sabretoothmovies Reviews

Black Swan (2010)

A whole lot of really good nothing

[8/10 · 19 January 2011]

She Literally Becomes the Black Swan, in the Mental Sense

The movie The Black Swan is about a woman who would probably be admitted to a pysc – ward with round the clock watch, with a sign on the door that reads – "Clinically Insane/ with hint of excessive obsession behaviour". She is a ballerina, mentally fragile to begin with, and then receives the lead in Swan Lake and becomes completely crazy.

The film revolves around Natalie Portman's character Nina, and her declining mental state. She has always been devoted to ballet but this becomes an obsession that affects her health, as she strives to follow her director's advice and dance with abandon and life.

Natalie Portman is absolutely amazing in her role as Nina and plays a really good CG (Crazy Girl)

She is happy/sad/up/down/high/innocent/drunk/prudish/beautiful/menacing in her role; it is clear and obvious why she is nominated for an Oscar.

The cinematography portion of this movie is exceptional, from every close cut camera angle to the same dance routine thirty times and especially to the gritty rave scene. There the music pounds louder and louder, as Nina tries to free herself by matching the free-spirit nature of the new dancer Lily. The rest of the time however when not the club scene or the music of the Swan Lake, the score made the movie closer to a horror movie. The second that deep violin music started playing you knew s**t was going to go down.

The movie for acting, directing, and cinematic view was amazing and near perfect but where the movie started to lack was the screenplay. It lacked in the caring department; there were no stakes or reasons for us to care about the character. Sure she was a dancer who got a good role, and had a weird mother – but that doesn't affect me or the world. CG can be crazy for all I care.

The movie also at some points had pretty strong connections to soft-core P***. Not saying it shouldn't have been included but some things can be implied.

Overall though, The Black Swan is a great film without a good story and really is a whole lot of nothing by the end.

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Tron: Legacy (2010)

Trontastic!!!

[5/10 · 22 December 2010]

A Deaf Person's Favourite Movie The 2010 Tron film is amazing to watch, provided you are either deaf or just don't care about a plot/decent writing. The movie looks fantastic; never have roman gladiator battles been so sleek and modern; never have inflatable motorcycles looked so realistic; never has Obi Wan Kenobi dressed so much like Morpheus. It is modern eye candy that explodes off the screen in dazzling effects.

The actual content however, is a muddled heap of garbage that borderlines the film on comedy territory. Here is the basic plot: ten year old son and father have clichéd conversation, father leaves and disappears, son grows up and goes all Tony Stark on his life minus the cool factor of Robert Downey Jr., son grows up and finds his way into grid world where he finds his father trapped by the evil supervillian Clu! Oh and there are glowing Frisbees that are crucial to your survival but you can also chuck them as weapons. The title of the film I think comes from the video game from which the movie is based, and is also the name of a character who was good but now is evil but then becomes good again so in the end it is all cool.

What is actually cool is Jeff Bridges, who plays the father/creator -of-the-grid/zen-master and then as a separate character plays Clu as well. Jeff Bridges is what would happen if you combined Gandalf with a very rugged lumberjack, and then added a touch of God to the mix. In short, he is awesome. Sure the director makes him do stupid stuff like whack a guard on the head to reprogram him, or create a swirling tornado out of nowhere but that is only because Jeff Bridges is a good sport. Also it is because he got paid millions.

The movie in total cost 170 million to make, and I would make an educated guess and say that most of that money was spent on making things look wicked sweet. The problem however, is that when things look wicked sweet, they don't look real. It's hard to care about a violent Frisbee battle when it just looks like a dramatic video game. It is even harder to care when the dialogue from the protagonist-with-daddy-issues goes something like this: "Is this really happening?" pause for something to explode "OMG it really is." Olivia Wilde as the Trinity of the film also seems fairly hollow. She's unconscious for a portion in the middle of the film and the audience really doesn't notice a difference. On a side note: can a human and a program hook up? Because that just seems weird to me.

I have not seen the original Tron, nor do I want to. Wikipedia says that it was criticized for its weak plot line, which its sequel clearly did not learn from. In the end, I just think Hollywood just needs to hold some teamwork seminars and figure out how writers like Aaron Sorkin or Diablo Cody could write the scripts for movies with awesome special effects. Like Juno but with aliens as the characters, or Tron with dialogue as fast and impressive as the motorcycle chases. That's all I want, but I think it is about as likely as a blind person liking Tron.

