Tag: 2015

Review: The Final Master

A stylish set of street fights are the highlights of this slick and sometimes overcomplicated historical martial arts epic.

Director and writer Xu Haofeng has quite literally grown up with martial arts. A student of them since the age of 14, he’s applied his practical talents to a series of novels and films, including penning the script for Wong Kar-Wai’s The Grandmaster. Adapting his own novel The Master, Xu conveys his clear love for the genre in this exploration of the end of an era, one that contrasts the tension between individualism and collectivist military thinking in pre-Second World War China.

THE FINAL MASTER is about the last Wing-Chun practitioner, Master Chen (Liao Fan), who promises his dying master that he will pass down his legacy by opening an academy in the martial arts mecca of Tianjin, the centre of martial arts at the time. The academies will not accept an outsider, so he takes on a local “coolie” as an apprentice (Song Yang) to beat the eight schools. Adding intrigue to the standard genre storyline is the increasing presence of the military in the district, a sign of the changing times. These might just serve to fill in the moments between set pieces, but it marks Xu’s film as something distinct, even if they serve to overcomplicate the plot. Even so, Xu isn’t beyond injecting a few twists here and there, including a scene where Chen fights off 20 thugs while confessing his life story to his lover.

Meticulously shot by veteran Wang Tianlin, the Xian Ruiqing (Eastern Bandits) production design is atmospheric and sensual. From the gorgeous costumes to the lingering shots on cigarette smoke trails, the camera devours the lush 1930s mix of traditional costumes and Western clothing styles, not to mention the glamorous Zhao Guo Hui (Song Jia). An Wei’s sexy Jazz inspired score is occasionally incongruous with the action, but adds to the idea of Western influences creeping into Tianjin life at every turn. Yet it’s the fast and brutal street fights that Xu uses to tell his primary story, choreographing them principally with knives to draw a line between the styles of the North and the South. Xu intentionally shows fully body shots during these scenes, as opposed to the “Hong Kong” close-ups and quick cuts. Despite the weight of the political wrangling plot, and the inconclusiveness of the ambiguous ending, it’s through the showcasing of this martial arts style that Xu literally cuts through with his message of selfhood in the face of the system.

2015 | China | DIR: Xu Haofeng | WRITERS: Xu Haofeng | CAST: Liao Fan, Song Jia, Jiang Wenli, Jin Shi-Jye, Song Yang and Huang Jue | DISTRIBUTOR: United Entertainment Partners (US) | RUNNING TIME: 109 minutes | RATING:★★★¾ (7.5/10)

THE FINAL MASTER is in selected cities in the US starting June 3 and 10.

June 4, 2016
Review: Queen of the Desert

An epic adventure film that revels in the poetry of life.

Werner Herzog has spent a career documenting humans forging their way into knowingly treacherous territory, whether it’s the mad perseverance of Fitzcarraldo or the deadly insanity of Grizzly Man, tracing the life and death of Timothy Treadwell at the hands of bears. With QUEEN OF THE DESERT, the writer/director’s first work of fiction since 2009’s My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done?, Herzog returns to historical fiction to chronicling the life of Getrude Bell. In addition to being a writer and explorer, Bell was a contemporary of T.E. Lawrence, and thus instrumental in helping establish the Hashemite dynasties in modern Jordan and Iraq.

The film covers the personal and professional adventures of Bell (Nicole Kidman), painting her as a restless spirit who never fit in with British society at the turn of the century. Sent to the British consulate in Tehran, she begins a romance with Henry Cadogan (James Franco) and a much larger one with what we now refer to generally as the Middle East. Herzog’s script glances over significant accomplishments such as the ten new paths she forged in the Bernese Alps, but instead stays in that romantic ideal of the half-dozen times she crossed “Arabia” over the course of 12 years. It certainly allows him and his frequent cinematographer Peter Zeitlinger to stage a lavish and gorgeously realised vision of the dunes and vistas of period Arabia.

