Jurassic Park

Today we have Jurassic Park stepping up. I'm sure this review above all so far will be one solely for just reading and won't convince anyone who hasn't seen it to do so if simply because everyone in the world must have seen this film by now.

As with a lot of my reviews i'll mention that the premise to this film at the time was brilliant. Sure, other films had used dinosaurs before but never with such high quality creatures or in such a well done way. Rather than time travel or a lost island they decided to have a theme park. Even so i'll have to put it down somewhat for the book it is based off of. The slight changes the movie made were not ones that helped it, not in this area at least.

The directing and the soundtrack to the movie are also both spectacular. I could probably of guessed that without even watching a trailer to the movie as two of the biggest and most talented men in their fields were involved. For directing Jurassic Park has Steven Spielberg who is probably the most famous director of all time. You also have the sound coming from the skills of John Williams.

For the most part the acting is also of a good standard that, when combined with the majority of the characters either being likeable, interesting or both. comes together to make the film all the better. While it is a mostly serious film (as it should be) it does add a dash of comedy to make the viewing experience more enjoyable but not enough to make it a comedy film or to break the pace and immersion of what is happening.

The story moves forward at a steady pace with enough going on that it never becomes boring or has too much going on that it becomes cluttered and messy. Overall you've got a milestone in the movie business that was brilliant when it came out and is still impressive by todays standards. This movie is a classic and one of my own personal favorites as i've always been a fan of dinosaur programs and movies and this is one of if not the best of them.

Personal Score: 10/10
Unbiased Score: 9/10

Mean Girls

This may well be where my non-bias approach to reviewing ends because I do not now if I will be able to sit through this film without hating every moment. That's because this time I get to review the chick-flick Mean Girls. Well then lets get this train wreck going.

I guess the idea at the beginning is a pretty good one. A 16 year old girl whose spent her life being home-schooled by her parents in Africa begins her first day of real school. This also sets up the exact target audience of the film. We've already established that it's a chick-flick and now that it's also a teenage one.

The movie begins with a strong start using some good comedy and while the different groups of the school are done over the top it works well enough to give comedy value without being annoying (at least not at the point where I am writing this) and all the actors seem to have been well picked to play their specific personality perfectly.

The movie tilts slightly more towards the girly side around the middle but still manages to stay funny. And there is one particular scene around this part that i'm sure any men that decide or are dragged into watching this will enjoy (you'll know it when you see it). Then it gets to what I guess is meant to be the climax which becomes all about feelings and such as I guess you'd expect in this genre but it still keeps the comedy going if at a somewhat less amount.

I've mentioned it several times and it's all i've really gone on about but thats all there is too it. The thing that makes this film any good is the comedy in it. You can't really go on the acting because it's all so heavily set on the different cliques of the highschool that acting becomes almost unnoticeable. The camera work, editing, music and directing are all your standard so there isn't much to say about that either.

Overall I was able to actually enjoy enough of this movie to get by but it really isn't my type of movie. Still I guess if you're into chick-flicks then you can guess it's for you. And for those of you who aren't but get dragged into watching it don't despair it isn't that bad and you might even enjoy it.

Personal Score: 5/10

Unbiased Score: 7/10

Matchstick Men

This time we have Matchstick Men. Starring are Nicolas Cage as Roy Waller and Sam Rockwell as Frank Mercer a pair of con artists with the former suffering from several mental disorders which Cage plays well clearly experienced at playing the insanity role from the cocaine scenes back when he did Bad Lieutenant.

Other than good acting from the starring pair and Alison Lohman who comes into it later as a girl called Angela (I'll say no more to avoid spoilers) there is also what has been written up by the makers. The characters are likeable for all their traits and quirks and the movie itself has a pretty decent storyline to it as well.

In fact just about everyone involved in this film seems to have done their job well. The directing by Ridley Scott is as good as he always is in the mass of films that he's worked on, the music was well chosen as well by man named Hans Zimmer which after looking at everything else he's done doesn't surprise me.

So you've got good camera, good sound, good acting, good character and a good story so shouldn't that all come together to make a perfect film? Sadly not. There are some points in the movie where it falls down and a couple of other actors who aren't as talented as the main few who even have a couple of points such as Angela's crying (not a spoiler) which doesn't seem that real to me. There is also the couple of points where special effects are used that they aren't very well done and at least one point in the movie makes no sense whatsoever in having the shot at all as it goes against the story though I doubt you'll even notice it.

There is also that aside from Roy there doesn't really seem to be anything about the other characters to make them stand out that much as interesting. Yes they're likeable but I still struggled to make myself care about what happens to them or to keep myself interested when the scenes don't have Roy in them which has left me not sure whether it's a good thing or a bad thing how heavily it focuses on him.

My final point is that while I haven't personally seen another film like this it still doesn't do anything new and exciting to make it stand out. It still has that "run of the mill everyday movie that you'll see dozens of each year" feel to it. While by no means is it a bad film I don't think that there is anything special about it. Personally and quite easily justifiable unbiased would be that it does nothing that wasn't done better in Ocean's Eleven and even the sequels Twelve and Thirteen were better movies.

Overally if you have two hours of time on your hands you could do a hell of a lot worse but you wouldn't be hard pressed to find something better. I think if you thought that Ocean's Eleven was too over the top and unrealistic then this is more the film for you.

Personal Score: 6/10
Unbiased Score: 6.5/10

Untraceable

Ok here we are once again. This week we have Untraceable stepping up to try and entertain me for the next hour and a half. Well for a start the premise of the film is something rather interesting as it delves into the darker side of the human psyche in what as horrible as it may be to think of is quite a true idea. If something like this were to happen in reality it would most likely go similarly to the plot of this film.

