Amazing Spiderman 2: Reviewed

Since my previous review, life's been good to Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield), finishing both high school and armed street thugs, it's probably one of his golden days of youth, beside his on-off relationship with Gwen Stacy (Emma Stone) there's seemed nothing that can stop his pretty beautiful days.from go on.

Of course there is always a but, while life's been good with both Spidey and Peter, it's not really had it going on with Max Dillon (Jamie Foxx), he's practically invisible, his boss stole his credit for his work, his colleauges doesn't even know about him, he's a nobody and he accepted that while at the same time harboring the growing need to be seen by the world, a really really unhealthy need. so it begins: The Amazing Spiderman 2

Being a sequel sucks, you must make sure you overshadow the first and deliver things that makes the audience said: "it's not a rehash of the first one", being a remake is even more sucks because you also have to make sure it's better in ALL things than the predecessors. So in this remake we've already knew that Spidey is a delinquent that enjoys spouting funny and catchy lines to the bad guys, and in this movie he also liked being in the spotlight and thrilled at every negative stigma of vigilantes labeled at him, Spidey made fun of the world while saving it, and that's cool, this movie is extremely optimistic and melancholic at the same time, Peter and Gwen has their share of optimistic love story, they're young, they're in love, and yes they can do anything....

Meanwhile: Max Dillon got into accident partially caused by the ignorance of his colleagues, while previously he has his issues with his obsession of Spiderman (after he got saved by Peter) when he finally returned as Electro he carried this unhealthy dose of his complex, so if you're bullied by almost everyone you met for God knows how long, what will you first do when you finally obtained a nearly unlimited power? revenge? unfortunately it's just a small prize, he's aiming beyond revenge, he developed a new obsession, obsession for his own power, and for that Spiderman must die since he's the only thing stand between him and his ultimate goal.

Spiderman and Electro are antithesis, it's the other theme of this movie, Spidey reject the statement of "the strong wins" while Electro accepted that, Spidey's aim is to protect while Electro is to rule, it's just like when the goblin said to Raimi's spiderman on the first movie: "they will hate you no matter what you do" Electro is that Spiderman if he accepted the offer to rule, and we can't really blamed him since Max was a broken man for far too long as the result of those who are strong, one more thing: the description of him in this movie never made the audience sympathizes with him, it's a perfect balance to split Max and Electro, when Electro lives Max is no more, while on the other hand just like the first movie we can't really split Spidey with Peter, with or without mask.

I know there are two other villain in this movie, The Goblin/Harry Osborn (Dan DeHaan) and Rhino (Paul Giamatti) but their appearance here is only a prelude for what is coming on the next sequel, and to be honest I'm afraid that it won't deliver, Amazing Spiderman 2 is a decent sequel and deliver a progress of both on Peter and Spiderman's life, it prepared him to face the next level with these baddies (and others) but I really don't think next level can be described in two hours length of movie because it can only focus so much on some character, Avangers did it with six heroes but each of them has their own prequel movie, what about six villain? I know there wll be spin off about them, but it will come after Amazing Spiderman 3, so what will spidey do on the third? Another Venom thing? I really hope it won't become another Venom-Carnage comic relief like in the cartoon series where only one of them is the villain and the other is just stand there to deliver Strascream's-minion-like cheesy monologue.

For this sequel, despite the review I'm gonna give it an eight since it's optimistic and light-hearted

Reviewing Berandal: The Raid 2

Minor Spoiler about the Ending of The Raid 1 below, you can view my past review here

I tried to make this a The Raid 1 spoiler-free review but unfortunately I can't since the story is a continuation, so anyway Gareth Evans is back with a sequel of the highly acclaimed The Raid, it's called Berandal: The Raid 2, here's the story so far: on the last movie we saw Rama (Iko Uwais) left the villain-infested apartment with his found-corrupt-superior, long story short he's been reassigned to capture the bigger fish of the crime network, this time it was a shady businessman Bangun (Tio Pakusadewo) and a passive aggressive mild-mannered bohemian called Bejo (Alex Abbad), to get through them Rama's gone incognito to get close to Bangun's son: Uco (Arifin Putra) which his bratty tantrum landed in jail, and after that things gone haywire, fight breaks, bodies dropped and blood flows

Unfortunately it wasn't enough for me, because...

