The Muppets (DVD release)

It's time to start the music, it's time to light the lights, it's time to meet the Muppets for...a flat and forgettable film. 


Under the new reign of Jason Segal, co-writer Nicholas Stroller and director James Bobin the Muppets are back - but are guilessly useless. Fozzy's farting shoes are not funny. Gonzo and Rizzo are seemingly non-existent. And our lovable Kermit the frog was made supporting role to a fuzzy, Muppet newby: Walter.


Now - don't get me wrong there is something charmingly relentless about the felt faced animals, vegetables and indescribables resilience, but the overreaching storyline in The Muppets isn't the most imaginative in the great Muppet franchise. 


As plots go, this one is almost as old as 'one day a boy meets a girl and they overcome an obstacle of some description', but really it's just a rouse for a reunion. Jason Segal teams up with Amy Adams and new-kid-on-the-block Walter as the films protagonist threesome.


Now- musicals magically move me and anyone who knows me knows I love things as camp-as-Christmas, but the endless musical outbreaks by the human quota are cringe worthy and detract from the Muppets' screen time and gay-abandon.


Some of the unnecessary numbers shroud the fun and fall short of the Muppet name. The same can be said for the drawn out duds along the way with the majority of the film's gag set-ups, once again, falling flat.


The felty Muppet favourites weren't shown enough but when they were their boundless enthusiasm carried them stubbornly on, life's a happy song they remind us- yes, Muppets, yes it is, but not from the lips of Jason Segal.


Take out the human limelight-hoggers, slap a feather bower on Miss Piggy, exaggerate the underdog storyline and bring back Rizzo and you've got yourself a show.

-ZB

Dress like a Darling Bud.

Florals – the perennial Spring/Summer trend – but with a delightfully mixed bunch of new season florals taking over our favourite Highstreet stores it's high time I sewed some seeds of advice on how to wear the floral trend.

Find out how to wear this seasons appliqué blooms:

http://www.yuppee.com/2012/06/28/darling-buds-julyaugust/

-ZB

Snow White and the Huntsman

Once upon a time, director Rupert Sanders and his band of merry writers began their quest to create an updated version of the family classic Snow White. It was a noble quest; they ditched helpful woodland animals and bobbed Disney princess' and opted for a darkness that seeps into the soul.

A modern fairytale was spawned, Snow White and the Huntsman, injecting the story with a darker tone that has long been missed. Yes - Sanders breathes life into the chirpy, witless, post-card-ready classic. He treats us to the "Once upon a time" voice over but quickly sets-up a jarring and haunting movie.


Much like its predecessors in the Snow White branch the tale follows a Princess whose wicked step mother Queen wants her guts-for-garters. But soon with the help of several dwarves and heart throbs a-plenty the Princess ascends to take on mommy dearest.


The cast is star-studded; from Kristen Stewert's tentative "Snow" to Charlize Theron's sensually terrifying performance as Queen Ravenna. In the contest for who's fairer - here, Theron comes out on top. Her presence is magnetic - she embodies the role of evil queen and still manages to look beautiful when ageing by the CGI-minute. While Kristen is left with little to say quite literally as the directors clearly cut her lines so as not to divert from the foolery of the American-English accent.


And not unlike the Twilight franchise Snow White and the Huntsman offers up two male leads: Huntsman Eric (Chris Hemsworth) and childhood sweetheart, William (Sam Clafin). Both play admirable roles but are quickly over-shadowed at the emergence of 7 very small but lovable characters - the dwarves. Bob Hoskins, Toby Jones, Ian McShane, Eddie Marsan, Nick Frost and Ray Winstone took on the roles of vertically challenged forest dwellers who come to our heroine's aid. And while they were engaging and amusing, I found myself trying so hard to work out each actor that I was completely taken out of what little story there was at their point of arrival.


However, this is a bold rethinking of a familiar old-story which is alleviated by striking design elements and arresting visuals. The astonishing hallows of the eidolic forest with its cloaked ghouls and phantom mists stand in stark contrast to the faerie sanctuary. While the fairy grotto looked like a scene straight out of Avatar, with Aslan the Lion-king showing up mid-film in the shape of a CGI-stag, Sanders proved his below par visuals in Alice in Wonderland could be rectified in this startling screenplay.

Snow White and the Huntsman proves you don't need a magic mirror to tell which summer release is the fairest of them all. 

