Moana Review

Over the course of this lockdown period, I've been either playing video game, watching whatever I can find or doing odd jobs for my mum to keep me busy. But usually on the weekend me and my family would all sit down and watch a movie together. And on that day we decided to watch a Disney movie that we never saw in cinema's but heard that it was a good movie. This of course was Moana (I mean its on the title).

Released back in 2016, Moana is an animated, fantasy adventure, comedy, musical based in Ancient Polynesia. The story centres on Moana (Auli'i Cravalho) as she is chosen by the ocean to save her island by restoring what was stolen by the demigod Maui (Dwayne Johnson). Like the wreck it ralph movies I reviewed previously, the animation is on point. Especially with the parts with the ocean itself. The songs in the film are an enjoyable part of the film from the popular 'your welcome' to 'how far I'll go' and even 'shiney' and there more a less the most notable song everything else is a variation of one of them.

Moana feels like a return the Disney films known back in the 90's, while at the time it was released, Disney seemed to have increased the quality in there animated movies with Frozen or Wreck-it- Ralph the year before that. Although know they might have a slight decline with Wreck-it- Ralph 2, we never know what it round the corner especially with what they could do on their recent streaming service with their future originals.

The most interesting thing in the is movie is that there isn't really a villain. I mean don't get me wrong there are antagonistic characters like whatever Jermaine Clement's crab character was called but apart from there isn't really a threat that Moana and Maui face except maybe Heihei the chicken (Alan Tudyk) I mean that chickens just trouble. If you haven't seen the movie you might not have got the last sentence.

Overall I'd give Moana a 8/10-  For a fun adventure with a bunch of great song with some great voice performances.

Wreck it Ralph and Ralph Breaks the Internet review

It's been a while since I have done a review and since my last post a lot has happened in the world. At the moment I currently live in isolation with my parents, as of last month Disney + came out across the UK and Europe. Me and my family have been on it either watching the Forky shorts or any Pixar short, the Simpsons or watching some of there films. The first film we saw was the exclusive Lady and the Tramp remake, long story short the films ok, theirs not much to talk about in that film to be fair. However last weekend me and my family sat in our lounge and watch both the Wreck it Ralph films. So in this review I will be talking about both the films.

So I think its fair to start with the first film 'Wreck it Ralph', the plot of the film is a simple yet effective one of a video game bad guy deciding that he's had enough of his life and wants to try something new.  In order to prove himself he goes into another game and steals a hero medal. From their he goes into another game and befriends a racer named Vanellope voiced by Sarah Silverman. Ralph helps her to build a cart and get ready to race and at the same time save the game from a virus. The films animation and voice acting is amazing and holds up pretty well, there a lot of arcade and console game characters like Pac-Man and Sonic. The relationship between Vanellope and Ralph is quite sweet and both John C. Reilly and Sarah Silverman do a good job of presenting the friendship between them. Other side character like Fix it Felix are enjoyable to watch as well. Overall I would Give Wreck it Ralph an 8-10 for some nice gaming references, enjoyable characters and a heartwarming ending.



Now you may be wondering why I gave the first film a short review as there is lot more to talk about like going Turbo or Vanellope's secret. Well don't worry, I did this on purpose as now we are going to talk about the sequel Ralph Breaks the Internet. The film starts 6 years after the first as the arcade owner installs Wi-Fi and all the characters are wondering what it its, however they are banned from going in there. Vanellope tells Ralph that shes getting tired of doing the same tracks over and over in her game and as an act of kindness Ralph creates a new track for her, however in the arcade it looks like the game is malfunctioning and as a result the game gets unplugged. In order to save the game Ralph and Vanellope must go into the internet to get a new steering wheel.

One of the things I left out in my review of the first film is going turbo. The story of this was a racer named Turbo got a jealous as a new racing game entered the arcade and stole his thunder, so as an act of revenge he goes into that game and glitches it causing both games to be unplugged. In the first film Ralph goes turbo to get the medal but he planned to go back into his own game afterwards but things got a turn for the worst as a Cybug ruined that plan and he went into Candy Crush and well he ends up saving that game from the Cybugs and Turbo himself who disguised himself as King Candy. So the act of going Turbo is serious to the world of Wreck it Ralph. And in the beginning of the film Ralph literally went into Candy Crush to build a new course in the arcades opening times and as a result gets Candy Crush unplugged.

