MAN OF STEEL

Warner Bros.

Running time: 1:43 Minutes

Rated PG-13



Click below to watch the Man of Steel movie trailer.




In Warner Bros. Man of Steel, Jor-El - Russell Crowe - and his wife Lara Lor-Van - Ayelet Zurer - send off their baby boy Kal-El from their doomed planet of Krypton to the planet Earth - where he grows up to be the outcast hero Superman, Henry Cavill.

Directed by Zack Snyder, and Written and Produced by Christopher Nolan, with Superman created by Jerry Siegel & Joe Shuster, Man of Steel is a new rebooted dark version of Superman and Superman II put together in one movie. This is not the upbeat Truth, Justice, and the American Way Superman with a sappy love story. However, most of the symbols concerning Superman are in this movie - including references to the TV series Smallville. Released in 2013 - the 75th Anniversary of the creation of Siegel's & Shuster's Superman - Man of Steel is the story of Henry Cavill as Clark Kent/Kal-El - with Dylan Sprayberry and Cooper Timberline portraying the young Clark Kent at various ages - being a bullied outcast struggling with and hiding his superhuman abilities from people.

Clark Kent's/Kal-El's/Cavill's parents Russell Crowe, Ayelet Zurer, as Kal-El's Kryptonian scientific parents, and  Kevin Costner, and Diane Lane as Clark Kent's human farming parents home in Kansas were great strong people. These people had to be strong people in order to develop the man who will eventually become known Superman, especially from Lane and Costner. Although I wish there were more scenes with Zurer. Nevertheless, you can especially feel the love coming from Costner and Lane for Kal-El/Cavill.

I liked how the U.S. Military was handled in the movie. This is how I believe the military would respond if there really was an alien invasion. There were a lot of military units in the credits that were thanked for their participation in the movie.

I also liked the relationship between Kal-El/Cavill and Lois Lane/Amy Adams. This was not a sappy love story, but a professional client/friendship relationship. Kal-El/Cavill was more concerned about his place among humans than a relationship with Lane/Adams. Although I regret that Lane/Adams did not have enough of the dramatic reporter-like scenes that shows that she is an award-winning reporter, this was more than in the previous Superman movie. Likewise Perry White/Laurence Fishburne was not used enough as the City Editor of the Daily Planet. White/Fishburne was used mostly as a victim.

The ending of the movie reminded me of the ending of The Avengers, especially the scenes in The Avengers of The Hulk battling Loki. I felt that the battles at the end of the movie of Man of Steel were a little too long and I was saying to myself, "Okay. I've seen enough of the battles. Let's get to the end of the movie."

I started to sympathise with General Zod - Michael Shannon - by the end of the movie. Zod/Shannon is still the obsessed bad guy of the movie searching for Kal El/Cavill, but at least I understood Zod/Shannon and his reasons. As the Kryptonians go wild looking for Kal El/Cavill, there were some plot points in the story that bothered me, until they were solved in a roundabout flashback way. Other flashbacks in the movie were handled better. It was sad that in the beginning of the movie - while Krypton is dying - the Kryptonian people were at war, following a military coup.

With Clark Kent's/Cavill's upbringing, it was hard to believe that Clark Kent/Kal-El had no regret when he and the Kryptonians started battling and causing damage, especially in a small town. During the various battles, you see the crowds running away but never hurt or killed. While those are implied, especially with buildings and skyscrapers collapsing in Metropolis, there is no obvious repercussions of the battles aside from all the damage. There was criticism that the people in general would not trust this Superman who had caused all this damage, despite his good intentions. He would not be considered and American idol and because of this First Contact situation, I could see the people of Earth giving up Superman to the Kryptonians and I could feel for Kal-El's/Cavill's forsakeness. And with references and comparisons to Jesus Christ, I could imagine Christ being treated the same way if Christ suddenly showed up today. With the millions of dollars of damage caused by their battles, it made me hope of a company like Marvel Comics Damage Control to handle all the rebuilding of the rubble.

There were several commercials in the theater before the movie played that had the Man of Steel theme. I had mixed feelings about that. While I liked the Man of Steel themes in the commercials just before the movie, I was uncomfortable with seeing those commercials in the theater. It made the movie feel too commercialized, especially when the showing was running late. I am not sure if running late is a new trend for movie theaters, or was just for that particular theater. The commercials just rather frustrated me as I wanted to see the movie and I could have gone for refreshments if I knew the movie was running late.

Because the movie was so dark, it made me long to see Superbman - The Other Movie again produced by my Orange Coast College film student colleagues Vern Dietsche and Dave Teubner for a good laugh.

I saw Man of Steel at a late show, and as I was leaving the fairly empty mall - a security guard asked me, "Did you come from the movies?" "Yes." "What did you see?" "Man of Steel." "I'm going to see that tomorrow! Is it good?" "Yes it is, but it is a dark movie."

Rated PG-13 for violence. Running time: 1:43 Minutes.

Click below to watch another movie trailer of Man of Steel.



Click below to watch the final movie trailer of Man of Steel.



Pancho 
All people smile in the same language.

Pancho's Movie Reviews



 

Les Miserables

Universal Pictures

Rated PG-13

Running time: 157 Minutes



Click below to watch the Les Miserables trailer.



In Universal Pictures Les Miserables, former prisoner Jean Valjean, Hugh Jackman, has been on the run from policeman Javert, Russell Crowe, for decades because Valjean/Jackman broke parole for stealing a loaf of bread for Jackman's starving nephew.

