Wicked Part 1 Review
The Plot
The long awaited big screen adaptation of the iconic musical production that explores the hidden true story of so called Wicked witch Elphaba, classmate Glinda and the infamous Wizard of Oz before Dorothy and Toto ever followed the yellow brick road to the emerald city.
The Good
Fans of Wicked have longed to see the award winning musical, which was itself inspired by one of the most iconic films of all time, take its seemingly rightful place up on the biggest screen possible. After many years it’s safe to say that the musical prowess and lavish production value of the stage show have been successfully adapted for screen, delivering a joyously grand and cinematic musical tale.
Armed with a large array of memorable songs, including the absolutely iconic showstopper Defying Gravity, the musical charms of Wicked carries the film along at an entertaining pace which helps prevent audiences dwelling too often on its lengthy runtime. A well-chosen and reliable cast also does musical justices to all these iconic numbers, sidestepping the usual Hollywood mistake of misguidedly shoehorning Hollywood acting stars into roles clearly well outside their vocal range, such as putting Russell Crowe in Les Miserables.
Beneath green face paint and bleached blonde hair respectively, lead actresses Cynthia Erivo and pop superstar Ariana Grande respectively do fine work in playing complicated frenemies Elphaba and Glinda. Erivo hits the daunting musical heights required in her big moments and also adequately conveys the stoic tragedy of Elphaba as an outcast looking for goodness in a deceptively ugly and cruel world. Ariana Grande likewise approaches Glinda with a suitably silly falsetto charm, allowing her own vulnerable good nature to gradual reveal itself beneath a pretty pink mess of pretty popular girl clichés.
Some fans may legitimately question whether or not the film could have found more convincingly youthful stars for its leading roles rather than continuing the stage production’s custom of employing seasoned veterans in their 30s to play these roles. Erivo in particular is 37 and does often feel a far more mature screen presence when paired with the forever 17 aura of diminutive pop starlet Grande. Clearly the filmmakers felt confident that audiences would be willing to overlook this minor issue in favour of a more convincing vocal gravitas. Honestly it’s also equally hard to imagine how the film would have played out with literal teenagers thrust into such overwhelmingly iconic roles. So perhaps it was the lesser evil to simply deliver audiences what they’re truly used to seeing for these characters on stage.
Speaking of which, for fans of the original stage production the film’s wonderful inclusion of founding Broadway stars Kristin Chenoweth and Idina Menzel is a magnificent crowd pleasing moment. Their involvement helps eases any lingering disappointment fans may have had that they didn’t get to bring the characters they helped originate to the screen themselves.
Casting wise a special mention must also go to Jeff Goldblum as the notoriously not so wondrous Wizard of Oz. His wry charm and perfectly crafted comical smugness is a fantastic fit for the role as the self-aggrandizing showman. He adds just the right splash of flamboyant gravitas to the film, helping to subtly set the stage for what fans know will be a grand and often poignant climax in the now already much awaited second film.
The Bad
Hollywood studios have learnt the painful financial lesson that audiences consistently avoid any film with Part 1 in its title. The reasons for this are fairly obvious as many people are inherently reluctant to invest time and full ticket prices in quite literally half a story. In an age of binge watching and instant gratification a lot of fans would simply prefer to wait until the complete series is released rather than rush to watch the first act a year or more before the concluding sequel finally arrives. This has resulted in repeatedly disappointing box office hauls for seemingly sure-fire hit franchises. Mission Impossible being just one recent example with Dead Reckoning Part 1.
This is why the marketing campaign for Wicked has been so outright fraudulent. All promotional materials for the film, trailer, posters and enthusiastic social media proclamations have exclusively referred to it as Wicked. It’s a pretty shameless lie by omission designed to make sure that for many audiences the first time they learn this is actually only Wicked Part 1 will be when the title card discretely adds a part 1 in the movie theatre.
For hard-core fans of the show the fact that it will be stretched out over 5-6 hours and two theatrical releases for its cinematic adaptations will be welcome news. Unfortunately there will undoubtedly be plenty of casual audiences left a little frustrated that they weren’t suitably warned that despite a 160 minute runtime they were in fact only getting act one of the show, with a now daunting year long wait to return to cinemas to watch the next instalment.
