October 17, 2007

  • TMNT

    I rented the TMNT (2007 film) DVD last thursday on a 1-week loan, and since I had to return it tomorrow I watched it today over lunch.  I must say I agree with the commentator someone who said that this was the best Turtles film yet.  I was initially sceptical when I heard they'd decided to do it all CGI, but after watching it, and after the successes of Pixar films such as The Incredibles, I think it was the correct choice.  Doing the film CGI allowed the filmmakers the freedom to make the Turtles do the kind of action people have always imagined them doing - you'd never be able to train an actor (other than, perhaps wushu actors, and good luck getting them all in one american-made film!) to do the moves and action they did in this movie, especially not in the 1990's era Turtle suits!

    As far as the cgi, I was very impressed with the overall quality, especially after I learned that it was made by a relatively unknown-till-now Hong Kong animation studio under the animation company Imagi.  They produced a level of animation comparable to that of Dreamworks and Pixar, with the shading, texturing, and overall darker look of it (compared to earlier cartoons and movies).  And the expressions!  In a movie about ninja turtles, they really needed to have their digital actors be expressive to carry through the "human" part of the acting, and they definitely succeeded in that respect.  The expressions by the characters, both human and... well... mutant... were lively, comic, not *too* cartoony (as might be the case from a Disney-pixar production), and yet very nicely followed the nuances of the voice acting.  Very impressed. The skin tone patterns, lighting, reflections, the little details on the turtles' and the buildings were also quite impressive, as was the ever-flowing contrails of the turtles' masks.

    As always, I was very impressed with the musical score by Klaus Badelt, who produced a very upbeat and energetic score that very much reflected the Turtles' roof-hopping nighttime escapades.  Every time I hear it I like it more, good heart-pumpin' night-rompin' action fun.

    I also have to say the visual style and directing was excellent - the movie always in motion, whether it be the martial arts action, following alongside the turtles as they patrolled the rooftops, or Mikey's skateboarding through the sewers.  There wasn't too much of the silly extreme closeup camerawork so typical of American action movies, which severely detracts from martial arts films (probably because the animators were from Hong Kong!  That, and they didn't have to worry about their CGI actors not being able to do the moves convincingly...).  The action choreography was also unexpectedly impressive for a CGI animated film.

    The plot was pretty standard and nothing too deep, perhaps a little cliche, but it was of a satisfactory to maintain the viewer's interest, and had a grand enough "save-the-world" scope to suffice for the Turtles' triumphant return to the big screen.  We're not expecting Shakespeare or Tom Clancy intrigue here, folks!  What really impressed me about the writing, however, was the dialogue.  The dialogue was always very sharp (as was the delivery by the voice actors), the jokes well-placed, never too cliche, and very characteristic for each of the characters.  There was rarely a flat moment.  You could tell the writing staff really understood their characters.

    Voice acting:  Good.  Everyone did their jobs decently.  That's all I have to say.  Kudo's to all actors, from Patrick Stewart to Sarah Michelle Gellar (never would have figured her as an April O'Neil...), (and Lawrence Fishburne's short narration, haha), and especially to the late Mako Iwamatsu as Splinter.  And unexpectedly, Zhang Ziyi as Karai... never heard her voice that low before, lol.  She's usually playing such brats in her on-screen roles, it's refreshing to see her play a different type of character.  One odd thing:  I don't know if it was just the DVD, but at many times, I felt the voices and the dialogue was somewhat muffled, and I had to turn up the volume to hear what was being said.

    As far as the comedy, I loved the little touches, the very characteristic witty banter between the personalities of each individual Turtle, the little character moments between each character, whether funny or dramatic.  However, don't get me wrong:  the laughs and the slapstick kept me very entertained, like Mikey falling off the couch, or what the Turtles have each been up to in the time since we last saw them.  Regarding little touches in the plot - I liked the fact that they kept this movie to the established continuity of the previous three films.  Nothing's more annoying than constantly rebooting a franchise with every new iteration.  There are even small visual cues left over from the previous Turtles' feature films if you look closely.

    One more note about the DVD:  The dvd comes with lots of little extras, deleted scenes, altered scenes, storyboard sequences, etc.  They really enhanced the enjoyment of the film.  The only change I would have suggested would be to have the option both of watching the deleted/altered/extended scenes with and without the commentary.  Although the commentary by writer/director Kevin Munroe was very interesting, at times you couldn't tell what they were talking about because you couldn't hear the original dialogue of the scene in the background.

    4 lightning bolts out of five.