Friday, 9 September 2016

Grimm Fairy Tales #22 review - 'The Snow Queen'


The main story-arc is finally starting to kick in somewhat in this issue of Grimm Fairy Tales, however after twenty-two plus issues and what amounts to almost two years worth of real-time story-telling, that's not exactly an impressive rate of momentum and had I been reading these as they were released I'm not sure I'd have stuck along until now. Such is the advantage of trade-binging I guess.
In any case, the enmity between Sela and Belinda continues to intensify, as the struggle for Timmy's (remember him? The little boy who lied about his neighbour molesting him, and ended up burning his foster family to death? The little scamp!) soul comes to a head. Belinda is manipulating Timmy into embracing the dark side by bullying a girl at his school, eventually escalating into tasking him with pushing her in front of a car. Luckily Sela intervenes just in time and manages to talk Timmy back from the edge of evil and to make him see that there is still good inside him. Yeah, he's a fucking saint...
This story is framed and paralleled by a riff on the Snow Queen story, albeit a very loose adaptation. In this thread Belinda takes on the role of The Snow Queen herself and controls a little boy (Timmy) with the magic dust from the evil mirror in that story. That's about the only real connection to the original tale. Again, in this side of the story Sela stops Timmy just in time before he embraces evil and..smashes a statue...? Yeah.
I enjoyed this issue, however something which has been bothering me over the last few issues and which became more apparent in this one, is that it's not made very clear as to whether the action shown in the 'fairy tale world' is actually happening/happened once upon a time or whether it's just a stylistic method of mirroring the present day story with a fairy tale. I'm inclined to sway towards the former, but that in itself opens up more questions, such as when is this supposed to have happened in the larger time-frame? I'm all for patience and building towards a pay-off/answers in comics and stories in general, but I get the sense with GFT that even the writers don't necessarily know the answers to these questions and are literally making it up as they go. So Belinda is The Snow Queen? Ok, well last we heard she was The Sorcerer's Apprentice and then a genie trapped in a lamp...Here's hoping somewhere down the line there is some clarification at least in regards to how all of these events follow on from one another.
As much as it may sound like I'm hating, I actually really enjoyed this issue and I like that the series seems to be fully embracing a serialised nature rather than the very episodic format of the earlier issues. The series is still very much a guilty pleasure, but the story is getting more intriguing with each passing issue and as a result I'm finding myself actually eager to read on, as supposed to the slight chore that the formulaic issues were becoming. 
The art also appears to improving steadily too. There are still the odd panel or two (or five!) that are glaringly bad and take you out of the story but overall it appears to be on the up. 
I'm pretty much of the mind now of 'just go with it' when it comes to GFT, which is actually part of what makes it so fun. Like that hot-mess friend or co-worker that everyone has, it's fun to tune in to find out what the next crazy, out-there developments are and be swept along for the ride. 

Stray thoughts:
- So if we are to assume that the action with Belinda/The Snow Queen in the 'fairy tale world' takes place in the past, then how does that explain the appearance of the girl from the previous issue who was getting hit on by/murdered her professor in the present...? I'm sure it'll all be explained...right...?

- The framing story that opened this issue surrounding the demon and the evil mirror was actually pretty strong as far as this series goes and it made me optimistic for what this series could do down the line with world-building. Maybe an entire arc set in the fairy tale world would be good to clarify its relationship with the real world.

- People (sorry, WOMEN!) in the fairy tale world sure don't seem to feel the cold by the look of it. I can kind of accept that The Snow Queen might not feel the need for a jacket (what with The Snow Queen and all), but Sela sauntering around in what essentially amounts to a corset and a loincloth is just asking for frostbite. I guess she and Elsa have something in common. 

Monday, 25 April 2016

'Friend Request' Review: Facebook is evil. 'Nuff said.

 
Well it was bound to happen. It's invaded pretty much everything else that we know and love, so it was only a matter of time before Facebook infiltrated the world of horror movies too, and so we get Simon Verhoeven's Friend Request. Whilst never named explicitly (I guess being associated with demonic murder is bad for business), the social network is the framework upon which the story of a group of college students terrorised by a malevolent online entity is told. It's nothing particularly new, it's been done before (and done better) but it's not necessarily all bad.
 
Not all bad sure, but definitely not great either. The plot revolves around popular college student Laura who, after accepting an online friend request from awkward lonely girl Marina, only to later reject her intense insistence on friendship in person, unwittingly plunges her group of friends into a nightmare as Marina (having committed suicide after Laura's rejection) proceeds to harass and haunt the group from beyond the grave via their laptops and smartphones, compelling them to kill themselves in turn in increasingly gruesome ways. Still following? Good.  
 
