Review of Seventh Son (2014) by Sylvester E — 08 Feb 2015

Jeff Bridges plays a cranky old mentor to a junior partner who must be initiated in the ways to fight against the forces of darkness. No, it's not RIPD. That was the last one.

Here we have a tale of witches, dragons, swords, sorcery, parental concern, and young love. When over half of the shots in a movie are special effect works, the result can become somewhat detached. This movie has an entire scene with an oversized blind leathery mole in the middle of film that seems unrelated to everything else and serves little purpose other than to separate our protagonists from all their possessions and act as setup for line, "You're hard to kill". That said, the shot of the mole thing jumping off the cliff is pretty cool.

Julianne Moore as the face of this particular evils gets to chew a little scenery. She seems to not have aged since I first saw her what seems like 20 years ago. Most of the acting is pretty stock. This one is about the visuals, and they are pretty strong. There is one acting standout. That is Olivia Williams as Mam Ward, mother of our apprenticing hero. She brings a touch of warmth to what otherwise is a CG exercise.