DARK SHADOWS.

My expectations for this weren't all that high going into it. Keep that in mind during this review. The film follows Barnabas Collins (Johnny Depp), a young man who is turned into a vampire by a young witch named Angelique (Eva Green) with whom he had an affair. He ends up trapped in a coffin for a couple hundred years only to wake up in the 1970s. His descendants--Elizabeth (Michelle Pfeiffer), Roger (Johnny Lee Miller), David (Gulliver McGrath), and Carolyn (Chloe Moretz), as well as their psychiatrist (Helena Bonham Carter) and caretaker (Jackie Earle Haley)--are now residing in his home. He falls for a new resident, as well, a young woman named Victoria (Bella Heathcote), who looks just like his previous love, who Angelique once killed. But Angelique is still alive and taking over the towns businesses and driving the Collins business out of... well... business. And it's up to Barnabas to help.

This is going to be a pretty short review. I have one main negative and one main positive about the film. The negative... is that the film is incredibly unfocused. Damn near The Room-level unfocused. It starts off with about a 10-minute summary that gets Barnabas in the ground. Then we follow Victoria for a big chunk of the beginning of the movie. So for pretty much the first 30 minutes or so, it's got a more creepy atmosphere, what I'm assuming to be closer to the show. But then Barnabas shows back up and Victoria all but disappears. The film gets incredibly cheesy from this point on (not necessarily a bad thing), and I can't tell what the story is supposed to be. Is it a revenge tale? Is it Barnabas saving the family business? Is it a ghost story? I could continue on and on here. There are just so many damn subplots it was hard to keep anything focused. The worst part is that a big one is the fact Barnabas basically falls in love with Victoria, but once he shows up, Victoria is barely in the movie. There is hardly any interaction between the two characters so it's hard to build up any caring about this relationship. Not to mention there are so many horror subgenres going on here. There's vampires, ghosts, witches, werewolves, etc. (I actually almost lost it when the werewolf twist showed its face, which is rather late in the movie.)

On the upside, despite all of its flaws, I was still really entertained by it. I thought it was rather humorous and charming in its own right. The comedy was solid. The cheesiness was plentiful but not overwhelming. The acting was also good all around, with Depp and Moretz shining through the most. So yeah, I can definitely see why people wouldn't like this flick and would give it a low score. I just happened to be entertained by it. And I don't even think it's in a so-bad-its-good kind of way. It's just a good film with a lot of flaws. For what it was, it was really entertaining, and that was enough for me.


I Am McLovin!

(P.S. My positive feelings were actually stronger right after seeing it, but I've come down just slightly. Still, it's entertaining and harmless, and I don't think anyone should act viscerally toward it.)

HUGO.

So, before anyone else had even heard of this movie, it was one of my most anticipated of the year. Then people started hearing of it and began anticipating it, too. Then the trailer came out... and what a piece of crap that was. It went from in my Top 3 most anticipated to not even in my Top 10. It just looked abysmal and Oh-My-God-What-Is-Scorsese-Doing? But then the reviews started coming in, and most people declared it one of the best of the year. I became confused. So when the film landed in my town for basically a week-long run, I knew I had to check it out before it was too late. And what did it end up being? A very difficult film to talk about.

On the surface, the film starts off as one thing but then turns into something completely different about halfway through. We meet Hugo (Asa Butterfield), an orphan who lives in the walls of a Parisian train station and fixes clocks. One day, he's caught thieving by a toy shop owner, Georges Melies (Ben Kingsley), and he takes a journal that belongs to Hugo. The journal belonged to Hugo's father (Jude Law) and told how he could continue fixing an automaton. Hugo befriends Georges' Goddaughter, Isabelle (Chloe Moretz), in an attempt to get the journal back. But in this process, he begins to discover the secrets behind the automaton and its connection to Georges, as well as Georges' secret past. Meanwhile, Hugo must stay out of sight from the Station Inspector (Sasha Baron Cohen), who would quickly snatch him up and send him to the orphanage. The film also co-stars Ray Winstone, Emily Mortimer, Christopher Lee, Helen McCrory, Frances de la Tour, and Richard Griffiths (yup... three Harry Potter alums!).

