It was a pleasant then horrifying then pleasant finding neverland-esque adventure for kids and willingly enchanted "grown-ups" like me. (Emphasis on horrifying.)
And Zooey Deschanel (the chic from Hitchhiker's Guide) is in it. So charming, she is.
:: B-
Ran (1985)
You know, I really, really tried to get into this movie, but it just wasn't doing it for me. I'm either not patient enough at this time in my life, or I'm approaching it from the wrong perspective. :/ Maybe in a few years...
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Ikiru (1952)
This was delightful surprise! I was scared going into this one after my failed attempt at "Ran". It only took a few minutes for me realize how much of a different movie it was going to be. It raises alot of questions about death and how many of us are just pulsing forms of it. I guess you could call Ikiru a "zombie movie". In reverse.
:: A
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Hairspray has 74 reviews on rottentomatoes.com and is at 95% freshness. This is really starting to scare me. Am I actually going to have to go and see this thing now? I quiver at the notion that I might enjoy several hours of a flaunting, bosomed Travolta in tights. Shudder!
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Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007)
THE GOOD:
helena bonham carter -- best twenty seconds of the movie...
THE BAD:
the length -- too short
THE UGLY:
the curtain -- poorly executed
--The scene with Dumbledor and Voldemort was intensely satisfying. And Harry's struggle with Voldemort in the end was heartbreaking. It was the first time I actually felt incredibly sad for Harry during one of the movies. That was unexpected.(save perhaps when he comes back with Cedric's body).
--Nicholas Hooper's score blended seamlessly with the movie, but it still isn't that great on CD (though its better now with context).
--Newspaper transitions. Niiice.
--I cannot say enough good things about Carter's performance as Bellatrix Lestrange. So good. It doesn't hurt that she's in that greasy, mangled hair either. Being evil is a bonus as well. I want to marry her. I don't know what she sees in that Burton guy. Passion? Bah! I've got passion!
--It was too short. Nearly 30 minutes too short. And the IMAX 3D was crap. Ironically it took me out of the movie instead of "immersing" me in it. The film is much better without the 3D.
--The death curtain was not developed enough. I knew what it was, I knew what was going to happen, but if I hadn't read the book I probably would have been confused.
--Most of what I could say about the film I am sure you have read elsewhere, so I won't say much more. It was good, not as good as Azkaban, but better than all the others. I like David Yates' direction and look forward to his next installment.
--Prediction one, confirmed. Two through six will have to wait until Monday morning. I'm going fishing this weekend and won't be back until late Sunday night, but I won't be back online until after I finish that book. Hopefully by Tuesday. Byyye.
::B+
Awww, we're so cute.
"This is one hundred times better than Armageddon!" *insert the sound of an entire theater of filmgoers writhing and groaning simultaneously*
No, Michael Bay, Armageddon was better.
You fool.
:: B-
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Toys, bugs, monsters, fish, superheros, cars, rats, and next year...a cute little robot. How much you want to bet the dutiful, simple, little robot Wall-e will put Michael Bay's erratic, dyslexic, complicated, and comical (they crack jokes you know...) robots to shame?
I loved Ratatouille. It was awesome.
:: A+
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I just broke one of my own rules and listened to the soundtrack for Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix before seeing the movie, and sadly I have to give it a huge thumbs down. Besides the first two tracks ("Fireworks" and "Professor Umbridge"), the rest of the album is muddled and hinged on reactionary cues, where the composer seemingly takes 10 seconds of film, scores it, and then goes on to the next 10 seconds, and scores it. The result is a literal musical translation of the film like that of the literal film translation of the first two books by Chris Columbus. It sounds like an hour of filler.
Of course, I am saying all of this without seeing the film, but from what I've heard on the soundtrack, the film is probably going to be held back by this rather unimpressive score. I love John Williams and I think Patrick Doyle did a superb job in the fourth film, but Nicholas Hooper had better brace himself. With the huge shoes he had to fill he was certainly going to be criticized by fans no matter how good a job he did, but now he is most definitely going to get venomously raked over the coals. And the venom will be all that much stronger considering he will probably be back to score the 6th film if his directing partner David Yates has anything to say about it (we don't want the breaking of a friendship, now do we?).
