Movie Review: Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole (2010)
Looks great, but the overall product is lacking
Photo: Warner Bros.
The term "auteur" gets thrown around a bit too liberally without much care for what it actually means if you ask me, but there is no mistaking, for better or for worse, Zack Snyder is a bona fide auteur. Snyder burst onto the scene with his Dawn of the Dead remake, but has since become known for his hyper-stylized direction of the surprise hit 300 and the lackluster comic adaptation Watchmen. Snyder's style is unmistakable and there's no doubt he's the one behind Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole, or "The Owl Movie" as it has come to be known in some circles.
The voice cast includes Emily Barclay, Abbie Cornish, Ryan Kwanten, Anthony LaPaglia, Miriam Margolyes, Helen Mirren, Sam Neill, Geoffrey Rush, Jim Sturgess, Hugo Weaving, Richard Roxburgh and David Wenham. For more information on this film including pictures, trailers and a detailed synopsis choose from the following menu.
Review
"Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole" is a Warner Bros. release, directed by Zack Snyder and is rated PG for some sequences of scary action. The running time is 1 hour 30 minutes.
As with all the movies we've seen Snyder direct, Legend of the Guardians certainly doesn't falter visually. From his signature sudden slow-motion shots to some of the best 3D I've seen in a film yet, Legend of the Guardians doesn't disappoint as a feast for the eyes. However, the story of warrior owls doesn't demand the audience's attention and while I think kids will be perfectly fine with it, I defy anyone to walk out and rattle off the names of the feathered characters in this feature.
Names such as Ezylryb, Mrs. Plithiver, Eglantine, Otulissa, Echidna and Kludd (which sounds like Clod when pronounced in the movie) all get jumbled into some sort of name-calling-whatchamacallit as the film plays on. Luckily, the star of the story has the easiest name of the bunch, Soren (voiced by Jim Sturgess), a young owl that finds himself in search of the fabled legendary group of owl warriors, the Guardians of Ga'Hoole.
When Soren and his brother Kludd ("True Blood's" Ryan Kwanten) find themselves captured by the Pure Ones (a.k.a. the bad guys) the story takes a familiar story-telling twist. Kludd feels at home with the Pure Ones, while Soren heads off to find help after realizing they are planning bad things with the metal fleck-powered doohickey they're developing. The blood lines are drawn and from there the story is rather easy to figure out.
The only truly original aspect of the film is that owls make up all of the characters, that is when bats aren't entered into the equation late in the game. The only other animated owls I can think of are Archimedes from The Sword in the Stone and Mr. Owl who took three licks to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop. Snyder's armor clad owls are certainly more well-equipped than those two and an impressive voice cast has been gathered to bring their words to life.
Along with Sturgess and Kwanten the voice cast includes Abbie Cornish, Emilie de Ravin, Miriam Margolyes, Helen Mirren, Sam Neill, Anthony LaPaglia, Joel Edgerton, Geoffrey Rush, Hugo Weaving and David Wenham. Most are easily recognizable, but it may take you a moment as some of these aren't names you immediately associate with animated films. Unfortunately, with such a cast of mostly prestigious names there's hardly any room for a light-hearted moment in this film. LaPaglia's lute playing character, Twilight, comes about as close as you're going to get. For the most part we're talking about a rather dark film as the evil Nyra (Mirren) and her husband Metal Beak (Edgerton) lord over their "moon blinked" minions with a Nazi-esque iron fist. You know… kid stuff.
Legend of the Guardians isn't a bad film by any stretch, but it's going to have a hard time connecting on any grand level and based on the ending they are certainly hoping for the opportunity to make a sequel. However, I don't know how many people will be all that excited for another trip to the dark recesses of the owl world. It seems to me dancing penguins are a much easier sell.
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for me and yeah Ive seen alot of violent movies this movie was the most violet my mum burst out into tears in the middle of it and we took my Nanna and she went out of the cinemas and told the cinemas how appalled she was it was based around violence even more so than Harry potter yeah some scenes were spectacular because they were so graphic but others were horrible for the same reason and who the hell rated it PG it should be M what message are you sending to people like my 5 yr old cousin its OK to drop someone whos mean into a fire it was so disturbing that by the end of it everyone was in tears I wouldnt put any child through see that movie because it is horrible it was meant to be a movie about animals an alternative to Cats and dogs who got in trouble with the RSPCA I know some people thought the scenery was spectacular and it was
1.Kludd was just not mean he was EVIL
2.Soren did not drop Kludd on purpose
I just have a few questions. I haven't seen the movie yet, by the way. So anyways, what happened to St. Aggies? I know a few movies don't go with the books, but this was a major story line! Kludd pushed Soren out of the nest, and then he got carried away by St. Aggies! That's where he met Glyfie. And then, when they escaped, just a little while after that, they met Twilight. I mean, St. Aggies played a big part in the first few books. And who is Echidna? I don't remember whoever that is in the books. I'm just really confused and I'm hoping that someone could answer my questions so I can get a better understanding of this.
Mel, you're an idiot. The movie was hardly violent, and how on earth did it teach your couisin it's ok to drop someone into a fire?
Kludd tried to kill him (more than once), it wasn't "just" being mean, and even then he DIDN'T drop him into the fire, he slipped from his grasp if you'd of bothered to pay attention. After that what violence was there? You see a headbut, a few collisions, and that's it, no more than you'd see in your average Tom and Jerry film. You sheltered morons really need to grow up, not everything that's animated needs to be 100% rainbows and kid friendly, it was PG and appropriately so, there wasn't one drop of blood in the movie and the violence was minimal at best.
Nina, it's in the movie. They change it up a bit where Kludd didn't push Soren (like in the books) instead they both compete branching while their parents are hunting and fall, then both get kidnapped and separated at St Auggies, overall it's very similar to the books with only a few tweaks made here and there do to time constraints.
My husband and I really enjoyed the movie. The story and graphics were really amazing. Very in depth.
I think if you really enjoy Redwall, the Secret of Nimh, or the Last Unicorn it's really great. I liked that the main character felt so pure and believed his brother incapable of doing evil unless forced to.
I haven't read the books but I'm definitely going to check them out after seeing this. :)
@Mel: You're an idiot. There's more violence in Tangled than this movie.