The film is very beautiful to watch. It gives off a magical appearance, like a whole new world exists within the walls of the Parisian train station. And it's rather fitting, as the movie as a whole is about embracing the magic of imagination. There is a lot of love given to cinema in this film, as movies play a large role in (the latter half of) the film.

But here's the problem I had with the movie... I just couldn't get absorbed by it all. It looked magical and beautiful. There was a solid mystery. The characters were good. Everything about this was completely solid film-making. But for some reason, none of that was getting my investment. I wasn't bored, though I did (ironically) look at my watch twice. The first time was a little over an hour in, and it felt like it had at least been thirty minutes longer than that.

I've thought about why this could be. I believe I've come to the conclusion that I was caught off guard; I wasn't watching what I thought I was supposed to be watching. The film was advertised as more of a whimsical kids movie about a kid who lives in clock towers and has adventures with a girl he befriends, mostly centered around a wacky station inspector and a mysterious robot. What it actually is... is a sad movie about losing everything you held dear, whether that be your parents, your leg, your love, your brother, or your life dream, and coping with it as best you can on a day-to-day basis. Every character in this movie (with the exception of Griffiths and de la Tour) lost something dear to them and live with a sadness behind their eyes. The aforementioned two just struggle to be with each other due to a minor complication.

In the end, there is a strong message of "never give up and always follow your heart." And everybody portrays that message greatly in their own little story. Even Sasha Baron Cohen moves beyond being a flat villain and has an arch of his own to overcome, and it's one of his best acting performances. Ben Kingsley also gives a very strong performance, as well (which is good considering the film is really about him).

I know I probably sounded very negative in this review, but I honestly still really liked the film. It wasn't anything like I expected, either in plot or in tone, but Scorsese still managed to show his chops in this lighter fare. Pay no attention to the terrible trailers. This film is much more than anything you've seen advertised. It has strong themes and is, as many have already said, a love song to following your dreams, to discovering the magic of imagination, and to viewing and appreciating film itself.


A Keanu 'Whoa'

LET ME IN.

I came in slightly late to the game with the original film. By the time I finally saw the whole thing, it had been over-hyped to the point where I expected it to be one of the greatest things ever put on film in the history of the world ever. Needless to say, my expectations were a bit too high going into it. I still loved it and thought it was great. However, I wasn't as blown away by it as everybody else. This time, I saw this version on opening weekend.

The story now takes place in 1980s New Mexico in March (apparently it still snows during March there). Owen (Kodi Smit-McPhee) is 12-years-old and is constantly bullied by bigger kids at school. And all he wants to do is find a way to get even. Enter Abby (Chloe Moretz), a strange young girl who walks around barefoot in the snow. She lives with her apparent father (Richard Jenkins), who goes out and kills people and drains them of their blood... specially for her. But the police are on the trail of this killing spree, headed up by a main policeman (Elias Koteas). During this, however, Owen and Abby become closer to each other, despite Abby's warnings that they can't be friends.

The movie holds its own against the original. It really does. There are some things I liked better in the original, and there are some things I liked better in this remake. So let's get the comparisons out of the way immediately. This movie isn't a shot-for-shot, but it's your basic concept-by-concept. The scenes portray the same general idea (though a lot of scenes do have a very similar look). There were five main cuts/changes from the original that I noticed in this one (NOTE: If you've not seen the original and don't know the story, skip the rest of this paragraph). First, the subplot of the townspeople/community was changed to people who just live in the same complex as Owen. I actually liked this change, as I didn't care for the townspeople angle in the original film. The second is how the father kills people; in this one, he hides out in their cars and waits for them to come to a desolate stop. Not too bad. The third is the whole segment where the main boy goes to his father's house. There's still turmoil between his parents, but he never goes to visit him. This is another change I didn't mind. Finally, the scene I knew wouldn't be shown: the castration scar. Abby says plenty of times that she's not a girl, but for those uninitiated with the story, most will infer that she means she's a vampire--not that she's a boy. There's actually the scene where he peeks on her getting dressed; they just don't show what he sees like the original does. Finally, unlike the original movie, this one basically comes straight out and tells you that "the father" was an old friend/lover, similar to how Owen is starting out. I liked this addition, despite the original's ambiguity in letting you figure it out on your own.