Bleh. Why can't they just make things simple and bring back successful directors (Cuaron) and composers (Williams) and stop making all of these huge quality risks on film-making and film-scoring newbies? It pains me to think of what the score would have been like with a composer like James Newton Howard, the recently successful John Powell, or the even the spunky, experimental Michael Giacchino. Heck, a generic and regurgitated James Horner rendition would have been more interesting than Hooper's utterly failed attempt at being interesting...
...here's to hoping I have spoken two days too soon, and that the score (still mediocre on disc) fits an excellent film like a glove...
"Hey, I'm sorry."
And so begins one of the most satisfying third acts to a movie ever.
Loved it.
Schwartzman.
Murray.
Williams.
Cox.
Music.
Heaven & Hell.
Everything.
A
"I wish
that
I knew what I know now
when I was younger."
So I am too lazy to write much of anything on Pirates.
I liked the first one. I liked the second one. But the anticipated finale, At World's End, ends its own world (forgive me). It's nothing like the other two. I fell asleep the first time. I fell asleep the second time. I don't like paying ten bucks to sleep.
It wasn't all a snooze-fest, though. The boat tipping was fun, the music was beautiful, and the demise of the British "villian" is fascinating to look at.
But I say stay home. Your bed is more comfortable and DVD's can be fast-forwarded.
Curse of the Black Pearl [2003] :: B+
Dead Man's Chest [2006] :: B
At World's End [2007] :: C-
While I sit around and lazily avoid writing about Pirates, here is my "cheat" review of 28 Weeks Later:
Mark Kermode and his quick lips of fire!
"Next." - Mark
"That's just extraordinary this...its a work of genius." - Simon
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-And now, go listen to Sam and Adam argue about it (its always best when they argue) at the Filmspotting.net Podcast.
Poor Sam missed the boat...
Absolutely mindless, disgusting, and crass...but brilliant.
I mean think about it. The entire movie is just a high-on-crack and caffeinated version of your typical American college guy's dormitory. How many college guys living in dorms are there in America? Alot. And how many middle-aged men are there in America wishing they were back in their college dormitories. Again, alot. There is a huge market for this type of sadistic buffoonery. Even women want in on the gag. Maybe not alot of women, but more than you might think. Most just don't want to admit their suppressed curiousity and scoff at our stupidity.
But is this form of "male-bonding" really stupid? Ya, most of it is. I can't think of anything more stupid than trying to tight-rope your way across alligator infested waters with meat stuffed in your underwear. And much of Jackass: The Movie is stupid stuff like that. But I enjoyed myself.
I won't try and justify it. Some of what these guys do is clearly unethical (terrorizing your family can only go so far) and yet the self-inflicted pain scenes are exhilarating. The intensity and discomfort of paper-cuts is brought to the screen full-throttle and the resulting feeling is a mixture of euphoria and horror. I laughed, I cried, I closed my eyes in discomfort several times, and I found immense pleasure in my pumped-and-revved-up state afterwards.
Like Rodriguez's Planet Terror, Jackass: The Movie is masochistic and gratuitous at times. But I enjoyed myself and actually wish I could have been a part of the empty glory. Determine from that what psychosis you will...
B-
one of the more "tame" scenes:
What is it with Robert Rodriguez and testicles??
One of the main things that kept me from liking his Sin City was it's s-exploitability (particularly how women were portrayed). Sure, some of it was visually appealing and sometimes funny/disgusting during movie (who doesn't find some sort of satisfaction in seeing an evil, yellow creature get his manhood ripped from his body?) , but in the end you have to ask yourself, "Was that completely even minutely necessary?" It all really sums up to nothing but a crutch to appeal the juvenile in people like me. Although not nearly (as in miles away, but still there) as strongly as with Sin City, I felt similarly uneasy after Planet Terror, Rodriquez's first half installment in the double feature movie event Grindhouse.
I almost feel bad bringing up the negative first because I enjoyed the movie for the most part, but I feel worse because I cannot recommend the movie to very many people because of it's overtly twisted sexuality. If Sin City had been any good, I would have had the same problem recommending it, but it wasn't any good, so there was no problem there. But now we have Planet Terror: a good movie with a little bit of the same tendencies of Sin City that make you ponder the mental stability of the director. This makes it so much more difficult to talk positively about the film with that glaring discrepancy, but there were many positives amidst its few negatives, and therefore I am giving Rodriguez the benefit of the doubt this time because I had such a good time with his raucous, bloody concoction.
