February 15, 2011

• Movie Review Update – 2/15/11

  previous reviews here.

  Absence of Malice (1981) – Paul muthafuckin Newman, Sally Fields lookin all cute as a button.  paul newman is unfairly named a person of suspicion in a criminal investigation and the story is leaked by a reporter, sally fields, with bad results.  this is a good film about that moving line between proper journalism and irresponsible persecution.  this movie seeps into all the interesting gray areas.  i think we need to see one of these every once in a while.  the latest was..  State of Play?  anyway, even though this is dated, Paul Newman is still muthafuckin Paul Newman and the issue is as relevant today as ever.  3.5 stars

  Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince (2009) – i haven’t caught up with this series and only saw this because it’s supposed to set me up for the finale.  i could live without watching crap about quiddich and could use more of Hermione.  less annoying Harry.  more spacey weird classmate who cracks me up.  and more dramatic crap like main characters getting killed off.  i simply love that stunt.  3 stars

  Couples Retreat (2009) – meh.  1 star. 

  Vengeance (2009) – Johnny To gangster film.  just plain crap.  he peaked with Election and never made it back again.  1 star.

  The Piano Teacher (2002) – french film.  a buttoned-up, strict spinster piano teacher sees an outlet for her twisted fantasies in one of her gifted students.  dark character film that’s more interesting than the 3 stars i rated it.  it’s french, so it takes its time and therefore tries the patience a bit, but develops into a unique descent into some peculiar emotional places.  3 stars

  Restrepo (2010) – another contemporary war documentary, this time in Afghanistan.  US Outpost Restrepo is the US Army’s giant middle finger to the insurgents that have been hounding them in the Korengal Valley.  (the outpost site was originally the high ground staging area the Taliban once launched attacks from.  one night the US army crept in there and dug in over the next few days to establish a permanent outpost.)  the filmmakers were embedded for over a year, and detail two key moments in the lives of these soldiers: the creation of Restrepo and Operation Rock Slide where the filmmakers filmed an ambush that inflicted US casualties.  this movie has some very frighteningly real footage of soldiers getting shot at, including a now popular clip of one soldier crying under fire when he learns that his sergeant was killed.  it limits its scope to the soldiers and lets them tell these two stories, which is its strength but also its weakness, since i had to wonder how much more the filmmakers could have covered with over a year’s worth of footage.  3 stars

  Black Swan (2010) – natalie portman and mila kunis in darren aronofsky’s horror/thriller about an industrious but innocent ballerina who must discover and embrace her dark side in order to land the lead role.  natalie portman, someone who i’m not usually enthusiastic about except as a pretty doll, deserves all the praise she’s getting as the White Swan Queen searching for her Dark Queen flip side.  the real kicker here though is aronofsky’s risky direction that baldly and successfully injects horror elements into an art-house film about ballet.  the mood is pulpy and screeching, and somehow totally relevant to the subject and characters.  4 stars

  Once Were Warriors (1994) – australian indie film about a poor aboriginal family and their violently lunatic father.  very rough around the edges, like most indie films, and isn’t afraid to be.  rather typical theme of finding inner strength in the face of seemingly impossible adversity, but did i detect a trace of caste bigotry thrown in there?  3 stars

  TRON: Legacy IMAX 3D (2010) – this should have been so much better, but it got caught up in its own crap zen mythology and eventually fell over itself trying to explain its existence.  fun to look at though.  2 stars

  Winter’s Bone (2010) – the little indie that could.  if expanding the Best Picture oscar category to 10 nominees means small films like this get recognition, then i’m all for it.  jennifer lawrence plays a teenaged older sister of two adolescents and daughter of an invalid mother looking for her missing meth cooking father in this great little film about pluckiness, determination and a poor criminal subculture in the trashy Ozark mountains.  she’s an interesting and empowering character, but what really interested me was the story and surroundings that produced this earthy griminess that wafted through the screen.  it’s an ugly place packed with ugly people where all she can do is try and survive.  4 stars

  Breaking Upwards (2009) – nyc indie film about a young couple of longstanding that decides it’s time to call it quits.  only they don’t sever the cord like normal people, but arrange a schedule of “on” and “off” nights to slowly ween themselves off each other.  starts out as a snarky, tongue in cheek look at two people who are still obviously nuts about each other, but ends up getting real.  here’s a nice tidbit: the two stars are actually ex-lovers and i think they co-made the film.  3.5 stars

  The Kids Are All Right (2010) – annette benning, juliane moore, mark ruffalo and new up-and-comer mia wasikowski.  mia’s moms are lesbians who had her and her brother via artificial insemination.  since mia is 18, she can contact the sperm donor, who is technically her father.  he is mark ruffalo and becomes a welcome or unwelcome quick fixture in their lives, depending on who you ask.  ultimately turns out to be a thesis on what constitutes a family.  a family is a family is a family.  i thought i had this one all figured out, but i didn’t, and i like that surprise about it.  not sure it’s as awesome as everyone else thinks it is though..  3.5 stars

  
  

  Carlos (2010) – golden globe winner for best mini-series.  this is an epic and sprawling biopic about famed international terrorist and assassin Carlos the Jackal.  i love the crime/assassin subject matter, but i hate biopics, which this is.  Carlos turns out to be a pretty annoying guy and hard to watch for FIVE HOURS.  still though, i give points for being so damn big in scale.  i think there were like 98 languages spoken on several continents, and all for a production that only aired on French tv.  2.5 stars

