The Last Days on Mars (2013)

Tags

Drama, Elias Koteas, Horror, Liev Schreiber, Movie, Romola Garai, Science Fiction, The Last Days on Mars

Hold still, there’s a bug on your face!

Ya know, when I saw a brief description of this one, I was hoping for more of a psychological drama.  Maybe they struggle with whether or not they should go back to Earth, knowing they’re infected with an unknown virus, or something like that.

Nope, just another super-violent-killer-monster movie.

People discover living substance on Mars…living substance infects 2 astronauts…they immediately turn into super strong zombie-like creatures…they attack and infect others…etc etc.  Been done before, you might say.  I wonder if this one started with somebody saying, “how about zombies…ON MARS!”

It has a nice look to it, and the mood of the first 20 minutes or so is effectively creepy I suppose, but by the end of it I felt like I had watched a pretty average B-movie about monsters on Mars.  If you stop and think about it (and you probably shouldn’t), not much in the movie really makes any sense.  Plus, none of the characters are developed to any extent at all, so their fates aren’t of any importance to the viewer.  Well, except for the cute girl I guess.  I was hoping she’d make it.

5.5/10

Let Me In (2010)

Tags

Chloe Moretz, Drama, Elias Koteas, Horror, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Let Me In, Movie, Richard Jenkins

c'mon, let me in! no, that's not blood on my face...it's...just ketchup...

R

Kodi Smit-McPhee, Chloe Moretz, Richard Jenkins, Elias Koteas

Owen: How old are you, really?
Abby: Twelve…but I’ve been twelve for a really long time.

A lonely 12 year old boy, Owen (Smit-McPhee), meets a 12 year old girl, Abby (Moretz), who just moved into his apartment complex.  Abby seems equally lonely – but way more mysterious – and the two slowly build up a friendship.  It’s a tough friendship to maintain though, seeing as how Abby can only come out at night…since, ya know, she’s a vampire.

Remakes…most people hate them, and with good reason.  Whenever one comes out, especially so soon after the high quality original, people wonder why bother going through the trouble.  Well, this is why.  It’s a good story I’m sure quite a few people would miss out on because they wouldn’t be willing to watch the original, Swedish, version.  Plus, as the filmmakers are quick to point out, it’s more like a different take on the book rather than a remake of another movie.

Yes, the original is probably superior, but not by a very wide margin.  In fact, I think the Matt Reeves directed version might best the original in a few areas.  I won’t go into a scene for scene comparison, but Reeves seems to know how to stage a tense, suspenseful sequence well.  And that’s one of the main differences between the two versions, the overall tone.  The original was a bit more calm, quiet, morose (but in a good way), while this version ramps up the tension and the scares a bit more.  Thankfully it doesn’t go overboard with it, and there’s still room for the quietly building, sweet friendship between Owen and Abby.

Speaking of them, Smit-McPhee and Moretz are both very good in their roles.  Moretz is becoming quite the scary little 12 year old when you consider her previous role as Hit Girl in Kick-Ass along with this movie.  Be careful around that one.  Besides having an odd name, Kodi Smit-McPhee also looks like he could have just walked straight out of the Swedish version of this story.  That’s pretty much perfect casting right there.

Their relationship is the heart of the movie, and it’s a strong heart.  If that relationship didn’t work, the film would be a waste of time.  The leads act it well, Reeves directs it well, and Michael Giacchino (of Lost fame) adds his usual emotive music into the mix.

Overall, both versions of this film are worth a watch.  They offer up different enough viewing experiences to make it not seem too repetitive to watch them both.  If I had seen this version first, I might think it was the superior version.  It’s always hard to judge remakes, or re-tellings, since you’ve essentially already seen it.  But I can say that I enjoyed watching this particular re-telling, even though I knew exactly where the story was going.  That’s a good sign.

Oh, and in case there are any vampires out there, consider this my invitation for you to come in and read my movie blog.

When you bully somebody, you bully their friends too.  Make sure you know who those friends are.

10 – 1 because it does go overlong a bit and probably could have done without the opening scene that’s repeated later – .4 for ramping up the scares/tension a bit too much = 8.6

The Fourth Kind (2009)

Tags

Corey Johnson, Drama, Elias Koteas, Hakeem Kae-Kazim, Horror, Milla Jovovich, Movie, The Fourth Kind, Will Patton

sorry folks, I'm about the closest thing to an alien you're gonna see in this movie...

