Monarch of the Moon

Monarch of the Moon may lack the authenticity of the original 1940s serials, but very little else is missing. The Lowry brothers and their crew have lovingly crafted a tribute to the likes of King of the Rocketmen, Zombies from the Stratosphere, The Black Widow, The Phantom, Dick Tracy etc... The DVD allows you the option to view the feature in colour or in good ol' black and white. Monarch of the Moon is best viewed in Black and white, the heavy shadows don't fair too well in colour. Blane Wheatley is a wonderful protagonist, who over acts perfectly without making a mockery of his role. Monica Himmelheber is gorgeous.

Serials are a risky genre to tackle. Simply put, people either "get it" or hate it. It's a genre that is filled with ridiculousness that doesn't strive to be serious. It borrows from an era when anything was possible, a golden age for western society that has since had it's "can do anything" attitude replaced with scepticism and doubt. Modern movie goers need their crazy served to them in a serious, "believable" manner (Transformers). God forbid that a viewer should still have to rely on their imagination while watching a flick... This isn't an attempt to sound like a snob. It's just a honest observation that audiences prefer the wonders of modern CG (which in recent years has proved that it can produce damn near anything and look amazing) to stylish (possibly (and in this case) low budget) fx.

I enjoyed Monarch of the Moon greatly. My only complaint with the feature would be that it struggles to include unnecessary comedic roles and tidbits. It sadly dumbs down the feature at points and disrupts the pacing.

Fans of the old Republic serials should enjoy Monarch of the Moon. It's fun and doesn't let the genre down. It's also incredibly interesting to see new methods of cinematography used to recreate rich archaic styles. Sadly, anything relating to serials of the past is doomed to only be praised if it is a slick reference hidden in Lost or a J.J. Abrahms internet teaser pic. Feature length tributes such as Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow and Monarch of the Moon appear to be losing their spot in Hollywood. Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skulls was mocked for it's now infamous fridge scene. Yet this scene fits perfectly in a serial inspired production. I felt it was a great way of capturing the heroes inevitable demise that concludes each chapter of a serial, only to have his miraculous survival explained a week later. Crystal Skulls failed as a movie for other reasons, the oft mocked fridge scene is just misunderstood.

There is an audience for the serial genre, I hope that creative minds will continue to figure out ways in which to keep it alive.

Comedies, even spoofs, are more difficult to make than most people realize. and when it comes to spoofing an old film style, most professional directors fail. Mel Brooks succeeded with "Young Frankenstein" but failed with "High Anxiety" and "Silent Movie". Others have failed spoofing the old 40's serials, the only exception being a movie that is not truly a spoof of the serials, but yet is funny and exciting: "Raiders of the Lost Ark".

"Monarch of the Moon" is another attempt to spoof the Flash Gordon, Batman and Zorro type serials from days gone by. Its obvious that these people love the genre and had a lot of fun making this, but, for the most part,it doesn't work. The main deficits in the film are slow pacing and a mix of acting styles and skills. Some of the actors are playing their roles fairly straight (Yellow Jacket, the Bear Scout kid and Dragonfly for example), while others are spoofing stereo-types (his drunken sidekick) while yet some others are playing it for silly slapstick (the secretary). Individually, many of these work, but together in a film, they clash against each other. Additionally, the script can't decide how far to go in the spoof and sometimes steps too close to absurdity and is occasionally derisive of the genre. There are a couple of funny lines and a few good performances, but for a seemingly long, slow-paced film . . .its not enough.

One does have to compliment all involved for their effort and for the detail they gave to the project. Good costuming, good CG, good makeup and good sets. The music score is okay as written, but is apparently performed on less-than-great synthesizers and so has a cold, distant, unexciting feel.

Worth seeing for those of us who are budding, low budget filmmakers, but I'm not 100% sure that it was worth the 20 bucks for the DVD.

My boy and some of his buddies made an agent/SciFi thriller when they were about 13 or 14 ... they had one camera, no money, and little time, but lots of enthusiasm and tinfoil, and the product was not very painful to watch if you belonged to the family. "Monarch of the Moon" is even better! No, seriously - although the low budget is clearly visible (sometimes in a painful way), "Monarch of the Moon" manages to circumvent most traps such productions use to fall into. The sets and FX are cheap but have a consistent quality and look; and the pacing is quick - no scene feels drawn-out.

The only trap they fell into is bad acting - if you're spoofing something so inherently funny as those old serials, the best thing you can do is try to catch the tone and play it straight - it doesn't get funnier by deliberate bad acting. And a minor gripe: The sound mix could use some fine-tuning. Bot overall, a charming mix of spoof and nostalgia which stays entertaining from start to finish.

I had no idea what this was when I sat down to watch it, and my first thought was 'what the hell is this?' It took a few minutes to realize that, instead of being a totally inept movie, this was a spoof of old action/adventure films, particularly serials. I ended up enjoying the movie and am glad to have seen it.

For a movie that is really over the top, it is quite subtly done. I know that those two things seem contradictory, but they both apply. The subtleties are what make this work.

However, this movie takes a bit of flexibility to enjoy. If you go into it with preconceptions of what it should be, you could be quite disappointed. Regardless, I heartily recommend _Monarch of the Moon_.

Last night, we watched the first episode of this new 6-episode serial that is s'posed to be an homage to 1940s serials.

It turns out that it's actually a Naked Gun-type spoof of serials (at least, it is based on the first episode) that has some impressive things in it, but which to me if it were an actual WWII serial would be one of the worst.

Blane Wheatley is the chain-smoking hero the Yellow Jacket, who can fly and control actual yellow jackets. Monica Himmelheber is his chain-smoking secretary/girlfriend, and she's the best thing in the episode (there's a running gag involving her being bonked on the noggin that is the only thing I found amusing here). Kimberly Page is the Dragonfly, a femme fatale Japanese agent who speaks like The Craw on Get Smart. There's a lot of references to "Japs" and "Krauts" and Y.J. has a professor-sidekick who is dull, which is supposed to be humorous.

The DVD comes with both color and B&W versions; oddly, they both look awful. The B&W looks like the color has simply been turned off, and the color looks like a B&W that's been colorized. Neither are satisfying, but after sampling both we chose the latter for episode one.

Stay tuned.