Bug finally got me to see Moana. It was a perfectly good Disney princess movie. I have to say that I like the new Disney princess movies. The princesses have agency and their parents do not have to die.
Moana gets to discover her true self, save her people, and be generally awesome. The songs are good and the animation is of typically high quality.
Tuesday, March 14, 2017
Friday, March 10, 2017
Logan
It is rare that I long for a movie to come out. I watched every trailer and waited for Logan to come out. I even got pre-clearance to see it on opening night. To put this into more context, I also have not seen an X-Men movie since Last Stand and the first attempt at a Wolverine stand-alone movie.
However, I loved Wolverine when I was a teenager. He was the only comic book hero who actually viscerally understood that he participated in violence and that it had a cost. He was broken in ways that others were not, and still found away to be a hero. Violence has a price and he paid it.
The trailers led me to believe that this would be a movie that got Wolverine and would show him and the costs of a life of violence.
I was not let down. The Logan in the movie is broken in ways that cannot be fixed. The years of fighting have worn him down. The adamantium that makes him unbreakable is killing him. He just wants to live out his remaining days in peace. Unfortunately, his peace is disturbed by caring for a mentally unstable Charles Xavier whose brain can randomly unleash devastating mental blasts that may, or may not have killed his students and Logan's only friends. Into the mix is tossed an orphan girl who is cloned from Logan's DNA and is being hunted down by a band of corporate killers who want their property back.
It sounds bleak, and it is. This is not an Avengers movie where there is a big, colorful set piece every fifteen minutes. There are long stretches of the movie where not much happens except people talking to each other about the stuff of life. It is more road trip movie than super-hero movie.
This is not to say the movie is without big fight scenes. It is rated R and it earns it in spades. The fight scenes are big and bloody. People get hurt, badly and obviously hurt.
Even the ending is perfect for a Wolverine movie. Bleak, broken, and yet hopeful. Hugh Jackman and Patrick Stewart picked a great project for a swan song.
However, I loved Wolverine when I was a teenager. He was the only comic book hero who actually viscerally understood that he participated in violence and that it had a cost. He was broken in ways that others were not, and still found away to be a hero. Violence has a price and he paid it.
The trailers led me to believe that this would be a movie that got Wolverine and would show him and the costs of a life of violence.
I was not let down. The Logan in the movie is broken in ways that cannot be fixed. The years of fighting have worn him down. The adamantium that makes him unbreakable is killing him. He just wants to live out his remaining days in peace. Unfortunately, his peace is disturbed by caring for a mentally unstable Charles Xavier whose brain can randomly unleash devastating mental blasts that may, or may not have killed his students and Logan's only friends. Into the mix is tossed an orphan girl who is cloned from Logan's DNA and is being hunted down by a band of corporate killers who want their property back.
It sounds bleak, and it is. This is not an Avengers movie where there is a big, colorful set piece every fifteen minutes. There are long stretches of the movie where not much happens except people talking to each other about the stuff of life. It is more road trip movie than super-hero movie.
This is not to say the movie is without big fight scenes. It is rated R and it earns it in spades. The fight scenes are big and bloody. People get hurt, badly and obviously hurt.
Even the ending is perfect for a Wolverine movie. Bleak, broken, and yet hopeful. Hugh Jackman and Patrick Stewart picked a great project for a swan song.
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