PG-13

Milla Jovovich, Will Patton, Hakeem Kae-Kazim, Elias Koteas, Corey Johnson

Abel: Counseling a fellow psychologist is like…talking to myself.

A psychologist, Abbey Tyler (Jovovich), starts to suspect that the sleep problems several of her patients are experiencing might be linked to something mysterious.  As she investigates, she slowly realizes that the same phenomenon might be happening to her too.

“Just when you thought it was safe to go back to bed!”  That would have been my tag line for this cleverly disguised Jaws clone.  “What does this have to do with Jaws”, you may ask?  “Not much”, I would answer, “but it makes it more fun to write the review, so let’s roll with it.”

First you have Abbey, filling the role of Martin Brody from Jaws.  Brody was sure there was a killer shark dining on the beach goers on Amity Island, just like Abbey is sure something very strange is going on with her patients.  Enter the angry Sheriff August (Patton).  His equivalent role in Jaws is that of Mayor Vaughn (“Come 4th of July, these beaches will be open!”).  Sheriff August thinks Abbey is playing mind games with people and wants her to just stop it stop stop it STOP IT STOP IT!!  Yeah, he’s an angry man.

Next, there’s the Matt Hooper equivalent, Awolowa Odusami (Kae-Kazim), an expert on ancient cultures who believes that extraterrestrials have been visiting earth since ancient times.  He believes in Abbey and helps translate some audio of a strange voice speaking in Sumerian (“Who ya gonna call!?”).  Lastly there’s Abel (Koteas), who can less directly be compared to Captain Quint in Jaws.  He’s an older colleague of Abbey’s who she brings in to help out.  He’s doubtful that anything extraordinary is really happening.  That is, until he starts to experience it up close.

Now, here’s the thing about Jaws.  Mr. Spielberg, courtesy of a malfunctioning robotic shark, stumbled onto a stroke of genius by not showing said shark very much in the early going of the movie.  Just a fin here, a tooth there, until he’d built as much tension in the viewer as in the ropes on John Goodman’s favorite hammock.  Then, there’s that big moment where the shark first rises up out of the water, resulting in the audience bolting up out of their seats, running for the exits, and moving to Nebraska (seriously, the population of Nebraska doubled in 1975, look it up*).  The point being, he did actually show the shark at some point.  Well, in The Fourth Kind, we get that tension building first hour of the movie, where we see hints of alien activity, but then…nothing…no pay off.  Sorry to be Mr. Spoiler, but we don’t see any aliens in this movie, people.  They are merely implied via weird voices on tape and some shadows in the dark.

Of course, the gimmick in this movie is that along with the regular movie, there’s supposedly actual footage from the *real* Dr. Abbey Tyler’s sessions with various residents of Nome, Alaska.  Plus, we have a supposedly real interview with her spliced in there too.  I use the word “supposedly” because clearly none of it is real.  I’m not sure they’re even trying to fool us into thinking it’s real.  So basically at times we’re watching the same scene played out by two different actors on screen at the same time.  As a regular movie on one side of the screen and low quality video footage on the other side.  Why do this?  Well, because sometimes (i.e. anytime something interesting happens) the supposedly real video footage experiences interference and becomes unwatchable.  Convenient.

This is a total miscalculation of a movie.  The director, Olatunde Osunsanmi, probably should have just gone with either a straightforward movie or a faux documentary.  Combining the two was distracting and removed any scariness that could have been built up.  Plus, maybe some sort of pay off would have been nice, you know, to thank the audience for sticking around the whole time.

Really, this just seems like a glorified Sci-Fi Channel special about alien abduction.  Actually, just take “glorified” out of that last sentence.  I suppose the actors do a good job (especially the ones on the supposedly real footage) and the movie mostly looks good, but so what?  In the end I was just left saying, “that’s it!?  …Where’s the shark!?”

*may not be an actual statistic

Don’t live in Nome, Alaska.

10 – 4 for meandering all over the place and being mostly pointless – 1.5 for building mild tension and having no interesting pay off = 4.5