Maybe the many good qualities of this first film will be enough to satisfy audiences. But it honestly feels just a little wrong that they were so deliberately deceived by a calculated marketing machine.
Beyond the film’s mildly misleading marketing, some audiences might also have mixed reactions to the somewhat heaving handed animal allegory for the insidious evils of racism and the film’s occasionally sombre and tragic tone. Though obviously intended as a smartly cynical deconstruction of the simplistic technicolour cinematic joys of The Wizard of Oz, Wicked may feel at times a little too mature for all the younger children inevitably lured into packed cinemas by the promise of magic, music, pretty dresses and a PG rating. Fans of the stage production will already know that the second film due out next year will be even more darkly tragic and heart wrenching in places. Though at least by that point families will have learnt to perhaps leave any sensitive or easily bored young ones at home.
The Ugly Truth
Wicked Part 1 delivers theatre fans with almost three hours of big screen delight that does adequate justice to the first act of a truly beloved and iconic musical landmark. Leaving both them and excited newcomers to the franchise with an agonisingly long wait for the concluding second film releasing in a year’s time. So those lacking patience should be adequately warned that the stories true climax is sold separately. Likewise well intentioned parents with restless toddlers should be aware this will likely prove a far more challenging viewing experience than more conveniently child friendly cartoon musicals.
Piece By Piece Review TIFF 2024
The Plot
The life and musical career of unique superstar Pharrell Williams is retold through interviews with his family, famous collaborators and the music mogul himself; all whimsically animated as a LEGO movie.
The Good
Pharrell Williams has had a uniquely impressive impact on music and pop culture which is truly worthy of being celebrated. This brightly coloured and mostly joyous film does a great job of reminding audiences of the seemingly never ending array of iconic songs he has crafted as both a genre redefining producer and a multi-talented performer. Retold in his own soft spoken words and contributions from so many of the global musical superstars that have worked alongside him, this is a comprehensive documentation of both his life story and musical genius.
The admittedly unexpected decision to make this otherwise by the numbers talking heads music documentary into an animated LEGO experience, does prove undoubtedly effective in making the film both visually distinctive and much more palatable for wider audiences than just hard-core fans of Pharrell and musical history.
Pharrell’s jaunty and joyful music clearly suits cartoonish visuals perfectly, as proved by the phenomenal success of his Despicable Me soundtracks. In that sense converting this film from the normal compilation of archive footage and interviews into something far more fluidly expressive and visually playful does work very effectively. The films is at its best when it takes more fantastical flights, whimsically reimagining ‘beats’ as glowing stacks of bouncing LEGO blocks or giving life to some of Pharrell’s inner imaging’s.
While the film is obviously mostly sanitised, it is still sincere and at times genuinely reflective. It also manages to mostly avoid coming across as shamelessly self-aggrandizing. It’s obviously a challenge to have Pharrell and his collaborators talk about his journey and musical achievements at length without veering too far into endless praise and self-importance. Thankfully unlike so many similar self-made musical autobiographies the film doesn’t feel obnoxiously boastful or shamelessly rose tinted.
The Bad
Pharrell and the film itself is swift to explain the decision to turn this documentary into an animated LEGO movie as purely an act of Pharrell’s whimsical artistic expression, necessary to allow his colourful vision to be brought to life more effectively on screen. Despite this it’s still honestly difficult to ignore all the implicit commercial motivations in effectively disguising a typical talking heads musical biopic as something far more palatable for younger audiences.
It’s easy to cynically assume that marketing this film as another ‘LEGO movie’ is little more than a carefully calculated brand partnership made in the pursuit of the typically lucrative box office of family cinema trips.
Since generations of preteens already know Pharrell best for his toe tapping soundtracks to the unending Despicable Me franchise it’s easy to imagine why the studio, LEGO and Pharrell himself would be so enthusiastic about pitching his life story at an unusually young demographic.
