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Initial Thought: When I saw the trailer for this I thought it looked like fun. I always tend to like epic fantasy films. After hearing all the bad reviews and feelings for the movie I decided to let it go. Finally I changed my mind and decided to see if I would like this when others didn't. Everyone has their own opinions.
Characters/Acting: This is flooded with excellent talent. A lot of the actors here are well known in the genre as well. Ben Barnes was actually part of the Chronicles of Narnia films as Prince Caspian. Julianne Moore has joined the final two films of the Hunger Games. Kit Harington is most famously known for his Game of Thrones fan favorite Jon Snow. Djimon Hounsou was actually part of a previously failed series starter by the name of Eragon. He did much better when he was cast in Guardians of the Galaxy. Oh man Jason Scott Lee still acts! I'm excited for Alicia Vikander and Kandyse McClure too big crushes of mine in one movie is just perfect. So much talent in one spot. Some are top tier while a few I don't really admire that much. Oh no we lose Jon Snow again! Once again Jeff Bridges is cast as the grumpy old master. It's kind of tiresome when he has so much skill beyond that. Would have liked more Kandyse McClure, but with a cast so big it's hard to give everyone a strong amount of screen time.
Story: A man is trained to fight evil spirits to protect humanity. It's a pretty straightforward plot if I do say so myself. The action is pretty good when it happens and the CGI is quite beautiful. I actually liked all the creature and witch designs. This reminds me of Stardust and Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters. I actually found most of this boring and cliche to be honest. It just wasn't strong enough for me. Not even the action was quite enough to save this from being mediocre. It did have a few moments that were pretty good albeit seldom. The ending wasn't my favorite. It felt odd. They did make it seem like it will have a sequel. It doesn't seem too likely, but only time will tell.
Directing/Writing: This is my first encounter with director Sergey Bodrov who tends to stick within earlier time periods like this one. This is inspired by the first of Joseph Delaney's Spook Apprentice books. The author isn't known for any other work. Matt Greenberg who wrote the "screen story" has a few notches in his belt. He has some pretty far lows with Children of the Corn III and Halloween H2O. His ups are pretty average with the likes of Reign of Fire and 1408. This also took two other writers to come up with the screenplay. Charles Leavitt hasn't had many in the past I'm familiar with except the excellent Blood Diamond film. He does however have Warcraft and In The Heart of the Sea coming out later this year. I have seen Redemption from Steven Knight and still need to see Locke. I wasn't really impressed with Closed Circuit, but The Hundred-Foot Journey was quite good. Wait what is the difference between a screen story and screenplay? That seems a bit odd to me. Anyways with these too as the screenwriters it can't be all that bad.
Final Thought: Well that was quite a disappointment. I really wanted to like it a lot, but it was quite a bit underwhelming. I didn't think it was awful though. It just could have been better and more epic than it was. Given the talent involved the expectations are high. That may be the reason it was disappointing. It might kill some time if you have nothing else to watch. Other than that you aren't really missing much here.