The concept is pretty fun and had a lot of potential, but the film has a number of flaws. Perhaps greatest amongst these is its characters. Laura and her friends are the kind of characters that I think I was supposed to relate to, but whom in reality are the kind of people whom I simply cannot stand. They're the kind of people who can't spend five minutes without checking their phone or logging into Facebook just in case someone has posted a 'hilarious' video clip or 'super-important' status update. They're the kind of people who post pictures of themselves on nights out (or doing any other activity for that matter) with captions like 'last night was SUCH a shambles' or 'I got so drunk I still can't feel my legs lol!' as if getting drunk and dancing is some sort of achievement, or post selfies with self-deprecating comments designed to garner compliments. They're the kind of people whose friends start dying around them and yet still have the time and inclination to have perfectly painted toe-nails!
 
'OMG, my hair is like SUCH a state! lol'
 
Yes, this is where the film fails the most. There's just no-one in it that I actually care about. In fact from the early montage of the friend group partying, laughing and generally being far too happy and perfect, I actively disliked them. Alycia Debnam-Carey (imagine a doe-eyed cross between Taissa Farmiga and Elizabeth Olsen) puts in an admirable attempt as quasi-final girl Laura, but there's just not enough of a character there to set her apart from Stock College Girl Character #2.
 
In fact perhaps the most relatable character (although perhaps this says more about me than the film itself!) is Marina, the (admittedly pretty whacko!) outsider who after being rejected by Laura and her perfect friends, proceeds to enact her revenge by offing them one by one with the intention of making Laura as lonely as she herself was in life. Sure, an extreme reaction, but she only wanted to be friends and it's easy to see how the constant deluge of photos and statuses depicting the relationships of a group of people she couldn't be part of could lead her to lashing out. It's almost hard not to sympathise with her. Just me...? Moving on!
 
Despite it's lack of any compelling characters, the film trundles along at a relatively engaging pace whilst providing a few admittedly creepy moments, never resting long enough for boredom to set in. However, there's just a sense throughout that it's trying too hard. With the film's main premise hanging on the fact that Laura is so popular and active on social media, as things get more and more sinister and Laura becomes publicly associated with the horrific events unfolding (Marina posts videos of each suicide on Laura's profile, posing as her), the film marks this downward spiral with an on-screen friend counter as people unfriend Laura and her popularity online decreases. It even takes a good few of her friends to be bumped off in horrific fashion before she even considers committing the unthinkable act of...deleting her profile! Yes really, the true horror in this film is the idea of people unfriending you on Facebook! The terror of it! Screaming Emoji!
 
Laura, you're friends are dying. Laura! Friends...dead...? Laura...? *facepalm*
This emphasis on the importance of online popularity and the characters' obsession with social media (Laura even studies Internet Addiction at college...yeah...) should allow for an interesting statement or cautionary tale, however it really just comes across as a wasted opportunity and the moments where it is treated as such are presented with such a lack of subtlety that the only cautionary tale I could glean was that rolling your eyes too much in quick succession leads to a headache! Connor Paolo's Kobe is a prime example of this as Laura's super-hacker friend (everyone has one of those, right?), whose main skill actually appears to be super-Googling, enabling him to solve the mystery of Marina's past with only a few quick clicks and key-strokes, reiterating the film's message that the internet can solve everything! No wait...
 
Despite how it may sound, this really isn't a bad little film overall. It has an interesting premise (at least initially), some genuinely unsettling imagery (the animated segments portraying Marina's homemade films are both beautiful and nightmare-inducing) and generally the actors make the most of what little they're given to work with. However, what starts out as a relatively fresh take on the techno-horror genre, soon devolves into the same old 'malevolent entity terrorises rich, attractive white people' shtick that we've seen time and time again, just with an extra dash of FaceTiming and txt spk. A lack of depth and a reliance on cliché lead to an uneven film, which despite all of its desperate efforts to make us relate to and like its characters, just leaves us feeling all the more disconnected, ironically emulating the experience of Facebook and social media down to a tee. Hmm, maybe this film is more clever than it seems...
 
DISCLAIMER: It's worth noting that Friend Request is actually a sort-of-kind-of-but-not-really remake of the (much superior) 2014 movie Unfriended. The original film is much more, well, original, presented entirely via the lead character's laptop screen in a clever twist on the found-footage genre, with developments occurring via Skype calls, Facebook chats and Google searches. If you find yourself with the choice, I'd definitely recommend Unfriended over Friend Request, but if you're morbidly curious the two films are different enough in plot and execution that you won't find yourself with remake-fatigue if you do decide to watch them both.