The story of the film is not bad and is handled a lot better than I thought it was going to be. There are a lot of new characters such as Knowsmore and Yasss. However the main characters arc seem to be lacking with Ralph seeimg to be the selfish one, in defense of this Vanellope is Ralphs best friend and the fact he wants to be protective of her in fear of losing her is quite interesting yet they don't fully explore that. As for Vanellope she has the same story arc Ralph has had in the first movie as she wants to try something different and as a result stays in the internet at the end of the movie.

Overall I would give Ralph Breaks the Internet a 6-10: Interesting plot, great acting and animation but lacks with character arcs and development.

Parasite review

Last week, I went to Cineworld in Wembley with some friends from uni to go and see this years best picture parasite. The film is set in South Korea and follows a poor family called the Kim's as they find work for a rich family, however a secret found in the families house changes their lives forever.

The film's acting was really strong, all the characters situations felt understandable and we can really sympathise with the Kim's struggles. The moral of the story highlights the treatment between the higher class and the lower class and how the lower class are looked down upon, this is seen in the movie as Mr Park keep saying that Mr Kim has certain type of smells him that is off putting. The film's use of cinematography in my opinion was the highlight of the film, each shot was well thought out and had good attention to detail, an example of this are the establishing shots that showcase the rich families household as you can everything happening in the house like the families youngest child playing outside the garden. After the Kim's find out about the secret hidden within the park's household, the film becomes more and more suspenseful leading to you guessing what is gonna happen next.

The film's director is Bong Joon Ho who has directed other movies such as Okja for Netflix and Snowpiercer starring Chris Evan. He not only directed these films but wrote the screenplays and produced them. Recently HBO has announced to make a series based on the film of rumour Mark Ruffalo taking the lead role, it will be produced by Bong and Adam McKay.  At the 2020 Oscars the film made history as the first international film to win Best picture. Bong also got awards for best screenplay and director. With this in mind not seeing any of his films prior to this, it gets me excited to see what else this man will do in the future and makes me want to watch his other films to see if  they have a similar style to this one.

I would give parasite a 10 out of 10 – for an amazing story, brilliant camera and good performances.

Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker Review

This review might be a bit overdue but you know what they say, 'better late than never'. Star Wars has now entered a new territory with the sequel trilogy and the 'Skywalker Saga' closed and with a new trilogy rumored to be based on the 'high republic' in the works, Stars Wars fans are interested to see what will happen next.

Last year had a lot to offer for Star Wars fans with the successful video came Jedi: Fallen Order and the release of the first season of The Mandalorian. The Rise of Skywalker had a lot to compete with especially with the divide of the fan base after The Last Jedi and the previous film Solo becoming the first Star Wars film to bomb at the box office. But did The Rise of Skywalker save what was considered to many a dying franchise, well here's what I thought as in this review I talk about the last entry in the Skywalker Saga.

The plot goes like this, Emperor Palpatine has mysteriously returned and Kylo Ren is in search for him, he finds the Emperor and he sends Kylo on a mission to find Rey and bring her to him. Meanwhile Rey is training at the resistance base with the help of Leia, until she is sent on a mission with the gang to fetch supplies that will help the resistance defeat the first order. Know this doesn't really sound like the plot of a grand finale especially to Star Wars. It doesn't fill like a finale to anything as it fills like we start half way through another smaller story so it takes a while to be invested what is happening in the movie.

The movies cast is the same as most with Daisy Ridley, John Boyega and Oscar Isaacs as Rey, Finn and Poe. Some new faces such as General Pryde played by Richard E. Grant, Naomi Ackie as Jannah and Keri Russel as Zorii Bliss. Now its time to talk about what I liked about the movie and that isn't that much, some of the shots were good especially when they first showed the emperor as the lighting made it looked like something from a horror film and the fact he looked like a zombie made it all better, C-3PO has a much bigger arc in this movie in fact it might be the biggest we have seen for the character and Anthony Daniels does an amazing job portraying him as he has done for more than 40 years. The effects were great and was accompanied by a great score composed by John Williams.

