#critc

Escrita y dirigida por el fantástico Christopher Nolan (Interstellar, Inception y The Dark Knight Trilogy) Dunkirk es, sin duda alguna, una de las mejores películas que he visto este año. Esta tan bien elaborada desde la preproducción y preparación de la narrativa que hasta parece irreal. Nolan diseñó una de sus mejores películas, y digo diseñó porque la manera en la que están contadas las historias en este filme es magnífica. No hubo ni un solo momento ni escena fuera de lugar ni innecesaria. Todo fue realizado de manera bellísima. Es una película excepcional.

“Dunkirk” cuenta la historia de soldados británicos acorralados en la costa de Dunkirk por tropas alemanas y su batalla por evacuar ese lugar durante la Segunda Guerra Mundial. Tú como espectador ves tres historias en este filme, las cuales están entrelazadas por ciertos momentos o personajes. Cada una de estas historias es tan perfecta por si sola y cuando llegan los momentos donde se cruzan es como ver magia frente a ti. No hay manera de explicar lo mucho que me sorprendió la manera en la que se desarrolla esta película. Es una obra de arte lo que nos entregó Nolan.

En cada una de las historias tenemos a nuestros protagonistas. La primera, The Mole, son los soldados en la costa esperando su rescate mientras son atacados sin cesar. La segunda, The Sea, es la historia de civiles que deciden ir en su bote privado a rescatar a la mayor cantidad de soldados que puedan. Y en tercero tenemos a la fuerza aérea, The Air, donde 3 pilotos expertos van a dar soporte a Dunkirk durante el rescate.

Por el hecho de tener tanta narrativa dispersa en la película se necesita un elenco grande y vaya que Nolan consiguió talento. Empezando con Tom Hardy, quien me sorprendió muchísimo, yo sé que es un gran actor, pero en esta película pasa el 90% con la boca cubierta por su máscara de respiración, y aun así logra expresar todo lo que el personaje necesitaba, sin siquiera hablar la mayoría de las veces, sus movimientos y expresiones faciales con puramente los ojos fueron perfectos, hizo un grandioso trabajo. De ahí le sigue Kenneth Branagh con una de las escenas más emotivas de la película, es un señor de talento. Y también Fionn Whitehead, Mark Rylance, Cillian Murphy, James D’Arcy, y Harry Styles. Déjenme hablarles un poco de este último, todos conocemos a este muchacho, famoso por One Direction, luego se hizo solista (buenas rolas la neta), y ahora con su primer filme con un papel bastante importante y con Christopher Nolan (consíganme a su representante porfa). Este chavo, Harry, comprobó que lo que se propone hacer, lo hace conmadre. Me sorprendió su muy buen trabajo, sus escenas me encantaron y espero verlo en más películas.

Ninguna película es grande solamente por sus escenas, se necesita buena música, y aquí tenemos a la banda sonora de Hans Zimmer, uno de mis favoritos de toda la industria. Trabajar con él es como sacarte la lotería. Su música logra mantenerte al borde del asiento desde el inicio hasta el último segundo, no te suelta jamás.

Esa sensación de angustia y desesperación fue un gran logro de esta película, lo ejecutaron tan perfectamente. Se mete en tu piel y te hace sentir la desesperación de los personajes desde la primera escena. Incluso sin música, porque la película cuenta con una magnifica introducción, es completamente sin dialogo y sin música, casi casi muda, más que el sonido del ambiente en el que están, y es tan desesperante y tan real. Te agarra de sorpresa desde esos primeros segundos, y como dije, no te suelta hasta el último segundo, con escenas tras escenas de tragedias, huidas, angustias y batallas, es toda una experiencia ver este filme.

Es una película técnicamente corta (100 minutos), pero por todo el suspenso que tiene, vas a sentir que llevas viviéndolo el mismo tiempo que los personajes, y es así la edición de esta película, la manera en que acomodaron las 3 distintas historias hacen que en ningún momento haya tranquilidad, siempre está pasando algo, no hay escena de relleno y cada una de estas angustiantes escenas con su respectiva banda sonora que solamente logra desesperarte más y más, estas ansioso de que los personajes con los que ya te encariñaste logren triunfar o al menos escapar.

Siento que no puedo decir más sin spoilearlos, solamente les diré que deben de verla. Es para todo tipo de personas, desde los amantes del cine hasta el espectador casual. Es una película excitante, bellísimamente editada, con un elenco excelente y unas tomas increíbles. Nolan nos dio uno de sus mejores trabajos, y es la mejor opción actualmente en el cine.

