The Dark Knight Rises

                                             My Rating: 4/4

                      Seeing as the epic finale to Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy was my most anticipated movie of 2012, it is an understatement to say that I was very excited for "The Dark Knight Rises". I have always greatly admired the Batman series for its style, unique colors, and oddly poetic writing. The question then becomes " can Nolan continue his winning streak?". "Batman Begins" was an incredible new take on a superhero whose previous visits to the screen have not quite done him justice. "The Dark Knight" was a revolution, and not merely for the wondrous fleeting spectacles that make up most comic book films, but for film in general.Where then does the story have left to go when it appears that it has reached the summit?
                      "The Dark Knight Rises" starts off slow, gradually weaning the audience back into Nolan's universe after its four year excursion, or in the film's timeline, returning from Bruce Wayne's(Christian Bale) eight year excursion from the Batman. He has been in hiding for this period of time ever since the Harvey Dent incident at the end of the previous film. Bruce has become a hermit, living with a broken body in his dwindling riches, he has long hair, and walks around with a cane and bathrobe on. He has been able to live in luxury with his internal feelings of pain and loss knowing that Gotham has been at peace, and that he can give up his days of masked crime-fighting. However, a new terrorist leader who is known only by the name "Bane"(Tom Hardy), has different plans for Gotham, and threatens innocent lives. Bruce must then resurface with the cape and cowl, or as police commissioner Jim Gordon(Gary Oldman) pleads, "the Batman must come back."
                       Now I must admit that the first hour or so of the film was not quite as riveting as I hoped. However, the second and third acts completely pick up the pace and throw you into a mindset that the film has really been preparing you for all along. When applied to reality, these acts are the most frightening. One of the big concepts explored in the film is the scenario of terrorist rule.The picture is made even clearer in the mind of the viewer with the fact that Gotham resembles New York City, which of course is not surprising because the scenes that take place there were filmed in New York City, Pittsburgh, and Los Angeles. The terrorists intimidate the government out of saving Gotham with the threat of nuclear annihilation, and introduce a new government. Now I have no intention of spoiling anything, so therefore I cannot reveal in complete detail the context in which these are used, but the film includes lines like "this is everyone's house now" and "We are not here as conquerors, but as liberators, and we only want to give Gotham back to the people", that really drive the idea of terrorist government home.
                       The action sequences and visual effects are stunning, and all combine for a sensational climax during the last half-hour. Many of the familiar toys and gadgets that Batman has used before return, all though I can't help but feel empty at the absence of the Batmobile, which makes no appearances during the whole movie. However, the film makes up for this by introducing a new flying vehicle, "the Bat".
                       There are several new characters in the film, who all have surprising roles in the story, and create new situations. Every performance from the actors is fantastic, bringing the characters to life, but the performance that stands out is Tom Hardy as Bane. Out of all of the Batman villains Nolan has used in his trilogy, Bane is the most menacing, ever more so than the Joker. Bane is an incredibly brutal, hulking, and monstrous man. The fact that Bane wears a very unique mask, and it's horrifying enough that it could work if it was used in a horror film, adds to this effect. The mask covers his mouth, nose, and the middle of his face(between the eyes). Because of this, Tom Hardy essentially ends up playing the character entirely with his eyes, conveying a various array of expressions. It is hard to imagine how difficult it is to do such a thing, but Hardy gets the job done is a terrifying manner.
                         In the end, "The Dark Knight Rises" is a suspenseful, stunning, and visionary epic with a captivating story and massive amounts of action. It combines elements from both "Batman Begins" and "The Dark Knight", and ultimately gives a satisfying conclusion not only for all of the characters that have grown on us over the past seven years as well as the new characters just introduced to us, but for the Batman story as a whole. I am happy to say that the film is a great experience, and is the strongest pillar of Nolan's Batman trilogy.

