Shmee Enjoys The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug!

The-Hobbit-The-Desolation-Of-Smaug

A year has past since The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, and Bilbo and his pack of Dwarf friends continue their quest to reclaim the throne of the King Under The Mountain.  Peter Jackson once again helms this Hobbit tale, and if you liked the first movie then you will like this film more, but if you did not care for the first Hobbit, I am not sure that this improved film will win you over.

This movie starts out with a little background in to how the quest got started, but then quickly gets us back to Bilbo (Martin Freeman), Thorin (Richard Armitage), and the rest of the dwarves as they continue to run from the orcs that are chasing them, and their quest to get to the Lonely Mountain by the last light of Durin’s Day.  Along the way they will have to contend with giant spiders, jerky elves, the aforementioned orcs, and Smaug himself. Gandalf (Ian McKellen) meanwhile has to deal with another threat.

Despite the over two hour and forty minute running time, they should really call these movies The Hobbit and The Lost Tales due to all the added material, The Desolation of Smaug has a much brisker pace.  They must have cut out all the random walking about, and just stuck to the action scenes.  Which is great because An Unexpected Journey gave me enough walking scenes for the rest of my life.  There are quite a few long action scenes in this movie, and they all show Jackson’s deft hand at directing since they are all wonderfully framed and a joy to watch.

From a technical standpoint though the action scenes are not perfect.  It must be really hard to show molten gold because it is by far the worst effect in the whole movie, and whoever convinced Jackson that it would be fine to use a GoPro 1 camera in the river barrel scene should be flogged.  Other than those two examples Weta Workshop continues to show that they are a top tier effects company because this movie looks great.  They just need to find a new gold animator.

When I first saw Evangeline Lilly’s Tauriel in promos for this film, I was unsure about her addition, but she great in this film, and adding a female character to this all male cast was much needed.  Adding Tauriel gave more depth to the elves as well as the dwarves, so she is not just a throw away character.  Martin Freeman’s Bilbo is fantastic.  It is great to see a character drawn to the power of the ring, and not just suffer the weight of it.  You can see the lust for its power in his eyes, and how he changes when he wears it.  He is better than the Bilbo in the book (Geek Note: I am not saying however that the movies are better than the book, just Bilbo).  The rest of the cast is great too, but they are pretty much background for Freeman.

This movie is much improved over The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, but it still has one major flaw.  Its ending, or I should say its lack of an ending.  It simply does not have one.  I won’t tell you where it ends or how, but after all the fun and adventure it ends in a questionable manner.  That is not enough for me not to recommend this movie however, and I do.  Especially to all of the Lord of the Rings and Hobbit fans out there.  It is a fun film with some great action sequences, and it is a good time in the theaters!

Jupiter Ascending: The Wachowskis Back Doing What They Do Best!

Ever since the Matrix, geeks everywhere, myself included, have been waiting for the Wachowskis to get back to hard core Sci-Fi, and it looks like they finally have with Jupiter Ascending.

The film is about a human girl named Jupiter (Mila Kunis) who is being targeted by the ruler of the universe, and Caine (Channing Tatum) is an alien trying to save her in order to save everyone.  It sounds a little like The Matrix in space, but hey Harry Potter is like the Matrix with magic, and that is pretty good.

The Wachowskis are wizards with special effects and worlds that don’t exist.  The future parts of Cloud Atlas were the best, and that was in no small part due to that wizardry, so a whole new movie with that sounds great!  Next year is shaping up to be a good one at the movies!

Spending Some Time With The DC Showcase Original Shorts Collection!

DCSOSC

The guys and gals over at DC Universe have made a quite a few good animated films, so when I saw Superman and Shazam: The Return of Black Adam on Netflix I decided to give it a watch.  It turns out that it was actually a collection of DC shorts called the DC Showcase Original Shorts Collection.  It was a cool way to see a few characters that don’t get a lot of coverage.

On Netflix there were four shorts: Superman and Shazam: The Return of Black Adam, The Spectre, Jonah Hex, and The Green Arrow.  If you check this out on DVD/Blu-Ray there is also a short Catwoman feature, but since I didn’t see it, I can’t review it.

