PA Ram… have you seen/will you see Dr. Strange?

My wife and I saw it last night. It’s got an Academy Award for special effects in its future – see it in 3D. It has the clever/witty dialogue that is a hallmark of all Marvel films and Cumberbatch was the perfect choice for Dr Strange. We really liked it.

• This reply was modified 8 years ago by nittany ram.

PA Ram wrote:

I didn’t have it on my list but I may check it out. I really don’t know anything about the character. I never read the comic. I was turned off a bit by the city turning upside down. I thought it felt like an “Inception” rip-off.

But I do like Cumberbatch. I may check it out.

I saw “Inferno” last week. Better than the reviews but all Dan Brown novels are pretty much the same. But I enjoy the little historical notes and locations.

Visually Dr Strange is better than Inception. The visuals are much more complex. But it’s not overdone. It’s just cool to watch.

I saw Inferno and liked it as well. I like the ‘historical puzzle’ aspect of it.

Also saw The Accountant recently and enjoyed it. The premise was interesting for an action film – Much better than Jack Reacher. But the best film I’ve seen recently is Girl on a Train. Very dark and suspenseful with a twist.

I saw this film today. Some thoughts:

The special effects(though heavily inspired by “Inception” were out of this world. Very well done. I saw this in 3D, by the way. It was a fun ride.

Having said that–the film was just that–a ride. Now that’s okay. I love rides. And yes–the ride was worth the price of admission. The film doesn’t fare as well when breaking down into story, characters and logic.

Let me start with logic. For this type of film I am more than ready to just toss it out the window. I get it. We’re dealing with magic, other worlds and dimensions. Who has time for logic? So that didn’t bother me. Well–maybe it bothered me a little but no more than any other film of this type. No big deal.

Characters. I didn’t think they were particularly well defined. I had no real feel for the relationship between Dr. Strange and Rachel McAdams character. Doctor Strange is somewhat rushed along because…well–there are special effects to get to(frankly I don’t think I’ve seen more special effects in a film ever). In some ways special effects were the main character. I had zero feel for the wonderful Mads Mikkelson. He had very little to work with, in my opinion.

Tilda Swinton is a wonderful actress but I had no real idea what to make of her character. I know they were trying to show that things aren’t always white and black but they just sort of tossed it in there without me ever feeling the character’s inner torment at that reality. The speech with Doctor Strange didn’t quite cut it for me. Her face was mostly without emotion–almost a mask.

Benedict Cumberbatch was great–as always. He looked like he was having fun. He didn’t take any of this too seriously.

Chiwetel Ejiofor’s Mordo seemed to have very little to do. He felt like a character there just to help the plot explain things but not particularly important.

Story: Nothing new here, really. We’ve seen it all before. Typical Marvel. That’s okay–but nothing new.

Highlights: the special effects(worth the price of admission, as I said–very cool), the cape which had a mind of its own and was actually a “character’ in the film. I liked that a lot. the librarian was also a fun character–and as I mentioned Cumberbatch was great for the role of Doctor Strange. I’m not sure where it goes from here. We’ll see. Some appearances in other superhero films? More of his own adventures?

We’ll have to see.

I did like the film. It didn’t blow me away but I did like it.

I saw the credits scene with Thor–but I missed the other one(Ugh–I HATE when Marvel does this). What did I miss?