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So, this week Golden Globe Nominations were released. This is who I think should win...and who I think will win, in all of the major film categories. Since there are a large number of nominations, here is a link to the complete list of nominations. http://tv.msn.com/tv/globe
Best Picture (DRAMA) -
Who Should Win - No Country For Old Men
Who Will Win - No Country For Old Men
Best Picture (Comedy or Musical) -
Should - Across The Universe (the only one I've seen)
Will - Sweeny Todd
Best Actor (Drama)
Should - George Clooney (Michael Clayton)
Will - Daniel Day Lewis (There Will Be Blood)
Best Actress (Drama)
Should - Angelina Jolie (A Mighty Heart)
Will - Julie Christie (Away From Her)
Best Actor (C or M)
Should - Ryan Gosling (Lars and The Real Girl
Will - I hope, Johnny Depp (Sweeny Todd)
Best Actress (C or M)
Should - Marion Cotillard (La Vie En Rose)
Will - Marion Cotillard (La Vie En Rose)
Best Supporting Actor
Should - Javier Bardem (No Country For Old Men), and if he doesn't, the world will end...he will kill you
Will - Javier Bardem (No Country For Old Men)
Best Supporting Actress
Should - Cate Blanchett (I'm Not There)
Will - Cate Blanchett (I'm Not There)
Best Director
Should - Joel and Ethan Cohen (No Country For Old Men)
Will - Joel and Ethan Cohen (No Country For Old Men)
Best Screenplay
Should - Diablo Cody (Juno)
Will - Diablo Cody (Juno)
Animated Film
Should - Ratatouille
Will - Ratatouille
Foreign Film
Should - Diving Bell and The Butterfly
Will - Diving Bell and The Butterfly
Original Score
Should - Into The Wild
Will - Into The Wild
Original Song
Should - "WALK HARD" (Walk Hard)
Will - "Guarenteed" (Into The Wild)
Atonement leads with 7 nominations.
This is a horrible film. Truly, it is a bad movie. There were just a few good things. The main girl is gorgeous. She is not tough on the eyes. The action scenes were really fun to watch and kept me into most of the film. However, that is about it.
The overall style of the film was bothersome. It was this heightend color scheme with bright reds and blue hues. This was kind of annoying. The acting was really horrible. Timothy Olyphant got some things out of the title character, however, most of his lines were laughable. Really annoying. The dialouge sucked in general. The action scenes, while looking cool, got really annoying. They were edited the same way every single time. Some of the shots were really interesting, but a majority of them were really tiresome and overdone. Every time he would pick up a gun and begin shooting, the scene would begin to slow down, and then speed back up. Finally, there was nothing that made me feel involved and really care about any of the characters. Theres not much to say for a story either. Timothy Olyphant plays Agent 47, a lethal assassin who is a master at what he does. He is set up by his agency and it follows a chase through Russia. That is really the overall plot. Simple, and really really boring.
So, it's been a while since my last post. Lots of turkey and food. Not enough energy to write. I'll be back soon with a review of Awake (hopefully not) or Before the Devil Knows Your Dead. Peace.
Lars and The Real Girl is a quirky Romantic Comedy in the mold of say, The Notebook by way of The Royal Tenenbaums. Now I bring up the obvious comparison to Wes Anderson and his sort of deadpan, absurdist comedy earlier, so that I can just get it out of the way. This film is very similar to that style of film, obviously, as you are dealing with a loner, who finds console in the company of a sex doll. This is not your girlfriend’s Romantic comedy.
Lars is a loner, with a fear of having someone touch him. This fear is so great, that it will actually “hurt” him if someone does. This is just the smallest little eccentricity about him. We first meet Lars in a close-up in his garage-turned-into-a-home home (the garage of his brothers home, who he lives next to), staring out of a window at his small, rural Wisconsin town. We see that he is looking out for his sister-in law Karen (played by Emily Mortimer), who he does not want to be near. Actually, he doesn’t really want to be with anybody. Lars is the definition of a loner. We then see that he goes to church and even has a job. When he goes to work, he sits at a desk in his cubicle and stares out at the world. One day, when he walks into his cubicle, his buddy tells him that they have a website online where you can order anatomically correct “sex dolls”. These dolls are not only anatomically correct, but you can set them to any specific weight, height, color, or any other bodily feature. So, a few days pass, and then he gets a phone call. It is Karen saying that he has a big box in his house. He rushes home just to discover that it is none other than one of those sex dolls. He decides to keep it, and he goes back up to his brother Gus’s house (Gus is played by Paul Schneider in a great comedic stand), and tells him that he has a visitor. It is none other than Bianca the Brazilian doll. Now, this is where it gets really interesting.
