Tag: Disney

Geekscape Movie Reviews: John Carter

by Molly Mahan

Last Friday, I saw John Carter in a movie theatre at 12:30AM, with approximately seven other movie goers. I didn’t go because I was pumped up for the flick–to be honest, aside from a couple of billboards around the LA area, I knew very little about it. From the pictures, I honestly thought he was fighting dinosaurs not some crazy martian creatures (to my credit, I only saw the images while driving and noted that he was fighting large green things). Needless to say, like most of the domestic market, I didn’t have any expectations about the film other than it was probably going to be a huge bomb and suck. Turns out, I was only half right–lucky for me, not so lucky for Disney.

Although the film has its problems, I thoroughly enjoyed it. I am still amazed it was ever made with a $250million budget. Not to say it didn’t feel like a movie with that kind of budget–it did–but, wow. If I was a creative executive at Disney, no matter how much I love the story, I don’t think I would allow for it. After all, it’s a straight forward pulp story, and those kind of tales don’t really have an audience anymore. Case in point: people went to see the last Indian Jones for nostalgia purposes and not for the love of the genre, that’s why it failed. Not because of the 4th dimensional being aspect. And, I’m sorry to anyone who feels different, but an alien religion which believes that knowledge is power isn’t all that strange or farfetched when you previously dealt with face melting artifacts, witch doctors, and immortality granting cups of water. (I’m not saying Crystal Skull was a good movie within the genre, but if aliens are you’re concern, then you aren’t paying much attention.)

So, tell me there’s a movie out there with a blockbuster budget about a civil war soldier being sent to Mars and fighting in their civil war,  based on a book that’s over a hundred years old with no existing franchise or fanbase, I’ll laugh in your face. Hollywood doesn’t make those kinds of leaps of faith anymore. Right? Apparently not.

The movie begins with images of the planet Mars and the typical voice over of, “So you think you know … but you don’t!” before bring us into the middle of a Martian battle, where one of the Martian leaders (a “Jeddak”) has control of some blue, mystical force, which we will later learn can be used for great good or evil (like nuclear). Then, we are taken back to earth, where John Carter has just sent a telegram to his nephew, Edgar (“Ned” in the message, and no doubt a reference to the author of the original stories) requesting his immediate presence.

When Edgar arrives at his uncle’s estate some time later, we learn that John Carter is dead and has left everything to his nephew. Edgar is just as confused as the rest of us, when Carter’s lawyer hands him a diary which may or may not explain Carter’s wishes, as only Edgar is allowed to read it. Once he is alone, Edgar begins to read the story  that is the rest of the movie: One day, living a pointless life now that his side lost the war, he accidentally comes across a Thern (an otherwise immortal alien race that attempts to control the destiny of the cosmos)  in a cave in the Arizona desert and shoots him. The dying Thern reaches for a medallion, which Carter takes, repeating the Thern’s dying words which send him to Mars.

Now on Mars (“Barsoom” in the Martian tongue), he gains Golden Age Superman powers–speed and the ability to leap tall buildings in a  single bound–and runs into the green, four-armed humanoid race of Tharks.  He quickly becomes enslaved, but is a held in high regard by the Jeddak of the Tharks, Tars Tarkas (voiced by Willem Dafoe). Along the way, he meets the beautiful and scientifically brilliant princess Dejah Thoris (Lynn Collins) who has run away to avoid marrying the villainous Sab Than (Dominic West) and uniting their kingdoms to end the humans’ civil war on the planet, aids the Thrak outcast Sola (voice by Samantha Moon), and matches wits with the enigmatic Therns.

Although the pacing sometimes lacks (the scene of John Carter realizing he’s on Mars is pointless, as the audience is already aware of his location thanks to the prologue) and there is nothing new or spectacular about the action, the world is still fun, filled with characters and visuals I would like to see again. The adorable dog-like creature Woola that follows John Carter around throughout the film is a scene stealer, full of personality and the right mix of ugly and cute. My favorite element, however, were the costumes and machines, which are a cool sci-fi Egypto-Roman blend that made me momentarily nostalgic for Stargate.

