Avatar Review

Length: 162 min

Rated: PG-13

Distributor: 20th Century Fox

Release Date: 2009-12-18

Starring: Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Stephen Lang, Sigourney Weaver, Joel Moore, Giovanni Ribisi, Michelle Rodriguez, Wes Studi, Peter Mensah, Laz Alonso, C.C.H. Pounder

Directed by James Cameron

Produced by James Cameron, Jon Landau

Written by James Cameron

Avatar isn't the future of movies; it's the past. Telling a story as old as Westerns and swashbucklers and epics and, hell, Greek mythology, it's a classical adventure story that happens to look very, very different from anything we've seen before. That revolutionary look is the reason people are rightly calling the movie a game-changer, but don't be fooled-- Avatar is as old-fashioned and romantic as Titanic, and thrillingly, just as wonderful to watch.

A rousing, play-it-to-the-rafters adventure story wrapped around a deep romance, Avatar is the exactly the James Cameron movie you would expect after 11 years in the making, a masterful combination of technology and the kind of storytelling that's made movies work since the beginning. Yes it's hokey and at times unoriginal, but with so much going on in the background of both the Pandoran forest and the advanced human technology, you'll want the simplest story possible in order for Cameron to play some more in this world. From the floating Hallelujah Mountains to the iridescent Tree of Souls, Pandora is so thoroughly realized that it feels quite literally like a transporting experience. Never before have 3D glasses felt less intrusive between the viewer and the screen; never before has CGI felt so natural, so necessary, or so alive.

In the future, earth has been destroyed, and an anonymous corporation has set upon Pandora to mine something called unobtanium (Cameron has a thing for obvious names, but that's a real scientific term). In one ignored corner of the corporation headquarters, scientist Grace Augustine (Sigourney Weaver) has invented avatars fused with DNA from both humans and the native culture, the Na'vi. While the company execs, led by Giovanni Ribisi's weasel-faced Parker Selfridge (what'd I tell you about the obvious names?) want to obliterate the native cultures, Grace's unit is aiming for humanitarian outreach and cross-cultural understanding.

Enter Jake Sully (Sam Worthington), brought to Grace's lab to replace his dead twin brother, and bringing a bullheaded ex-Marine's attitude that clashes immediately, and wonderfully, with Grace's own no-nonsense ways. Having lost use of his legs in combat years earlier, Jake takes to life within his avatar as a chance to experience the world again, and the minute he's out in the Pandoran forest, finds himself stranded after a chase with a particularly nasty local creature.

Coming to his rescue is Neytiri (Zoe Saldana), princess of the local Na'vi clan with pretty much no patience for Jake and his arrogance, having saved him only thanks to a symbol from their god figure, Eywah. Neytiri takes him home and the tribe is convinced to teach Jake their ways; as soon as he goes to sleep, though, he wakes up in his own body back in lab, sharing details about the Na'vi tribe with Grace as Selfridge, who along with tough military type Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang) is anxious to use all this insider knowledge to tear down the Na'vi from the inside.

You know how it goes from here-- Jake is dazzled by the Na'vi way of life, especially since that's where he gets to use his legs, but the human threat is approaching, and before too long you know they'll figure out he's been leaking information to the bad guys. But the story is there to make you feel familiar enough for the visuals to utterly blow you away. The bioluminescent Pandoran forest, from the giant palm fronds to the packs of dog-weasel beasts to the massive Home Tree that the Na'vi make their home, is so well-crafted, so gorgeous, that the line between CGI and reality simply disappears. It's impossible to overstate how real the Na'vi and avatar characters look, how every flick of their eyes or wrinkle in their faces seems organic. These alien creatures, their skills and their physicality and wild natures, are the best argument ever seen for motion-capture performances. There's never been anything like them.

For all the gaps in character motivation and underdeveloped side characters, Cameron introduces us to Pandora perfectly, so that when it comes time for the final battle, every peak and monstrous creature is a familiar friend. The CGI in those scenes is stunning, of course, but what's better is Cameron's handle on the cutting and camerawork required for battle scenes. In a decade where fight choreography is frequently masked by frantic editing, and you're lucky to know which side is where in an epic battle, Cameron shows himself, once again, as the old-school master.