Through some sessions of therapy, it is discovered that Lars is not using this doll for sex. They don’t even stay in the same house. Lars is simply using it as a companion. The perfect companion, at least to him. He even makes up dialogue and back story for her. Take for example, the day that Lars asks Bianca to marry him; he says the doll said no. Now if he was using it for anything more than companionship, he would have said it said yes, and to me, the movie would not have worked. The doll is a way for Lars to go through various emotional states. Rejection, love, life, and even death. Yes, a doll “dies”. This makes this story comical and very heartwarming as well. It really is a great film. It works on so many levels. It is a great comedy, a good romance story (in a weird way) and a well rounded film. This is not an amazing, groundbreaking, Oscar worthy film, but it is a great little breath of fresh air. It takes the lackluster category that is the Romantic Comedy, and flips it on its plastic, anatomically correct head. However, there are some flaws. If you have a problem with suspending your disbelief for two hours, then don’t see this movie. It is an improbable story, with “twists” and interactions that would never happen in real life. Also, if you are not a fan of absurdist, Wes Anderson-esque (now I keep saying his name because his films are the most similar in style, and I love him as a director) films, then again, don’t see this film. It is deadpan comedy that I know is not for everyone. This is not a stylish film, there are no technically great shots, and the dialogue is sometimes very sketchy. However, these troubles that the film encounters are helped by amazing performances. Ryan Gosling is a great actor. He is now one of the most interesting actors that we have today. I am waiting for every film that he is set to make, and I will be for a long time. As I already said, Paul Schneider is great, and Emily Mortimer is great as well. These performances, along with a great little role from Patricia Clarkson, helps this film be one of the better comedies I have seen this year.
This is not one of the best films of the year. I won’t be in many top 10’s and it probably won’t be up for many awards. However, if you have seen Michael Clayton, Gone Baby Gone, and No Country for Old Men, then give Lars and his sexy little doll a little support. You won’t be disappointed.
Thanks for reading, and in the next week, I will be doing three or four reviews including Beowulf, Hitman, and most importantly No Country for Old Men. Can’t wait. Have a good one.
Gone Baby Gone, the new film from first time feature film director Ben Affleck, is a new age moral noir. The film stars Casey Affleck, Ben’s brother, and it also stars Morgan Freeman, Ed Harris, Michelle Monaghan, and Amy Ryan. The film begins with a montage of Boston natives, just living in their neighborhood. This is a major point in this film. The biggest thing that one can take from this film is that it is a love letter to Boston. Ben is a Boston native, and uses many local characters and locales in this film. After the setting shot, we discover that a child has been abducted in the area, and Patrick Kenzie (Casey Affleck, who again is brilliant) and Angie Gennaro (Michelle Monaghan, who is equally amazing) are local Private Detectives. These two are persuade and eventually hired by the Aunt and Uncle of the missing child. The mother, Helene McCready, played by Amy Ryan, is a strung out drug mule, who seems to not care about the horrible events that have happened to her and her child. After a long discussion of the mother’s back-story, we discover that the local area cops are not interesting in helping the P.I.s. The Police Chief, Jack Doyle, played by Morgan Freeman, has some experience in the area of missing children. His daughter was a victim of a similar crime years earlier, and is very harsh on the two main characters. He doesn’t really resent working with Patrick and Angie, however, he believes that he should work with his men Remy Bressant (Ed Harris) and Nick Poole (John Ashton). From the point where we meet these two cops, the story takes twists and turns, and goes off ends that no one could think of. Just to say, that somehow the P.I.s end up with abducted children, murders, and people who are not who they seem.
This film is based on a novel written by Dennis Lehane, who also wrote the novel “Mystic River” that was turned into a movie of the same name. His books seem to have a dark gloom and tone to them, that fits gloriously in this film. This is truly an amazing film. There are not many technically amazing shots in this film, but what is in this film works perfectly. The majority of these shots are straight on, framed strictly and square, and nothing to flashy. Affleck shows great restraint for this material. He doesn’t take anything away from the story and has a great sense for tension and shooting scenes of dialogue. When the flashier moments come up, where he uses shaky camera shots and crane and helicopter shots, they add to the story, and make it more intense. The look of this film is great. There are many secrets that are held in this story as there always are in these style of films, however, what makes this film work better is that these secrets are so well concealed. Throughout the movie, there are little hints to what is to come ahead and I never would have thought about any of them until the end. Also, what works, is how much sense these secrets make after they are revealed. I truly can not say how complex this film becomes, and as it begins to become untwined, it becomes truly shocking and emotionally moving. This film is morally ambiguous, as was Mystic River, and each character has their little bits of grey, and it really works in this film. This has the ability to become a Lifetime film, and it steers away from it gloriously. This is easily one of the, if not the best film of the year. This is so genuinely moving and heart wrenching, that I felt numb coming out of the theatre. I cannot say enough good things about this film.
