Tags
Jamie Campbell-Bower, movie reviews, movies, The Mortal Instruments, The Mortal Instruments City of Bones, urban fantasy
I was interested in seeing “The Mortal Instruments – City of Bones” when it first released earlier this year. I was curious about it’s urban fantasy theme with human-angel hybrids with some vampires thrown in, so I watched it on Netflix this week.
Click for the film’s page on IMDB
Now, I’ve never read the books, so I may be missing out on what “The Mortal Instruments” is all about. But at the same time, I felt the first half of the movie moved too fast. The scenes ran quickly and I felt as if a lot was thrown in. I understand the first book of the series is long, so to squeeze a thick book into a two hour movie is always a challenge. But I wish things went slowly at this part.
I really liked the whole human-angel hybrids hunting demons, but I felt it wasn’t developed enough. While Jace, played by Jamie Campbell-Bower was telling Clary, played by Lily Collins, to never trust anyone, I felt that idea could’ve been expanded more because I got curious on what it is like to not know who is a demon or not. I also liked Clary learning more about who she is, but it was rushed and hard to absorb that way. The possible romance between Clary and Jace was kind of forced to me, as well as Simon and Clary. I liked learning about Clary’s mother, portrayed by Lena Headey who also appears in “Game of Thrones”, and how she fled Clary’s father, Valentine, played by Jonathan Rhys-Myers.
But overall, I felt the movie wasn’t developed enough and I wasn’t sure if I understood everything. I thought there was too much of an emphasis on Clary and Jace. I mean, if the story was really about defeating Valentine and having Clary understand who she is, why all the YA romance that was never meant to be anyway? Probably because Jamie Campbell-Bower is popular with teen girls (Although I have to admit he is good eye-candy).
I don’t know if Jace and Clary are really brother and sister. I heard they actually are not, but if they are, yeah incest is twisted, but Clary’s mother did it in a past life (wink, wink on that Game of Thrones reference)!
I will see the sequel because I like the angel-demon world that is largely invisible to ours. The fight scenes are awesome and the acting is pretty good. However, does Jonathan Rhys-Myers play the same character in all his projects?
Megan Cashman 