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Author Topic: Write about the last movie you watched (2006-2010)  (Read 5997476 times)

flieger

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Re: Write about the last movie you watched
« Reply #27570 on: February 17, 2010, 09:02:58 PM »

Shutter Island (Martin Scorcese, 2010)
There's a storm coming - as signposted by Krzysztof Penderecki's ominously booming score - and for Scorcese it's all in the subtext. Pity it's enveloped by an overly talky thriller, because the dream sequences and the flashbacks are so florid, such fever dreams, that you wish you could escape to that world. Ted Daniels wishes he could, but is it something he wants to go back to, or escape? Or is it both? The film tantalises us with ambiguity, then wallops you over the head with melodrama and exposition. The island is full of symbolic markers and the connection to the troubled consciousness of Ted Daniels is hard to miss.
Scorcese is again really exploring American cinema, from the soundtrack bursting with avant garde works and some stark shots that bring to mind Kubrick, to the melodramatic, crazy pulpiness that the plot demands to be played with. Scorcese duly obliges with smoke, chiaroscuro, contrastingly luscious and dank interiors, tangled and precarious exteriors. The symbolic markers of the island are paralleled by the cinematic markers that Scorcese holds so dear.
Performances were good, the standouts being Michelle Williams, DiCaprio and Elias Koteas (he really is a Canadian De Niro!). But that final act drags, as we have to talk it out like any good psychotherapy session, and the final flashback's pacing goes off, but is still bonkers beautiful and dreamlike and awfully sad. So, for me, the pacing was off, constrained by the plot's novelistic origins. The film is all in the detail, the real and emotional, the flesh and the brain, that Scorcese loves to explore.

PS. Since Gangs of New York (167 mins), the shortest DiCaprio film has been 119 minutes... the others: 138, 128, 141, 170, 151, 143. I mean, I love Leo, but how about a 90 minute one now and then?

smirnoff

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Re: Write about the last movie you watched
« Reply #27571 on: February 17, 2010, 09:50:05 PM »
Big Dreams Little Tokyo (Dave Boyle, 2006)

One of those strange movies you add to your queue and when it arrives you have no idea why you'd thought it'd be good. It seemed like it could be funny, but wasn't. The jokes weren't bad, but the amateur actors were unable to deliver them.

The film gets zero stars by default because I couldn't finish it.


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You Kill Me (John Dahl, 2007)

I've been a Téa Leoni fan since I first saw her in The Family Man (an under appreciated film imo). She's different somehow. I wish she was in more films. She was by far the funniest cast member in this one. There's not a ton of laughs to be had, but she gets most of them. Kingsley was good too, playing an alcoholic hitman. Bill Pullman and Luke Wilson show up here and there to keep things interesting.

Overall I wish the film had been funnier and dropped the meaningless side plot about the mobster family. Whatever my complaints, it's still a pretty easy movie to watch and enjoy. Not brilliant, not "an instant classic", but fun for one viewing.



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The Great Train Robbery (Michael Crichton, 1979)

I was looking at Crichton's imdb page one day and came across this film. I've always loved Crichton for the stories he comes up with, and when I read this was a heist movie I was immediately interested. What a find! This movie was really very enjoyable.

The target is a pile of gold on a train, but it could be anything really. The fun is in watching the plan unfold. A hundred little things half to go right for them to be successful, and even then it's going to take a bit of luck. There's something hugely satisfying about seeing it all come together. It's like watching an animated cross section of an internal combustion engine. Synchronized, seamless, and ingenious. It's kind of mesmering!

Sutherlands friendly mutton chops steal the show. :)


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« Last Edit: March 21, 2010, 08:35:21 PM by smirnoff »

Holly Harry

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Re: Write about the last movie you watched
« Reply #27572 on: February 17, 2010, 10:53:21 PM »
Goodness, "Bright Star" was lovely. Funnier than I expected too.

