Sin Nombre Review ~ Riley

Think of a country. Any country. Excluding like Canada, Finland, Switzerland, or any other crap like that. Alright, now do some research on the slums in that country, and make up a story about someone struggling to escape.

Congratulations, you just came up with the screenplay for a future critically-acclaimed film.

What Slumdog Millionaire and City of God did for India and Brazil, respectfully, Sin Nombre does for Mexico; that is, makes it so that anyone who sees the movie never wants to visit that country ever, ever again. Admittedly, most of us knew the conditions of these nations before seeing the films. But seeing the situation portrayed so vividly on the screen makes it something tangible for the viewer, making it more "real" than it would be from simply reading an article on it.

Our main character is Willy, known by his gang name, "El Casper". The first minutes of the film consist of him watching over a new initiate to his gang, the Mara Salvatrucha. The young recruit, about 12 or so, is nicknamed "Smiley," and the leader of their chapter of the gang is named "Lil' Mago", continuing the long-standing tradition of Latin American gang members having the least intimidating name possible (including the City of God characters "Lil' Ze", "Benny", and, my favorite, "Carrot". Somehow, "Oh shit guys, Carrot just shot a cop!" doesn't sound right.)

Willy's girlfriend shows up one of their meetings, and before he can get her out of there, Lil' Mago insists upon showing her out. He attempts to rape her, killing her in the process, after which he nonchalantly tells Willy "You'll find another." By the way, none of this is spoilers. This all happens in the exposition, which should lend an idea of how depressing this film is.

For whatever reason, Lil' Mago decides to take Smiley and Willy, the guy whose girlfriend he just killed, off to do a job that very night. Oh, and he gives Willy a machete and a gun. Alright, I'm not really an expert in running a crime syndicate, but it seems to me that you don't supply a fellow gangmember whose life you just ruined with the means, location, and opportunity to kill you on the same day. Maybe one of those, and maybe you wait a day or two, but Lil' Mago just seems reckless. 

Anyways, they wind up robbing people sitting on the roof of a train heading towards Texas. They stumble upon a girl named Sayra, a young Honduran illegally going with her father and uncle to New Jersey by way of Texas. Well, Lil' Mago, having a rape quota apparently not filled by Willy's girl, starts raping this poor migrant (with her father not two feet away.) Inevitably, Willy kills Lil' Mago with a machete to the neck, stays on the train, and sends Smiley back to the gang. The other migrants on the train see Willy as a threat, because of the notoriety of the MS, and plot to kill him. Luckily, Sayra sees him not as a threat, but as her savior, and in turn warns him of the plot. Smiley, back with the gang, now begins trying to track down Willy for vengeance, with help from basically every gang member in the country of Mexico. From then on, the movie is essentially a race between Willy and Sayra trying to reach the border, and the MS trying to find Willy. 

Although Sin Nombre shares the idea of a gang in a third-world country, it's far from the same story as Slumdog or City of God shoved in a new locale: unlike the former, the film is definitely no inspiring love story; it's his love for his late girlfriend that really even causes the conflict to start. And, unlike the latter, the movie does not detail a struggle between two powerful gangs, but is about one man running from the dominant gang in Mexico, and even parts of America. And, different from both, the film lacks any real comic relief or underlying optimism. I know many people who wouldn't like that, but the gritty realness of this film would be lost if they threw in a joke or two.

Some viewers (my dad) may find the ending predictable. And, I'll admit, it seems to be the only logical place that the film could go. But people who let that distract from the quality of the film shouldn't be allowed to watch good cinema, if they spend their time trying to guess what's going to happen (like my dad.) The acting and directing are superb, and though the script suffers a little, this film wound up being one of the few films from 2009 that I wished were longer. My favorite drama of the year, I hope to see this garner attention from Academy voters. It went completely ignored at the Golden Globes, largely due to its unfortunate limited release date in March, and I fear that it will suffer the same fate at the Oscars. However, Sin Nombre connected with me the most, and kept me engaged the most of any film from 2009.

Overall Score: 10/10

Sherlock Holmes Review ~ Colton

Before I get into the review, I'd like to propose something: Robert Downey Junior plays Sherlock Holmes in this movie. That is awesome. Robert Downey Junior plays Iron Man in the Iron Man movies. That is also awesome. That being the case, would it not be the epitome of awesome if they took Sherlock Holmes out of Sherlock Holmes and replaced it with THE GODDAMN IRON MAN? Seriously, all deductive reasoning would be so far out the window it'd be in the building next door. The police would be like, "What do you think of this piece of evidence, Mister Holmes?" and Robert Downey Junior would be like, "I think that piece of evidence is about to be blasted through the wall." AND HE WOULD DO IT. He would blast the evidence through the wall, and the cop too, and then he'd go KILL LORD BLACKWOOD WITH HIS ROBOT SUIT. That would be the coolest thing ever.

