Go see John Carter. It was awesome. It’s an epic and encompassing science fiction film with a lot of heart and incredibly good storytelling. There hasn’t been a film like this in a very very long time and Andrew Stanton (writer/director of Finding Nemo and WALL-E) knocks it out of the atmosphere. It’s his first live action feature film but I’m not sure exactly how much of it is actually live action as a huge amount of the movie is CG aliens and special effects. John Carter is an origin story based on the first novel of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ 11-volume Barsoom series called A Princess of Mars. This is going to be a film that inspires kids to make films in the future.
The movie takes a little bit of time to work its 9th ray magic on you but once you’re introduced to the distinct characters and their historic backgrounds, you get swept away in this Barsoom world just as John Carter did himself. The movie is told as a story within a story with flashbacks of Carter’s past. Don’t worry, it’s not as confusing as I just made it sound. It’s actually a really impressive beginning to what is sure to be an expansive series of many many sequels. The story is gripping, fascinating, and full of wonder which is quite incredible for a source material dating back to 1912. Yes, this is the centennial year of the first appearance of John Carter.
Will Dejah be the new Disney Princess? I hope so!
John Cater stars Taylor Kitsch as John Carter and Lynn Collins as Princess Dejah Thoris…possibly the best Disney princess to date! There are other familiar faces as well like Mark Strong, Ciarán Hinds, James Purefoy, and even Bryan Cranston. Willem Dafoe and Thomas Haden Church lend their voices and likenesses to Tharks – one of the hordes of one of the many species on Mars. A very interesting aspect of this story is the sheer depth of “things” bestowed by the source material. It’s a whole different imagining of science fiction based on old science of yesteryear with a myriad of new animals, jargon, religion, traditions, architecture, clothing, and meaning. Though the action is still the same with massive brawls, sword-fighting, and hand to hand combat.
Tharks - be the sand, be the stone
This movie is literally for everybody. From young to old and man to girl. Disney definitely grew up a bit with this one showing corpses, blood of various colors, and more while not being too graphic. It’s rated PG-13 kids. There is plenty of action, comedy, and story to tide over both male and female. But as mentioned before, Dejah Thoris is a kickass princess and perfect role model for girls. She’s intelligent hailing from the Hall of Science, she’s beautiful yet playfulness isn’t her main purpose, and she can fend for herself! John Carter is a guy’s guy with bad boy compassion. He doesn’t fight any fights he doesn’t believe in or fight for anyone he doesn’t care about. He’s thoughtful and adventurous with a bit of spunk to him. Both main characters are very likable as well as the supporting cast.
awwwww! Woola!
But nobody is as likable as Woola, John Carter’s fasted and most loyal dog-like alien companion. He’s super cute AND super badass. There’s just so much to love in this epic adventure that I can only recommend that you experience it for yourself. There’s enough sci-fi to make geeks reminisce about why they love the genre in the first place but not enough to turn away unsuspecting people from enjoying a rich tale. It opens your eyes and wets your appetite for what’s to come. The 3D is unimportant as this movie is actually all about the story. Having said that, I did jump out of my seat during one scene and I have no idea why – it just seemed liked something flew at me. I honestly can’t wait to watch this movie again as well as every single sequel that comes out and ride every single ride Disney makes in its parks and watch every spin off TV show or comic book or whatever else they have in store. Go see John Carter. It was awesome.
Remember your high school prom? Getting ready for your upcoming one? I thought it was all about spiking the punch, getting a hotel room for the night and cutting loose with people you won’t have to see again until the reunion ten years later. According to Disney, however, it’s that magical night where no matter which clique or high school stereotype you were, it doesn’t matter and you can have a good time that you’ll remember for eternity. Prom is the most wholesome formulated flick I’ve seen in a long while. There’s no depth, hardly any emotion or anything unexpected. It’s the quintessential teen dramedy that girls will gossip over and guys…guys, why are you watching this?
