I was honestly blown away by this film. Its rich plot and well conceived story is so beautifully crafted, its no surprised that this movie attracted such a diverse and hugely talented cast.
Written and Directed by Christoper Nolan whom everyone will know as the guy who directed the new Batman movies. However he's also the guy who wrote and directed one of my most acclaimed films, Memento. Memento was nominated for an academy award for best original screenplay, and lost to Gosford Park. But don't get me started on that. Its safe to say that Nolan is becoming one of Warner Brothers' most treasured assets.
Inception is arguably Nolan's masterpeice thus far. Anyone who's seen Memento could argue the opposite but both hugely impressed me at the time of their release.
I mentioned a richly talented and diverse cast headed by none other than Leonardo DiCaprio. DiCaprio is this generation's Robert Redford. He's truly emerged as one of the best actors in Hollywood and does an excellent job proving it in this film.
In Inception DiCaprio plays Cobb a man who has the intelligence to wield a fantastic technology where you can enter the mind of another through their dreams, and ultimately discovering their deepest, darkest secrets. Stealing them for profit.
Cobb and his team attempt to do so from Saito played by Ken Watanabe (The Last Samurai), a powerful billionaire, who knows of their intent to steal from him and ultimately hires them for a job of his own. The job, is to commit inception, which is instead of stealing an idea, they implant an idea into someone. However, in order for inception to stick, the subject must believe that he conceived the idea on his own.
Cobb along with his right hand man, Arthur played by Joseph Gordan-Levitt (Third Rock from the Sun), they seek out new recruits for a new team to commit to Saito's plan. Gordan-Levitt really impressed me in this film, and has come along way from that goofy Third Rock kid.
The recruited personnel are played by Ellen Page (Juno), Dileep Rao and Tom Hardy, and aid the gang in order to commit inception in the mind of Cillian Murphy's character.
The film also casts Tom Berenger, Marion Cotillard, Pete Postlethwaite and legendary actor Michael Caine in small but hugely important roles.
I can't do this film any justice by continuing on with the plot. It's pretty complicated and equally interesting in it's execution. There are concepts in this film that echo Richard Linklater's Waking Life. Which is a film that is more of a dialogue on reality, the perception of the mind, dreams and much more. Genius stuff.
Inception is so well crafted in it's complexity and ends on such a wonderfully pleasing note. Its a mix of action, drama and has the ability to make you ponder about the complexity of dreams and reality.
Inception is easily one of the best films of the year and I wouldn't be surprised to see it hold onto that title till years-end.
A very gratifying movie going experience.
5/5 Xombie Heads
Monday, July 19, 2010
Saturday, July 10, 2010
Predators - Horrifyingly fun!
I have to admit, I had been waiting for the Robert Rodriguez produced Predators all summer. I just knew seeing Rodriguez's name attached to the reboot of this once glorious Sci-fi franchise would be something completely different then the hugely disappointing Alien vs. Predator films.
Directed by Nimród Antal, Predators is a kick-back to the original Arnold Schwarzenegger classic Predator. There were so many elements to this film that paid tribute to the original, while adding to Predators' over all ambiance. They used the same original score in Predators as they did in the original. They even ended the movie with the country-rock song that Blaine plays during the chopper scene in the first Predator movie. Sadly i don't know the name of this song. I'm Guessing it's "We're gonna have some fun Tonight".
Predators even managed to improve the Infrared Predator view so you can actually see more detail. In the first film all you saw was red blur.
Lets not forget to mention that the plot of Predators is mirrored directly to the first film. A group of bad-asses are stuck in the jungle and are hunted by a Predator. However in Predators, there's obviously more then one, and the bad-asses aren't apart of a team, but a selection of bad-asses across Earth chosen to be hunted by the Predators.
The characters even make reference to the first film, but sadly ignore Predator 2, which never got its due credit. I thought it was a good follow up to the First.
The lead bad-ass is played by Adrien Brody, whom you wouldn't think would be able to pull off a bad-ass like Schwarzenegger, but does a good job in proving us wrong. Alice Braga plays the secondary bad-ass and only female role in this film. She is the one who knows about the incident in the first Predator movie. As the only female role, she did an excellent job holding her own space. You might remember her from the fantastic Brazilian film City of God.
Topher Grace, of That 70's show fame, somehow managed to get into this film as the "Doctor". I just don't like seeing this guy. Honestly, he was a piss-poor Venom in Spiderman 3, and he continued to be his usual smart-alecy self in this film. Just not a right fit. He should stick to comedic roles only.
