A few films recently watched.

almost famous - 8/10

saw this year ago and loved it. been wanting (and not wanting) to watch it again. saw it last night and it hadn't become awful like some films i liked years ago. it dulled a little. one thing that taints it a little for me is the fact that its based on cameron crowes own experiences but not factually. he spiced it up and moved things/people around. i find that distasteful. either its a great real life story or its made up. this is confusing to me. it just feels a bit wrong to mess with what actually happened. i mean we're old/smart enough to see it as it really happened. can we not keep track of 30+ smaller characters? why does everything have to be so neat? why does it have to be one trip, one band. i can see why he did it but it taints the memory and the movie for me. you guys probably hate it anyway. feeeeverdddddoog scratching down my backdoooor.

Glue.

6/10. An arty foreign film about some teenage sorta bisexual kid. Was okay.

Seeing Moon soon, pretty excited as I've heard only good things about it. Glad to hear Clint Mansell is doing the soundtrack, that guys great.

PWEI

I Love You, Man

8/10

  On 7/23/2009 at 7:25 PM, Mr Salads said:

  On 7/23/2009 at 7:24 AM, Al Hounos said:

spring, summer, fall, winter, and spring

 

beautiful Korean movie about a couple of buddhist monks. highly recommended.

 

actually its vietnamese

not the one i saw

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0374546/

So I finally finished "Let the right one in". It was a weird experience as I bought a rip of the original film in Swedish with English subtitles from a street vendor but it turned out to be corrupted halfway through; it took me several months to find another copy, but it was the dubbed in English version with no Swedish language option. So I had to watch more than half the film listening to these horrible voice actors, which I'm sure made me feel less generously towards the film.

That said, I think the film started out promising but went downhill. It seemed to get more and more disjointed and unsure of itself as it went along. The subplot with the woman who gets turned into a vampire - wtf, her boyfriend sees her get attacked from above by a small child, knocks the child off, but doesn't pursue her? And no-one notices the two puncture marks on her neck? The cgi cat-attack sequence was also embarrassing. The sequence where the guy sneaks into the vampire's flat to murder her made no sense. And the bully subplot seemed really forced as well. Overall a weak film with some nice production values and strong acting. Sad thing was I could see how they could have made it a better film with just some small tweaks. 7/10.

I fell asleep watching that movie...

yeah that was a boring piece of shit

been working my way through this 8-movie almodóvar box set.

the Heat bank robbery scene

10/10

  On 7/26/2009 at 4:06 AM, zaphod said:

the happening 1/10

 

holy mother of fuck

my sentiments exactly, and i actually like most of his films except for this one and the Village. i would rate this one his worst by far

he claimed he wanted to make a movie in the vein of Invasion of the body snatchers (original) or Andromeda Strain He utterly failed in trying to capture what he set out to do

i liked let the right one in. i didnt see why everyone shit their pants over it (oh yeah, cause it's foreign, nvm) but it certainly wasn't bad and the end was cool. and at least it fuckin stuck to vampire mythology which is more than i can say for a lot of recent vampire movies where they do whatever the fuck they want and still try to call em vampires.

I really liked the (female? male?) actor that played the vampire, she/he/it did a great job. I was less convinced by her effeminate aryan sidekick. I think they just didn't know what they were doing. If I were the director, I would decide the point of the movie was *to show how the unusual relationship between a vampire and his sidekick/protege/familiar develops.* I found this the most intriguing dynamic in the film, between the vampire and the older guy who is supposed to harvest his/her victims. When that guy died the film went downhill imo. So I assumed the whole idea was to explore the psychology of the kid who would become his/her next protege/familiar. That would have made a superb film in my opinion. However in the end of the film it's unclear if the aryan kid is now filling the role the older guy did, or if he's just her boyfriend. Since he was submissive the entire film (except for smacking the bully in the ear), it's not clear he has what it takes to bring the vampire fresh meat. In fact one of the film's major faults was that it was unclear why the vampire even needed the bumbling older guy in the first place, as she/he seemed fully capable of harvesting victims him/herself. It should have been made more clear that when the vampire has gone too long without fresh blood, she/he really *needs* someone else to harvest victims. The vampire's affection for her longtime helper should also have been made more evident.

Imagine if the film went this way instead. They drop the entire bully subplot, but instead make the aryan kid the victim of an abusive father. Or perhaps he just witnesses his father abusing his mother. The audience is made to side with the kid against his dad. Then at the climax, with the vampire's guidance the kid finally stands up for himself, by killing the father. In the last scene they make it more clear that the kid has taken the place of the older guy who used to be the vampire's helper, so the audience is left uneasy: they side with the kid, and yet they realize he is now the thrall of a vampire. I dunno, at least I thought that was the point they were moving towards, but it just wasn't clear enough.

L'année dernière à Marienbad (1961)

Loved it.

  On 7/26/2009 at 5:51 AM, Al Hounos said:

  On 7/23/2009 at 7:25 PM, Mr Salads said:

  On 7/23/2009 at 7:24 AM, Al Hounos said:

spring, summer, fall, winter, and spring

 

beautiful Korean movie about a couple of buddhist monks. highly recommended.

