Divergent - Noodles Review

5 out of 10 Noodles

   Teen angst movies can almost be their own genre nowadays. Whether we'd like to admit it or not, this film was greenlit for one reason only: the success of films based on teen books like Hunger Games, Twilight, and even Harry Potter. And in that respect, it doesn't bring much new to the table. Divergent is based on a popular book series of the same name by Veronica Roth that takes place in post-apocalyptic America, wherein people belong to separately specialized "factions," all under one oppressive government. Ring any bells (*cough cough* Hunger Games)? That's not it though; individuals in this world have to eventually undergo a test by an electronic Sorting Hat type thing, that tells whichever faction fits them best based on their personality (almost like the Sorting Hat in Harry Potter that places you in a house based on what you're like). The main girl, Tris, is found out to be what is called a Divergent; meaning she doesn't really fit into any of these specific faction. Apparently, the government is afraid of these rare Divergents because there's a possibilty that due to their free thinking mindset, they have the ability to revolt and overthrow the power. So Tris instead hides her Divergent-ness (I'll just make that a word) by joining the warrior-type faction. From then on she trains and trains and trains. 

    Now like I said earlier, Hollywood always has knack now for investing in movies based on popular young adults books series. And that's not always the best idea. They get lucky sometimes, as with The Hunger Games series, and then everything tries to play off of it. Unlike the Hunger Games, I have not read any of the Divergent books so I can't really say anything for how well of an adaptation it is. But I will say, that the story and writing in this film were very weak, and I wanna blame the source material there. I mean, most of this movie was just training and preparing for Tris's life. Tris is the shining point of this film, I think Shailene Woodley did a terrific job playing her, and she's really bringing herself into a great career. A lot of her emotional scenes can be likened to Jennifer Lawrence's role as Katniss, but one thing about Woodley is that she's so damn likable, like you wanna see her succeed and get behind her. She's got a trainer who also acts as a love interest, because of course it's a teen book movie, we must have a love interest! I felt he was only okay in the role, a bit wooden at times. The romance between them though was completely wooden and lacked chemistry. There was another badass trainer guy though too, he was awesome. Kate Winslet is also in the movie, and ya almost feel like she's just there to bring it some form of credibility. Of course, her character is important, but I feel like putting Winslet in the role was a bit of a shoehorn. She's good in the role, and you get the vibe that she's a mean government lady, but we didn't really even get much from her. There wasn't much material for her there, and I blame that again on the writing and the source material.  

    A lot of the things that happened in the story didn't really make sense or had holes, and yeah I blame the source material there again because I imagine that's how it probably happend in the book too. For example, there's one guy that's a Divergent, in which the government is literally hunting down the Divergent people, he has a huge ass tattoo that ultimately would just scream "Hey I'm a Divergent!" However, I will honestly say that once the training was over with and the climax kicked in, I did enjoy it. I think some of the emotional scenes towards the climax of this film were done well and convincingly. The action here was executred well, as were much of the stunts. We're undoubtedly gonna compare this to the other movie series based on books. However, it pleasantly surprised me because I thought I wasn't gonna like it at all. It's somewhere between The Mortal Instruments and the first Hunger Games for me, because the former was just an okay film but really missed the mark in appealing to fans or pulling in audiences, and the latter was effective in bringing in audiences and building the world/characters but wasn't exactly great. I don't think Divergent was great, but I'm happy to say it wasn't bad either, with a 5 out of 10 Noodles. The writing and romance are bland probably due to source material, but this movie still has enough to catch interest in viewers, thanks to a great lead actress in Shailene Woodley and a very promising final 20-30 minutes in the film. It was a little longer than it needed to be but kicked into high gear before the length could become too detrimental. The end doesn't leave much for you to think about, and I'm wondering where the sequels will even go. Still gonna see em though.

