Movies Dragonlord's 2014 Movie Guide

[Dragonlordxxxxx]

June 11, 2014

Dragonlord's Review of HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON 2 (No Spoilers)

Five years have passed since the events from 2010's How to Train Your Dragon, the Viking island of Berk has fully accepted and integrated the dragons into their lives as evident in the opening scene involving a Quidditch-style game involving the lovable serpents and their riders. Our scrawny hero, Hiccup (voiced by Jay Baruchel), is now a young adult and spends most of his time exploring new lands and discovering new species of dragons. Trouble comes when he encounters dragon trapper Eret (Kit Harrington) and learns that a dragon hunter named Drago Bludvist (Djimon Hounsou) is amassing a dragon army to conquer the lands.

Things get more complicated when Hiccup meets his supposedly-deceased mother, Valka (Cate Blanchett), who has now become a dragon activist and preservationis a la the Dian Fossey or Jane Goodall (which the character bears a striking resemblance) for dragons. Valka with her mysterious get-up and ominous mask and the way she communes with the dragons reminds me of Hayao Miyazaki's Princess Mononoke and Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, the latter most especially when she rides her dragon standing up. Even while just voice acting, Blanchett's performance still shines through with her fierceness and sincerity (kudos also to the animators).

The animation is incredibly gorgeous. The nuances in their facial expressions and the intricate details are just outstanding. Toothless is absolutely adorable, you really feel like wanting a pet/friend like him after watching this. But the story regarding an evil dragon conqueror just felt like a rehash (to me) because I've already seen them do this in their spinoff television series, Dragons: Riders of Berk. Even Dragon Bludvist has a similar design and build as the TV series villain, Alvin the Treacherous.

The story wasn't as engaging or as fun as the first film. Hiccup's naive approach to resolving conflict by talking was also annoying. The power of friendship theme was tethering on Pokemon cheesiness at the end. Still, How to Train Your Dragon 2 is a solid entertaining animated flick and I probably would have rate it higher if I didn't see the TV series first.

Rating: 7/10

 

[heavyarms21]

Is the 3D worth it ? I'm taking the family to see it, on the fence about what time and which screen.

 

[Dragonlordxxxxx]

Is the 3D worth it ? I'm taking the family to see it, on the fence about what time and which screen.

I just saw it in regular 2D.

 

[JBSchroeds]

Edge of Tomorrow
Score: 9/10
Genre: Sci-fi, Action
Director: Doug Liman
Staring: Tom Cruise as Bill Cage, and Emily Blunt as Rita Vrataski

TL;DR Review: The best sci-fi actioner of the last 10-15 years. Solid from top to bottom.

Full Review: This high budget action movie is based on a book by Hiroshi Sakurazaka titled All you Need is Kill. If that author name doesn't ring a bell don't worry, he's a small time light novel author working in Japan and hasn't done anything to put him on the map. Having read the book and the manga adaption before seeing the movie I can confidently say that the film is the best version of this story, and by a good margin. I do a review of the other two below, but know you aren't missing anything if all you do is see the movie.

Tom Cruise plays a military PR rep. The man is a coward who gets sent to the front lines of a war with an alien invader. This role is a departure from most of Cruise's parts where he's the super competent and confident guy who can do anything. Despite this break from type he still turns in a very solid performance. His growth from the start to the end of the film is believable and is a strongly empathetic portrayal. It's not an easy balance to pull off: being a self centered coward who the audience is invested in seeing succeed rather than rooting for him to fail.

Emily Blunt is hot. She spends almost the whole film being all toned and sweaty and kicking ass. I'd say her acting isn't quite as good as Cruise but she still does a good job and never really has a bad scene. I think one thing she did particularly well was being a bad-ass while still showing emotional vulnerability but not being too overt about it. It's a unified performance rather than a dichotomous one.

The rest of the cast are in pretty minimal roles. Bill Paxton's Sgt. Farell is enjoyable but somewhat underused and isn't given much range to work with. But what he does get he nails. The other people in the unit don't have much to do and are probably the weakest aspect of the movie. None of them stood out and they felt a bit incongruous. They were still necessary to the plot, and I don't think more screen time would have improved them, but still: meh.

