Movie Tab II

The Dark Knight: 3/5
I wasnt impressed by this one over any other Batman - not at all. In fact, I liked Jack Nicholson's Joker better. The only real difference was the decade/setting of the storyline. This particular version was younger. Much younger.

The House Bunny
pure cheese. 2/5

Traitor 4/5
disturbing in yet another line of middle east conflict movies. however, I did think this one had more "soul" and feeling, for lack of a better word. I felt it was at least empathetic to the muslim culture - something I think is lacking in the other films.

Eagle Eye 3/5
flash and bang - typical action flick, but I expected it so I didnt hate it as much as some did. Furthermore, I dont hate the concept of a machine taking over (Terminator, SKYnet, anyone?) and making unacceptable decisions. Plus, its Shia all grown up!

The LongShots 4/5
Ice Cube does yet another family film. I wonder if he has children, and if that is why he is so dead set on cleaning up his act, or if it is simply age and responsibility? Either or, this was a nice slow paced fam film with a "message" I guess, that even girls can be quarterbacks in boys leagues. In my mind, the jury is still out on that one!

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something witty goes here......

Near Dark (Bigelow, 1987) -

Well, I will admit I certainly did enjoy Near Dark. Took a while to get into, but I liked this particularly crafty take on vampire lore. Not to mention the various small things that really built it up - the supporting cast was top form, especially Lance Henriksen and Bill Paxton as two of the most interesting vampires on offer. I also reckon the special effects were a pretty good job all around - not only was the gore well-executed (no pun intended) but the depiction of what happens when sunlight hits a "vampire" (which surprisingly enough they don't get called in Near Dark). I also have to give props to the score by Tangerine Dream - so damned atmospheric it makes me want to find the soundtrack.

The only issue I have with the film (albeit a somewhat minor one) is...

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Iro's Top 100 Movies v3.0

see, the picture alone wouldve turned me off, but now it might be worth a watch Iro. How into vampire lore are you? I ask because the Blade goes one way, Underworld goes another, Anne Ricey films go another, and then the old 80s type vamp films go at it another way: all with different takes and sympathies on the occurence and correction of vampirism.

personally, as trite as Underworld really is, I find that I like their explanation so much better, as it meshes with science: it comes from a virus, and modern science can kill it with UV bullets - you cant get better than that!

In response to your question - I wouldn't say I'm into vampire lore. I may watch or read the occasional story that interests me enough, but as for actively seeking out anything purely because it's got vampires, no.

7/10

Top Quality Western that suffers from Eastwood's cinematic brilliance. I think this is easily one of the best Westerns ever made but the kind of Western fan I am is more akin to something along the lines of Sam Peckinpaw's "The Wild Bunch". I like shooting, lots and lots of shooting. Westerns can easily be sub-genred and sub-genred again. Unforgiven would be a Western Drama. Very solid cast, great direction, a good screenplay and a gun nut's wet dream ending. Clint doesn't disappoint. I felt the same way after "High Plains Drifter". I just wish Clint was more akin to his Leone days.

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A casual stroll through the lunatic asylum shows that faith does not prove anything.
http://s0undw4ve.dvdaf.com/owned - My Collection

Let The Right One In aka Låt den rätte komma in (Tomas Alfredson 2008)

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Adapted for the screen by John Ajvide Lindqvist from his critically acclaimed novel Let The Right One In is a tender film about friendship, love, loneliness and loyalty. It's also a smart horror movie that isn't afraid to challenge genre conventions, and throw around plenty of claret.

Set in early 1980's snowy Stockholm where a serial killer is on the loose draining peoples blood; this is the story of Oskar (Kåre Hedebrant) an only child of divorced parents. Oskar is a sensitive loner, who harbours revenge fantasies as he's constantly bullied at school. That is until he meets Eli (Lina Leandersson) an oddly mature, androgenous looking young girl who only ever comes out at night. The two outsiders gradually form a strong friendship finding solace together from their very different but equally isolated lives. It's then that Oskar discovers the truth about Eli, a truth that tests his loyalty like nothing else before it.