Top 5 Russell Crowe Films

Something new I'm gonna try to do is make a Top Five list relevant to a specific movie or theme during the week of a movie I review. So this time around, it was Noah, which got me thinking of Russell Crowe's best movies. He's a phenomenal actor, and has produced a couple of my favourite movies, as well a wholly consistent repertoire of roles.

5. American Gangster (2007)
I'm a huge fan of mobster/gangster films, so what better way to start off this list than with American Gangster. This is the most recent movie on this list, and barely edged out Man of Steel, which I thought Crowe was amazing in but didn't choose it due to how small his role was. Here, he plays a detective who's out to bring down the drug empire of Denzel Washington's character, Frank Lucas. It's a big and intense American crime movie which sort of the closest in style to that of The Godfather and Goodfellas because it just had that feel to it. The writing was brilliant and the characters were so complex that it grips your attention for its long runtime. As well as being legitimately dramatic with an intense climax, American Gangster shows that Russell Crowe's still got it.

4. Master & Commander: The Far Side of the World (2003)

In relation to his just released film, Noah, this movie also chronicles Russell Crowe on an epic adventure in the seas. Master & Commander is an intense period piece about a British captain that pushes his crew to the limits. The direction and technical aspects of this movie are spectacular: amazing sound editing and realistic ship; as well as the Oscar-winning cinematography. The director and cast did their jobs excellently. But Russell Crowe's performance as the weathered captain who's got so much on his plate but keeps on going; that was awesome. It's great to see when an epic adventure with great sound and scale can be capitalized on by a great performance.

3. L.A. Confidential (1997)
It could be argued that this is the movie that put Crowe on the movie star map. L.A. Confidential is one of the best written films of all time, conveying an intricate story that weaves together three different cops: Guy Pearce as the boy scout-type cop, Kevin Spacey as the corrupt Vice cop, and Russell Crowe as the gruffy roughed up badass cop; as they investigate a series of murders. The back-and-forth and the realistic dialogue could be argued to be the stellar aspect of this movie. But Russell Crowe really sells it in this movie, and you can tell that it seriously jumpstarted his career, showing the complexity and seriousness he could put into a character.

2. Gladiator (2000)

"Father to a murdered son. Husband to a murdered wife. And I will have my vengeance in this life or the next." I can't talk about this movie without mentioning that quote. Gladiator is one of the most epic films of all time, as well as probably the best display of downright vengeance I've ever seen in a movie. Everything about this movie just screams epicness: the production value, the huge scope, the realistic set design, the absolutely intense action sequences, and even the conversations that are had between characters. This is the movie that won Crowe his Oscar for Best Actor, and it was so well deserved because he was so amazing in this role as Maximus Decimus Meridius. You really saw the devotion in him and we were all behind him throughout the entire film. I can't speak enough about how much I love Gladiator, because it's one of the greatest movies of all time to me. But there is one more that places higher:

1. A Beautiful Mind (2001)
Right after he wins Best Actor and his movie wins Best Picture, he gives another stellar performance in another Best Picture winning movie the subsequent year. A Beautiful Mind is my favourite Russell Crowe movie and also, in my opinion, his best performance. He plays the real-life mathematician John Nash, an absolutely brilliant man who thought he was working in secret service cryptography but instead sees his life spiral downward into basically a nightmare. Keep in mind, that this film was a true story, and never before have I seen a real person so convincingly portrayed. A Beautiful Mind was the first time I ever saw a character in a movie and think, "Wow he's actually genuinely a genius;" not like Doc Brown from Back to the Future who's a wacky genius, but actually a realistic prodigy. And the way Crowe did every single mannerism, the way he spoke every single word, and the way he showed his emotions were so compelling, that this is not only the best Russell Crowe movie, but also one of my favourite films of all time.

