Welcome back gang. It's the end of one year and the beginning of another, and I got a new post for ya'll. A vacation from work gave me the time to really dig deep and a big week is in store. Now, things are gonna be a bit different around here. I have started an internship at an online magazine writing up entertainment related biz. So I may not be as frequent on this. But even if I am, I won't be writing up movies released that week, as I will write them up for the mag. I'll post links to my weeks entries if I'm good with the work load. But, if this be the last one (probably not), it's a big one with a damn good variety. So read up and enjoy. Belated Happy Holidays and a Happy New Year.
The Tragedy of Macbeth (December 28th, 2014)
Director: Roman Polanski
Starring: Jon Finch, Francesca Annis, Martin Shaw, and Terence Bayler
It's always nice to have context of the history of a film maker or the events that helped shape a movie, but it isn't always vital. Usually not. And while it doesn't make this movie better or worse, it's interesting to know the history behind this. For this was the first movie Polanski made after the ritualistic murder of his wife and unborn child by the Manson family. Knowing that the mans family was brutally and nastily murdered gives us an idea of where his mind was when turning his version of Macbeth into the bloodiest and most brutal adaptation of the play yet. Also gives us a reason why our titular character is a bit younger than usually portrayed. But all that doesn't make the movie good or not. It's the execution and it's here. This is a damn good adaptation of the play. It's different enough not to be a boring retread. Polanski changed it up to strip away the supernatural elements and make it more of psychological tragedy, making Macbeths slipping sanity the reason for some of the outlandish elements. The cast is all here, Finch doing damn good work as the tortured but ambitious warrior. The movie has a bleak look and feel to it, as if all this is just inevitable. Hence the titular tragedy. This is for Shakespeare fans, since it still has the Bards language in it and that can be hard for uninitiated audiences. I have trouble occasionally with it so know that going in. But I gotta say this was a damn fine film and a worthy entry into the sex fiends filmography.
Rating: 9/10
About Time (December 28th, 2014)
Director: Richard Curtis
Starring: Domhnall Gleeson, Rachel MacAdams, Tom Hollander, and Bill Nighy
Sometimes it is great when a movie is marketed in a way to mask the true movie lurking beneath. In this case it probably hurt the movies financial success, but it certainly sucker punched me. What appears to be a high concept rom com turns into something a bit heavier, dealing in loss and the ability to appreciate what we have. In an effort to keep the secrets of this movie secret, I won't get too much into details here. But this is from the man who brought us Love, Actually. So it isn't too much of a surprise to say that this movie is pretty funny, and not in a typical rom com way. It's got a dirty sense of humor, some real grown up humor. It also has one of the best sight gags I've seen in a while. The cast is also superb as well, another talent Curtis has. Gleeson is a surprise, showing he's more than just a Weasley. MacAdams manages to bring life to a character that sounded initially like a Notebook redux. And Nighy is Nighy, the rockstar that he is. It's always refreshing to see a movie like this come along that shames all the other cynical and repurposed rom coms that come around. A real special movie that should be seen by all.
Rating: 9/10
Paris, Texas (December 29th, 2014)
Director: Wim Wenders
Starring: Harry Dean Stanton, Dean Stockwell, Aurore Clement, and Nastassja Kinski
This movie really sneaks up on you. What starts off as what appears to be an off kilter comedy about a silent man walking to some unknown destination (definitely an inspiration for Nebraska) slowly morphs into a heartbreaking movie about a broken man and his regrets. Harry Dean Stanton is amazing here, working wonders as this slightly odd man who has some pain inside of him. The secrets of why he was missing for 4 years and why he was walking through the desert are unlocked throughout and it's a killer. I won't spoil much, but I'll say that he has a kid he hasn't seen in those years and the mother is out of picture. This is a true, down to earth blue collar movie. We know these people and it's a sad sight to see these all too familiar problems. I haven't seen such a beautifully sad movie in a long time. I gotta recommend this for everyone. A real treat.
