PROMETHEUS

PROMETHEUS (2012)
US
Directed by Ridley Scott

CAST:
Noomi Rapace - Elizabeth Shaw
Michael Fassbender - David
Charlize Theron - Meredith Vickers

PLOT:
     A team of explorers discover a clue to the origins of mankind on Earth, leading them on a journey to the darkest corners of the universe. There, they must fight a terrifying battle to save the future of the human race.

REVIEW:
     I usually start my reviews with random thoughts and such, yet with this one I decided to put down a quote from H.P. Lovecraft instead as it says everything quite perfectly about the Alien franchise including this one,

    

"The true weird tale has something more than secret murder, bloody bones, or a sheeted form clanking chains according to rule. A certain atmosphere of breathless and unexplainable dread of outer, unknown forces must be present; and there must be a hint, expressed with a seriousness and portentousness becoming its subject, of that most terrible conception of the human brain -- a malign and particular suspension or defeat of those fixed laws of Nature which are our only safeguard against the assaults of chaos and the dæmons of unplumbed space."
― H. P. Lovecraft, 'Supernatural Horror in Literature'

      While everyone is saying how much the film is stolen by Michael Fassbender as David, I'll get to him in a second, Noomi Rapace as Elizabeth Shaw to me is the best actor in the film. Rapace's character will no doubt be compared to Ripley as both are strong female leads in a hopeless situation. The reason why I'm saying this is plain and simple the film is about her and the faith she has then loses. Rapace adds a softness to the character that all the other characters are lacking. This doesn't mean that she is the weakest character, in fact this adds a humanity to her that saves her life at one point in the movie.  Michael Fassbender's David is the quirkiest character in the film as we the viewers can tell that he is always thinking, or processing if you want, of the other characters and what makes them different and what motivates their actions. There is a childlike quality to David that Fassbender adds to the role that almost makes you feel betrayed after watching some of David's actions he takes against the crew. These actions aren't out of cruelty or revenge, but out of more curiosity and wonderment at what would happen and his questioning of his own role among humanity. Charlize Theron's Meredith Vickers was the one true question mark out of all the characters as she is mostly always seen standing away from everyone and tries to keep the entire crew at arms length. The reason for this is explained later on in the film and up until a certain point the viewers may think that Vickers is actually a second android next to David, though you find out that she is in fact human and a very weak one at that as she seems to lose composure whenever her authority is threatened or a order is disobeyed. Despite Vickers' icy exterior inside she is severely insecure and is trying to overcompensate for that fact.

     I will admit that before I saw Prometheus that I read a couple of reviews. One thing I've noticed about them is that they either loved the movie or hated it. So much so in fact that the two sides have broken down to name calling on some boards. And do not doubt that you will either love the movie or hate it as there really is no in-between when it comes to this. This has to do with that the fact that the movie asks you to think, which is almost a unheard of these days. It asks us to get the notion of God out of our heads and in it's place to put in a notion that takes hold throughout the film. What if we were made by another alien race. Would you be willing to have all that you hold true, that wall that we built, knocked down to truly know the truth. These are lofty questions that most everyone can understand and it is these questions that are the foundations of the story to Prometheus. On the flip side is the mythology aspect of Prometheus. The one where the Gods become pissed at the titan Prometheus and punish him for giving fire to the humans. For giving them knowledge. What is not widely known is that by giving humans knowledge, it is this knowledge that helped mankind stop their own destruction from the Gods.  The knowledge being sought in this is why did, as Elizabeth Shaw puts them, the Engineers create humans. For what purpose. Yet by the end of the film this question has changed to why are they, the Engineers, trying to destroy us. Did we overstep our bounds by learning and asking to much? While not all the answers are giving in the film some are answered. Another interesting story point that is brought up in the film is that the planet the crew find the Engineers on turns out to be a staging point, or to put it more simply, a military installation. The one bad aspect of this is that how they came to this conclusion or found out is not giving. This is more than likely from a cut scene that explains how they found out. This is the only real slight I found with the film. Ridley Scott set the film up this way for a reason and I can't thank him enough for making a film that is smart and doesn't take the idiot route that most do.