Performance wise, this film exceeds expectations. Casey Affleck, I mean, what more is there to say. Coming off a brilliant stand in “The Assasination of Jesse James…” and hilarious stints in the Oceans series, is amazing. He takes this character, and runs with it. His character’s whole idea is that he can get into places that no other cops can. He knows Boston better than anyone, and you truly believe that he can go anywhere and get information. He envelops his character and makes it his own. Ed Harris is a badass cop, Morgan Freeman is great as usual, and Amy Ryan is Oscar worthy. Every actor plays his or her roles brilliantly. This film will definitely be talked about come Oscar time, and deservedly so.
The only thing about this film that can be a hindrance is that this may be a little too touchy of a subject for some. This was an emotionally tense and moving film that some scenes may be a little much. There is no nudity or anything graphic, but the subject matter may be a little too much for some. However, it goes with the story, and is meant with no bad intentions. Truly, if you can look past the fact that it is about child abduction, then this is one of the best movies that you will see all year. I cannot tell you to run out and see this film fast enough.
American Gangster starts with a scene of a man, tied in a chair, with gasoline being poured upon him. A menacing Denzel Washington then proceeds to light him on fire, and then shoot him numerous times. King Kong definetly has nothing on him. Denzel plays drug dealer Frank Lucas, who, after the death of his boss Bumpy Johnson, begins to run his own drug ring. However, this is not the normal drug family. He has no middle man. He buys directly through the source, and thus is able to get "pure" heroin. This allows Lucas to sell a product that is twice the quality for half the price. This makes him a marked man. He is able to corner the New York drug market, without any struggle. Pure capitalism. Then there is Russel Crowe's character Richie Roberts, a womanizing divorcie, with a penchant for "doing the right thing". These two character's are the two main storylines that incompass the great film that is American Gangster.
In this great film, Lucas is a low key gangster. There are no rings on his fingers, chains around his necks, just what would end up being a self worth of 150 million dollars. He is a family man who puts family first. He has a low key marriage, and there is no flashy actions that he is involved in. He just goes out, and does the job he thinks he must do. He flies to suppliers in South Asia, imports the drugs into the U.S. by putting it in the caskets of fallen American soldiers, and sells a high quality product at costs that put the other families in the unemployment lines. Just as unshakable as Lucas, is Richie Roberts. He does what he thinks is right, in his own way, even in the face of his horrifying boss, played amazingly by Josh Brolin. He vows that he will bring down Lucas, which he does, although, it is not easy. Not easy at all. Heres an example of what his style of work is. Who would find one million dollars in drug money, and turn it in. I know I wouldn't, but he does, and it is a very funny running joke that is talked about, even in the final scene. These two characters aren't able to bump heads until the last 15 minutes. However, it is an amazing 15 minutes, that really show just how amazing these two actors are. It's worth admission alone.
Denzel Washington is amazing. He is ruthless in his actions, but also humble enough to remember where he is from. This is played perfectly by Washington. He is just smooth and suave enough to make you think that he is really Frank Lucas. Russel Crowe is in the same boat. He is just stubborn and cocky enough to make you think that he really is a straight cop with an ego and a child support bill to pay. Both actors will definetly be looking at a great award season coming up. There are also numerous cameos, from the likes of T.I. to Common, and even RZA of the Wu-Tang Clan in a great comedic stand. However, no cameo has the power of Ruby Dee as Franks mother. It really is something to behold. She is an amazing actress and really adds a human aspect to Frank, as she is someone who he really listens to and loves. It's a perfect role.
Now onto the movie part. This film was gorgeous. It was just gritty enough, while still having a suave style just like it's anti-hero. While the camera moves were lacking, as in little to none, when the action got heated and the camera became shaky, it was a great breath of fresh air. It really added something to this film. This film was initially claimed to be the Black Scarface. However, this is not the case, and that is not a bad thing. This film works in many ways, that that film didn't. It is a lot more similar to Heat, as the two main people are on the screen together for no more than 10 minutes, and it is about the two people lives, and the road they take. There are similarities as both gangsters are sort of glorified, however, there is a sense of reality that is nonexistent in Scarface. It keeps you into the film and never lets go. It is a great film.
However, there are a few problems. The dialouge is great, as expected, however, some lines are a little corny and out of place. Some characters had no arc, and therefore no point either. Take Cuba Gooding Jr.'s role. He is in the film for five minutes, and is great, but has no role in the story. These instances were bothersome. Also, the film's second act began to drag after a while. It is 157 minutes long, so it was expected. Not bothersome, but it did get a little boring after a while. The last problem I had is that there seemed to be a lot of postiering by Lucas. Take this for example. Lucas and his brothers are sitting down in a diner, and then he notices a rival on the sidewalk. So he decides that, in broad daylight, he must go over there, put a bullet in his head, and come back. These scenes were also very bothersome. However, these things did not take much away from this truly amazing film.
