Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (Burton)

Overall:

It's not easy doing justice to a Roald Dahl book. The man was a creative genius with such imagination that to recreate one of his tales on screen would require a tremendous amount of effort, not to mention extreme skill. Luckily, Tim Burton was willing to put in the hard yards to not only do justice to this literary childrens' masterpiece, but to bring it to life. The work poured into this 2005 film was enormous, but the result was nothing less than spectacular.

'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory' is possibly my favourite Roald Dahl book; I'd highly recommend it to anyone of any age. I love what the filmmakers did to this movie, because it seems as if they read the book, let their imaginations run wild, and then put what they saw onto a screen.

It was brilliant.

Plot:

Don't you hate it when filmmakers think they know better than the author of the book on which the film is based, and make drastic, unnecessary changes to the plot? Of course, it is ridiculous to say that a film should not deviate from the novel at all. There are always some sensible, smallish tweaks to the original story that are needed to make the movie more cinematic, or more understandable, or to fit into the time frame with more ease, but a lot of the time the filmmakers take these changes much too far.

Thankfully, in 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory', Dahl's genius has been appreciated and the main story has been largely untouched. The main changes came from delving deeper into Willy Wonka's past and developing the character more, so they were worthwhile.

Characters:


Charlie



Charlie Bucket (Freddie Highmore) - The thing which defines Charlie Bucket in the book 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory' is that he is quite normal. His family is poor, which makes him nice and appreciative - not rotten like the other children who win tickets to see Wonka's Chocolate Factory. This is how the filmmakers kept him in the movie.

I liked this. Charlie was not 'special'. He didn't have any super-powers, he wasn't a genius, and he didn't have any cool gadgets. He was normal, like us. We can relate to this boy!
Also, in a world where many films have main characters that are selfish, reinforcing the 'it's all about me' message that people seem to like so much, Charlie was a refreshing change. Polite and caring, he's a good role model to the kids watching the movie.
Thumbs up to Tim Burton for keeping Charlie's character true to the book!



Augustus

Augustus Gloop (Philip Wiegratz) - Grandpa George tells Charlie that the first person to find a golden ticket will be "Fat, fat, fat!" Augustus Gloop sure did prove him right! The actor had to wear a fat suit to appear porky enough for the part, and was constantly eating a bar of chocolate. He wasn't quite disgusting enough to put me off chocolate, though...  but a good portrayal of this character.

Veruca

Veruca Salt (Julia Winter) - The way Veruca Salt was portrayed in this film was absolutely priceless. Julia Winter played this spoilt brat brilliantly. It was so entertaining!
Veruca is also a demonstration to children of how having everything isn't necessarily that great. That, and that throwing tantrums makes you look ridiculous.

Violet

Violet Beauregarde (Anasophia Robb) - I imagine that Roald Dahl must have really hated seeing kids chewing gum all the time when he created the character of Violet Beauregarde, because in the book her sole purpose was to show children what a disgusting habit it is to chew gum all day. The filmmakers have expanded Violet's character a bit to turn her into a girl bent on winning anything and everything, mainly to do with chewing gum. This wasn't a bad change, as it made her a less likable, less deserving character.




Mike

Mike Teavee (Jordan Fry) - The novel 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory' was written in 1964, where not that many people owned televisions. Even then, Dahl could tell that children were spending far too long in front of screens. The original Mike Teavee was a kid who watched lots of spy/gun shows, and carried around some ludicrous number of guns with him. This film was made in 2005, so the filmmakers have modernised Mike a bit into a violent video gamer. This is established early into the film as the audience are introduced to him playing a video game, yelling, "DIE, DIE, DIE!" Unfortunately, the filmmakers chose to make him a know-all when it came to science, which I thought slightly undermined the 'TV makes you dumb' message. Apart from that, though, I thought that Mike Teavee was portrayed very well, and made the film seem more modern.



Wonka

 Willy Wonka (Johnny Depp) - A lot is left to interpretation when it comes to Willy Wonka in the novel. He's simply seen as some marvellous, generous man who happens to be an eccentric genius. When putting this into a film, though, one has to consider exactly what an eccentric genius looks like. The book describes him as a man who wears a top hat, a purple waistcoat, green pants and a black goatee. Obviously, that doesn't tell us a lot about who he is and how he got to where he did. What I like about the film is that they looked at Willy Wonka's backstory: what his childhood was like, etc. On top of being very entertaining, it helped us as the audience to realise why Mr. Wonka was so... unusual. Johnny Depp was said to have based his character on Michael Jackson. It wasn't quite what I imagined Willy Wonka to be when I was eight years old, reading the book, but I prefered this to the Willy Wonka from the previous film rendition (who was kind of scary).



Oompa Loompas

 Oompa Loompas (Deep Roy): All the Oompa Loompas (Tens? Hundreds?Thousands, maybe?) were played by just one man in this film, which I thought was fantastic. A lot of work, yes. Effective, definitely. The attention to detail was phenomenal. All the dances to the songs were choreographed and excecuted perfectly in time. Keeping them at knee height for the whole movie (involving a lot of shooting on oversized sets and CGI) was done so smoothly that the first few times I watched the film, I thought the actor must have been naturally that small. The Oompa Loompas were a hilarious part of the film that really helped bring it to life and added some great humour to the film. Loved them. :)

Themes:
In the book, all the themes are fairly self-explanitory, and most of the important ones have been outlined in the character section of this review. To my delight, the film included the great majority of these. It also added a theme: the importance of family. I still can't decide whether I'm pleased or upset that they included this (to be honest, I'm not sure I care too much), because on one hand, it fights for the main focus of the film, leaving less time for the themes in the book to be explored, but on the other hand, it's a family movie and it didn't really hurt to have it thrown in. I suppose it doesn't really matter too much.

Props / Scenery:
Wow. Just wow.
The sets for this film were absolutely amazing. Wacky, beautiful, eccentric, fun, mysterious, colourful... they were Burton's imagination come to life. The effort that was put in to create the sets must have been phenomenal. I can say one thing: this was no half-hearted endevour. The pictures are so vivid... Charlie's tiny little house with its twisted charm in the foreground, with the dull, orderly city behind it and Willy Wonka's huge chocolate factory looming over it all, dark, mysterious and inviting... A room where everything, from the candied grass to the viscous chocolate river is edible... you can imagine being in every single scene of the movie with no difficulty, which draws the viewer right in.
Again, wow.

Special Effects:
As has been the trend with this film, the special effects were so great that the viewer couldn't tell they were special effects. Well, I couldn't, anyway. Take, for example, the squirrels in the nut room. When I thought about it, I could never figure out whether they were real or CGI. They looked as if they were real ones, but I was quite sure they couldn't be trained to do what they did. It turned out that it was a clever blend of filming real squirrels, CGI and animatronic puppets. Animal trainers spent three months training baby squirrels to run where they wanted them to and appear to be cracking nuts. Three months! Talk about making an effort! The only special effect I thought could have been a bit more realistic was Violet Beauregarde turning into a blueberry. It looked slightly fake. Yet again, what's realistic about somebody turning into a blueberry? Altogether, the SFX were very good.

