Network

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

My bluray arrived. I love that 70's grain in HD.

What can one say about Network. I honestly don't know where to begin. It's a titan. Funny and horrifying and one of the greatest dramas from the 70's or indeed ever. The script is immaculate and the performances match. A film that I only saw for the first time last year and while that's something I'm a little ashamed to admit I'm glad I didn't see it when I was much younger because there's no way my sensibilities would have appreciated it as much as I can now.

God what a cast.

A lot of the satire of network news predictions have come to fruition now, and it's just as relevant today as it was 40 years ago.

We're mad as hell and we're not gonna take it anymore. That scene stops my breath. Can't wait to hear the commentary.

Red Dawn

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

This one has also been in the news a bit of late. MGM is finally getting out of it's bankruptcy and will be able to release the remake they shot a year and a half ago. But the filmmakers have made the amusing and somewhat controversial decision to go back and digitally change the communist invaders from Chinese to North Korean. I'd only seen this once before a few years ago, right after I had 4 wisdom teeth out, so I though it would be a good time to revisit.

I think the best thing about this film is the opening. It's shocking and brutal. The image of the paratroopers landing on the school grounds is beautiful and foreboding and then BAM the massacre starts. The battle is over and the core group of kids have escaped with supplies into the mountains while the county is overrun by evil communist invaders. All this happens within the first 10 minutes. It's great.

The rest of the film follows them as they become guerilla terrorists fighting back for their land. There are some neat, suspenseful action beats and these kids get mowed down. This ain't Tomorrow When The War Began.

Some of the acting is a little unconvincing, even with the great young cast but they are having to play some really large moments. The quieter moments and action work best. I find entire chunks of the middle section unengaging. The finale is understated and works, but they wrap up so quickly there is no time to process.

There's a lot to like here. I do love extreme violence agains children. This film is pretty mean. I like that Lea Thompson survived and went on to make Back to the Future. I don't like that Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Grey were both killed but went on to make Dirty Dancing anyway. It's much better than it's modern Australian counterpart, and I'm sure the remake will be a lot of fun, whoever the bad guys are.

The Sugarland Express

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

The Beard's first theatrical feature film. Most people overlook this and jump straight to Jaws but this film has a lot to offer. I love the feel of the early Spielberg films. I decided to watch this one again because I have heard it mentioned as a reference in a lot of reviews of the new sci-fi road comedy Paul. Apparently there are a lot of Spielberg references so I'm extra excited for that now.

I see Matthew Robbins' name pop up again as one of the writers. More importantly this is the first time Steven Spielberg and John Williams worked together on a film. Match made in heaven.

The acting here is great. I sometimes find Goldie Hawn annoying but she is just on fire here sinking her teeth into this great character. She is a standout.

Based on a true story, I love the way the bad situation just escalates throughout the running time until there is only really one way it can possibly end. It's funny, poignant, heartbreaking and filled with a lot of car action and gun shoot outs. So many 70's cars. It also features one of the few real downbeat endings in a Spielberg film but it still manages to feel nostalgic somehow. Maybe just because it's old. heh.

If you've never seen this one it's definitely worth checking out. Anything Spielberg directs is always, at the very least, well made.

The Thief of Bagdad

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

I this I was the lone kid in 1992 who was more anxious to see this film again rather than the Disney cartoon Aladdin. That could be more to do with the fact that there was a real search involved in trying to find a copy of the film, which I assumed was also called Aladdin because it was the same story, whereas the cartoon was plastered onto every surface anywhere you looked.

It wasn't until a few years back that I was reading up on Sabu, who I must have watched at least one a week in the best version of Jungle Book and realised that the film I had been searching for all those years back was called The Thief of Bagdad and was not quite the same story although they have in common many of the same elements.

What this film has which the cartoon lacks is:
1. Sabu. He's just the most loveable scamp ever. And...
2. A giant spider battle over a pool with a giant octopus. That's to two of my favourite giant creatures together!

Watching this now I am really in love with the way they create such epic looking shots in the old ratio. The design of all the temples and the shots are all to accommodate the taller frame and it is really beautifully composed. You don't need widescreen to look epic.