      Director Ridley Scott has done something that I thought really wasn't possible after so many years of bad movies that had the xenomorphs in them and that is to make the alien films mean something again, while creating something completely new with something that could be just as deadly and potentially more dangerous with the Engineers, or as they are more well known as the race that is the Space Jockeys. The film is beautifully shot with a even hand that doesn't pull away from a shot. When what action there is happens the camera doesn't pull away from it, try to hide or make the camera shake to make it seems like there is more going on than there really is. What we are seeing is what is happening, nothing more or less. Prometheus is more about the tension and the unknown. Most of what is happening cannot be explained, and that makes the film more powerful. As we are there as an observer only, not everything is explained and I think that is what makes most people hate the film. There are stand out scenes that are amazing to watch and see and I'm not going to go into those scenes as to go into it will ruin it. What I will say is that if you can watch it in 3D, do so. While a lot of the films that are using the format to make things pop out on the screen or for a quick jolt to the audience, Scott does something different. Scott uses the format to help the film and not for thrill, but to enhance what is shown and help add depth to what is being seen. The reason for this is that this is not a small movie, in fact Prometheus is a far reaching film that has ideas that pushes the audience and what is being seen has to match it as well. And the visuals do. What also helps with this is the use of as much in-camera effects as possible. Prometheus is a film that will with time become more accepted such as a lot of Ridley Scott's other works have become. But to me this film is a classic already as it pushes boundaries and ideas and isn't afraid to leave it up to the viewer to think for theirself.

BEST DEATH:
      Fifield's melting doom.

BEST LINE:
     You know what this place is? Hell.

FUN FACTS:
     Designer and artist H.R. Giger, who worked on the original design of the Xenomorph Alien, was brought in to assist in reverse-engineering the design of the Aliens in the film.

     Cinematographer Dariusz Wolski convinced Ridley Scott that it would be possible to shoot the film in 3D with the same ease and efficiency of typical filming. 3D company 3ality Technica provided some of the rigs and equipment to facilitate 3D filming, and trained the film's crew in their proper operation. Since 3D films need high lighting levels on set, the traditional dark shadowy atmosphere of the Alien films was added in post-production through grading processes, while the 3D equipment will be based on post Avatar technology. Supposedly the first quarter of the film was finished filming when the decision to film it in full 3D was agreed upon causing the shot scenes to be re-shot in 3D.

     During production Ridley Scott kept the use of computer-generated imagery as low as possible, using CGI mainly in space scenes; Scott recalled advice VFXpert Douglas Trumbull gave him on the set of Blade Runner: "If you can do it live, do it live", and also claimed that practical VFX was more cost-effective than digital VFX. And in my opinion look better as well.

     Ridley Scott and James Cameron both were working on a sequel to Alien franchise in 2002 together that would explore the engineered origin of the aliens in the film series, when both dropped out due to Fox's greenlighting of Alien Vs. Predator. Cameron was very vocal about the potential of the cross-over ruining both franchises and wanted nothing to do with Fox's influence on any Alien sequel do to it.

     According to Ridley Scott, the film's plot was inspired by Erich von Daniken's writings about ancient astronauts: "Both NASA and the Vatican agree that it is almost mathematically impossible that we can be where we are today, without there being a little help along the way. That's what we're looking at: we are talking about gods and engineers, engineers of space. Were the Aliens designed as a form of biological warfare, or biology that would go in and clean up a planet?"

THE NEXT PROMETHEUS VIRAL

     Here we are about two months out from the release of Prometheus and small bits of the behind the scenes in that universe is being released, which while staying away from spoilers, I watch every single one.

     The newest one was just releases today and it's kinda creepy, yet just adds to the alien universe that has been established  already and adds more layers to it.

     This time it's the full Weyland Industries David video which we got to see a snippet of in the last viral video.

