Film Thursday

9

My last “Film Thursday” for 6 weeks as I’m on placement from Monday. Argh. It wasn’t as busy as I was hoping, with only three films making the “can be arsed going to see” category.

Cirque Du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant

The trailers for this looked good and it didn’t disappoint, despite almost being an overlong trailer for an upcoming series in its own right.

Plot-in-a-nutshell: Two best friends end up becoming vampires by different mean; one a “good” vampire, the other a “bad” Vampaneze. Begin Blade-style “them against us” plotline.

Having had a quick scan through the related Wikipedia articles, there are definitely some differences between the film and the two source novels by Darren Shan. In fact, the two books which give up most of their content to form the plot for the film are Cirqu du Freak and The Vampire’s Assistant. They in turn are the first two books in a trilogy, itself the first of four such trilogies. So you can see that Hollywood would be begging for the rights with so much pre-written story to adapt.

As I’ve not read the books I can’t comment on how “good” an adaptation it is, but as a film in its own right it’s certainly enjoyable. There is enough revealed about the background world in which its set to certainly get the imagination going and I do hope they start work on a sequel or three. Mainly as I don’t have the time to read another twelve novels.

It is a little violent and there’s a smattering of bad language, but it’s suitable for the young teens and up in my opinion. The humour is quite dark (as it should be) with some good slapstick and gruesome effects.

Oh, and Salma Hayek is still hot, even with a beard.

9

Coincidentally, the second film of the day shares an actor with the first. Mr Crepsley from Vampire’s Assistant and “Number 5″ from 9 are both played by John C. Reilly. However, in this wonderfully designed animated feature only his vocal talents are used.

Plot-in-a-nutshell: The world has been destroyed and all that’s left are some little sentient dolls and a very scary mechanical dog. But what happened? And why?

I was really, really looking forward to 9 and I have to admit to being a little disappointed. Mainly in the story which just doesn’t seem to be deep enough. Visually, however, it is a complete and utter treat. It’s not been so much sketched out and drawn, but mechanically designed. This very much appeals to my inner geek.

It is still a very moving film with some wonderful characters and a lovely ending. The journey to that ending is superbly crafted, but it just seemed to be missing a little something for me. I couldn’t tell you what, annoyingly enough.

There is no denying the Tim Burton influence in the freaky designs, though there are even shades of the scary hybrid toys from the first Toy Story movie. Only with engines and snippy bits and laser eyes and stuff.

For the pure visual wonderfulness, I would recommend 9.

Fantastic Mr Fox

I am so going to get it in the neck for this one, but I have my issues with this film… like 9 it is beautifully made, though the animation is far more simplistic. The voice acting if pretty good, though I think 9‘s was better (and yes, that’s even taking into account George Clooney). It’s the story, of all things.

Plot-in-a-nutshell: A fox family move into a shiny new tree, but soon find themselves the centre of a pest-control war waged by three mean farmers.

So what’s my problem with the story? Bear in mind that I love Roald Dahl and everything he stood for, but for a kids’ story the morals on this are all messed up. The foxes start off fine. Mr Fox decides he wants to steal loads of stuff, which he then does. The farmers get a bit peeved at this and decide they don’t want him living next to them – who would?

But guess who wins?

Yes, kids. Steal stuff, annoy people… and you’ll get away with it if you have a cool (read “annoying”) trademark whistle and a way with words. Actually, in fairness it worked for our politicians for long enough.

I have to confess I’ve never read the book. It was one of the ones I just didn’t get round to as a kid. I couldn’t tell you how many times I read Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator. I absolutely adored them, but now I feel almost glad that I didn’t read Mr Fox as it actually seems a bit weak.

Please tell me that the book didn’t have the “whistle-click” trademark in it? That’s just awful. As is some of the dialogue. I’m really hoping it’s just been destroyed in adaptation as I can’t believe Dahl would have been so trite in places.

But as I said: it looks fantastic. However overall it’s more kind of “Passable Mister Fox”

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• The Vampire’s Assistant Review (themovieblog.com)

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