Into the Woods (2014)

Tuesday, 2 December 2014Wednesday, 3 December 2014 Starr1 Comment

Last night, I got to watch an early screening of Disney’s Into the Woods, the adaptation of the Tony-award winning musical by Steven Sondheim.

First of all, I do need to say that I watched the original Broadway run of Into the Woods in class back in middle school. It was a long time ago, so all it really means is that I am familiar with the story and the songs. I would not call myself a die-hard fan but it does remain one of my favorite musicals.

That being said, I thought the movie was a pretty faithful adaptation of the stage version! It wasn’t going to be perfect, by any means, especially because Disney adapted it. As most musicals go, there are some less-than-G-rated moments in Into the Woods. During development, we heard a lot of rumors of songs getting cut for being too Disney-inappropriate, like “Hello, Little Girl” and “Any Moment”, but those songs both made it into the movie. There were a few plot changes, which I’ll go over in the spoilers section below the trailer.

For my spoiler-free portion of this, I do highly recommend you see this if:

You like the original musical
You like musicals in general
You like fairy tales
You like fairy tale crossovers
You like after ever-after fairy tale stories
You like any of the cast members
You like laughter

Even though Into the Woods can get a little dark a times, it is a really funny show, so expect to laugh. A lot. Comedic timing was done REALLY well, it definitely translated very well to screen. That was key for me, because I mostly remember laughing along with this show and I laughed a lot during the movie.

I do need to say things about this movie that bothered me a little:

Maybe it was because of how close I was to the screen for this viewing, but the sound seemed a bit off. Some of the sound was WAY too loud but the rest of it was normal so I don’t know what went on. Let’s just say I definitely would not nominate them for a Best Sound Mixing Academy Award if that’s how they’re going to release the film.
Some of the camera work was distracting. Tracking a character shouldn’t be something noticeable but I noticed and it distracted me. If you can’t track your actors properly then don’t do such a tight shot. Zoom out so that they have more freedom to move about the frame. I usually don’t notice things like that but I did here and that’s kind of the problem. (I did appreciate a lot of their framing, though.)

Some [spoiler-free] casting notes:

Johnny Depp as the Wolf was pretty perfect. What can I say, he’s really good at playing creepy dudes. (See Pirates of the Caribbean, Willy Wonka, etc.) Even though his screentime was tragically limited (I am so not used to him not being the star of his films, I realize), he really made the most of it. The Wolf is a fun character and adding Johnny Depp’s special flavor of fun to the Wolf’s fun was pretty perfect. He has this great command of the screen when he appears, and easily his few minutes were some of the best minutes of the entire movie. Just because we are used to him playing these interesting characters does NOT mean it does not require great talent for him to do so. I don’t know, I am talking a lot about an actor who is on-screen for less than 10 minutes but everything is SO deliberate about his performance. Every movement, every look, every note he sings. It’s all extremely deliberate and intentional and really perfect for this role.
Meryl Streep can do no wrong, so obviously she was a fantastic Witch. There’s not much else I can say because we all know she’s awesome and amazing. The Witch is one of the MOST key characters in Into the Woods, and obviously Meryl made carrying a film look effortless. And you know, even though I don’t naturally think of Meryl for musicals, she does have a really expressive voice. “Stay With Me” was done so so well.
Chris Pine did great as Cinderella’s Prince, although I’ll admit that it doesn’t seem to be much of a challenge for him to play charming-to-a-fault types. (See Princess Diaries 2 and his Kirk in the Star Trek films.) But charming-to-a-fault is exactly what this role calls for and he delivers what he delivers best. Also, I didn’t know he was much of a singer until he was cast in this role and found out via this interview that he has a lovely singing voice. Pine Nuts, go crazy, this is Chris Pine gold.
To be totally honest, I thought that Anna Kendrick wasn’t really able to shine in her role as Cinderella. I absolutely adore her as an actress and as a person (I mean, have you seen her Twitter?) but this role felt so stifling in my opinion. It fell a bit flat for me. Even her songs just didn’t have that oomph that I was expecting from her. Most of all, I felt that she just wasn’t very expressive in this film. Both her face and her voice are very expressive but I didn’t get much of that in this movie.
Just have to share that I love that Lucy Punch plays a stepsister in this because she ALSO plays one of the stepsisters in Ella Enchanted. Apparently, it is the role she was destined to play. She’s great. Again, not much screentime, but she makes the most of it.
Left: Lucy Punch (center) as Hattie in Ella Enchanted
Right: Lucy Punch (left) as Lucinda in Into the Woods