Rating: 9.5/10
Willow Creek (December 29th, 2014)
Director: Bobcat Goldwaith
Starring: Alexie Gilmore and Bryce Johnson
This movie isn't bad but all I could say when it ended was... "eh". It's a really short movie and almost nothing happens in it until the last 20 minutes. And even then, it's fairly anticlimactic. I understand where Goldwaith was coming from with this. And the technical aspects I like. Doing a found footage movie like a real found footage movie. All the edits are actually done in camera, there's no oddly perfect cuts. There's long stretches with no cuts, done in many long takes. But it's also a real case study in the pretty limited ability of the found footage idea to really work. It's limiting and lacks a cinematic feel. That and it's a movie about bigfoot without bigfoot. And I'm not even sure if it's because bigfoot isn't even in it. It's not clear and not in a cool way. It's ambiguous to be ambiguous, another fault in the idea of sticking to true found footage. I just hope this is the last found footage movie I see.
Rating: 7.5/10
Kagemusha (December 30th, 2014)
Director: Akira Kurosawa
Starring: Tatsuya Nakadai, Kenichi Hagiwara, Tsutomu Yamazaki, and Shuji Otaki
Time to repeat myself. Kurosawa is a master and hasn't done anything bad, at least of the stuff I've seen. He's a master of framing and storytelling. Underrated it seems know, he should be talked about more than Kubrick. Everyone learned from him. The times changed around him and he was still working. For a guy who started out in the 50s, like Kubrick, he managed really well. And he was able to change his filming techniques from the square, full screen black and white cameras back in the day to the wide screen, gorgeous color cameras. This movie is gorgeous to look at, full of bright colors and big images. Japan has rarely looked nicer. Telling an essentially changed version of the Prince and The Pauper but in the Samurai era, Kurosawa tackles the idea of power. By having a lowly peasant take over the role of a dead leader, the thief learns the true meaning of power. And instead of abusing it, the man starts to become a leader. He understands the responsibility and it's really interesting to see unfold. Maybe running a bit too long, that is the only thing holding this back from a full on 10. But ignoring that, this is one of the best things Kurosawa has done. A true epic that should be seen by any cinephile.
Rating: 9.5/10
The Wicker Man (December 30th, 2014)
Director: Robin Hardy
Starring: Edward Woodward, Britt Ekland, Diane Cilento, and Christopher Lee
Man, this movie was a disappointment. I really wanted to like this, hearing so much praise for it for years. Finally getting to it now, I just don't get it. Do fans of this just ignore the hilariously bad music that accompanies it? Or is there a version without it? How bout the absolutely ridiculous, all time bad scene of a man being wooed by an awfully dancing woman in another room despite not knowing she's naked or dancing? Or what about the ridiculous amounts of time spent just watching naked people dancing in a field? Or the ridiculously over complicated plot to get this cop to be a sacrifice? And man, this fucking guy. What a terrible protagonist. A good horror movie/thriller should make it that you don't want the character to die. But this prick just deserves it. Closed minded and immediately distrustful of this island before even getting to the weirdness. But then he walks into the middle of an orgy and is kinda not too thrown off by it. The ideas behind the movie are cool and Lee is always awesome. But man, the execution is lacking severely. It just barely works. And I may like this less as time goes on. It also doesn't help that Hot Fuzz pretty much ripped this kind of movie apart. Idk. I can't really recommend this.
Rating: 7/10
Kelly's Heroes (December 31st, 2014)
Director: Brian Hutton
Starring: Clint Eastwood, Telly Savalas, Don Rickles, and Donald Sutherland
This is just entertainment. There's nothing wrong with that at all. But that's all this is. A good romp with a bunch of actors from the time that people know. It's kind of like the Oceans Eleven of it's time set during WWII (despite there being an Oceans movie back then, shut up). Clint plays a former Army officer who was demoted due to bullshit politics. When he hears of 16 million dollars of Nazi gold in a nearby bank, he grabs a group of guys to go rob it. Nothing is great or groundbreaking. Fun is the theme. The only one playing a character is Sutherland, playing this really weird hippie with a ridiculous accent who also leads a tank battalion. What's kind of nice about the movie is that these guys are kinda shitheels. They are thieves and the only reason we don't care is because they're fun to watch. That's it. These guys are AWOL essentially. Traitors in a way. But that's a lot of Clint movies, even in this pre Dirty Harry movie. Just moral ambiguity. It's a fun movie and a good time for any Clint or Sutherland fans.
