Summer Recap in Winter Transission

I just finished my last summer film which was just released last week in Italy, Guardians of the Galaxy. Now I am competent enough to make a summer recap post. To be honest, this summer the films are quite tame. We didn't have anything that's incredibly badass like last year's Pacific Rim. When the top-grossing movie of the summer is a film with a raccoon and a talking tree, clearly something's wrong with Hollywood's blockbusters (or its audience).

Top 3 Films
1. Dawn of the Planet of the Apes
This sequel is grand and brave. Parts of the films were communicated in ape language. The story is engaging, emotional and amazing. Apes franchise could easily be so laughable but they kept on elevating the level of this film. Jason Clarke was a great successor to James Franco, but the star is motion capture master Andy Serkis who, with Weta, created the superb Caesar. Toby Kebbell's Koba is equally awesome as well. Matt Reeves also prove himself to be worthy to take care of this franchise after Rupert Wyatt.




2. Guardians of the Galaxy
Guardians isn't necessarily a breakthrough film, but it's more like a perfect throwback to the age before gritty summer blockbuster films ala Christopher Nolan. Its fun atmosphere, expansion of Marvel Cinematic Universe and exceptionally well-cast actors definitely helped Guardians of the Galaxy to be immensely watchable. Don't forget the super funny script with amazingly quotable lines. Guardians work because its bravery to take C-list comic material and lifted into A-list. But I wouldn't be too confident to launch another quirky material like this (winking at Inhumans). Lightning doesn't strike the same place twice, otherwise it's War of the Worlds.


3. TIE Edge of Tomorrow & How to Train Your Dragon 2
Edge of Tomorrow (or now titled Live.Die.Repeat) was one of the smartest action sci-fi films ever put on film. With Tom Cruise at his sci-fi best and Emily Blunt being unbelievably badass, it has everything you want in a summer film: action, humor, explosions, famous actors, director with a cred. While How to Train Your Dragon 2 is just beautiful. It's not simply a cash grab film because the first one was immensely popular, it's amazing. The animation has never been better. The voice work is great (Dude Cate Blanchett's in it!). The story greatly expands the world that's established in the first one. It's an amazing work although the film's not as good as the original.

Honorable mentions:
- A sequel to the prequel which actually is a sequel to the original trilogy, X-Men: Days of Future Past which Avenger-ized the X-Men franchise by combining original trilogy actors with prequel actors and eventually erasing the original trilogy timeline and Brett Ratner's contribution.
- The hyper-funny and meta 22 Jump Street. Being a good sequel which base is the relationship between Channing and Jonah while also making fun of themselves, literally.

Most Surprising Film
Lucy
Lucy is Bad Boys meets Transporter meets Limitless meets The Tree of Life. It is a super high concept sci-fi action film starring Scarlett Johansson and Morgan Freeman. It's about a human who's able to access the maximum cerebral capacity after being to a drug. Lucy is a very unconventional Hollywood film. It's surprising for me because it has a great premise and in the middle it sometimes became laughable and finally the ending mind-fucked you. It's fun to see Scarlett Johansson kick ass though.

Honorable mention:
The incredible improvement that is The Purge Anarchy, which is the film I was hoping for in the first one and also it has a great story for a B-movie premise while also setting up things for more Purging.

Worst Film
Transformers: Age of Extinction
I don't think this should be explained in a paragraph. This is coming from a person who enjoys the Shia LaBeouf-led Transformers trilogy. Age of Extinction is Hollywood being desperate. We have Dawn which successfully changed leading actors. We have Guardians that broke the innovation wall. We have an honest, crafted-from-the-heart sequel in HTTYD 2. This film is all the opposite of the films that were just mentioned. It is a lazy, bloated summer film. And what pains me that it still raked in more than 1 billion dollars. It was so bad.

Galaxy Society

That post title was a reference to the false Captain America film, Serpent Society. But the galaxy refers to of course, Guardians of the Galaxy. Finally I have watched that film, the biggest film of the summer, in cinema too! In English too! What a good day. If only I don't have midterm the next day. Yeah, the thing is I'm just super thankful to be able seeing this on the big screen. I went to some kind of mall just on the suburbs of Milan. It has an 18-studio cinema. Cray.

So Guardians of the Galaxy is this weird team of aliens. They are not superheros. They are just weird aliens. We have the Han Solo-esque leader in the form of Peter Quill (Chris Pratt), weaponized alien assassin Gamora (Zoe Saldana), a brute alien bodybuilder who speaks Asgardian English Drax (Dave Bautista), a talking racoon Rocket (voiced by Bradley Cooper) and a three-word-speaking walking tree Groot (voiced by Vin Diesel). Together they formed this unlikely group to stop Ronan (Lee Pace) destroying the galaxy.

