As always, there may be minor spoilers below.

Acting - 87%

Robert Pattinson stars as this writer's favorite take on the Batman. That's right, I said it. Frankly, I didn't really have a favorite before. None really stood out to me. But, Robert has achieved something amazing with this character, actually digging into the depths of the character, but without the melodrama that tends to come with that. This is a Batman who understands that fear is a weapon, because he is afraid. That is the core of Batman, and it's so rarely represented. I will be so bold as to say that it has never been represented this well in live-action film. Perhaps more importantly, this is a Batman who is truly the World's Greatest Detective, not just a Super Badass Ninja Fighter.

Zoe Kravitz is a fantastic Catwoman. Some have said the characterization here is a bit off, and I can understand that argument, but you also have to remember that this is an origin story. She's not a world-weary badass cat burgler yet, she's just a regular badass cat burgler. She did great, and I hope she sticks around so we can see more from this character in the future. Maybe a bit more stoic next time?

Paul Dano is a fantastic Riddler. Genius and arrogant, always one step ahead. Also, I really enjoyed Jeffery Wright as Jim Gordon, he was just the right kind of hardboiled and the right kind of soft teddy bear. There's also a spoiler actor who I'm not going to get into, but I do want to say that I don't think the version we got here is fleshed out yet. Look for some big changes if they move forward with that in future films.

Plot - 74% for originality, 89% for substance

I always like to point out, because it is a bit confusing, but adaptations get a maximum of 75% for originality (cause adaptations are, by their very nature, unoriginal). It's especially interesting to point out here, because I still gave it a 74 out of 75%. Almost a "perfect" score. I gave it this score, because this is one of the best adaptations of a source material that I have ever seen. Here, the Batman from the comics makes a full transition to the big screen; for the first time, in this writer's opinion.

The plot is a gritty murder mystery, a whodunnit borrowing basically all of the tropes from the Noir genre. This Batman has only been at this for two years, young and inexperienced but still very effective. It's a fantastic plot full of twists and turns. Think the Zodiac meets Watchmen.

Visual Effects - 87%

Is it even worth saying it? The movie is very dark. And, yeah, I get the point of turning down the brightness and saturation, gives the whole thing a much gloomier and more depressing feeling. But, it is a little much in a few parts.

That said, this film is gorgeous. Just brilliantly shot. Reminded me of the Batman cartoon at certain points, using the darkness to frame characters, and color grading to set very specific moods. Oh, and the batsuit looks badass. Very functional. It seems realisitc that you could both move with agility, and take a lot of punishment in that suit.

Sound Production - 89%

This might be one of my best sound production scores. But, this deserves it.

Some of you noticed this, other people are about to have their mind blown: The Riddler's theme is just Ave Maria in minor key. Ok, a lot of you probably noticed that one. But, did you notice that Batman's theme is just a few chords from Something in the Way repeated? I believe that every character had a motif, though I noticed this too late in the film to pick out anything about the other motifs. But, frankly, I like the use of motif so much in general, and this use of motif in particualr, that I'm giving it a high score pretty much just based on that.

Though, I will say this: the movie seems to keep getting louder as it goes, and... please, filmmakers, stop doing that. I get it, it's supposed to give it a feeling of rising excitement... but, all it means for me is I have to slowly turn it down.

Overall - 85.2% (Average of the above)

This was a great movie. I hope they don't fuck it up from here, but I do look forward to seeing what they do with these characters. Frankly, Penguin was one of the least interesting to me, but... of course he's the one getting a spin-off.

UPDATE 2024: Future Bronson here. There has, of course, been news about this since. First of all, the Penguin show just released a few weeks ago as I'm writing this. I haven't watched it yet, but I've actually been hearing good things. More importantly though, The Batman has confirmed to be the first in a new trilogy which will be separate from James Gunn's DCU. Rumor has it that villains of the piece might include, but aren't limited to Scarecrow and Clayface, which would be amazing.

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As always, there may be minor spoilers below.

Acting - 83%

Guy Pearce (Fernand Mondego in The Count of Monte Cristo, The Time Traveler in The Time Machine, and soon to be the head of the Extremis Project, Aldrich Killian in Iron Man 3) stars as Snow, who is apparently Ex-CIA (blink and you'll miss it, along with the date: 2079). He's essentially all the douchebaggy parts of Mark Wahlberg (more specifically his characters in The Big Hit, and The Italian Job), with a bit more testosterone and horrible sense of humor sprinkled on. That said, somehow I ended up kinda liking the character. He had just the right amount of sarcasm and bravado...

Maggie Grace (holy shit, she's been in movies other than Taken?!) plays Emilie Warnock, the First Daughter, who is, at the start of the movie, visiting a supermax prison in space to check and make sure all the prisoners (who are kept in "stasis") are being treated humanely [sigh]... Surprisingly, she actually has a fairly engaging character arc (and she's the only character here who really has an arc at all, unless you count the secondary antagonist's spiral into madness). I can't wait to see what this girl does once she starts getting better scripts; she can act. She's got great emotionality, and even proved herself to be a decent physical actress.

Best actor in the film, besides maybe:

Vincent Regan (300, Troy, Clash of the Titans). I've always been a fan of this guy, though he never has extremely major roles. In fact, this may be his largest role to date, appearing as the primary antagonist. Named Alex, he's 'the leader of the criminals (though how he gets them to obey is never explained), and the cunning, skilled murderer. Vincent is as good as ever, playing a great villain. Cold, calculating, ruthless... and, all with very few good lines to use to show it.

Joe Gilgun (Nothing we'd know on this side of the pond) plays Hydell, Alex's brother. He's the insane rapist/murderer. No skill, no brains, all insanity. Joe plays it perfectly, wearing what must have been fairly extensive prosthesis (facial scars, and one dead eye) as if they were a second skin. This guy is a decent actor, and I think we'll start to see him in many more "insane villain" roles in the future. As mentioned before, he slowly descends ever further into insanity, fueled by his lust for Emilie.

Plot - 18% for originality, (56)(82)% for substance

Please take a moment to note the double scores in the "substance" category. The first number is for the first half of the movie. The second number is for the second half. Let me explain:

The first half of this movie was written by a fourteen-year-old, and edited by his twelve-year-old brother who just wanted to participate somehow. You know how kids are. The movie opens with a guy lighting up a cigarette, all suave-like. A man off-screen asks him a question. He responds with a classic variation on the "yo momma" joke (namely, a "I slept with your wife" joke). Man punches cigarette guy in the mouth, breaking his cigarette. Cigarette guy says, "Guess that's why they call it a 'punchline'". I shit you not, he really says that. He gets punched in the face again. After another "your wife" joke, he gets punched again, and the camera pans out on the classic interrogation scene. I don't even need to describe it. You already know what it looks like.

SuDdEn CUt tO AcTiON!!!!1111!!! Shittily choreographed, flashy, hotel room action. Back to interrogati-BaCK oT ACtIoN!!>!1111!!! Ok, no, seriously, now it's - BUT WAIT! Something else important happened in the other scene... A moment later there's a horrible chase scene, which I'm not even really sure how they got to... and a stupid, pointless MacGuffin is set up, that was never even intended to pay off in this film (and they aren't making another one of these, I can tell you that right now...).

From there the film continues to be horrible, and cliche. At one point this guy shoots a pane of glass and it explodes. And, fuck, don't get me started on the horrible wire work and lack of understanding as to what exactly zero gravity means. It's just hard to describe how bad the beginning of this movie is. I was seriously, for a little while there, prepared to call this move worse than The Happening... One of these days, I'll watch it through again, and take notes on all the most horrible parts, and add that list to this.

Then, as the movie progresses... well, there's no specific turning point, but at some point the movie gained a heart. Pacing improved, acting improved, even writing (both dialogue and plot) improved. There were actually some serious surprises, some scenes that were truly pretty badass. Character development... began. (I was gonna say "got much better", but that implies that it existed to begin with). The ending of the movie was actually a pretty decent, if banal, Sci-Fi/Action flick.

Now, I'll explain the Originality score. First of all, that is not the lowest score I have ever given. Long-time readers will remember that my first ever review was of the movie Insidious which just had seriously the most shitty and annoying sound production in the history of cinema, and received a 14% in response. However, an 18% may even be a bit lenient. It's like the plot of this movie was written by hitting the "Random Article" button on TVtropes.com; like they seriously threw things in because they were cliche. Some might call this "homage", and if done well I would agree... This was not done well. And the entire movie was universally cliche, even when the movie was taken out of the hands of the fourteen-year-old.

Visual Effects - (32)(81)%

Same deal as before, first score is the first half, the second score is the second half. But, this one I'll give them less of a hard time on. They clearly ran out of budget for certain scenes, and had to outsource to shittier graphics houses. It's a problem that plagues even some of the greatest productions. But, it's still a problem.

The worst offender is the chase scene I mentioned briefly earlier: PS2 graphics, at best, with an HD actor poorly superimposed in the middle. Why exactly they needed him to be riding a motorcycle, I'm not really sure. It did tie in with the next scene well, but they could have found a better way to do that (and should have anyway, the whole briefcase hand-off was kinda awkward and dumb anyway... you'll know what I mean if you see it). The whole effect would at least maybe have been excusable if there wasn't a live person in the middle of all those pixels.

Then, there are certain shots, like the prison itself, and the several shots of space shuttles going to and from the prison, that just looked spectacular. If it hadn't been for the generally poor art design on the prison itself, I would have sworn it looked real... However, the entire architecture of the structure just doesn't make sense. Random protrusions, entire arms of the station with very few ways to access them... It's just not a very efficient design for a space station... But, the CGI work on it was great.

Sound Production - 78%

Generally decent music. Most of it sounded very unoriginal, like everything else in this movie. For the most part it just blended in with the background. But, a decent job, and worthy of a bit more than the 75% for an unnoticeable soundtrack

Overall - (53.4% - First Half) (68.4% - Second Half) (60.9% - Average) (Average of the above)

Well, there you have it: The worst film I've reviewed to date... though, it should be noted that I've never reviewed any truly horrible films, and any film I do review it's because it intrigued me for some reason. This movie's reason was the duality in quality. But, I would like to say that this movie was worth watching, and I would watch it again, if just to make note of all the really horrible shit.

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As always, there may be minor spoilers below.

Acting - 82%

We all know what Christian Bale's Batman is like, we've seen him variously evolve and stagnate over two films now. This Bat isn't much different. Still broken over the loss of Rachel in the Dark Knight, this is a Bat defeated. But, Bale stops short of true emotionality. Perhaps he was going for the "broken introvert" archetype, but it reads more as, "depressed billionare playboy." I will say this though: He toned down the Bat-voice, so now you can actually understand his lines on first viewing.

Now on to the part you've all been waiting for: Tom Hardy (Inception, Mad Max: Fury Road) plays an excellent Bane. All muscle and genius, he is the perfect foil to the Batman. Personally, I felt that he could have used a few more scenes displaying his legendary genius. As it is, he comes across as merely a well-spoken tactician. But, Tom Hardy plays it well. Showing that kind of charisma with a mask covering 80% of your face is no easy task. That said, he's no Heath Ledger. After the Joker, Bane seems almost too... nice, even as he executes his plan to take over Gotham City. But, comparing really any villain to Ledger's Joker is a bit unfair. Beyond his wit and charisma, Bane is, of course, also huge. Like, really huge. At one point it shows him standing next to one of his kneeling subordinates, and the dudes arm is almost as big as that entire person. But, he's also fast, and well-trained. And, not restricted by a Bat-Suit... A bad combination for the Bat.