Speaking of the ancient element of the film, I wondered how conscious the casting of Rome‘s Caesar and Mark Antony (Ciarán Hinds and James Purefoy, respectively) was as the Jeddak and Captain of Helium. Although their roles are important, they are rather brief and so the ethos of their earlier roles may be drawn upon. Additionally, I was curious why the filmmakers hid that Isis and goddess they worship on Barsoom (also Isis but pronounced “Is-is”) are the same. Considering the lack of subtly the rest of the film had, it was an odd choice to ignore.

The motives of the Thern are also a little vague, but their purpose in the plot serves.

Despite these issues, I still had a blast, as it was a decent film that didn’t try to take itself too seriously. So, if you’re looking to have your worldview changed, don’t bother. Although not quite so black and white as Avatar, the villains and plot turns are obvious. But, if you want to see a new world, filled with four armed apes, eight legged dogs, and attractive, tattooed humans, then bop on in to the theatre and make Disney feel a little better for trying.

First Photo From Disney’s The Lone Ranger Hits The Web

by Matt Landsman

Thinking about Disney’s The Lone Ranger, the term “Development Hell” comes to mind.  Producer Jerry Bruckheimer (Pirates of the Caribbean) tweeted this photo this morning from the film.  After some budget cuts, the film is finally on schedule and is slated for release May 31st, 2013 directed by Gore Verbinski. From the bird on his head to the warpaint, one can only wonder if Johnny Depp will be channeling The Crow.  Who’s excited for The Lone Ranger?

The first image of Johnny Depp and Armie Hammer in The Lone Ranger

Tim Burton’s Frankenweenie Remake Has a Trailer

by Saintmort

When I was a kid Tim Burton was my favorite director. I didn’t know who he was but based on the fact that four of my favorite movies as a kid (Frankenweenie, Pee Wee’s Big Adventure, Beetlejuice and Batman) were all directed by him it’s obvious I was a fan of his style. Frankenweenie I caught on the Disney channel one day and I assumed it was an old film being that it was black & white. And now Burton is remaking the film in the stop-motion animation style he’s become known for.

The trailer looks great, full of the same energy and fun as the original. I find it funny that this film is being put out by Disney since the original Frankenweenie led to Burton being fired by Disney for ‘wasting company resources’ on something ‘too scary for kids’.

Over 4 Minutes of John Carter Appears Online

by Jonathan

This past weekend, while waiting for Ghost Rider to start, Ian Kerner and I saw the new trailer for John Carter. We both had the same thing to say: “Well, I guess I’m gonna see it.”

Why is no one excited for this movie? Why is it tracking so poorly? Why are there rumors that it’s estimated $250 million budget might be the greatest write off in the history of Hollywood? Why does the entire marketing campaign leave us all so… apathetic?

And most confusingly, why are NONE of the ads stating “From the creator of Tarzan”!?!

Well, four minutes new minutes of footage, including a lot of the arena scene, have been released online, and they definitely help to get me a bit more excited about the movie, releasing in the States in just two weeks on March 8th. Now, I guess, Ian and I can both say “we’re definitely seeing this movie”. Besides, we did see (and enjoyed) Ghost Rider.

What do you guys think?

Edgar Wright to Helm Johnny Depp’s The Night Stalker

by Gilmore

In what promises to be the highest grossing Edgar Wright (and lowest grossing Johnny Depp) movie of all time, Disney is remaking the 1970s TV hit The Night Stalker into a feature film.

The original TV movie/series was about a Chicago newspaper reporter, Carl Kolchak (played by Darren McGaven), who investigates unsolved mysteries and crimes that end up having been perpetrated with vampires, werewolves, aliens and other supernatural beings, which is why it makes sense that Disney wants it. They’re getting it cheap/easy because it used to be an ABC show, so it makes sense and everyone’s happy.

According to Deadline, Edgar Wright is set to direct the feature and has agreed (but has not yet been confirmed) to helm the entire project, meaning he’ll get to write it as well since they haven’t hired anyone to do that yet.

The entire project was originally Depp’s idea, and with Edgar Wright’s whimsical directing style and amazing grasp of the best parts of sci-fi, fantasy and the supernatural, this movie should actually be watchable. And hey, maybe it’ll lead to another awesome franchise so that Disney can keep Johnny Depp locked up in a dungeon for another decade.

