New Alias and New Profile

Oh, hello. You haven't noticed the new improvements on my blog profile. It's because I switched blog accounts. I've changed my blog identity from FilmGuruLad to RadDingo, the name of a production company I'll be forming after I finish my 5-year animated project, Not the Sal & Mason Show. It took me a long, exciting and challenging process of trying to animate the extensive movements of the characters to learn and strengthen my animation skills.

You can now send me an email to my address as raddingoproductions@gmail.com. Feel free to email me if you have suggestions for improvements to my site or ideas on delivering movie information.

I'll be back tomorrow to post another news update, and Tuesday, I plan to publish the film review of WarGames and re-publish the newly updated Blended.

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Winners of the 87th Academy Awards

Greetings, I'm Film Guru Lad. I'm sorry for the delay in not giving the official announcement of the winners of the 87th Oscars. I ran some errands in my blog by fixing my six Star Wars movie reviews and adding more names to the crew description. 

I've deleted the gadget from my blog, where you can translate it into any foreign language. I think it's linked to some of the feedback that is spam.

Best Visual Effects
Interstellar - Paul Franklin, Andrew Lockley, Ian Hunter
and Scott Fisher

Best Film Editing
Whiplash - Tom Cross

Best Costume Design
The Grand Budapest Hotel - Milena Canonero

Best Makeup and Hairstyling

The Grand Budapest Hotel - Frances Hannon and Mark Coulier 

Best Cinematography

Birdman - Emmanuel Lubezki

Best Production Design

The Grand Budapest Hotel - Adam Stockhausen (Production Design); Anna Pinnock (Set Decoration)

Best Sound Mixing

Whiplash - Craig Mann, Ben Wilkins and Thomas Curley

Best Sound Editing

American Sniper - Alan Robert Murray and Bub Asman

Best Original Song

"Glory" from Selma - John Legend and Common

Best Original Score

The Grand Budapest Hotel - Alexandre Desplat

Best Animated Short Film

Feast - Patrick Osborne and Kristina Reed

Best Live Action Short Film

The Phone Call - Mat Kirkby and James Lucas 

Best Documentary - Short Subject

Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1 - Ellen Goosenberg Kent and Dana Perry

Best Documentary - Feature

Citizenfour - Laura Poitras, Mathilde Bonnefey and Dirk Wilutsky

Best Foreign Language Film 

Ida (Poland) in Polish - Pawel Pawlikowski

Best Animated Feature Film

Big Hero 6 - Don Hall, Chris Williams and Roy Conli

Best Writing - Adapted Screenplay

The Imitation Game - Graham Moore from Alan Turing: The Enigma - Andrew Hodges

Best Writing - Original Screenplay

Birdman - Alejandro Gonzáles Iñárittu, Nicólas Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris, Jr. and 

Armando Bo

Best Supporting Actress

Patricia Arquette - Boyhood as Olivia Evans

Best Supporting Actor

J.K. Simmons - Whiplash as Terence Fletcher

Best Actress

Julianne Moore - Still Alice as Dr. Alice Howland

Best Actor

Eddie Redmayne - The Theory of Everything as Stephen Hawking

Best Director

Alejandro Gonzáles Iñárittu - Birdman

Best Picture
Birdman - Alejandro Gonzáles Iñárittu, John Lesherand James W. Skotchdopole

Academy Honorary Awards
Jean-Claude Carriere
Hayao Miyazaki
Maureen O'Hara

Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award
Harry Belafonte

It's not much I expected from the winners of this big annual presentation. I'm stunned that Big Hero 6 finally got an award for Best Animated Feature, which marks the second time for Walt Disney Animated Studios after last year's Frozen. I was disappointed that Hans Zimmer ended up empty-handed with only a nomination for Interstellar and snubbed in favour of Alexandre Desplat's score of The Grand Budapest Hotel.

