The Hunger Games

thoughts on the film, Catching Fire, Mockingjay, and the phenomenon in general.

For those of you who read my last post about The Hunger Games, if you were enraged by my flippancy, now you will receive justice. However, let's take things one at a time.

Item One: The Film

I had the uncanny good fortune of being able to see The Hunger Games movie at Cinetopia. Sadly the livingroom theatre was sold out for that day, but any of the auditoriums are preferable to the cramped and scummy stadium seats of your typical moviehouse. I could therefore cite the quality of the picture, the hugeness of the sound, but when it came down to it, The Hunger Games is, quite simply, a good movie.

First of all, the cast was excellent. All of the principles were aptly chosen. Jennifer Lawrence, by now a veteran huntress with Winter's Bone behind her, was Katniss Everdeen through and through. She was serious, intense, and internal - just like her counterpart Katniss from the book. Josh Hutcherson  as Peeta Mellark was likewise perfect. His expertise was in his delivery, expressions...pretty much in everything. We didn't see much of Liam Hemsworth as Gale Hawthorne, other than him brooding, so he's had yet to impress me. I guess that he's Thor's little brother has to count for something, though. Lenny Kravitz was the perfect Cinna, and, fun fact, it helped that he and Jennifer Lawrence were already friends, seeing as she worked with his daughter on X-Men: First Class. Wes Bentley cut an excellent Seneca Crane, Elizabeth Banks was the spitting image of Effie Trinket, and Donald Sutherland was an aptly venomous President Snow.

But the brilliance wasn't just in the cast. The cinematography of this film also exceeded my expectations. The scene which comes to mind is when Katniss and Peeta, having been chosen as tributes, stumble onto the train headed for the capitol. Something about the looks on their faces combined with the way the camera moved to show the opulence of the train car highlighted the pointlessness of that opulence, of how very wrong it was to plunge these two children into so many changes and in such a succession.

Likewise, the score is brilliant. Written by James Newton Howard, the orchestrated moments in the movie are potentially the most powerful. Then again, with most of M. Night Shamalan's films under his belt, I'm not surprised. (Whatever you think of Mr. M. Night Shamalamadingdong, as he is sometimes called around here, you have to admit that his movies are beautifully scored.)

In all, I went to this film with a bit of an attitude. Was I ever wrong. Hindsight 20/20 all around with this series.

For more information on the film, visit the official movie page and IMDb.

Item Two: Catching Fire

The strange thing about this series for me is that I stopped dead in the middle. After finishing The Hunger Games I downloaded book two, Catching Fire, for the kindle and began reading immediately. Sadly, I couldn't quite finish two books in a day, and I had to depart for my dearly beloved college town the next. I stopped directly in the middle. After that I couldn't quite find the will to keep reading.

And then I watched the movie.

Seeing it on the screen brought the story back to life for me, which is saying something. (I don't want to give the plot of the second book away entirely, but the first half seems a little innocuous in comparison to the end of the first book: it has its own merits, of course, but it's hard to keep up something as engaging as the conclusion to the 74th annual Hunger Games.) After watching Jennifer Lawrence's Katniss live through that arena, I had to know more. I had to know what happened, and I stayed up way too late finishing book two and most of book three.

The plot twist in book two also impressed me. At first glance I thought it was something that even Suzanne Collins could pull off with little success, but she made it work for her. The Quarter Quell was very different than the year which preceded it, and I salute her for making it work.

Item Three: Mockingjay

The thing about Mockingjay is that I have heard more complaints about it than with the other two books combined. I'm not sure what it is that makes some Hunger Games fans unhappy about this third and final volume, because I honestly thought it was brilliant. The discontent could stem from the fact that it comes off as much more real, and therefore much more hopeless, than the other two books, but something in that appealed to me as a reader.