To simply call Let The Right One In an effective horror movie would be doing it a huge disservice. Whilst it definitely is a 'horror' film (and a very good one); Lindqvist and Anderson place the emphasis heavily on the friendship, acceptance, trust and loyalty aspects of the story rather than the scares. As a result when the horror does come it's integral to the plot feeling shockingly beautiful, rather than sickeningly gratuitous. Lina Leandersson is a revelation in her role as Eli, she injects her with a subtle maturity, tenderness and vulnerability ensuring the character is completely believable. Anything less and Eli might have come over as hokey or unsympathetic, but this is a classy production and the cast generally reflect that. Kåre Hedebrant as Oskar is also solidly competent (if a little one note) and perfectly convinces as the placid schoolboy.

That just leaves me to mention the pleasing combination of subdued photography and understated score, effectively capturing the minimalist architecture and snowy locales. I'd also like to offer some of my thoughts on the main talking points in this thread regarding the film. I actually saw it as being very much about isolation, as in retrospect every character in the story seemed lonely, unhappy and detached in some way. Whether it was Oskar's alcoholic father, Eli's aging guardian, or the gang of unwilling bullies and their cowardly leader (who was in turn bullied by his obnoxious older brother). They were all tragic figures, some caught in a spiral of self destruction having loved and lost, others crying out for love. Ironically only Eli seemed truly warm and animated, able to share that gift with a fellow lonely soul. Her/his gender was never issue with me even if it was for Lindqvist (I've not read the book...yet); I only ever saw Eli as an androgenous being who'd chosen to assume a female identity/form. Vampires are generally perceived to be shape shifters anyway, and this film stuck to the rules on everything else. Ultimately though I think it's Oskar's perception of Eli that is most important; he saw her as female so perhaps we were meant to see her the same way. I also wondered if in Eli's guardian we were supposed to be seeing a reflection of Oskar's future self/fate. Was Eli merely grooming Oskar for the same role? I don't want to believe that, I like to think they were soul mates, but it's this kind of depth that really fascinates me about Let The Right One In. It kind of reminded me of John Fawcett's werewolf flick Ginger Snaps, all be it far superior with a much more subtle sense of black humour. I can safely say I haven't enjoyed a film this much since Del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth, this is compulsive viewing, I loved it and will shut up now.

Oh and I really enjoyed hearing Flash In The Night by Secret Service on the soundtrack; synth-pop classic that is.

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100 Favourites From The Future: REWIRED

Letters From Iwo Jima (2006) -

awww i can't post pictures i already looked at the upgrade bug thread and apparently it's in the middle of being fixed...but i had a really good picture

so anyway, this movie was interesting because it was told from the Japanese's point of view, i haven't seen Flags of our Fathers yet but i plan to...eventually. But other than the POV it was pretty average war movie which is still above average because i like war movies that much

Fistful of Dollars (1964) -

My goodness this was the happiest i've been while watching a movie since LOTR in theaters. I watched the whole trilogy backwards because that's just how it was available to rent but i need to watch all of them again before i can put forth the ultimatum that i like this one the best, i just recently added The Good, the Bad and the Ugly to my favorite movies list so i need to watch that one again to see if it should be replaced because i really really loved Fistful of Dollars. But the love i felt could have just been for the whole series because i love all of them! Either way this trilogy is in my top ten somewhere and Clint Eastwood was sooo sexy...kay i'm done

Im glad you finaly got around to watching Fistful of Dollars. I knew you would like it. Watching the trilogy backwards might have made you appreciate the character more(maybe)

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Stallone is my hero!

Igor(2008)-had it's laughs probably thanks to Steve Buscemi

Bolt(2008)-it was nice

Dawn of the Dead(2004)-love that one 3rd viewing

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I'm in movie heaven

Next -

I wasn't expecting much; I saw it on sale on Blu-ray for $10 and decided to pick it up, and as it turns out I was very impressed. The concept of the film is really cool and there are some awesome action sequences and effects throughout. Nicholas Cage delivered an excellent performance and Jessica Biel is drop-dead-gorgeous. The ending didn't sit too well with me (it caught me off-guard and left me in disappointed disbelief), but the buildup to it was just short of phenomenal.

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"The mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven."
John Milton, Paradise Lost

My Movie Review Thread | My Top 100

City of Ember (Gil Kenan, 2008)

Why can't there be more films like this? Why do 90% of all movies with a target demo below the age of 14 have to be complete fluff-fests? I mean, yeah, City of Ember has more than its fair share of glaring plot holes. And it's got a forced/protracted final act that's, if not wholly unsatisfying, at least a bit disappointing.