Also, the stepmother and stepsisters had AMAZING outfits for the ball. Ohmygosh, where can I get a black and gold gown like those?
Daniel Huttlestone is really making a name for himself in these musical film-adaptations. You might know him as Gavroche from Les Miserables and he plays Jack (of beanstalk-fame) here. Really good voice on this one, and I love what he does with his facial expressions. Looking forward to seeing more of him.
I liked James Corden in his role as the Baker. It reminds me of his Doctor Who role as Craig in that he’s this sincere but kind of clueless guy with a baby. (Stormageddon, Dark Lord of All!) While I remember Chip Zien as this kind of scrawny guy playing the Baker, it makes sense to have a guy like James Corden play him.

(Character posters courtesy of International Business Times)

One thing to note about casting is that, for the stage version, there is a lot more dramatic irony with double casting of characters. For example, the Prince and the Wolf are played by the same actor, which makes their behavior make more sense when you realize it is essentially the same. These things get lost in the movie. Just like how we lost our Narrator and the Mystery Man. BUT of course, when you translate to film, you take advantage of talent wherever you can and you simplify things.

Overall, really solid and good movie, perfect for the holiday season. I’d give it 4.5/5 stars.

Here’s the trailer for Into the Woods, in theaters on December 25th. Definitely catch it when you can!

Big Hero 6 (2014)

Friday, 7 November 2014Saturday, 20 December 2014 Starr4 Comments

Last week, I was able to see Disney’s newest animated feature, Big Hero 6 early in theaters.

Me and Baymax! I’m dressed a bit like Gogo Tomago and worked hard to get her makeup look down, which you can’t see at all in this photo but it came out pretty well, lemme tell ya.

Basically, it was amazing fantastic awesome spectacular. This is kind of a longer review, but it gets a full 5/5 100% recommend you watch it for the following reasons:

Fantastic characters
Beautiful animation
Great promotion of the sciences
Fun story and funnier lines

I have been waiting for this movie for over a year now. No, really. (It’s not easy being a Disnerd. The wait for Moana is agonizing as well.) This is Disney Animation’s first go with a Marvel property and it’s pretty great.

Let’s look at our cast of characters first, because that’s really where this movie just comes alive.

From L to R: Fred, GoGo Tomago, Baymax, Hiro, Honey Lemon, Wasabi

These are our 6 heroes. Let’s meet them, shall we?

Hiro Hamada (voiced by Ryan Potter) is the protagonist of our film. He’s 14-years-old and a casual robotics prodigy. We get a really good feel of his personality in the opening scene, where he’s at an [illegal] underground robot fight. As a character, there is a lot of depth to Hiro that I really really loved. Seriously classic example of how to put a character through hardships and see him pull through. He’s a teenager at the cusp of puberty, so he’s awkward and sassy and kind but selfish. He’s many things and that complexity is SO delicious because it makes him more real without making him too real. (I tend to dislike characters who are TOO realistically flawed.) I also really want to talk about his family, but just know that Hiro’s relationship with his brother and his aunt are really special.

Meet Baymax, our adorable squishy character. THIS is how you do a non-human sidekick. (Note: I hate Olaf from Frozen.) Baymax is squishy and chock full o’ comic relief because he is a robot and doesn’t understand our zany human ways! I’ll admit, I was skeptical of Baymax because it seemed like an Olaf-esque ploy to just push out merchandise and have a recognizable character for the franchise. But he’s completely terrific.

Gogo Tomago (voiced by Jamie Chung) is one of my favorite characters in this movie. First of all, I’m always thrilled when more Asian characters are added to the Disneyverse and Gogo Tomago is everything we could have asked for. She’s a no-nonsense butt-kicker who is, as with the rest of the team, also really smart. She works with electromagnetic disks (that you see her wearing above) and chews gum. Also PURPLE. She’s awesome, everything about her just screams cool.

