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Terrible pacing. It starts really slow, boring the audience with too many character introduction and flimsy animation.

The fight is awesome and the choreography is unique, to say the least. I really enjoyed the gun-kata fighting style for its flashiness. But I guess the good stuff stops at that. The plot is so-so, the foreshadowing is kinda obvious. A decent action flick but I think it's wrong to see it as a sci-fi movie with breath-taking story (like some critics seem to expect).

It started with a lot of narration explaining the context. Might be a bit tedious for the first few minutes but as the movie building up its tense I was getting used to it. This is a very long movie (3 hours) and there are lots of moments lumped into the movie, but it all tied up nicely, with some events unsuspectingly leading to another event.

I watched this after Wolf of Wall Street, and I feel a similar vibe (though obviously with many differences): a quest to power, wealth, stardom--and how the guy trying to maintain it ended up with losing everything. The last scene nailed it best, evoking how all his greed resulted in nothing and he has it enough with "that's that".

Interesting movie. It plays out "racism" a bit differently, with Turner (Samuel Jackson) being the racist bigot and Mattson (Patrick Wilson) being the victim. The movie builds up the racial tension so patiently, cautiously. There are moments of thrill when you'll be worrying if the yelling and name-calling would turn violent--and turns out it's cleverly tuned down to a humane, civil negotiation. The conflict is played nicely like this sort of tension is highly probable to happen in our backyard.

That interesting build up, unfortunately, is resolved with a cartoon-ish, (un)expectedly boring in the ending, making all the tension feels useless and crashed all the way down.

Marvelous acting, mesmerizing cinematography and immersing music. Glass (DiCaprio) lives up his name as "the revenant" as he struggles through the pain and hardship to the end of the movie. The music is particularly impeccable. It's always able to bring me back to the film's atmosphere just by listening to them - the cold, hard, depressing winter, the emotional struggle of survival and revenge.

However the characterization seems to lack a further... depth. We know Glass is so determined and Fitzgerald (Hardy) is cunning, opportunist prick (for Fitzgerald I knew it from the start, exactly when he started to make racist commentaries)--but their characterization stops there. There don't seem enough exploration on their motivations or dilemmas in achieving what they desire; it just feels a bit one dimensional. The plot is fairly simple and predictable, though that doesn't necessarily make it boring. Except for the last 30 minutes where everything seems to be a bit rushed to reach the climax.

There seems to be a lot of things going on in the background, like the shady things Jessica does, Abel's relationship with his brother, the scheming of Abel's rivals and the police investigation, Julian's personal problems, and plenty others. But those all are left scattered as clues for the viewers to find out ourselves--never to be explained in the movie directly. This makes the movie difficult to follow, especially for a non-American like me who doesn't understand the context of what's happening in the 1980s America.

Cinematography is nice, scoring is fine, but all of that is not built on top of a comprehensible plot. It feels like a piece of subplots jumbled together. This makes the supposedly dramatic ending feels abruptly ended.

The movie takes the first half of it to the world-building, and it does that successfully. With a series of events--only minimal dialogue--it shows the kind of apocalyptic world Max lives in. The plot is fairly simple, but the world which plot rests on it is convincing. The war boys culture, resource monopoly, woman objectification, etc. The rest of the movie jams the audience with action-packed scenes while slipping insight into the world through several lines of dialogue and character's behavior.

Some relationship/character-building seem to happen off-screen and seem to be implied, but the progress seems natural that you know something has been going on between them. You can see the development of one of the character where he went from a brash, rash youth to a soft-spoken guy. The last scene seems to put off the suspension of disbelief for a while (on how easy they made the final decision after going on for that long), but it is remedied by the action and the last drama involving one of the supporting character. Very solid composition for a fantasy-action movie.

The movie has a bit more drama compared to its previous movies, making this not as a pure action flick like the original. Not saying that it's a bad thing, but as the consequence the story has to be weighted more while watching this sequel, and unfortunately the movie has quite several different subplots which, though it intertwines each other, seems to be resolved abruptly with no further effect/follow-up in affecting each other. It jumps from one subplot to another as if they're different casualty of events that seem to accidentally happen to the protagonist Ip Man. The action is satisfying as usual--the choreography is perfect and the shot is nicely done--however more improvement can be done with joining the subplots together.

Ordinary plot, decent action, and Liam Neeson has became a somewhat invincible superman instead of a believable experienced agent with tactical and martial prowess like he was before.