Rating: S-a-b-r-e

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 (2010)

Potter won't Win an Oscar ... but it doesn't matter

[10/10 · 19 November 2010]

At the moment Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part One is the lowest rated Potter movie on Rotten Tomatoes, and has gotten a poor reception from some of the top critics across the globe. Unfortunately for these self-satisfied critics who like nothing more than to hear the sound of their own bickering this movie wasn't made for them. This movie was made for the millions of Harry Potter fans who have reread the books and rewatched the movies dozens of times and who were ready to see the epic story of their hero come to an end. For them this movie is a masterpiece and that is why Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part One is the best we've seen from the Potter Franchise to date.

The movie takes more lines verbatim from the book than any of its predecessors. Book fans will be smiling throughout as their favourite line gets its air time. And for the first time in Potter movie history people will not be leaving the theatre bitching about what wasn't in the movie. The decision to split the movie finally gave the filmmakers enough time to do the book justice. The slower moving pace of the movie may bore some, but really allows the characters to get their final payoff.

And of course these characters were the highlight of the film. Dan Radcliffe, Rupert Grint and Emma Watson have developed into three of the best young actors of our generation. Our favourite trio really flex their acting muscle during the fight between Harry and Ron, Harry and Hermione's walk through Godric's Hollow, and Hermione 's torture scene. For the first time we are away from Hogwarts and they cannot rely on the adult actors to pick up the slack, but they don't miss the likes of Alan Rickman, Maggie Smith, Robbie Coltrane one bit.

Director, David Yates, took a much more "artsy" approach to this film than they've had in the past making for some quite fantastic visuals. The animated "Tale of the Three Brothers" scene is beautifully done and really keeps you captivated throughout quite a long story which yet again is taken almost directly from the book. The panning scenery shots we see in this film add another layer of depth to this visual masterpiece.

Part One of the finale certainly does not pull any punches in the violence department between Bathilda's attack, Ron's splinching and the previously mentioned Hermionie torture scene. All of this leaves us wondering what surprises we could be in for during the much gorier and violent Part Two of the movie.

I couldn't finish this review without mentioning what is undoubtedly the saddest scene in a Harry Potter movie to date. If Dobby's death at the end doesn't have you tearing up you're probably Lord Voldemort... or at least had your soul ripped apart a few times.

Yes the movie leaves you on a hanging point, yes it wasn't 24/7 action, yes it didn't have the charm of the first few. But Deathly Hallows Part One had much more than that and if you're getting hung up on these details go join the critics who are bashing this movie and you can all get your hate on together because for the rest of us this movie is absolutely brilliant.

Rating: S-A-B-R-E +1 Check out our site at : Sabretoothmovies.blogspot.com

Up (2009)

UP with the Movie, Down with the Dogs

[8/10 · 5 January 2010]

As we have learned from their previous nine films, Pixar makes amazingly awesome movies (with possibly the exception of Cars, but even then not really). For their tenth endeavour they have produced UP, a family film that lives up to the company name. My opinion during the first half an hour of the movie in fact, was that UP would be the best Pixar film yet, and it almost was.

I'm not going to spend time on the good parts of the movie, because they're the usual good pixar things. Instead I'm just going to have to talk about the damn dogs.

Starting around a half hour in the audience is introduced to a group of dogs, whose collars transmit what their thinking into words. To me this sounds like a bad idea on paper and it looks worse on screen, especially since Pixar can't make up it's mind to whether the dogs are geniuseswho can fly airplanes or the typical mutts that gets distracted by a squirrell. I mean it's weird enough as it is, having an old explorer living in a tropical forst own hundred of dogs let alone ones that can talk. In one scene the heroes of the movie escape imprisonment by throwing a tennis ball by their guards. In another the dogs make fun of their leader because he has to wear the cone of shame (one of those anti-itch dog cones). Keeping in mind these are dogs who in previous scenes have used GPS systems and cooked gourment meals. This might be okay in another cartoon movie but come on Pixar I expected more from you than a scene wear dogs are playing poker in the background.

In the end though this is another great Pixar movie that is miles ahead of any other kid movie. I just wished there weren't the stupid dogs.

Avatar (2009)

You will want your Avatar to come to this movie with you so that you can see it twice.

[10/10 · 5 January 2010]

At one point in Avatar the military unit on Pandora throws gas canisters into the home of the Na'vi. A shot shows one of these gas canisters hitting the ground and rebounding; sitting in the theatre with my 3D glasses on I flinched. 3D is cool.