The movie takes place three weeks before prom and everything is going according to plan but you know that’s about to change. Our narrator is Nova Prescott (Aimee Teegarden) who is the class president and head of the prom planning committee. She’s little miss perfect and has all her ducks in a row. She would win the “award for winning most awards.” She has her heart set on the other goody goody Brandon (Jonathan Keitz) to ask her to prom but if you know these movies there’s a bad boy that appears from behind fountains he fixes (you’ll get it once you see the movie). This bad boy is named Jesse Richter (Thomas McDonell) and has long hair, wears a leather jacket and rides a motorcycle…total stereotypical bad ass. He also has the stereotypical misunderstood heart of a fighter who takes care of his single mom and little brother.
Good Girl meet Bad Boy. Wait, haven't I seen this movie before? like a hundred times...
That’s the main story but this is an ensemble cast flick which moves from couple to couple. We have the obvious prom king and queen via player player/captain of the lacrosse team Tyler Barso (DeVaughn Nixon) and beautiful Jordan Lundley (Kylie Bunbury). The couple together since elementary school whose paths are about to separate with Justin Wexler (Jared Kusnitz) going to the University of Michigan and Mei Kwan (Yin CHang) heading to New York (she hasn’t told him yet). A musically obsessed sophomore friend duo – Lucas (Nolan Sotillo) and Corey (Cameron Monaghan) who try to get Lucas to finally ask out his cutest crush Simone Daniels (Danielle Campbell) who is being played by Tyler (o0o0o0o plot thickens). The zoned out Rolo (Joe Adler) who may or may not have a hot girlfriend from Canada that gossip queen Ali Gomez (Janelle Ortiz) doesn’t believe. And my favorite side plot…the awkwardly shy Lloyd (Nicholas Braun) and his step sister with the adorable smile Tess Torres (Raini Rodriguez). Whew, lots to keep track of but the stories are so straightforward and predictable…it’s not a problem.
Adorable Disney Munchkin.
The movie begins with all the cutesy creative ways guys ask out their dates out to the prom. Everything goes swimmingly except for Lloyd who can’t seem to catch a break and has many funny failed attempts with trying to ask out every single girl in school. In the weeks leading up to prom, everyone’s busy and Nova has no one to help her prepare for the big night. Bad boy Jesse gets in trouble with the principal and is ordered to assist Nova or not graduate. So as they get to know each other (and fall in looooooove), the other couples go through their mundane high school drama and before you know it everyone’s at the dance. You know the Disney formula: here are our characters, oh no…here’s a problem for each of the characters that they are obviously going to overcome, learn a lesson and then dance. The End.
These two are in high school...really?
There’s plenty to smirk about and go awwww over but the movie is as flat as high school teenagers…there’s just not much to work with. The major theme in this movie is to not make a big deal over whatever you’re worrying about and know that everything will work out in the end. No hard hitting themes like sex, drugs, abuse, bullying or even not going to college. Instead you get lines like my favorite: “but now I’m in this tree and you’re so beautiful.” Just rainbows and unicorns. This is pretty much perfect marketing timing for a bunch of high school girls to see a movie in anticipation of their own proms. So now you have to buy your prom tickets, find a date, get a limo, buy a tux or dress…and see this movie. So only one question left: Will you go to prom with me?
girls next to me every 5 minutes: "awww, he's so cute"
Old fairy tale brought back to life, beautiful princess, prestigious castle, lovable supporting characters. Tangled has all the elements of a great classic Disney film. Visually, it was stunning…story-wise, it was captivating…and song-wise, it was just enough. There was little wrong with Tangled and I think it’ll go down as another classic to add to the collection that has only been growing recently thanks to Pixar.
It was said that Disney went back to its roots with the 2D animated film, The Princess and the Frog, but I think they really went back to their roots with this one. It has the familiar formula that everybody remembers growing up with. In the likes of Snow White, Cinderella, and Belle, Rapunzel now has her place in a Disney castle. They took the story that everyone knows and somehow made it contemporary and timeless at the same time. Kids and adults will automatically “get” this film and easily relate. I can also see this being watched a decade or two from now like other Disney films and still have relevance.