It's a really different Marvel film. Marvel has always incorporated  humor in their films. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it doesn't. My favorite Marvel humor scenes are the 'do you fondue?' from the pedestrian Captain America original and the 'Thor wants more' from the first Thor. And then the ones that don't work are all the jokes on Iron Man 3 and some of the kiddies stuff on The Avengers. But in GotG, it works beautifully and seamlessly. Even the dance off doesn't seem silly, it works just fine. Shane Black should fit right in in this galaxy. All the characters have time to shine as well. Drax, for example, could be instantly functional and forgettable but here he's one of the high point of the jokes for me. Oh, this film also has a girl fight between Nebula (awesome Karen Gillan) and Gamora. Any movie with a girl fight is a YES for me.

I love the songs from the Awesome Mix Vol 1, it gives more color to the film. Best decision ever to have it on film and I must applaud Marvel and Disney for being very brave to release this movie. I love Chris Pratt, he's awesome. Zoe Saldana has always been my favorite actress, she specializes in being alien and badass at the same time. I'm a bit disappointed actually by how Groot and Rocket are voiced by famous actors for the sake of publicity. It's a shame they don't get Bradley Cooper or Vin Diesel to do motion capture. I watched Dawn of the Planet of the Apes and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles days before this and I was awed by the mo-cap. Here it's just a shame to have those actors just did the voice work. But Groot and Rocket were amazing work by the VFX team. It's great for the MCU to introduce us to this infinity stones. Which now makes that newly announced Avengers two-parter subtitle more relevant. Infinity War. I just want to see more of this film before their eventual team-up later on. Guardians of the Galaxy: rated 4/4.

Best lines from Guardians of the Galaxy:
- If I had a black light, this place would look like a Jackson Pollock painting
- They got my dick message!
- Dance off, bro. Me and you!
- I don't know if I believe anyone is 100% a dick


I still think one of the new Marvel films has to fail. Black Panther perhaps. That sounded so racist to me. Panther is black. Why do you have to have that obvious adjective before that obvious fact? I respect Chadwick Boseman though. And Marvel has that cool flair that DC don't have when they announce stuff.

Next up: a two-month late annual Summer Re-cap

Dark Night

Fox's new series Gotham is a prequel to the Batman stories that we all have been familiar with. Taking the center stage, Detective James Gordon (played by the wide-eyed Ben McKenzie) and his sidekick Detective Harvey Bullock (best-part-of-the-show Donald Logue). Like every beginning of a Batman-thing, it started with a lackluster, TV-edition of the infamous Wayne murders. It went a bit high at some point, but it's just another overhyped, no-good TV. Let me walk you through it (I'm going as I walkthrough the first five episodes)

Selina Kyle
A very annoying young character whose job is just to lurk around, climb stuff. Just because she's gonna be Catwoman in the future doesn't mean she has to act like a cat since this young! And her name is beautifully Selina Kyle, why does she want to call herself Cat? Enough with this wink-wink at her future alter ego already.

Wayne Murders

This was handled so badly. These rich people voluntarily walked into a dark alley at night after a show. Why? In Nolan-verse, they went out from the backdoor--plausible. Here, plain stupid. And God, take a look at that bad CGI blood. So bad. So TV.

Detective Harvey Bullock
Yes. First ever portrayal of Bullock on TV or film. Greatly performed by Donald Logue. Might be one of the few likable peeps here.

Bruce Wayne
Hmm. Not sure if I should like this little Bruce. I'd like him if he doesn't show up in every episode. At least David Mazouz is given more stuff to do than in Touch.

Detective James Gordon
Hey, you ain't Gary Oldman. You're a rookie. Stop making bullshit promises and bad speeches to this little guy. Sometime he's likable, but mostly I hate his dead-eye stare at things. Might be because the character is struggling so much to be likable that it turns out to be unlikable. For me, at least.

Alfred Pennyworth
I kinda like this rough Alfred. It's refreshing, it's new. One point for originality.

Edward Nygma
Fuck this shit. 12 minutes into the pilot and we have Edward Nygma working for GCPD. And he likes making riddles. wink wink *punch winking eyes.

Fish Mooney
So badly acted and doesn't work for me.

Oswald Cobblepot
I think, the movies ruined Gotham. We have great actors portraying these familiar people. Danny DeVito is a tough one to top. But one point for making the most out of Penguin here.

Scenery
I hate Gotham's fake-looking, over-saturated, CGI-enhanced backdrop. I get the look they're going for but it looks fake as hell. Please know your limits, or at least spend some cash on making little sets. Make a goddamn painting like its the 1930s would even work better. You want vintage look? There you go. You're welcome.

