Oh Jeremy Irons, how far you have fallen!!
Hello all! In the true spirit of American Christmastime, I went and saw two movies today. (Also in celebration of my being home for the holidays. Yep, I'm back in town for a limited time only.) I saw "A Night at the Museum" and "Eragon". Reviews to follow. "Night" was cute, "Eragon" was the worst. Movie. EVA. Really. Spoilers to follow.
SOME SPOILERS!!!
REALLY!!!
ESPECIALLY ABOUT ERAGON!!
WHICH WAS TERRIBLE!!
So, "Night at the Museum" was cute and cuddly and very child-friendly. It helped that I'm a complete history geek and would love to be in a museum with LIVE HISTORICAL FIGURES. Wow that would be awesome. Robin Williams works wonders as Teddy Roosevelt (yes, the president; not Colonel Mustard or Custard as one of my friends was wondering). He has a lovely role as comic relief and motivational speaker, which, surprisingly, suits him rather well. I recommend this if you're looking for an easy brain trip or a guilty pleasure. 3 1/2 stars.
"Eragon". Oh God. I was not at all kidding when I said this was terrible. It even deserved the incorrect spelling of "ever", it was so bad. Let's start with casting, shall we? The kid who played Eragon, Ed Speleers, is a nice enough boy trying to make it into Hollywood. Very blond, very Norwegian, very Aryan actually. Accent: British suburb, as in not RP but not Cockney. He made me think of a teenage Oliver Twist, actually.
His screen cousin looked like his twin, which I found odd, and the accents of both cousin and uncle are very nice Midwestern America. Strike one on casting.
John Malkovich plays the evil king/ex-dragon rider Galbatorix (whose name seems to have come from a bad game of Boggle) and he has the worst, most halting lines in the entire movie. Which is saying something, considering about half of Eragon's lines are facepalmers like, "It's an egg!" 20 seconds after the damn thing hatched. Poor John. I know stilted is his style, sort of, but here it just seems like he's forcing himself to say lines he KNOWS are awful, like swallowing a bad pill or something.
Jeremy Irons plays the ruffian hero guy, Brom. His lines were awful, too, but I love Jeremy Irons so much I was willing to put up with quite a bit. Plus I just love his voice. After his character's death, though, I gave up (apparently the movie did, too; it just got worse). So we have another slightly British accent to add to our melting pot.
The one that really annoyed me in terms of casting was one of the leaders of the Varden, King Hrothgar. Who is Scottish, and has an accordingly thick accent. Who was cast opposite Djimon Hounsou, who is as African as you can get. Yeah, THAT made sense.
So we have a cast that was thrown together to get names, not netting. Fine. But the movie itself was awful! The wide-pan traveling shots were total rip-offs of Lord of the Rings, the final battle was blatant Helm's Deep, the Castle O' Doom was remarkably Harry Potter-ish, and the dialogue was painful. Add to this the probable realization that the dialogue was terrible, because every five minutes Patrick Doyle (the Music Guy) has these melancholy-sounding string themes underscored by suitably heart-wrenching brass that try to make every minute an epic of itself. It was distracting, after a while, how often the soundtrack was telling me "you should feel intense emotion right now". And when they got to the battle scenes with the drums in the background? Oy.
Not to mention all the continuity goofs within the movie, like that fact that Sapphira's armor is completely different on display than it is on her. The face plate is actually cut in half. "Stupid female dragons, elves stay up all night making them armor and then they decide to wear something else." (The last is a quote from drklaugh, by the way.)
All in all, I say possibly one of the best scenes is when baby Sapphira eats a rat whole in the first 20 minutes of the film, which doesn't bode well at all. Save your money and go see something else, like "A Night at the Museum" or something, because this flick is a total rip-off of Lord of the Rings mixed with Pern dragonriders. Peter Buchman and Christopher Paolini, shame on you. Find some maturity and creativity to work with.
