Argo
is a drama based on the true events of a secret CIA mission to extract
six Americans from Iran in 1980. Iran at this time is going through a
revolution and has put a new Islamic government in place. They want to
charge the old leader for crimes against
the people but he has been granted exile in the US. The people of Iran
are deeply angry with this and eventually they end up storming the US
embassy, whilst taking all the people they can find as hostages. Little
do they know that six Americans have escaped, but the clock is ticking
and it’s only a matter of time before the Iranians realise.
The
film starts with a brief history of Iran and tells the story of how the
region became what it was in 1979-80 in less than two minutes. In this
time they dedicate a whole sentence stating that the US and Britain
actually helped to overthrow a democratic government and then replaced
it with an evil dictator. After skimming over the history of Iran and
how the west has screwed over its people on more than one occasion, the
film cuts to Iranians appearing to be irrationally angry towards the
west.
The
story itself though, as already mentioned, is set around a CIA mission
that aims to get a group of Americans out of an obviously dangerous
place and it is actually told really well. Ben Affleck plays the lead
role as CIA agent Tony Mendez and he is also the director of the film.
He manages to give a connection with the characters and the audience,
even if you don’t really want one. Affleck plays his acting part really
well too, but to be honest there isn’t much to his character so he
doesn’t have to try too hard. He makes a much better director, telling
the story really well and dragging you to the edge of your seat by the
end - no matter how you feel about this period of history.
The
other characters are also played well, but considering the film is
meant to be about them there isn’t much in the way of character
development. Affleck still keeps you feeling for them though, by showing
that they are very vulnerable and extremely dependent on those around
them. There were other characters though that didn’t need that much
development because the actor was good enough to play the role
perfectly. I’m thinking of John Goodman here, who plays the role of
Hollywood makeup artist.
This
brings me to another small issue that I had with this film. Argo makes
out that Hollywood was the real Hero in this story. Now I don’t mind
that so much and it could well be true, I’ve been far too lazy to find
out in all honesty. But what I don’t like about it is that as a result
of this Hollywood have dramatically overrated this film. Don’t get me
wrong it’s a good film; it’s just not as good as the vain people of
Hollywood believe.
The Verdict Argo
is a good film and it tells the story of a Hollywood/CIA rescue
operation set in the mists of the 1980 Iranian revolution, although
fails to put much emphasis on how Iran got to that place to start with.
Affleck does a good job in the lead role and a better one at directing.
The support actors are really good and no matter what you think to the
situation in Iran, you’ll be hoping that the US civilians get out alive.
In Silver Linings Playbook we don't really see much American football... Instead, we follow the story of Pat (Bradley Cooper), a man desperately trying to regain his former life.
Recently discharged from an 8 month stint in a mental hospital, Pat is trying to come to terms with the break down of his relationship after he walked in on his wife cheating on him. Through making this discovery something inside Pat snapped and, after dishing out a beating to the man his wife was cheating with, Pat is now a shell of his former self. The attention Pat gained after his violent outburst brought out the fact the Pat is Bi-polar, something he was previously unaware of. Struggling to accept this, he refuses medication and seems to resist the help offered to him at every turn. The social awkwardness brought on by his fragile state of mind leads him to speak before he thinks, often getting him into trouble with friends and family.
Pat's sole purpose in life is now to win back his wife. We discover that whilst incarcerated he has undertaken a journey of self improvement - losing weight and changing other aspects of his life that his wife used to dislike. This obsession is the driving force behind Pat's every action, and we really begin to see how much the incident has had an effect on him. His ambition often lands him into trouble as he attempts to contact her in a number of ways but is restricted from doing so by a restraining order she has had placed on him. Along with this Pat has to deal with his dad, played brilliantly by Robert De Niro, who is focused on raising funds to start a restaurant business after losing his job. He has become a professional (and superstitious) gambler, often forcing Pat to watch American football with him as his lucky charm, adding to the stress of Pat's situation.
Through a friend Pat meets an unlikely helper, in the form of a recently widowed girl from down the street, Tiffany (Jennifer Lawrence). Tiffany is in the middle of her own crisis after going off the rails following the death of her husband. It's easy to draw parallels between their situations and they clash and come together with their similarity in a bitter-sweet relationship. It is unclear at the offset whether they will be a good or a bad influence on each other and this uncertainty remains throughout the film.