Noah - Noodles Review

7 out of 10 Noodles

    Before anything is said about this movie, it should be taken into account that it's adapted from the biblical story of Noah's Ark. I say adapted, because it's not exactly how it plays out it in the Bible, or in any other religious text I know of that mentions him. This movie is an adaptation, so it takes creative liberties to make it a drama/tension-filled epic. While I have nothing against the Bible or the way things take place in it, I think that trying to watch this movie as a purist (judging it on its differences from the Biblical tale) would definitely diverge one's enjoyment of it. So, in my opinion, you should only watch this movie if you're going in just as a viewer who wants to see an epic adventure. That being said, let's talk about one of my most anticipated movies of 2013: Noah. As you might have guessed, it's about the biblical figure, Noah, and the events that occurred in his life that led him to build his famous Ark, so as to survive the great flood. Now, it's kind of one of those movies where you have a vague idea of what's gonna go down. Like in Titanic, we know that there's going to be a prestigious ship, and that it's eventually going to meet its demise via impact with an iceberg; yet we don't really know how the director will interpret such events or what the characters will be like. While this is certainly not on the same boat as the 1997 masterpiece, Noah has sort of the same notion wherein we know that he's gonna build an ark, we know there's gonna be rain and an epic flood that wipes out mankind; but the interpretation of such events and creative directions taken are completely new. Darren Aronofsky is a great character director, as well as great at creating tension; these were evident in his previous films, Black Swan, The Fountain, and the classic Requiem for a Dream. Those were, however, incredibly thought-provoking movies made on relatively low budgets, whereas Noah is a big-budget adventure. Luckily, this film still takes effect in creating great three-dimensional characters.

    Noah is played by Russell Crowe which, along with Aronofsky's direction, is mainly what piqued my interest to see this movie. And I must say that he owns this role; he perfectly captured that sense of intense devotion, almost to the point where you don't even know if you wanna root for him at some points, and others where you wanna keep cheering him on. It's great to see him interpret Noah as such a dynamic character, and the level of intensity he portrayed in almost every shot was greatly convincing. Jennifer Connelly plays his wife, and it's funny that the last time she played the wife of Russell Crowe, he was still a somewhat troubled but devoted character whose actions take an emotional toll on her. I thought she was good in this movie as well, especially in a scene where she argues with Noah. The rest of the family is also played well, Emma Watson in particular and Anthony Hopkins who we know annihilates every role. There's also a villain, played by Ray Winstone; I thought he was incredibly menacing and awesome in the role, but I didn't really always think his character fit into the film.

   With all the praise I'm giving to the acting, there has to be some takeaways. The writing of the film is good but not great; there are some great moments and quotes, but not all the story elements always feel necessary or fitting. And I'll be honest, about 10-15 minutes into this movie I was afraid I was gonna be gravely disappointed. In the beginning the movie really doesn't look like it knows where it's going, and it can even come off as boring. But once Noah gets started on that Ark, then the film picks up, it gains focus, and redeems itself. From then on, it consistently played out as a suspenseful and epic movie; but I can't deny that it really started off quite rocky. And that brings me to the big rock dudes known as the "Watchers." I didn't really think they needed to be there, other then to give us more valid reasons as to why Noah was able to build the Ark and fend off the bad guys in time. But they were pretty cool. The special effects were awesome; these were some of the best water destruction effects I've ever seen in a movie. When that flood kicks in, it was some of the coolest shit I'd seen in awhile, and at the end of the day, that's the thing that stuck out in my head: how awesome the actual flood was.
    This movie does also sort of serve as a social commentary on what mankind does to the Earth, and in that aspect it gets its point across; which is a great hinging point in Noah's character. It's not an overtly polarizing religious film like Passion of the Christ or Ten Commandments; I think Noah is one of those movies that can be watched as just an epic story, without really thinking about the its biblical roots. Though it does get off on a rocky start and has some pacing issues throughout; at the end of the day, it's got some great acting and some awesome epic moments to earn it a solid 7 out of 10 Noodles. It's not your typical Aronofsky film, but it does still have his trademark character complexity at its simplest form. I think if you were to plan on starting to watch Aronofsky's movies, this would definitely be the movie to start you off, because it's simple yet it introduces you to his style, and prepares you for the mind-numbing of his other films.

