In The Mood For Love

Saw In The Mood For Love. Such longing and melancholy. Two neighbors discover their spouses are both cheating on them and struggle not to also cheat despite falling in love. It's shocking that there isn't a script. It's like jazz.

The Burbs

Saw The Burbs. I was very disappointed by the ending which changed the message of the film from "accept those who are different" to "those who are different are probably trying to kill you." Boo.

Sphere

Saw Sphere. A nice taut psycho-drama with sci-fi/action elements. A lot of my good-will toward the movie comes from my having read the book. The ending would probably infuriate me if I hadn't. The book does a better job of justifying and contextualizing the ending.

Sherlock Jr

Saw Sherlock Jr. I think I love Buster Keaton.

The Towering Inferno

Saw The Towering Inferno. It was a disaster movie where a skyscraper burns up. I don't know why they don't make disaster movies like this and The Poseidon Adventure anymore. They're pretty corny, but so are a lot of movies and these make perfectly ripping tales. In this one, firemen are the saintly saviors of everyone. The amount of fireman worship is cray.

Ordinary People

Saw Ordinary People. An obligatorily ironic title because of course the film is about people who are rich and troubled. Usually I'm annoyed by such movies because they often revolve around who to marry or how to save face or other such "problems" but this one I liked. It earned its sentiment and was genuinely sad and troubling. The characters (particularly the dad) did pretty much what I would have done which saved me some mental shouting at the screen. There was only one character who behaved inhumanly but that was a major plot-point. Always a plus in a drama.

Also, main character on swim-team = dripping guys in speedos. Awesome. I don't know why America has seized upon football as the go-to high school sport when this is clearly preferable.

Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter ... and Spring

Saw Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter ... and Spring. It was a very Buddhist movie, all to do with cycles and repeated or transmuted sins. I think my enjoyment of the film is hindered a bit by lack of knowledge about animal symbolism in Korean culture (snake/fish/frog/cat/dog/turtle are all important.) It was beautiful and lyrical. There is a sequence where the protagonist is climbing a mountain that was solid gold. I really liked it. Death is used sometimes to heighten the drama in what I think is an unearned way, but such is the way in Asian movies.

The 13th Warrior

Saw The 13th Warrior. I generally don't like war films, but this was alright. I liked that death was treated semi-seriously (tho not realistically of course, and there were (as ever) hundreds of minions carelessly mowed down.) I kept wondering how Antonio Banderas stayed so clean-shaven. It suffered from the same overwrought sad trumpets and stupid manhood-proving sequences that all war movies have but then, what can you expect? Silliness aside, it was entertaining.

Man With a Movie Camera

Saw Man With a Movie Camera. Such a fun film! All the camera tricks possible in the 30s are on display, all the tricks are used to dazzle and amuse. It's like the opening credits of Amelie, but an hour long. Really dug it.

All Dogs Go to Heaven

Saw All Dogs Go to Heaven. It felt very over-stuffed to me, not in an entirely bad way. It may be that all children's movies are like this and I'm only just now noticing. There's a lot of little flourishes to catch in repeat viewings but the effect is a little busy and overwhelming the first time 'round. This includes the plot which really zips along, leaving threads dangling and picked up again sort of arbitrarily (or at least unpredictably.) The little girl was very well animated (weirdly it seemed like a lot of attention was given to getting her tights just right) the only prominent adults less so (the woman especially creeped me out). I was happy that the dogs very rarely looked like humans in suits and were generally animated in a rolly-polly silly-dog sort of way. The movie was too cute for any of the threats in the film to be taken very seriously though. The sad scenes were way more effective than the scary ones. Perhaps my adult shell of cynicism is just too thick for me to unreservedly enjoy this one, but it was alright.

The Life of Emile Zola

Saw The Life of Emile Zola. A stirring movie about a muckraking philosopher/journalist. It had a lot of kind words to say about him but I was left slightly cold. Perhaps it's because the editorializing that Zola used to great effect has become so wide-spread that people seem to want a more staid approach to reporting these days. Of course what people actually want is scandal and spectacle, but I think you follow me. The mob is treated curiously in this movie as well. They seem to be utterly swayed by pamphlets and single (paid) agitators and yet they are frequently venerated by Zola as arbiters of fate. Is this a sly dig at Zola's life-work? Probably I'm just seeing things that aren't there. For a while just now, I was convinced I saw a french author inside my television screen!