Kidman is a natural fit for this film, her star status disarming the audience into thinking there is nothing more to this adventurer than being a high-born daughter of privilege. Yet like Bell herself, Kidman is perfectly at ease in this harsh environment. The film doesn’t shy from her headstrong nature, something that was a fact of Bell’s popular reputation at the time, and the series of men that her life quite literally can’t wait to give up their treasures and secrets to her. Of those men, Franco’s accent shifts as constantly as the desert sands, but he provides a charming entry point for the handful of people who tie her more to Western civilisation than her beloved desert. By contrast, there is a desperation about Damian Lewis’ military man, who also becomes enamoured by the Desert Queen. These repeated loves and encounters merely hammer home the point that her “heart belongs to no-one now by the desert.”

QUEEN OF THE DESERT is fully aware of the cinematic legacy that it follows with David Lean’s epic, and indeed engages in a kind of intertextual dialogue with Lawrence of Arabia. It’s no mistake that someone of Robert Pattinson’s fame plays Lawrence in a small but memorable role, flippantly dismissing his own part in the British insertion in the Middle East, while rightfully praising Bell’s accomplishments. There’s more of a weariness about Pattinson’s Lawrence than Peter O’Toole’s, but there’s a direct line between the two performances, even as Pattinson downplays it to make it his own. At times, you can almost hear Maurice Jarre’s classic score stirring. Yet where Lawrence of Arabia found grandeur around every corner, QUEEN OF THE DESERT finds the unwritten beauty in the everyday moments of Bell’s travels.

Herzog’s deliberate pacing may frustrate some, as will the very definite heightened language of the melodrama that the film revels in. Yet like the Persian romance poetry that it so often references, the film patterns itself on the “poetry of life” that Bell professes she finds intoxicating about the desert. Herzog ultimately delivers something very different to his previous work, and it is an ambitious addition to his already significant contributions to cinema.

2015 | US | DIR: Werner Herzog | WRITERS: Werner Herzog | CAST: Nicole Kidman, James Franco, Damian Lewis, Robert Pattinson | DISTRIBUTOR: Transmission (AUS) | RUNNING TIME: 128 minutes | RATING:★★★★ (8/10)

June 1, 2016
Review: Fantastic Four

Fox’s latest reboot not only fails to live up to its title, but the comic book legacy that spawned it.

The team affectionately known as Marvel’s First Family may have launched the modern Marvel universe in 1961, but their cinematic track record has been less than stellar.

Following a fondly remembered television cartoon in the 1960s, and another in the late 1970s, the franchise was notoriously made into an ashcan production by Roger Corman in 1994. Tim Story’s 2005 reboot was mixed in its results, but did well enough with audiences to earn a sequel, the much derided Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer. For all of their fits and starts, these outings had two things in common: an attempt to pay tribute to their comic book legacy, and an innate sense of fun. Josh Trank’s FANTASTIC FOUR (or FANT4STIC if you prefer) not only abandons its half-century legacy, but any sense of joy as well.

Lifting much of its elongated first act from Brian Michael Bendis, Mark Millar, and Adam Kubert’s Ultimate Fantastic Four comic book series, the latest incarnation of Reed Richards (Miles Teller) is a misunderstood teen genius, discovered at a high-school science fair with his rough-around-the-edges friend Ben Grimm (Jamie Bell) by Professor Franklin Storm (Reg E. Cathey), director of the Baxter Foundation, and his daughter Sue (Kate Mara). Tasked to complete a inter-dimensional “Quantum Gate” alongside Storm’s troubled protege Victor Von Doom (Toby Kebbell) and reckless son Johnny (Michael B. Jordan), they are all imbued with amazing powers when they travel to another planet filled with a strange energy.

With this reboot, Fox and their superhero licences were given a golden opportunity to start anew with the team, and all they really had to do was follow any of the various origin stories the team has been given by countless top tier writers over the decades. Simon Kinberg, who recently updated Fox’s X-Men: Days of Future Past to much acclaim – alongside newbie writer Jeremy Slater and director Josh Trank – have delivered a total reinvention of the premise, and in doing so have robbed the film of even a fantasy believability. Which is where Fantastic Four lies: firmly in the realms of fantasy. Instead, the film revels in the grotesque of Reed’s stretching limbs, the agony of Grimm’s rock exterior, while totally over-explaining the notion that Sue can be invisible and create forcefields. Not once does it let these characters simply play with their newfound abilities.