They Put A Story on an Action Flix

In the Raid 1 there's almost zero long dialogue, the longest dialogue is probably Tama's explaining how the network works at the end of the movie, however in the Raid 2 there is a story, there's characters, there's long dialogues, and they're so... awful, the dialogues seemed sporadic and disconnected one after another and there's a LOT of unnecessary story scenes and talks which makes my adrenaline have a significant down time, I seriously don't give a crap about all that conspiracy stories, it's a FIGHTING MOVIE, I want to see people brutally mutilate one another again and if I want a drama I'll watch Xenosaga (the FMV version) , you know what makes the Raid 1 so good? it because the story doesn't need a long dialogue, instead they replaced it with....

Not you Al, you're dead in #1

Oh S*it moment 

I called this necessary, in the Raid 1 the first Oh S*it moment is when they encounter a kid in the one of apartment's hallway, this kid is a 'screamer', a living alarm that will alert everyone that there's cops abound, so he ran to tell them, and the cops go after him, what will they do? will they shoot the kid? will they captured him? will there will be another conclusion? even his status as an underage child makes every decision feels wrong, there's only bad and worse end here, what will they do? what will they do? Oh S*it. It's the first scene that get me into The Raid, the do or die, the wrong and horribly wrong case that can blows up everything in their face, also who will forgot those Easterners scene?

DAMMIT AL!!

In the Raid 2 there's nothing, no suspense, we already know Rama (or his incognito persona: Yudha) will gone through every scene until he find those bastards, you see... Iko Uwais mostly going solo in this sequel, so there's no scene risking his friend/companion/random passing people that he wants to protect, maybe that's why...

There's almost no creativity in the fight

A lot of people will kill me for saying this but the first fight scene made me questioning: Is this The Raid? it's so... plain... the second one is a mass fight, something new and it's good, but wait... where's the finishers? the movie's first half fighting scene made me yawn because almost all of it is unfinished and too many OFF SCREEN FINISHING!! fortunately the second half is better, there's at least five distinct fighters in this movie. First is Rama which has fast punch and kicks, Prakoso (Yayan Ruhyan) which has powerful hand to hand attacks, Hammer Girl (Julie Estelle) and Baseball Bat Man (Very Tri Yulisman) a couple who use their respected tools in fights, and the last is The Assassin (Cecep Arif Rahman) which has similar style with Rama but also using carok (spiked knuckles).

The fighters deliver better that the fight on the first half seems to be just a filler or appetizer for the movie's second half, it's stylish, it's new, but it's NOT satisfying, when every single Raid 1 fight scene has their own unpredictable finisher (which trigger audience's applause at the end of almost every scene) The Raid 2 seems to forgot all about it, the fights on Raid 2 are fatally choreographed and bloodied to the teeth but none (except one) deliver an unpredictable finishing blow, every fights are powerful and efficient but unfortunately not intense enough, I want the finishers to be more unpredictable than the Raid 1, more fatal, bloodier and destructive enough that we'll sure the dead stay dead, I guess it was my really high expectation talking

Endgame

There's one single moment which express my disappointment and disapproval of the movie, but since it will be a spoiler I can't talk about it.  Until this time I can't still pinpoint the good about The Raid 2 because it seems scattered everywhere in the movie, I like some of the drama scene, the camera works are awesome, I like most of the fighting scene, I ABSOLUTELY LOVE THE FINAL BATTLE SCENE!! But despite everything I rant about above -- I will recommend it to everyone, it's a good movie, but it was nowhere near my expectation, whether I should lower it a bit or this movie needs a Director's Cut edition for people like me =))

The Amazing Ultimate Unlimited Review: The Amazing Spiderman

I should've get an achievement called "I finally get my lazy bum to the nearest Theater and watch The Amazing Spiderman (in 3D)", it also creates the hardest review I ever wrote... so the short words would probably: "I'm awesome":))

So let's get to the The Big Question first: Is this Spiderman BETTER than the rest of them? I can honestly answer no, it's not, but it's still a good movie though, you see the real problem with reboot is you always compared them with their predecessor, and in this case: with Sam Raimi's spiderman, you will start comparing the casts, the story, the director, the special effects (if there was).