Music:
The music in this film is probably one of my favourite scores ever. It fit so perfectly into the film that I could probably write an essay on it. But I won't, because I can't be bothered and nobody would read it anyway. So I'll try to fit all of what I want to say into a couple of paragraphs:
The music is all done by Danny Elfman - the score, the Oompa Loompa songs... he even sang all the different Oompa Loompa voices himself, and it was perfect. The score he composed for the opening credits was the best part, in my opinion: low brass playing mysterious, rising undertones; percussion enforcing the in a regular, mechanical beat that emphasised the factory background; Oompa Loompa voices singing in a somewhat sickly-sweetly manner that reminds the viewer of candy; all meshed together in a theme that intrigues the audience and draws them right into the film from the very start. It just goes to show what a high standard the music is at not only to have made me interested in the opening credits (which, admittedly, are generally the most boring part of the film apart from the end credits), but to make that scene one of my favourites in the film.
The Oompa Loompa songs are also brilliant - each of them is so unique, with a completely different style each, but all of them are utterly entertaining. What I was particularly impressed with was the fact that the lyrics were all taken from the book, once again honouring Roald Dahl and his masterpiece. The soundtrack is one I would highly reccommend to anyone who has seen the film or read the book (to those who haven't, the lyrics might seem a bit... odd).

Good Things:

• The complete respect with which the filmmakers treated every aspect of the book :D
• The casting - all the actors suited their characters very well
• The Oompa Loompas - a lot of work, but worth it
• The sets. Amazing.
• The special effects - for the most part, very realistic
• The music

Bad things:
(Not much here, really)

• Being nitpicky, perhaps the Violet-turns-into-a-blueberry scene needed to be slightly more realistic
• No sequel! And now, Freddie Highmore is probably too old to play Charlie in 'Charlie and the Glass Elevator', which is very disappointing.

Overall:
This film really respects the book (which, being a bookworm, I cannot encourage more), and look where that got the filmmakers - a movie that made heaps of money because everybody loved it! I'm sure that Roald Dahl would have loved it. As far as adaptations go, I'm giving it five stars (out of five). For entertainment value, I give it four and a half stars. I highly reccommend both the film and the book to all of my readers.

~IoP

Bear with me...

Hi everyone,
Sorry I haven't been around lately. I have a music exam coming up and I've been using most of my spare time preparing for it. So I apologise for my lack of attention to this blog for the next month or so (not that that's exactly a different trend from the last two months), and hope to blog soon!
Thanks for your patience,
~SON

VDT Film Breakdown - Overall Character Development

One of the best things about fantasy, I do believe, is the fact that a well-written fantasy novel can indeed be more realistic than a book set in the real world.
Why? Well, it's quite simple. The fact that the world in which the novel is set is so surreal means that for the tale to be believeable, each of the characters must be 100% relatable, with the same thought processes as ourselves. Because a fantasy world is so far from our reality, the characters must be especially close to it.
They may be fighting a dragon, or sailing to the end of the world, or running away from a host of nightmarish creatures, yet the fact that the characters act the way we might in the same situation makes us believe every word the story is saying. It intrigues us to see everyday people who are very similar to us face adverseries we will never have to face (such as dragons) and overcome everyday things we all have to face (such as lack of confidence). It is this mixture of the unbelievable and the believable that makes fantasy so entertaining.
Perhaps this is one of the reasons I was not a fan of VDT when I saw it on DVD. All the sets were absolutely gorgeous, many of them depicting Narnia very close to what I had imagined, but the lack of character development throughout the film was pitiful. Shallow character arcs with terrible dialouge made for a film that was visually stunning, but lacked any connection to reality.
Over the next while, I'll be going into detail over each of the characters in VDT and how they fell short of the characters C.S. Lewis wrote about in his novel.
I realise I haven't been around for AGES, and I really do apologise for this. But I've been learning how to be diligent lately, putting church, family, violin and school in  front of my hobbies.
I've also discovered an amazing fantasy series, called 'The Wheel of Time'. I just finished the first book, 'The Eye of the World' this morning. All the elements of a great fantasy book are right there, including... yes, you guessed it, incredibly believable main characters. The series is an exceedingly long one; the first book was almost 800 pages and so far there are 13 in the series (a fourteenth coming out this December, I'm told), but 'The Eye of the World' was very easy to read, and with about 30 minutes of reading each day, I managed to finish it in about a month. I'll be sure to dedicate a whole post to it later.
I hope you all haven't given up on me just yet!
Signing off,
~SON

P.S. If anyone has a preference to which charaver they would prefer to be analysed first, feel free to comment. :)

VDT - Second Thoughts

So it's been about five months since Voyage of the Dawn Treader came out in the cinemas. A couple of weeks ago my brother, Sir Lipine, and I borrowed the DVD and rewatched it. Our thoughts, now it wasn't on the big screen?
Well, there's no easy way to say this, so I'd better just get this out of me. We thought it was pathetic. Most opinions we had of the film in the cinemas were completely washed away, leaving only disappointment their place. We so wanted this film to be great, to capture the heart of my favourite book, but once we saw it on DVD we could no longer deny that this was a terrible adaptaion and a terrible film.
For the next while or so, in an effort to keep myself blogging more often, I'm going to write small posts covering in detail different aspects in the film. I'll have a post for the plot, a post for each of the characters and a post for each of the themes. After this, I'll do a sum up of all these things and the way they all impact on the overall film.
That's the plan, anyway. :)
~SON

A Christmas Carol (2009 Animated)

Hello there, my loyal bookworms! I've finally escaped (for a time) that ugly black hole of homework and study! With this new-found (though likely short-lived) freedom, I am very happy to present to you another one of my (admittedly rare) comparative analysis reviews. This is one I've been wanting to do for ages, so now, without further ado, A Christmas Carol!

Overall position of the film:

I began watching this film expecting an adaptation of 'A Christmas Carol' for children, with more modern, easy-to-understand language and a fair bit of slapstick humour. However, I was completely caught unawares! This is a thorough, very close adaptation of Charles Dickens' classic novel that barely deviates from the plot, language and most importantly, themes, that were in the book. I would even go as far as to say that it is the closest film adaptation of 'A Christmas Carol' that I have ever seen.

Plot:

As I mentioned earlier, the plot barely deviates from the book at all in this film. There is slight poetic licence taken here and there (for example, Scrooge is at one point chased by the Ghost of Christmas yet to Come), but for the most part, Dickens' work is greatly respected and great attention to detail is shown in the story.

Characters:

Scrooge - This was certainly one of Jim Carrey's more serious roles. He voiced Scrooge with much conviction and character, bringing the old miser at the centre of this story to life. I also loved the way the animators portrayed him: tallish, very skinny, with thin lips, and a long, hooked nose.

Marley - I thought that the filmmakers were very clever in the way they portrayed Marley's ghost. He was, in all truth, a fairly scary guy, with his glowing chains and message he gives to Scrooge, besides the fact that he is the first ghost we see in this tale. The filmmakers proceeded to make him seem a little less intimidating by throwing in a little bit of slapstick humour, but not so much as to make the audience forget the what is about to happen to the main character.

