Film Review- Inception

It's odd when a movie like Christopher Nolan's Inception is released in the middle of summer. Summertime for the movie industry usually means the time when Hollywood rolls out big, expensive blockbusters ranging from the critically acclaimed franchises such as The Dark Knight and Toy Story 3 to the insanely expensive and stupidly annoying action films such as anything by Michael Bay. Inception is the odd film out because its not based on any franchise nor does the plot take a backseat to random crap blowing every nine-and-a-half minutes. Inception is a big-budget sci-fi film with excellent visuals and an extremely superb story that one might expect that this film was adapted from best-selling novel, only-surprise,surprise- it's not.

The main plot centers around Dom Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio), an "extractor", who's job is to enter people's dreams and steal thoughts, ideas and information from them. Cobb's abilities have cost him life as both a family man and an American citizen, but he sees a chance to return to his old life after one last heist with his team of specialists. That one last heist will be harder then any other heist however, since it will involve planting an idea, through a process called "inception", rather than extracting and thus we have our title for the film. So basically, it's like combining the old cliche "one last heist" film with Psychonauts, only less cartoony and more Christopher Nolan-y.

The writing of the film is exceptional. It takes that whole "one last heist" cliche I mentioned in the last paragraph and creates a unique concept and premise about it. At the beginning of the movie, we almost know nothing about the world yet the movie explains the rules of "extraction" and the whole laws of dreams and subconcious without going into a tiresome and lengthy exposition scene. The main story is also well-told. It has great pacing, giving us a little information at a time. It unveils Cobb's past while seamlessly blending that story along with main heist plot.

The visuals are something else to be commented on. They are what makes the dreams look like actual dreams. Effects from simulating almost zero gravity to turning the dream-worlds into something out of M.C. Escher's brain really serve to show off the special effects and make them serve a purpose to the plot at the same time. A thing that a few other directors should learn how to do.

Overall, Inception could be one of the best films of the year next to Toy Story 3 in my opinion. It serves it's purpose as a big-budget sci-fi film while still having an air of sophistication about that even the most stuck-up of film critics go for. It's well-written, has stunning, dream-like visuals (obviously), excellent acting by DiCaprio and others of the cast and a unique premise. I think there is a flaw or two in this film, but wherever it is, I sure can't find it. This film is a much needed breath of fresh air from the glut of sequels, remakes and adaptations that spill out of Hollywood these days. It's original, it's fresh and since Christopher Nolan spent a good decade writing and perfecting the script for this film, it is a devotion to creativity and the art of film-making and story-telling. This film must be seen by all who enjoy a good movie that can tell a spectacular story. It does not disappoint. Not at all.

Film Review- Iron Man 2

Just got back from the film Iron Man 2 and here is what I have to say about it. I thought that the movie overall was really good and was pretty good start to the 2010 summer blockbuster season. It had great acting, epic action sequences that kept you on the edge of your seat and compelling characters. It’s not without its flaws, however.

For one thing, there are a lot more jokes in this movie than there were in the first Iron Man movie. That’s not a bad thing, in fact, a good chunk of those jokes were pretty funny and had some good comic timing. Plus, those jokes really did serve purpose as reliving the tensions of the action scenes like proper comic relief moments. The problem is that those jokes tended to distract from the main storyline. There were some parts where I was laughing at a joke one character said, but then felt like I missed an important plot point that was briefly mentioned shortly after said joke. It’s a little frustrating when the price of chuckling at Tony Stark totally smashed in his Iron Man armor is having to try to keep up with what was just said seconds later that was essential to the plot. Speaking of which, another gripe I had with this movie is that while the acting is good, most of the actors say there lines way too fast. Especially in the first half of the film, the actors sound like there on fast-forward. I guess this is supposed to imitate how quickly and efficiently business people must relay info between one another, but the audience might feel like they missed a few plot details in all those sentences without pauses. Then again, this may be just a nitpick, so whatever.

Also, this movie seems to expect that you know most of the Marvel mythology because there are Marvel superheroes that aren’t explicitly named. Scarlett Johansson’s character, Natasha Romanoff, is never referred by her comic name of Black Widow. Also, Lt. James Rhodes doesn’t get his name War Machine in this film. It’s just implied in the fight scene between him and Tony Stark. Then again, this is also another nitpick.