L'Enfant

saw the majority of L'Enfant. (My version was quite corrupt.) It was touching and sad. It used close-ups a lot which I found annoying. I much prefer long-shots, to isolate and frame, but I guess these work too. I sort of got immediately that L'enfant was L'main character, Bruno, and not actually the baby. He is too innocent of others' emotions to be truly cruel and too impulsive to make it as anything but a career criminal. It is easy and silly to make martyrs out of criminals, but this film doesn't try to do that. Bruno is shown to be deeply flawed and there are times you hate him, but after all he's just a foolish boy grown big. I just wish I could see the scenes I missed.

Taken

Saw Taken. It was a nice taught thriller. A little school-marmish (I'm pretty sure France is safe to travel) but this meshes well with the school-marmish main character who has seen some shit (not recommended) and is become paranoid. Also, there was silly action-movie physics (bones are about as tough to snap as bread sticks. Except for the last Big Boss. He's super tough) and cartoonish super-villains but hey, it's an action film. It aims to please and I was pretty much pleased.

Hiroshima Mon Amour

Saw Hiroshima Mon Amour. It was interesting, but I think it was at the very limit of my current cinematic grasp. I got the love=war theme, and the ending gives away a huge chunk of what's on the movie's mind. I think my lack of history may be hindering me here.

Suspiria

Saw Suspiria. I really liked it. It was very imaginative and anarchic. Very colorful, which is very strange for a horror. I can see how this inspired a lot of other gaudy, red-paint-for-blood films. It's the sort of movie that inspires horror fandom.

Leaving Las Vegas

Saw Leaving Las Vegas. A gloriously absent film. Until the end, the relationship between the drunk and the whore didn't really make sense to me. The soundtrack is awesome. Melancholy and pretty to look at, like neon in the rain.

4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days

finally saw 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days. It was a fairly chilly film about the gulf between a woman and nearly everything else in her life. The catalyst for this is an abortion her friend needs. By this mean, she is separated and alienated from her boyfriend, society, and at last, even her friend. In a shallow way, I found the friend very annoying. She seems unreliable and arbitrary (though of course, through half the film she's just had an abortion, so in another way I can't judge.) The film itself is a big fan of long takes that simultaneously force empathy for the character and isolate the character. A very grimy film. There's only one or two really difficult scenes. Mostly things are just grim and sort of shitty.

The Devil's Backbone

Saw The Devil's Backbone. Not as scary as I'd thought, more eerie. A horror of the 'sad ghosts' variety. Like the only other del Toro movie I've seen (Pan's Labyrinth) this one used fantastical elements to tell a more realistic story. This one I could not parse. I saw almost every image in the film duplicated (the hunters bringing down a mammoth with spears, two pairs of drownings, the opening lines are also the closing lines, a bombing seen from both the bomber and bomb-ee) and thematic duplications as well, with the little war in the school beginning just before the larger Spanish Civil War itself intrudes on the school (another parallel: the dead innocent and the dead bomb seem equally powerful.) There is an interesting bunch of parallels and duplications, but I can't see what the point of it is. It's neat, and that can be a justification in itself, but I felt like there was something I'm missing.

I also think I might have seen this one before? I hate this feeling.

The Battle of Algiers

Saw The Battle of Algiers. It was a shot in a pseudo-documentary style. The filmmaker had obviously gone to lengths to make sure the content matched reality, so it seems hard to comment on the film without becoming (or already being) a bit of a historian. Of course though the film is historical fiction it is still fiction and thus has its own little moments of audience-manipulation and plot development. The story is quite bare however, mostly declaring via voice-over that thus-and-such happened. It didn't obviously take sides, so I liked it.

Come and See

Saw Come and See. It was a very tough movie. I think I'm gonna go lie down on the floor now.

