Movie review: Immortals

I've always enjoyed watching sword and sorcery epic movies. Clash of the Titans (the old one, not the remake), 300, Conan the Barbarian (Arnold's version), the Sword and the Sorcerer etc etc...

So now they have the Immortals showing on the big screens. What's this one about? Check out the reviews below:

Immortals: Big, dumb yet perversely watchable

By Davin Arul

Starring: Henry Cavill, Mickey Rourke, Freida Pinto, Luke Evans, Stephen Dorff, John Hurt, Kellan Lutz

Here's a pre-flight (of fancy) checklist to fill in prior to watching Immortals.

Is it big and sprawling, with lots of 300-inspired fight scenes? Check.

Is it full of plot holes, inconsistent behaviour and silly deeds by otherwise intelligent-seeming characters that cause their enemies to gain the upper hand? Check.

Is it packed to the brim with posturing, furrowed brows, stirring speeches and the morose faces of people and gods on the brink of being exterminated? Check.

Does the story ignore everything – and I mean everything apart from the "fact" that Zeus is ruler of the gods – about the mythology that fuels its storyline? Oh hell yeah.

Was way more attention was paid to getting everything to look pretty, than to turning in a script that made sense and had lively dialogue? Oh boy, yes.

And does Mickey Rourke spend half his scenes chewing on assorted fruits and nuts from the production caterer's buffet spread? Uh-huh, and in blatant defiance of the "no eating on the set" rule too.

BUT ... the movie is also brutal, visually arresting, and packs enough gore even in its censored form to satisfy anyone out for a spleen-venting dose of carnage.

And while we're at it, as epic fantasies go, this tale of mortals out to destroy or save the gods of ancient Greece is also more enjoyable than the recent Conanor Clash of the Titans remakes.

Granted, given the level of those two films, that is not exactly high praise.

What Immortals does have going for it, despite its many problems and a final scene that makes absolutely no sense, is its stylishly-shot action sequences which frequently explode into startling violence.

Yes, that's it really. Forget about white-robed Greek gods who sit around ruminating on the foibles of mortals and how mighty Zeus can't keep his, er, divinity in his chiton.

Freida is the hottie in this movie

When the gods in Immortals show up you can bet an economy-size can of whoop-ass is about to get opened.

Basically, it's the story of Theseus (Cavill), a Greek peasant who finds himself thrust into the role of unwitting saviour of both gods and men.

The vengeance-crazed King Hyperion (Rourke) wants to free the gods' arch-enemies, the long-imprisoned Titans, to destroy the immortal beings while his own forces exterminate their human worshippers.

The most notable thing to take away from this movie is that where heroic figures are concerned, star Henry Cavill does have the makings of a pretty decent Superman. So, hope remains for 2013's Man of Steel.

The "man of steel" in action

As for Immortals, well, it's the kind of film that is so riddled with flaws in the scripting and storytelling departments that it should not be able to hold together for more than half an hour. Yet somehow it does, grabbing our focus with the kind of brain-squelching violence that makes watching it feel almost like indulging a perversion.

Movie Review: The Adventures of Tintin

By Davin Arul

The Adventures Of Tintin

Starring: Jamie Bell, Andy Serkis, Daniel Craig, Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Cary Elwes

First things first: this review comes to you through the eyes of a non-fan.

Nothing against Herge's work – it was purely a budgetary consideration back in my teens. Asterix or Tintin? Finally, roast boar, bruised legionaries and magic potion won my hard-earned dollars.

Which brings me to Messrs Spielberg and (Peter) Jackson's adaptation of the beloved-by-millions Tintin comics.

Having no emotional investment in the characters and stories, I can say that this big-screen outing of Tintin kept me thoroughly entertained, almost from start to finish.

There were a couple of oh-get-on-with-it-already moments, but for the most part, every scene in the film propels the story along nicely.

It hasn't exactly turned me into a fan, so I'm not about to rush out and grab all the comics to catch up on what I've been missing since that fateful financial decision.

But even to these indifferent eyes, The Adventures of Tintin has all the trappings of a rollicking good adventure: shadowy comings and goings, sinister baddies, abductions, escapes, punch-ups, shootings, chases, more chases, still more chases, and even – what's this – duelling cranes? (As in the heavy machinery, not the bird.)

While one Tintin follower tells me that the originals seldom had this level of spectacle (read: excess approaching the level of 1941), I didn't really find anything too out of place.

