Similar, Yet Different: The Three Moriartys

With the recent Guy Richie Sherlock Holmes sequel, 'a Game of Shadows', and last Sunday's conclusion of Stephen Moffat's second series of 'Sherlock', I was struck by a number of things I thought were interesting. Namely, the ways that they portrayed Sherlock Holmes' archenemy: James Moriarty.

Now, the original one from the books was interesting in his own right: a celebrated mathematician and author of an early book on astrophysics who, at the same time, controlled all crime within the city of London. Every pickpocket, burglar, blackmailer or armed robber in town made sure that they gave the Professor a cut of their loot, in exchange for support setting up their capers as well as money for additional expenses if required.

Now both big and small screen incarnations of the character bear similarities to both each other, and their original source material, but how much so?

Here I cover the similarities and differences between the characters, and see whether sticking to source material effects the portrayal in a postive or negative manner. Is being original better than being being faithful to the books.

Now this contains spoilers for both Guy Richie movies as well as seasons one and two of Sherlock, so beware all ye who enter here. And, just to say, this is kind of my opinion, but if you have a different one, please let me know. Discussions are interesting.

Movies I've Seen: the Man from Nowhere

Somehow over the years, I've become a big fan of movies from South Korea. Not entirely sure how it happened, but either way a whole new area of cinema that I wouldn't otherwise have been exposed to was opened up to me.

Today, after watching Lady Vengence and Sympathy for Mr Vengence last week, I decided to watch 2010's highest earning Korean movie: the Man from Nowhere.

For those who don't know, it's about a man who befriends a young girl whose mum is involved in drug related crimes. One day, gangsters kidnap the girl and her mum, and the mysterious man goes out to try and rescue her.

The story is well paced and fairly interesting, the bad guys are believably evil, and the cops who are pursuing the male lead character, Cha Tae-sik, don't come off as cartoonish or unreasonable, which is always the risk in this kind of movie.

The fight scenes are excellent, the acting is also suprisingly good. The addition of what appeared to be a Bjork song at the end of the movie was kind of suprising though. Probably wasn't Bjork, but it sounded like it was.

I recommend it, particularly of fans of the Professional and Taken.

4 out of 5, I'd give it.

Futurama Review: Neutopia and Benderama

Futurama - Neutopia.

Alright, Futurama's back, huzzah! The premise of this episode: After being stranded on a planet where the aliens have no concept of gender, the Planet Express crew get transgendered in order to determine which sex is better.

It has Leela in a suprising outfit.

Anyways, I kind of found in the initial setup for the episode to kind of forced, with them having to exaggerate the gender differences so that they could make fun of 'em.

Parts were funny, other parts were potentially minddestroying.

I'd overall give it a C, maybe C+

Benderama

The Professor invents a machine that makes smaller duplicates of whatever's put into it, which he uses to shrink his sweaters so that they'd now fit him. He puts Bender in charge of folding the sweaters, but he decides to mess about make hundreds of copies of himself instead.

This one was better overall, and had a number of good moments in it. Not exactly a return to form, but still a little above average.

I'd rate it around a B+

Movies I've Seen: X-Men - First Class

Just got back from watchin' X-Men: First Class, and I thought that it was a very well put together movie. I liked that the storyline riffed on both the Connery Era Bond movies as well as the superhero genre, but I'm always a sucker for retroscience fiction stories.

I thought that James MacAvoy, Michael Fassbender and Kevin Bacon were all great in their roles as Charles, Eric and Shaw respectively, but the real points I feel should go out to Jennifer Lawrence for her protrayal of Mystique, who managed to lift a rather one-note character from the previous films into something a bit more special.

The plot skipped along at a fairly good pace, though I especially liked the sections at the beginning which involved Eric in his Nazi hunting days. I have to admit that I may have seen too many movies at this point, but the fact that Charles' manor was the same mansion that they used for Wayne Manor in Batman Begins really amused me. As did a Soviet general having a summer home that was used in a Bond movie, Living Daylights I think it was, as a Mi6 safehouse.