Rating: 8/10
The Dark Half (January 2nd, 2015)
Director: George A. Romero
Starring: Timothy Hutton, Amy Madigan, Julie Harris, and Michael Rooker
Stephen King is hard to adapt to the screen. Sure, there are some classics like The Shawshank Redemption, Stand By Me and The Mist. But those are atypically normal stories by the man. Even The Mist, a horror story, doesn't get as weird as alot of his stories. And a key component in a weird King story is a weird fucking ending. So in adapting a very weird, meta and personal book from his bibliography, would Romero keep a weird ending? Fuck yeah he did, because this ending is absolutely bonkers. Inspired by the time in the 80s when King used a pseudonym for some books, we follow Thaddeus Beaumont. Thad is a writer who used a fake name to write some pulp books to make money to support his family while he wrote "real" books. But when deciding to end the "life" of this fake name, George Stark, things get weird and Stark comes to life. This is a very Twilight Zone-esque story. Aside from the way it uses an outlandish set up to dal with a problem people face, the daily battle with out worse instincts, it also just has no problem with not really explaining why this happens to Thad. Romero does some solid work outside of his zombie works. It still retains some typical lackluster acting that Romero can deal in. Hutton is good in the dual roles of Thad and George (actually reminding me of Josh Brolin at points) and Rooker is good as the cop. But some of the side people are stiff and don't really work alot of the time. Visually the movie is nice, a good job at feeling like a King story. But then there's some really bad effects work that really take you out of the movie. But through some of these weak links, the movie works pretty well. It's a nice, weird little story that works as a thriller but also as two men (King and Romero) working out some issues they had with their careers. Highly recommended for King and Romero fans. Others may tread more lightly, but still worth a trip.
Rating: 8.5/10
Stretch (January 3rd, 2015)
Director: Joe Carnahan
Starring: Patrick Wilson, Chris Pine, Jessica Alba, and Ed Helms
How did this not get released? I'm not gonna claim that this is some sort of masterpiece of cinema, a game changer or any such thing. But we live in a world where Kevin Smith can shit out whatever bullshit idea waddles its way into his stoner fucking "mind" onto screens, yet a real talent like Carnahan can't get a really solid movie released. It's a weird movie, admittedly. But Tusk happened, and that was Kevin Smith just dumping on the audience. Narratively it's not even that weird. We've seen it before. It's about a guy on an odyssey throughout a single night, learning a lesson while dealing with some shit. It's just in the finer details that this movie is weird. I'll leave those as nice surprises for anyone who decides to watch it (it's streaming on netflix). But what I will say is that the movie is really funny. Carnahan is known primarily for testosterone fueled movies, and while this has some of that, it has a lighter touch than even The A-Team or Smokin' Aces. And, while rough around the edges, is a pretty good looking movie. It doesn't reach Collateral level style of late night LA, but it does a decent enough job to be a slightly off kilter version. Wilson is the man on the journey, and he does really solid work. He has to play down on his luck with a snarky attitude, but also come off as a decent guy and he nails it. The rest of the cast is fine, but are barely in it enough to leave a mark. Except for Pine that is. This is Pines second go with Carnahan (playing a neo nazi in Smokin' Aces) and he is just as big and wild and unlike Pine that it's crazy. Looking like a younger version of current Rick Rubin, he is unrecognizable for the most part. He is unhinged and has an evil lurking in his eyes, a whirling dervish of chaos. It's a great performance and it is a shame that he's been kinda wasted in Hollywood, outside of Carnahan and JJ Abrams. Wilson is a limo driver/down on his luck actor who ends up driving Pines eccentric/dangerous rich guy. It touches on the ridiculous nature of LA and the Hollywood lifestyle and it has a bit of bite. There's some other twists and subplots in here, but it's narratively very simple. This was a hell of a movie and I enjoyed it immensely. Hopefully Carnahan can bounce back from this and deliver yet again.
