Reviews

I'm a Sherlock Holmes fan, more specifically a fan of the original stories. But this movie is not about Sherlock Holmes. Keep that in mind. In this movie Sherlock Holmes himself is just a supporting role.

This is a family friendly adventure movie about a mother who has taught her daughter to be her own, rather than conform to the norms of society. It's exciting and funny, with a hint of mystery to it. Acting and direction is great, and I really hope there will be a sequel.

The characters: First of all you should know that this movie is character driven as opposed to story driven. The characters' individual journeys, how they are developed over the course of the story, are very thought through and, although some of them will seem flat at first, they soon start to grow and change into individual personalities.

The setting: It explores the base human instincts in an unforgiving world with little comfort, where survival is the everyday struggle. It brilliantly portrays, through acting and directing, the insanity that affects this worlds inhabitants, and how their desperation to survive drives them to believe in anything that they're told that gives them hope.

The art direction: The visuals are stunning. Miller allegedly wanted the movie to be colourful because he thought that, in a world such as this, humans will try to gather every scrap of beauty they can find to try and make their hard lives a little more bearable. This coupled with the amazing Namibian desert makes for an impactful picture.

The acting: The portrayal of the different characters in the movie is fantastic. Even the supporting cast has memorable personalities that are conveyed through a few simple actions - The adaptable survivor, the long term thinking life lover, the weak one searching for security, the brave protector. And these are just supporting characters. The main characters are equally brilliant, and thanks to actors with a proved track record these are brought to life in a great way that makes their emotions your own - hopelessness, desperation, anguish.

The action: Here's one important aspect. The action will drive your pulse through the roof. From almost the very start the high pace will have you gripping your seat. An acquaintance of mine measured their pulse while watching the movie and was apparently doing heavy cardio excercise while sitting down. If you watch this in a movie theater you'll hear the audience gasp for air between the action sequences. It's like a roller coaster ride, and I'm not exaggerating.

Lastly I want to explain how I rate movies. I give them a number from 1 to 10 based on my initial feeling and then I go over the movie and try to find things worth retracting points for. In this case the initial impression was so good, and after analysing it I decided that neither of the two things that made me go "huh?" while watching the movie was worth retracting points for.

I will definitely watch this movie again and this is one of those few instances where I'll be getting a copy to put on my shelf as well.

To have classical writing like that of Robert E Howard at your disposal, and make a movie that is so bad that it isn't even an enjoyable popcorn-flick takes a huge lack of talent. Having followed the process since Paradox Entertainment acquired the rights to Conan from Conan Properties Inc many years ago I have time and again been left dumbfounded at how they completely fail to get the point.

Not only is this movie not a good Conan-movie or faithful to Robert E Howard's creation. It also crushes the hopes of us Howard-fans getting one within a foreseeable future. This is the kind of movie that has you yawning and makes you go get snacks without pausing the movie if you're at home, or checking your watch if you're in the theater.

To blame for all this is obviously several people rather than one. Many of the producers has had their dirty fingers in it with clauses of right to mess with the product in their contracts. None of them ever thought keeping this true to Robert E Howard would be the key to success, even though so many other productions have proved vastly successful by doing reboots that are faithful. The worst part about all the people in charge on this project is that once they learned that the movie didn't make as much as they hoped they blame it on everything else but themselves. They blame the Conan-brand, they blame the fans and they even have the nerve to make up lies for the poor actors who've worked their asses off trying to make the movie the producers has convinced them that the fans want. So the actors are now left with a bad taste in the mouth and from their comments on panels and interviews you can tell someone withheld the reason the movie bombed from them.

This whole project is a mess and it makes me sad.

For the actual movie and story itself it's a mix of way too much blood spurting in very unrealistic ways, bad cgi where they haven't even taken into account the way the light falls on the cast, an inability to keep martial arts and parcour out of a movie that is meant to depict a pre-historic age (I have nothing against MA or parcour. I just think that they could have come up with something of their own, that felt more genuine and not constructed), overly fancy and unrealistic swordplay, and finally a story that is completely unnecessary as it is not part of Robert E Howard's work, and it even conflicts with it. How on earth is that faithful? The answer: It isn't.

This movie is utter crap. Don't watch it unless someone pays you.

Now I have obviously not seen *all* of Jeunet's movies, but having seen a few (Delicatessen, City of Lost Children, Alien: Resurrection and Amélie) Micmacs definitely doesn't leave me disappointed. The ever present dark humour and crazy twists are there, in a way similar to Tim Burton, only Jeunet "goes to eleven".

The political message is new to me with regards to Jeunet's movies and in my opinion doesn't fit his very characteristic style of movie-making. It would have dragged my rating down a notch had it not been for the absolutely flawless execution stopping me dead in my tracks. I'm obviously wrong and Jeunet's style works just fine with the political message.

In earlier creations Jeunet has let his characters be strange to the core. In Micmacs however he strays from that and they each present at first a somewhat eccentric or downright crazy behaviour, but as the movie progress real, believable and warm characters step forth and they turn out to be normal people who just happen to be in a very strange environment, as if our world is described by Jeunet, while the inhabitants speak for themselves.

If you've seen other movies by Jean Pierre Jeunet you will recognize his style. If you have *not* seen anything by him I would like to caution you: Sit down in front of the movie with a very open mind and no expectations.

I will have to watch this movie again a couple of times because I noticed that like with his earlier movies this one is packed with little details and jokes hiding in the background, which leaves for new things to experience every time you watch it.

I just came back from the theater and I must say I was pleasantly surprised. This new take has great actors, nice costume, great camera direction and a solid story.

The acting is very good and especially Cate Blanchet shines. Max von Sydow's English is getting better with every movie and he can finally portray someone without a Swedish accent.

The costume is well done and almost as historically accurate as one can ask from a movie that tells a mostly fictional story.

There are a few issues of course, that makes me lower the score.

Comical relief is avoided mostly, but could have been left out altogether in my opinion. Luckily the people used for comic relief are not the ones you'd expect.

And the final battle which is a big part of the movie annoys me greatly in it's composition, and you will see why when you watch the movie.

And what in the world *is* that weapon that Little John is wielding? Could they not come up with something more appropriate?

Having read most (even if not all) of the original stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and having winced through the years at all the different adaptations of the stories into a visual medium I was very sceptic at first, when I heard and read about this movie. But since I'm a big fan of the original Sherlock Holmes I thought I'd give them at least one chance. And they surely deserved it. This movie is possibly the most faithful adaptation of Doyle's writing to film so far. Ironically the things that most people will go "Hey, that's not how Doyle wrote it!" is actually just as he wrote them. They've chosen to show sides of Holmes that have been ignored before. Doyle wrote Mr Holmes as an eccentric, drug abusing, violin playing, unpleasant fighter, and they've chosen to let him be that man. Another thing I was pleasantly surprised at was how, untypical of modern day movie-making, they did Dr Watson justice. Instead of, as so many earlier versions have, portray him as a stumbling, daft fool and comical sidekick (if it's not Watson who is incorrectly used as a comical sidekick it's Gimli or Ron Weasley) he is allowed to be smart and driven by curiosity and lust for adventure.

Finally they also manage to capture the dirty, early twentieth century London well. Costumes are well done, apart from the cleavage on the ladies which is a bit too modern, and Zimmer's music mixed with the occasional old folksong works fine too.

I warmly recommend this movie to anyone who is a fan of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes, and to everyone else too of course. I will myself return to the theatre to watch it again.