While there are some flaws with this film, it is right now one of the better films of this year. While you should see this movie, do so later. There are better things out right now. With this said, I totally recomend this film. If I gave star ratings, it would get four out of five. So take that for whatever. I can whole heartedly recomend this film.
The Darjeeling Limited is a story of three brothers. Francis (Owen Wilson) is the eldest, and has been involved in a motorcycle accident so throughout the movie he looks as though he was a stunt double for The Mummy. Next is Peter (Adrien Brody) who is poised on divorcing his wife, who is 6 weeks away from giving birth. The last brother is Jack (Jason Schwartzman) who keeps up on his ex-girlfriends voice mails and also writes. These three brothers have not spoken in exactly a year, since there late fathers funeral. Francis decides to get his two brothers to come to India and go on a "spiritual journey". However, before I get into the feature's plot, I should point out that before this film, there is another short film called "Hotel Chevalier". This is a gorgeous short. It does play into the feature. It is currently available on iTunes for download for free.
Now the feature. The three brothers go to India, in attempt to become brothers once again. However, Francis doesn't tell them everything. He has truly gotten them together to go see their mother (Anjelica Huston) to see why she did not attend their father's funeral. There isn't a twist ending, or anything that really shocks you. Except for one moment, which I don't want to give away, that pushes the spiritual journey further. It is a sad event, that helps the brothers see exactly what is important in life.
The visual style of this film is gorgeous. This is Wes Anderson's best looking film. It has his normal style with dead camera moves, framing the characters in the middle of the frame, brilliant soundtrack. However, it is upped to the nth degree. The way the frames are filled with stuff to show the materialism of the characters is great. His camera moves are refreshing and the soundtrack is possibly his best yet. The pallet for this film is so bright and cheerful that it pops on the screen. The mustard yellows, light blues, and aqua greens are amazing and work perfectly for this film.
The acting in this film is also quite good.Wilson and Schwartzman are hilarious as normal. Schwartzman plays a womanizer, and is simply comidic gold in this role. The first time he sees a train atendant that he finds attractive, he simply proclaims "I want her". This is hilarious, and works very well for those who saw Hotel Chevalier right before the film. Adrien Brody is the biggest suprise of this film. He is amazing. He is hilarious, and he plays his role perfectly. He is really great. Angelica Huston is probably the weakest part of the film. She is good, but she can be sort of annoying. Not to the point where it was a problem, but she seemed to not really have a purpose other than being the mom. However the moments where we discover that during a previous scene where Wilson was ordering the food for everyone, he was not only play the mother role, he was playing THEIR mother's role. This was really a great moment in the film.
The flaws. While I loved this movie and it is the second best film I have seen all year, it still has some flaws, mainly with the handiling of the Indian actors. To me, they seemed kind of like set pieces. They really had no role. Take the great actor Irfan Khan for example. He plays a father of a child who dies, and his role is to sit there for five or ten minutes and silently mourn. He is left with a dead role. That was kind of bothersome. That is really the only big problem I had with the film. It was truly a gem of a movie.
Thank you guys for reading, and I will be back with a review of either American Gangster or Lars and The Real Girl.
30 Days of Night. Where to start. This is not a great movie. Based on the graphic novel "30 Days", it is a stylized horror flick in the feel of fellow graphic novel adaptations Sin City and 300. The town of Barrow, Alaska, is a small village, where there is no sun for 30 consecutive days. Evan Oleson (played horrifically by Josh Hartnett...he himself is the horror part of the film) is the Sherriff of this town and his relationship with fellow officer Stella (what a clever name) is on the rocks. The first day of no sunlight goes by without a hitch until a local couple reports that something has happened to there K-9 companions. THe town goes to hell after that fateful event. A lonley drifter (played intensly and very well by the amazing Ben Foster) comes into a restaurant and gets himself arrested by Evan. This drifter then informs the group of Stella, Evan, Evan's brother, grandmother and various other characters who are only there to eventually die, that the cold that has come into town is not the weather...but it is death. That spooks the group, and they decide to investigate. What they discover is that the violence in the town has been caused by Danny Huston and his rag tag group of velociraptor-esque vampires. Thats about where the plot ends.
Visually, the film is monotone. It looks pretty cool though. Nothing really new, but it's a good style and fits the film and mood of the film very good. It gets darker when they are colder, and in warmer areas it gets a warmer hue. There are some stunning shots, such as a birds eye view of the utter destruction of the town. It was really beautiful, in a gory kind of way. Nothing that you would get from the horrible Saw series or any of the other pure gore films. This gets at something that none of the other contenders in it's genre does. It attempts to have a story. Yes, the first Saw was a great film. The twist was amazing, but thats really it. 2 was unwatchable, so was 3, and now Saw 4 is going to dominate the box office even though it will probably continue this trend. 30 Days was by no means a great film. It was a hell of a ride, and a breath of fresh air in the year that gave us Halloween and will give us Saw 4. It shows that, however feeble the attempt and how outlandish the plot, gore films can have a plot.
