Honest and Family Friendly Reviews

My 8-year-old daughter was right when she told me “Mom, I think you better see ‘John Carter’ without me.”  I shudder to think how many scenes would have warranted my hand over her 3D glasses-clad eyes.  

Reactions from Mom, Dad, Daughter and Son

This story, which took 100 years to become a movie, is, in a sentence, a science fiction tale of John Carter, a former captain in the American military and his mysterious arrival on Mars (called Barsoom in the film).  After a long narrative lead that requires close attention (if you care to follow the storyline), viewers are thrust into 3-dimensional, immediate and intense warfare.  Those last two words can serve to describe, oh, I’d guess about 75% of the film:  intense warfare.  John Carter is, in my motherly opinion, by no means a family film, despite what you may read on Disney’s website.

White Apes, John Carter (Taylor Kitsch, center) ©2011 Disney.

While the tried and true boy-meets-girl/good-defeats-evil formula is present in this film, the story itself is not what carries the movie.  It’s the relentless battles between – at last count – four different civilizations (even species) on Barsoom.  You are treated to high tech weaponry and effects galore, yet the combatants resort to hand-to-hand combat anyway.  I would grouse that a vivid imagination should yield more humane ways of settling differences on another planet, but I absolve the filmmakers only because this story, as I said, is a hundred years old.

Things I loved:

• • There are plenty of amusing moments in John Carter.  He’s tenacious and irreverent and mouthy, and it’s fun to watch him struggle with his new leaping abilities on Mars/Barsoom (can you say early Peter Parker?).  His accidental nickname is hilarious too.
• • Most of the movie has passed before you discover that John Carter really is heroic.  Regardless, he seems like a hero early on without doing anything worthy of the designation.

A Four Armed THARK

• • The double set of arms on the Tharks is cool.  And surprising.  I guess I never realized how expressive arms and hands can be.  Imagine how many things you could express with 4 arms and hands!
• • I heart the hairless blue-tongued “dog”!

Woola, A Man From Jarsoom's Best Friend

• • Some of the scenery (I understand this movie was shot largely in Utah) is breathtaking, 3D or not.  Watch for the amazing aerial shots of the boat ride down the river.  Wow!
• • There’s a great surprise twist at what feels like the end.  It breathes new life into the end of a long film.
• • Watching Taylor Kitch in a loin cloth for 2 hours and 11 minutes was not a bad thing!

It get's hot on Mars, so stay cool, don a loin-cloth

Things I didn’t love:

• • Violence, violence, violence!  I’ll save the specifics for the following bullet points, but parents be warned, this movie is violent.  Capital V.
• • Need proof?  You’ll witness infanticide, public lynching, branding someone (also in public) with a hot iron until no unburned skin remains, point blank shooting, and a mob beating a dog.
• • Language isn’t awful, but you’ll be treated to more than one “What the hell?”

The Warhoons, the Bad versions of the Peaceful 4-armed Tharks

• • At first I wanted to applaud the movie for putting female warriors shoulder to shoulder with male warriors.  Finally, equality!  But alas, it quickly devolved into the objectification of women when the princess is forced (by her father, no less!) to marry the enemy in an attempt to achieve peace on the planet.  Back to the drawing board, ladies.  Big sigh….
• • It took half the movie (and it’s a long movie) for John Carter to realize he’s no longer on Earth.  I thought that was strange given the whole gravity change and green monster stuff.

The 9th Ray is Revealed

• • It was funny to watch the princess “shake” John Carter’s hand (she literally jiggles it by his thumb).  Apparently they don’t shake hands on Mars.  But she sure knew how to kiss!
• • Back to the violence.  The blue-colored blood was a relief but even that didn’t disguise the gruesome killing of the white ape.  Too much, guys.
• • The movie borrowed too much from others:  “Spiderman” (with the leaping), “Harry Potter” (John C. learning to fly a solo vehicle looked like Harry P.learning to fly a broom for Quiddich), and the white ape slaying felt like a reenactment of the iconic scene from that old (violent) Mel Gibson movie, “Braveheart”, when he belts out the speech about the enemy never taking their freedom.  John Carter does something almost identical, blue skin and all!

Able to leap tall sand dunes in a single bound...

This movie will please the males in your life.  Your sons (if you allow them to see it) will think you’re a cool mom, but I don’t vie for higher ranking on my son’s cool factor scale.  My son will have to wait for his dad to take him to this one.  Against my better judgment.

Rated PG-13

In theaters March 9, 2012