Epic (2013)

You may have noticed that I have kind of a blind spot when it comes to kids films.  Not having any kids, the appeal or desire to see some of these films just isn't there sometimes.  Epic is an example of why I tend to avoid them.  It's not that Epic is a bad film, but it's definitely a film geared towards a younger audience, and as far as the story, isn't anything you haven't seen before.

M.K. (Amanda Seyfried) moves in with her father, after the recent death of her mother.  Her father, Professor Bomba (Jason Sudeikis), is an eccentric scientist obsessed with finding evidence of tiny humans living in the forest.  They do a pretty good job of making M.K. unlikable, giving her no tolerance or compassion towards her father.  She just thinks he's weird and wants him to give it up.  She's so frustrated that after like a day, she bails on him.  I don't know where she was planning on going, being only 17, and walking out on her remaining parent.  Leave it to angsty teens to have a thought out plan, right?

Anyway, as M.K. is leaving, she chases their half-blind, three-legged dog (I'm not making that up) into the woods.  She finds the queen of the forest, Tara (Beyoncé Knowles), dying.  Tara gives her a pod that was part of a ritual to name her heir, and shrinks her down to their size.  Her dying request is that M.K. take this pod to someone to complete the ritual.  She joins up with Ronin (Colin Farrell), a commanding soldier; a snail and slug, Grub (Chris O'Dowd) and Mub (Aziz Ansari); and a rebellious soldier named Nod (Josh Hutcherson) to complete this task.  Their primary threat are the Boggans, a race of creatures that seek to destroy the forest.  They are led by the evil Mandrake (Christoph Waltz).

It's a standard adventure story from there.  People overcome their differences, characters grow up and learn lessons, etc.  It's all pretty predictable and familiar.  It's almost ironic to call this Epic, as it didn't feel too epic to me.  If anything I'd expect some indie film to use the title ironically.  Epic was based off the William Joyce book The Leaf Men and the Brave Good Bugs, but it was director Chris Wedge's goal to adapt the story to make it more of an action-adventure.  It looks like something got a little lost in the adaptation as the whole story felt thin to me.  There's not a lot of depth to the story or characters.  I'm sure having five (five?!) screenwriters didn't help either.

Again, I'm not saying Epic is a bad movie, or even has a that bad of a story.  I just never got invested in what was going on or found myself caring about any of the characters.  I spent more time keeping all the character's names straight in my head, and when I wasn't doing that, I was trying to figure out who the voices of all the main characters were.  For the record, I only guessed four right: Beyoncé, Aziz Ansari, Colin Farrell, and Christoph Waltz.

Most of the attempts at humor fell flat.  It seemed to be working for the kids though, and that's really all Epic can aim for, an average kids film.  I see this being something you can put on the TV, and it'll entertain your kids for 100 minutes, but I don't see them falling in love with it and watching it over and over.  It's just not that memorable.

I did enjoy the CG though.  The design of the world was very interesting and there were a lot of nice details with the characters and settings.  The animation was very fluid, with the exception of how they animated Professor Bomba.  He had a very jerky and unnatural way of moment that was too cartoonish and seemed too much of a contrast from everyone else.

Epic isn't a complete waste of time, but it's yet another middle of the road animated film that borrows heavily from many other films and themes.  Unlike some stronger animated films, it's gonna struggle to hold the attention of anyone over the age of 10.  It's a solid kid's film though and one you can feel confident with letting them watch unattended.  Epic is a rental.

2.5 (out of 5) Death Stars

Total Recall (2012) - Movie Review

Well, it's August already, so it's time to start dumping out the films that can't compete with the big boys of Summer.  I know that sounds a little harsh, but we're starting the month with a totally unnecessary remake of a film that many of you already own on DVD.  I guess you could say there are spoilers here, if you haven't seen the original.  Otherwise, nothing that happens in this new Total Recall is going to surprise you.  In fact they seem to reference the original movie constantly to the point where you're like, "Why don't I just watch the original instead?"

If you're totally unfamiliar with the story, Colin Farrell takes over for former Governator Arnold Schwarzenegger as Doug Quaid.  Quaid is a factory worker married to Lori (Kate Beckinsale), and has a very basic life.  However, he continues to have nightmares and can't shake the feeling that he's meant for something else.  He decides to go to Rekall, a place were you can get memories implanted to experience different things.  He chooses to have memories about being a spy, but before anything happens, a SWAT team bursts in and Quaid manages to kill them all.  He returns home to find Lori isn't actually his wife and reveals that he actually is a spy.  Then he goes on a series of chases, eventually joined by a resistance member (Jessica Biel), who tries to help him stop the evil Cohaagen (Bryan Cranston) and foil his plan.  Cohaagen's evil plan involves creating an army of the robots from I, Robot to take over.

Both this and the original were based on a Philip K. Dick short story "We Can Remember It for You Wholesale".  Initially, we were promised a more faithful adaptation to the original story, but what we got here was just a remake of the original film with a few slight changes.  Gone in this version are the references to Mars.  Instead we're introduced to a world ravaged by war, where there are only two habitable areas left on opposite sides of the planet.  To travel between the two, they've built a giant train that travels through the core of the Earth.  You can try and wrap your head around that one, but this is Summer film, so if I can buy in to the premise of a colony and travel to Mars, I guess I have to accept a giant elevator travelling through the planet.  Although, travelling to Mars seems like the more realistic scenario these days.

Unfortunately, I just don't have all that much to say about Total Recall.  I saw the same movie 20 years ago, and I still have a fondness for it.  It didn't need a remake.  Sure, the original was silly and it doesn't hold up great, but it had one crucial thing that was missing here: fun.  This remake is just too serious and dark.  Plus, it's missing all of the mind games I felt the original had, but maybe that's due to the fact that I'm too familiar with the story.

The cast is fine, but it seemed like everyone was just going through the motions, and I just wasn't all that interested in any of the characters.  There's never any suspense or a moment where you think that Quaid is in any real danger.  I think part of the problem is that in an action film like this, you need someone with the presence of Schwarzenegger.  It's not that Colin Farrell did a bad job, he's clearly a better actor, but I just didn't get the same feeling from the character that I needed to truly be invested in the story.  It's a shame they get people like Jessica Biel and Bryan Cranston to be in this and just don't give them that much to do.  I think Kate Beckinsale was probably the highlight for me, as she has most of the best scenes, but this shouldn't really be a surprise as she's married to the director.

Director, and Fremont native, Len Wiseman (nice shout out during the movie to my home town) did a decent job.  From his previous films like Underworld and Live Free or Die Hard, he seems to do well directing action and big action sequences, which are the best parts of the film.  He just didn't do enough with the story, and instead filled it with tons of action sequences, which to be honest, started to get kind of boring and repetitive as the movie wore on.  I felt like the movie lost steam about halfway through.

The effects were pretty good though and it's a nice looking film.  You can see where they spent most of this films budget.  However, there were some times, especially when they did wider shots of the city, where I thought some of the details looked really bad.  Like it needed just a little more polish.

I guess it's kind of ironic that a movie with recall in the title reminded me of so may other films.  You'll watch this and be reminded of stuff like I, Robot, Minority Report, Blade Runner, and even The Core.  They are all just mashed up together.

As a standalone action film, Total Recall isn't terrible, but if you've seen the original, there's nothing here that you haven't already seen before.  Watching it feels like playing a familiar video game, just with different graphics and skins.  It's a rental.

2.5 (out of 5) Death Stars