Superman and Shazam: The Return of Black Adam is the longest of the shorts clocking in at twenty-five minutes.  It features the origin of the new Captain Marvel (different from Marvel’s Captain Marvel, yes it is very confusing) as he enlists Superman’s help to take out Black Adam.

The Spectre is different from most of the DCU stuff because they set it in the 70’s, and it follows The Spectre as he terrorizes the people that killed a movie mogul.  The Spectre unlike most DC Heroes has no problem killing guilty people.

Jonah Hex rides in to town to find a bounty, but it turns out he will have to take out a gang that has been killing rich people and stealing their money.

The Green Arrow is planning a special night with Dinah Lance/Black Canary when Merlyn the Magnificent shows up to kill the Princess of Perdita, so it is time for a Green Arrow versus Black Arrow shoot off.

All of the shorts are well done, and like I said before it is fun to check out some of the lesser DC Heroes.  You almost never hear about The Spectre, and after the awful Jonah Hex movie is great to see him in something good.  It is also nice to see a more true to the comic book Green Arrow over what is presented by the TV showMarvel’s Captain Marvel is better, but DC’s is still good, and I was happy to see him.

DCU continues to pump out great animated flicks, and I stand by my assertion that they should be heading up DC/Warner Brothers live action super hero movies because everything that I have watched that they have done has at least been interesting.  But I guess we will see how the new Batman versus Superman movie turns out before I get too judgmental.  Maybe.

They Finally Cast A Wonder Woman!

gal-gadot-2

Well it must be very cold someplace hot because they have finally cast Wonder Woman for the Batman vs Superman movie, Gal Gadot!  I have not seen much of what Gal Gadot has been in, but maybe that is good since I will not have any preconceived ideas about her acting abilities unlike the man set to be Batman.  She may not be my choice, but she has got the look, and has been in a few action movies, so I wish her the best.  With the main cast set, I hope this movie gets DC’s comic book cinematic universe rolling!

The Hunger Games: Catching Fire Burns Bright!

The-Hunger-Games-Catching-Fire-Teaser

The Hunger Games: Catching Fire is Lionsgate’s 2013 sequel to the 2012 film The Hunger Games, and it does everything that a sequel should:  It builds on and makes better just about every part of the first movie.  I was a little worried when they started production without a finished script and a new director Francis Lawrence, but my concerns were apparently unfounded.

The story picks up fairly soon after the first movie with Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) and Peeta Mellark (Josh Hutcherson) back home after their survival of the last Hunger Games.  They are trying to adjust to their new lives as Victors, when they are swept away on a tour of the districts.  Tensions are running high in Panem and the people see Katniss as a symbol of hope against the tyranny leveled against them by The Capitol.   Can Katniss keep her family safe as the 75th Hunger Games and 3rd Quarter Quell (Every 25th Hunger Games) approach?

Jennifer Lawrence is amazing in this film.  It would be so easy to play Katniss as a mopey jerk, but she brings so much more emotion to this role it is just wonderful.  Josh Hutcherson must have gotten an acting coach because he has gotten much better.  He gave Peeta a little more life this time, and since Peeta is such a Boy Scout any nuance that he can be given the better.  The other actors all breathed a little more life in to their characters this time around as well which made this world much more believable.

Francis Lawrence thankfully erased all the shaky camera work from the first movie, so for that reason alone it was worth changing up the directors.  He also used his much larger budget well.  The special effects and the editing were great, the world of Panem seemed like a real place.  This is one of the rare movies that didn’t feel a little too long, or like they skipped too much of the story to tighten up the running time.  I hope that they tie Francis Lawrence up for the next two movies.

If you liked the first movie than you will love this movie, but even if you were not a big fan of The Hunger Games you should still put this movie on your watch list.  It is not only one of the biggest hits of this year, but it is one of the best films of the year too.  I can only hope that they can keep the quality up for the next two movies, because if they can we are in for a real treat.