wijnand-1 Reviews

The Dark Knight Rises (2012)

Does a lot of injustice to the batman personalities involved

[4/10 · 26 July 2012]

I went into this movie expecting another Nolan masterpiece. Before I write my review however I need to make it perfectly clear that Nolan makes good movies and i tend to enjoy his movies for what they are.

No matter how much I try though I find his third installment to be the weakest batman of the 3.

We start the story 8 years after the dark knight "killed" Harvey dent. But thanks to the Dent law crime in Gotham is almost all gone (how a law could do that i do not know). But the impression is given that the law is almost considered a form of oppression.

We find Bruce Wayne to have a bad knee and to be living as a recluse wondering openly what his live with Rachel would have been like. However with the coming of bane we suddenly need our hero needs to come out of retirement because of the actions of Selina Kyle (who is NEVER called catwoman!).

My biggest problem with this movie is that it used bits and pieces of different batman comics to make a story. The famous bane breaking batman scene is in the movie. But it loses much of its impact. Knightfall was about bane knowing who batman was and wanting to break his soul AND body. Only when batman was mentally and physically drained from all his hardships did bane decide to fight batman purely to destroy him and who he was.

There was no such thing here, bane just managed to get him into a room with batman and he kicked the snot out of him. However the powerful scene where batman gets his back "dislocated" is immediately destroyed by the fact some random guy can just punch Batman's back straight like it is some bend piece of iron that needs to smashed straight.

We then get a basic rockyish theme where batman is training while bane takes over the city. But sadly where I felt bane was not the bane I know and while I do agree that Nolan needs creative freedom the way he handled the obvious spoiler of Talia al Ghul is detestable.

We are introducted to a raving lunatic who wants nothing more than Bruce to die and Gotham to burn.

My entire problem with this premise is that it does zero justice to the persona we known from the DC comics Talia was always conflicted because she was in Love with Bruce Wayne and was loyal to the goals of her father which meant she always had to take a side. This one on the other hand was just angry and had no soul she was there because of the sake of being there.

The way bane was portrayed is good but Ifelt they really ignored his venom addiction which makes him so strong. Now he was just a body builder with pain suppressants. And Just like Batman's knee (which apparently happened during Batman's fall in 2 at the end) why on earth where people mutilating bane in one cut scene it would have been nice to get a deeper glimpse in the persona bane rather than the few peeks.

Another perfect example of where Nolan just dropped the ball is with Alfred. He just told Bruce Wayne that he burned Rachel her letter and he was hone the next part for almost the entire movie i really felt the Rachel scene and the repercussions it had on Bruce AND Alfred should have been highlighted more. We had 3 hours but most of it was spend on excellent photography and set pieces but sadly the plot suffered for it.

If you do not know the batman persona's I listed here I am certain you will enjoy this movie for what it is. If you expect a dark knight x2 your going to sadly be disappointed.

Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011)

Transformers garbage in disguise

[1/10 · 10 September 2011]

Revenge of the Fallen was a terrible movie. Michael Bay himself stated this and he even went as far as saying this would be a lot beter. I am trying hard to think of anything positive in this movie.

For some reason the bay formula has always been about action explosions, car chases and American flags draped over everything and people walking cool ( with a flag , guns down etc...) at the end of every movie. Pan downs.

The latest installment continues this trend itsobvious that michael bay has absolutely no clue about what story means in a movie. A movie should make the audience root for someone bad or good. Right now we are stuck with wondering who most these robots are. coming from a transformers background for me it was horrible to see the bay interpertations of devastator but i was more shocked when I saw the new and improved soundwave.

All of these transformers are shells of nothing I do not like optimus neither do I like Megatron who was called a bitch by someone before he decides to finally do something in the movie and then getting his head pulled off his total action time was 3 minutes! . He served NO purpose in this movie other then being a miserable robot being.

The animations while great again add nothing to the movie except for trying to hide the most glaring flaws this movie has. THe lack of a story obvious copying of a few old transformers episodes but ultimately it falls short on its face.