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Chitty Chitty Bang Bang Review

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

Release Date: 19th December 1968 - Australia 

Production Companies

Dramatic Features

Warfield

Genre: Family/Musical

Rating: G

Runtime: 144 minutes

Budget: $10,000,000 

Box Office Gross: $7,500,000 

(USA) (Rentals)

Plot Summary

An eccentric professor 

invents wacky machinery, 

but can't seem to make 

ends meet. When he 

invents a revolutionary car, 

a foreign government 

becomes interested in it, 

and resorts to skulduggery 

to get their hands on it. 
(Source - IMDb)

Cast

Dick Van Dyke - Carcatacus 
Potts 

Sally Ann Howes - Truly 
Scrumptious 

Gert Fröbe - Baron Bomburst

Anna Quayle - Baronness 
Bomburst 

Benny Hill - The Toymaker

Heather Ripley - Jemima 

Adrian Hall - Jeremy

Lionel Jeffries - Grandpa 
Potts
James Robertson Justice - 
Lord Scrumptious

Robert Helpmann - The 
Child Catcher

Crew

Screenplay/Director - Ken Russell 

Based on Book "Chitty Chitty 

Bang Bang" - Ian Fleming

Screenplay - Roald Dahl 

Additional Dialogue - 

Richard Maibaum

Producer - Albert R. Broccoli 

Production Designer - Ken Adam
Creator: Potts Inventions - 
Rowland Emett 

Colour Costume Designers - 

Joan Bridge and Elizabeth 

Haffenden 

Director of Photography - 

Christopher Challis

Special Effects - John Stears

Stagers: Musical Numbers - 

Marc Breaux and Dee Dee 

Wood

Songs/Lyrics - Richard M. & 

Robert B. Sherman

Conductor/Music Supervisor - 

Irwin Kostal


Awards

1969 Academy Awards
Best Music, Original Song "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" -
Richard M. & Robert B. Sherman (Nominated)

Review

As most of you viewers are probably too young to recognise or have heard the name "CHITTY CHITTY BANG BANG" when the feature was already well-known to movie buffs since 1968. Through all my years, I have grown from this family-musical and I wasn't keen to review this ever since family films from nowadays like recent ones have lost the adult appeal for example, the abysmal trilogies of 'The Smurfs' and 'Alvin and the Chipmunks'. Behind the wheels on this jovial musical, there lies the comic brilliance from screenwriter Roald Dahl as he adapts the book from James Bond creator, the late Ian Fleming and added a few signature styles to make the movie very childish. Of course having the heroes as slightly comical and the antagonists as laughably immature fits his capable ground of foretelling a story or character.

I don't mind Dick Van Dyke as well as the songs from The Sherman Brothers, I'm not exactly above enjoying their work in 'CHITTY CHITTY' since they all previously worked with Dick before in 'Mary Poppins'. Though few of their tunes have some catchiness in between them. My main favourite part that I definitely find interesting is the Child Catcher character, looking back now, he was really creepy for his appearance and enjoys kidnapping young kids. Australian actor Robert Helpmann did an incredible job in mastering the villainous character to feel as sinister although the character does come out as seemingly in a over-the-top villainy when in front of children.

It's a price to pay that there aren't any more non-Bond films made from the makers that did the series. It's a good way to give the people for extra credit when they're not doing more films of the spy-saga in favour of this cheerful tone of the musical. Likewise for myself, I find 'CHITTY CHITTY BANG BANG' as one of the two singing films to be very uptight respectable to revisit. So remember to skip the film's intermission when some of the kiddies are bored!

Star rating: (8/10) Very Good Movie

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My Eighth Important Message

Hello again. You may or may not notice that in most of my reviews, I split its paragraphs, have made minor changes and probably unlisted some of my posts that were not supposed to be updated. All because my writing skills are improving again, instead of one paragraph together in all sentences. I break them all into two or three. So it'll make my blog a much more readable site for everyone who is a film enthusiast or went to film school for the result.

Another important announcement is I re-wrote the critique of the crime-caper film Now You See Me and reverted to its star rating of 4 out of 5. It depends on if you like or don't like my old downgrades. You can comment on the tab below if you're done reading this news update.

I've taken off the critique of last year's Blended for renovations which I will hopefully publish sometime. I then updated four of my reviews at the end of this message.