***Not even going to try to be non-spoilery in the next part, fair warning***

Mockingjay has a lot to say about the dynamics of revolution. That the story depends so wholly on Katniss as a figurehead, and a televised one at that, speaks a lot to the concept of the funded cause. The only way that the revolution in Panem could have kept going was by the aid of Capitol money and therefore Capitol sedition: it is only the causes picked by members of the dominant regime which get the backing and the momentum to continue and, ultimately, succeed. That, I think, is some serious food for thought.

In Other News...

The Hunger Games as a phenomenon has exploded. Hot Topic is carrying Hunger Games memorabilia, including the Mockingjay pin, there's a game for the iPhone called Hunger Games: Girl on Fire, there is a facebook page devoted to becoming a Capitol citizen where you can get a free physical Panem ID card, and there's a Hunger Games adventure game, also on facebook. There are t-shirts, journals, several spoofs, even a book of philosophy. The Hunger Games is the next big thing, just like I thought it would be when I initially felt resistance to the growing fad. Only this time, I think I'm okay with a little bit of fanaticism.

Later today I will be attending a lecture on the fashion of the capitol and what it has to say, socially and politically, and how these choices control the people of the capitol. For a blog on that, please see Hyperbole's sister blog: tangential!

If you're interested in how Philosophy relates to all this, please consider Amazon. After all, the lecturer I'm hearing is published in this book. Cheers!

The AFK Tavern

I recently had the great fortune to visit the AFK Tavern in Everett, WA.

The menu, like everything else, was delightfully geeky. For victuals I ordered something called the Mt. Doom burger - a beef patty topped with the one onion ring to rule them all followed by the hottest hot sauce I think I have ever consumed. Though my mouth was burning with the fires of a thousand ages, the upside is that I can say I've eaten a volcano in my lifetime.

The drinks menu was, likewise, full of mishaps. While my friend threw back her Gryffindor shot and sipped on a Previously, on Battlestar Galactica... I ordered nothing but Zelda drinks.


#1 - Lon-Lon Milk

If you aren't singing Epona's song in your head right now, there's something wrong.

Rich, creamy and with a hint of nuttiness, Lon-Lon Milk goes all out with a float of whipped cream to t
op it off!

Hearts: full. Sword: charged. It's game time.

Made with Frangelico, American Honey, and Half and Half.

#2 - The Triforce

Make a wish, you're in the Sacred Realm.

Intense but with a light hint of smoky haziness when going down. Pure gold.

Goldschlager, Vanilla Vodka, and Dark Rum.

#3 - Gerudo Valley Tea

For which there is no photo :(

Smokey with a hint of sour and rimmed with sugar, evokes long treks across the wastes and getting thrown in jail by sexy thieves.

Made with Firefly tea and Bulliet Bourbon.

In short: totally awesome. I'll be going back.

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

Honestly, my mind is still racing to catch up. I haven't devoured a book the way I devoured The Hunger Games since right before fall quarter, the exhausting two-day stint wherein I completed both Gaiman's The Graveyard Book and Brom's The Child Thief.

There are a few reasons this parallel came as a surprise. I admit that at first I was a little resistant to reading The Hunger Games, though with 20/20 hindsight it was a foolish reaction. On some level I feared a sort of fiction-following rebound. In the gaping hole that the cinematic conclusion Harry Potter left behind in addition with the fact that the last piece of the Twilight saga is nearly at hand, part of me wondered if the fanatical attention given to Hunger Games wasn't just to fill the massive media vacuum both franchises have and will inevitably leave behind. To some extent I think the Hunger Games film is meant to do just that, but more on that front later.

This resistance was tough to shake, especially when I opened the book and was immediately confronted with not only first-person but also present tense narrative. I have close to no conception why, but either of these on their own is enough to shut me down to a fiction book, let alone both in tandem. As I said, I couldn't tell you why, though if asked I suppose I would answer that something in the cadence of it feels all wrong ninety percent of the time. That being said, just how hooked I was, and in such a short amount of time, is a testament to Suzanne Collins' sheer mastery.