The Ghost of Christmas Past - I was quite startled at how well this ghost fitted the book's description, for it is one of those things that is easy to imagine but hard to visually portray. Dickens described it as:

"Like a child: yet not so like a child as an old man, [...] from the crown of its head there sprung a bright clear jet of light, by which all this was visible; and which was doubtless the occasion of its using, in its duller moments, a great extinguisher for a cap, which it now held under its arm."

The thing I was perhaps most impressed with was the way the face was constantly changing from old to young. I applaud the animators for the admirable job they did in bringing this character to life.

The Ghost of Christmas Present - Can't really complain for this ghost, either. Of course, this ghost, being the one closest to human form, is the easiest to visually depict. The way he was represented was not really very different to any other films, but it fitted the book's description, so I was still fairly happy with it even though is perhaps lacked the 'wow' factor of the other ghosts.

The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come - My goodness, this spirit was by far the scariest of the three! I absolutely loved the way the animators chose to portray it, for it was like nothing I had seen before and highly original. It actually had no form; it was only seen as the shadow of a cloaked figure, and this made it all the more frightening. Because there was no indication of how tall or short it was, and because it wasn't something one of the characters could touch any more than you or I could grasp a shadow, there was a huge element of mystery involved in this character. The filmmakers understood a very important concept here: the fear of the unknown is far greater than the fear of what you can see, because it lets the viewer's imagination fill in the gaps.

Themes:

I think that anyone who has read this classic novella would agree with me that it has the amazing theme of redemption running through it as Scrooge goes from a miserable old man who cares for nothing but himself to one who sees the error of his ways and is completely changed into a new man. This was not at all downplayed in the film for the comfort of the general public, which I was greatly appreciative of.
The theme of compassion is one that also runs throughout the book as Scrooge learns the importance of caring for others, not just one's self. This too was very much a part of this movie.

Christian Messages:

Even though the novel never explicitly mentions God having a hand in Scrooge's redemption or Scrooge realising Christ to be his personal savior, there are nevertheless many Christian messages present in this book. One of them is the fact that said main character was not able to change on his own. For that matter, he didn't even realise that magnitude of his actions until the three spirits showed him. This is something also picked up in the film - that redemption is not something we can achieve ourselves.

Setting:

All the background sets were very well thought out to highlight the fact that this is a story set in England somewhere around the year of 1843 (which was when this tale was published). I found it a fascinating insight to the way people lived back then, with the horse-drawn carriages and the huge churches and the small shops. They were the sort of sets that really took you back to the time and showed you what day to day life looked like.

Animation:

What can I say? The animation and art departments for this movie did a truly spectacular job. There is nothing I can really complain about, because everything they visually presented absolutely respected and embraced the spirit of this classic tale.

Music:

The music very much fitted in with the emotion of the film, at points full of Christmas cheer, at other times suspenseful and fast-paced. I especially loved the incorporation of much percussion with the other orchestral instruments (in my opinion, a good film score is one that makes good use of percussion!).

Things I disliked about the film:

• The only thing I can think to say is that this was advertised as a family film, but because of some scary scenes and the complexity of the language, it's more geared towards the 10+ age group.

Things I liked about the film:

• Accurate portrayal of all the characters
• Preservation of key themes from the text
• Lack of deviation from the text
• True to the cultural and historical context of the text

Overall:

I must say that I was very impressed by this adaptation of 'A Christmas Carol'. The choice to use animation rather than live action lent itself extremely well to this story, as things that would be difficult to depict in real life were presented skillfully in this medium. What I most of all enjoyed about this movie was the respect the filmmakers had for the original text and their reluctance to deviate from it. At the same time, however, their approach was creative. I would definitely recommend both the film and novella, but would caution that the film should not be seen by children under the age of ten years.

So there we have it, folks. I'd be interested to hear what you think of 'A Christmas Carol', whether it's insights about the book or comments about other film adaptations. You know what that means. ;)

Signing off,

~SON

Help!

Greetings, bookworms.
Currently trapped in a pile of homework with a mass greater than that of a black hole the size of jupiter. Will not let me blog. Hope to escape soon. Wish me luck!
~SON

Escape by a Hair

Hi there, bookworms!
I just realised, there are a few things on  my last post I probably need to clarify. Firstly, I should probably let you know that I was practising my 'council of Elrond' tone in the first few sentences, in preperation for my Lord of the Rings review. Then I sort of forgot about that for the rest of the post, hence the change from the 'you are doomed' tone to a more casual voice.
Secondly, I started writing that post last Monday, but didn't finish it. I banned myself from my computer for the next few days because of assessments due for my classes in the following days, hence I didn't get the post up until Thursday. I thought I would say that just to let you all know that I am at least making an effort to post more regularly, even if it appears I am not.
Anyway, to the actual point of this post. A while back, I introduced you all to a friend of mine named Henry (see here). King Henry the Tenth of Destria, to be precise. Of all the characters I have devised in my stories, he is by far my favourite. Watching him learn what it means to be a king, through many tantrums, arguments and discussions, has been the most enjoyable writing experience I have ever been a part of.
I've been thinking a bit, and I've missed Henry a fair bit. I think he needs to play a far greater part in this blog. So... I'm going to be posting a few short stories on here centred around my pal.
Some of them will also involve other main characters from the Kingdom of Destria, such as Sam, Will and Petra (three teenagers who slew the usurper keeping Henry in prison for five years), James (Henry's best friend and only companion during his imprisonment), and Neville (Henry's valet being his formal position, although 'Castle Mum' would perhaps be a more fitting name).
So, without further ado...

'Escape by a Hair'

King Henry the Tenth, ruler of the Kingdom of Destrian, flung open the door and, slamming it behind him, darted into the room beyond.
From where he was sitting at his desk, James looked up.
“Nice of you to knock,” he remarked with a wry smile.
“No time for sarcasm!” Henry snapped exasperatedly. “Just hide me somewhere!”
Truth be told, James almost laughed at his best friend’s ripped clothes, dirty face and wild hair that was sticking up in all directions. He looked more like a highway robber than a king! However, the hunted look in Henry’s normally even, measuring gaze made James uneasy and he found himself escorting the king to a wardrobe in the corner of his room.
Soon, Henry was comfortable (that is to say, as comfortable as one can be when squashed into the bottom of a closet) and James shut the door of the wardrobe.
“So, is there any reason as to why the King of Destrian barged into my room looking like a beggar?” James asked casually. “I mean, you look as if you’ve been in a stampede!”
“I have,” came Henry’s muffled reply.
“Care to explain?”
“No.”
James waited patiently for ten seconds.
“Alright, alright, I’ll tell you. But you mustn’t breathe a word to Neville about this!”
“I won’t,” James promised with a smile. Neville was Henry’s personal valet, a short, blustering man who was constantly mopping his forehead with a handkerchief. He had good intentions, but was rather a worry wart. Whenever Henry was so much as scratched from battle training, the poor man acted as if the world was coming to an end!
“I was attacked,” Henry began.
James’ ears perked up. Attacked! Perhaps the assailant was in the castle that instant, about to burst into the room and demand to know where the king was!
“By whom?” He was unable to hide the curiosity in his voice.
Henry proceeded to tell his friend the whole story from the beginning, and James listened with mixed sympathy and horror. How close it had been! How lucky he had been to escape!
“......and there was not one, but two of them, James! And they were both fighting over me, pulling me this way and that as if I were a rag doll!”
“It sounds horrible!” Disgust was plastered all over James’ face.
At that moment, Neville burst into the room.
“James, you - well - have you seen - is Henry around?” blustered Neville.
James adopted his best puzzled face. “No, haven’t seen him all morning, actually. But he is 21 years old. I expect he can look after himself.
Neville wasted no more time, rushing out of the room.
Cautiously, Henry crept out of the closet. “Thank you so much, James!”
James shrugged. “What are friends for?”
Suddenly, Henry frowned. “Just one question: how will I escape the royal hairdressers tomorrow?”

