Vert's movie Reviews on Newgrounds

[Waterlollies]

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... I'm a bit lost for words here.

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I mean, I could write about just how brilhant you and you're animations are, but that seems almost unecessary, not only because there are certain "self evident truths", which require no speaking.

For example, I could say your animation technique and drawings skills are is so good that I could watch a single waterfall drawn and animated by you for hours on end, but again, it's kind of pointless, you must certainly know this sort thing already.

Or how your characters are incredibly well developed and styled, in a way that they create genuine empathy and emotions from the viewers, something so hard to do in our thick skinned society. Not a small part of this is because of the fantastic music you use.

I really could, in all honesty and with all sincerity, write more paragraphs upon paragraphs on just fantastic experience Waterlollies was, whilst finding it very, very hard to produce anything to criticise (which any good review should, ideally, have, but sadly this one won't). In the end, all this praise would be slightly pointless, since I all I would be saying are things that are obviously true and I wouldn't be able to provide critisims to help you improve.

So, instead, what I will say is thank you. Thank you for continuing to produce such wonderful animations that are much beyond anything else that I know of. They really cheer me up and create a sense of wonder and excitement that I rarely feel now a days, but I used to feel alot when I was but a child.

chluaid responds:

thanks for taking the time to review this. I'm glad you liked it :)

[Pick Up: Act 2]

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... well, that was a very good movie, in pretty much all aspects, so what else can I add?

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Nah, I'm kidding, there's plenty I can add, so let's get down to details:

The overall drawing quality was very high, with some great character design (probably the best aspect of the movie, Snow, in particular, has an excelent look and feel), some nifty backgrounds and pretty good attention to detail, but there's a small snag with the animation. It's because your animation style, although way above average and (for the most part) pretty good, isn't so good when it comes to action filled scenes. In Metal Gear Yotsuba, for example, the animation comes off with out a hitch, but here it's (slightly) problematic.

And it's dificult to explain why, but I think it's because you seem to use a lot of tweens (which are really dificult to use when a scene has a lot of moviment), and it's not really a fair criticism, since everyone can and should use their own animation style (if everyone did frame-by-frame, it wouldn't be special). In this sense, it reminds me of a Pikanjo movie, which also has great drawings, but slight animation problems.

Despite this (slight) problem, the action was well "choreographed" and played out nicely. And this is a pretty big complement coming from me, since I'm not a fan of "dragon ball z style hammerspace teleportation" in action scenes, but I think you used it well and made it, well, exciting!

The voice acting was spot on (but a little confusing, a few times, when voices overlaped each other), the sound effects were well used and the music was well picked and complemented the on screen action well. Finally, the story, although abrupt, was interesting and made me want to see what's going to happen next!

So, over all, a truely fine movie, solid in all aspects. Cheers and kudos (and I really look foward to your next movie)! Oh, and the current score of aprox. 3.8 is ridiculously low, this movie deserves a score of above 4.1, easily! NG users sometimes can't seem to reconize greatness even when it hit's them in the face!

[Happiness Apotheosis]

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... that was really clever. I mean really clever! You had a truely creative and clever ideia and you executed it pretty well, making for one of the best Madness Movies so far! But let's get technical:

The overall animation and drawings style was farely close to that of Krinkels, but the diference was noticable, which isn't a big deal (but, in the case of this movie, the closer you made it, the better). Still, despite it's diferences, it was still well animated and drawn and pretty polished too.

The choice of music was pretty much obvious (but good), the same going for sound effects, but I have to admit that the use of voice (although very, very sparse) was probably a bad choice, simply because Madness never has had any...

The humour in the moive was excelent and you managed to parody famous scenes from the previous Madness pretty well. The intro (i.e., up to enterting the building), in particular was really, really good! Spot on!

So, over all, that was an excelent ideia very well excecuted and this movie deserves a much better score than it's current ~3.95. Cheers and kudos for a great movie!