Love the effects. Love the Miklós Rózsa score, especially that creepy music for the mechanical lady that kills the king. This is a remake of the silent version with Douglas Fairbanks, which I have never seen, but I have read many people prefer that version to this. I'll have to seek that out.

But this was that unattainable film from my childhood, the one that I saw one lazy Sunday afternoon on tv at my grandmother's house, the one that no-one in my class believed a live action version of Aladdin existed. The dvd transfer I have is not the greatest, but at least I can definitely state that the film exists and it is damn great entertainment.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being

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

I think I did this film a bit of a disservice, my head wasn't completely together as I was watching. I think i needed something more perky today but instead all I could find was this rather slow moving character relationship piece. There was something about the war and a lot of sexy scenes but ultimately I missed the point of it all.

Juliette Binoche;s character is a little screwed up. She feels everything so intensely. I don't think I've seen much of Lena Olin's stuff before the late 90's so that was a treat. Ditto for Daniel Day-Lewis. They all craft great layered characters.

It's also shot beautifully. Not just the countryside landscapes of sex scenes, but Soviet's invade and they switch filmstock it's visceral and look authentic, for all I know they used stock footage and shot pieces like this so they would match but either way I really like that.

I wasn't ready for the end when it came, but I don't think I was paying close enough attention to the workings of the characters to figure out what they were leading up to. So if I'm just going by plot, I couldn't say I'd plan to revisit this one. It really just felt like a sequence of events that happened.

Battle: Los Angeles

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

eeeehhehehe.

Sooo much better than Skyline, but that's a given. Despite all the good moments of action set pieces and a few scenes of suspense the entire film stops dead periodically for bad movie dialogue and "character" moments that no one cares about. They should have just dispensed with that and given us carnage, I really didn't care if I was supposed to be invested in the characters or not.

It did make for one of the more unintentionally hilarious line readings I've heard in quite some time. Well not so much Aaron Eckhart's reading of it as it is the line itself. After one of the longer dramary scenes just before the 3rd act starts and everyone is having a cry about who's died there is a big long load of exposition about backstory that has been foreshadowed rather clumsily from the beginning. As it the writers never got past placeholder lines, at the end of this big emotional outburst he rather aptly states "But none of that's important right now" and then goes on to the next mission. if only they had realised none of it was important before they got to shooting stage.

There were a few very obviously foreshadowed deaths. But the action sequences are cool, if only anyone could tell what was going on. Actually that's a bit of a disservice, You usually have a great sense of geography but it is all in spite of the rapid edits and woefully arbitrary crash zooms in and out and in and out. It is incredibly annoying and take you out of the film, wondering what the hell the camera operator is on.

I've been having a load of problems matchmoving and 3d tracking of late, but i think it's nothing compared to what the effects guys must have had to deal with in this one. I think it would have even made Michael Bay's head dizzy.

I like the more low-tech alien fighters. They are super neato. And strangely enough even after watching the whole film I would have trouble telling you what they looked like. They are kept out of sight for the first section of the film which creates some great tense moments but you definitely see much more of them later on. I guess it's just the way it's shot, the way the move, a lot of the time staying in darkness or being filmed from very far away, or always ducking behind the nearest car, you never get too much a view of them to destroy any suspension of disbelief. Even when they have one and are doing an autopsy on it.

So bad dialogue and character building time wasted aside there is some cool action and awesome aliens to be seen here. It play like military propaganda, and not the fun and ironic kind from Starship Troopers, but killing aliens is fine though right?

Arthur

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

Seem as the remake is coming out I figured I had better see this.

It didn't grab my interest very much. Hobson was the most interesting character, so I'm interested to see what Helen Mirren does in the same role and how much they have changed it.

Really he's just drunk all for the majority of the film and has an annoying laugh. i didn't believe the relationship between the two leads at all. It wasn't an offensive film in any way but I definitely think it can be improved upon. It could also be a lot worse... We shall see.

Phase IV

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

When I found out that legendary title and graphics designer Saul Bass had directed a film in the 70's I had to see it. And just as I though it looks amazing.

