Tag: Ray Winstone

Cats.

I was looking forward to Cats! When the trailer dropped, I was giddy with how ridiculous it looked. People bad mouthed the CGI designs, which I can see, but I figured I’d get used to it.

I love musicals, so I was excited to see a new musical on the screen, especially from an established property. I knew very little about it, except some cat names, and the song Memories.

But most importantly, I saw the movie Six Degrees of Separation, based on a play of the same name, with Will Smith in one of his first film roles. Why are they related? Because there is a long discussion about the musical cats being made into a movie, how it could not be done, and with Ian McKellen‘s character trying to get a role in the film.

It took 26 years, but he finally got that role!

Cat Boobs

Alright, so in this movie about cats, there is kind of a plot?

It takes place in the alley’s of London, where every year, these cats gather together and do a singing competition, where one of the cats is chosen one! The chosen cat gets to arise into the heavens and be reborn. There is a lot they could do about that plot if they wanted to, like questioning motives and stuff. Maybe something like Logan’s Run!

But they don’t, we and they accept all of this. We get to be told their story, because a new cat, Victoria (Francesca Hayward) gets thrown into their ally from a bag, abandoned on the same night of their festival. So we get some narrator cat Munkustrap (Robbie Fairchild) to take her under the wing and introduce people.

These cats are all about their names and having a purpose in their lives. There is a cat for a very specific focus, and I guess that is it. Only some cats want to be reborn though, and for what reason is mostly unclear.

Anyways, a lot of cats get together to sing about themselves, and one cat, Macavity (Idris Elba) is a bad guy cat who wants to eliminate the competition so only he remains.

Starring a lot of weirdly named cats. Like Danny Collins, Naoimh Morgan, Mette Towley, Laurie Davidson, Jennifer Hudson, Jason Derulo, Taylor Swift, Judi Dench, Ian McKellen, Rebel Wilson, James Corden, Ray Winstone, and Steven McRae.

More Cat Boobs. Assumption: I will get used to these CGI looks for the cats and maybe the trailers weren’t just super polished.

Reality: Oh my goodness, these CGI looking cats look terrible. Why did they not do cat costumes!?

Yes, it is really distracting/off putting. I can see a lot of work done on most of their faces, but the rest of them, neck down, just feel like poor animation for the most part. When they are doing elaborate dance numbers, taps, or flips…it does nothing for me. I don’t know if there are real people behind them doing that. They might be! They probably are! But it also feels like it could be completely animated and just a face, which makes it zero levels of impressive.

It makes sense that the main song people know is Memory. It is probably the only song in the entire musical that isn’t very repetitive and full of a cat’s name over and over. Wanna know which song is sung by Rum Tum Tugger? The one with his name a whole lot. Shit, Pokemon execs probably saw Cats and thought them saying their name a lot was a good idea and launched the biggest multi-media franchise of all time.

This is a movie that is just a lot of introductions, and eventually it ends. It is visually appalling to watch not amazing CGI cat bodies dancing in front of pretty bad CGI backgrounds.

And one final note, how many times do they sing Memory in the musical live version? I feel like it heard it three times, or maybe one of those times was extra long. It did not have an amazing impact on me at the end when I already heard the thing 40 minutes prior. Such a strange decision.

Easily one of the worst films of the year, and a shocking (because of my naivety and love of musicals) one at that.

0 out of 4.

A score of “religious” movies have come out recently. A month ago we had Son Of God, God’s Not Dead somehow elevated from made for TV B-Movie status to a wide theatrical release and next month is Heaven Is For Real.

But Noah is something completely different. It is directed by Darren Aronofsky and he was given complete directorial control over the picture. That’s right, the guy who directed The Fountain and Black Swan is taking on the Bible.

This won’t be a simple story and in all likelihood, it won’t be like anything you read before.

Hah. The joke implying that I have actually read a book before.

For one thing, the entity that created the world pre-flood is always referred to as “The Creator.” I won’t tell you all the differences because that would ruin the fun.

Let’s just say that the Adam and Eve story is basically the same, and the Cain and Abel happened the same way too. Noah (Russell Crowe) is a descendant of Seth, the third son of Adam, while the vast majority of civilization is a descendant of Cain.

These men have pillaged the world, draining it of its natural resources and animal friends. Noah has tried to protect his family from their corruptness, keeping them to a mostly nomadic lifestyle. Then he gets a vision. He believes the world will be cleansed by water and he must build an ark to save the animals upon it.

But if Man is the problem, can he save others? Is he even allowed to save his family or himself?

Jennifer Connelly plays his wife, Logan Lerman, Douglas Booth and Leo McHugh Carroll are his three sons, Emma Watson his adopted daughter he finds along the way, Anthony Hopkins his grandfather, and Ray Winstone his main enemy.

There is also a very strange massive man wet dance number in the middle.

Here is a pro-tip. Don’t drink a lot of fluids in theaters while watching Noah. It is a movie about a giant flood, which also occurs about halfway through the movie. Given the length of the movie, you might have some uncomfortable feelings before you reach the end.

Since the flood occurs so early, the second half of the movie is mostly human drama aboard the ark. Because of the drama, the ending does seem to drag on a little bit.

I thought Noah was awesome. The movie was visually stimulating. It was beautifully shot and the CGI elements weren’t terrible. The acting from the leads felt great on all accounts. In particular, I really loved the story of how Man came to be from the Creator in six days. It is a famous tale, but the way it was shown from start to finish in this movie was pretty unique.

However, at times I still felt the movie was just a tad bit too long. There are also certainly going to be people upset with the movie due to its loose interpretation of the source material.

Noah was definitely a much better movie than I thought it would be. It told a good story, wasn’t pushy with any messages, had great acting, and was visually pleasing.

One thing the movie could have used? More puns. Just imagine this ending. The family finally makes it to land. The wife says “Now we can spread out and repopulate the earth!” Her husband turns to look at her and says: “Yeah, I Noah.”

3 out of 4.