Rating: 9/10
Top Movies
1. Paris, Texas
2. Kagemusha
3. About Time
4. Stretch
5. Macbeth
6. The Dark Half
7. Kelly's Heroes
8. Willow Creek
9. The Wicker Man
Top 5 Performances
1. Harry Dean Stanton - Paris, Texas
2. Chris Pine - Stretch
3. Domhnall Gleeson - About Time
4. Donald Sutherlands - Kelly's Heroes
5. Timothy Hutton - The Dark Half
Top Moments
1. The Booth Confession - Paris, Texas
2. The Opening - Kagemusha
3. Chris Pines Entrance - Stretch
4. A Late Trip To The Beach - About Time
5. Macbeths Last Stand - Macbeth
About Time (December 28th, 2014)
Director: Richard Curtis
Starring: Domhnall Gleeson, Rachel MacAdams, Tom Hollander, and Bill Nighy
Sometimes it is great when a movie is marketed in a way to mask the true movie lurking beneath. In this case it probably hurt the movies financial success, but it certainly sucker punched me. What appears to be a high concept rom com turns into something a bit heavier, dealing in loss and the ability to appreciate what we have. In an effort to keep the secrets of this movie secret, I won't get too much into details here. But this is from the man who brought us Love, Actually. So it isn't too much of a surprise to say that this movie is pretty funny, and not in a typical rom com way. It's got a dirty sense of humor, some real grown up humor. It also has one of the best sight gags I've seen in a while. The cast is also superb as well, another talent Curtis has. Gleeson is a surprise, showing he's more than just a Weasley. MacAdams manages to bring life to a character that sounded initially like a Notebook redux. And Nighy is Nighy, the rockstar that he is. It's always refreshing to see a movie like this come along that shames all the other cynical and repurposed rom coms that come around. A real special movie that should be seen by all.
Paris, Texas (December 29th, 2014)
Director: Wim Wenders
Starring: Harry Dean Stanton, Dean Stockwell, Aurore Clement, and Nastassja Kinski
This movie really sneaks up on you. What starts off as what appears to be an off kilter comedy about a silent man walking to some unknown destination (definitely an inspiration for Nebraska) slowly morphs into a heartbreaking movie about a broken man and his regrets. Harry Dean Stanton is amazing here, working wonders as this slightly odd man who has some pain inside of him. The secrets of why he was missing for 4 years and why he was walking through the desert are unlocked throughout and it's a killer. I won't spoil much, but I'll say that he has a kid he hasn't seen in those years and the mother is out of picture. This is a true, down to earth blue collar movie. We know these people and it's a sad sight to see these all too familiar problems. I haven't seen such a beautifully sad movie in a long time. I gotta recommend this for everyone. A real treat.
Willow Creek (December 29th, 2014)
Director: Bobcat Goldwaith
Starring: Alexie Gilmore and Bryce Johnson
This movie isn't bad but all I could say when it ended was... "eh". It's a really short movie and almost nothing happens in it until the last 20 minutes. And even then, it's fairly anticlimactic. I understand where Goldwaith was coming from with this. And the technical aspects I like. Doing a found footage movie like a real found footage movie. All the edits are actually done in camera, there's no oddly perfect cuts. There's long stretches with no cuts, done in many long takes. But it's also a real case study in the pretty limited ability of the found footage idea to really work. It's limiting and lacks a cinematic feel. That and it's a movie about bigfoot without bigfoot. And I'm not even sure if it's because bigfoot isn't even in it. It's not clear and not in a cool way. It's ambiguous to be ambiguous, another fault in the idea of sticking to true found footage. I just hope this is the last found footage movie I see.
