Skip to main content


Rating: 3.9/5
Review: "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie review"

Producer Michael Bay reboots the franchise with Jonathan Liebesman on the helm. As far as gritty reboots go, this is actually far from dark. It has plenty of light moments although things are kept in a realistic fashion (such as the humanistic turtles' designs). It is a movie that all ages can enjoy; it does not have the sexual tone in a Michael Bay's movie. Jonathan, known for his Wrath of the Titans and Battle: Los Angeles, know his action beats well enough and keeps things fast paced.

The story: Megan Fox plays April O'Neil, a reporter, who stumbles upon an attempt robbery by mysterious Foot Clan. She becomes obsessed in finding the mysterious vigilantes who have stopped the robbery. The plot is straight forward but Jonathan keeps the pace fast enough to last through 1 hour and 41 minutes. Mind you, the turtles are not properly revealed until the 20 minutes mark into the movie. Once the turtles are revealed, the movie becomes a CGI fest. Each of the turtle has a distinctive look and characteristics that is easy to tell on screen. Fortunately, Jonathan knows how to direct action decently although at times, the CGI is a little overwhelming. The last 40 minutes is packed with action; a exciting raid in the underground lair, an exhilarating break-out escape and an explosive CGI-laden climax. The action seems to be influenced by Michael Bay; slo-mo and lens flare. The villain, Shredder, is a little bland and solely exists to show off his wide range of blades. His background story is not properly laid out but he does a decent job during the action scenes, showing his menace against the heroes. Acting wise is alright. Megan Fox plays her role better in this than in the Transformers movies. The rest are not memorable. CGI looks good, the CGI of the turtles and Shredder are decent. Music by Brian Tyler is decent but not very memorable.

Overall: It delivers what general audience wants; fast paced story with decent CGI action. Looking at the incredibly negative reviews by the critics, I have to admit that this is nothing more than a mindless action movie with little soul but it is far from the worst movie this year. As usual, the movie ends off by hinting that more things are on the way.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Rating: 3.4/5 Review: "The Spirit of Ramayana" (103 minutes) "A passable Thai horror movie with an interesting concept but weak execution." As a low-budget horror movie, it has enough entertainment values. In the recent years, there are a few strong Thai horror movies with decent production values and there are many mediocre low-budget horror movies. The Spirit of Ramayana is somewhat in the middle. It may not look that polished but its themes and concept are intriguing enough. The story: The narrative is straight forward however its editing made the movie look messy and disjointed. It is a simple story about Mintra, a young dancer who is rejected for the main role because she cannot pull off an evil and sensual side. However, a spirit helps her to unleash her dark side. On paper, it sounds like a supernatural Black Swan. It lacks the emotional depth of Black Swan as the director seems only interested in churning out cheap scares. As the plot develops fur...
Post a Comment
Read more
Rating: 3.7/5 Review: "Terminator Salvation DVD review" -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This is not bad. It is not the worst terminator movie, I actually thought Terminator 1 is just okay. Terminator 2 and 3 are quite entertaining followed by also entertaining Salvation. MCG, the director of Charlies' Angels, takes the directing seat and turned terminator into a dark and gritty world. As what he said, he did not want the future to be a shiny world but a dark and gritty world. He is considered to have done a great job in that and creating the realistic and cool action. But his story pretty much stays the same as his other movies, a simple mindless thrill ride. The story: The future is here and the year is 2018...John Conner is a daring man who will be willing to save people from Skynet, a evil organisation which creates Terminators. A mysterious man who is supposed to be dead suddenly finds himself in the year of...
Post a Comment
Read more
Rating: 3.7/5 Review: "Fantastic Four movie review" "A decent gritty reboot that could have been something more than what it is now." This is Josh Trank's first big budget movie and it seems he is slightly inexperienced of directing a movie of a massive scale. Fresh from directing a small budget movie, Chronicle, it seems that he is overwhelmed by whatever happened (there are rumours that Matthew Vaughn was brought in to reshoot). Nonetheless, on the whole, the reboot is an alright movie that rehashes on the tired superhero origin. It is disappointing that it is a little shallow. I think with a longer runtime, it could benefit the characters' development and flow of the story. The story: Apparently, the writers of the film said that it does not follow any story from the source material. Instead, a new origin is created. I didn't exactly know how the original source material goes (I read a couple of Fantastic Four comic books to know the tone ...
Post a Comment
Read more