Rodent's Reviews

I didn't like it as much as you Rodent but I thought it was a really good movie

__________________

See, that's why I love Avatar. Sure, the central ideas have been done to death, but the world and the characters created to tell the story are original, creative, and mesmerizing all at once. A brilliant review once again, Rodent.

Cheers for the replies on Avatar guys. Glad I finally got to #100 anyways.


You all know how I do my reviews by now, my percentage rating is based neutrally and soully on screenplay, script, dialogue, acting, effects etc etc, regardless of whether I like the movie or not....

... but I have spent the past two and a half hours going over all of my reviews and adding a Rodent's Personal Recommendation to the end of each movie that I've reviewed.

Basically, if I think it's actually a decent film on my own personal level.

__________________

Nice to have you back Rodent, that feels like your longest gap between reviews since you got here.

Anyway while I ddin't love it, I enjoyed Avatar (about 8 or 8.5 out of 10) but I've only seen it once and think the score had a lot to do with the experience of seeing it on the big screen in 3D. If I were to watch it on DVD on my TV could see it getting a lower score as it loses out on the spectacle.

__________________

Cheers JayDee, took me about 7 days altogether to get the wording right. Hopefully I captured what I wanted to, especially with it being a big film and that it was my 100th.

That was my main problem with it too: The 3D scam being utilised with abandonment by Cameron... and screw everyone else who either;
A) Isn't into getting scammed by 3D, or
B) Can't see the 3D because of a disability.
Personally I'm both A and B.

If I could see 3D, I might give it a go a some point, just to see what it's like this time round, but still, Cameron seriously made me feel alienated when some of the 'written soully for 3D' scenes were taking place.


Still a top movie though and packed full of little secrets and metaphors that the viewer needs to have an open eye out for.

But you can. That's the biggest part of the 3D scam.

__________________
5-time MoFo Award winner.

If you're gonna use the word solely so much, at least spell it right.

Cheers Skepsis!


HK, my right eye is for depth perception only... I can't focus on anything with it and if I close my left eye (my good eye), the right one doesn't automatically take over like a working eye does.
If I close my good eye, I'm pretty much blind apart from blurred images and flashes of colour that I can see from distance.

But, I'm lucky in a way. Being born this way means I actually still have perfect depth perception if I close my bad right eye.
My brain is able to judge distances without needing use of the bad right eye.


My brain doesn't pick up fake 3D imagery at all, so when I try to look at '3D' films and flat pieces of paper that supposedly have '3D' pictures on them... all I get is a blurry image in my good eye.

Fake 3D doesn't work.
If it did work as well as the Studios and Directors want me to believe, I'd be able to see it with one eye, like the way I have depth perception in real life with one eye.

Avatar is one of those movies I love to watch when I am or it is a day it

__________________
Health is the greatest gift, contentment the greatest wealth, faithfulness the best relationship.
Buddha

Avatar for me was a movie I am glad I watched but I really doubt I will watch it again, I don't think there is anything wrong with it but just not my cup of tea. Nice review Rodent.

__________________

Review #101: The Simpsons Movie



Homer Simpson in his usual non-thinking mentality, decides to get himself a new pet. In the process, he poisons Lake Springfield beyond recovery and the EPA decide that Springfield is too polluted to be allowed to live.
When the EPA decide to drop a giant glass Dome over the town, the Simpson family, under fear of being lynched due to Homer's stupid ways, manage to escape and head for Alaska.
Eventually though, guilt gets the better of them and they head home to save their friends.


More of an extended version of the hit TV show, The Simpsons Movie starts out with one ideal, then heads quickly through a sequence of unrelated events and eventually finds it's main story about a third of the way through.
What makes the movie watchable is the similar feel to the TV series in screenplay.

The humour of the TV series is carried over brilliantly too. Coming from the guys who have basically written a squillion episodes anyway I guess that wasn't too hard.
What gives it more substance though is that some of the humour is a little bit more risque in feel and some imagery is seen that probably wouldn't have made it into the family friendly series.
What does let it down though is that anyone not up on the series may feel a bit left out through some of the in-jokes, the movie isn't really universal.

The animation is the main thing about the movie.
Compared to the series, it's far grander, clearer, cleaner and much more colourful and computers have also been brought into play, giving the look of the animation the ocassional Futurama-esk feel.

The voice acting is better than the series too.
All of the cast, well, I say all of the cast, what I mean is the 2 people that voice pretty much ever character involved are at the top of their game.
The dialogue delivery and, simply the overall voices, are all given 1000% by the actors.