Now on to the things I didn't like about the movie, the script for one thing was awful. Now I already said how the plot didn't feel like a finale to this sort of franchise (or any) but the dialogue was just awful. The movie was directed by and co- written by J.J Abrams who also directed and co- wrote the Force Awakens. I feel Abrams was a little forced to direct this movie since original director Colin Trevorrow was fired by Lucasfilm head Kathleen Kennedy for creative differences. And it really shows in the film as no one on that side wanted to make the film, but it needed to be made to finish the story they started back in 2015.

Overall, The Rise of Skywalker is a mess of a film, it has a messy plot that felt like it was written at the lat minute, directed by a director who clearly didn't want make another Star Wars but was forced to do it as Disney couldn't find a replacement and overall feels like a bit of a let down, especially with all the good Star Wars media that was out this year.

I would give Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker a 5/10- for a messy plot, made by a team of actors and writers who were clearly done with the franchise and marginally has a satisfying conclusion to a 42 year old story.

Terminator: Dark Fate Review

In this review, I will be talking about the latest instalment in the Terminator franchise. Every Terminator Movie seemed to be getting worse after Terminator 2. The news of a sixth movie naturally got many concerned, although fans got excited as not only was Arnold Schwarzenegger returning to his role as the T-800,  Linda Hamilton would return as Sarah Connor and James Cameron would be returning as a producer on the film. This all sounded amazing and there seemed that there was little hope that this would save the Terminator franchise from all its other films. However, as the movie drew nearer people were less and less keen to see it as the marketing for the film didn't help to sell the film to the audience e.g: the bad trailers. Before I start this review there will be spoilers so if you want to see this movie come back after seeing the movie to read my opinion on it.

Terminator Dark Fate ignores the other Terminator movies and opens a few years after T2 with Sarah and John Connor relaxing on a beach. A Terminator appears out of nowhere and does what most of the Terminators have tried to do since 1984's The Terminator and kills John Connor. We then move on to the present day where a Terminator named the Rev 9 (Gabriel Luna) and a Cyborg named Grace (Mackenzie Grace) arrive in Mexico City. If you've seen any Terminator you can guess that one is sent to terminate and the other is sent to protect. Grace is sent to protect a girl named Daniele Ramos (Natalia Rayes).

From this short paragraph about the film's story, there is nothing original as it follows the exact same premise as the other movies. But another element of the film that feels lacking is the characters. The main character Dani has the same storyline as Sarah Connor in the first film, but her offspring won't be the leader of the resistance fighting the new future, no in an obvious twist, she is the leader of the resistance. This twist was obvious to see coming and was the only thing they could do with the character without copying the entire arc of Sarah Connor from the first Terminator.

Another character I feel was lacking was Grace. On paper, Grace sounds like a unique character as she is a cyborg sent back from the future to protect Dani to repay her debt to her as Dani saved her as a child. However, she comes across as a not very likeable person as she shouts a lot and acts like a bit of an asshole especially round Sarah Connor. Talking about Sarah Connor she feels like she was only including in this movie for fan service and nothing else, the reason I say this is because she just feels like she is in the background and doesn't serve much in the overall story.

Now we've talked about some of the weaker parts of the film, its time to talk about some of the film's strengths. The chase scenes in the film were well filmed, the CGI looked good, Arnie does a really good performance as the T- 800 as well as Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connor, the film's concept was quite interesting but the execution wasn't great.

Overall I would give Terminator Dark Fate a 5/10- great concept, bad execution.

Spider-Man: Far From Home Review

As I haven't been active for a good few months now, I decided to review the next instalment in the MCU. Before the third Spider-Man 2 film was released there was a little event called Avengers Endgame that ended the 'first half' of the MCU off, giving us closure for two of their biggest characters Tony Stark and Captain America. A lot of people where know wondering how Far From Home will play out after this event and if the MCU could still live up to its reputation after the release of their biggest film ever (at least at the time of writing this anyway).

