 |
Brave (DVD)
by HelenDK
I bought Brave a couple of weeks ago, on a buy 3 for £16 deal on Amazon, for my daughters 11th birthday on Wednesday. I had seen the adverts and thought it looked fun and so we were all eager to watch. We watched it on Thursday night.
Released in 2012 by Pixar but distributed by Disney, it was directed by Mark Andrews and ... Brenda Chapman, and lasts 93 minutes.
Brave is an animation set in the Highlands of Scotland, the key characters are the princess Merrida (Kelly MacDonald) her mother Queen Elinor (Emma Thomson) her dad King Fergus (Billy Connelly) and her twin younger brothers. Meridas character is that of a headstrong and independent princess (with wild red hair) but to be honest she came over as a madam, her mother portrayed harshly as constantly nagging about manners / how to behave and her father as gregarious and fun loving lout. At no point did I feel that I bonded with any of the characters and the film trundled along with Elinor trying to find a suitor for Merida, by organising a meeting of the clans which thus ends in further revolt from Merida. Merida seeks another way out of agreeing to a betrothal and predictable it all goes horribly wrong, but with a moral of the story evident.
There were a few laughs, but in my opinion far too few, the characters lacked depth, the princess desperately wanted a bit of quality time on the naughty step and not a role model, which can be said about a lot of reccent american created films / shows. Definitely not worthy of a link to the Disney name and not a film I would recommend. We all watched it, my 2 older daughters were not impressed however my youngest (11) was seen to be entranced at certain key scenes and therefore as it was for her birthday, and the actual animation is of a high standard I will award 2 dooyoo Stars.
Read the complete review |
 |
Burn After Reading (DVD)
by m_illie
I'd like to preface this review with the statement that if you do not like the Black Comedy genre then this film is definitely not for you. Much of the bad press that I've seen of this film is from people who appear to have missed the jokes, mostly because the humour is dark and understated and not what you'd expect from your average ... comedy film. But this film is not your average comedy film.
Burn After Reading is yet another film to have been pumped out by the Coen Brothers. It has what I would describe as a slow climax, a climax that if you blink you might miss entirely. The humour is very inconspicuous and so if this is what you are looking from from this film I think you should keep looking. It is not a laugh out loud film and in fact the one big moment of comedy, or rather what I found funny, for others could be seen as shocking or appalling. The film is probably better described as bizarre quirkiness which at times goes beyond the Coen Brother's renowned eccentricity into the weird, the boring and at times the trying-too-hard.
The plot of the film is very good and I enjoyed the way it progressed. I thought that the story itself was creative and it evolved in a way I did not expect. There are seemingly four different stories all developing at once and at one time or another they intertwine with one another. At times this may be difficult to keep up with and the end is also very underwhelming, but this isn't necessarily a bad thing. One thing that must be said of this film is that it is entirely unpredictable, after all how could you possibly guess the circumstances of two idiots finding a government agent's "top secret information" and the comedy that ensues. The ending of the film was also something I really enjoyed. It was very subtle, so subtle in fact I was able to miss the entire revelation at the end and had to rewatch the film to fully understand what happened. The pace here was much speedier, making up for the long drawn out nature of the beginning half of the film. You are fed information quick and fast and become almost dragged along with the action.
The film manages to maintain a subtle complexity which keeps you constantly engaged and this can also be said for the very high profile names that appear in the film. The likes of George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Tilda Swinton and John Malkovich all star and are able to portray interesting enough characters, although in my opinion they were never fully crafted and so did not feel entirely real. John Malkovich was able to provide us with his typical non-stop shouting, swearing performance which reminded me a lot of his performance in Con Air (not necessarily a positive thing). I think of the stars he was perhaps the weakest, although that might be a little unfair as his acting did exactly what the character demanded, it was just the character Ozzie himself who I couldn't stand. Brad Pitt's character was much more captivating and he played a role far different to other ones I have seen him in so I enjoyed this variety. He gave the film comic relief from time to time and was also able to spearhead the progression of the plot. His character is very shallow, but here it is the one acceptable time as that is reflective of his personality in the film and so I was able to enjoy his scenes without being quite so frustrated.
