Fantastic Mr. Fox

I made a conscious decision not to see Fantastic Mr. Fox at the cinema having seen the trailers and thought I wouldn't quite like the style of animation and therefore would not enjoy this, how I was wrong.

Mr. Fox (George Clooney) is having trouble settling down to family life after his life of chicken stealing, but when he moves in to his new tree, he finds three villainous farmers as his new neighbours he gets drawn back in for one last job.

The stop motion animation works perfectly for this with director Wes Anderson purposely using a slower frame rate to film it in so as your attention is not drawn away from the animation artwork. The tone of the film is excellent mixing humor, and it is quite a funny film, with heartfelt sentiment of a much loved children's book.

There were influences of the directors other films, most notably The Royal Tenembuams with the dysfunctional family and Mr Fox's struggle to find common ground with his son Ash (Jason Swartzman). Watch out for former Pulp frontman Jarvis Cocker's cameo halfway through with a brilliant musical highlight, I also thought the use of blueberries to take out guard dogs was particularly in genius.

An animation of a children's book this may be but I cannot see a child taking any thing from this as it is largely an adult affair. Over all an excellent, humorous adaptation of a Roald Dahl classic.

I give this film 4 pop corns out of 5.

Alice In Wonderland

Many years after Alice's first adventure in underland, a now late teens Alice returns to thr magical place that feels like a strange dream for her.

I cannot say I've read the original book, so I can't comment on how far it strays from the story, I do understand that this was meant as a kind of sequel rather than a straight adaptation. Tim Burton has definatley put his own touch on the characters, of which I thought Helena Bonham Carter's Red Queen was the standout winner, even over a usually crazier than anyone Johnny Depp, the Mad Hatter, who seemed to me more of a manacly depressed hatter. I found myself routing for the Evil Red Queen over the strangley goth like White Queen in Anne Hathaway, as she was much more entertaining. I particulary found amusing the Red Queens abuse of animals, playing Croquet with flamingoes and hedgehogs and using a pig as a footstool, also everytime someone anyoed her she would shout "off with their head".

I also have issues with films that were never supposed to be in 3D from day one and then decide to go 3D as an after thought, when done properly 3D can really add an extra dimension, if you will, to a film but when added at a later date it feels gimmicky, like the film companies are just using it as a way of charging an extra £2.

Unfortunately I think I set my expectations too high and was sorely disappointed with a very mediocre film.

I give this film 2 pop corns out of 5.

Whiteout

As formulaic as it gets really, it starts with a pre credit scene in which a Russian plane crashes in the Antarctic in the 50's. We skip forward to present day and US Marshall Stetko (Kate Beckinsale), who is trying to escape an incident from her past which reveals itself in a series of flashbacks, she stumbles upon a dead body in the middle of nowhere and it all begins to lead back to the precious cargo on the crashed plane.

Very predictable and uneventful, where the most amount of tension comes laughably from the protagonist and her assailant clipping and unclipping themselves onto a series of ropes to prevent them getting swept away in the treacherous conditions. All the action comes about 15 minutes from the end which leads to a massively boring and unfulfilling ending that seems to have been ripped straight from Point Break. I couldn't help, while I was watching this, comparing it to other films of the same setting like The Thing and how much I would rather be watching a superior film like that.

Overall not totally terrible but there are many, many better thrillers and could have done with a better lead rather than the always dull Kate Beckinsale.

I give this film 1 pop corn out of 5