What maybe lets the film down is the script. The screenplay is good, as I said, it's the same as the TV series and feels nicely familiar, but the overall script is a bit stale.
With the money that was thrown at the writing department, they could have found something better than just a basic environmental story mixed with typical Simpsons humour.

All in all, a lengthy version of the series but is still a lot of fun and the humour and animation are much crisper than usual.
Still though, I'd only really recommend it for fans of the TV series.
My rating 70%

Man, I loved the Simpsons movie, though mostly because the show is one of my all-time favorites. It did feel a bit sluggish at times, but the performances were all sublime, and the story was pretty farfetched, just like most of the main series's stories.

The sick and rainy day part really applies to me with James Stewart movies. Idk why I just love watching them on those type of days.

Review #102: District 9



3 months after an alien ship appears over Johannesburg, humans decide to try to make contact with whoever or whatever is inside it. What they discover are malnutritioned alien beings, living in squalor.
The Government decide to take the aliens (now dubbed 'Prawns' due to their physical appearance) under their wing and set up an area of the city as a concentration camp.
After a short time, the camp becomes a hell hole of crime and scum and an underground criminal element of humans and aliens starts forming. Within this underground movement is an alien project to build extremely powerful weapons.
Eventually, due to the criminal element becoming out of control and 'racial' prejudices from human citizens of Johannesburg, the Prawns are moved to a new 'District 9' away from the city, in the hope that it will stop the racial tensions and cure the problem of crime.

While inside the original District 9, a Government worker is affected at a Genetic level by a kind of 'biological device', he must enlist the help of the Prawn that built it and the Prawn's son, before his humanity is lost forever. What he discovers in the process though, is another side to the apparent 'alien scum' and also another side to humanity, that he didn't realise existed.


District 9 isn't the usual kind of alien sci-fi movie. It incorporates certain elements of real life and sci-fi mixed together.
The film is a little gem when it comes to story building and giving the viewer a journey of discovery, and it's all blanketed by a very familiar backdrop of racial tension in a third world country.
The main piece of this is the relationship between the humans and the aliens, the prejudices seen are a direct parallel with real life human racial tensions.

The movie as a whole is very cleverly put together.
It starts relatively quiet, with a documentary shooting style of following the human policing of the alien visitors, then goes into the usual movie-screenplay-mode that audiences are accustomed to, and gradually the action gets bigger as the movie progresses.

One thing the movie doesn't do is go all stupid at the end either.
I'm talking about the third act not going all silly explosions and action. It still keeps itself relatively low key and relies heavily on action sequences combined with tension and story, that are similar in tone to Black Hawk Down.
It's still exciting though and very well choreographed.

There's even a little cliffhanger at the end too.

The film also makes well with certain elements of drama too. There's a nice little back-and-forth storyline between the main protagonist and the father-and-son 'Prawns' that are trying to help him. They start out hating and mistrusting one another, but find a common ground and a respect between them.
There's also a small sub-plot between the main trio and the various 'factions' of humans too.


What really makes it's mark though is the CGI used throughout, it's extremely well rendered.
Not just the aliens, but the alien machinery.

As for the aliens themselves... they're very well designed and extremely believable. They're actually that well done you can see the emotions they're portraying.


The acting throughout is top notch.
Sharlto Copley as the main protagonist Wikus van de Merwe is brilliantly panic ridden when he realsises what's happening around him.
The supporting cast from, almost, a bunch of unknowns gives the character driven plot some depth too.


All in all, not everyone's cup of tea and it feels like it's lacking something, I'm not quite sure what though but it's definitely lacking something.
Still though, it's entertaining and is certainly an original and unfamiliar (yet still strangely familiar) take on the 'Aliens On Earth' story. Worth a watch if you like sci-fi alien movies that actually have a plot.
My rating 84%

District 9 was very well done for a low budget film, but I still haven't seen the entire thing. The differing styles of film (documentary to action without a clear transition) throw me off too much to watch it completely. I really enjoyed what I saw though, and I might have to watch it again.

Woops. On second reading I noticed I put Antagonist instead of Protagonist.

I'd def give it a watch MM, it's worth a go if you like low-key sci-fi with a story.

Review #103: Slither



An alien parasite lands on earth in a small South Carolina town and begins taking over the inhabitants by infecting their brains by entering their bodies.
A small group of survivors must find a way to stop the organism before it gets out of control.

