Letterboxd — Your life in film

"I will walk over your cold corpses!"

J. J. Abrams Star Trek was a brilliant film and one of my favourites from 2009. his reinvention of the characters and the story is bold and, if you know Trekkies, quite controversial.

Four years after the first "reboot" film Into Darkness has had a bit of a long journey to the screen. Followed by a lot of old and newly reaped fans the development has been going on for the past two years or so and various leaks and footage and rumors came out trying to work out what the film would be about. However for all the media that the film got, not a SINGLE thing was spoiled at all for me. Even after watching about three different trailers I was surprised by every aspect of the story.

Abram's direction is of course superb with the cameras making all sorts of amazing twists and turns that were just so unbelievable to watch. Like any film and especially a science fiction one, Into Darkness is extremely visual and even with a super keen eye it looks seamless. Not one set piece was awkward and not one textured graphic looked awkward. Just seamless visionary craftsmanship from start to finish.

The acting was also superb. Benedict Cumberbatch was the person I was most enthralled by, but I think that will be most people's opinions. Not because it's him, well it might have been, but because he was sooooo good! His voice gave me chills, which is exactly why I included the introductory quote that I did. When he speaks threats I feel like just killing myself. Very similar presence to that of Bane in The Dark Knight Rises. Massive foreboding character that is just not scared of anything.

Of course the rest of the cast is really amazing and as my friend knows I have an infatuation with McCoy's furrow.....

Anyway, Into Darkness is fantastic, I think anyone like my brother is going to hate it, but I love it. Looking forward to seeing it again sometime, cause seriously, it's fantastic!

"Our lives are not our own. From womb to tomb we're bound to others."

Cloud Atlas is one the most amazing movies I've seen. I'm really annoyed that I didn't see it in the cinemas, but thanks to limited release in Australia it was really hard to anyway.

Anywho, like I said the film is incredible. Everyone gave a pretty good performance and the story is surprisingly, really well put together. The main thing that I have to mention is the pacing, which is actually INCREDIBLE. Seriously, I don't know how they did it, but this close to 3 hour long tale is so well timed and delivered that I was not bored once. The editing kept me fully invested in the characters and what was going on.

Now I talked about the acting before, however there is a lot more to be said. The only person I really had any problem with was Tom Hanks. In some parts his characters were just too unreal and he wasn't the best at maintaining accents. Especially while playing his Irish gangster character.

The directing trio also pump fighting scenes with tremendous action. This isn't too surprising given that the Wachowskis are involved. All round the movie is visually stunning. The effects and camera work are so beautiful and the make-up is amazing! I really don't get why this isn't talked about more. I guess 3 hours seems like a lot of time, and admittedly that's why I was apprehensive of it at times, but as I said before the time never really mattered to me in the end.

I think any lover of stories will enjoy this, though I suppose if you're a Wachowski or a science fiction fan you should love this too!