In the Heat of the Night

Saw In the Heat of the Night. It was a pleasant police procedural that spiced things up with race issues. I thought Mr. Tibbs was a little magical (the scene when he's determining the handed-ness of a suspect especially) but he was incorrect in a big way at another point and so was redeemed from mere perfection. I could see this made into a show.

Silent Hill 3D

Saw Silent Hill 3D. It was okay, but not very imaginative. Clowns and dolls? Yes, yes. Also had a villain who knew she was a villain and a thing that jumped OUT OF THE SCREEN at you!!(3D)!!

Audition

Saw Audition. It was pretty harrowing. I handled this Takashi Miike film much better than the last I saw (Ichi the Killer, which I saw not having any idea what I was in for) but it was still pretty harrowing. Enough had been spoiler-ed for me so I knew most of the big scenes already (kiri-kiri-kiri-kiri!) but I hadn't been told of the psycho-drama beforehand which I got a kick out of. I wish we'd seen more of the girl. Her back story was covered in a very hand-waving way I felt. I'm perhaps morbidly interested in more of her.

The Departed

So I apparently already have seen The Departed in theaters. I didn't remember because I had no record of it. Such are the dangers of keeping your memory in a spreadsheet. It was much more comprehensible this time 'round. Cute rat at the end, Martin :|

Barry Lyndon

Saw Barry Lyndon. It portrayed the rise and fall of a man in Gregorian England. I found the main character to be kind of an anti-hero in that I hated him as he rose and loved him as he fell. The film is shot beautifully. Some scenes could be mistaken for oil paintings. The whole thing is very slow and deliberate, but hey, it's Kubrick. What do you expect?

Police Story

Saw Police Story. It was a lot of fun. Very simplistic story that anyway only exists to provide kick-ass fight scenes and explosions. I like Jackie Chan's playful stunts. There's a scene with telephones that's positively Chaplinesque. The ending betrays the moral foundations of the main character in a big way. I don't think it was purposeful, just lazy philosophy.

Sinister

Saw Sinister from under a protective cloak of alcohol. It was okay and I had been told (and enjoyed spotting) the references to The Shining. A lot of annoying jumps, but the movie had the courtesy to loudly telegraph when the jump was about to happen. There is an interesting attempt at meta-horror (ala The Ring) which feels a little tacked on and silly and anyway only leads to one last jump. One early scene with a boy in a box I really dug (you can pretty much see it in the trailer.) All else: it was a movie.

How Green Was My Valley

Saw How Green Was My Valley. It was an epic of the Thorton Wilder type (a family's adventures through the ages.) It was very episodic, almost a series of anecdotes. The whole affair was extremely sentimental. It had enough going on inside of it to support and sort of earn the sentiment, but it still annoyed me. The lead in particular was sometimes just too precious. It dealt with class warfare, society vs the individual, family, etc etc. There was a vignette about a lot of things. There was a neat Metropolis-esque sequence where miners march into the whirring elevator of the coal mine, swallowed whole.

Crimson Gold

Saw Crimson Gold. It had the deliberate, removed camerawork of a modern arty film. It was about a man being constantly faced with the perpetual, low-level humiliation of poverty. There is nothing overtly sad in this film, but by under-selling the grimness of the story, it hits all the harder. It culminates in a botched jewelry store robbery which is shown at the beginning of the film in a move to heighten the feeling of sad inevitability. A good movie, but kind of a lite bummer.

Ladyhawke

Saw Ladyhawke. It was alright as long as you played along with it. The ending was fairly goofy, but I loved the transformation sequence in the snow. Another of those weird epic, slightly magical, medieval films.

Aguirre: The Wrath of God

Saw Aguirre: The Wrath of God. It was very interesting. Its gaze is so detached as to be almost anthropological, yet of course it is a fiction. There are jabs at the arrogance of the Spaniards, what with the sedan chair being hauled along for miles and the horse on the raft. There's also grim looks at power and ambition driving us to ruin such as the crowning of one character as the 'king of Eldorado', and the titular monologue (which is awesome.) I found the jungle to be the most interesting. It is never shown to be particularly hostile or threatening. It is just lush and indifferent.