Pretty different from "Sweetie", the only other Campion film I've seen, but terrific all the same.

I had never seen Abbie Cornish in a film before, and had only seen Whishaw in "I'm Not There", and they were both fantastic.

This film is also continuing the proof that it should be obligated by law for Paul Schneider to be in every movie.
« Last Edit: February 17, 2010, 10:56:11 PM by Holly Harry »
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Clovis8

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Re: Write about the last movie you watched
« Reply #27573 on: February 17, 2010, 10:57:14 PM »
Goodness, "Bright Star" was lovely.

Pretty different from "Sweetie", the only other Campion film I've seen, but terrific all the same.

I had never seen Abbie Cornish in a film before, and had only seen Whishaw in "I'm Not There", and they were both fantastic.

This film is also continuing the proof that it should be obligated by law for Paul Schneider to be in every movie.

Ya it's really great. Cornish and Schneider are so good too.

Verite

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Re: Write about the last movie you watched
« Reply #27574 on: February 17, 2010, 11:04:47 PM »
Funnier than I expected too.

I mentioned the film's humor in hopes of that getting people to check it out in time for Filmspots.
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Corndog

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Re: Write about the last movie you watched
« Reply #27575 on: February 17, 2010, 11:07:50 PM »
Funnier than I expected too.

I mentioned the film's humor in hopes of that getting people to check it out in time for Filmspots.

the little girl is pretty funny, in addition to being oodles of cuteness.
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oneaprilday

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Re: Write about the last movie you watched
« Reply #27576 on: February 17, 2010, 11:17:09 PM »
Goodness, "Bright Star" was lovely. Funnier than I expected too.

Pretty different from "Sweetie", the only other Campion film I've seen, but terrific all the same.

I had never seen Abbie Cornish in a film before, and had only seen Whishaw in "I'm Not There", and they were both fantastic.

This film is also continuing the proof that it should be obligated by law for Paul Schneider to be in every movie.
Yay!!! Holly Harry continues to show her fantastic taste and judgment. :)

Would love to hear your take sometime on the other Campions I've seen, viz. The Piano and An Angel at My Table.

Junior

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Re: Write about the last movie you watched
« Reply #27577 on: February 17, 2010, 11:40:26 PM »
And now for another burying of a Frank Borzage film late at night and towards the end of a page...

Little Man, What Now (1934).

The second talkie we've seen for class and way way way different from Liliom. None of the strangeness of that film is present here. No, we only have a real, touching narrative of the ups and downs in one couple's lives in the months leading up to WWII in Germany. But it's not about Nazis or communism, though both do happen to appear in the film. No this is really just about what it takes to be a good person. Hans, our main character played by Douglass Montgomery, goes through trial after trial, mostly involving finding then being fired from a job. He must keep a job to support his wife, played to perfection by Margaret Sullavan. She's the true center of the film and the relationship. When Hans realizes that his step-mother who took him in from the cold is running a whorehouse and using his wife as a maid he threatens one of the customers with a knife only to be pulled back by Sullivan.

This is kind of an episodic movie, but I like that. Every time we see Hans rise a little in the world, he is pulled back down. Only when he is with the love of his life is he truly happy. The movie ends with one of the best depictions of an everyday miracle that I've seen on film. I had tears of happiness in my eyes. Some might say (and did, in the post film discussion) that the movie becomes a little too saccharine, but I think it works in the context of the world that Borzage creates.

It's a funny and happy and sad and beautiful film. It's too bad there's pretty much no way any of you can watch it.

A+.
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Junior

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Re: Write about the last movie you watched
« Reply #27578 on: February 17, 2010, 11:47:00 PM »
But wait, I lied. After a quick search it seems that the film is on youtube in its entirety! Just watch the scene that starts at the 8:24 mark here and continues at the beginning of the next clip. Amazing.

Borzage: Little Man, What Now? 2/9

Borzage: Little Man, What Now? 3/9
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