Aside from the (expected?) surprise in the beginning, there is nothing much going on in this episode. Alexandrians still adapting to the new situation, zombies still wailing on the wall, Ron still hating on Carl, and Father Gabriel still showing up as additional filler. IMO there are too many characters depicted that it feels a bit disjointed and lacking further progress. Something happens in the end, but that's it--cliffhanger again. It's really unfortunate as I thought we've got past the filler episode last week.

I still wonder why the heck don't they stab the zombies on the gate one by one like they did in prison back then?

The Daryl subplot is interesting: it introduces new group which seems to lead to new antagonists. I wonder if they're hinting more Wolves involvement here since they went into that trailers that are overrun by zombies (the same trailers that Aaron and Daryl visited in previous episodes?).

The Abraham-Sasha subplot though, not so much. Not that it's bad but the show can flesh more on Abraham's character.

Nothing much is going on, as usual it's the "build-up episode" which gives clues and prepares build-up for future episodes. TWD always has episodes like this (Wolves, Terminus). So don't get so fed up, I guess.

The only thing that bothers me is: why the heck don't they kill those walkers one by one like they did back in Prison?

The movie ain't bad, but there's nothing much to watch. It's just a bunch of teens wreaking havoc in a neighborhood. The characters, the teens who are trying too hard to do some cool stuff, are unlikeable - if not detestable. Which makes sense actually, since they're teens anyway, but there is hardly anything to let the audience have any sympathy with them. Except Thomas, the main character, which seems to retain common sense, but in the end it is downplayed.

I wonder why they put Morgan's flashback in this episode. I was expecting his flashback to be told a bit later, or with more exposition. It's nice, but it feels a bit too hurried in the last half of the episode.

Well, it's a short movie. Light-hearted movie with very simple plot. The animation is fun and dazzling.

It's surprising, to say the least. There's been an obvious dead flag throughout the episode, but this person has escaped from such dead flag again and again. This time though - this person doesn't survive.

Lots of people die in this episode, so the death is a bit unexpected and and the same time... seems a bit less dramatical. We had a whole episode for Tyrone, a climactic end for Beth, even moments of atonement for Merle. But this person seems to be one of the crowds. Which, actually, makes sense in a post-apocalyptic world such as in Walking Dead's - it's unforgiving and death is just a statistic. But for a person who's been with the audience for a long time to be gone, just like that, seems a bit unsettling for me. I guess there's still more to come.

It started a bit slow but once it gets into the action it plays really nicely. Some people were seemingly presented to be cannon fodders, on the other hand some scenes make you wonder if one of the recurring cast is going to survive this season or not for their way of life in Walking Dead's post apocalyptic world. Especially with one Alexandrian holding the gun.

Carol once again takes the spotlight for being a badass. And the cold-blooded Carol is contrasted nicely with Morgan's peaceful approach. In the middle of conflict, there's also this little bit of drama of some Alexandrian still holding resentment to Rick's group. Good episode.

Not bad, but not great either. Especially for a premiere. The plot seems to reconnect the people after-Reg (and shows subtle, potential conflict), while in the same time it moves on with a new matter at hand. I don't really take issue with the plot but the editing could be better, I guess.

It has an interesting premise, unfortunately I think the movie fails to deliver it well. The plot feels disjointed, jumping from one to another without a strong connecting lines. Jolie's acting is superb, CGI is good (like any today high-budget movies), and the trailer looks awesome (more than the movie) - but there's all to it.

Pretty decent episode. Emphasizes a lot on the drama so it may disappoint those who expect action, but still good nonetheless. We get the bonding between Daryl and Aaron, Sasha's stress, Rick and the barber Jesse, and that "W" letter hint again. And Carol! From an "invisible" lady to a threatening killer in an instant. That scene is priceless.

A number of things are still going on here. Still a decent episode.

Perhaps because this movie tries hard to mirror Lord of the Rings - to be an "LoTR prequel" - it does not succeed too much in being a good movie.

First we get the continuation of Smaug's terror on the Laketown. This whole event that eventually leads to Smaug's demise feels so much hurried. We see Smaug ravaging the town, we see people fleeing in fear, but we don't see any actual horror preyed upon the people of Laketown. It feels like "just another dragon's burning routine on another town nearby". And the hero who is destined by blood to beat down dragon seems to have lost his mind when jumping straight into the tower without preparation. He even forgot to carry the legendary arrow!

Perhaps because the action, the tense, has been drown so much. When the great dragon is finally taken down, there is no sense of accomplishment at all. This Smaug scene should have been included in the previous movie. The film opens with a rather unsatisfying pace, a rather tedious 30 minutes, before diving into the main event which is the subtitle of this movie: "The Battle of the Five Armies".