But I digress. This review is not about Iron Holmes, it is about Sherlock Holmes, and Sherlock Holmes is a good movie.

My only previous experience with Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes character was reading Hound of the Baskervilles for a school project. In the novel, Sherlock Holmes basically stood in one place and told everyone what everything meant for 300-something pages. In the Sherlock Holmes movie, however, Sherlock Holmes told everyone what everything meant for two-plus hours, but he beat the ever-loving crap out of people while doing so. Robert Downey Junior may not be playing the Iron Man in this movie, but his Holmes comes off as almost Batman-esque: dangerously intelligent, dangerously handsome, and just plain dangerous. However, the Bat-Holmes shtick wasn't overdone: there are two parts in the movie where Holmes sees his opponent, quickly scans his surroundings to ascertain how best to take him down, and then does so. While he's scanning, the scene plays out in slow motion, then again in regular speed when he actually does it. It's an interesting concept, and it gave Holmes another fictitious character to relate to: Samus Aran. Also, Holmes doesn't come off as the strongest man alive: he loses his fights a lot of the time, and even when he wins, he gets his ass properly handed to him at least twice before his victory.

So the movie wasn't faithful to the book; that's forgivable in this case. After all, no one wants to sit for two hours watching Robert Downey Junior deduce things. They want to see him kicking ass. The movie gets away with this crime, but perpetrates another, much more serious one: Watson and Holmes are gay. Like, so unbelievably gay. Mind you, not in an intentional "We are two men, and we enjoy having sex" kind of way. More in a "We act like a bitter old gay couple" kind of way. Almost every scene that Watson and Holmes share together that is not filled with explosions and giant European men with sledgehammers is filled to the brim with gay subtext. It's as if Robert Downey Junior and Jude Law got together before filming and conspired to act as gay as humanly possible.

Just... Just so gay.

Despite the overbearing homosexual undertones (and overtones and sidewaystones and basicallyeverywheretones), the movie manages to blend four genres: action, mystery, suspense, and fantasy. This would be quite the feat for any movie, but Sherlock Holmes leaves them all in the dust by actually doing it well. The movie has a large focus on black magic, but it's not overbearing. The movie has a large focus on Holmes kicking ass, but it's not overbearing. In fact, that sums up the movie pretty accurately: it's not overbearing. It doesn't get right up in your face and demand that you like it, and that's what makes it so good.

One final problem with the movie: the special effects were nothing... special. All of the digitally added set pieces, props, et cetera looked like they were digitally added. But, to give the movie credit, it's Sherlock Holmes, not James Cameron's Avatar. If you had to go see one movie in theatres this month, Sherlock Holmes should definitely be at the top of your list.

Overall Score: 9/10

9 Review ~ Colton

I started 9 wanting to like it. The previews and promotional posters were enticingly dark, the premise seemed creative, and Tim Burton has only ever disappointed me once (screw you, Corpse Bride. Way to waste an hour plus of my life). Sadly, I was underwhelmed yet again, and for very similar reasons to why Avatar didn't strike a chord with me.

The basic plot of 9: a bunch of dolls try to fight a robot. One of these dolls is Elijah Wood. No one cares about any of the other dolls, because one of these dolls is Elijah Wood. There are eight dolls and Elijah Wood, for a grand total of nine dolls (hence the title). The following is a comprehensive list of all nine dolls, going over each of their personality quirks and characteristics in the most detailed manner possible.

1: A tyrant, and basically a huge dick.
2: Old.
3: A twin, doesn't talk.
4: A twin, doesn't talk.
5: Has one eye. Other than this, he is exactly like 9.
6: Crazy.
7: A girl.
8: Big, stupid.
9: ELIJAH WOOD. Also has two eyes. Other than that, exactly like 5.

Each doll has less character development and personality than the last. All of the relationships between these characters seem forced and contrived: everyone accepts 9 into their party only because he's numbered, and they befriend him almost instantly, without even taking the time to develop any sort of feelings for each other. The only people who don't take to 9 are 1 and 8, because 1 has the highest number and feels entitled to authority, and because 8 is 1's toadie.

