May in Movies

I watched a lot of movies in May. 21 to be exact, that brings my total for the year up to 86. The best movie I watched was The Triplets of Belleville which scored a perfect 10/10 for me.
Coming up next would be the Akira Kurosawa film The Hidden Fortress. This is only the third Kurosawa film I've seen and I must watch some more.
Coming up in third place tied with a 9/10 rating are The Lady Eve (review), To Be or not to Be and No Country For Old Men.
And some special consideration for: Planet Terror (review), Raiders of the Lost Ark (review) and There Will Be Blood.

Happy June

I woke up this morning to the news that we have hit a new month: June. This fact scares the shits out of me. What the hell am I going to do when this month is over? I'm going to be so fucked.

I watched Hairspray last night. I must say that I admire the campy fun, everything else just seemed so forced - the acting, the script, the songs, the computer generated helicopter shot at the start. How are you supposed to have fun when you're being forced to?

Review: Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

Well, the new one has had its premiere in Cannes so I thought I'd give the first one a watch. Introduce myself to the whole Indiana Jones thing. It's good for someone who studies pop culture to actually acquaint myself with some of it.

The most interesting thing about the movie for me though, watching it 27 years after it's been released was that I felt that I had watched it all before - everything seemed so familiar. My theory is that the entire movie has been parodied and referenced by so many different people that you could actually reconstruct the entire movie from them. The first place you'll start would be The Simpsons and then you'll move on.

The movie itself was great - everything you could want from an action film really. And what most action films have been aspiring to do since. I'll have to grab a copy of the second and watch it as soon as I can me thinks.

8.5/10

Review: Spider-Man 2 (2004)

God, when did Spider-Man become so fucking emo?

**spoilers!**
OK, we're two years after the events of the first film, a film that I liked and it appears that Peter has not moved on emotionally at all. He still wants to fuck Mary Jane and every single time he sees her it just seems to open up some emotional wound for him that causes him to go for some emo drifting around New York City. As Peter Parker he acts as a seriously sad bitch, he has no money, he's nearly failing class and he works for a man that demonises him. Things seem to be going well for everyone else but everyone else is also miserable, Harry still wants a hug from his dead father, auntie blames herself for her husband's death, Mary Jane wants to fuck Peter but he's in emo-land so she settles for an astronaut.

Are you serious? An astronaut? Do we still send people into outer space?

There's a villian called Dr. Octopus and he's crazy... like the last villian. Peter decides giving up everything he wants isn't worth being Spider-Man so he throws his little uniform away and becomes a nerd instead with spiffing glasses. Crime rises but Peter doesn't care, he can now finally have his shot with Mary Jane, but tough luck pal. She's getting fucking married. You knew that. He tries to convince her with a smashing argument but she is somehow not convinced.

The entire plot becomes ridiculous as the movie progresses. Scenes full of plot holes arise, for instance: no one (including Mr. Super Spider Senses) notices that a man with four huge metalliac arms enters a bank until he thows open the vault door. Later in the film, the said man with the metalliac arms is given one clue (Peter Parker) to find Spider-Man and then KILLS him. Oh, wait, he didn't. Because Peter Parker has super powers. Right. That was lucky otherwise you would have killed your only clue and then you wouldn't have got your precious whatever that glowing shit was.

And don't get me started on the ending. Don't get me started on that awful speech that is repeated throughout the film. Don't get me started on the phrase "with great power comes great responsiblity". Don't get me started on the useless sequences.

We should just talk about J.K. Simmons. He's fucking awesome. I wish the rest of the movie could just live up to him.

I'll finish with a picture... from the first movie because that was so much better.

Quick Film Reviews: The Procrastination Edition

I was meant to be busy this week so I procrastinated and watched a whole bunch of films.

