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TheNFV
Reviews
Live Free or Die Hard (2007)
Keeps true to the Die Hard name.
Once more we've been treated to a tale of John MacClane. In 1, he was stuck in a building with terrorists. In 2, he was out to save his wife. In 3, he was out to save himself. In 4, it's the entire country.
As 1 and 3 were linked by Simon and Hans, 2 and 4 are linked as the terrorists are once more former United States citizens turned against the country for personal gain. Thomas Gabriel does provide a bit of wit, but no where near as memorable as MacClane's previous antagonists. MacClane makes it seem his years of experience pay off well as he handles all of Gabriel's men with relative ease, which was unseen in the original three Die Hards. MacClane came back to a licking, but proves once again, he or his stories aren't going to die easily.
Underworld: Evolution (2006)
Werewolves, Vampires and Quick Cuts! OH MY!
Having watched the original, I can say I had high hopes for this film when I first walked into the theater. When I walked out, I was less than disappointed. This sequel stands as more of a joke than the original did, which is sad simply because both had the necessary elements to make a good film. A decent story of a family inner war that became a world's problem, a struggling couple looking to find their own place in that same world, and most of all a war that has raged on for centuries due in part to the family inner turmoil.
With that said, I will now say that the film does not fail because of cheesy acting or over dramatic fight sequences. Those are new defining elements of the action genre and I full heartily expect them as so should all of you once you walk into the movie. If I see werewolves growling, I'd expect some limbs flying off and men being ripped to shreds. The makeup and character designs were, in fact, down right petrifying at moments. Marcus and William both stand out as classic movie monster villains and Marcus does an excellent job of keeping up with that role in his acting. Even the locations are dark, graphic and fitting for the movie in which they are placed. A pure blend of the Gothic elements of old Europe and technological means of today gives the movie that time line of the characters that they have been around for a long time, but still are able to move along with the rest of the world with each new enhancement of life.
Where this film fails is simply put, the editing. The attempt at a fast pace, razzle dazzle approach to this film makes for the fight sequences to make the audience say "what just happened?!" or "my eyes hurt from the flashing!" I warn those prone to seizures to stay far away from this movie at all costs. With that said, the character of William is only scene really on screen for a few key moments at which point his terrifying presence is brilliantly displayed. Unfortunately through editing, the poor beast becomes a less than formidable foe due to the quick cuts and pans that ruin a perfectly choreographed fight sequence.
This film has been compared to Blade and Matrix for the action sequences, the vampire nature, and even the art work of the film. However, what the Matrix and Blade did right was allowing the actors to show their fighting skills and have the camera just far enough back to focus mainly on the fight, but Underworld: Evolutions tragically got up into the face of the fight making everyone in the audience as disoriented as possible.
If you have ADD, this film is a perfect mix of just the right elements to keep you entertained and not squirming in your seat. If you are looking for mere enjoyment out of the vampire versus werewolf tale, you also will not be entirely disappointed. However, if you are looking for some more interesting action sequences other than a rather steamy sex sequence between the main characters, you may want to save your money for the DVD release or go rent the original... Awh, hell, the original is worth another look anyway.
Mindhunters (2004)
Eight Little Mindhunters (Or and there was two.)
Judging by the title of this piece, one can ask many questions just like why was Mindhunters based off an Agatha Christine story? Ten little Indians, or And then there were none, stands as the basis for this very story and, having not known this going in, thus this movie became a delightful surprise.
Keeping the heart of the piece in the story while updating it for "originality" purposes, the tale still follows a group of assorted people each with their own vice that eventually leads to their downfall. Ten Little Indians is summed up as a murder mystery in which ten strangers receive letters, signed by an old friend, inviting them to spend the week at a mansion on the infamous and deserted Indian Island. When they do arrive at the island, their host never shows up. Then, someone dies mysteriously--murdered by someone or something not seen by anyone else. Then another guest is murdered, and another. It isn't until the remaining guests see an old nursery rhyme about different ways you can die that they realize what their fate will soon be. They are aware that they are not able to contact anyone on the mainland until the end of the week. In the original piece, everyone was murdered with the both the killer and the main character committing suicide. However, for the play version of the plot, two people survived the murderer and escaped the island after killing him off.
Now in the movie, the characters meet up with the "Puppeteer" who loves to mess with time instead of some unknown entity. This is one of the changes from the original script; however, majority of the characters survive through to the movie.
The main character of Mindhunters, Sara Moore, is plagued by her memories of her drowned family member. This is not far from the main character of Ten Little Indians, who shares the same fear of water for almost the same reason except it is her lover not a family member. Sara also faces Gabe (LL Cool J) at the end of the movie with both thinking each other are the murderer. This is taken directly from the Ten Little Indians story as at the end the two main characters fight each other over a gun. In the play and the original story, the girl shoots the guy and returns to the house. In the play, she is confronted by the murderer, who was believed to be shot dead but was only playing dead to help his scheme. The man returns, having just been wounded, to the rescue and ends up shooting the murderer dead. If I remember correctly, the line, "looks like his weakness was bullets" is actually from the play.
