Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole

After an entire month of horror movie reviews, what better way to cleanse the palette than an animated feature for children?  I opted to go with a movie that I had always been curious about, but never went to see because...well...I don't have kids, so I can pick and choose my animated movie experiences.  Aside from the fact that the CG animation looks amazing in this trailer, this is also Zack Snyder's first effort at directing an animated movie (although I would argue that Watchmen and 300 come pretty darn close), and I've always liked his visual touch, so hopefully this is pretty awesome.

In a throwback to 80s "children" movies like The Dark Crystal, The Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole opens with a kidnapping.  After all, who says that children's movies shouldn't make your children cry?  Soren (voiced by Jim Sturgess) is an owl that was goofing off with his little brother, Kludd (Ryan Kwanten), when Kludd kicks Soren out of the nest, before he could fly.  And, because nature abhors terrible siblings, Kludd also lost his balance and fell to the base of their maghty home tree, with Soren.  Instead of getting eaten by Tasamanian Devils, which was apparently an option, the pair was rescued/kidnapped by a couple of dim-witted adult owls.  These scary-looking creatures take young Soren and Kludd to a distant land, where they are presented with an interesting choice.  They can either follow the racist/speciesist teachings of Nyra (Helen Mirren), queen of the Pure Ones, or they can become mindless slaves.

Alternate title: White (Owl) Power

Kludd opts to follow the obvious villain, while Soren rebels and tries to escape.  The strange thing about the Pure Ones is that they're supposed to be the stuff of legend; Soren and Kludd grew up to takes of them being the villains in a long battle against the heroic Guardians.  If the Pure Ones are real, I wonder if the Guardians could be real, too?

Above: an owl realizing that someone wrote sixteen books about owl racism

Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole could not be a modern animated movie without a ridiculously famous cast of voice actors.  The most effective in their roles were probably Helen Mirren and Geoffrey Rush; both have wonderfully emotive voices and did a fine job as important, but ultimately peripheral, characters.  Rush plays a great grouch, so it was nice to see that talent being utilized.  Hugo Weaving had a double role, although his voice talents are not exactly what I would call "audibly versatile."  He fine fine in both parts, but anyone who knows his voice can instantly recognize him in both roles.  Joel Edgerton was pretty good as the head bad guy, but it seems odd in retrospect that he was the cast member chosen for the villain role, and not Weaving or Rush.

Maybe he got the role thanks to his physical presence

Sam Neill was well-cast in a bit part, where his lovely voice was meant to be a contrast to his character's actions, and that was nicely done.  But those are just the most notable supporting voice actors.  Jim Sturgess played the main character, a young and idealistic owl who sometimes gets the benefits of super-slow motion shots.

ACTING!

Sturgess was fine, but this is a pretty generic character and he didn't really add anything special to the part.  An odd thing about this cast (that I just noticed) is that it is predominantly Australian, with a few Brits  sprinkled here and there.  I didn't realize that owls needed to speak the Queen's English.  Ryan Kwanten, Anthony LaPaglia, Richard Roxburgh, Leigh Whannell, David Wenham, Essie Davis, Abbie Cornish, and Angus Sampson, Aussies one and all, had roles of varying importance.  Most of their voices were recognizable, but I guess that's point when you fill your voice cast with actual actors.  None of them were bad, but none were too impressive.  As for the non-Australian supporting cast, I thought Miriam Margolyes was suitably cartoonish as a snake nanny and Emily Barclay was suitably bland as the romantic interest for Jim Sturgess.

Romantic owl eyes are slightly unsettling

What about Zack Snyder's direction?  It's no secret that Snyder likes to aim for "epic" as a director, and he did a solid job framing Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole in an epic fashion.  It is interesting watching Snyder's direction in a film where he can get exactly the visuals he wants.  It's not too different from his normal style.  The visuals are stunning.  The slow-motion is prominent and occasionally questionable.

Or, as Snyder likes to call it, "The speed at which all things should happen"

There are large-scale battles, where a small cast of heroes faces down a large number of interchangeable villains.

They're like Storm Troopers that cough up pellets

Snyder tells the story ably enough, but he doesn't get great performances out of his most important characters.  The ideas of love and betrayal have never been prominent in any of Snyder's other films, so seeing him ignore them in a children's story might not be as surprising as it should be.  Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole has all the basic elements of an entertaining animated film, but there's no emotional core to it. Part of the problem is with the writing, which spends little time on characterization, but the director should notice a little thing like entirely two-dimensional characters and have it changed.

