Collection Update (December 2014 part 1)

How time can fly. It has been a year since my last collection update and having bought more then a small number of films this year I have decided to split this up over the next few weeks in several different posts. Due to the number of release I will only be commenting on specific releases that I fell attention should be brought to. So without further adieu part one of this rather massive collection update.

The film from the above which was easily among the larger surprises of the year was Blue is The Warmest Color. With near universal  acclaim it was a film that I found to be an overly long and bloated film that had plenty of potential that I didn't fell was realized (click here to see my full review). As a fan of Spike Jonze I was very happy to pick up Being John Malkovich which is a film that comes with my highest recommendation. Likewise Edge of Tomorrow was possibly the nicest surprise of the year. I wasn't expecting much and what I got was a tremendous sci fi action film with superb 3d.

Her is another film by Spike Jonze that I can't recommend highly enough. At times purposefully awkward, at other times bitter sweet. It is a film that on paper would likely appear to be a disaster waiting to happen. However thanks to some brilliant direction, acting and of course writing it stunningly is easily amongst the better films of recent memory. Catching Fire is another film I would highly recommend and the blu-ray alternates between it's scope ratio and 1.78:1 (full screen) for the imax scenes which is present throughout the entire time spent in the arena. Sadly the blu-ray does have some flaws, most notably is the film seems bit starved and thus some obvious and ugly banding is sadly present. Of note is this is the American release (which is region locked). The local Australian release does not alternate aspect ratios which some may prefer (especially those with CIH setups).

Whilst the sequel Silent Hill revelation was a travesty (click here to see my full review), the first Silent Hill is personal favourite of mine. Unfortunately the only competent blu-ray release is the French edition which I took the plunge and bought. It not only is the only release approved by the director it is the only one that doesn't have risen black levels that starves the image of any 'pop' resulting in a murky mess (the darkest black appears to be light grey). Thankfully the French release does justice to the film and its gorgeous cinematography. Likewise Super is a film by the director of Guardians of the Galaxy that few seem to have seen. It's premise is very similar to that of the first Kick-Ass film. It however doesn't drop the idea of a nobody trying to act like a super hero in favour of having 'real heroes' (such as Big Daddy and Hit Girl). This is most apparent in the final act and is a film I would recommend to those who are fans of the first Kick-Ass film.

Silent Hill Revelation Review

Leading up to the release of Silent Hill Revelation Michael J Basset who both wrote and directed the film showed in several interviews that he understood the source material and thus I was rather exited to see what the results where. This was especially the case given that the first Silent Hill excluding the poor ending is an accomplished horror film that makes some effective changes to both the story and world that the game series takes place in that successfully enhances the experience and was one of the very few movies based on a video game that is recommendable. Unfortunately Silent Hill Revelation is unable to reach the same heights as the first film and catastrophically has even lower lows then the poor ending to the first film.

Silent Hill Revelation as one would expect is a continuation of the first Silent Hill film and follows Heather Mason and her father living on the run from the police for reasons that involves one of the many unnecessary and convoluted portions of the 'story'. Silent Hill Revelation both in terms of the characters present and the story is simply a mess with very little care taken. The extent to which this is the case can be shown when the filmmakers fell fit to develop a romantic relationship between two characters who have been established to be cousins. Most egregiously this isn't part of the horror present rather it seems to be quite a large oversight by the film makers. Admittedly their is a brief campy cameo by Malcolm McDowell which provides for the only modestly entertaining albeit unnecessary scene in the film. Otherwise none of the actors or actresses are anything but horrible in their roles despite the obvious talent that the cast have shown in numerous other productions. Lines fell forced and memorized and numerous accent changes are present. I usually am able to forgive such accent slips and more often then not don't even notice them, sadly the all around poor stilted acting seems to have emphasized the issue in this film moreso then had the acting been otherwise competent.

Silent Hill Revelation is based on the game Silent Hill 3, a game which had an oppressing atmosphere and understood how to tell an admittedly minimalist story in both a creepy and scary manner. Sadly Silent Hill Revelation only succeeds in creating any sense of atmosphere in one of the few positives I can muster up regarding this film, which is the use of 3d which is reasonable well done save some poor use of gimmicky shoots. None the less several moments where we see characters as they walk through the ash ridden Silent Hill are visually striking if nothing else. Sadly all other areas regarding Silent Hill Revelation's atmosphere is beyond poorly done. Creature design is strong when it follows the source materials design but when it strays it is generally laughably bad. The worst offender is a mannequin monster who presumably is meant to be hunting down the protagonists resulting in a tense and riveting scene, however the actual result is a depressingly hilarious scene with an out of place an obvious cgi looking mannequin and a scene that lacks any sense of tension. Likewise scenes that involve the well designed monsters from the game such as the nurses or pyramid head are poorly staged to a degree that removes any degree of tension or excitement that could have been present.

Ultimately Silent Hill Revelation is a disappointing vacuous waste of an opportunity which is perplexing given Michael J Basset in interviews showed that he seemed to understood what worked in the source material (I assume an overly limited budget, studio tampering and lack of talent are all possible causes) . Sadly none of that knowledge has been successfully translated into the film Silent Hill Revelation which is often unintentionally hilarious in a sadly depressing manner. Hence I strongly would urge those who have yet to see the original Silent Hill film to consider giving that film a chance and those wanting more to perhaps try out the original game trilogy released on the playstation one and two. Simply put I would recommend staying far away from Silent Hill Revelation.