This, as the subtitle indicates, should have been a grand event as much as the LoTR's Battle of the Black Gate or Battle of Pelennor fields. Especially since the movie tries so hard to be a LoTR's prequel: epic story of war and a rising darkness.

But nope. The battle itself is not as grandeur as LoTR. The occasional comic relief (like we usually see between Gimli and Legolas) does not work here either.

First, there is almost no buildup for the war. None. We suddenly get an elf army, Thorin's hard-headedness, his distant kin, all out of nowhere. We are presented with bunch of gold-hungry people ready for war without a strong reason to go for war. We see no explanation for Thranduil's hunger for their crown jewel (except for "it's our people's jewel") and so is for Thorin's sudden craziness for gold.

Thorin's greed is supposed to be the main theme of The Hobbit, but we only a slight clue leading to his greedy craziness. It was foreshadowed in the second movie and I was expecting it to be more laid out in this third movie.

Second, the war itself is rather... how to say it, just a clash of weapons. The pacing is very terrible. Especially when the orc armies finally came. The tense between the dwarves and elves were building prior to the orc's arrival, but it gets broken fast (the dwarves just go after the orcs very soon as if they're really that blood-thirsty). Also the title is "Battle of the Five Armies" but the ones who get into action are only dwarves, the elves, and the orcs. The human is just there struggling to survive and the eagles, the fifth army, came very late and were only shown in a flash. We don't even get a view how the war is resolved except for a distant view - a glimpse - that the orc's army is waning. We don't even told how is the Arkenstone - the supposed cause of the conflict - is doing after the war broke!

All this are accompanied with a too-often comic relief brought to you by Alfrid, the former Laketown mayor's second-in-command. Seriously he is really distracting. He bears no relevance to the story at all but the writer keeps bringing him up again and again.

Third, the ultimate showdown between Thorin and Azog is really disappointing. Thorin, who bears so much grudge with the orc who killed his grandfather, fights with no passion at all. The hot-blooded guy who we usually see being rash to many people, do not seem to show his contempt to the very person who brought death to his own family! As a king with remarkable combat prowess, Thorin also looks really clumsy fighting Azog, like his previous combat experience has just gone suddenly.

I just can't understand how easy he thought Azog was dead. I mean it's Azog; it's the guy who he knows himself (indicated in the previous two movies) is very hard to kill. He doesn't even bother to deal a finishing blow and hopes freeze will caught Azog dead! It's like the burning passion in his eyes, when he met Azog face-to-face in the forest (in the previous movie), it's like... it's like that passion has just gone. Gone with the wind.

Last, the epilogue. The dialogue between Tauriel and Thranduil when she is mourning is REALLY REALLY cheesy ("because it was real," really?). Thranduil also sounds so confusingly random when Legolas decides to go ("your mother loves you"... so? Wasn't it Tauriel who brought up the whole "love" stuff?).

It's such a shame because the first and second movie are at least decent.

47 Ronin is an adaptation of a story of loyalty, but it spends too much time on the poster boy (who never existed) and his love life.

The movie spent its first 30 minutes building up the story of Kai (Keanu Reeves), an unwanted child found in the forest, and the girl of his life, Mika (Shibasaki Kou), the daughter of a feudal lord. It tried to depict the hard life of Kai as a hated half-breed boy among Japanese samurai, who is struggling to raise his place among his peers and being conflicted with his Romeo and Juliet affair with Mika.

Or at least that's what the movie attempted to do.

The relationship between Kai and Mika feels really bland even though the movie seems to try so hard emphasizing this in the course of the story. Kai and Mika are depicted as being involved in a forbidden love but they don't show a slightest enthusiasm in their expression of love (except for Mika constant worrying of Kai's life without taking any action like a damsel in distress).

Meanwhile, at the same time, the movie also tries to bring up the reason why the 47 Ronin caused havok in the first place: loyalty. Which unfortunately also failed. The samurais (prior becoming ronin) keep talking about "the spirit of samurai", "the bushido", "the will of loyalty", but it's all talk. We don't get to see in what way their loyalty to their lord manifested. There is not enough build-up, not enough motivation to set up the samurais into a quest of revenge.

When the Lord Asano (Tanaka Min) finally meets his demise, the samurais all of sudden realize that their lord have been wronged by his rival, Lord Kira (Asano Tadanobu). This happens regardless of how scant the evidence showing up that it was actually Kira who does the evil deed to their lord (Kira used some sort of witch trickery which is supposed to be secretive). Oishi (Hiroyuki Sanada) even didn't believe witchcraft existed when Kai tried to warn him. And we are not shown even a slightest hint how Kira and Asano were in rivalry.

