December 2010
52 posts
DVD Tuesday
THE AMERICAN - It’s pretty to look at, but there’s not a lot of ‘there’ there.
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Movie Review
TRUE GRIT
I imagine the Coens had the Charles Portis novel on-set when they shot their fantastic No Country For Old Men. This film (not a remake of the ‘69 film, but rather a new adaptation of the novel) feels like it was borne from the filmmakers’ residual feelings explored there. It reminds me a bit of Unforgiven, only it takes the Western genre and deconstructs it almost...
1001 Movies
So my dear friend Steph just gave me this fine book for Xmas. Fuckin’ Netflix queue keeps growin’……
WatchGive this new site, Pummelvision, access to your Flickr or Facebook photos, and it assembles a video to music and posts it to your Vimeo or YouTube account. It’s free, so I tried it. I was skeptical at first, but it’s strangely pleasing to see the last 10 years of my life flash by in this format. It’s funny how certain images really stand out. In the last 10 years, I’ve...
Ye Olde Christmase Carole
Just heard Dickens’ classic tale on XM Radio, as performed by the fine actors of the Campbell Playhouse, narrated by a successful young actor named Orson Welles. Originally aired December 23rd, 1938.
The Essential 100
The Toronto Film Festival just released the list of the 100 most essential films in history. Below you’ll find it, with an asterisk next to those I’ve already seen (15 of which have been viewed in the past two years. Thank you, movie-a-day plan!).
Guess I’ve got a new list of films to start on for 2011:
1 THE PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC (Carl Theodor Dreyer) 2 CITIZEN KANE (Orson...
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Movie Review
TANGLED
Thank goodness for Pixar’s John Lasseter heading Disney Animation. Under his watchful eye, we got last year’s The Princess and the Frog (in classic, hand-drawn style). And we’ve got this. Considering the immense success of Shrek, attempting a CG-animated fairy tale can fall very easily into ironic self-awareness (which was damn funny in the first Shrek, tired by...
Movie Review
TANGLED
Thank goodness for Pixar’s John Lasseter heading Disney Animation. Under his watchful eye, we got last year’s The Princess and the Frog (in classic, hand-drawn style). And we’ve got this. Considering the immense success of Shrek, attempting a CG-animated fairy tale can fall very easily into ironic self-awareness (which was damn funny in the first Shrek, tired by...
DVD Tuesday
WALL STREET: MONEY NEVER SLEEPS - A disappointing more-of-the-same film from Oliver Stone.
Just in time for the holidays....
WHY I’M AN ATHEIST, by Ricky Gervais
For funskys
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Movie Review
THE BIG SLEEP
The first movie to really take advantage of the Bogie/Bacall craze following To Have And Have Not. This Howard Hawks-directed noir adapts a Raymond Chandler novel, and it sure does hit every note of that hard-boiled noir detective film. Including a highly-confusing plot - even the filmmakers didn’t entirely know who did it (it didn’t help that they had to makes some...
I tend to whistle quite a bit. All kinds of...
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Movie Review
I’M STILL HERE
For most of 2009, Hollywood was wondering what was up with Joaquin Phoenix. Claiming he’s quit acting to focus on a rap career, letting his appearance go, seeming incoherent and odd when giving interviews or when seen out and about. People knew that Affleck was filming it, so many thought it a hoax. But it just kept going. On Letterman. On red carpets. Getting...
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Movie Review
JOAN RIVERS: A PIECE OF WORK
Joan Rivers has become something of a punchline. She knows it. Plastic surgery, old woman, has-been. But you know what? They don’t let just anyone sub in for the Best-Man-Ever-On-Television*. She was groundbreaking, she was fresh, and she works. She works hard, still to this day. This documentary follows a year of her life, and it’s impossible not...
DVD Tuesday
There’s a lot today, so in the interest of clean visual presentation, I won’t include the DVD covers like I usually do:
EXIT THROUGH THE GIFT SHOP - One of the more bizarre docs I’ve seen. But is this Banksy-made doc actually a “doc”?
JOAN RIVERS: A PIECE OF WORK - Another doc showing up on some best-of lists. I missed it in theaters, but it’s available...
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Movie Review
THE FIGHTER
I was surprised by this film, and I suppose I shouldn’t have been. Mark Wahlberg doesn’t try to get just any movie made for five years (he’s also a producer here). Darren Aronofsky doesn’t decide to direct just any film (this was to be the complementary film to The Wrestler. Aronofsky instead made Black Swan that complement. He’s also an Exec Prod...
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Movie Review
SHREK FOREVER AFTER
Get used to it, people. This is how Katzenberg and Dreamworks Animation see their future: creating animated franchises that they can milk until they die. Madagascar 3 is coming, and a fourth has been hinted at. Kung Fu Panda has a six-part plan, and How To Train Your Dragon is at least a planned trilogy, though Katzenberg has noted that there are eight books.