Johnny Depp is like Disney’s Katie Holmes

It will be a family-friendly, PG-13 film most likely targeted at Disney’s regular wheelhouse of “everybody who doesn’t hate happiness”.

The film has a tentative release of 2014 according to IMDb.

Loud and Clear?

by Jonathan

It goes without saying (but I’m going to say it anyways): Our children are our future.

Me? No. I don’t have kids. I have dogs. And you can’t take dogs into public movie theaters. But if I could no doubt even they would pick up on the not so subtle messages being presented to them in recent animated family blockbusters like Wall-E and Happy Feet. Both films tell the story of cute and loveable cast-outs forced to live among the ruinous influence of man. They are both underdogs against overwhelming odds, not only in their immediate social structures (that of more advanced robots and more singing-inclined penguins, respectively), but also against the encroaching destruction wreaked by humanity and their neglect for the planet. Both movies carry huge, whop you over the head like a mallet in Whack-A-Mole, sized messages of conservation, recycling and anti-pollution.

Is this the best way to get the message across? Well, I think that each film has a varying level of effectiveness. No doubt, this is the exact audience that this message needs to reach the most. Yes. Our children are our future? Me? I’ll be joining the 30-somethings in December. The card game is already long in the tooth and everybody knows the cards I’m holding. But the future of this planet lies in the hands of children who are being told something very clear from a source that they absolutely listen to: cartoons.

You know that scene in Disney’s Pinnochio where that jackass kid leads Pinnochio astray and starts smoking gets turned into, well, a jackass? That scene horrified me. I absolutely credit that nightmarish sequence as one of the reasons I’ve never picked up a cigarette. It kept me up at night for countless nights.  It completely scared me off of gambling and smoking (I have yet to properly learn the game of poker).

That approach is what was employed in George Miller’s Happy Feet. For the first half of the movie, you have one of the most magical animated stories I have ever seen. When that little egg pops out penguin feet and starts dancing around, you are in love. The entire time Happy Feet grows into adolescence, you are there. We recognize all of the moments: feeling outcast, your first love, striving to be the best at being you. The first half of Happy Feet was one of my favorite experiences in a theater that year.

Then something just… snaps. We meet the older penguin voiced by Mork from Ork. He’s got a plastic six-pack holder stuck around his neck. Okay. It’s Robin Williams so it’s still funny… right? I’m still with it, I guess. Then the heavier pollution themes begin to appear. The ice is melting. The oil tankers are coming. There’s a horrific scene where Robin Williams’ penguin appears to have died violently while gasping for air. The story begins to get weighed down to a crawl. Then it starts to bend under this weight. The audience checks their watches. Happy Feet gets caught in a net and brought into the world of man.

Then the movie turns into a SCI-FI HORROR FILM AND I AM SCARED! In minutes, Happy Feet goes from being something that I am completely invested in to something that scares the living hell out of me. The visual language of the film is from horror films. The themes and sounds resonate the darkest science fiction, alien invasion plots of the 1950s and 1960s. I am 100% creeped the fuck out. The kid next to me is covering his eyes. We are sharing the same expression on our faces. Our jaws are agape and our eyes are wide. Complete “what the hell is happening” fear.

In Happy Feet, the humans might be represented as faceless members of a whole but they are absolutely REAL. They are realistic in their compositions and rendering. They are human in their voices. The pollution and destruction that they have wrought are real world terrors from the front pages of our newspapers (or at least the papers that Al Gore and I read). There is an immediate recognition and attribution when these horrors and humans are on screen.

Is it too much? The movie went on to rake in all sorts of cash at the box office. We lived in a world of Happy Feet for 6 months. The film won an Oscar for Best Animated Feature (over the perfect Monster House). But I can’t help but think that many of us were left behind. For me, the language of the message was too much.

With Happy Feet I felt as though I was being scared into a certain way of thinking. The stance was obvious and I was being provoked into getting in line. The gradual brainwashing sequence in the film comes to mind. Happy Feet scared you into being a better person… for the good of our world.