However, after seeing Far From Home, I am now able to say that the MCU reputation is still in good hands. This film may not be one of the best Spider-Man movies ever made, but maybe the best standalone MCU movie for a good while. The film takes place a few months after the events of Endgame with Peter's school on a field trip around Europe, Peter (Tom Holland) has plans tell MJ (Zendaya) that he likes her on the trip but however there is a more pressing matter as Peter is called by Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) to stop these new threats from another universe known as the Elementals with the help of the lone survivor of that universe Quentin Beck/ Mysterio (Jake Gyllenhaal) making Peter's plans for the trip even harder to achieve.

SPOILER WARNING:

Now there is going to be some spoilers from here as there is a lot in the trailers don't show, in fact, the trailers show at least the first quarter of the movie. Anway on to the cast of this movie was great, they made us feel invested in their characters and hoped nothing bad was going to happen them and there are some returning characters from other films in the MCU as well but more on those later. Jake Gyllenhaal did a great performance as Mysterio making him a likeable character and a big influence on Peter as he understands what he is dealing with and how hard it can be at times, however, when the big twist, I say big but Mysterio is a Spider-Man villain so its not really comes that he is the main person behind the Elementals, it stings a little as he was such a likeable character and the reveal kind of makes you want to punch him in the face.

Anyway, I said about some returning MCU characters in the film. Mysterio's origin in this film is that he was an ex Stark Industries employee who helped to develop the technology that was used in the conference scene in Civil War which showed how Tony wanted his last time with his parents to be. Mysterio complained to Tony about the name and that he took the credit for his work so he was fired. However, this tech was used to help develop his illusions and making the Elementals. He has a team of ex Stark Industries employees who helped him develop the technology and the character of Mysterio. One member of the team has a scene in the first Iron Man where Obadiah Stane fires him as he couldn't deliver on an arc reactor for his Iron Monger suit. The last two Spider-Man movies have seemed to reflect on the consequences of Stark's actions, with Vulture and his crew in homecoming being fired from there cleaning up sight as it was being taken over by Tony's new Damage Control. Other returning characters include Nick Fury and Maria Hill (Cobie Smulders) and Happy Hogan (Jon Favreau) as well as the Skrull General Talos (played again by Ben Mendelsohn)  and a surprise returning character J. Jonah Jameson (played once again by J.K. Simmons).

There are a lot of good scenes in the film with one of them being an illusion trick that Mysterio does on Peter reflecting his failures as Spider-Man such as giving him the technology that could be used to control Stark satellites and that Peter feels he has failed Tony by trusting Mysterio at all, this is shown through a corpse of Tony in an Iron Man suit. This is a good scene as it is visually amazing and it represents the power that Mysterio has over Peter.

There are two new suits in this movie, there is the stealth suit that Spider-Man wears for most of the movie to help conceal his identity a to his school mates as they might question why Spider-Man is in Europe and that Peter is not with them which would make them question is whereabouts. And the upgraded suit which is the Homecoming suit with a brighter shade of red and instead of blue it has black with a white spider logo on its back.

However, there are a few parts of the movie that I felt lacked a bit. Such the Peter and MJ scenes as although they could be sweet it could drag a bit making them slightly awkward to watch at points. And the end credits scene seemed a little bit pointless to include apart from hinting at what the future could look like.

Overall, Spider-Man Far From Home is a fun and entertaining Spider-Man movie that deals with the impact that Tony has on Peter which makes him want to become a better hero like Spider-Man.

I will give Spider-Man: Far From Home an 8/10- a fun film with some prolonged scenes.

Avengers: Endgame review (SPOILERS)

It's finally time to talk about one of the biggest Marvel films to date marking an 'end' to an 11-year cinematic milestone. Now before I start there will be spoilers as I can't really review the movie in depth without spoiling anything as a lot happens in this movie.

Now it's not the first time we have had a finale type film, there's been Lord of the Rings: Return of the King, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part 2, The Dark Knight Rises, Star Wars episodes 6 and 3 and 9 (coming December) and so on. But none of these films apart from the exception of Star Wars have really had a huge cinematic milestone to celebrate. If this doesn't make sense to you then I will explain, Star Wars success helped pave the way for Sci-Fi movies going forward, Marvel, on the other hand, have done something different. Marvel has managed to keep a whole cinematic universe successful for over 10 years and has succeeded in this while other big movie studios try and fail at starting up there own cinematic universes.