The Amazing Spider-Man

                                            My Rating: 3.5/4


         As a big fan of Sam Raimi's original 2002 adaptation of Marvel's most classic character, I had my doubts about any new film in franchise that wasn't called "Spider-Man 4". But, as time went on, I gradually began to like the idea of a new start for Peter Parker's story, and now that it's here, I'm glad to say I was not disappointed.  For his very first big-budget film and second film ever, director Marc Webb (I'm also surprised no one has been cracking Spider-Man jokes about his last name) certainly delivers the material well.
        One of the tremendous challenges facing a Spidey reboot is the fact that it has been released a mere ten years after the first installment of the last series. Because of this, the writers has to add a new twist to the origin story so it doesn't simply become a rehash of what we have already seen. The challenge within that challenge is making sure that this twist isn't so odd that it doesn't not belong in Spider-Man's world.
         This new twist is that Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield) has become the first successful subject of what the film calls "cross-species genetics". This is the concept of taking certain genes from the animal kingdom and merging them with human DNA, which in this case is of course genes from Arachnids. The concept was apparently explored by Peter's father, who disappeared when he was young. Another scientist who also worked with his father on the project is an amputee named Dr. Curt Connors (Rhys Ifans) who later becomes a very unsuccessful subject of cross-species genetics. Serving as both a mentor and an enemy to Peter, Connors holds the key to him unraveling the mystery not only behind the disappearance of his parents, but also behind his very identity as Spider-Man.
         The nature behind Andrew Garfield's version of Peter Parker is the sense that he is a lost soul desperately attempting to find himself. This makes the story's struggle not only a physical struggle, but an emotional one.He must learn the classic lesson of "with great power comes great responsibility." This emotional struggle is made very believable with great performances from every actor. Garfield brings a deeper, more thoughtful take on Peter Parker while Emma Stone, Dennis Leary, and Rhys Ifans  bring new characters to life that we haven't seen before.
        The visual effects are very fun to look at, and the action scenes are much more grounded in style and choreographed in a way that is easy to process. Mindless violence is non-existent in the story, and when there is violence it is for a very specific reason, especially the action scenes that take place long before the hero dawns the tights.
        Overall, "The Amazing Spider-Man" triumphs over the 2002 original. I am happy to be as blown away walking out of the theater from this film as I was walking out of the original film. The performances are great, the plot, despite a few loose ends, goes where it needs to go, and it brings a new interpretation of Spider-Man's story to the screen in spectacular fashion.

The Dictator

                                    My Rating: 2/4

                  Sacha Baron Cohen has been one of the central (and controversial) comedic figures in the entertainment industry since the 2006 release of his film "Borat". The movie was a huge success, and the funniest movie I have ever seen. Three years later, in 2009, Cohen released his next film "Bruno", which was not received as well, but was still an intelligent comedy. Both of these films were shot as mockumentaries, as well as his television show "Da Ali G Show". Now, three years after the release of "Bruno", comes "The Dictator". This film is Sasha Baron Cohen's first time co-writing and starring in something that is not a mockumentary.  "The Dictator" is a fresh new type of story for Cohen to tell, and fortunately, it retains the same controversial ethnic humor and razor-sharp political satire. The latter is definitely the movie's strongest asset.
                  The story centers around Cohen's fourth character, General Aladeen, who is the dictator of a fictional North-African nation of Wadiya. He is the epitome of the oppressive, cruel, violent, insensitive tyrant that we all imagine when we hear the word "dictator". However, Aladeen is also a very lonely and clueless soul who is thrown into a situation of betrayal in New York City that forces him to go on a personal quest to discover the world outside of his own country that has been completely shut off from the rest of the world, and is on the verge of destruction.
                There is good material here, but I would have to say this is one of the few times Cohen has not delivered things very well. The whole point (or seemingly the whole point) of each of his movies is to bring forth some revelation about the United States. Borat showed us that America harbors a lot of stupid people, Bruno showed us that America harbors a lot of hateful people, and the Dictator shows us the America harbors many elements of a dictatorship. The revelation here is not the problem, it is the build up.
                 "The Dictator" is full of many weak spots the ultimately bring it down. There is obviously a lot of ethnic humor in this film, and I don't care about racial comments in movies as long as they are funny, and Cohen has a history of doing a good job with that sort of thing. However, this movie contains many jokes that simply exist. They are not there to move the story forward nor are the even really that funny. It seems like they are there simply to serve the purpose of being vulgar.
                  There are also a lot of celebrities in the movie, and like many other things in the movie, most of them don't need to be there. John C. Reilly is in the movie for about ten minutes, Megan Fox is in it for about five minutes, SNL's Nasim Pedrad is in it for about two minutes, and Edward Norton is in the movie for about twenty seconds. The only big actors other than Cohen that have necessary roles are Ben Kingsley and Anna Faris, and even their characters were not interesting in the slightest sense.
                  In the end, "The Dictator" fails. It fails to be funny, or at least it failed to be funny to me. I only laughed one or two times, but to see the big picture as funny would probably require a complete suspension of one's maturity. Also, in some ways, the movie fails to be intelligent. The jokes are tasteless and unimpressive, and won't reach a wide range of audiences. I appreciate Cohen's humor, and I'm glad he took the opportunity to venture out of his comfort zone and into a different type of movie. However, with this three-year pattern of his big releases, I hope that in 2015 he goes back to his roots and releases another mockumentary. This round was certainly a disappointment for me, because it was a film I desperately wanted to like and didn't.