Tangled tells the story of the long-haired girl trapped in a tower. In this creation, she’s a cute and naive eighteen year-old (voiced by Mandy Moore) dreaming to see the world and find her place in life (kind of like every eighteen year-old). She’s trapped by an old woman (voiced by Donna Murphy) who uses Rapunzel’s hair to stay young forever. She tricks Rapunzel into thinking that she’s her mother and reminds me of a mom from one of those Real Desperate Housewives shows…pretty hilarious but sad at the same time. She’s “rescued” by a charming thief named Flynn Ryder (voiced by Zachary Levi).
Rapunzel and Pascal dealing with Flynn Ryder
I think I counted six songs all together. None of them really stood out to me but a couple had that epic feeling. We’ll see if kids will be singing it on the way home and at school. I’m not exactly at that age anymore. What Tangled did really well in this movie were the animal characters. Everybody is going to fall in love with the dog-like palace horse named Maximus and Rapunzel’s chameleon friend Pascal. They truly stole the show along with a frying pan. “Frying pans. Who knew, right!?”
Mommy, can I have a frying pan for Christmas!?
The 3D was done perfectly in my opinion. It was mainly used for camera angle shots which added to the cinematic experience. You were immersed in the world as the story played out and kind of forgot you were watching a 3D movie…but in a good way! They had some great visual effects that only an animated CGI film could pull off (they have a huge advantage since everything is being done over the computer anyway). There is this one scene with two lanterns that just took my breath away…probably the best usage of 3D I’ve ever seen. One of the kids in the audience screamed, “Get it!” and all the kids had their hands out trying to grab the screen.
I want to learn how to make one of those lanterns...
Obviously this film was made and targeted to the young female demographic but there’s enough for all ages and genders. I honestly think I heard the adults laughing more than the kids…the kids were just mesmerized by the storytelling and 3D visuals while the adults were remembering why they fell in love with Disney in the first place. Guys will be tapping their shoes to a few of the songs and laughing at the band of misfit ducklings. There’s something for everyone and I already want to watch it again!
Want to see an advance screening of Disney Animation’s new film Tangled? Then head over to http://adisney.go.com/disneypictures/tangled/rsvp/ and RSVP for a pass before they run out. Trust me, they will go super fast.
How about a prize pack including t-shirts!? Klout is teaming up with Walt Disney Pictures to reward “influencers” with perks from the movie. You can sign up at http://klout.com/perks/tangled. Basically, they measure what you say on Twitter and Facebook to see if you can get other people to see the movie. So if you talk about Tangled a bunch of social media sites, you might get some free schwag in the mail! …or even a pass to an advance screening in one of these cities: Los Angeles, New York City, Washington D.C., Chicago, San Francisco, Houston, Austin, or Philadelphia.
Walt Disney Pictures presents “Tangled,” one of the most hilarious, hair-raising tales ever told. When the kingdom’s most wanted-and most charming-bandit Flynn Rider (voice of Zachary Levi) hides out in a mysterious tower, he’s taken hostage by Rapunzel (voice of Mandy Moore), a beautiful and feisty tower-bound teen with 70 feet of magical, golden hair. Flynn’s curious captor, who’s looking for her ticket out of the tower where she’s been locked away for years, strikes a deal with the handsome thief and the unlikely duo sets off on an action-packed escapade, complete with a super-cop horse, an over-protective chameleon and a gruff gang of pub thugs. In theaters this holiday season in Disney Digital 3D(TM), “Tangled” is a story of adventure, heart, humor and hair-lots of hair. — (C) Disney
Disney started their showcase with a first look at Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time starring Jake Gyllenhaal, produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, and directed by Mike Newell…all three were in attendance to talk about the movie. Prince of Persia is based on the popular video game of the same name. It follows the adventures of a prince who stumbles upon a mythical object which can affect time itself. He teams up with the princess of his rivals to stop a sandstorm which would end of the world. From what they showed and said, it’s definitely an action-packed summer blockbuster but Jerry kept highlighting the points that it would have lots of comedy and romance. Pretty much, it’s trying to have mass appeal and target the largest market possible. It was filmed in Morocco where it was said to be over a hundred degrees every day. Additionally, they sent teams around the world to take authentic pictures and bring back the images to build unique sets. But even with that backdrop, a lot of the movie will be computer generated. The footage they showed looked very common and bland. Granted, it’s still early and the scenes weren’t polished up yet. However, the time travel affects with the sand looked awesome as well as the scenes with snakes…they did some really cool things there. It’s reminiscent of the director, Mike Newell’s work in Harry Potter, very magical. You can expect a lot of free running/parkour type stuff from Jake who literally runs up walls.
