On August 5, 2013, OneRepublic performed at the Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts and while it was not the borderline religious experience that I had with The Antlers concert earlier this year, I can honestly say that of all the hours I've lived through during my short 19 years of existence, this concert was, without a doubt, one of the best one and a half hours I've ever had the fortune of experiencing in my life. The concert was that good.
Wednesday, August 7, 2013
Monsters University (2013)
When a studio like Pixar announces the release of yet another movie and a sequel (or rather, prequel) no less, the pressure to live up to the expectations set by not only the original movie, but also the standards set by every other excellent Pixar movie made (with the exception of Cars) is always high. While I did not expect Monsters University to be nearly as good as Up, one of my favorite Pixar movies to date, I was pleasantly surprised to find that it was nearly as good as Monsters, Inc, which is a feat in and of itself.
Not so much the heartwarming tale that forms the basis for Monsters, Inc., Monsters University is a coming-of-age tale, campus comedy, and sports movie all packaged into one outstanding movie. While the spirit that embodied Monsters, Inc. continues to live on in its prequel, the movie's creators never rely on the audience's love for the first movie to carry on through this one--the new creative content is endless.
"The Blue Umbrella", the Pixar short that begins the film, tells a love story between two umbrellas. It's imaginative, artistic, and cute, utilizing anything that can pass off as a face (drainpipes, crossing signals, to name a few), as characters. This is not Pixar's best short; it's relatively bland and unmemorable, but I can't deny its creativity.
Monsters University starts off with a 6-year-old Mike, who dreams of becoming a scarer upon visiting Monsters, Inc. on a school field trip. Mike is relatively friendless as a kid and is unable to find a partner when asked to pair up on the trip. It's hard not to pity Mike at this point because this is a scene that is relatable to anyone--everyone has experienced, at some point in their lives, that moment of panic when the teacher asks the students to pair up for some group project and you think you might end up alone. The politics of partner-finding are more complicated than you might think, but I digress. A good movie must be, above all, relatable to its audience and Monsters University is full of these kinds of moments.
Fast-forward a decade and Mike is a scare major at Monsters University, presumably one of the most prestigious colleges in the monster world. He's a hard-worker and he gets the good grades, but it's obvious he just doesn't have the talent for a life of scaring. Enter Sulley, who by any standard is the polar opposite. He's a jock who gets by the scaring program based solely on pure natural talent passed down along generations of famous scarers. We find that Sulley's lazy, underachieving attitude, however, is really just a front to cope with the high pressure and expectations that come with being born into a distinguished scarer family. If it's not obvious enough already, the dimensionality of every character within the movie is crazy; you begin to forget that the movie is filled with monsters, not humans. That the characters' mannerisms are not achieved through human acting, but through pure animation, is astounding.
As a current college student myself, Pixar's portrayal of college life, while slightly exaggerated, is still strangely realistic, or as realistic as a movie about monsters in college can be, and completely relatable. There is the school rivalry between Monsters University and Fear Tech (ahem, Virginia Tech) and the annual scare games held by Monsters University's Greek system, which itself consists of the fraternity of stereotypical jocks, the fraternity of outcasts, the sorority of bubbly, giggly monsters, among others. There is no shortage of adventure and it is in this movie that we get to see the start of Mike and Sulley's friendship and eventually, partnership at Monsters, Inc. (as told through a series of well-chosen "photographs" of the two).
Was this movie worth $11.50? Without a doubt, yes! Pixar movies are Pixar movies because of Pixar's attention to even the smallest detail. It's a quality that has yet to be successfully emulated by any other animation studio. Monsters University is just a testament to Pixar's continued genius.
Despicable Me 2 (2013)
I never understood the appeal of Despicable Me. The yellow minions were a little cute and there were the occasional funny and emotional moments, but I found the movie to be completely bland and unremarkable as a whole. Rarely does a sequel ever successfully meet the standards set by the original and if anything, with an ending as conclusive and satisfying as the one to Despicable Me, it's clear a sequel was made solely because Universal Pictures couldn't resist raking in the first movie's $251 million dollar domestic box office gross yet again. If I haven't made it obvious enough already, I walked into the movie theater almost reluctantly and with almost zero expectations. Unfortunately, the movie met my expectations in almost every single way, and I mean this in the most disappointing way possible.
Despicable Me 2 was essentially a worse version of the original. At least the first movie successfully managed to tug at my heartstrings a bit towards the end, and while the sequel does have its moments, it's just nowhere nearly as good. Gru, the former criminal mastermind turned father, is recruited to help Lucy, from the Anti-Villain League, find the villain responsible for using the mutagen, PX-41, to turn even the most harmless of fluffy bunnies into indestructible killing machines. Working together as undercover bakery owners at a mall where every shop owner is considered suspect, the inevitable happens: Gru and Lucy fall in love. It's a little heartwarming because everyone in the movie realizes that Gru's adopted daughters are in need of a mother, even the girls, who take it upon themselves to set up an online dating profile for the guy, but again, this plot is no where near as inspired as that of the first movie. The movie's full of one-liners that are kind of funny, but not funny enough to make me laugh.
If it weren't for the minions, who play a bigger role than ever in this sequel, this movie would not have the same appeal that it did. Scientific studies show that 80% of the movie's audience watched the sequel solely for the minions (only half-joking, of course). It's no surprise Universal is making a spinoff dedicated solely to those adorable yellow creatures.