Here are some of the positives that I really liked about this movie. For one thing, Robert Downy Jr. is still a convincing Tony Stark. Even though Stark is still more of an eccentric and narcissistic billionaire in this one, Downey still shows us that Stark is well aware of the responsibilities of being a hero and tries to deal with the consequences that come with being a superhero with publicity. Also, I loved the direction they took introducing the antagonist Ivan Vanko. In the intro, they offer some subtle hints of who he might be and what sort of grudge he has against Stark, but it still kept shrouded in mystery. He rarely speaks and the movie pretty much just shows him preparing for his plans which keeps the audience guessing of what direction he’s going to go in. It’s a great example of showing and not telling. Not only that, but Mickey Rourke really does make a convincing Russian especially with the accent. True, he does sound like he’s mumbling most of the time, but that sort of fits Ivan Vanko’s character. Actions speak louder than words.

The action scenes are stunning. They are quickly paced and have great suspense in them. You can almost feel the tension and fear the heroes are going through as they fight off enemies while trying to avoid civilian casualties. There are times where the cinematographers employ the “shaky-cam” technique, but those moments are few and far between and only last a few seconds.

So, that’s Iron Man 2. It’s a great super-hero movie, though not as good as the first, but well worth breaking out the cash for.

Animation Vault- Flint the Time Detective

It's strange, really. Not the fact that I keep updating this blog that has little to no known readers, but the fact that seems to be very little anime on American television nowadays. Now I know anime is still in a bit of a niche genre, but roughly ten years ago anime was fairly common among children's television circuit. Most well known is the Toonami block, but there was also Kid's WB with Pokemon and Fox Kids with Digimon (yeah the mon genre was REALLY big back in the day). Anyway, Fox Kids basically relied on Digimon to bring in viewers and to compete with Pokemon. While Digimon did have a pretty good following and decent ratings, it still wasn't enough to compete with the powerhouse that was Pokemon. So Fox Kids decided "Hey since Pokemon is from Japan, why don't we get more cartoons form Japan." Thus, they imported anime all the way from Japan to be dubbed by the Saban company and anime was the majority of there programing with shows like Monster Rancher, Escaflowne and Dinozaurs. Judging from those titles, they were mostly of the action variety, but there was one imported anime that had more of a comedic Saturday morning cartoon bent to it. This is Flint the Time Detective.

It seems like the series got lost among the seas of Pokemon, Digimon and later Yu-Gi-Oh at the turn of the millennium. However, if you ever watched any of those shows and really had that thirst for anime as kid, chances are you've seen this show. Produced by Sanrio (yes the same Sanrio that created Hello Kitty), Flint was shonen series about a cave boy named Flint that was fossilized along with his father and revived in a futuristic Japan by a pre-teen brother/sister duo and there scientist uncle. Flint is then recruited to become a Time Detective (don't ask me how, it was only briefly touched upon in the first episode). What follows is Flint, his father who was turned into sledgehammer during the fossilization process and the twins who are there just to be Penny and Brain to Flint's Inspector Gadget. However, Flint isn't completely ineffectual despite his naivety. He basically can foil the bad guys' plans single-handedly as well as win over the Time-Shifters with his Goku level of niceness.

Oh I forgot to mention about the Time-Shifters. Time-Shifters are these Sarino-esq beings that flow in and out of the timeline of history and have various powers such as turning anything into gold, controlling weather and bringing artwork to life. Also, they can transform into two different forms depending on whose controlling them . A Con-form (which is basically an Eldritch nightmare) if they are controlled by evil or a Master form (which is basically humanoid superhero form with some exceptions) if controlled by good. These Time-Shifters are usually found in the hands of historical figures, such as the Wright Brothers, Leonardo da Vinci and even Bruce Lee. This is what made the show stand out from other animes released at the time. Most animes were toy-centric and used for pushing products, Flint had a bit of an educational tone to it mixed with the comedy and action. The show explained a little bit about the setting and the historical figures they meet without deviating from the plot too much. Also, since this was a Japanese anime, at least half of the places they visited was in Feudal or Edo-era Japan or even earlier. So I basically was learning stuff I wasn't event taught in high-school.

But if you ask me what the most memorable aspect of this cartoon is, that would the English theme song. A fast, jungle like pace and cavemen chanting that will be stuck in your head for days along with visual exposition of the plot for new viewers, all those lead to an ear worm of theme song. Just listen:

All in all, Flint was pretty much a standard Saturday morning cartoon. It didn't spawn a huge following like Pokemon and was cheesy in some places, but it still told great stories, had good humour at times and it also helped me get into to anime a bit more as well. Even though it may be lost among the more critically acclaimed or more marketable animes of today and yesterday, Flint did have unique premise for anime. How many anime series do you know that have a Dr. Who-like plot that is aimed at kid's? Maybe there could be more time-travel anime series as well. Until then, all we have is a cave kid with his talking sledge-hammer traversing the timeline and righting all of the wrongs.