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time comes out May 28, 2010.
Jerry Bruckheimer stayed in his seat as the panels changed because he was presenting his 2nd upcoming film with Disney, The Sorcerer’s Apprentice starring Nicolas Cage and Jay Baruchel and is directed by Jon Turteltaub. Set in modern-day, a college student in New York City finds himself in a magical battle between good and evil. He is destined to become a great and powerful sorcerer trained by an old wizard by the name of Balthazar. On the plot, Jon Turteltaub commented on how fundamental this plot is to Disney and that it originated from a segment in Fantasia. He comically said that obviously they’re not doing a cartoon for two hours of a mop (even though the iconic sequence of the mop is in the film). To me, the footage looked amazing. This is going to be a homerun for Disney and regain them some lost fans while gaining them a lot of new ones from the younger generation who has no idea what Fantasia is and would definitely not sit through it today. You can tell it’s still geared towards kids, but it looks really funny and entertaining…kind of a Harry Potter like feel. The Sorcerer’s Apprentice looks at magic a different way than Harry Potter though. Turteltaub said he wanted to create a very realistic and modern weird feeling as if you were in this world with the characters on the screen and then the magic would enter all of our lives.
The Sorcerer’s Apprentice opens on July 16, 2010.
Finally, Disney’s last film showcased was a continuation of a little known franchise from Disney Pixar called Toy Story 3. The third film in this series follows the characters as they are abandoned in a day care while their owner, Andy, goes away to college. At first, to all of the toys except Woody, it looks like a paradise but kids love new toys…The director, Lee Unkrich, said that it took two days in a cabin to come up with the story but over two and half years of storyboarding and fine tuning. He felt the pressure of taking this huge franchise and creating a third feature length film every day of the process of making it but it doesn’t look like he failed…every time a new character was shown to the audience, there was a collective “awww.” There’s no doubt in my mind that this film will resonate with the new generation of kids and that the old fans will flock back to see the new instalment. When an audience member asked Jeff Garlin about improvising in the movie he said that when the script is good, he doesn’t like to improvise. He likes to improvise in order to help a movie out but with Wall-E and Toy Story 3, he felt that the scripts were great so that should give you an idea of how good this one is going to be.
Toy Story 3 arrives in theaters on June 18, 2010.
Remember, they are doing a special cliffhanger screening (first hour of the movie) for college students. You can see if your city is included here: Toy Story 3 Advance Screenings
WonderCon is one of the country’s best comics conventions featuring guests and events for comics, movies, video games, and other popular media. This year, WonderCon had presentations by such Hollywood studios as Disney, Warner Bros., Sony, and Lionsgate. Visit WonderCon’s Official Website
Go see John Carter. It was awesome. It’s an epic and encompassing science fiction film with a lot of heart and incredibly good storytelling. There hasn’t been a film like this in a very very long time and Andrew Stanton (writer/director of Finding Nemo and WALL-E) knocks it out of the atmosphere. It’s his first live action feature film but I’m not sure exactly how much of it is actually live action as a huge amount of the movie is CG aliens and special effects. John Carter is an origin story based on the first novel of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ 11-volume Barsoom series called A Princess of Mars. This is going to be a film that inspires kids to make films in the future.
Remember your high school prom? Getting ready for your upcoming one? I thought it was all about spiking the punch, getting a hotel room for the night and cutting loose with people you won’t have to see again until the reunion ten years later. According to Disney, however, it’s that magical night where no matter which clique or high school stereotype you were, it doesn’t matter and you can have a good time that you’ll remember for eternity. Prom is the most wholesome formulated flick I’ve seen in a long while. There’s no depth, hardly any emotion or anything unexpected. It’s the quintessential teen dramedy that girls will gossip over and guys…guys, why are you watching this?