The science fiction part of the movie is your fairly standard alien invasion. It's not all that original, but it's all very well handled. The visual effects for the aliens are great looking. They manage to look particular (as in "made of many particles") without being overly busy and still look like a living predator rather than some sort of cloud. I really liked how when one was killed it would freeze in the configuration it was in when it was disabled. They'd be these spiky, almost plant-like, shapes that did a good job emphasizing how different they looked in motion than as a still object.

The other big sci-fi trope is the "time loop", which has been done many times (ST:TNG, SG:SG1, Groundhog Day, etc) but this one is particularly interesting because the loop isn't based on any exact time, rather resets when Cage is killed. This time looping is also explained as the reason why the aliens have been unbeatable: whenever they lose they send the info back in time and try it again until they get it right. Only Cruise gets caught up in this and the aliens can't move on until they manage to cut him out of the loop. This looping is the crux of the whole film but it isn't as repetitive as it might sound. The editing and plotting is handled exquisitely so that you don't get sick of any one part. There's also an unexpected humorous bent to many of the resets. The humor is placed just in the right spots so that it doesn't get in the way of the action and doesn't undermine any of the drama (Marvel, take note of this!).

Spoilers:

Spoiler

I wasn't a huge fan of the ending. It wasn't bad by any means, and there's a real emotional satisfaction to it, but it also somewhat undermined the payoff of their victory. It also needs a little too much rationalizing. I don't need to be spoon-fed an explanation, but when you make a sudden jump like that, especially right at the end, it should make more intuitive sense. That said, it's a better ending than the book which is too bleak.

Conclusion: This was my most anticipated film of the year, and boy did it deliver the goods. Everything is well done with only a few complaints. The action is exciting, the acting is good, it's well paced and plotted, and it has a satisfying conclusion. This is the kind of movie Micheal Bay wishes he could make, but never has been able to pull off.

Bonus Review - Book: The book is an entertaining read, but it's got some things holding it from greatness. The biggest issue is that the author is obviously inexperienced. The plotting and pacing are inconsistent and there's too many exposition dumps and some wonky narrative jumps. The ending is also the sort of thing a teenager would say "man, that's deep" but for an adult reader it's not nearly so satisfying and feels sort of edgy for edgy's sake. At only 200 pages it's a jaunty read, but I couldn't help think how much better it could have been in the hands of a more talented writer. [6.5/10].

Bonus Review - Manga: The artistic fidelity is top notch, as expected of Takeshi Obata (Death Note, Bakuman, etc), but the actual designs themselves suck. The mimics look retarded, sort of like the Langoliers' down-syndrome cousin. And the suits are too futuristic and don't look like something that would be mass produced during total war and then given to grunts. The pacing is also somewhat break-neck, with the first chapter covering almost the first third of the novel. The characters never get time to breath and the finale is extremely rushed. Over all it's just a poorly executed adaption. [3/10]






Also, another review that I forgot to write. Bit late now, but I'll do a quick review anyways
X-Men: Days of Future Past
Score: 7.8/10
Genre: Superhero
Director: Bryan Singer
Staring: Hugh Jackman as Wolverine, Michael Fassbender as Magneto, James McAvoy as Professor X, and Jennifer Lawrence as Mystique

TL;DR Review: One of the best entries in the X-Men franchise. Combines the best parts of the original and First Class storylines.

Full Review: Bryan Singer returns to helm his first X-Men film since X2. After the abortion of Origins and mediocrity of Wolverine, this was the movie the franchise needed. It does a great job juggling it's huge cast and does about as good a job weaving things together as you can expect from something with multiple timelines. It's not perfect, but it works if you don't squint too hard at it.

The core cast is great. Fassbender and McAvoy continue to be excellent, and Jackman does his thing with Wolverine (proving, IMO, the problem with his solo outings was all about the script and not him). The supporting cast is mostly good, but Dinklage is underused. I'm still not sold on Jennifer Lawrence's Mystique. She's a good actress and has more range than Romijn had, but there's just something missing (probably the raw sex-appeal that Rebecca managed even though she had very few lines). Nicholas Hoult as Beast continues to be weak.

In the supporting cast there were two big surprises. The first was Blink, whose portal power was evocative and the actress had the most screen presence of all the new future mutants. The second was Quicksilver. The design for the character looked bad, but the portrayal was great. The personality and irreverent boredom fit great for somebody who can move through the world at a speed normal people can't even imagine. And the effects sequence that shows off his powers was flat out amazing. Fox really threw down the gauntlet with that one and Marvel is going to have a bitch of a time matching up to it.

