Language - English
Genre - Sci-fi
Characters
John
Carter - Our hero, an earth man & a bit of a rogue
Dejah
Thoris
-
A Red Martian princess
Tars
Tarkas
-
A Green Martian warrior
Sab
Than - A red Martian, our villain (kind of)
John
Carter is a Disney film based upon ‘The Princess of Mars’ by
Edgar Rice Burroughs, the creator of Tarzan and follows John Carter a
soldier in the American confederate army who finds himself
transported to Mars.
I
have to say that when I started to watch John Carter I was unsure of
what to expect as most of the review’s I had read had said how bad
it was but I have to disagree with them.
The
film is not entirely faithful to the book but it keeps the same feel.
For example When John is transported to Mars in the book he is chased
by Native Americans into a cave where he experiences a strange
sensation, hears a creature behind him and then passes out to wake up
on Mars, where as in the film he is chased into the same cave but he
finds a dying Martian who is attempting to return to Mars but who
ends up sending John instead, this is all part of a slightly new story line which does work well in the film.
There
are some quite funny moments in John Carter some of which are brought
from the book. When John first arrives on Mars he doesn’t
know where he is and so doesn’t expect the difference in gravity
resulting in his comedic attempts to move, this scene is played for
laughs but also sets up things for further in the film. I’ve
read that this scene in the book was part of what influenced the
creation of Superman who, when he first appeared couldn't fly but
could leap tall buildings with a single bound and, when seeing it on
the screen it is easy to how the two could be linked.
Another
good thing about the film is the portrayal
of Dejah
Thoris
who
is a Martian princess who is being forced into marriage for political
reasons. Although she is being forced to marry someone she
doesn’t want to she is not portrayed as needing saving and shows,
more than once that she can stand on her own to feet. It’s
worth noting that she is also depicted wearing more clothing than in
the book although this is probably due to the film being a Disney
film and so aimed a younger audience.
One
thing worth mentioning are the effects. One of the reasons John
carter is slated in other reviews is the amount of money it cost to
make but you can see that a lot of it went into the effects. There
are three intelligent humanoid(ish) races on Mars in the first book
as well as the animals and in the film there is an extra race. The
new race and the red Martians are the most human so they would be the
most easy to do but the four armed green Martians and the white apes
of Mars needed to have some money spent on them otherwise they may
have looked out of place or tacky and it was obvious that the money
had been spent on all of the film and not just the main characters,
this was shown in the baby green Martians.
One
thing John carter avoids is the slight racist tone of the books which
is a sign of the time they were written in although this was more
obvious in the second book than the first.
Over
all I found John Carter a quite enjoyable movie that would be fun to
watch with the family.