Anyway, now we have the comparisons out of the way, let's focus on this one, shall we? The acting is superb. Chloe Moretz and Kodi Smit-McPhee are outstanding. I actually forgot I was watching two kid actors (which is especially good with Moretz, who has the Hit-Girl stigma hanging over her). Richard Jenkins plays the troubled and conflicted father-figure well, too. And the main bully was just totally mean/nasty. And I was also totally into Elias Koteas' policeman character, which I don't remember being as big a role in the original, though I haven't seen it in a while. Regardless, he was great.

The cinematography was great, as well. I don't think it was as breathtaking as the original (I know, I said I would stop...), but it was definitely up there. I loved a lot of the camera choices Matt Reeves made, particularly when we had a stationary camera inside a car, so where everything else was moving expect the camera--like in a particularly trippy car crash scene. Overall, everything was great to look at in that regard. Though everything really came down to how they would film the climax, being the scene that grasped so many people in the original. For the most part, it's very similar, but the camera angle is different and there's a lot more blood. The jury's still out on which climax I preferred.

My biggest issue with the film (besides the name change) is the CGI. When Abby goes vamp-mode, they have her in some insanely disturbing and creepy makeup. It looks totally awesome (though they do give her a deeper voice to go with it, which was strange). However, when she's doing vamp-power things, like attacking people or climbing a tree or something like that, it's this silly CGI figure with monkey-like movements. You can tell it isn't real, even though there's never a close up on it. The biggest "why?" moment is relatively early on when Abby has to feed on somebody. She's already in this guy's arms, but then she starts bouncing all over him to attack him in a very CGI-fashion instead of just biting him and knocking him over. Fortunately, there are maybe only 3 or so of these CGI moments throughout the entire film, so you don't have to deal with them much.

The film is very visceral. There are quite a few blood and cringe moments in the film. Now, it's not a slasher/horror or anything like that. It's actually a very quiet film, much like the original. It's just that when one of the violent moments comes up, the violence is amped up and made much more brutal. Again, I liked this change.

The last thing I wanted to touch on is the musical score. The score is just beautiful, and it matches every scene perfectly. That's really all there is to it.

Overall, the movie is fantastic. It's a solid rival for the original. As I said before, some things I liked better in the original (from how some things were handled to how a scene was shot) and some things I liked better in this remake (certain cuts/changes). The acting is superb. The cinematography is really good, though the random CGI moments could have been toned down. This film was very well done and put together. Should people still see the original? Totally. But this was definitely a high class remake.


Royale With Cheese

(P.S. I found it funny that there were quite a few 7-13-year-old girls in my showing. There was even a mom with a girl who couldn't have been any older than 5. Thankfully, they were able to keep quiet for most of the film, except for the preteens giggling at serious moments. I just felt bad for that real little girl.)

Top 5 Up-And-Coming Young Actresses.

I've had this post idea for a while, and I think I finally have enough thoughts to get it down.

In this day and age, you have a lot of the mediocre in the younger world of actresses (Miley Cyrus, Vanessa Hudgens, Selena Gomez, etc... can you see the pattern there?). But there is also a lot of amazing talent out there as well. Some names are bigger than others, but you also have your non-household names.

The five actresses I detail in this post are, for the most part, relatively young. You might have only seen one or two of their films. You might have seen more and just not realized it. But in their repertoire, they expose themselves as great up-and-comers. For each actress, I'll state their current age (even if their birthday is next month, I'll state what it is right now); the number of movies they've been in (including those in post-production, but not including TV work); where you might recognize them; and further details/my thoughts. So without further ado, I will now detail my top 5 favorite up-and-coming young actresses.

Top 5 Up-And-Coming Young Actresses

5. AnnaSophia Robb
Current Age: 16
# of Movies: 11
Probably Recognized From: Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Bridge to Terabithia
Details: She's probably the oldest on my list. AnnaSophia Robb has a tendency to be in not-so-good movies, with I believe Bridge to Terabithia being a prime exception. But even in bad movies, she's always one of the biggest highlights. Most notably, she probably did the best job in the abysmally disappointing film Jumper, playing a younger version of Rachel Bilson. I also personally believe she should have played Annabeth in the movie adaptation of Percy Jackson: The Lightning Thief, as every description of that character in the book pointed to AnnaSophia.

