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austonian77
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Chappie (2015)
Too Much "Consciousness" (Minor spoilers)
Let me start off by saying i'm a huge fan of Blomkamp. In my opinion, District 9 is one of the best films of the last decade, and I'll forever love him for that fine work of metaphorical beauty. Chappie on the other hand tries to deliver the same experience but with the director and writers' hands tied behind their back as they try to flesh this out. I fell in love with the concept of this film since Tetra Vaal was released. When Martin Scorsese gave the writer of Wolf Of Wall Street, Terrence Winter, the plot of the movie, he said he wanted the same feel and pace of Goodfellas. Neill must've taken that on to himself with writing this compared to District 9, along with similarities to Elysium. (Sigh) A big disappointment to everyone, I know, yet it was a great concept! Also, believe me when I say that Chappie is one-hundred times better than Elysium. So, on to the film itself. The first twenty minutes are great, setting the real story of the film. Clichés aside, it goes well for the first half. Then ambiguity started to sink into the writers' heads and brought on an Elysium-type concept. Too much concept, not enough great writing. I'm a fan of Die Antwoord, the crazy rap experimental group that takes up three- fourths of the film's screen time, and I was pleasantly surprised by their performances. I don't think I'll be seeing them at the Academy Awards ever, besides maybe performing some outrageous song, but nevertheless, good acting. As the story continues, Yolandi's time with Chappie grows on you and you quite to really enjoy the chemistry of great voice-acting from Sharlto Copley (playing Chappie) with his immediate sympathized character love that you could compare to the Prawn species in D9, and maybe even Elephant Man. The art concepts of Die Antwoord's palace as you may call it was a beautiful touch by the crazy group, and gave it a good feel for fans of them that they were playing themselves. (Also retaining their stage names). Dev Patel's screen time is nothing compared to Die Antwoord's which was bothersome, and even more so; Hugh Jackman and Sigourney Weaver. Remember how in Elysium, Weaver had five minutes on screen? She has three in this. With no character development, and no sense of even being a character. Hugh Jackman was a cliché jealous coworker but did shine with some direction from Blomkamp in some scenes. Emphasis on some. The fact that they practically brought this robot police tank-like fighter straight out of a mash-up of D9's ending, Robocop, and Avatar made it feel unoriginal. Sixty minutes into the film, you're still liking it. And the scenes between Yolandi and Chappie still hang over everything else. The use of the "Black Sheep" story is a nice touch, but hangs a little too close to being overused, Next, we have the last twenty-five minutes. Warning: laughter of ridiculous ambiguity ensued from me, along with the small audience I sat with in the cinema. Remember when in Avatar, they use a machine to transfer your consciousness into some other body? Here it is, being even more ridiculous. I won't get into it, but wow is it cringey, along with just bad writing. A fight scene that's so well setup turns into a backtracking mission of wounded "protagonists" and death scenes that don't make you feel anything. Originality gets squashed and turns into a slo-mo scene of Michael Bay garbage. At this point, my friend had dropped his popcorn on the floor mistakenly, but ended up becoming a metaphor for how bad this film became. Fast forward an awful fifteen minutes of Interstellar-type- ambiguity-nonsense, and here we are. One person after another, getting their consciousness into something else that I won't mention, making this movie dumber by the minute. The last shot opens it for a sequel (God, please don't make a sequel) and makes you "wanting" more. I wasn't feeling any desire for this film to go on or be dragged into a worse sequel. I know I speak mostly ill of this movie, but I give it a 7/10 for good directing for most of it, and a new take on some old concepts that go back to the 80s. Great VFX (which I usually hate in nowaday superhero films and the fantastic (sarcasm) Transformers franchise.
Pros- - It's fun. - Smart writing for three-fourths of the film. - Sharlto Copley's voice performance, along with Die Antwoords'. - Some original concepts. - Blomkamp's fun directing style. - Great VFX.
Cons- - Falls flat on its face towards the end. - Forced emotion. - Too. Much. Ambiguity. - Not enough screen time for the "stars". - Writing gets dull. - Clichés all over. - Overall undeveloped concept that could've been way better.
Leviafan (2014)
The dark microcosm that is Leviathan
From the first five minutes, I was appealed to this movie more than 3/4 of what I've seen this year. It was dark, it was beautifully shot, and established its characters nicely. People complain it took too long for the characters to be established and that the story took too long to unfold. Haven't you heard of visual storytelling? As it plays out, you find out the dark shadows that follow each character and who they really are in the situation they're in. From the wife (most interesting character), to the step- son of the wife. The father is a dark character that is strained beyond limits, and the fantastic acting portrayed by the father is just one of the great performances done by all the actors and actresses. It fights the bond of love, land, and power. The corruption that still stands tall in Russia and its small towns that surround the leviathan that is the story. It unravels extremely slow, but thats what makes more of an impact. The over-thirty second shot of the woman in court explaining the case is so well done, you can really just see the effort put into each role in the film. If only American films could be so well thought out. For any person who has the near two and a half hour time to watch a superb film, sit down and immerse yourself into the gloomy world that inhabits these characters. It teaches you, it haunts you, it stays with you.