Movie Roundup – May 06

Star Wars – Clone Wars – Series 2

Not the movie but the cartoon series. Saw the first series a while ago and, whilst I thought it was ok, wasn’t overly impressed. The main problem was a lack of narrative – each 5 minute cartoon was self contained. This is a problem the second series doesn’t have and it’s much better because of it. The stories all combine together to make a single uninterrupted episode (shown as a movie on the dvd). They show the development of Anakin and help explain his desent to the dark side, with the series ending as Anakin and Obi-Wan Kenobi enter into the battle that starts the third film. Well worth a look.

Corpse Bride

An animated movie created by Tim Burton. The film uses stop motion animation to bring a rather dreary world to life. I had seen the trailer previously and thought it all looked rather interesting. Unfortunately the actual movie left me feeling much like the inhabitants of the world it portrayed – disappointed. The animation itself is wonderful, as are the design and effects, but the story left something to be desired. I think part of the problem is recent stories from companies like Pixar setting the bar too high for their competitors – give me Toy Story any day.

Amalie

Wow – this film is wonderful. I would recommend it to absolutely anyone. I had been meaning to see it for ages, kept hearing good things about it, but never actually gotten around to watching. I’m glad I finally got to see it. The story follows Amélie, played by the wonderful Audrey Tautou, as she goes about her simple life – helping improve the lives of others. There is a warm center to the movie that can’t help but make you feel good – I love it.

Final Fantasy – Advent Children

I have played other final fantasy games, and I have seen Final Fantasy – The Spirits Within but I’ve never played Final Fantasy 7 (although I do own it :S). Despite this I have watched Final Fantasy – Advent Children, which is a follow up to the very popular PlayStation game. Like Spirits Within, Advent Children is a rather confused film – I suspect it would have made much more sense if I had actually played the game (I will one day). Unlike Spirits Within, Advent Children played up to it’s video game heritage a lot more. Spirits Within stuck to a real life style making things realistic and believable (as believable as space based fantasy can be anyway), whilst Advent children went for a more anime style movie – I felt that was a much better choice. Overall it was interesting but something felt missing which would most likely have been filled in if I had played the game.

How was it for you? Let me know on BlueSky or Mastodon

Link to this page

Thanks for reading. I'd really appreciate it if you'd link to this page if you mention it in your newsletter or on your blog.