Then there's Anne Hathaway as Selina Kyle a.k.a. Catwoman. I gotta say, while she pulled it off, I still disagree with this casting. When Michelle Pfeiffer played Catwoman back in the Tim Burton days, she was perfect: as Selina Kyle she was every bit the demure assistant, and as Catwoman she was every bit the deranged sado-masochist cat burglar. Anne Hathaway never makes the transition. She's never deranged, she never really shows any hint of a real edge. When she plays the act of the docile housemaid early in the film, that feels more authentic than the cat burglar she tries to act as the rest of the time. Because Hathaways is just simply too docile and too soft to play this role.

SPOILER ALERT (Seriously, you do not want to read this section if you haven't seen the movie)

There are two other new characters introduced, the first a love interest of Bruce's (Marion Cotillard), the second a new Detective in the force (Joseph Gordon-Levitt). Both are not who they seem... or, are exactly who they seem, depending on how much you pay attention. Marion Cotillard (also from Inception) plays a woman ostensibly named Miranda Tate. She does a good job at working her way into Bruce Wayne's good graces, using the quick way (namely, through his pants). But, savvy movie-goers wont trust her from the start, especially after some romance starts blooming between the Bat and the Cat. One of these chicks has to be evil, and Catwoman is too obvious. So, some may not be as surprised as others to learn that she is actually none other than Talia Al Ghul, Ra's Al Ghul's daughter. She plays it all well, though she doesn't have long to strut her stuff as Talia; the reveal happens towards the end of the movie, and she dies soon afterwards in one of the most comical movie deaths of all time.

As for Joseph Gordon-Levitt (Cobra Commander, 3rd Rock from the Sun), he plays "Detective Blake"... and that's even more obviously a pseudonym in the film. He tries to gloss it over when he introduces himself, but it doesn't work too well, especially since he doesn't give a full name. For 99% of the film, he's just the new upcoming hot-headed detective, and a bit of a protege of Commissioner Gordon's. It's not until the very end that his real name is revealed to be... Robin. No, not Dick Grayson like it should have been, his full name is apparently Robin John Blake. So, they dropped the ball there a bit, but I kinda get it: if they had revealed that his name was Dick Grayson, most people would have turned to the person next to them and said "Who?" So, "Robin" was the easiest way to get across what they needed to quickly.

You'll just have to watch the movie to know how this all fits together though, I'm not going to spoil everything here.

SPOILERS END

Plot - 70% for originality, 84% for substance

The plot was, honestly, a bit confusing on first watching. I'll have to see it again before I can really say I understand everything that happened... but, it was the same with The Dark Knight.

There are things left intentionally vague, which I dislike. But, it never really distracts from the story as a whole. All in all, it was a good story. And, finally, it's the end of a Hero's Story arc. That's not something that's seen very often, if ever. We've had thousands of origin stories for hundreds of heroes, but none of these stories have ever come to a conclusion... until now.

This was a story about being broken, and putting yourself back together, like Batman stories almost always are.

"Why do you fall?" Bruce's father asked him. "To learn how to get back up."

And that's really the theme of the movie. Falling. And then Rising.

Beyond these vague descriptions, I really can't say anything concrete about the story without spoiling anything. Just watch it for yourself. Even at almost 3 hours long, it's definitely worth it.

Visual Effects - 85%

Superb effects, in that I barely noticed them. Though, I gotta say, directors have really got to find a solution to this gun problem. Bullets never seem to go where a person is aiming, kick-back is random, and it all just looks kinda shoddy. That's what you get for CGing in muzzle flash, and having the actors just mime what they think kick-back looks like...

Sound Production - 74%

Barely noticeable soundtrack. In fact, there were scenes which I felt suffered from poor music direction, something I never thought I'd say of Hans Zimmer's work. He's usually unobtrusive, yes, but never bad.

Also, I found Bane's vocoder/voice to be a bit much. The guy's just wearing a mask, but he sounds like he's hooked up to a synthesizer. So, low points here all around... in fact, it deserves a little less than that, but... well, I don't want this movie to have an extremely bad score...

Overall - 79% (Average of the above)

Wow... that's unexpected. But, really, appropriate I guess. It was truly a merely mediocre film. It was good yes, and I'd watch it again right now if someone wanted to go, but... it most certainly was no Dark Knight... Y'know, I may do a review of the Dark Knight, just so this series can get the recognition it deserves on this Blog.

SPOILER ALERT

I want to take a moment to talk about the Breaking of the Bat. It's a pivotal scene in the movie, based on what's considered to be one of the greatest Batman stories ever written. It also goes by way too quickly, with much too little fanfare. Bane fights Batman, and just completely shuts him out. After kicking his ass, and breaking his mask. Bane lifts Batman over his head, and breaks him over his knee. It's all done quickly, inexorably, and with almost no dramatic music, or pause for effect... I personally didn't feel like this scene packed the emotional punch it should have. I see what they were going for. They wanted it to feel inevitable, but not final. This isn't the climax after all.

But here's how I would have done it: the action music dies down into a somber, almost dirge-like theme as the bat lays there, beaten. Then, a crescendo slowly builds as Bane reaches down to lift the bat over his head. There's a pause for dramatic effect as Bane delivers whatever line it is he said there, a moment for the theme to build. Then, complete silence as the Bat is broken on Bane's knee. The Bat falls to the ground, unmoving, and an almost Requiem Mass-like theme comes in. Huge, dramatic, a chorus of a thousand lamenting voices, as it pauses on an almost still frame of the Bat's broken form for 5 to ten full seconds (a long time in screen time). Then, it moves on to the next scene.

Way over the top? Yes. But, I felt that scene needed some over the top. In fact, I felt the whole movie could have used a bit more over the top. After the Joker, Bane seemed too... real. He was, and this is a huge contradiction in terms, too real to be believable. At the very least as a Batman villain.

SPOILERS END

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As always, there may be minor spoilers below.

Acting - 81%

For a movie made for $5 million with a cast of nobodies, the acting is actually pretty decent. No overacting, no reaching. Mainly just a bunch of people playing slightly altered versions of themselves, from what I could tell.

Teddy and Melissa Barnes (Michel Laurino and Anessa Ramsey) and their friend Walter Myrick (Alex Draper) all have a shared obsession: a town called Friar. But, more about that in the plot. These three are the core trio, though several other important characters are involved. Michel is a decent actor, but never really reaches for the desperation the role required. Anessa is even better, a passionate, intelligent woman. But, it's Alex who really shines of the three. I don't know why, but I found his character intriguing. Walter is a shrink who apparently specializes in keeping up morale in expeditions. He's the wise man, the conscience of the group. Gotta have one, and I always like that character.

Teddy, the main character, is the one truly obsessed (the other two are really just enablers). He's a photographer and a journalist... and, honestly, it never really explains why he wants to do this expedition. Maybe just for recognition? I don't know. His wife, Melissa, is there because... well, I don't really know that either... she was just kinda there.

Besides those three, they bring along a Wildlife Preserve dude, a map-making husband and wife team, an assistant, and this crazy chick they meet on the way. All are fully-realized (if not fully explained) characters, and there's not a single shitty actor among them, which really honestly quite surprised me. I mean, there are no Johnny Depps or Robert Downey Jr.s, but still, some of these people actually deserve a good bit of credit.

Plot - 77% for originality, 80% for substance

You could make a very good argument that this movie is a horror re-telling of the classic, The Wizard of Oz. However, I chose not to view it that way, and thus I have decided not to restrict the originality score to a base 75%.

I have mentioned the town named Friar but, it's not the town that's important. What's important is a little trail just outside of Friar, the beginning of which is marked with a sign that says "Yellow Brick Road". The story goes that one day back in the '40's every single man, woman, and child in the town of Friar all donned their finest clothing and, taking nothing with them except their hand-crank record players, all walked into the woods along a trail that was, at the time, unmarked. Over 300 were later found dead, some frozen to death, some violently slaughtered. The rest (the full population is never stated) were never found. The film begins with a recording of the lone survivor, who mainly babbles incoherently, but keeps asking why no one else can hear... something that, obviously, we cannot hear.

Interesting setup. Kinda has a Blair Witch feel to it. But, to begin watching is to be hooked into this story (that initial recording is very official-sounding and quite chilling).

Our story actually begins in 2008, when Teddy Barnes is, after two years of trying, finally able to see the old police records of the event. He finds the location of the trail (or "the Road" as they refer to it), and the group sets out to document the area. Somehow, even through all this basic setup, where nothing really happens, the atmosphere of the movie is just thick with tension. This tension will rarely break for the rest of the movie.

Soon, along the Road, they begin to hear music. '40's music. Coming from further on up the road... but, that's all I'll say on that. The rest is best experienced for yourself.

I would however, like to note that the ending to this movie is a bit unsatisfying. It's abrupt, and doesn't seem to make a whole lot of sense... But, then, there's this nagging doubt that maybe there was just something I missed, some piece of the puzzle that makes this last one fit... I don't know, and in fact I may not be sure until I've seen it a second time...

Also, one more note: There is exactly one instance in this movie in which gore is used for shock value. Anyone that I've ever had a conversation with regarding horror movies knows that I despise horror movies that exist only for shock value. However, this one instance is an important factor in setting up the atmosphere of dread for the rest of the movie, and I think it was handled very well. It didn't dwell on the gore for the sake of disgust, and it was a huge turning point in the movie.

Visual Effects - 63%

For a $5 million budget, they actually did extremely well... but, ultimately, what looks good looks good and what doesn't doesn't (that's known as the Identity Property kids!), and this movie doesn't look that great, special-effects-wise. The saving grace here is that the special effects are used sparingly, and when they are used, they happen very quickly, so you don't really get a lot of time to think about how bad it looks. All that makes it sound like a bad thing, but really I applaud them for knowing their limits, and effectively masking their greatest weakness with strong editing and planning. Though... I hate to pick on the ending, but it sort of reversed this philosophy, displaying their rather weak CGI openly.

But, the cinematography was actually pretty well-executed, though nothing in particular really stood out.

Sound Production - 91%

This is the surprise strength of this film. The sound, especially the '40's music is used to add a hint of insanity to everything that happens. In fact, the sound itself is a major driving force of the plot. The music varies in volume (usually very quiet, but sometimes extremely loud), the "records" scratch, sometimes the music transforms into some weird dissonant noise.

(MINOR SPOILER/CONUNDRUM: at one point one of the characters says she hears a pattern in the noise, and another character scoffs like this is obvious but, as far as I could tell, that was never explained... I wonder what the pattern is...)

All in all the sound, not just the music in-film, but the background music (which yes, there is some sometimes, but not very often) and the ambient noises as well, all come together to make the viewer feel just as crazy as the people they're watching.

Overall - 78.4% (Average of the above)

Generally a pretty decent movie, one I would recommend to anyone who enjoys a good horror flick. The pace may be a bit slow for some, and the ending is arguably bad enough to ruin the entire experience. I, however, felt that the movie was very worth watching, despite it's regrettable ending, and I probably will watch it again... just not for a while... (It wasn't that good.)