 

actually its vietnamese

not the one i saw

 

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0374546/

that was just a little inside joke

  On 7/26/2009 at 4:47 PM, lumpenprol said:

I really liked the (female? male?) actor that played the vampire, she/he/it did a great job. I was less convinced by her effeminate aryan sidekick. I think they just didn't know what they were doing. If I were the director, I would decide the point of the movie was *to show how the unusual relationship between a vampire and his sidekick/protege/familiar develops.* I found this the most intriguing dynamic in the film, between the vampire and the older guy who is supposed to harvest his/her victims. When that guy died the film went downhill imo. So I assumed the whole idea was to explore the psychology of the kid who would become his/her next protege/familiar. That would have made a superb film in my opinion. However in the end of the film it's unclear if the aryan kid is now filling the role the older guy did, or if he's just her boyfriend. Since he was submissive the entire film (except for smacking the bully in the ear), it's not clear he has what it takes to bring the vampire fresh meat. In fact one of the film's major faults was that it was unclear why the vampire even needed the bumbling older guy in the first place, as she/he seemed fully capable of harvesting victims him/herself. It should have been made more clear that when the vampire has gone too long without fresh blood, she/he really *needs* someone else to harvest victims. The vampire's affection for her longtime helper should also have been made more evident.

 

Imagine if the film went this way instead. They drop the entire bully subplot, but instead make the aryan kid the victim of an abusive father. Or perhaps he just witnesses his father abusing his mother. The audience is made to side with the kid against his dad. Then at the climax, with the vampire's guidance the kid finally stands up for himself, by killing the father. In the last scene they make it more clear that the kid has taken the place of the older guy who used to be the vampire's helper, so the audience is left uneasy: they side with the kid, and yet they realize he is now the thrall of a vampire. I dunno, at least I thought that was the point they were moving towards, but it just wasn't clear enough.

Let the right one in - 9/10

I didnt want this film to go in any different plot directions. It was creepy, and it had a cool post-communist bloc feeling to it. The snow looked great at night.

If you thought this was boring, your mother's a cunt.

Body of Lies - Well, I'm a sucker, admittedly, for the whole espionage / intelligence / counterintelligence type of film, especially when it concerns the middle east. I also love Ridley Scott, so I enjoyed this movie a lot.

I also think William Monahan is a very good writer.

The International - I was always a bit reluctant to overly praise Run, Lola, Run and not just because I thought it was a gimmicky and rather "technical" film. I saw Princess and the Warrior and thought it was almost immediately forgettable. Tom Tykwer's most recent effort, The International, is one of the biggest piles of shit I've ever seen.

run lola run gets me pumping my techno fist in the air

avoided the international. clive owen is jason statham without/with the fun/hair.

  On 7/26/2009 at 7:31 PM, The Overlook said:

The International - I was always a bit reluctant to overly praise Run, Lola, Run and not just because I thought it was a gimmicky and rather "technical" film. I saw Princess and the Warrior and thought it was almost immediately forgettable. Tom Tykwer's most recent effort, The International, is one of the biggest piles of shit I've ever seen.

Did you see Perfume?

  On 7/26/2009 at 7:28 PM, The Overlook said:

Body of Lies - Well, I'm a sucker, admittedly, for the whole espionage / intelligence / counterintelligence type of film, especially when it concerns the middle east. I also love Ridley Scott, so I enjoyed this movie a lot.

 

I also think William Monahan is a very good writer.

you know whats better than that? body of evidence. man madonna was fuckin hot in that movie.

(500) Days of Summer - Kind of meh, occasionally cute in a non cloying way. 7.5 knocked down to 7 for having parentheses at the beginning of the title. Parentheses at the end of the title would've gained points (eg. 500 Days of Sunn O))))

Scratch - short doc about turntablism & hip hop. Decent but nothing special. Seeing the mounds of records DJ Shadow claws through was pretty intense. 7/10

  On 7/27/2009 at 12:16 AM, Overand said:

(500) Days of Summer - Kind of meh, occasionally cute in a non cloying way. 7.5 knocked down to 7 for having parentheses at the beginning of the title. Parentheses at the end of the title would've gained points (eg. 500 Days of Sunn O))))

I like the way you think.

  On 7/26/2009 at 10:50 PM, takeshi said:

  On 7/26/2009 at 7:31 PM, The Overlook said:

The International - I was always a bit reluctant to overly praise Run, Lola, Run and not just because I thought it was a gimmicky and rather "technical" film. I saw Princess and the Warrior and thought it was almost immediately forgettable. Tom Tykwer's most recent effort, The International, is one of the biggest piles of shit I've ever seen.

 

Did you see Perfume?

I haven't seen that, but I've meant to...have you seen it? Thoughts?

  On 7/27/2009 at 12:25 AM, The Overlook said:

  On 7/26/2009 at 10:50 PM, takeshi said:

  On 7/26/2009 at 7:31 PM, The Overlook said:

The International - I was always a bit reluctant to overly praise Run, Lola, Run and not just because I thought it was a gimmicky and rather "technical" film. I saw Princess and the Warrior and thought it was almost immediately forgettable. Tom Tykwer's most recent effort, The International, is one of the biggest piles of shit I've ever seen.

 

Did you see Perfume?

 

I haven't seen that, but I've meant to...have you seen it? Thoughts?

It's been a few years since I saw it but I remember liking it. It's basically a fairytale with a serial killer as the main character. I think it could have lost a few of the plot points, as some of them were kind of repetitious. It's a beautiful film to look at, though, and worth recommending just for the cinematography. The ending of the film definitely took me by surprise (I haven't read the book it's based on), but in a good way.