This is not a great movie. No where near a great film. Did it scare me. Yes. Did the plot work, even though it is totally unbelievable. Sure, it really doesn't matter. Don't expect much other than a scary B-movie with a little bit of style.
I would like to say something about the director. This film was directed by David Slade, who's biggest hit, Hard Candy, is one of my personal favorites. It is a great film, and I completly recomend that to anyone who want a good thriller. That is my DVD pick for the week.
Now, on to We Own The Night
We Own The Night is a cop drama based in the 1980's and is directed by first time director James Gray. This is truly a great film. Bobby Green (played electricly by Jaoquin Pheonix) is a drug-happy Brooklyn party kid, and works at a club as the host. What most people don't know about him is that his father (Robert Duvall) is cheif of police, and his brother (Marky Mark) is one of the most honored policemen on the force. The plot thickens as his brother is awarded a spot as leader of a new force to take out the gangs and especially the Russian Mob in New York. At the banquet for him, Bobby takes his girlfreind Amada (played by Eva Mendes in her best role to date) to the banquet. The next night, Joseph raids the very club Bobby is manager of. The plot unfolds after that. This is a very thick plot, so there is no point in discussing it that much, but I would like to say that this is some of the most intense and truly fun filmgoing I have been a part of all year. This film steps on the peddle from frame one in a sexy opening scene involving Mendes and Phoenix, and never steps off. There are your basics, car chases and cat and mouse games, even campy one-liners given perfectly by Duvall.
Visually, this film is stunning. It is just as intense as the plot and performances are. It is not the stereotypical shaky camera that has now taken over cinema. Granted, I am a huge fan of shaky camera work, but this was a breathe of fresh air in an overdone genre. The car chase in this film is one that can rival any I have seen all year. It is so different. It is not ultra-edited and ubber action packed. It is very quiet, low light, rainy, and slower than most films today. It is the slower version of the last car chase in Death Proof (although not as visually arresting). It is one of the most intense scenes I have been apart of all year rivaling the cat and mouse chase in the European bus station from The Bourne Ultimatum. The performances are amazing as well. All of the actors give some of there best roles to date, with the exception of Mark Whalberg who is pretty much bring his character from the Departed over into this movie, minus the accent. It is a damn good film. Not the best of the year, but easily in my top ten or maybe five. 3 of 4 Stars!
Thanks for reading my incesent rambling...hope you enjoyed the reviews.
Check out the No Country For Old Men, trust me, you wont be sorry.
Peace!
Okay...the plot is this. Jude (a purly brilliant Jim Sturgess), a Liverpudlian (I think thats what a person from Liverpool is called, I dont know) who works at a shipping dock. He decides to leave his family and lover to go and try to find his father. He discovers that his father has a Princeton address. This makes him anxious, as he believes he may be a professor at the prestigious school. However, he is simply a janitor. However, while there, he meets Max (another amazing actor, Joe Anderson) and more importantly his sister, Lucy (the gorgeous Evan Rachel Wood). From then on, the group, which includes a few other well crafted characters (minus the purly idiotic Prudence) as they go through the turbulent time of the Vietnam War.
The biggest thing this film had to do is make the music of the Beatles a voice for a generation. It did this, however, not to the fullest of it's capabilites. Take a song like I Wanna Hold Your Hand. They decide to have this song sung by Prudence, to her fellow cheerleader whom she has a crush on. While the song is well done, and choreographed well, why couldn't they have a group of protesters sing this song to a group of police officers near the end. However, this is simply a minor problem. Another little beef I had was that some of the characters seemed wooden and gimmicky. Take the character of Mr. Kite, a character from the Revolver album. Eddie Izzard is an amazing comedian, and he is forced to play a character that has no purpose other than to show some acid induced choreography. While this scene is amazing to look at, it seems forced and hevy handed. They showed a similar scene before this, where Bono (yes Bono, and he is amazing) plays Dr. Roberts, an author of a book called I Am The Walrus. It is a similar scene, and is really well done. It also plays into the story, as a few of the scenes in the film don't.
Now what did I love about the film. Pretty much the entire thing. The story worked for me. I fell for most of the characters and I was really engaged the entire time. I loved this film. As I already stated Sturgess and Anderson are brilliant. They are easily two of my favorite performances from this year. Brilliant. Visually, the film is stunning. Visually arresting. Some of the most beautiful footage I have seen since The Fountain. There is no other way to put it. BEST LOOKING FILM OF THE YEAR. No contest. However, it's not a case of style over substance. It's a great film. Top 10 of the year. Great film.
