Crisp Criticism - "Kung Fu Panda 3", "The Huntsman: Winter’s War", "Eye in the Sky"

by

Julien Faddoul

Kung Fu Panda 3 **

Continuing his Kung Fu journey, Po must face two threats: one supernatural and the other a little closer to his home.

Clearly the weakest of the series so far: Its adherence to mainstream comedy over intricate mythology disappoints after the elegance of the first two films. This is no doubt the result of the studio's recent corporate restructure. And the plot's awkward movement is also frustrating coming from this specific crew. But the action scenes are just too fun and the animation (much of which is hand-drawn) is just too gorgeous.

d – Jennifer Yuh Nelson, Alessandro Carloni

w – Jonathan Aibel, Glenn Berger

pd – Raymond Zibach

m – Hans Zimmer

ed – Clare Knight

p – Melissa Cobb

Cast: Jack Black, Angelina Jolie, Dustin Hoffman, Seth Rogen, David Cross, Lucy Liu, Jackie Chan, Bryan Cranston, JK Simmons, James Hong, Kate Hudson, Randall Duk Kim

The Huntsman: Winter’s War

As two evil sisters prepare to conquer the land, two renegades set out to stop them.

Often risible sequel-cum-prequel to a previously useless film, struggling to balance camp pageantry with the adolescent heroics of the blockbusters of the modern era, borrowing from films that were themselves bad. It also contains some of the worst attempts at Scottish accents in recent memory.

d – Cedric Nicolas-Troyan

w – Evan Spiliotopoulos, Craig Mazin

ph – Phedon Papamichael

pd – Dominic Watkins

m – James Newton Howard

ed – Conrad Buff IV

cos – Colleen Atwood

p – Joe Roth

Cast: Chris Hemsworth, Charlize Theron, Emily Blunt, Jessica Chastain, Nick Frost, Sheridan Smith, Rob Brydon, Alexandra Roach, Sam Claflin, Colin Morgan

Eye in the Sky *

A military officer in command of a drone operation to capture terrorists in Kenya sees her mission escalate from “capture” to “kill” just as a nine-year old girl enters the kill zone.

Overblown military thriller with an interesting moral compass. The intrigue it delves into in the second half doesn’t make up for the slack handling in the first.

d – Gavin Hood

w – Guy Hibbert

ph – Haris Zambarloukos

pd – Johnny Breedt

m – Paul Hepker, Mark Kilian

ed – Megan Gill

cos – Ruy Filipe

p – Ged Doherty, Colin Firth, David Lancaster

Cast: Helen Mirren, Aaron Paul, Alan Rickman, Iain Glen, Barkhad Abdi, Phoebe Fox, Kim Engelbrecht, Jeremy Northam, Meganne Young, Carl Beukes