Wasabi (No Ginger?) (voiced by Damon Wayans Jr.) is also a really fun character. He’s the biggest hero of the team (besides Baymax, of course), but he has this really funny neuroticism that makes him maybe too relate-able, personally speaking. He seems like the most real-world-esque character. He gets freaked out flying over the city, he is scared of creepy abandoned warehouses, he doesn’t like his workspace being disturbed because he has a system goshdarnit! He’s also wicked awesome with lasers.

Honey Lemon (voiced by Génesis Rodriguez) is a bubbly and cute character (although her accent was inconsistent in a way that I found slightly distracting). She is also really kind, and that is not really shoved down your throat too much, which is great. She’s just an overall sweetie and her love for chemistry is adorable.

Oh Fred Zilla (voiced by T. J. Miller) is easily one of the most fun characters in this entire movie. The only hero in our group who is not a genius student at SFIT, he is the mascot and dreams of being a fire-breathing dragon. So the team uses science to make that a reality. I usually don’t like characters like Fred too much (think Shaggy from Scooby Doo) because they’re a little TOO laidback and TOO silly. But BH6 did a really great job of making him likable for me.

Tadashi Hamada (voiced by Daniel Henney) (“I thought he sounded hot!” – my friend) is Hiro’s lovely older brother. Like brother like brother, he is the robotics specialist in the group of nerds at SFIT and built Baymax to be a healthcare robot and help people. His powerful desire to help other people is, again, not overdone but it really does affect everything he does. He saves his brother from an illegal robot fight, he gently encourages to use his genius for more noble pursuits, and more. It’s difficult not to really adore his character, I think because I’m just such a sucker for really beautiful families.

Speaking of beautiful families, this is Aunt Cass (voiced by Maya Rudolph) (but Tumblr says she looks like the animators used Tina Fey for a reference model). It’s not really explored much in the movie, but Hiro and Tadashi’s parents are dead and she is their guardian. She does the best she can and it really shows, just how much she loves her two boys. She works really hard to support them in their endeavors, runs a cute cafe, and is just such a cute and fun and loving character. She’s easily one of my favorite characters in this movie.

There are so many things I love about this movie. One is how appealing it makes getting a STEM (Science Technology Engineering Math) education. The heroes are all engineering geniuses, more or less. They attend a “nerd school” where they are changing the world. One of my favorite moments in this movie is when Tadashi, Hiro’s older brother who is a student at San Fransokyo Institute of Technology, shows Hiro what he can be doing with his genius. I really think that Big Hero 6 will inspire so many children to look into studying science and engineering. It’s going to be amazing and I’m so happy that Disney has really been pushing this with lots of innovation-themed contests for kids. Amazing.

Also, can I just say WOWOWOWOWOWOW to the animation team? The animation in this movie was absolutely beautiful.

I can’t find too many examples online but I remember, even as I was watching, just being stupendously impressed with the attention to detail and the framing and WOW. Just visually, this is SUCH a stunning film.

I also think this is one of Disney’s funniest movies of late. I just found myself laughing so much because the screenwriters made such good use of awkward silence, omission, physical humor, puns, etc. You’ve probably seen scenes like this online already, and it is definitely one of the moments that shows you how funny of a character Baymax can be right here in his introduction:

Too good. Toooooooo good.

Please please please please go watch this movie, I promise it will be well worth your time.

Spoilers below the trailer! (SRS SPOILERS)

Feast (2014)

Tuesday, 4 November 2014Saturday, 20 December 2014 Starr1 Comment

Before I tell you guys about Big Hero 6, which I got to see last week at a groovy early screening, I really want to talk to you guys about Disney’s newest animated short: Feast.

Feast stars this adorable pup:

This cutie is Winston! He has a beautifully adorable appetite.

What the teaser doesn’t show is that this isn’t just a short about a dog who loves to eat. It’s also about his bystander perspective on the love story involving the kind man who takes him home one day.

I felt such an intense roller coaster of emotions watching Feast. Maybe it’s because I was just so darn excited to see both this short and the feature. I laughed, I cried. (No really, there were tears.)

What I really loved about Feast was just how much they were able to communicate in the background. Winston and his appetite is the main story, but the love story going on while he eats is told so beautifully and simply. The animation was great, too.

Really did a great job of setting the mood for the feature, Big Hero 6. I can’t wait to share my thoughts about BH6 with you.

You can catch Feast before Big Hero 6 in theaters this Friday.

