The Lady

IMDB
First time viewed: Yes
Current Release: Yes
Watched With: Myself

I always take note when Luc Besson makes a new film. Even this film, which doesn't completely work dramatically and seems like a very unlikely match of material and director, has some great moments.

First and foremost the true story is rather incredible, although perhaps not the easiest to dramatise. They play up the separated lovers romance angle but it never had the groundwork to really resonate. They cram a lot of stuff in and it is quite a long film but there's usually something interesting happening to keep things moving. They managed to cram a lot in.

Michelle Yeoh and David Thewlis are just fantastic. It helps I'm a big fan of both but even then they can never quite sell the blatant sentimentality they heap on at the end. It's a terrible thing to say, considering it's all a true story but it's one of those stories that if you saw as just a film you probably wouldn't believe it. 

There are a lot of great scenes that really do work though. Mainly all the stuff towards the first half in Burma and the campaign for democracy. The way they portray the evil regime is like something out of a 90's action film. I guess that's Besson coming through. But perhaps the language barrier or difficult shooting conditions stop him from really connecting this one with the audience. 

I was very intrigued by the end titles alluded to the difficulty of getting footage from inside Burma. Sounds fascinating. And it works as a political and historical educational piece but the rest is a little dry. 

The Caller

IMDB
First time viewed: Yes
Current Release: Yes
Watched With: Myself

Ooooooooooo problematic. It's cool to come up with a cool high concept plot device and I really loved the idea behind this one but paying it off and filling in the plot holes that pop up once questions start being asked, you know, actually making it work. That's another skill altogether.

I think even in the trailer you can see the problems with this one. I'm not one for alternate timeline theory but to be fair, the film sets up rules and sticks to them so I guess that's fine. But it's really tenuous. It doesn't bother to explain it's conceit either, it just is and expects you to go along with it.

Conceit aside, this film played up the horror right from the get go and doesn't ease you into it at all. This film really doesn't care much about suspension of disbelief. The suspicion and fear is cranked up to 11 from the opening and there's just no way to get in as an audience. You kinda get used to it as you go along but it makes those opening moments very hard to take seriously and consequently you're never quite onboard for the rest of the film.

Vampire Bill is in this. As is Luis Guzman whom I just cannot take seriously which makes his role problematic here too.

Yep. The whole film is just problematic. Points for trying. Some nice ideas that just don't develop too well and lack the execution needed to make it work.

Flight of the Navigator

IMDB
First time viewed: No
Current Release: No
Watched With: Jordan, Tyler

Write up.

80's kids sci-fi adventure awesomeness.

Agora

IMDB
First time viewed: No
Current Release: No
Watched With: Jordan

This film was also quite overlooked when it was released. Huge budgeted Spanish film, made in english language set in Alexandria at a time of great religious upheaval. Sure to be a controversial subject with a lot of resonance today.

The film is really telling the story of Hypatia, played by Rachel Weisz. And that is interesting in its own right but with the backdrop of the religious politics of the day and the civil war in the city you have a big epic looking backdrop to place her character in.

As impressive as the production design and scale of everything is, I sometimes wish the film had chosen to just focus on one of the elements. You could make the biopic for less than half the cost of this film and I'm sure it would be just as interesting.

But what is fascinating that you get by putting them together is the futility of it all. It actually does serve to emphasise themes and makes a great point. Director Alejandro Amenábar includes these almost godlike point of view shots from the heavens, cameras that zoom in or out right from space to the bustling streets of the city. Again it's all about putting eveything in context and it works rather well.

It's an intriguing story that raises a lot of questions as well. It can be a little stuffy at times but the production is an impressive feat and well worth a look. 

The War of the Worlds

IMDB
First time viewed: No
Current Release: No
Watched With: Jordan

Write Up.

This story has been at the centre of a debate between myself and some friends and thus a screening was in order. The debate rages on. But the screening was fun!

Bug

IMDB
First time viewed: No
Current Release: No
Watched With: Mum

This is a bloody fantastic movie that was completely overlooked when it was dumped straight to dvd in Australia a few years back. William Friedkin adaptation of Tracy Letts' creepy play was one of my favourite releases of 2006. Not in the least for another intense and off the wall performance by Michael Shannon who is reprising his role from the stage.

That trailer does a terrible job of advertising the film and makes it look more like a straight forward horror film. In truth I can't think of a way you really could market the film to a broad audience but rest assured, it's not a b-grade monster movie. It's a psychological paranoid thriller that is wonderfully shot and paced and has some really really great performances.

The way the madness of the film builds and the paranoia spreads like a disease is absolutely riveting and horrifying to watch. It's short and intense, has a great sound design and leaves you with some strange ideas, especially if you stay through the credits and see the little scenes hidden in them.

