Mortal Instrument: City of Bones: like a plate of rojak without the belacan

Despite the low ratings given by Rottentomatoes and Metacritic, I do feel Mortal Instrument: City of Bones deserve a higher recognition. It is still far from perfect, but I guess it did introduce everyone to the ongoing young adult series of novel, which my wife is diligently following. Well, that is the main reason I was drag to the cinema. But it was a nice surprise though.

According to my wife, the movie did follow closely to the main plot of the first book of the series, albeit some creative innovative decision here and there. The main story follow Clary as one day, her mother suddenly disappear and she began to see the same symbols everywhere. Throw in some demons on her trail, and a handsome young man, Jace who came to her rescue. It was revealed that she is, in fact a shadow hunter, a group of elite beings who draw runes (symbols) on their bodies ( I think so, though it was not properly address in the movie) to gain extraordinary powers and healing and some other stuff. Shadowhunter originally were created to fight the demons, but at the same time, there are other beings, vampires, werewolves, warlock and witches that existed together in the same world though they were in a sort of ceasefire situation. Now, somehow, Clary is in the possesion of the knowledge of the location of a holy cup, Mortal Cup which should bring certain powers (again, not address by the movie), which is sought after by the rogue Shadowhunter, Valentine and his small group of renegade shadowhunter. And the main plot revolves around the main love story between Jace and Clary. Duh!

Most of the negative movie reviews accuse that the movie is a rip off or parody of many young adults movie/ series. Well, to be fair, the original Mortal Instrument novel series do have many of the elements borrowed from other famous series. The main forbidden love thingy is in all the young adults book but one may see the shadow of Twilight series. The inhuman beings with powers, a girl torn between 2 loves (here is shadowhunter vs vampire). The girl who start seeing symbols was in fact the starting of Percy Jackson (though I am not sure which book came first, but at least Percy movie came out first). The girl born with immense power but unaware of it and were enrolled in a special institution appeared familiar with Harry  Potter's fans. However, I have no problem with that as most of the young adult series copy each other. Some people are not comfortable with the amalgam of the creatures of the night, making it rather distracting. Again, I have no problem with that, just that the authors should throw in the undead zombies, creatures from Frankeinstein, probably the Thing from the swamp, and Bigfoot/ yeti and we would have one big happy family.


So, is the movie good? Sad to say, not exactly. The potential is there. Lily Collins as Clary is better than her role in Mirror Mirror. Jace looks like a samseng in the beginning but probably the audience started to root for him once the show picked up. The action was average to the most. What went wrong was the whole adaptation. The book has so many pages to deals with details and therefore the readers were able to appreciate the finer details that brought richness to the whole world of Mortal Instrument. Here, the scriptwriter chose to omit lots of details and in the end, to those people who had not read the book, were oblivious to may details and in the end, the whole show felt more like a serious version of Scooby Doo with all different monster. Once my wife told me about certain twist which were meant to be revealed later but was brought forward into the first movie, I felt disappointed. The whole story felt rushed, with so many things going on, and it felt like cooking instant noodle and eating it up in one gulp. (or probably it felt that way since I watch it the same week as Elysium which took its time for everything)


However, it is not that bad. In fact, it is rather good start to the series, just that with so much going on, it felt like a plate of rojak. The immense world with so many character development, and so rich with creatures of the night, it did have much potential to be great. Just that the execution of the whole movie gives a feeling of lacking the "oomph" factor or lack of "kick". In the end, the plate of rojak could be good, but it felt like someone forgot to put the belacan in.

ratings: 3 poink!
comments: I may be harsh on the movie, but it is actually an interesting show. Look at the bright side, among all the movie one girlfriend/ wife drag you to see, this may be the best. Beats Twilight in every single aspect.

Elysium: predictable, cliche, and slow in the shadow of District 9

There is always this curse of big budget film and fame. Neill Blomkamp was rather unknown (probably not true) when he made District 9. And suddenly, he score big in the critically acclaimed movie. Everyone seems to know him (again, may not be totally true). This reminded me of the rise (and fall ) of M Night Shamaylan. He hit the jackpot with Sixth Sense (and still remain the top 10 movie for me) and fame, big budget brought more movies, but more miss than hits. The same goes with Blomkamp; after District 9, naturally came bigger budget from studios and more famous names in his movies. The South African director did a very good job with District 9, so much so that he may have difficulties reaching the same benchmark he set.

In Elysium, expect cliche sci-fi storyline. In the future, the world is so overpopulated that the rich had built for themselves a space station to preserve their ways of life. Abundant food, entertainments and high tech machines in each home to diagnose and heal virtually any illness (except death), the population in Elysium lives in a virtual heaven. The poor who were left behind on earth, lives their remaining lives in slums. Matt Damon, during his daily work in a droid producing factory was exposed to deadly dose of radiation, so much so he will be expecting death unless healed by on of those machine in Elysium. Thus, began his non stop adventure to go up to Elysium, in the process brought a major change to the whole society structure in Elysium and Earth.

The movie boast a bigger cast, with Matt Damon carrying the lead. He was alright, as someone who is fighting for survival, though I think he was limited by the script. Jodie Foster, as one of the villain, as my wife pointed out, was underutilized. She still have the aura of elegance around her, and I would love to see her with more screen time. The rest of the cast are forgettable, including the main villain.

Bulk of the budget probably went to the CGI, and Elysium does look pretty. The action sequence was limited, isolated and did not work well for me. I was never a fan of those shaking camera action sequence. Still, on paper, the movie should work. On reality, it did not. The whole pace was too slooooooow. At the end I actually got bored watching Damon on screen. He did occupied the same screen time in Bourne series but those series are much much more bearable and memorable. The plot is soooo cliche that you have the usual society separated by social norm. The hero trying to make difference. The villain trying to maintain status quo. The villain had to be cruel enough so people will love to hate. Another villain trying to take over the earth. Hero vs villain. Hero won. Predictable. In the same argument, I can still draw some parallel to District 9. Similarly the society is divided into 2 (rich,poor vs human,aliens), privileged vs the under-privilege. The difference is the main character in District 9 is rather memorable and everyone can sympathize with him. In the end the division between the two social classes is broken down. In District 9, the division was brought down in the main character own  personal self, in Elysium, it affected the whole earth.

Theories aside. Good effort. But I bet after I woke up from my sleep, I would have thought that Elysium is a new drug that came into the market.

ratings: 2 half poink!
comments: go watch District 9. much, much, much better.