Film: September 2005 Archives
A totally different review this evening.. Or morning.. However you want to look at it! I was recommended this film from a coworker, and decided to spend an hour and a half with this interesting Japanese film.
Godzilla vs Mechagozilla is the english translation for this film. I'm not going to go into too much detail with the plot. Basically it's just another Godzilla versus another creature movie.
What is cool about this film are the extravagant amounts of miniature work created, and the men-in-suits versions of Godzilla and Mechagodzilla. It's almost laughable, and it probably is laughable in the end, but oh so well done. Cheese, but nice cheese. Some really horrible visual effects, along side some really excellent visual effects. It was a toss up in that department. The actual physical effects and sets created for these two monsters to battle it out were pretty elaborate. I'm sure that the guys in the suits had an awesome time causing mayhem among the miniature cities, and lighting up fireworks and explosives all around them! Some pretty sweet monster and environment lighting. Definitely cool. Some of the buildings didn't look as large as they should be. They're all going to get demolished anyway by Godzilla or his foe.
Story? Uh.. No story. Something about live and death and the struggle in between. But it's got Godzilla and its mechanised foe!
What do I rate this one? I give it a 5 out of 10. Watchable maybe once if you're really into the men in costumes and pyrotechnics and miniature work.
Ah.. A movie review. It's been a while since I've done one of these, because, basically, I figured all of you out there have already read so many reviews! Here's mine of the new Terry Gilliam movie, The Brothers Grimm.
I wasn't sure what to expect from this film by Mr. Gilliam. I recall watching Brazil with both trepidation and awe. It was mindblowing, to say the least! The Brothers Grimm combines a slew of fairy tales, while trying to remain original. His previous films, 12 Monkeys and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, are some of my favorites. Needless to say, both Fear and Loathing and Brazil are in the Criterion Collection of groundbreaking movies!
Back to the film.. The visuals and cinematography was wonderful. Fairly muted colors, save for the princess in the tower and other icon figures, for example, Little Red Riding Hood. Some nice sets, and some decent miniature work. Terry Gilliam manages to infuse several of the more popular fairy tales, like I mentioned above, into a story about the Grimm brothers, a pair of con artists out to make a living rescuing villagers from their fake demons and witches. All the while, Jacob, the more intellectual of the two, writes down all the stories that they encounter, which weaves the tales and fables told to us when we were kids. Little Red Riding Hood, Hansel and Gretal, Rapunzel, and several more.
The visual effects are nothing to get wet about. They are fairly nice. The only house that I recall seeing was the Peerless Camera Company. Several of the scenes which involves bugs weren't as well done as they could have been. I blame this on basic bug development. How do you make bugs sink into their environment? Especially when they're iridescent and translucent all at the same time? We had similar problems when creating bugs for Constantine. The big bad wolf was fairly well done. Can't say much more than that. Didn't see any horrible black density problems, and most of the effects with the wolf were during the night. Overall, a good looking film, with good effects (not awesome, but not horrible either).
It's interesting to note that this film was filmed in Prague. The city and surrounding countryside is definitely the look that Terry Gilliam was after. Prague has also been the site of several other dark movies, such as Blade 2 and Van Helsing.
A decent movie. I give this one a 7 out of 10.
