Showing posts with label Epic. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Epic. Show all posts

Monday, August 4, 2008

The Golden Compass


IMDB: The Golden Compass
  • OVERALL: 79
  • VISUAL: 91
  • STORY: 67
  • ACTING: 80
  • BETTER THAN: The Polar Bear King
  • NOT AS GOOD AS: The Spiderwick Chronicles
  • WAS MISSING: Coca-Cola product placement with all those polar bears running around.
  • SEE IT FOR: Any scene with the polar bears, especially the one-on-one battle, as well as a few cool steampunk elements thrown in.

Henry V


IMDB: Henry V
  • OVERALL: 91
  • VISUAL: 89
  • STORY: 91
  • ACTING: 93
  • BETTER THAN: Love's Labour's Lost
  • NOT AS GOOD AS: Dead Again
  • WAS MISSING: An illuminated manuscript at the beginning to highlight Derek Jacobi's bookends.
  • SEE IT FOR: Branagh's deeply moving and passionate directing debut and portrayal of the title character, especially in the pivotal Falstaff scene. Jacobi is fiery, plus you get a young Christian Bale in a supporting role.

Thursday, July 31, 2008

Frazetta: Painting With Fire


IMDB: Frazetta: Painting With Fire
  • OVERALL: 92
  • VISUAL: 99
  • STORY: 93
  • CHARACTERS: 84
  • BETTER THAN: Crumb
  • NOT AS GOOD AS: The Joy of Painting (TV Series & Collected)
  • WAS MISSING: Even more time spent on the countless knock off Frazetta artists, including comic book covers, magazines, films and album covers. So many people used his style. I would've loved to see even more of these exposed, either as plagiarism or homages.
  • SEE IT FOR: Unbelievable mastery of art and the human form. You would never have guessed his lack of training, his "funnies" beginnings or his sincere dedication to family. I also truly enjoyed the before and after shots of works he repainted in hopes of improving them.

Tuesday, July 22, 2008

Labyrinth


IMDB: Labyrinth
  • OVERALL: 86
  • VISUAL: 91
  • STORY: 87
  • ACTING: 79
  • BETTER THAN: Meet the Feebles
  • NOT AS GOOD AS: The Dark Crystal
  • WAS MISSING: A laser light show and a creepy talking wolf.
  • SEE IT FOR: An early film from Jennifer Connelly, "helping hands," and a scene where Harry Potter's Yule Ball meets Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut.

Thursday, July 17, 2008

Starcrash


IMDB: Starcrash
  • OVERALL: 49
  • VISUAL: 51
  • STORY: 39
  • ACTING: 32
  • BETTER THAN: Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone
  • NOT AS GOOD AS: Ice Pirates
  • WAS MISSING: A "Comedy" or "Parody" classification. Still, there's value here!
  • SEE IT FOR: Too many to list. You have redneck robots, leather slave girls, Argonaut-ish stop-motion giants, blatant Star Wars ripoffs, Windows Media Player-type special effects and hilariously voice-tracked dialogue. And, I haven't even mentioned The Hoff in makeup!

Monday, July 14, 2008

Gymkata

I'm about to get married. It's the tail end of my bachelor party. What would any respectable bunch of drunk men want to do to end the night? Well, watch Gymkata and play drinking games, of course!

One guy had to drink every time somebody got hurt. Another guy had to drink every time there was a gymnastic-related move. A third guy had to drink every time there was bad dialogue, and I had to drink every time there was a ninja. Needless to say, by the end of the movie, we might as well have all had IVs of Newcastle pumping through our veins!

You can either watch the movie as is, or read the back of the box to give it a pretty different meaning. My favorite part is where our young hero finds himself racing through the village of the crazies (how politically correct is that!?), and he finds himself surrounded by baddies. He is backed into the center of the town square where he finds a conveniently placed pommel horse. Olympic-inspired swift kicks ensue. God bless Gymkata.

IMDB: Gymkata
  • OVERALL: 80
  • VISUAL: 90
  • STORY: 92
  • ACTING: 59
  • BETTER THAN: Surviving the Game
  • NOT AS GOOD AS: The Condemned
  • WAS MISSING: A Russian judge giving Jonathan Cabot a 7.9 for his perfect dismount after each battle.
  • SEE IT FOR: The arms race in the fictional country of Parmestan! The only problem? You would never know that without reading the back of the box. The in-movie plot is all gymnastics, all ninjas, all the time. You can't get much better than this movie folks, especially for drinking games.

10,000 B.C.


IMDB: 10,000 B.C.
  • OVERALL: 69
  • VISUAL: 87
  • STORY: 54
  • ACTING: 66
  • BETTER THAN: Carnosaur
  • NOT AS GOOD AS: Jurassic Park
  • WAS MISSING: Any desire to root for the humans
  • SEE IT FOR: Mum-Rah, beautiful red sails and the bird from Hell that every pet owner should have.

Thursday, July 10, 2008

Fire & Ice


IMDB: Fire & Ice
  • OVERALL: 78
  • VISUAL: 91
  • STORY: 75
  • ACTING: 69
  • BETTER THAN: Quest for Camelot
  • NOT AS GOOD AS: Heavy Metal
  • WAS MISSING: Clothes. I think everybody chose fashion over protection.
  • SEE IT FOR: Frazetta's artwork inspired this bad boy, so enjoy the battle sequences, women and warriors.

Monday, July 7, 2008

Nomad: The Warrior


IMDB: Nomad: The Warrior
  • OVERALL: 75
  • VISUAL: 80
  • STORY: 74
  • ACTING: 70
  • BETTER THAN: Warriors of Heaven and Earth (Tian di ying xiong)
  • NOT AS GOOD AS: Gladiator
  • WAS MISSING: Originality. It has every epic movie cliche rolled into one Kazakh setting. You may actually think you are watching Gladiator if you doze off.
  • SEE IT FOR: Kuno Becker's smile. Really. Also, composer Siliotto makes a score that sounds eerily similar to Edelman's Dragonheart score, which isn't a bad thing!