At the beginning of the movie, I wondered to myself why it deserved a PG-13 rating. The atmosphere was a bit dark, certainly, but 9 was downright cute, and most of the setting, while jagged and rough, seemed mostly harmless. My answer came three minutes in when 9 discovers a dead woman cradling her dead baby. Understand that this wasn't a random dead baby: 9 is a post-apocalyptic politcal allegory, but still. Dead baby. This movie means business.

Dead baby aside, the movie has a fairly simple plot: 9 wakes up in a demolished laboratory next to a dead old man and a golden talisman. He takes the talisman, runs out into the demolished world, finds 2. 2 gets carried off by a robot cat. 5 finds 9, they meet 1, 6, and 8, and 5 and 9 run off to find 2, much to 1's disapproval. 5 and 9 find 2, but the robocat attacks them. 7 comes out of nowhere and kills the cat. 9 puts the talisman in a port that he finds, awakening a giant, evil robot. 5, 7, and 9 run away to find 3 and 4, who then go to find 6, only to be intercepted by 1 and 8. Then a steampunk pterodactyl attacks them. They all go to find the giant, evil robot, but 8 and 7 get captured by a robot snake with a human skull for a head. 8 is killed by the robot. They blow up the robot, but it turns out they didn't blow it up well enough, because it comes back to kill 5 and 6. 9 travels back to the lab from whence he came and learns that each of the dolls contains a piece of the dead old man's soul. It turns out that the old man was a scientist, and that he created the giant, evil robot, but it was originally intended to be giant, not evil robot, but the big, bad government took care of that and made the giant, not evil robot kill all humans for reasons unexplained. The scientist then put his soul into each of the 9 dolls so that humanity would live on. 9 runs to share this news with his friends, but when he arrives, they are attacked by the robot. The robot kills 1. 9 kills the robot and takes the talisman back. 9 releases the souls of 1, 2, 5, 6, and 8 from the talisman and they float into the sky. The movie ends with rain and 9 saying that the world is their oyster.

The real problem in the movie: nothing happens. Or, rather, nothing happens for a reason. Why does the giant, evil robot want the souls of the dolls? Why did the scientist split his soul into nine instead of just making one really great doll for his soul? If all the dolls come from the same soul, why do they all have different personalities? Why did the scientist make 2, 5, and 9 essentially the same in appearance while the other six are totally different? The movie provides no answers.

I said before that 9 was an allegorical movie with a political spin. It's making a statement that the government corrupts even the most pure things that can be created (the scientist made the giant, evil robot for peace-making purposes, and the government barged in, confiscated the machine, and ended the world). If you're paying attention, you'll pick up on this. However, there is about three minutes of statement and roughly an hour-and-a-half of the movie cramming steampunk bullshit down your throat and pretending it has a real story. The most steadfast believers in 9's political significance could say that the fact that nothing was adequately explained could be symbolic of government censorship. To that I say: "Bullshit, guy. You can't make a bad movie into a symbol." And the believer will cry and cry, and I will laugh and flaunt my opinion as I backhand them repeatedly.

But I digress. 9 was very much like James Cameron's Avatar: interesting to look at with a creative atmosphere, but severely lacking in the areas of plot and character development. If you really must watch a Tim Burton movie, rent Nightmare Before Christmas. Not Corpse Bride.

Never Corpse Bride.

Overall Score: 5/10

Scribblenauts Review (DS) ~ Colton

This game could get away with murder.

It has some of the worst graphics I've ever seen on the DS (here's to you, Drawn to Life), has a buggy control scheme, and the NPCs that you are occasionally paired with make Ashley from Resident Evil 4 look competent in comparison.

Those flaws could crush any mortal game in an instant. Any normal game with those qualities would be selling for $7.99 on the used shelf of your local gaming store. But not this game.

Why?

BECAUSE IT'S FUCKING SCRIBBLENAUTS.

You want to see a bear and an emu duke it out on Mars? Done. You want to chase a priest atop a Tyrannosaurus Rex while wearing a false mustache down the streets of a city? An easy feat. You want Batman to duke it out with a giant penis while President Obama cowers in fear? You can't do that, actually (the game restricts use of copyrighted characters, vulgarities, and proper nouns), BUT IT WOULD BE SO COOL IF YOU COULD.

The entire premise of Scribblenauts can be summed up by its tagline: “Write Anything. Solve Everything.” You progress through levels of increasingly difficult puzzles, using your incredible power to draw anything to solve your way to getting the “Starite,” the metaphorical checkered flag for each level. This game is not about progressing through the levels, though. Far from it. The Starite is just a gimmick to hold the game together. If the designers had their druthers, this would be an open sandbox game where you just did whatever the hell you wanted until you got bored. However, since the puzzle mode exists, I am obligated to spend a little time on it.