Many of the big parts of the story are disappointments-- the Na'vi, with their feathered headdresses and braids, resemble far too closely the racist "noble savages" of past Westerns, and the lesson of environmental tolerance attached to them feels rote at best, insulting at the worst. The corporate and military characters are so transparently evil that they often feel like the real cartoons, while Jake Sully, despite getting in a good zinger once in a while, is essentially a blank slate on which to project our own notions of how heroic we could be, too. But it's all the details that will make you go "wow"; the way the Na'vi literally connect with the earth and animals around them, Neytiri's cries of anguish, or even the technology in Grace's lab. After all, it's not Odysseus's journey and his character we remember; it's all the cool stuff he got to see along the way.

Had Cameron not stuck so closely to a simple story, or replaced some of his notoriously awful dialogue with something slightly less tin-eared, he might have truly had a masterpiece. But then, Avatar might not have felt like such a return to classic epics, and probably wouldn't have been nearly as fun. Over the past decade we've preferred our adventures with a twinge of darkness or irony, be it Johnny Depp's Pirates swagger or the many existential crises of Batman. Cameron has returned to tell us that all we need is a slight and earnest story, a few good characters to carry it along, and thrilling visuals to sweep us all away. Avatar has it all. It's great to have him back.

The Princess And The Frog Review

Rated: G

Distributor: Walt Disney Animation Studios

Release Date: 2009-11-25

Starring: Voices: Anika Noni Rose, Keith David, Jenifer Lewis, John Goodman

Directed by John Musker, Ron Clements

Produced by Peter Del Vecho

Written by Ron Clements, Rob Edwards

It’s actually only been five years since Disney’s last traditionally animated feature but not since the mid-90s has one of them felt this right. The Princess and the Frog is an entry in the mold of Disney’s most enduring, classic, fairytale movies and while its been done before, it never seems to get old. Their obsession with princes and princesses continues and now it’s set to inspire a whole new generation of little girls to run around wearing tiaras. But unlike some of their past efforts, this particular iteration comes with a little more substance than the usual, empty dreaming of true love.

Tiana is a New Orleans waitress with dreams, not of finding a prince, but of owning her own business. Since she was a little girl Tiana has wanted to own a restaurant, and to make that dream come true, she works and works hard. She knows that success takes more than simply wishing on a star and so Tiana ignores frivolity to work double shifts and saves the money she’ll need to make fantasy reality. And though later in the film she’ll learn there’s more to life than hard work, the movie never lets her abandon those core values which have her rolling up her sleeves and getting the job done. She never turns the lovesick waif who abandons herself to follow around a man, you won’t find her sitting around in a castle waiting for him to come and save her. Tiana finds love on her own terms and makes her dreams come true not with wizards or magic, but with determination and effort.

But there’s plenty of magic around her, usually getting in the way. Tiana’s plans for success go awry when she bumps into a talking frog who happens to be a prince named Naveen. Naveen recently ran afoul of a dastardly voodoo practitioner called The Shadow Man, a character in the mold of Disney’s evil, magical, villains. Desperate to become human again, Naveen mistakes her for a princess, convinces her to kiss him, and everything backfires dooming Tiana to the same froggy fate as Naveen. Together they race through the swamp looking for a way to become human again. Along the way they meet a cast of Cajun accented animal critters including Louis, a jazz playing gator, and Ray, a folksy lightning bug with a family full of bright-butted relatives.

Ray in particular was a genius decision on the part of Princess and the Frog’s writers. He could have been a lizard, or a fish, or literally any of the thousands of creatures inhabiting the swamp. But making Ray a lightning bug opens up an amazing range of visual possibilities, as directors Ron Clements and John Musker use Ray and his lightning bug friends to, quite literally, light up the dark in their swampy world. Thousands of tiny firefly lights flit through every scene, lighting up flowers and trees and writing in the sky as the movie’s toe-tapping musical numbers drive the plot and lovingly hand-drawn characters whirl across the screen.

