Godizza was so bad it was good ;-) 

 

i just saw four marriages and a funeral (?!) again (saw it as a kid in cinema, iirc).

Hm, I'm surprised how much i like it. The marriages are shot in the most entertaining way, I'm kinda wondering what techniques make them so entertaining.

The end is a bit clichee, of course (and very.. ninetyish?), but a great movie if you just want to have some fun. 

The Spanish Prisoner (1997) - another fairly solid drama-thriller by David Mamet that is generally well written but is, as usual, a little too clever for its own good. As the name suggests, the general story is a variation on the well known confidence scam, but Mamet folds the plot back onto itself multiple times and, importantly, in entertaining ways. The cast is good, including Steve Martin in a rare serious role, and the Mamet dialogue doesn�t disappoint.

7/10 

Entourage Season 3 Part 2 - out of all the seasons I've seen (and I know this is technically part 2), probably enjoyed this one the most. It may have something to do with the fact that it was only 8 episodes rather than the usual 12, so it didn�t feel like it was marking time as often as some of the others. Anyway, overall, it's another season of reasonably well made, entertaining but forgettable stuff.

7/10 

Vacancy and Weirdsville.Both good movies.

Vacancy was REALLY good and intense. Once the action started, it didn't stop and kept the suspense high the entire time. If you like games like Manhunt you will probably like this movie. There's no gore, only some blood, with emphasis on the situation instead of shock value.

Weirdsville was also a good, offbeat comedy about heroine addicts, russian drug pushers, satanic cults and an army of midget medievalists. Pretty funny, some parts were better than others. Quite an odd little movie. 

Any opinions? To me, it seemed like a prequel to The Departed. 

Jarhead - its well made and finely acted but it doesn�t really have a whole lot to say that hasn�t already been said in numerous better films. In fact, a lot of its best scenes are directly derivative of similar scenes in other greater movies and most of those scenes are shot in a similar fashion as a homage, so the comparison just becomes inevitable.

Every now and then though, it manages to have a fresh spin on things such as the climactic walk through the oil fields and the ironic use of the helicopter attack scene from Apocalypse Now being used to pump up recruits.

6.5/10


The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser (1974) - I havent seen any Werner Herzog before but this is a very odd little film. Based on the true story in the early 1800's of a man who is released in the town of Nuremberg after having spent the majority of his life in a cellar by himself, it is at times full of fascinating scenes that are both funny and touching.

I thought Bruno S was quite remarkable in the main role (although you have to wonder how much of it was personal experience given that he himself was institutionalised for 20 years and had no formal training as an actor), maintaining the right balance of innocence, obliviousness and curiosity.

However, despite all the good stuff, I had trouble getting into it at times because of a tendency by Herzog to wallow in very drawn out and oblique scenes that in my opinion detracted from the more stronger emotional scenes.

6.5/10 

The Princess Bride (1987) - rewatch, never liked this fantasy satire the first time around and pretty much had the same feeling this time around.

Still find it unfunny as a satire and don�t buy the non-satirical parts of it either. Pity because I have liked most of Rob Reiner's stuff and have also liked william goldman's scripts in the past too.

5/10



The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (1976) - John Cassavetes' film is really a character study dressed up as a crime drama. Although it drags and is awkwardly paced, it is most definitely the work of a very talented filmmaker with a very careful eye for character development.

The story is not really worth talking about, suffice to say that a deluded strip club owner finds himself with a gambling debt and is forced to commit the titular action as repayment, but the treatment is fascinating.

Ben Gazzara is awesome in the main role of Cosmo Vitelli, a man who has convinced himself that he is amazing and that his personally scripted and staged strip shows offer the world "more than the usual".

Some tighter editing would have made this a great film but as it stands the numerous drawn out scenes at the club, even though they serve to help us understand the extent of vitelli's delusion, hamper the narrative quite a bit.

7/10 

Slings and Arrows Season 3 - the final season of the show continues the excellent blend of drama and comedy and actually manages to avoid the pitfall of season 2 where the format followed was identical to that of season 1.

It seems as the makers were aware that this was going to be the final season quite early on, and as such, the show focuses on different themes than previous seasons (also reflected in the play being mounted in this season, King Lear).

The writing is still top notch and the performances are consistently impressive across the board (sarah polley also guest stars).