Animation Vault-A Kitty Bobo Show

Around the first full week of April, Cartoon Network will be premiering their new series Adventure Time With Finn and Jake and from what I've seen from the sneak previews, it could be cartoon that helps bring Cartoon Network out of there slump ever since that whole CN Real debacle. Well for those of you who don't know or don't frequent YouTube, Adventure Time started out as a six minute short meant for a Nickelodeon animated variety show that never came into fruition. In fact, a lot of animated series in general start of as shorts. However, Cartoon Network's cartoons always seemed to originate in the forms of shorts. The What-a-Cartoon Show, a Cartoon Network animated variety show in the 90s, gave birth to shows like Dexter's Laboratory, Powerpuff Girls and Courage the Cowardly Dog as well as other Cartoon Cartoons that aired on the network during the late 90s-early 00s. A couple of other Cartoon Network series got green-lit thanks to shorts, but today I will be talking about a short that didn't quite make it. Today’s subject: A Kitty Bobo Show.

Before I get into the short itself, let me go into how the short appeared on Cartoon Network. Back in 2000, the What-a-Cartoon Show had been off the air for awhile so Cartoon Network decided to organize a summer event where they would show cartoon shorts and the viewers would get to vote online for which short would get made into a cartoon series. This was known as the Big Pick and the Big Pick helped introduce to the world The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy series as well as the short-lived Sheep in the Big City and the EXTREMELY short-lived Whatever Happened to Robot Jones?. So that event was so successful in getting ratings, they did it again in 2001 with the Big Pick 2. The event kicked off on August 24 with the premier of last year's winner Billy and Mandy (then known as Grim and Evil) and continued showing the pilots they premiered over the summer along with episodes of Courage the Cowardly Dog, Ed, Edd n Eddy and such.

One of these cartoon pilots that premiered during the summer was A Kitty Bobo Show, created by Kevin Kaliher. The pilot can be viewed here:


For those of you who do not have the time or desire to watch the above pilot, here's a brief summary. The short centers around Kitty Bobo, a teenage cat who has just gotten his own cell phone and is pretty much annoying his friends to call him on it just so he can appear cool. In the end, he ends up breaking it in a freak accident (i.e. texting while biking) and irony ensues when his friends get their own cell phones and he's left without one.

Looking back on this show that never was, it’s kind of disappointing that never did grace the airwaves. For one thing, I found the art style to be amazing and (dare I say) unique for its time. It sort of had a combination of traditional, Flash and cut-out animation. It really did fit in with the whole urban setting the show took place in. In fact, according to a promotional poster for the show, the animators would have the characters were different outfits (subverting the whole limited wardrobe trope). Another thing I liked about this show was the characters. The main characters had the personalities of people you hang out with: the wannabe, the laid-back voice of reason, and the stoic guy who rarely speaks ect.

Now it does have some drawbacks. For one thing, some of the writing is pretty dated since it came out less than a decade ago. Some of Kitty Bobo's slang can be particularly grating, but it can be justified because, believe it or not, words like "homies" and "honeys" were once cool. That, or it could just exemplify how desperate Kitty Bobo is to be cool.

I do kind of wish this show got on to Cartoon Network. A Kitty Bobo Show actually got second place in the Big Pick 2, running up to Codename: Kids Next Door. In fact, from what I've heard, a lot of the animators in CN Studios at the time saw real potential in the show and it got a positive response on most animation forums. So if it was a fan and professional favorite, why didn't it become a series?

In fact, around 2006-2007, Kevin Kaliher posted on his blog that he had plans to revive A Kitty Bobo Show. He sort of filled in the gaps in the pilot like why Kitty Bobo's parents were dogs and such. Sadly, according to his blog, Nickelodeon, Disney Channel and Cartoon Network didn't accept his pitches so A Kitty Bobo Show was shelved once again, this time maybe permanently. So only time will tell if Kaliher decides to try again a third time to get this show of the ground.

So that's A Kitty Bobo Show, a short that had great potential, but never got the chance. On the other hand, who knows? Maybe during the Cartoon Network Upfront on April 21, it may be surprise series. Though even I, a fairly wide-eyed idealist, know that there are better chances of Jimi Hendrix descending from Heaven on a cyborg unicorn than that happening, an animation fan can dream can't he?