The plot with the sentinels is alright, but I still think that the most interesting part of the movie was watching the characters interact. There aren't too many effects laden tent poll films that can say that, but it also means that the action wasn't as good as it could have been. They went really big with some of it, but in doing so sacrificed being dynamic.

Conclusion: Not quite enough for me to call it the best X-Men movie ever, but it does a very good job building back trust in the series and leaves things at an exciting jumping-off point.

 

[Philippou4Life]

Is the 3D worth it ? I'm taking the family to see it, on the fence about what time and which screen.

You god damn better watch it in 3D. It's amazing. It's worth it.

Make sure it's on a proper XD 3D or IMAX 3D---not some cheap, mom and pop theater where the screen is all dark and fuzzy.

 

[Philippou4Life]

June 11, 2014

Dragonlord's Review of HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON 2 (No Spoilers)

Five years have passed since the events from 2010's How to Train Your Dragon, the Viking island of Berk has fully accepted and integrated the dragons into their lives as evident in the opening scene involving a Quidditch-style game involving the lovable serpents and their riders. Our scrawny hero, Hiccup (voiced by Jay Baruchel), is now a young adult and spends most of his time exploring new lands and discovering new species of dragons. Trouble comes when he encounters dragon trapper Eret (Kit Harrington) and learns that a dragon hunter named Drago Bludvist (Djimon Hounsou) is amassing a dragon army to conquer the lands.

Things get more complicated when Hiccup meets his supposedly-deceased mother, Valka (Cate Blanchett), who has now become a dragon activist and preservationis a la the Dian Fossey or Jane Goodall (which the character bears a striking resemblance) for dragons. Valka with her mysterious get-up and ominous mask and the way she communes with the dragons reminds me of Hayao Miyazaki's Princess Mononoke and Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, the latter most especially when she rides her dragon standing up. Even while just voice acting, Blanchett's performance still shines through with her fierceness and sincerity (kudos also to the animators).

The animation is incredibly gorgeous. The nuances in their facial expressions and the intricate details are just outstanding. Toothless is absolutely adorable, you really feel like wanting a pet/friend like him after watching this. But the story regarding an evil dragon conqueror just felt like a rehash because I've already seen them do this in their spinoff television series, Dragons: Riders of Berk. Even Dragon Bludvist has a similar design and build as the TV series villain, Alvin the Treacherous. The story wasn't as engaging or as fun as the first film. Hiccup's naive approach to resolving conflict by talking was also annoying. The power of friendship theme was tethering on Pokemon cheesiness at the end. Still, the sequel is a solid entertaining animated flick and I probably would have rate it higher if I didn't see the TV series first.

Rating: 7/10

 

[heavyarms21]

Saw it today with the family , we liked it , I never even knew there was a spin off TV series so this and the first movie are my only real connection to this world so it felt fresh and not a rehash of anything as dragon mentioned. I liked that early on it felt like there wouldn't be much of a plot conflict but then the kick in the guts in the middle and villain being more menacing than I thought and good resolution at the end. Not the best pacing and moments meant to tug at the heart strings but overall enjoyable.

7.7/10

 

[Dragonlordxxxxx]

HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON 2

Release Date: June 13 (Wide Release)

Genre: Family Adventure Animation

Director: Dean DeBlois (How to Train Your Dragon, Lilo & Stitch)

Cast: Jay Baruchel, Gerard Butler, Craig Ferguson, America Ferrera, Jonah Hill, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, T. J. Miller, Kristen Wiig, Kit Harington, Djimon Hounsou, Cate Blanchett

Synopsis: It has been five years since Hiccup and Toothless successfully united dragons and Vikings on the island of Berk. While Astrid, Snotlout and the rest of the gang are challenging each other to dragon races (the island's new favorite contact sport), the now inseparable pair journey through the skies, charting unmapped territories and exploring new worlds. At the beginning, Hiccup is pressured by Stoick to start a family and become chief, but Hiccup rebels by flying away from Berk and exploring new lands. When one of their adventures leads to the discovery of a secret ice cave that is home to hundreds of new wild dragons and the mysterious Dragon Rider, the two friends find themselves at the center of a battle to protect the peace. Now, Hiccup and Toothless must unite to stand up for what they believe while recognizing that only together do they have the power to change the future of both men and dragons.