I'm guessing he focused more on eye reflections than the script

My other problem with Legend of the Guardians is that it feels very, very familiar.  If you're familiar with Star Wars or the Chronicles of Narnia, or just about any other epic tale with children as an intended audience, then you've seen this plot before.  A lot of kid's movies are like that, but this feels like a Frankenstein of epic childhood fiction, with the only new addition being the owls.

This scene actually dubs in dialogue from Attack of the Clones

I take that back.  Making some of the child characters into mindless slaves is somewhat unique, especially in a movie aimed at children.

The moment that crystallized my feelings toward Legend of the Guardians came toward the end.  After growing up with tales of the Guardians of Ga'Hoole, Soren is happy to tell his father that the Guardians are not just legend, but are real.  His father's response was, "You made them real."  At first glance, it looks like the meaningless "kids rawk" fluff that often pops up in animated movies.  But this was so blatantly wrong that my wife got seriously irritated.  She actually raised her voice to ask, "HOW?  They already exist!"  My wife doesn't like every movie, but she doesn't loudly question movies very often.  To put that in perspective, the last time she watched an animated feature and wasn't happy with it was G-Force.  Congrats, Legend of the Guardians, you are in elite company.  Apparently, there was not enough cute to counteract the dull and stupid here.

Sorry kid, not cute enough

Let's be honest, though.  This is a movie for kids, and the standards of entertainment for children are comically low.  Sadly, Legend of the Guardians doesn't quite meet those unimpressive standards.  There are a few moments that truly "wow" the viewer --- yes, they are in slow motion --- but they are not the most important or memorable parts of the plot.

This scene > rain flying

However, thanks to the dull story, these inconsequential scenes are what I remember most about this film.  The story is too dark to be cutesy, but there are characters clearly designed to just be cute.  And yet, the story is not dark enough to be frightening or to make the story less predictable.  Even the primary staple of animated movies, the goofy supporting character, is absent for most of this movie.  Yes, Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole looks nice, but it is genuinely uninteresting and charmless.

300

"Prepare for glory," indeed.  After the awesomeness that was Sin City, I was excited when 300 was announced; not only am I a comic book geek, but I am a particularly big fan of Frank Miller's work.  And when 300 came out, it was glorious.  Angry, manly, violent, and not at all homoerotic (wink, wink), this movie was perfect for what it was.  However, when I bought it on DVD and re-watched it a few times, I started to notice that the movie was...well, a little silly, I suppose.  It has been a few years since my last viewing, so I wonder how gracefully the film has aged for me...

Nope.  Not even a little gay.

For the uninitiated, 300 is the story of the Battle of Thermopylae in 480 BC.  When an emissary from the Persian "god-king" Xerxes (Rodrigo Santoro) arrives in the Greek city-state of Sparta, he more or less threatens to rape Sparta if King Leonidas (Gerard Butler) does not choose to surrender to the overwhelming numbers of the Persian army.  Leonidas informs the messenger that this is Sparta, which is apparently a previously agreed upon signal for Spartans to push the messenger and his guards into a dark pit in the middle of Sparta, which seems to exist only for pushing people into.

"THIS!  IS!  RIDICULOUS!"

From this point on, Sparta must prepare for war against Persia, right?  Not so fast.  Some disgusting, inbred priests apparently have the last word on going to war, and they won't approve it (for a few reasons).  Leonidas cannot have the army of Sparta fight the Persians.  He can, however, take an honor guard of three hundred men (so...shouldn't this be titled 301?) and go on a little stroll that leads them to where the Persians will undoubtedly march.  What can three hundred men do against the hordes of Persia?  With a clever choice of where to fight --- and a heaping dose of bad-assery --- the answer is "quite a bit, actually."

Before I get into the acting of 300, I want to mention the style of the film.  The movie was filmed almost entirely with a blue screen, so the backgrounds and lighting are both highly stylized.  The movie uses slow-motion constantly, even for seemingly inane tasks, like climbing a mountain.  The battle scenes are grisly and gory, with a lot of stylized blood spattering the screen (although, oddly enough, not the Spartans).  And the acting is composed almost entirely of shouts.  Of course, the movie is being related as a motivational tale, told by Dilios (David Wenham) around a campfire; the fantastic and fearless characters in this movie are being related by a narrator that has good reason to make these Spartans sound like the damn bogeymen.  That's neither an approval or a disapproval of the acting in this movie --- I'm just saying that there was a reason for the director to have everyone act the way they do.

That said, wow.  The acting is something else.  I would love to blame the actors for their horribawful line delivery (cast slogan: "Try shouting more"), as well as the script, but that would be unfair.  No one in this film gives a complex performance (aside from Lena Headey) and every character is clearly good or evil, with absolutely no shades of grey.  So, what does the cast have left to do?  They have to look cool and tough while wearing undies and a cape.