Of course, it has the brave but somewhat one-dimensional intrepid boy reporter Tintin (Bell) at its centre, along with the characters you would expect: Captain Haddock (brilliantly motion-capture-performed by Serkis), the plucky pooch Snowy (NOT Serkis, no matter what others might tell you) and the bumbling cops Thomson and Thompson (Frost and Pegg).

The loyal dog Snowy. Nope, not Anthony Serkis!

TAoT has a strong Indiana Jones vibe in its chase sequences, with the already mentioned over-the-top moment or two.

But it succeeds 90% of the time in maintaining a heady and infectious sense of adventure, liberally dosed with humour – the kind that will make you chuckle along, but not split your sides laughing – and it's all boosted by a pleasing John Williams score.

There's a wealth of detail for keen-eyed viewers to spot, and I hear fans of the comic found numerous familiar visual elements that might as well have been winking at them from the screen.

It wouldn't be complete without Captain Haddock, literally the life of this party; without his … er, alcohol-fueled hijinks, colourful metaphors and alliterative epithets, I probably wouldn't have enjoyed myself half as much.

The good ol' Captain

By Toutatis (oops), I'm glad that for once I didn't have any fan baggage to weigh me down.

REAL STEEL - The world of Ultimate Robot Fighting!

By Davin Arul

Starring: Hugh Jackman, Evangeline Lilly, Dakota Goyo, Kevin Durand, Anthony Mackie

Put up your dukes

 

In the near future, audience demands for spectator-sport carnage have grown so high that human fighters have been replaced with robots. On the understanding that, you know, robots can rip each other's limbs and heads off and there's no loss of life.

That is the simple notion behind the film's setting – the world of robot boxing – and I say "simple" because I don't buy the idea that people will be appeased by robot gladiators pounding each other into scrap outside of a Transformers movie.

There's a reason the word is "bloodthirsty" and not "oilthirsty".

Well, that quibble aside, Real Steel turned out to be pretty close to the Real Deal as far as fight flicks go.

While not in the same league as Warrior, this sci-fi-themed film works on several levels.

Its fight scenes have that whole Rocky underdog vibe going, the drama touches the heart without getting cloying, and there's a general sense of good humour maintained throughout the film that keeps even the tense moments from getting too intense.

Hopefully Jackman will be back as Wolverine soon

 Jackman puts in a winning performance as Charlie Kenton, a washed-up boxer who now ekes out a living managing robot boxers while searching for that one big payday that will have him set up for life.

The pursuit of this "dream" has left him in debt to numerous nasty types, and he's also losing all credibility with childhood friend and sometimes-landlady Bailey Tallet (Lilly), the daughter of his late boxing trainer and mentor.

With so much going wrong … er, on in his life, can you blame Charlie for forgetting that he has a son? Of course you can, but who could pin an abandonment rap on Hugh Jackman for long? (Yeah, it's mostly Jackman's show, though he is matched every step of the way by his young co-star. And sometimes even outpunched.)

Anyway, Charlie ends up "caring" for 11-year-old Max (Goto) after the lad's mother dies, but the kid is just another meal ticket to him … initially.

Father and son, strangers at the outset, have a rough time at first but eventually bond over a sparring robot named Atom that Max rescues from the junk pile.

It dawns on them that Atom is no ordinary sparring robot – and soon, the little feller ("little" in comparison to the other metal behemoths he fights) is making waves on the robot boxing circuit.

The Kentons and Atom eventually catch the attention of the powerful Lemkova family, which manages the world champion 'bot, Zeus. Care to guess where Atom's fairytale run will lead them? Don't worry … you'll be absolutely right.

Real Steel is smart enough to declare that it's only "partly" based on the Richard Matheson short story Steel, which was previously made into a Twilight Zone episode back in the 1960s.

Smart, because the "partly" lets it play with the concept of robot boxing in ways that sticking faithfully to the source material would not allow.

While I still find it hard to believe that bloodthirsty people would get all stirred into a frenzy over robots (and not living beings) tearing each other apart, I will say that Real Steel does what it's here to do.

It gets us all fired up, puts on a good show for the yokels … er, moviegoers … and fades out with a "Yo, Adrian, I did it!" moment that undeniably shows that the Rocky movies, more than Matheson's story, inspired its filmmakers.

And still, this movie about a busted-up piece of junk helping to mend broken and nonexistent relationships has more heart than the last couple of movies with the Italian Stallion. I'd call that, um, Iron-y. 

