JOHN CARTER (m)
When: Opens March 8
Where: General release
Preview: Alana Schetzer
IF you’ve seen Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones, you’re either going to love or hate Disney’s latest blockbuster, John Carter, because they’re basically the same film.
The similarities are uncanny – inter-galactic royal in need of rescue? Check. A rough and world-weary hero? Check. Lovable and cheeky alien sidekick? Check. An arena scene, where the heroes are pitted against bizarre, ferocious beasts in a fight to the death, is especially similar. If I were George Lucas, I’d be talking to my lawyers.
Disney does have a defence: John Carter is based on the books by American author Edgar Rice Burroughs novels, with the first released in serialisation in 1912.
Carter is a American Civil War captain who finds himself transported to Mars, where a bloody tribal war has broken out. He finds himself a prisoner to one group, and a potential hero to another.
As expected of a film with a budget bigger than a Pacific island’s GPD, the special effects are top-notch, but the dialogue sadly wooden and overly silly.
Canadian actor Taylor Kitsch plays the title character. Ruggedly handsome and broody, the best thing that can be said about his performance is that he graduated from the School of Talking Really, Really Deep.
There’s already speculation the film will be the first in a franchise, which is unsurprising. On paper John Carter has all the right ingredients for a Disney brand – action, romance, comedy and special effects. The door has certainly been left open to that option.
The film will certainly appeal to younger children and those just after a couple of hours of escapism. But as the recent Spiderman and X-Men films proved, you can have sharp writing and complex characters within a blockbuster setting, John Carter can hardly rest on the defence that it’s ‘‘just’’ a popcorn film.