Mission accomplished.

Gerard Butler really seems to enjoy himself as the too-tough-to-bleed Spartan king, and I can't blame him.  How often do you get to deliver lines like "Tonight we dine in Hell" as part of a motivational speech?  I would hesitate to call Butler good here, but he is entertaining enough.  David Wenham is the narrator, and at times, his narration sounds like he is doing voice-over for some very dirty porn.  I'm not sure why his character is the only one with a 20th century haircut, either, but whatever.  His voice just bothers me.  The other Spartans played their parts well enough, with only Vincent Regan and Michael Fassbender really standing out; Regan stuck out because his hair gets a major case of the frizzies as the film progresses and Fassbender was pretty cool as the Spartan that enjoys war the most. 

Lena Headey was pretty good as the tough wife of the king; she stands out, if only because hers is the only character with moral ambiguity.  Dominic West, who is capable of good work, was pretty boring as a sleazy politician.  The only Persian that wasn't a faceless, characterless monster was King Xerxes himself, Rodrigo Santoro; I guess he was okay, given the script, but his character design is pretty strange.

Director and co-writer Zack Snyder did his very best to bring the comic book 300 to life and stay true to the source material.  In that, he was successful.  You can tell which scenes were taken from the graphic novel, if only because every one of them is shot in slow-motion.  I will give Snyder a lot of credit for making this a visually unusual film.  The color palette, the stylized gore, and the omnipresent slow-motion shots add up for a very distinctive and very visually appealing film.  "Visually appealing" is not always the same as "well directed," though.  Snyder put all his efforts into making this movie look cool --- and he definitely succeeds --- but he omitted any subtlety or emotion with the actors and characters.  Snyder made a movie that looks and feels like the work of an artist, but without any depth.  It's not surprising to me that his follow-up films have been less successful than this one; how often do you find a script where the audience just wants to see them screaming and murdering people?  Ooh, maybe Snyder should direct the next Friday the 13th!

This is the most difficult movie I have reviewed so far, because it is both awesome and terrible at the same time.  The slow-motion is beyond excessive and is used without any regard for context or meaning.  Sometimes it looks cool, but sometimes it is just inappropriately funny.  The story is painfully simple, and yet omits some very basic things; the Spartans all march off to fight the Persians with just their leather undies, capes, and weapons --- and then, all of a sudden, they pull out their metal helmets that they were obviously not carrying at any point on their march.  Did they keister those things, or what?  And why is Gerard Butler wearing eyeliner in the final scenes?  That was just strange.  Not as strange as an army full of mostly bearded Greeks having absolutely no body hair, but strange nonetheless. 

Not even a treasure trail.

And the performances...!  I have seen Holocaust dramas with more wit and humor in them than 300.  Everything is super-serious (unless it involves Michael Fassbender loving violence), all the dialogue is shouted, and teeth are gritted whenever actors are not shouting.  And I don't even want to get into the WTF quality of the Persian characters.  I have no problem portraying an invading army as evil, but damn...the Persians in this movie are all inhuman monsters.  Again, I understand that this is probably because the film is being told as a story to motivate the Greek troops, but I can sympathize with anyone offended by the movie.  In so many ways, this is an awful movie.

And yet...and yet...I really enjoy 300.  Not in an ironic fashion, or because I laugh when I watch it (although I do that, too).  I genuinely like this movie.  But it's so bad!  But it's so bad-ass!  I've pointed out some of the shortcomings of the film, but the pure and brutal testosterone jolt this film provides balances things out for me.  This is pure, unadulterated violence on film, with none of the guilt or feelings that other violent movies try and force upon you.  Sure, this is probably the most homoerotic film in my collection, aside from Spartacus.  Whatever.  Whoever said that being manly excludes homosexual under- or overtones?  I think the important thing about this movie is that, despite everything it does poorly, I am still happy to watch it and revel in its 400-feet-over-the-top goodness.

When I was searching for movies stills online, I can across a wealth of 300-inspired visual jokes.  Here are the best I found:

This next one is my favorite.  When I was in high school, I worked at a grocery store, and we have caution signs to put up whenever there was a wet floor.  I took a Sharpie marker and doodled enough to make the falling guy look like he was diving for a baseball.  Whoever did this is much funnier than me.