A Patch of Blue

Saw A Patch of Blue. It was fairly touching, but I could see where it was going a mile off. The central romance was oddly unromantic which I found interesting and novel. Could it be that a man is altruistically interested in the well-being of a woman? But they ultimately succumbed to romance. Romance in drama is like the force of gravity: unrelenting and inevitable.

Get Out Your Handkerchiefs

Saw Get Out Your Handkerchiefs. Not an old movie as I'd suspected, but a relatively modern french comedy. It reminded me of Wes Anderson's stuff, with childish adults and adult-acting children. I think it was a sort of art-y comedy. Aggravating in parts.

Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life is Calling

Saw Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life is Calling. It seemed amateurish at times but heartfelt. I have no idea why this is on my lists though.

Into the Wild

Saw Into the Wild. A good movie. It indulges in some slightly high-school-ish philosophical excesses (for example, the more precisely/inscrutably something is said, the more true it becomes) but these are forgivable foibles, given when it was made. It anyway undercuts all of its philosophizing with ultimate doses of harsh reality. It is a hard thing the main character is attempting. He appeared slightly mad to me (and characters in the film) for even attempting it. I think he's correct when he says happiness is not derived solely from human interaction, but just as money (which he also eschews) cannot either buy happiness, both surely help.

L'Age D'Or

Saw L'Age D'Or. A surrealist film, so I didn't try to analyze it much. If the director is being willfully obscure, I say let him but don't expect me to play that game with him. I am a lazy man at heart.

Dear Zachary

Saw Dear Zachary. It was very heart-wrenching. Like, really heart-wrenching. The movie relies a lot on collages of footage which is sometimes perfect (when Andrew's friends are remembering him and all repeating the same kind words) and sometimes kind of tasteless (when the autopsy reports are being reviewed.) This is an annoying thing a lot of sad documentaries do. They decide something's not sad enough and try to goose the sorrow by tarting it up with fast cuts and music. This shows a lack of faith in the viewer and makes me wonder just how commercial the film-maker wants his friend's death to be. I assume he meant well, he just isn't a pro and this is a personal project. My god it's hard to watch though, and sometimes really does capture that feeling of floor-falling-away-from-beneath-you, shocking misfortune.

Around the World in 80 Days

Saw Around the World in 80 Days (1956 version) It was very british. Lots of mustaches and tea. They met cute natives and got into cute trouble. It was sort of like around the it's a small world ride in 80 days. That said, it was slick and pleasing, so I have no real complaint. Hell of a lot of random cameos.

Querelle

Saw Querelle. It was very gay. Simultaneously very confusing and tawdry. A strange movie.

Predator

Saw Predator. A breathtaking work of subtlety and genius. The glasses-guy's sexist jokes subtly enforcing the sexism endemic in the military, underscored by the woman's feigned helplessness and eventual competence. But even she falls before the Predator who, as is revealed by his eerily human laugh, is only the worst of us. Note the mushroom cloud immediately following his laugh. Arnold must swallow his machismo and slather himself with literal dirt before he can triumph. The film reveals itself to be a critique of this gung-ho militarism in the moment when Arnold calls for quiet, only for wheezing horns to slyly start up on the soundtrack, as if to ask "am I quiet enough for you now?" The Predator's technological superiority symbolizes a military gone gadget-mad. Black-dude-who-isn't-Carl-Weathers is shown to be a self-hating black guy who literally tries to shave his skin-color away. Notice how he hates actually-Carl-Weathers-guy immediately, irrationally. His only idea of 'going to have some fun' is to wander into self-destruction with the Predator. See how he looks around himself after his soliloquy to Jesse 'Mr Boddy' Ventura to see who was listening in on him. Native-dude was listening. About native-dude: whereas everyone else has painted their faces in cammo, he has opted for little curls under his eyes, giving the impression of a Jacky-Onassis-style hairdo. Notice also how he removes his shirt and welcomes the Predator, as opposed to Arnold, who shrinks in fear as the Predator disrobes. There's so much more to unpack. I think I need more time to think about what I experienced.

Gran Torino

Saw Gran Torino. It was quite touching. There was a heavy theme of 'masculinity' in the film, which I usually find patronizing or vaguely threatening, but this time it was explored with an emphasis on how masculinity nurtures, gruffly and secretly. This is much better than the masculinity demonstrated by lesser movies, which is only defined by the things it's not (things which I either have no problem with or am.) I was frankly shocked that his dog survived. Good movie.