Movie Review: Green Lantern

It's not easy being green

By Davin Arul

 Green Lantern

Rating(out of 5): * * *

(Warner Bros.)

Starring: Ryan Reynolds, Blake Lively, Peter Sarsgaard, Mark Strong, Temuera Morrison

Rambo Lantern?

 

Ryan Reynolds? Not a fan, after Blade: Trinity. I received the news that he was to play Hal Jordan pretty much the same way I reacted when my dentist said he'd have to grind two perfectly good teeth down to stubs to fit my bridgework.

So, yeah … as much as I had become an overnight fan of the "rejuvenated" GL comics under writer Geoff Johns, I wasn't exactly looking forward to the movie.

When the previews hit, and more scenes of the Green Lantern Corps plus some of the series mythology was presented, I thought they might be on to something here.

After all, director Martin Campbell kick-started the stalled James Bond franchise – twice – and made an old-school masked avenger like Zorro all modernsexycool.

An intergalactic canvas, however, is not so easily painted on, even with green as the dominant colour in the palette.

The result is an origin story that falls a bit short of the best "begins" movies to spring from the DC stable (the gold standards would be Superman: The Movie and Batman Begins).

So, while the filmmakers certainly were on to something here, they don't exploit it to its fullest. There are, however, enough fan-pleasing moments and appearances to keep … well, at least to keep this fan happy. 

As an example, there's a scene where supporting character Amanda Waller (Bassett), a prominent member of the DC Universe, brushes against a telepathic supervillain (Sarsgaard) and he accesses memories of her husband and children being murdered – as they were in her comic-book roots. Pretty good attention to detail there, I'd say.

The lovely Ms Lively

 

For the uninformed units out there, Green Lantern is the story of how brash test pilot Hal Jordan (Reynolds) is chosen to become a member of an intergalactic peacekeeping force known as the Green Lantern Corps.

The Lanterns are each equipped with a power ring that conjures up whatever the wearer can imagine, from jet fighters to giant fists to, uh, Hot Wheels-style stunt car tracks (really).

Oh, and they can also fly through space and travel incredible distances in the wink of an eye.

Unfortunately, the circumstances of Jordan's recruitment also bring our young and humble planet to the attention of an ancient, destructive entity known as Parallax – a twisted creature that will devour anything in its path to get revenge on the Lanterns and their creators.

The Parallax of the movie is significantly different from what longtime readers of the comic would picture – not just in appearance but in origin too.

The villain aside, there's been some dumbing-down of much of the Green Lantern mythology to make the movie more accessible to the un-clued-in viewer.

At least Campbell and his production designers did go to obvious lengths to ensure that, if anything, the film would live up to expectations as a visual adaptation of the comics.

The planet Oa, home of the Lanterns, the dazzlingly diverse members of the Corps, even the made-of-pure-energy Green Lantern suits with their "fibre-optic networks", are all wonderfully rendered.

Majestic Planet Oa

 

What about the main character, you ask? Well, to a degree, Reynolds handles the cocksure, deeply troubled aspects of Hal Jordan well and acquits himself satisfactorily when the character undergoes the inevitable transformation into a confident hero able to overcome his fears.

Given the numerous triumphs and tragedies in the character's (printed) life, in this sense the film does a nice job of depicting Jordan's struggle to rise above his own character defects.

So, while I'm still no fan of Reynolds, at least it will be all right having him in the role for however long the franchise survives.

The best interpretation in this film is, for me, Mark Strong's Sinestro, perhaps one of the most complex characters in mainstream comics. 

His initial disdain and eventual respect for Jordan mirror the characters' relationship in the comics perfectly, and Strong makes a fine meal of it all – he even carries the red makeup and pointy ears majestically.

Strong Sinestro

 

The hits: the visuals, Strong, Sarsgaard as a human supervillain with daddy issues, some good action scenes, and a funny bit that shoots down the whole notion of why heroes wear masks. 

The misses: Parallax (ok, so he/it wasn't as bad as the movie version of Galactus), not enough Corps time, a messy story flow and somewhat cartoonish ring constructs that hark back to the silliness of the 60s and early 70s comics.

Oh, and the 3D – absolutely unnecessary in my opinion, as it just got in the way of my viewing pleasure and had no truly memorable "comin' at ya" moments.

All things considered, I found Green Lantern to be an enjoyable but flawed entry in the superhero sweepstakes, much like Thor. Both have got the look right, but we're just not feeling it yet, yo.