The Hatchling premeired on October 17 last week from this mini-review's posting. I watched it the moment it came out, and here are my thoughts on it (if you haven't seen my Twitter tweet on it).
I think it's excellent. First and foremost, the visuals for the dinosaurs done by Max Bellomio (Forgotten Bloodlines fame) are excellent and highly accurate, provided by Max Bellomio. The short's runtime, while only 10 minutes, is still rather well paced, playing out like an excerpt from a feature length film, aided by great performances from the actors (I hope they go onto bigger things), and keeps the other dinosaurs in it only briefly to keep focus on the Deinocheirus. I also like how the characters actually do address that the dinosaurs showing up and making themselves at home would be bad for the eosystem no matter what (something I wish a certain Jurassic Park film did in detail, but enough of that). The music is also nice too, carrying the classic 80's and 90's feel of movies with sense of wonder and awe - Like Spielberg's and Amblin's, it clearly owes a lot from without being obvious and derivative.
I don't even mind the short doesn't take place in the 80's or 90's like I thought it would. It's a minor complaint at best, as is the short runtime. Must be an effect of an indie budget, CG visuals notwithstanding.
Story - 8/10
Accuracy - 9/10
Aging - 9/10
Visuals - 10/10
Music - 8/10
Rewatchability - 10/10
The Hatchling is great, 10/10 in my book, doing pretty much everything great. Here's hoping director Tim Cianfano can make a feature length version someday.
What do you think of The Hatchling? What's great about it to you? Share your thoughts wherever you can.
I apologise for the nearly-month hiatus at Mesozoic Mind. I had other projects to work on. But don't worry, this blog is still active, so welcome back everyone. And I've been to a new place today (well kind of, as you shall learn) that's on my my mind today - my Mesozoic mind. Today as part of an excersise walk with my personal trainer, I went along the waterfront of Toronto and eventually went to Budapest Park, located on the west side of Toronto on its Lakeshore. It wasn't planned, and I have never set foot thewre, but we did so. Budapest Park itself is a smalk lakeside park not unlike others out there, save for one thing I came for now that it was in walking distance for me: it has dinosaur statues. The statues consist of two ornithischians, Chasmosaurus and a Stegosaurus . They are made of concrete and are small, at the very least as tall as me. Apparently they came from a now-closed park open in the 1960's and 70's in Huntsville, Muskoka Dinosaur Land, that...
Two years. Two years at Mesozoic Mind , through ups and downs and bringing you the best I could give you, and expanded my horizons in life, to go where I could only dream of. To celebrate, here's what I made for all of you readers as a gift: remaking Walking with Dinosaurs for the 21st century as I'd do it. Yeah, I know, people stopped doing this kind of thing years ago, but what the heck, I wanted to do it myself, and I only really do the big ones for special occasions like these. The episodes would be quite different from the origials in setting, but would stil have enough rocognisable creature archtypes and plot beats to show which corresponds to which. Although I still see fit to tell you which is which. Also, please forgive any anachronisms in the lineups I have created. I tried my best to avoid them. Also also, the pictures used here serve to get an idea of what things would feel or look like, not be direct representations. Episode One - Archosauria Art by Olmagon Set in...
Well, Walking with Dinosaurs 2025 came and went. The reboot to the icon of palaeodocumentaries, promising a new take that would appeal to audiences not versed in the nitty gritty by showing dig sites in action to show how palaeontology works alongside the usual nature doc-style life reconstruction sequences. It .... was .... Not very good. While no one ws expecting it to surpass the original, so much seems to conspire to make it subpar. There's a reduced budget compared to the original, so there aren't that many species, and to choose active dig sites only limited the sites, meaning half the series is Cretaceous North America. Conbine that with being made in the fog of COVID and at a time when nature docs are bing underfunded by a society caring only for sating the rich, and you thus get a series which feel thin and empty, not really a succesor to the classic. But which reaches the heights of what came before it and which plunged deeper then even the movie? Let's find out....
Comments
Post a Comment