-ZB

Prometheus.

 

A poor man's Alien - Ridley Scott takes us on a voyage to another planet to meet our maker, we float over silver-grey vistas and ironically as the characters are woken from their stasis pods we are slowly lulled into slumber. 

What was promised was a film to rival Prometheus' predecessor: Alien; with Scott having dabbled in the sci-fi pit of extraterrestrial life and tentacle flailing facehuggers Prometheus was tipped to be a success, but what ensued was poor plot and even poorer acting.

Archaeologist couple Elizabeth and David Shaw head up a ship of tech-savy space geeks in a bid to meet the "engineers" who made them. Really there's not much plot from here; the mission results in a wipeout of the cast and a second journey which takes us full circle to everything we asked at the start of the film. 

Basically, while Prometheus asks "the most meaningful questions ever asked by mankind," in the words of one character, it really fails to answer any of them. We are as clueless at the end as the start.

The defunk of the plot was let down by the appalling acting by Noomi Rapace who plays a very unconvincing Elizabeth Shaw. Her character falls flat on all hurdles; her soul search was half-hearted and her love scenes were scarier than the creeps Scott attempted to stage.

Characters perish, but without great wit or design, and in fits and starts until we are just left with Rapace. The film can't fix on where it wants the action to occur, dragging the cast between the Apple-elegant fixtures of the good ship Prometheus and the dullened bio-horror chambers of the 'temple'. 

In fact, none of the characters were really likable its hard to empathise when the "heroic" characters are shrouded by bad acting and poor script.  It's plain to see the purse strings were tightened when it came to casting and script.

Evidently the $130 million budget was spent on the special effects; but the stunning visuals, gloopy madness, and sterling Fassbenderiness can't prevent Prometheus seeming like Alien's poor relation.

What Prometheus lacks in style and substance it makes up in special effects but unlike Alien's moniker "in space no one can hear you scream" Prometheus was stilted. I didn't scream. I didn't jump. I barely cringed.

I won't call this a space odyssey but to paraphrase the Alien campaign "in this space no one can hear me eulogize."

-ZB 

Avengers Assemble

Six superheroes for the price of one ticket, all with specific personalities, abilities and back stories that need to be wrangled into a cohesive fighting force. Yes - it is a task that Buffy creator Joss Whedon has taken on in bringing Marvel’s Avengers together at last with what is essentially a massive comic franchise toy box in which Whedon embarks in dollplay. And Whedon has used every toy in the box. 


Let's cut to the chase: Marvel's The Avengers is the movie comic book fans, who have been curled up in their parents' box rooms surrounded by the package bound figurines of Captain America, have been fantasizing about for half a century. The iconic six: Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, Hawkeye, Black Widow and the Hulk have featured in a string of recent solo summer movies priming the pump for the film that would bring them all together. But don't be fooled by this Marvel mash-up it is no sequel to the others; it's its own thing unto itself.

The plot is merely a side line to the legends. The world is about to end because of banished demigod, Loki, and so the heaviest hitters in the superhero circuit unite with a rep bigger than the West Side to defend the mere mortals. In essence a getting-the-lads-together story, The Avengers opens with a threat and ends with happy heroes and a devastated New York. 

Each of the characters are perfectly cast, from Samuel L. Jackson's sullen performance as Laden Fury to Robert Downey Junior's sharp-tongued Stark. Captain America is as ever pleasantly retro and Johanson's Black Widow unleashes some marvellous stunts. But the stand out performance is almost indefinitely Mark Ruffalo as Banner. His depiction of a man deftly controlling the tempests of his Jekyl/Hyde reality evokes stirring poignance and his slapstick humour is flawless.

All of this is spiced up by Whedon's engaging script; from witty lines and wise cracks to unexpected moments of action, the screenplay proved to be almost as legendary as its protagonists, adding levity from an otherwise storm and stress plot. Whedon proves he can combat wrenching emotion with effervescent lightness. This thematically resonant big-screen mythmaker ticks most of the boxes.

But, this isn't to say that The Avengers is without its weaknesses. While the character of Loki is gut wrenchingly detestable he hardly compares to comicdom's more legendary villains. Loki really doesn't compare to Marvel men like The Joker. And the dark and philosophical layering of Dark Knight seems a far cry from what we see here. However, when it comes to the true clichéd superhero movie great Odin's beard this film has got it!

-ZB