____________________





22 JUMP STREET

Release Date: June 13 (Wide Release)

Genre: Action Comedy

Director: Phil Lord, Chris Miller (21 Jump Street, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2)

Cast: Channing Tatum, Jonah Hill, Ice Cube, Amber Stevens, Nick Offerman, Dave Franco, Rob Riggle

Synopsis: After making their way through high school (twice), big changes are in store for officers Schmidt (Jonah Hill) and Jenko (Channing Tatum) when they go deep undercover at a local college. But when Jenko meets a kindred spirit on the football team, and Schmidt infiltrates the bohemian art major scene, they begin to question their partnership. Now they don

 

[Dragonlordxxxxx]

Friday Box Office:

22 JUMP STREET Surpasses HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON 2

With two major sequels hitting theaters this weekend, it was a foregone conclusion that box office numbers would be impressive. What was much less conclusive was which of those two sequels would ultimately wind up in first place. Between How to Train Your Dragon 2 and 22 Jump Street, most box office watchers had their money on DreamWorks

 

[Gambitpool]

Edge of Tomorrow (2014):

As one of Tom Cruise's few remaining fans, I am always intrigued or excited by his future projects. His past few, Jack Reacher and Oblivion, I found very enjoyable. I was interested in All You Need is Kill, when it was named that, since the first released images of Cruise running in clunky-looking battle armor. However, the first trailer and the film renamed to Edge of Tomorrow, cast doubts in me that this would be another generic sci-fi flick.

Thankfully, I can say Edge of Tomorrow soars past it's generic title to deliver an immensely enjoyable, thoughtful, and more importantly, original Sci-Fi flick. Cruise is in top form here as Major William Cage. His progression from sarcastic weasel to alien killing machine is very well written. I have to give props to Cruise as he is one of the few actors trying his damn best to keep the Sci-Fi genre alive. For that, I thank him.

But it takes two to tango as Emily Blunt is his great dance partner. She is a strong female warrior whose character doesn't reek of girl power. Instead, she tough and gruff, silent but violent. Her chemistry with Cruise is a thriving part in a film full of great parts.

The action is superb. The time looping premise leads to great evolving action sequences and visual set pieces. The design of the aliens reminded me of a organic version of the tentacle machines from the Matrix. The human's battle armor looks great as it's seems like something the military would build months into a war.

The film's most surprising aspect is it's comedic moments. A serious story like this could have been overly serious, but hilarious scenes inject life where it could've been dead. While the story is well-written, it's ending is not so much. You'll leave the theater scratching your head questioning the plausibility of it. A few hints or scientific theories might have helped.

Overall, Edge of Tomorrow is one of the best films of 2014 as well as a frontrunner for Best Blockbuster of the Summer. Do Cinema a favor and spend your money on original films instead of remakes, reboots, and sequels. The film's tagline is "Live, Die, Repeat." Mine is "Watch, Enjoy, Repeat." 9/10.

 

[Dragonlordxxxxx]

Critics Review of HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON 2

Rotten Tomatoes: 92% Approval Rating (95 out of 103 critics like it)

Consensus: Exciting, emotionally resonant, and beautifully animated, How to Train Your Dragon 2 builds on its predecessor's successes just the way a sequel should.

Entertainment Weekly - B
The movie's visual scope is magnificent, both in the photorealistic rendering of fire, water, and translucent green ice (maestro cinematographer Roger Deakins once again served as a consultant) and in the subtle, moving character design of Toothless, a descendant of Hayao Miyazaki's beloved Totoro mixed with a big black cat. Composer John Powell's offbeat score is spiked with a zesty new song by erstwhile Sigur R

 

[Dragonlordxxxxx]

Critics Review of 22 JUMP STREET

Rotten Tomatoes: 82% Approval Rating (133 out of 160 critics like it)

Consensus: Boasting even more of the bromantic chemistry between its stars -- and even more of the goofy, good-natured humor that made its predecessor so much fun -- 22 Jump Street is the rare sequel that improves upon the original.

