53 lines
4.8 KiB
Plaintext
53 lines
4.8 KiB
Plaintext
wizards is an animated feature that begins with a narration of epic proportions .
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over black and white drawings , we are told that the earth is destroyed in an apocalyptic nuclear exchange , sending the remnants of humanity through generations of radiation-induced mutation .
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the " original " inhabitants of the earth , fairies and elves , return to populate the globe , along with their evil , mutant counterparts .
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one day ( and i say " one day " not to be trite , but because that's exactly how it happened - no advance notice ) , a fairy queen gives birth to twins , one good and one evil .
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the twins grow up to be powerful wizards , the good one embracing magic , and the bad one utilizing technology to attempt to expand his evil empire .
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we are given the notion that an ultimate battle must occur between the forces of magic and those of technology .
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as unoriginal as the premise is , i was still somewhat interested in how this story would play itself out .
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there's a lot you can do in an animated fantasy world , after all .
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i soon learned , however , that the fantasy was the expectation of a decent film .
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once the transition was made from still art to color animation , an entirely different feel takes precedence .
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rather than the epic saga promised by the narration , we get a goofy-looking world of a saturday morning cartoon .
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not just the look , mind you , but all the zany sounds like >honk boing
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for years , blackwolf has lost his battles against the magical forces of good , since his armies of ogres and other mutants would get dispirited or distracted soon after battle is joined .
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however , blackwolf now has a secret weapon : nazis .
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yup , adolf hitler , the luftwaffe and the wehrmacht .
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okay , not the real things , but an archival film his minions dug up .
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projected into the sky for all to see , it inspires his own army while shocking the enemy into submission long enough for the ogres to hack them up .
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before you know it , there are dead elves everywhere .
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this is just as well .
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the characters are so bad that the viewer doesn't care about any of them .
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they're either silly , sappy , or both .
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the dialog gets much of the credit for this .
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an example is when avatar nonchalantly says , " well , looks like my brother and i begin our final battle . "
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not very formidable when he's also the guy who says , " this is the biggest bummer of a trip i've ever been on . "
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my favorite line was from a sideline fairy who is asked by her child why good can't fight back against the nazi-charged evil .
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her response is , " they have weapons and technology .
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we just have love . "
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suffice to say , the characters are strictly two-dimensional , and we therefore don't expect anything more than the obvious to happen .
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which it does .
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the only unexpected occurrence is the way the final battle between brothers is played out , which is anticlimactic and disappointing .
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please note that it is the action that is unexpected .
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that it is disappointing is not .
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the film couldn't settle on a particular mood .
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it seems to move from dark to light with the cuts from scene to scene and even angle to angle .
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scenes which are seemingly meant to contain deep meaning are ruined by acts of levity .
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the dramatics , which seem to occur at random , are overly staged and overly acted , detracting from any kind of value or even enjoyment which could otherwise be gleaned .
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ralph bakshi , the director , makes an obvious attempt to get a message across in this film : hitler and the nazis were bad .
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so who doesn't know this already ?
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well , maybe children .
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okay , so you might say that this is a movie for children .
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it's not .
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in the scenes where good fights evil , there's a lot of violence and gore that children should not be seeing if they're watching a cartoon .
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so is the film for adults ?
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if so , we probably don't need to be bashed over the head to get the point .
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why not have the bad guys be symbolic of the nazis instead of using old propaganda in a seriously disjointed attempt to show us something we already know ?
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wizards gives us a lot of footage of nazi tanks and airplanes , and hitler giving speeches .
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however , we don't see any reason why they should be considered bad .
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we see no atrocities being committed , not even any real battle footage .
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there is absolutely no connection made between the armies of evil and the third reich , and we're not even given a cursory explanation as to why this stuff is inspiring in the first place .
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this needed to be thought out much more thoroughly if a point were to be made , since subject matter such as this deserves better treatment .
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i'd like to assume that bakshi was trying to say that the same nationalist movement that drove the nazis could happen anywhere , at any time , and we must therefore be vigilant .
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however , i'm not sure if i want to give him that much credit .
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