Wall-E goes about the same message in a very different way. Here, the problems are magnified far beyond reality. Our world is already uninhabitable and has been for centuries. The Earth has already lost. Humanity has already begun a slow devolution as punishment for their myopic and selfish crimes. But you laughed! And even though the world in which Wall-E exists is severely separated from the reality we currently live in, we felt more empathetic towards it. This is a world we wanted to see succeed, even though the odds were that much more insurmountable. Despite its distance from us and the fact that our main character spoke in beeps and whirs, we were invested in its human element.

Wall-E’s complete separation from reality is what gives the message its effectiveness. We aren’t being scared into thinking a certain way. We are painted a picture and given the exaggerated facts and then left with them to make of what we will. THIS is the world of the future. THESE are the people of the future. THAT is what we are left with. The circumstances are SO extreme and farfetched that it gives us the safety to be able to look at the situation objectively. Rather than having a finger pushed in our face and being challenged to react, we are given an image of the world in the film and are asked “how did we end up like this?”.

My girlfriend Laura has an incredible tool that she has mastered through years of working in human resources. I no doubt discovered this tool by messing up somehow but I will spare you that story and share this lesson with you freely. It works wonders.

Simply, when you are met with an interpersonal communication problem, start each sentence with “help me understand…”. It’s fucking genius. “Help me understand why you borrowed my razor without asking me first.” “Help me understand how my XBox Live profile got deleted.” “Help me understand why you thought it was a good idea to have sex in the changing rooms while we were taking store inventory.” Try it. It works in every situation.

What it does is several things. First, it diffuses the problem a bit and keeps both sides from taking immediate defensive positions going into problem solving. Second, it places the ball in THEIR hands. It asks THEM to help YOU. Rather than defensively responding in a rush of excuses, the other side problem solves and processes the series of events that led to the current situation. YOU are the open-armed good guy. THEY are now on your team, working with you to make things right. Someone might be in the wrong, but you start digesting the problem from a neutral and balanced place.

Pixar’s storytellers are so damn smart. The entire world of Wall-E is presented in this way. Even in the opening shots, the film is saying “Help me understand…”. We see spires and mountains and skyscrapers of abandoned junk. The audience is asked by these images to answer… “what happened here?” They are shown the problems of the film’s world on a grand scale but never forced or manipulated into judging. Just given a simple “help me understand.”

On the flipside, Happy Feet does to audiences what I do to my dogs when they won’t eat their pills. I start them off with their food and I watch as they eat it. While they do, I quietly get a treat and bury a pill into it. Then I feed it to them. By the time the pill has been swallowed, it’s too late. I have tricked them! They definitely hate me for that and are defensive about it. Any human would be.

So I pose the question to you: when it comes to using animated films to teach our children lessons, what approach is more effective or welcome? The open armed, humorous distancing of Wall-E? Or the cold, harsh reality lessons of Happy Feet? At the end of the day, is the message getting through? Is the storytelling lost in the lesson or the lesson lost in the storytelling?

Please. Help me understand. Did the message get through to you?

Ollie Johnston: 1912-2008

by Jonathan

 

This morning I was thrown into a bit of reflection when Harry Knowles over at AICN ran a story about the passing of Ollie Johston. As of my last checking, IMDB has yet to pick up on this news. Harry says that he has known about Ollie Johnston almost his entire life. And it’s not hard to believe. Ollie Johnston was one of the Nine Old Men who, with Walt Disney, animated the classic Disney films and cartoons that we all grew up with.

We have ALL known Ollie Johnston our entire lives. We just didn’t know him by name. You’ve seen his animated characters countless times and you’ve even seen his face. Ollie Johnston, along with his best friend Frank Thomas, cameod in both of Brad Bird’s movies The Iron Giant and The Incredibles. Bird credits the pair as both his friends and his teachers. I was sitting in a press screening for The Forbidden Kingdom (expect a review tomorrow) and I overhead a conversation in the row behind me in which a woman was going on and on about how perfect the Pixar films are. They are perfect because John Lassetter and Brad Bird and all of the animation directors at Pixar worshipped in the church of the Nine Old Men!