300: Rise of an Empire - Noodles Review

6.5 out of 10 Noodles

   I didn't have the highest of expectations for this film. I love 300 but I don't really think a sequel is necessary for it. You didn't really even feel like there was room for a sequel. Also this sequel isn't even directed by Zack Snyder, so how could it capture the greatness of the first. Fortunately, I found out that this is based on another Frank Miller comic, entitled Xerxes, so that made me feel a little bit safer with this. But I still wasn't sold. But I'm glad to have been wrong. I cannot deny that this movie was freaking awesome. The first 300 was revolutionary in its action, in that it used a new style in which slow motion and fast motion intertwine seamlessly and in a cool way. Many many many movies tried to emulate that in the following years but not could truly capture that glory (Immortals came close though with the gods vs titans battle). Even recently, Legend of Hercules tried it and just seemed sloppy and unoriginal. But it's nice to see that action style back where it belongs: in a 300 movie. It works great. One gripe is that there's way too much unnecessary blood, that all looks really fake. Sure, 300 had a lot of blood spurting out, but Rise of an Empire will drop a bucket of blood if a guy just stubs his toe. It's too much sometimes. However, the battles were still awesome and epic. This movie has a very different tone from the first one though. The colour palette, even, was noticeably different. In 300, it was all sandy and yellow, but here it's dark blue; which is probably because a lot of this movie is naval combat. Also, we're not dealing with Spartans here. Spartans were the badasses who thought dying in battle was glorious. But in this film, we've got the rest of the Greeks, mainly Athenians, who just wanna survive and see their friends survive as well. You could even tell that from the fighting styles; you could tell they didn't wanna fight but felt momentum when they were doing good. I like that, because it gives us more relatable characters.
    Themistokles is our main character here. The timeline of this film doesn't really warrant it being called a sequel, because in the beginning it takes place before the first movie; wherein Themistokles battles the Persians for the first time, and we see Xerxes's rise to power as well. Later, it takes place at the same time as 300, like you may even hear "oh the Spartans just had a battle over at Thermopylae." And then, the last third or half of the movie takes place after 300; "oh the Spartans have all died." But Themistokles has so much ambition throughout this whole film, that's what made you wanna get behind him. He realizes that they're not like the Spartans, who can just kill 100 guys each. He has to come up with battle strategies to try to trick the Persians. He's also a badass, he will just sometimes go all Rambo, and it's pretty cool. The villain, Artemisia played by Eva Green, she was great too. She was a great villain, she was ruthless, sexy, and badass. However, none of the other characters really felt that important, or you couldn't really get invested in anyone else. You could argue Xerxes, but he's not in the movie all that much either. The other Greek captains and such didn't feel important, nor did anyone with a name, because those are the only names I remember. There's a couple little easter eggs, like it'll show a character from 300 and how they're tied to this movie too; those are fun but not always needed. The last minute of this movie, though, I just didn't like how it ended; you might understand why if you see it.
    Like I said earlier, the fight scenes were awesome and epic, but sometimes the green screen didn't work well; for example, you could sometimes see the green haze next to Themistokles's beard. C'mon this is a $100 million movie, we shouldn't see cheap green screens. Also, the blood looked really fake but I guess that's something we should suspend belief with. All in all, I still like the first movie a lot better, but 300: Rise of an Empire was really awesome and was still an very enjoyable flick, so I'm giving it 6.5 out of 10 Noodles. What I'd really like to see is a superedit of 300 and Rise of an Empire, like in chronological order with the events of 300 plopped right in the middle to make a long 3.5 hour Greek war epic. That would be awesome.

So what's your favourite sword-sandal movie. I already mentioned that I love the first 300, but my favourite in that category would have to be Gladiator with Russell Crowe, the perfect tale of vengeance, as well as a masterfully directed cinematic experience with awesome action.