The Triplets of Belleville (2003 - Sylvain Chomet)
I gave two films 10/10 last year - Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid and Band of Outsiders and this becomes the first film this year to receive that rating. Every single frame was injected with so much energy and originality that I was giddy for the entire 81 minutes. Finding Nemo, a film I quite liked beat this one for the Oscar of best animated feature. Nemo should have been CRUSHED. But oh well; not everyone's cup of tea I guess. To emphasise the point: 10/10

Mission Impossible III (2006 - J.J. Abrams)
Having not seen the first two I don't really know what to compare this too. As an action flick I thought it worked quite well. 7.5/10

Cars (2006 - John Lasseter & Joe Ranft)
Pixar's weakest film to date. But still quite lovable and pretty. Still good. 8/10

Priceless (2006 - Pierre Salvadori)
Lots of expensive stuff on display. Everything looks pretty and its fun some of the time if it wasn't for that dull predictable plot. And Audrey Tautou, one of my favourite actresses after Amelie looks so skinny, was she always like that? 6/10

Planet Terror (2007 - Robert Rodrigeuz)
Now this was fun. Pure fun. Delivered exactly what they promised. Need to see Tarantino's Death Proof now. I read that the fake trailer at the beginning is actually going to be made into a real movie. Now that is awesome. 8.5/10

The Conversation (1974 - Francis Ford Coppola)
Part of the New Hollywood in the 70s. Coppola made this between the first two Godfather films. Interesting thriller. 8/10

Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936 - Frank Capra)
I always liked that Gilmore Girls by Paris when she is in Stars Hollow for the first time and describes it as a place "that would even make Frank Capra throw up". This is one of those films with those Capra idealistic characters that are so pure and innocent and full of integrity that it'll make you throw up. Other examples is Jimmy Stewart from It's a Wonderful Life and Jimmy Stewart from Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. I'm sure he's got a few more movies that have these characters. If they weren't so lovable in their integrity this film will be awful but Gary Cooper does well here. 8/10

The Lady Eve (1941 - Preston Sturges)
I'm still trying to work out what happened in the end there. It kind of confuses me. No judgement yet.

Review: Bon Voyage (2003)

How could a film so riddled with cliches and scenes that has already been seen be so entertaining?

I didn't have much expectations when I decided to watch it, my flatmate had rented it and hadn't gone around to seeing it and I was feeling awake and alert that Sunday night. What else was I to do? It was awesome, the film flirts with Hitchcock, Truffaut and others I'm probably not aware of (the IMDB reviewers seemed to mentioning Renoir a lot). It wasn't very substantial but was mere entertainment (those expecting a World War Two drama would have been disappointed).

My flatmate attempted to watch but gave up after about half an hour declaring it 'shit'. I'll give it 8/10.

Review: Twilight Watch by Sergei Lukyanenko

When I said at the start of the year that I should more Russian authors I don't think I meant this.

Nevertheless, I've found myself addicted to the Watch series since last year when I watched the Night Watch movie followed up by the Day Watch movie earlier this year. I got out the books from the library and promptly read them and now just finished Twilight Watch - the third book in the series. If you're into a mixture of magician/vampire/detective novels with a little satire on bureaucracy and some musing on modern Russia then this is will be right down your alley. If not, read War and Peace or something.

Admittedly, this book is not as good as the the first two but has it moments. Lukyanenko keeps up his annoying habit of putting heaps of lyrics in the prose. I don't let Thomas Pynchon do that and Lukyanenko gets the same treatment. What's the point? I don't even bother reading them.

There is a movie called Twilight Watch scheducled for release in 2009 but the setting has been changed from Russia to the States and it will feature American actors rather than Russians. A obviously disapointing movie with the only bright spot being that they've retained the director Timur Bekmambetov. So it should be interesting, the books and the movies are two different beasts with the movies going in a completely diffferent direction to the books. We'll just have to wait and see.

Some Quick Film Reviews

Seen a bunch of films over the last couple of weeks. So without wasting any more time...