But, at the same time, it's a spectacularly refreshing experience. It's a children's movie that's ambitious in every sense of the word and it never once panders to or cheats the viewer. It's visually arresting, it has a compelling story and it's got Bill Murray, man. A lot of care and thought was put into this thing and actually I guess you could say that about almost any movie in the history of anything. But I think if you look at everything here from the cast to the design of the sets, you just get the sense that this is one of those labor of love type deals. Really is a shame that such a wonderful and charming little movie like this couldn't find an audience.






Also watched Redbelt and Frost/Nixon recently. All things considered, Redbelt may deserve a slightly better rating than the I'm gonna give it, but that movie just bored my pants off. Frost/Nixon, which I thought I'd dislike, was a pretty enjoyable flick. It felt very slight and maybe even wholly insignificant, though, and I don't think it should be getting anywhere near the kind of praise that it's been taking in. I'd give it a low and it might have been a bit higher if I didn't feel the movie went a step too far in misrepresenting the importance of the actual interviews. Oh well, two very good performances anyway from Sheen and Langella.

How the West Was Won -

(FIRST VIEWING)



It's not a word I like to use often, but "epic" pretty much describes this movie. This has only been the second big-time Western that I've ever seen (Once Upon a Time in the West being the first), and boy am I off to a roaring start with the genre. While I thought Once Upon a Time in the West was decent, I thought How the West Was Won was fantastic, albeit (of course) a much different kind of movie. It was broken up into several 20-40 minute segments, each taking place during a different part of the 1800's explaining the story of the West, some having certain reoccurring characters in common. It was pretty remarkable the way the story of the film was told, in that respect.

Also, it goes without saying that Henry Fonda and Lee J. Cobb delivered outstanding performances. Doris Day also gave a dazzling performance and Jimmy Stewart's was gold.

With a rewatch, my rating for this movie has the potential to go up to a solid .

yeah i think that might be why i felt such a surge of love while watching it lol, so i'm going to watch GBU again now that i'm more familiar with the character because i bet i'll enjoy it even more.

i also forgot...

Kuch Kuch Hota Hai (1998) -
**note** this movie is only a five because i love it and have loved it since i was little, that doesn't mean that this is necessarily a great movie...



yeah so i hadn't seen this movie in years and i just watched it again for the first time last night and my goodness i love it! and i hate musicals, they're always so boring to me...but this one isn't, i dunno if it's because it's in another language and i can just avoid the subtitles and the songs are just more tolerable that way...but no i think it's just because this is a childhood movie that i love. Sooo much happens! It's about this guy Rahul who has a best friend named Anjali and Anjali loves Rahul but Rahul falls in love with Tina and Tina figures out that Anjali loves Rahul and feels really bad but then Anjali goes on a train and leaves forever!! (almost) then Rahul and Tina get married and have a kid but Tina dies from complications with the childbirth and leaves her daughter 8 letters for each of her birthdays, in the eighth letter she tells her daughter (also named Anjali) to set her father up with Anjali because Tina thinks she interfered with their love! so Anjali (the 8 year old daughter) and her grandma come up with a scheme to set up Rahul with Anjali after they hadn't seen each other for years but of course to make things complicated Anjali is already engaged to another man...so that's the plot and it's pretty much awesome...

Just saw Pineapple Express, giving it a 3.5/5, we'll see how it does with repeat viewings. Unfortunately I was distracted alot while watching the movie, the whole time I was thinking how I wished I still smoked weed.

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"Don't be so gloomy. After all it's not that awful. Like the fella says, in Italy for 30 years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder, and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and the Renaissance. In Switzerland they had brotherly love - they had 500 years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock."

City of Ember looks cool, PW. I will pop it in my queue.

Meanwhile:

His Girl Friday (Hawks, 1940)





Fantastic comedy. Grant slays it, as does Russell.

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Heavenly Creatures (1994) -

What a messed up movie. Wow. The ending will haunt me forever. Oh yeah, and Kate Winslet rocked.

UF- where did you get to see Let the Right One In?

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I'll reply in a PM as I'm a bit ashamed

Appaloosa (2008) 4/5 - Loved the interaction between Harris and Mortensen...

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Meet Bill(2008)-good movie before bed