Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides Review

I finally watched the fourth installment of the preposterously lucrative and popular "Pirates of the Caribbean" franchise, entitled, with barely a breath to spare, "Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides." They should have divided it up into parts just to be a little extra ridiculous, and acknowledged which installment. Imagine: "Pirates of the Caribbean Four: On Stranger Tides: Part 1: The Fountain of Youth." 


But no, seriously, Pirates 4 (much easier) is not very good. Or "good" for that matter. In a nutshell, Pirates 4 mirrors the last film in many ways: the special effects still dazzle, explosions abound and astound, sword-fights are exquisitely heart-pounding, and there is a lot of water. Unfortunately, most of the cons have carried over as well: needlessly overwrought dialogue, an overly ambitious plot, a weak script with weaker performances, and new characters we could care less about. Perhaps the most glaring failure of this installment as well as its predecessor is how tiresome [Captain] Jack Sparrow has gotten over the years.


As far as I know, most people will concede that the first "Pirates" film is still the best. Of course, when confronted with the ever-astounding "Why is that so?" I'll probably get a blank stare and an explanation not unlike "because it's the original. Duh."


Albeit, most franchises tend to hold the first installment most prominently - the shiny trophy that everyone still holds the standard to. Yet there are plenty of trilogies and what-have-you that improved with time, and even if this weren't true, this doesn't mean that just because something came first, it is automatically better. How many parents consider their oldest child their most sacred? Practically none. And don't even get me started on middle-children.


It's usually the "only" children who get the best treatment. They don't have to comprise quantity for quality or vice-versa because they get A LOT of AWESOME things. Thus, while I certainly have enjoyed all the Pirates films up to this point, even "On Stranger Tides," not only do I vastly prefer the original but I think it should have been left alone.


Leave it to our industry to milk one good thing for all its worth, though. I'm looking at "The Hangover 2" or "Part 2" or "The Same Movie You Saw 2 Years Ago but in Asia." Okay, I haven't seen it, but that's what I'm expecting and that's probably what I (i.e. we) will get.


But you're not reading this because you want to hear me moan about a movie that hasn't come out yet! No! You're probably here because I guilt tripped you into reading and "liking" this because I fear no one cares about my opinion! And also to (maybe) hear more about Pirates 4.


Everything I've just said applies to the new "Pirates" so far, though. It's giving us more of what we want... it's not giving us pirates and the open sea and the hilarious antics of a monkey; it's giving us Captain Jack Sparrow. Realistically, the film might as well be called "Pirate of the Caribbean." Throughout the years, I've still held Captain Hector Barbossa as the best character and the scene-stealer, from the beginning up to now. In the first film, Sparrow and Barbossa were about on equal footing, but due to my instinctive need to be "different," I gave Barbossa the upper-hand. And I've proudly stood my ground. Jack Sparrow (oh, sorry, Captain Jack Sparrow, because that joke hasn't gotten old) has just lost his touch. He chimes in with a witty one-liner here and there, and Depp's acting is impeccable, but those are his best characteristics. In the original Pirates, top billing went to Bloom and Knightley before Depp. Of course, Sparrow is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay better than "Will Turner" and "Elizabeth Swan" in almost every respect, but using him as a secondary character worked tremendously better than putting his face on EVERYTHING and up-selling it. 


But that's Disney, isn't it? They've become so successful because they know how to milk. If the Disney corporation was a farmer's company, we would be drinking milk out of our faucets. And speaking of milk, that's what I'm comparing Jack Sparrow to. A lot of people love him! Some think he's gross. Others just don't care or can't really get into him (probably due to a medical condition). But he's only great for so long and in spurts; you leave him around for a whopping EIGHT years, he's going to grow gross and he'll need to be thrown away. At that point, the only people that will like him are the same who prefer chunky moldy milk.. you know, the weird people.


Alright, no offense to the Jack Sparrow devotees. I still like him and, as stated before, Depp's performance is brilliant. There's only so many times he can stumble around in an effeminate matter, get a close up on his gold teeth, and make fun of anyone and everyone he can. That got pretty old in the second film, let alone the third and fourth. But nothing "piratey" is going to sell unless Depp's mug is all over it, so what else can you expect?