• Iron Man 2
• Speed
• How to Train Your Dragon 2
• White House Down
• Batman Begins
• The Dark Knight
• The Dark Knight Rises
• Dumb and Dumber To
• X-Men: The Last Stand
• X-Men: First Class
• Ghost Rider
  

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Minutemen Review

Minutemen

Broadcast Date: 12th April 2008 - Australia

Production Companies

Disney Channel

Salty Pictures

Distribution

Disney Media Distribution

Genre: Sci-Fi/Family

Rating: G

Runtime: 90 minutes

Budget: $5,000,000

Plot Summary

A high school senior and his 

friends invent a time  
machine so that future  
generations of students  
won't have to endure some 
of the more preventable 

adolescent pains, only 
to find that they have 
inadvertently opened a 
black hole in the process. 
Virgil and his pals are 

determined to make life a 
little easier for the less 
popular students in their 
high school, and in order 
to make that happen they 
create a time machine. But 
strange things can happen 
when you go messing with 
the laws of physics, and 
when Virgil and friends 
open a black hole they find
 that turning back the clock 

can have messy 
repercussions. (Source - 
Rotten Tomatoes)

Cast

Jason Dolley - Virgil Fox
Luke Benward - Charlie
Tuttle
Nicholas Braun - Zeke
Thompson
Chelsea Kane - Stephanie
Jameson
Kara Crane - Jeanette
J. P. Manoux - Vice Principal
Stewart Tolkan
Steven R. McQueen - Derek
Beaugard
Dexter Darden - Chester
Kellie Cockrell - Jocelyn Lee
Molly Jepson - Amy Fox

Crew
Director - Lev L. Spiro
Story/Co-Executive
Producers - David Diamond
and David Weissman
Teleplay - John Killoran
Producer - Don Schain
Broadcast Producer - Barbara Biddle
Production Designer - Mark Hofeling
Director of Photography - Bruce Douglas Johnson
Visual Effects Supervisor - Dan Schmit
Film Editor - Mark Conte
Music - Nathan Wang

Review

I haven't had the pleasure of seeing the teen movies from the family-oriented Disney Channel including the abominations of the movie series 'High School Musical' and 'Camp Rock'. I won't bother reviewing these cringe-worthy flick trilogies, I have however watched a few of its original shows, but let's get down to one of its better TV flicks. For those who have already experienced the hilarious results of time travel in films such as 'Back to the Future' and 'Bill & Ted', it is with regret that the film I am about to review does not even come close to the classic time travel hits. 'MINUTEMEN' develops a concept of going through a portal device of time so that the character can become heroes in their high school. The film felt good but not great and certainly didn't offer any outstanding qualities to justify watching this rare film a second time.

I don't recognise many of the actors who were in their parts of the made-for-TV picture excluding Disney Channel's bad boy Jason Dolley. I felt he almost managed to live up to the standards of Michael J. Fox and Keanu Reeves when they were in their teens and I feel that Jason deserves a second-try for this one.

In summary, I think this flick is worth a one time watch, but if you are looking for something with long-lasting appeal; I suggest you try a big-budget time-travel hit.

Star rating: (6/10) Fair Movie

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Megamind Review

Megamind

Release Date: 9th December 2010 - Australia

Production Companies

DreamWorks Animation

Pacific Digital Images

Distribution
20th Century Fox Australia

Genre: Animation/Family/

Comedy

Rating: PG

Runtime: 96 minutes


Budget: $130,000,000

Box Office Gross:

$321,885,765 (Worldwide)

Plot Summary

Megamind is a supervillain known to be the most brilliant and the least successful. He has an ongoing rivalry with a caped superhero known as "Metro Man", as they have long been arch-foes since infancy.

Megamind has tried to

conquer Metro City for years

in every imaginable way

possible. But whenever

Metro Man shows up,

he always thwarts his

diabolical efforts. Until now,

Megamind finally defeats

him in one of his botched

evil schemes.

With his superhero nemesis out of the way, Megamind gets bored when his victory is meaningless and soon realises that there's no hero left to fight. He decides to make a new foe, Tighten, who, rather than using his powers for good, becomes evil, forcing Megamind into a position where he must save the day for the first time.