The Avengers

                                      My Rating: 3.5/4

      With "The Avengers", Joss Whedon has brought a well-told, witty, and visually stunning story to the big screen. With a lot to dig out of Marvel's comic book lore, the story is put together in a way that will satisfy the members of the audience, regardless of their reasons for attending a screening. When I was at the theater to see this, there was a sea of both people who seemed to know everything about Marvel and people who seemed to know very little about Marvel, and one thing the movie really has going for it is that you don't have to be either to enjoy it.
       The "Avengers" are a group of superheroes from the marvel universe who work together against whatever threat is greatest. Originally, the Avengers had more members and there were constant changes in the roster, however, Marvel luckily decided to stick to its main icons for the sake of the film. The team in the movie consists mainly of Iron Man(Robert Downey Jr.), Captain America(Chris Evans), Hulk(Mark Ruffalo), and Thor(Chris Hemsworth), with its "lesser" members being Hawkeye(Jeremy Renner) and Black Widow(Scarlett Johansson). The Story picks up after the events left off by the respective movies of the four main Avengers. Thor's evil brother, Loki(Tom Hiddleston), has joined with a mysterious race of aliens, robots, or whatever you'd like to call them. It's not really explained what they are, it is only mentioned that they are from another dimension and they are called the "Chitauri". Loki is leading his army of Chitauri to Earth to retrieve powerful cube-shaped object called the Tesseract, which also made an appearance in "The First Avenger: Captain America". In order to defend the Earth from Loki's invasion, Nick Fury(Samuel L. Jackson) and the secret government organization "S.H.I.E.L.D." begin a recruitment effort to bring together a team that can save the planet.
        Now one key concern I, as well as many other people, had about the film was that the screenplay would not give each Avenger the spotlight, and that some may seem less important than the others. In writing the script, I am sure that that was one of Whedon's main challenges. However, somehow each Avenger is given their own time to shine, and none of the Avengers seem to be more important than the others. This achievement ends up being more important than it seems, because with a balance between the characters, it adds another element to the storytelling where each character's own individual story is made known, while at the same time it shows how those stories converge into this story.
       With all of these great heroes, such a story requires a good villain. Tom Hiddleston's performance as Loki has been very underrated since the film's release. His portrayal of Loki really gives you a sense that his character is vengeful, violent, powerful, greedy, and a worthy opponent to the Avengers. The witty combination of argument and banter between the characters is very amusing, with the best being between Loki and the other characters.
        Although the film brings all of these amazing elements together, my favorite thing about "The Avengers" is that it is an engaging story the entire way through. The dialogue always furthers the story, the dynamic between the characters never ceases to flip and twist in ways you would not have suspected, and surprisingly, the movie is very funny. I have been to comedies at the theater where people did not laugh as hard as they did at this movie. I was laughing too, because somehow the film seems to have outdone many comedies. The reaction of the audience did not lie, people were cheering, applauding, laughing, and really enjoying themselves. "The Avengers" reminded me why we go to movies in the first place.