THE END

So that is Henry early on in my novel, before wars break out and such. :) You can tell me what you think about my story if you like, but I'm not desperate for the feedback. I'm just using this blog as motivation to write a bit more in my spare time.
Anyway, that's all I really have time for, so there you go.
Yours Sincerely,
~SON
P.S. Please comment, even if it's only to say "Hi!"

Nemesis

Greetings, bookworms of the council of SON.
We have many matters to discuss in the council today (the grand total of two), so I would ask you to bear with me as I outline the subjects of discussion, then you may contribute (in other words, comment).
Firstly, we come to the matter of the Harry Potter review. To begin, I would like to say to Nerd Till the Very End not to worry about causing me trouble in their request, as I it is a topic I can rant on about when before I had nothing to talk about. As I see it, I now have two options:

1. I can get someone I know to do a Harry Potter review for me
2. I can get Nerd Till the Very End to do the review, if they would like to (all in favour of this comment 'I' at the end of the post).

I don't mind if people are biased towards the book more than the movie, I mean, you have to be biased to write an opinionated review. So if anyone out there is busting to write a review of a book-to-movie, just ask me! I would prefer it if you wrote it according to this site's structure (i.e. Overall position of the film, plot, characters, themes, messages, props/scenery, Special FX, music, things you didn't like, things you did like, altogether), but if I think it is good enough without that structure, you may find yourself lucky. ;) Of course, your review would have to go past me first, just so I can check it's appropriate.
Now that I've got that off my chest, on to the second topic of our discussion. There is an amazing series of books all bookworms need to know about, and it is called Nemesis. I picked up the first book, Into the Shadows, at random from the local library, and almost didn't read it because the blurb made it sound really dark and morbid. However, as I could find nothing else that looked decent, I borrowed it and began to read.
The first thing I noticed was that I was pleasantly surprised it wasn't nearly as dark as the blurb made it seem. The second thing I noticed was that the book was completely addictive.
The story is told by a boy, who I assume is between the ages of twelve and fifteen (I think it's twelve, but he acts older than that throughout the series) who one morning wakes up in a derelict stairwell with no memory whatsoever, apart from cryptic dreams he can't make head or tail of. He can't even remember his name, but the word 'Ram' comes to mind.
When he finds a dying man in a lift and is seen next to him, Ram is a murder suspect and goes into hiding.
Why can't Ram remember anything? Who is tracking him down? What can the cryptic last words of the dying man in the elevator possibly mean? These are some of the mysteries that keep you on the edge of your seat when reading this fantastic book.
As I am a person who really enjoys the 'character' aspect of books, I really loved this. The characters were so believable, yet so loyal and steadfast, a rare occurrence in teen novels today. Their desire to stick to what they knew was right restored my faith in books for young adults not to shy down from condoning what is right. Ram was a character who especially stood out to me for his high moral standards. There were so many instances throughout every book where it would have been so much easier for Ram to ignore someone in danger, or to let someone chasing him die, yet he would always do whatever he could to help someone in trouble, even if it meant putting himself in an unsafe situation. For some reason that is not apparent until the last (fourth) book, Ram's motto is "No-one's expendable." To this hero, everyone matters.
Going off on a tangent here, I'm a person who can't get into a book if I don't like the characters. At the moment I'm reading 'The Bourne Identity', by Robert Ludlum, and I admit I'm struggling a bit to get into it. Anyone who has seen the movie (which is absolutely edge-of-your-seat awesomeness, I highly recommend it) would know that in the film, Jason Bourne is someone who does not like to cause innocent people harm. Unfortunately, in the book, he is far more self-centred, and will hurt, even kill, innocent people if it means he will survive. From what it's looking like so far, I'd just say watch the movie.
Anyway, that's another comparative analysis review to look forward to in the future.
Back to Nemesis now. As I was saying, Ram is awesome. On top of this, all the mysteries, chases, escapes, fights, friendships and most of all, nail-biting suspense make it a series you'd be crazy not to read. I posted a review of Conspiracy 365 a while ago (see review here). This is ten times better than that (apart from the fact there is only four books - I want more!). Oh, and by the way, you should definitely borrow all the books at once if you get the chance. They are so suspenseful that they put you in agony if you can't get the next one soon enough! It will surprise you how fast you'll get through them- they're about 250-300 pages long (from memory, correct me if I'm wrong), and I finished each one in about two days, even though I had classes.
In conclusion, in case you didn't get the vibe of what I was saying, READ NEMESIS! (By Catherine MacPhail) You won't regret it!

Of Hogborts, or something like that...

Hey, bookworms! How's it going?
As you may have guessed, I'm trying to post more regularly, if only to provide excuses for why I am not posting more often. I would LOVE to be able to put out a review every day, but I'm a bit of a perfectionist sometimes, and I want to put in as much research as possible so that you, my wonderful readers, may get the most in-depth analysis you can from me. Besides, I do have a social life, you know, catching up with interstate friends (mainly arguing over who would win if we were to fight a ninja battle), calculating how much energy it would take for teleportation for someone of my mass, that sort of stuff. Okay, so when I said social life, I meant a nerd's social life (which is virtually non-existent), but still...
Now, a very important request has been made by Nerd till the Very End for me to review the Harry Potter movies. One of my good friends, Ashywashy, warned me that this would happen, and I guess that I knew it was inevitable; that one day someone would request it. However, I didn't imagine this day would come so soon! I suppose I should be honest, Nerd till the Very End, and get the truth out now. The fact is that I have never seen or read Harry Potter, and that my life has always been very HP free.
Now, bookworms, you see my dilemma. I would love to fulfill any requests my bookworms make, but in this case I am unable to. The way I see it, I have three options:

1. I can read and watch Harry Potter, and you can expect the review in perhaps 6 months time.
2. I can have a guest reviewer who is a HP fan to do the review for me (I would make sure that this fan is an expert on the subject).
3. I could ignore Nerd till the Very End's request, and pretend that I just haven't gotten around to doing the review yet (I am not particularly in favour of this option as I have just revealed the treachery of it for everyone to see, meaning I would be busted rather quickly and perhaps lose the only British follower I have).

