INTERSTELLAR

Paramount Pictures

Rated PG-13

Running time: 169 Minutes

Click below to watch a movie trailer of Interstellar.



In Paramount Pictures Interstellar, former farmer astronaut Matthew McConaughey agrees to leave his family behind in order to pilot a desperate mission through interstellar space in order to save a doomed Earth.

A combination of Gravity and 2001: A Space Odyssey - especially toward the end - Interstellar, Written with his brother Jonathan Nolan and Directed by Christopher Nolan, is a dramatic science fiction movie that explores the fate and potential of a doomed human race. This is not your typical CGI action-packed science fiction movie - but a practical examination of the exploration of deep space and the intentions of actually going out into space, with astronauts McConaughey and Anne Hathaway on opposite sides of the argument. It was great that Nolan had researched NASA and the private space program SpaceX - as well having former astronaut Marsha Ivins and theoretical physicist Kip Thorne, who has a cameo, as a scientific consultant to Interstellar to maintain the authenticity of the movie.

With Earth's natural resources, especially food ravaged from a blight, becoming so scarce - humanity is on the verge of failure in the midst of a dust bowl. McConaughey does what he can to improve his farm. It was nice that Nolan got permission from Director Ken Burns of the TV mini-series documentary The Dust Bowl, which took place in America during the Great Depression of the 1930's, to use their interview footage in the movie Interstellar. The logos for Warner Bros., Paramount, Syncopy, and Legendary all have a "dusty" look to them to foreshadow the movie. What got to me the most was the historical revisionism of the Apollo moon landings in McConaughey's daughter Murphy's/Mackenzie Foy's school. Of course McConaughey takes umbrage to such revisionism.

One of the most important plot points in the movie deals with time dilation and suspended animation  - time will go slower for the astronauts than for the people back home on Earth due to Einstein's general relativity equations, especially near the black hole, of which the black hole and the wormhole are two completely different things in the movie, so the people on Earth will age while the astronauts will remain the same age while they travel through the wormhole and are out on the other side of the galaxy. This was a tearjerker of a plot point theme with McConaughey and reminded me of The Twilight Zone episode The Long Morrow as the movie bounces back and forth between Earth and space.

I thought the constant use of the poem "Do not go gentle into that good night" by Dylan Thomas, which was written for his dying father, was quite appropriate - especially during the launching of the spacecraft Endurance while it searches for a way to save the human race as they follow after the Lazarus missions.

Interstellar also has an interstellar cast, most of whom were never in the marketing of the film that I am aware of - with at least one star's involvement kept secret. So it was awesome to see these people in the movie, without have any preconceived notions of what kind of characters these stars would be playing. I really do not want to give away the stars of this movie - except for this, it was funny seeing Topher Grace in the movie as I had just seen him that morning on TV in That 70's Show. It is curious when I saw this movie that it was the day before Anne Hathaway's birthday.

Since Nolan wanted to avoid using anthropomorphic robots in the movie, it was strange to me not to see a traditional humanoid-looking robot. But the use of the quadrilateral design of the robots, Bill Irwin and Josh Stewart, were interesting - and more human with intelligence and emotion than most robots, especially with McConaughey programming the robots - and that the design of these robots was especially impressive to me when used on the water planet Miller.

Hans Zimmer's unique musical score was dictated by Nolan who wanted the traditional instruments to go by the wayside.

The movie is a long movie. With the movie trailers, Interstellar is close to three hours.

It is curious that for the limited release of the movie - Interstellar was released in 70mm and 35mm film in theaters that still support those formats, including 70mm IMAX theaters. This is an exception to Paramount Pictures goal to stop releasing movies on film and to distribute only in digital format as nearly all the theaters in the United States have converted to digital projection.

At the end of the movie, the audience applauded.

Click below to watch another movie trailer of Interstellar.



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Rated PG-13 for violence and language. Running time: 169 Minutes.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

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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.

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Pancho 
All people smile in the same language.

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THE DARK KNIGHT RISES

Warner Bros. Pictures

Rated PG-13

Running time: 164 Minutes



Click below to watch The Dark Knight Rises trailer.



In Warner Bros. The Dark Knight Rises, crippled, reclusive billionaire Bruce Wayne, Christian Bale, comes out of retirement when terrorist leader Bane, Tom Hardy, threatens to destroy Gotham City - and billionaire Wayne/Bale returns as The Batman.

Sad to say that this film will probably go down in movie history more for incident of the midnight screening shootings at Aurora, Colorado rather than as more as the end of the Christopher Nolan/Christian Bale trilogy of the Dark Knight series. It was pretty shocking for me to wake up to this breaking news that day. If I did not have to be at work the next morning, I probably would have been at a midnight screening myself as well. Naturally, the cast and crew had expressed their deepest sympathies to the victims.

The movie itself is more of a dark suspense thriller, instead of a fun superhero action film like The Avengers. In fact, this movie was more like a serious James Bond film rather than as a comic book film. 