ATTENTION! Friday the 19th, check out the Insomniac Film Festival on Apple.com. Yours truly is staring in a film called Sunday Morning. VOTE FOR IT!!! Here's the trailer and poster done by Amber Kipp. I know no one reads this, so it's pointless...but here it is.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=Df3QbymWM0M Trailer
http://img528.imageshack.us/img528/6597/h
Thanks and check back soon for a review of 30 Days of Night.
Okay, this is how it's gonna go. This movie was shit. Pure garbage from beginning to end. I don't even want to talk about it, so I won't. DO NOT SEE THIS MOVIE. It's like taking a kick to the crotch from a punter in steel toed boots. It hurts to watch. So, I will be back in a few days with something happier.
Okay. With the end of September comes the end of the summer blockbuster sequel and franchise season. It marks the begining of Oscar season. This is when the meat of the film industry gets released. What better way to start the season than with David Cronenberg. His newest film, "Eastern Promises", is the first film that DC has done since one of my favorites of '05 "A History Of Violence". It also marks the second time that he and Viggo Mortenson have worked together. However, the biggest similarity between the two is this one thing. They are both brilliant pieces of art.
"Eastern Promises" opens in a barber shop, where we see an elderly man shaving a customer. He is then startled by his son, who he "made a deal with". He hands his son the metalic shaver, and he proceeds to cut the customers throat. While this plays no immediate importance, this is a perfect shot for what is to come. The next shot is of a 14 year old girl walking through a pharmacy asking for help. Now, I don't want to disgust any people, so lets just say she dies, and it is discovered that she is expecting. The mid-wife, played expertly by Naomi Watts, finds a journal in the girls coat, and asks her uncle to decode it. It spirals downward from there. The story twists and turns, and for a thriller, is paced very nicely. It drills you into the underground that is the Russian mob, and completely immerses yhou in that world. It is a great story, and it is a great study on the duality of man. The tension between Mortenson's character and Watt's character show that they each have two different sides of each other, and find the persons dark side (with Watts looking at Mortenson's character) and the love that she has that he is unable to show. This infatuation culminates in an ending that can be taken as brilliant, or truly horrible. (I personally thought it was quite good). This was a brilliant take on an overdone genre.
I don't normally do this, but I want to talk about one scene in particular. I don't want to discuss the setup to it, but it is a scene in which the elderly man from the first scene takes the newly admitted (into the mob) Mortenson into a Russian bathhouse. This cullminates in one of the most amazing fight scenes that has been captured in a long, long, long time. It is a brilliantly choreographed, shot, and completly visceral scene that is one that I will never forget. It is extremely brutal and is at the same time very artfully done. It's the French Connection of fight scenes.
Now on to the performances. Naomi Watt's is amazing. She plays a great midwife, and again solidifies herself as one of the best actresses in hollywood. Viggo Mortenson is also truly great in this movie. The way that just looking at his face and how that can tell so much more than any word is truly startiling. The mob boss played by Armin Mueller-Sthall is to me the only weakness in this film, along with a few scenes with Vincent Cassell. The screenplay was written by Steven Knight who also wrote a great little film called "Dirty Pretty Things", and is also very well done. Suprisingly, the film was set in London, and I couldn't tell as there was no Londoner in a noticeable role.
I have been on a role lately of saying that a movie may not have been great but it was a great time (minus The Ten, in which I would rather eat nails covered in acid than watch that). However, this is truly an amazing film. One of the best of the year. It will stick with you for days. I know it has for me.
Okay, instead of giving a DVD pick, I would like to give everyone a link for a little short film that is from the director of Me, You, and Everyone We Know. It's called, "Are You The Favorite Person Of Anyone." It stars John C. Riley and is a cute little short.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=asyWVtoCjNM
Aright, that is all for this review. I hope to hear from you guys. In the meanwhile, go see Just For Kicks, The Good German, Rage In Placid Lake, which are all on DVD. Most of all, go see Eastern Promises.
So, what do you get when you mix "Highlander", a videogame, and a gore flick? You get a hell of a ride. Resident Evil: Extinction may not be the highest brow thing, but it was a great time.
The movie opens with a great fake out scene in which it reveals that Umbrella, and the meniacle Dr. Isaacs are making clones of Alice (Milla Jovovich) to create a cure from her blood. This may not be the most original idea, but it really isn't that prominent of a storyline. Most of the film is a sequence of really great fight scenes that are coreographed with style. After we meet the real Alice, she meets up with fellow returning actors like Oded Fehr, who is not great, but plays a good role in the movie. Alice discovers that there may be a clean area of the world in Alaska, and this information causes the group of survivors to go up to Alaska, until the make a stop in the heavily infected Las Vegas, which has since been turned into a desert wasteland. From then on, it is non stop action, and is very graphic and stylized, which worked.