Kagemusha (December 30th, 2014)
Director: Akira Kurosawa
Starring: Tatsuya Nakadai, Kenichi Hagiwara, Tsutomu Yamazaki, and Shuji Otaki
Time to repeat myself. Kurosawa is a master and hasn't done anything bad, at least of the stuff I've seen. He's a master of framing and storytelling. Underrated it seems know, he should be talked about more than Kubrick. Everyone learned from him. The times changed around him and he was still working. For a guy who started out in the 50s, like Kubrick, he managed really well. And he was able to change his filming techniques from the square, full screen black and white cameras back in the day to the wide screen, gorgeous color cameras. This movie is gorgeous to look at, full of bright colors and big images. Japan has rarely looked nicer. Telling an essentially changed version of the Prince and The Pauper but in the Samurai era, Kurosawa tackles the idea of power. By having a lowly peasant take over the role of a dead leader, the thief learns the true meaning of power. And instead of abusing it, the man starts to become a leader. He understands the responsibility and it's really interesting to see unfold. Maybe running a bit too long, that is the only thing holding this back from a full on 10. But ignoring that, this is one of the best things Kurosawa has done. A true epic that should be seen by any cinephile.
The Wicker Man (December 30th, 2014)
Director: Robin Hardy
Starring: Edward Woodward, Britt Ekland, Diane Cilento, and Christopher Lee
Man, this movie was a disappointment. I really wanted to like this, hearing so much praise for it for years. Finally getting to it now, I just don't get it. Do fans of this just ignore the hilariously bad music that accompanies it? Or is there a version without it? How bout the absolutely ridiculous, all time bad scene of a man being wooed by an awfully dancing woman in another room despite not knowing she's naked or dancing? Or what about the ridiculous amounts of time spent just watching naked people dancing in a field? Or the ridiculously over complicated plot to get this cop to be a sacrifice? And man, this fucking guy. What a terrible protagonist. A good horror movie/thriller should make it that you don't want the character to die. But this prick just deserves it. Closed minded and immediately distrustful of this island before even getting to the weirdness. But then he walks into the middle of an orgy and is kinda not too thrown off by it. The ideas behind the movie are cool and Lee is always awesome. But man, the execution is lacking severely. It just barely works. And I may like this less as time goes on. It also doesn't help that Hot Fuzz pretty much ripped this kind of movie apart. Idk. I can't really recommend this.
Kelly's Heroes (December 31st, 2014)
Director: Brian Hutton
Starring: Clint Eastwood, Telly Savalas, Don Rickles, and Donald Sutherland
This is just entertainment. There's nothing wrong with that at all. But that's all this is. A good romp with a bunch of actors from the time that people know. It's kind of like the Oceans Eleven of it's time set during WWII (despite there being an Oceans movie back then, shut up). Clint plays a former Army officer who was demoted due to bullshit politics. When he hears of 16 million dollars of Nazi gold in a nearby bank, he grabs a group of guys to go rob it. Nothing is great or groundbreaking. Fun is the theme. The only one playing a character is Sutherland, playing this really weird hippie with a ridiculous accent who also leads a tank battalion. What's kind of nice about the movie is that these guys are kinda shitheels. They are thieves and the only reason we don't care is because they're fun to watch. That's it. These guys are AWOL essentially. Traitors in a way. But that's a lot of Clint movies, even in this pre Dirty Harry movie. Just moral ambiguity. It's a fun movie and a good time for any Clint or Sutherland fans.