Thelma & Louise (1991, Ridley Scott)
I now finally understand that Simpsons episode where Marge meets Ruth Powers. This is one of those movies that everyone has seemed to have seen except for me... but not anymore! The film itself was really enjoyable. 8/10

Strictly Ballroom (1992, Baz Luhrmann)
I saw Moulin Rouge! about a month ago which introduced me to the exorbitant Baz Luhrmann. The amazing thing is how effortlessly he pulls it off. This film is certainly a charmer. 8/10

A Mighty Wind (2003, Christopher Guest)
Back in first year I randomly got the poster for this film to liven up the hallway in my hall of residence. There was something about those cheery faces that I felt would unsettle everyone else on the floor. I'm a huge fan of the previous movies (Best In Show, Waiting For Guffman, etc...) and this one was nice while not quite living up to those ones. 7.5/10

THX 1138 (1971, George Lucas)
I've never been a big fan of these totalitarian visions of the future movies. They all seem too 1984ish. A good one though. 7/10

Pret-A-Porter (1994, Robert Altman)
This is the eighth Altman film I've seen and this one just felt like Altman going through the paces. It was him applying all those techniques he's known for but for what? It was funny, had some interesting characters and worked. Maybe I'm just experiencing some Altman burnout - seven of those Altman films I saw this year. 7/10

Review: Easy Rider (1969)

I'm currently doing a course about New Hollywood, the period in film history that started in 1967 when the studios relinquished creative control over to the directors. This period arguably ended about eight years later though Wikipedia puts the time of death in 1982 with Francis Ford Coppola's One From The Heart (which I need to see - I missed the screening on Tuesday). When I saw this on the video store shelf - I had to get it out on $1 day.

Easy Rider, always mentioned after the likes of Bonnie & Clyde and The Graduate is one of the earliest films of New Hollywood and you can definitely see the aesthetic of the period shining through here. I feel that the freedom that the directors had is nicely encapsulated by the words of the characters.

However, I didn't really feel anything for this film. It was good, a very enjoyable 94 minutes of my life. Ultimately, 7.5/10

(As a sidenote: reading the Wikipedia section on the production section of Easy Rider makes director Dennis Hopper sound very intense. Not someone to mess with...)

Review: JFK (1991)

I watched this film over the weekend. It took me three attempts to actually get through the entire thing, which requires me to make a mental note. No, several mental notes. (OK - three)

1) Don't get out films that are 198 minutes long.
I should repeat this to myself over and over: I do not like long movies. I do not buy into Roger Ebert's (I think he said it) saying that no good movie is long enough and that no bad movie is short enough. Movies should never overstay their welcome. I don't care if you're The Godfather. I have a short attention span.

There are a few exceptions to the rule: Nashville clocks in at 159 minutes, Magnolia at 188, Boogie Nights at 156 and I'm sure there's some more that I'll admit to liking that are over 150 minutes.

The kicker for JFK was that I rented out the director's cut. So what started out as a three hour movie had an extra 20 minutes tacked on.

2) Kevin Costner is Satan
I have this thing about Kevin Costner, I have a theory that it all stemmed from when I studied Dances With Wolves back in high school. Dear lord, I hated that movie so much. Since then no Costner movie has stood a chance.

3) Conspiracy Theories Are Only Fun If Bill Hicks Is Telling Them...
I remember once upon a time when watching a friend's Bill Hicks DVD that Hicks did his own summary of the "Magic Bullet" which was so much better than anything in this movie - I should find a youtube video. Doesn't matter that much anyway - Wikipedia says that the Magic Bullet scene (my favourite of the movie) isn't actually based on fact. Oh well, it was still funny.

One last thing - while reading I found this web site interesting - "One Hundred Errors of Fact and Judgment in Oliver Stone's JFK" almost reminds me of the web sites that attacked Bowling For Columbine such as this one.

Overall: 5/10 for the film. Also note that is in the book, 1001 Films You Must See Before You Die.