9

Every so often a movie comes out that restores my faith in film making. This is one of them. 9 is an amazing adventure set in the post apocalyptic world of the future. Mankind is all dead and machines rule the Earth.

There are 9 other life-forms though that have to hide because the machines are trying to kill them too. The 9 are machines too, but with something extra. They seem to think and feel. They are lead by 1, who is afraid to go outside and urges everyone to remain hidden. His plan is to wait out the death of the machines just like he waited out the death of humans. 2 doesn’t agree and goes adventuring. He finds 9, just as 9 wakes up. They travel together for a bit and 2 gets taken by a machine.

9 wants to go find him, 1 doesn’t allow it and we have our conflict. Of course 9 will go after 2 and 5 decides to help him. At this point you may be getting confused because they are named numbers and not proper names. But actually this is really brilliant. Each character is totally unique and you can tell them apart instantly, and not only that but I can still remember who is who. My personal fave is 6 (cause he’s the weird one – voiced by crispin glover – which makes him even cooler).

This film is just remarkable in every way. The adventures are amazing, the animation and character design are wicked, and I just loved every second of it!

This has to be one of my top 10 favourite animated movies of all time.

Even the little things, like when 9 finds a spear and takes off the blade and places a light bulb in its place. Favouring technology vs barbarism. The bulb also symbolizes thinking, which is what 9 does. He questions and thinks about things before deciding what to do. 1 just does things out of fear.

You must see this movie.

5/5

--J-KraKen--[>

White Heat

White Heat

Cagney (who is becoming one of my all time faves) is a gangster (surprise!) and he is causing havoc on society. The cops are after him, and this is the first movie that actually shows you how they investigate. How they tail a suspect etc.

Cagney’s mom (not his real mom, his mom in the film) is the only person he loves and trusts. She is part of the gang and looks out for him. Cagney pulls a big time train robbery and the cops are getting close to him…he has a plan, the same day as the heist there was a small time robbery at a hotel in another state. He planned that job, but someone else pulled it off.

Cagney plans on confessing in that state to that smaller crime, so that he goes away for a couple of years – thus proving he didn’t commit the train robbery cause he was convicted of a crime that occurred that same day in another state! BRILLIANT!!!!!!!!!!

That is just one example of this movies writing!!!!!!!! Not only that, but the real story begins when the cops use an undercover officer and “convict” him of a crime so that he ends up in the same cell as Cagney. This guy has to gain his trust, not an easy thing to do, when Cagney would willing sacrifice his own guys!

What a great film this was. You should all own it.

5/5

--J-KraKen--[>

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.

No it wasn’t me. I’m not gonna tell you who it was…youll have to watch this movie to find out. And trust me, it’s worth it!

Jimmy Stewart is a lawyer who is beaten up and mugged by Liberty Valance – a low life scumbag who pillages towns and cheats at cards.

John Wayne is well, John Wayne…tough guy gunslinger but all around cool dude. Jimmy wants to put away Liberty, Wayne says it aint gonna happen unless you pick up a gun and fight back.

Their ideals clash and the local girl is sort of torn between them. Both are nice guys but both believe in different things.

Who will she pick?
Who will live?
Who will die?
Who shot Liberty Valance?

Buy this movie and find out! (It’s one of the best Westerns I have ever seen).

5/5

--J-KraKen--[>

Outlaw Josey Wales.

Eastwood plays a drifter who can kick a lot of ass. Big shock. This character has been played and perfect by Eastwood to the point that you cant even name anyone else who compares (maybe Snake Plissken – but that’s it).

In this one, Josey Wales (Clint) is a regular old fellow, until his wife and son are murdered by Red Legs – pro-union guys during the civil war. Josey wants revenge and picks up a pistol and teaches himself to shoot! Which is wicked!!! So then he joins up with Fletcher and his gang of renegades and they go around doing…well renegade stuff, until Fletcher decides he’s had enough of war and joins the union chaps (they paid him off too) and when Fletchers gang comes in, the union guys kill them! Josey takes revenge and kills most of them, but the one Red-Legger (who has now joined the union) and Fletcher.

So Red Legs and Fletcher team up to kill Josey.

That is just the beginning of this epic movie. Josey meets other loners on his path and they team up with him too. One guy is an old Indian who can no longer sneak up on people, an Indian trait that he has lost due to being civilized.