Saturday, 16 April 2016

'The Jungle Book' review: Fun, fear and feels! Jungle-tastic!

 
 
 
Now that's how you do a live-action remake of a beloved animated classic!
 
As much as I am a huge Disney fan and will watch (and usually love) anything they put out, I'm not a huge fan of this recent trend they seem to have of just remaking all of their old animated films in live-action. It seems like every other day there's an announcement about another one in development and my reaction is more often than not a resounding groan. If I could remember that far back, my reaction to learning about The Jungle Book was most likely the same truth be told, however after finally witnessing the splendour that Jon Favreau has whipped up, I hastily say 'shut my mouth!'.
 
Simply put, Favreau's film is magnificent. Visually it is stunning (no really, stunning!), with the landscapes and animals on-screen so lifelike that even whilst knowing that most of it is just computer trickery (what with the talking animals and all), you can't quite process that what you are seeing isn't actually real. I thought after seeing the trailer that the hyper-realistic animals talking with human voices would be distracting, and it was a little strange at first, but after a few minutes it seemed almost normal. In fact I now want a talking wolf-cub of my own. Get on it science!
 
In all seriousness though, the film is just a beauty to behold visually. With so many movies saturated in CGI and unholy amounts of unnecessary special effects these days, it's so easy to become almost numb to it all and as a cinema-going public I think many have become pretty hard to impress in that department. However with The Jungle Book the effects are the film. And that's not intended to imply that the film lacks heart, depth or plot (because it has those in spades), but simply that this film could not have been done so well without such copious and detailed effects work. It really is a wonder to behold, and I'd even go so far as to say that in the succession of movies that truly push the boundaries of what can be done in regards to effects-led storytelling, The Jungle Book sits right there one step beyond Avatar.
 
About that heart though! The film is full of it! Neel Sethi plays the part of Mowgli with such adorable innocence and spunk that you just can't help but love him. His performance is even more admirable when you consider that he played his part essentially solo, considering all of his co-stars are composed of pixels. It's doubtful Sethi will win any major awards for his role (such is the sad state of award shows), but there really should be a mainstream award show based on just this type of thing, taking into consideration the unconventional factors behind a performance. Regardless, this little guy is a revelation and I'm sure it's just the beginning for him.
 
They say never work with kids or animals...Joke's on them!
 
The rest of the cast (albeit heard and not seen) are also near-perfect in their roles, the obvious stand-outs being Ben Kingsley as Bagheera and Bill Murray as Baloo. Both imbue their characters with such warmth and depth that you really do believe a panther can talk and that he'd have pretty wise advice to give you when he did. I did find the casting of Scarlett Johansson as Kaa the snake a little odd at first, especially considering Kaa is originally male (poor Scarlett, first she's not the right gender, now she's not the right race, she can't seem to do anything right lately!), however her sultry, seductive voice actually worked pretty well for the hypnotic (and damn creepy!) serpent who tries to make a meal out of Mowgli. Last mention to Idris Elba as Shere Khan almost goes without saying as Elba is awesome in pretty much anything he does, and his villainous tiger is no different, bringing the perfect measure of arrogance and tempered crazy to the role.
 
The musical numbers, sparse though they were, felt slightly out of place within the film as a whole (with King Louie's updated version of 'I Wanna Be Like You' seeming especially jarring tonally), however not enough to derail what was a pretty perfect pacing throughout. In fact 'The Bare Necessities' was admittedly pretty damn cute!
 
Overall, I absolutely loved it and it's instantly entered into my top five films of the year so far! Sure there are those who will say it's unnecessary (and I was one of them before the trailers dropped!), but it's actually a solidly made film, crafted with genuine love and respect for the original, with enough tweaks to bring it up to date technologically and otherwise. Despite still having my reservations about Disney's newfound obsession with live-actionising all of their old films, The Jungle Book gives me renewed hope that at least some of them will be actually worth the effort. Hopefully they will take note of what has been achieved here and realise that we don't need to see how Prince Charming became so charming, or where Cruella De Vil goes to get her iconic monochrome hairstyle dyed. All that's needed (if the need is there at all) is to recreate the magic that made these films classics in the first place. But, you know, with real people! If they can keep on doing that, I'll happily watch them remake their entire back catalogue, as it appears they intend to do in any case.
 
Having said that, with the (admittedly deserved) success and the effects on display in The Jungle Book, it can only be a matter of time before we get...dare I say it...a live-action The Lion King. If I've thought of it, you just know some Disney exec has! Is nothing sacred?! I guess we'll see.
 
My only gripe is that we never saw this moment recreated in live-action...