Movie Reviews
Spoilers @ Ender's Game, Thor 2.
Ender's Game
Ender's Game isn't really about giant space battles or even the competition game, but rather the social and psychological aspects of the kids at Battle School. Unfortunately this doesn't really cinematize that well, so a lot of the team-building and competition, as well as Ender's inner thoughts, were cut from the transition to movie format. The ideas are retained well enough that you can infer what went on between, say, Ender transferring to Dragon and the team's rise up the ranks, or just how many battles they went through at the final stretch, but I suppose including everything would have made the movie five hours long.
What there was was subtle enough that the audience isn't being hit over the head with A Message, though it's a bit weird watching Harrison Ford (@Han Solo) play a Gendou Ikari type of character. The creepy atmosphere in the mind game, in particular, worked well on screen, and a lot of effort was spent making the ship combat sequences not only look impressive CG-wise but link up well in terms of dramatic tension with the kids in the control room (when do we start getting these cool 3D holographic UIs in real life, anyway?). The competition game scenes did look a bit dinky but there's not a whole lot you can do about that.
Thor: The Dark World
The first half of the movie has some brilliant moments (mostly involving the Asgardians), though as we begin with an infodump it's mostly a ton of setup and background. That's probably inevitable this setting though, as unlike other superheroes Thor has an independent setting that is not just modern day Earth + superpowers. Once the action gets going it's basically the Avengers fights-interspersed-by-one-liners, which is really how superhero movies work best given the often campy nature of the material. Kudos to the CG effects in the library books.
My opinion on the characters - best moments involve Thor, his coterie, and Loki, and Jane Foster is flat and boring - are probably in line with the Screaming Loki Fangirl Crowd, but I'm not actually a Loki fangirl. It doesn't take hormone overdose to be amused by witty banter and complicated friend/family relationships, and female characters shoehorned in as obligatory romance/quest objects is really a bit old. A lot of effort was spent trying to make Jane relevant to the plot (by amazing contrived coincidence), and it's still not as effective as Sif's two or three brief scenes go as far as communicating a believable relationship. Points also to Loki for retaining the complete and utter ambiguity as to which parts of his emoting are an act and which are genuine, that perhaps require some sort of complicated percentage algorithm to discern.
Next up: The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug. Whatever happened to just tacking numbers on to the end of sequels?
Ender's Game
Ender's Game isn't really about giant space battles or even the competition game, but rather the social and psychological aspects of the kids at Battle School. Unfortunately this doesn't really cinematize that well, so a lot of the team-building and competition, as well as Ender's inner thoughts, were cut from the transition to movie format. The ideas are retained well enough that you can infer what went on between, say, Ender transferring to Dragon and the team's rise up the ranks, or just how many battles they went through at the final stretch, but I suppose including everything would have made the movie five hours long.
What there was was subtle enough that the audience isn't being hit over the head with A Message, though it's a bit weird watching Harrison Ford (@Han Solo) play a Gendou Ikari type of character. The creepy atmosphere in the mind game, in particular, worked well on screen, and a lot of effort was spent making the ship combat sequences not only look impressive CG-wise but link up well in terms of dramatic tension with the kids in the control room (when do we start getting these cool 3D holographic UIs in real life, anyway?). The competition game scenes did look a bit dinky but there's not a whole lot you can do about that.
Thor: The Dark World
The first half of the movie has some brilliant moments (mostly involving the Asgardians), though as we begin with an infodump it's mostly a ton of setup and background. That's probably inevitable this setting though, as unlike other superheroes Thor has an independent setting that is not just modern day Earth + superpowers. Once the action gets going it's basically the Avengers fights-interspersed-by-one-liners, which is really how superhero movies work best given the often campy nature of the material. Kudos to the CG effects in the library books.
My opinion on the characters - best moments involve Thor, his coterie, and Loki, and Jane Foster is flat and boring - are probably in line with the Screaming Loki Fangirl Crowd, but I'm not actually a Loki fangirl. It doesn't take hormone overdose to be amused by witty banter and complicated friend/family relationships, and female characters shoehorned in as obligatory romance/quest objects is really a bit old. A lot of effort was spent trying to make Jane relevant to the plot (by amazing contrived coincidence), and it's still not as effective as Sif's two or three brief scenes go as far as communicating a believable relationship. Points also to Loki for retaining the complete and utter ambiguity as to which parts of his emoting are an act and which are genuine, that perhaps require some sort of complicated percentage algorithm to discern.
Next up: The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug. Whatever happened to just tacking numbers on to the end of sequels?