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As always, there may be minor spoilers below.

Acting - 88%

Milla Jovovich (Resident Evil) and Charlotte Milchard (nothing in particular) are Dr. Abigail Taylor. Milla plays the cable network dramatized version, and Charlotte plays the "real" version. This is a gimmick that really pays off. Milla plays it a bit off her game, but you can tell it's on purpose, to get that horrible acting, BBC docudrama vibe. Charlotte looks nothing like Milla, itself a commentary on how bad those types of dramatizations usually are. However, both actresses turn in spectacular performances. Charlotte in particular is very believable. Something about her big, watery eyes (and the black makeup around them), really makes her appear defeated and terrified. Dr. Abigail Taylor is a shrink, who is very open-minded; when the signs point to aliens, she doesn't hesitate to go there.

Elias Koteas (I could name a bunch of movies, but it wouldn't help; you'd know him if you saw him, but he isn't really the main character in anything) plays Dr. Abel Campos [Alias] (his name appears with that next to it every time in appears in the movie), Dr. Taylor's complete foil. Even after certain... "unexplainable events", he is still unwilling to even discuss the possibility of aliens. I've always been a fan of Elias, even though his roles are always fairly small. He's as good as usual in this.

Will Patton (a man a lot like Elias; he's in Armageddon, but besides that hes just randomly in a lot of stuff) is the Police Chief, big tough badass. Or, he really wants to be anyway. A good performance... lots of anger.

Plot - 81% for originality, 94% for substance

Where to even start? It begins with an Owl. But, there's no owl... It's this image, a simple snowy owl that sets up the tension which will continue to build for the entire movie.

It is, from front to back, a perfectly executed B-ish docudrama. The movie's presentation as being a dramatization of "real" events, including recordings of the "real" events alongside said dramatizations, is flawless. The first scene features Milla Jovovich looking into the camera and introducing her character, before cutting to an interview with the "real" Abigail Taylor. It's little things like that, and the name labels that appear when characters are introduced, that just really sell the idea, so that by the time the really crazy (read: absolutely terrifying) stuff starts going down, it's hard to believe that what you're seeing didn't actually happen.

And that may be the most intriguing thing about this movie for me: it is genuinely terrifying. It's 5:22 in the morning... I probably won't be able to go to sleep for quite a while. This movie incorporates all that I've always said makes for a truly scary movie. I've always said that the scariest things are those that you don't quite see, that you just have to sort of make up in your head. This movie is the embodiment of that philosophy.

But, even more important than the horror for me is the emotionality of the movie. By the time the credits roll, you truly feel sorry for Abigail Taylor, and some of the things she goes through are emotionally challenging for the audience as well.

Now that I think about it, in the end, it's the combination of the two that make the story really effective. The horror plays into the emotion, and the emotion into the horror.

Visual Effects - 89%

The visual effects weren't especially impressive, but then they didn't have to be. In fact, if anything I think they should have toned it down a bit. Made it just a bit cheesier to really pull off the B-movie vibe. All of the "real" footage was done flawlessly though. The effects there mainly consisted of distorting the picture whenever anything actually started happening, but this is actually a well-documented effect of supposed UFO encounters; and besides, it made it scarier for the reasons mentioned above. It was distorted in just such a way that you caught the tiniest horrifying glimpses of what was going on. And that was plenty.

Sound Production - 91%

A surprisingly great score. They used music to really set up the emotionality of scenes, which helped to focus the audience on noise in general. This became pretty important in scenes with the above-mentioned video distortion; during all those tiny horrifying glimpses, there's always the relentless noise. Usually screaming, but also demonic wailing and otherworldly voices. A horrible cacophany that will stay with you long after the film has ended.

Overall - 88.6% (Average of the above)

Well, there we have it. I did not adjust these scores after seeing this number (and you should know, I do that sometimes) because I honestly can't argue with it. This number suggests that this movie is .1% better than Chronicle and, grudgingly, I have to agree. The film was perfectly edited, perfectly directed, flawlessly executed, and completely terrifying. So, yes, I think it actually was .1% better than Chronicle.

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As always, there may be minor spoilers below.

Acting - 92%

If you're anything like me you know these people, and the characters they play. So, this will be brief, and I'll try to focus on the newer characters. First, Mark Ruffalo (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Shutter Island) replaces Edward Norton as Bruce Banner, better known as the Hulk. I am not, or should I say "was not", a fan of Mark Ruffalo. But, he really proved himself in this film, playing a very nuanced, smart, and witty Bruce Banner. That guy can deadpan an insult like nobody's business, and gets in several verbal sparring matches with Robert Downey, Jr.'s Tony Stark (as does pretty much everyone else. What can he say, its what he does). Also, for the first time in any Hulk production, Mark Ruffalo also plays the Hulk. They used Avatar's stop-motion capture technology to record Ruffalo's performance, and then adapted the body of a bodybuilder (and stripper) named Steve Romm onto the frame. He played these scenes with a truly believable ferocity. Also, Lou Ferrigno returns to voice the Hulk. I guess he's the only person Hollywood trusts to do it.

Jeremy Renner (28 Weeks Later, The Hurt Locker), briefly seen in Thor, returns as Hawkeye, the "greatest marksman in the world" with his bow. He's the fierce warrior, through and through. Stoic, hard-assed, and mostly quiet. Probably for the best, as, while he's not a bad actor, he's' acting amongst greats. Comparatively, some of his lines didn't come off as well as they could have... but, remember, this is "comparatively" to Robert Downey, Jr., so the fact that he can hold his own at all is great praise.

Scarlett Johansson (The Island, The Spirit, The Prestige) returns as Black Widow, who appeared in Iron Man 2, but couldn't really have been said to be the Black Widow yet... or really a fully fleshed-out character at all. Here she's a femme fatale badass, all charming deceit and ass-kickery. She's a girl with horrors in her past ("red in her ledger", as she puts it, frankly an annoyingly large amount of times), who means to redeem herself.

The others you know. Robert Downey, Jr.'s Tony Stark, the "genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist" and Iron Man, is as sharp as ever, but even brings in a slight bit more nuance to the performance this time around, some real humanity. Probably due to expert guidance from Joss Whedon.

Then there's the leader of the Avengers, Chris Evan's Captain America, a man out of time. Subtle (and sometimes not-so-subtle) hints of how little he understands the new time period he finds himself in brings believability to the character. He's the moral center of the group, the greatest tactical mind, and the most fit to lead. When he steps up and gives orders, not even Tony Stark questions it.

Chris Hemsworth is Thor, the god of thunder (but not rock n' roll, that's Tony's department). His lines, being in High English, were hard to pull off, so I tend to try and cut him some slack. But, amongst all these great actors, he really shows his ineptitude in certain scenes. Not enough to bring down the film by any means, but it is noticeable. Still, he turns in a good performance, though he obviously doesn't have much experience with green screen acting (see "Visual Effects" below).

Samuel L. Jackson's Nick Fury becomes a full character here, a man with a mission: to save the world, without destroying it in the process. It's Samuel L. Motherfuckin' Jackson, what more do I need to say?

The most amazing thing about all of this is that not a single one of these can be said to be the main character. They're all the main characters of this movie. Not a single one of them, not even the non-super powered Black Widow and Hawkeye, were left behind. Every one of them was not only useful, but integral to the success of the mission. It took careful balancing on Whedon's part, but that's what the man excels at.

Plot - 78% for originality, 91% for substance

Had to reduce the originality for being an existing property, but since it's reduced to 75%, it should be noted that that is the first perfect score I've ever given..., and then I decided to add a few points, because this move truly breaks away from it's source material, and makes it something more. This wasn't just an excuse to have a bunch of heroes in a movie together, this was the logical, organic conclusion to the individual story lines presented. This is, of course, due almost entirely to Whedon's masterful directing, since the studio obviously just wanted a bunch of heroes in a movie together.

At the start of the movie, Loki returns from he exile, and steals the tesseract. Nick Fury assembles the Avengers in preparation for the coming war... and, I won't give you any more than that, as this is a story best left to unfold in the proper order. Suffice it to say that what comes next is one biggest, most badass battles of all time. But, when the Avengers aren't doing some avenging, they're just being themselves. Bruce Banner and Tony Stark get into some intense conversations about the Hulk and what he represents for Banner. Steve Rogers does his whole "moral compass" thing. There are some truly great scenes in there that don't have any action or explosions in them. This is, and I'm sure this will be said many many times by many many reviewers, a superhero flick with true heart, and not just another throwaway action flick.

However, one small complaint: in all the character introductions (and rebuilding of old characters), and in those characters trying to figure out how to interact with each other, there's not a whole lot of time to set up emotionality for the film (it's a two and a half hour movie... there was just a lot of ground to cover), and so some scenes that should be emotional fall flat a bit. But, this is a minor complaint.

All in all, Whedon does his thing, and lets everyone else do their thing, and what comes out the other side is not just one of the greatest thrill-rides ever, but also just a masterpiece of cinema.

Visual Effects - 94%

The effects were amazing. Scratches and dents on Iron Man's armor, the creatures from another dimension, even the Hulk (most of the time), all looked real, and believable. I say "most of the time" on Hulk, because there was one scene I felt could have been done a bit better, though it's one of the hardest things to do in a CGI-heavy film: CGI characters interacting with real characters. In one scene in particular, the Hulk takes a swing at Thor, and, I don't know what it was, though I'm thinking poor acting on Chris Hemsworth's part, but the whole effect just doesn't work.

Really, just a beautifully real and gritty film.

Sound Production - 82%

Honestly, the sound production, of all things, was one of few downsides to the movie. An alien fires a gun that we humans couldn't even comprehend, powered by the tesseract, an even more incomprehensible force and it sounds like... a large machine gun? Maybe I'm nitpicking, but it just didn't really work for me... however, oversights like that are balanced out by a pretty great score (which I don't entirely remember, but I do remember being fairly impressed with what they did with it in certain scenes).

Overall - 87.4% (Average of the above)

Well, there you have it folks. It should be noted that, had this been a completely original idea, that number would have been closer to 90%, and would have certainly beaten Chronicle's record of 88.5%. But, this is a system I've devised to reward originality, and so I'll stick with it, as that's how I would want my work to be scored. As it stands, it's the second best film I've reviewed to date, beating out Primer for that position, which has the highest Originality score of any movie I've ever reviewed, no easy task.

Truly a great movie, even for people who aren't nerds. It stands as a testament to raw storytelling potential, wherein action movies don't have to just be about explosions, and super heroes can just be people too.

Fans of this movie will be happy to know that Whedon has signed an option for future Avengers films. It's very possible that we will have a second, at very least, though not until "Phase 2" of the Marvel entertainment cycle completes, starting with Iron Man 3 and including a Mark Ruffalo Hulk movie somewhere in there. Everyone gets a sequel, and the fans rejoice.

Also, I called this coming out of the theater, and I'm writing it here as proof: the words "Avengers, Assemble" were never once spoken in this movie, so they will be either some of the first words spoken in the second one, the tagline for the movie, or maybe even the name of the movie itself. Officially called.