Gone Girl (2014)

Tuesday, 7 October 2014Tuesday, 7 October 2014 Starr7 Comments

~~Thanks to Yelp, I was able to see an advanced screening of Gone Girl last night.~~ SO the advanced screening folks issued way too many tickets for the screening and I was turned away despite turning up really early. So mad. A lot of folks were mad. I was one of them. SO MAD. But I got to go to a theater with reclining seats (!!!) to watch with my parents today so it all turned out well in the end!

As per usual, I did not read this book before watching the movie. Long story short, I get to enjoy the movie without knowing how it’ll end or how it deviated from the book.

I like this poster, although it’s not what I expected because it looks almost nothing like the book cover.

I’ll admit, I didn’t understand why people were getting so excited about this movie. Not being part of a book fandom will do that to you, I guess. Reviews started pouring in and everyone was raving about the movie, so I went in with fairly high expectations. I’m also a really big fan of David Fincher, the director, so I was ready for a ride.

And boy did I get it.

What a roller coaster of emotions. With the greys between villain and victim, Gillian Flynn (author of the book and the screenwriter) paints this incredible portrait of how many people doing the wrong thing turns into a sh*tstorm, to say the least. The plot takes you for a ride, with plot twists cropping up every which way. It is really enjoyable if you haven’t read the novel, because then the twists really surprise you. There were several points near the middle/end of the film where I thought it was over but then BOOM MORE STUFF IS GOING ON, IT AIN’T OVER JUST YET.

What kind of man smiles at a press conference announcing that his wife is missing? A sociopath? A bundle of camera-shy nerves? Both? Neither?

Some spoiler-free points:

While I do love Fincher’s work, I would like to see him do more with color. He uses this muted color palette so often in his films (see The Social Network, Fight Club, Se7en, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, etc.) and I want to see him and his cinematographers play with COLOR more. Maybe I’ve just been spoiled by Zhang Yimou and Brian Fuller, but I think he can do it.
I like Ben Affleck in general as a person and as a director, but I’m really just not hot on him as an actor. I don’t know, he often plays these characters where things happen to him, which doesn’t require too much on his part as an actor, and even then it just falls short. I’m kind of over Ben Affleck as an actor, and I’m really curious about what he’ll bring to the table as Batman because… I don’t know, I always feel underwhelmed.
On the other hand, I really liked the casting of Rosamund Pike. I’ve only seen a few of her movies, and her characters usually don’t have too much depth in those movies. Bond girl. Bennett sister. But here, I got some new things from her, namely:
- An American accent, which is new to me and done well
- More depth and breadth to her character, which she also does well
- She is amazing in Gone Girl. She is about to become HUGE in Hollywood because of this role, and rightfully so.
Neil Patrick Harris does a great job in his role as the maybe stalker ex-boyfriend. He manages to play on the edge of concerned and obsessed so well. You never quite knew which he was, and that was extremely unnerving. Although it gets overlooked often, I think he did the same with Barney Stinson on How I Met Your Mother: you were never totally sure where he stood morally, and there was something about the way he carried himself where you felt at ease with him most of the time but in the back of your mind you worried about him because you knew deep down you couldn’t 100% predict his next move. So good.
Extra unnerving for me considering I haven’t seen in him a non-comedic role before. Nailed it so hard.

In fact, I would argue that what is great about Gone Girl, as is usually the case with many David Fincher films, is that it is really difficult to put a character in a box. Their moral character, as is the case with real people, is not clearly defined. These folks live in the greys between right and wrong, and the film was done in a way that, even as I was leaving the theater, I didn’t know who was the “good guy” or the “bad guy”. Add in the great unreliable narration written in by Gillian Flynn, as both the book and film are told from two characters at odds with each other and who are both, as most people are, unreliable… Plus, we have the craziness of the media as a big theme in this story, and I think that comes across so well. Some of the main antagonistic forces in this movie are the sensationalizing media and the mob mentality of the people who consume those media. MMM yes so good.

… I understand why there’s SO much buzz around this movie. It is good. You don’t know what the truth is. You realize that no character knows the truth either. You understand that the truth exists outside of any single person’s story. Messy stories don’t endings tied neatly in a bow. That’s how life is, and it’s unsettling and fantastically done.