----------------------------------------------

4. Saoirse Ronan
Current Age: 16
# of Movies: 8
Probably Recognized From: Atonement, The Lovely Bones, City of Ember
Details: She's probably (arguably) the biggest name on my list (at least critically). Atonement, as a film, left me conflicted, but there were two things I loved about it: the music and Saoirse Ronan. I knew from the second the film ended that this girl was going to be something special. Hers was always my favorite portrayal of that character. I don't remember much about City of Ember, meaning it left me pretty underwhelmed. But I do remember I enjoyed her character more than anything else in the movie. She's an excellent young actress, proving she can do both adult drama and children's fantasy.

----------------------------------------------

3. Jodelle Ferland
Current Age: 15
# of Movies: 16
Probably Recognized From: Silent Hill
Details: Jodelle Ferland is kinda like my female Ben Foster. Not really a household name (though Ben is getting there), but I find myself excited when I realize she's in a movie. Strangely, she's in quite a bit of horror. I guess she does the creepy little girl thing well, regardless of her doing the 'creepy little girl' or not. A big thing she brings with her, though, is innocence. She has an amazing innocent and likable quality to her (which I suppose is why they chose her for the mostly pointless character of Bree in the recent Eclipse). She's quite excellent in Silent Hill. But she's also done a crazy amount of TV. For instance, she was in a mini-series from a while back called Kingdom Hospital. She was also in the pilot episode of the criminally underrated and prematurely canceled Dead Like Me (talk about a tear-jerker episode). But I can totally see this girl hopping from the horror-train to more dramatic roles. There's no doubt in my mind she'll end up with more recognition in the future. It might take a while, but it'll happen.

----------------------------------------------

2. Elle Fanning
Current Age: 12
# of Movies: 19
Probably Recognized From: Phoebe in Wonderland, Benjamin Button
Details: Simultaneously the youngest on my list and owner of the largest number of movies (though if you count television, Ms. Ferland and the following choice might rival her). Of course I know her as the younger sister of Dakota. But part of me wonders if Elle is even better than her sister. She didn't really show up on my radar as somebody to watch until I somewhat recently saw Phoebe in Wonderland. That is an amazing film, and her acting in it is phenomenal. Usually, her role is a young sibling or a younger version of a main character. But she's almost always not the focal point of the film (if a younger version, for instance, that version might not be shown for long). Though after her starring role in Phoebe, I'm definitely going to keep an eye out for this one.

----------------------------------------------

1. Chloe Moretz
Current Age: 13
# of Movies: 17
Probably Recognized From: Kick-Ass, Let Me In (trailers, at this point)
Details: No surprise here. Chloe, of course, hit it big as Hit-Girl in Kick-Ass. But she already had quite a resume under her belt before that point. And it's strange looking at it, as it makes me go "She was in that?" For instance, I don't remember her in (500) Days of Summer, nor do I remember her in the Amityville Horror remake from a few years back. But she makes my number 1 spot because she's basically jumped up in popularity quite a bit since her Hit-Girl performance, and I think I can safely assume she's gonna become a 'go-to' child actress for a lot of things here soon.

----------------------------------------------

Runner-Up: Isabelle Fuhrman
Current Age: 13
# of Movies: 5
Probably Recognized From: Orphan
Detail: Have you seen Orphan? I don't blame you if you haven't. I had an aversion to it myself, despite my love of horror (crappy or otherwise). It's not the best horror film in the world, but holy crap is Isabelle Fuhrman's perfomance great. Kind of a spoiler here... but she was essentially an 11-year-old American girl playing a 30-something-year-old European woman pretending to be a 9-year-old Russian girl. And she pulls it off. It's really an outstanding performance on this little girl's part, and I think most would agree--whether you liked the movie or not.


(P.S. Keep an eye out for a potential Top 5 Up-And-Coming Young Actors.)

KICK-ASS.

I've been anticipating this movie for quite some time. But I really didn't know what to think of it from the Green Band trailer. Then the Red Band trailer came out and it was like "OMG," as they say. And the closer it came to release, the more excited I got. Ironically, though, I didn't realize it was coming out this week until it was almost Friday. Lame. But I just got back from seeing it, and I must share my opinion.