Friedkin seems rejuvenated by the material here. I'm very excited to see his next film, also written by Letts, which looks equally as nuts. For now though, everyone go out and find a copy of this amazing film and watch it alone late one night. It's a lot of fun!

Midnight in Paris

IMDB
First time viewed: No
Current Release: Yes
Watched With: Mum

Write Up.

Lovely little film.

Trishna

IMDB
First time viewed: Yes

Current Release: Yes
Watched With: Myself

It's always worth taking note whenever Michael Winterbottom makes a new film. Like Gore Verbinski, Ang Lee or Takashi Miike, he has an unmistakable style but seems able to adapt to any kind of genre or story. This time, the story is Tess of the d'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy, transplanted to modern day India.

Freida Pinto has the unenviable task of making a rather passive character sympathetic and engaging and I think she pulls it off. My favourite part of the film is watching the slow arc of this central relationship develop and sour. Unfortunately it's a double edged sword. 

While it's great how the relationship subtly evolves, the film really does drag on in spots. It takes its time I guess, but I think Winterbottom was a little too indulgent in some scenes, most of which I presume were improvised to a degree. Sure there is a lot of nice stuff but it all adds up to a lot of fat that should probably have been trimmed. 

Thankfully it has quite a strong finish but I'm still debating as to wether it was worth the long build up.

The Fog

IMDB
First time viewed: No
Current Release: No
Watched With: Myself

I just got the bluray and thought it should have a spin. I saw this a very long time ago and at the time remember being more scared by this than Carpenter's Halloween.

Watching it again I see how incredibly simple the set up is. This is much more creepy but probably far less visceral than Halloween. It does have a fantastic cast of characters though.

I love the opening, the old man telling ghost stories to kids. It's very effective. I honestly didn't find the rest of the film as scary as I remember. It was also much more straight forward and shorter than I thought, like it's missing a second act or a real climax.

But there are some great sequences and I do love the feeling it evokes. Even though it was slightly less than I remember from my childhood memories I still enjoyed catching up with it.

Melancholia

IMDB
First time viewed: No
Current Release: Yes
Watched With: Myself

Write Up.

 Tonight I watched this on bluray with Lars von Trier doing a commentary. He is rather hilarious but his sense of humour is so odd that it's no wonder he keeps getting into trouble. Well it's on full display in the commentary and it'd so easy to see why he gets tripped up. And I just find that even more hilarious.

There's some interesting bits about the filming and some great features on the disc about the fx work. Trier shows a lot of irreverence to his own work but if I distance myself from him as a personality I still have a film that I'm really fond of. If you missed this ins cinemas, check it out now.

Anonymous

IMDB
First time viewed: No
Current Release: Yes
Watched With: Myself

Write Up.

I listened to the commentary on the bluray. Roland Emmerich is always an interesting listen, regardless of what you might think of his films (plus he has a funky accent) and writer John Orloff makes an interesting foil.

It was actually a really great informative commentary. Not only about creating the story, which parts are historically accurate, where they took liberties, what the scholars think and all that kind of intellectual stuff, but also purely rom a technical point of view.

I did not know this was the first film shot on the Arri Alexa. They talk about testing it out and trying to push its abilities in low light, with entire scenes shot only in candle light. Obviously this has been done before, most famously by Kubrick, but they were impressed with the richness of colour they still managed to get from the scenes and it's true, it does look pretty great.

I also had no idea exactly how much of the film was effects. Like 300, this was shot almost entirely on greenscreen or with a modular set, here they used a few walls, doorways and arches which they would redress and rearrange slightly to create all of the rooms, castles, pubs, courtyards, bridges and houses in the film. He actually used all the effects to make the film cheaper. Only a man who is so versed in big budget filmmaking and use of fx would know how to do that.

They also show a lot of love for their actors, who are all really great but they don't ever shut up about them. But it was a really good listen and well recommended.

The Divide

IMDB
First time viewed: Yes
Current Release: Yes
Watched With: Jordan

The best part of the film was the pre-credit opening. Once you're trapped in the fallout shelter with these "characters" the film becomes a mess.

I'm a real sucker for nuclear fallout and post-apocolyptic survival films so I just HAD to see this one and while it offers some nice ideas it never attempts to explain or develop any of the ones I actually cared about.

Instead of being worried about the bigger picture things, the nuclear war, who attacked them, what is going on up on the surface, who are the evil dudes in suits, what are these experiments they are doing, why are they kidnapping people, how will the the inevitable final girl survive once she escapes, etc. it instead chooses to focus on the much more budgetary friendly group dynamic and the characters decent into madness. I'm fine with that, in fact I usually really enjoy that and expected it but it just never clicked.