Approximately fifteen years after originally conceived, Avatar is finally in theatres and it is, amazing. The story centres on Jake Sully and his experiences on a planet called Pandora that humans have recently discovered. On Pandora there are all kinds of new life including the Na'vi, a race similar to humans except overall just better. Due to really really cool technology Jake controls an avatar (a body that looks just like a Na'vi) and can see, hear and feel through his avatar all from the comfort of the lab. Soon he (as in his avatar) is living with the real Na'vi, learning their ways, falling in love and eventually protecting them against the greedy, capitalistic humans. This story is complicated but James Cameron has almost three hours for it to develop and the plot never feels rushed.

The story alone is interesting enough to make this movie worthwhile but it is the visuals that set this movie apart. A whole new world has been created with this movie. Pandora looks like Discovery Channel's Holy Grail; every minute detail is incredible, from the Na'vi to the plants in the background of some unimportant scene. The hours logged to make this movie must be astronomical. Even the technology of the humans is cool and least remotely realistic. Giant planes and helicopters, impressive iron man-robot-type-deals, hell the breathing masks are cool.

And then there's the 3D. Avatar is considered the first 3D movie directed at adults; translation being: this movie will make or break the future of 3D. Luckily it's made it. Besides the whole "look-something's popping out of the screen" gimmick 3D is amazing because it makes everything look ultra-high-definition. Scenes are given layers and the audience is brought that much closer into the film. This movie has shown that even romantic comedies could have 3D in the future; maybe James Cameron is king of the world.

What this movie needs now is a prequel. How did humans discover/locate /get-to/land-on /settle/learn-the-language /set-up-a-school/create-avatars /discover-that-expensive-mineral /develop-the-technology /etc./etc./etc.? And what about on earth, are there avatars there, are wars being fought with casualties that aren't real? What do people think of Pandora, how are the international politics playing out? If it takes six years to get to Pandora but you don't age during that time, that's got to create some weird things; a mother could end up six years older than her child. Avatar ignores a lot of questions that could fit into a whole other movie.

Avatar is the future of film, there is no doubt in my mind that more and more action movies will begin to be made in 3D, with other genres soon to follow. James Cameron has created an epic movie, that movie-goers will swarm to and that will inspire the film industry and its future direction. And it only took fifteen years and three hundred million dollars.

The Men Who Stare at Goats (2009)

The Men Who Stare at Goats (so as to become Jedi Warriors and create world peace while possibly under the influence of LSD) Any questions?

[8/10 · 5 January 2010]

Even from the title, a person can guess that this movie will be different. Men staring at goats doesn't seem like the most interesting plot line; maybe then does the movie aim to be original rather than just having commercial appeal? The answer is a resounding yes. Men Who Stare at Goats is absurd, odd, hilarious, amusing, definitely original, possibly good and not at all what you would expect.

The plot, well the plot is complicated and involves a present-time storyline that is broken up between flashbacks. In short, George Clooney and Ewan McGregor are on one hell of a road trip in Iraq while Clooney tells McGregor about his time in a secret army training program, bent on creating Jedi warriors. So it's your typical movie. What it really is is one of those smart-and-dumb-at-the-same-time -comedies-that-involves- George-Clooney; films such as Burn After Reading and The Informant (which he produced) also fall into this category. Whether you like this movie or not, will depend on how accepting you are of the ridiculous. The movie deals with developing Jedi warriors in a comedically serious way that will be just too much for some people. The sixties counter culture is popular target for jokes in films, but an army program run by a long-haired hippy, working on world peace by dancing, that's pushing it. My personal feeling for the movie was overall positive; it was original and some segments were genuinely funny. Also on the plus side was the acting. The two leads were good, though McGregor had some accent slips, but the supporting cast was also impressive. Kevin Spacey, Jeff Bridges and Stephen Lang all embraced the absurdity of their roles and played them with relish.

As for the comedy, the movie is funny. Some parts drag on a little long with no laughs but patience is always rewarded. Jokes in this movie are both smart and dumb, mixing slapstick with intellectual comedy. Clooney running over someone he's trying to rescue falls in the slapstick category; a guy explaining why the US has to finance the Jedi training because the USSR thinks there already financing it is smart funny. Kevin Spacey's "psychic voice" is just plain funny.

To finish off, I can only think to repeat that the movie is absurd and just plain odd, but then again so is real life. If the US can torture people with Barney why can't they train people with Star Wars?

