The Adventures of Tintin - The Secret of the Unicorn

A large grin dressed my face throughout the picture and in all honesty, it is very difficult to say something bad about The Adventures of Tintin - The Secret of the Unicorn, other than the usual exaggerations of recent Spielberg films, the ending that is not really an ending, and Milou’s stupid name translation (Snowy??!! What the hell is wrong with Milo??!!), although this was not Spielberg’s decision.

A pure pleasure.

I’m French (Canadian) and I grew up reading all the Tintin books. In fact, The Black Island was the first book I ever read/looked-at-the-pictures when I put on my first pair of glasses at a very young age, and it remains my favourite Tintin adventure to this day.

My expectations were very high when delving into the dark theatre. After all, this was one of the more interesting adventures of Tintin put on the big screen by a true Master film maker, Steven Spielberg, and Peter Jackson, who delivered the absolutely magnificent The Lord of Rings trilogy. Add to this a plethora of great voice actors including Andy Serkis as Captain Haddock (perfect casting), Simon Pegg and Nick Frost as Thompson and Thomson (no, they’re not twins!), and Daniel Craig as Sacharine/Red Rackam, Weta Workshop on special effects and music by John Williams. Things of this magnitude have gone wrong before, but this time George Lucas is not involved...

So The Secret of the Unicorn exceeded my expectations in every way. Quick but steady pacing, flawless visuals, great use of 3D (although the exasperation for the technology is beginning to grind at the enjoyment), refreshing setting (mostly Europe), fantastic story effectively told, beautiful music and impressive sound effects, etc. Like dark chocolate dipped in smooth fudge topped with cool raspberry syrup and wrapped in bacon. Delicious!

A few bumps in the road.

The Adventures of Tintin - The Secret of the Unicorn is similar to the Indiana Jones adventures in many ways. In fact, Steven Spielberg as mentioned before that Indy was partly inspired by Tintin. It is therefore not surprising that the film shares some of the flaws of Spielberg’s previous adventure efforts, most notably Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. A few cringe-inducing scenes from Tintin are painful reminders of the nuked fridge or monkey chase scenes, most notably an action sequence in which Captain Haddock restarts the engine of a crashing plane using only the fumes from his alcohol-infused breath, or when two galleons locked at the masts twirl with each other above raging waves during an intense flashbacked naval battle.
I also found that Tintin was quickly eclipsed by the exuberance of Captain Haddock, and even Milou (sorry, I can’t bring myself to call him Snowy) in many scenes. Tintin drives the story forward, but the film is more a Haddock vehicle, which I believe is the case with the book, but we are expecting a Tintin adventure, not a Haddock sea tale.
Rest assured, these are very minor gripes that pale in comparison to the complete work, like three small drops of water in a bottle of great and ancient wine.

Forget the haters who say this is a kid’s movie or that it’s too far from the source material, or who cry “SACRILIGIOUS!” at the few changes that were made to accommodate the medium. Tintin was great. Like reconnecting with a dear old friend or watching Raiders of the Lost Ark for the first time. This is Steven Spielberg film making at its best, and sometimes at its worst. But more importantly, The Adventures of Tintin – The Secret of the Unicorn is a fun time at the movies, a total blast from beginning to end.

9/10

Sucker Punch

One word easily describes Sucker Punch: Disappointing.
It can be compared to Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, as a film full of great ideas and potential that ultimately falls flat, and as being much less then the sum of its parts.

Sucker Punch is a completely original idea from director Zack Snyder (300, Watchmen), something that is a rarity in Hollywood (originality, not Zack Snyder), carried by a carefully selected and directed cast, with fantastic visuals, sounds and themes, great action scenes, troubling drama, and a story that cannot be considered a rehash or predictable.

Somehow, Sucker Punch fails.