I think the biggest problem is the huge jumps in behaviour that happen. Sure you expect things to fall apart and descend into Lord of the Flies territory but this film has absolutely no grace or subtlety about it. It rushes to get there and then tries to exploit it as much as it can, but unfortunately all this shocking behaviour just comes off as laughable.

You can't really blame the actors, who are obviously giving it their all trying desperately to convince you but never managing to rise above the material.

While it has some nice ideas, overall it's not successful for me. The trailer has pretty much the whole opening, that's all you really need to see.

The Five-Year Engagement

IMDB
First time viewed: Yes
Current Release: Yes
Watched With: Jordan

Another crowd pleasing winner from the gratduate class of Judd Apatow. Jason Segel and
Nicholas Stoller's latest is even more accessible than Forgetting Sarah Marshall but still has an edge over the bland series of romantic comedies being slapped together these days. That mainly comes from the few out of left field moments that no one would expect in a formulaic romantic comedy and a great cast that give these characters enough weight to feel realistic and relatable.

Jason Segel and Emily Blunt are immensely likeable, it's hard not to fall in love with them yourself. And as always they are surrounded by the best cast of supporting characters you could want. Chris Pratt as Segal's brother and Lauren Weedman as his boss were standouts for me but it could have easily been any number of them.

The film opens with the proposal and intriguingly the tale of the meet-cute is spread throughout the film via various flashbacks which works surprisingly well and leads up to the finale nicely to tie everything together.

Once the inevitable roadblocks kick in the film, although enjoyable enough, tends to drag a little. They really make you feel those five years. I was surprised how far off the deep end they were willing to push Segal's characters but he's never been one to shy away from going there (or appearing naked, which he once again does several times in this film).

For a film that plays things so realistically it's a shame they had to push in a few tropes to get to the crowd pleasing ending. They make it work as best they can and it's probably the most naturally progressing plot structure you'll likely to see in a romantic comedy for a long time. 

Still it's hard not to be swayed by the feel goodlyness of it all. Although I think it could use some tightening up in the middle the characters and story works and most importantly, it is actually funny.

Safe

IMDB
First time viewed: Yes
Current Release: Yes
Watched With: Myself

Jason Statham continues to make solid little action flicks. That he of all people would be this generations Bruce Willis or Sylvester Stallone always seemed unlikely to me and yet he's always been pretty reliable, his films enjoyable, at least his theatrical releases are.

This one, whilst having some nice action, also uses a good half of the film setting up its story and characters. We follow two characters intercut in their own little self contained films, one a down on his luck boxer film, the other a orphan girl with a gift coming of age film and then when they finally meet halfway through it explodes into nonstop action for the rest of it.

It is a long set up but it completely worked for me, while the story isn't anything that new or special it was convincingly done. I'll admit to getting a little gun fatigue, most of the action is fast paced shaky cam shoot outs, but it is punctuated often enough with little hand to hand moments and some inventive and very painful sounding blows. The bad guys in this film get hurt and the audience feels it too.

Another pleasant surprise was seeing some familiar faces pop up as supporting characters. Particularly James Hong whom I recently enjoyed rewatching in Big Trouble in Little China and Chris Sarandon who recently made a geektastic cameo in the new Fright Night.

Cathrine Chan never gets to the dizzying heights of, say, Natalie Portman in Leon, but she is serviceable as the young girl who is mixed up with all these gangsters.

This is definitely one of Statham's best and if he continues to output action of this quality and volume he's sure to be remembered with those 80's greats.

The Evil Dead

IMDB
First time viewed: No
Current Release: No
Watched With: Myself

It's been almost 4 days since I last saw a film. I have been flat out with work and have unexpectedly found myself spearheading a campaign to get Cabin in the Woods released here in Australia theatrically. Roadshow changed their mind and decided to dump it to dvd. Bastards! So please do everything in your power to help out.

I decided I should watch this today. It's never not a good time to watch this icon of independent horror. Sam Raimi's masterpiece and probably the best cabin in the woods horror ever made (except for it's sequel, which I think mixes horror and comedy in perfect amounts and is my favourite of the series).

This film is just manic. The camera angles and movement and accompanying sound design almost make this cartoonish. It's larger than life. The gore and effects, while low budget and a little rough around the edges, are pulled off with glee and gusto.

And of course, The Chin. Joyous. The man is some kind of god.

It's a little strange in the widescreen aspect ratio on bluray, I don't like knowing half the image is cropped out, but it's still great to have in HD. It's just one of the best movies ever made. It does make me feel a little better too.