Tomb Raider

     I found the rotten tomatoes page for this film amusing. It hung around nearly a perfect 50% for so long. Though I'd say the viewer's grade of 70% is more correct.

     Here's the deal: the film was good. Had some cool sequences, but the pacing was a bit off. The first act lasted longer than it needed to, spending time on action sequences that didn't truly connect to the plot. Also on scenes that weren't strictly necessary to move the plot along (her pawning a necklace to get money could've been replaced with her just finding her father's stash).
      In addition, there were some sequences that tried to build up tension, but instead just felt gamey. Which is to be expected, given that this film was based off the 2013 game Tomb Raider. But lifting scenes straight from the games doesn't work quite the same in a movie as in a game. There is a sequence where she is trying to a void going down a water fall, and keeps jumping from frying pan to frying pan, and even remarks with a lampshading "Seriously?!" in regards to the fact she doesn't get a breather. This sequence would be good in a game (and it was), but in a movie it does reach levels of ridiculousness.
      But, beyond the pacing, there was another problem in the feel of the movie... it took itself too seriously. Everything is super gritty, dirty, painful... and there is no levity to the proceedings. The film is basically The Mummy with Brandon Fraser, minus the comedy that made it an adventure film instead of an action film.
      Lara Croft and Tomb Raider are adventures, not straight action. On an adventure, there has to be fun, otherwise it is a boring adventure. I get that Lara is pretty serious here because it is life and death... but that's why the other characters should pick up the slack. I can't even remember the name of the main villain, and he was so bland I sometimes confused him with some of his lackies. If he's gone stir crazy from hunting on the island for 7 years, SHOW IT. He should be bombastic; he should be beyond excited to find and enter the tomb, laugh at inappropriate times, and generally be a fun and memorable villain.


     What might've hurt the movie was sticking closely to the game. Lara Croft is not so difficult to work with that you have to copy her acclaimed game to do well. She is literally a more mountain climby version of Indiana Jones, with a bow or two pistols instead of a whip.
      I think sequels are very likely to occur, and may even do better than this origin story, but they will have to look at the story from a different angle than a game. What works in a game won't necessarily work in a movie. A unique story for Tomb Raider wouldn't even be that hard, it's just a game of madlibs:

"Lara goes to a __(burial location)___ in _(region)_ that contains an ancient _(magical thing)_ that needs to be __(verb)__ to save the _(location)_"

     Add some fun people to talk to, some jokes, action sequences with tomb traps, a crazy villain, and you got the makings of a good Tomb Raider movie.

A Wrinkle in Time

     In Monster Hunter, the main weapon I use is a Lance.

What if he comes at you with a pointed stick?

     The lance has THE strongest defense in the game series, especially in the latest entry, World. With the right abilities and moves, you can defend against ANY attack. Behind your shield, you are invincible. However, you can't hunt monsters just by blocking. You have to fight back as well.

     That's the thing with the lance; while it has the best defense, to use it best, you are meant to be aggressive. Think of fights and conflict as a scale containing positive and negative actions. A positive action is when you act, you attack, or you do something that gives you free reign to attack. Negative actions are when you resist, or negate someone else's positive action.

      You want to have that scale leaning heavily in the positive, but with enough in the negative to not die.

       That metaphor is about positive characters; characters that take action, and take control over their situation. Negative characters just go along for the ride and have nothing to really contribute.

        For instance, take Phoebe of The Magic School Bus:

We never made intros this long at my old school...

     She is just along for the ride. She has no claim to any positive actions over her situation, or the situations she is led to. Meanwhile, Arnold, the resident complainer, has made multiple positive actions. Though he still lacks control over his situations, he has made actions that exert control over the direction that they go, such as forcing his cousin to abandon her space junk by removing his helmet (if you have understood the references so far, you already know that one, but if you don't know, Magic School Bus is a series by Scholastic books that got turned into a TV show in 1994...)

      The Magic School Bus is the perfect comparison for A Wrinkle in Time.

     The plot is basically this: Mrs. Frizzle takes her class of Meg, Charles Wallace, and Scott on a trip to Ireland with Tusks (I call it Tuskreland), and then has them huff cave fumes to go on a psychedelic trip to find Meg's father inside Ego's mind.

     That may sound reductive, but the film honestly could use some trimming. For starters, the third kid's name isn't Scott, it's Hobbes. No, it's actually Klein. Point is, it doesn't matter.

    Point blank, the only white male in the film doesn't need to be there, serves no narrative purpose, and ultimately takes no actions of his own, positive or negative. His presence adds nothing, and nothing will remind us of him.

     Then there's Meg... She is the central character, and she is Phoebe. She is dragged along kicking and screaming; never saying yes, only saying no. Her only actions are beaning a girl with a basket ball, and telling her brother "I love you Charles Wallace!"

      Don't mean to interrupt myself, but this has to be dealt with NOW. His name is beyond awkward, because they ALWAYS use his full name like that. Combined with his nature as a weird little smartalek makes it seem like he's more of a charge than a little brother. If you actually love someone, and are around them enough, you tend to only use that many syllables when referring to them by name when you're mad. Otherwise, you're more likely to call them one name, use initials, a nickname, a diminutive... He should be referred to as Charles, Wallace, Charlie, Wally, Waldo, or even CW. Always calling him Charles Wallace not only seems overly formal and weird, but also wastes space on the screenplay.

