Many reviews...

[alobear]

Footloose:

I watched the recent remake of Footloose last weekend and my abiding impression was one of pointlessness.  It wasn’t different enough from the original to be either annoying or interesting, nothing in it stood out as particularly impressive, and the recreation of specific dances from the original made it feel dated.  I was also confused (as I never have been watching the original) as to how all the kids in the town could be quite so good at dancing when it had been against the law for three years.  Hey ho – it was passably entertaining, I suppose, but not provocative in any of the ways I’d hoped or feared.

Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists!

This was a pretty weird film, that didn’t do much for me, overall.  Mr Bobo, the cue-card wielding chimpanzee was pretty cool and I liked Surprisingly Curvaceous Pirate, but mostly it didn’t quite hit the level of actually funny for me.  Perhaps I was unfairly expecting the usual Aardman style of humour, which had obviously been circumvented by the source material, but it just didn’t strike the right notes of comedy in my view.

The Alchemist:

Another entertaining Restoration comedy from the troupe at the White Bear Theatre.  I remember seeing this play in Stratford many years ago on a school trip, and it was still good, with an amusing array of victims for the central con artists to manipulate, and lots of silly costume changes and ridiculous disguises.  Always fun.

Avengers Assemble:

This billed itself officially in the credits as A Joss Whedon Film, and it certainly was that.  Dave identified the usual stabbage before we went, but I resisted believing it until it actually happened, as I never learn.  Still, there were many, many things to like about the film.  In particular, I thought the Black Widow/Hawkeye arc was very well done, giving them an emotional hook to help them hold their own among the more powerful/familiar characters.  I also really liked the portrayal of Bruce Banner – one of the better versions of him I’ve seen.  The fighting was awesome, the humour cropped up just frequently enough to provide some relief without detracting from the more serious aspects, and I enjoyed it enough that I’m planning to go and see it again next weekend.

Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch:

This book was recommended to me by several people, but turned out to be rather different than I expected.  It has been presented as “Harry Potter in the London Metropolitan Police” but it’s much more like The Dresden Files in tone, magic system, violence, bad language, and first person narrator.  It was really rather unpleasant in places, which doesn’t always bother me, but there wasn’t enough other stuff of interest to mitigate the ick.  More bothersome were the regular off-colour remarks by the narrator about race, sexuality, gender and how everything and everyone about him was one small item away from fulfilling standard clichés.  Pointing out that your writing contains a lot of clichés doesn’t necessarily counteract that fact.  Not a series I plan to continue with.

Hunting Party by Elizabeth Moon:

I recently discovered that an author I like has a series of 12 books I’d never heard of, so I downloaded them all in audio format, and this was the first.  It was one of those “movie and your mind” affairs that I’ve found rather off-putting previously, but this was a somewhat toned down version that I quite enjoyed once I got used to the music and sound effects.  It was a fairly standard tale of an ex-military spaceship captain taking on a civilian commission and discovering nefarious activities on her first planetary destination.  It was well performed, though, and lots of the characters were likeable.  No great literary achievement, but certainly entertaining enough for my daily walk to work.

Comments

[prunesquallormd.livejournal.com]

You failed to mention the cutest dodo ever! I'm disappointed XD

I had no idea they'd done a remake of Footloose. It does sound rather pointless. It just seems so much of its time to me. What next, remaking Saturday Night Fever?

Must see the new Avengers film, and Cabin in the Woods sounds rather fun too.

[alobear.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure *fun* is quite the word I'd use to describe Cabin in the Woods, but I'm certainly intrigued.

[prunesquallormd.livejournal.com]

Um, fun in a gruesome sort of a way maybe :)

[lareinemisere.livejournal.com]

>What next, remaking Saturday Night Fever?

If Simon Cowell gets his way, yes. (Seriously, Google it...)

[prunesquallormd.livejournal.com]

Oh god, why?
*cries*