The director, Russel Mulchaly, who also directed the aformentioned Highlander pulls off many stylized and well done pieces. From some skinless dogs attacking Alice, to a Hicthcokian scene in which a giant group of infected crows viscously attacks the group of survivors. These are just a few of the good scenes that made this movie a great suprise for me. I was not excited for this movie. However, I changed my tune as soon as the first scene ended. This was not a great movie in any sense of the word. It is the best RE movie however, and it was one hell of a good time. Go see this with a group of freinds and laugh and scream. Have fun, cause it really works.
My DVD pick for this review is Cabin Fever. This just like Resident Evil: Extinction, is not a great movie. However, in the same sense, it is a great time. I first saw this movie with a group of freinds, and we all just laughed at it, and also screamed during some scenes, and have a great time. There are just some movies that are great because you can throw them on at a party and everyone will love watching it. This is definetly one of those.
There really isn't much new news that has come out in the past week, as we have just entered the Fall season, so I just have one thing to say.
My thoughts go out to the family of the stunt cordinator who died recently in an accident off the set of Batman: The Dark Knight. The person is not a well known person so many of you may not have heard about it, so I thought I would shed some light on it. Here is a link to an article from Hollywood.com. http://www.hollywood.com/news/Death_on_B
So, that is all that I have to say, so I hope I will talk to you all later. I hope to review Eastern Promises or maybe The Kingdom. So come back in a few days to check that out. Peace
Okay, so I was going to see Across The Universe this weekend, but instead, not only was I unable to see it, but it will not be releasing anywhere near me until October 5...so instead, I will be reviewing Resident Evil: Extinction. So, I about a day or so, I will have a review of that movie posted on here. Sorry about that.
Finally, I would like to say that everyone who reads this (yes, the three of you) should go out and listen to Scene Unseen Podcast. Your minds will melt with the greatness that is Chris and Jimmy. Subscribe now.
http://www.sceneunseenpodcast.com
Thanks, and see ya in a bit
"The Ten" is a set of ten short stories, each based on a different commandment. There is no plot to speak of, but each of the characters intertwine, and sometimes have multiple stories. The stories are told by the narrator played great by Paul Rudd, and he is one of very few good things about this film. Each story has its funny moments. Ranging from a doctor who was charged with murder by leaving a pair of scisors in a patient as a goof, to a sexy hispanic jesus, the stories are comical. However they die on screen. It feels like Monty Python if Monty Python was a group of turds.
The cast is chock full of amazing actors too. Justin Therox, Winona Rider, Oliver Platt, and Paul Rudd. Not to mention other familiar faces like Jessica Alba, and many other "The State" staples. Another movie used people from that now famous comedy group, being "Reno 911: Miami". However, that was actually a good movie. Therox was great in this movie. He stole the first story as a sexual Hispanic Jesus. He was quite funny. However, to me, the funniest person in the movie was Winona Rider. She was a character in the "thou shalt not steal" story. Of course, and trust me, everyone noticed the irony. She gave a great performance, and the end was probably the funniest thing about the film. It was a song that was more entertaining a clever than any single thing before it. The worst story is an animated tale that concludes a giant, town destroying wiener dog orgy. Not kidding...
I'm not gonna mention anything about The Decalouge, because it is a far better movie. It uses the Ten Commandments to tell ten emotional, and very compelling stories. It is a great movie. So getting into that movie would be blastphemous. The Ten was not shot in an interesting way, it was often times unfunny, the story was loose, the characters were often loathable, and it was genuinely not good. This was a dissapointment. Probably the biggest one of the year for me. From the great cast, to the first film by David Wain, and mainly how great Stella was. It is the kind of stupid humor that relies on the audience being prone to laughing at rape and "man stuck in ground" jokes. If you can stand loosing brain cells, then of course, go see this. Hopefully you aren't one of those people. This was a kick to the mouth, and I took it for 95 minutes. I wouldn't wish that upon anyone else.
So, on to a happier note. This is just gonna be the review, as I am still going to review Across The Universe and in that I will give a DVD pick and talk about what will come out, and other things. So, hopefully I will get some comments on how you all DIDN'T see this movie.
Leave it to the director of The Crying Game to flip this genre on it's ass. First off, the story. Jodie Foster is a popular local radio host in New York City, and she walks the town recording sounds and telling stories on the radio. She is about to get married to her fiance who is played by Neveen Andrews of Lost fame. She discusses what the invites should look like, and these little insites give a good deal of depth into the character, and makes the two human, which works. They are out for a late walk until they are brutally atacked in a tunnel, and her fiance is killed and she is seriously injured. She survives, and three weeks later, she leaves the hospital. She feels as though she can not survive much longer, so she goes out and byes a gun, and she becomes a vigilante.