Pamela Isley Ivy
Seriously? Poison Ivy's real name is Pamela Isley, not Ivy. So, in this universe, when Bruce Wayne decided to be Batman, would he call himself Wayne-Man? In this universe, when Joker shows up, his real name would be Joker? You want me to punch your other winking eye, Fox? 

Education
Is Bruce Wayne receiving proper education? Maybe that's why he burns himself, doodles scary pictures and listen to disturbingly loud rock music. Problem solved. Or, is it to be Batman you have to burn yourself, doodle scary pictures and listen to disturbingly loud rock music? And on top of that, have no proper education? Wow, you guys successfully downgraded Batman to the lowest point possible.

look at that cop, he has a freakin gun

Villain-of-the-week
Third episode in and we hit the lowest storyline ever. The Balloonman. Gotham's first vigilante. The balloonman, what the fuck. Hey, Mario Pepper was easily shot to dead. Why can't these Gotham people just shoot the balloon instead of reporting the news? Also, what will make Batman special if these vigilantes are already showing up this early?

Lesbian Past
Just. Like. Every. Other. TV. Show.

Bad CGI
Gaze at this monstrosity you call TV CGI! Definitely not caused by some precursor drug to Bane's Venom. It's just bad CGI.

The real questions are should we continue overhyping this show? 

Should we continue watching this mediocrity?

Let's see in the next coming weeks.

Meanwhile, I watched The Flash pilot. It was okay at best. It's so much like Smallville, they will encountered these 'meta-humans' instead of those Kryptonite-exposed people. Not going to watch this cheap looking series.

Well, in Marvel camp, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. is proving to be quite the juggernaut. They have better pacing and storyline than their debut season. They even don't name-drop The Avengers anymore. They're that confident now. Learn from that, Gotham.

I'm rooting so much for DC to find its own footing and succeed. I don't even want them to build a cinematic universe. Maybe that's Marvel's game, maybe it's not yours DC. They need to start making quality films or series from now on. Come Agent Carter, Gotham may fade.

Next post

I don't know what's next actually

Probably some little reviews from the summer films I just watched

Sugar Storm

I have dedicated most part of my two years in Japan traveling inter-city for a movie cinema. Last week I graduated to a whole new level: traveling inter-country for a movie cinema. I have my defense: the movie was Gone Girl by David Fincher and I was peer-pressured into traveling by most of my friends here. So there I was, finding myself on a morning bus from Milan to Zurich. It was a 3-hour journey with bonus of some amazing scenery on the way. I was also planning to see Guardians of the Galaxy, because I am the only one left in the world who hasn't seen it. But man, tickets were so expensive, for the sake of survival I had to save some money.

Gone Girl is an adaptation of Gillian Flynn's best seller (which I'm reading right now), adapted by one of Hollywood's ace directors David Fincher. It tells the story of a missing wife, Amy (Rosamund Pike) at the time of her fifth anniversary with her husband, Nick (Ben Affleck). With the media coverage to find Amy, Nick's life is overturned as more and more secrets are unraveled.

Gone Girl is amazing. I wish I could just end this review like that. But we gotta elaborate right? Firstly, it's a Fincher film; he just couldn't do bad films. I even like his Alien 3, it's not bad and the ending is brave. Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike is great. This film pumped me up for Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (what a fucking title). Don't you just want to see all those Fincher-trademark, dimly-beautifully lit scenes and that ethereal score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross? Not to forget, this film's source material is already top-notch. And author Gillian Flynn penned the screenplay herself. Combined it with Fincher and we had a great, dark, un-Hollywood thriller. It's so not Hollywood and it's definitely not the usual major studio material. But thank God it's out there for us to see. I see the story as a criticism of media and how media is driving the people to some serious allegations. It's an evil thing if not handled well. I can only say this much about this movie, fearing I would spoil some things. But all in all, it's one of the most fucked-up movies a major studio has ever made in America. Definitely one of the year's best, and would love to see it recognized in the awards season. Gone Girl: rated 4/4.

Stay tuned for upcoming posts where I will dissect Fox's new, picked-up-for-second-season, mediocre Gotham.

Shameless Self Promotion

So back in July 31 until August 4, I shot a film with some of my friends. A more mainstream fare than my previous film titled Cops/Thieves. The new film is titled #3, you read it as Number Three. It's about a boy who's trying to win back a girl and at the same time asks, what is the most important thing in your life? So, here's the film, and tell us what you think about it :)

*it's mostly in Indonesian, but we have English or Japanese subtitles for em.