Up (2009)

Up.

" I hid under your porch because I love you. "

Up is storytelling at its best. The adventure film takes audiences through the full spectrum of emotions, with action and thrills mixed with comedy and suspense. Up delivers a wondrous world filled with people and creatures you'll fall head over heels in love with.
The film is centered around a grumpy old man named Carl Fredricksen and a young little explorer named Russell who decided to take an adventure to South America in a floating house suspended from helium balloons. Together they fly down to a magical realm full of dense forests and immense waterfalls. All the while, tethered to their portable house, the memories it embodies weighing them down, they’re looking for the spot Ellie had always wanted to go. Along the way, they’re accompanied by a rare 13-foot-tall, chocolate-chomping bird nicknamed Kevin. They’re chased by savage dogs with squeaky voices. Muntz turns out to be different from the hero that Carl had once imagined him.




The story itself is rather easy to follow and entertaining for all age and gender eventhough the first 10-15 minutes was fairly emotional and laughter didn't kick in after a good 20minutes or so. This shows us that Up is not just based on comical and laughter but also loving and caring twoards each other as shown throught the character of Carl Fredricksen and his wife, Ellie. The wonder of Up is that it’s loosely enough plotted to float and drift in new directions, to the extent that it’s almost two or three films in one. Nonetheless it never entirely abandons the memory of the sadness, difficult joy and blue-noted consolations of those early scenes.
However, in some parts of the film, scenes did drag on abit too long before it gets to the point and from my point of view, some scenes could be taken out of the film to reduce the drag but this didn't effect hugely on to the film. Overall, it is something everyone can watch and enjoy as it explores more than one point as mentioned above. The story contains love, care, happiness as well as sad moments.

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007)

SWEENEY TODD.

"Sweeney Todd. He never forgets and he never forgives."

The story is rather simple, a man, falsely accused and sent away for a decade and a half by a lecherous judge returns and exacts his revenge. He was a barber before and now he's a barber again, but he does a little more bloodletting than he used to in the past. He's aided by a woman who sells the worst meat pies in London. And there's a side story about Todd's daughter and a sailor who loves her (and also happened to have rescued Todd at sea).

Broken down, this is a tale that focuses on how obsession with revenge leads to tragic consequences as well as a narrow field of vision where mistakes can be made. On top of the emptiness of the act. In some ways, it's similar to Park Chan-Wook's revenge trilogy (OLD BOY etc...), being visually stunning and focused on the problems of revenge.

I suppose, I have to admit, the mystery elements are telegraphed a little too early (if you want enough mysteries and revenge films), but I suppose it would remain well obfuscated for those less experienced with such genres. Although, I'm aware that the blood and guts are part of the story, I was very discomforted by the quantity of up-close dissections witnessed, but this is appropriate to its new medium.

My only qualm about the movie was the first half-hour. First was Depp's entrance. It was hard to get past the idea of Jack Sparrow and it sure doesn't help that he uses the same accent and his first scene is on a ship. A black, ghostly one, at that. But after a while, I hardly even noticed it. The other dragger was the non-stop songs. Within the first half-hour, there had to be maybe ten songs with at least three lines of dialogue here or there. It was quite slow. However, once it got to the contest, it picked up pace fast.

Burton breaks a golden musical rule - The musical numbers should never be rushed. That's why we're there – to appreciate the beauty of Sondheim's layered and dense masterpiece. Only that isn't why Burton is there. Clearly, Todd's penchant for slashing throats is what most fascinated the man at the helm of this horror story. And while the blood gushing out and splattering against the camera and the walls is both disgusting and exhilarating at the same time, it amounts to very little more than gorgeous torture porn. Who knew that SWEENEY TODD would be so maniacal that even the insane genius of Tim Burton could not fully comprehend the man himself?
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