Gabe comes to Sara's rescue at the end; however, Sara is the one to take out the Puppeteer instead of Gabe. Also, Gabe fights Sara insisting on surviving while in the play the man tries to reason with the girl as so to keep both their lives.
Also, Gabe shows no signs of being exactly like the character in the tale. Instead, Bobby is more of that role as he tries to relate to Sara.
In the end, the tale of the Roanoke Colony and Croatoa replaces the ten little Indians poem that sets up each murder allowing for the screen writer to surprise the audience with the guessing of "who's next?"
Despite being a revision of the classic tale, this movie still stands well enough on its own to be a decent thriller with an interesting plot. I would say though, you do see the ending coming long before it actually comes if you pay attention.
Not the best, but still decent.
Kingdom of Heaven (2005)
Kingdom of Boredom
What is Jerusalem worth? Not much in this epic. With men such as Liam Neeson, Orlando Bloom, and Jeremy Irons playing the lead roles, one would belief this to be possibly one of the better of the recent epic piles of big-budget scrapheaps, such as the lackluster King Arthur or downright-awful Alexander. This assumption, however, is wrong. Kingdom of Heaven is two hours and about 25 minutes in length. It is only those last twenty five minutes that are actually devoted to the battle for Jerusalem; The rest is random clips strung together with the hope of converting a few years into two hours, which rarely ever works. The editing of this story is the main problem in addition to the lack of flow to the tale. Jumping from some European country then heading west to where the men speak Italian then heading further on to where they speak something, the story's structure is like a ten year old recalling his or her history lesson for the entire school semester in a minute.
Orlando Bloom, whose father is played by one of the better actors in this movie, meets up with dear old dad to go on a crusade only to have dear old dad get mortally wounded. Jump forward around who knows how many months to the group at Messina with Neelson clinging to life. From here, Bloom is knighted and heads to Israel to take over his dead daddy's business, protecting the king. The trip from Messina to Israel is summed up in one bad, stormy night in which his tiny ship is destroyed and capsized. Bloom wakes up perfectly fine on the beaches of Israel. Upon walking through the mountains of his drowned comrades, he discovers the only other survivor, a black steed. The steed, trapped in one large, almost untouched section of the ship which the rest of litters the beach like the fallen comrades, runs off shortly after being freed only to be captured later on after Bloom's short (one scene) romp through the desert to an oasis. Then the first duel of the movie ensues and Bloom's character moves on to Jersualem. Finally, after months and months of... wait, it's only been a little more than twenty minutes?
Ignoring the movie magic of cutting out the mundaneness of the journey, the story would be fine. Unfortunately, Scott decided to spend another twenty minutes on Bloom, who is now a Barron, and his newly inherited lands as they dig for water. This attempt at building up Bloom's character as a man of the people is actually played out in almost every scene the man is in. Had Scott spent more time on Bloom's character's struggle with the fact he's in Jersualem for forgiveness for his wife and his sins and not on Bloom hooking up with the King's sister and having some random kid interrupt him every few scenes, then the movie would have been a bit less dull and dry like the desert in which it is placed.
The battles are all very small, ranging from a duel to a small band of men versus another small band, up until the final battle for Jersualem. Ridley Scott, for some reason, decided to tempt the viewers with both the army of Christians and the army of Muslims under Saladin - played one of the other better than Bloom actors, Ghassan Massoud - meeting in full fledged battle gear outside of Kerak only to agree to part ways in order to keep the struggling peace. Eventually, the king dies from leprosy and the new king Guy De Lusignan, played by Marton Csokas, takes over. Guy wants war and so he sends out the Templars to start war because God wills it. Well, apparently Scott willed it that the actual battle between army of Christians and the Army of Muslims would not be seen as he only has the aftermath shown through the eyes of Bloom's character. To call this movie an epic about the second Crusade and not show the most important part of the crusade and instead spend time on digging up water is just like putting a toy car in a monster truck rally; the outcome isn't pretty.
To be far to Scott as he did bring us Gladiator, Scott does include several scenes reminiscent of his last epic as well as gives an interesting final battle that rivals any LOTR battle in any of the three, but to have just this battle in the movie and for it to be two hours and 25 minutes is inexcusable. The movie was actually an hour and a half, but with all the needless kids running and random people running around instead of focusing on just the main characters the movie became longer. Ridley Scott, although providing us with the best epic thus far in the recent years, fails to deliver another Gladiator. Jeremy Irons tells Bloom's character that there is no need for real knights in Jersualem just like there is no need to see this movie unless you're in need of sleep.