Men In Black 3

Well here's something I genuinely did not expect to see, and it's something that I even denounced in my post of which films we'd be looking forward to coming out this year. Yep, after the horrendous second instalment of the franchise had seemingly killed off the whole idea, it was time for the third outing for Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones in Men In Black 3.

Let's be honest, if you, like me and many thousands of others like me loved the original film, you were more than a little disappointed with what a hatchet job was made of the sequel. Men In Black 2 has become one of those films you fully expect to see turning up on ITV3 at least once a month, swapping places with The Scorpion King and Van Helsing as a throwaway piece of filler material on an otherwise program-less channel. The spirit of Men In Black was completely lost, no quirky mystery, smart if slightly simple jokes were traded for cheesy gags and product placement was king. But remember, when Men In Black was first released, it was so unlike a majority of films of the time, it had that sense of coolness about it, and was a refreshing display of how to make family-friendly, fun and, most importantly, good science fiction movie. So whilst we weren't expecting much of this third film, a lot rested on the shoulders of director Barry Sonnenfeld, who was responsible for both previous offerings.

Quick, spoiler-free plot summary, as is standard: extremely dangerous criminal Boris The Animal (Jermaine Clement) escapes from prison on the moon and heads to Earth to seek revenge on the man who locked him up in 1969 - Agent K (Jones); Boris travels back in time and kills K, leading Agent J (Smith) to head back to 1969 to stop Boris and save his younger partner - played by Josh Brolin. Got it? It's actually quite a well-worked plot, and given how dangerous time travel stories can be to a movie (see Star Trek Generations or Back To The Future sequels), it sticks with minimal plot holes. Don't get me wrong, there are a couple, but each are largely addressed later in the film...so you'll just have to trust me on this one, because I'm not spoiling it for you. There's a very nice cyclical feel to the story, as the first film saw K training J, and being saved in the process, the second film saw K saving the day, this time they're saving each other, and bring the franchise to a very nice, totally worked out point.

For the entire movie, we, like Agent J are constantly asking what the major event that triggered Agent K's trademark sourfaced, emotionless look on life, which seemed to commence on one fateful day in 1969. Naturally, this is the climactic scene of the film, and believe me, it's a goodun. It's a twist for sure, and you're not necessarily likely to see it coming until seconds before it happens, but it provides an extremely well-thought out sense of meaning to all three films, and will add a particularly pleasing peace of sentimental value for fans of the first release. But you'll have to go see it for yourself...

The comedy aspect has been kept totally intact this time round, and the chemistry between J and K is definitely back to the original level. However, this is slightly more impressive, given that the Agent K we see on screen for the majority of the film is Brolin, not Jones. It is Brolin who steals the show here, his impression of Tommy Lee Jones is frighteningly accurate, but is more importantly faithful to the K character, whilst also recognising that he is a more expressive version of the Agent. There are some funny and some touching moments between Brolin and Smith as their characters explore the unfamiliar versions of each other, and we're certainly allowed to enjoy every minute of it. With Will Smith, you know exactly what you're going to get if it's a comedy-happy role, and he is essentially exactly the same as he is in the first two films, but with the occasional nod to the added 14-odd years of experience added to his belt. Similarly, Jones gives an as-you-were performance, but with a note of sadness, which is key to the story...spoiler, no more, sorry! There are pleasing little appearances from Emma Thompson as Agent O (replacing Agent Z as the head of the MIB), and Michael Stuhlbarg as a multi-dimensional being - both adding a sense of warmth to the film, whilst the latter in particular is also an integral piece of the plot. Serious respect needs to go to Jermaine Clement also, in his performance as Boris The Animal; whilst his appearance is greatly aided by impressive - and occasionally skin-crawling - CGI, the extremely bizarre vocal display is fantastic, and truly in the mould of previous MIB villain, Edgar the Bug. Watch out for cameo roles from Bill Hader and Will Arnett too, as well as a host of pleasing references to the previous films, especially ones involving a certain four-legged furry agent.