Bay has since Pearl harbour only made graphically impressive movies but his story and his ideas of a good movie are completely wrong. I think Bay has a lot more potential then this when there is someone who keeps im under control. Right now I see TF3 as a showbook case on what you can achieve with technology but it does not leave a single brand or shred story wise. I hope they find a director who understand what made transformers special.

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009)

Horrible

[1/10 · 27 June 2009]

Don't let people fool you with this film, you are beter off putting a few toasters in your dishwasher and turning that on the racket and flashes constitutes this whole film the whole 2 hours of it! Where to begin with this trainwreck of a movie? The plot - passable but lame I do not want to spoil too much but just imagine pearl harbor + blackhawk down and you have your disaster of a movie. The script is predictable the dialog made me cringe. The American army rock beat every 3 minutes whenever a jet comes over is repetitive and lame this entire movie seems to rely on its CGI effects and explosions. Strip that away and you have a movie that has no redeeming factor whatsoever.

Whoever's idea it was to put "gangsta" twin robots in this movie should be transfered back to the commercial department for 50 cent. These are ROBOTS that are supposed to be INTELLIGENT. The endless trashtalk from them is boring and lame. The main autobots barely have any screen time and its just this mess of decepticons that pop up everywhere and apparently know how to build robots? I was inclined to not even put a spoiler tag onbut I am not even sure what this entire movie was about! I honestly cannot recommend this movie it ruined a entire franchise for me that i grew up with. Michael bay is great at effects and thats it. the entire movie reeks of it. He should stick ot what he is good at and stop trying to make such movies. The movie was long repetitive and boring. I felt like i was watching transformers 1 with just the desert scene in it. The Love scene between sam and mikiella was just so forced it made me think of all the criticism of Pearl Harbor.

If you did not like pearl harbor you will def not like this movie. It has the same flaws and weaknesses as the that movie. Whenever Bay is given freedom to do whatever he pleases it just... becomes bad.

Battlestar Galactica: Razor (2007 TV Movie)

Great start of season 4!

[9/10 · 7 November 2007]

I just finished watching a preview of Razor and have to admit that my doubts about another Season 3 fiasco are all but removed. My biggest issues with SEason 3 was its slow pace and a lot of the episodes were stand alone meaning that the things happening during those episodes had no consequence of the overall story.

Razor is mostly a flashback and deals with the pegasus crew how they survived the attack on the colonies. And how Helena Cain changes from a caring and warm person to a "razor". The best part of Razor is mostly the character development we start to see how the burden of command affects lee and how his father has to guide him when making decisions that can have effects to the lives of many.

RAzor has a lot of nods to the old series, and its fun to see them specially in the story being told. It adds a new dimenstion to the story that will ultimately pay back in the rest of Season 4. I hope the nelson ratings go up again because this SEason is starting to look like it might top season 2 in terms of story and action.

Battlestar Galactica (2004–2009)

Very good!

[10/10 · 29 December 2006]

Honestly some reviewers who bash the BSG remake purely because its not BSG need to take a look at why this is a remake. I seen both BSG and the BSG:RDM version, and personally I take the Remake over the original one. Purely because the political aspect, and the religious aspect are much beter fleshed out.

(possible spoler if you did NOT see the miniseries)

BSG about a old ragtag fleet of survivors that lost their home planets due to a nuclear attack by the cylons. Unlike the original BSG its quite clear that there are a lot of complications to this fleet, first of all the governmental infrastructure is damaged people lose hope. Adama gives them hope with the idea of finding earth that was only a legend. Its all about the fleet trying to sustain itself, finding things to keep them alive, like water fuel everything a normal human needs and gets ignored like they done in Voyager.

What is so good about BSG is the plot, its very well written and intrigueing, its enjoyable to see Baltar get in trouble all the time. But also the sheer horror of the dilemma's adama and his crew face.

If you like a good series with drama, and strong acting I suggest this for everyone. the SCIFI is not a big part of BSG only a few scenes involve space combat, but when they do occur its with a big flash and bang. But most of this is with political problems and internal strife in the fleet making this more of a realistic show compared to the old one.