So, bookworms, what shall I do? It's up to you to decide for me (see the trick there? In leaving it up to you, I have removed all forms of accountability from myself to you. Enjoy).
Please, tell me what you think!
Yours sincerely,
~SON
(Requests are still always welcome, even if I cannot fulfill them)

Far-fetched Mr Fox

Hello, bookworms! What's this? SON has posted TWICE in less than two weeks??? Again, I would ask you all to refrain from passing out until AFTER you have read and - all importantly - COMMENTED on this post :)
Hey there to my two new followers, by the way! Barbara, Sir Lipine and Ashywashy - be nice to them. ;)
Don't forget about the nagging principle, guys. Remember, nagging + procrastination = motivation + results!
So finally, I have the review for 'Fantastic Mr. Fox', dedicated to my awesome brother Sir Lipine the Awesome. Please forgive me, Sir Lipine, for taking so long! It was the homework's fault!
Getting down to business, when I heard this movie was coming out, I was very excited. 'Fantastic Mr. Fox' happens to be my favourite Roald Dahl book of all time, right from when my mum read it to my siblings and I when we were very young as a bedtime story. The story is a delightful, fun tale full of adventure and mischief. The 'bad guys' (Boggis, Bunce and Bean) are truly awful and hideous in every sense of the word. The book is indeed a great pleasure to read, which I rediscovered when reading it for research.
"But how does the movie compare to the book?" you ask. That is a very good question. Allow me to do my best to answer it:

Overall position of the film:

Look, I'll be frank here straight away. The movie is nothing like the book. At best, you could say it was loosely based on the book. If you're looking for a film that captures the essence of 'Fantastic Mr.Fox', don't watch it. If, however, you want to watch a quirky movie that doesn't really have much of a point, go right ahead and see it. I did sort of like it, despite it being really weird. And Sir Lipine loved it. But I was also quite disappointed because I did not at all see Roald Dahl's story on the screen.

Plot:

Unfortunately, the plot is not really based at all on the book. Rather than following the daring exploits of Fantastic Mr. Fox as he gives those mean farmers what they deserve, the film follows the story of an average fox going through a midlife crisis (now you see why 'far-fetched' was in the title) who thinks he has to go back to the old excitement of stealing poultry from high-security farms to make himself feel complete. Roald Dahl's solution to the problem of the three mean farmers was ignored, and instead the filmmakers try to invent a complicated plot which is, put nicely, hardly genius.

Characters:

Bean- If you have read the book, you will know just how absolutely disgusting Farmer Bean is. If you have not, let me quote a passage to you:

Bean never took a bath. He never even washed. As a result, his earholes were clogged with all kinds of muck and wax and bits of chewing gum and dead flies and stuff like that. This made him deaf. [...] Bean rubbed the back of his neck with a dirty finger. He had a boil coming there and it itched.

See what I mean? Absolutely disgusting. Roald Dahl truly has a gift for creating the most loathsome characters in children's literature. In the movie, unfortunately, bean is not nearly as revolting as in the book. He's somewhat mean, and sort of tall, but by no means ridiculous. The beauty of Roald Dahl's bad guys is that they are ridiculous, and hideously so. Farmer Bean in the film was far too ordinary.

Bunce and Boggis- The film was quite strange in that it quoted the book more than I have ever seen in a film, yet it deviated from the book drastically. When introducing the farmers, Badger (who is a lawyer in the film - go figure) quotes directly from the book what they are like, how Boggis is extremely fat, Bunce is extremely short, and Bean is extremely tall and lean. Again, even though the film introduced them with the same words the book did, their disgusting personalities didn't really shine through and they just seemed like grumpy old men rather than ridiculously mean farmers.

Mr. Fox- I hate to have to say this, but Mr. Fox was hardly as fantastic, dashing, ingenious and heroic as Mr. Fox was in the book. As mentioned in the plot summary above, he's a fox going through a midlife crisis which, put nicely, is stupid, pointless and unrealistic, as he is a FOX. Okay, so maybe it's unrealistic for a fox to be noble and smart, as Dahl wrote Mr. Fox, but hey, it's a kid's book, and you're allowed to do that sort of stuff. This movie, however, wasn't really aimed at kids. I'm not saying that it's an adult movie or anything, but most of the (terrible) humour and (unoriginal) storyline would have gone straight over an eight year-old's head. Back to talking about Mr. Fox, though, the biggest problem I had with him was that I didn't really like him. He's the protagonist, everyone's supposed to love him! Instead, he was an ordinary, selfish fox who risked the lives of his family to have a bit of excitement. The filmmakers failed miserably in bringing Fantastic Mr. Fox to life.

Ash- Now, in the book, Mr. Fox has four adorable little cubs (is that the right word for a baby fox? Correct me if I'm wrong) who are just as thoughtful and smart as their father. Did we get this in the movie? No. Instead, we get Ash, Mr. Fox's only son, who is moody and selfish and just plain WEIRD. I am especially annoyed that they called him Ash, because I personally quite like the name Ash, and this just ruins it. I personally think that far too much glory is given to Ash in the film, because all the characters are telling Mr. Fox to accept his son, even though he is 'different'. Well, Ash isn't so much different as he is RUDE to everyone around him, and instead of just making an excuse that being rude is part of Ash's 'different' personality, I would say that Mr. Fox needs to teach his son some manners and stop being so selfish.

Other Characters- None of the other characters are really worth mentioning, all you need to know is that not one of them is the way they are in the books. Even the Rat has been changed in a pathetic character arc that the filmmakers really shouldn't have bothered with.

Themes:

This really is one of the strangest films I've ever seen when it comes to themes. Every time you think someone is going to make a point, they don't, and what they say end up being just like the movie as a whole: pointless. Overall, there really aren't that many themes to discuss. I suppose you could perhaps squeeze the theme of family in there, in how Mr. Fox comes to appreciate his family a little bit more, but really that is a weak theme that barely shows through the film. When it comes to it, to be honest, the movie actually doesn't have really have anything to say.

Messages:

Ditto the themes- there were none. :'(

Setting:

Nothing particularly special about the scenery, it was really quite average. Not once in the film did I think, "Wow, that place is exactly how I imagined it in the book!", and nothing really stood out.

Animation:

This film was made using stop animation with puppets. Overall, the picture at times wasn't as smooth as, say, a Wallace and Grommit movie, but seeing as at some points in production the animators were shooting 25 scenes at a time, the process was quite genius. The animators came up with a whole new program that enabled them to communicate with the director live, wherever he was, and for this I congratulate them. To see a video of how they did this, click here.

Music:

The music matched the movie, in that it was somewhat quirky but really rather boring. However, there was one theme in the music I really loved, which was children singing:

"Boggis, Bunce and Bean,

One fat, one short, one lean.

These horrible crooks, so different in looks,

Are none the less equally mean."

which was a rhyme in the novel that the children sang, so I thought that was quite fitting in the soundtrack. Apart from that small song, though, the music was nothing special.

Things I hated about the film:

• The characters (particularly Mr. Fox, Ash, and Farmer Bean
• The plot, which the filmmakers completely destroyed
• The lack of themes to discuss
• The overall pointlessness of the film
• It was BORING

Things I didn't mind about the film:

• The animation was okay
• The children's rhyme was cool
• Quoting the book in many places was good (it would have been even better if they

Overall:

The root of all the problems in this film was that the filmmakers completely disregarded the novel and basically marred it until it was almost unrecognisable. If they had any respect for the book, they would have seen it for the pure genius it was and tried to make the film as close to the book as possible. I realise that with any book-to-film adaptation, some changes are going to be made, but this is just pitiful. Fantastic Mr. Fox is such a wonderful novel, and it hurts me to see that so little effort went into preserving the original story. I would advise all bookworms who listen to my opinion (you are few and far between) not to watch this film, and if you are unfortunate enough to see it, watch it as a quirky movie with no point rather than an adaptation of Fantastic Mr. Fox. I don't like to be this scathing, but if you want good reviews from nerds such as myself, you're going to have to make good adaptations of my favourite books.