The Invention of Lying (2009)

The Invention of the Good Romantic Comedy ... And we're not Lying

[7/10 · 5 January 2010]

Ricky Gervais is one of the funniest men in the world. He created, wrote and starred in The Office, a revolutionary TV show and when he speaks at award shows the audience laughs, and not the pretend, acknowledging-the-joke-laugh but a real, that-was-actually-funny laugh. The Invention of Lying is Gervais's newest project, one that he once again created, wrote and starred in and it too is a hit. The premise is original, the jokes new, the acting well done; in short the movie works even with certain given clichés.

The premise of The Invention of Lying is believe it or not about the invention of lying. It is an alternate universe where no one in the world can lie, or even knows what a lie is. In fact for some unexplainable reason not only do people lie but they go out of their way to tell the truth. Pepsi's slogan is "for when they don't have coke", retirement homes are called "A sad place where old people go to die", doctors tell you your diagnosis with added details. It is in this world that Mark (Gervais) tells the first lie and soon, with his power, he is living the high life. Unfortunately however, his ability cannot get him true love or save his dying mother and that is where the romantic portion as well as religious musings enters the movie.

That's right romance and religion; those of you who watched the trailer are probably surprised because the movie is advertised as a straight-up comedy. It is however, a romantic comedy with dramatic portions, just to be one hundred percent up front. Hopefully this will not dissuade anyone from going because this movie is worth watching. To repeat from earlier, Ricky Gervais is one of the funniest men in the world, and this shows in The Invention of Lying.

The cast is star-studded including Jennifer Garner, Rob Lowe, Jonah Hill and Tina Fey, and all of them are impressive. Jonah Hill in particular was funny, playing a suicidal character who openly conversed about his attempts to kill himself. The religious sub-plot is also amusing, with the population pestering Mark about what exactly constitutes as a sin. Where the movie gets frustrating however, is the clichés it does fall into. How many romantic comedies have resolved with a wedding scene where the man begs the soon-to-be-married-woman to marry him instead (I can think of five just off the top of my head)? And on top of that the movie only ever resolves the romantic plot ignoring the lingering questions of religion.

To sum it up when Mark says: "This is the greatest movie ever made" he's not lying, just exaggerating a little.

Inglourious Basterds (2009)

Glorious Basterds

[9/10 · 5 January 2010]

Quentin Tarantino is like no other director, and Inglourious Basterds is like no other Word War II. These two statements surmise the entire two and a half hours of Inglourious Basterds, which is an incredible film. Divided into five chapters (which I'm sure someone smart could parallel to Shakespeare's five acts) the movie tells the stories of a young Jewish woman orphaned by the Nazis, and an American guerrilla unit in Germany known for removing Nazi scalps. Both the young woman (Melanie Laurent) and the military unit (lead by a southern Brad Pitt) hatch separate plans to assassinate Adolph Hitler and chaos ensues. The antagonist to all of this and one of the best parts of the movie is the chillingly uncaring Col. Hans Landa (Christopher Waltz) aka "the Jew Hunter." Inglourious Basterds is not a thriller, action, comedy or drama, though it's not not any of those genre's either; instead it is probably safest to say that it was made by Quentin Tarantino. For people who have not seen anything by Quentin Tarantino the term adult-fairy-tale could be used as well. The characters are larger than life, the sets are over the top, the plot is simple yet huge in scope, and of course it begins with "once upon a time." In addition, the cinematography, the music, the acting and the editing are all excellent and it leaves the movie with the feeling that it is too romanticized to be real life yet somehow more like real life than most other films. All of this comes out from Taratino's distinct style, which is what makes the movie work. The scene in the basement tavern showcases this in particularly, with the suspicious Nazi, the suave British spy and the double-agent socialite battling it out in one long unabridged sequence.

The acting as mentioned is incredibly well done; Brad Pitt becomes the southern US and Christopher Waltz impersonates an evil at par with Heath Ledger's joker. Melanie Laurent is ruthless, beautiful, angry, simple, vengeful etc. all in one complex character. Even Mike Myers and B.J. Novak, known for their comedy, pull off serious roles without problem.

In short Quentin Tarantino is a unique and awe-inspiring film-maker. I mean how many people do you think can pull off an out of the blue narration by Samuel L. Jackson accompanied by sixties font and music in the middle of a WWII movie and make it seem normal. He makes movies with a style so their own that they would be refreshing if the plot revolved around a blind eighty year old dictioneer (dictioneer (n'): one who writes dictionaries). So what if he slightly fudged the facts of WWII, the movie was entertaining and that is kind of the point. Inglourious Basterds deserves full praise as much as Lt. Aldo Raine deserves his one hundred Nazi scalps.