Need For Speed - Noodles Review

4.5 out of 10 Noodles

   So at the end of the Breaking Bad series finale, we see Jesse Pinkman drive off into the distance and never to be seen again. Well, I guess we now know where he drove off to. Need For Speed is one of our cool racing movies with car stunts, however it's based on the video game. That's the main concern, because video game movies are normally known to suck. The only one I like is Silent Hill, while Mortal Kombat and Tomb Raider aren't half-bad. But the point is, video game movies don't really work out often, so we don't have high expectation for them. That's the case here for that reason, but also because the Need For Speed games aren't very story driven; the main reason to play those games is to customize your cars and race; the story takes a backseat there. So how could they adapt it into a movie? Answer: make it an underdog story about a guy who's really good at racing. Generic, right? Basically, his character goes to prison but it's obviously not his fault, so he decides to race against Ironman's dad who's actually responsible, and prove his innocence. Whilst doing so, they partake in a cross-country race, that interferes with the law a lot, wherein we say, "wait that shit doesn't make sense." Because it doesn't. The logic, decisions, and conveniences of this movie are not realistic at all, nor are the characters and dialogue. It doesn't make sense that a really rich guy will just loan his super fast car to this ex-convict. Businessmen don't just do that. Also, you'll see Aaron Paul driving his car that we've already established is one of the fastest cars in the world, yet you'll see cop cars or dune buggies right on his tail. Doesn't make sense. 

    Now, I will not in anyway deny that the car stunts were cool and entertaining. In no way is any of it believable, but I have to admit that some of it is cool as hell and not something I could've thought of. In the end, this movie is enjoyable if you can suspend your belief about anything in the world that's logical or anything you know that is physically impossible; if you can put that all aside, you can watch this movie and have a fun time. If you're looking for character development, witty dialogue, good story, virtually anything of cinematic prowess or merit, then you should turn the other way. It makes no sense. But if you're just looking for a fun time and some mindless car stunts/explosion, then yeah this movie's cool. It's not a terribly bad movie, it's just not good either, so it's a mediocre 4.5 out of 10 Noodles.

So what's your favourite movie based around cars? Mine's probably Death Race 2000, just because it's so unbelievable and great. Ya know there's something to watch when a hospital puts out old people in the middle of the street so that the cars can hit them. I'm kidding, that's terrible, I like Fast Five, because it brought us the great heist action to a beloved car movie franchise. 

The LEGO Movie - Noodles Review

8.5 out of Noodles

    Everything is awesome! After watching this movie, that song will be stuck in your head forever. But that's okay because this movie was utterly awesome. I didn't really know much about this movie. It's relatively low-budget for a big animated release, and the trailers weren't very well done. I was forced, however, to take my kid sister to see this movie. I think I might've gotten more enjoyment from it than her though. When I was kid, I had tons upon tons of Legos and loved building them, playing with them, and displaying them (I even still have a couple on my shelf now). And this movie knows that we've all had or dealt with Legos at least once in our lives, and it plays upon that. I totally dug the animation style of this movie. It was totally done by computers, but the way it looks is as if someone took a camera and zoomed in on Lego people moving around in their cities. It's awesome because it addresses the physics of actual Legos and makes fun of it, as well as showcases the building of lego structures and such. And literally everything is made out of Legos: the waves of the ocean, the fire in an explosion, the clouds, everything. The LEGO Movie is about this absolutely average Lego guy named Emmet. He is literally the definition of an everyman character, because he's not spectacular in any way, he's got no skills, and he just lives his days conformed in the society. But one day, he finds an artifact called the Kragel which can ultimately stop the evil Lord Business. As a result, the Master Builders (a group of super Lego characters that can build anything out of anything, without instructions) take him on an extravagant adventure through the many Lego worlds.
   One thing I wanna touch on first is that there may've been too many worlds for this movie's own good, which made it feel a bit crowded. And they may be for two reasons: 1) because the movie has several writers, and 2) because Lego has licenses to use practically everything. That second reason also aids in making this movie great though. It makes so many pop culture references that I couldn't stop laughing and there were so many great Lego characters. The voice acting was stellar. Emmet was a perfect average joe. Morgan Freeman was great as the wise old guy whose name eludes me right now.Liam Neeson as the cop was awesome too. Batman was badass, and the other superheroes (who play lessers roles) were hilarious and a great addition. There's so many characters that I can't give recognition to all of them. However, one character, Wildstyle, the love interest of Emmet, was little off for me. She just didn't really click.
    The various characters made this movie hilarious, and so did the various pop culture references and funny physics of the Legos. There was one especially hilarious Star Wars-related moment that made me laugh out loud. And watching this movie, I thought it was a really good and funny kid's animation. But then the last 15-20 minutes of this movie kicked in and it became a great kid's animation. I coulda swore that the makers of this movie called up the writers of Toy Story 3 and said, "hey, finish this movie for us." It really hit you deep down and I liked that a lot. And almost a quarter of the year done, The LEGO Movie is so far the best movie of 2014. 8.5 out of 10 Noodles. 

