Under The Mountain (Is Where The Hobbits Live!)
(Spoilers ahead! Don't read if you want to watch the movie first!)
Okay, normally I try not to put in scathing remarks unless it's really that bad. This time though, it was kind of...THAT bad. LOL!
The movie poster that I saw promotes the fact that it's Weta Workshop (the amazing people behind the LOTR series!) doing the special effects, so I thought...Hmm, shouldn't be too bad right? WRONG!
So, what's the story about? Theo and Rachel are fraternal twins who share a special, 'psychic' bond with each other. But things changed after a tragedy and Theo's relationship with Rachel began to drift apart. They stayed with their uncle and aunt (in one of the most fancy houses I've ever seen...one would think that New Zealanders are super rich!) for the holidays, and found strange things happening whilst they're there; among them, meeting a mysterious Mr Jones, who tells them that Earth is being invaded by aliens (he himself is one! *gasp* *rolls eyes*) and only THEY can stop them with some special weapon invented by his race...
True, the special effects were great...one wouldn't expect less from the people who gave amazing effects to LOTR, but this time around, it didn't help much to enhance the storyline (which isn't much of a storyline anyways). The aliens were apparently disguised as humans on Earth so that they're less 'visible'...but heck, one look at them and you can already tell they're SOOO not human. *rolls eyes* Are New Zealanders that dim-witted that they can't differentiate a foreigner with guys that look like they just got splashed with hydrochloric acid on their bodies?? And what kind of human talks so slow (think. I. talk. like. this.) that people don't notice at all? Too polite to tell, or it's normal talk speed for them? Sheesh!
And to make things even worse, there's all sorts of weird clichés like SMOOTH PEBBLES as weapons? And FIRE to bring down slug-like creatures from another planet?! I mean, come on! If the aliens are so darn easy to bring down with fire, how come we don't just use napalm? No need to wait hundreds of years for twins to come and 'Save The World From Imminent Death'. And why twins in the first place? What's with the 'twin-ness' thing? I digress.
This movie was adapted from a book which was written by Maurice Gee, a famous New Zealand author. I seriously hope his book wasn't as bad as the movie, coz if it was, then it's saying something about the kind of books New Zealanders read, right? No offense to New Zealand and its people...I'm sure there are great movies out there made by NZ, but for this particular one, it's a thumbs down mostly. Sorry!
Ah exactly how i feel about the Percy Jackson movie...