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The Proposal (I) (2009)

Romantic Comedy #1537

[6/10 · 5 January 2010]

I have seen my fair share of romantic comedies, way more than I would like to admit. I have seen so many romantic comedies that I could probably list Meg Ryan's ten last films ... in order. I have definitely seen enough romantic comedies to know the typical format of the genre, considering it never ever changes. Now I know this is true of most genres, but for some reason romantic comedies seem especially bad. I almost wonder if there's a writing-romantic-comedies-for-dummies book out there that all screen writers use that says scene five must be a comedic incident that causes witty banter and scene fourteen must include a deep conversation about love.

Where I am getting with this is that The Proposal is not a bad movie, it's just a typical one. In the film, Ryan Reynolds plays Andrew an Alaskan born twenty-something living in New York City. Against his parents wishes he moved to New York to become a successful publisher, but has spent the last two years as a glorified secretary under the iron thumb of the cold-hearted but successful Margaret (Sandra Bullock, falling way short of Meryl Streep). Margaret however is Canadian and when her green card isn't renewed she risks being deported back to the cold barren waste land ... unless she marries an American citizen. Before you know it Andrew and Margaret are getting married (he get's a promotion for his effort) and they're off to Alaska to meet the parents.

Due to my extensive knowledge in rom-com's I know that the fake-relationship plot line has been used in films such as What Happen's in Vegas, and Failure to Launch (both made in the last three years), so this angle is not new. Neither is the fact that the love interests at the beginning of the film hate each other, or the fact that they end up together at the end (I would've put a spoiler alert in front of that but let's face it we all knew it anyway). Even the scene where Margaret let's the inside-only pet outside was used in Meet the Parents. The jokes are partially recycled and worst of all the new, funny jokes they did have were all given away in the trailer. The movie in short is nothing new.

The good news though is that those of you that like the standard romantic comedies will love The Proposal in the same way fans of Die Hard loved Die Hard 2. This movie has an audience, a specific but dedicated audience. And it's not all bad; Betty White is awesome, and so is the house in Alaska. Some scenes are funny. the acting is good and it's not totally unrealistic (just around the same level as Die Hard ... it could happen).

So in the end I suppose all that really needs to be said about The Proposal is that it's a romantic comedy, and not a totally bad one at that.

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Watchmen (2009)

Monday, June 1, 2009

[9/10 · 5 January 2010]

Watchmen is the Bible of comic books. Every true comic book nerd keeps a copy by their bedside and every night they worship the author/God, Alan Moore (Who incidentally looks exactly like one would picture a comic book God to look like.). The book itself is original, deep, smart, provocative, action-packed and in short amazing. That being said, how does the movie compare? To keep the religious analogy going it's not the Holy Grail of comic book movies, that title still lies with the Dark Knight. Watchmen however is a strong second (Consider it a really-really-nice grail even if it's not holy.).

Why the movie is so good probably has a lot to do with the fact that very little is changed from the actual comic book. Almost all of the dialogue is identical, and most of the scenes are extremely faithful to the comic. A major thing that was altered was the ending even though only minimally and in my opinion for the better. Also one of the best lines in the book, "Nothing ever ends," is said as an afterthought in the movie and not by the intimidating blue dude like in the book, but that's nit-picking.

Where the movie doesn't work is the acting, which varies from amazing to painful. Rorschach, the Comedian and Sally Jupiter fall into the amazing category; Laurie Jupiter and Ozymandias sadly do not. Laurie Jupiter looks good in her part but the acting seems forced and her lines cheesy. Ozymandias could not seem like a more stereotypical cold and heartless villain right from the beginning which is not good because it's supposed to be a surprise that he is the stereotypical cold and heartless villain.

Back to the plus side, Zach Snyder the director does an awesome job. The montage to "The Times they are a Changing" is one of the best parts of the movie and just overall his style works with the film. Like all really good directors however he doesn't know how to keep a movie short (Peter Jackson anyone?) and Watchmen is over two and a half hours.

That pretty much sums it up. If you have ever read a comic book you have probably already seen the movie … multiple times. If you somehow fall into the above category but have not seen it, I would make it a top priority. As for you others out there who have never read a comic and haven't seen the movie, I would go see it and consider it kind of like watching one of those foreign films with subtitles. You won't really understand anything that happens but you'll appreciate your glimpse into a different and alien culture.

The Question should not be " Who watches the watchmen" but " Who doesn't watch the watchmen" Like the review check out more at Sabretoothmovies.blogspot.com