Review: Moon (2009)

This is another film that’s been sat in a ‘recommended’ list for so long I forgot why it was there in the first place. After watching it the other night, I suspect it was recommended to me after reviewing Interstellar, or maybe even Gravity, but that’s just a guess! As I write this now the UK is going through an insufferable heat wave, and with hindsight, maybe watching a mind-boggling sci-fi whilst melting in my living room was the wrong thing to do.

Moon is a clever little sci-fi film set in the future, where mankind has discovered an alternative fuel source found on the moon, helium-3. Sam (Sam Rockwell) is the sole employee at a lunar station on the moon, where we manges the machines responsible for harvesting the helium-3 from the moon’s surface. As his 3 year contract comes to an end and he looks forward to coming back home to earth, he is injured in an accident.

I think that’s all I can really tell you without spoiling anything. If you’re thinking about watching Moon, I promise to keep this spoiler free for you! Also, you must forgive the sloppy review.Sci-fi is not my forte, and ‘space stuff’ tends to go right over my head. For example, there’s a robot in Moon called GERTY (voiced by Kevin Spacey), that I’m told is a nod to a robot in 2001: A Space Odyssey, but I haven’t seen that...maybe that’ll be one for the Blind Spot list next year.

Speaking of GERTY though, he was delightful. He has a little monitor with an emotion-style face which ranges from a grin to crying, which tells us how he’s feeling at any time. Does he feel? Does he have AI? I’m not sure! He does have a ‘kick me’ sign on his back though, which made me chuckle.

It was nice to see Sam Rockwell in such a serious role. I’ve only seen him in comedies so far and I really do think he’s a good actor. There’s a particular scene which really stuck with me where he has a complete breakdown, and it was so moving. He nailed it! The music as well was brilliant, and straight from the start it gave me a feeling that things weren’t going to be happy fun times.

So, as much as I’ve praised Moon, something still doesn’t sit right with me. Sam didn’t freak out as much as I thought he should have done at a certain revelation, and the twist kind of wasn’t a twist, either. I don’t know? It’s hard to explain, but nothing really shocked me in this. It was enjoyable for sure, but I didn’t love it as much as I perhaps should have done. Absolutely worth a watch though!

Review: The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water (2015)

I am a twenty five year old adult with a grown up job...I am a twenty five year old adult with...oh to hell with it. Cartoons have always been something I’ve loved, from Saturday morning action cartoons when I was a child to the high-as-hell Adventure Time when I was, well...yesterday! SpongeBob is a personal favourite of mine, a cartoon loved by my whole family, who quote it on a near daily basis. Cue dolphin noises instead of swears, explanations on how to blow a bubble correctly to talking (ppthhhhh) like those (ppthhhh) fish when SpongeBob (ppthhhh) was waiting (ppthhhh) for that bus (ppthhh) after being at Glove World.  I thought I was a SpongeBob Squarepants fan but after reading this I am clearly lacking in SpongeBob related knowledge - I bow down to you oh master of SpongeBobness.....

For anyone now wanting to Google ‘ppthhh’, that was my attempt at typing a raspberry sound. Try it! It’s harder than it looks. Thhhuuuurrrrr ?!

Anyway, back onto some kind of track. The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge out of Water goes back to it’s roots and uses a plot the fans are all familiar with. Yep, Plankton is after the Krabby Patty secret formula once again. Despite it’s title, our beloved main characters only spend about 20 minutes of screen time out of the water! This was the biggest disappointment for me to be fair!

Sponge out of Water caters to the fans. Although little can make sense in a regular SpongeBob episode, there are so many nods and references to the show in this movie that I wouldn’t be surprised if someone new to the franchise slated the movie for being a random acid trip. That’s kind of how it goes though! There’s plenty for the fans to enjoy, and I couldn’t contain my glee when the famous ‘my leg!’ line was said, or yelped even.  So this explains a lot, I was disappointed with the movie because it was just plain bizarre, half the jokes didn't make sense and it was (I can imagine) what an acid trip would be like.... I need to go back watch back to back SpongeBob episodes and then try this again I think!

It’s the style of jokes that make this movie so funny. Think of Plankton, that tiny green little bad guy, creeping across a room. The music changes to the high pitched notes of a key instrument, just two notes played again and again. A few seconds later, we realise that SpongeBob is actually playing a tiny piano placed in his hand! (this bit was hilarious!) On the other hand, we’re provided terrible puns, which just happens to be one of my favourite things. 

“Hey, it’s raining pickles. Now it’s raining...TANKS!”

“You’re welcome.” - I don't get it?! Oh my God! Tanks...sounds like thanks!!

Joke-telling aside, the only thing that really disappointed me was the lack of songs. There are many memorable SpongeBob songs from the episodes that could have been remastered, but all we got was a new one. I’m grateful, don’t get me wrong, but it wasn’t better than the Krusty Krab Pizza.  It turns out a friend that I went with, Shmistine (names have been changed to protect identities) learnt all the words to the theme song in preparation for seeing this and refused to leave the cinema until she had sang the whole thing - full volume, I nearly left her there!!

Did these scenes remind anyone else of Mad Max?!

All in all, this was a fun-filled nostalgia trip for me, and I’ll be watching it again with my brother if we happen to have a movie night sometime.  I really to try this again and re-review it!  You and me are going to have a SpongeBob-a-thon sometime soon, haha!