"Avatar" ~ 3/10

Of course with such a budget, there _has_ to be something good.
But what ?

The story is way too simple, completely expected and manichaeic ; the imaginary world, fauna, and flora involved are beautifully created but never very far from existing exotisms (so not that much imaginative), and finally it almost sounds immoral : using so much money just to recreate an historically wrong metaphor about Americas' and America's births, and the many wrongdoings perpetrated at these different times - after all, in "Titanic" they did not take the right to make such historical changes, and the boat _did actually_ sink in the end... Or did it not ?

This movie might be very well done technically (above all when it comes to the subject of 3D, and especially the depth of field that comes up with), but ideologically it's a big crap : hippies and tree huggers only get by if helped by a Marine ! Maybe was it even a consumable insult ?

What's the point in quoting two of the most important pro-environmental filmmakers of our days (Godfrey Reggio and Hayao Miyazaki), just to show that war is the answer and solution to an environmental and geopolitical issue ?

...

2010.01.22 : After some long thinking over this awfully immoral movie, I decided to lower my vote from 6 to 3/10. The world does not deserves such Hollywood propaganda trying to make you believe they care about environmental issues. Hence, 3 points lost for immorality.

"Astro Boy" ~ 3/10

This movie might be the biggest insult to a major author (hence, Osamu Tezuka here) since "I am Robot" featuring Will Smith (it does still hurt when I write about that shit !).
Even with great voicing actors such as Nicholas Cage and Bill Nighy, the movie is just fun enough for some 4 year old stupid children who would not give a shit about what one of the most important mangaka did create.
Tezuka's manga influenced the entire production of comic books in his time, and since this very formatted media has not seen many changes, one may say Tezuka is still influencing the biggest part of the current comic books production, 20 years after his death.
The most horrifying fact, according to me, might be that such a bad movie is hiding Osamu Tezuka's own production as an animated-movie director ; he was one of the best directors ever in this field, even if his best works were not the old series adaptations of "Testsu-wan Atom" ("Astro Boy"), but short films he made at the end of his life, such as "Jumping".

"Arthur et la vengeance de Maltazard" ~ 2/10

How in the world was it possible that Mr Besson let a five year old child enter his office and type such a stupid story ? A story where an adult living in the country would want to kill *one* bee because his son is allergic... Where the very same silly adult, who then just got bitten by the bee, would want to throw a stone at an entire beehive... And it goes on and on for one and a half hours.
I would never let MY child enter such an outrageously sick movie.

"[Rec] 2" ~ 6/10

This sequel does not have the spontaneity the first opus had, spontaneity which gave the entire flick such a frightening style. Anyway the good point of this second movie was the way they found a good story to follow the - already very good - first one.

"A Christmas Carol" [fr="Le Drôle de Noël de Scrooge"] ~ 5/10

Dickens' story is beautifully represented in this movie. And Dickens' London is shown in a way we would never had hoped to see...
As for Zemeckis, he's now far from his best movies, but that might still be better for 3d cinema to be made by such a good filmmaker ?
Anyway, the best Christmas animation movie ever was (and probably will ever be) "The Snowman", and Zemeckis should stop trying to compete with such a huge masterpiece.

PS : it was good to have Jim Carrey and Cary Elwes together again in a movie !

"Zombieland" [fr="Bienvenue à Zombieland"] ~ 7/10

Contrarily to the strange poster of this flick, "Zombieland" came out to be a very good comedy. The best part is when a secret guest star enters the film...

"Le vilain" ~ 8/10

This new Dupontel flick is a bit less dark than "Bernie" and "Le créateur" but still very fun. Dupontel keeps on his idea of a 'social cartoon', with much talent, and wonderful actors, amongst whom Catherine Frot and Bouli Lanners, both in very original parts.
The best improvement of all, here, was Albert Dupontel himself : he's really become an extremely good actor in his own craziness, with an improved comical talent.