In the last of The Dark Knight trilogy, The Dark Knight Rises is written with Christopher Nolan and his brother Jonathan Nolan, and is based on the DC Comics character Batman created by Bob Kane, with influences by the darker Batman comics of "Knightfall" and "No Man's Land." Selina Kyle, Anne Hathaway - as "the Cat" - steals the pearl's of Bale's mother. Since this was more than a simple cat burglary, Bale comes out of his eight year reclusive isolation since the events of The Dark Knight to find out the real reason Hathaway accessed his safe. A corporate takeover of Wayne Enterprises by Board Member Ben Mendelsohn incorporated Hathaway and terrorist Bane/Hardy as Mendelsohn's henchman. Bane/Hardy is formally a part of being with Ra's al Ghul's League of Shadows - just like Wayne/Bale used to be a part of the League. Bane/Hardy has his own agenda from Mendelsohn - assuming the leadership of the League of Shadows, and in taking up Ra's al Ghul's mission to destroy Gotham City.

Although Aaron Eckhart did not appear as his character District Attorney Harvey Dent in The Dark Knight Rises - because Eckhart was killed off in The Dark Knight - Eckhart's pictures and archival footage were used throughout the movie as a reference to his character and of how much Dent/Eckhart still had as an influence to Gotham City. Gary Oldman reprises his role as Commissioner Gordon, who feels guilty in covering up District Attorney Dent/Eckhart's crimes when Dent/Eckhart was the criminal Two-Face. The Joker is never mentioned in The Dark Knight Rises out of respect for Heath Ledger - although, this lack of mentioning The Joker in the movie is ironic considering the events that have surrounded this movie.

Hathaway was very good as Selina Kyle's Catwoman, however she was never referred to as Catwoman in the movie. Hathaway went through intense training to be Catwoman and she says that this was her most physically demanding role to date. I believed that Hathaway could kick-ass while I was watching her - especially when she goes from sweet, innocent girl, to "the Cat." Tom Hardy as Bane also trained heavily for this movie by studying various fighting styles but, with Hardy's face covered by Bane's mask, you feel that it could be anybody under his mask - especially with Hardy's accented voice, just like anybody could be The Batman with Bale's gravelly voice. You don't really get to see any deep acting from Hardy because of the mask. He could have just been some big hulking wrestler under the mask with Hardy doing a voice-over for all we know. At least this time the character of Bane was more like the original comic book character of a general, strategist, and one-man ruthless army to be a villainous equal to Batman mentally as well as being the villainous character physically.

While I expected Joseph Gordon-Levitt having a minor role in the movie - he actually had a larger more integral role than I had expected, becoming Gordon/Oldman's right hand man. Levitt was good, however I felt the character should have been younger. The character should at least be fresh out of the Police Academy with his idealism.  Liam Neeson's cameo reprising his role as Ra's al Ghul was an unexpected pleasure to see. The Pittsburgh Steelers make cameo appearances in the football game.

You need a willing suspension of disbelief to accept Bale's healing of his injuries as I felt there was not sufficient time allowed in the showing of the film's story to allow for proper healing. Even with the doctors Bale had, that is still not enough sense of time in the movie to heal properly. If you accept that there was enough of a period of time for Bale to heal, then the events in the movie happened over a very long period of time which seems excessive to me. Also, the fact that the entire police force is sent underground is unbelievable as that would leave the entire city exposed. I know the Fire Department will not give up all their assets for Mutual Aid as that would leave their own city at risk, so I would not be surprised if the Police Department had something similar in their procedures. The climax of the war between the police and the criminal gangs is also unbelievable, given the firepower involved. There is a similar scene in War Horse that was much more believable. On the other hand, Batman's equipment was great to see in action as he drove around in them. Instead of a batmobile, this time he has a batplane. Although it was sad to see what happens to some of the equipment, it was still great to see. As a veteran cop tells his rookie partner, "sit back, you're in for a show."

The film was a long movie. I felt it could have been trimmed a little in the second half, just before the climax. As it is, this is the longest film Nolan has ever directed. There was also a lot of exposition in the movie, exposition of the plot rather than dialog. One, maybe two, exposition scenes I could except, like Michael Caine's concerned fantasy about the welfare for Bale while Bale was away for years for the first time. Cutting out some of this exposition could have trimmed the movie.

This is definitely the end of the Dark Knight trilogy, but the end of the movie is a positive ending left open for a new generation, a new direction for the next series of movies.

The audience I saw The Dark Knight Rises with applauded and cheered at the end and it was a pretty full house for a matinee, so not many people were intimidated by the events. Although as I was going up to the theater, a group was also going to see the film. A family man with his kids was coming out of the theater. The group asked him, "Did you see The Dark Knight?" The family man jokingly said, "no, he did not want to get shot." I was wondering if the events would hurt or help the film, or have no effect at all, to what the box office will take. We shall see as Warner Bros. will not release the opening weekend result until later "out of respect for the victims and their families." So while I think most people will live out their lives and not let the Aurora tragedy make them live in fear, it will take a while for the rest of us to get over it and heal.

Rated PG-13 for violence. Running time: 164 Minutes.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

Pancho's Movie Reviews