I liked a number of the little touches in the movie, like a couple of cameos from the previous X-men movies (one of which was damn hilarious), as well as little things like how James MacAvoy's Xavier isn't really the wise and allknowing leader he'd be by the time he'd aged into Patrick Stewart. For example, his means of attempting to calm Eric down, considering Magneto's history, was really, REALLY a poor decision on his part.

If I have any complaints though, and they'll be pretty minor ones at that, is if they wanted this to be a straight-up reboot of the franchise instead of the prequel that they intended, they really should have checked it a bit more for inconsistencies. Like the difference between the ages of Emma Frost in this movie and Emma in her cameo in that crap Wolverine flick.

Oh, and Beast's facial make-up was awful.

All in all, I'd recommend this movie, if only because the team of Michael Vaughn and Jane Goldman have done a stellar job in turning what was rapidly becoming the Hugh Jackman Show, featuring some other mutants, into more of an effective team superhero movie.

Kind of saddened that due to Fox owning the rights to the X-Men movies we won't have a Michael Fassbender/Ian MacKellan Magneto versus Hugo Weaving's Red Skull fight, but c'est la vie.

Movies I've Seen: Tangled

It is interesting that they marketed the movie as being a movie of the Shrek mold, irreverent treatment of the Disney formula, "adult" humour, emphasis more on action and comedy etc. in both the trailers,


And in the poster, where they invoked the oft-mocked Dreamworks eyebrow,

Oh, in regards to the trailer: the hair fight bit was made PURELY for the trailers and wasn't in the actual movie, and Rider isn't the made character either. The language is modernised, but not to the extent that the trailer suggested with its "She's been grounded, like... FOREVER!!!" tagline. Also it's a musical.

And although, to an extent, it does share some simularities with Dreamworks' productions (a male lead that isn't as cleancut as the traditional Disney male lead, a female lead that actually DOES SOMETHING), it... still is pretty much a Disney movie in tone, albeit updated to a 2010s audience.

The musical numbers are there, complete with villain song (invoking Out There from), the castles and princesses are there, as are animal sidekicks (who don't actually talk, thank god).

It's a very good natured movie, and the people involved seem to be having a lot of fun, which seemed to be something missing from Disney's last effort. I mean, Princess and the Frog was okay with a couple of good parts in there (voodoo not being an evil religion, the 1920s New Orleans setting, the emphasis on actually working to get what you want, Friends on the Other Side, and the subversions of regular fairy tale cliches were all interesting in the very least), but it seemed a little like they'd worked so hard in making it non-offensive to one group or another than it just seemed... a little flat.

Maybe it's because the female lead in PatF didn't really have that much personality compared to the other characters or something, I don't know.

In Tangled, most of the cast is actually interesting, yes, even the animal sidekicks, and you get the idea of there being multiple layers to their personalities, or at least multiple interpretations of what's going on that you can think about.

For example, how much of the Witch's concern over Rapunzel leaving her is due to her not wanting her walking fountain of youth to wander off, and how much is her having genuine affection for a girl she effectively raised as her daughter.

I think that it leans somewhere towards the latter in that regard, as although the Witch IS vain and selfish she does at least seem to be trying to be nice, though being a centuries (possibly millennia) old witch means her sense of humour is kind of wonky (imagine a slightly more good natured version of Glados). She gives the impression that she's trying to be nice, but she's unintentionally being really emotionally abusive.

All in all, it was a cute, well made movie. Villain was interesting, good animation, fairly good songs and great characterisation. The male lead was interesting for a Disney movie, in that he had a personality without resorting to being an asshole until "love redeems him" ala Prince Naveen from the last Disney movie. Also, it had Ron Perlman and Richard "Jaws" Kiel in it!