7.5/10



A Fistful of Dynamite (1971) - one of sergio leone's unsung films, coming in between his Dollars trilogy and Once Upon a Time in the West, probably not surprising given that it's unlike most of his other westerns.

The focus is very much on character and not on atmosphere as is usually the case. That focus is the key to the film's success because otherwise it's a bit of a mess, a film that constantly feels like its struggling to find the right tone throughout its overlong running time.

Rod Steiger and James Coburn provide engaging performances though, and coupled with the interesting character development, make the whole experience worthwhile.

6.5/10


Hud (1963) - Great film, pretty much faultless in all departments. Its one of those movies which you can tell will be great within the first five minutes when elmer bernstein's score gels with the cinematography so well. And once the actors get on screen, its hard to take your eyes off them.

Of all the great Paul Newman performances, I have always thought Cool Hand Luke and The Hustler to be the most definitive. However, his work here is quite possibly even better. And it's matched by equally brilliant work by Melvyn Douglas and Patrcial Neal.

On top of all that, the script is great, one of those works where the dialgoue is able to give voice and articulate its themes without sounding phoney, preachy or overwritten.

9/10 

This just worked. The strong characters (especially Keyes!)
No nonsense really. My parents liked it too.

Not the movie of a century or an epic, it was just a good film, clean in its style.
Billy Wilder was the director and participated in the script too according to IMDB, based on James McCain's novel.

I generally feel that novels often make better movies and sometimes plays too, than scripts made for movies or plays. 

personally think of it as one of the greatest dialogue scripts. 

El Aura (2005) - minimalist masterpiece. Argentina's 2005 oscar entry is a brooding, moody and Melvillian drama/thriller which unfolds in a careful and captivating fashion. The plot is deceptively simple, an introverted taxidermist preoccupied with the notion of a perfect crime finds himself in cirucmstances that allow him to try out his fantasy, but the movie is a complex and intelligent affair.

Also, late director Fabian Belsinki goes a bit Rashomon with his camerawork in the Patagonian forests and the cinematography and sound design are brilliant. The lead performance by Ricardo Darin is also pretty compelling.


8/10 

Monsieur Hire (1989) - well made, interesting story and characters but I just don�t like it. Patrice Leconte was obviously going for enigmatic and touching in this movie about a middle aged social recluse who is a suspect in a murder of a young girl and does not help his situation by watching a young woman Rear Window style every evening, but I found it to be predictable and dull.

It's really strange because the plot explains all motivations for the characters but I still didn�t buy any of them.

5/10



Oceans 13 - I really liked the retro look and feel that Soderbergh got going in this one and overall found it be reasonably entertaining and enjoyable even though the story is extremely weak and it is not in the least way realistic (I don�t think it ever tries to be). But it's definitely fun, which is more than what could be said about the last outing.

6/10 

Angels in America - had never seen the whole thing on tv so finally got around to it.

It must have been a very difficult thing to adapt because even though the writing is of a very high quality, it's always remindng you that it's from a play. But Mike Nichols does enough, without being showy, to make sure that the visuals become just as important as the words.

Similarly, the actors (with the exception of Emma Thompson who I thought was the weakest of the ensemble) also make small and varied adjustments to their dialogues to make it seem more conversational and natural.

Having said all of that the real star is the writing, stagey or otherwise, with Tony Kushner doing a staggering job in combining humour and drama in beautifully complex and layered dialogue that is just a pleasure to hear.

9/10 

Casablanca

Yes.


The Golden Compass

No. 

this begs for a huge "ORLY?"

Golden Compass has a good idea tho, and some say that the books are good 

Was laughably bad. Even if I had enjoyed it, I would be furious because the ending literally was like "OK well nothing at all has been resolved, but if you want to find out more, we plan on making 8 more of these movies so see ya then!!"

It had some nice art and animation and stuff, but there were a *LOT* of scenes that had really bad looking animations. The girl riding the bear across the snowy terrain comes to mind.

The acting was shitty, the plot veered off in 800 directions and everything that happened was completely predictable. 

Guys, don't watch the Dark Materials movies (Golden Compass etc). Read the books if you think you might like them. They are so wonderful and no movie (especially no hollywood movie) could ever grab the magic. They are stories meant for reading and fantasizing, not for watching as a movie.
I've been trying to avoid getting my fantasy ruined by the terrible pictures I have seen of it so far. Seriously, even less filmable than Lord of the Rings. 

