Snow White and The Huntsman

Thank god for good casting. Because without it, this film would have dragged on for even longer than it did and this isn’t a particularly long film. It’s just over two hours, but it felt closer to two and a half with how it came out. But that is not to say that the film is all bad, far from it indeed, but there was a lot that could have been trimmed here, or changed with quicker editing in parts.

Potential spoilers from this point on.

As mentioned earlier, the casting of the primary cast is the biggest draw of the film, as well as its biggest strength. For the second time this summer Chris Hemsworth delivers a great “heroic” performance as the titular Huntsman, Eric. In other less capable hands, this could have come across as a blocky character that switches from initial comedic fool, to more than capable warrior to finally being a sort of love interest, a very loose one at that. But in Hemsworth’s portrayal we get a complete character that plays all these parts simultaneously.

Charlize Theron and Kristen Stewart, like Hemsworth bring a complete character to the screen, rising above the scripts’ sluggish pace and obvious dialogue that cuts through the film. Theron’s queen is genuinely dangerous and offers the film a level of threat that most of these kind of films sadly lack and as a result make the ending all the more predictable. But considering how well known this story is and no doubt the chance of a sequel now likely, whacking either Snow White or the Huntsman would have been a stupid business decision.  Back to the performances, Stewart offers a performance that is light years ahead of her Twilight films (although I have only seen the first and third, I think) where she is restricted to dull ham fisted scene’s, but here she thrives on the scenes where she has a chance for decent character interaction and development, most often with Theron of Hemsworth.

The basic story for the film is that Snow White’s father, the king, is seduced by Ravena (Theron), who he then marries but is murdered by on his wedding night, allowing her men to storm the castle and take Snow White captive. Ravena then declares herself queen and rules the land for the next decade, ruining the land as she “feeds” on the young women of the land to stay young. Years later and with the knowledge that by taking Snow White’s beauty and youth she will be stay young forever, she sends her (creepy looking) brother to bring her to him, but as he does, Snow White escapes and makes her way into the dark forest. It’s at this point that the Huntsman is brought in. in exchange for bringing his wife back from the dead, all he has to do is deliver Snow White. All of this happens in the first ten-fifteen minutes of the film, so the stakes and basic premise is quickly established before we are straight into the main part of the film.

Another positive of the film is it’s look, offering up a good mix of real and CGI based characters and locations, Sanders has created a complete world, one that has different looks and regions depending on where the characters go, which is essential for any fantasy based film or narrative.

However, as previously mentioned, where the film comes unstuck and falters is in the second act when the plot slows down, this could be either through the writing or the editing, which is more a possible reason. There a number of action sequences, although most of them are just standard chase scenes, where Snow White and The Huntsman are fleeing Ravenna’s men which can grow tiresome with no variety to the sequences. Only a short one on one fight with a troll offers anything different until the siege on the castle finale.

Know normally I am not one for tacked on romantic sub plots, but Snow White and The Huntsman sure could have used one. A childhood friend, William, who meet at the beginning, but who then disappears for the next forty minutes, to only then again appear sporadically through the rest of the film, seems to have been set up as some kind of red herring of a love interest, but ultimately comes off as an expendable character who offers very little in terms of character or plot. The Huntsman would have been a more fitting romantic interest, but due to his past, he is unable to truly fulfil that role, which meant that as a result the script had written itself into a hole, as neither man could have been used to be the love interest. One was too minor a character and the others past forbid him from doing it.

I was disappointed by this film in the end, I had high hopes for it given the cast and the mature tone that it had according to the trailers. It needed to either lose ten to twenty minutes, or gain the same amount to flesh out some of the supporting characters, William in particular and also give us more back story on what happened during the decade or so that Ravenna was in control.

Definitely worth a trip to the cinema, just don’t expect a great story.

Prometheus

Spoilers ahead, you have been warned!

It’s definitely set in the same universe as the other Alien films (I’m not including the AVP films, as they have their own continuity), and has aspects from them that help to anchor in that universe. But whether it’s a direct prequel to Alien or just set in the world of it, has been something of puzzler given the conflicting statements from both Ridley Scott, Michael Fassbender and other cast members. Having seen it a few days ago, I think I have got a grips on where it stands in regard to the series and primarily Alien and the events both preceding it and following it.

Prometheus, as far as I take it, acts as both an origin theory for mankind, and in the smaller scale, an origin of how the xenomorphs (the series primary antagonists) came into existence, as it is clear from the outset of this film, that they were engineered as a biological weapon, and a pretty efficient one going off what they get up to in the future. As for the origin of mankind, the opening sequence (or prologue, depending on your personal taste) offers up an alternative theory, with one of the engineers sacrificing himself to create life on what is almost certainly Earth.

I wouldn’t give a blow by blow account of the film’s story, but following on the prologue, we are introduced to our heroine Dr Elizabeth Shaw (Noomi Rapace), an archaeologist who is searching for the creation of life (I think, but I could be wrong on this point), but finds evidence pertaining to the engineers and shortly after, her and the rest of the crew of the ship, also called Prometheus, are heading towards LV-223. Not the fabled, and possibly the worst holiday destination in cinema history, LV-426.