The Hunger Games

My Rating: 3/4

What appears to be a group consisting every teenager who reads and then some has been raiding the theaters in eager excitement for "The Hunger Games". Based on the first book of the best-selling "Hunger Games" trilogy which was written by Suzanne Collins, the story takes place in post-apocalyptic North America which has been divided into twelve districts and a Capitol. The Capitol rules the districts, and as punishment for a rebellion that the districts fought against the Capitol 74 years earlier, Each district must annually select at random one male and one female "tribute" between the ages of twelve and eighteen to compete in an arena where they must fight to the death. This televised event is known as the Hunger Games.
When the story begins, we meet the main protagonist: a sixteen-year-old girl from district twelve named Katniss Everdeen. On the "day of reaping", on which the tributes are selected, Primrose Everdeen, the twelve-year-old little sister of Katniss, is chosen as the female tribute. Not wanting her sister to die, Katniss volunteers in her sister's place, and must fight for her life in the arena.
Right off the bat, "The Hunger Games" has something many stories lack: originality. It brings a new dimension to science fiction in which has a much darker yet more realistic take on the future. The beauty is that the story uses this make a seemingly preposterous idea into a story that grabs the audience's interest.
In preparation for seeing the film, I decided to read the book. I was glad I did, because it turns out that all of the hype centered around "The Hunger Games" was not a false promise. I found that it is a unique story with characters that you come to really care about. I instantly became a part of the giant fan base the series has, and as a big fan of the books, I held high expectations for the movie.
To my relief, I was not disappointed.
Director Gary Ross has brought not only his vision to the screen but he has also brought the author's vision as well. He does a great job of articulating the many different elements and tones of the book, and making sure that the characters are believable and that the audience becomes attached to them whether they have read the books or not. The characters have been perfectly cast, and when I say "perfectly", I literally mean the choices could not have been better. Each cast member portrays their respective characters exactly as they are portrayed in the books. Some of the performances that really stood out were Elizabeth Banks as Effie Trinket, Stanley Tucci as Caesar Flickerman, and the oddly moving presence of Jennifer Lawrence as Katniss Everdeen.
Another smart move the production team made was having Suzanne Collins help write the script. No one would have a better vision for a book on screen than the author herself. While a few details are left out, the film is extremely close to the book, which is really the job of a novel adaptation.
Just as the books does, the movie keeps you on the edge of your seat, and does a beautiful job of incorporating story, action, and character development so that they all work in harmony for the duration of the film.
In the end, "The Hunger Games" reveals itself not only as a movie, but as an experience. An experience that interests an audience that isn't really gender specific or too age specific, even if it may seem that way.
The next installment, "Catching Fire", is slated for release in November 2013. I have high expectations for the next film, in hopes that the production team will continue to capture the essence of the amazing story to be told and bring it to life on screen, just as they have this first of three, and possibly four, rounds.

