I can't say I was that excited by the announcement of this picture, so it wasn't that big of a deal when it didn't impress me. It's not necessarily a bad film, but it just isn't that notable.
First I guess I need to explain the plot. Dave Lizewski is a dorky teenager growing up in New York who one days decides to become the superhero Kick-Ass!
and soon meets up with...no, wait. Sorry, Dave STUTLER is a dorky pre teen who one day on a field trip writes a letter for his crush asking if she'd like to go out with him. The wind blows it away and leads him to a shop owned by Damon Macready, a former cop known today as the ruthless vigilante, Big Daddy! 
Oh wait, it's just his actor, Nicholas Cage. He's playing an ancient sorceror named Balthazar Blake, the titular Sorceror. Honest to god, this is an alternate universe version of Kick-Ass. Except not as funny.
Centuries back, Merlin had three apprentices, Balthazar, Veronica (I think) and Horvath. After Veronica decides she loves Balthazar, Horvath decides to help Merlin's mortal enemy, Morgana Le Fey storm the castle and steal Merlin's most powerful spell, one that would allow her to summon a legion of undead minions. Veronica magically absorbs Morgana, but she is too strong, so Balthazar traps her in a Russian Matroshka (spelling?) doll called the Grimhold. Merlin gives him a ring shaped like a dragon to find the one person who could destroy Morgana, the Prime Merlinian. Along the way he captures even more evil sorceror's in the Grimhold, including Horvath. This is Dave.
Dave accidentally releases Horvath, who fights with Balthazar, and ends with them trapped in a giant urn for ten years. During this times, Dave has established himself as an older version of himself with a weird voice and a knack for Quantum Physics. Balthazar and Horvath finally escape the urn and cause mayhem for Dave in their battles.
The first weird thing about this film is the blatant use of the word Sorceror. They just throw it at you and expect you to accept it. There's not even any build up, we just have to accept that this is about sorcery straight off the bat. Not that you don't expect that, I mean it's called the Sorceror's Apprentice, but we need some build up, maybe just a small paragraph worth of dialogue explaining the wizard. I usually hate that kind of thing, but the film dosn't get much from the opening narration anyway.
Second, the plot aside from the sorcery is so damn cliche! Dave is a loner, yet has extraordinary talents, and finally gets the chance to be with his crush, in part due to the unusual occurances in the film. What's another film that did that?
...you know, I didn't really mean that at first.
The film fails to give itself its own atmosphere, but that isn't that big of a problem. However, I might make mention that I enjoy the travesty of a film that is League of Extraordinary Gentlemen in part due to its atmosphere, so this can contribute quite a bit to the production.
While I can certainly believe that Balthazar is shooting balls of energy from his hands, other effects aren't as well done. I speak of course of the large steel eagle as seen in the trailers. Yes, we see it fly, and yes it comes up more than once, but those experiences are barely worth mentioning. We mostly get to see it arrive and land, take a fair bit away from how awesome it could have been.
I may also mention that there is an unexpected amount of Body Horror in this film. The most notable that I can think of is when a sorceror turns one of those chinese dragons that you see at celebrations into a real one. The people inside are then incased within the dragon as it becomes a being of flesh, and their legs are morphed into that of the dragons, that is High Octane Nightmare Fuel!
Second most notable are the Sorcery for disguises. When a character disguises themselves as another human being, their face is pushed to the side and replaced by another. Disturbing, but admittedly a neat effect.
Cage's performance as Balthazar isn't his best. In my humble opinion, that is Big Daddy. He is still an enjoyable character, and I don't really have any gripes, but I just really can't say it was all that memorable. Horvath is somewhat more interesting, boasting a nice hat and being made out of cockroaches (another nice effect). He also gets a few funny moments, and is certainly going to make an appearance in Villain Spotlight at some stage in the future.
The film moves at a decent pace, but I'm not sure if they really thought about a few things. As we establish Dave, we know he does some pretty great quantum physics, but it just comes off as confusing when we suddenly cut to him in an underground laboratory using a machine to strike lightning all around the place. I thought they skipped a scene or something.
Next we also have the fight with the dragon. Not the best fight in history, but for this film, its pretty epic. The fight with Morgana at the end is kinda dissapointing by comparison, to say the least. And how exactly did he know electricity would beat her? It may have been explained, but I don't recall.
All in all, I have to say that if you're going to see one film this season, you could do worse than Sorceror's Apprentice. It had a fair number of flaws, but still comes across as decent inspite of them. It's a 7/10 fom me.
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