So with all that wishful "why testicles?" thinking aside, Planet Terror was an excellent, yet absolutely absurd, horror adventure. I wasn't expecting it to be quite as scary as it was. I jumped a few times, and held my breath in others. I probably found too much joy in the splatter festivities. When a prominent and gusto character unexpectedly gets blown to smithereens towards the end, I laughed harder than when Dory spoke whale in Disney's Finding Nemo four years ago...and that is saying alot. Rodriguez keeps t
he story moving forward so your mind never has a chance to wander. His film is a satisfying "on-purpose" blend of ridiculousness and seriousness that pays tribute to the "on-accident" blend of ridiculousness and seriousness characteristic of the first taboo, rebellious horror flicks of the twentieth century.
If you can handle a movie bloodier than anything you ever seen before, than I cautiously recommend it. It is a funny, often hilarious, over-the-top gritty film that packs enough punches to make a jock feel queasy and an emo-kid laugh. Otherwise, if you can't handle blood and the crushing, ripping, dropping, obliterating, eating, or cutting of body parts (some of which were never meant to see the light of day or roll across the wet asphalt of night) than avoid it with every fiber of your being. It is as bad as you can possibly imagine it to be, and it is as pointless and juvenile as that which it is paying homage.
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Quentin Tarantino. Death Proof. First of all, like before, let's get the negative out of the way. Tarantino needs a major mouth washing. I can deal with curse words. I use them sometimes, but seriously...the lip of some of the characters was exhausting, if not an all out verbal raping of my now not so virgin ears...
But...with that out of the way, Tarantino is a bloody genius. Where Planet Terror thrived off of the constant adrenaline rush of something happening, Death Proof thrives off the constant adrenaline of "nothing" happening. Like the calm before a storm, his film blows gusts of uneasiness our way, taunting us with the careful patience of the perpetrator just waiting to drop the giant rains and winds of chaos on an unexpecting town of commoners minding their own business.
I loved Death Proof.
The crackling dialogue and flowing cinematography had me giggling like a school girl. There is a scene in which the group of women are sitting in a diner talking, and the camera is continually moving around them. The technical challenge behind a scene like that dumbfounds me, and the result is simply enthralling. The car chase nearly made me crap my pants, both in the excitement of it all and the pure horror at the fact that what I was watching was for the most part actually happening. I wonder how many documents that girl had to sign that said "If you die, that's your fault, your family and/or dog cannot sue us." I'm glad she signed them, because her dramatic tango with death was great fun!
The ending of Death Proof was just too good to be true. I kept asking the person next to me if that actually just happened. He said it did, but I still don't believe him. Darn. Guess I have to go see it again...just to make sure...
Anyone?
Planet Terror: B
Death Proof: A-
P.S. There were fake trailers in between the two films, but the only one I remember specifically is Don't because it was funny.
I didn't think I was going to like Blades of Glory. I could see myself possibly hating it. But, its Will Ferrel...and I have a soft spot for him and his foolishness, so I went.
And I laughed nearly the entire time. The hokeyness of it all was just too good for me not to. Everything wreaked with absolute absurdity from the very beginning and never delved into
trying to be serious. I dedicated nearly 8 years of my life to the sport, and still watch it on television, so I can say with confidence that the parody was spot on. The cameos were a nice touch, as well. The only person I didn't see though, and wanted to, was Dick Button. He's my favorite commentator. He always has something to say, and he always says it...and his name is funny. I also saw a few skaters in the background who I used to skate with on a daily basis, and I haven't seen them in yeeears. They look so different now...aww...nostalgia...
Be forewarned, though, it is a bit on the sexually blunt side of things, so it isn't a movie I'd sit down with my family and watch. But even with the few blatant "that's just wrong" moments, it was a nice trip down hardy-har-har-lane.
If an hour and a half of utter ridiculousness is your fancy, its worth it.
B
Why isn't this at the top of the box office? Seriously, if there ever was an independent-esque film that needed to be marketed like a mainstream blockbuster, it is this one.
Its a funny, sexy, intensely satisfying bank robbery drama about a handicapped young man (Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Brick) reclaiming his life with the help of a blind man (Jeff Daniels, The Squid and the Whale). Gordon-Levitt? Daniels? What's not to like?
Scott Frank, the screenwriter who penned such classics as Get Shorty, Out of Sight, and Minority Report, gives us a wonderful screenplay that doesn't resort to the ultimate of cliches in regards to bank robbery movies: there is no twist ending. Adam Kempenaar of the Filmspotting Podcast said he "kept expecting with this crime movie there to be some big twist reveal at the end." I was as well. And if anything, Frank's straight forward approach is a twist ending in and of itself because of our expectations.