The plot is pretty straight forward. Dave Lizewski (Aaron Johnson) is a nerd who starts to wonder why nobody has ever tried being a superhero. And after yet another mugging of him and his friends (Even Peters and Clark Duke), he decides to order a wet suit and be one. Well... it doesn't really work out, ending up in a near-death experience. However, it messes with some nerve endings and infuses his body with some metal plates, allowing him to take quite a punch or two. And then he tries again... still getting his ass kicked, but fairing better. And this time, people see it happen and put videos of the fight up on YouTube (or a similar site). Meanwhile, mobster Frank D'Amico (Mark Strong) is losing some money and drugs to somebody ruining his plans, and he starts believing it's the new superhero Kick-Ass, while it's really the vengeful daughter-father team of Hit-Girl (Chloe Moretz) and Big Daddy (Nicolas Cage), who take a page from Kick-Ass' book and dress up like superheroes. But Frank can't get a hold of Kick-Ass, so his son, Chris (Christopher Mintz-Plasse), who really just wants to prove himself to his father, takes up the moniker of Red Mist to lure Kick-Ass into a trap and deliver him to his father. But all of this isn't nearly as easy as it seems.

Really, there's not a whole lot to say about the movie besides the obvious: it kicked ass (I know, so original). The action is phenomenally over-the-top and awesome, especially in regards to Hit-Girl. Chloe Moretz is the real star of the movie... at least the action parts. Kick-Ass (the character) really has Harry Potter syndrome. He's in over his head and, albeit having potential, mostly relies on his friends and acquaintances to survive at any given time. In other words, he gets the crap kicked out of him for most of the movie. But I believe that's the point.

As for the other characters, the most surprising was Chris/Red Mist. The trailers make him look like he's just gonna be some kind of wannabe inspired by Kick-Ass, but his story is actually much more interesting. Christopher Mintz-Plasse plays a much darker character here than he's done in the past, and he actually didn't make any of the character turns I expected him to. As for Nicolas Cage... other people have said it already, but this is one of his best roles in years.

There were only really a couple disappointing factors, but they weren't anything huge. First, the love interest angle of the story almost felt tacked on, like they did the rest of the movie and realized that they needed to give the main character a personal story as well, something for him to connect with when he's not getting beaten up. It wasn't overtly like that, but there were times when it just wasn't working for me. The other minor quibble was that they seem to build up this whole "he can't leap from one building to another" thing, but it doesn't really pay off anywhere. Granted, what it might have been doing was setting up a fear of heights which plays into the climax of the movie... if that's the case, then it's understandable. I was just waiting for a moment when he'd have to leap from one building to another, and it just didn't happen.

You've heard it already--the movie is uber-violent. Let's just say Tarantino would be proud. So let's just segue from that into the visuals: there's some good camera work, and the action scenes aren't confusing to follow whatsoever. And while there is a tiny bit of slo-mo, it doesn't feel out of place or overused. And there are some fantastic cinematography shots, like during the strobe-light fight, which is probably (outside the climax) one of the coolest parts of the whole film.

Besides the violence, the movie is hilarious, too. The only joke that really kinda seems out of place is one from the Red Band trailer--the masturbation joke. But it's so early on in the movie (the very beginning) that it doesn't feel out of place at the time. Only in hindsight. But there really aren't all that many crude sex jokes. And I'm not saying it bothered me. It didn't. It's just a random note looking back at the humor of the film.

One last thing I want to bring up is the soundtrack. This movie had to have one of the coolest action-comedy soundtracks ever. I seriously just loved the music in this movie, from the instrumental stuff to the ones with lyrics. The only gripe I have with the music is that they ripped off the main theme to 28 Days/Weeks Later (the long song they play at the beginning parts of both movies and/or during any slow-building intense moments of either film). Well, I don't think it's a rip-off, because it isn't a song that sounds like the theme. It actually is the song itself. But considering it's one of my favorite movie tracks ever, I forgave it just for the sake of including such a great song during a cool scene.

In fact, I can forgive practically all of my quibbles with the movie based on the last 20-30 minutes alone. It's practically one long action sequence (like... a pre-climax leading up to the climax). And with a big dose of incredible and over-the-top action and good humor, Kick-Ass is the movie to see right now. At least if you're into insane action-comedies.


Royale With Cheese

(P.S. Was I the only person to chuckle at the movie theater marquee sporting that "The Spirit 3" was now playing?)