The Martlet

Disney’s A Christmas Carol

Anyone ready for a new spin on an old tale would be wise seek out Disney’s A Christmas Carol — even weeks after the holiday is over.

While most are familiar with the old Charles Dickens tale, a story that Disney already had its way with back in 1983 with Mickey’s Christmas Carol, the new adaptation sees us leaving behind Donald Duck and Jiminy Cricket and replacing them with a much darker, poignant tale of a life gone wrong — and one that more clearly reflects the intent of Dickens’ work.

Crafted with the most electrifying advances in animation, this Carol takes the story of Ebenezer Scrooge to a frightening new level and director Robert Zemeckis manages to create a masterpiece for the new decade.

Jim Carrey, who plays our beloved money-grubbing miser, turns Scrooge into a character we can all identify with on some levels — or at least one we can feel a painful sympathy for. Carrey also seamlessly plays the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Yet to Come, all with a twist that’s been void on screen until now.

Gary Oldman as Scrooge’s dead business partner, Marley, is a terrifying experience and makes this perverse “fairy tale” leave the world of kid-dom and grow up for a 2010 audience. That same viewership who fell in love with Mickey’s version of the tale will become equally enamored here — just be ready to replace Goofy (who played Marley in Disney’s old version) with a grotesque creature whose blind, decomposed ghoul body has trouble keeping its jaw intact while terrorizing Scrooge.

As has become the trend of this season, seeing the Carol in 3D is the best way to go. Whether or not the DVD compilation will see fit to offer this is yet to be seen, but it may be worth seeking out a pair of those fantastic glasses, just in case.

Danielle Pope

Avatar

When I walked out of Jurassic Park when I was nine-years-old, I was weak-kneed and dazed, having been taken on a ride my imagination could hardly handle. The sets, the characters, the dinosaurs — it was almost too much for me to take in at once.

Over 15 years later, another movie has created a world so fully realized, so aesthetically overwhelming, so engaging, I felt like that little kid again. That movie is Avatar.

The decade wait for James Cameron’s follow-up to Titanic is over, and audiences and critics are in agreement — Avatar is fucking awesome.

This week, it surpassed $1 billion mark, only the fifth movie to do so. If this momentum keeps up, Cameron will have helmed the two highest grossing movies of all time.

Let’s put aside the blue aliens for a moment. Some nitpickers may complain that the movie essentially plagiarizes Pocohontas or Dances With Wolves. They may say the writing is formulaic and a little weak. None of the catch-phrases compare with former Cameron lines, like “Hasta la vista, baby” or “I’m the king of the world.”

But let’s be very clear on this point: Cameron’s movie is a painstakingly-constructed, master work. Sure, it’s an action movie. Sure, a couple of parts are hokey or predictable. But anyone bitching about these tiny issues is forgetting what it’s like to be a child, tirelessly stuffing popcorn into their mouth while their eyes bulge out of their head.

Only the hardest, cold-hearted cynics will not be swept away from one of the best movies to come out of Hollywood in the last 25 years.

Will Johnson

Nine

With a star-studded cast full of academy award winners, the director who brought us Chicago and a script based on a hit musical, you might think that Nine was destined for greatness. But you’d be wrong.

The story revolves around Guido Contini (Daniel Day-Lewis), a filmmaker who can’t overcome his writer’s block.

In theory, Nine paints a portrait of Contini as a lost and troubled man through examining his relationships with the women in his life, from his wife Luisa (Marion Cotillard) to Saraghina, a prostitute from his childhood (Fergie). But in reality, the film lacks the flow necessary to connect plot points. We’re left not really caring about who Contini is, much less what happens to him.

Nine does showcase the musical talents of some of the world’s greatest actors, however. Day-Lewis shows that he’s a triple threat actor/singer/dancer, and Penelope Cruz, who plays Contini’s mistress, Carla, gets a steamy scene where she belts out a song about phone sex.

But other performances, like Sophia Loren, who plays Contini’s mother, are barely memorable. Some characters, like the American journalist Stephanie (Kate Hudson), don’t even seem to add anything to Contini’s life, or to the story in general, other than their one big musical number.

Nine’s greatest attraction comes from being able to see so many big names together. But really, you wouldn’t be missing much if you skipped the movie and just watched them schmooze on the red carpet at the Golden Globes.

Gemma Karstens-Smith

Up in the Air

2009: year of the shitty big-budget blockbuster.  G.I. Joe wasn’t worth the time it took to watch the trailer. Critics and fans may never fully recover from how astonishingly appalling Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen was. Terminator Salvation? This is all I can say about that: fuck you, McG.

The truth is, most of the movies that critics and audiences have ended up talking about and loving this year have been smaller-budgeted films with solid roles and directors (see: A Single Man, An Education, Precious, The Hurt Locker). None stand out more so than Up in the Air.

Written and directed by Canadian Jason Reitman, whose previous credits include Juno and Thank You For Smoking, this is the most modern and meaningful film in years. The movie follows Ryan Bingham (George Clooney) who is sent out by his company to fire people while trying to prove the young Natalie Keener (Anna Kendrick), a woman who wants to downsize the company and make Bingham obsolete, wrong.

Clooney finishes a fantastic year with one of his best performances.

Like the Reitman’s previous works, this movie is funny, dramatic and just sexy enough that it’s almost in a genre of its own.

In an obvious way, it’s about careers and love. But it also deals with how we choose to live our lives.

Yet, this film is subtle and, dare I say it, cool enough that you can watch it and take away your own themes and meanings that relate to your life as well.

The problem with almost all these big budget films is that they try too hard to entertain you, but also fail to be intimate or personal.

Go see a film that’s so good, it does both.

Matthew McLaren