The Dark Half (January 2nd, 2015)
Director: George A. Romero
Starring: Timothy Hutton, Amy Madigan, Julie Harris, and Michael Rooker
Stephen King is hard to adapt to the screen. Sure, there are some classics like The Shawshank Redemption, Stand By Me and The Mist. But those are atypically normal stories by the man. Even The Mist, a horror story, doesn't get as weird as alot of his stories. And a key component in a weird King story is a weird fucking ending. So in adapting a very weird, meta and personal book from his bibliography, would Romero keep a weird ending? Fuck yeah he did, because this ending is absolutely bonkers. Inspired by the time in the 80s when King used a pseudonym for some books, we follow Thaddeus Beaumont. Thad is a writer who used a fake name to write some pulp books to make money to support his family while he wrote "real" books. But when deciding to end the "life" of this fake name, George Stark, things get weird and Stark comes to life. This is a very Twilight Zone-esque story. Aside from the way it uses an outlandish set up to dal with a problem people face, the daily battle with out worse instincts, it also just has no problem with not really explaining why this happens to Thad. Romero does some solid work outside of his zombie works. It still retains some typical lackluster acting that Romero can deal in. Hutton is good in the dual roles of Thad and George (actually reminding me of Josh Brolin at points) and Rooker is good as the cop. But some of the side people are stiff and don't really work alot of the time. Visually the movie is nice, a good job at feeling like a King story. But then there's some really bad effects work that really take you out of the movie. But through some of these weak links, the movie works pretty well. It's a nice, weird little story that works as a thriller but also as two men (King and Romero) working out some issues they had with their careers. Highly recommended for King and Romero fans. Others may tread more lightly, but still worth a trip.
Stretch (January 3rd, 2015)
Director: Joe Carnahan
Starring: Patrick Wilson, Chris Pine, Jessica Alba, and Ed Helms
How did this not get released? I'm not gonna claim that this is some sort of masterpiece of cinema, a game changer or any such thing. But we live in a world where Kevin Smith can shit out whatever bullshit idea waddles its way into his stoner fucking "mind" onto screens, yet a real talent like Carnahan can't get a really solid movie released. It's a weird movie, admittedly. But Tusk happened, and that was Kevin Smith just dumping on the audience. Narratively it's not even that weird. We've seen it before. It's about a guy on an odyssey throughout a single night, learning a lesson while dealing with some shit. It's just in the finer details that this movie is weird. I'll leave those as nice surprises for anyone who decides to watch it (it's streaming on netflix). But what I will say is that the movie is really funny. Carnahan is known primarily for testosterone fueled movies, and while this has some of that, it has a lighter touch than even The A-Team or Smokin' Aces. And, while rough around the edges, is a pretty good looking movie. It doesn't reach Collateral level style of late night LA, but it does a decent enough job to be a slightly off kilter version. Wilson is the man on the journey, and he does really solid work. He has to play down on his luck with a snarky attitude, but also come off as a decent guy and he nails it. The rest of the cast is fine, but are barely in it enough to leave a mark. Except for Pine that is. This is Pines second go with Carnahan (playing a neo nazi in Smokin' Aces) and he is just as big and wild and unlike Pine that it's crazy. Looking like a younger version of current Rick Rubin, he is unrecognizable for the most part. He is unhinged and has an evil lurking in his eyes, a whirling dervish of chaos. It's a great performance and it is a shame that he's been kinda wasted in Hollywood, outside of Carnahan and JJ Abrams. Wilson is a limo driver/down on his luck actor who ends up driving Pines eccentric/dangerous rich guy. It touches on the ridiculous nature of LA and the Hollywood lifestyle and it has a bit of bite. There's some other twists and subplots in here, but it's narratively very simple. This was a hell of a movie and I enjoyed it immensely. Hopefully Carnahan can bounce back from this and deliver yet again.
Top Movies
1. Paris, Texas
2. Kagemusha
3. About Time
4. Stretch
5. Macbeth
6. The Dark Half
7. Kelly's Heroes
8. Willow Creek
9. The Wicker Man
Top 5 Performances
1. Harry Dean Stanton - Paris, Texas
2. Chris Pine - Stretch
3. Domhnall Gleeson - About Time
4. Donald Sutherlands - Kelly's Heroes
5. Timothy Hutton - The Dark Half
Top Moments
1. The Booth Confession - Paris, Texas
2. The Opening - Kagemusha
3. Chris Pines Entrance - Stretch
4. A Late Trip To The Beach - About Time
5. Macbeths Last Stand - Macbeth
- Tom Lorenzo
No comments:
Post a Comment