What I knew about the film was that a girl dreams up a world to escape some terrible real-life predicament, and that this dream world, from the previews, looks totally awesome.
What I didn’t know was that the rhythm of the film suffers from being constantly broken by the brothel scenes. The editing gives Sucker Punch a “mission’” structure, very similar to many video games. This is not always a bad thing, but it is in this case.

Sucker Punch’s tale is told on three levels: The Reality (R1), in which Baby Doll (Emily Browning) accidentally kills her sister and is sent to a mental institution by her stepfather in order to be lobotomized, so that this asshole can get to his dead wife’s inheritance in place of her daughters. The Dreamworld (D1), made up by Baby Doll to escape her grim fate, is a brothel in which girls, “owned” by Blue the “gangsta”, dance for money. And finally, the Dreamworld within the Dreamworld (D2), where Baby Doll and her four girlfriends from D1 battle creatures and demons to find the artefacts that will set them free from the brothel/mental institution. D2 comes up when Baby Doll uses her dancing talent in D1 as a diversion while her girlfriends can acquire the items/artefacts. Much like Bollywood films show a musical number in place of a love scene, Sucker Punch presents us with a high-octane action piece in place of Baby Doll’s dance.

By the way, there is a big, confusing twist.

Personally, I think Sucker Punch would’ve made its point with R1 moving into D1, replace the dancing thing with something else and move into D2 for most of the film, then out into D1 and finally, back into R1 with the same finale.

Does that make sense?

Also, Sucker Punch does not hold men in high regards. With the exception of the Wise Man (Scott Glenn), all men in the film are dirty rotten scum, rapists, pedophiles, murderers, greasy disgusting losers, etc. The film almost made me want to cut my balls off.

Almost.

What works in Sucker Punch are the actors, the music, the visuals and each set-piece by themselves are all great. The problem is that when they are edited together, they feel as though the director had a bunch of really cool ideas (they are) that he wanted to put into a single film (he did) instead of making a movie for each, and patched together the dream within a dream plot that is far from being as efficient as, say, Inception.

It’s the kind of movie that should make for some very nice home entertainment on Blue Ray, so I advise to wait a few months and rent it.

4/10

The Green Hornet

The Green Hornet is a Seth Rogen vehicle, and nothing more.

The story is very average, uninteresting and bland, the movie is not very funny, the visuals are ordinary at best and since it takes place in Los Angeles, the environments are ugly and drab, the acting is subpar for the most part and the music, even though we get nice rock tunes, generally the pieces don’t fit too well with what’s on the screen.
The Green Hornet has a few good moments, but most of them are ruined by Seth Rogen’ man-child idiotic antics.
Rogen’s Britt Reid is obnoxious and completely unlikable from start to finish. Rogen doesn’t even act He just plays the same character he’s been playing for ten years: a slacker pothead with no ambition.
I could probably write about the performances of Christoph Waltz (awesome), Cameron Diaz, Edward James Olmos, Tom Wilkinson and Jay Chou, about the cool cars and gadgets, the action and the 3D, but ultimately it’s all ruined by Seth Rogen’s overacted incompetence.

By the way, why is this film in 3D? It’s completely useless, and I had to add 3$ to get those stupid headache-inducing glasses. NO MORE 3D PLEASE!

If you still like Seth Rogen, you will probably like The Green Hornet because the film is all about HIM. If not, skip it and go see something else.

The shortness of this review compared to the others I’ve written should be a good clue to STAY AWAY!

3/10

Tron Legacy

Tron Legacy is a difficult film to review. It’s good, but it follows the Hollywood recipe so closely that it also becomes forgettable. The events depicted in the story are predictable, but there is a strong nostalgia factor that is difficult to ignore. It is visually stunning, even in normal D, and the acting is exceptional, especially from Jeff Bridges who steals the show as always. The rhythm of the film is smooth and regular, even during the excellent action pieces, and the soundtrack, composed by Daft Punk, is beautiful and very appropriate.

