Nina Forever (2015) Rob's girlfriend died in a car crash and every time he tries to have sex with his new girlfriend, Holly, the ex returns bloody and broken. This may sound like a comedy premise, but it's actually a thoughtful and touching metaphor for grief, jealousy and the limits of helping somebody you care about cope with horrible situations. The characters are written in a really insightful way, extending to Nina's parents, who Rob still sees occasionally. Despite the blood, the frequent sex is quite sexy and comes with an emotional honesty that helps sell the fantasy. (I don't know anyone that would lend support the way Holly does, but I believe that type of person exists, and newcomer Abigail Hardingham excels in this difficult role.)
I don't know why the film is edited slightly out of sequence. (Some scenes mix up the sequence of events of that day, so it's not flashing back and forth, but delivering information of the moment in a non-linear way.) It's distracting and when the story is this fantastical, a cleaner timeline would've made it easier. There are also too many musical montages, which I know because I started noticing how much time they were taking up, adding almost nothing to the story.
Rating: * * * - Okay - Not scary, but often bloody
Gojira/Godzilla (1954) I'd always heard about Godzilla starting out as a metaphor for the nuclear bombs dropped on Japan, but I couldn't imagine how that works with my modern idea of a Godzilla film. Now I see how it makes perfect sense. Remove most of the camp - there's still the one-eyed scientist with the oxygen-removing bomb - add in somber choir music and film in stark black and white and Godzilla becomes a walking holocaust. Mass destruction on such an unimaginable scale, the people wonder if they brought it on themselves. There's also the legendary Takashi Shimura as the most convincing scientist ever to question why we're so bent on destroying the monster and not trying to understand it. (That character type has never been more sympathetic.) As for the one-eyed scientist, even he becomes a philosophical question of fighting all-out destruction with a weapon even more powerful.
This is so far removed from my idea of a Godzilla movie, I admire it more than I recommend it.
This recent poll about Star Wars directors veered into a discussion about filmmakers who would make a different type of film within that universe. This suggests the same. What if Paul Greengrass made a Godzilla film where the monster destroys New York City with modern effects, creating an epic 9/11 that people could never hope to recover from? I wish I had more time to follow the series and see when Godzilla transforms into Japan's protector.
Rating: * * * - Okay - Safe for Sandy