocative), which makes me wonder why the game wasn't postponed.

Review Synopsis

Overall Bioshock is an incredible game with an ending which appears rushed due to time constraints. If the game was postpone until november it would have been at least second in line for the title of "Game of the Year" but as it stands Bioshock stands at about 4th place pending. Everyone knows the ending is the most important part.

8/10