The film's duration is probably my greatest issue with it. Running for 96 minutes, much of it felt as though they were simply setting up later action rather than unravelling anything interesting in the beginning half. Similarly, I would have expected with so much time to play with to have had better developed characters and yet this was not the case. That being said there was an upfront nature to the film which I enjoyed. The relationships were obvious, as were the flaws within them, the humour also very in your face, and the zaniness ever-present. The performance is what makes up for the lack of any fleshing out and so you are able to forgive this and hopefully look past it.
Regardless of your opinion of Burn After Reading and in fact even the Coen Brothers themselves, its always memorable. The characters, the quirky plot and the way it manages to unravel in a way that feels natural and effortless make it an easy watch but one that does not easily become boring. The Coens manage to grab the Spy/Thriller genre by the scruff of the neck and evolve it into clever satire, of the US, its looks-obsessed society, and equally the general stupidity of people, and create which for the most part is an interesting film.
Read the complete review |
|
|
Bridget Jones's Diary (DVD)
by xxfoxyredxx
Film Only Review:
Meet Briget (Renee Zellweger), posh sounding, slightly overweight, smoking, drinking, singleton who lives in London and is a 32 years old. Happy enough in her publishing job and dreaming about getting it on with posh totty Daniel Cleaver (Hugh Grant) she is very miserable with her single status and takes to ... writing a diary.
Christmas is at her Mums for the usual turkey supper where her mum usually tries to get Bridget off with any elidgable in her eyes that Bridget hates and her Mum introduces her to Mark Darcy (Colin Firth) who is at best aloof and rather rude. Its not a good meeting between them and bumbling Bridget manages to mouth off and look a bit daft for her to only hear him slating her shortly after.
Bridget decides no more. She must lose weight, quit smoking and become sensible but this isn't an easy task for the naturally clumsy and not very good at talking to people Bridget who seems to say always what she thinks rather than thinking things through first lol. However all of a sudden Daniel Cleaver seems to take notice of Bridget in the office, openly flirting and they do manage to get into a relationship which Bridget is very happy about.
Things seem to be ok for Bridget in the love stakes, she bumps into Mark a few times but Daniel tells her about in his time of knowing Mark that Mark slept with his wife, Bridget doesn't approve of this and believes it totally. She bumps into Mark and there always seems to be a bit of a spark between them but either she drops herself in it or he acts like he doesn't give a damn and she mouths off all about that in her diary.
However her relationship with Daniel is suffering and her and the delicious Mark have chemistry that cannot be denied but will she ever find the right words to say without making a show of herself and he seems to like her just the way she is but can he simply tell her that? Will he tell her he likes her...could there be a happy ending for two people that on paper are so not right for eachother at all?
My Opinion:
I absoloutely love this film and was so happy when the second one was released (I was on the set of the second film by accident!). Its a 15 rating which for me is about right and it runs 133 minutes which in my opinion just flies by and isn't enough.
Its brilliantly shot, all the members of the cast hold there own but the three main characters (Bridget, Mark and Daniel) are astounding and I love the characters.
There is plenty going on to entertain you and lots of real laugh out loud moments that even though over the years I have seen time and time again really do make me chuckle and whats great about the Bridget Jones character is that most of us single girls and even ones that have been single but have now settled down we can relate to her.
Bridget isn't the stereotypical woman. She packs a few pounds, makes mistakes, swears, drinks and has mad friends. She can't help getting in mixed up situations but all she wants is a nice boyfriend and to fit in. However its hard because her mum and dad who had a great relationship for years spit up which changes her ideas a bit and just when she thinks she is doing ok with her relationship it crumbles and makes her question love.
I love Bridget and I see alot of who I am and who my single mates are in her and I won't deny that I have sang 'All By Myself' when drunk into an empty bottle feeling sorry for myself at silly o'clock wearing my onesie!
This to me is a fantastic chick flick but I think even men could like this, there's even a silly fight scene in the middle of the film that is more laughable than violent and this to me really goes into my top ten movies of all time, even the soundtrack which has a few soul tracks in it is great!
A feel good movie..but is there a happy ending for our Bridget or could she even mess that up? If you haven't seen it shame on you this is a romantic comedy at its very finest!
Read the complete review |