Entertainment Weekly - B-
If you loved 21 Jump Street, you're in luck: The sequel, 22 Jump Street, is the exact same movie. o cover up the script's lack of originality, screenwriters Michael Bacall, Oren Uziel, and Rodney Rothman pummel us with a string of self-aware meta-commentary jokes that poke fun at bloated sequels. It's a good thing, then, that Hill and Tatum continue to have such great chemistry. I get that with sequels, moviegoers are, to some extent, asking to see more of the same. But does the same have to feel quite so samey?


Rolling Stone - 3/4
If there is such a thing as a meta-sequel, then this flagrantly silly and self-aware follow-up to 2012's 21 Jump Street is it. How so? Because 22 Jump Street explodes the whole concept of franchise filmmaking and then studies the shards to figure out why audiences are always panting to see the same damn thing over and over. Sorry. I'm not trying to make a term paper out of a throwaway summer farce. 22 Jump Street is damn funny, sometimes outrageously so. It laughs at its own dumb logic and invites us in on the fun.


James Berardinelli - 2.5/4
There are times when 22 Jump Street is borderline brilliant. Unfortunately, those instances are outnumbered by segments that don't work for one reason or another. On balance, the film has just enough to earn it a recommendation but, with a little trimming to a too-fat running time and less focus on the action elements of the "comedy/action" label, 22 Jump Street might have earned a place as one of 2014's most memorable comedies. As it is, it will be remembered as co-directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller's second-best film of the year (behind The Lego Movie).

 

[Dragonlordxxxxx]

Weekend Box Office:

22 JUMP STREET Beats 'DRAGON 2' with $60 Million Debut

1. 22 Jump Street -- $60,000,000 weekend; $60m total
2. How to Train Your Dragon 2 -- $50,000,000 weekend; $50m total
3. Maleficent -- $19,008,000 weekend; $163.5m total
4. The Fault in Our Stars -- $15,725,000 weekend; $81.7m total
5. Edge of Tomorrow -- $16,175,000 weekend; $56.6m total

As expected, highly-anticipated sequels 22 Jump Street and How to Train Your Dragon 2 took the top two spots at the box office this weekend. It came as quite the surprise, though, that the R-rated comedy easily took first place ahead of the DreamWorks Animation movie. Playing at 3,306 locations, 22 Jump Street opened to a fantastic $60 million this weekend. That's the second-biggest opening ever for an R-rated comedy behind The Hangover Part II, and ahead of hits like Neighbors and Ted. It's also up a whopping 65 percent from 21 Jump Street's $36 million debut in March 2012.

22 Jump Street's strong start is likely due to a combination of goodwill from the first movie and a strong marketing campaign this time around. 21 Jump Street came out just over two years ago

 

[heavyarms21]

A big unexpected to me , thought it would be flipped.

 

[blink_man182]

Glad to see HTTYD2 is getting great reviews. The first might be one of my favorite animated movies of all time.

 

[MaveDeltzer]

Still, the sequel is a solid entertaining animated flick and I probably would have rate it higher if I didn't see the TV series first.

Rating: 7/10

Hadn't seen the series and went 8/10. Didn't have the punch of the first but is still a fun film. Looks amazing but the early flying scene is a step down from the first one's flying scene (my favorite part of that one) because they felt the need to add singing to the fantastic theme for the series. Then they used that theme over and over. The relationships were all really cute.

Felt somethings were missing during the battle of the Alphas, my friend and I discussed that right after the movie. After the loss of the foot in the first one I knew they'd go bigger this time and I know some people who will be very sad when they see this.

Can't wait for a big bearded Hiccup in the next one.

 

[kidcas]

22 jumpstreet is pretty funny. had some great moments and some not so great ones.
7/10

 

[chardog]

A big unexpected to me , thought it would be flipped.

the marketing that movie is getting...... that's what sets it apart. I have no doubt that HTTYD2 will end up making more money. Word of mouth, you cant stop it. HTTYD2 was phenomenal.

Seriously right up there with toy story 3 if you ask me.

 

[LurkMore]

Just saw 22 Jump Street. I thought it was pretty funny; it was as entertaining as the first one. The credits scene was awesome.

 

[pinkybrief]

didn't have a clue on that dragon movie, but I'm glad I watched it last night. It was a fun movie, toothless was adorable. Hiccup's voice is weird