UPDATE 2024: Man it's crazy reading this now. Lots has changed since then. Mostly I'm writing this update to say... We STILL haven't gotten that Mark Ruffalo Hulk movie. (Also, I was completely wrong, though Cap did finally say, "Avengers Assemble" at the perfect climax of 23 films, of which I believe the Avengers was #10 or so?

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As always, there may be minor spoilers below.

Acting - 86%

Aaron (Shane Carruth) and Abe (David Sullivan) are two fairly ordinary dudes. They know their engineering and physics through and through, so it's safe to say they're pretty smart ordinary dudes. Both men play their parts well; Abe is the reserved and cautious one, and the wiser of the two. Aaron is pretty much his opposite; he's the intelligent risk-taker, smart enough to know why he should be cautious, and, in the end, ballsy enough to not care. Each plays the foil of the other, though both can be said to be the protagonist of the story.

Besides them, other characters float in and out of Aaron and Abe's story, but none are ever extremely important, and in fact the only other character that gets any good amount of screen time is Aaron's wife, whose name I don't even remember...

Plot - 91% for originality, 89% for substance

At the start of the movie, from what I gathered in the mix of techno-babble, Aaron has an idea for a device - well, it's not really his idea per say, but he knows how he can make it better than the company (I think it was Russian) that originally makes it does. There's a lot of talk about using Platinum instead of Palladium... I don't really know, though I've heard every bit of it actually makes a lot of sense if you know what they're talking about.

Anyway, so they build their machine. They put weight on a disc, cover it with a box, and fill the box with Argon. The weight measures 7.7 decigrams before it goes in... after a moment in the machine, it weighs 6.6 decigrams. But they very quickly begin to realize that this machine has properties that they did not anticpate. They realize that what they've actually built is... A time machine.

What follows that is a puzzle that is not easy to solve, but doing so is extremely rewarding. Aaron and Abe have very different ideas of what this technology means for them, and the ending is ominous and bleak.

Visual Effects - 82%

Not really a lot to say here, actually. The movie is more about ideas presented than it is the visuals... still, I don't think this movie would really work as a book, mainly because a lot of the clues to what's really going on in the story are visual or audial. I gave this a relatively high score despite the lack of interesting visuals, because I felt that that absence of any CGI time-travel visuals set this apart from other time-travel movies, and let the viewer know that this is a serious, realistic movie about time travel theory. I greatly respect both the courage to do that, and the skill to pull it off, which they did. Oh man, did they ever...

Sound Production - 79%

I'm changing the name of this category to "Sound Production", as my "Soundtrack" sections usually give fairly poor scores, and that should not always be so; and to make these reviews much more comprehensive. Some films lack soundtracks or have intentionally "bad" soundtracks to increase tension or set specific moods. Sound production is a much more complex topic than just the sountrack.

And this is a great example; the soundtrack to this movie is mainly silence. However, sound in general is used to great effect. For instance, the identity of the Narrator is unknown in the beginning, and somewhat difficult to decipher throughout, due to a slight distortion of the voice. You will make an assumption quickly, but sometimes he says things that disorient this assumption...

Overall - 85.4% (Average of the above)

A fucking awesome film, and by far my favorite time-travel movie to date. It's the first time-travel movie I've ever seen that displays a realistic portrayal of the concept, while keeping with all of it's own internal rules. It's a movie designed like a lateral thinking puzzle; all of the logical pieces are there, it's up to you to figure out how they all fit together... It's a puzzle I look forward to solving, preferably over several re-watchings... maybe I'll do a full-spoiler review, or just general rant, about it after I've figured out everything... as it stands I only have the most basic concept of what I think happened... and this is one of the few times I've ever actually been okay with that... actually, now that I think about it, it's a feeling I haven't had since I first made the effort to really figure out Donnie Darko (itself a very fun puzzle to pick apart).

UPDATE 2024: Due to the extremely confusing nature of this film, I highly recommend planning to watch it at least twice (don't worry, you'll want to anyway). Watch the first time going in blind, just enjoy it and if you notice things you don't understand, just accept it and move on. Then, watch a breakdown video or read a timeline. Keep these handy to reference as you watch through again (no, not the same night, that would be crazy...)

Also, I want to note that this review has been fairly heavily edited from the original. I don't know if part of it was lost or what happened, but the original plot section stopped at describing the weights of the materials in the machine (which I'm not even sure why I felt the need to describe so explicitly anyway. I left that part in so as not to remove too much that was already there, but I added the entire plot summary after that'

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As always, there may be minor spoilers below.

Acting - 93%

Let me start off with saying that while I had my doubts with some of the casting choices going into it, literally every character in this movie performed their role flawlessly, exactly as it was in the book. Jennifer Lawrence (Winter's Bone, X-Men: First Class) stars as Katniss Everdeen, the unlikable, surly girl who's one hell of a hunter. She does surly, and she pulls off hunter... but, never quite reaches "unlikable", which I can't really hold against the director or her. The star of the show can't be unlikable, especially when it's already hard for the audience to really connect with the situation. But, more on that later.

John Hutcherson (Zathura, Cirque Du Freak: The Vampires Assistant) co-stars as Peeta Mellark, strong, well-spoken, and madly in love with Katniss. He plays his role flawlessly. It's kinda funny: he was the casting choice I was most worried about before seeing it, and after seeing it I think he's the most appropriately cast person in the film... After, of course, Woody Harrelson, who played a perfect, spot-on Haymitch. Gruff, drunk, and surprisingly helpful, the character as presented in the movie is straight cut from the novel. There were many, many honorable mentions, so I'll just mention a couple of my favorites.

First of all, Rue was the cutest, sweetest little child I've ever seen. I want to adopt her.

Stanley Tucci as the talk show host Caesar Flickerman was just flawless. His scenes really had the feeling of a (more dramatic, and slightly more scripted) talk show. He reacted just like a host, covering for his guest's mistakes, or for their silence, building a rapport, and generally helping them along through the process. Brilliant.

And, last but most definitely not least, Lenny Kravitz appears as Cinna, Katniss' awesome black person (ABP, everyone gets one)... I mean, her stylist. He played his role well. He didn't have a lot of room in the role (only three or four lines to work with), but he actually did really well with what he had to work with.

Plot - 73% for originality, 84% for substance

Let me remind you that the originality score is reduced to a highest score of 75% for adapted works. But, still, I gave it extremely high scores in that department, because this movie was very different from the book in a lot of ways, while still preserving the true spirit of the book (for a discussion on the changes, read the Spoilers section below). I scored it fairly low on the substance section however, because really, while there are some good, dramatic, emotional scenes, they don't hit quite as hard as they should. I personally believe this is mainly due to timing. There's not enough time spent at the beginning, setting up how hard life is in the districts. Then it speeds through training and otherwise preparing for the games. Really, the entire exposition is just rushed, I feel. Then again, at 142 minutes (2.37 hours), it's already not a short movie. But, I (and I would be willing to bet, a lot of other people) would have watched a 3 hour long version of this movie, easy. That would give them plenty of time to set up two of the more important facts for setting up the emotionality of the movie, which are: 1) That life in District 12 sucked. There was no food, it was cold, and everything was covered with coal. And, 2) That Katniss' mother did almost nothing, and hadn't since the death of her husband (Katniss' Father), when Katniss was eleven. Since then, Katniss has taken care of her younger sister Primrose (Seven at the time of her father's death) and her catatonic mother... But, then again, I can see the other side. They do have a movie to market, after all. And when you get down to brass tax (or is the expression "tacks"? I never really got that...), the truth is less people will go see a three hour movie than will go see a two-point-three hour movie... So, here's crossing our fingers for an extended edition, am I right?

SPOILERS AHEAD (book and movie)

To be honest, the movie changed all kinds of things from the book. The first thing you'll notice (within the first two minutes of the movie), is the changed origin of the Mockingjay Pendant. In the book, Katniss' "friend" Madge Undersee gave it to her on the train on the way out to the Games. In the movie, she buys it from a woman we can assume is Greasy Sae while out buying some thread. Some people may immediately be outraged by this, but, really when you think about it, Madge was never a very important character anyway. And, it's not extremely important where the Pendant came from, what's important is what it comes to represent later. So, while I agree with the choice, the timing could have been better. It literally happens right at the beginning of the movie. I think they were trying to say, "Look, it's not the book. We're gonna change some shit. Get over it." which I would applaud them for, if they actually got that message across. But somehow, through some trick of the timing, or maybe something to do with the item itself, I don't know, but they actually ended up saying, "Look! We fucked up the book! The entire movie is gonna be entirely different!" Which might even almost work itself, if just as such a recklessly bold statement that you kinda wanna see where this goes, if it were actually true. Because the truth is that even though they changed a lot, everything that's truly important is still totally intact. It's actually a pretty faithful adaptation. Just with some things changed, and some others added... Speaking of which, there are several entirely new scenes that, as they didn't happen from Katniss' perspective, you didn't see in the book. Several times the movie will smash cut to Seneca Crane talking with President Snow about something in the games (such as discussing the rule change that brings Katniss and Peeta together). Or, more often, Caesar Flickerman will interject an explanation of what's going on, as if to viewers (to explain what a Tracker Jacker is, among other things). But, my personal favorites of the new scenes are those of the control center, people sitting around high tech tables fine-tuning small details of the arena. The new scenes are all perfectly in the style of the book, fit the continuity for later, and, most importantly, serve to clear up what is going on and keep the plot moving forward. Back to the pendant for a moment, one small thing they changed in regards to that, that really served no bearing on anything: for some reason it was treated as a secret that she was wearing it in the arena. It would have taken one simple line of dialogue, Cinna coulda just said, "You get to take one token." Boom. Done.

END SPOILERS

Visual Effects - 91%

buildings in the Capitol (a style that I'm sure will be famous, and oft-copied three movies from now). Lots of flowing lines, almost nothing blocky, in sharp contrast with the almost old west feel of the districts, both of which completely contrast with the forest of the arena. And, speaking of that forest, it was a beautiful place. I don't know where they shot it, but it was just a beautiful lush green forest, with some awesome streams and a nice lake... Anyway... I was afraid the pictures in the sky might look kinda weird. They solved this problem in a way that I'm not sure I entirely agree with: the entire sky has this big electric grid on it, and the pictures appear on that. The problem here doesn't arise until the second book/movie, and I won't mention it here, but anyone that's read the second book should be able to figure out where I'm going with this. But, anyway, the pictures don't look corny, and in fact the effect is pretty cool. The tech for the control center was done well... shit, pretty much everything was done well. Thus, the good score. Whaddaya know...

Soundtrack - 74%

Well, I'm gettin tired of using this excuse, but I really didn't notice the soundtrack, pretty much at all. So, I went with the base 75% for that... then, I got to thinkin, and I remembered that the only thing I actually do remember about the soundtrack is that every once in a while some loud dramatic note would play, and then just hold there for forever, and once or twice this was kinda annoying or at odds with the scene (I don't quite remember). So, -1%.

Overall - 83% (Average of the above)

Awesome movie, but my overall score ended up kinda low. Hopefully in the future installments they can pull together all the elements, and give me my highest score yet (only gotta beat 88.5). But, they have great actors, and a great visual style. Just gotta get some better sounds (T Bone Burnett is an awesome producer, but working alone he's not that great... it would have been awesome to have Danny Elfman like they originally planned for the role), and maybe a better editor, or maybe just a better director... All in all, it could have been better, but I still loved it, and I can't wait for Catching Fire (Which, and I'm calling this now, they're almost certainly gonna rename The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, or something to that effect)

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As always, there may be minor spoilers below.