If there's one criticism I can throw at any member of the cast, it's to Nicole Scherzinger, who "plays" Lily, the unfortunate girlfriend of Boris. Given that she is only on screen for about 60 seconds, and speaks no more than five times, it's remarkable that someone can turn in such an unconvincing performance to a role; exactly how do you manage to overact with less than 30 words to your role? Her appearance had me fearing the worst for the movie, as she was all too similar to the Serleena character from MIB II, but thankfully her role is cut very short, in what I'd like to feel is the writers way of saying "we're sorry for the last film, here's more of what you actually wanted." And they delivered.

The effects? What did you expect? They're fantastic again, and each alien you see on screen is either brilliantly original, or tipping the hat to sci-fi films of the past. But once more, the focus here is on Boris The Alien; whoever dreamt up the appearance of this guy is either seriously skilled at what he does, or seriously messed up, as the end product is amazing.

4/5  - I concede defeat. I thought this would be a wimper of a movie, but it certainly proved me wrong. The fun and cleverness is back in the franchise. The story is brilliant and well presented, even moving in places. Should the franchise continue? If they do, they've set themselves back on the right path, if they don't, they've ended it on a much stronger footing. We finally have the sequel the original deserved.

If you want a fun movie experience, go see it.

Dark Shadows

What have we been missing so far this year? A slightly spooky, with a hint of gothicism and extremely colourful film release with a cast of extremely familiar actors? Well then, I guess it's time for a rummage around of the spooky, gothic-y, eye-gogglingly colourful world of Tim Burton.

Indeed (probably the most used word in the film right there), it is time for the give-or-take bi-annual traditional Tim Burton/Johnny Depp collaboration of the weird and wonderful that we've become very much used to in the last decade. Again, the pair have worked together to create a re-imagining of a previous production, in the mould of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Sweeney Todd and Alice In Wonderland, Dark Shadows is the re-working of a cult American 60s-70s gothic horror soap opera of the same name. So you all know basically what to expect, right? Some whimsical opening sequence with lots of swirls and skeletons and whatnot, or perhaps a trippy hallucinogenic intro to the story? Actually no, this time we're just thrown right in there, for a quick ten minute round up of Depp's character, Barnabas Collins, who moves from Liverpool to Maine in 1760, grows up, spurns the love of a witch, who then kills his parents, his lover, curses him to the existence of a vampire and buries him in a chained coffin for nearly 200 years. Got it? Spiffing.

The concept of the film is fairly simple; set in the 1970s, the current Collins resident at the family estate are on hard times, as their fishing industry is falling to the shallow waters of a local competitor, upon Barnabas' escape, he wishes to rejoin the family and help them escape their plight. The bumps along the road to success are equally as simple to breakdown, because I don't know about you, but the witch who cursed Barnabas looks an awful lot like the owner of the company running the Collins' into the ground, don't you think? So cue a rivalry between main attractions, Depp and Eva Green.

A huge piece of the enjoyment you get from the film stems from the charm of the first hour or so of Barnabas' attempts at grappling with the cultural changes of nearly two centuries. There's a lot to be said for the comic timing and delivery of Mr Depp, with particular favourite moments of mine coming through the mixture of 18th century dialect thrown into 20th century living. You know what you're going to get with Depp, and yes, his accent is basically just a Ichabod Crane-Jack Sparrow-Sweeney Todd mash-up, but there's a nice vampirey twang to it now as well. Furthermore, there is great chemistry between he and Green, who manages to be both genuinely funny and loathsome at the same time, sort of a Burtonified version of Annie Wilkes from Misery.

