Though I haven't written any reviews all summer, I have seen a bunch of movies. So to make up for it, I've decided to make a top 5 list for the summer (meaning June, July, August; I don't count May as summer), consisting of my favourite movies of the summer with mini reviews of each. I've decided to do it this way because making a full detailed review for every new movie this summer would just be too much work, & I really only want to talk about the ones I enjoyed. So without further ado, let's get started with the honourable mentions.
Honourable Mentions
This Is The End - A movie about the end of the world during a party at James Franco's house? Count me in. This movie is really funny and it's inevitable that you'll be entertained throughout the movie. It's not exactly groundbreaking, but it is seriously funny with some clever moments as well as some jokes pointed at the actors themselves. If you can get past the raunchy humour, you'll enjoy it.
The Wolverine - The elephant in the room here is that
X-Men Origins: Wolverine was a huge disappointment. I, myself, am a huge comic book fan and love the X-Men comics, cartoon, and most of the movies. However, I pretend like
Origins didn't happen. Good thing
The Wolverine came around to help me forget the aforementioned piece of crap. This is definitely an awesome movie and it dives into some really deep shit with Wolverine's personal life. It could honestly be watched as a standalone movie because it's dramatic and has a central story. The action is great (except for the action scenes containing shaky cam) and so is the acting, especially Hugh Jackman's portrayal (we're at a point where he is the only man who can play Wolverine). It's a very solid attempt at giving Wolverine his own movie and I had a lot of fun.
The Conjuring - If you've read my
Evil Dead review, you'll know that I'm not a big fan of horror movies. It used to be because I get scared so easily and it sticks with me, but now it's because so many horror movies nowadays are just absolutely weak in story, character development, acting, and all the technical components of film-making. Thankfully,
The Conjuring was pretty good with those things, especially the directing. It had a really slow buildup with some good character development, which made me care about them when scary things happened and most of the scares were well done. And while I still wasn't able to sleep after watching this movie, I was joyed by how well it was crafted.
5. Pacific Rim
It was really between this and
The Conjuring that were competing for the number 5 spot, but I just can't deny how much fun I had with
Pacific Rim. The story is actually really simple, in which huge monsters rise up from an inter-dimensional portal in the Pacific Ocean. The movie drops you in the middle of it, in which it's been happening for awhile so we've created huge badass robots to fight the monsters. It's a decent enough premise to make the awesome concepts of battles between giant monsters & giant robots plausible. It's reason enough for us to get locked into this movie. The character development was alright, as was the acting. Charlie Hunnam plays the protagonist; and while I absolutely love him in
Sons of Anarchy, he's not spectacular in the movie. He gets the job done and you root for him but you're gonna buy his action figure. Then there's Idris Elba. We already know he's awesome, because with every role he takes on, the film could be terrible but you know Elba is gonna perform greatly. However, not everyone comes to this movie for the characters. We came to watch giant robots battle giant monsters. And I'll tell you it's so awesome. The battles are so epic. The scale of these battles are humongous and it allows you to actually see the entire fight occur, as opposed to the
Transformers movies where it's all in you face and you can't tell what's going most of the time other than the sound of clanking metal. No, with this movie you see it all, and it is absolutely awesome.
7.5 out of 10 Noodles.
4. The Hunt
This is a lesser known film (probably because it's foreign) but it's definitely a great one.
The Hunt is a Danish film concerning the a man named Lucas, played by Mads Mikkelsen. You may know him as the Bond villain from
Casino Royale or as Hannibal Lecter in the show
Hannibal. He's a phenomenal actor and he really shows that here (I'd be surprised if didn't get nominated for this). In this film, he plays an innocent-minded teacher. What I love about this movie is that it's so grounded and real. You really believe that this guy, Lucas, is a real person and everything that happens in the movie is so believable. He's a recently divorced guy who's close to getting custody of his son; he's starting a new relationship; as a teacher, all the kids love him. His life is a pretty positive one at the moment, until... one little girl decides to tell a little lie and falsely accuse him of sexually harassing her. And even though there's no evidence of this, Lucas's life begins to crumble. It all happens so realistically and that's credit to the writing and direction of this movie. When I watched this movie, I literally sat forward in my seat, motionless, witnessing the events of the film unfold. There's no special effects or spectacular events; it's just pure raw emotion in an intensely believable situation. One of the best compliments I can give a foreign-language film is that I forget that I'm reading the subtitles because I'm so engrossed in what's happening. To me, this is one of the best crafted films of recent years. Not everyone can watch it because a lot of people would find it boring or uninteresting, but it is just beautiful to me.
