Star Trek Into Darkness

Abrams is back, prior to his Star Wars Disney Reboot, with the second of his Star Trek movies.

Yup, he's back to the other space based franchise he successfully booted up four years ago with one of the most fun and rewatchable movies of that decade. In the first of this series, time is rewritten as to allow Spock (Zachary Quinto, Heroes), Kirk (Chris Pine, This Means War) and the rest of the crew aboard the Enterprise to engage in novel and increasingly energetic adventures. Into Darkness follows the team as they fight against the evil genius of John Harrison (Benedict Cumberbatch, Sherlock) who has declared war on his former employers, Star Fleet.

How does this latest outing compare to it's predecessor? Well, the acting is terrible, the science is off, the ridiculous plots and melodrama are cranked up to eleven and the dialogue is laughable. Basically, all I could have hoped for. I should preface this review with a warning that I am not a fan of the Nimoy and Shatner films, nor the original series - mainly due to never having watched them. What follows will only refer to the previous Abrams film, and nothing that precedes it.

That being said, what I do love about the current reboot of the franchise is the sense of fun that has made repeat viewings of the first film possible and pleasurable. Its silliness and the campness allowed for total immersion in the whole new world that the directer created. If, like me, this was your experience of the 2009 film, then I believe you shouldn't be disappointed with the latest offerings.

Having now seen Into Darkness twice - with a possible third viewing on the near horizon - I think that the over-the-top-action-romp-ness of the film will carry it at least as far as the audience who enjoyed the first. These are films very much centred around punching, shooting, blowing things up and screaming over the sounds of explosions (in space. Yeah, don't ask.) There are, if you wish to find such things, some broad questions raised in the areas of politics, race relations and such issues, but really if that were the point of a movie like Star Trek Into Darkness, it would have failed miserably to achieve it's prime directive.

I believe the only true problem in the film is the acting. It is terrible. It's easily over come by loud bangs and gun fights, but I mention it only in passing as it provided, for me, the highest level of comedy the film reached - even with amusing wit and repartee written into the script. But if you fancy a good, hearty laugh, look out for the hammed up performances of Pine, Urban, Pegg, Yelchin, Cumberbatch and Eve.

The most fitting comment I think I could make regarding Star Trek Into Darkness was one made by those who designed the advertisements played before the movie. Before Star Trek started, the audience was treated to the action-packed first scene of the new Fast and Furious (6) film. Need I say more.

Rewrite and Restructure

It's been a while. Too long, in fact.

I'm finding the fact that I've written very little for this blog a horrible perpetual motion machine of annoyance. As much as I've love writing here, University deadlines, exams and a drying up of funds has lead to less cinema trips (and more DVD watching). Even more unfortunate is the fact that this all has resulted in an apathy for review writing because the blog looks so bare!

In solution to this suck-y state of affairs, I'm gonna change the mission statement of the blog. Where, originally, my intent was to give reviews of what was on at the cinema, what I'd recommend people see and what to stay away from, I think an all purpose cinema blog would be far easier to run.

The plan now is to have three different types of posts; to continue the "what's on at the cinema" section; to begin a "what I've been watching"  review section; and to have a space where I can voice general thoughts, opinions and ideas about movie related happenings going on around me. I hope there are still people interested enough to keep up looking through the posts and keeping up to date with everything new coming along. In an ideal world, this new system (and the five month holiday I find myself at the beginning of) will lead to a minimum of one review/update a week. If that works out well, and there are still people showing interesting, I'll endeavor to keep it on a more regular schedule when I return to Uni in September. 

Also, it has been pointed out to me, I'm not running the greatest looking site on the internet. Although, I am not the most artful person in the world, I'd love to have someone who knows how themes and blogs work to help me out if they have the time, and make the blog look better! Throw me and e-mail, or get me on Facebook if you wish to be my kind-hearted savior.

Thank you for your patience those who have come back to the blog to read this!

A Trilogy

Today I went back to the cinema, and since I was there with a friend who doesn't make it there a lot, we went to see the new Danny Boyle (Trainspotting) movie Trance. I'd seen this for the first time around a month ago, and thoroughly enjoyed myself letting this silly, slightly sleazy and slick film wash over me. The second time through, I enjoyed it even more, but what struck me about the movie was just how it reminded me of two other films I had watched recently, how fun I'd found all three, and how the three might just be one of the best selections to put together for a movie marathon night in.

The other two films that Trance put me in mind of were Black Swan (Darren Aronofsky's 2010 Oscar winning movie) and Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh's, supposed final film). Trance is the story of Simon (James McAvoy, X-Men: First Class), an amnesia-suffering, inside man in an art theft who is taken to a hypnotherapist (Rosario Dawson, Sin City) in an attempt to find where he had hidden a stolen painting. Black Swan tells the story of a ballerina (Natalie Portman, V for Vendetta) driven to insanity by her quest for perfection in the role of Swan Queen, while being constantly advised by her choreographer (Vincent Cassel, Trance) to learn to lose herself in the role. Finally, Side Effects is the description-defying story of Emily Taylor (Rooney Mara, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo), the depression she suffered, the relationship between her and her therapist (Jude Law, Sherlock Holmes), and how her recovery unraveled. 

There seems to be a long list of things connecting these films, as is apparent, no doubt, by their summaries. What is true of their style, is that all three films look good. Danny Boyle's stylized view goes into hyperdrive as this movie descends further into McAvoy's mind, while Aronofsky manages to get inside the dancing sequences of Swan Lake fantastically and Soderbergh's slow and unassuming camera led to genuine shock as the plot twists rolled into this "medical" drama.

The other areas which these films share common ground, are those that all similar genre pieces do - but in these films they are about as good as it gets. The three all dive head first into the minds of their protagonists, they manage to shock and excite in equally shocking and exciting ways, and maybe most importantly (although their sexual politics all occasionally waver in ways which are all too common in the movie business,) they all contain interesting, well developed and brilliantly acted female characters. Natalie Portman's Swan Queen was exceptionally well done and was the performance for which she won an Oscar. Rosario Dawson's therapeutic tones guided you through the movie beautifully, but in a subtle way could lead you astray from what was behind each character you encounter. Rooney Mara's performance as Emily Taylor was, again understated, at times sinister and even elegant in the most appropriate ways.

 As a trilogy they deliver all of these things, and more. Add to this that they all, without exception, have had a profoundly strange effect on me, at least. I have a habit of attempting to guess where a film is going story-wise, especially with films such as these, but in each case I had a different experience. Whenever a revelation was made concerning plot or character (and believe me, between these three, you aren't short on them), instead of thinking "as I thought" or "I'd have never guessed that," my brain said to me, "How the hell did you not see that coming?" After I thought this through a while I realized that this was the greatest strength of the movies. These are films that you are engaged in to such an extent that no amount of explicit foreshadowing will render them silly, instead the films wash over you in the most enjoyable way possible and not a thought is given to what is coming next because what is on right now enthralls you greatly.

These three films, despite my enthusiastic praise, are not the high water mark of cinema, and they are in no way the best movies ever made. What they are however, are fantastically fun, and thematically linked films which are easy to laugh, cringe and engage with. Anyway, this is probably just my way of telling you that I'll no doubt be having a movie marathon when the three of these come out on DVD, and I'd recommend anyone with a love of horror-inflected, "psychological," M. Night-style movies do the same, and see them all.