With my new Movie Review section, I’ve decided to continue my temporary enthusiasm for writing reviews by providing the occasional short review (or RevShts). And because two recent films deserve a mention: Happy Feet and Casino Royale.
Happy Feet (2006)
Elijah Wood, Hugh Jackman, Nicole Kidman, Brittany Murphy, Robin Williams
Dir: George Miller – 2006 – USA
Happy Feet tells of Mumble, an emperor penguin who doesn’t inherit
the trait of singing like all other emperors, but instead develops a
strange talent for tap-dancing. Meanwhile, the fish are disappearing
from the oceans and the elders of the penguin community believe it is
down to the lack of respect for tradition and the gods. Outcasted,
Mumble goes off to find the real reason for the missing fish – humans.
The animated movie bar has been set high by the likes of Pixar (Toy Story, Finding Nemo) and Dreamworks (Shrek), and for any other studio, it’s a high bar to reach. Happy Feet showed promise, particularly when I saw the 3D trailer in an IMAX theatre a few months ago, and the cuteness of penguins was always going to be a hit with the girls. Sadly though, while there is some fabulous choreography and some brilliant animation, the plot doesn’t match up to the quality of recent films by Pixar and Dreamworks. Nonetheless, the kids will love it!
Rating:
Casino Royale (2006)
Daniel Craig, Eva Green, Mads Mikkelsen, Judi Dench
Dir: Martin Campbell – 2006 – USA/UK/Ger/Cze
Probably the best Bond ever, most people say. Bond (Daniel Craig) starts out as a new recruit and quickly gets noticed for his ruthlessness and his enormous ego. Howeverm when he is assigned to attempt to bankrupt terrorism financier, Le Chiffre (Mads Mikkelsen), his beautiful assigned observer from HM Treasury, Vesper Lynd (Eva Green) steals his heart.
This is probably one of the darkest Bond movies done, and it succeeds where the almost equally darker Bond movies with Timothy Dalton failed. The humour is there, the storyline is one of the best for a Bond film and there has been a lot of work done on drawing out the personalities of the characters involved. Personally, I’ll go with the crowd’s opinion. I do think this is probably the best Bond movie ever.
Rating:
Links:
IMDb: Happy Feet, Casino Royale
Official Links: Happy Feet, Casino Royale