Yet even if this wasn’t an adaptation of a beloved series of heroes, FANTASTIC FOUR is a troubled production. The overly complicated origin tries to science the hell out of a concept that once needed “cosmic rays” to justify powers, and takes a good hour to get past this exposition. Even simple concepts, such as Grimm’s family owning a junk yard, is both shown visually and then still explained in dialogue moments later. In fact, every is line telegraphed to the point of cliché (“We can’t change the past, but we can control the future!”, “There is no Victor…only Zuul Doom!”). None of the characters are imbued with much personality, and most disappointingly of all, even the pantsless Thing is reduced to nothing more than a government controlled hulk aimed at tanks. While early reports of Doom being a blogger are inaccurate, they aren’t far off either: his introduction is in a windowless room playing video games, and a far cry from the powerful ruler who fully commands his own sense of justice.

FANTASTIC FOUR may be many things, but it isn’t Fantastic Four. For much of the film, characters are simply occupying screen time, neither furthering their own development or the plot. When the running time indicates that it is time to start wrapping things up, there is a final and inevitable confrontation with Doom that descends into nothing less that undirected chaos, with found-footage director Trank (Chronicle) simply failing to control it. While a sequel is scheduled, one that might give us a unified team that lives up to the title, there is little here to give either fans or uninitiated audiences hope for a fantastic future.

FANTASTIC FOUR is released on 6 August 2016 in Australia, and 7 August 2015 in the US, from Fox.

2015 | Country: USA | Director: Josh Trank | Writers: Simon Kinberg, Jeremy Slater, Josh Trank | Runtime: 100 minute | Starring: Miles Teller, Michael B. Jordan, Kate Mara, Jamie Bell, Toby Kebbell, Reg E. Cathey, Tim Blake Nelson | Distributor: Fox | | Rating: ★★

August 6, 2015
Review: Inside Out

One of Pixar’s most imaginative and best films to date, and that’s saying quite a bit.

It seemed for a while there that Disney’s native animation studio was stealing back the crown from stable-mate Pixar, with Big Hero 6 and the monolithic Frozen reclaiming the thunder that Pixar had rightfully borrowed for the better part of the decade. In response, the digital born studio had offered up some half-hearted sequels (Cars 2, Monsters University) and the less-than-spectacular Brave. However, with INSIDE OUT they return to form, doing what they do best by exploring the hidden worlds we humble humans know nothing about.

Inside the mind of 11-year-old Riley, there are five Emotions that work to keep her on track: the effervescent optimist Joy (voice of Amy Poehler), who views her entire mission in life to make Riley happy. Fear (Bill Hader) worries about everything to keep Riley safe, Anger (Lewis Black) voices her inner outrage and Disgust (Mindy Kaling) keeps physical (and social) poisons away from her. Meanwhile, nobody can quite work out what Sadness (Phyllis Smith) is for. However, she kicks into gear when Riley’s parents move her across country, throwing her world into chaos. The Emotions scramble to keep her on track so that her Core Memories don’t turn from happy ones to sad.

INSIDE OUT combines all the charm of Toy Story, the hidden creatures hard at work of Monsters Inc. and the fantastic worlds of Wreck-It-Ralph. From a simple premise, Monsters Inc. and Up director manages to keep us on our toes for the duration, opening up hidden bits of the inner psyche and pure fantasy. Once we get into the long-term memory archives, anything goes, especially with the introduction of an imaginary friend and a journey through abstract thought. The sequence is not only a terrific throwback to the surreal moments of Disney’s history (think Winnie the Pooh’s ““Heffalumps and Woozles” meeting Chuck Jones’ Duck Amuck short), but a Trojan horse of educational on the stages of abstraction. The characters literally fall apart during their “deconstruction” stage. It’s a great example of how some jokes will work on a purely visual level for kids, while adults can smile knowingly at the deeper meaning. Funny and genuine, it also has one of the most positive messages for kids (of all ages): it’s not just okay to be sad sometimes, but that can also be one of your greatest strengths.