While Despicable Me 2 was cute and funny, it was not cute and funny enough to warrant spending $11.50 for a ticket. Save your money for something better (like Monsters University, for example).
Friends with Benefits (2011)
It's hard to keep movies like these from getting too repetitive and bland, but director Will Gluck makes it work with excellent direction and witty dialogue. And to be honest, it's hard not to like this movie when Mila Kunis and Justin Timberlake are delivering the lines--their likability is too hard to resist.
Tuesday, August 6, 2013
Fast & Furious 6 (2013)
I walked into the movie theater knowing only two things about the series: that it involved cars (the fast) and that it had to involve some completely predictable plot line to form the basis and I suppose, "furiousness," of the movie, as with any other run-of-the-mill action flick (the furious). I don't know what I expected (my expectations were undeniably low), but I guess you get exactly what you expect with a movie like this: cars, beautiful people, ridiculous action sequences, more cars, and more ridiculous action sequences. I can see why this testosterone-fueled series developed such an avid following over the years; this movie has all the ingredients of an action movie made specifically to entertain, without much to say for its plot.
At its very base, Fast & Furious 6 is about friendship and that, to me, is the only redeeming quality of the movie. With the antagonists essentially a mirror image of Dom's crew, the only thing that differentiates the two is loyalty and that is essentially how Dom and his Fast Six crew wins out in the end. If there's one thing Justin Lin has yet to learn, it's that the best action movies are the ones where the audience is made to care. At the heart of any action movie is the character's basest need to survive. It is the director's job to make the audience root for the characters as they struggle to live while undoubtedly risking their lives for some honorable cause. Friendship alone is not enough to save the movie from the boredom I felt at certain points in the film. You'd think car chases (with a tank plowing down the wrong side of a highway, no less) and explosions would cause some level of excitement, but instead I felt only restlessness and the hope that those scenes would soon be over to allow for the plot to continue to move forward. Some characters do end up dying in this movie--the Fast Six crew cannot remain intact forever with all the crazy antics they get involved in, but I felt maybe only a short moment of loss, if that, before more explosions and car chases were thrown at us. I couldn't even care about the characters if I tried; we weren't given a chance to.
Some of the action sequences were so outrageous I actually laughed out loud in the theater. With any action movie, we have come to expect the survival of at least the main characters, despite how ridiculous the odds are they'd survive if that same scenario were to occur in reality. There is a limit to that ridiculousness, however, and this movie toes that line. Some of the more outrageous moments involve gravity-defying jumps and a fight involving The Rock and the antagonistic version of himself.
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Was this movie worth $11.50? In my opinion, definitely not, but you'll certainly get your fill of explosions and car chases for maybe an entire month.
Star Trek Into Darkness (2013)
By any standard, Star Trek Into Darkness is a superb action movie. Certain action movies have come to bore me (read: Fast & Furious 6, but that's for another day), but J. J. Abrams keeps the movie interesting by doing what he does best--developing the characters in such a way that the audience actually cares for their wellbeing. Of course, there are some moments that engender some incredulity, but what are Hollywood action movies without characters who survive despite the impossibility of it all?
The movie begins on a gorgeous red planet populated by a primitive white species. While trying to save the planet from an impending volcanic eruption, something invariably goes wrong and violation of the Prime Directive is necessary to save Spock from being burnt to a crisp in the volcanic core. It is here that we begin to see the dynamic that has come to define Kirk and Spock's relationship. Spock, with his actions defined by irrefutable logic and the ongoing internal conflict between his Vulcan and human roots, would rather sacrifice his life than violate the Prime Directive. Kirk, with his careless, playboy, "I do what I want" attitude, has no problems disregarding the Prime Directive to save his friend. It's Kirk's general tendency to make spontaneous and completely rash decisions that unfailingly result in Kirk winning by the seat of his pants that keeps this movie moving along. Plot twists and emotionally-charged moments (read: Spock and Kirk's bromance) are abound with a scene that harkens back to The Wrath of Khan. I didn't get it at the time, but I feel like it would have been a nice touch to Trekkies everywhere.
This movie was not only worth the $11.50 for a ticket, but also worth the extra $6 to watch in 3D. While most movies released in 3D today seem to serve no other purpose than for the sake of being in 3D (and reaping the cash), the effects were truly something special--it's hard to believe the 3D effects were put in post-production.
Saturday, August 3, 2013
Rainy Day Essentials
I love summer rain. I can open my windows and let the sound and smell of rain accompanied by the notes of a select few songs instill a certain special sense of serenity; it's a feeling you'd be hard-pressed to find elsewhere! Here are a couple songs and artists I consider essential to any rainy day mix. Enjoy!
- Comptine d’un autre été : L’Après-midi / Yann Tiersen
- Anything by Ludovico Einaudi (I suggest "Experience", "Run", and "Giorni Dispari")
- Any of the Chopin nocturnes (Nocturne #19 in E minor and #20 in C# minor are my favorites)
- Avril 14th / Aphex Twin
(Reviews of movies posted almost immediately after the initial viewing requires a certain kind of discipline that I lack. I'm working on my reviews though, I swear! Expect them sometime in the near future.)
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