I think the best way to describe it is THEM! by way of 2001: A Space Odyssey as written by Michael Crichton. It's a trippy existential mediation about two research scientists and a girl trying to deal with intelligent killer ants. It's not a typical b-movie creature feature.

It's definitely low budget and often very clunky but it has moments that are reminiscent of 2001 or The Andromeda Strain. There is a lot of macro photography of ants. And as to be expected there are some very cool design stuff throughout.

It's an odd film, one that ultimately doesn't quite work but is a fascinating view nonetheless.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

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

Ahh I needed that.

My bluray copy just arrived and I couldn't remember if I had heard the commentary before or not. Now that I've heard it I'm still not sure, there wasn't that much info in there that isn't in the extras except for a little more talk about the lighting and use of smoke which was cool.

But what else can you say about this film? It's the best romantic comedy ever made? Michel Gondry is a visual genius? Charlie Kaufmen writes the best scripts ever? The cast is Awesome? Jon Brion scores are the best? All valid and true and all superfluous, most everybody that's seen it knows this. And those that haven't can't be my friend. Seriously, if you can't appreciate even one element of this film then I don't understand how you could like film at all.

The Bluray show up some of the older cg effects, maybe I'm looking too hard for them though now that I know where they all are and have analysed every frame within an inch of it's life looking for the seams and transition points in the visual trickery.

Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet, both cast against type, do outstanding work here. The whole cast is so cool. Despite the bizarre and fantastical elements everyone can find something relatable in these characters situations and relationships. It's a story filled with hurt and heart. I loved the tech side of it, but repeat viewings are mainly for that.

All the Real Girls

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

I wanted to check out David Gordon Green's earlier films but Im having serious trouble getting my hands on a copy of his first film George Washington but I did find this film. If his other early films are anything like this one I can understand why people though he was an odd choice to direct Pineapple Express. This is a very slow, quiet character relationship drama. It's subtle and sweet and there is no gunplay or outrageous comedy.

I love Zooey Deschanel, Paul Schneider and Patricia Clarkson and they are great here. The central relationship, while very sweet, didn't really interest me all that much. Which is basically the whole film. It's not uninteresting, it's just very slow moving and I wasn't really in the mood for it, especially after the ridiculousness of Black Dog.

Anyway I'll be interested to see how Your Highness turns out. It looks far more like his comedy work than this though.

Black Dog

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

This film is about semi-trucks exploding. It has Patrick Swayze burnin' some rubber and the most hilariously cliched "movie dialogue" (and "plot"). It's like a Hollywood blockbuster parody that characters watch inside another movie.

Meatloaf looked like he was having fun. Charles S. Dutton and Stephen Tobolowsky have what is supposed to pass for witty banter, but it's just silly.


The plot, oh god the plot hahahah. Read the IMDB synopsis, the film writes itself.

I really don't like country music, this film was full of it but despite that it was enjoyable for what it was. Fast food of the film world.

Buried

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

Kind of how I feel right now.

This is a great film. Not for those who get claustrophobic easily. Ryan Reynolds in a box for 90 minutes. It's deceptively simple, low budget and completely effective.

Everything that is in a normal action hostage film is in this. It's structured the same, there are the action set pieces, the quiet drama moments the relationships, only it is all done from within a coffin with one man and a phone. They never cheat by cutting to the other end of the line or having flashbacks or big fantasy sequences. You're stuck in there with him. It's a fine tuned script that everyone said was unfilmable. Thankfully Rodrigo Cortés proved them wrong.

And some how it is never boring or visually repetitive. The way this film is shot is incredible, they never shoot the next sequence the same way. Editing and sound and music play a huge part in this. It's all done like a big budget action thriller.

At the centre of it all is Ryan Reynolds who must have gone though all kinds of hell to make this. It's an incredible performance.

I love this film. It's not nearly as claustrophobic as it was sitting up the front by myself at the cinema but it's still very effective, so get it out now if you a willing for a gritty and grim survival experience. Would make a great double with Frozen.