Which reminds me. I was looking at my traffic sources, and discovered one was a pornography site. I must say, this came as a surprise. I am a grown mature adult and such things don't make me blush easily, but I was still taken aback that my blog would be connected in any such way with an establishment of that sort.
Now I can't make people not come to my site from wherever they choose, at least not to my knowledge (I did a little research on it), but I can say, if you get any sort of pornographic material via any links with my blog, I apologize. And I want my readers to know that despite my occasional swear word, I do my best to keep a family friendly place here. Not just because of my religious allegiances, but because I was raised that way. It's good business to keep things proper. That's my take on it, these days.
Thanks for listening. And as always, thanks for reading my stuff. I appreciate it.
Oh, and I also did a touch of editing to my Princess Bride Dual Review. I was informed of some spelling errors, and I commented at the bottom on something I was told that I had forgotten. Just an FYI
Now the review:
Wreck-It Ralph (2012)
A video game villain wants to be a hero and sets out to fulfill his dream, but his quest brings havoc to the whole arcade where he lives. Short synopsis of Wreck-It Ralph taken from IMDb.com
Wreck-It Ralph. Unfortunately, the best humor parts were in the trailer. My wife opined that there were only two funny parts, and the rest was forgettable. First, when Felix figured out he could break the bars in the "Fungeon" (that's a dungeon, but a "fun" one, thus the "F") cell, and then hit them with his magic hammer and accidentally "fixed" them. And second, when Venelope in the end became a princess and told the other girl racers who had been unkind to her that everyone who had been mean to her would be executed - and they all broke into tears, and Jane Lynch's soldier character quipped: "'Sugar Rush' just got interesting." Venelope retracted the death sentence, but the reaction all around was entertaining.
What else can I say about the movie? I liked the familiar faces, good guys and bad, from games of my youth. But cameos by famous video game characters aside, the majority of the film's plot ended up revolving around the cute little girl and the big dumb "bad"-guy who wants to be a hero. Yes, it is a kid movie, but for once, can't we address villains as... well, villains? Truth is, Wreck-It Ralph is just a cutsy movie under a "hip" draping.
 |
| "Bad Anon," the local arcade's video game villain support group. Included here are "Satin" - Horny from Dungeon Keeper, Human Smoke - Mortal Kombat, Bowser - various Super Mario games, Zangief - Street Fighter 2, Dr. Ivo "Eggman" Robotnik - various Sonic the Hedgehog games, M Bison - Street Fighter 2, Clyde - one of the four original Pac-Man ghosts, a robot based from the Nintendo 64 game Blast Corps, a character based on Mishaela from Shining Force, Demon Master Neff - Altered Beast, Beholder - Dungeons and Dragons, Kano - Mortal Kombat, and a zombie based on Cyril from House of the Dead. Just so you know, I didn't know all these myself, and had to use this site to look them up. / Image Source: Joblo.com |
It seems to me like the games Halo, Mario Kart, and Donkey Kong Jr, all got together in a room and had a tug-o-war over which game should get the most attention in the film. Looks like Mario Kart won, in this case. To explain, Mario Kart in its various iterations, and the film's main locale,"Sugar Rush," (as well as other arcade "racer" games of the past decade or so) have much in common. But Mario Kart without any racing going on for most of the time. This made the plot drag unnessecarily at times. Couldn't we see some more varied terrain? Not to be a stereotypical male, but I"d have liked to see just a bit more of that shooter game "Hero's Duty."
Oh, that reminds me. There were some moments of crude humor in here. "Hero's Duty" being one. When Actress Sara Silverman, as Venelope, start riffing bathroom jokes over the name of "Hero's Duty," I wasn't thrilled. It would have been a "haha-whatever" moment had I not been sitting with my wife and my six year old. Yes, I know some people may say "lighten up," and really, I don't mean to sound my age (though some days I feel like I'm in mid-30s more than others). I just thought the movie could have gone without that bit. Or toned it down just a tad. Let the adults get the joke and not serve it up on a platter for the children's general understanding and amusement as well. I don't think kids are dumb, but if they don't get it, why force-feed it to them so they do? When Venelope first said it, I thought - yeah, that's a little funny, but then there was that second of recognition when I realized - with mild distress - that they were gonna keep going. And then I was like: oh no. Please just move on.
What else? On the positive side, Jane Lynch as the female Sargent, and the guy who played Felix from Ralph's game "Fix-It Felix Jr." (a veiled smack at Donkey Kong/DK Jr. if I ever heard one) were my favorite parts of the film. She fit the hand-holder but tough-as-nails type of many modern first-person shooter games, and he was... charming. In that way old video game characters were/are charming. The hero of older games got a lot of the attention in game development, since you were often paying a lot of attention to him/her/it ("her" being rare, but it did happen on occasion) and the filmmakers did a decent job bringing that across with Felix. For instance, the part where Ralph accidentally knocks a low ceiling down upon Felix, he dies in typical game manner with the lily on the chest, and then pops back up ready to go was worth a guffaw for me. And through it all Felix is so darn ernest. That's what I mean about his charm. Does that make sense?
 |
| The film's primary cast - John C. Reily as Ralph, Jack McBrayer as Felix Jr., Jane Lynch as Sargent Calhoun (remembered she was a Sargent, forgot her name), and Sara Silverman as Vanellope von Schweetz. / Source: AwardsCircuit.com |
Then again, at times the game... er... movie - didn't seem to know where it was going with its potential. And when it did, it took a simple moral play and beat it into the ground. I guess at the end of the day, I did enjoy a few things about Wreck-It Ralph, but most of it was pointless and/or heavy-handed, and it missed the boat in several crucial ways. Video games as a social gestalt, the motivations of villains in video games, the evolution of gamers' expectations, video games as a form of shared consciousness - all could have been addressed in some way. There are plenty of avenues this film could have taken that would have kept video gaming as an integral part, but Disney went the patent story route with a trendy gaming window dressing out front.
Wreck-It Ralph reminds me of an old saying that you can't turn a video game into a good movie. And history is rife with examples of films that tried to beat this curse and died on the mountain, their bones picked clean by dis-satisfied viewers. One of the worst I ever saw was Ewe Boll's horrendous Alone in the Dark. I read reviews before going to the theater and thought, "it can't be that bad, can it?" Boy was I wrong. And sadly, my anticipation that Wreck-It Ralph would be worth seeing at full price, as mentioned before in this blog, was off too. I wished I'd only gone to see it at the cheap seats, and then by myself. It might have been worth that price.
In summary, Wreck-It Ralph was too preachy, and somewhat predictable. "Be yourself and don't be a bully." Ad naseum. Got it. Disappointing, Disney. Do that with your Star Wars acquisitions and you'll be risking the eternal torment that beckons to George Lucas ever since he made Han Solo shoot second. Everybody knows that Han shot first. End of story.
The parting comment:
 |
| Source: LolSnaps.com |
Sometimes the simple pictures are the best. The captions makes perfect sense, if you ask me. But from a bathroom? No thanks. But hey, this sort of bacon delivery system could really catch on, if somebody wanted to market it in malls, plazas and shopping districts. Make your millions by being the bacon vendor!
bacon,Bacon, BACON!
ReplyDelete