Comic relief is added to the film by the trouble Pat's social awkwardness brings and the addition of his fellow mental patient Danny, played by Chris Tucker, who is constantly breaking out of the mental home to visit him.
Pat's dedication to renewing his relationship with his wife often brings into question his commitment to other responsibilities and as the film goes on we see a change in Pat for the better. Pat and Tiffany's friendship grows stronger and they have a sobering effect on each other*.
*If I could make a science reference (and I will) it would be like
watching a strong acid and a strong alkali mixed together, reacting
violently at first and then becoming harmless. Science is awesome...
THE
VERDICT
The acting is superb and the film thoroughly deserves the critical acclaim it has received. The pace of the film remains consistent throughout, never leading to a dull moment. The film is brilliantly directed and the comic relief sprinkled into the film doesn't take away from it's sincerity. The only criticism of the film is that it's a bit predictable in nature. If you haven't guessed the ending by the halfway point you obviously don't watch many films. That being said, it doesn't take away from the enjoyment of the film and it'll leave you laughing, and caring for the characters in equal measure with surprisingly little American football throughout.
Have you ever tried
sleeping on a night train? It’s brilliant in theory and at first it’s really
exciting. But in practice you’re thrown from side to side, there’s the constant
noise of the track, and the other five people snoring in your carriage. You spend
the entire journey praying for it to end. That’s exactly what this campaign is
like. You’ll enjoy the first thirty minutes to an hour and then you’ll suddenly
think to yourself “what the hell have they done to this game and why won’t it
end?!”
THE CAMPAIGN
Aliens:
Colonial Marines is set seventeen weeks after the film Aliens and is on the
same planet. USS Sephora gets a
distress call from the planet and goes to have a look around. To everyone’s
surprise there just happens to be an infestation of Xenomorph on the planet.
Your character and those around you have no idea what is going on and are
constantly asking questions that anyone who has ever heard of the Alien films
would have been able to give the answer to. This right here is the start of a
long trend whereby the game tries to build some sort of suspense but it just
doesn’t work at all.
The game starts off
quite well though and they chuck you straight into the deep end. You find
yourself battling Xenomorph from the word go and it does seem quite fun. But
then something happens. For some unknown reason you find yourself shooting at
other humans that have pretty much come out of nowhere. Turns out they’re
Weyland-Yutani men and they’re mad. You actually fight these guys for so long
that you forget that this is a game about aliens until they remind you about
two hours later. Luckily for you though their A.I isn’t very well programmed so
you’ll find that they’ll just stand in the middle of rooms for you to kill
them. Saying that the alien’s A.I is the same but occasionally they’ll walk on
walls as well. Don’t expect too much support from your fellow NPC marine chums
either because they’re A.I is just as good.
Anyway the story
continues to try and build suspense as it goes and fails miserably. It turns
out that one of your fellow marines has an alien inside of her and you have to
go on a little jolly to try and save her. I call it a jolly because the aliens
really aren’t scary when you out number them and they run towards you in
straight lines. After that you have to find a way of leaving the planet. Turns
out whoever wrote this storyline had no imagination and just decided to steal a
load of stuff from the films, rewrite some of it as if it was fan fiction,
throw it all together, and call it a game.
But the writers and A.I
programmers aren’t completely to blame for how bad this game really is, because
whoever designed the graphics did such a bad job that I spend thirty minutes
thinking that my TV was broken! How can you make graphics that bad in 2013 and
at the end of a computer generation? At least make the doors and elevators look
descent if you’re going to force players to stand in front of them for twelve
minutes whilst the game loads up the next section.
The weapons appear to
be very cool though. Well for about an hour anyway. They’ve kept the weapons
from the film which is great and they do give you quite a few weapons to choose
from. As well as this, as you rank up you unlock upgrades for your weapons. Unfortunately
there doesn’t seem to be much difference in the weapon choices and they all
pretty much have the same specs as each other. What also seems brilliant at
first but will leave you wanting to listen to traffic go by just for some
variety, is the sound of the weapons. They sound just like they do in the film.
This is awesome and I’m sure there would have been outrage if they’d changed
it. But when you have five guns that all sound the same going off constantly
for six hours.... well let’s just say this could be adopted as a new torture
technique.
Most people will
struggle to finish this campaign and will probably only do so because they feel
that they need to get their money’s worth. But there is no chance that anyone
will replay this campaign. The only reason anyone will put themselves through a
second play through of this is because they’ve got a friend that hasn’t played
it yet and they want to see them suffer.