So here...
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Movie Review
BEST WORST MOVIE
When Michael Stephenson was 11 years old, he starred in a little film called Troll 2, by “acclaimed” Italian director Claudio Fragasso. That film has since become a cult hit, and widely considered one of the worst ever made. Stephenson decided to make this doc to examine the cult following, and picks George Hardy, the man who played his father, as the doc’s...
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Movie Review
BLACK SWAN
And now, though recognizing there are quite a few fine films coming in the next few weeks, we have my favorite film of the year. And the complete opposite of my previous fave film, The Kids Are All Right. On the surface, Aronofsky’s story of a prima-ballerina struggling with the duality of her role in Swan Lake is an extreme metaphor about how art and desire can infect you,...
Inception, The App
Dude, go to iTunes and download the free Inception app. Then start it up, put on your headphones, and trip balls with the augmented sound experience.
More info here.
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Best Picture summation
And so here we are. Begun on September 23rd, finished today, I have now seen every single Best Picture winner except for two: 1928’s Wings and 1933’s Cavalcade, which are currently unavailable on DVD. It’s been a nice little adventure, I’ve learned a lot about Hollywood’s history. I’d like to point out one particular website that helped me put each...
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Movie Review
THE LAST EMPEROR
Bernardo Bertolucci’s epic film, about Puyi, the last young emperor of Imperial China at the start of the 20th century, won 1987’s Best Picture Oscar. The entire film is grand in scale: the first to be allowed to shoot inside The Forbidden City, it’s beautiful to look at. The art direction, costumes and photography are amazing. The whole thing has a...
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Best Picture update
1986’s Best Picture winner was Oliver Stone’s violent and haunting Platoon. This kicked my ass when I saw it (granted I was only about 10 years old).
1987’s Best Picture winner is next, and then we’ve made it. I will have seen every single Best Picture winner (save for two, not yet available on DVD or streaming).
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Movie Review
OUT OF AFRICA
1985’s Best Picture winner starts out slow, and then dies over the course of its nearly 3-hour running time. Directed by Sydney Pollack, it tells the (true-ish) story of a Dutch woman who marries a Brit and moves to a coffee farm in Africa. She meets a dashing man who honors the land, falls for him instead of her philandering husband, and off we go. Streep is fantastic...
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Best Picture update
Almost done! 1983’s Best Picture winner was James L Brooks’ Terms of Endearment. It’s okay, I guess. Not my favorite Brooks by far.
1984’s winner was Amadeus. I. Love. That. Movie. So. Much. Really love it.
1985 is next.
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Movie Review
I LOVE YOU PHILIP MORRIS
I was befuddled by this film. It doesn’t entirely seem like it knows what it wants to be. The first act concentrates solely on Steven Russell (Jim Carrey, doing his thing but quite well) and his search for love. Man love. The first act plays almost like a Farrelly Brothers over-the-top satire about a gay man finding love in prison. But then the second act,...
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Movie Review
ORDINARY PEOPLE
I was surprised by the 1980 Best Picture winner. The directorial debut of Robert Redford (and feature debut of Timothy Hutton. Both won Oscars for their work), it deals with an upper-class family in suburban Chicago. Watching it today, it’s definitely subject matter that’s all over the place these days, in film and television. A well-off couple. A lost child. ...
DVD Tuesday
INCEPTION - BWAAAAAAM! Inception is out! BWAAAAAM! On Blu-Ray and DVD! BWAAAAAAM! I’m all over it!
RESTREPO - Haunting doc about the war in Afghanistan. A must-see.
SALT - Just a ‘bleh’ thriller, trying to constantly trick the audience in the worst kind of way.
SHREK FOREVER AFTER - Haven’t seen it yet, but I am glad to see “The Final Chapter”...
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Movie Review
GANDHI
There’s one main reason this movie is as good as it is: Ben Kingsley. He’s absolutely perfect as Mohandas Gandhi, a complete transformation into the man. His humility, his humor, his quiet, all of it is on-screen with such effortless depth, of course he won the Oscar. The other big success behind 1982’s Best Picture winner is the steady direction of Richard...
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Movie Review
CHARIOTS OF FIRE
There is a character in episodes of Family Guy, an old British gentleman in tux, top hat and monocle, named Buzz Killington. He kills the buzz in the room by saying things such as, “Now, who here loves a good story about a bridge?” This is his movie. “Who would like to see a proper English drama about running?” Really? Running? Proper young Brits...
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Best Picture update
1979’s Best Picture winner was Kramer vs Kramer. It’s pretty good, plays like theatre quite a bit, with great performances by Hoffman and Streep (natch).
My next viewing should be 1980’s winner, Ordinary People, but for some reason there’s a “Long Wait” on Netflix, so we’ll move on until it arrives in the mail.
1981!