The Lone Ranger Trailer

UK Release Date: 9th August 2013.

Stars: Gore Verbinski (director), Arnie Hammer, Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter, William Fichtner, Tom Wilkinson, James Badge Dale

Plot: Native American spirit warrior Tonto recounts the untold tales that transformed John Reid, a man of the law, into a legend of justice.

Almost everything about this trailer is poor. Right from the start with the awfully boring voice over to the minuscule action scenes that tell us absolutely nothing about the characters or story. When I watch a trailer I want to be impressed and made to look forward to a film, I want to be told something about the characters or the plot that gives me indication to watch; I don’t want to just see Johnny Depp looking up from under a train.

The only good thing that comes of this trailer is that Helena Bonham Carter actually looks as though she belongs in this setting which is more than can be said for any of the other main actors that feature in this minute and a half trailer. It’s a risk putting Arnie Hammer as the lead man seeing as though he’s not been a lead before (the same risk earlier this year with Taylor Kitsch cost Disney millions) and I can’t help but feel that Johnny Depp is miscast and I think that it might get pretty annoying hearing him through the entirety of the film with that accent.

To me it looks as though Disney have another flop on their hands. This does nothing to inspire the fun or the great sotrytelling that Disney films are usually associated with. When promo pictures for The Lone Ranger were first released they were met with negativity, the same has happened with the trailer on internet forums. Oh dear.

Mirror, Mirror… Reflection and Review on the Updated Fairytale

***WARNING: CONTAINS SPOILERS***

Mirror Mirror is the first in a long line of fairytale remakes heading to the big screen over the next couple of years. But while its competition in the genre, and natural main rival Snow White and the Huntsman, plan on setting a much darker tone on their stories, Mirror Mirror opts for a lighter, more comedic take on the classic tale.

So the story is pretty obvious. Mirror Mirror is of course about Snow White and her wicked step mother, the Evil Queen. Snow White is sent out to the forest to be killed, yet she is instead let free and ends up living with seven dwarves. However, in this version Snow White learns how to look after herself and become a skilled fighter and thief with the help of the dwarves whilst trying to win back the Prince who is under a love spell condemning him to long for the Evil Queen.

The cast really only carries one big hitter and that is Julia Roberts in the role of the Evil Queen. Roberts does a very good job really; you’re not supposed to like her character and the way that she is played makes you really see what a horrible character she is, not just as a villain but as a human being in general. You will probably find yourself wondering how much you could slap the Queen before you got bored. Lily Collins looks the part as the Evil Queen’s step daughter and heroine, Snow White; she is a perfect fit for the beautiful and innocent young girl and although her acting skills are not fully developed quite yet she certainly has potential.

The laughs are there in Mirror Mirror which is pretty handy considering it is being marketed for its comedy value. Arnie Hammer and Nathan Lane both offer up some laughs in their roles as Prince Alcott and Brighton respectively. But really the dwarves are the main source of comedy and that seems to be their main purpose within the film. A couple of the dwarves in particular, Grub and Half Pint will stand out.

So thats the good parts done with, now for the bad. The dialogue at times is really forced and chunky, placed within the film in order to blatantly feed the audience with information to a point where it is almost insulting the intelligence of the viewers. It felt like people were talking a lot more than they needed to be and the script could have been sharpened up slightly. There were several parts of the film where it felt as though the film had been clumsily put together and instead of flowing seamlessly from one scene to a next it just didn’t fit right.

I also have a problem with Snow White as a heroine. In the Disney film she wasn’t brilliant but that was many years ago now and people’s attitudes and expectations of the character surely would have changed but here she is still that naive princess. Despite learning to fight and look after herself she still needs the help of eight men at the end of the film to overcome ‘the beast’ and throughout the film it seems as though she is easily manipulated and as for the scenes getting her ready for her first kiss, it was very much playing up to little girls’ ideas of being a princess I felt and wasn’t really needed. She just is not a great heroine, but anyway I digress.

The biggest problem was the ending and the less said about how surplus to requirements it is, the better. We are told at the beginning that the King (Snow’s father) was never seen again. That was roughly ten years before the movie took place, the audience can and have accepted that Snow has not got a father anymore so there is really no need to bring him back at the end of the film, let alone let it turn out that he is ‘the beast’. How pointless is that. Really?!

Mirror Mirror, for all of its flaws, is enjoyable and it will probably make you laugh here and there. Its worth a watch at least once, maybe rent it once its out or just wait for it on television, but still worth a watch.

My Rating: 5/10.