The songs and animation are beautiful, the characters are fully realized, and there’s a great lesson here should you be looking for a way to deprogram your Twilight-mesmerized daughter. If there’s any problem with Princess and the Frog it’s only that it doesn’t feel as epic as some of Disney’s true masterpieces. In a sense it plays out like a small-scale version of movies they’ve already done. As a villain, for instance, The Shadow Man, though colorful and engaging is really just a less powerful version of Little Mermaid’s Ursula or Aladdin’s Jafar. Remember that sweeping, frightening, awesome in scale scene from The Little Mermaid where Ursula grabs Ariel with her magic, twisting and shaping her body into human form while the seas and mountains of the ocean boil around her? Princess and the Frog has that scene too and, while it’s artfully done, it’s on a much smaller scale. Everything about the movie ends up working the same way. It’s a more modestly told affair, a simpler tale in a simpler setting with engaging characters that just don’t quite have the epic pizzazz of some of the others created by Disney.

But that’s not enough to ruin it, only enough to leave Princess and the Frog out of the upper pantheon of Disney’s greatest films. It falls somewhere in the middle, between the unforgettable classics like Beauty and the Beast or The Lion King and the forgettable late-nineties entries like Tarzan or Hercules, the movies which signaled the beginning of the end in Disney’s dominance. Now though, the wait is over. Disney animation is back. The Princess and the Frog is a warm and infinitely enjoyable movie, one which takes advantage of the artistic beauty of hand-drawn animation to tell the kind of fairytale fantasy that only hand-drawn animation can get right.

2012 Reviews

Length: 158 min

Rated: PG-13

Distributor: Columbia Pictures- Sony Pictures

Release Date: 2009-11-13

Starring: John Cusack, Woody Harrelson, Amanda Peet, Danny Glover, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Oliver Platt, Thandie Newton, George Segal, Tom McCarthy

Directed by Roland Emmerich

Produced by Roland Emmerich, Harald Kloser

Written by Roland Emmerich, Harald Kloser

People who view screenwriting as an art and don't particularly care about audience reaction to their films bristle at the thought of screenplay classes, in which Plot Element A and Plot Element B can be put together in such a way that-- voila!-- a hit is born. But Roland Emmerich has taken that very kind of formula writing and made a veritable empire out of it, returning every few years to destroy some corner of the earth and invent a handful of earnest heroes, wisecracking sidekicks and solemn old men to survive his newest take on the apocalypse.

With 2012, as you probably could have guessed from the poster art of tidal waves crashing over the Himalayas, Emmerich is letting go of whatever restraint he might have had before. Clocking in at nearly three hours, boasting about a dozen major characters and at least half a dozen emotional death scenes, 2012 operates on the assumption that, if we liked seeing New York destroyed in The Day After Tomorrow and Washington D.C. zapped in Independence Day, we'll really love witnessing the wholesale destruction of the globe.

I hate to say it, but Emmerich is pretty much right. Far from conveying the horrors that might befall us should anything remotely so destructive happen, 2012 feels more like a soothing bath of Hollywood tropes and cliches, allowing us to witness Los Angeles slide into the ocean like Atlantis, but then warming us with a Woody Harrelson wisecrack and a rousing speech from Chiwetel Ejiofor. It's numbing, sure, especially when the first half is nothing but CGI explosion after another, but on some level it's exactly what we expect out of Hollywood-- shallow spectacle and a bevy of stars, an adventure and a few moral lessons, a giant budget spent guaranteeing we won't feel a bit different than we did when walking into the theater.

If there's any surprise at all in 2012, it's that Chiwetel Ejiofor, not John Cusack, is in fact the star of the film. We meet him in what amount to the film's prologue, a White House-employed geologist trying to prove to a cynical chief of staff (Oliver Platt, wonderfully hammy and villainous) that, in fact, the end is nigh. The cause is less important than the results-- giant fissures open up in the earth's surface, mountains turns to volcanos and skyscrapers turn to ash, and eventually tidal waves cover the entire earth's surface.

