Inkheart (2008)

I'm not going to lie. Inkheart is one of my favorite books, as are the sequels, so my opinion may be slightly biased. Now that I've given you that warning, I'll cut straight to it: This film reduced me to an angry, seething mess. When I first saw it, I wasn't particularly upset. However, the more I thought about what they did to the book that holds a special place on the bookshelf of my heart, the more outraged I became. This film, in no way, did the book justice. So many small but important points were changed that it was pretty much just a spin-off of the original story. I won't name them here, in fear of ruining the book for others (I'm not worried about ruining the movie, there isn't much more damage to be done there. The creators took care of that themselves.), but I will say that if you want to engage in this thrilling story, just buy the books.

Within our world special men exist with the ability to transgress from our reality into that of what they read, able to pull out elements of the told story. These special beings are called Silvertongues. Not all are fully aware of their power, often only evidencing this trait when it is already too late. Such is the curse of Mortimer, also known as Mo (Brendan Fraser), who discovered the gift whilst reading a bedtime story to his daughter Meggie (Eliza Bennett). The book "Inkheart" brings into our reality the malicious Basta (Jamie Foreman) and his henchmen, as well as the fire-juggler Dustfinger (Paul Bettany), meanwhile trapping his wife (Sienna Guillory) into the story. Left to singlehandedly bring up Meggie, Mo never gives up on attempting to retrieve his entrapped beloved. Basta, however, remains too fond of this world and destroys any found copies of the obscure fantasy novel, whilst simultaneously planning to overtake this world through utilising the force hidden in Mo's voice.Brendan Fraser found himself a sweet niche, as a hapless hero, aimlessly stumbling to victory and heroism with charm abound. "Inkheart" however fails to offer him much material to truly work with, supplanting a swiftly engaging and fantastic story with a tired schematic leading to a culmination that fizzle, instead of bangs. Despite being tied to the power of words, the dialogue reeks of repetitive banter with little focus on creating a stirring backdrop in enticing characters. Instead they slowly inhabit the screen, more odd presences than fully flung characters (such as a young thief invoked from the "Arabian Nights"). Even the seemingly dramatic events as Mo and Meggie finally reuniting with Resa after 12 years in Inkheart oblivion lack any dramatic pull, hardly registering as key plot points. The elements to make a good tale do linger in the background, however far-fetched and logically fallible the base premise, but there is no magic, instead a tired connect-the-dots to the final battle. The touches of CGI magic do cause a slight stir, but in this day and age the backbone for mindless satisfaction needs to be much sturdier. Definitely no Never-Ending Story...

I just have to say this is just what I thought of the acting and cinematography.We had to watch this in English class and then do some assignments based on it afterwords. It was really hard to pay attention because the acting was so damn bad!! You can't take them seriously at all. The graphics aren't the best either. Why Helen Mirren aspired to be in this movie, I don't know. She was the best actor in the whole movie (no surprise there.) If they got better actors and and changed the whole look of the background and animations it might of been enjoyable to watch. But for me, a 15 y/o it was too cheesy for me, maybe a younger person might of enjoyed this, but I certainly did not.

This movie is pretty much identical to the 1981 movie though the special effects are worthy of a modern movie and the plot seems to be somewhat tighter than the previous film. However, pretty much the themes and the plot remains the same. The story is really about how humanity has turned its back on the gods and declared war against them, believing that they are now the rightful rulers of the world. This is the theme that runs through the bible, however the difference is that in the bible, it is God who has been wronged, whereas in the film it is a matter of a power struggle between the gods and man, and sympathy tends to lie with men.The background is (which sort of follows the Greek Myth) that the original rulers were the Titans, who were the parents of the current Greek pantheon. However, the gods, led by Zues, warred against the Titans and defeated them, and Zeus claimed rulership over Olympus. However, Zeus created humanity so that they might worship them, and that their prayers would be the fuel for their power. Hades, one of the three major gods, was tricked into becoming ruler of the underworld, and as such has arisen (in this film at least) as the bad guy. This is not entirely correct, as Hades was lord of the dead, but was not necessarily considered and evil god.The main part of the movie opens with humanity going about a destroying the statues of the gods, and while they are destroying one particular statue, Perseus and his father are sailing by in their fishing boat. As man is destroying the idols, Hades appears and destroys the lot of them, and Perseus' family is killed in the ensuring melee. Perseus, who is then rescued by the Argives, is taken to Argos where he vows to seek vengeance for his father's death.The rest of the movie sort of follows the same plot as the earlier version. The gods curse Argos (this is not the Argos that I knew, particularly since I did not believe that it was a port city, I know that there is currently no harbour in Argos, and that it is located at least 5 km from the sea) in that it will be destroyed by the Kraken (the Kraken is not a Greek monster, it is Scandanavian) unless the daughter of the king, Andromeda, is sacrificed (once again, this departs from the myth, as Andromeda was Ethiopian, and Perseus rescued her on his way back from killing Medusa). So, Peresus, and a number of soldiers, go on a quest to get the Medusa's head and kill the Kraken.What differs in this film from the original is the Perseus rejects his divine heritage and seeks to do everything under his own power. He is a fisherman, and desires to remain a fisherman, but he is thrust into this world of adventure, against his will. In the original film, his love interest is Andromeda (as is the case in the myth) where as the filmmakers added Io into the mix, who becomes Perseus' love interest. The problem with Io is that she is not apart of this myth. In fact the story of Io is set much earlier than many of the other myths. Io was one of Zeus' lovers, however she was turned into a Heifer to hide her from Hera. However, Hera was not fooled, and set a gadfly to eternally torment her, driving her from place to place. Io was not human either, she was a Neried, a demi-god connected with nature and spring, and it is also suggested that her father was a river god. However, in the film she is a human who was cursed by Zeus to remain forever young because she rejected his advances.Unfortunately, when it comes to a lot of movies like this I tend to be a purist. I have yet to see The Immortals (and am unlikely to do so in the near future, though I am sure to wander into a video shop sooner or later and hire it), and I simply groan whenever I see a movie that has liberally referred to the original source. Granted, not every book can easily be turned into a movie (particularly if we delve into the thoughts and feelings of the characters, which can be very hard to move onto the screen), but when the filmmakers clearly butcher ancient mythology, it does put me off. However, this film is still entertaining and visually spectacular, and the plot has been tightened up a lot more.