For more a more indepth analysis of the similarities between Tangled and the productions of Dreamworks, please check out these two videos by Lindsay Ellis' Nostalgia Chick videos,

Movies I've Seen: Husk

Scarecrows, are they ever not scary? ...Well obviously not in (most) Wizard of Oz settings, but elsewhere they at least create a sense of unease, which hasn't really been THAT exploited in movies. At least not to the same extent as clowns and janitors.

It is in this niche that we find 'Husk', the tale of five twenty somethings that are out driving through a seemingly endless series of cornfields, where they end up crashing their car into a ditch after a murder of crows (hurr hurr) collides with their car's windscreen.

Having never seen Children of the Corn, not even the one with that chick from Californication in it, they all wander blindly into the cornfield were they find themselves preyed upon by the bag-headed beasties within.

Eh, it's a pretty good monster/slasher flick. The scarecrow designs and methods were pretty cool, and it's good to see a supernatural horror film these days that appears to have had some effort put into it.

The characters though, aren't exactly the deepest, and unlike in other movies that keep the characters around for so long and makes them so unappealing that you're wanting to have them killed off, like in Cloverfield, Husk seems to have the opposite problem.

Namely, they all get attacked so damn fast that there isn't really any character arc with them, and they stumble about until the last ten or fifteen minutes before actually trying to piece things together.

This movie is, in all, good for a watch, though it isn't really going to be up there with the better ones of the genre.

Movies I've Seen: How to Train Your Dragon

Finally got around to watching How to Train Your Dragon. Mostly because it was on sale for £8.

Anyways, it was recommended in a lot of places, and since I enjoyed Megamina and Monsters vs. Aliens I thought that I'd give it a shot.

The movie, for those who don't know, is about an island of Vikings who have to fight off regular attacks by dragons, who steal their food and burn down their houses. Being vikings, a large part their lives is taken but by being as macho as possible and on the island dragon-killing equals manliness (even for the women)!

The protagonist of the show is Hiccup, the son of the chief Stoic, played by Gerard Butler, who is shunned by the majority of the island for being a weedy little guy who is better at building things than killing stuff.

One day, Hiccup comes across a dragon with a busted tailfin, and after taming it, he manages to build it a prosthetic fin and uses it to fly about the place.

The story, admittedly, is kind of lightweight compared to AvsM or Megamind, but the voiceacting and the animation makes it hold together really well. I thought that it was an amusing touch that Hiccup spoke with... a Minnesotan or Wisconsin(?) accent, an accent at has at least some influence from the Scandinavian folk that immigrated there. Weird that all of the other adults spoke with Scots accents though (probably why they shunned him so).

All in all, an interesting movie to see, if only for the flying scenes, which were SO GOOD!!! Better than Avatar's (the fake one with the Smurfs).

Movies I've Seen: Thor

Was actually a lot of fun, with their depiction of the Norse Gods seemingly coming from the same place as Grant Morrison's version of the New Gods from Final Crisis (unsuprising, their both Kirby inventions). That is to say, rather than being aliens with things that are recognisable as ray guns and the like, the Asgardians are the literal embodiment of Clarke's Law.

The references to other parts of the Marvel Movie Universe weren't TOO distracting, the villain was well done and Chris Helmsworth did a really good job at being a boisterous prick as well as a more humble version of himself later in the movie.

I was also pleased that pretty much everyone that had a speaking role has a fair bit to do, and even characters that you'd expect to be relegated to just being a cameo had a fair bit of character growth and stuff.

Dr. Erik Selvig, played by Stellan Skarsgard, for example, goes a bit further than being "token mentor/European scientist who grew up with the stories of Thor and etc".

Natalie Portman put in yet another fun performance as a smart leading lady, who kind of acts in a similar manner to Pepper Potts over in the Iron Man movie.

And Heimdall, Idris Elba, was all kinds of awesome. So screw you, racist people who complained about him getting the part because he was black!

