That's not saying much, I'll admit. The number of films I've seen this year in theatres can be counted on one hand, with enough left over to pick up a teacup. I watched "Thor", which I liked. It was a little slow, and the love interest was so shoehorned into the story that it felt a little weak at the end when Thor starts pining over her, but it worked. This is a universe that I can imagine, and that was the movie's biggest task - an introduction to a world of Aesir and Jotunn and Yigdrassil and Einherjar, the staples of Norse mythology, as real, flesh-and-blood, breathing characters. It plays fast and loose with some aspects - Odin's a terrible father, but that's an improvement outright villain of some tales; the Bifrost is a magic portal now, rather than a rainbow (or even a double rainbow); and Thor seems to see Sif as more of a friend than the wife she was in myth. It's okay. I think it sets up a nice triangle for Thor 2 - does he choose the normal girl who adores the hell out of this weird guy who's "cut", or does he choose the Asgardian shieldmaiden who knows exactly who and what he is, and can reign him in a little. And Loki? For a "summer blockbuster", the definition of which I imagine to have a picture of Michael Bay standing in front of the Eiffel Tower exploding, "Thor" does brilliant things with Loki. He's defending his brash and arrogant brother. Now he's setting him up! Now he's letting the Giants kill Odin! Now he's turning on the Giants to become King of Asgard! Now he's KILLING the Giants, and fighting his brother! You don't get a character that has so many irons in the fire (he has all of the plans, all of them! ::::D) in most "blockbusters". It's a disappointment that Kenneth Branagh isn't directing Thor 2 - I hope whoever is does as good a job or better.
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| Natalie Portman, why are you on the poster? It's not like you were a main...oh. Bugger. |
Caesar is a chimpanzee born intelligent because his mother was pregnant when she was injected with a virus that improves her intelligence. Because the scientists are too stupid to check her cage and see she's given birth, she gets angry, goes on a rampage, and is killed in front of executives who were about to greenlight the project. Needless to say, Will feels he's a little to blame for this, and decides that when the rest of the Apes are terminated that he can't bring himself to kill the baby chimp, and decides to keep it. We see Caesar grow up, with a human-like childhood, swinging through the house and having the whole of the attic to himself. But he's not allowed to set foot outside of the house. Eventually, Will and his new girlfriend take him to the Californian redwoods *cough*New Zealand Kauri *cough* where he has a ball of a time, but begins to question whether all he is to them is a pet. He's told no, but the question crops up. Others, understandably, treat him as just an animal. When he rushes to his adoptive grandfather's defence, he injures a man, and is sent to a "sanctuary", what amounts to Ape Prison. We see Caesar at first enthusiastic to be among others of his kind, but he realises that they aren't his kind at all - he's not human, but he's no longer just a chimp either - he's something new. And he despairs. His abuse at the hands of the "wardens", the sanctuary owner's sons, doesn't help matters. Eventually, he hatches a plan, deciding to change the status quo - he rejects Will's attempt to free him, and then escapes on his own, stealing canisters of a new formula, and returns and uses them on the other apes in the sanctuary, mostly chimps but also an Orangutan and a Gorilla. He befriends the Gorilla, and uses him as an enforced to beat the old tribe leader into submission and take over - and thus we begin the Slave Uprising.
It sounds a little silly calling apes slaves - and yet that's what they are here. And it's entirely plausible. If we discovered that whales could calculate pi to the fourteenth digit and compose sonnets, we'd be shocked and appalled that Scandinavian and Japanese sailors are harpooning them for unethical "research", and selling the "leftovers" to restaurants. If we discovered dogs could dream of a democratic government, we'd declare war on China and the Koreas. But we know that Apes are intelligent, that when taught sign language they can understand complex concepts, and yet the bushmeat industry in Africa goes largely ignored, even though species of Gorilla are on the verge of extinction. We just don't care. Perhaps it's because they're too close to ourselves? If we granted apes "sentient" status, would we see them as competitors to this planet? And that's the idea behind this movie.