So what's your favourite animated movie? I absolutely adore Toy Story 3 especially as it's one of those movies that can make me cry, but my favourite of all time is Finding Nemo. I can watch that movie everyday and love every second of it. It's hilarious and is a tale of great ambition so I love it.

The Monuments Men - Noodles Review

4.5 out of 10 Noodles

     The Monuments Men was on my Top 10 Most Anticipated Movies of 2013 list, and for good reason. The trailers were great, it showed us some wit and humor amidst the backdrop of World War II. It's got George Clooney at the helm directing, along with an ensemble cast. You've got a cool premise, and the anticipation that it could be like Ocean's Eleven; well it ended up being more like Ocean's Twelve. This film had such great potential. It's a true story about a group of guys who have to go into the warzone and reclaim art pieces that were captured by the Nazis. They had great historical stuff to work with and the ability to make it cool, too. But in reality, this movie can be described in one way: boring. Now there's a difference between boring movies and slow movies. There are movies like Schindler's List, Gandhi, or Seven Years in Tibet that are admittedly slow; yet they hold value within them, encapsulating cinematic merit, intelligent writing and themes, as well as retaining engrossment despite the slow pace. Then we have films like The Monuments Men, which is straightup boring and doesn't have much to be entertained by.
    A selling point for this movie would've been the characters and how well they worked together. And yet, I still have no idea who any of these guys were. While that's testament to the writing (which will be touched upon in a bit), even the acting isn't as great as we'd hoped. Of course, the acting's bad in anyway; we've got George Clooney, Matt Damon, John Goodman, Jean Dujardin, and Bill fricken Murray! But it just felt like it was missing something. Take George Clooney for instance: he just didn't seem to uphold that Clooney charm that we all know him for. The whole group, even, didn't really have much dynamic to them.
   Apart from the acting though, I was really just hoping for this cool witty historical movie with witty dialogue and some fun action. And when I realized I wasn't getting that, I tried to at least watch the movie to appreciate the historical aspects of the movie and learn the story; but even then it's not interesting there because it's so boring. The writing of this movie was a huge problem, as the dialogue wasn't believable (the only golden scene there ever was, was showed off and exhausted in the trailer almost a year ago), and the narrative was so jumpy. The directing and editing also contribute to that; it's so choppy and points, and the film jumps from scene to scene, sometimes over a week, sometimes over two years. I really wanted to like this movie; hell it was one of my most anticipated for this whole year. But I just could not get invested in the characters or story, and the film itself held little enthusiasm. The disappointment factor takes a whole point away from the score, which leaves this movies with 4 out of 10 Noodles. Now I understand why they moved it to be released in February.


Now I'm gonna do something new where I ask a relevant question at the end of the review, just for fun, normally regarding a favourite movie of similar type; and I'll answer it myself too. So for this one, what's your favourite World War II movie. Some of mine would be Life is Beautiful, Schindler's List, and The Pianist; but my number 1 would be Saving Private Ryan, one of my favourite movies of all time, as well as one of the best war epics.