Now let's talk about this film, Endgame marks an end to 22 movies over the last 10 years. It may not be the best Marvel film plot-wise but the areas it is strong in are its characters who they have developed for 10 years and their themes. The plot of Endgame is set a few weeks after the events of Infinity War, the Avengers struggle with there failure and try to find a way to reverse Thanos's actions. Once they find a way some of the Avengers are divided by this decision but in the end, they come together to defeat Thanos. That is a brief summary of the plot without spoiling anything in the movie.

The film has the surviving members of the Avengers which consist of Tony Stark/ Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr), Steve Rodgers/ Captain America (Chris Evans), Thor (Chris Hemsworth), Bruce Banner/ Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) and James Rhodes/ War Machine (Don Cheadle). There is also the inclusion of other characters who help such as Paul Rudds Ant-Man, Brie Larson returning as Captain Marvel, Jeremy Renner returning as Hawkeye or Ronan as he's called now and of course Bradley Cooper as Rocket Raccoon and Josh Brolin reprising his role as Thanos.

Now it's time to get into spoiler territory so if you haven't seen it yet, which I'm sure you probably have but if not read the score at the bottom. What I like about the movie is its characters, one of the shocking things that they did in the movie was the five-year time jump so it is now 2023. We get to see how the characters have dealt with the events of the snap, some of the highlights being Thor who after feeling he failed everything he believed in his people, the universe, his friends (which he did) he becomes a fat, lazy, drunk slob of a man who doesn't even go outside as he doesn't want to witness the result of his failure.

Another one is Bruce Banner/ The Hulk. Why I feel this one was a high light is because after five years he finds a way to tame the Hulk and become the best of both worlds. Also, it was quite funny to see him get embarrassed after seeing him smashing stuff when they go back to the battle of New York in the first Avengers. And the last one is Iron Man because compared to the others who have either become worse because of it or have tried to find a way to move around it, Tony just moved forward and had a life with his wife and has a daughter. So when Scott, Steve and Natasha come to him with time travel he refuses as he doesn't want to lose what he gained.

There are many more characters that are like the three I mentioned such as Hawkeye where his family where victims of the snap and like Thor became a shadow of what he used to be and Natasha sacrifices herself so he could become himself once more giving him a second chance.

Another strength with the movie was the way it was shot and it uses of CGI. I felt the way it was shot was very well done with a lot of close-ups and Extreme Long Shots to show how the characters and their surroundings have changed and become unrecognisable. Marvel's CGI can often be really obvious as there is usually a lot happening in the scenes and if feels they are trying to do more than they can handle but it felt different in the film with the CGI spreading out evenly till it was needed in the third act of the film.

Another strength would be the third act of the film as it might be one of the best third acts that Marvel has ever produced as not only do they save everyone but it also celebrates the 11 year legacy that they have produced with every character either a background character in a movie before this helping in the battle against Thanos.

However, the movie does have its downsides such as the plot holes that they left open due to either future movies or TV shows on Disney +. Also, its use of time travel is very confusing as it does not follow the laws of time travel that we have grown accustomed to through movies like Back to the Future as the time travel seems element seems to work on dimensional plain where it, if something happens in a timeline that is not supposed to it, creates a reality where it happened. An example of this would be Nebula killing her past self from the first Guardians as she does not fade away which it weird because killing her past self would mean that her future never existed, but in the films case killing her past self mean that she knows exists with her future self being her past self living her present which is very confusing and I hope they address the timeline in future movies or TV shows.

Overall, Avengers Endgame is a movie that celebrates an 11-year legacy and marks the end to an era. Although it suffers from plot holes and questionable time travel, the film mainly focuses on the characters that they have developed for a long time. This may not be the last movie Marvel will ever produce considering there is a Spider-Man movie coming out in the next few months and Marvel already announcing its next six movies as a part of Phase 4, it will never feel the same and makes me question how long I will watch these movies till they become shadows of what they used to be.

I would give Avengers Endgame an 8/ 10- Great character moments, lots of emotional moments but it suffers from its plot holes and confusing time travel which I hope they can explain more in future movies like Doctor Strange 2.