Lawrence Fishburn also makes an appearance in this film and has a total of 5 minutes of screen time. Fishburn plays one of the hunted humans, from a previous hunt who survived this whole time on his own. This was one of the worst casts of the film. As Fishburn is a good actor, he's also gotten pretty fat over the years. His character has survived on this alien planet for about "10 hunting seasons", but somehow managed to scrounge up some McDonald's during that time.
A notable mention to Louis Ozawa Changchien who plays the Yakuza, Hanzo in the movie. Hanzo manages to find an old Samurai sword from a previous hunt, and later uses it to face off against one of the Predators in what was a pretty cool samurai showdown scene.
Danny Trejo, Rodriguez' favorite actor, who's been in just about all his films, also had some screen time. Trejo will star in the next Rodriguez's directed film Machete, which we saw a Trailer for before the start of Predators. Machete, was one of the fake trailers during the GRINDHOUSE collaboration between Quentin Tarantino and Rodriguez.
Predators as a whole, was bloody Gory and delivered suspenseful and creepy scenes while keeping us on the edge of our seats. It was a hell of a good time, and I was really glad to see this Franchise rebooted with an 'R' rating. After all, the Aliens Vs. Predator movies were both rated "PG", you can kinda guess why they weren't that successful.
In the end, Predators brought back the Nuance of the first film and delivered a horrifyingly fun movie going experience.
4/5 Xombie Heads
Directed by Nimród Antal, Predators is a kick-back to the original Arnold Schwarzenegger classic Predator. There were so many elements to this film that paid tribute to the original, while adding to Predators' over all ambiance. They used the same original score in Predators as they did in the original. They even ended the movie with the country-rock song that Blaine plays during the chopper scene in the first Predator movie. Sadly i don't know the name of this song. I'm Guessing it's "We're gonna have some fun Tonight".
Predators even managed to improve the Infrared Predator view so you can actually see more detail. In the first film all you saw was red blur.
Lets not forget to mention that the plot of Predators is mirrored directly to the first film. A group of bad-asses are stuck in the jungle and are hunted by a Predator. However in Predators, there's obviously more then one, and the bad-asses aren't apart of a team, but a selection of bad-asses across Earth chosen to be hunted by the Predators.
The characters even make reference to the first film, but sadly ignore Predator 2, which never got its due credit. I thought it was a good follow up to the First.
The lead bad-ass is played by Adrien Brody, whom you wouldn't think would be able to pull off a bad-ass like Schwarzenegger, but does a good job in proving us wrong. Alice Braga plays the secondary bad-ass and only female role in this film. She is the one who knows about the incident in the first Predator movie. As the only female role, she did an excellent job holding her own space. You might remember her from the fantastic Brazilian film City of God.
Topher Grace, of That 70's show fame, somehow managed to get into this film as the "Doctor". I just don't like seeing this guy. Honestly, he was a piss-poor Venom in Spiderman 3, and he continued to be his usual smart-alecy self in this film. Just not a right fit. He should stick to comedic roles only.
Lawrence Fishburn also makes an appearance in this film and has a total of 5 minutes of screen time. Fishburn plays one of the hunted humans, from a previous hunt who survived this whole time on his own. This was one of the worst casts of the film. As Fishburn is a good actor, he's also gotten pretty fat over the years. His character has survived on this alien planet for about "10 hunting seasons", but somehow managed to scrounge up some McDonald's during that time.
A notable mention to Louis Ozawa Changchien who plays the Yakuza, Hanzo in the movie. Hanzo manages to find an old Samurai sword from a previous hunt, and later uses it to face off against one of the Predators in what was a pretty cool samurai showdown scene.
Danny Trejo, Rodriguez' favorite actor, who's been in just about all his films, also had some screen time. Trejo will star in the next Rodriguez's directed film Machete, which we saw a Trailer for before the start of Predators. Machete, was one of the fake trailers during the GRINDHOUSE collaboration between Quentin Tarantino and Rodriguez.
Predators as a whole, was bloody Gory and delivered suspenseful and creepy scenes while keeping us on the edge of our seats. It was a hell of a good time, and I was really glad to see this Franchise rebooted with an 'R' rating. After all, the Aliens Vs. Predator movies were both rated "PG", you can kinda guess why they weren't that successful.
In the end, Predators brought back the Nuance of the first film and delivered a horrifyingly fun movie going experience.
4/5 Xombie Heads
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