Film review: Clash of The Titans

21 Wednesday Apr 2010

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Clash of The Titans

I really liked the look of this film. The trailer was ace. Liam Neeson looked good and shouty. Big monsters.

Hrm.

The film is a remake, a remake of a Ray Harryhausen classic. It tells the story of Perseus, son of Zeus who must stop the Kraken from destroying all kinds of stuff.

Sounds like an awesome swords and sorcery epic. Sounds like.

There are problems. Main one is that Peresus is such a blank character that he drags the whole film down. Sam Worthington is usually a great action presence but here he’s got nothing to work with. He scowls and stabs things but his character doesn’t have the weight that it should.

Next problem is 3D. This film wasn’t made in 3D, as Avatar was, it was put through a post-production process to make it 3D and it shows. Most of the time you can’t tell it’s in 3D and when it is it doesn’t have the depth or subtlety that Avatar has.

If more films are going to be like this then we have a problem. James Cameron himself has gone on record saying that this way of doing 3D just doesn’t work and even Michael Bay agrees with him. If you’re going to do 3D then do it properly, here it is just a distraction that gets in the way of the film.

It’s not all bad. The set pieces are fun and Kraken definitely gets released at the end. It should be an over the top guilty pleasure. But it doesn’t quite click and ends up being average.

In a word? Shame.

Film review: Kick-Ass

17 Saturday Apr 2010

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Kick-Ass @ IMDB

What has been really good about the recent explosion in comic book movies is that the comics are being treated with respect. Too often in the past what made the comic interesting was thrown away in the pursuit of a mainstream audience.

Not anymore. Well, with the exception of Wanted. The comic that was based on was about Supervillains who had conquered the world. The film, however, was about a group of assassins and the Loom of Fate.

Well the writer of Wanted, Mark Millar, has had another bite of the cherry. Does this comic adaption suffer the same fate?

No. Well, ish.

Both films tell the tale of a high school comic nerd who can’t help but think “What don’t people put on a costume and be superheroes?” and then actually does it. And gets his ass kicked. And gets involved in a whole bunch of organised crime.

What the film really captures is the tone of the comic, the anarchic balls to the wall style. It is violent, it is sweary and it is over the top. It’s all these things but in the best way possible. Everyone gets the joke, from Kick-Ass bumbling naivety to Hit Girl’s wanton violence, it’s all transferred from the page to the screen seamlessly. It’s a massive amount of fun, despite what some people think.

The only thing I would take issue with the is that sometimes it drifts a little too much into the superhero world. The story is supposed to be about what would happen to a superhero in the real world. The film does this for the most part but towards the end it’s pushing your (or at least my) suspension of disbelief right to the edge and just over. It doesn’t ruin the film, it fits in perfectly with the excesses of the film, but as a fan of the comic it is noticeable.

This really is a great film and the best of the year so far. Even Nic Cage shines doing a great Adam West. Very highly recommended, just make sure you buy the comic as well.

In a word? Hoot.

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