The puzzles in Scribblenauts range from “Heh, I can just walk over there and pick up the Starite” to “FUCKING HELL I HAVE NEVER SEEN SO MANY GODDAMN ZOMBIES.” On one level, you could simply have to melt a block of ice away from the Starite in order to obtain it. In the next, you might be suspended on a small patch of dirt in a room made of lava. Which, when you take into consideration that the protagonist, Maxwell, occasionally decides to run into walls at random without your consent (due to the completely shattered control scheme), spells nothing short of an instant, crispy death.

The most infuriating levels, however, are those in which you are paired with a tagalong NPC, which happens far to often for one's mental health. In one level, you have to reunite a knight with his lovely princess. However, the princess is guarded by a giant, generic monster and a witch. In a SURPRISE TWIST, if you harm the witch, you fail the level! "Easy enough," you say to yourself, perhaps cracking your knuckles, "Send a superhuman over to slay the monster and trap the witch inside a makeshift house! All I need to do is hop across this gap, walk over to the cliff, summon a trampoline to give me that little boost to the top of the cliff, and presto, one princess. Now, to hop over the gap..." You frown. "Okay, the knight fell into the chasm. Restart the level, I guess. Hero kills the monster, trap the witch. Jump the gap, knight clears it this time, no problem. Make a trampoline and-- Okay, seriously, Mr. Knight, why did destroy my trampoline with your sword? Was that really necessary? Now I have to make another-- You killed that one too, you enormous fucker. You killed my goddamn trampoline. Do you have any idea how long it takes to type trampoline? It takes much less time to write “gun,” if you get my drift. Okay, one more-- YOU SON OF A BITCH. You know what? Helicopter. I'm going to make a helicopter, tie a rope to it, tie you to the other end of the rope, and airlift you to your lover. I'll drop this rope down to you and-- You cut up the rope. You son of a WHORE, you cut up the ROPE. Do you not care about seeing your-- You know what? Your bitch girlfriend doesn't have a sword. I'll tie the rope to her, drag her down to your level, get the Starite, and get the fuck away from YOU. There. Done. You've got your girl. I hope you have plenty of RETARDED BABIES. They'd be JUST LIKE THEIR DADDY."

But I digress. Perhaps even more mentally trying than the princess level is the level where you have to get a brave female explorer past a monkey and a lion (who are both, incidentally, hell-bent on killing her) in order to get to an outhouse. However, environmentalist hippies that the developers are, you are not allowed to kill the animals. The explorer NPC, however, has the bizarre tendency to fling herself willingly into the outstretched paws of the murderous lion, suffering a gristly death and making me restart the level. Again. And again. And again. I won't go into detail, but I ended up chaining the explorer to her tent while I airlifted the animals onto higher ground to prevent her from ritualistic suicide. Apparently, being devoured by bloodthirsty jungle animals is less of a trial than a full bladder.

But again, I digress. Personal problems with the game aside, Scribblenauts is good. It's an innovative concept that was well-executed, but too much focus was put on the gimmick of the game instead of the game itself. If a rerelase or sequel to Scribblenauts was ever made, it would be a masterpiece if the developers took the time to repair the movement controls and maybe touch up the graphics a little. All in all, Scribblenauts is a game worth looking into if you've got a spare $30 laying around.

Overall Score: 8/10

Connect with Applesauce

Hey, multitudes of fans, screaming women dying for our bodies, and Lloyd Cunningham. It's Colton, and boy, have I got good news for you. You can now keep up-to-date with the happenings of Applesauce Reviews in two new ways: by joining our Facebook Page and/or following us on Twitter. With these marvelous pieces of technology on your side, you'll never miss a single Applesauce Review!

Also, if you've got a review you'd like either Riley or me to review, you can send your request to either of the aforementioned places, or send us an e-mail at applesaucereviews@gmail.com.

Stay tuned!

Classics with Riley! This Week: Shoot the Piano Player

I attend an arts magnet school, where I major in cinema. As a part of that class, every week I have to watch and critique a movie from an approved list of thousands of movies. Though the list features some movie from the 2000's, I usually do an old movie because they're easier to find online for free. As such, I will be writing reviews of them to add to our esteemed site. These reviews will generally be shorter gratuities compared to the normal reviews, but they may sometimes be the only ones I'll be able to post in a week. You'll just have to deal with that, I got things to do.