Old fairy tale brought back to life, beautiful princess, prestigious castle, lovable supporting characters. Tangled has all the elements of a great classic Disney film. Visually, it was stunning…story-wise, it was captivating…and song-wise, it was just enough. There was little wrong with Tangled and I think it’ll go down as another classic to add to the collection that has only been growing recently thanks to Pixar.
Disney started their showcase with a first look at Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time starring Jake Gyllenhaal, produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, and directed by Mike Newell…all three were in attendance to talk about the movie. Prince of Persia is based on the popular video game of the same name. It follows the adventures of a prince who stumbles upon a mythical object which can affect time itself. He teams up with the princess of his rivals to stop a sandstorm which would end of the world. From what they showed and said, it’s definitely an action-packed summer blockbuster but Jerry kept highlighting the points that it would have lots of comedy and romance. Pretty much, it’s trying to have mass appeal and target the largest market possible. It was filmed in Morocco where it was said to be over a hundred degrees every day. Additionally, they sent teams around the world to take authentic pictures and bring back the images to build unique sets. But even with that backdrop, a lot of the movie will be computer generated. The footage they showed looked very common and bland. Granted, it’s still early and the scenes weren’t polished up yet. However, the time travel affects with the sand looked awesome as well as the scenes with snakes…they did some really cool things there. It’s reminiscent of the director, Mike Newell’s work in Harry Potter, very magical. You can expect a lot of free running/parkour type stuff from Jake who literally runs up walls.
Jerry Bruckheimer stayed in his seat as the panels changed because he was presenting his 2nd upcoming film with Disney, The Sorcerer’s Apprentice starring Nicolas Cage and Jay Baruchel and is directed by Jon Turteltaub. Set in modern-day, a college student in New York City finds himself in a magical battle between good and evil. He is destined to become a great and powerful sorcerer trained by an old wizard by the name of Balthazar. On the plot, Jon Turteltaub commented on how fundamental this plot is to Disney and that it originated from a segment in Fantasia. He comically said that obviously they’re not doing a cartoon for two hours of a mop (even though the iconic sequence of the mop is in the film). To me, the footage looked amazing. This is going to be a homerun for Disney and regain them some lost fans while gaining them a lot of new ones from the younger generation who has no idea what Fantasia is and would definitely not sit through it today. You can tell it’s still geared towards kids, but it looks really funny and entertaining…kind of a Harry Potter like feel. The Sorcerer’s Apprentice looks at magic a different way than Harry Potter though. Turteltaub said he wanted to create a very realistic and modern weird feeling as if you were in this world with the characters on the screen and then the magic would enter all of our lives.
Finally, Disney’s last film showcased was a continuation of a little known franchise from Disney Pixar called Toy Story 3. The third film in this series follows the characters as they are abandoned in a day care while their owner, Andy, goes away to college. At first, to all of the toys except Woody, it looks like a paradise but kids love new toys…The director, Lee Unkrich, said that it took two days in a cabin to come up with the story but over two and half years of storyboarding and fine tuning. He felt the pressure of taking this huge franchise and creating a third feature length film every day of the process of making it but it doesn’t look like he failed…every time a new character was shown to the audience, there was a collective “awww.” There’s no doubt in my mind that this film will resonate with the new generation of kids and that the old fans will flock back to see the new instalment. When an audience member asked Jeff Garlin about improvising in the movie he said that when the script is good, he doesn’t like to improvise. He likes to improvise in order to help a movie out but with Wall-E and Toy Story 3, he felt that the scripts were great so that should give you an idea of how good this one is going to be.
WonderCon is one of the country’s best comics conventions featuring guests and events for comics, movies, video games, and other popular media. This year, WonderCon had presentations by such Hollywood studios as Disney, Warner Bros., Sony, and Lionsgate.