2015 | US | Dir: Pete Docter | Writers: Pete Docter, Meg LeFauve, Josh Cooley | Cast: Amy Poehler, Phyllis Smith, Bill Hader, Lewis Black, Mindy Kaling | Distributor: Disney | Running time: 102 minutes | Rating:★★★★¾ (9.5/10)

June 17, 2015
SFF 2015 Review: Steve Jobs: The Man in the Machine

A new documentary covers some familiar ground, and still ends with the same question it poses.

What could possible be said about Apple founder Steve Jobs that hasn’t already be said? Having put himself in the spotlight for most of his professional life, and being the subject of emotive documentaries and features like Jobs since his death in 2011, the technology guru’s biography is almost as ubiquitous as the products his company produces. Which is where documentarian Alex Gibney begins, with shots of fans around the world weeping over his monuments, pondering why there is such an emotional attachment to what is nothing more than a fashion-focused tech company. Via bountiful archive footage and original interviews, Gibney covers some familiar ground but attempts to uncover the personal side of the story. We are repeatedly reminded that this was the Jobs ethos: putting “us” into the picture. The film really starts digging into new meat when it focuses on the stock options scandals, the working conditions in China and discrepancies around the subject’s illness. Yet it somehow also loses some focus here, along with some of its editorial balance in some slightly mean-spirited lines of argument, before Gibney ultimately ends up with the same puzzle he began with. The question remains an apt one, with the cult of Apple continuing to this day, perhaps even stronger than ever. However, the subject remains elusive, and perhaps always will. Or maybe there really isn’t anything more to say.

2015 | US | Dir: Alex Gibney | Rating:★★★½ (7/10)

June 6, 2015
Review: Tomorrowland

“To all who come to this happy place: Welcome. Disneyland is your land. Here age relives fond memories of the past, and here youth may savor the challenge and promise of the future.”

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Director: Brad Bird

Writers: Damon Lindelof, Brad Bird

Runtime: 120 minutes

Starring: Britt Robertson, George Clooney, Raffey Cassidy, Hugh Laurie, Keegan-Michael Key, Kathryn Hahn

Distributor: Disney

Country: US

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Anybody who has walked through the gates of a Disney theme park over the last sixty years will be familiar with those words. Part of Walt Disney’s opening day address to the first visitors to Disneyland in 1955, it neatly encapsulates the philosophy Walt held publicly for the future. It was a aspiration that could be seen infused in the spires of the Tomorrowland section of the Disney parks, and later the Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow, better known as EPCOT. While those concepts are better known for their geodesic spheres and distinct Space Mountains, Walt actually intended EPCOT to be a community of 20,000 people. It was to be a model for cities of the future, complete with a unique transportation system that would “always be in a state of becoming.” His dream remained just that upon his death in 1966, shortly after unveiling the concept, but Brad Bird has cleverly revived it in a way for the future-focused TOMORROWLAND.

After an awkward direct-to-camera framing narration, design to give audiences an early dose of George Clooney, TOMORROWLAND kicks off at the 1964 New York World’s Fair. Fans will know that this is where Walt Disney unveiled the classic ride “It’s A Small World,” as well as introducing the Audio-Animatronic robots that would later populate the “Pirates of the Caribbean” and “Haunted Mansion” attractions to name a few. Against this backdrop, a young Frank Walker (Thomas Robinson) presents a homemade jetpack to David Nix (Hugh Laurie) for an innovation prize. He’s rejected, but the mysterious girl Athena (Raffey Cassidy) spots promise in him and whisks him away to a futuristic place. Decades later, the rebellious Casey Newton (Britt Robertson) is given a mysterious pin, which appears to open up a portal to that same place. She must seek out an older Frank (Clooney) to help her understand her destiny.