Acting - 89%

The acting was a bit hit-and-miss for me. Dane DeHaan (A virtual nobody, though some may know him from True Blood) is the hit part of the equation. He brings weight and emotionality to the role of Andrew Detmer, who, at the beginning of the story, is your typical high school outcast. After an event that I'll not spoil here, him, his cousin Matt Garetty (Alex Russel, who doesn't even have a wiki article), and Matt's friend Steve Montgomery (played with a certain panache by someone hilariously named Michael B. Jordan) all gain the ability to move things with their mind. Matt is the miss in this situation. He was alright, but not believable. The guy had a sort of haughty, holier-than-thou look about him, but spent most of the movie quoting Carl Jung and his other favorite philosophers. Between the unlikelihood of that, and the fact that his line delivery was a bit sketchy in places, he was by far the weak link. But, balancing out the shyness of Andrew and the droll-ness of Matt, was energetic and intelligent Steve. Steve was really the heart of the group. While Matt was the brains, Steve was the leader.

I'd like to take a moment to talk about their powers: From what I could tell, Steve was the most powerful, but had the least control, whereas Andrew was the opposite. While not lacking in power, his extreme level of control allowed him to quickly (read: immediately) outstrip the other two. Then, of course, there's Matt who didn't display any amazing power or control, and in fact was almost reluctant to use his powers.

Besides those three, there were several other fairly forgettable characters. Ashley Hinshaw did the best she could with her minimal role as the love interest of Matt, a girl named Casey Letter (which was fairly interesting, as this marks one of the first times that a secondary character has a love interest without any main love interest for the lead. And, make no mistake, Andrew was definitely the lead character).

I would like to hereby apologize on behalf of the filmmakers for the role of Monica, the fleeting "love" interest for Andrew, played by a girl named Anna Wood, who looked to be in her late twenties to early thirties, trying to pass off as a high schooler (and who is actually in a relationship with the actor that played Andrew, and has been since '06).

Plot - 86% for originality, 93% for substance

Whew... where to start? Well, I guess where the movie started is the best place; Andrew's home life. You see, as the movie begins, Andrew's mom is dying from an undisclosed condition. And, on top of that, his dad was injured on the job (he was a firefighter), and so is forced to collect a meager disability check every month, which he proceeds to spend on booze. This writer kinda wonders at the nature of this disability, as it seems to stop him from working, but not from beating the shit out of his son. Andrew, tired of this, buys a camera and resolves to start taping... everything. I know, a bit much, but you kinda have to accept these kinds of things in a found-footage style movie.

Andrew rides to school every day with his cousin, Matt, who attempts to take Andrew under his wing, and break him from his shell. In the course of this, Matt convinces Andrew to attend a party at this abandoned warehouse. Long story short, Andrew ends up leaving the party, and instead goes off with Matt and Steve, the latter he's just met for the first time, to this large hole in the ground that Matt and Steve want to film. What happens next is intense and confusing, and I"ll leave you to interpret that for yourself, but needless to say, they come out of that hole changed men.

So they start testing their abilities, using them to basically just mess with people. They play with some Lego's, they mess with people at supermarkets, they do everything every one of us would do if we had those powers. My favorite scene from the movie takes place during this, the second act, where Andrew and Steve decide to join the school talent show, but I'll not spoil any more than that.

The rest of the movie tracks Andrew's gradual but inevitable decent (or ascent, depending on your moral view) to the idea that he is better than everyone, and everyone else are but bugs to be squashed. It's one hell of a thrill ride when shit starts hitting the fan, with several moments that forced me to exclaim, "Holy Fuck!"

Visual Effects - 86%

Well, the best I can say is that they pulled off everything they attempted, and with only a $12 Million budget, which is no mean feat for a movie about three dudes with superpowers of any kind.

The wire work was cheesy, the CGI basic. But, they never overstepped their limits, never attempted anything they didn't know they could pull off. If anything, I respect that they knew their limitations, but weren't afraid to push right up against them.

The camera work was exceptional. Something to be prepared for: this movie doesn't just take place through Andrew's lens, but also skips without warning to other cameras, such as the one in the hands of Casey (Matt's love interest), who is a bit of an amateur photographer; but also to security cameras, and quite a few other things towards the end. It's as if this movie was pieced together from everything filmed in that time period, and I thought it was a very interesting and unique effect... in fact, I'm gonna give this category a +5% for camera work.

SPOILERS AHEAD

My favorite visual effect of the movie was actually a makeup effect; that is, the burn scars at the end. They made Andrew appear definitely non-human, while also being realistic. It really added to the scene, making Andrew really look the bad guy, instead of just the misunderstood high schooler that he would have looked like instead. The burns, the bandages, even the hospital gown all came together to make him really just look wrong somehow.

END SPOILERS

Soundtrack - (-)%

As with Paranormal Activity, this section is being omitted, as this movie had no real discernible soundtrack. It did have music in it, but only in scenes where music actually had a reason to be playing, like the party, or just a couple of dudes hanging out. This would usually put it at the default 75%, except that I don't feel this movie deserves to have any score that low.

Overall - 88.5% (Average of the above)

Well, this is my best-reviewed movie to date, so I'd say it was pretty damn good. Seriously, go out and see it. It's a spectacle worth experiencing on the big screen. I see big things in the future for Dane DeHaan, as his acting was, really, just superb. I said it once as I left the theater, and I'll say it again to anyone who asks, this is the best original movie I've seen in a good long time, perhaps since Christopher Nolan's Magnum Opus Inception two years ago (God, was it really that long?), though obviously lacking it's style and polish. (Though, I must say, there have been other great movies since then, including The Adjustment Bureau, and Hanna).

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As always, there may be minor spoilers below.

Acting - 81%

The Twilight series of movies has a trend of getting better and better in pretty much every respect in each subsequent film. Breaking Dawn, Pt. 1 continues this trend, especially in the acting department.

Bella Swan, (Kristen Stewart, whose best role I've seen thus far was playing Joan Jett in Runaways) and Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson, a.k.a "That guy who you forgot also played Cedric Diggory") finally show some onscreen chemistry for, from what I've seen, the first time in the series. Though they still don't really manage to show any traces of love for each other, replacing it with looks that suggest to this author that there has been some behind-the-scenes "fooling around" between the two actors. They seem a bit too comfortable with each other... which is good, because it's the only thing that makes the sex scenes, that they've been building up to for four movies now, less than awkward. But, it's about time there seems to be something between them; instead of just being two people that happen to be near each other, there is at least a base lust there, which was sufficient to carry the movie.

Jacob Black (Taylor Lautner, in my opinion the best actor of the main three, who some may have also seen in the movie Abduction, which I have yet to see) SPOILER has his shirt off three seconds into the movie. Literally. Count it. But, overplayed abs aside, he puts in his usual forceful, nuanced performance. Lautner will be an actor to watch in upcoming years; when he loses the slight whine to his voice, I see him becoming a pretty great actor. As usual, he shows true love and caring for Bella, and once again seems crushed at the thought of losing her. And, of course, no Twilight review would be complete without mentioning the greatest actor in the series: Billy Burke (who was apparently in 24, if for some reason you watch that. Also mentioned in my Red Riding Hood review, where he plays the father of the main actress... again), who plays Charlie Swan, Bella's father. He is his usual melancholicly hilarious self. He shows concern for Bella, and disdain for Edward, as any father should of their daughter's boyfriend. Just superb acting.

Honorable mentions include Jackson Rathbone (who did the best he could with what he was given as Sokka in The Last Airbender) as Jasper Cullen. He was... Jasper Cullen. Kellan Lutz (who was in the newest Nightmare on Elm Street, and also Poseidon [a barely noticeable role] in Immortals [which I didn't do a review for, because the 3D messed up in out theatre, and so I was unable to really enjoy it... I barely remember it now]) plays Emmet Cullen, who shows again that he is a decent physical actor, performing well in his several fight scenes.

Also a surpringingly decent performance comes from left-field when the character Seth Clearwater becomes a semi-important figure, played by a kid with the misfortune to have the name Booboo Stewart (whose biggest achievement I can find is being featured in a music video for a cover of "Kung Fu Fighting" by Cee Lo Green and Jack Black, linked below). The kid has gumption, a difficult-to-explain spark onscreen. Once he refines his technique, I see him making it in the Comedy field.

Kung fu fighting- cee-lo green & jack black 2008

Plot - 72% for originality, 88% for substance

While I had to lower it to the usual 75% in originality because it is based on a book, it was a great, faithful adaptation of it's source materiel, so I decided to score it quite high in that department.

Anyone who has read the books has been asking themselves since Twilight came out in 2008, "How and the hell are they gonna do all that shit in the last book?" Well, let me assure you, they pull it off, and with style. Unfortunately, that's almost all I can say without any spoilers, so, people who haven't read the books or seen this movie yet, skip the following section. For the Twi-Hards, read on. (God, I hate that term...)

SPOILERS AHEAD

Many screaming girls everywhere are very concerned about the wedding. I gotta say, even as a man, I can admit it was a beautiful wedding. The theme seemed to be "nature", with benches that look to be carved of raw wood, flowers hanging overhead. Just gorgeous, really. The dress was a tight form-fit silk with a mesh, open back (I don't know these terms, I'm sure "mesh" is entirely incorrect) and, yes, was white (I know, I know... lol). He wore a rather dorky, old fashioned black and white tux... I'll be honest, I really don't care about all this, just giving my readers what they want...

The part I was very concerned about was the birth of Renesmee. It was handled fairly well. Kristen Stewart looked like shit during her pregnancy, as she should have with a child inside her drinking her blood and breaking her ribs. I believe they used the same or similar technology to that used to make Captain America's Chris Evans look scrawny and feeble. The birth itself was... gruesome. But, appropriately so. In the book, it describes Edward having no choice but to eat his way into the baby, as the embryonic sac is just too strong. You are spared this scarring image in the film, but left with images of blood pooling around the area of Bella's vagina, and the effect is a bit sickening.

And then, there's Bella's transformation, handled artfully. It shows an inside view of Edwards venom spreading through her body, healing her broken bones, and drying her blood vessels. It's a very interesting visual style, somewhat at odds with the other films in the series. But, I felt they didn't let it linger long enough. Pretty much the most tense, most interesting moments in the entire book series for me are the days Bella spends lying on that bed, mentally writhing in pain, but outwardly not moving a muscle. They show this briefly, then cut to the aforementioned transformation process. Bella's eyes open, blood red. Credits.

Yes, that's where they ended it, for those concerned about the timing of the split. I found it to be extremely effective, making the viewer unable to wait to see the second part, and final movie in the Twilight Saga.

Also, one last thing: the imprinting. Many people might think it will look... well, kinda fucked up, a grown man falling in love with an infant. But, this is handled artfully (which is apparently the word of the day), with a montage showing an older Renesmee, over the words spoken by Jacob in New Moon, explaining imprinting. The upshot here is that you get an early shot of Renesmee all growed up. Don't worry folks, it's all handled very well.