9 out of 10 Noodles.
3. Man of Steel
Truthfully, this and
The Hunt are interchangeable at the number 3 spot because
The Hunt is definitely a better movie but
Man of Steel is just so entertaining. I mean, come on, it's not a bird & it's not a plane. It's Superman!
Man of Steel was actually my most anticipated movie of 2013 and while I hate to say it, I was somewhat disappointed. I didn't get that special spark that I was hoping for, which I got from the
Dark Knight movies. And I'm probably gonna compare it to that too. However, I still like this movie a lot. If you didn't know,
Man of Steel is the reboot of the Superman franchise. It's actually a great start for the hero, but it's not perfect. Henry Cavill actually owns the role of Superman, and Amy Adams as Lois Lane is convincing as well. But the show is stolen by the fathers, Russell Crowe as Jor-El and Kevin Costner as Jonathan Kent. Michael Shannon as General Zod was great, too, but he lacked the emotion and intensity that I was expecting to get from him (especially showcased in one of the trailers). He was great in the role, but he's not the definitive Zod. Nonetheless, this movie still housed a ton of awesome sequences. Essentially every fight scene in this movie is done well and I just can't deny how much I enjoyed every second of them. Director Zack Snyder's visual direction of this movie is so great. However, I felt at times that there was too many action sequences in comparison to how much time is spent developing characters and emotion and all that stuff. While the movie has it's emotional scenes, it's not wholly inspiring or at the caliber of emotion that I was hoping for. But it's more so on the level of action-packed summer movieness. But I still enjoy this movie a lot and I'm so excited to see where the franchise heads (especially with the inclusion of Batman in the sequel!).
8.5 out of 10 Noodles.
2. Despicable Me 2
I was seriously contemplating the high placement of this movie on my list, but I just have to stress how much replay value this movie has. I can honestly watch it so many times. There's never really a dull moment in this movie. If you liked the first one, I'm pretty sure you'll like this one too. Personally, I loved the first one and I might even like this one more.
Despicable Me 2 is about the ex-villain Gru moving on from his life of crime and instead raising his family (of which the youngest girl Agnes is probably the cutest animated character. Ever.). Along the way, there's a spy conspiracy concerning a supervillain on his hands, as well as the outstandingly lovable minions. We all love the minions and the makers of this film realized and capitalized on that. There's so much more minion humour in this movie and it's great. Essentially all the humour in this movie is laugh-out-loud hilarious and the best funny parts are the really subtle things. It's actually rewarding in a sense. The second half of the movie is also filled with cool spy stuff (bear in mind that it's not Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol though) and it's all fun and entertaining, while still retaining all the laughs. It's fun for kids, teenagers, and adults: the quintessential family movie of this year so far and definitely the funniest.
8.5 out of 10 Noodles.
1. Elysium
I was really excited for
Elysium since I absolutely adore writer/director Neil Blomkamp's first film
District 9. It had a gritty, realistic feel to it; the character development and acting was great, as well as the action; and there were interesting themes of social commentary in it. Thankfully, Blomkamp has delivered that yet again with
Elysium. This is one of those movies that you walk into not fully knowing what to expect. However, it all pays off since this is the best movie of the summer and possibly of the year.
Elysium takes place about a century or two into the future and Earth is in a pretty bad, crumbling type, condition here. Don't expect the world of
Back to the Future 2 because this Earth is overpopulated, polluted; it sucks. And in this film, there's essentially no middle class of society is really present. We have the poor class living on this tattered Earth. Then we have the rich class (politically "the 1%") living on this perfect habitat in a space station called Elysium. On Elysium, life is great: everything's clean, everything's high society, they listen to classical music and speak French. There's medical machines that can essentially fix anything (from fixing broken legs to curing cancer). Jodie Foster kind of runs the place. She's actually the secretary of defense, but you know she really runs things. We know she's a great actress, and she's good here. Some people may be bothered by the weird, almost unique, accent she gives her character but I kind of felt it added to her character. However, she's one of the antagonists of the film as she pretty much hates the poor people who illegally immigrate to Elysium.