Yo le doy a Dunkirk 5/5 estrellas, estoy sin palabras pero a la vez quiero hablar horas de esta película.

“We shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to the end. We shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender.” ― Winston S. Churchill, hablando sobre lo sucedido en Dunkirk.

Muchas gracias por leerme de nuevo, es genial escribir de nuevo aunque no sé si sea permanente, ya veremos. Compártanla con sus amigos y tengan un excelente día.

Adrián Vega Magaña.

Film Review: How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World

The third installment of How to Train Your Dragon was a huge disappointment in my view. My expectations for the closure of the trilogy and Netflix series was high. The story felt rushed and for me the comedy itself was lacking in The Hidden World.

I wish the story was more invested in the journey of the hidden world or more invested in the new dragon hunter, rather than rushing both storylines…

 Whom is the character am I going to criticize?

Queen Elsa of Arendelle

Where do I start with her? Gosh. When I saw her in the trailer and promotions, you name it and I was curious but I knew not to get my hopes up. But of course, when people went to see Frozen and talked about how great Frozen was on tumblr... I couldn't help but get excited at the hype and waited to buy a dvd of frozen for my sister. Boy, I should not have my expectations so dang high.

Elsa is nothing what I excepted from by her personality. I like her design but it's too boring. Yes it's boring, lazy and stupid move on their part to think wearing a dress made of ice while in the freezing weather. I have no idea why the dress can move and everything if it's made of ice...??? Logic and common are thrown out and banished from the movie.

When I watched the beginning of the movie, I enjoyed the few moments between Anna and Elsa that reminded me of me and my older sister but then after the incident with Anna getting hurt... It was a train wreck, I was horrified and shocked at the parents taking the trolls's advice to heart and decided to shut Elsa off to isolate her away from her sister. The fact they erased Anna's memories of Elsa having powers are insane and I could see the shock on her emotion which I sympathized with her. I would be horrified if my parents had done that to my sister.

I can understand her reasons and being traumatized from the mental and emotional abuse from her parents and yet... I'm so disappointed, it's so obvious she can control her powers just fine in the beginning. Elsa is supposedly be struggling with depression, emotional and mental trauma and everything but the way she acts doesn't always match the symptoms with depression, emotional and mental trauma. I hate, hate that in the end love cures depression magically, yay!!! It doesn't work like that. Either way, Elsa knew better to make choices that would affect not only her sister but the kingdom too and when she showed that she could control her powers by creating ice stuff and everything which baffled me.

How can she do that when she's isolated in the castle so long? But we just don't know because we barely know who Elsa is aside the tragic back story of her parents and sister. Hell we don't even know where she got her powers from or why she's blond while her parents have dark hair? Maybe it's because of her powers or that the queen had a child with her former husband. We just don't know!

To summarize it up;

As the voice of a sweet, endearing old women begins to speak over the swooping shots of the fictional kingdom we will be inhabiting for the next hour and a half, I was excited. The story of Sleeping Beauty, more so the Disney classic film, was one of the first fairy tales movies I remember seeing. Sadly, I still prefer the 1959 version to this updated, POV shift from Aurora to the baddest villain in Disney history.

The appeal of Maleficent as a villain is that she is a bitch. Plain and simple. She was not troubled in the cartoon version, she had no reason for the curse she placed on a child and at the end when she morphs into the green flamed dragon and the prince slays her, we all sigh in relief that she is dead. By giving Maleficent a backstory and subsequently making her a "mother" figure to Aurora we loose much of that evil that made her a villain. 

Robert Stromberg does a fine job of creating the world in which these characters dwell, the film itself is visually stunning (even those overdone flying shots over the kingdom). He keeps the film moving even when the story begins to lag and eye-rolls begin. The major problem is the story. When I see a story about Maleficent i expect to see some evil and I really wanna hate her, this is not what occurs.

I understand the point was to provide a backstory, which was fine and I rather enjoyed [spoiler alert: she's bad because of a broken heart]. In fact, the beginning of the film is it's strongest because of he backstory, it is after the cures is placed that the film begins to falter. The actors, especially Jolie as the lead, make the best of the script and we are finally reminded as to just how commanding and brilliant Jolie can be when given a juicy role. She is magnificent in scenes where she can be bad, drawing out her lines filling them with menace and shadows. Elle Fanning is fine as the princess whose main job is to prick her finger. 