Don't forget to stay until the post-credit clip, as well as their being people called Withamage and Stonebreaker (or something similar, a weirdly dwarfy name it was to do with stones), it also pretty much sets up the Avengers movie.

In all, a fun watch and suprisingly well put together movie for someone who I don't think has done that much action, science fiction or fantasy (in a directing capacity, I'm aware he was in Wild Wild West and Harry Potter),

Go See!

Movies I've Seen: Summer Wars

Ah, Summer Wars, movie that combines science fiction with warm, funny romantic comedy with suprising skill.

The premise of Summer Wars is thus: an awkward computer nerd called Kenji Koiso is roped into accompanying Natsuki Shinohara, the most popular girl in school, to her grandmother's birthday party/family reunion as her date, and, as it's revealled, her faux fiance.

There he meets her large, extended family and has to duck about to ensure no one twigs to his and Natsuki's con. BUT, in the midst of this schenangians, a sentient and aggressive computer virus attacks the massive social network that controls most of Japan, who frames Kenji for his hijinxs.

Directed by the spectacular the Girl Who Leapt Through Time's Mamoru Hosoda, the interplay between the characters, both in the real world and in the CGI world of the Oz network, is really well done, and the animation is spectacular.

The villain of the piece, the AI called LoveMachine, is a really good bad guy in that he manages to come off as intimidating even before he actually starts to get into the heavy stuff, though he comes across as being more of a spiteful prick than a program though, which I guess makes sense. Him being self aware and junk.

My only real major complaint is that Natsuki doesn't really have THAT much to actually do. Admittedly she does play a larger part towards the end of the movie, but as is the case with a lot of movies such a large cast of characters, she doesn't really get that much screentime once the plot gets moving.

All in all, I'd give it about 8 out of 10, and do reccommend that you track it down if you can.

The Girl Who Leapt Through Time too, that movie is AWESOME.

Movies I've Seen: Megamind

For those who don't know, the plot of the movie involves the battle between the supervillain Megamind and his archenemy, the superhero Metroman, and what happens when, against all logic, Megamind defeats him and the resulting fallout.

Great animation, funny in the right places, and although it did do some pop cultural references, as is the way with Dreamworks movies, they were actually relevant to what to the genre the movie was a homage to.

When Megamind is impersonating a holographic Jor-El figure to teach a new superhero, for example, he does a Marlon Brando impression... though it's Brando circa the Godfather, which is AWESOME.

Certainly up there was the better Dreamworks movies, and also one of the better superhero movies as well to an extent. Certainly had better superhuman action scenes than a lot of live-action ones (Superman Returns, I'm looking at you, you and your giant rock!).

The characters are nicely realised, putting a nice slant on Silver Age comics, particularly Superman ones. Even the characters who in other productions would be kind of toolish, Metroman for example, actually comes across as fairly rounded.

Movies I've Seen: Source Code

Damn good movie, and certainly not the "Groundhog Day with explosions" movie that a lot of critics have dismissively described it as.

For those who don't know, the movie is about an army helicopter pilot, played by Jake Gyllenhaal, whose mind is projected into another man's memories, with the intention of finding out a terrorist's next planned target.

He only is able to do the last eight minutes of the man's life, which I guess is where the 'Groundhog Day' comparisions come from, but really, it's a really good damn movie.

Duncan Jones, director of 'Moon' and son of David Bowie, did an awesome job with this movie. From the features from the weird, cramped metal box that Gyllenhaal goes to between trips, to the casting joke with Jake's character's dad, it's a really well put together movie.

Unashamedly Science fiction, the writing relishes the concepts and ideas that allow the story to work, unlike people like the guy who directed 'Battle: Los Angeles' who insisted that his movie about an alien invasion WASN'T science fiction, it was a war movie that happened to have aliens in it.

Anyways, the writing is great, the acting is awesome and I hearily endorse this movie.