Transformers: Dark of the Moon

My Rating: 2.5/4

I believe Micheal Bay has dished out his best attempt at making the Transformers trilogy, and in my opinion, he has not done a bad job. He made a surprisingly good first installment, the second installment got a negative fan reaction, and now Bay must take his only shot at redemption, Transformers: Dark of the Moon. In the film, Bay does many of the same things he has done right in past movies, but has lost many things that are part of the "essence" of the franchise. The plot centers around the first Apollo mission to the moon, where Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong discover a crashed Autobot spaceship, and the United States has been covering it up for the last forty years. Now, Decepticon forces are coming after a device invented by an Autobot that allows them to teleport, and Deceptions want to use it to take over the galaxy. Now, sounds like a good Transformers plot, it puts good v.s. evil, and opens many doors the clanking of robots punching each other. The writers captured that epic feel needed for large action movies, and before the film was released they stated they wanted a much darker movie this time around, and they succeeded at this. But they may have gone so dark that they have lost the playful light-hearted feel from the first film, which was a main factor in making it the most liked movie of the three for the majority of its viewers. The plot was the weakest link in "Revenge of the Fallen", and I'm afraid it has transferred over to "Dark of the Moon". Each film has centered the plot around some type of conspiracy, each putting more of an emphasis on it than the last, the first being the Hoover Dam hiding a powerful alien artifact, the second being the Pyramids hiding a powerful alien artifact, and now the government hiding the existence of an alien artifact on the moon. Transformers is supposed to be fun. The story telling of "Dark of the Moon" has become so saturated in government cover-ups that it looses a lot of the exciting and fun elements. A good script usually will make up for a bad plot, but unfortunately, "Dark of the Moon" has its share of fails in this area as well. I was especially bothered by this in the opening minutes, when we are introduced to Sam Witwicky's(Shia Lebouf) new girlfriend, Carly(Rosie-Huntington Whitley) explaining how they met, and the entire sequence is very cheesy and rushed. It moves way too fast, and just seems awkward in how the script was handled. The problem is not the actors, who are very good actors, but the problem is what they have the actors do. Some characters feel uninteresting and the audience is not really inclined to care about these characters because the writers have not deeply shown their signifigance. I do not know if there will be a Tranformers 4, but if there is, my input to them is to not put all of their focus into special effects. The effects are amazing, and one of the few things in "Dark of the Moon" I have nothing to complain about. Spend more time coming up with ideas and making the script engaging and design it to give the audience the reaction you want. There is but ONE scene in the entire film where they really capture this. There is a scene in the final face-off when Bumblebee, one of the main Autobots, is about to be executed by Decepticons, and I could honestly feel the suspense and tension of the audience rising, and when(spoiler alert!) he is saved, people started clapping. This is what those scenes should feel like all the time. Most movies are meant to give the audience a very engaging and entertaining experience, which is captured here, and the entire movie should give the mood you want it too, not just one scene. I understand a lot of time needs to be invested into the animations and special effects of the film. But if it takes a lot of time to do both the special effects and write a great script, then take your time. You will be more successful in taking a long time to make a great film than if you take an average or short amount of time to cram in a mediocre film. If you are looking for something that's not super special, and will provide you with two hours to just be entertained, then I recommend you watch "Transformers: Dark of the Moon".

Kung Fu Panda 2

My Rating: 3.5/4

After three years, Dreamworks, has released the sequel to the very popular 2008 film. It's got the same cast, consisting mainly of Jack Black, Angelina Jolie, Lucy Liu, Jackie Chan, Seth Rogen, David Cross, and Dustin Hoffman.
Fortunately, however, Kung Fu Panda 2 does NOT have the same story. Today, we see many sequels fall prey to the mistake of making the sequel follow the same plot line as it's predecessor. But for this movie, instead of just being another shallow repeat, it's rather a continuation of a grand plot line spanning the series. Or as described in the film by Master Shifu(Dustin Hoffman), "the next phase of Po's Journey". So what is this "next phase"?
Well, the movie picks up right where the original left off. (If you haven't seen the first one, stop reading) Po is now the Dragon Warrior, leading the Furious Five against evil. Now, a fierce enemy comes once again. A "Peacock Lord" named "Shen", who is coming to invade the kingdom his parents banished him from. With bladed feathers and an army of wolves at his command, he is very dangerous.
What I like is that instead of leaving the story off right there, I won't say too much, but in this film you will learn many revelations about Po, mainly centered around his parentage and origins. Things like who his parents are(which is good because I'd hate for all the small children watching this movie to be under the illusion that Ducks give birth to Pandas), where Po was born, and how he ended up at his adoptive father's house.
With this great plot line and script, the foundations are already laid, and the last frontier is pulling off the CGI animation. Which, is very impressive. The first battle sequence in the movie was very well animated and choreographed. When this is done, it is actually very fun to watch these scenes.
With a star-studded cast, I don't need to say much about the acting.
Overall, the movie is done very well, and evades many of the common mistakes in sequel plot lines, and if you liked the first one, I strongly recommend the sequel. I think Dreamworks has achieved a great success, and should put a lot more energy in this series because it may be their next "Shrek".