Sansho the Bailiff

Saw Sansho the Bailiff. It was terribly sad. It reminded me a lot of a Charles Dickens novel. The suffering of the protagonist is protracted, unlikely means deliver him to salvation, punishment of the guilty is swift and terrible. The moral of the story is repeated until you can't miss it. It's a good message (it is essentially 'be kind') and simple enough to forget, but I think I've had enough of emotionally harrowing Japanese movies from the 50s.

Dawn of the Dead (1978)

Saw the original Dawn of the Dead. Whole lotta references make sense now. It was very good, very thrilling and with a certain sense humor that straddles the line between slapstick and morbid very well. It is unfortunately up to one guy to screw everything up all the time (why can't you even take your key-ring off without it turning into a fiasco, you moron pilot?) I'd heard the movie was a sort-of-satire of consumer culture, but it didn't seem particularly biting to me. Perhaps I'm just used to more dour condemnations.

Yankee Doodle Dandy

Saw Yaaaankeee Doooodle Dandeeeee. I'm now filled with an overwhelming urge to buy war bonds.

Ace in the Hole

Saw Ace in the Hole. I wanted to see it because it was directed by the same guy who directed Sunset Blvd, Billy Wilder. Boy, did it deliver. Like Sunset Blvd, the protagonist is a guy naturally drawn to exploitation. He's a down-on-his-luck reporter who's found a great story: a man trapped in a cave-in. As he exploits the story he starts off paying lip-service to his job ("I don't make things happen, I just report 'em") but eventually even this sham is abandoned as he lets his own lust for notoriety and showboating get the better of him. Wilder lets the stakes and tension mount and mount until the feverish, hysterical end. Some of the symbolism was a bit heavy (His old editor is good, often shot with crosses. His new friends are evil, have pet rattlesnakes (which I think they kill)) but he has some great "terrible" scenes, like when the miner comes into the protagonist's office, proclaiming doom. Great stuff.

Tombstone

Saw Tombstone. It was a western.

Playtime

Finally saw Playtime. It starts out mining comedy from mass production. A travel agent's office has posters showing off identical skyscrapers in different locals. In one scene, four identical men get into four identical cars in synchrony. The main character looks so identical to every other person that no one can tell who he is. This all climaxes in a restaurant scene which is funny I guess but goes on a bit long (I also don't find rich, eccentric/drunk Americans to be very funny. It's a comedic archetype from a different time I suppose. It's funny how comedy can separate us from the past sometimes.) I liked the beginning, but I liked the ending of the film best of all. The film makes this identical, mass-produced Paris into a carnival. A roundabout becomes a merry-go-round, a cherry-picker becomes a giraffe, car-lifts become rides. It's very sweet and ends on a merry note which, judging from the "oh, this hectic modern life" tone of the beginning, I didn't expect. Ending in this way, the film seems to be saying "Life is crazy! Enjoy the ride!" And I think that's great.

Ali: Fear Eats the Soul

Saw Ali: Fear Eats the Soul. It's about an old woman who falls in love with a young Moroccan man. It was terribly sweet and touching. The ending was especially good. Happy but not pat, only life bumbling on in its messy way. The reaction of her neighbors after she takes a trip halfway through the film confused me (of course the trip may have been years long?) I liked how she wasn't conventionally attractive, but kind of old and genuinely dowdy. A very sweet film.

A Place in the Sun

Saw A Place in the Sun. Such a feeling of desperation. It was complex and interesting but had a constant feeling of crushing, squeezing. It turned strangely moralistic near the end, but nicely showed and didn't tell the resolution of the film. Haunting.

Close Encounters of the Third Kind

Saw Close Encounters of the Third Kind. It was very well put together. I was annoyed that they actually showed the aliens, but I guess it had to be done. Someday I'll see an alien movie with the guts to not show something in a rubber suit. I really liked the nervy maybe-mental-problems in the beginning.

