Holiday Season 2005

Damn! I can’t believe it’s been a good two months since my last entry! I guess time flies when you’re busy as hell. So where was I? Ah yes, December. The big month for big budget family movies. And December 2005 brought us some top notch examples of the quality of filmmaking Hollywood can achieve when it sets its mind to it. The first of these was The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe. I have to say, I really enjoyed this movie. And that’s saying a lot, because I’m a HUGE fan of the original stories, and a very big fan of the old BBC version of this book (which is basically a scene-for-scene, line-for-line, completely faithful translation of the book, which is pretty impressive. Of course, it was also a 165 minute long TV mini-series, which is kind of hard to duplicate on the big screen, regardless of how long theatrical movies are getting these days).

Now I do have to admit, there were a few minor changes here and there from the book that I found annoying (mostly because I didn’t see any reason why they couldn’t have left them as they were in the book), but most of these were very minor, and weren’t items most people would notice unless they’d read the book several times (and they didn’t negatively impact the story flow of the movie at all – they were just different than the book). And I figure if this is the worst thing you can say about a movie adaptation of a wonderful book, then the movie’s done a pretty darned good job.

Visually, the movie is stunning. The visual effects are very well done, and the fantasy creatures all look spectacular. Aslan is especially amazing to watch (and the choice of Liam Neeson to do the voice was just inspired casting – he does an incredible, first-rate job). I also like that they followed the Harry Potter path of getting unknown British kids to play the lead roles. All of the kids did a great job, and I can’t wait to see them again in the next movie. This one I rushed out to buy as soon as it was available on DVD.

The next big holiday blockbuster was Peter Jackson’s King Kong, remake of the classic monster movie. Now firstly, I have to say that while the original King Kong is now considered a classic film, mainly because of the stop motion visual effects used in its making, story wise its basically a B-movie (which is not to say I don’t like it – I love B-movies). Which means that when you get right down to it, Peter Jackson honestly didn’t have a whole lot to work with in trying to turn it into a modern day blockbuster. He does a pretty good job of it, and I did go ahead and buy the 2-disk DVD when it came out. But I have to agree with the comment my good friend Cliffie made after he’d seen it – Peter Jackson (like too many of his fellow directors these days, sadly) has fallen way too in love with what he can do with digital effects. Being a computer geek myself, I can understand how easy it is to get caught up in all the amazing things that CGI can do nowadays. But sadly I also feel that it’s a trap, one that can pull a director away from the story and the characters, which in my not-so-humble opinion are the key elements to making a great movie.

Don’t get me wrong, I did like the movie quite a bit, and it's a lot of fun to watch, but with a running time of 3 hours and 7 minutes, the thinness of the story certainly shows in spots. And much like The Matrix Reloaded (although that was a horrid waste of a movie, which King Kong is not), there are a couple of the big CGI-heavy action scenes that really drag on longer than they need to. Sure, they look great, but you reach a point where you’re like, “Okay, we’ve watched Kong fighting the dinosaurs for long enough; let’s move on.” One positive thing I will say about the visual effects, however, is this – they did an unbelievable job on Kong’s face. You could really see the emotions playing across the big ape’s face in a number of scenes. It was really impressive. So all in all I think I’ll give King Kong three and a half stars. It was a good movie without doubt, but it could have been a lot better with a little trimming here and there and a little more focus on the keeping the story tight.

Which leaves us with one final movie that I managed to catch at the theaters during the month of December – Memoirs of a Geisha (which has been out on DVD for a while now – it’s hard to believe how quickly they’re turning movies around from theatrical release to DVD these days). This was a really enjoyable movie – but I’m a big fan of Zhang Ziyi and have enjoyed everything I've seen her in. And of course there’s the beautiful and talented Gong Li and Michelle Yeoh as well. Not to mention the very talented actors Ken Watanabe, Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa (an actor I’ve always liked), Ted Levine, and Mako (another actor I've always liked). The visuals are beautiful, the story is well told, and it’s just a wonderful movie to watch. Because of the fact that it’s basically a romantic drama, it probably wouldn’t make my top 10 list for 2005 (but that’s because I’m more of an action/sci-fi kind of guy), but it’s still a movie I’d like to pick up on DVD eventually (when I have the money – and when I’ve caught up with watching the couple dozen DVDs that I’ve bought that I haven’t found time to watch yet).

And that should about do it for 2005. And since I’m so far behind, I’m just going to jump into 2006. I guess my best and worst of 2005 lists just aren’t going to get done (but then again, if you’ve read through all my entries for last year, it’s pretty easy to tell which movies I really liked, and which ones I really hated last year). And so now it’s on to the early 2006 movies, coming soon!!