The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones

Judith Rumelt aka Cassandra Clare is best known for The Mortal Instruments Series of books that has been apparently very well received out west over the past 5-7 years.  But what does Cassandra Clare go through when the book goes onto the silver screen and the movie makers come to her with a dime a dozen changes.  I guess that’s a problem that most authors come up with and hence the term “True to the book”.

Resident Evil : Retribution

And she is back. With the 5th of a series that doesn’t cease to amaze me in terms of capability to generate revenues. What else could be the only reason why they keep coming back with more and more of Resident Evil? 5 parts in 10 years and each with a story that is ever so slightly different. But each with the same kind of special effects and similar (but continuously improving on quality) of special effects.

The consistency probably comes from the fact that the producer is the same for all 5 parts. Paul W S Anderson. He has in fact directed the first part and the last 2 installments i.e. Afterlife and now Retribution. To that extent full credit in ensuring that audiences get what they expect more often than not.

There will be a new creature that wreaks havoc. There will be zillions of bullets fired and some special kind of weapons that will make their appearance. There will be Mila Jovovich in the lead role of Alice whether you like it or not. There will be situations where several undead people will corner Alice and her friends but she will come out all guns blazing in a miss of blood and gore.

So you can expect all of the above for certain. Without any debate whatsoever. To touch upon the story just a little bit for posterity (not that it matters in any way), we have Alice who wakes up in a fancy and happy family with a daughter, only to realize that it is all part of an elaborate testing facility set up by the Umbrella corporation. None of it is real by a country mile and a half.

When the bubble bursts about 10 minutes into the movie, she finds herself – yet again – half naked – in a large cylindrical room with white lighting all around. In a few seconds, she walks out of the room replete with the ammo that’s equivalent to World War II on herself. How? Because a band of rebels, that include her old friend Luther West (Boris Kodjoe) have decided to attack the set up and relieve her.

We then go through the usual process of 7459 fights, 3.82 tons of ammunition, 483 dead bodies of human beings and about 4587 litres of blood being spilt before Alice overcomes all odds and brings us to a point where we realize that – Dammit!!! We have more installments to follow?

Dear Paul W S Anderson – When will we see the final edition of this mega franchise? Frankly, it is getting a bit difficult and really boring to see the same things over and over again. Unfortunately, the special effects ensure that we cannot see it on TV. 6 on 10. Not fair at all. Not Fair!!!

Watch the trailer at http://www.imdb.com/video/imdb/vi3931415065/

I Am Number Four

This is one of the movies that missed out earlier this year. One of the 8 or 9 movie release weekends which I simply could not get my arms around all through 2011. Hope 2012 is not as packed. On hindsight which coincidentally everyone is @ 20/20 levels, I don’t quite regret having missed I Am Number Four on the big screen. I picked up the book a couple of weeks back and finished reading it last afternoon. Picked the DVD over the weekend because I wanted to watch it immediately after finishing the book yesterday. The book by Pittacus Lore (I am sure that’s an anagram for something. Need to research it) is a fantasy which is not the best written super hero / fantasy piece ever. But to its credit, it is well paced, doesn’t take too much time to build up and is never short of excitement. Quite entertaining in short. And therefore, I was hoping that the movie will turn out to be a reasonably entertaining flick. Not to be.

We are talking about a planet called Lorien which has been destroyed by another civilization called The Mogadarians – Mogs for short. The Mogs have a simple funda – they pick a planet and drain it off all the resources. Once done, they move to the next planet. This planet hopping gets them to Lorien and the ensuing war results in the latter getting obliterated. However, 9 children have been saved along with their guardians and some animals – something like Noah’s Ark – and sent to…no points for guessing – EARTH (as if there was a paucity of planets). And thankfully they are spread across various locations on the planet. They are in hiding so that they can grow into strong Loriens one day and claims their planet back. The Mogs, however, have other plans. They are chasing the Loriens down to ensure no one is left over. The thing is that they cannot kill them at random. Thanks to a Loric spell, they have to kill them in a serial order. 3 have been killed to date over the past 6 years. Our hero is Number 4.

