Dark Skies

Dark Skies entered my life when a bus drove past advertising the film.  Insidious was mentioned on the poster and this was enough to convince me that the film would be worth a look.

PLOT:  Deep in suburban America the Barrett family are randomly selected for experimentation by aliens.  The aliens use tried and tested horror clichés to district the family in order that they can steal one of the children.  Google can take you from “bird deaths” to “my son if being stalked by an alien” in three mouse clicks.  There is no plot twist.  END PLOT

The most unsettling thing about Dark Skies was the constant feeling of déjà vu that I couldn’t shake off during the entire 97mins (IMDB) running time.  Dark Skies doesn’t contain one single original idea and is the most paint by numbers film I have endured for a long time.

The traditional horror style scares and sci-fi don't mix well and the subplot involving the family’s financial woes and marital problems is overdone and almost grinds the film to a halt.

The characters are stereotypical with the worried mother (Kerri Russell), cynical father (Josh Hamilton), obnoxious teen (Dakota Goyo) and creepy young kid (Kadan Rockett) making up the Barrett family. 

The cast do the best they can but they are saddled with clunky dialogue which has been copied and pasted from the generic book of film scripts.

 

There are next to no scares and the vast majority of the action involves the parents running around in the dark looking for their young son.  They don’t think to turn on a light – this is the kind of stupidity we are forced to sit through.

 

Dark Skies is not a good film.  The mixture of horror and sci-fi didn’t work and played out like Signs meets Paranormal Activity meets the recession.  The open ending is screaming for a sequel that the film doesn’t deserve.  Dark Skies gets 3.5/10.  The only way you will enjoy Dark Skies is if you haven’t watched a film in the past ten years. 

Rise of the Guardians

 

Rise of the Guardians appeared with very little promotion but the knowledge that Hugh Jackman voices a rabbit is more than enough to get me to the cinema.  It is more out of formality than anything else that I would like to confirm, for the record, that I have not read the books the film is based upon.  It may be a different blog but I do enjoy singing the same tune.

PLOT:  Jack Frost (Chris Pine) wakes from his summer sleep and finds himself transported to the North Pole where he must help the Guardians - North (Alec Baldwin), Tooth (Isla Fisher), Bunny (Hugh Jackman) and Sandy to defeat the evil Pitch Black (Jude Law).  END PLOT

The plot of Rise of the Guardians plays out like an animated mash-up between The Bourne Identity and The Avengers although admittedly I wasn’t able to make these comparisons myself.  This is no bad thing as it puts a different spin on what is essentially a familiar coming of age storyline.

The voice work of the cast is excellent with Alec Baldwin’s Russian Santa and Hugh Jackman’s Australian Easter Bunny being the most memorable and entertaining of the bunch.  Jude Law does deserve a mention for his uber posh English villain Pitch Black.

There is plenty of humour mostly in the form of the idiotic elves or put-upon Yetis but as it transpires that I have a genuine affection for Rise of the Guardians I found the humour more entertaining than I probably should have.

Rise of the Guardians is a gorgeous film and the 3D version does add some depth to the animation.  Unfortunately the pop out moments never stray beyond a few snowflakes at the beginning and end of the film.  The film was enjoyable enough to look past this but if the option was there I would have chosen 2D.

Pixar has held the monopoly on animated films for years but they were easily knocked off their pedestal with How To Train Your Dragon.  While not quite up to the standard of How To Train Your Dragon, Rise of the Guardians does show that the quality of Dreamworks animation is on the rise. 

Rise of the Guardians gets an 8/10 but poor box office returns means that we may not get any more films in the franchise which is a shame. 

Real Steel

 

Summer Season has been and gone so perhaps it was a strategic decision to release Real Steel in a cold and damp October spot and avoid the summer mêlée.

PLOT:  Charlie (Hugh Jackman) is a down and out robot fighter who inherits his estranged eleven year old son Max (Dakota Goyo) after the child's mother dies.  Charlie and Max don’t get along or care about one another until they stumble upon an old robot named Atom.  Father and son fix and fight the robot on the underground scene until they hit the big league and ultimately challenge the undefeated world champion Zeus.   END PLOT

The plot of Real Steel is not original in any way, shape or form as there is not a cliché left unused or a single surprise in the entire film.  It has everything from father/son drama, training montages and a good old fashioned underdog story……saying that even though the film was completely lacking in originality it was very well executed.

Hugh Jackman didn’t stretch himself too far and although Charlie was pretty unlikeable for early part of the film his charm and charisma saw him through and in he same vein Dakota Goyo didn’t stray into annoying child actor territory.  Jackman and Goyo had good chemistry as the father/son team.

The supporting cast were made up of Evangeline Lily, Kevin Duran and Anthony Mackie and all were fine with what little they were given to do.  Anthony Mackie is clearly just waiting for that one big role to boost his career and bring him into the spotlight and I hope it comes sooner rather than later.

I know nothing about boxing but recently I have seen my fair sharing of boxing movies and without fail I become totally invested in them and Real Steal was no different.  The robot fights, although slightly silly in its premise, were all very well staged with a good mix of special effects and real robots.

A lot of effort was spent giving the robots individual personalities and with Atom, like Bumblebee, it was through his eyes and facial movements that I fell in love with him.

Real Steel is a clever film in that doesn’t attempt to rewrite the rulebook but has instead decided to strictly adhere to it from cover to cover and the final product turned out to be a very solid film.

The kids I took to see Real Steel (8 and 11) hailed it as the best film ever! I cannot give the film this accolade but Real Steel was a very enjoyable cinema experience and it gets a strong 8/10.  In terms of longevity it wont end up in my dvd collection but if the kids are staying and want to put their copy on I wont be too upset.