On Earth, we have Matt Damon's character Max. He's a really likable guy and easy to root for. He cracks jokes and kicks ass, but is also really determined to reach his goals. Matt Damon delivers here with probably his best performance since
The Departed. Through a number of events, he's gotta get to Elysium so he gets an awesome robotic suit bolted onto his body. It's pretty graphic when this happens too, the guys who do it don't exactly look like professionals, more so like thugs in the slums. Also on Earth is Agent Kruger, played by Sharlto Copley. I have to tell you right now that this guy completely steals the show. He's an actor with incredible range, playing an innocent fidgety guy who becomes a determined fighter in
District 9, and then playing an all out psycho (who is awesome) in this movie. He works for the Elysium government but he still lives on the slums of Earth with his guys. The entirety of Earth is essentially the slums and the movie spends a lot of time on Earth, which I actually enjoyed. The location filming is fantastic and the setting is incredibly engrossing. You felt like you were in this world with them and caring about what would happen. The action sequences were so cool too. It's not tame though, there's very detailed blood and gore. And there's the robots, too, whom I can't even tell if they're actual set pieces or special effects. Whichever it is, they look so real.
Another real thing about this movie is the social commentary of it. Yeah, with
District 9, Blomkamp gave us the themes of apartheid and racism, while wrapping them up in a really interesting and unique movie with aliens. In
Elysium, we have the issues of immigration, healthcare, and class boundaries discussed in this movie. My dad would even point out how interesting they made it, like where a group of poor Earthlings take some illegal ships up to Elysium and Jodie Foster wants to deport them because they're technically illegal immigrants. It really makes you think about how society is in our world today. When a movie can do that, while still being an incredibly entertaining and engrossing sci-fi flick, you know it's gonna be awesome. And whether you agree with the societal themes or not, you have to admire how much passion Neil Blomkamp pours into this film. In 2013, it's pretty rare to see that and I really love it.
Elysium is a fantastic sci-fi drama with some deep human elements, as well as some amazing action scenes and awesome sequences (there's a Bugatti spaceship... how is that not awesome?).
9 out of 10 Noodles.
In this movie, the five main characters, led by Pegg's character Gary King, partook in the Golden Mile as teenagers; which is a pub crawl challenge from their hometown in which you have to drink a pint of beer from each pub on this mile-long stretch, ending with the pub called The World's End. The gang wasn't able to complete the Golden Mile back then, so after like 20 years now, they come back together and head back to their hometown to take another crack at it. However, upon coming back, the crew realizes that the town they grew up in has been replaced with alien robots. It sounds ridiculous, right. It is explained competently, but the ridiculousness of this film is one of the best parts. And among the chaos brought upon by these robots, the gang continues to go on the Golden Mile, and the further the film progresses, the more drunk the guys get. And they play it so well that it's believable and hilarious. Simon Pegg kills it in this movie as the self-declared leader of the group. He's a complete loose-cannon and everything that comes out of the guy's mouth is comedy gold. The rest of group, too, are all great in the movie. They've all moved on in their lives. One's a lawyer, another's car salesman with a family; they all just feel like real regular people and seem like they all know eachother so well as if they were really best friends as kids, which adds to this film because you relate to them and care about them. My personal favourite was Martin Freeman's character, Oliver (or as he hates being called, the "O-Man!"), the real estate agent with the bluetooth who always says the acronym "WTF." The acting and character writing of this film are on point, which is possibly the main reason it's so funny. What I also liked about the comedy is that it's cleverly written. There's a lot of jokes that develop in the movie to be funny, and then there's also the subtleties that a lot of people will miss that are really hilarious.
The comedy and entertainment of this movie is also due highly to the direction. Edgar Wright has his own style of direction in which he does quick cuts, cool zooms, long takes, all mixed together. And the choreography of the fight scenes were fun, too. An example is when the gang is in one pub brawling against a bunch of robots and Pegg's character keeps trying to finish his glass of beer, while also being preoccupied by the ongoing fight. Just as well, it has some dramatic scenes that would otherwise be really cheesy in any other movie. However, the relatable characters and clever writing make it fit right in. My only gripes for this movie are that the last third aren't as strong as the the first two. It's still good and entertaining, don't get me wrong, but I feel like it's not as fun or engrossing as the beginning; it got more action. That, and the movie's not really for everyone. A lot of people really wouldn't find the British comedy as funny; and there are those who won't understand some of the more clever jokes. But for me, this was a laugh-out-loud 8.25 out of 10 Noodles (I couldn't decide between 8 and 8.5 so I just went in the middle). Had I made my Top 5 Summer Movies list after seeing this film, it would've knocked Pacific Rim into the Honourable Mentions.