Unfortunately those children will likely be far less captivated by mostly watching Jay Z and a long list of hip hop icons casually reminisce about Pharrell’s trials and tribulations in the studio churning out hit singles.
While adult fans can certainely enjoy the palatable novelty of the film’s genuinely joyous animated aesthetics, in reality the film never fully commits to being sincerely aimed at a truly childish audience.
The film easily could have simply used more extended musical sequences to loosely reimagine Pharrell’s life story and impressive back catalogue in child friendly ways. Instead the film simply slips a convenient animated veneer on an otherwise typically adult focused documentary. That feels especially true when the film wallows in the cliché pressures of superstardom and very briefly veers into sombre political territory during its later stages.
To that extent the film’s carefully crafted two minute trailer borders close to false advertising in effectively tricking armies of young Minions fans into demanding a family cinema outing to see ‘the LEGO musical movie’.
The Ugly Truth
While the film is a colourful celebration of Pharrell Williams unique pop culture impact and presents an effective summary of his remarkable musical output, it’s still difficult to shake a slight confusion about whether the decision to make and market this as a ‘LEGO movie’ is wonderfully inspired or merely a misguided effort to conveniently capitalise on younger fans for a much bigger Box office haul.
Parents of young children should in particular probably be warned that the film is not fully suited for entertaining a toddler for 90 minutes. This isn’t The Lego Movie 3, it’s a standard issue VH1 behind the music style documentary with an animation filter turned on.
The Life of Chuck Review TIFF 2024
The Plot
Inspired by a Stephen King novella and told in three distinct chapters, The Life of Chuck weaves a carefully interconnected and mysterious tale of humanity facing the apocalyptic end of the world and an intimate exploration of the life of a seemingly ordinary accountant named Charles Krantz.
The Good
The Life of Chuck adapts one of Stephen King’s more uncharacteristically optimistic tales, flavoured with his usual brand of supernatural tension but without the sense of nightmarish dread that typically defines his celebrated horror classics. Starkly juxtaposing a kind natured portrait of one man’s life with mankind’s final cosmic curtain call could easily have been an exercise in cruel irony, but instead the film gradually reveals itself to be something far more therapeutic and thankful.
The film’s compartmentalised three act non-linear storytelling structure is also massively effective in preserving the stories’ many central mysteries while also allowing audiences to explore different emotional tones and sometimes complex recurrent philosophical themes in easily digestible ways.
All of this is only possible because of a truly gifted ensemble cast with Chiwetel Ejiofor, Karen Gillan, Mark Hamill and Tom Hiddleston all on equally sensational form. Hiddleston’s fleet footed and kind faced turn as Charles Krantz, the mysterious titular Chuck, serves as a symbolic through line for the entire film. However in reality the film only functions and manages to weave its meticulously interconnected tale thanks to constantly superb performances from the entire cast. Hiddleston’s presence may loom both literally and metaphorically large across the screen but it’s ultimately a grand story of multitudes not just one man.
That said Hiddleston’s famously talented dancing prowess does create one of the film’s most instantly memorable and joyous sequences. It’s an eye catching and shamelessly crowd pleasing moment alongside a steady string of more subtle yet equally uplifting moments.
Overall the film’s ability to find life affirming comfort in the face of seemingly dire disaster and doomed hopelessness feels like a welcome and much needed gift in the increasingly troubled world we now inhabit.
The Bad
As with all grand mysteries this film begins by posing a myriad of unapologetically profound questions for audiences. All of the films mystique is tied to the promise of the grand reveal of eventual answers. Though the film does indeed ultimately deliver on that promise, naturally it won’t entirely satisfy everyone. The boundless ambiguity of metaphysical and supernatural questions allows audiences a little too much room to imagine their own wildly varied explanations. Meaning that when the film does eventually provide a single definitive concrete outcome it will naturally differ from what some people may have hoped for or expected.
That’s not an indictment of the film’s genuinely clever and largely satisfying narrative, just an acknowledgement that mysteries are perhaps always at their most potent when unsolved. In reality most audiences will be pleased that at least the film does deliver firm choices and resolution rather than simply getting hopelessly lost in its own premise or attempting to fudge some kind of deliberately open ended climax.