It’s hard to argue with TOMORROWLAND‘s buoyancy, and it is rare to see a studio have such a direct dialogue with its own brand. It is something that Disney used to do all the time, especially when Walt was the public face of the company, but over the course of the last few decades the brand has shifted. It’s certainly not the first time that they have based a film on a theme park ride (Pirates of the Caribbean, Haunted Mansion, and…Country Bears) or the debut of their futurism on screen (Meet the Robinsons), but it is the first time they’ve directly attempted to define what that legacy means in this kind of narrative. It’s incredibly refreshing to see a cinematic vision of the future that isn’t overrun by the robot apocalypse, or is a declining dystopia. In this sense, it comes the closest to Walt Disney’s original vision of a “vista into a world of wondrous ideas…and the hope for a peaceful, unified world.”

Yet TOMORROWLAND is also confused film. On the one hand, it is unabashedly optimistic, a curious combination of the 1960s and 1970s Disney live action films like Escape From Witch Mountain or The Cat From Outer Space, Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind with a bit of National Treasure thrown in for good measure. It is also the most overtly political of Disney’s recent fare, condemning climate change deniers but at the same time casting the person who rails against it as the de facto villain. It manages to go from wide-eyed optimism to action oriented street chases and broader humour with the introduction of shop owners Hugo (Keegan-Michael Key) and Ursula (Kathryn Hahn). Yet it commits its biggest mistake in being wholly straightforward, coming down to a clash of wills between the antagonist and our heroes, the antithesis of the unpredictability of the future that underlies the Tomorrowland concept. Director and co-writer Brad Bird mastered this sense of wonder with the final act of Iron Giant, and the kinetic energy of The Incredibles, yet here he seems firmly attached to a monorail track. Perhaps this can be pinned to the presence of Damon Lindelof on co-scripting duties, who similarly struggled to join an existing property to a new story in Prometheus.

Where it doesn’t falter is in the terrific casting. Under The Dome‘s Britt Robertson is a likeable lead, a potential successor to the likes of Hayley Mills, while Clooney serves as a modern day version of the Kurt Russell characters. Raffey Cassidy, the Audio-Animatronic girl, manages to convey a weight of an ageless robot that has seen and felt more than she initially lets on. Robertson in particular has to tread the line between being cloyingly optimistic and the chief protagonist, and role which she undertakes without falling into sentimentality, even if the script does on occasion.

TOMORROWLAND is a missed opportunity. It is easy to see why more references to Walt Disney, originally slated for a “cameo” of sorts in the film, were pulled for fear of this being too much of an ad for Disney. Yet at the same time, the film is in desperate need of some more of that old school magic and fairy dust that permeates all of their physical resorts and parks.

TOMORROWLAND is released in Australia on 28 July 2015 from Disney.

May 26, 2015
Review: Mad Max: Fury Road

Max is back, and apparently still quite angry about things.

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Director: George Miller

Writers: George Miller, Brendan McCarthy, Nico Lathouris

Runtime: 120 minutes

Starring: Tom Hardy, Charlize Theron, Nicholas Hoult, Hugh Keays-Byrne, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, Riley Keough, Zoë Kravitz, Abbey Lee, Courtney Eaton

Distributor: Roadshow Films

Country: Australia/US

Rating: 9/10

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It’s been 30 years since the last Mad Max film, and 34 since the last good one, but the legendary Road Warrior has remained alive in the hearts, minds and dashboards of fans and revheads. Lost in development hell for over a quarter of a century, MAD MAX: FURY ROAD has taken the long cut as director/co-writer George Miller explored family friendly fare in the Babe and Happy Feet franchises. Yet the series, like the titular character originated by Mel Gibson, has transcended individuals and conventional notions of cinema, becoming every bit the mythological figure in the real world that his fictional counterpart has.

With all the the self-assured swagger of a series whose last film was not Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, MAD MAX: FURY ROAD wastes little time in heralding its arrival. Max (now played by Tom Hardy), still overcoming the mental hardships of an off-screen adventure, is captured by the War Boys, minions of King Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne) fascist leader of a dystopian community in the middle of the vast apocalyptic Wasteland. Here his story intersects with Furiosa (Charlize Theron), a woman attempting to drive a truck across the desert to deliver the Five Wives out of the captivity of Immortan Joe.