Night Watch

Saw Night Watch. It was a lot of fun. It got kind of bogged down in slow-motion and flashbacks near the end and there are a lot of loose ends of course. I kind of feel like I'm cheating the movie by not immediately watching the sequels. Apparently it was originally intended to be a four-part miniseries for TV. I think it would have been better in that format. There's a neat world here to be explored, but we're breathlessly rushing about it in one cataclysm after another. The opening scene with its Matrix-like suggestion of mysteries hiding just beneath the surface was my favorite part of the film. I was annoyed at the endless camera-tricks on display, but I do have a great weakness for strange visuals and in that this movie successfully delivered. All in all, not as good as I was hoping, but not bad either.

Voyage to Italy

Saw Voyage to Italy. It was about a husband and wife trying to salvage their failing marriage. The script/acting were very good, with both characters trying to score points and divine the other's feelings without tipping their own hand. I was disappointed that we didn't get to know the husband as well as the wife. He was supposed to be cold and distant, but it would satisfy me more if I'd seen something to love in him.

Rich tension is mined in the contrast between their petty but potentially life-changing squabbles vs the ancient and unchanging ruins of Italy. There is an excellent scene where they watch the bodies of a man and woman being excavated from Pompeii. "A man and a wife, perhaps" says the archeologist. Really good stuff. Very melancholy stuff though. I don't think I was in the right mood for it, but it was quite good.

Tromeo & Juliet

Saw Tromeo & Juliet. That movie was bullshit. It got tedious near the end, but I dug the ridiculousness of it all. I liked how it kept (trying to) top itself in every scene. Dirty and cheap-looking, but well-meaning.

The Jazz Singer

Saw The Jazz Singer. I was thinkin' it was goofy old-timey fun (oh mammie!) and then BAM! Blackface. Well, I guess it was pretty tame fun, just much more suddenly edgy than I thought it would be.

The Killing Room

Saw The Killing Room. It's about four people locked in a room, tortured, etc. by the government (no wait, this project exists "outside the government" (?)) The magic words "post-911" are said as is the phrase "MK-ultra" and we're then expected to swallow the absurdities of the next hour or so without complaint. Perhaps I'm being too sensitive, but this premise fills me with more dismay and discomfort than the rest of the movie. Just the idea that this is now a plausible thing. Ugh. I was also annoyed by the loud bangs following barely audible dialogue (which was mumbled. Seriously, this was a big problem. I had to keep rewinding it.) Nice "scares," guys. An uncomfortable watch for me, but I think not in the way it was intended to be.

Kingdom of Heaven

Saw Kingdom of Heaven. It was very overblown and showy, but all epics are like that. Near the end, perhaps only because I was feeling tired of it, I began noticing some spoon-fed symbolism and some distracting set-pieces (a climactic sword fight takes place in an alley where brightly colored bolts of cloth have been hung for no reason. Also, a bowl of yellow has been left out solely for one of the characters to throw into the air.) But the subject of the movie was more than just political maneuvering (though there was a lot of that) and had more to do with religious tolerance vs organized religion vs power-&-money-tee-tum-tee-tum. This is shockingly unusual for an epic and I like to be shocked, so I liked this. Also, it gets bonus points for having one character always wearing a mask. I love masked characters.

My Darling Clementine

Saw My Darling Clementine. I didn't like it that much. It had a lot of prototypical western-genre stuff (a shootout at the OK Corral, for example) which was interesting but not very gripping. The story was complex and interesting and the characters were not too terribly thin but I just couldn't get into it.

Dark Knight Rises

Saw Dark Knight Rises. It was very loud fun. I'd read a theory somewhere that the trilogy is aaaallll about the war on terror. I can see the connections, what with bombs and some quotes ("we don't negotiate with terrorists!") but apart from maybe-reference-spotting, I can make neither head nor tail of this theory. Well anyway, I liked the movie okay.

The Dark Night of the Scarecrow

Saw The Dark Night of the Scarecrow. It was surprisingly good. It has obviously no budget and is a horror film but despite these flaws, it draws great effect from the isolation of countryside and the claustrophobia of a small town. The characters set their deaths up a bit (one is shown sharpening and using a wood-chipper, one very pointedly grabs his chest and gulps pills.) The ending is especially great. There is a shot of a harvesting machine blindly grinding up pumpkins that perfectly captured this sort of stupid, implacable malice. Much better than you'd expect out of a made-for-TV movie.

