Movie Review: Inception

While I hold off on the new Orla Fallon CD, I've decided instead to do another movie review for Christopher Nolan's "Inception", which I saw earlier this week.

"Inception" is not your typical heist movie commonly seen in theaters today. Leonardo DiCaprio plays Cobb, a thief who does his work in a most unusual fashion: breaking into someone's mind while they sleep and stealing their ideas. After a botched job, his victim, played by Ken Watanabe, offers him a deal: if he can cause the break-up of a rival company, he will enable Cobb to return home, as he has been living overseas in exile for an unspecified amount of time. Cobb assembles a team together and prepare to do this very risky job, but his personal demons are not far behind and could put the entire mission in jeopardy.

All in all, the movie was absolutely amazing. The story being centered around how we dream was a fascinating concept and came across as being very original. There was good, solid acting from everyone, and I have no complaints about the characters, even though DiCaprio's character in some ways was reminiscent of his role in "Shutter Island". The special effects were excellent, and they gave the film a surreal, dream-like feel. And, not to mention the ending of the film which will have everyone talking about it for days and make you want to see it again.

I highly recommend this film, and it is truly one of the best movies I have seen in a long time.

I give it five out of five stars.

Upcoming CD Review

I am, at the moment, listening to former Celtic Woman Orla Fallon's Christmas/ winter CD "Winter, Fire, and Snow", purchased in MP3 form from Green Hill Music. However, because of her upcoming Christmas show in Nashville and because the CD largely being released the second week of September, I will not be posting a review until around then. Besides, it will give me more time to digest the CD and its content, something I wish I had done when writing a review of her "Distant Shore" last year. So, keep your eyes open for this upcoming review.

Movie Review: Shutter Island

A few weeks ago, on a recommendation from some friends and my own brother, my family rented this thriller from Blockbuster.

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD


Edward (also known as "Teddy") Daniels is a US marshal summoned out to Ashecliff, a psychiatric hospital on Shutter Island, to find a missing patient named Rachel Solando there. He and his new partner "Chuck", as they dig deeper into finding the woman, discover that not everything is as it seems and that darker things could be happening at the hospital while, at the same time, Teddy battles the memory of his dead wife Dolores who urges him to find the man who killed her and may be on the island himself.

This movie was an interesting choice for Martin Scorsese, who is more well-known for his gritty films like "The Departed" and "Gangs of New York", but he pulled off this psychological thriller very well. Even though I had partially guessed the twist ending about halfway through the movie, it was still a surprise to me. The ending left no plot holes and fit the story perfectly; in fact, watching it a second time, I picked up more clues that gave it away, so do pay attention to it. I have no general complaints about this film, as it was enjoyable and well-done.

I give it four and a half stars out of five.

Sorry for Being Slow

Well, the title says it all. I've had a couple of ideas of what to post, but none so far have materialized, as I'm in the middle of a creative drought at the moment. I'll try to post something soon.

Movie Review: Alice in Wonderland

A few weeks ago, 3/5 of my family saw this film for the first time thanks to Blockbuster, as the other 2/5 had already seen it in theaters.

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD



Tim Burton, known for his wacky films like "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" (yes, I know it should be in italics) and "Big Fish", at first seems to be made to bring Lewis Carrol's film to the big screen. Instead of sticking to the original material, Burton creates a new and independent story where the original events occurred before the movie begins. Several years have passed, and Alice has grown up into an independently-minded young woman who hates popular society but does not feel she can get out of an arranged marriage. While at her engagement party, she sees a white rabbit running around and follows it down the hole. The viewer soon learns that Alice has been in Wonderland before as a child but that she has virtually no memory of it, believing it to have been a bad dream. Upon her arrival, Alice discovers that Wonderland is being ruled by the bad-tempered Red Queen, whose pet jabberwocky is wrecking havoc on the kingdom, and that it is only she who can kill the jabberwocky and restore the rightful ruler the White Queen to the throne. Alice denies that she can do this, but she goes on a quest to find the needed sword and help her new friends.

On the one hand, I can understand why Burton wanted to give the story a plot because the original lacks a definitive one, but on the other hand it comes across as silly and unoriginal. While watching the movie, I kept thinking of "Chronicles of Narnia": child goes to other world, discovers is object of prophecy but refuses to believe it, then goes on a journey of self-discovery and ends up fulfilling its destiny then returning home to find that normal life can be conquered after all. This, I thought, was a very modern-fied version of Carrol's classic story and did not flow smoothly with it. Not only that, but several elements such as the White Queen and the jabberwocky were not even from the original story but were from other works of Carrol's, and so they really did not fit into the general scheme of things. The characters were not well-done either. Far from being the curious child, Alice has turned into an independent woman, the stereotypical girl not sure what to do who later decides to do things her own way. The rest of the characters are nothing really memorable, and even Johnny Depp's performance as the Mad Hatter wasn't as good as his other roles such as Captain Jack Sparrow or Willy Wonka; plus, the whole implied relationship between Alice and the Hatter was a bit weird.

The movie wasn't that bad, but it wasn't great either. It was worth it for one watch but not to see over and over again.

I give it two out of five stars.

Movie Review: Robin Hood

Last weekend, my family and some friends went to the theater, which is a rare occasion for us, to see Ridley Scott's "Robin Hood".

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD



This adaptation of the legend tries to fit into history and real events. You have Robin as a soldier fighting under Richard Lionheart in France and then returning home to fulfill a promise made to Robert of Loxley as he lay dying. He meets Loxley's widow Marian and her father-in-law Walter, who convince him to stay for a while and pretend to be the dead Loxley. At the same time, you have Godfrey, working for the French king, wrecking havoc all over England and the newly crowned King John trying to deal with this and other issues in his kingdom.

I can see why a lot of reviewers did not like this particular version, as it severely deviates from the original legend. Sometimes this can be a good thing, but in some cases it can cripple the story. Most of the time, Robin uses a sword and leaves the bow behind, only to use it for a few specific shots that last only a few seconds. Prince John and the Sheriff of Nottingham were barely even villains, and the prince only because he refused to sign a version of the Magna Carta. There was almost no mention of the taxes and suffering of the general people so well-known to the legend, and the only thieving that Robin does is stealing corn so Marian can plant. Only three of the Merry Men are shown, and they have very minor roles in the story, mostly as comic relief occasionally called upon to help Robin fight when they're not chasing the women of Nottingham.

The story itself was weak and did not flow smoothly. Besides the fact that it started off slow then had a brief big battle at the end, there was too much going on. You have the Magna Carta (portrayed more as freedom for the people than as something the nobility created) then abruptly shift gears to Godfrey's rebellion with no further mention of it or to the war with France, which was unrelated. It came across to me as if the writers could not decide on what aspect to focus on, so they threw them all together into a jumbled mess. The story ends with the realization that this is meant to be a prequel or an explanation for the legend, which left me feeling unsatisfied and hoping that the story isn't continued into another movie.

In the end, the movie was nothing epic or something that I'd watch over and over again. I should have saved the seven dollars from the movie ticket for something else.

I give it two stars out of five.

Plagiarism

A note to my readers: I may be hiding this blog and only letting certain people read it, though I've yet to make a decision about this. I was doing a random google search earlier today and discovered that the book review for "How to Save the World" Book 1 that I posted back last summer was re-posted elsewhere... alongside some atrocious grammar and spelling plus a couple of unintelligible sentences, but it was most certainly my review... like someone taking credit for writing it. I know reviews aren't copyrighted unless you publish them for a magazine or something like that, but it makes me a bit nervous about how many of my reviews have been re-written on the internet.