Voice Cast

Will Ferrell - Megamind

David Cross - Minion

Tina Fey - Roxanne Ritchie

Jonah Hill - Hal Stewart/Tighten

Brad Pitt - Metroman
J.K. Simmons - Warden
Ben Stiller - Bernard
Justin Theroux - Megamind's Father

(Cameo)
Jessica Schulte - Megamind's Mother

Christopher Knights - Prison Guard
Tom McGrath - Lord Scott/Prison Guard

Jack Blessing - Newscaster
Emily Nordwind - Lady Scott

Rod Corddry - Random Citizen

Crew
Director - Tom McGrath
Writers - Alan J. Schoolcraft
and Brent Simons

Associate Producer - Holly Edwards
Executive Producers - Stuart Cornfeld
and Ben Stiller
Producers - Lara Breay and
Denise Nolan Cascino
Creative Consultants - Justin Theroux and
Guillermo del Toro
Production Designer - David James
Art Director/Character Designer - Timothy Lamb
Character Designer - Devin Crane

Pre-Production Development: Character

Design - Andy Bialk, Shane Prigmore,

Sylvain Deboissy, Tony Siruno,

Dermot Power and Shannon Tindle

Head of Story - Catherine Yuh Rader
Additional Head of Story - Robert Koo

Pre-Production Development: Story -

Sean Bishop, Li Hong, Elaine Bogan,

Jeffrey A. Lynch, Thom Enriquez,

Jordan Reicheck, Kathleen Thomson Good,

John Sanford, Kevin L. Harkey and

Ryan Savas

Production Managers - Andre de Oliviera Araujo

and Maude Lewis

Pre-Production Manager - Kate Spencer 

Head of Character Animation - Jason Schleifer
Animation Supervisors - Jason Ryan,
Mark Donald, Dave Burgess,

Anthony Hodgson, Sean Mahoney,

Jason Spencer Galsworthy, David Torres

and and Maren Kochout (Uncredited)

Supervising Character Technical Directors -

Lawrence D. Cutler and Lucia Modesto

Head of Lighting - Laura Grieve

Head of Character Effects - Damon Riesberg

Head of Layout - Nol Le Meyer

Head of Effects - David Lipton
Visual Effects Supervisor - Philippe Denis

City Development Supervisor - Jonathan Gibbs

Director of Previsualization - Kent Seki

Stereoscopic Supervisor - Phil 'Captain 3D' McNally

Editor - Michael Andrews

Associate Editors - Christopher Knights,

Michelle Mendenhall and Lynn Hobson

Supervising Sound Editors - Ethan Van der Ryan

and Erik Aadahl

Sound Mixers - Andy Nelson and

Andy Behlmer
Music - Hans Zimmer and Lorne Balfe
Additional Music Arrangers - Stephen Hilton
and Junkie XL
Music Consultants - Bob Badami and
Chris Douridas

Additional Mixing - Alan Meyerson

Review

Some of you may not have seen MEGAMIND when it came out. It feels overshadowed by The Incredibles. Disney/Pixar was the first to break the transitional barriers of experiencing superheroes in film animation. There are reasons why, in comparison, MEGAMIND is not as good as this other movie we've all seen on the big screen. The most noticeable deficit is unbalanced attention to comedy and story. MEGAMIND turned out to be an animated parody/comedy that features Will Ferrell's hilarious portrayal of a character, a self-indulged gentleman who claims to be a self-proclaimed master of evil. I suspect Ferrell gets to play a villainous hero, as he did play an antagonist once in Zoolander before moving on years later to play a non-heroic villain, recently in The LEGO Movie. I was satisfied with actors like Tina Fey, Jonah Hill and David Cross, who joined forces with Ferrell to make the voices dominant as their characters.

It's not on par with Pixar's golden trophy, nor surprisingly does it help DreamWorks after the same year the studio had carved its triumph on How to Train Your Dragon. Something is appealing in MEGAMIND that makes it feel joyful and rewarding to watch, especially if you love seeing the Superman references while watching the film.

Star rating: (7/10) Good Movie

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Big Hero 6 Review

Big Hero 6


Release Date: 26th December 2014 - Australia


Production Companies
Walt Disney Pictures
Walt Disney Animation Studios

Distribution
Walt Disney Studios Motion
Pictures Australia


Genre: Animation/Family/

Sci-Fi/Action

Rating: PG

Runtime: 102 minutes


Budget: $165,000,000

Box Office Gross: $657,870,525 (Worldwide)


Plot Summary
Young robotics prodigy Hiro Hamada and inflatable robot Baymax form a special bond. Both are catapulted into an evil plot with their close friends and form a band of high-tech heroes.