Long story short, Caesar becomes Spartacus, and leads his newly intelligent Ape Army to break out of prison, liberating their less intelligent brethren from the zoos and laboratories of San Francisco, and illuminating them. They march across the Golden Gate bridge, attacking cops on horseback, and the original Gorilla bringing down a helicopter. Implausible, yes. Badass? HELL YES. They break through the blockade, and make it to the forest, where they hope to set up a new Ape Society, while stupid humanity is dying off due to the same virus that gave the Apes their intelligence. Hoisted by our own petard, indeed. In a movie about Apes, the humans seem like cardboard cutouts, and that's because they need to be. The real Humanity of the movie is invested in the Apes. These are the characters we like, we care for, we root for. Their ending is a good one for the real heroes of the story - the impending obliteration of the Apes' oppressors, and a chance to begin anew.
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| I come not to praise Caesar, but to bury him. |
Which brings me into the us-and-them theme of X-Men: First Class.
Like Rise of the Apes (I refuse to use the full name), First Class features a new "race" discovering themselves, defined by their relationship to humanity. If you've seen any of the X-Men movies before this one, you know the story - Good Mutants vs Bad Mutants, with humanity wavering between acceptance and intolerance. The intolerance here is a lot more pronounced - even while working for the CIA, CIA employees still mock them. They discover that a scientist already working there has been hiding his mutation - "you didn't ask, so I didn't tell." Raven, the future Mystique, even says "Mutant and Proud." Also, she grows up with Xavier while they're kids as a sort of adopted sister/love interest figure, hidden from his mum by his telepathy and later, when they're both grown up and living together in his huge mansion, her own shapeshifting powers. Hiding in plain sight. The gay allegory is right out and in the open, pardon the metaphor. And we see that "regular" humans are willing to annihilate the fledgling mutants to save the status quo. But we also see a somewhat sympathetic side to the debate - the mutants prove that they are genuinely disastrous - Eric Lensherr goes on regular killing sprees, and the Hellfire Club bring the world to the point of nuclear armageddon, stopped only by the newly-formed X-Men. We also see what motivates Magneto, clearer than ever - he survived one Holocaust, and has no intention of enduring another one, in the process becoming the very thing he hates most - a racial supremacist fanatic. We also see the evolution, pardon the second metaphor, of Charles Xavier - from a cocky rich kid to a more serious, determined, and altruistic teacher who takes the young mutants he finds under his wing. I love the new lineup - Havoc, Banshee, Mystique and Beast. I know, Kelsey Grammer, X3, etc, but we can retcon that away - this is a far better Beast story. The only disappointment is that Xavier and Lensherr end the film parting ways - theirs is meant to be a long relationship soured by differing philosophies. Theirs is more than a short but powerful bromance. They're meant to be warped versions of each other - both genuises, both devoted to helping mutant kind, Magneto taking the easier militant path to impose acceptance through force, and Xavier taking the harder path of forcing humanity to accept them for who they are, not who the are not. He says he helped build Cerebro. We see the two interviewing Jean Grey. At the end, he takes over the Hellfire Club, breaks Emma Frost out of prison, and assumed the mantle of Magneto - a little early, I think. Don't get me wrong, it does it very well. It's just the event itself.
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| There's also Mystique, if all that cerebral stuff doesn't appeal to you. A LOT of Mystique. |
I really wish I'd seen it in cinemas. Not in 3D though - I watched Thor in 3D, but I didn't find it really enhanced anything. It was just there in the background. It was nice, but not worth the higher ticket price.
You know what? Maybe I've found this blog's purpose - reviewing films and DVDs I've seen or own? I know nobody's reading this, yet, but I like to think that you'll be entertained. And who knows? It may mutate into other things along the way?
That joke was absolutely intentional. It was also very bad.
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