MovieComment

Tropic Thunder

Posted by Player under Comedy

The war movie is as classic as the war novel, but just because something is classic, does not mean we can’t make fun of it. I suppose Ben Stiller had that in mind when he put together this satire of a movie about making a movie of a war movie. Together with Jack Black, Robert Downey Jr., Nic Nolte, and even Tom Cruise, Stiller tells the hardship of Hollywood actors trying to survive the physical dangers of acting and the emotional heartbreaks of not being able to cry on camera or have a real friend.

Stiller plays the action star whose acting abilities are in doubt and whose time in the spotlight is quickly fading, while Downey Jr. plays the talented actor who has no real friends in real life. Everything goes astray, once their director places them in harm’s way, in order to save the film from being a catastrophe. Too bad the drug dealers do not play along and end up capturing Stiller and holding him ransom. What ensues is a series of great explosions, out of Rambo II and Platoon, and eventually Jack Black in his underwear, screaming “My Ass!!!”.

Overall, Tropic Thunder is not the greatest movie ever made, but if you ever saw a war action movie in the last two decades, you’ll laugh at the satire that shows up in this movie.

Spider-Man 2

Posted by Player under Action

The biggest summer movie of 2004 is definitely Spider-Man 2. On its opening day alone, it made a cool $30 million! But is it worth the hype? Well, yes!

In this film, we get to meet Peter Parker, the struggling college student and moonlighting super hero. He is well on his way to a nervous breakdown as he can’t seem to keep a job or keep up with his school work. On top of this he knows his relationship with Mary Jane Watson is falling apart. In total, his personal life is really in shambles and this starts to effect his superpowers as well.

He gets to meet a brilliant scientist, Octavious, who is transformed into the evil Doc Oct by an experiment that goes wrong. Together, the two have some very amazing battles, which all lead up to a final confrontation, with MJ being once again the beautiful maiden in distress.

In all there’s a lot of action, a lot of story, and some humor thrown in as Peter Parker’s life is anything but glamorous.

As to what not to like about the film:

For any kid, there really is not anything. This is really a kids film. The action is very cool to kids and the love story is interesting for adults, and everything else is just a little too over the top or make-believe. The fusion experiment does not make sense, in fact most things about Doc Oct don’t really work in the real world, and so the comic book aspect of the movie is pretty solid. In other words, this world does not exist, but its problems do come across as being very real. We all have doubts, we all fail, and so in a sense we may not live in Spider-Man’s world, but we do relate very well to Peter Parker.

Some fans will surely point out that the unmasking of Spider-Man was not necessary, but in the real world of Peter Parker, it does. You can’t keep lieing to the ones you love, right?

There was a couple of times where I thought I was watching The Matrix, specifically in the train scene, where Spider-Man is carried, and with the whole heroes speech, which is cheesy and reminded me of Morpheous’s War speech in Reloaded.

As for the technical aspects of the film, the film could not look any better. Danny Elfman provides yet again another interesting and diverse soundtrack, which is neither harsh nor out of step with the scene.

In the end you have to give it to Hollywood for finally coming up with a film that appeals to almost every age group and taste.

Hidalgo

Posted by Player under Drama

I kind of compared this movie to Tom Cruise in The Last Samurai, cause the story lines are similar, but overall I liked Hidalgo better than Last Samurai.

Hidalgo is the name of the horse, a wild mustang, which Frank Hopkins races in the race of all races. As part Native American Indian, Hopkins is conflicted in the beginning of the story, as his actions help lead to the massacre of Indians at Wounded Knee, it is at this time that he and his horse are challenged to enter the 3000 mile race in the middle east.

Hopkins arrives as the only American to enter a race where only the fastest and best stallions ride and where most men do not even survive the race. Hopkins is befriended by the Skiek’s daughter as he tries to learn the rigid culture of Arabs as well as avoid the pitfalls of a 3000 mile race through the desert.

Viggo Mortensen of LordofTheRings fame plays Hopkins and the rest of the cast is very well casted, so the film is very well acted. But I must confess that I can hardly hear what Hopkins is saying half the time. Mortensen plays Hopkins as a quiet American, and as a man of few words.

Visuals throughout the movie look very authentic (with the excepton of CGI scenes, like the leopard scene), but I often wondered if they could have been better. The grandness of a 3000 mile trek through the desert, could lend itself to some very cool backgrounds, but somehow the film delivers only a few.

For the audio, the DVD includes a 5.1 DTS track that is as good as it gets for a drama/action film. Some surround effects though are pretty impressive, even in the first opening scene even.

In the end, I thought Hidalgo was a pretty good film, nicely made, and nicely performed. The story may be more fiction, than truth, but the sometimes it’s really all about the moral of the story, and as movies go these days, this film has a pretty good moral at the end.

Lagaan

Posted by Player under Foreign

Lagaan: The Musical Cricket Saga

Lagaan is the word given for the tax which villages in India had to pay the British colonial army, during its occupation. It is also the title of this foreign film. Let me just say, that if you have never seen or heard of India’s long standing tradition of film, you might want to make this movie your first introduction to the musical and colorful world of Indian films. Most younger Americans think of Disney when hearing the word Musical, but in fact America has a long tradition of musicals, and so if you don’t like musicals don’t watch Indian films, cause Lagaan and other Indian films are about music and dance, singing and celebrating.

The plot is pretty simple, the evil British captain dares a daring villager to play him in a game of cricket (the most boring sport of all time). If the “darkies” beat his British team, he will forgive them their lagaan for a full 3 years. Since it has not rained at all, the village is starving and cannot afford to pay the tax, so Buvan, the lead Indian villager accepts the challenge and then has to convince his village that they can win, then train them, then play the game. In between there is a love triangle between Buvan and Ghauri (the Indian hottie), and Elizabeth (the uptight but caring British hottie). They both want Buvan, but they will have to wait for the game of Cricket is all that matters now to Buvan.

The film has excellent color and very little noise in the video can be seen. The audio side is in digital surround, but this movie takes very little advantage of. The only audio track is in the native language with English or French subtitles. There is some English spoken in the movie by the British actors, so you can follow along sometimes without subtitles.

This is probably the longest movie I’ve ever watched recently. It seemed like it took 4 hours. Every time I thought it was done, they started to sing again and dance. The women have very high pitched voices, so definitely you have to get into the songs. The cricket game takes place in the second part of the movie and it is longer than most baseball games I’ve seen!

In the end I learned a lot about Indian film, native story telling, and of course why I hate cricket and most British people who play it. It is rather surprising that Ted Koppel, a native Englishman, hates baseball, but comes from a country that can play such a long and boring game as cricket.