Saw both the latest Harry Potter flick and also The Day
After Tomorrow, yesterday. Hmm. Also bought Prince of
Persia for the cube today. Micro-reviews of each below.
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
Saw this with Fi yesterday afternoon
Usual fare, with the ever-growing ensemble cast now
each having so little screen-time it's just silly.
Even Malfoy only seems to have a few minutes at most.
Radcliffe is getting too old to be believable in the role.
The powers that be are setting up the Ron-Hermione
relationship quite strongly. Oldman has so little screen-time
it's just a ridiculous waste.
My one laugh-out-loud moment was when Ron was sleep-talking
about spiders wanting him to tap dance and how he didn't want
to tap dance, and Harry saying "you tell those spiders, Ron",
fully aware that Ron is actually still asleep. It's moderately
amusing in its own right, but much more so given that Fiona
sleep-talks regularly, so it's a very familiar situation for us.
Overall, nothing terribly surprising or notable, lacking the
cohesion of the past two (but then the third book is notably
longer than the first two, in fairness). By all means see it,
but don't expect to be hugely moved either way.
The Day After Tomorrow
Saw this with Cat last night. Interesting to see Dennis Quaid
in a leading role again. Jake Gyllenhaal is completely wasted
in a thin and undeveloped role with little purpose other than
to allow Quaid to trek across the frozen wasteland that used to
be the north eastern states of the US.
Pretty CG, daft dialogue. I think Cat summed it up best: there
may just be a slight political message in this movie.
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
3D third-person hack-and-slash 'em up set in the Prince of Persia
universe, and remaining true to the signature acrobatics of the
original 2D games. Let me just say this up-front: this <em>fucking
rocks</em>.
I'm talking Matrix-style moves with swordplay. Running up and along
vertical walls, wall-jumping, somersaulting over enemies and slicing
them in the back of the head on the way down, slowing down and even
rewinding time... jesus. The coolness factor is very high.
Moves are very easy to pull off (just shy of being too automatic for
it to be fun, though), and combat is efficient if samey and sometimes needlessly
prolonged. Lifespan isn't great, but you'll go back just to show off.
I'd definitely recommend it, though not at full price. I used some old
vouchers I had lying around and got it new for £12, which is a
bargain. Naturally, it includes the original PoP as an unlockable extra.
Get hold of it.
Postscript: A note to FACT (the Federation Against Copyright Theft)
I used my phone's camera to take a picture of your dire, overblown and
disturbingly Orwellian warning about not using recording equipment in
the cinema, designed to make everyone feel like a criminal. Fuck you.