Signing off,
~SON

Don't forget to comment!!!

Conspiracy 365

Greetings, any bookworms who have not completely lost faith in me!

Yes, there is a new post on my blog. You are not hallucinating. Please, try to refrain you fainting at least until you have read my post and COMMENTED.

I suppose I owe my faithful bookworms an apology and an excuse. I am sorry, really I am. You actually wouldn't believe how much I have wanted to have enough time to spend on my blog. Unfortunately, the holidays are over, and the term has begun. Ah, the joys of being a student! Classes to bore you in the day, homework to bore you at night.
Anyway, to give you a rough idea of where my reviews are:

• Lord of the Rings: I know that a while ago I estimated my FotR review would be finished by the end of January. You may have noticed that hasn't exactly happened. I still need to carry out research and catch up with a few people to discuss themes, characters, etc. I really don't want to rush this one, because I really want to respect Tolkien's work in my review, and make it the best it can be. To be realistic, I would predict about June for this one.
• Chronicles of Narnia- LWW (Walden): I can pretty much write this review any time I want, I have read it and seen it so many times! However, I figure it's a great excuse to watch the movie and read the book again. Maybe I'll be finished in about a month?
• Fantastic Mr. Fox: The review is half written but I have barely any motivation to continue. It'll be out sometime, maybe in the next two weeks, though please don't quote me on that.
• A Christmas Carol: I have all the information I need to write the review, I just need to get the time to write it. Expect it in maybe a month.
• Chronicles of Narnia- LWW (BBC): I found the DVD in the local library, which means that I don't wait 6 months until our family decides to venture into the DVD rental store again to write my review! (For the record, we ended up handing in Inkheart about a week late, hence the ban) I might release this one after the review of Walden's adaptation.

 Now, bookworms, let me introduce you to the way my mind procrastinating mind works: nagging = me working quicker. You have the right to nag me as much as you like, any of you, to see the review you want! Let me explain it in a chemical formula: Nagging + procrastination = motivation + results. And just like a balanced chemical formula, the more nagging you put in, the more motivation and results you get (the nagging can't just disappear into thin air, now can it? I didn't think so). Don't worry about hurting my feelings or anything... I'll be very happy if somebody nags me, because it shows that they are interested. =D

Okay, now into the action. I have come across an awesome series of books called 'Conspiracy 365', thanks to Barbara and Sir Lipine's recommendations. To all the girls reading the blog, don't be turned off by the fact they were written for boys. Who says girls should all have to read corny romantic novels with titles such as 'Toxic Bachelor'? Not I.

These books are really interesting and right from the start they draw you straight in. From the first page I was swept off my feet (metaphorically speaking, I should hope) into the life of Callum Ormond, a normal teen whose life suddenly goes in a downward spiral after he is told on New Year's Eve by a raving stranger that he has to survive the next 365 days. Danger and mystery follow as his ordinary life is thrown into disarray and he has to live as a hunted fugitive, trying desperately to survive what each day throws at him.

The characters are all utterly believable, from Cal who just wants to go back to his normal life to Boges, Cal's best mate, who has to deal with his best friend becoming a fugitive (on top of being awesome, which seems to be Boges' job throughout the series), to Gabbi, Cal's sister, who just wants her brother back. The good guys don't always do and say the 'right thing', like any human, but they're willing to fight for justice, and that's what I like in main characters.

I also like the setting, which sticks mainly to the city of Melbourne, Australia. That's because all the places Cal wanders are actually real, and brings a sense of reality into the books.

Even the formatting for the books is clever. In keeping with the 365 day countdown theme, there is one book for each month of the year, starting with January and ending with December (12 books in total). Each chapter is a day (although not every single day is written about), and at the beginning of each chapter there is a countdown on how many days left until December 31st. And get this: the page numbers count DOWN instead of UP. How cool is that? Well, I think it's cool, anyway.
Overall, I am highly recommending this series. They're awesome, and keep you right on the edge of your seat. I just have a couple of warnings:

1. DO NOT finish one of these novels just before you go to bed. Trust me, I know from experience that you will be up all night.
2. DO NOT finish one of these novels before you have the next one handy. Because if there's one thing that's more annoying than staying up all night wondering what's going to happen next, it's staying up all night, all week, wondering what's going to happen next and when your library will hurry up and get the next book.

That's pretty much all I have to say. I'd love to say more, but I'm right in the middle of December, and Cal is in a rather life-threatening fix... gotta go!

~SON

P.S. Please comment, nag, come to my house with torches and pitchforks, whatever takes your fancy. Suggestions are also welcome :)

Of Kings and Tantrums

Greetings, Bookworms!

So we come, as we inevitably must, to yet another period of my life where I have not the motivation to write another review, but know that I have to show my faithful bookworms I still exist. That is why I am introducing a new segment, called ‘Random Opinion’. Basically, it serves as a way for me to voice a certain opinion of mine that has been boiling away inside of me for a while, without having to do all the research necessary for a review. Tell me what you think about these segments: mindless vents or interesting insights? (For the record, they basically are mindless vents. If you like them, that’s a big bonus for me!)

The subject of this mindless ve- I mean, random opinion, is the character development of kings in books.

Now, as someone who loves writing, I have been through the stage of wanting all the good guys in my stories to be flawless. It’s one of the reasons I often wince when reading stories I wrote when I was in primary and early high school. Back then, I thought that if you had a great, exciting plot, everyone would like your stories. Thankfully, my eyes were gradually opened to the truth: your narrative is only as good as your characters.

Back then, in my early writing years when people deemed me too young to receive proper criticism, such as “Your story isn’t as great as you think it is,” (come to think of it, at that age I probably wouldn’t have received that very well- I just wanted to be told that my stories were good) I thought that a good character was one that was good at everything, who was always kind and knew all the right things to say. It’s a good thing that I was never one for romance, because that would have been just painful.

It was only when I was about 14 (pretty late, I know, but better late than never, huh?) that I realised that really good characters are ones that have flaws. Characters that have struggles, fears, tempers and faults they have to get over in order to do a set task. I saw that people don’t want to read about perfect characters leading perfect lives; they want to read about real characters going through real struggles: characters that we all, being humans, can relate to.

I had suddenly entered into a whole new dimension of writing: one where you don’t just enjoy it because of the erotic excitement of creating an amazing plot full of so many twists it makes you dizzy, but because there is a genuine joy in discovering your characters’ strengths and weaknesses, and journeying with them as they overcome their struggles. It’s like meeting new people: at first, you don’t really know them that well. But as you continue to watch them, you begin to get an idea of who they are, with all their complexities and mannerisms. Gradually, they grow on you until a deep friendship is formed, and you get excited because you know who they are at the beginning of the story and the changed person they’re going to be at the end of the story and you’re going to be there every step of the way to watch them grow into that person.