But anyway, a film can't get by on just the idea that was behind it so lets move on. Batting for the good guys this time round is female lead character Jennifer Marsh (played by Diane Lane according to IMDB) who is an FBI agent working for the cyber police. The film does well to make you like both Jennifer and her colleague Griffin during the beginning of the movie through a mixture of good acting and likeable characters. It also does the reverse for the villain making you want the FBI to win but it shouldn't win points for that because of the fact almost every movie does so.

Now this film when it came out commented well on Diane Lane's acting but not much else with the general feel being that it was little more than another addition to the mass of torture porn films that have been released. I'd like to tell you that this isn't the case. Yes the main part of the film is these people getting killed and so on but it doesn't focus as much on that. While it does show the people being tortured, killed etc it instead pays more attention to the reactions of the other characters as they work to catch the killer and at their horror of what is happening.

I don't really have any major complaints about this movie. I have one or two minor irritations that I can't really talk about because of spoilers but even they aren't that big a deal. Overall this is a pretty good movie. Not one of the best in the world and while the idea is quite clever it doesn't really do much else to make it stand out from the rest. Still better one new point than none. It's definately one to watch if you like thiller/crime movies and even if you don't it's still probably worth seeing if they aren't your cup of tea. You never know you may change your mind.

Personal Score: 9.5/10 (this is my kind of movie)

Unbiased Score: 7.5/10

(Sorry if these reviews seem a little short or empty. Despite watching the movies looking for things to write about I struggle to find anything to talk about in them that won't cause a spoiler)

The Social Network

Here it is. My second film review. I plan to do it like this every week if possible (based on time, films suggested etc) one midweek and one at the weekend. So lets get started.

The Social Network, for those of you who don't already know, is about the founding of the internet social site facebook which i'll assume you use since it'll be where I post the link to this blog. The film stars Jesse Eisenberg as Mark Zuckerberg a social awkward nerd obsessed with getting into a final club at Harvard which he is a student at. His genius level IQ makes him arrogant believing himself to be better than others which when combined with his social awkwardness makes him rather unbearable to others. Eisenberg plays this role brilliantly showing what would be good acting normally but when compared to a lot of current actors is a refreshing break.

The supporting cast also provide good acting which leads me to be quite fine with saying that one of the best points of this movie is the acting for example, I've never been that big a fan of the music that Justin Timberlake makes but I must say that I enjoyed his acting as Sean Parker.. The slow development of each part of facebook orginally and how it changes is interesting as it provides a good idea for how it came to be rather than the usual reasoning of films of "because I say so".

There's not much I can really go into with my wish to avoid any spoilers. Despite me first saying that the beginning has the "slow development of each part of facebook" that doesn't mean that the beginning of the film is slow or boring itself. It starts strong, stays strong in the middle with good character development and change in the relationships between the characters as tensions rise.

When the ending came around it started off just as well as the rest of the film had done but right there in the last minute or so before the credits I...I want to say I was disappointed but at the same time I agree with the choice of how they ended it. Doing it any other way would have taken a lot more time and would have risked making what was already a 2 hour long film drag on.

As it stands the 2 hours passes comfortably. It may be quite a long film but it is by no means a dull one. I definately think that this is a must see film for most people if not everyone. I'm just glad i've had a break from all the usual films I watch to see something like this and i'll probably watch it again at some point in the near future.

Personal Score: 9/10
Unbiased Score: 8.5/10

Mega Shark Vs Giant Octopus

Well I guess this is as good as any a point on which to start my film reviews. I will try with this and any other reviews to avoid spoilers as much as possible but I can't promise I won't accidently show smaller details.

I guess I should start off with the obvious. Yes I know it's a film entirely about two giant sea monsters and the entire basis of this movie is simply stupid but oh well lets just roll with it because that's not the only negative though the realism in this movie takes a backseat especially at the point where a shark leaps high enough to eat a plane out of the air and at least the film somewhat justifies it with "resurrected, prehistoric sea monsters" which the characters of the movie are just as hesitant to go along with as they always are in monster movies.

One scene in particular seems to have been cut and chopped straight from Jaws with the man in charge refusing to believe that it was an animal that has eaten a chunk of a whale in both cases a shark though instead of a oversized and angry great white it's a megalodon. Another negative point would be the editing both during and between camera shots. It seems to be in love with having random loss of colour in the shot before it returns. I had to check another source to make sure it wasn't a poor copy of the film. It also will have shots changing with bright white flashes and a crashing sound during the first part.

The military, the government and just about everyone else with any power outside of the main characters is so overly macho and ignorant. While I know this is common in films like this to make them seem like the bad guys when you can't do so for the monsters that are acting on instinct it's just the level of it that the film goes to.

Now for some good points. The acting is varied across the board but comes off relatively well for the lead characters who are also fairly well characterized with decent enough backstories and views. The choice to have the female lead (and overall main character) a cynic at points and dozey at points makes her seem normal and everyday against her intelligence that she possesses.

Another good point is that it doesn't spend to much time just concentrating on the havoc the creautres cause. In fact a lot of the movie is more about the scientists trying to figure out how to stop the creatures and avoid the repeated attempts by the military to just blow stuff up some of which are fairly good ideas that are decently explained as to why it makes sense.

Now the special effects are very varied. At some points they look quite good for what it is and at others they are quite awful but overall i'd say the special effects are average which is why it's good that the film doesn't just concentrate on the creatures the entire film or it would be like watching 2012 if it had been a B movie.

I think this is about time to wrap it up for this movie. It's average. Not the worst film around but does nothing special to make it any better than that. If you're into monster movies it's worth watching once and even if you're not you might as well give it a try and see if you like it. I enjoyed it when I watched it before and I still found it relatively enjoyable the second time round.

Personal Score 6/10
Unbiased Score 4.5/10