Of course, what would a Tim Burton movie be without the Tim Burton cast? Not only do we have Depp in the lead role, but we have another staple of the Burton tradition, Helena Bonham Carter starring as the funny, slightly unhinged supporting role; this time she is Dr Julia Hoffman, an alcoholic psychiatrist determined to stay young for as long as possible, who develops something of an unhealthy fascination with Barnabas. And yes, you know she's going to be good at the role, because she's done it a good few times, but it's still enjoyable stuff. Michelle Pfeiffer is also back in a Burton movie, this time as the current Collins matriarch, Elizabeth Collins Stoddard. In all honesty, her character is barely developed at any point in the film, despite featuring an awful lot - Pfeiffer does a decent job of making you half-remember a character who is almost totally forgotten in the overall plot of things. There's even a cameo for lord of all that is silver screen, Sir Christopher Lee, who I'm beginning to think might actually be evil now, and not acting, he's been doing it so long - you don't need me to tell you if he's any good, he's Christopher DRACULA SARUMAN SUMMERISLE Lee. Honourable mentions should also go to Jackie Earle Haley as Willie Loomis, the slightly dim-witted caretaker, who gives a funny, if a little cheesy-in-places supporting performance, and future headliner Chloe Grace Moretz, who gives a brilliant and almost unnerving showing of weirdy teenage angst in the form of sister Carolyn Stoddard.

As is the standard of a Burton movie, this one looks spectacular. Every scene uses colour to perfect effect; it's just the right kind of dark and weird for the spooky scenes, and it's the exact purple and hippy for the full-on 1970s snapshots. The effects are pretty good too, particularly the climactic sequence between Depp and Green, where the latter's skin takes on an egg-shell quality. The music used is very cleverly done too, capturing the 70s feel in a fitting manner, but definitely through the eyes of Burton, with contributions from the likes of Iggy Pop and The Moody Blues; and naturally, Danny Elfman is the man behind another Burton score.

However, the film just seems to lack some final special quality. Yes, it's entertaining enough, but by the time the final half an hour of the film kicks into action, you begin to realise that the story is extremely condensed in places. As mentioned, Pfeiffer's character fades into the background disappointingly; much is initially made of the want-away low-life dad Roger Collins, before he too (and quite literally) leaves the story altogether; and the climax of the movie just seems to throw in some quirks for two minutes of screen time to the characters that will have assumingly been present in the original series. It all just seems a little rushed after a promising start. It would appear that Burton wanted to make an homage to a show he loved, had fun with the comedy aspects of the set-up, but seemed to lose control of direction towards the end. I hate to say it, as I'm a huge fan of some of his work, but this is becoming something of a trend in Burton's films, particularly those with Depp involved, as I felt, Sweeney Todd, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Alice In Wonderland and Corpse Bride all suffered from the same exact same symptoms.

2/5 - You'll seriously enjoy the first half of the film, you really will. However, a growing sense of cheesiness, bordering on laziness and same-old-Burton-story seems to creep up on you. Strange, not a total disaster, but it could have been so much better.

The Avengers

It's finally arrived! After seven years of planning, five individual films, and a choice of roughly four billion superheroes and villains to choose from, the finest hour of the Marvel Universe's cinematic releases has arrived. We are, of course, talking about The Avengers.

Way back in 2008, fans of Marvel would have probably been forgiven for not exactly getting excited about the release of Iron Man that year. The simple reason for this is two-fold: The Hulk (2003) and Spider-Man 3 were both unspeakably awful. And yet it was probably the release of those two films which seemed to kick super-sci-fi-genius Joss Whedon (Buffy, Firefly, Toy Story etc.) to bring back the good name of the Marvel Universe. A departure from Marvel Enterprises and Universal (The Incredible Hulk aside) and into Marvel Production and a distribution of Paramount and Disney seemed to add a new sense of direct purpose to the project. Both Iron Man films were fantastic, particularly thanks to a career-changing performance from Robert Downey Jnr.. The second attempt at the Hulk was extremely impressive. Add to that the totally solid releases of Thor and Captain America: The First Avenger and pretty much everyone who enjoys films is excited for this culmination of parts, regardless of whether you really knew the respective comics.

Therefore, most people watching The Avengers will already be familiar with what's going on here, as we've been introduced to each of the characters back stories in their own films. However, we are given a subtle reminder right from the off, with Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) finally getting a scene before the end credits tampering with the Tesseract (source of all power and all-round scary artefact), leading to the arrival of arch-villain, and half-brother of Thor, Loki (Tom Hiddleston). Cue a pleasing tie-in to a few of the "hidden" scenes from the end of each of the previous films and hey-ho, we're right up to date and ready for some serious fun.

