"The adventures of writer Newt Scamander in New York's secret community of witches and wizards seventy years before Harry Potter reads his book in school."
Meh, there's nothing too original or exciting in "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them". As many have noticed, it really is like a "Doctor Who" special mixed with "King Kong" mixed with "Pokémon".
The lead who I can't be bothered to look up the name of (Edit: it's Eddie Redmayne) channels Matt Smith so much that he might as well be Matt Smith. He has the same mannerisms, awkwardness, and dress sense. He even has a bowtie, uses his wand like a sonic screwdriver, and carries a suitcase with Tardis properties. I'm not calling J.K. Rowling a plagiarist, but... yeah, this is either plagiarism or a really blatant homage, take your pick.
For those who care, Colin Farrell is more than tolerable, and Johnny Depp gets less than a minute of screen time roughly 5 minutes from the end.
Other than that, and the abundance of CGI, "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them" isn't the worst thing I've ever seen. The period setting in New York works well, and I expect American Harry Potter fans will love it. But because I'm not ten years old, and I loathe all things Harry Potter, it didn't do anything memorable for me.
As theatrical family films go, it's okay-ish. The creatures aren't very scary, and the story is easy to follow. It's just so below average in every other way that it's hardly one of this year's "must sees".
"Twenty-two years after the events of Jurassic Park, Isla Nublar now features a fully functioning dinosaur theme park, Jurassic World, as originally envisioned by John Hammond. After 10 years of operation and visitor rates declining, in order to fulfill a corporate mandate, a new attraction is created to re-spark visitor's interest, which backfires horribly."
I remember way back in the far distant past of 1993 that I was sixth in a queue of eager moviegoers over a mile long which ran all the way down the street from the cinema, past a park, and over a bridge. The original "Jurassic Park" was so hyped that the world went a little bit crazy that opening weekend for dinosaurs, and I'm proud to admit that I was part of the insanity. I may have been too old for it, but I still bought the action figures, books, and anything else labelled with the "Jurassic Park" brand.
Twenty-two years later, nothing seems to have changed apart from the age of the original audience. With box office takings of over $551 million so far, "Jurassic World" has become an unprecedented success for a third sequel, but it's not only due to my generation's nostalgia.
Dinosaurs have and always will be one of the biggest draws for audiences of all ages. Everyone loves dinosaurs! Stick a dinosaur in a movie and it's almost guaranteed money in the bank. A couple of dud sequels in the "Jurassic Park" series have done nothing to diminish the yearning to see more of the same.
Velociraptors and motorcycles are cool.
Since I'm trying to be not my seemingly negative and jaded self, let me just interject the obvious fact that "Jurassic World" is a PG-13 Summer movie meant for little kids and family audiences. As such, it's no better or worse than any other movie released to get asses on seats for money this year, and it's full of all the spectacle that you would imagine.
Unfortunately, "Jurassic World" is overlong at 124 minutes, and it often suffers both from lag and unsympathetic characters. In fact, the action doesn't even get going until around an hour in, so if you haven't seen it yet, you can arrive late and not miss anything very important. Apart from a load of exposition and crowd scenes of visitors to the new Jurassic theme park, the CGI dinosaurs mostly mill around aimlessly and aren't nearly as impressive or groundbreaking as in the original.
Chris Pratt plays an ex-marine who has semi-trained a bunch of velociraptors in one of many "Chekhov's Gun" tropes which predictably play out later on in the story. As the most charismatic actor in "Jurassic World", he tends to steal the show, especially from the younger actors who are more or less forgetten during the second-half.
Bryce Dallas Howard provides some corporate eye-candy with a heart, but minor characters and the other co-stars tend to remain minor and one-dimensional with no surprises or chemistry whatsoever. Having none of the original "Jurassic Park" cast members even in cameos, "Jurassic World" appears to have thrown the baby out with the bathwater for the sake of making everything "new".
And now for some SPOILERS. Stop reading here if you don't want to know!
Imodium Rex will scare the shit out of you.
SPOILERS
The best part of "Jurassic World" is undoubtedly a death scene at the 80 minute mark which almost rivals the opening sequence of "Jaws" (1975) in terms of excitement. Yes, it's the one with the aquatic Mosasaurus which is heavily featured in the marketing. Being CGI and rated PG-13, all the deaths are quite bloodless, but this one is rather good despite those limitations.
All the predictable fights ensue, and the Pterodactyls or Pteranodons which are a big part of Michael Crichton's novel are nicely used. Fans of flying reptiles will be pleased.