The massive hooks throughout the book, and possibly the best aspect of Collins' writing, consist of tremendous amounts of suspense coupled with extremely visual, imaginative prose. It's little wonder the movie companies couldn't wait to sink their claws into it - turning this into a storyboard would be a piece of cake. Paring it down to the length of a single film? Maybe not so much.

***Now we enter the potential Spoiler zone. Read on at your own risk***

On the subject of the trailer, having watched it now that I'm in the know I completely understand all my friends and acquaintances who claim they're already bracing themselves for disappointment. The casting all along the board seems all wrong, Katniss seems hopelessly toned down, and the visual look of what the audience gets from the meager two minutes of trailer seems listing far off-course from the look and feel of the book. Danger! Here there be monsters!

Which of course comes back to the whole 'divorce the book and the movie so that you don't get mad' business.

My other reservations lie in how self-sufficient this first volume is. Not for a second did the conception even enter my mind that the entire games would be over and dealt with in the first novel. The suspense throughout its entirety was insane - the driving plot to stay alive, to kill or be killed, to keep up a farce in order to earn food and water - but what does that leave? The only remnant from the first novel which will inevitably carry over to the subsequent two is the love-triangle which is hardly even a triangle. I congratulate Collins on the portrayal of a girl who is confused and doesn't know what she wants, thinks, or feels - that she "can't explain how things are...because [she] doesn't know [her]self" (373). But is that really enough to go on for two more books, after the whirl, desperation and brutality of the games? It teeters dangerously close to that media vacuum I mentioned before - worse, the teen-romance portion of the vacuum that verges on the inane. I can only hope this'll be incorporated into that hindsight 20/20 bit.

In all I have my doubts, clearly, but I'm determined to reserve judgment. Suzanne Collins has impressed me once, and done a thorough job of it. I am more than willing to believe that she can do it again.

Interested in purchase? Say no more.

Howdy!

It's been a while! In light of the fact, this might seem a bit more like a ramble than anything else. Or maybe a list. I'm not really sure.

Had the wonderful opportunity to see both The Santaland Diaries at Portland Center Stage and The Dimes at the Kennedy School. Both were fun, but The Dimes were phenomenal. If you haven't checked them out yet, shame on you. Go do so. However, the adventures for today were:

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows

EXCELLENT. I was far more impressed with this film than I expected to be. Not to say that I had any doubt it'd be decent, only that I can't honestly say which film could be called "better," even with the first having the advantage of being, well, first. Jude Law and Robert Downey Jr. give a grand show as expected, and the addition of the lovely Noomi Rapace as Madam Simza and the excellent Stephen Fry as Mycroft worked wonders. However, Jared Harris as the supremely chilling Professor James Moriarty must, inevitably, take the cake.

While diehard Conan Doyle fans will take issue with some of the choices, I think they are inevitably justified by the structure of the Holmes Adventures in the first place: they are only episodes. Yes, we are told that Sherlock goes away to become a beekeeper somewhere for his retirement, but that doesn't mean we are privy to every case - each story is open ended. That isn't to say that anything goes, necessarily, but this film has many nice touches, including the preservation of that openness which characterizes the serialized adventures. So, diehard or not, please go see this film. It's absolutely lovely.

Check it out on IMBd.

And

The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword

THIS GAME. IS SO GOOD.
It is the reason I am currently unable to sleep.
In retrospect, I have no idea why I didn't think of blogging a Skyward Sword diary. It would have been so much fun! And caused me to be even more sleep deprived than I already am, but whatever. In interest of not spoiling it for anyone, watch out for warnings.

First of all, the controls are great. Yes, the wiimote doesn't always respond correctly, but that's to be expected, really, especially when you're swinging it wildly, shouting "NO, HORIZONTAL SLASH, YOU--" etc. etc. Other than this slight (but predictable) setback, the only control issue is that the wiimote/nunchuck combination required drains batteries extremely quickly. Get thee some rechargables or Zelda fans will destroy the environment all by themselves!!

