Let me just first announce my claim to the first Grapefruit review released before the movie. This easily beats the previous best.¹ Tom had his chance. He saw the movie. If he’s not going to post a review then that’s his problem. So now I own the record for the earliest review on Grapefruit. Let me take a couple of line breaks to enjoy this feeling.

Ahh, that was good. The movie goes something like this: A quick voice over and some galactic panning of the camera to set the scene. The camera then roves the ship E.R. style sneakily introducing the crew to non-Firefly fans while Firefly fans are still dazed by the realisation that the movie is finally showing.² The crew being miscreants and cattle rustlers decide to start the movie with a bank heist that goes wrong. While the crew are laying low after the robbery, River flips out like a ninja and attracts the attention of the authorities. There are hints at a mysterious past and government conspiracies. The crew then fly around the galaxy searching for the answers to River’s past while avoiding the authorities and there’s a big shoot out at the end.

Serentity has a touch of classic Star Wars about it. The captain is bit like shoot-first Han, Kaylee is a little like Chewbacca³ and Shepherd Book is like Obi Wan. The captain’s character had changed slightly through the series to a direction I wasn’t keen on, but in Serenity he’s smarter and more careful and less prone to doing stupid things. These are all qualities I like in my heroes.

It’s been a while since I saw an action movie this good. It’s been a while since I liked something from Joss Whedon. It’s been a while since a tv show cancelled after 13 episodes has been remade as a movie. Hmm, actually I don’t know if that’s ever happened. I don’t know how Joss did it. He does occasionally produce some great stuff. The last seasons of Buffy showed a marked decline in quality but this is a return to his best form. He’s also adapted well to the movie format and uses the time well. It felt slow in during the middle and meandered somewhat, but regained all the tension for a gripping final scene. I found the final scene was made especially tense because I know that Joss likes to kill his characters to shock the audience and, well, I got attached to these characters and didn’t want them to die. I know some characters have to die but everytime one of them was injured I thought “no please don’t kill that one.” I haven’t been this concerned about movie characters for a while, since The Matrix perhaps. In the end I realised that I liked all the characters thanks to the high standard of acting. Joss has collected an excellent cast of actors. They’re given plenty of material thanks to a witty script.

Cliches are used sparingly and are broken up with a joke avoiding too much cheese. The best jokes are used in the trailer but having suppressed memory of the trailer I was free to laugh at the jokes. The minimal use of cgi payed off, giving it a grittier more realistic effect, although I would have liked to see more of the large fleet battle at the end. It mentions themes subtly and doesn’t shower the viewer with catch phrases. For an action movie it is far above the norm. Much better than I was expecting and worth driving to Knox City for.

1. This movie also contains people being saved from falling deaths by unlikely wires. ↩
2. Or possibly they’re stunned by the smell of the other nerds in close proximity. ↩
3. By which I mean she fixes the ship, not that she’s tall and hairy. ↩

This entry was posted by the illustrious Andy Cocker on Thursday, September 15th, 2005. It concerns such pressing issues as film, Firefly. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.