Alright, I'm just going to come right out and say the biggest factor this film has going against it: it is French. Like, so French. You don't even know. I mean, if you took Ratatouille and added surrendering and body odor, it would only be half as French as this movie. 

Okay, once you get past the insulting French-ness of Shoot the Piano Player, it's a pretty good film. 

The plot revolves around Charlie, a French piano player in a French bar (see? Right there, already!). A shy loner, he's content to sit there every night and play his tunes, until one night his also French brother comes in, chased by seriously pissed of gangsters. In helping his brother escape from them, he ties himself into their conflict, upsetting the balance he'd achieved in his life. That same night, he winds up walking home Lena, a waitress at the bar, who has loved him since she met him.

Now, this movie moves pretty slowly. There are some action scenes, but, like most French New Wave films, much of the time is spent examining love and sex and relationships and cigarettes (I'm almost certain there is one in every scene).

Also in the style of the French New Wave, the editing is a little unfamiliar and possibly unsettling for some viewers: jump cuts are employed frequently, as are creative narration techniques.

However, if you can stomach these distinctions without them being distracting, this movie has many good parts for you to enjoy. Themes are explored delicately, without imposing any specific opinions on them. Also, despite the slow pace, the plot is quite gripping, especially if you sympathize with the characters as I did with Charlie. I'd definitely recommend it to those of you who can appreciate what films like this contribute to cinema, and have high French-tolerance levels.

Overall Score: 8/10

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince Review ~ Colton

(Note: This review was written when HBP was first released in theatres. Adding it to the blog for nostalgic purposes, plus I rewatched it last night and hated it again.)

Went and saw HBP with my best buddy yesterday.

Unfortunately, I have to say I was wholly disappointed.

Let me start out by saying that HBP was my second favorite book in the Potter series; a close second to Prisoner of Azkaban. I was expecting the most for this movie, and ended up getting a wishy-washy, second rate film that left me with a bad taste in my mouth.

First off, all of the relationships in the movie seemed really forced. Dumbledore's friendship with Harry was only vaguely established, and extremely awkward. Mister Yates, orders to shave and inquiries about one's personal life does not a best friend make. The HarryxGinny aspect really wasn't built at all. They shared about three meaningful glances, one kiss, and that was it. The end. No one really cared, even though it was a fairly developed relationship in the books. RonxHermione was forced and incredibly awkward, and there seemed to be a running "there's something on your lip" gag that didn't work at all.

Second: Daniel Radcliffe's acting. Is it just me, or does he seem to get worse and worse every film? In the latest installment, most if not all of his dialogue is cringe-worthy. As a child in the first few movies, he was more natural when delivering his lines: he was a fresh face, and was doing his utmost hardest to do his best. As the series progressed, however, he settled into his role, and, knowing that he could not be dropped, got slipshoddy with his acting.

Next, the movie was only barely faithful to the book. People who liked the book will hate it because of the horrible novel-to-film transition, and people who didn't read the book will hate it because the movie assumes that the viewer has read the books and cuts corners in the plot development. My biggest qualm was the scene outside the Burrow. Spoiler Warning:

After an almost-cute scene between Harry and Ginny, BELLATRIX LESTRANGE COMES AND LIGHTS THE FIELDS OUTSIDE THE WEASLEY'S HOUSE ON FIRE. Those that have read the book know that this doesn't happen. The movie, however, decides that the book isn't good enough for them to base their movie off of, and takes creative license in such a drastic manner that it made me sick to my stomach. Harru runs though the ring of fire after Bellatrix, Ginny follows him, and the two duel a group of Death Eaters until Lupin and Tonks come to save the day, woo-hoo. Oh, and the Death Eaters then set fire to The Burrow and make it explode.

THIS. DID. NOT. HAPPEN. Nothing even REMOTELY like this happened! Not only did this not happen in the books, it served no point whatsoever to the plot of the movie. It was just eye-candy; something designed to keep you on your toes, and... well, no, that's about the extent of it. It's just supposed to amuse you; nothing else.

Spoilers over.

The one good thing I can saw for the movie: the last twenty minutes or so were excellent. Throughout the movie, the director took every chance to show off the products of the special effects budget. In the earlier stages of the film, it seemed forced and unnecessary, but in the penultimate scene in the cave, it's put to good use. I won't spoil anything, except to say that, for all practical intents and purposes, Albus Dumbledore is God.

tl;dr

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince was an all around let down as a movie. I wouldn't see it again, but if you liked the books, it's a good opportunity for a little mockery.

Overall Score: 4/10