Billions of people die in the ensuing melee, but there are only a few we're instructed to care about. Chief among them is Cusack and his family, who start driving out of Los Angeles seconds before the destruction begins thanks to a tip from Woody Harrelson, who plays a Yellowstone-residing conspiracy theorist who saw the whole thing coming and made a YouTube video about it (Emmerich's nods toward modern concerns, like casting Danny Glover as the President and having characters constantly complain about cell service, head toward parody when Harrelson demands that Cusack "download my blog.") Plot mechanics too silly to describe require Cusack, his ex-wife (Amanda Peet), her new boyfriend (Tom McCarthy) and their cutesy kids (Liam James and Morgan Lily) to fly a series of planes on their way to China, where they intend to save their own skins in a manner that's best left discovered in the theater.

Somewhere along the way George Segal perishes on a cruise ship, Danny Glover does the heroic Presidential thing, a Russian oligarch and his bratty kids team up with Cusack and company, and the main players in Washington-- plus the President's comely daughter (Thandie Newton)-- all make their way to a souped-up version of Dick Cheney's undisclosed location. The final quarter of the film, while utterly unnecessary to the disaster elements, is also the best section, finally abandoning generic and plasticine CGI for situations that feel real and dangerous. There's no villain here, unless you count the merely loathsome Platt character, so it takes a lot of effort to keep putting the characters in danger, and by the end of the movie, Emmerich has most certainly run out ideas. But there's something about the scale of it all, or maybe the way seemingly random characters tie into the main plot, that keeps the train chugging along. When Ejiofor gets to make his hero speech, and certain bad characters make good at the eleventh hour, it's not quite a "This is our Independence Day!" moment, but it does come closer than any of Emmerich's films since then. Somehow he's got a real heart beating inside his movie, and no amount of groaner one-liners or thunderous explosions can take that away.

Emmerich claims that 2012 is his final disaster movie, unless Independence Day 2 ever gets off the ground, and the movie is nothing if not an indulgent curtain call for the man who figured out how much we like watching cinematic portrayals of our own demise. It's all the reasons we've ever loved or hated his movies, but also a reminder of why it's high time to move on. When he ends the movie, no lie, on a bathroom, joke, it's not exactly going out on top, but those of us who love Emmerich despite him wouldn't have wanted it any other way.

Level Up Faster in Mafia Wars

1. You level up by gaining experience points. To maximize experience earned, you must choose either fearless (more stamina to fight) or maniac (more energy to do jobs).
2. Try to set a time every day to play the game. That way you will be consistent with your energy and stamina bars filled up to the maximum.
3. Get a buddy. Get a friend that also plays the game. Be sure that both of you connect at different times, and send energy packs to each other on a daily basis. This way you will maximize your energy.
4. Schedule your time so you will be able to deplete your energy bar, level up, and use your daily energy pack. If you time it right, you might be able to enhance your character by 3 levels or more in one day.
5. Don't be afraid to fight. Add stamina points and pick fights often. Fights are a great source of experience. Your stamina (to fight) and your energy (to do jobs) recharge in parallel, so it is always a good idea to deplete both every time you can.
6. Get buddies to put you as 'Mastermind' on their mafias. Also do the same for them and you will gain more experience from jobs and level up faster.
7. Recruit to your mafia, so you can pick fights with larger mafias and get more experience.

Related Articles :

• How to Master Mafia Wars
• Get Your Mafia Wars Energy Faster

Get Your Mafia Wars Energy Faster

1. Start out by choosing the Maniac class when you create your Mafia Wars character. This class has a faster energy refresh time in Mafia Wars. Choosing this class in Mafia Wars will help you level up your character faster because you will be able to complete more missions per day because your energy will refill faster.
2. Use reward points to fill up your energy in Mafia Wars. Each time you complete a job tier or level up your character in Mafia Wars you will earn reward points. You can go to the godfather and use your reward points in Mafia Wars to refill your energy. This will allow you to complete more missions by filling up your energy faster in Mafia Wars. You can also purchase reward points in Mafia Wars with your credit card or you can complete offers to gain more reward points so that you can use your Mafia Wars reward points more often.
3. Master all of the jobs 3 times in the Boss tier in Mafia Wars. When you master all of the jobs in the Boss tier in Mafia Wars you will be rewarded with a golden throne. The Golden Throne in Mafia Wars will give your character 2x energy regeneration every time it refreshes in Mafia Wars. This will double the amount of energy that you get each time it refreshes in Mafia Wars.