END SPOILERS

Visual Effects - 89%

They really kicked up the visual effects in this one. The Wolves in particular looked great. When they're still, they're almost mistakable for real wolves. It's movement that's still the problem. Motion blur effects just havent reached the level of realism that visual effects have achieved. But, when these wolves growl and bare their teeth, there is a bunching of skin around the snout, there is visible saliva. It really has the effect of a real wolf baring it's teeth. It's all done extremely well. The aforementioned transformations scenes were handled artfully, yet somehow realistically. Great visual effects work all around, really.

Soundtrack - 84%

The soundtrack is well done, picking pop-ish songs always appropriate to the occasion, though in one or two instances the lyrics are a bit distracting and out of place. Also a great use of silence to create dramatic effect. All around great musical choices.

Overall - 82.8% (Average of the above)

A generally great job handling all of the difficult things that go on in this book... Though, I'm considering subtracting a bit for Sparkly Vampires. lol I truly cannot wait for the final movie of the series. They have some obstacles to overcome, but, given the way they handled the events of this movie, I believe they can do well with the rest of it.

Now all I'm really worried about for the next part is that final battle, which was extremely anticlimactic in the book. They'd best spice it up a bit, or it could end up looking very disappointing in the film.

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As always, there may be minor spoilers below.

Acting - 79%

Anyone familiar with the first two movies already know Katie and Kristi. Here they return as little kids, probably eight and six respectively. Katie is played by Chloe Csengery, and Kristi by Jessica Tyler Brown. Both of them do extremely well for how little they are, Kristi seeming to genuinely be keeping secrets from her father about her "imaginary" friend Tobi, and Katie playing the overbearing older sister to great effect.

Their father, named Dennis and portrayed by Brian Boland, is, as usual for these films, the man behind the camera. His face is seen semi-rarely, and I honestly couldn't tell you what he looked like. But, he put in a very good performance. Perhaps not as good of an actor as Paranormal Activity's Micah Sloat, but less of a douchebag, so I'll give him some credit. He played the suspicious protector of the household, and was the perfect foil to his wife's steadfast disbelief in the fact that something was obviously going on in their house.

The wife, Julie, played by Lauren Bittner, was kind of a bitch. She just downright refuses to listen when her husband, and even her own children, try and tell her about the fucked up shit going on. But, it's excusable, really. If I hadn't seen some of the things that happened, I would have chalked the entire suspicion up to childish antics and a strong creative imagination myself. It's that she refuses to watch the tapes that her husband has made that really gets me; if you believe that strongly that there is nothing going on, then what would it hurt to indulge him for a moment? Especially if it means that you have a chance to prove him wrong, and make him agree to drop the subject, rather than just attempt to ignore the subject entirely...

Really, neither of the parents got a whole lot of screen time; the main focus was the children. But, the best actor in the movie (in my humble opinion)? Randy, the random friend of Dennis' that comes over to see the tapes. He has a scene in particular in which he babysits Katie while Kristi is being taken to the hospital for a fever (a plot point they never go back to, now that I think about it...) that was freaky as hell. But, I wont spoil it, you'll have to see for yourself. Randy, played by Christopher Nicholas Smith, is the only character in the movie that managed to pull off genuine terror, while at the same time seeming to be just... some dude. You might meet him on the street and not think twice.

Besides that, the only character of note is the kids' grandma, Lois, played by Hallie Foote (C.H.U.D., a movie Donnie Darko fan's should have heard about... though I've still never seen it). She's the creepy grandma Death character (sorry, couldn't help but make the reference, after having already mentioned Donnie Darko), who has a bigger part at the end. She does very little actual acting really, just stands around being all grandmotherly... Until the end, that is...

Plot - 83% for originality, 71% for substance

I don't even really know what to say about the plot, except to say: there wasn't one. The setup is a cool idea, but handled poorly: Katie (grown-up, soon-to-be-possessed Katie) brings a box of VHS tapes to her sister's new house right after they move in (meaning this happens immediately prior to Paranormal Activity 2), and Daniel (Kristi's husband, and father of Hunter) tapes over the first of them and then... stops doing so... and the rest of the movie is the footage on those tapes... I guess. It never actually explains this, or if it did, it didn't do it very well, cause I completely missed it.

But, once you've forgotten completely about that, it falls into the now all-too-familiar rhythm of a Paranormal Activity movie. Something weird happens, and Dennis sets up camera's around the house. A bit later in the movie, he fashions a moving pedestal for a camera out of a simple fan, so that he can tape both the living room and the kitchen (an idea that I found pretty genius, and set up some of the better scares for the movie).

As mentioned before, Kristi has an imaginary friend, named Tobi (an anecdote here: Tobi was an early clue in the viral marketing campaign, and everyone was trying to figure out what the fuck it meant, if it needed to be translated via rotation cipher, or if maybe it itself was a key to a cipher... no one ever even considered it was just a fuckin name. lol). It is fairly immediately stated that Kristi tells secrets to Tobi, and that sometimes Tobi tells her secrets back. In several parts it is implied that Tobi has asked her to do something, though it's never explicitly stated what (though fans of Paranormal Activity 2 should be able to piece it together). Tobi is not a nice imaginary friend. In fact, it quickly becomes apparent that he's the one behind the strange events going on around the house.

A quick note about this, though: Tobi is stated to be a guy, but the story they seem to be basing these more recent movies on is that of "Bloody Mary" who, as the name sort of suggests, is female. Kinda strange, but I digress...

Everything comes to a head at Grandma's house, but I literally cannot describe anything that happens there without giving anything away. Suffice it to say that it quickly comes to a horrifying, though somewhat unsatisfying, ending. I think the reason it's really unsatisfying is because of the true purpose of the movie: to set up events that would take place seventeen years later. This movie can't come to any true, satisfying ending, because if it did, the events of the other two movies could not have taken place. Which, while I applaud their making a movie to fit the story, rather than what would sell, I wish they had concluded it with at least an allusion to the next film...

Basically, what I'm saying here is: be prepared to want to re-watch the other two...

Visual Effects - 87%

There are some really, just genuinely superb effects in here, as I've come to expect from this series. Of course, as per usual, almost none of it was done with CG effects, so I'm grading this almost entirely on their ingenuity.

All of it looked supernatural, while still looking wholly, entirely real... and, unfortunately, I cant give even one single example without ruining some part of the movie.

That said, some of the tricks have been used before... and that's really all I have to say on the negative side. These are still used to great effect, if not in entirely original ways.

Actually, now that I think about it though, this seems like a good place to subtract a bit for editing. Some of the shots cut away just like right at the end of, sometimes damn near during a sentence. The rough cuts were just a bit too rough, and there were parts where they had obviously cut out a part of what someone was saying, and just little things like that. This would make sense if they had the excuse that the editing job was done unprofessionally as well (you know, if one of the characters had edited this all together to show to someone), but these are just supposed to be family videos, shot for the sake of capturing these suspicious events. And that, I think, is worth a -3%... (sweet, that brings it from an 80.75%, which would have been the first time I went into four digits, to a straight 80%)

Soundtrack - (-)%

I'm discounting this section, because, as anyone who has seen the other movies already know, Paranormal Activity 3 has no soundtrack. It's just the ambient noises of a house, mostly at night. The chorus' are of crickets, and the percussion, the stomping of feet and the falling of objects. I applaud their use of silence to build tension, and I love the realism created by the lack of soundtrack. Because of all this, I have no idea what kind of score I would give it, so I'm simply not including this section in the average.

Overall - 80% (Average of the above)

Generally, a pretty decent movie. Fans of the original two will enjoy this. However, if you didn't enjoy/haven't seen the other two, this movie may not be for you. It's the first one my brother Aaron saw, and I gotta say, it was kind of a bad place to start. This movie has very little plot that isn't directly meant to tie-in to the other two. But, I liked it, and will look forward to the next one... but, I have to say, if the next one is just more of the same, as this one was, it's very likely that I'll lose interest.

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Long-time readers may notice that I have changed the format ever so slightly, putting the acting before the plot. I felt this made more sense: this way I can introduce the characters and then explain how they interact. Also, I'm gonna start putting the Overall percentage in the title, and will go back and do this to previous ones as well. This is the way I will be doing it from here on out. Deal with it. Or don't. lol

As always, there may be minor spoilers below.

Acting - 91%

Hugh Jackman (Wolverine, The Prestige) stars as Charlie Keaton, a terrible father, generally an asshole, and all around horrible person. At least at the beginning of the movie. By the end, you can take off the "terrible father" part, and downgrade the "horrible person" to "not-so-great dude". But, more about that in the plot section. Hugh, as always, performed admirably, perhaps even better than usual. There was real depth to his character; you really got the feel that this guy was an asshole because the world made him that way, but also because he's just too stubborn to quit. But, as nuanced a performance he put in, he was still upstaged by an 11-year-old kid.

Dakota Goyo (Young Thor in Thor, also in Defendor apparently, but I don't remember it, probably a nearly non-existent role) plays Max Keaton, Charlie's son who he hasn't seen since his birth. This kid has spirit. He plays off of Hugh's assholish stubbornness, and throws it back in spades. He's a foul-mouthed, stubborn, cocky little kid, a kid who knows what he wants, and will do what it takes to get it. And Goyo pulls it all off like he's used to hyping up crowds, challenging gigantic robots to fights, all the while making thousands of dollars... Well, he might actually be used to that last part by now...

Evangeline Lilly (who some of you know from Lost, but I certainly don't... I can't start watching that show, or it will suck me in... Also, she's to play an elf in the upcoming The Hobbit, which should be awkward, as she looks exactly like Liv Tyler) plays the obligatory love interest, but it doesn't feel like a role simply thrown in to tap the female audience. Bailey Tallet is the daughter of some great boxer or another, the man who trained Charlie. They've known each other their entire lives, and there is an implied on-and-off-again relationship between them. But, it goes beyond that. She acts as Charlies conscience (which is good, because he clearly doesn't have one), and is also his tech expert. She fixes the Robots after he's done destroying them and making very little money off of it. She plays the role well, if a bit over-emotionally for someone who has had to put up with this jackass her entire life.

(EDIT: Ugh.. I wrote this? Really? Must have been really late... I apologize for the awkward sentence structure and bad word usage, but I can't in good journalistic integrity go back and change my opinion...)

Other honorable mentions include Kevin Durand (Fred Dukes aka "The Blob" in Wolverine, and the Mogadorian Commander in I am Number Four), who plays some cowboy dude charlie owes money to. He was weird as usual. Anthony Mackie (The dude who helps the main characters in Adjustment Bureau, a movie I need to do a review of, because it was awesome, and more people should know it) plays a dude taking bets during the big events. He's just some cool random black dude. Phil LaMarr (MadTv, Pulp Fiction) plays an announcer dude. Blink and you'll miss him. Just had to add that cause Phil LaMarr is awesome.

Wikipedia also lists Audrey Bitoni, the porn star, as playing someone named "Laura Daily" but for the life of me I cannot remember a character by that name in the film, or even any characters that might fit. So, that may or may not be true. Either way, pretty funny.