I have nothing against fantasia. In fact, you will notice through my writings that I love it. What cheeses me off is a weak attempt to get a super hero movie to life. There has been absolutely no emphasis on the background story from Lorien. The story has been changed in the second half. The Mogs have been reduced to a bunch of ugly looking gangsters who have gills to breath. The Mog soldier with his flashy, colourful, magical sword doesn’t exist in the movie. There is no emphasis whatsoever on #4s training. Add to that, performances which were barely average. Direction was barely OK.

What is that old saying – Never judge a movie by its book? 2 movies over the weekend which were based on works of fiction. One Day – I haven’t read but I am eagerly looking forward to getting my hands on because the story was quite good. IANF – wasted investment in both book and movie I guess. And yes – a sequel is in the offing – smart thinking but remains to be seen how it is executed. Thank God the DVD was priced @ a 40% discount. 4 on10 for the movie.

Watch the trailer at http://www.imdb.com/video/imdb/vi2997656345/

X Men Origins - Wolverine

What defines a successful movie franchise? Or for that matter, any successful franchise? I would guess it would be scalability. In the easiest possible manner. When the first edition of X Men, directed by Bryan Singer was released 10 years back, I think the makers would have given serious thought to ensure that it was not the last time an X Men movie was released. 3 successful movies later, it was only natural that they go into letting people know how they all started in the first place. One can’t help but think that Wolverine is the first in the series of X Men Origins. Actually, one would hope that this is not the last coz they are all very well made to say the least. And they have Stan Lee and Jack Kirby to thank for starting it all nearly 50 years back.
James Howlett, as a young boy, kills his biological father Thomas Logan in a fit of rage when Logan Sr. kills his father John Howlett. Logan Sr. leaves behind Victor, who is James’ elder brother. Both of them then take off and Victor gets James to promise that they would look out for each other for as long as it takes. What they don’t quite understand is that they have natural regenerative powers. In other words, it would take a lot and I mean A LOT to really kill them. Over the next few decades, they grow into James (Hugh Jackman) and Victor (Liev Schrieber) Logan through all possible wars from the late 1800s to date.
As the years roll by, Victor’s rage gets completely out of control till he kills an officer who stops him from raping an innocent girl in ‘nam. After a while, Major William Stryker (Danny Huston) offers the brothers a place in the Team X which includes Bolt (Dominic Monaghan) who can control electricity, Wade (Ryan Reynolds) and manic swordsman, Agent Zero (Daniel Henney) an expert marksman, John Wraith (Will I Am) who can teleport and Dukes (Kevin Durand) who is indestructible in a manner of speaking. However, with Victor’s rage not improving and not being in agreement with the concept of Team X, Logan decides to part ways.
Six years later, Stryker tracks Logan who is now settled with Kayla Silverfox (Lynn Collins) and informs him that someone is killing the members of Team X one by one. Stryker asks Logan to help him in vain. However, when Kayla is killed shortly after, Victor agrees and gets enrolled into a programme where his bones are bonded with a new substance called Adamantium which is literally indestructible and recovered from a meteorite. However, he hears Stryker asking the team to erase his memory and flees. Knowing that Kayla was killed by Victor, Logan begins the search for his brother so that he can get his revenge. The transition is complete when he changes his dog tags from Logan to Wolverine.
Wolverine is directed by little known director Gavin Hood whose claim to fame before this would have been the 2005 South African Academy Award winning movie Tsotsi. That one was quite critically acclaimed. I haven’t seen that one yet and Wolverine does not completely inspire me to either. Hoods direction is just about at par and does enough to ensure that the excitement of the X Men franchise continues and keeps you looking forward to the next one.
Hugh Jackman continues to play the role of Wolverine like no else I can think of. The rest of the cast is quite passé. The movie overall is very exciting and quite full of action. Similar to the previous 3 editions of the X Men. Special Effects are definitely up there. Overall I would give this a 6 on 10. Worth a watch for sure. Preferably on the big screen though.