     Enjoy!

X-MEN: FIRST CLASS

X-MEN: FIRST CLASS
US
Directed by Matthew Vaughn

CAST:
James McAvoy - Charles Xavier
Michael Fassbender - Erik Lehnsherr/ Magneto
Kevin Bacon - Sebastian Shaw

PLOT:
     Before Charles Xavier and Erik Lensherr took the names Professor X and Magneto, they were two young men discovering their powers for the first time. Before they were archenemies, they were closest of friends, working together,. Over time, a rift between them opened, which began the eternal war between Magneto's Brotherhood and Professor X's X-MEN.

REVIEW:
     By now everyone can pretty much agree that the last two X-Men movies were a let down on a massive scale.  Last Stand was to full of itself and broke away from the character molds set by the better first two. While Wolverine had two really good parts in it (Ryan Reynolds at the start of it and Liev Schreiber for every scene he was in) and the rest of the movie was just a big pile of shite. First Class has a lot to live up to, and to put the franchise back to where it should be. So does the movie work?

      If there was one thing that this movie needed more than anything else it would have to be more of Micheal Fassbender as Erik Lenhsherr. Or I should say him hunting Nazis. Even though once Fassbender joins up with  James McAvoy's Charles Xavier, who  have an amazing chemistry on screen together, it cannot compare to the stand alone scenes of Lenhsherr working toward his personal goal and the tension that is on screen during those times. Fassbender is just such fun to watch during this. McAvoy's Xavier though has the largest character change in the whole movie. As Charles Xavier, he starts out as a smarmy, horny well educated graduate who is only at first interested in getting laid, yet changes once he finds out there are more mutants in the world than what he thought. Yet it's his meeting with Lenhsherr that changes him the most, as this is someone that he can openly talk to about his ideas that isn't afraid to disagree with him. This is what changes him from wanting to be a teacher and actually becoming one. Both McAvoy and Fassbender give their characters a human quality that was missing from the previous movies, as you truly care about what happens to them both. Kevin Bacon though seemed like he enjoyed his time as Sebastian Shaw the most, as every scene he was in he stole and for good reason.

     The film moves at an amazing pace, as it seems like not line of dialogue or action is out of place or used to show something undue. Even though the main story is to stop the start of a war, the true story is the friendship of Xavier and Lenhsherr and the dissolution of it due to differing views of the human race. Even though it is talked about in the film, a whole hour could have been devoted to just that subject as discussed between the two characters, as the heart of the film is the two of them together. There's only two things I had a problem in with the movie. One was that Shaw's group isn't giving much dialogue or back story as they're just there, and are exceptionally powerful, as is Shaw. The other problem is of the character of Darwin, as he's used as the "token black guy". Enough said about that.

     If nothing else, First Class reboots the X-Men franchise as Batman Begins rebooted the Batman franchise. It basically wipes most of the past movies away, though it keeps two characters  the same that appeared in the previous films (you'll know who when you see them, as one of them has the best line in the whole movie). As for the team behind the camera for the movie, if Fox is smart they will keep all of them in place as they are the ones that made the film as good as it is. As far as comic book movies go, this is probably my second favorite one after The Dark Knight, as the film is compelling, smart, and actually has a soul to it that was missing from the previous ones and is probably the best movie I've seen so far this year.

BEST DEATH:
     Exploratory surgery with a coin!

BEST LINE:
     Go fuck yourself.

FUN FACTS:
     Bryan Singer was approached to direct First Class, but declined due to previous commitments. Yet he stayed on as producer.

     A telepathic battle between Professor X and Emma Frost was going to be in the film, but upon the release of Inception, the scene was scrapped.

     Matthew Vaughn wanted everyone to drop their accents in their performances. James McAvoy was somewhat disappointed in this decision due to none of the main characters would have accents including Moira MacTaggert who is Scottish, due to he, himself, is Scottish.

     The filmmakers hired an "X-Men" specialist to help the cast understand their roles.