Plot - 82% for originality, 87% for substance

The premise was simple; Robot fighting matches have replaced real boxing sometime in the future. It never tells exactly when in the future, or when boxing became popular again after it's recent overtaking by MMA, but you can ignore things like that, because underlying the simple premise is the much more complicated subject of the relationship between father and son. Max comes back into Charlies life after the mysterious death of his mother. Ok, so it's not mysterious, it just never says exactly how it happened (which actually leads to a somewhat awkward line of dialogue later in the film by Jackman). Charlie never wanted to be a father, and makes this very clear when he asks the extremely rich husband of Max's Aunt (next-of-kin) for $100,000 in exchange for letting them adopt the kid (the other option being orphanage and, hopefully, foster home). Charlie (for reasons that aren't really clear) decides to keep the kid for the summer. Charlie soon realizes that this kid knows all about Robot Fighting, and they end up traveling together, get a new robot, and start winning matches.

Throughout the movie, Charlie changes. He realizes that he loves his son, and genuinely changes. But, it isn't the usual Hollywood, "I used to be an asshole but now I'm the nicest person in the world" (or "The Scrooge Effect"). This is a change from assholish terrible father to assholish somewhat decent dad, played in a way that feels authentic.

The dialogue is well-written, the movie paced flawlessly, never floundering, but never moving too fast. I had to subtract a bit though, because there is very little revealed in the way of back story. There's too much left to, eh, they'll figure it out. Like I said, it never says the date (only mentioning the year 2016 at one point as if it was sometime in the past. So, the best estimate I can make is, "after 2017"), you never see Max's mom, or find out how she died. There's no explanation of the technology of the time, and there's all the little things that are left unexplained. Character motivations and things like that. (I'll be honest, I started that last paragraph with a mind to build up to some certain point, but now I, for the life of me, cannot remember what it was... there was something that bugged me that they didn't explain though...)

Visual Effects - 90%

Not a lot to say, really. These were Robots. Fighting. It looked exactly like it would if you actually built these Robots with a mind to move like a person and trained them to box. Really, just spot on, realistic stuff. The only thing I can criticize is the motion-blur effect. When the robots got moving really quickly, they blurred a bit, like a person would moving at those speeds... except that this looked more like a pixelated blur than an actual motion blur. But, I cant be too pissed about that, there just simply hasn't been an algorithm written yet that does that well. They apparently used the same motion capture technology they used in Avatar for the robot fights. They must have used well-trained boxers, because these things moved like champions. Apparently Sugar Ray Leonard (not to be confused with the band Sugar Ray, who did that awesome 90s anthem "Fly") was the boxing consultant, teaching Hugh Jackman quite a bit about the art. I gotta say, Hugh is a surprisingly great boxer. He moves flawlessly. And, after the forty or so pounds of muscle he put on for Wolverine, he's now definitely not someone you wanna mess with.

Soundtrack - 72%

I gave it the usual 75% for a soundtrack that I didn't really notice most of the time, but then subtracted 3% for gratuitous use of Eminem. All of that is really weird when you consider that the score was done by Danny Elfman, a man who couldn't blend in if he tried, and who should never in any way be associated with Eminem.

That's really all I have to say on that, though. The music was appropriate (and the opening song was pretty decent, though I don't remember what it was), and that's about it.

Overall - 84.4% (Average of the above)

Generally a very decent movie, one I would recommend for anyone. Go see it, you wont be disappointed.

To be honest, I had very very low expectations of this movie. "Rock 'em Sock 'em Robots: The Movie?" I thought, "There's no way that can be anything but a steaming pile of crap with crap sauce and a side of shit." (This was right before I thought, "Y'know, maybe I read too many Cracked articles...") But, I was pleasantly surprised, and I am rarely this happy to have been proven wrong. Though, I wasn't wrong about the Rock 'em Sock 'em Robots: The Movie part. Cause that's still totally what this was. There was even a part that had to be in homage to those old plastic robots, during one of the fight scenes. But, you'll see it for yourself...

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As always, there may be minor spoilers below.

Plot - 85% for originality, 92% for substance

What can I really say? It was great. The setup was nearly flawless. Dude testing Alzheimer drug on chimps, chimp goes crazy, they scrap the project and put down all the chimps. One chimp that was on the medication ends up being pregnant, the baby chimp lives, scientist takes it home with him, and the medication passes through the blood. Caesar, as this chimp is named, is smart. Really smart. Smarter than human children at his age.

It goes over some technical stuff at points, but actually makes it interesting. The movie never really loses that feeling of complete engagement, even in the slower parts, of which there were few to begin with. At first I felt like they might be rushing things a bit, but that was just their hook, and it was extremely effective. The pace was fast, but they had a lot of ground to cover, and it never felt exhausting; never felt like you couldn't keep up. At the same time, they managed to cover a lot of ground without the movie dragging at any point. Basically, flawless pacing.

The action was handled extremely well. I hate it when movies are all over the place, and the camera's shaking so much, you can barely follow what's going on. None of that here. It felt like every shot was planned out to get across exactly what it needed to, which was usually that these apes were faster, stronger, smarter, and more united than the humans they fought against.

By the way, this is officially being called a reboot, meaning it has nothing to do with 2001's Planet of the Apes, which sort of implies that there will likely be a sequel. It certainly made enough money to do so, making almost $20 million at the box office so far. Of course, on a $90 million movie, they better make a bit more than that over the next couple weeks.

Acting - 79%

James Franco (Spiderman, Your Highness, and Oz in the upcoming Oz: the Great and Powerful) plays Will Rodman (I actually found out his name just now, looking it up; they don't say it much in the movie), the aforementioned scientist. He did well, but it seemed like kind of an awkward role for him. It's not that he can't be smart, it's just that he doesn't look the scientist part. Of course, it's better than Tobey McGuire, who they wanted for the role, but (thankfully) negotiations on that fell through. As I said, he did well, though, showing true compassion for Caesar, which must have been difficult as Caesar was entirely CG. Caesar's part was done by Andy Serkis (Gollum from The Lord of the Rings), although I'm not really sure exactly how much he did for the role. Mostly face capture stuff, probably. It was done well; you could tell pretty much tell exactly what Caesar was thinking at all times. He had a "pissed off face" that would strike fear into the soul of the most stoic of men.

Freida Pinto (Slumdog Millionaire, which I've never seen, and the upcoming Immortals) plays the obligatory love interest, an essentially unnecessary role. She did well with what she was given though.

Tom Felton (Draco) plays the guard at this place that is essentially a prison for apes. He plays the same kind of douchebag as Draco, making one wonder if he'll be stuck in that role for the rest of his career. He plays it well, giving Caesar good reason to revolt against the humans.

John Lithgow (3rd Rock from the Sun, Dexter, and also apparently a musician... I didn't know that) plays Will's father. He has Alzheimers, and so is the driving force behind Will's search for a "cure". He plays the clueless Alzheimers patient flawlessly. Some of the time I really wasn't certain if he actually knew what was going on. As usual, he was brilliant.

Brian Cox (William Stryker in X-men, and countless other random roles) plays the owner of the aforementioned ape prison, playing the slimy businessman type, who it is implied has some dark history with apes. Or maybe that's just Brian, bringing an intensity to the role that's really kinda unnecessary. He does that.

Visual Effects - 91%

The ape effects were superb. While you could tell it was CG, it was done with a subtlety and nuance that is rarely seen in that kind of work. The intelligent apes looked intelligent, you could just see it in their eyes. And the dumb apes just looked... well, like apes. It was really the display of emotion that got me. You could tell when the apes were pissed off (which was most of the time), but you could also see happiness, sadness, regret, really the entire spectrum of human emotions. Quite amazing to see on the face of a CG ape (for those of you that are curious, the difference between a monkey and an ape is a tail. Apes have no tails, thus these are apes, not monkeys).

There is an intense final scene that takes place on the Golden Gate bridge, and it is completely covered in fog. This entire scene was shot flawlessly, with intense special effects, including that of a chopper going down. All of this was done so well, it really felt almost real. I mean, movie real... you know what I mean.

All in all, just really a great looking film.

Soundtrack - 77%

Again, just like the Red Riding Hood one, the music was blended into the background. Non-important, just a set piece. Things that don't stand out can't be considered great. So, I give this 75%, because I'm sure the music was done well, but I didn't notice.

Of note, though, is a part where John Lithgow plays the piano. That dude is really damn good. Actually, you know what, I think I'm gonna add another 2% based on that, cause not only did he play the piano, it was actually part of the story. When he played with Alzheimers, it was horrible, and when he played without, it was awesome. (That sentence will make a lot more sense when you see the movie).

Overall - 84.4% (Average of the above)

All in all, a must see movie. I can see how people could consider some parts kinda awkward (a lot of people even laughed at the theater during one inappropriate moment in particular right at the end; I'm sure you'll be able to tell which one that is), but I found the suspension of disbelief to be flawless, the pacing superb, and basically the entire idea of the movie awesome. The moral of the story: If you're a douchebag, apes will take over the planet.

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As always, there may be minor spoilers below.

Plot - 64% for originality, 84% for substance

I had to give it a low score for originality, it being based on one of the oldest still surviving stories out there. As a general rule, I think I'm going to make 75% the highest score a remake can get for originality. So, that means that 64% is actually a pretty decent score, and it deserves it. It took that old tale and made it into an original feeling movie. It's a pretty hard thing to do, to take an old story like that, and make it into a movie that actually kept me guessing until the end. Just when you were certain who the werewolf was, that person either died, or was proved without a doubt to be the wrong person. They even managed to do this multiple times without it seeming exhausting, keeping up the feeling of mystery throughout.

The plot begins, and ends, as a romance. It never really becomes the action-ish movie that it seems like it might be starting to become at a few points, keeping the pace slow, but bearable. That said, the dominate genre would have to be "murder-mystery" in my (not so humble) opinion (for the record, it's officially [here meaning, "by wikipedia"] being called an "Epic Fantasy" which it most certainly is not), a genre which works well for the story.

Some of the time, it feels like they're trying way too hard to make you think the werewolf is definitely this person or that person. I felt like it could have used more time during the second act, where the werewolf could be almost anyone, or at least a larger group of people. Without spoiling anything, a clue is given very early on about who it could be, almost immediately narrowing the list of suspects to four or five people. Before that, it could have been anyone in the town, or even the main character, and I felt it could have used a little more time to let that sink in, to let you naturally suspect whichever character you personally didn't like. To formulate your own ideas, before it started making up your mind for you.

I'd have to say, one of my biggest problems with the plot of the movie is the beginning. Or, really, just the way the characters are introduced, or, should I say, not introduced at all. The beginning of the movie is just this barrage of different names, and you're trying to keep up, create a couple of family trees in your head to keep track of things, but at first it's just too much. I honestly feel like I missed a couple of the early plot points because of this, figuring out what they meant later on in the movie. I honestly don't know how they could have remedied this, but... I don't know, it feels like they could have spent a bit more time at the beginning. I mean, shit, the movie is only an hour-and-a-half long. They could have added an extra ten minutes to the beginning and ten minutes to the middle, fleshed out their characters, made their mystery slightly more engaging. Again, I don't really know what they would have added in this time, but a good filmmaker could have found something.