MULTIPLAYER
The multiplayer is
where it was expected that this game would redeem itself. After all, there are
a lot of games that have awful campaigns but really good multiplayer segments. Well
it can be said that the multiplayer aspect of this game is better than its
campaign aspect, but that doesn’t really tell anyone anything.
There are four different
modes for multiplayer. Team Deathmatch is one of them and by far the worst
aspect of multiplayer. It’s a standard run around and shoot aliens game. Unless
you’re the aliens then you’ve got to attack the marines. What makes it worse is
that you still have the same weapons from the campaign, so you may as well all
have the same gun. But if you’re an alien then you’re in luck because you get
to choose out of three different primary attacks. The developers really messed
up what they could do with both aliens and marines right here.
The next mode, which is
slightly better than Team Deathmatch, is Extermination. Your class choices are
the same as before and are the same throughout all the multiplayer modes. But the
small difference is that the marines in this mode have to set bombs to destroy
nests of alien eggs, whilst the aliens have to stop this from happening. The idea
is pretty good but it’s ruined mainly by the fact that there is some sort of
overlord voice telling you what is going on ever five seconds and repeating
itself three or four times. It’s extremely irritating.
Then there’s Survivor mode
and you have to... well survive. All this mode consists of is four marines
hiding in a corner whilst four aliens run towards them. It is really boring. The
only upside to this mode is that when playing as the aliens you have a bit more
access to different classes. But you have to find them around the map and they’re
still not a great improvement.
The final mode is
called Escape. This mode is actually quite fun. It’s like Survivor but this
time the marines have to make their way from one end of the map to the other. It’s
quite enjoyable but at the same time you’ll find yourself thinking something
along the lines of “Left 4 Dead does this so much better” and saying to your
friends stuff like “Someone remind me, Why are we playing this instead of Left
4 Dead?”.
At least I can say the
controls were good though. I’d be lying of course, but I can still say it. To
be fair they’re not terrible, but they’re not good either. Controlling the
marines is ok if not a little erratic at times, but controlling the aliens isn’t
good at all. Actually it’s when you first take control of an alien that you
realise how regimented their motions really are.
THE
VERDICT
Aliens: Colonial
Marines is one of the worst things to come out of this franchise, and that’s
saying a lot. The story seems to be a load of ideas that have been stolen from
the films. Then they’ve been thrown together, mixed around, and edited to make
even less sense. If the story wasn’t so boring I think people would actually be
angry. The graphics do an ok job, but then have some real bad parts that are
just unforgivable. Then there’s the A.I. It does the job but it should do a lot
better. If you like you ‘A’ to have some ‘I’ then expect to be disappointed. The
weapons and sound effects are fun to start with but they soon lose their novelty,
and there is no way anyone is going to replay the campaign. The multiplayer redeems
itself a little, but not by much. It has some game mode variety, but they’re
all quite boring and have been done a lot better by other games a few years
ago. It’s a shame that the developers have ruined this great opportunity that
they were given.
LHSRAting
for Aliens: Colonial Marines 4.3/10 (Xbox 360)
Les Misérables is quite possibly the
best novel based, turned musical play, turned film, ever. Alright, that might
be a bit of a small category area, but it’s still pretty damn good. It has
something for everyone and even the most masculine of people won’t be able to
help but enjoy this well told story.
Les Mis is a musical drama set in France
during the 19th century, which itself is a brilliant historical
place and time. The story follows a man named Jean Valjean (Hugh Jackman), an
ex-convict who breaks bail and is constantly on the run from a police officer called
Javert (Russell Crowe). During the film Valjean comes into contact with a range
of different people, spanning from prostitutes and convicts, to revolutionaries
and priests. Each one of them has a unique tale to tell about their lives, and
each one is gripping in its own way.
As you would expect with a musical
there is quite a lot of singing in this film. In fact, unlike most other
musical films, this story is almost 100% sung to us. At first it seems a little
strange, but after the first five minutes you kind of forget that it’s a
musical and you just find yourself engrossed in the character’s lives. Most of
the music, like most of the film, is really quite depressing. But you kind of
have to expect that in a film that is about the people at the bottom of society
in a time and place that was well and truly hard.