Patton

Saw Patton. It was a film mainly about Patton himself - a fascinating character. Tellingly, the Germans seem to understand him best. His greatest source of consternation seems to be his allies. He shows himself to be so addicted to the romantic rigors of war that he's beginning to loose hold of the realities of it. He is riding on the tail end of the era when there was any romance to be had in war. The film was vast and sweeping, yet still personal.

Romancing the Stone

Saw Romancing the Stone. Fluffy and not surprising but not boring either. Suffers a little from the bad habits of the 80s (saxophones can add a touch of class to any scene.) Solid entertainment.

Cinema Paradiso

Saw Cinema Paradiso. It was very sweet and heavily sentimental. The kind of movie that inspires great affection. There was a shot of a lion's head breathing fire near the beginning of the film that blew me away so completely that the rest of the movie felt kind of flat in comparison. Too bad. Also, it sneakily argues against nostalgia and sentimentality while simultaneously hitting those two notes really hard. This would make me love it all the more if I hadn't seen through this ruse. Nice try, Cinema.

An American Werewolf in London

Saw An American Werewolf in London. It was a lot of spooky fun. More goofy than I expected but still a bit creepy. Thankfully, it wasn't as annoying as most horrors are (though the main character somehow has trouble getting himself arrested. Dude, just punch a cop.)

The Piano

Saw The Piano. It was quite good. The ending is really haunting and really nice. I wish the start of the film could have sped up the trite seduction/betrayal plot to get to the nice, weird ending.

Total Recall

Saw Total Recall by Paul Verhoeven. It was pretty good. It fell in line with my obsessions about reality and memories. They even bring the real/not real theme up explicitly within the context of the movie making me smile. It's got all kinds of cleverness and of course a heavy dose of action-movie stupidness as well. It's special effects have aged slightly badly, but are still quite good for the most part. Liked.

Il Pianeta Degli Uomini Spenti

Saw Il Pianeta Degli Uomini Spenti by Antonio Margheriti (AKA, Battle of the Worlds, dubbed) it was a whooole lotta cheese. Full of sci-fi nonsense like "Human feelings are inconsistent. In fact, they're the only inconsistent elements in all nature." I wish I'd seen it with friends as it was (as usual) a high-minded sci-fi thriller marred by its pitiful budget and lacking imagination.

Moonrise Kingdom

Saw Moonrise Kingdom. Every scene was like a little diorama. It was really funny and nice.

Fermat's Room

Saw Fermat's Room. Infuriating movie. Four mathematicians are tortured by being forced to pretend they've never heard various classic puzzles ("A man with one boat! a fox! a chicken! and a bag of grain!") and then solving them in the most roundabout manner possible ("Okay, imagine you're the fox! This table is the boat!") If they don't work fast enough, the room they're inside of shrinks a little. They wisely spend much of the time bickering and losing the little PDA that they put answers into. They round out the movie by destroying the unpublished solution to the Goldbach conjecture. Woo! Take that, number theory!

There were some very striking scenes and nice twists, but I nerd-raged way too hard to enjoy.

Brave

Saw Brave last night. It was very good and funny. I was trolling my friends afterward by discussing the subtle patriarchal-ism of pre-film short.

Enemy Mine

Saw Enemy Mine. A very campy film. Space camp gives way to a different sort of campy-ness (I think the process of becoming friends is essentially un-film-able) and ends well. A Flash Gordon-esque film.

Stagecoach

Saw Stagecoach. Liked it a lot. A straightforward story well done. Good show, John Ford.

Satan's Sadists

Saw Satan's Sadists. Not bad. Forgettable movie, but awesome title.

Frankenstein

Saw the original Frankenstein. It was apparently a fairly modern, restored version. Initially, there was a line about being god that was cut (blasphemy) and a scene where the monster throws a girl into a lake was cut (too grisly.) Sometimes I wonder how people from the 30s would react if you showed them a modern film (say, Transformers) but now I know they'd be terrified and burn it as a witch.

