Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem (4 Stars)

It's good to be back. I don't think I've ever been away from blogging for three weeks, not once since I began my blog in 2010. I didn't even give up blogging when I was in hospital last year, although I admit that my blog posts were about my illness, not films. So what's my excuse for this uncharacteristic lapse? In my last post I mentioned that I would be on holiday for two weeks. So what's the third week about? Laziness? The very opposite! I bought a new computer, which was delivered while I was away. I needed days to set it up when I got home. I don't just mean the operating system, I mean the software I'm accustomed to. I'm almost finished. Almost. For reasons unclear to me my printer (an HP Laserjet) doesn't work with my computer. After hours of fiddling around I've given up. I can still print from my laptop. I have some ideas what I can still try, but I'm exhausted and will leave it till next week.

I'm really proud of the computer. It's the best computer I've ever had. I bought it from Alternate, a company that specialises in gaming computers. I'm not a gamer, but I trust Alternate for quality, so they were the first company I considered. After making my initial decisions on the configuration I had a long conversation with a technical support man who gave me a few tips on improving my choices. In the end I decided on a 16 core Intel i7 processor, with 64 GB memory and 3 TB of disk space. The graphics card is only a GTX 1650. As I said, I'm not a gamer, so the graphics card is an area where I was able to save money. The GTX 1650 is the ideal card for watching 4K movies and doing simple video editing.

The processor is possibly overkill, but on occasion I do chess analysis, so it's good to have the power in reserve. Intel is necessary, because AMD processors have weaker numeric processors and tend to overheat when doing chess analysis. For reasons that I've never understood, AMD has cut corners with integer arithmetic, which is essential for chess programs.

I hesitated a long time with the disk space. I knew I wanted a 1 TB SSD as my first disk drive, but should the second drive be 2 TB or 4 TB? In the end I decided on a 2 TB drive to discipline myself. I already have four external drives, but if I have too much internal disc space I might get lazy and not back up my data often enough. Most of my data consists of material that I've downloaded from the Web, but I also have original creations that I can't afford to lose.

I might have been able to set up my computer faster, but there were distractions. It's the school holidays, so I had to spend time with my grandchildren. I didn't want to, but my family has grown used to me being the full time babysitter, so I couldn't just lock myself away with my computer.

Let's get to the film, before you think I've forgotten about it. I was impressed by the film's atmosphere from the beginning. It seems very dark, surprisingly dark for a film aimed at children aged 6 and upwards. This is in the style of the original comic books. When they were first published in 1984 I ignored them, thinking they were silly comics for children. A few years later I read a few copies, and I was surprised at how adult they were. They were invented by Kevin Eastman, best known as the husband of the actress Julie Strain. He even appeared in a few films with her, such as "Return to Savage Beach".

The film's graphics are amazing. At times it looks like they're painted with oil colours, especially in the night scenes. It looks much better than the messy graphics in the animated Spider-Verse films.

What I don't like is the way the characters of the individual turtles aren't properly developed. They can only be told apart by their different coloured masks and their different weapons. Even the weapons aren't a help, because in the fight scenes everything's a blur and we can't see what weapons are being used. Are the turtles ever introduced by name? I don't think so, but their names are used as the film develops.

Maybe the story is too complicated. The turtles are hunting for a villain called Superfly, but at the same time they're being hunted by scientists who want to steal their powers by milking them. The film jumps from one plot to the other. This type of story works well in comics, but is it suitable for films? I'm not sure. My grandson Oliver didn't seem to have any problems following the film.

I need to watch the film again at least once to get a good impression. I'll write more about it next time, and I'll write less about my computer. It feels good to write my first post with my new computer. Okay, I'm still using the same keyboard, so it isn't a completely different experience. It just gives me a warm feeling in my stomach.