Film Review: Chronicle

So today is a leap-year, everyone was saying that everyone else should do something 'cool' and 'fun' with that extra day they have been given. Some people actually get to celebrate their Birthday for the first time in four years (Happy Birthday to you if you are one of those people) and dudes get to be proposed to. My birthday is a January and I don't have a girlfriend to propose to me (PHEW!). But I did however go to see 'Chronicle' and it was insanely good.

2012 is set to be one of the biggest years for blockbuster movies, with films such as The Dark Knight Rises ($150 million), The Amazing Spider-Man ($130 Million), The Avengers ($80 Million) and Men In Black 3 ($200 Million) it's hard to see how a low budget ($12 Million) science fiction film, with a virgin feature length film director could even get noticed amongst all the comic book commotion. Easy, make it an intelligently written drama first, and an explosive spectacle second.

The film is based around three high school friends with the protagonist called Andrew, played brilliantly by Dane DeHaan, Andrews' philosophical babbling cousin Matt and soon to be class President Steve (Steve is that guy at school who is good at everything and every time you see him you hope he falls over).

Andrew gets hold of a video camera and decides to start filming everything! The camera creeps everyone out but they become the three best friends anyone could have when they come across an underground energy source and develop next level awesome telekinesis powers.

The three high school friends use these powers to pull of a string of laugh out loud pranks on unknowing members of the public. Scaring kids with floating teddy bears, throwing balls at each other with mad accuracy. But not everyone can be happy forever and a film with a tag line "It's all fun and games until EVERYONE get's hurt," you just know something bad is going to happen.

But like I said this is a film with a budget and that budget has been put to good use. It's Andrews han held camera that gives us the way the film is shot, I think it's known as 'found footage.' (Blair Witch Project/Cloverfield style) This is where Trank stands out, he plays with the genre and comes up with inventive ways of shooting the film. The super powers enable the trio of friends to levitate the camera over their shoulder or Trank would use black and white security footage to show what was going on. 

At roughly 90 minutes long 'Chronicle' comes up trumps in that it isn't a three hour, crass, over sexualisation of a childhood toy with borderline racist punchlines for jokes (see the last three Michael Bay films which involve a company called Hasbro and you will know what I mean!!!!!!!) 'Chronicle's' pace has to be quick to fit everything in. Setting up the story takes time but it makes you feel like you have an invested interest in what happens to these characters. But nothing is missed out and every action taken by the three protagonists makes sense because the film makers have taken time in setting up the backstories and personalities. 

'Chronicle's' sequence which best describes the film is when Andrew takes to the stage and uses his powers to show off a series of magic tricks. Start small and ending big. But just as a true showman works, he starts off and seems to be failing which provokes the audience to heckle until he finds his feet and at the end has the audience whooping and a hollering, as one of the biggest looser in school becomes it's biggest legend!

So arriving at the start of the year in what some of the well established film magazines are calling the 'biggest year for blockbusters EVER,' which are going to be sequels, prequels, comic book adaptations, special effects heavy, 'this film cost so much we could have bailed out Greece and Spain' monstrosities, it's 'Chronicle' they are going to have to beat.

See the full trailer:

Track Check: 'Dem Onez' by Tiamat ft. Sonorous & Kid Fury

Another quick one as I haven't posted in a while, mainly because I ain't had anything to talk about. But I got dropped a link the other day from one of Oxfords finnest Hip-Hop DJ's Kid Fury.

It's by Tiamat ft. Sonorous & Kid Fury called 'Dem Onez'


Enjoy.

       

Follow Kid Fury on Twitter @MrFury


Follow Sonorous on Twitter @SonorousHIPHOP

Mixtape: Mumdance - 'Different Circles Level 2'

Just a quick one. I got hold of this through the Mad Decent website and it's straight banging mixtape. With exclusives from Mumdance, Luckybeard and Roy Apron,  it's definitely worth a listen.

Enjoy.