Gameplay is great. Everything about it that I was reluctant about - stamina gauge and upgrades, mostly - have been incorporated smoothly. Even the upgrade system (which normally makes me shudder under the brunt of never-ending RPG that usually goes with said function) is fantastic. The only mechanic which could have been improved was the controls for the musical instrument. There are no Ocarina-style command patterns needed, the game just identifies which song you've learned that goes with the location you're in and, essentially, plays it for you. A slight setback, in light of the rest of the game, but a bit of a let-down, nonetheless.

The story is great. After all, it is a prequel to the ENTIRE series, so I expected they'd have to come up with something good. There are plenty of little things (and big things!) to make long-time Zelda fans drop their jaws or throw up their hands in combined frustration and elation. This is coupled with a non-stereotypical Zelda main villain with a flair for the theatrical: the diamond theme was a nice touch in light of that. (SPOILER: A villain who, I hear through the grapevine, doesn't turn into a raging psychopath at the end, like Zant did.)

But the best is possibly the ART. This game is gorgeous and I can't even do it justice. So here. Have some concept paintings. (WARNING: snarky captions might be considered spoilers by some parties.)

Epona?! What happened to you?

I swear, if you tongue my ear one more time...

All in all? This game is completely addictive. Not recommended for young children or pregnant women.

Also, for those of you who have played/are working on it: the trials. Isn't it appropriate that the things you have to find in the Silent Realms are called "tears"? After all, when you're playing those parts you're CRYING THE WHOLE TIME.

But, massive time-challenge stress aside, this is a great game. If you want to check out official stuff, take a look at the website.

That's all for now, folks - I've got to get back to saving the world.

Rant and a Half

A preface: this quarter, I'm taking English 313, Theory and Criticism. Not only is the class sufficiently oblique and vague for the nature of its title, there are some interesting participants.

Today, we were discussing Plato's Ion and, more relevantly, Arthur C. Danto's Dangerous Art, published in Demetrio Paparoni's volume Eretica: The Transcendent and the Profane in Contemporary Art (173-201).

Danto's essay, or at least what I was able to grok from it, had to do with art, censorship, politics, and how they're all tied up together. What I found most interesting was his assertion of a rather curious conundrum: whether or not censorship is in place, art is assaulted, and if the state of censorship changes, art is assaulted again.

His best example on the side of change was a passage about Rock Music in the Soviet Union in light of Glasnost. Rock, he tells us, was dangerous and underground due to censorship and was therefore powerful. When Glasnost was put into place, that necessity, therefore the danger, and therefore the power of Rock n' Roll evaporated. "To legitimize rock is therefore to rob it of its form and hence its meaning:" he writes, "an officially condoned rock is precisely rock that the state has conquered" (176). So art under censorship is powerful and the transition to transparency destroyed that meaning, that function. The same, I am sure, could be argued for a change in the opposite direction.

Likewise, his example of art under censorship was in context of the Soviet Union, but before glasnost. Focusing on Literature, his main argument was that, since everything was considered a potential threat, both author and audience had to examine what wasn't said, rather than what was said: that the skill of reading between the lines, or "deep reading," as Danto terms it, was the only way to get a message across.

He then goes on to analyze what I will term, in reference to him, 'free' art. His assertion - which he drives home over and over again - is that to put art on a pedestal is actually to put it in a prison: that in a country where expression is free, the label "art" derives the work of all its danger, significance, function and power. The idea is that no matter how offensive or controversial a piece or its content is, it can immediately be waved away with the phrase, "Oh, it's art." He credits this to Plato himself, who originated the idea that anything material at all is only a copy of an idea, therefore imperfect, therefore not real. And since art is a copy of life and therefore a copy of a copy, it is doubly un-real. And naturally, anything unreal can't do real damage. So what is its significance? For Danto, the state of 'free' art means art which is not free at all: art which has been stripped of its meaning entirely.