Although I wouldn’t call it one of my favorite films, Gone Girl delivers so well on what it promised.
Rating:★★★★★ 5/5
Would I recommend watching it? Yes. (Please note that there is disturbing imagery in this film that is hard to get out of your head afterwards.)

Comments with spoilers below the trailer.

The Maze Runner (2014)

Friday, 19 September 2014Saturday, 20 December 2014 StarrLeave a comment

Thanks to Punch Drunk Critics, I was able to see an advance screening of The Maze Runner on Tuesday. I like Dylan O’Brien, and I know this is a[nother] popular YA dystopian novel trilogy, so I was really looking forward to seeing it and am really really glad I got to see it early.

The Maze Runner really delivers on action and I particularly liked taking a look at how these teenage boys have to figure out a way to coexist and keep each other alive in the society that they’ve been forced to create. It seems relatively utopian in that pre/post-technology way: everyone working together to make sure that the collective group has food, water, shelter, and most importantly, each other. That is, of course, unless you remember that every single boy living on The Glade was put there against their will with no explanation and that they are trapped there. So we have a very interesting dynamic and conflict between newcomer Thomas (Dylan O’Brien), who immediately wants to figure out how to leave and how he got to The Glade on his first day, and Gally (Will Poulter) who dislikes Thomas rocking the boat and works to maintain the status quo that has been keeping them alive.

Spoilers after the jump, but here are a few thoughts I had about the film while watching. (Please bear in mind that I have not read the novel.)

I really like Dylan O’Brien. I’ve liked him since I first (and, really, last) saw him in The Internship. (Which, itself, wasn’t a great movie.) He essentially has to carry the movie with his performance and he does a great job with that. (He also does a great job looking confused. Definite bonus for this role.)
While I’m glad that Ki Hong Lee got to have a prominent role in this film, his character kind of lacks depth in the film. But I like Ki Hong, so I’m glad he got this really huge break. Maybe Minho will get more fleshing out in future films?
You may know him from his work with Wong Fu Productions or The Nine Lives of Chloe King
Also, I’m so glad to see Thomas Brodie-Sangster. I don’t watch him on Game of Thrones, so really the last time I saw him was Love Actually, and he was teeny tiny back then. I like his face, it’s so playful.
Maybe it’s because I just have a lot of anxiety about being chased and having to run away from things, but I thought that they did a really great job building tension with all of the running scenes. (“Maze Runner” = there are a LOT of running scenes)
I usually don’t notice things like this, but I thought the scoring really did a great job elevating anxiety during those tense running scenes. I was VERY STRESSED watching this movie and the music was just adding to that.
Actually, overall, really good use of lighting, camera angles, AND scoring did a great job of building tension.
Did I mention that I do like the cast? Good chemistry with them, although we really didn’t have a lot of time to explore their characters. We did get to hear from more supporting characters than I expected, which is nice.
Also speaking of the cast, good amount of diversity among a group of boys. I liked that. (Not sure if it’s written this way in the book or not.)
I remember flinching when the first girl (played by Kaya Scodelario) because I was really worried about what the introduction of a girl to an all-boys society would do. Luckily, it didn’t do anything other than elicit the comment: “Are all girls like this?!”
Also, I am really glad that Will Poulter got this role and is an actor because a) he clearly worked really hard to bulk up for this film and b) he looks a bit like Sid from Toy Story aka has a “bully face” and I’m just really happy for him because ordinarily that might be annoying to deal with in life but he is literally being paid a lot to make that bully face work.

I just kept thinking throughout this movie that Sid looks like he could have been modeled off a today-version of Will Poulter.

Poulter in the film
Not sure if this is because of the book or the film adaptation or what, but I left the theater kind of mad that none of my questions from the moment the movie started were answered. Like NONE OF THEM. If anything, I had more questions, and I kind of hate sequel-baiting. Movies should be able to stand alone.

In general, this was a really well-done movie. Not sure how true it is to the book and whatnot, but it’s definitely a very good action film. As far as comparing it with The Hunger Games and Divergent, which everyone knows is going to happen, I still favor The Hunger Games as a solid story and for the complexity and depth. I was never all that impressed with Divergent to begin with.

The Maze Runner comes out today, Friday, September 19th. Spoilers below this jump. (And by spoilers, I mostly mean my unanswered questions.)