Thursday, June 26, 2008

Lancelot of the Lake (Lancelot du Lac)


IMDB: Lancelot of the Lake (Lancelot du Lac)
  • OVERALL: 87
  • VISUAL: 89
  • STORY: 92
  • ACTING: 81
  • BETTER THAN: Lancelot and Guinevere
  • NOT AS GOOD AS: First Knight
  • WAS MISSING: Any sense of passion or leadership from the King Arthur character.
  • SEE IT FOR: One of the best "Huh? Say it ain't so!" endings ever. Plus, one of the rawest portrayals of Guinevere as a young, naive girl who finds herself innocently torn between her distant sense of duty and her blossoming intrigue for passion.

Wednesday, June 25, 2008

Jabberwocky


IMDB: Jabberwocky
  • OVERALL: 73
  • VISUAL: 79
  • STORY: 69
  • ACTING: 72
  • BETTER THAN: Satan's Cheerleaders
  • NOT AS GOOD AS: Monty Python and the Holy Grail
  • WAS MISSING: John Cleese and gangs of medieval nuns.
  • SEE IT FOR: Slow-motion jousting and knights playing hide-and-seek. The movie ends with an impressive visual of the horned-helmet knight versus a great, giant Jabberwocky puppet monster.

Monday, June 23, 2008

Excalibur


IMDB: Excalibur
  • OVERALL: 99
  • VISUAL: 100
  • STORY: 100
  • ACTING: 96
  • BETTER THAN: The Sword in the Stone
  • NOT AS GOOD AS: Braveheart
  • WAS MISSING: Not much. If I had to be picky, I'd say an original score that matched the greatness of the movie.
  • SEE IT FOR: One of Liam Neeson's first roles, as well as Orff's masterpiece Carmina Burana in its finest form. It's been used in so many movies since, but never has it been more inspiring and epic than Excalibur's scenes of the knights charging up over the misty hills on armored horseback.

Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Braveheart

I have tried to get my wife to watch this numerous times by telling her it is a love story. For me, it is! It is one of the saddest and most compelling love stories I've seen! Talk about a man driven by passion! Still, once his first wife leaves the film, my wife shuts off. I don't blame her... that's one of the toughest scenes to watch no matter how many times you've seen it, at least for those of us with a heart!

You get plenty of action and witty Mel Gibsonisms, and the score for the movie is one of the best I've ever heard. To this day, any time I am trying to get somebody to wait or hold on, I annoyingly yell "HOLD... HOLD... HOLD!" If you don't get that, watch the movie again! That is an extremely intense scene and the music and visuals perfectly build to a fulfilling climax!

The quotes you can take away from this movie are endless, and for my dollar, the betrayal, scheming and battlefield hijinx in Braveheart stand alone at the top of the drama heap.

IMDB: Braveheart
  • OVERALL: 99
  • VISUAL: 99
  • STORY: 100
  • ACTING: 97
  • BETTER THAN: Apocalypto
  • NOT AS GOOD AS: For the genre, this IS the best!
  • WAS MISSING: More camera time for the women so my wife believes it's a love story!
  • SEE IT FOR: It's a love story! Really! James Horner's score perfectly frames the passion and betrayal.

Friday, June 13, 2008

Atonement


IMDB: Atonement
  • OVERALL: 94
  • VISUAL: 93
  • STORY: 97
  • ACTING: 92
  • BETTER THAN: Pearl Harbor
  • NOT AS GOOD AS: Pride & Prejudice (2005)
  • WAS MISSING: Even more extravagant costume design. Yeah, I said it!
  • SEE IT FOR: The sadness, the passion, the beauty, the twists... they'll all move you. And that Keira gal ain't half bad in those roles. ;)

Monday, June 9, 2008

Top 10 Best Medieval Movies (Non-Animated)


Top 10 Best Medieval Movies (Non-Animated)
Links will be added as the reviews go up! The list keeps growing!
  1. Braveheart - 99
  2. Excalibur - 99
  3. Lord of the Rings Trilogy - 98
  4. Gladiator - 97
  5. Flesh & Blood - 95
  6. Ladyhawke - 94
  7. King Arthur - 93
  8. The 13th Warrior - 93
  9. 300 - 93
  10. Camelot - 93
  11. The Princess Bride - 92
  12. Monty Python & The Holy Grail - 92
  13. Henry V - 91
  14. Dragonheart - 90
  15. First Knight - 90
  16. Brotherhood of the Wolf (Le pacte de loups) - 90
  17. A Knight's Tale - 90
  18. The Reckoning - 89
  19. Timeline - 89
  20. The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc - 88
  21. Krull - 88
  22. Robin Hood: Men In Tights - 87
  23. Lancelot of the Lake - 87
  24. The Highlander - 86
  25. Conan The Barbarian - 85
  26. The Three Musketeers - 85
  27. Pathfinder - 83
  28. The Last Legion - 83
  29. Troy - 80
  30. Willow - 80
  31. The Man in the Iron Mask - 78
  32. Beowulf (1999) - 77
  33. In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale - 76
  34. The Viking Sagas - 75
  35. Lancelot and Guinevere - 75
  36. Kingdom of Heaven - 74
  37. Alexander - 74
  38. George & The Dragon - 73
  39. Jabberwocky - 73
  40. Black Knight - 73
  41. A Kid in King Arthur's Court - 72
  42. Attack of the Gryphon - 70