Hello all,
Well, my break is basically now over. I now start 2016 with the traditional slog of what will most likely be completely crappy January releases that normally wouldn’t see release any other time of the year. That being said the first week or two can have some hold overs from last year that did not get a proper release as well. Long story short it’s basically a crap shoot, I’ve blabbed on long enough let’s get to the reviews shall we?
The Revenant Review
Plot Summary - In 1823, a group of pelters under military command are preparing animal pelts for transport when they come under attack by the local native american tribe. After losing most of their men, the remainder flee with Hugh Glass (Leonardo Dicaprio) as their wilderness guide. With the group are his son, and a man named Fitzgerald (Tom Hardy) a scalping survivor who openly resents Glass and his half native son. After Glass is grievously injured, Fitzgerald tired to finish him off, but kills his son and leaves him for dead. Now, badly wounded and alone in the wild, Glass forces himself forward to seek revenge.
Pros - My main compliment towards the film is just how stunningly gorgeous every single shot of it is. There’s not a single moment of this film that doesn’t look amazing. The acting is phenomenal, Tom Hardy is barely recognizable, even the supporting cast brings in their A game as well. The action scenes as tense and fast paced without being too overwhelming, the manage to balance out the bleak moments for the most part, not really with humour but with mostly beautiful imagery.
Cons - Now this might seem weird, but hear me out. Revenant is 2h 37m long, eleven minutes longer than Hateful Eight. Yet were Hateful Eight didn’t feel like it was that long, The Revenant did in spades. It was during this when I realized that there are a lot of minor hiccups throughout the movie. There’s quite a few arthouse style scenes that feel like padding, you start to lose any sense of how much time has passed for these characters, there’s quite a few quiet moments that stay quiet just too long. I should also mention that I ended up leaving the movie with a massive headache, but I still can’t quite figure out why.
Final Score - 9/10
This is a beautiful film, but I cannot deny it’s flawed just enough to miss the full score. It’s definitely a must see though.
The Forest Review
Plot Summary - Sara Price (Natalie Dormer) is an average woman who is revealed to have received a series of phone calls from Japan regarding the disappearance of her twin sister Jess (Also Natalie Dormer). When she heads over to the forest Jess was last seen in, she hires a local guide Aiden (Taylor Kinney) to lead her into the haunted forest.
Pros - The film is based around the Aokigahara Forest at the base of Mount. Fuji in Japan, a well known spot for people to go and commit suicide, which in itself just breeds potential for a good horror movie. To the film’s credit there are a few kind of creepy scenes in the film.
Cons - Oh, just about everything else. My biggest nitpick is that Aiden is supposed to be Australian and yet he doesn’t have a fucking Australian accent. Natalie Dormer is on autopilot in both sister roles, and everyone else looks bored. The scares are lackluster, while being scattered too thin and lacking any real build up. Overall the whole film feels like a bad American remake of a Japanese horror film that never existed. It does try really hard to be like a Japanese horror film, except it doesn’t know how to do that and gets reduced to the usual jump scare garbage we’ve sadly come to expect. Oh, and every character in this movie is dumber than a bag of hammer’s.
Final Score - (1/10)
Overall, it’ just boring and a waste of time. There’s a film that was made last year called Sea of Trees that I don’t know if it’s been released or not, but Matthew McConaughey is in it and from what little I’ve seen it looks a million times better. Look for that when it comes out.
The first of many film reviews for this year, I’m actually looking forward to a lot of these, and I hope you all join me on another year of reviewing. Even though I don’t know what film I’m doing next yet.
Until then, I’ll see you folks at the movies.
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