Also stated above, all the effects and blockbuster elements are there and just as good as ever, despite lacking a whirlpool vortex of doom. The action sequences are all directed superbly, though the film delved into camp territory with the whole mermaid sequence. Also, I'm sure plenty of people were excited for the idea of "zombies" in Pirates 4, but they're not there. I mean, they are, but nary a zombie-related concept is referenced. They serve as loyal, super-strong subordinates of Captain Blackbeard, and that's it. I think there is a scene where someone stabs one of the zombies through the heart, and then the zombie doesn't die. Awesome.


Speaking of Captain Blackbeard, what the f***? Here's a list of what Captain Blackbeard can, allegedly, do with his mystical sword of God:

-Shrink objects
-Create weather
-Telekinetically control inanimate objects
-Raise people from the dead (and then give them the power of super strength and receive eternal loyalty)
-Voodoo
-Probably something else that I forgot

A good argument, one that I uphold, against most of my grievances is the simple "It's a movie, get over it!" Alas, everything in a film has to go together and be consistent. So while the "Kraken" hasn't been proven to exist and Tia Dalma can summon thunderstorms and grow into the 50-foot woman at will, excuse me for being taken aback when Blackbeard can f***ing control things with his mind. If he had a white beard, people would have thought this was a Harry Potter/Lord of the Rings/Pirates crossover, except not knowing who was who. Blackbeard was never referenced before this (much less his superpowers), so yes, it's shoddy writing when that's how they pose him as a threat. These powers don't even help him accomplish anything! Each of these magical abilities are exposed once, then forgotten. So who cares if he's psychic? Barbossa and Davy Jones were way more iconic and they didn't resort to raising the dead to do it. Sure, knock them for being supernatural since one was a REAL zombie and the other was a fishman, but these were both concepts that were referenced and kept consistent throughout the films. The world of Pirates of the Caribbean, despite being far from "realistic," has mostly posed plausible situations (at least within its own territory). I don't think any pirates escaped being hung or shot in the manner (or as many times) as Jack Sparrow has, but at least he didn't just summon a cloud that took him away as it rained fire on his enemies. No, he (more or less) cleverly utilizes his surroundings to his advantage to flee from his pursuers, only using lethal violence as a last resort. He's kind of like Batman. Batman is awesome. So is Jack Sparrow (when he's doing stunts).


His main nemesis in the film? Everyone, I guess, but his main-main nemesis is Blackbeard. It's beyond me why Blackbeard even has a sword when he can control ropes with his mind to hang a dozen people or just shrink them to the size of a shilling and the squash them. Or, better yet, why didn't he just kill everyone and then raise them from the dead? He would have an unbeatable army of pirates who obey ONLY HIM. If Sparrow is like Batman (who is awesome), then Blackbeard is like an evil Superman (who is overpowered and awful).


And just because every movie ever released absolutely has to have a romantic sub-plot (which, if you read any of my other reviews like a real friend, you'd know I hate), you have two to tango with: Jack with Angelica (Penelope Cruz) and some mermaid who was named, like a newly bought puppy, "Syrena" with a crazy religious fellow named Philip (Astrid Frisbey and Sam Claflin, respectively). I find it peculiar and a bit funny that Philip is heavily referenced as being a man of God, always donning a bible and talking about saving one's soul and whatnot, but the guy gets stabbed twice, is tied to the mast of a ship for a veiled amount of time, and is even patronized for his beliefs. Realistically, though, he is the only "good" character with the only "good" morals and objectives. I was always a fan of Sparrow's ever-ambiguous side-taking, but in the end he's just selfish and trusts no one. Despite never really liking Swan or Turner from the older films, their innocence and naiveness were charming and complimented Sparrow's performance and hilarious lines, usually at their expense. If you've seen the last three films, you'll know it's bad when you start to miss Swan and Turner.  Every other character is virtually the same, with the small exception of Angelica, but even she double-crosses a few times. 


And she's a pirate so by default she's going to hell. But back to Syrena and Philip, their ..."relationship" is severely underplayed. Philip apparently loves her, but with no justification. She's a bone-munching version of "The Little Mermaid," and even Ariel was a thief and an idiot. In the end, he falls for her for her looks... which, coming from a morally positive man of the Lord, is a pretty shallow reason to fall in love with someone. And a stupid one, at that, considering that's their feature that kills people. They lure men with their angelic beauty, and then eat them. That's like if you became infatuated with Freddy Kreuger because he's the man of your dreams. So why would you trust her, Philip? I'm still convinced she killed and ate him at the end, for the record. 