The Ugly Truth
A brilliant ensemble cast breathe compelling life into a story which is both cosmically grand and touchingly intimate in equal measure. A patient script and earnest performances keep audiences compelled and captures a great deal of Stephen King’s celebrated brilliance. It’s a complex yet simple tale that guides audiences through daunting supernatural mysteries towards satisfying and deeply life affirming conclusions.
Borderlands Review
The Plot
A mismatched team of outlaws and fugitives are forced to search together for a mythical alien treasure on the most dangerous planet in the Galaxy. They have to battle through all manner of monsters, private armies and hordes of barbaric psychos in order to survive and unlock the true mysteries of Pandora.
The Good
Fans of the bestselling video game series will be relieved that this long in development big screen outing finally made it to cinemas. As whatever its flaws this film is likely to be the only crossover media experience gamers get to enjoy for the franchise. To that end it at least manages to introduce the series to some new fans and pay knowing homage to some of the familiar and clearly beloved characters. Hopefully this also helps push the games series forward and encourages renewed efforts to ensure further instalments in the now long running series are crowd pleasing hits.
While it’s impossible to ignore the film’s obvious flaws it is fair to say that certain characters from the game series survive the transfer to the big screen better than others. Comedic robot sidekick Claptrap, voiced enthusiastically by Jack Black, is one such highlight. His antics provide the film with rare moments approaching genuine humour, standing out amidst an otherwise drab sea of miscasting and failed flat delivery.
The Bad
The biggest mystery of Borderlands is not what hidden alien treasures lie buried in the mythical vault, but why Oscar winner Cate Blanchett ever accepted the thankless task of playing the lead role in such an obviously ill-fated video game adaptation.
The 55 year old screen icon looks instantly badly misplaced in neon red hair and a costume seemingly borrowed from a low budget 90s kid’s Saturday morning sci-fi show. Perhaps director Eli Roth and the producers mistakenly hoped that shoehorning an A list dramatic actress into the role of gun toting intergalactic bounty hunter Lilith would lend the production some much needed credibility and distinguish it from other lacklustre big screen video game adaptations.
Unfortunately in reality this decision tragically backfires on the film as luring in household name stars like Blanchett and Kevin Hart only serves to emphasise their obvious miscasting and the missed opportunity to allow fresh faces to provide these popular video characters with more authentic personality.
Audiences are growing more adept at quickly sensing cash grab insincerity and sadly for Borderlands it felt painfully obvious from the first look trailer that this was a film awkwardly assembled by a marketing committee with the embarrassing goal of luring audiences into a disappointing experience. Plagiarising very obviously from James Gunn’s Guardians of The Galaxy, Borderlands tries to recreate the appealing intergalactic magic of catchy classic rock songs and wry wisecracks, but it just feels instantly inferior and joyless.
Almost every aspect of Borderlands feels borrowed and unoriginal, simply a shameless regurgitation of supposedly popular genre tropes wrapped in bad costumes and disappointing CGI. The film somehow manages to look both obviously ill-advisedly expensive and awkwardly ‘cheap’ at the same time. The planet of Pandora is a desert like wilderness strewn with literal trash piles and quite clearly cobbled together through a tragic mix of sound stages and horribly ineffective CGI.
Set against this drab backdrop of failed production value it’s impossible for even household name stars like Blanchett, Hart and Jamie Lee Curtis to invest audiences in proceedings. A threadbare script lacking in ideas, laughs or subtle plot twists also dooms the cast to total failure.
A special mention sadly also must go to young Disney starlet Arianna Greenblatt, her performance as brattish bunny ears wearing bomb enthusiast Tiny Tina is painfully obnoxious and helps push the film even closer to the brink of being truly unwatchable. The fact the much of the film’s plot requires her to be the damsel in distress the misfit band of space antiheroes must rally around to protect makes her chronic unlikability even more unfortunate.