On that note, I'm sure Mother Dear is getting frustrated that I've been out here with my computer for quite some time, so off I go. I'll update you all on the final run of the show later, as well.
Merry Christmas Eve, folks, I'll try to post an actual merry Christmas tomorrow.
SOME SPOILERS!!!
REALLY!!!
ESPECIALLY ABOUT ERAGON!!
WHICH WAS TERRIBLE!!
So, "Night at the Museum" was cute and cuddly and very child-friendly. It helped that I'm a complete history geek and would love to be in a museum with LIVE HISTORICAL FIGURES. Wow that would be awesome. Robin Williams works wonders as Teddy Roosevelt (yes, the president; not Colonel Mustard or Custard as one of my friends was wondering). He has a lovely role as comic relief and motivational speaker, which, surprisingly, suits him rather well. I recommend this if you're looking for an easy brain trip or a guilty pleasure. 3 1/2 stars.
"Eragon". Oh God. I was not at all kidding when I said this was terrible. It even deserved the incorrect spelling of "ever", it was so bad. Let's start with casting, shall we? The kid who played Eragon, Ed Speleers, is a nice enough boy trying to make it into Hollywood. Very blond, very Norwegian, very Aryan actually. Accent: British suburb, as in not RP but not Cockney. He made me think of a teenage Oliver Twist, actually.
His screen cousin looked like his twin, which I found odd, and the accents of both cousin and uncle are very nice Midwestern America. Strike one on casting.
John Malkovich plays the evil king/ex-dragon rider Galbatorix (whose name seems to have come from a bad game of Boggle) and he has the worst, most halting lines in the entire movie. Which is saying something, considering about half of Eragon's lines are facepalmers like, "It's an egg!" 20 seconds after the damn thing hatched. Poor John. I know stilted is his style, sort of, but here it just seems like he's forcing himself to say lines he KNOWS are awful, like swallowing a bad pill or something.
Jeremy Irons plays the ruffian hero guy, Brom. His lines were awful, too, but I love Jeremy Irons so much I was willing to put up with quite a bit. Plus I just love his voice. After his character's death, though, I gave up (apparently the movie did, too; it just got worse). So we have another slightly British accent to add to our melting pot.
The one that really annoyed me in terms of casting was one of the leaders of the Varden, King Hrothgar. Who is Scottish, and has an accordingly thick accent. Who was cast opposite Djimon Hounsou, who is as African as you can get. Yeah, THAT made sense.
So we have a cast that was thrown together to get names, not netting. Fine. But the movie itself was awful! The wide-pan traveling shots were total rip-offs of Lord of the Rings, the final battle was blatant Helm's Deep, the Castle O' Doom was remarkably Harry Potter-ish, and the dialogue was painful. Add to this the probable realization that the dialogue was terrible, because every five minutes Patrick Doyle (the Music Guy) has these melancholy-sounding string themes underscored by suitably heart-wrenching brass that try to make every minute an epic of itself. It was distracting, after a while, how often the soundtrack was telling me "you should feel intense emotion right now". And when they got to the battle scenes with the drums in the background? Oy.
Not to mention all the continuity goofs within the movie, like that fact that Sapphira's armor is completely different on display than it is on her. The face plate is actually cut in half. "Stupid female dragons, elves stay up all night making them armor and then they decide to wear something else." (The last is a quote from drklaugh, by the way.)
All in all, I say possibly one of the best scenes is when baby Sapphira eats a rat whole in the first 20 minutes of the film, which doesn't bode well at all. Save your money and go see something else, like "A Night at the Museum" or something, because this flick is a total rip-off of Lord of the Rings mixed with Pern dragonriders. Peter Buchman and Christopher Paolini, shame on you. Find some maturity and creativity to work with.
On that note, I'm sure Mother Dear is getting frustrated that I've been out here with my computer for quite some time, so off I go. I'll update you all on the final run of the show later, as well.
Merry Christmas Eve, folks, I'll try to post an actual merry Christmas tomorrow.