Like the core Alien films, we follow a selection of the crew, focusing on their stories and developments, and keeping the others in background (to be sacrificed when it is called for). These main characters are the aforementioned Rapace, Michael Fassbender as the android (a perfect piece of casting), Idris Elba as the ship’s captain Janek, Charlize Theron as the Weyland Industries executive, and Logan Marshall-Green as Rapace’s colleague and “love interest”. Of these, the stand out is, as usual, Michael Fassbender as David, who along with Shaw are the films central characters, once again the Alien series has avoided using the traditional heroic male character, instead of two unlikely, but interesting characters. A doctor and an android.  David, occupies the position of being both inferior, and yet superior to his shipmates, acting as both the human to the crew’s engineers, and also being the engineer at the same time, firm is his superiority and coldness when it comes to decisions and experiments. Prometheus is in all honestly, watching just for Fassbender’s David.

Visually, this film is stunning, as all Ridley Scott’s films, and makes you wonder what Alien would have look like with this budget and freedom, but perhaps that film would have suffered for it. Prometheus however, does not, the glorious claustrophobic interiors of the dome, hark back to the darker parts of the Nostromo, and the basements from LV-426, while giving us a scale and history that adds to the previous films. Showing what happened to the engineers, and the birth of the xenomorphs.

Some people will be unhappy that it doesn’t dovetail nicely with Alien, but I am not one of them, this films acts as fork in the road, in one direction we get Alien, Aliens, etc, the history of the xenomorphs and Ripley. Where as the other direction will hopefully take us off into the direction of the history of both the engineers and more ideas about the creation of humanity. Did it need more action and facehugging action? Maybe, but I found the bigger questions and ideas it raised more interesting than seeing someone torn to pieces. Not that there are no horror moments, there are three genuine, squirm in your seat moments, one features the classic sc-fi convention of the excess crew members in the wrong place, at the wrong time. The second is a brilliant, tense piece of self preservation and on the spot surgery that even Dr Nick wouldn’t be so hasty to get started, and the final is a struggle, in very close proximity featuring all three species.

Ignore the negative comments, and go and experience this film in the cinema where it is at it’s best. My only piece of advice, is don’t go in expecting a carbon copy of Alien, because you will let a great, thought provoking film pass you by.

Men In Black 3

I remember when the first Men in Black came out, and I saw it on VHS, I enjoyed the hell out of it, and looked forward to the next one which again I saw on video or maybe on TV, but anyway, I wasn’t exactly over enthused by it, it just seemed to lack something, or maybe try and follow the formula of the previous film to closely. Fast forward to now, and the basic story of the film, I’ll get to it later, is something much more interesting and shows the series embracing the more technological side of the science fiction universe that these characters inhabit.

Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith reprise their roles as the series protagonists, agent’s J and K, picking up where they have left off, with great on screen chemistry, powered forward by zipping, witty dialogue. Whilst due to story reasons, I’ll get to that soon, I promise, Will Smith has more screen time, Jones’ character and portrayal of K is the main motivation for both Smith and the story, giving the character a more vulnerable side to him, than we have seen in the previous two films. Smith is on top comedic form as he interacts with various alien and human characters, especially in the period of the film set in 1969.

Josh Brolin is the main addition to the series, playing a much younger K, in 1969, a performance which hits perfectly, avoiding the potential risk of it becoming nothing more than an impersonation of Jones’ older version. Instead he plays him amusingly, giving the character a more rounded performance, capable of being happy, and showing it. A fact that J frequently points out, and calls him upon. This films villain is probably the most sinister, but also the most entertaining, played by Jermaine Clement, Boris the Animal is first humanoid(loosely speaking) villain that we have seen, and one who is both intentionally funny and unintentionally funny at the same time, sporting a Macho Man Randy Savage look.. A roaring stand off between him and an early version is one of the films witty moments, not featuring J and K.

The basic plot of the film, is that Boris the Animal escapes from Lunar Max (a prison on the jail) and manages to travel back in time and kill K before he can stop him and arrest him. From there on we follow J as he follows Boris back in time to stop him from killing K. The film manages to keep the time travel aspects both simple and easy too understand, as well as using it in clever, complicated ways to give us some new uses for the theoretical technology.

Humour has always been one of the driving forces in the Men in Black series, the first one had some great physical and dialogue based comedic moments, shared equally by J and K, as well as the other supporting characters and villains. The second fell short, because it didn’t have the amount or overall quality and diversity of jokes. Almost all of the humour comes from either J or K. But this third sees some what of a return to the diverse humour of the first, although the first act is at times somber and very foreboding, there are still streaks and promises of what is come. But it truly starts after the jump back into 1969, the clash of cultures between J and a younger K offer up some of the highlights, along with a scene with Andy Warhol and two policemen who take, somewhat of a dislike to J, are probably the comedic highlights of the film.

Men in Black 3 is a return to the form of the first film, bringing back the laughs and adding more a personal stake to the story than the two previous films. The ending of this film, undoubtedly has more emotional weight than the previous two films, and in a way ties the whole series together. I thoroughly enjoyed the film, because I was surprised with how much fun I had with it. Compared with the other films of the summer, this may not be one of the big events, but it’s certainly worth a trip to the summer. Tonally, I imagine it will sit closer to The Avengers than The Dark Knight Rises or Prometheus, and stands up as a classic enjoyable summer blockbuster.