In light of all this, the class was discussing what could have contributed to this phenomenon of powerless art. Guy#1 speculated that the availability of materials through the internet could have contributed, especially where music is involved. He brought up how anything can be cut, sampled, mixed, and posted without need of a studio, rights, regulations, any of it. Our professor reacted by asking if we thought this process had taken the political nature out of music. Guy#2 jumped on that question, talking up and down about how music wasn't worth it any more, that it had been drained of meaning by the internet, that it no longer had a message.

If my brain was't full of snot due to my Bronchitis I just might have sworn.

Item one: How do you possibly think that free access and distribution of music could have the capacity to hinder meaning? Distribution has nothing to do with content at all. Some of the best music in my library (The Dimes, to name one) is readily available on the internet and that doesn't affect their content in the slightest. Hell, most of their early music was written and recorded separately through use of digital microphones on their personal computers and they sound fantastic, both on CD and in real life. Musicians out there have plenty to say, regardless of whether they're as popular as can be or in your back yard (Decemberists, Abney Park, Lady GaGa, Jessie J, Green Day, Airborne Toxic Event, Rebecca Drysdale, just to name a few.) And guess what? That long list can all be got through the internet.

Item two: Now that we've established that music can still have meaning, what kind of logic do you have to use to think the internet is detrimental to that meaning? There is a lovely interview - that's right, available right here on YouTube - by Neil Gaiman discussing the benefit of advertising through the internet. While it's a little off topic, the point is the same. Your work reaches more people in less time through use of the internet. Over the internet, any message aimed at any audience is bound to reach hundreds if not thousands more people than would ever encounter it if it weren't on the web. Hell, we can jack that number up to millions provided the item goes viral. If that isn't sufficient evidence, the Oregonian ran an article last year about an author who, after being repeatedly rejected by publishing companies, decided to cut out the middleman and self-publish for, you guessed it, the e-book market. Her readership (as well as her bank account) jumped up immediately. Through clever web marketing, she's now significantly contributing to her family's expenses with her art.

Item three: Nothing exists in a vacuum. Early on in Dangerous Art, Danto proposes as a thesis that "our art and our political reality are made for one another; that each, one might say, is the same set of symbolic forms differently embodied" (175-6). In that light, how could it be possible that music isn't political? Just because we don't have an heir to Zack de la Roca's approach of up close and personal confrontation of what I might even dare to call "the system" doesn't mean that music inherently has no political meaning.

Item four: Perhaps most importantly, art as a whole, including music, is what you as an audience make of it. This is reached by what I now regard as fact: that artist's intent in inherently less important than audience interpretation. There is such a thing as interpretation without grounds, however, once someone makes something and puts it into the world, they are no longer there to mollycoddle it or justify it. It's on its own, becomes its own entity. If you as a viewer or listener assume that music is dead and has no meaning, you'll be proven right every time by grace of the stale interpretations of your perfectly closed mind. This is a two-way street, of course, and you can find sunshine and rainbows in pretty much anything if you look hard enough.

The point is, please be discerning, and perhaps give music as a whole another listen.

Double Whammy

Two books in two days, BAM!
And did I mention I finished Sherlock Holmes? No? Oh. Well then.

Sherlock is awesome. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is awesome. Look into it.

Book no. 1: The Graveyard Book, by Neil Gaiman.


Suffice it to say that my initial response to The Graveyard Book was:
"The Graveyard Book is over and done -
one of the best I've ever read -
and now that day is long past gone
I'm ready to sleep like the dead."

Reading fiction, especially children's-to-young-adult fiction, doesn't usually inspire me to write poetry, let alone rhyming lines, let alone at three o'clock in the morning.

Get thee to a bookstore. NOW.

Especially if you have a love of ghost stories. Gaiman is a wizard, I swear.

However, the volume that currently consumes my thoughts is none other than

Book no. 2, Brom's latest work: The Child Thief.