It is a wonderful film with some excellent dialogues between Gordon-Levitt and Daniels that "you just have fun listening to" (Kempenaar). It was fun. And I plan on watching it again on DVD.
A
Explanation: my cousin wanted to see it, I said I wouldn't pay to see it, he said he'd pay, so I reluctantly went. It was terrible.
D
I happened to come across the movie A Night to Remember while channel surfing last night. I caught it just as it was starting. I've wanted to see it for some time now. It is the second film of four about the sinking of the Titanic in April of 1912. I have heard that the first film version from 1953 is not very noteworthy. And the third I had not even heard of until tonight when I looked it up. Apparently, in 1996, there was another theatrical release version starring Catherine Zeta-Jones. Who knew? It must have been pretty awful, because it only grossed 13,000,000 at the box office. Compare that to James Cameron's 1.8 billion world wide grossing in his version a year later. I'm not suggesting that the amount a film grosses has anything to do with its merit, but Cameron must have been onto something that the Zeta-Jones version clearly missed.
Although I have bagged on Cameron's 1997 version quite a bit over the years, I have recently come to appreciate some of the beauty in it. The relationship between Jack and Rose still bothers me a little bit because it just doesn't belong there, but the movie otherwise has some qualities, particularly Cameron's action sequence technique that probably shouldn't be enthralling considering the subject matter. But it is just that: enthralling. The spectacle quality of the film was the "Lord of the Rings" of the day. It was groundbreaking in its size and wonder, and still holds much of that wonder now in 2007. Add to that a magnificent score (which so many people hate, but I love) and you've got yourself the stepping stones of a beautiful movie. Unfortunately, Cameron mistook the basics stepping stones as a bridge to the other side of the gargantuan river known as film making. Spectacle sells, but if you want film geeks to respect you for centuries, you've got to have some meaningful focus.
A Night to Remember has that focus. It wastes no time getting into the meat of things. Within 25 minutes, the ship has hit the iceberg, and men are playing ice soccer on deck. Things play out much like they did in Cameron's version, with the only big and important exception being the added dimension of the communication (or lack thereof) between the Titanic, the Carpathia, and the foolish crew of the Californian. This is a major plot point missing in Cameron's version. Few people know that the Californian was only ten miles away from the Titanic as it sank and could very well have gotten there on time to save almost every life. In fact, they had stopped for the night because of icebergs (imagine that) and could see the Titanic's lights from where they were. They saw the distress rockets, and even logged their notebooks when the Titanic seemingly disappeared from the horizon. Not only that, they had turned off their radio earlier in the evening so all of the distress calls never reached them. Talk about waking up the next morning to some major regrets. None of this was in Cameron's version. 'Tis ashame, because that very well could have made his version a near masterpiece, if only he could have gotten over the rather un-rapturing love story. If he had focused more on the historical figures and done more research, he would have had so many stories to tell that Jack and Rose would have been made extras sitting in deck chairs. (sidenote: probably the greatest achievement of Cameron's Titanic is the thrusting into stardom of Leonardo Dicaprio and Kate Winslet, two incredible performers; unfortunately their characters don't matter that much in this movie.)
That said, I enjoyed A Night to Remember immensely. The fact that it is black and white didn't hinder it a bit. I've always had a liking for black and white movies anyway. And as I've said, it includes the stories of the other ships involved that evening, which thoroughly enhances the story line and makes it so much more of a historical piece than its successor. It may not have the sweeping camera moves and the glorious music of James Horner, but it does have a well researched back bone. This historical accuracy pays in my book. Fluff is nice, but not nearly as important to me as story. Story, story, story. So I guess I can't blame James Cameron entirely, now can I? I mean, his screenwriter is just as much to blame as he is, if not much more. Oh wait, Cameron was the screenwriter. Wow, it is all his fault! No scape goat there.
Titanic (1997) B
A Night to Remember (1958) A-
Interesting fact:
"The Carpathia docked at Pier 54 at Little West 12th Street in New York with the survivors. It arrived at night and was greeted by thousands of people. The Titanic had been headed for Pier 59 at 20th Street. The Carpathia dropped off the empty Titanic lifeboats at Pier 59, as property of the White Star Line, before unloading the survivors at Pier 54." - (wikipedia)
