Big Hero 6 (2014)

4/5

Big Hero 6 is a wonderfully enjoyable animated film by Disney. Much of the film centers around the relationship between Hiro (Potter), a young technophile and "bot fighter," and his older brother Tadachi (Henney), an engineering student at a futuristic tech institute. Tadachi has created a health-focused robot called Baymax (Adsit), but Hiro is less than impressed at the huggable marshmallow of a machine. After a catastrophe at the institute's tech fair, Hiro must join up with a band of misfit superheroes to protect the city from a nefarious villain.

The same production company behind Frozen makes essentially its action-oriented counterpart, focusing on brotherly love in the context of a superhero world instead of a princess fairytale. It features similar themes and predictable plot points, but the repetition surprisingly does nothing to take away from the overall experience. Disney films are never really about shocking audiences with plot twists but about wowing them with stellar storytelling and magical details. Big Hero 6 delights--it's adorable, exciting, and fun--and is another big win for Disney.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2245084/

The Artist (2011)

2/5

Michel Hazanavicius's The Artist is an interesting film. It is (almost entirely) a silent film, about the transition from silent film to talking moving pictures, similar to Singin' in the Rain. George Valentin (Dujardin) is the silent film star and Peppy Miller (Bejo) is the rising new talent. As Peppy continues her ascension to the top by embracing the future, Valentin inevitably loses his fame and fortune by his refusal to give in to what he sees as a passing fad. Valentin sees all of his wealth auctioned off and is eventually pushed to the brink of suicide.

The story is deeper than it seems at first. One could look at it with the lens of gender politics. It serves as an allegory for the emasculation of man, as well as the rise of the powerful woman and feminism as a whole. One could also look at it with the lens of revolution. It is about anything and everything in life that is affected by the unending onslaught of technological advances. We saw it with talking pictures, with color film, and perhaps we are seeing it now with 3D movies. But it is about any revolution, not just in movies and not just with technology. It is about men clinging to their past glory and failing to fully grasp the threat of change.

But just because a movie has a lot to say doesn't mean it's good. I came into the theater knowing nothing about the film, not even that it was silent, and I think that was a mistake. I felt increasingly claustrophobic in the theater, as if I was taking off in an airplane and my ears weren't popping. The pressure kept building up and building up in my head as I waited for someone to make a sound, but the oppressive silence continued. I understand why Hazanavicius chose to make it silent, and indeed there are two phenomenal scenes that derive their power from the silence (the nightmare sequence and the "BANG!" at the end), but I just couldn't take it.

I don't know what it was about this movie, because I love silent films that were made in that era, but I just could not tolerate this one. It already had the difficult task competing with Singin' in the Rain in content, and starting the movie off in silence drew comparisons to how The Wizard of Oz started off in monochrome. (Also, there is a scene where Peppy sticks her arm in the sleeve of a hanging jacket and pretends it is a man hugging her that I am sure was stolen for another movie, but I can't remember which, and I find that irritating for some reason.)

All in all, this is a movie that takes a chance by using silence, and does so to great effect, but which may easily alienate some viewers. I don't quite know how to explain my bad experience, but I am sure others will be better able to appreciate this film for what it is.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1655442/

W. (2008)

2/5

Oliver Stone's W. claims to be an honest representation of the former President in the hopes of dismantling years of misconceptions, both positive and negative, but is instead a ludicrous farce filled with exaggerations and caricatures. The movie goes back and forth between history and the present, starting with his time in office and intercutting with past events that led him there (including random, unrelated ones). I can imagine this was done for no other reason than to make up for lacking transitions and storyline inconsistencies. There is no progression or escalation, merely event after event after event, which makes the 2 hour runtime laboriously slow. (I thought it was nearing the end before 90 minutes in.) And each vignette is only hinted at, nothing is fleshed out, so we are left with a frustratingly inadequate and incomplete picture of a man nobody really cares about anymore. Not only that, but the rest of the screen is filled with people who are more focused on their horrific accents than their characters, which turn out to be flatter than their real counterparts (and those I've only seen in stilted TV announcements).

The one redeeming factor is the humor that is infused in this film, although I'm not sure it was all intentional. Because everything is so extreme, it is also preposterous to the point of comedy. The movie cannot be taken seriously anymore. Dick Cheney is a raving, power-hungry, egomaniacal lunatic--weren't we trying to dispel myths and prejudices? Condoleezza Rice is, for some bizarre reason, an uglier, female version of Neil Goldman from Family Guy. Below I have included a clip with Neil Goldman; as you watch it, just imagine Thandie Newton in disfiguring makeup prosthetics talking to Bush, and you have the movie W. Don't watch this movie; it's a waste of time.



IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1175491/

The Queen (2006)

2/5

What a way to bring in the New Year than with a terrible movie, as is my usual habit. The Queen is supposed to be a stunning character study of Queen Elizabeth following Princess Diana's sudden death, but it ended up being a bland, plotless, meandering mess. It failed as a character study, since it spent surprisingly little time on the Queen and much more time on Tony Blair, her family, her aide, and their influences on her. I found her character to be rather shallow and uninteresting; she was merely a puppet that was being pushed and pulled by different people without fleshed-out characteristics that make her an individual. Subject-wise, it failed to interest me and did not even take the time to explain the characters and their motivations--its audience is limited to only those most interested in the Princess Diana controversy. The acting on all parts was amateurish and camera-shy, although it may be the fault of the director using poor takes. The editing was absolutely atrocious; it was almost as if they used Windows Movie Maker to do it. The music was so uninsightful and melodramatic that the realism was completely removed. In using archival footage, however, they attempted to mimic the realistic feel of United 93, but that movie succeeded on many more levels to bringing home the impact and the raw realism inherent in the depiction of true events.

The ending was surprisingly better than expected. Instead of ending on a simple, sappy note with Elton John singing Candle in the Wind, it added an epilogue scene that both gave its characters much more complexity and made a full turn-around and brought it back to the start (something I am quite fond of). The symbolism of the stag was interesting and worth analyzing. Also, the title shot gave me great expectations for the film (even though they did not live up to them). Wholly unrecommended, unless of course you are extremely entrenched in Diana pathos.

IMDb link: http://imdb.com/title/tt0436697/