In my case though rather than just comparing This Spiderman with the original Tobey Maguire's I also started to compare it with an old cartoon series from Saban: called Spider-man Unlimited, it aired during the late 99, here's a synopsis from it:

"While covering the launch of John Jameson's one man mission to Counter-Earth (another Earth located on the far side of the Sun), Spider-Man attempts to stop his two symbiote adversaries Venom and Carnage from boarding the shuttlecraft. Blamed for Jameson losing contact with our Earth, Spider-Man becomes a target of persecution by the media and the public. Believed to be dead after saving a person's life in a fire, Peter Parker uses the ruse to embark on a mission to retrieve John Jameson on Counter-Earth, using nanotechnology borrowed from Reed Richards to design a new suit that incorporates stealth technology and sonic weaponry. Making his way to the planet, Spider-Man learns that Jameson has fallen in with a band of freedom fighters opposed to the High Evolutionary whose Beastials, hybrids of animal and humanoid attributes, are the dominant species whilst humans are the second-class minority" (Wikipedia)

I love the series, Of course I was still in high school at that time and can't dedicate much to watch it, but it was the first time I watch Spiderman in all time badassery, Peter Parker is cool in and out of his suit, and that blue-black-red nanobot suit is badass, the war theme is badass, even Jameson.Jr is badass, of course it's a short lived series but I still can't shake the image, when I first saw Raimi's Spider-Man I always think Tobey Maguire portrayed a rather timid Peter Parker but it fits perfectly with other character especially J.J Jameson, but the ting of badassery resurface again in The Amazing Spiderman, Andrew Garfield portrayed a high schooler Spiderman, true to it's comic theme, complete with it's all teen angst, he's also portrayed a genius, capable to solve complex equations and (again: stay true to the comic) invent his own web-shooter, in other words: This Spiderman is a vigilante punk.

The story is a soap opera, yes, it's a love story between Parker and Stacy without any secrets between them, just a nice flowing sometimes agitated first love, the same captivating theme as in Eureka Seven series without any major shouting dramas, but the problem of the movie is the villain, The Lizard is probably the most forgettable person in the movie despite him being the major villain, it's because the protagonist build a good theme surrounding Parker. the movie is reek of goodness of Parker, if the Tobey-Spidey is the most unknown person in his Parker persona, trying to make ends meet and college on-offing in the harsh uncaring city of New York while being unknown superhero that roams the night, Andrew-Spidey is a shining persona in his friend and family, he's also sometimes portrayed without masks on some occasions (the same reason why Spiderman 2 is the best movie from the previous franchise), the movie humanizes Spiderman and merge him and Peter parker together that you'll start to see they're the same person, known to some people and unknown but still a human to other.

The future of the franchise is also intriguing, you know who's the first Spiderman franchise's most memorable character? Yep,the Green Goblin a.k.a Norman Osborn, the character portrayed by Willem Defoe is so strong it's overshadow Spidey in the first movie, the character is never shown in Amazing Spiderman but always hinted strongly that he'll be the major villain on the next movie. It'll be interesting who's gonna portray him next, I personally like Defoe's Goblin and want to see if the sequel suffers from sequel syndrome. Also this Spiderman is more fit to join the Avengers rather than Tobey-Spidey, everyone will always need a punk running around among the superiority-complex men =))

Overall: Good movie, fresh reboot, heartwarming drama, 7.9/10

I'm just gonna post it here, image from Link

Gundam Age Third Look: I want to cry now, can I?

Gundam Age act III, okay for all of you who doesn't realize it until now: This anime has become creepier and incompatible with my brain parts, and also an insult to the gundam franchise, this is a reminder for all of you movie makers: You CAN'T take Band of Brothers and tone down the level of violence so it'll be suitable for kids, Gundam is a story about war, about kids killing other kids or adults, you CAN'T TONE DOWN that!! and if the franchise really wants to sell more toys to kids please let me remind you that kids in Japan is a non existant entity. And the amount of teenage nerds that bought Gundam toy models is even bigger than the population in my city anyway

Because if there are kids in Japan, they'll start building weapons of mass destruction

Ok, so in the end of Act two the dark lord Flit Asuno and his force-less apprentice son Asemu set up a trap to lure the Earth spies for the Vagan, which apparently the president of Earth itself, so Darth Asuno captured him, executed him and the rest of his senate accomplice and start the dark reign of Earth under the military rules and strict martial law, turning the Earth itself into a training grounds for the new Sith generation.

Yeah...