The main problem I keep having with the story is that Maleficent starts to care about, even fall in love with Aurora and vice versa. This is too much of a derail from the original story and a choice that hindered the film. I kept waiting for the climatic scenes where Philip would climb through the thrones and slay the Dragon. Well there is dragon...but not the way one would expect and do not even get me started on the "true love's kiss" part of the story that made me rolling my eyes so hard I thought they were going to pop out of my head.

Just a little context before I begin, I am currently studying A-Level English in comprehensive school and am by no means a writer. I do a little in my spare time, but nothing noteworthy. Upon discovering that I would be studying ‘The Time Machine’ in depth, I kicked my arse into gear and finally finished reading it. This is what I thought.

First thing’s first, I will not even mention the science of how time travel is explained in this novel. I have looked into it with some interest and know that the science in the book is false. However, we must keep in mind that when the book was written, we knew less about our universe than we do now. Just based on that idea I can’t talk about the science without sounding like an obnoxious member of the 21st century. I’m sure that in another hundred years, we will look like the ignorant people of the past. The characters in this book are about as realistic as they get. They react to the Time Travellers tale as you or I may under the circumstances, and that is a huge compliment. The way they interact and exchange polite dinner conversation makes them seem somehow more ‘alive’, unlike I have read elsewhere. Generally speaking a dinner party tends to leave characters seeming a little wooden to me. Another story that handles that well is ‘An Inspector Calls’. Wells crafts a world that seems foreign to us simply through his description of the natural world. This impresses me because the natural world is how most of us would define our planet. Sure most people would say that buildings are a pretty clear indicator, however the natural world was always there, as opposed to the brief time we’ve been here, relatively speaking of course. This world of foreign agriculture and life unnerves the reader slightly, as it does the Time Traveller. It should. The way Wells writes always makes the reader suspect that something is not quite right. If the decline in scientific discovery and clear decline in intelligence isn’t enough to put you off, the wells (haha.) that nobody seems to draw water from are a pretty obvious indicator. That’s even omitting the statue that everybody seems to be terrified of. At least they are content picking their flowers and fornicating in the meadows… That came out creepier than I meant it to. The Time Traveller, as many characters in the novel, isn’t given a name. In the first draft of ‘The Time Machine’ named ‘The Chronic Argonauts’ he was named Dr. Moses Nebogipfel, however it seems that what happened to that name isn’t known. I choose to believe that he is remained nameless to say that Wells himself is the Time Traveller, as the narrator is named Mr. Hillyer, in an alternate timeline where he carries on down the scientific route with life, as he did for a time, but didn’t break his leg, meaning he never thought to write. This is unlikely, however it is fun to use one’s imagination, is it not? I am loathe to say something negative about this book because it is bloody well written and is definitely in my top ten books. However, it is closer to ten than one. This is primarily because of how the ending felt to me. It wasn’t badly handled by any stretch, but I just felt that it was being rushed a little. I can understand that for books like ‘1984’ because Orwell was actually fighting against death as he wrote it, however, as far as I am aware, there is no such excuse for ‘The Time Machine’. There was a large action scene leading up to the conclusion and a buildup to some overarching conclusion where he would make his daring escape back to his time fighting off Morlocks as he went. This was followed up by saying that he fought them off and escaped. I believe there were about two paragraphs dedicated to this as opposed to the several pages for the action scene. I’m sure the ending wasn’t rushed and took a long time to write and edit, but that is just the way it felt to me. Lastly, I would like to talk about the ideas the book presents. The idea that scientific discovery led to a more safe and peaceful life is a very real possibility. We’re nigh on that now and we aren’t quite at the year 8000000 yet. Wells says that scientists ran out of things to discover and intelligence began to decline. This I don’t think I can possibly agree with. You would think that as progress in made in research and development, it would lead to more possibilities, particularly in the field of medicine. Even once that is finished scientists can focus on religion! Surely simply running out of ideas isn’t enough to make humans stop caring about their own knowledge, i like to think that we are more ambitious than that. The lower population, due to better population control is believable, but I think unlikely outside of North Korea and maybe China. The idea that two social classes were formed that coexisted, both aware of their standing and still accepting of it is pseudo-1984 in my mind. I understand that I have already made that comparison, but in 1984 the working class are aware that they are ‘Proles’ and they accept that despite knowing that they are looked down on somewhat, and are made to live in worse conditions. Crappy apartments for the ‘Proles’ and the underground for the Morlocks.

Overall, I give this book 4 Eloi out of a possible 5. I highly recommend that you give this a read, whether you are a big reader of the genre or not.

The Sender review