No Essay Tonight

Hey guys,

I'm not posting an Animation Vault up tonight because I had just gotten back from a weekend at Momocon and I am bushed. Even if I did have the energy tonight, writer's block has set in so, I'm not motivated to write an essay anyway. I'll try to post a big one next week. Until then, chill.

-H.R Hancock

Animation Vault- The Secret of Kells

In the spirit of St. Patrick's Day around the corner, what better way to pay tribute to this holiday dedicated to Ireland and alcholism than to talk about an Irish animated feature. Lads an' lasses, I give yee The Secret of Kells.

Now this is an extremely recent film that came out around this time last year and from what I can gather from it, this film was a HUGE critical darling in its home country. However, I consider this film obscure on the grounds I didn't even hear of such film until last weeks Oscars where it was nominated for Best Animated Feature. In fact, it was the only nominated film I didn't see in the theatres. So, I did some research on this film and it is easy to see why this film got nominated.

First off, the animation is STUNNING!!! It reminds me of the game Okami in terms of design. The animation of the film looks as if it is made from paintings or ancient scroll designs. Its almost unlike anything I have ever seen in a film. Possibly because this film was done by the same people who did the cartoon series Skunk Fu! which uses similar animation stylings.

The story of the film basically involves a young monk named Brendan who wants to help the other monks illuminating texts. However, his overprotective uncle forbids him to go outside the abbey due to an impending viking attack and that he should focus on helping fortify the abbey. Brendan then finds a teacher in the visiting Brother Aiden, who allows him to go outside the abbey walls in order to go get ink for the texts. Outside the abbey walls, Brenden discovers a forest filled with wonder and danger as well as Aisling, a cute little fairy who has been guarding the forest for centuries. Basically, the film is about Brendan conquring his fears and achieving his dream of finishing the legendary Book of Kells with the help of Aisling.

So does our stallwort hero achieve his dream? I dunno, I haven't seen the whole movie yet. All I've seen our clips and trailers of the film on Youtube and I don't know where I can get the DVD. However, if reading this blog entry piqued your intrest in this film, go check out the trailer on Youtube.

So in closing, have happy, safe St. Patricks Day all and don't forget to wear green.

On the Subject of Tonight's Academy Awards

It's that time of the year again and I am not talking about the time year where people grow fangs and howl at the moon. I am talking about Oscar Night, my personal Super Bowl. Being the film buff that I am, I shall forgo this week's Animation Vault and focus on the only award show that I actually care about.

Tonight, ten pictures have been nominated for the coveted Best Picture Award and I'm going to give my two cents on which film I think should win. However, since I only caught three of the ten nominations this year, I'm only going to give my analysis on those three. Okay? Okay.

First on the agenda is Avatar. Now, before anyone says anything, I LOVED this movie. Yeah, some of the dialogue was awkward and the story was pretty archetypical, but I really felt I got my $14 worth when I saw that film. It was possibly one of the best movie expiereinces I have ever had in my entire life. However, the question I must ask is "Does this film deserve Best Picture"? The answer: No.

Oh sure, I loved the movie, but it does not deserve the award because its a pretty flawed film. Also, Avatar winning the award might garner even more negative hype than has been recieving. It just got the highest grossing film rate of all time; do you think that's enough of a reward?

Second, Inglourious Basterds. I have to be frank, this is my first Tarentino film I've seen all the way through, but it does make me intrested in seeing his other works. The film has great writing, excellent action sequences and Tarentino knows how to hold a lot of tension in a scene. However, the film does tend to drag in a few places since it can be heavy on both the dialogue and the tension and there was a point where I was just begging for something to happen because of it. So does this flick deseve the award? Survey says: Possibly yes.

On one hand, this is really well-made film. It combines funny and dramatic dialogue with violent and extreme action sequnces and melds them seemlessly. It really does seem well deserving due to great direction and acting. I do have some issues against the film, but all those reasons would be nitpicking.

Finally ther is the film Up. This has to be Pixars greatest film. It had humor, emotion and thrills. It put those elements together perfectly and its also the movie I would have to say deserves the award.

While my reasoning may be biased due to the fact that I'm such an animation junkie, I stand by my position. If this movie wins the awarad for Best Picture, it might be the step that the whole animation genre needs for people to start taking animation seriously as a genre again. To show that not all animation movies are pop culture cracks and toilet jokes (we've got children's sitcoms for that). For Up to win the awarad would surely be not only a milestone for animation, but film as well.

Then again, these are my opinions and I'm only going by the films I have seen. So, dear reader, you shouldn't take what I just said at face value and make your own judgement on who should win this glourious award for the film medium. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have an award show to catch.