      Since we're on him, I should also mention how his weirdness is just plain distracting. He up and vanishes for no reason at one point, just to reappear with no explanation. Then he is hypnotized by IT (I'd clarify it is not the killer clown, but it might as well have been actually) with a multiplication times table. That isn't a joke, he is literally hypnotized by reciting his two times table. Then he becomes the embodiment of the main villain.
       I get the idea they were going for this, upping the stakes by having the villain take over the body of a friend. Unfortunately the friend was a 6 year old hippie in a sweater-vest with all the menace and presence of a jar of cucumbers. If they had instead taken the father as the face, that would've had some impact. Admittedly it would've just looked like Kirk went power mad, but still.

        Speaking of resemblances, can you identify this person:

      If you said Oprah, then you see the problem. Mrs. Frizzle's college professor here is actually called "Mrs. Which." But she will only be seen as Oprah. Not helped by the fact it is painfully obvious during a lot of CG shots that Oprah wasn't on set with them, and was likely filmed separate. At most, I could count one scene where she could have been on set with them. You never believe in Mrs. Which. It could've been played by anyone else and it would've worked better. If it was Morgan Freeman, he would have SOLD that part, despite being Morgan Freeman. The only reason it is Oprah is because of marketing. Her acting was passable at times, but any time she tried to sound inspiring or reassuring, she just sounded like she was on her talk show, and like even she didn't believe what she was saying.

     Literal Mrs.Frizzle is also in the movie, called "Mrs. Whatsit."

     ...

     Anyway, Meg does nothing positive really. The reason why this is important is because it makes her boring. If Rocky was just about talking about the upcoming fight, not doing anything about it, and then only guarding from Apollo's hits until Apollo tuckers himself out, you'd rightfully call it boring and think that the only thing Rocky has going for him is a bunch of endurance and possibly no brain. The reason I started with an explanation about the lance in Monster Hunter is because of the oft repeated phrase in the trailers, "be a warrior."
     The film does not seem to know what a warrior is. A warrior is someone willing to take action, be brave in the face of their own fears, and live their life in a way that would allow them to enter the gates of Valhalla. Die gloriously while fighting, that is what being a warrior is. While "fighting" can be interpreted in some wide ways, including fighting diseases or for peace, it does not include hiding and pleading. There is a distinct difference between pleading, and calling out. Meg didn't win the final battle, it was Waldo. She called out for Wally to fight IT, and he did. She didn't counter IT's logic, or attack IT to release CW, she just pleaded for Charlie to come to the fore.



     Finally, the biggest flaws with the movie... being weird for the sake of being weird isn't whimsical, it is just weird. Also you cannot glide by on whimsy. Avatar wasn't the success it was just because it was beautiful; despite what the internet may have you believe, it was also because it had a good story. Also, beautiful imagery is only beautiful if we can tell where we are in a scene. more than once I got lost on where people were standing on an open field because the camera completely threw out the 180 degree rule.
     Something I also noticed was a complete lack of any interesting animals or foliage. These were alien worlds, and we didn't even seen strange birds, just some color changing flowers out of Alice in Wonderland. Your whimsy was weak!



     But, the film could be done better. I know it could, last October it got really good reviews. Of course, it went under the name IT and was written by Stephen King, but it was essentially the same plot. A group of kids fight off an extraterrestrial evil, and save their friend through the power of love. The main difference is in IT, the kids take positive actions, fighting off a bully, actively hunting the clown, trying to learn about the clown, and eventually bring it down.
    That is the crux of a Wrinkle in Time's problem. It doesn't throw the kinds of obstacles at its characters that they could take positive action against. They also don't set up love as being a possible barrier or counter to IT's evil
    The first round of fixes is to condense the characters; one weird star girl, Meg, and her brother Charlie. More screentime for each allows for more characterization, and increases their abilities to make positive actions. Second, change the obstacles to ones they can counter or combat. No tornadoes or sky squid ink... and don't make IT so easily countered by saying no. You know that one scene in Stepford? Yeah the trailers showed that scene in full. They don't attack the heroes or try to hypnotize them... they just decline some food and they go away. It should be a lot harder. The planet is essentially like the mirror world in Doctor Strange, it should FORCE the characters to fight, not just resist. The world should run off their fears, or entice their desires. Else, IT just seems like an idiot that deserves to be beaten and outsmarted by Mrs Frizzle and Oprah.
     Finally... don't have the villain physically attack Meg. Mentally attack her. make her pull a Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix and tell It why it is wrong, and prove her mental fortitude. Or hell, have her use her knowledge of physics (she apparently has that, not well established, I imagine scenes were cut) to cause IT to be ripped apart by teleportation, or send IT into a star. At the end of the movie, it doesn't really seem like she stopped IT, just that it was shaken off.
     Basically, the characters need a way to create an actual impact on the plot, good or ill.



     So that's my writing type of the day! Make sure your characters can actually do things and not just be led by the nose like cattle!