My story about Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas is a bit different than Harry’s. During the summer of 2005 I was broke. Flat broke. In March, I had finished my work as a runner PA on the Kirstie Alley show Fat Actress and was looking for work. Up to this point, in two years in Hollywood, every job that I had was either as a runner or as a PA. Some of these stories are so rage-inducingly horrible that to share them with you now would be to invite the shattering of your own souls and your abandonment of cinema forever. Okay, it was bad and I was broke, but it wasn’t THAT bad. The consistency of my blood was mainly top ramen at that point.

Anyhow, in early May I received a phone call from an Austin friend who was leaving a job and wanted to know if I could take over. I didn’t care what it was. I had to take it. I asked what it entailed. “Being an office assistant.” For who? “A documentary filmmaker and his wife.” Oh man… I was getting further and further away from the box office Hollywood dreams with every word! What’s he done? “His name is Ted and he made a movie called Frank and Ollie. His dad animated the spaghetti scene in Lady and the Tramp.” Huh?!? What?!? My mind flashed back to being 8 and learning to read Spanish from a Donald Duck comic book on the steps of a pharmacy in Ajijic, Mexico while visiting my grandparents. My entire childhood was in worship of Mickey Mouse. Financial needs aside, I had to take this job!

Theodore and Kuniko lived 5 minutes away. Their office was local and they needed help with phones and transcriptions on some older projects plus a new documentary that they had in production. They were laid back and incredible to work with. I’ll tell you all about the new documentary as soon as Ted says it’s ready for festivals or exhibition but it is Disney history related. And for those few months that I worked for Theodore Thomas Productions, I felt as though I was showing up every morning to step into a time machine to my childhood.

For weeks I transcribed interviews that had been done with original Imagineers, animators, John Lassetter, Roy Disney, Brad Bird, you name it. This was footage that would end up mostly on the editing room floor in lieu of snippets and sound bites. But I got the lucky job of seeing and hearing how these people related to each other and worked with each other on a daily basis! After two years of seeing how I didn’t want Hollywood to work… I was finally seeing how Hollywood should! I was seeing how the magic that you and I joke about, actually was created by every day people doing their jobs!

Ted’s resemblance to his father Frank is incredible. Like Frank, Ted is a jazz musician. He sported a cool beatnick goatee and was excited about my beginning music video work. He and Kuniko acted like my biggest fans whenever I would show them my latest project or relay to them the latest news. Frank showed me photos of his dad and Ollie Johnston working alongside Walt Disney in the new Burbank offices after the company left the studio in Silver Lake. I watched interview footage of Ollie Johnston talking about how he got Walt into trains or the jokes they would tell or pranks they would pull.

In a few months, Hollywood suddenly became closer and working within it became more attainable. Watching films today or reading gossip rags or overhearing rumors you can quickly assume that the system does not work. You can become very cynical of anything and everything around you. Thousands and thousands of young filmmakers and aspiring creatives move out here every year but turn right back around when they are met with the intense negative climate associated with the industry. It’s a rat race with more rats than cheese.

But that summer with Ted and Kuniko taught me that you can’t focus on the rats. You have to focus on the mice. You have to celebrate the mice and you have to celebrate being a mouse. You have to do good and you have to do good work. You have to love to do it. Frank and Ollie loved what they did. I transcribed the love and saw photos of the love. We all sat in front of a television or in a theater as kids and RECEIVED that love through our eyes and ears. Frank and Ollie and the original Disney animators had talent in spades. But the inkwell that they dipped their talented pens into was the love for what they did. Magic was just the byproduct.

I love working. I loved working for Ted and Kuniko. I loved listening to the old stories and watching the footage of how the love of storytelling can overpower any myopic studio decision or cut-throat firing. Those months in the summer of 2005 recalibrated completely and refueled my creative engines. I haven’t looked back since. Hell! The main character in my project Singledom is a fledgling animator! I am SO thankful for this short period in my life!

The world of entertainment lost one of their biggest grandfathers in Ollie Johnston. But be thankful for all of the people that he has inspired in his time here. We will feel their magic but we may not yet know them all by name.

Frank and Ollie (Special Edition) and Walt – The Man Behind the Myth are both available for purchase or Netflixing. I highly recommend both of them for a better picture of Ollie Johnston, Frank Thomas and this incredible period in storytelling.