Do you, dear reader, recall how the 2003 film version of Peter Pan, starring Jeremy Sumpter (Peter) and Jason Isaacs (Hook), sought to re-inject some of the darkness of faery back into the tale which had been inevitably candy-coated through mediums like Disney? Brom's retelling of J.M. Barrie's classic novel gives that film a cold, back-handed, lip-splitting slap to the face.

This overhaul begins in modern New York, in Brooklyn, steeped in its drugs, thug violence, and urban brutality and desperation. Cue Peter, the Child Thief, ready to tempt his newly-found runaways into the Mist and out of this world, into one which is different in every way and yet equally cruel. Welcome to Avalon.

Like Brom's other works, The Child Thief is impossibly dark. In a way, rightfully so. Brom invites his audience to re-examine J.M. Barrie's own Peter, the first Peter, the true Peter. Brom quotes Barrie's novel, “The boys on the island vary, of course, in numbers, according as they get killed and so on; and when they seem to be growing up, which is against the rules, Peter thins them out; but at this time there were six of them, counting the twins as two.” And if that was't enough, he found another gem: ""I forget them after I kill them," he (Peter) replied carelessly.”

Personally, I had forgotten those lines. In light of them, the world of The Child Thief seems a logical, even a natural, inference to make. And while Brom's Peter occasionally shows the flippancy and the childishness that might excuse his predecessor - for surely a child would not understand death, not really, not the way an adult would - he has no excuses. He asks for none. He kills and has been killing all his long, ageless life.

Which brings me to a word of caution: this book is graphic. Terribly graphic. The kind of graphic that should never be translated into visual representations of any kind. If you can't take the thought of glistening entrails being anywhere other than inside one's body, close the book, put it back on the shelf, this one's not for you. (For the record, the language is also vulgar as hell.) Furthermore, whether or not your are opposed to the language, the portrayal, the violence, anything, this is the kind of book that once you're hooked, you're sunk, it's over, goodnight. The novel is 480 pages long. I read more than half of it today and forgot to eat. That hasn't happened to me before.

And yet, as much as it - as he - is terrifying, Brom's words and Peter's winning nature are enchanting. I found myself hoping, wishing for a reason for all the brutality, for the battles and the senselessness, and at first I thought there was. But Brom has a way of bringing out the painfully human in things which are portrayed as superhuman: of tearing away all artifice and illusion, of standing the most charismatic leader beside the most corrupt tyrant and stripping them both down to nothing more than greed, and lust, and grit, and pain. Identical. And, for some reason, it's impossible not to watch.

As harsh as I am toward Brom's Peterbird, I have to admit, he did a marvelous job in crafting him. The only spoiler I will give is a phrase used throughout the book: "...because Peter's smile is a most contagious thing." Sociopath or not, kidnapper or not, Peter is charismatic as hell. I fought with the concept of his faults all through the novel, wanting to make him into the simple hero minds like Disney's made him into, to make him into a person who was good, and only good. It wasn't possible. And that's okay. If I'd been a runaway, I'd only have had one answer, and it was the same, beginning of the novel to its end:

"I go willingly."

So if you have a mind, and a strong stomach, and perhaps even a touch of dark humor about you, pick up The Child Thief. But beware: it's not like you remember it.

Red Riding Hood

starring Amanda Seyfried as Red (Valerie) and directed by Catherine Hardwicke. Wait, you say, Catherine Hardwicke? The director of Twilight?

Yes, folks. The director of Twilight.

My first reaction when seeing the trailer and knowing this fact was "Why, world? Why didn't you let it be Tim Burton?"

In spite of this, I tried very hard not to judge it based solely on the choice of director. My dad might tell you otherwise, having watched the movie with me (sorry, dad!), but I really did try. It didn't work incredibly well. Too much of the film was just too predictable.