Acting - 85%

The voluptuous Amanda Seyfried (the geeky chick from Jennifer's Body) stars as Valerie, the girl with the titular Red Riding Hood. Her (and her gigantic... eyes lol) put in a great performance, managing lust, sadness, anger... but, no real fear to speak of. Perhaps that was just a choice for her character, but, even with a wolf staring her right in the face, she appeared almost... calm, collected. I guess it does somewhat make sense for the character, but at the same time, it came off as somewhat awkward. Her main love interest is Shiloh Fernandez (a virtual nobody, having mainly TV roles), who plays Peter, the stoic woodcutter. He does well, at least in the scenes where he's supposed to be showing his love for Valerie (though one scene was all lust... he looked like he was about to ruin that girl. lol), but who couldn't, really? (Ok, I'll stop making references about how hot Amanda Seyfried is...) Of course, that's 90% of his screen time, the rest being scenes of him standing around, looking all mysterious (or, trying to look all mysterious anyway), or else arguing with Max Irons' (another nobody) character, Henry, the guy who Valerie has been arranged to marry. Max Irons has much less experience as an actor than Shiloh, but acts circles around him, showing true compassion for Valerie, and appears truly defeated when Valerie reveals that she is in love with Peter, and doesn't want to marry him. All in all, he's definitely the third best actor in the film, which actually is saying something in a film with so many different random actors.

Speaking of which, I was surprised to see Gary Oldman (you don't need me to tell you what he was from) show up as Father Solomon, the priest and hunter of the supernatural. He puts in his usual stellar performance, even working with a script that's a little beneath him. Though, even he isn't immune to my nitpicking, and I have to say, he proved himself to be a somewhat inept physical actor in this film. Most of it was just post-production problems, and could have been solved with a decent editor, but some of it was... well, kinda awkward. My biggest complaint was with his showdown with the werewolf. He seemed to just be wildly swinging his silver sword, with no real skill or technique. One could argue that he's getting too old for that shit, and I would agree... which is why he shouldn't have done it; used a stunt actor, or asked them to find a different way to work that scene.

SPOILERS AHEAD

Another problem I had with his performance was his death. It was awkward. He didn't look dead, he looked like he twitched and then stared off into space for a moment. Again, some of that is a post-production problem, they should have "deadened" his eyes a bit, maybe paled his face a bit. But, mostly, it was him.

END SPOILERS

I hate to kinda pick on him, but he's Gary Fucking Oldman. I expect better. One could make the excuse that he probably didn't care too much about this movie, so probably didn't give it his full attention. I mean, even great actors have to make a living, and his last movie was Book of Eli, in January of last year (not counting his very, very small role in Deathly Hallows Part 2). But still... I expect better.

Billy Burke (Charlie Swan in The Twilight Saga, a.k.a. the Best Actor in the Twilight Series) plays Valerie's father, and puts in a fine performance on this, bringing believability to an otherwise slightly off movie.

Other than that Virginia Madsen (The Number 23, The Astronaut Farmer) plays Valerie's mother, in a forgettable role, and Julie Christie (Madam Rosmerta from Harry Potter, also Troy) plays Valerie's grandmother, who is at once creepy and the warm, motherly type (like most Grandmas lol). You may also recognize Lukas Haas from Inception, the chemical guy at the beginning, who plays Father Auguste, putting in a fine performance himself.

Visual Effects - 52%

First and foremost, the "snow" that constantly covered the ground in this movie was obviously fake. I thought it looked like large-grain salt or something like that. It didn't fall right, it didn't scatter right, it didn't make prints right. It was just wrong.

Also, I'm pretty sure they just took the one of the wolves from Twilight and pasted it into this movie. And then went and rendered it shitily. Not that it looked entirely horrible, per se, but it was entirely unoriginal, and it was way too obviously CG. No possibility for suspension of disbelief. I have to admit, though, that I am spoiled on great graphics, but I thought we had come beyond things that looked that obviously fake.

The setting of the movie was the town of "Daggerhorn", which, first of all, sounds like it came straight out of World of Warcraft, but, second of all, every building in Daggerhorn was made of gigantic spiky logs, the kind you usually see lining the trenches of old-time swords and spears warfare movies like The Thirteenth Warrior. That place is a fuckin deathtrap. Slip and fall at any point, and you've just been impaled on a, no shit, two foot spike. It was kinda ridiculous. I get it, really I do, it was supposed to represent the fact that the town had been plagued by this werewolf for generations, and thus had to defend itself. But, the way this town is set up, you are much, much more likely to be killed at the local tavern than you are by any werewolf, especially considering that, at the beginning of the movie they mention that the werewolf hasn't killed anyone in twenty years. I mean, yeah, maybe that's only true because of the massive amounts of defenses, but still... a single, or even a couple, deaths every full moon is worth it when the alternative is gruesome, agonizing death at any moment.

Soundtrack - 75%

To be honest, I'm giving this score somewhat arbitrarily, as I didn't really notice the score. It was your generic movie score, to be honest. It set the mood, and otherwise stayed in the background. I decided on 75%, rather than the 50% I was planning on giving it because, while it was completely average, not standing out in any way, it did what it was meant to do, which is set the mood of the scenes in the movie. A decent score can do one of two things, stand out or blend in. This one blended in.

Overall - 72% (Average of the above)

Some of what happens really doesn't make a lot of sense, in retrospect. It won't be near as good the second time around, not that it was really good enough the first time to want to watch over and over again. That said, it was worth watching, and I wouldn't not want to watch it again. If someone hadn't seen it (preferably a female who's not my mom) I would sit and watch it with them. This is definitely more of a chick flick, but guys will enjoy it as well. So guys, rent it and watch it with your girl, before she rents it and makes you watch it anyway.

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My first official movie review! Unfortunately, I'm starting off with a not-so-great film. I won't say it sucked, cause it had many redeeming features. But, some of it was just a bit too silly to be actually scary... but, I'm getting ahead of myself. I think I'll break it down into four sections, giving a rating out of 100% for each (and I expect to never give a full 100% to any movie in any category, unless it truly is flawless). Some minor spoilers below.

Plot - 82% for originality, 67% for substance

The plot had it's ups and downs. It was overall interesting, but in a few places kinda felt like it was grasping at straws. It was sort of a collection of random paranormal events, as if someone had wrote up a list, rolled a die twice, and ended up with "Astral Projection" and "Demonic Possession", and then figured out a way to connect the two. Also, some of it kinda felt like it was written by M. Night Shyamalan (namely the ending). As a fan of Oren Peli's Paranormal Activity, I was excited to see that he was involved, but it was only a producing role. I kinda feel like the movie would have ended up better if he had had more say in it, mainly in the little things. For instance, Oren Peli would have likely kept the demon in the shadows most of the time, instead of displaying him prominently like they did. I feel that's important for a horror movie: it's not what you see, but what you don't see that's truly terrifying.

It was overall worth watching, but maybe if less people were involved in the production, it would have ended up feeling less eclectic (it had no less than five producers). Or, maybe it was the director, James Wan (of Saw fame), who, as shown in Saw, is not the best at showing true horror, and is at his best when he's making people squirm in discomfort at the ghastly images in his movies. They're calling this "The Scariest Movie since Poltergeist", but, while it wasn't entirely un-frightening, it wasn't even near as scary as Paranormal Activity. I'd hate to see Poltergeist...

Acting - 86%

Not the greatest acting ever, but that's to be expected. I mean, they didn't have the greatest actors ever. Rose Byrne (28 Weeks Later, Knowing) is as strong as ever, bringing realistic emotionality to the movie. Which is good, because she's opposite Patrick Wilson (Night Owl from Watchmen) who remains entirely unemotional, even as his son falls into a coma. Not to say that he's an entirely bad actor. Towards the end he shows himself to be a decent physical actor, and he plays the gallant if disbelieving husband well (which is to say, he can play a dick well... not necessarily a bad thing). To be honest, he's out-acted (albeit by a small margin) by the aforementioned son, played by Ty Simpkins. Towards the end of the movie, he manages to show some true terror (and in one part, be truly terrifying), which is a lot more than Patrick can say. I guess you could make the argument that he was being "stalwart", simply not allowing his fear to get the better of him. But, showing some of it, at some point, would have helped.

Lin Shaye (the Landlady from Kingpin) came into the scene late as the psychic character with all the answers. She managed to be creepy, and used her facial expressions to do most of her acting (most of her lines were half-whispers). It worked, but it seems like there are much better people who could have filled that role.

The main demon (played by the guy who did the music for Repo! The Genetic Opera) was excellent, acted as well as can be expected, and with a truly terrifying appearance (more on that in the "Visual Effects" section). The rest of the "entities" not so much. Most were kinda awkward, seeming more like zombies than ghosts. The ones featured prominently, the "Dolls" and the "Long Haired Fiend" as they're referred to by the producers, were good enough (the "Dolls" managing to be especially creepy in their major scene). But, most of the extra ghosts were just that: extra. Here meaning "Unnecessary."

A note about the writing: The conversations were written in an attempt at a realistic style, with Patrick's character even stumbling over words as if not sure what to say... I applaud them for the attempt, but if you're going to do that, you have to use some actors with some improvisational skill, which Patrick Wilson simply doesn't have. And, it's somehow made even more awkward by how impressively good Rose Byrne is. Her acting really carried the movie, and in fact she is pretty much the main character for the entire first and second act, with the focus shifting to Patrick towards the end.

Visual Effects - 87%

I gotta hand it to them, they really pulled off all the looks they were going for. They must have spent a fortune (and hours upon hours) on all that makeup. The demon, as mentioned, was terrifying. The deep red of his face, and the pitch black of the rest of him came together for a quite striking effect, accentuated by the bright yellow of his eyes. That said, it was very slightly too cartoony to keep you up at night.

The overall general style was great, but there were one or two glaring exceptions. Watch out for Lin Shaye in a gigantic gas mask, which looked quite silly to be honest. Also, there were two techies with some sort of paranormal monitoring equipment that looked kinda silly, with random things sticking off in random directions, as if in an attempt to make them more sci-fi looking. Honestly, as you can tell by the fact that I didn't even mention them in the "Acting" section, those characters felt out of place and pointless, just like their equipment.

Soundtrack - 14%

Holy hell the god-awful noises they made in this movie! At one point I swear to god they used the noise of someone beating a piano with a baseball bat as a soundtrack. I shit you not. Later, it sounded like one of the violins (which was already making that horrible buzzing racket they use in a lot of horror movies) broke a string, and they just left it in. Guess they liked the effect. It made me want to go take all of their instruments and give them to 8 year old children, who could play them much better. It was horrible. But, it had those few random moments when the effect worked to their favor (mainly the "beating a piano with a baseball bat" at the exact moment something jumped out of a cupboard), hence the "14%" rather than a "1%" (0% is no soundtrack at all...).

Overall - 67.2% (Average of the above)

It was a fairly decent movie. It wasn't a "God, why did I just waste two hours of my life on that drivel?" type of movie. It was worth watching... I'll probably never watch it again though. It wasn't scary enough to be a horror movie, it wasn't suspenseful enough to be a suspense movie, and it wasn't thrilling enough to be a thriller. So, that leaves it being just another Paranormal movie, which, while not a bad thing, isn't good enough.

Thus concludes my first in-depth review of a movie. I hope it was educational for y'all. I know it was for me... for instance: did you know it takes nearly an hour to write 1,300 words at 4:00 in the morning? You do now, and so do I. I'm gonna go pass out before I do it right here. See ya next time, until then ::insert random sign-off that includes a reference to "Bottomless Thought"::

(One of these days, I'll actually have to think of one of those...)

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