It’s your job to then introduce others to the amazing new people you’ve met, to share the sheer delight you’ve found in watching these characters mature before you through words. That is the joy and challenge of writing I have discovered.

Now, I deeply love stories about ordinary people leading ordinary lives being thrown into situations where they suddenly have to be courageous, strong and do things they never imagined they could do, where they then discover that they are not ordinary; they are, in fact, extraordinary. This is one of the many reasons my favourite book of all time happens to be ‘Voyage of the Dawn Treader’ by C.S. Lewis. This is a delightful tale of discovery: both through literal exploration of uncharted waters and each character’s personal voyage. These two separate aspects of the story merge together at the end of the book, where both journeys come together in the climax: meeting Aslan at world’s end.

I could go on for pages and pages about how each character grows throughout this amazing book, but I will spare you. There are places such as NarniaWeb to let out such observations gradually so that friends and family are spared from people such as myself never shutting up about the wonders of Narnia.

I will restrain myself enough to concentrate on one character in particular- given the topic of this particular ‘random opinion’, can you guess who that is? If you guessed Edmund, take off 50 points. If I was writing a segment on him in relation to VDT, I would name it more along the lines of ‘Of kings and the Midas conspiracy’. Besides, most of his character development is in LWW. Duh. If you guessed Peter, take off 100 points. Yes, in movie-verse PC he is very good at throwing tantrums, but he isn’t even in VDT. Get your facts straight!

No, I am talking about Caspian! You see, Lewis acknowledged that once someone becomes a king, they are by no means perfect. Even three years after he is crowned, when VDT takes place, Caspian still has important things to learn, and the book focuses a lot on how this king of Narnia matures from a boy used to having his orders followed to a man who realises it is not through his experience he can ever be worthy of ruling Narnia, but by the grace and guidance of Aslan.

Of course, he does not suddenly realise this. This wisdom comes through him making many mistakes, and at the end of the book throwing a massive tantrum, after which Aslan gives him a stern talking to. This is the major character development scene for Caspian, and you know what annoyed me about the movie? THEY LEFT IT OUT!!!

The whole movie, Caspian is this guy who doesn’t make mistakes. Yes, it saves time, but at what price? The only slight character development involves no tantrums whatsoever. To put it in a nutshell, from Caspian’s point of view: “To make up for losing my fake Spanish accent, I must brood over my father's death and come to the conclusion he thinks I am a failure (even though he’s dead) to show everyone I still have traces of Inigo Montoya syndrome so they will feel sorry for me!” That is the only reason I can think of as to why the filmmakers would create such a shallow character arc, and even there I can’t really see the logic behind it!

Book-verse Caspian was someone many people look up to, myself included. In fact, he was a character I unknowingly based my main character, King Henry, on (King Henry the Tenth, in case you’re wondering) in my latest NaNoWriMo novel.

To give you some background info on my pal, Henry, he was born a mischievous prince who had a palace at his disposal to play all the practical jokes he could ever wish. However, when he was about 16, his parents were murdered and he was taken captive by a usurper, with only his best friend for company. Five years later, the usurper was overthrown and he was given back the throne.

Imagine what it would be like for a twenty-one year old who is still used to being a spoilt kid suddenly having the enormous responsibility of being king thrown upon him, and you have Henry.  Watching him grow from a childish, immature (but well meaning) boy into a mature and patient king through many tantrums, arguments, and moments of reflections asking himself where he went wrong has been so much fun, and now he’s my best friend trapped in the confines of my mind and ink and paper.

What I never realised when I was writing about Henry was that he would never have existed if it were not for Caspian’s tantrum scene at the end of the Voyage of the Dawn Treader book.

This is the reason why I was so annoyed they did not include Caspian’s tantrum in the movie. Kings have their moments of imperfection, just like the rest of us. And we all love characters we can relate to. Not everyone who sees the movie will know the horrible pain of losing a father, but everyone who sees the movie will know what it’s like to think you’re right when in actual fact you’re wrong, and to make an idiot of yourself when doing so. Audiences need to see all the characters work through their problems in all of their embarrassing glory!

Long live the character development of fictional kings!!!

(For the record, VDT is still an awesome movie with a much clearer message than the other two. I would highly recommend it to everyone.)

(Feel free to comment)

Inkheart

*warning, mild spoilers*

Hey, Bookworms!
Okay, firstly, I would like to thank everyone who has shown interest and given me criticism. I really need it! Someone even pointed out to me that I was spelling 'criticism' wrong. How embarrassing! Thanks for that!
I'm still researching LotR, so bear with me for that review! Anyway, if you're a LotR fanatic and you have an insightful comment you would like me to include in my review, just post a comment and I'll make sure I include it (AND give you credit for it).
To other matters, by request of The Cactus I have made a review of the movie 'Inkheart', which by chance I have been itching to write for quite some time now. Here goes...

Overall Position of the Film:

Okay, I am going to die for saying this. I'm just waiting for a mob of angry bookworms to show up at my door with torches and pitchforks to drag me away and kill me. But I can't lie about my opinion. The fact remains: I actually liked the movie more than I liked the book! Please, be nice to me! I would really like to live long enough to at least complete my review of LotR!
But let me explain the reason for this. You see, the movie is made very, very well. Everything that was put into the movie needed to be there, and all the things left out weren’t really necessary, taking into consideration that the book is at least 500 pages (depending on what edition you get), and that the movie was intended for the whole family to watch.
Inkheart is supposedly a book written for children. I disagree. I certainly wouldn’t recommend it for anyone below the age of 13, for the complexities of the characters and the quite realistic bad morals of most of them.
Don’t get me wrong; Inkheart is a really great book, and Cornelia Funke is a genius to have thought of an idea so original. But the beauty of the film is that it is a movie the whole family can enjoy, with just as much fun and magic as the book but with better morals and heroes that are much more likeable.

Plot:

Basically, as far as plot was concerned, the movie was fairly close to the book. There were a few slight changes, but nothing really major, just a few things to make it a little bit shorter and more cinematic.
The one thing that didn’t really make sense in the storyline was that Capricorn threatened Meggie he’d kill her mother if she didn’t read the shadow out of the book. Thing was, the shadow was going to feast on Resa and Fenoglio anyway if she were to read it out, so why conjure up something when threatened if the thing that is being threatened is going to happen anyway, plus a lot more chaos. It just didn’t quite make sense to me.
Besides that slight glitch, however, the storyline worked really well and was quite close to the book.

Characters:

Meggie- I’ll say it now, Meggie was a lot more likable in the movie than in the book- more resourceful, observant and innocent. It is important for her to be this way, as she is the main heroine in the film (Mo doesn’t play as much of a part as he does in the book). Her longing to have her family reunited and to see her mother again makes the audience sympathise with her and want her to have a happy ending. As a few of you will know, Eliza Bennett’s performance as Meggie has convinced me that she would be a great casting choice for Jill if The Silver Chair ever gets made, as she plays the role (a fairly difficult one for that matter) very believably. Need I say any more?

