Movie review: The Great Wall IMAX 3D

Last Saturday I went to the Pathe Arena in Amsterdam. For those of you who don't know, it's a cineplex and they have an IMAX theater.
I went to see three movies, Split, The Great Wall IMAX 3D and Sleepless. In this post I will write a short review of The Great Wall IMAX 3D.

So The Great Wall, featuring among others Matt Damon is about an adventurer traveling with a band of fellow adventurers through medieval China, looking for gun powder, the black powder, which was in those days only a myth.
Our hero is good with bow and arrow and he's willing to show the Chinese that his mastery of this weapon is unrivaled.
Pretty soon in the movie we find out that there's a reason why the Great Wall was build by the Chinese. Okay, so in the movie's opening credits, they already tell us that the wall was build to keep out 'creatures' and we find out soon enough that this is true. Of course our protagonist elects to fight among the Chinese to fend off the critters and along the way gets to find out all about the mythical black powder.

So far for the story without spoilers. On with the review.

I can be short: The Great Wall is a good two hours of entertainment. See it in IMAX 3D and it'll be entertainment on a large scale. As far as the story goes, it's far from original. I would characterize it as a mediaval Independence Day. Up to the point that I think they swapped the laser guns with bow-and-arrows and that's about it. So no, the story is not original and far from impressive.
The special effects are pretty good, but I wasn't awe struck. Even the IMAX screen didn't blow me away.

All in all I would consider this a movie you should consider as your main attraction of entertainment on a night out. There's no dull moment during the 105 minutes as they were pretty action packed. No real annoying story quircks.

Overall verdict: Happy to have seen it, no reason to see it again. 3/5 stars

Movie Review: The Wrestler

Does Mickey Rourke deserve an Oscar based on this performance? I don't know, although his acting is quite good, it's not great. Well maybe it is, because during the movie you're starting to feel for his character. The story is quite predictable. There are no surprises or twists in the story. But that's not a problem, since the story doesn't require any mysteries or suspense to be involving.

The story though is about a man who's lost contact with his daughter, who's in love with a stripper and considers a paycheck with more than 10 bucks on it a good day. And when you're asking me if I can relate I'ld have to say 'No', but still the acting is such that you understand why things are going the way they are, and you'll be finding yourself against better judgement, hoping for events to take different turns.

The Wrestler is a slow moving story. The action scenes in it are there only to underpin the story, not to blow you away. But on top of it all, the movie captivates at times, and is interesting overall. And not to forget Marissa Tomei, who shows some wrinkles, but is still damn cute.

Iwan

Movie Review: The Simpsons

Hi,

This week I saw the Simpsons movie, and I liked it. But mainly because it was just the Simpsons. Nothing fancy, nothing new, just an episode as any other episode, only taking 90 minutes.
All the characters you know are there and they're all playing their role. Excellent.

I can tell you what the story is about, but it is as absurd as any other Simpsons story, so it won't help you to decide whether or not you should see this one. But I can tell you, if you like the Simpsons, you'll like the movie. Although going to see it on the big screen is maybe not worth the effort, but then again, when you're a fan, you probably want to get the experience anyway.

Iwan

Movie Review: White Noise 2: The Light

Here's another movie review: White Noise 2: The Light. It's the sequel to White Noise, which I haven't seen but do own on DVD... but after seeing the sequel I'm not really looking forward to the original movie. On the other hand, sequels are typically not as good as the original and since this one is not too bad, I might watch White Noise sometime soon.

So after this philosophical introduction, here's the review: White Noise 2: The Light is a thriller with paranormal aspects. It's by no means a horror and all scary moments in the movie are done by "showing all of a sudden a decaying dead person". Trust me, it's scarier to just all of a sudden scream at the person next to you than watching these scenes.
The story is interesting and the movie starts of with some statistics that are supposedly there to make the story more believable. But in the end it matters if you belief in near-death-experiences or not to make this movie believable.


With the current slant of horrors, psycho thrillers and paranormal thrillers at the movies, there are more alternatives. All in all: Rent the DVD.

Iwan

Movie Review: Bordertown

Two weeks ago I saw the movie 'Bordertown' staring Jennifer Lopez and Antonio Banderas.
The movie is about a journalist (Lopez) who is covering a series of rapes/murders in the Mexican border town Juarez. (Movie Trivia: The dice in Ocean's 13 are produced in Juarez.)
Local news paper publisher Banderas is helping here with the story, which becomes her biggest story ever. Meanwhile J'Lo is also trying to uncover the serial rapist/murderer and starts a romance with one of the local industrialists.

I saw the movie in the sneakpreview, otherwise I would probably never see this movie as it doesn't appeal to me. Not seeing the movie would've been a waste, as this is a nice and interesting story and both main characters are well acted.
This is not a movie for the big screen and I can very well envision you seeing the movie at home on DVD.

Iwan