Fortunately, the second half of the movie isn't that bad.

The ultimate battle, the siege of Kira's castle, is very well-done. From the stealthily tactics to the final confrontation with Kira. I can't help but be reminded with 13 Assassins, which employs similar ruse, and both movies in this regard made a good final showdown.

Still, during the course of the movie, it overall still feels really odd. First because the dialogue sounds pretty jarring: the movie is spoken in English. Keanu Reeves speaks a really fluent English meanwhile the rest of the actors, who are Japanese (and not their fault), speak a less fluent English (except a few like the Tengu leader). When Keanu is having conversation with the others it feels like they are speaking with foreign man and foreign language.

Second, the whole landscape design and the scenes depicted feel very "Western". Very orientalism. The way the Buddha statue just sit in the middle of nowhere, the spooky Tengu bamboo forest, the grimdark castle of Kira, and the witch's deception and many of the beasts; all feel precisely like something coming out straight from Dungeons and Dragons (D&D). Which may not be necessarily bad, but this kind of image of "Japanese fantasy" makes it clear that this movie is of Hollywood, American production. It's not the type you would see in fantasy-ish Japanese movie. Visually it's more similar to Lord of the Rings if anything.

So-so plot. The story feels disjointed with quite a number things left unexplained (like how did Hahou Mo become instructor in the first place? Why don't the cops try to secure the suspected victims? Why did Sinn Ying do that in the last half of the movie?). But I suppose plot is not meant to be the strongest department in this movie.

It's the action. You'll see some names from previous Donnie Yen's movies (Ip Man), and they're all great martial artists. The fights, which involve the five phases of kung fu, were all done nicely. Especially the ultimate fight between Hahou Mo (Donnie Yen) and Fung Yu-sau (Wang Baoqiang) which takes place in the middle of the street - with cars and trucks passing over! The choreography is stunning and the camera movement is swift, capturing all essential shots needed to portray the dynamics of the fight.

The movie started out a bit slow with its seemingly typical presentation of post-apocalyptic world. We are too presented with the seemingly typical mankind's arrogance on other species deemed as inferior. I really thought the humans will fuck up as usual.

They didn't.

This is one of the few movies that keep reminds me of how arrogant mankind can be - or more precisely, how arrogant a species with extraordinaire intelligence can be. It is instinct of survival accompanied by the psyche of superiority complex that can be possessed by creatures such as ours. The more we seemingly think we understand ourselves, the more we seemingly make borders to judge others. The way Dreyfus (Gary Oldman) keep saying how apes are "just animals". Koba's (Toby Kebbell) rise to power and his nefarious hatred that put humans to prisons.

Our main characters though - Caesar (Andy Serkis) and Malcolm (Jason Clarke) - show that we don't have to be like that. We can be more than that.

I don't want to sound pretentious, but that's the message I caught from the movie and what touched me the most. When Caesar and Malcolm understood that it is not kinship, not similarity of physical stature, that make our trust - but our deeds. When we were brought back at a glance to the deep bond Caesar formed with William (from the previous movie). A bond that transcends boundaries of species.

Putting all those aside... there are a few criticism on the movie. As said earlier, about very first 15-30 minutes is presented a bit too slow. Audience already familiar with post-apocalyptic setting might be a bit bored. The plot is quite predictable in the first half of the movie. A few scenes, such as when Malcolm entered the apes' domain, then Koba scout the human's territory, etc were also seem to be presented a bit ineffective - a long still shot with lack of plot progression. The accompanying soundtrack is spectacular, but again noticeably off in the very first 30 minutes. And finally, the movie's end puts a question to the title of this movie: wasn't it supposed to be The "Dawn" of the Planet of the Apes?

Beyond that there is no further complains though. Andy Serkis really deserves every award he got for his performance in this movie.

Good humor (funny one-liners), pretty impressive animation, interesting main characters, but the plot... the plot seemed to be promising at first, as it seemed to take us to a pipeline journey. But in ended up with the same, usual, boring cliche. Not to mention the forced deus ex machina and really forced climax that does not succeed in portraying the intended message (facing your fear). The conflict that leads to the resolution to the climax is not satisfying.

The movie has an interesting premise, but the execution didn't turn out so well. The difference between surrogate and real humans is clear-cut (technical limitation, I guess). The character appears out of nowhere, didn't have much time to be developed. And the plot... it's the typical one-big-villain-involved-in-all-things. Still a decent watch though.