You know what, though? None of my words matter. None of the words of any critic or any person in the world will matter. If you've seen the last three films, you will most likely be watching this one for the shameless popcorn-movie that it is. Several instances of the film make absolutely no sense (both physically and psychologically), none of the characters are interesting, certain questionable elements (like a certain accident that has befallen Barbossa) are flat-out explained to the audience like an end-user license agreement, Sparrow's funniest moments aren't in this film, and it just feels rushed and haphazardly thrown together. I totally approve of another installment of the "Pirates" franchise, but I sincerely wish they downplayed Sparrow a bit, had a more interesting and well-developed story, more interesting characters (Blackbeard is hardly a villain, especially compared to Davy Jones) and made it less than two hours. I enjoyed the film, mainly by pretending I was a 5 year old boy who was permitted to watch a "big boy" movie by my mom, but upon realizing I have quadrupled in age since then, I also realized my intelligence and dignity have as well.


...Even if I still threw $8.50 at Disney for this movie. But I did it angrily.


4.0/10
-Kyle Shelton

Zombieland Review: As Close to Zombie Heaven as you can Get

Vampires! Mummies! Zombies! Oh my! While the Mummy craze is pretty much dead and gone (being composed of only 3 films by the same people: The Mummy), Vampires and Zombies conquer the modern horror sub-genre. Vampires, especially, have grown in popularity quite significantly, what with HBO's True Blood series and the ever-popular "Twilight" saga, but Zombies of old and new are gaining more and more hype as days go by. Perhaps what will kick-start the neo-zombie movement is Ruben Fleischer's directorial debut, Zombieland.

As you could probably assume from the title itself, Zombieland is a film about a world inhabited by zombies, with few survivors remaining: Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson), the "badass" rebel-without-a-cause zombie slayer, Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg), the shy yet smart teen, Wichita (Emma Stone), the rambunctious teenager who trusts no one, and Little Rock (Abigail Breslin), Wichita's younger sister who is as devious as she is cute.

Holy Hell, is it a fun film.

Columbus sets 30+ rules for surviving the post-apocalyptic world of the undead such as: always wear a seatbelt, always check the backseat, be careful with bathrooms, cardio and double tap. After traveling a while back to his hometown of Columbus, Ohio to discover the fate of his parents, he meets Tallahassee, who is driving down the road in a pseudo-armored Cadillac Escalade. They decide to travel together, and along the way they teach each other new things while encountering hordes of more zombies, as well as Wichita and Little Rock, both of whom like to scam and trick people into getting what they want. From there, hilarity ensues.

Zombieland is a film you can't judge heavily, considering its overall purpose is to serve as a silly slapstick comedy, smacked with a zombie label. At its core, though, its a witty parody of the zombie movie genre. It can be viewed as a B-movie exploitation film that populated the 60's and 70's if it weren't for its overwhelming self-awareness. While Zombieland is fun, fun, and more fun, it has its share of faults that hold it back from being the undead savior we've been waiting for.

First off, as I just stated, its self-awareness is blatant and just a bit impeding on what the film wants to be. Yes, Zombieland is a parody and makes fun of the zillions of other films it so gleefully rips off, and it knows it, which seems to be as much of a drawback as a push forward. In one sense, Zombieland would be nothing without its own sinister sense of humor, but in another sense, it plays off itself so much that it expands out of the "movie" realm and into the "look how funny this is" realm.

Zombieland also has its own sense of style, but falls inconsistent too many times. The "rules" that CGI themselves into the narrative are funny and fall into place rightly enough in the first 1/4 of the movie, but eventually are sporadically spread out through different scenes to the point where they're completely forgotten about but make an appearance just to remind you they existed. They were an interesting theme/motif at the beginning, but by the end, they're played out and uninteresting.

The four main characters, although fun, are relatively shallow. Columbus is your run-of-the-mill "ordinary world" hero archetype whose self-proclaimed phobias never really come into play throughout the film. Tallahassee is also your typical "badass" hero who loves guns and smacking the bejesus out of the horde of undead and doesn't like getting too close to anyone. The sisters, Wichita and Little Rock, are the most fun characters considering their deviousness and trickery, but ultimately they repeat a redundant pattern and eventually have their "turn around" moment of goodness.