The Ugly Truth
Borderlands is destined to be one of this year’s biggest box office misfires but deservedly so. Miscast star names an awful script and low quality production value throughout makes this a truly joyless space romp that squanders any potential the genuinely fun video game franchise might have had. It feels tragic that studios are still making these sort of embarrassingly costly mistakes in 2024. This feels like the kind of paint by numbers atrocious video game adaptations that would have been greeted with dismay decades ago. It’s a badge of shame for all involved that this film exists as such a disappointing reminder that sometimes Hollywood truly never learns.
Twisters Review
Loosely set in the same universe as the cult classic 90s film, this belated sequel sees a new generation of storm chasers flung recklessly into the path of nature’s fury as they seek to unlock the destructive mysteries of tornedoes for professional and personal reasons.
The Good
For fans of the original film this sequel serves as both a timely reminder and earnest homage to a fondly remembered cult cinematic favourite. While only loosely tied to the original film this return to the ill-advised thrills of storm chasing seeks to recapture the spirit of one of the most memorable blockbuster films of its era. To that extent it adopts a very similar approach to Jurassic World, with both that film and now Twisters effectively serving as a soft reboot/remake of the original, borrowing the concept and world setting whilst introducing an entirely new generation of characters.
One advantage of this is that Twisters can easily be viewed as a standalone film without any need to be familiar already with the 90s original. At the same time returning fans will find just enough obvious references to the first film to recognise the world and feel that the new filmmakers have sufficiently preserved the core components of the newly formed franchise.
While the original film was marketed on the grounds of its awe inspiring effects, bringing the unique terror of tornedoes to life it was in fact largely held together by the compelling human appeal of stars Helen Hunt and Bill Paxton. While it’s obviously impossible to fully replicate those brilliant star turns, the new film at least does well in adding Glen Powell as a likably rugged leading man.
The Bad
While the original Twister was a memorably ground-breaking accomplishment in cutting edge special effects that fused practical tricks with the exciting new frontier of CGI wizardry, sadly this sequel simply can’t replicate that impact. After decades of advances in visual effects audiences are quite simply immune to any sense of shock and awe in the face of any well animated cinematic mayhem.
Robbed of the ability to show audiences anything truly new or more convincingly ‘real’, this new film sadly has its obviously strained plot points and weaker acting moments far more cruelly exposed. Sadly this also worsens the already nagging doubt that this much belated and some would argue redundant sequel is purely a predictable repetition of the original.
Twisters biggest problem is that it’s even more awkwardly noticeable in a second film just how hard the film has to work to come up with plausible excuses to repeatedly put its heroes in the destructive path of a conveniently frequent series of exponentially big ‘killer storms’.
In a modern world full of drones and genuine cutting edge fully automated technology it’s tricky to avoid wondering why anyone really needs to be careening around in trucks a few feet from the edge of apocalyptic size Tornedos. Likewise even when the intrepid storm hunters do take a sensible break from actively driving into danger, it’s a little awkwardly convenient that more monstrous storms seem equally determined to simply come and find them instead.
While the original film mostly managed to hide these obvious flaws in logic and common sense beneath jaw dropping effects and a surprisingly compelling human story, sadly those elements fall far more flat in this sequel, leaving audiences a little too much time to notice how unrealistic or unnecessary the whole spectacular spectacle really is.
The original film had such a satisfying and seemingly conclusive narrative that it’s easy to expect audiences to find themselves quick to question the need to essentially repeat the entire premise purely for some slightly better data sets.
The Ugly Truth
Twisters conspicuously retraces all the steps of the original film but sadly with much diminished returns. It can’t recreate the shock and awe of the once ground-breaking special effects for an audience now fully desensitised to CGI destruction. Likewise a mostly bland cast can’t match the memorable chemistry of the 90’s film. Shoehorning in heavy handed messages about corporate greed and watering down the romantic subplot this time aren’t improvements either.
Ultimately Twisters perhaps works best for newcomers who won’t realise how heavily plagiarized the sequel feels or for devoted fans of the original who will simply accept this as long overdue celebration of the original.