The Proposition

The typical Western has good guys (usually sheriffs or the like) and bad guys (horse thieves, Indians, bank robbers, etc.) fighting in a town that looks like it wouldn't be a terrible place to visit.  Sure, it looks a little dirty and there's no running water, but where else can you order a sarsaparilla in a bar and not get any weird looks?  In the traditional Western, there are a lot of broad landscape shots, showing how open and rich the country is, and some Westerns will explore that openness, only to return to the warmth of the town at the end.

The Proposition is not that kind of Western.  It may take place in the 1880s, but the location alone makes this film noteworthy.  Instead of America's vast frontier, this movie takes place in Australia.  Not Australia, land of lobsters, wine and the Great Barrier Reef, either.  This is the Outback.  It is as wide and vast as America's western vista, but it is intimidating instead of inspiring.  This is a land that painted in brown and red, with dust and blood baked by the sun into everything you see.  This is Australia, the continent-sized penal colony.

With that in mind, it should not be surprising to learn that this is not a typical Western plot.  The movie begins with a shootout, where Charlie (Guy Pearce) and Mike Burns are outmanned and outgunned.  They are soon captured by the local law, specifically Captain Stanley (Ray Winstone).  Apparently, Captain Stanley is hell-bent on "civilizing" Australia, or at least making is resemble England in manners, if not appearances.  The biggest lawbreakers (and thus, the most uncivilized force) around is Arthur Burns (Danny Huston) and his gang.  Until recently, that gang included Charlie and Mike, but Arthur's bloodthirsty tendencies caused a rift between the brothers.  Captain Stanley knows this and wants Arthur dead.  He makes Charlie a proposition: Charlie has a few days to find Arthur, kill him, and return to town, or else Mike will be hanged.  If Charlie is successful, both he and Mike get a legal pardon.

Of course, nothing's ever that simple.  Charlie has to contend with a bounty hunter (John Hurt) and angry Aborigines on his quest to reach Arthur, and then has to decide whether to kill his brother or not.  Captain Stanley's job is not much easier.  The complete Burns gang (Charlie and Mike included) recently murdered an entire family, pausing only to rape the pregnant wife.  Allowing any member of the gang to go free causes considerable distress among the townsfolk.  The town wants their pound of flesh, regardless of who is the greater evil.

The Proposition is an interesting movie because there is no character with a clear-cut high moral ground.  Yes, Captain Stanley wants to "civilize" Australia, but what does that mean?  He brought his young wife to a a lonely wasteland, where they put up a small picket fence and have tea on their porch.  These little touches of Britishness are almost tragic in this environment.  These details quietly ask "Who is this guy kidding?"  Stanley's entire motivation is so out of sync with his environment that it is almost funny.  He believes in himself, though, and is willing to kill almost anyone in town to protect the captive Mike Burns from lynching.  Charlie Burns is not as complex; he is a bad man that wants to save his delicate (possibly retarded) younger brother.  Killing Arthur might even be a relief to Charlie.  Arthur doesn't show up until halfway through the film, but lives up to the hype.  He is mean and without conscience, but he recites poetry and loves to hear Irish ballads.  He really doesn't seem bad until he gets around so-called "civilized" folk.

The cast here is very good.  It's always nice to see Guy Pearce in a decent movie, because the man can act.  Here, he balances familial duty and conscience well.  Ray Winstone does a great job as the Captain.  He shows such toughness around men, but shows his weakness with his wife (Emily Watson), although not to her.  The supporting cast is fine in relatively one-dimensional roles.  Emily Watson is a frightened and lonely wife, surrounded by men who could conceivably rape her with little notice.  David Wenham is decent as the highest local authority, acting within the bounds of British law, but not necessarily applying those laws well in Australia.  John Hurt does a nice job as the weathered bounty hunter.  Tom Budge is eerie as a Burns gang killer with a heavenly voice.  Danny Huston steals the show, though.  The oddities in his character make him very likable in the quiet Outback scenes, but terrifying when he is on the warpath.

Nick Cave's script (yes, Nick Cave the musician) clearly wants this movie to be on par with the best Sam Peckinpah Westerns, and it comes very close.  The only difference between this movie and, for instance, The Wild Bunch, is that this movie doesn't really make you root for the main character.  Instead, you sympathize with Ray Winstone and maybe Danny Huston.  Director John Hillcoat is relatively inexperienced, but it doesn't show here; he does a fantastic job with the bleak scenery, the mood, and the actors.  Ultimately, though, the lack of character for Guy Pearce to work with hampers this film.  This isn't a fun viewing experience, so having a sympathetic main character is essential to a good ending.  Despite this flaw, the film retains a sense of brutal authenticity.  American Westerns don't make the Old West look like much fun (most of the time), but this Western feels like hell.