I lied, apparently the citizen of earth are okay with those execution and live happily ever after, which is weird because in my head the battle between the V and the Earthers are becoming more and more 1980s cold war-like, except both parties endlessly launched giant robots to space and blow up planets and space stations, it's extremy unfathomable that Sith Emperor Asuno brainwashed the entire Earth citizen to hate Vagans while on the other side the prophetic leader of Vagans brainwashed the entire Martians to think Earth is their rights to take, it's like watching the entire international conflict on World War 1 fused itself into a giant ball of polarized opinion

I don't have any good picture to describe this but this one come close

So, let's continue, after Asemu and the most screen time girl have coitus (legally of course, they're married anyway) they have a son called Kio, apparently dark lord Asuno isn't finished on his quest to eradicate all communists.... i mean Vagans so he brought his grandson a combat simulation which apparently a Gundam cockpit simulator, so yeah little cute Kio has been trained to kill Vagans since he was five.

His parents will be so proud

After that the story goes on, Kio got a transformer big Gundam called Age 3 and start blasting away Vagans with ease, and that's that.

yes, that's all, the end, now let me cry.

Reviewing The Raid: Redemption

The Raid doesn't start with a bang, it started with usual buildup towards the inevitable violence, but when the things started, you can't take your eyes off it, and it continues to rolled over you over and over again like a mean ashpalt roller machine. The plot is quite simple: A squad of SWAT team prepares a Raid on a building owned by a drug lord, it also serves on a hideout for dangerous criminals and terorrists, then fate goes batshit crazy (triggered by n R-rated scene that will probably created the spin-off, The Raid: Lost Generation), long story short the SWAT's raid become a fight for survival, a journey full of carnage and beautiful violence.

 This is the very first picture on google search, the sole reason I posted it

 

What's the good? The Raid has only one strong point: The fights, every single fight scenes in this movie is beautifully executed, unpredictable, and well-choregraphed, whether it's one-one-one, two-on-one, or even a mass fight involving several people at once, the solo fights by Iko Uwais are the highlighted events from the movie, the fights scene will came at you full-powered, it didn't build up, it didn't take long, they're fast fast and straight in your face street fighting with every assortment of lethal tools including the building's concrete walls itself, it's brutal and adrenaline surging, it's not shiny like the Matrix or flowing like Ong Bak, it's goddamned bleak as hell where every wrong enemy moves are exploited and often resulted in quick death or a grotesque scene.

The Lethality level of fight is strengthened by the scene's ambience, like the light, camera positioning, and sounds. My God, the sounds of the fight is uniquely satisfying for my ears, whether it's a knuckle's, a swinging sword, or just a guttural sounds of a severed neck artery and so on. The sounds itself is so connected with the fight, the sound of a knuckle that broke's a rib is different from a knuckle that didn't, you can tell the fight is coming to an end when the punches or kickes become so erratic you won't even blink due the fear you'll lose the next frame. The lighting helps a lot, the camera positioning are good and the CG helps a lot (most of the bloods are animated but didn't feel too phony).

 

 The body count caused by the right guy's moustache is also satisfying

Despite the great fighting scenes, there are also some fight scene that didn't exceed the expectation, the fight on the drugs lab are so lame it didn't get the usual applause from the audience, it feels like a filler and so anticlimactic, the story is predictable and the movie is ended with another anticlimactic event, the actor are decent but none too groundbreaking, Ray Sahetapy provide a good one at the beginning but also too comical. Iko Uwais doesn't speak much but he's just about so-so, Donny Alamsyah is better (too bad he didn't get too much fighting scenes), special credits to Yayan Ruhiyan for his moustache and hair.... err no, it's because his crazy moves strengthen his Mad Dog character, all others are mediocre, but as I said before the story doesn't matter, it's a martial art movie and it live it's hype.

The one thing that noticed by me is the amount of dark humour scattered at this movie, I watched this movie with it's original language and laughed my ass hard when that Eastern Indonesian speaks with his dialect in a scene, no offense but their dialect never quite grew in my ear, I noticed the amount of serious dialogue and the... I don't know... 'funny' dialogues amounted the same, were they intended by the director? Could be, but it helps release the tension after or before the fight, IMO it's probably there in purpose to made the audience didn't fall asleep on the in-between-fight scenes, I personally want to see how's the subtitled version looks like on these scenes, hope it helps them feel the humours.

I recalled his real name is Alfred or something: 

Well Al, believe me, you're my new fave cameo ever

Final Verdict: It's awesome, and I KEEP WANTING MORE, GODDAMIT THIS MOVIE IS TOO SHORT!!! I don't care about the story but how should I? The movie already makes me want to spar with my friends so I guess it's quite influencing, let me gives this beautiful piece of art an 8.8