Big Hero 6 (2014)

A treat for both Marvel and Disney fans, Big Hero 6 is great family fun, full to the brim with humour, in-jokes/references and gorgeous animation. It's got a big heart, and features a central character, Baymax, that should easily win a place in the heart of any child.

Hiro is a young boy with a fantastic brain for science and robotics, but no self-motivation. If he applied himself then he could do something truly great, and his brother, Tadashi, knows this. Tadashi takes Hiro to his place of work, a surprise visit that opens Hiro's eyes to the cool possibilities available to someone of his intellect. He also gets to meet Baymax, a health care robot that resembles a humanoid made from marshmallow (yes, he's a BIT like Mr. Stay Puft). It's not long, however, until tragedy strikes. Struggling to cope with his grief, Hiro ends up growing closer to Baymax, and eventually retooling the robot into something quite far removed from his original incarnation. This might help them to bring down a strange supervillain who has appeared in town, one wearing a Kabuki mask. However, Baymax encourages Hiro to contact, and receive support from, a number of friends, which allows a small team of potential heroes to be formed.

Although it's a bit too sweet and cutesy at times, I can't recommend Big Hero 6 highly enough to those who want to watch a superior animated movie aimed at a younger audience. From the city environment - San Fansokyo (a lush amalgamation of San Francisco and Tokyo architectural styles) - to the character design, and the tech on display, this is one of those movies that serves up a veritable feast in every scene.

Directors Don Hall and Chris Williams oversee everything with keen eyes, keeping those gorgeous visuals attached to a script (written by Jordan Roberts, Daniel Gerson and Robert L. Baird) that never shifts the focus away from the main characters. The voice cast includes quite a few famous names (Alan Tudyk, James Cromwell, Damon Wayans Jr, Maya Rudolph, Jaime Chung, T. J. Miller, Genesis Rodriguez), and every single performer does a great job, with highlights being Wayans Jr, Miller, and Rudolph. The two leads may not have name recognition, Ryan Potter voices Hiro and Scott Adsit voices Baymax, but the most important thing here is that their voices work, and work brilliantly.

You're never more than a few moments away from a good laugh, the action scenes are exhilarating, and any one of the main characters could make a cool role model. But be warned, the film also manages to explore loss and grief without sugar-coating the heartache. There may be one or two conversations being had between parents and children as they leave the cinema, and it's something worth being prepared for. Is there anything here on a par with the potential trauma many of us experienced when we first saw Bambi? Maybe not. But it's almost too close to call.

Based upon some comic material that I was formerly unaware of, this proves once again that you don't necessarily need brand recognition or a built-in fanbase to deliver a near-perfect blockbuster movie. You just need some TLC.

8/10

If you have enjoyed this, or any other, review on the blog then do consider the following ways to show your appreciation. A subscription/follow costs nothing.
It also costs nothing to like/subscribe to the YouTube channel attached to the podcast I am part of - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCErkxBO0xds5qd_rhjFgDmA
Or you may have a couple of quid to throw at me, in Ko-fi form - https://ko-fi.com/kevinmatthews

Tusk (2014)

Tusk is a strange beast, no pun intended (considering the content of the film). A highly flawed, uneven film that many will find impossible to like, it shows writer-director Kevin Smith continuing to develop and highlight his darker side. Many of his comedies had black humour in them, of course, but it was Red State that really let him dip his toes into something approaching horror. Tusk, at least on the surface, does the same. But the fact that it's actually a comedy makes it a tough one to easily recommend.

Let's get the basic storyline out of the way. Justin Long plays a podcaster named Wallace Bryton. Wallace and his friend,Teddy (Haley Joel Osment), use their airtime to look at clips on the internet of people who have gone viral, mainly through stupidity but sometimes because of certain strange characteristics. Wallace is always after the next big thing with which to shock and impress his audience, which takes him to the home of an old man (Michael Parks) who assures him that he has a story or two to tell. He does indeed have some stories. But his most interesting one hasn't been completed yet, and it may well involve Wallace.

Based on an idea that came about during Smith's own podcast (SModcast), and featuring a number of ideas and even lines of dialogue pre-approved by his fanbase, you'd be forgiven for wondering if Tusk was a franken-film. It certainly feels, at times, like a number of disconnected scenes thrown together with little thought given to the central storyline. Yet it also has a pretty obvious message underlying most of the content, so writing it off as nothing more than an easy fan-pleaser is probably doing it a bit of a disservice. It's also worth noting that every moment that doesn't quite work, every comedic beat that feels too weird, every wild image pushing the film further into dark absurdity, it all shows a confident (or brave . . . . . or foolish) director in the hot seat.

Long isn't at his best here, but he's not too bad. His characters is supposed to be mildly irritating, at best, and he is. Parks is the star turn, reeling off tales that range from the sublime to the ridiculous with equal ease and aplomb. Osment and Genesis Rodriguez both do well in supporting roles, with the latter playing the girlfriend of Long's character, and there's a performance from Johnny Depp to add to another list of his kooky performances. It's that performance, if anything, that should clue viewers in to the fact that this is a pitch black comedy. Although if you don't get it by that point then you've just not been paying attention.

Anyone expecting another piece of nastiness like The Human Centipede (First Sequence) should content themselves by instead renting The Human Centipede: Full Sequence. This is a film aimed more at people who start to grunt and mutter as soon as they hear of yet another internet "celebrity" with no obvious talent. It's not one I'd rush to revisit, but it's certainly an interesting curio.

6/10

http://www.amazon.com/Tusk-Blu-ray-Michael-Parks/dp/B00NX8RUZE/ref=sr_1_2?s=movies-tv&ie=UTF8&qid=1418819387&sr=1-2&keywords=tusk