[How to Recognize Aliens]

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... nice to see a new movie from you, Matzerath! And it's pretty good too, albite with all the good and bad points your movies usually have. Let me clarify:

- The overall quality of the animation and drawings are quite good, although (as with pretty much all your movies) it isn't really "action packed", so little animation is used... still, what's in there is good. I also enjoy your pretty unique drawing style and I found the sutble changes you've made in this movie (in regards to previous ones) a welcome adition (such as the more pronounced black outlines).

- The background music is meh, but it really isn't important, as the dialogue takes front stage here.

- The voice acting was excelent, the "stacato" delivery of the co-worker being simply great, by being so strange but well delivered. This was possibly the best aspect of the movie.

- The humour was good and very much in your style. But the length of the movie was way too short... I know you're extending short movie, but other tips (as per Worst Case Scenarios) would have made the movie great.

So, all in all, a fine, funny movie, but lacking slightly in some departments. Still, I'm a fan of your work and so I say cheers and kudos to you!

[Boris Grishenko trailer]

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... well, the idea for the plot of this movie is good enough that I can certainly see you extending it to make a good, full movie, so please do so! But let's get down to the detailed analyses of the movie itself:

- Decent animation and drawing style, although both could certainly use a bit more polish (the bond scene being a good example of where things could be better), you should probably imporve your efforts of improvement here a bit.

- The voice acting was pretty good and you made nice use of the music too.

- The jokes were reasonable and made me smile, but I'd probable try to avoid overusing Austin Powers references and instead concentrate on Boris's exagerated personality and general wackiness.

- It was, quite obviously, very short, but be careful with the size of the finished movie... It's quite easy to make it too long (and tiresome) and too short... But get the jokes right, and the first shouldn't be a problem. Still, I imagine a movie you want to make should probably last something like 3-7 minutes. Maybe.

So, all in all, this has the potential to be quite a good movie! But you should try to improve your animation and, above all, it's very important to get the humour right! Because in a parody, it matters more than anything else, really... Cheers and good luck with the movie (if could PM me when it's done, I'd be grateful).

[RienLand]

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... excellent stuff, that was, well, awesome! I mean, the "plot" was completely bizarre and didn't make much sense, but that's completely irrelevant when compared to great animation and drawings! I really liked how you mixed up different "drawing" styles and used lots of different camera angles extremely well. The pacing of the movie was also top notch, once the action begins it doesn’t let up and it goes well with the music (which, despite being a matrix-cliché song, was extremely well used).

The character’s style was also something I particularly liked, neither too stylish nor too simple, both the ants and the humans, the facial expressions being particular good. What else can I say... let me think... Oh, how about that this is going into my favourites and I'm really looking forward to your next movie! Cheers and extra kudos for a great piece of entertainment!

[Cow on Trampoline]

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... one big problem here: length! This is simply too short. It was decently animated, had adequate drawings and was mildly (but very mildly) humorous. But it barely lasted 10 seconds! It also didn’t have any but the most rudimentary of plots, but that’s not such a big deal. Try to expand your idea somehow and you should make it through the portal. You have some potential.

Imacow responds:

Thanks, this was for a collab so it was kinda short.

[Virus Alert - "Weird Al"]

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... although this isn't my favourite Weird Al music, it's still pretty funny (honestly, even a "weak" Weird Al song still is much better than most) and the music video you've made (which I had already seen on youtube, btw) is really good. Although you kept your "unique" stlye, it fits the music well, and, of course, it's very well drawn and animated.

More importantly, the humor of the movie was in "perfect harmony" (well, that's a slight exageration) with the music, exagerated (as it should, with Weird Al) and pretty funny. Yeah, only "pretty funny", but in all honesty, I actually think that the music is the "weak" link here, you did pretty much everything right!

Of course, even though even single review is going to mention this, the RAB cameos were great! Oh, and I also found the (small) extra scene interesting, but you should have shown us more of the game! It wasn't enough to get any feeling of how it looks and works (etc) and, thus, it didn't make curious enough to go check it out. In any case, cheers and 'grats on actually making a Weird Al video!

One little question, though (although I don't expect you to answer, given the huge number of reviews I'm expecting), how much input did Al give into the music video? Did give you a free hand, or did he pretty much tell you everything?