Friday, July 22, 2016

Paper Planes (2015)


Who would have thought paper planes could be so serious?  To the point that there is a world championship with all the thrills, excitement and tension of any other competitive sports.  Paper Planes follows a primary school student, Dylan, from a small town in Australia as he wins his way up to the national tournament, and then eventually the world championship in Japan.  Paper Planes doesn't use your standard paper plane design, rather it branches out to more inventive designs, some of which are complicated and it suspends your disbelief.  This is true in the finale where on the fly, Dylan creates a new design based on an eagle, and the way it flies was too melodramatic.  You appreciate that they were aiming for something more deep and linking it back to the father-son relationship, but it was a massive roll-your-eyes moment and you would have rather they stayed in the competitive route with no gimmicks.  This movie includes all your cliche characters, from the competitive bully jerk, to your love interest, even when it feels like it would have been better to exclude them.  On the whole, while the plot can be uneven at times, it was enjoyable, if purely for the refreshing concept alone.

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