Related Articles :

• How to Master Mafia Wars
• Level Up Faster in Mafia Wars
  

How to Master Mafia Wars

1. Jobs/Investments
You’ll want to do some jobs to get some money. But pretty soon, you won’t have to do any jobs, because with the right investments, you can make more money letting your investments do the work for you. At that point, you’ll just be doing jobs to level up. Stick to doing jobs that give you the highest payoff/energy used ratio or the highest experienced gained/energy used ratio. This will let you gain money faster or level up faster, or both.

Once you have some money, you’ll want to invest it. Stick to getting the most out of your money. Mafia Mike’s is the best investment you can make, so get as many as you can. After that, only buy properties with the highest return to investment ratio. Don’t forget to include the land cost into this figure; once you build on land you lose the return the land gives you.

It’s better to stick the money in the bank until you can put it to use later. The bank will charge you a 10% laundering fee, but that’s much better than losing it all in a fight.

Once you have a stable income, you can move on to outfitting your mafia with weapons, armor, and vehicles.

Note: As you complete jobs, you will level up, and you will gain experience and Godfather points. Do not spend them without reading the section about leveling (below).

2. Winning Fights
To win more attacks, outfit everyone in your mafia with the weapons, armor, and vehicles with the highest attack ratings. The higher your average attack rating per mafia member is, the better your chances are of winning the fight. Usually the best weapons are awarded from the Godfather.

To win more when you are attacked, you should also have the weapons, armor, and vehicles with the highest defense ratings. When you are being attacked, your mafia will use those items to defend instead of the attack weapons. Again, the higher your average defense rating per mafia member, the better your chances are of winning the fight.

3. People that want to take you out
Instead of spending endless amounts of stamina trying to kill your attackers, spend 1 stamina point to have them killed on the hit list. There is always someone out there willing to kill your opponent for a tiny $10,000. You get to keep your stamina, and they learn you are ruthless and will not tolerate being attacked.

The benefit of this is twofold. Not only can you get even with your attacker, but you can also focus the entire game around defense. Since you won’t ever be attacking anyone, you can spend those experience points on defense, and increase your chances of winning more when you are attacked. This will keep your statistics higher throughout the game.

Also, you can check out a website I found where you can put their ID up on hit list without using stamina. It's http://www.mafiawarshits.com

4. Leveling
When you advance your level, you are awarded experience points and godfather points. Early in the game, focus on increasing your energy. You should do this until you can have enough energy to do most of the jobs (I recommend about 40-50 energy points). After that, focus on defense and stamina. Later in the game, you can adjust the strategy a bit to fit your needs.

Normally, you should not spend Godfather points on anything except weapons. If you wish, you can earn godfather points by completing offers or purchasing them. In the event you earn some extra godfather points, use them to boost your skill points or to get specialty weapons. The other options (like giving you cash or a full energy refill) will come in time with no interaction required by you anyway, so why spend precious godfather points on them?5. Mafia Size
You don’t need a large mafia to be successful at Mafia Wars. In fact, the larger your mafia is, the harder it is to play the game, especially early in the game. When you have a large mafia, you have to outfit each member with the best weapons, armor, and vehicles you can get your hands on. This costs a large amount of money, and unless you have a very large income, it’s better to just build your investments so you can afford to grow your mafia later. Once you have a large income (at least $1 million per hour), then you can start to grow your mafia. As you grow your mafia, remember to get both attack and defense items for them to use.

Tips & Warnings

• When you are not logged in, money that you have earned from investments since you logged out cannot be lost in a fight. However, money you have not invested or deposited in the bank can still be lost.
• If you have health below the fight threshold, you won't see when someone attacks you (and if you attack someone, they won't see it on their updates...an easy way to tell if they are too weak is to try to add them to the hitlist. If the game asks you how much money you want to spend, they are not too weak; otherwise, you will get a message telling you that you can't add them to the hitlist).
• Do not build your mafia size until you have enough money or Godfather points to outfit your entire mafia with the best items for fights.