MAD MAX: FURY ROAD is pure heavy metal. Miller has talked at length about designing the film in storyboards first, before committing any essential words to paper. 3500 panels later, he and cinematographer John Seale have delivered something on screen that looks like nothing less than a fully realised vision. Every one of the final shots is a slave to detail, conjuring a rich combination of European inspired comic book work found in the pages of Métal Hurlant (aka Heavy Metal) and the abandoned wastelands of the original films. From the introduction of Immortan Joe, a horrific combination of Japanese body horror and Blue Velvet‘s Frank Booth, to the constant driving soundtrack of the Coma-Doof Warrior (iOTA) – literally playing a flaming guitar on the front of a speeding truck – this is one long and meticulously staged car chase across the desert, raising the stakes for all vehicular action in the future. The film is a relentless storm of sound and vision that has few cinematic parallels.

Hardy’s Max is a tortured soul, and despite never quite settling on an accent, takes mere moments to make us forget that he is not the first to inhabit the role. Succumbing to flashbacks to a tragedy we’ve not yet seen on screen, and haunted by the souls of people he’s failed to save, Miller cleverly keeps him restrained for the first half of the film, literally muzzling him, allowing the visuals and the power of his physical presence to lead. It also gives a chance for the film to develop the six strong female characters, especially Furiosa, who is every bit as relentless as Max. If this had not been a Mad Max film, she would have been the lead, and indeed the original vision for the shooting would have seen her follow through to an immediate sequel shot back-to-back with this one. Miller’s feminist subtext is strong in this film, along with musings on the “One-Percenters”, but none of it is didactic or overbearing. It simply exists in this world, and Miller leaves the issues laying flat out in the desert, where their essential truths are impossible to escape.

Which is ultimately why MAD MAX: FURY ROAD soars over its contemporaries, in that Miller is fully aware of every aspect of this world. It was fully realised before it even came to the screen, and the world-building doesn’t require lengthy exposition. It’s a film that simultaneously pays homage to the original films while sitting comfortably within that series, but also cleanly breaks away and heads in a striking new direction. Indeed, the few set pieces that look less than authentic are within an actual dust storm of CGI, with everything else wholly created for the cameras. Not simply an essential piece of action cinema, but perhaps the benchmark by which the next wave will be measured.

MAD MAX: FURY ROAD is released in Australia on May 14, and in the US on May 15.

May 15, 2015
Review: Avengers – Age of Ultron

The sequel to be most successful comic book film ever takes everything up several notches, and can barely keep it all inside.

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Director: Joss Whedon

Writers: Joss Whedon

Runtime: 142 minutes

Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Chris Hemsworth, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Don Cheadle, James Spader, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Elizabeth Olsen, Paul Bettany, Cobie Smulders, Samuel L. Jackson

Distributor: Disney

Country: US

More info

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NOTE: This review originally appeared at our sister site, BEHIND THE PANELS. Please visit there for more comic book content, and our weekly podcast.

The coming together of geek god king Joss Whedon and the world of cinematic comic bookery was enough to make even the most cynical fan reach for his or her swooning couch, and the box office success of that union proved that superhero popularity extended well beyond the chaise longue. In the last three years, the rest of the Marvel Cinematic Universe has continued to grow in unexpected but equally successful ways, across television and mixed media, so it’s a very different landscape that AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON lands in.

Whedon wastes no time in throwing the audience into the action, perhaps responding to audience reactions of the slower beat of the previous film’s first act. In a refreshingly exposition free set-up, it’s evident some time has passed since the last time we saw any of these characters, as they are now a fully-fledged team on the last of a series of recon missions. Discovering not only Baron Von Strucker (Thomas Kretschmann) in possession of Loki’s sceptre, but the “enhanced” twins Pietro (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) and Wanda Maximoff (Elizabeth Olsen), they unwittingly set in motion a bigger plan, and kickstart the artificial intelligence Ultron (James Spader) to life.

