You would definitely not think so from any of the trailers, but Rango is a fun and very well put together film with some great animation and acting, interesting characters and one of the best chase sequences I’ve seen in years. It’s also definitely not for kids, as the trailer would suggest, and it’s also not even close to being an animated Fear and Loathing. I don’t even understand why people have been saying this. People are stupid.

But back to the trailers… to say that I was put off by them is an understatement. I even struggled to find a good clip to accompany this review, something that would show just a little bit of the quality and story that can be found in this film. There wasn’t one moment where the film didn’t lose my interest, but I guess that’s not hard when you give me a western… and animate it… and add in a mariachi band made up of four little owls. The Owls are lucky, they can fly around and find some water, but unfortunately for the rest of the inhabitants of Dirt, the little desert town Rango finds himself in, finding this precious resource is a bit more difficult. In fact, water runs the town – it’s the local currency. Run out of water and not only can you not buy a new house… you could even die!

For the next two hours we are witness to a masterpiece of animation, some nice jokes and some excellent characters. A lot of time has been spent crafting every little animal we see, from the character design to the voice acting. If you didn’t read his name on the poster walking in, you wouldn’t even know that Johnny Depp was providing the voice of Rango, and I don’t hesitate to say that it is his best performance in years. Bill Nighy is great as the viscous Rattlesnake Jake, Abigail Breslin cute as always as the little cactus mouse Priscilla and a short but hilarious appearance by Alfred Molina as an armadillo named Roadkill really shows the care that went into selecting these actors.

This film also represents something else exciting – the emergence of Industrial Light and Magic as a feature Animation studio. The animation in Rango is flawless, and I commend Nickelodeon for allowing IL&M to go crazy here. The animals surpass even the best character work of Pixar, and that really is something difficult to achieve. It really does feel like we are in the middle of one of the best eras of animation that film has ever seen, and I’m always happy to see another studio joining the fray and putting together such an excellent piece of work. This is also Nickelodeon’s best film to date and I can only hope that they are setting themselves a new quality benchmark.

This movie is going to be bad ass.

BAD.

ASS.

There are a bunch of exciting movies coming out later this year, but Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World is definitely the one I am most looking forward to. I absolutely love Edgar Wright and if the film is only 10% as great as the trailer is making it out to be then this will be his best film yet, let alone the best thing that Michael Cera has ever done. The haters can keep on hating, but I think Cera has more to offer us than that character he plays where he plays himself being an awkward dude. I’ve definitely never seen him do any of these kind of moves before! Kicking ex-boyfriend ass = kicking hater ass.

I was finding it difficult to write about Iron Man 2. There doesn’t seem to be that much substance here. The new characters are interesting but flat, the fight scenes  predictable yet still exciting and the story is similar in structure to many other comic book film sequels, but none of this actually detracts from the experience. This is a high-budget popcorn movie and it doesn’t hide that fact. It’s completely self-aware, and delivers on most of its promise.

The film starts off with Tony Stark finding political pressure back home as the government (faced by a very funny Garry Shandling as a US Senator) believes that they should be in control of the Iron Man ‘weapon’. Stark makes some jokes, makes everyone smile and lets the peeps of the world know that no one could EVER get this technology in ten… TWENTY years. LITTLE DOES HE KNOW that a completely pissed off Russian, Ivan Vanko (Mickey Rourke) has a nice blue print of that EXACT SAME technology that makes Iron Man so iron-y and man-y. CUE MOVIE.

Jon Favreau’s direction is spot on, and he shows us once again that he can be quite the comic actor when he wishes. Apart from the perfect Robert Downey Jr filling the shoes of Tony Stark, Sam Rockwell might just be the best thing about the film. I wish this man could be in every film ever made, but I don’t think he has time to do that, which is a great loss for this world. He plays Justin Hammer, an arms dealer who finds an ally in Vanko. He reminded me a lot of and is every bit as good as Aaron Eckhart’s Harvey Dent in The Dark Knight.

Unfortunately Rourke just doesn’t pull off the villain as well as he probably should have – the character is excellent, but by the end of the film it’s all just a bit flat. Unfortunately this can also be said for Scarlett Johansson and Sam Jackson, who don’t leave me with too much enthusiasm for future Avengers films. Although I’m glad that this quite obvious set-up for future releases wasn’t as in your face as I had expected.

But I’m not going to lie, the action is just as mesmerising as the first film, and while it all felt a bit of a re-hash, there aren’t that many moves you can pull when you are a man in a flying suit, being chased by other flying suits. Favreau and Downey Jr. have once again provided the world with two hours of pure fun – they aren’t out to push boundaries or make us sit there and think about the state of the world, and that’s just fine with me.

Three stars out of five.