Voice Cast
Ryan Cooper - Hiro Hamada
Scott Adsit - Baymax
T. J. Miller - Fred
Jamie Chung - GoGo Tamago
Damon Wayans, Jr - Wasabi
Genesis Rodriguez - Honey Lemon

Daniel Henney - Tadashi Hamada

James Cromwell - Professor
Robert Callaghan

Maya Rudolph - Aunt Cass

Alan Tudyk - Alistair Krei

Abraham Benrubi - General

Katie Lowes - Abigail

Billy Bush - Newscaster

Daniel Gerson - Desk Sergeant
Paul Briggs - Yama

Charlotte Gulezian - Ringleader

David Shaughnessy - Heathcliff
Stan Lee - Fred's Dad (Cameo)

Crew
Directors - Don Hall and Chris Williams
Big Hero 6 Team and Characters Creators - Man of Action
Screenplay - Jordan Roberts,
Daniel Gerson and Robert
L. Baird

Additional Story Material - Bert V. Royal
Executive Producer - John Lasseter
Producer - Roy Conli

Co-Producer - Kristina Reed

Creative Advisors - Nathan
Greno and Mark Kennedy

Lead Production Supervisor: Animation - Karen Ann Ryan
Production Designer - Paul
A. Felix

Art Director - Scott Watanabe
Character Design
Supervisor - Jin Kim
Lead Character Designer -
Shiyoon Kim

Heads of Story - Paul Briggs
and Joseph Mateo

Lead Story Artists - John Ripa

and Marc E. Price

Modelling Supervisor - Zack Petroc
Head of Animation - Zach A. Parrish

Animation Supervisors - Nathan Engelhardt,

Jason Figliozzi, Michael Franceschi,

Brent Homman and Doug Bennett

Lead 2D Animator - Mark Henn

Environment CG Supervisor - Larry Wu

Character CG Supervisor - Carlos Cabral

Background Designer - Barry Atkinson
Director of Cinematography: Lighting -

Adolph Lusinsky
Director of Cinematography: Layout -

Rob Dressel

Cinematographic Consultant - Robert Richardson

Production Manager - Yvett Merino Flores

Head of Effects - Michael Kaschalk
Visual Effects Supervisor - Kyle Odermatt

Editor - Tim Mertens

Additional Editors - Lisa Lassek

and Julie Rodgers

Associate Editors - Shannon Stein

and Karen A. White

Supervising Sound Editor & Designer -

Shannon Mills

Sound Effects Editors - Addison Teague,

David C. Hughes, Nia Hansen and

Jeremy Bowker

Supervising ADR Editor - Daniel Laurie

Re-Recording Mixers - David E. Fluhr

and Gabriel Guy

Foley Artists - John Roesch and

Alyson Dee Moore

Music - Henry Jackman

Composers: Additional Music - Dominic Lewis

and Paul Mounsey

Executive Music Producer - Chris Montan

Music Supervisor - Tom MacDougall

Score Recordist and Mixer - Alan Meyerson


Awards

2015 Academy Awards
Best Animated Feature - Chris Williams, Don Hall
and Roy Conli (Won)


Review
Marvel is still a Disney property and has always been a close competitor to Warner Brothers' DC. Since Disney's purchase, they continued to bring the life of the treasured comic book heroes on the big screen. The two corporate giants had never done an animated feature together. Finally, the Disney animation studio people decided upon BIG HERO 6. It's one of Marvel's lesser-known properties and is from the group that created Ben 10. There isn't a movie with so many scenes containing mind-boggling animation and fast-paced action since Disney put away the toys on their two earlier attempts, Atlantis: The Lost Empire and Treasure Planet.

This movie contains a story and a blend of humour and action and delivers perfectly crafted animation rivalled by a few others. The film also includes scenes that show a lot of sadness. I was captivated by experiencing this incredible film that no studio has ever done since Pixar pushed the envelope in their mega-hit production The Incredibles to blow away the superhero comic fan base in childlike wonder.

There are many good factors to choose from in BIG HERO 6 besides its 3D animation pixels and some weight of human emotion. The film carries the background setting in the city, which is supposed to be an amalgam of Tokyo and San Francisco and is supposed to be an architectural blend. I was amazed at the film, which reminded me of another animated feature I reviewed of The Iron Giant, particularly the friendship between a boy and a machine and the end where one of those main characters makes a heroic sacrifice.

It's one step ahead of Frozen and probably a better film. Nothing gets crazy with BIG HERO 6. It will continue to be its new greatest triumph in the animation field.

Star rating: (10/10) Best Movie Ever

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