First, the introduction was trying too hard to be Twilight. The establishing shots of foggy, groggy, Pacific North-West style rolling forest hills could have been cut and pasted from Hardwicke's aforementioned project. Second, the acting, barring only miss Seyfried (by grace of her portraying a young lady with a million times more grace and dexterity than Kristen Stewart's Bella - then again, it doesn't take much), was pretty atrocious. I also bar Gary Oldman from this judgment, who I hope was paid extremely well in compensation for the terrible accent he had to put on. Last, and most important, was the severe incongruousness.

The setting (temporal): the village where the story plays out is one where Red/Valerie is arranged to marry the Blacksmith (Henry), as she will have a much more secure financial life with him, rather than with the woodcutter she loves (Peter). The houses are what you would imagine: simple, wooden, rustic. The costuming hints at a period piece while deftly side-stepping any real temporal commitment. When Gary Oldman (Father Solomon, who also happens to be the only character with a costume which could potentially be dated) appears on the scene, his thick pseudo-German accent would hint that they are somewhere in Europe. As he and his entourage arrive on horseback and the village, if it is truly as isolated as is professed by our heroine and narrator, would almost certainly not know of a Werewolf specialist from overseas, I have to conclude that they are somewhere at least on the same continent. All of the other actors speak with American accents.

The setting (physical): I said village, right? Rustic, scenic, isolated. The aforementioned costuming throws logic to the winds and the peasants of this community dress in fine, bright fabrics. There is an array of colors, from bright blue to bright yellow, and in hues that simple folk of their bent would almost certainly be unable to afford or make. What use would they have of a forest-green work shirt, let alone finery, when Red tells us in the very beginning that the rest of the world doesn't even know her village's name? (Thanks to IMDb's lovely reminder, I can also gripe about the glass windows, which only the rich could afford.) Back to the clothes. To give credit where it is due, I understand that this is meant to be a fantasy and that these kind of things can, and do, slide. But aesthetically speaking, to have a dingier, grittier village would have lent all the more visual power and command to Red's beautiful cloak, which was much more realistic: while it was bright red, as promised, it was coarse-woven and a gift from Red's granny. It seemed just as it should be.

So ultimately I forgive the costumes. What I can't quite forgive, as this is a period piece, was that Peter's hair was clearly moussed. Not only was this a serious affront in the period piece category, it made him an Edward-wannabe and, similar to the effect it had on Robert Pattinson, took away practically all of Shiloh Fernandez's attractiveness. And, for those of you who are interested, I don't know if you've looked at other pictures of him, but he is SMOKIN'. So seriously, I don't know what they were thinking with the hair gel. I can only hope that, in spite of bad hair choices, we'll see more of him in better-directed, better-written movies.

And now to give credit where it really is due. The cinematography was quite good. It didn't make up for the writing, but there were some extremely lovely moments, especially Red's hallucination-scenes wherein her cloak gets much longer and is usually being blown around in the wind as she walks through untouched snow. SO visually appealing. So kudos to the crew for that.

I will also own that the Wolf was meticulously animated. While I still prefer Van Helsing's man-wolf, the oversized, lean Wolf of Red Riding Hood ranks right up there with the best. I may even place it as my second-favorite werewolf design in film. (Perhaps third, with American Werewolf in London holding an honorary second place.)

The next credit-award is possibly what shocked me most of all: I actually didn't predict who the Wolf was. It distracted me even from the poor acting for almost the entire second half of the film. There are some false threads and enough ambiguity that the reveal was refreshing. I won't spoil that part, just in case anyone wants to find out on their own.

What amused me the most about this film, however, was the blatant murder-mystery-game feeling the whole production had. Gary Oldman literally said something to the effect of "Bar the entrances. No-one leaves!" I burst out laughing.

My conclusion is that someone got drunk, played The Werewolves of Miller's Hollow, watched Twilight, and spat out "I HAVE A WONDERFUL IDEA."

Tim Burton, Danny Elfman, you make me mourn what this movie could have been.

Red on IMDb
Red's YouTube Trailer
The best game in Existence: The Werewolves of Miller's Hollow and its two expansions, New Moon and The Village!