Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Let's review...John Carter (3D)

It wasn't my choice of movie to watch on a Friday night, but it also so happened to be the opening day of The Hunger Games, and those were all sold out.  But a friend really wanted to watch it, I never heard of it, so I said, "Why not?"

Those two words expanded:

Why not watch John Carter?  It's 3D, fantasy, sci-fi, action, the trailer I looked at before going to the theaters looked decent.  But something inside of me told me that it was going to be a big flop.  Here's an advice for young movie goers.  With the rare occasion, if you haven't heard about the movie in the theater, even though it's been out for a couple of weeks...it's probably not that great of a movie...ergo, not worth mentioning.  This doesn't necessarily mean that the opposite is true.  Just because there's a huge ordeal over a new release, doesn't mean it's going to be a blockbuster hit (e.g. Twilight Saga...sorry Twilight fans...no disrespect...everybody has his/her quirky movie).

But I tried to convince myself to like it.  I really did.  I thought,"Hey, at least it's in 3D.  That will be entertaining."  Wrong.  This was just another movie that had no need for 3D.  Unlike Avatar where the movie was specifically made to display the 3D effects, John Carter could have been watched the regular 2D since I didn't quite notice much 3D effects during the movie.  Rather, I was just annoyed constantly adjusting the glasses throughout the entire movie.

John Carter starts off with a back story taking place in 1868, where a Civil War veteran, John Carter (Taylor Kitsch) is trying to make a normal life for himself.  He gets into trouble with the United States Government due to refusal of joining the army.  He escapes jail and seeks refuge in a cave where he encounters a mysterious man that tries to kill him.  He takes the medallion from the man and is whisked away to a mysterious place.  Without giving too much away, he discovers he is on another planet, which allows him to have incredible physical strength and the ability to jump long distance and he finds civilizations warring among each other.

Basically the entire story and plot is quite dull.  One could have simply kept the entire story on planet Earth, made the story about the conflict between the White Americans versus the Native American Indians, with a romantic relationship between a Native American princess and a war-worn veteran White American and it would've been been just an unoriginal.

For a movie that seemed to depend on action, there wasn't much any spectacular scenes, and for a Disney romance, it was more cheesy than any other Disney romance movie.

There was no chemistry between the actors and the characters were very one dimensional (excuse my pun).  Nobody was quite memorable and I wouldn't be able to tell you how each character contributed to the movie.  There was simply no depth.  There were obviously good guys and bad guys...the end.

All in all, nothing could have made the movie any more boring or dull than the name of the movie itself.