So today we have a 'face off' of sorts....
Tangled - By disney, a re-envision of the old tale of Rapunzel, classic disney princess/prince affair.
Megamind - By Dreamworks, the story of a troubled supervillain trying to find himself
Despicable Me - By newcomer 'Illumination entertainment' , another story about a supervillain, but this time trying to out supervillain another supervillain.
Films will be rated on Story, Comedy, Graphics, music and general how much i liked it (overall)
Lets begin then.
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Tangled (2010)Tangled is without a doubt the prettiest of the 3 films, like.... seriously seriously pretty, the enviroments, character detail, lighting... things like hair and water look amazing.
That said, I thought that the humor in tangled was the worst of the 3, with comedy fairly slapstick in most cases, Granted its supposedly a childrens movie, but so are the rest of the films in this post, and so are all of the pixar films and they still manage to keep a good balance between childish slapstick humor and subtle adult jokes.
Something i didnt actually know until about 10 minutes before i watched the film is that it is a
borderline musical ,now this isnt exactly a bad thing, but I guess I wasnt completely mentally prepared for it - Or i thought i was... and i wasnt. The film really reminds me of old school disney films like Beauty and the Beast, Happy endings, animal companions and the occasional sing and dance - This makes sense as the logical progression for Disney however (I hear princess and the frog was a flop)
Oh. Id also like to add that it sort of felt like the main character was based loosely on Miley Cyrus or something.
Best Bit? Without a doubt the Lantern scene which the film builds up to for the first half hour or so. Really Beautiful.
The scores:
Story : 5/10 - Fairly predictable Disney affair, I also felt the pacing was a little slow... Maybe because there wasnt actually much story to begin with
Comedy : 3/10 - As mentioned earlier, not much comedy here other than slapstick
Graphics : 10/10 - Amazing
Music : 8/10 - Its a musical, so i was kind of on edge during any song in case a housemate came in, the music is generally decent and fits the scene well, the tavern song was lol.
Overall : 7/10 - Its a good film, but I felt the lack of comedy let it down a little, However, Id say the film is actually worth watching JUST for the graphics. If you have a spare 90 minutes, grab a HD version and enjoy.
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Megamind (2010)I saw megamind last, So its still pretty fresh in my mind.
Im not really sure what, but I felt like something was missing from the film, Something felt out of place but I cant really put my finger on what, maybe the voices? Maybe the characters were unlovable? Im not really sure..
The story starts fairly strong, and then kind of loses its way after a while before trying to find itself, of course everybody watching already kind of knows where the story is going to end up and how the story will end, The plot is actually vaguely like the episode of Dexter's Lab where he 'Fires' Deedee and then spends the rest of the episode trying to hire a new sister.
As sort of mentioned, I think the characters were a little...crap... Cant really say why, the main character was kind of unlovable and dumb, which is unsurprising because apparently his voice actor is Will Ferrel, who is also unlovable and dumb.
The film is pretty funny, about 50:50 slapstick:adult, this film also I think rocks the best music, because its hard not to enjoy a film where old famous rock songs are played.
Uh....more or less sums it up i think? I didnt really expect much from Megamind and whilst it didnt really shock me with anything but kept me entertained throughout.
Best bit? I cranked my speakers for the finale when Welcome to the Jungle came on for the final battle...
The Scores:
Story: 7/10 - Could have been more original, I feel like I've already seen this film somewhere else with different characters somewhere.
Comedy: 7/10 - Pretty funny with lots of variety
Graphics: 9/10 - I watched the 1080p version, And it was very pretty, yet somehow upstaged by Tangled in 720p, this may have scored higher had I not seen Tangled prior
Music: 9/10 - ALL ABOARD!~
Overall: 8/10 - A good animated film, brought down by a few little smudges here and there. Definitely worth a watch.
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Despicable Me (2010)I sort of stumbled into watching this film, taking a break from my work to stroll into the lounge where my housemates had just started watching it, my brother said it was a really good film so i dropped what i was doing and went to watch, it was a good call on my part.
In my opinion, I'd say Despicable Me is the best film of this bunch, im a bit of a sucker for cutesy films, comedies and bizarre shit, and Despicable Me seems to tick all the right boxes.
It feels like the writers and animators really tried their best to make the film hilarious, both in a bit of a slapstick way - with the little yellow minions acting similar to rabbits (from the rayman series) - and in a very clever way, the way the characters interact with each other is really good and entertaining in itself, add in some clever dialogue and the main characters voice/accent and its golden ("I SAID COOKIE ROBOTS. NOT BOOGIE. WHY ARE YOU SO OLD.")
Another great asset the film has are that you will fall in love with most of the characters, the main, the minions, the girls, the pirahnadog, its about the opposite to the feeling I had towards the characters in megamind.
The story is very simple but with a few twists here and there (he fly to the moon, he shrink the moon, he take the moon...) but story is arguably the weakest part of the film.
Best Bit? Its really hard to think of a best bit, I feel like the film was pretty consistently great all the way through and didnt really peak and drop like other films. So i guess i'll just put a picture of Gru and the girls on the rollercoaster
The Scores:
Story: 6/10 - Very simple as mentioned before, and whilst its probably the film's main weakness, it is by no means bad
Comedy: 10/10 - I laughed out loud, a lot. From the easy laughs like the failed Dart gun and failed bank presentation to the more obscure stuff.
Graphics: 8/10 - Slightly simpler graphics compared to the other two films, yet by no means bad, animation is still top notch but stuff just isnt as detailed as the others.
Music: 6/10 - It was alright, nothing too spectacular, but it all went with the film just fine. I did feel a little awkward watching the end dance though, it felt a little forced...
Overall: 10/10 - A very very enjoyable film, and one which I'd happily watch again in a few months maybe. Give it a watch for sure.