This dramatic movie musical based on the theatrical stage musical of Les Miserables by Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schonberg  - which has been performing world-wide for over 25 years as of 2012, and is the longest running musical in the world - is a musical where 99% of the dialog is sung. As a result, you have to really listen to the lyrics of the songs to follow the plot of the movie - which is based on Victor Hugo's novel Les Miserables, considered to be one of the longest books ever written. What is great is that instead of listening to a playback of the music and then singing the songs, the actors actually sang the songs while they were acting - thus giving more of a performance for the camera as they sing. Set during the time of the Paris Uprising of 1832, otherwise known as the June Rebellion, the story of Les Miserables follows Valjean/Jackman as he transforms from escaped parolee to prominent mayor who undertakes an obligation to rescue the daughter, Cosette - a young Isabelle Allen and Amanda Seyfried - of his former factory employee Fantine, Anne Hathaway, who was thrown out on the street. Although it was a little confusing for me and took me some time to realize that she was being ostracized by the rest of the factory employees for Fantine/Hathaway sending money to her illegitamate child Cosette/young Isabelle Allen.

In all these years, I had never seen the musical Les Miserables or read the book. I have only heard clips of the music and knew of the general story of Javert's manhunt of pursuing Valjean. While my musical theater family and friends were not happy with the stars singing performances in the movie - and with good reason, especially with Crowe's singing - they loved the ensemble cast. It seems like the producers just got stars to make the movie so they can have a greater movie audience. Personally, I accepted the stars, except for Crowe's singing. At least the movie did have some of the Les Miserables stars from the musical production performing in the movie, and the ensemble cast throughout the movie were great. Several of the ensemble cast had performed in various stage productions of Les Miserables, so it was great to have them performing in the movie.

I was blown away by Hathaway's emotional performance of the song "I Dreamed A Dream." I could feel her pain of hitting rock bottom in her life and never climbing out of the hole that she is in - even if her singing might have been a little rough, but that roughness added to the emotion of the song for me as Hathaway did not want to sing it pretty considering the scene. Hathaway supposedly blew everyone away at her audition, leaving them in tears, and I would not be surprised if she had used this song for that audition. Hathaway also cut her hair and lost weight for the role as the sickly Fantine. Make no mistake, this is not a pretty Broadway movie - but a dark historical movie, dealing with the various castes of historical France as well as the bloody Paris Uprising of 1832 from which Hugo's novel is about. Having Hathaway's mother, stage actress Kate McCauley Hathaway, being the first Fantine in the First U.S. National Tour of Les Miserables makes a nice continuity touch with Hathaway portraying Fantine in the movie. Young Isabelle Allen as the young Cosette was very good for her age when she performed. Young Daniel Huttlestone was also good as the young Revolutionary urchin Gavroche.

Sacha Baron Cohen and Helena Bonham Carter as Samantha Barks/Eponine's parents - and cruel guardians of the now motherless Cosette/Isabelle Allen - added to the comic relief to the movie, which was a nice contrast to the darkness of the rest of the movie, thus giving their part of the movie a Sweeney Todd type of feel to the movie.

I felt the sudden romantic triangle with Cosette/Seyfried, Marius/Eddie Redmayne, and Eponine/Barks was an obligatory love story - especially when Marius/Redmayne spots Cosette/Seyfried across the way and it is love at first sight, which totally made this plot point unreal for me. Having Cosette/Seyfried losing the hardness of her childhood and becoming seemingly innocent again was also unreal for me. I felt she should have kept her cynisism when initially meeting Marius/Redmayne. But eventually this romantic triangle became an integral story plot to the rest of the movie and made sense, however it did take awhile for this love story to become acceptable to me. I was not happy that the revolutionaries were too well off to be downtrodden citizens, especially Marius/Redmayne with his rich uncle. The revolutionaries were basically liberal college students protesting against the conservative establishment rather than being real downtrodden citizens. The revolutionaries became acceptable to me when they were singing their song of revolution "Do You Hear the People Sing" with the citizens, but otherwise the revolutionaries were still liberal college students instead of poor French citizens.

I was surprised that the movie was not in 3D, but Director Tom Hooper felt that it would not receive a wide enough audience if the movie was in 3D. From the opening shots, the movie would have been great in 3D and would have been one of the first 3D musicals - if not the first 3D musical. As it is, the movie was very visual for material originally developed for the theatrical stage. The Paris Uprising in the movie were actual battles, and not a light show such as shown in the 25th anniversary concert that I had seen on PBS, although the movie uprising was not as graphic as a real uprising would have been. Having Javert/Crowe leading the French soldiers seemed quite appropriate as the symbol of the oppressive establishment, especially as he goes after Valjean/Jackman. What I did not like about the story was that there was no reference to Valjean/Jackman's nephew or sister years later. They were the reason he went to prison. What happened to them? Instead of being with his family, Valjean/Jackman creates a new family with Cosette/Seyfried.

With Valjean/Jackman encountering the Bishop Colm Wilkinson, thus experiencing compassion for perhaps the first time in his life, Valjean/Jackman begins his journey to redemption for his sins of being a thief. This religious encounter basically transforms the rest of Valjean/Jackman's life as he takes on numerous responsibilities for himself and for other people's lives. Valjean/Jackman's redemption is perhaps my favorite theme of the movie - even as Valjean/Jackman struggles with moral consequences, especially when someone is arrested believed to be him - as Valjean/Jackman continuously turns to the God for help and I am glad the movie ended with this theme. I will admit that at the end of the movie, I teared up - which I think was mainly due to this theme, and I am glad of that.

After the movie was over, the audience applauded.

Rated PG-13 for violence and sexual situations. Running time: 157 Minutes.

Click below to watch another musical trailer of Les Miserables.




Pancho 
All people smile in the same language.

 Follow us on Facebook: Pancho's Movie Reviews