Related Articles :

• Get Your Mafia Wars Energy Faster
• Level Up Faster in Mafia Wars
  

Shoe Polish & Polishing Leather Shoes

As I was looking for certain shoe polish products, I was surprised to find warnings that shoe polish contained toxic chemicals and could actually be considered very dangerous.

While I know most of us have had shoe polish around the house for years, probably without any problems, the warnings I found were of enough concern to me that I wanted to share the information with all of you. Below is more information about the toxicity of certain shoe polishes, as well as alternative and traditional polishing instructions.

Toxicity of Shoe Polish

Certain shoe polishes contain toxic chemicals that can be absorbed through the skin and or inhaled (read more at the epa web site).

It is essential that if you use shoe polish, you wear gloves when doing so, do not drink alcohol while polishing shoes (it can increase the effects of certain chemicals), and keep all shoe polish out of reach of children and animal companions.

If used, shoe polish should be used in a well-ventilated area, and all of the product shoud be used, with any residual being discarded or given to someone who will use it.

When disposed, shoe polish needs to be handled as a hazardous househould substance. Rags or clothes used that come in contact with the shoe polish should also be immediately discarded.

While some shoe polished claim to be non-toxic, most do not list their ingredients, so it is impossible to know that they are truly free of dangerous chemicals. While it is better to avoid shoe polish if possible, if this is not practical for you, and you do feel the need to buy commercial shoe polish - please use the necessary precautions.

Alternatives to Using Traditional Shoe Polish

Take your shoes to a shoe repair shop to have them cleaned and polished for you.

Rub your smooth leather shoes (not suede or nubuck) with the inside of a banana peel (test this method first on a small spot of the shoe), then buff and shine with a soft cloth or rag.

Olive oil or walnut oil works for smooth leather as well. Work a small amount into shoe, and polish with a soft cotton cloth. Again, try this method in an inconspicous spot before using the oil on the entire shoe.

Polishing Your Leather Shoes with Traditional Shoe Polish

Shoe polishes are available in liquid, cream or paste. Liquid shoe polish dries quickly, but is not readily available in a lot of colors and does not last as long as the other options. Shoe polish paste is the longest lasting, but is very messy and slow to work with. Shoe polish cream is a great compromise, and is available in lots of colors.

Of course you'll need to get the appropriate color of polish for you shoes. You can find a variety of shoe polishes at shoe stores, shoe repair shops and general stores, although you won't find a large variety of colors at the latter. There are also several places on the web where you can find shoe polish. For example, George's Shoes sells several different colors and types of shoe polishes.

Apply the polish to a small, less conspicous area of the shoe to test and be sure the color is right.

Rub the polish into the shoe with a soft cloth, and allow it to dry thoroughly.

After the shoe polish is dry, shine your shoes by buffing them with a soft cloth or brush made specifically for shining shoes.

Cleaning and Conditioning Leather Shoes

Cleaning Smooth Leather Shoes

Remove dirt by cleaning with a leather cleaner made specifically for smooth leathers. You can use saddle soap or a smooth leather shoe cleaner.

Shoe cleaners come in gels, foams, sprays, liquids and creams. Many leather cleaners come with an applicator top, or you can use a soft shoe brush to aid in removing dirt from the surface of the shoe. This will also help to remove dirt from any cracks in the shoes.

After cleaning, let the shoes dry for a few minutes and begin shining the shoes with a soft cotton cloth - either a shoe shine cloth, or even an old t-shirt, as long as it's soft and made of cotton.

Conditioning Leather Shoes

Conditioning your leather shoes will help soften and moisturize the leather, and protect it from drying out and cracking. Certain types of leather, and shoes worn in dryer climates might need to be conditioned more often.

Some shoe cleaning products will clean and condition your shoes, but if you want your shoes to get the full treatment, or used a product specifically for cleaning, the next step is to condition your smooth leather shoes.

Of course, you'll want a conditioner made for the specific type of shoe you're working on. Also, look for a natural conditioner that is absorbed into the material of the shoe, as opposed to a synthetic conditioner that sits on top of the surface.

Rub small amounts of conditioner into the shoe, until the entire shoe has been covered with conditioner. After a couple of minutes, wipe any remaining conditioner off of the shoes, as the leather will only absorb what it can.