It’s not all doom and gloom though. Thénardier
(Sacha Baron Cohen) and his wife (Helena Bonham Carter) bring a comical element
to the film and just as you’re about to cry they will make you laugh. I
honestly think this is the best role Cohen has ever played. It’s like it was
written just for him.
That been said, every single actor played
their role perfectly and the acting really could not have been improved. It’s
even more impressive when you think that most of the main actors aren’t professional
singers. One actor that stood out for me though has to be the young Daniel
Huttlestone who plays Gavroche, a child soldier who is more than aware of his position
in society and is more than happy to do his part for the French revolution.
The only real complaint I have to make
about this film is that it did go on a little too long. Even for a brilliant
musical, 158 minutes is quite a long time. So even though there is something
for everyone in this film, it goes on for a while so you might be waiting
sometime between the parts that you enjoy. That been said though, I personally
enjoyed the entire thing, just some parts more than others. It’s still worth
sitting through and it is really only the ending that seems to drag a little.
THE
VERDICT
Les Misérables might turn out to be the
best musical you’ll have seen in recent memory. It is set in a period of French
history that was a really hard time to live in, and tells the story of one man
and those that he comes into contact with throughout his life. The music and
songs sang tell the story brilliantly and the acting is next to flawless. Even though
the film goes on for quite a long time, it is still one that could make you
shed a tear or two and will definitely make you laugh on occasion.
Ralph (John C. Reilly) is a computer villain in an arcade and he’s been around for thirty years. It’s his job to wreck the crap out
of things whilst Fix-it Felix (Jack Mcbrayer), well, fixes it and is loved by everyone
for it. Ralph on the other hand is hated by everyone in this computer game
universe, even though he’s really a nice guy who has been programmed to do a
bad job. So after thirty years of being bullied for been a bad guy Ralph decides
he can be a hero and goes on a quest to prove it by game jumping across the arcade
that he’s in. During this film Ralph and other characters show a range of different
games and characters from different gaming generations.
Wreck-it Ralph is a well animated film with some great voice acting. It has a
funny storyline for both young children and adult gamers. The film is bright
and colourful and very fast paced, which will keep children entertained. At the
same time there are some well hidden adult jokes (similar to how The Simpsons do
it). If you’re an adult gamer then you’ll appreciate it even more as they’ve
sneaked in loads of little references to games and consoles
(like the Konami Code). So if you have a young child that you want to keep occupied
for an hour or two and you’re into computer games, then this film is perfect
for you!
Wreck-it Ralph is superb role modelling for children as well. It shows
that some people that seem bad might be good and that those that seem good,
might be bad. It also teaches that you shouldn’t bully people because of things
that they’re born/programmed with. I know that you’d probably expect that from
a Disney film, but to be honest they have a huge track record of racially and
sexually profiling their characters. This doesn’t seem to happen in this film
though and this made me very happy, especially with female badasses like Sergeant
Calhoun (Jane Lynch) and Vanellope von Schweets (Sarah Silverman). With any luck
this will be a direction that Disney continues to go in.
The film could probably have done with featuring more of the real game
characters as they don’t really make very many appearances. However, they may
have made the right decision not to give them bigger roles because if they got
it wrong there would have been a lot of complaining from the gaming community. Something
that they shouldn’t have done though is put in that awful ‘music’ by Rihanna, although
it did fit quite well and I almost didn’t notice it until she repeated the word ‘drive’
several times.
THE VERDICT
Ralph is bad, and that’s good. He’ll never be good, and that’s not bad. In
fact, it’s pretty damn brilliant. This is a great story for young children,
parents, and adult gamers. It sets a good example for children to follow whilst
entertaining them, and has some brilliant voice acting in it too. At the same time
Wreck-it Ralph is filled with adult humour and gamer references. We don’t see
as many real game characters as would be liked, but it still works very well.
Disney have made a great family film here and I really recommend that if you’re
taking the kids to the cinema this weekend, that you take them to see this
film.
Argo
is a drama based on the true events of a secret CIA mission to extract
six Americans from Iran in 1980. Iran at this time is going through a
revolution and has put a new Islamic government in place. They want to
charge the old leader for crimes against
the people but he has been granted exile in the US. The people of Iran
are deeply angry with this and eventually they end up storming the US
embassy, whilst taking all the people they can find as hostages. Little
do they know that six Americans have escaped, but the clock is ticking
and it’s only a matter of time before the Iranians realise.