The story that has been laid out for The Avengers is a big one, but a very well thought out one at that. In a nutshell: Loki steals the tesseract and is using it to summon an alien army he plans on using to enslave the Earth in order to seek revenge upon his half-brother for being de-throned in his home world, and it's up to our heroes to unite against him to save us. Simple enough sounding, I guess, but keep in mind that this has been set up over five films that have all linked in and you begin to realise that details from a few years ago are actually much more relevant to the end product. What's particularly impressive about the film is that you just sort of go with it, you know that what you're seeing is ridiculous - it's fantastic, but ridiculous - but you have to apply what's known as "Superhero Physics" to do so. For example, the laws of physics and probability are the same in the film as they are in reality, with the exception of each of the heroes and villains has altered the rules slightly - totally accepted in the film, therefore totally accepted by us. And what's more, even though you know it's a film about six superheroes, most of whom are not going to be killed off, you can't help but get immersed in the situation whenever Captain America is put in a tight spot.

The underlying theme of the film is a goodun too; the Avengers don't start out all happy-clappy with each other, they have to fight to be become a working team. This makes for some cinematic gold, with the tensions between Tony Stark (Downey Jnr.) and Captain America (Chris Evans), and almost everything that comes out of Bruce Banner's (Mark Ruffalo) mouth being prime examples of how to add a sense of humour to a superhero film that could easily tip over the edge into the over-the-top. The additional attention to the stories of assassins Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) and Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) adds something of a darker tone in the background too. The confrontation scenes, particularly the battle between Iron Man, Captain America and Thor makes for particularly exciting viewing, not to mention probably one of the best choreographed combat scenes I've ever seen between the two aforementioned assassins. The climax of all this tension means that when the team finally get their act together, you go all goose-bumpy with nerd joy.

The performances of all involved are pretty much flawless too, which is surprising for a movie as big as this. Downey Jnr. simply is Tony Stark again, as mesmerising as he was the first two times. Evans' Captain America is played with a humorous honesty (cue the jokes about what he's missed all these years he's been asleep), and Chris Hemsworth's Thor is exactly what you got from the last time; big, booming Nordic fighting, joking machine. Johansson's performance is again full of dark humour whilst convincing you that there's more to uncover between her character and Hawkeye (hopefully we find out more next time). And Ruffalo's take on Banner is reassuringly excellent. A lot of people were worried by the news of Edward Norton not wishing to reprise the role he played so well in the Hulk's last outing, but Ruffalo adds a surprising amount of genuinely great humour to the part, whilst giving an air of zen master, adding a lot of depth to the character - some of the best scenes of the film all centre around Banner or his giant green rage monster equivalent. Arguably the best performance of the lot though, is Tom Hiddleston as Loki. He's clearly gone a little deranged due to his experience of falling into the void at the end of Thor, and as such, we now have a near maniacal level of villain. Mixed together with a truly sinister smirk and pompous arrogance is also (and I feel like I'm repeating myself now) an honest sense of humour, which seems to underline the fact that he's gone a little mad. You'll end up liking almost all of the characters, and they all get time to show off what they can do; that even goes for Agent Coulson, another who cameoed in the previous films, again reprised by the impressive Clark Gregg.

What's more, the film is visually spectacular. Not only are the scenes involving just our heroes seriously cool (not really another word that works so well for it), but they don't go too far to make us lose touch with the end product. Furthermore, the climactic battle scene will most likely leave your jaw somewhere on the popcorn-splattered floor, and it almost certainly only gets better in the 3D version.

Yep, The Avengers was great, I can honestly say I enjoyed every minute of it, particularly as it would seem the film has restored the reputation of Marvel. The only negative thing? I already wanted the sequel by the time the final fade-to-black had kicked in.

5/5  - You won't see a more fun superhero film. Probably ever. I don't have a single bad thing say about it. Off you go, go on, stop reading, buy tickets.

P.S.
In true Avengers film fashion, stick around for the credits...