The characters lead to the plot of Zombieland (as if it needed one). It's predictable from beginning to end. Sure, Little Rock fooled me the first time I saw her, but I figured out the sisters' calculating course after that. Also, the plot falls too formulaic by the end, with an unnecessary (and purely humorous) love story that only really develops at the very end; in fact, there's no real development of the connection between Wichita and Columbus other than the clearing of the hair over a girl's ear that he so whimsically desires to accomplish. Rather than subtle or progressive changing, each character has a big turnaround in their lifestyles within the last 15 minutes of the film. That throws off the pacing; that is to say, you will most likely enjoy the first half of Zombieland than the second.

The first half relies on style more than substance (naturally) to showcase the powerful filmmaking and ballet-style cinematography of the director and the cinematographer, which is where Zombieland has its golden moments. The opening sequences are extremely exciting, demonstrating slow motion gore and humor in ways never seen before. There's also a fun scene in a "Kemo Sabe" store that, if you're a fan of destruction, will satisfy your annihilation funny bone better than any Michael Bay flick. Then you start getting to the second half of the film, which attempts to finally blend style with substance, which every movie should do. Ultimately, it fails. The reason for the failure seems to be that the director somewhat forgot that Zombieland was an exercise in "coolness" and tried to put some real character development and emotional feeling into the fragment of a story he had. Of course, for any semi-serious portion of the film was an outstandingly funny segment in close following, so at least Zombieland never completely diverts from its core, but it does drive off-course enough to be relatively annoying.

All in all, you won't really care for the characters; if it wasn't for the comedy that each of them emit from time to time, you wouldn't be attached at all. For what Zombieland does right, it does right big. For everything else that Zombieland tried to be, which to me, felt like the perfect rounded movie, it dreadfully falls flat. I was excited to see the zombie-exploitative gore fest of fun, which I did, but not to the degree I was truly expecting. The sisters' stories bothered me the most, though; was it really that important to travel to a cheesy childhood wonderland? Of course, only to...well, when you watch the film, you'll realize how idiotic the ending was; it became an excuse for the slaphappy super-fun itchy-trigger undead destruction carnival to take place in an amusement park. When it comes down to it, a lot of the film just ends up using excuses to set up another scene instead of story progression or, well...logic. God forbid I'm ever stuck with a man who solely lives to eat a Twinkie when the apocalypse takes place. Enjoy Zombieland's extremity in the extreme for the first half or so, but try your best to sit through any of the slower parts toward the end...and also, turn off your brain: other than not getting eaten by zombies, you may be able to fully extract all the satisfaction you can out of this film made by the very same zombies by doing so. Zombieland is creative in its own right and certainly an entertaining popcorn movie, but it may have suited the Summer movie rush more than the Fall. The film is eye-candy, through and through, and that's it. While most may argue that Zombieland is supposed to be stupid-funny and its not trying to win any oscars, its an unbalanced bag. The writing is actually clever and fun, never diluting itself to tasteless jokes (ahem, Transformers 2), but the dialogue is the only part of the writing that really holds tight. Kudos to the style and cinematic powerhouse of direction and flare...negative kudos to everything else.

6.5/10

Zombieland Preview: Amuzement and Zany Zombie Fun For All!

Well, if you know me personally, then you know that I am a sucker for anything having to do with zombies, pirates, ninjas, robots, dinosaurs, or any conglomerate combination of the such. Well, I look out for zombie movies in particular because they are a bit difficult to create well. Luckily, though, Woody Harrelson is here to save the day...I give you Zombieland:



Now, from this trailer, we can deduce one thing: Zombieland is meant almost entirely to be a comedy schlock-and-awe type of film. So if you're looking for some Romero recall, look elsewhere; this is all fun and games, even after an eye gets poked out. From several glances, Zombieland seems to tell the tale of a group of adolescents who find solace from the overrun world of zombies with a rebellious drifter-type badass named Tallahassee played by Harrelson. The cuts of all the different weapons being used, the "zombie kill of the week" clip, and the sarcastic, documentary-esque voiceover all point to one thing: fun.

And the camera work and visual style are a little different looking, but I can't put my finger on how, exactly. It looks a tad bit low-budget, which is fine especially considering its a zombie flick, and just seems like its unprofessional. You could probably ignore this entire paragraph, but I like it because it looks to be a shallow yet exciting and interesting feature. When an old lady drops a piano on a crazy, carniverous undead mutant, you know its going to be a good time. Bill Murray, Abigail Breslin, Emma Stone, and Jesse Eisenberg are also slated to star.

At any rate, keep your eyes peeled, if you're into zombies and gore films like I am anyway, for Zombieland, hitting theaters this October!