It’s difficult to be too critical of AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON, for in every way it mostly achieves what it sets out to do by being a bigger and rompier version of its predecessor. This doesn’t begin as the origin story of a team, but rather an established group of characters interacting in a way we’ve never seen on screen before. The opening raid sequence is one of the impressive displays of superheroics ever, placing the characters in real peril and surrounding them in a swirling chaos. It’s a pace that the film rarely lets up on, with the already infamous “Hulkbuster” sequence, several Ultron attacks and a literally earth-shattering climax all coming in rapid succession.

Yet the film shows some of the weaknesses that the Avengers themselves face during their latest outing, in that the individual parts are all vying for a bigger piece of the whole. There’s a conscious decision with Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner), for example, to give him a significant amount of backstory to make up for his perfunctory role in the 2012 film. While it’s a positive step, Renner isn’t the only star in the game, and every single one of the characters is given their own arc. This may sound like a good thing on paper, and works well within the context of a monthly comic, but many of the arcs get buried in the cacophony of concurrent threads. With the multitude of storylines – not to mention the introduction of several new lead characters – it’s occasionally hard to keep track of what’s happening and it really does feel as though bits are missing between scenes. Ultron escalates from newborn to global threat in the space of a scene, barely giving us time to take in the enormity of the issue.

In many ways, Whedon is trying to ape the compressed storytelling movement of the comic book world, lurching from one scene to the next to keep momentum going while tying up as many threads as possible in a short burst. This works brilliantly until you stop and try to piece together some of the disparate scenes, such as why it was necessary to have perfunctory visits to Africa and South Korea. For this reason, the middle act feels a bit messy on occasions. Instead of developing a fuller narrative, we instead get a series of tried-and-true shortcuts: a repeated gag about Rogers swearing, a trip to a farm to recuperate after a loss, and even an evacuation sequence with both a last minute child and a dog making it onto the last ship.

Whedon’s vision is a singular one, and there is little denying that he has still got a finger placed firmly to the pulse when it comes to delivering exactly what the audience wants to see on a grand scale. Yet that also unfortunately means discarding those elements he seems to disagree with from previous films. Tony Stark’s profound decision and resolution at the end of the divisive Iron Man 3 is ignored for favour of cool new toys. Any substance in the Steve Rogers/Natasha Romanov relationship in Captain America: The Winter Soldier is dismissed in a one-liner about flirting. Indeed, the closeness of Black Widow to Clint Barton/Hawkeye that Whedon himself set up in The Avengers is cast aside for a new revelation about Barton’s personal life that feels more about plot necessity than character development.

The cinematography of Ben Davis (Guardians of the Galaxy, Kick-Ass), a regular collaborator with Matthew Vaughn, replaces the sometimes cramped photography of Seamus McGarvey. This gives the film the epic look it needs, and it is a revelation to see these characters assemble in a wider scope with darker shades surrounding them. This is necessary for the introduction of the robotic Ultron, captured as one of Whedon’s sarcastic “Big Bads” by James Spader, filling the impossibly large frame with swagger and ponce. Yet it also gives newcomer Wanda Maximoff/Scarlet Witch a realistic stage to play her mind games on the team, and it’s evident by the end that Whedon may have just used this film as an excuse to bring her into the fold.

AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON nevertheless ends on a massively positive vibe, setting us up for the next phase via a wickedly funny mid-credits stinger, and is bookended by action sequences and liberal doses of humour that the writer/director is known for. If the middle act is a little emotionally uneven, or compressed to the point of brevity, perhaps it is through being overly ambitious. With Avengers: Infinity War planned to be two films, it is evident that the scale of the storytelling in these films is getting larger. Indeed, the first cut of this film was reportedly over 3 hours, and despite the scale, this chapter is actually slightly shorter than the first outing. It’s one of those rare instances where a longer film was justified in giving the film some breathing room, albeit it still remains a worthy romp in the end.

AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON releases in Australia on 23 April 2015, and on 1 May 2015 in the US, from Disney.

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April 22, 2015