13 (Tzameti)

Saw 13 (Tzameti) Quite harrowing tension. Neat miserable noir.

Dog Soldiers

Saw Dog Soldiers. Big stupid fun. Enough sinister creepiness to over-rule the macho bullshit.

Pickpocket

Saw Pickpocket. Interesting film. Raskolnikov as petty thief. The beauty of a magician preforming their tricks.

Re-Animator

Saw Re-Animator. The bits with the cat were quite creepy. The scenes with the girlfriend doing her best 'scream-queen' were less so. The scene with the girlfriend on an autopsy table were way creepy in a completely different direction.

Mutiny on the Bounty

Watched Mutiny on the Bounty. Very aggravating beginning, satisfying middle, draggy ending. All in all, very good.

Conan the Barbarian

Saw Conan the Barbarian. It was okay so long as Arnold kept his goofy mouth shut. It was going hard for the serious mood of the Lord of the Rings movies, but with Arnold and the special effects of last decade.

The Celluloid Closet

Saw The Celluloid Closet. So sweet and hopeful, yet so condemning and isn't it typical that I'd like it? Ah! It makes my heart ache.

Bringing Up Baby

Saw Bringing Up Baby. Deeply depressing comedy. This sociopath breaks up a guy's marriage because he's too incoherent to defend himself. Tony Curtis suffers and stutters through the whole thing and then declares he loved it at the end. Did you, Tony? What part did you love? I kept thinking what I could have done in his situation. Maybe cry? Would she have left him alone then? How deliciously absurd, right? There were also some neat camera tricks. Ugh. Draining.

Rambo 4

Saw Rambo 4 : very violent silliness. What it lacked in characterization and individual deaths it made up for in bulk of bloodshed. Also apparently the filmmakers felt that audiences would not hate a guy who's overseeing genocide unless he was also a pedophile ¯\(°_°)/¯

American Graffiti

Saw American Graffiti: oddly depressing. But then most nostalgia-trips are.

Window to Paris

Saw Window to Paris. It was nuts. Dream sequences, pied piper-ing, dancing whore-clowns. I thought it would be a simple story of the magic of Paris, but boy was I wrong. I think it's a romance at heart, but a very strange one.

Demolition Man

Saw Demolition Man. It was stupid-interesting. According to a review I read, the dystopian future-society may have been Hollywood in the 90s. Interesting thought, no evidence. Oh well.

The Earrings of Madame De...

Saw The Earrings of Madame De... : rich people be crazy.

Child's Play

Saw Child's Play. Hard to be scared by something that could be stopped by a Rubbermaid tub and a heavy book.

Let the Right One In

Saw Let the Right One In. It was very melancholy. But sweet.

Crank

Saw Crank. So, Crank is amazing.

The Exorcist

The Exorcist may be the perfect horror movie. Demonic possession aside, what more do you need than sudden mysterious sickness?

Braveheart

Saw Braaaaveheeeeeeart I wish they'd left all the gore in and cut all the shots of that gay guy being dumb instead.

A Better Tomorrow

Saw A Better Tomorrow. It did this very neat thing where before each cut, it would slow down or freeze for just a frame or two. It was interesting, but I don't know if it was intentional or an encoding problem. Has anyone else seen this? Confirm/deny?

The Avengers

Saw The Avengers. It was good. I hadn't really liked the other super-hero movies I'd seen, but this one I liked. Also, I have a random dislike for Joss Whedon which this movie cured. Damn, can that man avoid a cliche.

Wild Reeds

Saw Wild Reeds. I have mixed feelings about it. I liked it, but I'm not sure what I liked about it. I'm very confusing.

Mauvais Sang

Mauvais Sang is such a strange and excellent film.

Big Trouble in Little China

Saw Big Trouble in Little China last night. It was HAMAZING!

Nowhere To Hide

Saw Nowhere To Hide. The first half hour is awesome fun. And then the movie goes nowhere. I think it's best enjoyed as a straight-faced parody of cop movies.

The Orphanage

Just saw The Orphanage. Now I want to play a treasure hunt.

Rambo First Blood

Just saw Rambo First Blood and now a lot of other movies and parodies make sense.