Movie Review: Edge of Tomorrow

This weekend I went with my daughter and my BFF Mike to see the latest Tom Cruise movie, Edge of Tomorrow.

The film, based off the 2004 Japanese novel All You Need is Kill, focuses on a man forced into a War he recruits for but doesn't participate in, and the events surrounding his death on his first day in battle.

The problem is, as soon as he dies, he wakes up again, two days earlier, and relives the same two days again, and again, and again.

The film itself is pretty great, both leads do a wonderful job and the effects are pretty fantastic (although I still don't recommend seeing it in 3D if you can avoid it).  I enjoyed it a lot more than Oblivion last year, and to be fair, I liked that film fine enough, but this one brought a lot of interesting concepts to the table, and also had Mechs (robotic suits of armour found commonly in Japanese animation) which I absolutely loved.

My only issue with the film (as with a lot of movie adaptations) was that it left out a number of things from the original book I would have liked to have seen (including the ending).

In the end, see the movie, as it's well worth it, but definitely pick up the book, because it was just amazing.

Book Review: All You Need is Kill

For the first time since finishing Grad School, I've finished a book in a day.

Also the book was pretty freaking awesome!

All You Need is Kill, by Hiroshi Sakurazaka is a great little military science fiction story which begins like a bizarre war-themed SF story mixed with the film Groundhog Day and quickly evolves into something much more interesting.

I fully admit that I picked up the novel as I wanted an excuse to go see the new Tom Cruise film Edge of Tomorrow (which is based on the book) and always find it easier to justify seeing a film if I've read the original source material.

The story moves incredibly quickly and is a great mix of Japanese Mecha Science Fiction (focusing on stories involving robotic suits controlled by people) and an intriguing concept, both of which kept me interested throughout and turning pages faster than I normally do while reading SF.

Would I recommend it?  Absolutely.

Movie Review: Oblivion

For my last post before switching over to my month of examining Hack/Slash I thought I would talk about a pretty great movie I saw over the weekend; Joseph Kosinski's Oblivion.

Adapted from an unpublished graphic novel (once the film was picked up, the publication date for the graphic novel was moved to coincide with the release of the film), Oblivion, starring Tom Cruise was a pretty amazing looking film.

As a story, I ran into the issue that I've read a lot of science fiction over the years and was pretty confident as I went through the film what all of the major plot points and twists would be - I still enjoyed the movie, but it was for other reasons.

First of all, the film is staggering in how good it looks - the sets (specifically the house in the clouds the two main characters live in) was simply amazing to look at - I'm used to spotting computer-gernated effects in films and there really didn't seem to be a lot as far as the sets were concerned.  Secondly, the score, by M83 was just great - I haven't purchased a lot of scores in the last few years, but I have to admit I was pretty tempted here.  I felt the acting was pretty great - I just sort of wish the story had a bit more of a wow factor for me - which again, may just be a jaded science fiction fan's response.

Definitely worth checking out.