Film Review: The Muppets

             So a week before The Muppets was released nationwide I was privy to a private screening at a secret location. It was an event a nerdy website called Den of Geek ran. (It's worth checking out because they get the scoops on a lot of British cinema stuff). I have been to one of these 'private' screenings before for a film called 'Sucker Punch,' thank god those tickets were free because that was the worst film I have ever seen at the cinema.

But I went to this screening of The Muppets and I fucking loved it and here's why. Firstly we haven't had a Muppet outing since the dreadful 'Muppets From Space,' I don't know why I hate that movie, I just do. But before that we had two amazing films, 'Muppet Treasure Island' and Muppet Christmas Carol.' The Muppets is effectively a reboot, a wiping of the slate clean if you will, if comic book heroes can do it why can't lovable felt puppets do it?

At the start of the film we meet Walter clearly a Muppet from his felt texture and his inability to grow during a short montage about his early childhood years with brother Gary (Jason Segal). It's not explained how these two are brothers, just accepted. As plot lines go it's  basic "bad guy wants to destroy the studio for money, gang must reform and save it,"  but this is just a mask for the reunion. As the band start reforming with Kermit the first to return I started to realize just how many of the muppets I knew by name and face. There was Miss Piggy, Fozzie Bear, Sam Eagle, Rizzo the Rat, Gonzo, Animal, Beaker and Pepe The King Prawn are just a few to name. This sets the film of to a great pace and gives it a direction which was what was lacking in Muppets From Space due to the back drop of 'space' they were given. Give the Muppets a small set and you leave them nothing else to do but just be weird at each other like blowing themselves up or inventing 'fart shoes.'

Credit where credit is due, Jason Segal and co-writer Nicholas Stoller have hit the nail on the head with this film. They could have made unlimited jokes about Gary and Walters questionable relationship as brothers, but they don't, instead focusing on the bigger picture like with cast members bursting into song every 10 minutes. (most of the songs were written by Bret McKenzie who did Flight of the Concords) The musical numbers in the film are worth a mention. With the big numbers which involve the entirety of "Smalltown" called 'Life's A Happy Song' which includes everyone from the postman to the butcher to the local tramp dancing in synchronization on the only set of crossroads in Smalltown, to the small numbers like 'Party of One' which is Amy Adam's ballad of how she is slowly loosing her boyfriend. The other notable musical number is The Muppets Barbershop quartet's rendition of Nirvanas' 'Smells Like Teen-spirit' with Breaker mee-mooing his way through a classic.

So with Segal, Stoller and James Bobin (he also did Flight of the Concords) The Muppets are back to what they do best and that is putting on a show and being useless. Fozzie Bear isn't funny, Gonzo can't get any of his stunts right and Kermit seems to be singing with a ping-pong ball stuck half way down his throat. The Muppets don't know there acts are rubbish, but it's the naivety and belief in themselves we salute them for.

There are plenty of celebrity cameos to go with this film just like The Muppet Show of old. But The Muppet Show used to grab big name stars such as Bob Hope. But the film couldn't grab many A-listers and 'settled' for a lot of recognisable faces (some celebrity kids in there apparently I had know idea who they were). Emily Blunt is probably the best cameo doing a secretary throw back to when she was in The Devil Wears Prada, she would be the funniest. The film builds this ever growing expectation that someone huge is going to turn up.......................................They never do. But the Muppets doesn't rest on big name Hollywood stars to save the film, they do this completely by themselves. Jason Segal, Amy Adams and Chris Cooper do really well acting next to puppets but they are background in this film and it's The Muppets that really stand out.

So parts of the film loose there way and others parts don't hit credible punch lines. But as kids films go this is one based for adults. The jokes are subtle and in your face at the same time. It seems to me that this film really has recaptured the heart and imagineation of what The Muppets set out to bring all those years ago and that is to create "laughter, which is the third best thing in the world, after children and ice cream," Kermit The Frog, 2011.