 |
| Thomas is deposited in a community of boys after his memory is erased, soon learning they're all trapped in a maze that will require him to join forces with fellow "runners" for a shot at escape. -Summary from IMDB |
This is the first of two reviews
that Sarah and I are doing for The Maze
Runner movie. This review focuses on the movie itself separate from the
book and contains NO SPOILERS. Sarah will soon post A Reader’s Response to The Maze
Runner which will be comparing the book to the movie and will contain spoilers
for both.
_______________________________________________________________________
Watching The Maze Runner on the big screen while I was high on caffeine is
not an experience I’ll soon forget. My
mind was running 5 miles a minute and I was jittery as all get out. I’m not
used to caffeine.
It was when the first Griever was
shown that I figured out that The Maze
Runner is a movie that likes to mess with your mind. I am familiar with the
premise of the story, but I haven’t read the book. It wasn’t until that moment
that I realized that the Grievers weren’t supernatural monsters, they were
man-made. The whole maze is being controlled by someone on the outside, and
that messed with my mind, as I am sure it did with the characters. Yes, the
monsters were scary, but it was the ideas behind them that had more of an
impact for me. That being said, I did feel like I nearly jumped out of my skin
twice during the movie. Even a couple of minutes afterwards I was still shaking
out my arms trying to convince them that I really would prefer to stay inside
my skin. Like I said: caffeine.
Even though a movie does not have
as much time as a book to develop characters, I felt like I knew them well
enough to like them. I will admit that I am also influenced by superficial
things such as looks (hey, I’m only human). My favorite character was definitely
Newt (he’s gorgeous!), and I actually liked Gally. I could tell he was supposed
to be the jerk of the story, but I couldn’t really hate him that much. Part of
it has to do with how he was portrayed, the other part is again probably for
superficial reasons… at least I’m honest. Overall, I was generally fond of all
the characters.
As someone who has never read the
book, I am really impressed by The Maze Runner. Some book movies are just
mediocre, and can’t survive without the book to give it depth and a fanbase.
The Maze Runner is fine on its own. I really wasn’t confused during the movie,
which is something that is vital for a book movie. The only thing that had me
shaking my head was the characters saying that no one had seen a Griever and
lived… I had to ask Sarah if Grievers were the things that stung people,
because that meant they had obviously seen them. I just chalk that up to overdramatic
stupidity, it’s not really a big deal.
The
Maze Runner is an action-packed, psychological, dystopian, horror. Yes, it
is all those things at once. Just go with it. It is definitely worth seeing
even if you haven’t read the books yet. I am totally looking forward to seeing how
the rest of the movies play out.
-Christina
No comments:
Post a Comment