Mo- From the protectiveness of his daughter to the desperation to find his missing wife, Mo is a great hero for this movie (although he ends up as a bit of a sidekick to Meggie in the end). Everything he does is reflective of his love of his family, from spending nine years chasing up a copy of Inkheart to refusing to read Dustfinger back. For those of you who have read Inkspell and Inkdeath, you can completely imagine him as the Bluejay in the future. As one small, nitpicky thing, I would have liked his voice to have sounded as beautiful as described in the text, but it’s really no big deal, and apart from that he was great- just like the book.

Elinor- In the books, Elinor Loredan was someone who, to me, always seemed like a chunk of ice: harsh, abrupt and cold. It was only Meggie, Mo and Resa who could thaw her. In the film, Helen Mirren portrayed her perfectly, from the mean old lady at the start to somebody who values her family more than her books in the end, and no longer wishes to be lonely. Even though the books always described her as plump, I always imagined her to be thin anyway- thin and tough, rather than plump and soft. So do not fear, bookworms, Elinor is still just as icy in the film as she is in the text.

Farid- In the book, he plays a fairly major role. In the film, he is more a comic relief than anything else, but that is not necessarily a bad thing. He is a lot less serious and a lot more likeable. He still helps defeat Capricorn and learns ‘Dragon’s Breath’ from Dustfinger, but does so in a comical, easy going way. His accent isn’t great, I’ll admit, but in my eyes, dare I say it, the movie verse version of him is still an improvement on then bookverse.

Capricorn- Well doesn’t this guy (Andy Serkis) just love playing criminals? First Gollumn, now this. I have to admit, he plays them very well. And he is hilarious as well as being evil, with his love of duct tape. But yes, he is very good. They probably ‘toned down’ his malevolence a little to make the film more family friendly, but seeing as it is, after all, a family film, I have no problems with that.

Basta- If it were not for his heavy superstition, Basta may have been a fairly scary guy. As it turned out, he still was kind of scary, but comical enough for the audience not to worry about him too much, and that is the beauty of it. He is bad, but far too wimpy to frighten young children too much, even with his knife.

Fenoglio- Absolutely fantastic would be an understatement for Fenoglio. He thinks so highly of himself, as well as being so daft, annoying and utterly useless that you can’t help but laugh. The adoration he has for his characters, even the evil ones, is priceless, and there is no doubt he is their author. Loved it!

Dustfinger- As in my review of ‘Voyage of the Dawn Treader’, I have decided to leave the best portrayed character until last. And let me tell you now, Dustfinger was definitely the best portrayed out of all of them. Like Eustace, it was as if he was stepping off the page onto the screen. In fact, you understand him far better in the film than you do in the text. The thing I love most about Dustfinger is that he is so wonderfully complex; there are two sides to him that are constantly battling within him. There is the weak, deceitful character that will do anything, even betray his friends, to get back to the Inkworld, and there is the other side of him is the part that hates betraying others and wants to do something to help someone for a change. The indecision on his face whenever he is about to betray somebody is really great. You can see that he really hates what he is about to do, but has already made up his mind. He’s the sort of character that the audience loves and hates at the same time. It was Dustfinger’s character that truly brought the movie to life.

Themes:

I really enjoyed the themes they focussed on in this movie. The one they gave the most attention was probably ‘destiny versus choice’ and the struggle Dustfinger goes through to fight against the way he was ‘written’. Another theme I picked out was ‘longing to be with family’, as demonstrated through the characters Mo, Meggie, Resa, Dustfinger and Elinor. A couple they did not focus so much on that were very prominent in the book were ‘growing up’ and ‘the joy of reading’. I was slightly disappointed they did not choose to focus so much on the latter two themes as much, but it’s a family length film and if they tried to include everything you’d be drowning in the themes. So thematically, I thought they did quite well.

Messages:

To be honest, the film didn’t really have any messages… not from what I could pick out, in any case. It’s really an entertainment film only, and it’s not trying to tell the audience anything profound. In that respect, it’s pretty much the same as the book.

Props/scenery:

I must say, the arts department did a very good job for this film. Of course, Italy is a great place to film a movie. When Mo and Meggie were driving to Elinor’s house, there are beautiful rolling hills and cute little villages seen all around. The book store towards the beginning of the movie was really cool: there were beautiful old books everywhere (I wished Mo would read me there so I could see them all). As for Elinor’s library… that was something else altogether. It was completely and utterly drool-worthy. Capricorn’s castle and village was spectacular as well, built all over the hills. Altogether, the props/scenery really brought atmosphere into the film.

Special effects:

I really loved the special effects in the movie- they were really subtle but altogether gave the film a much more magical feel. Small things such as cameras shaking/blurring slightly at the same time as light flashing were a really neat touch to make the characters/objects come out of the books rather than just making them magically appear. The creatures that had been read out of books (flying monkeys, ticking crocodile, etc) had great CGI and were very believable. Perhaps the best special effect of the movie was of The Shadow, which was utterly brilliant. To me, CGI always looks best if it is based on something moving without too much solid form, e.g. the water god in ‘Prince Caspian’ was made out of running water, which was a lot more realistic than some big blue man coming out of the river. The shadow was formed by a huge, billowing cloud of ashes which took a loosely humanoid shape with arms, legs and a head. Its eyes and mouth were gaping, fiery holes in the cloud. It was really stunning and very realistic.

Music:

The music of Inkheart was a beautiful accompaniment to the movie that added a lot of emotional dimension and atmosphere. I really enjoyed the music at the start, which was eerie, beautiful and mysterious and drew the audience right in. In contrast, Dustfinger’s theme was wistful, sad and slightly gypsy-sounding. Use of a whole range of instruments gave different scenes distinction and variation from one another. Use of choirs as part of the score also added to the overall atmosphere of the film. When all these elements were combined, the result was music that moved with the movie and made the audience feel as if they were part of the movie too.

Things I wasn’t really happy about:

I can’t think of anything major I wasn’t happy about, so this list is going to be small and rather nitpicky:

·         Mo’s voice (Meggie’s too, for that matter), wasn’t as beautiful as described in the book

·         The ‘Joy of Reading’ theme wasn’t picked up on as much

·         I would have really loved to see the scene where Mo and Meggie write notes to each other in Elvish… simply because that would have been kind of cool… but yes, you can probably see that I’m really running out of ideas here…

·         Oh yeah, Farid looked a bit like a girl with his long hair and eye makeup

As you can see, this isn’t a particularly big list, and my points are slightly irrelevant. That’s how much I liked the movie!

Things I was happy about:

*laughs* Where do I start?

·         Family friendly movie

·         Characters- Dustfinger particularly

·         Plot fairly close to the book

·         Props/scenery

·         Special effects

·         Music

Altogether:

The film is absolutely fantastic. I really loved it, and, dare I say it, it was quite a bit more enjoyable than the book (for me, anyway). Of course, it doesn’t come close to the Chronicles of Narnia or Lord of the Rings or National Treasure or Inception or anything like that, but is a great flick for the family to watch on a cold Friday night with lots of chocolate in arm’s reach. I would definitely recommend it to any fans of Inkheart who want a lively, close adaptation of the book.

By the way, I apologise for this review perhaps being slightly sloppy. My major LotR project preoccupies my mind at the moment, so my comparative analysis has taken a bit of a small blow. Nevertheless, I will endeavour to post a new review every 2 weeks or so. Happy New Year, bookworms!

~SON