The story of Tron Legacy follows Sam Flynn (Garret Edlund) as he searches for his father Kevin (Jeff Bridges), who vanished 20 years before, after telling his then 7 year old son of a miracle happening in The Grid, a virtual world he created within a computer. Sam is eventually trapped in this world, and with the help of his father and Quorra (Olivia Wilde), a program within The Grid, he plans his escape from this world, and to bring his father home.

The comparisons with The Matrix would be embarrassingly obvious if Tron Legacy wasn’t a sequel to a film released twenty years before the Wachowski brothers’ Magnum Opus. However, if The Matrix “borrowed” ideas from the original Tron, it is difficult not to wonder if Tron Legacy also “borrowed” ideas from The Matrix. Some scenes are filmed almost shot for shot, most notably a fight in a hotel/club with guns and sword-like weapons, and the Zuse character, which is a carbon copy of The Merovingian (Lambert Wilson).
Other scenes are reminiscent of Star Wars, such as a dog fight where Sam mans the turret of a transport ship (for those who don’t know, the Millennium Falcon is a transport ship) and proceeds in shooting down Tie fighters… I mean light jets. He even gets cocky!

Visually, Tron Legacy is absolutely marvellous, even in Double D (2D). The Grid is a beautiful place, clean, crisp, full of light, colours and detail; this world is complex and believable. I can’t wait for the Blu-Ray goodness that this film will provide.
Although personally I am not a fan of electronica/pop music, I was very surprised at the beauty of the score. Daft Punk’s work with Tron Legacy is one of its best features, along with Jeff Bridges’ acting. If there is one soundtrack I will be buying this year, so far it will be Tron Legacy.

Tron Legacy has great visuals, great music and sound with an average story depicted by average actors, with the exception of Jeff Bridges.
It is a movie that is best described as a burger on the BBQ. It’s fast food, but it tastes so good that you want to take your time and savour the flavour.

Enjoy.

7.5/10

Predators

Imagine walking around in a thick jungle full of heat, dampness and mortal danger, minding your own business, when suddenly you find yourself running from a huge dog equipped with long bony spikes protruding from its face and back. That dog wants to eat you. What do you do?

What DO you do?

You call Arnold, because He is your only hope.

Watching Predators will generate the feeling you now have in your gut.

The original still stands today as one of the best science fiction movies ever made, and one of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s best works, right up there with Conan the Barbarian, Terminator 2 and True Lies (I omit Total Recall because it did not stand the test of time like the above four).

Predators is a sequel/remake/reboot type of film that, although not bad at all, goes the safe way and keeps the themes of the original while changing the characters just a little bit. It takes place on another planet, but a jungle is a jungle so who cares?

The themes are survival in the face of impossible odds (just like every American film made in the last 100 years), teamwork, mystery, guns and violence. Please feel free to comment if you can find more. I think like I’m stretching this already though.

The team of usual suspects (the quiet, super awesome loner, the heavy weapons guy, the useless civilian, the crazy mental guy, the badass leader, the pretty girl, etc) must face three of the Nameless Aliens we have come to know and love. This time around however, the humans are not Marines or police officers but scum, killers, rapists, assassins, themselves predators and chosen by the Nameless Aliens as game for the hunt.

Very little is known about the characters on screen. We do not have much background, aside from their daily job and some of them have family. All we know is that they are all killers, except for Topher Grace’s character who is a doctor. In fact, the last words of the movie are from the two main characters who finally reveal their name to us. I suppose this is so that we don’t identify with murderers, god forbid we should go home, get our shotgun out of the closet and begin pumping lead into strangers…

That being said, the absence of identifiable characters doesn’t really hurt the film. This picture is about big guns, gore and special effects, not much more, and on this level it succeeds very well. There are some clever strategies used to survive, mostly from Adrian Brody’s character, and a few twists, although predictable, bring some welcome spice to the story.

For those who enjoyed the original, this is a step down, except for the visuals and acting. But it fills a whole for the lovers of violent science fiction films.

7/10