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Movie Reviews

Transcendence – Movie Review

transcendence poster

Plot:  

Dr. Will Caster (Johnny Depp) and his wife Evelyn (Rebecca Hall) are researchers in the field of Artificial Intelligence.  Will’s goal is to create a machine that can think for itself and feel a full range of human emotions. However, there are those that aim to stop any further attempts at AI technology and thus target Will and his colleagues. In an attempt to “save” Will’s life after he has been shot with a bullet traced with radiation poisoning, Evelyn uploads Will’s mind to a supercomputer.

Review: 

If there’s one thing that Transcendence does well, it’s warning people away from the potential future of technology.  Just seeing the ways that technology consumed Will Caster was almost enough to make me swear off of technology for good. Almost.

The trailers for this movie looked so good. I wanted to like this movie, I really did. But as someone who knows next-to-nothing about the future of technology,  this movie was so far-fetched.

Once Will is connected to the Internet, he has access to all of the information online and can thus rapidly expand his knowledge. This allows Will to almost instantaneously provide his wife with an absurd amount of money so that she can move to some far-off desert town, buy all of the land and property, and build a lab where Will can further his research and experiments, one of which is to create a cell that replicates and rebuilds itself. Will uses these cells for basically everything, spreading them around the world like pixie dust. Eventually he even makes a replica of his body that is habitable.

If Johnny Depp’s computer death stare isn’t enough to keep you from agreeing to upload your mind to a supercomputer some day, I don’t know what will.

Transcendence hits theaters April 18.

Grade: C

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Movie Reviews

300: Rise of an Empire – Movie Review

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Plot:

300: Rise of an Empire is the not-a-sequel sequel to 2006’s 300, the story of a group of 300 Spartan men who head to battle against Xerxes and his army of Persians. Rise takes place at the same time as the events of 300, and shows the efforts of Athenian general Themistokles (Sullivan Stapleton), who tries to unite Greece’s city-states to fight against the approaching Persian navy, led by Artemisia (Eva Green), who is hell-bent on seeking revenge against Greece. The film also brings back Spartan Queen Gorgo (Lena Headey) and Persian god-King Xerxes (Rodrigo Santoro).

Review:

Rise of an Empire is based off of a yet-to-be-released graphic novel of the same name by Frank Miller. Though Rise isn’t directed by Zack Snyder like the original, the film’s director Noam Murro kept many elements of the film the same, including the signature slow-motion, blood splattered fighting scenes and highly altered colors that 300 is known for.

Like the original, there are plenty of shirtless men with spectacular abs. While that much exposed skin might not make for the best way to fight in a battle, it certainly is nice to look at while you’re watching these men be sliced open by swords and pierced by arrows. If there’s going to be some gore, at least it’s sexy gore.

Arguably the best scene in the whole film is sex scene that takes place between Stapleton and Green. Artemesia seduces Themistokles whilst trying to convince him to abandon the Greeks and fight for the Persians. Not much progress is made though, as Themistokles falls victim to Artemesia’s allure and soon they are violently attacking one another and ripping each other’s clothes off. Nothing is off-limits for these two as Themistokles passionately thrusts his “sword” all over Artemesia’s “battlefield.”

While I’m still having trouble trying to comprehend how one can walk into a pool of water and come out hairless and covered in gold jewelry and an obscene amount of eye makeup, Xerxes remains a force to be reckoned with in this film, as he tries to avenge his father’s death. While he isn’t the antagonist with the most screen time, you still get the feeling of a power hungry psychopath whenever he rears his clean-shaven, gold plated body.

Overall, the film is nothing spectacular, but it has great action sequences and that signature blood-splattered look and feel of the original.

300: Rise of an Empire is in theaters now

Grade: C+

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Movie Reviews

Need For Speed – Movie Review

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Plot:

Just released from prison for a murder he didn’t commit, Tobey Marshall (Aaron Paul) sets out to seek revenge on the man who framed him, former business associate Dino Brewster (Dominic Cooper). Marshall must race across the country while evading the police along the way.

Review:

At face value, Need for Speed may seem like Dreamworks’ attempt at a car movie to rival the likes of Universal’s Fast and Furiousfranchise. There are cars and criminals involved, so they must be the same, right? Wrong. While fans of Fast will surely enjoy Speed, there are only a few parallels between them.

Based off the popular Electronic Arts video game series of the same name, Need for Speed features high-speed action sequences, a quest for revenge and great footage of the cars. The plot of the movie itself is nothing special, but it was more than enough to keep me interested in between the best parts of the movie—the cars. There are plenty of humorous lines weaved throughout the movie and there is a fair amount of romantic tension between Paul’s Tobey and Imogen Poots’s Julia.

The cars themselves are works of art, and are hands-down the stars of the film. Among the vehicles featured in the film are three Koenigsegg Ageras, a Bugatti Veyron Super Sport, Lamborghini Sesto Elemento, McLaren P1, Saleen S7 and a GTA Spano. Combined, that’s upwards of $14 million worth of cars. It seems such a shame to wreck such nice cars for a film, not to mention a huge waste of money, so naturally many of the cars that are used are actually replicas of the originals, solely built for destruction.

The driving is nothing short of spectacular, with plenty of close calls, numerous occasions of driving the wrong direction straight-on into traffic (and miraculously making it out safe every time) and a cleverly named stunt called a “Grasshopper” in which the Shelby Mustang is driven up a grass embankment at high speeds and launched over two lanes of traffic to land perfectly in on the road and continue driving as though it had been there the whole time.

The special effects of the film were highly realistic, making it seem as though these cars were actually hitting one another and careening off the road. This can all be credited to a decision made by Director Scott Waugh, who wanted everything to be filmed using practical special effects as an homage to car films in the 60’s and 70’s. So everything you see on screen is real, or at least as real as these things get in Hollywood. That means that no digital effects were used in post-production, save for perhaps one scene when Marshall reveals a remodeled Shelby Mustang.

Though there are no digital effects, the practical effects are more than enough to make the driving and crashes seem real. The footage from many of the crash scenes isn’t the same high quality as the rest of the film, which is to be expected because no one in their right mind would put their nicest cameras inside of vehicles that are about to be totaled.  Not all of the cars that are used for the movie are seen on-screen—the camera cars, or cars that are used to mount cameras to film the high-speed racing scenes, must be fast enough to keep up with the cars that are featured in the film. The camera cars include a Mustang and a Ferrari 458 Italia.

Overall, it is a great film to ride along with for a couple of hours and not have to think about much.

Need for Speed hits theaters March 14.

Grade: B+