Apocalypto - nothing more than a chase flick with high production values and an interesting setting, and it never really tries to be anything more, but its very well made. Yes it's violent, and because it's not a mob movie or a "horror" movie or a Tarantino movie, that's apparently unacceptable and wrong. Seriously speaking, it's gratuitous every now and then, but given that it was set in a society that was built around sacrifice and survival, it is not out of place.

Anyway, enough with the ranting. Its suspenseful, exciting, has characters that you can connect with and transports you to the ancient Mayan world, and later on into the jungle, pretty commendably. I also quite liked the music and sound design.

Having said all of that, there are a couple of eye rolling moments and for what it is, its also slightly overlong. And the ending is interesting.

7.5/10


Shooter - its movies like this that make the Bourne films, good as they are, look like masterpieces. Completely banal, predictable as clockwork, may as well have been acted by correspondence and poorly shot. And to top it all off it seems to think its an intelligent film because it makes a few statements about the current state of the world, right before Mark Wahlberg says another corny line and continues on his vigilante spree.

3/10


Scandal (1950) - minor early Kurosawa that doesn�t quite work, you can see he is still trying to find his feet, but its still quite an interesting watch because moments of genius still shine through and its theme of celebrity obsession and media attention are inescapable today.

Toshiro Mifune puts in another great turn as a famous painter who is inadvertently snapped by paparazzi in the company of a famous female singer but is unwilling to be exploited by the media without a fight. The opening is brilliant, Kurosawa setting up proceedings very efficiently, but things start to get a bit overly melodramatic when Takeshi Shimura's morally dubious attorney turns up to defend Mifune's character.

I am not quite sure the scenes with Shimura's character work and in this case it probably would have been better if Kurosawa stuck with making a film that focused solely on the main plot.

6/10 

Die Hard 4.0
^ Yeah that's the UK title, I guess they conjectured that Live Free or Die Hard would cause British people to vomit uncontrollably, and rightly so. I wasn't expecting great things as I hadn't heard almost anything about it, and almost no one in the UK went to see it I think, but this is one fucking awesome action flick. Pure entertainment in the exact same vein as the first 3 films, but better than all of them combined.

Granted, the scheme being executed by the bad guys is absolutely retarded, and the main bad dude is certainly no Alan Rickman, but the action and stunts are good enough that it just doesn't matter. The computer hacking stuff is hilarious, literally up there with 'Hackers' for sheer unfeasibility. In the Die Hard 4 world, you could use your mobile phone to hack into your neighbour's microwave so that it overheated their pizza, no problem.

I don't want to over-analyse this film, but it's probably more entertaining than you think it'll be... the 'Mac' kid from the apple adverts isn't bad at all, and McClane has a hot daughter. That is all.


Enchanted
Completely deserved what I got for going to see this. Horrible even if you can handle and enjoy most Disney. Also, why is the Disney cartoon girl such a hottie, but when she comes into the real world she's a 7 at best? 

I think they have been doing the marketing campaign for this movie too far ahead of time, but most of what they've released makes the movie look awesome. I just hope they have the Joker do _really_ fucked up stuff, not the usual comic book villain "rob banks, fight police, take hero's girlfriend hostage." (which 1989 Joker did too) I'm talking Hannibal Lecter stuff, torture and so forth, the character needs to be disturbing, he is a psychopath not a dastardly evildoer. 

looks great. 

I saw it too, while I sort of agree with starbucks review I cant believe he rates it above die hard 1, which is undoubtedly the best in the series by far!

Yes the whole hacking thing in 4 is hilarious, made more funny by the old lady sitting behind me asking her grand daughter if people can really do all this stuff with computers, the reply was a disturbing "of course!" ...

And mmmmm dark knight trailer, looks fantastic! 

Klute (1971)<b/> - a little dated now in some aspects, I'm sure it was quite frank and provocative when it came out, and as a mystery/thriller it's pretty average.

But what it does have is some well done characterisation that is brought to life by some excellent acting from Jane Fonda (and to a lesser extent Donald Sutherland even though his character is underwritten) and some highly impressive cinematography by the great Gordon Willis (its not pretty or anything just very effective and suitable). The end result is a reasonably good film that although predictable excels in its character moments.

6.5-7/10