Obviously, the biggest thing in "Jurassic World" is the much touted super-dinosaur which is called Imodium Rex or something similar made-up for the sake of it. There's no great educational exploration of dinosaurs or any apparent scientific accuracy here, but the story works as a fantasy-adventure for the intended audience.
END OF SPOILERS
Overall, there's nothing really to hate in "Jurassic World", but there's not a lot that most people haven't already seen before, either in the previous "Jurassic Park" movies or clones. A few "in-jokes" and homages don't detract from the considerable retreading of the same ground as "Jurassic Park", but they don't add anything new or memorable either.
If you just want to relax, switch off most of your analytical brain functions, and enjoy a kids' movie (or have a family to take with you), you won't go wrong by choosing "Jurassic World" over the other theatrical offerings this month.
Including nods to similar scenes at the end of "Jurassic Park", this love letter to the fans (both young and old) is a worthy finale, but it will cause déjà vu.
"A family whose suburban home is haunted by evil forces must come together to rescue their youngest daughter after the apparitions take her captive."
Oh God, here we go with the unnecessary remakes again! 'Tis the season! Not that I'm opposed to every remake. Some of them have been better than the originals, particularly in nearly every case of the Asian horror movies which I once collected.
Yeah, some of those remakes are on the Ghost House Pictures label, the same company who are the producers of this movie, so you'd think that they would know what they were doing by now. You'd be wrong, of course. So very wrong.
Look, I'm sure that you know exactly what I'm going to say about "Poltergeist" before I even write it, so let's cut straight through the chase here.
The remake of "Poltergeist" is complete and utter shite!
Print that on the eventual Blu-ray slipcase!
I don't feel the need to back this up with any reasons. It's already bad enough that I wasted my time and money by watching this soulless piece of crap, and I don't want to torture myself more by writing about it. And no, it has nothing to do with nostalgia.
I've always disliked the original 1982 version because it only has one scene in it which even resembles real poltergeist activity, i.e. the stacking chairs one, and thus even the title of the movie was a bait and switch con job. Fundamentally, the rest of "Poltergeist" is a padded and updated ripoff of the "Little Girl Lost" episode from "The Twilight Zone" TV series anyway.
I can't stand the dope-smoking parents, or the irritating kids, and jump scares don't work on me. On top of that, the smug ghosthunting team and that awful Tangina thing grip my shit. The only two things which I care to remember fondly from the whole ordeal are JoBeth Williams' beautiful shiny legs. That's it.
In my opinion, the original "Poltergeist" is a stupid but fairly harmless, family-friendly Spielberg fantasy in everything but the director's name. I have no idea if Tobe Hooper really directed it or not. I don't care. I simply don't like "Poltergeist". I'm not an American, I don't connect with the suburban situation or the characters, and I have absolutely no nostalgic feelings about it whatsoever. Just waves and waves of bitter disappointment that it isn't actually about poltergeists.
And you know what? I don't like the sequels either.
"Poltergeist II: The Other Side" (1986) seems like an inferior ripoff of John G. Jones' genuinely terrifying "The Amityville Horror Part II" (1982) novel to me, and "Poltergeist III" (1988) is nothing but a badly made final cash grab which isn't worth piss. Back in the day, I only got through that mess of a movie because I didn't want to completely waste the VHS rental fee. It then turned into a waste both of money and part of my life. Fuck that movie too!
As for this "Poltergeist" remake. I've said all that I want to. If you need further validation, I recommend that you read round the other independent reviewers rather than the "big name" sites carrying those enormous "Poltergeist" advertisements. We all feel much the same way. There's probably nothing different on any of the free blogs which I wouldn't have said about "Poltergeist" myself if I even gave two shits about it, but the most condemnation that the shill sites will dare to write is "Well, it's not bad for a remake..." Fuck that noise!
Just watch the IMDb score drop over the weekend as more people find out the truth for themselves. It's only on 5.8 now! The comments on the official Facebook page are hilariously illuminating too. "Poltergeist is bad, it's really bad. It's "A Nightmare on Elm Street" remake bad! It's too modern, truncated, the ending is rushed, the acting/characterisation is horrible, there's no chemistry, no emotion, it isn't scary... Oh, you nearly got me there. No, I'm not doing this anymore. No more negativity!!! I'm outta here!
If you're really that desperate for a "Poltergeist" remake, try "Grave Secrets: The Legacy of Hilltop Drive" (1992) or "Insidious" (2010) instead. I haven't reviewed them either.