That's really all there is to say, the bog standard, well-used-before-plot is something very familiar with anyone who has seen sci-fi-alien-takeover movies before.
Anybody who has seen any creature feature, from Invasion Of The Bodysnatchers to Tremors will know what to expect from Slither...

... what makes Slither stand out though is the overall use of humour throughout and the overall screenplay too.
It's along the lines of the tongue-in-cheek humour seen in Eight Legged Freaks (albeit with less slapstick) or even Tremors and the film has made well with the sex and gore that is rarely seen in Bodysnatcher style alien movies too.
Some of the plotlines and storytelling, and in particular the dialogue used, is almost parodying those 1950s B-movies too, but in a respectful way.

The action is also along the same lines as the comedy-horror-FX scenes too. A lot of it contains lashings of situation comedy dialogue and still manages to be exciting and really well choreographed.

The effects though are really what the movie is about. There's more use of practical, slimy and gory effects rather than just going all stupid with CGI.
The overall use of well designed makeup and practical effects make for a fresh feeling modern horror-comedy.
The overall design and use of the creatures too is really well put together. Some of it is squeamish, a lot of it is done using humour too.

The overall acting is pretty cheesey, but it's knowingly cheesey and intentionally written that way and the actors involved must have had masses of fun in the process.
Elizabeth Banks and Nathan Fillion as the main duo of the group of survivors are very engaging and almost make the movie on their own.
Underrated actor Michael Rooker as the main antagonist is absolutely brilliant. He's funny, believable in the role and also quite scary at times too.

All in all, a modern comedy horror that's better written than most, and has masses of respectful nods toward the B-movie genre.
In it's own right though, it's a top movie for anyone who's into the aliens taking over small towns plot.
My rating 88%

Review #104: Wanted



Wesley Gibson is down on his luck office worker, his life stinks, his job stinks, his boss hates him and his girlfriend is sleeping with his best friend/co-worker. He suffers from panic attacks and high blood pressure too.
Suddently he's thrown into a fight for survival and a world he's unfamiliar with when a woman called Fox appears and tells him his father was a member of a Secret Society called The Fraternity, who was killed by a rogue assassin, and that he has now become the next target for the same assassin.
Cue lots of fish out of water sequences and stylish training regimes for Wesley so he can stop this assassin and gain the respect of the other members of The Fraternity.

The plot is another pretty well used one for my reviews thread but Wanted makes well with highly stylish action and violence throughout.
The overall feel of the screenplay is pretty well put together in terms of sequence, it doesn't lose the audience in what could have been a complex series of scenes.

There's plenty of humour mixed in too that keeps the audience fixed to the screen, particularly with James McAvoy's character being out of his depth.
Plus there's a little subplot involving human evolution and superhuman skills too which adds a touch of originality to the proceedings.

The action is really what the film is about.
There's lots of CGI used and use of slow motion camera tricks that bring the action almost into it's own genre, in a similar vein to Equilibrium but using slow motion in the same way as The Matrix.
It's highly stylised and very well rendered in the computer department and still manages to be really well choreographed and exciting when there's real life stuff seen on screen.
Some of the scenes involved can be a little brutal too, bordering almost on ultraviolence, but still, it's stylised to the point of not being uncomfortable.

The acting is pretty standard throughout though.
James McAvoy as the main protagonist is the best on show. He's funny, confused, naive and yet still belivable in the role of a newly trained assassin.
Angelina Jolie and Morgan Freeman are at their usual likable levels. Jolie in particular doing her Mrs Smith thing again.
Terrence Stamp makes a nice appearance too.

What lets the film down though, the overall feel of the film feels like a relatively fresh take on the action movie genre, but it still feels as though I've seen it all before in a host of other movies of the past decade.
Matrix, Equilibrium or even the likes of Jumper.
Basically, stylised CGI slow-mo actioners.


All in all, an enjoyable actioner that's relatively exciting and funny at the same time, but the originality it tries to revel in, just isn't that refreshing and makes the overall finish a pretty bog-standard one.
My rating 68%

Wanted was pretty good, I thought. It copies a lot of other films in terms of style, but the concept is still original, if only by a tiny bit.

And about your District 9 review. After watching it again (liking it more and more, by the way), I think I know what the film is "lacking," as you so eloquently put it. It's missing a pure "high note." In other words, it's missing that pivotal moment where it's message becomes none the clearer. Either this film is for something or against something (or trying to prove some compromising point), and I feel the film just barely missed that moment. Either way, it was a great film altogether.