They meet up with a bunch of goody-two shoes from Kansas, who find out the hard way that the frontier life aint too happy.

And so on.

The cool thing about the movie is that each scene plays out in a way that you cant really predict what will happen.

Josey meets up with some renegade Indians that wanna scalp the Kansas people and how Josey fights them off is wicked!!!!!

All the characters are awesome and a lot of neat things happen…bounty hunters etc. It all plays out a bit slow, but not as slow as Good, Bad, and Ugly. Compared to that, this movie is Run Lola Run.

4.5/5

--J-KraKen--[>

Marvel and Disney: Two great tastes that taste great together!

Well, it's been almost a week since the announcement that Disney wanted to buy Marvel. And it's been almost a week since fanboys everywhere went batshit angry over the news, predicting doom and gloom and the end of Marvel and all its characters. Sigh. Why are fanboys so bitter about everything nowadays? What is the frickin' problem??

I actually think this is an amazing thing to happen to Marvel. Yes, it would be nice to have seen Marvel grow and flourish as its own "Disney" and become a powerhouse entertainment company relying on the strength of its intellecdtual property. But Marvel realized that strength too damn late in the game. They had filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy in the late 90's, and only then started to get their film projects up and rolling, putting their characters out there for more exposure to the general public, which has now given Spidey the same pop-culture exposure that Batman experienced in the 60's and 90's and Superman experienced in the 80's. Recently, Marvel decided to open their own film studio in a bid to make more money off of their characters (despite the couple billion dollars plus that the Spidey and X-Men movies have made over the years, Marvel sees a fraction of that since the film rights are with Sony and Fox respectively). They were taking steps in the right direction, but Disney will supply everything Marvel wanted in the blink of an eye (distribution, theme parks, multi-media exposure, etc.). And yes, as we all know now, you will still get your Iron Man 2 and such. And, Lord help us all, Fox will still try to churn or X-Men pap and "reboot" Fantastic Four, since they still have the rights to those and Sony will still try to crank out Spider-Man 4, 5 and 6 or however many they're making since they have Spidey movie rights still.

Now, for all you fanboys worried about Marvel suddenly becoming too family friendly because they're now owned by Disney -- what decade are you living in? Disney no longer means dumb talking animals in movies only a 5 year old could love. They haven't been there in at least 15 years. Because of the Disney/Pixar merger, Disney routinely puts out all-ages movies with currently the best storytelling in American cinema with their Pixar movies and they constantly garner massive crossover success with all demographics. Yes, Disney also makes stupid live-action crap like Race to Witch Mountain and Hannah Montannah, but the important thing to realize is the company's ability to separate them and develop mutiple brands for multiple audiences. Witch Mountain, Jonas Brothers and Hannah Montannah are jokey, stupid and innocuous and are for the tween set. Mickey Mouse and all his friends are currently in TV and "edutainment" content aimed at small children. The Pixar movies are a little more challenging and are for ages 5 to 90. Touchstone pictures are for grownups. See? Disney knows where to slot things. I see them making kid-friendy and also challenging Marvel movies and TV. You may get Spidey teaching children math and ABCs, but you'll also get Spidey fighting Morbius or Electro in movies, Hulk smashing stuff and maybe a hard edged Blade movie or two. And Marvel's publishing program will not be touched. If anything, Marvel would start making Mickey comics and stuff, but all of the hard-edged stroylines in Marvel comics like Civil War and Planet Hulk will remain. It's not like WB ever put a stop to Bane breaking Batman's back or Superman dying or whatever, even when they were pushing for family freindly Batman movies with Batman Forever and Batman and Robin. Disney won't either.

What I like is that now Marvel has access to Disney's world-wide network of entertainment. Finally, a reason to go to the Disney store! Imagine the Marvel crap they could sell in there. Imagine what Marvel attractions they could create at the Disney themeparks! And now Marvel has access to Disney animation. All that incredible cell animation work and Pixar's writing and computer animation team could be at Marvel's disposal. Much has been made of Pixar's John Lassiter's meating with Marvel execs discussing possible Marvel projects in the future and Lassiter reportedly becoming "very excited very fast". Now, all of this won't happen immediately, like you won't see a Pixar Thor movie anytime soon, but you will eventually.

In the meantime, relax. This could be very good. And if it's not, then you'll see a 20 page essay from me on why the worl sucks.

Deceptisean