Now onto the performances. Jodie Foster kills in this film. Literally and figuratively. This is one of her best performances since Silence of the Lambs. She brings a great amount of humanity to this character. Terance Howard is also very good, and some scenes between the two are very intense, and feels as though it could explode at any moment. Howard plays a cop who is on the trail of a man who he believes to be a drug pusher who has killed his wife because she was gonna testify against him. Howards partner played by Nicky Katt is funny as hell, and brings a great amount of comedy to this film. The direction is also very good. The only problem that I have is that there is a certain way that some scenes are shot that can get repetitive, however, it's easy to look past that. This is more about the psychology of revenge, and if a vigilante who takes the law in their own hands can cross a certain moral line. This is truly a great movie.
This weeks DVD pick is a revenge movie that may not be the best one, but it is a movie that is great and I think not many people have seen. It is Mean Creek. Take the time to put this in your queue and check it out.
So, what is new on DVD and what is everyone talking about. Two words, Death Proof. The Quentin Tarantino half of Grindhouse is coming out on Tuesday in a special 2 disc set. I can not wait. While I still think that Planet Terror is a better movie, Death Proof was damn good and I will be there, as should everyone else.
We are about to hit the Fall season of movies, and that means that a lot of great movies are coming out soon. So in the spirit of that, this is my top ten most anticipated films of the fall.
10. Juno
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0467406/
09. American Gangster
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0765429/
08. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0443680/
07. Darjeeling Limited
http://imdb.com/title/tt0838221/
06. Margot At The Wedding
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0757361/
05. No Country For Old Men
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0477348/
04. Sweeny Todd
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0408236/
03. There Will Be Blood
http://imdb.com/title/tt0469494/
02. Lust, Caution
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0808357/
01. Across The Universe
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0445922/
I would have written about all of those, but IMDB does a better job of describing what they are about.
That's it. Thanks for reading...see you next week. I will be reviewing either Across The Universe or Resident Evil: Extinction. Maybe Good Luck Chuck...come back to see.
Okay...so this is the post that I have been wanting to do for a while, and it just took me a long long long time to actually put a list together...and I still haven't gotten it perfect. So here it is. A rough order of my 100 favorite movies that I have ever seen. The Top 20 are in order, and then there is somewhat of an order, but they are all amazing films and I love them all to death. Here it is...THE list.
1. Pulp Fiction
2. Piano Tuner Of Earthquakes
3. Fear and Loathing In Las Vegas
4. City of God
5. Dr. Strangelove
6. 2001: A Space Odyssey
7. Pi
8. Reservoir Dogs
9. Se7en
10. Rear Window
11. House of Sand and Fog
12. Amelie
13. Mullholland Dr.
14. Casino
15. Children of Men
16. Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels
17. Blade Runner
18. 2046
19. Aladdin
20. Metropolis
21. Once Upon A Time In Mexico
22. Requiem for a Dream
23. The Fountain
24. Clerks
25. Full Metal Jacket
26. Lion King
27. Dogma
28. Eternal Sunshine of A Spotless Mind
29. Casablanca
30. Memento
31. United 93
32. Sin City
33. Vertigo
34. The Breakfast Club
35. A Clockwork Orange
36. Schindler’s List
37. Taxi Driver
38. American History X
39. Yellow Submarine
40. Fight Club
41. To Kill a Mockingbird
42. The Pianist
43. Oldboy
44. 21 Grams
45. From Hell
46. Panic Room
47. Grindhouse
48. Ed Wood
49. Toy Story
50. Kill Bill (Both volumes)
51. Cruel Intentions
52. A Mighty Heart
53. Wet Hot American Summer
54. Raging Bull
55. The Machinist
56. An Inconvenient Truth
57. From Russia With Love
58. Rushmore
59. 16 Candles
60. Capote
61. The Departed
62. Jackie Brown
63. Beauty and The Beast
64. Silence of The Lambs
65. The Exorcist
66. Amores Perros
67. The Motorcycle Diary’s
68. Jurassic Park
69. Goodfellas
70. Training Day
71. The Godfather
72. Mean Creek
73. The Cable Guy
74. Man on The Moon
75. One Hour Photo
76. Bottle Rocket
77. Adaptation
78. Pretty in Pink
79. The Graduate
80. Audition
81. Cache
82. Running Scared
83. A Guide To Recognizing Your Saints
84. Brick
85. Dead Poets Society
86. West Side Story
87. Un Chien Andalou
88. High Fidelity
89. Hotel Rwanda
90. One Flew Over The Cooqoos Nest
91. The Good The Bad And The Ugly
92. A Hard Day’s Night
93. The Shining