  The King’s Speech (2010) – not bad.  but i definitely didn’t love it like everyone else i know who saw it.  the king of england has a stuttering problem that only the zany madcap therapist knows how to handle.  colin firth is a solid actor.  he’s been gunning for this oscar for a few years now and he just might deserve it.  so might the director, who took a very pedestrian and contrived script and made it into a watchable, even enjoyable film.  (my eyes couldn’t roll back in my head far enough during the “I HAVE A VOICE!” scene.  please, son.  what a crap line.)  but best script?  best supporting actress?  best picture?  all undeserved, imo.  i realize you probably love this film, but, sorry, i did not.  3 stars

  Blue Valentine (2010) – ryan gosling, michelle williams, a broken marriage.  man, this one is heavy.  and married people should be banned from viewing.  ryan gosling and michelle williams are married parents who are trying to rekindle some last spark of their marriage on a night out alone.  the pain of this effort is multiplied when, as viewers watching intermingled flashbacks, we see their relationship’s sweet beginning.  ryan singing for a dancing michelle while he plays his ukulele.  great acting and just a devastatingly real-looking story about the unceremonious death of love.  4 stars

  Mary and Max (2009) – claymation film from australia about a misfit young girl from australia who begins a pen-pal relationship with a misfit old man in new york.  a few words to describe this film: funny, cute, warm and also very dark and sad.  somehow it is all those things.  i loved it.  4 stars

  True Grit (2010) – the Academy seems to love these plucky teenage girls.  newcomer Hailee Steinfeld is the undisputed star of this show despite her nomination as a “supporting” actress.  along with Jeff Bridges, Matt Damon, Josh Brolin and Barry Pepper, this western remake is almost completely devoid of action, by western standards anyway, but doesn’t feel like it.  at every turn, the Coens made efforts to paint deep characters, starting with Hailee Steinfeld’s, and the result is a great romp through what should be familiar territory.  that it’s not is why this film is pretty darn good.  two hours went by in a blink.  4 stars

  
  

  I Am Love (2010) – Tilda Swinton in an italian film about the unbridled nature of love.  she is a wealthy mother living a formed and seemingly pre-ordained middle-aged life of dinner parties and growing children.  the ground under life shakes when love walks the earth.  this film is about 30 minutes too long, which is a really long time to be too long for.  2.5 stars

  
  

  The Social Network (2010) – aaron sorkin’s script, david fincher directs.  the film about mark zuckerberg and this thing called Facebook.  he’s a nerd bent on revenge.  screws a few people on the way to becoming a mega billionaire.  how cliche.  but seriously.  aaron sorkin’s gift for writing characters who prattle off wonky dialogue while keeping you interested isn’t lost here.  he’s a master at that as anyone who likes The West Wing already knows.  the drama and issues seem like they might have been real at some point?  as do the motivations that drive the main characters.  as a step-by-step walk through of the creation of Facebook and the blood spilled along the way, this is an effective and engaging movie.  everyone involved should get kudos for taking material and characters that aren’t normally compelling, relatable or consequential and elevating it into a movie that i was sort of sad to see end.  really, why should i give a shit about anyone or thing in this story?  i did, though, and that’s to the film’s credit.  3.5 stars

  
  

  Best Worst Movie (2009) – documentary about a movie so bad that it’s celebrated as a film event all over the country.  Troll 2′s stars are the filmmaker and subject of this unexpected documentary revisiting the project that brought them together several decades ago, and is now enjoying a revival for all the wrong reasons.  it was voted the worst movie of all time on imdb.com.  they speak with the director and other co-stars and talk about where they are now and how the film did or didn’t get them there.  the subjects are, for the most part, totally game to accept the awfulness of their common work, but at least one, the major star, seems to revel in its newfound notoriety.  most come across as real people enjoying a final twirl in the spotlight, which makes this pretty fun to watch.  3 stars

  
  

  Toy Story 3 (2010) – just go see it.  3.5 stars

  
  

  The Secret in Their Eyes (2009) – spanish language film about a retired prosecutor rehashing an old murder case that still haunts him.  it’s a story about life and its fulfillment on many levels, but it’s a tad darker than that.  there is a murder involved after all.  shmaltzy at times and a bit pokey in the middle, but the end pays off.  3 stars

  
  

  Inside Deep Throat (2005) – documentary about one of the first (and only?) hard core porn films to penetrate common American pop culture.  interviews with the filmmakers, stars, distributors and lots of other people involved paint the complete picture you probably could have guessed before watching the film.  in a documentary with very little surprises one statistic stood out:  after running in theaters for two years, it was still as high as #11 in america.  movies are lucky to last two weeks these days.  two years!  2.5 stars

  
  

  The Housemaid (2010) – korean remake of a 1960s korean film of the same name.  the always awesome jeon do yeon stars with (a very ripped and often shirtless, for you ladies) lee jung jae in this film about a poor young woman hired to work as a maid in a very rich young couple’s house.  she’s sexy and willing and he’s a cad, so trouble ensues, of course.  this theme of poor girl in an obscenely rich dude’s house seems to be a very common thing in korean media.  wtf is up with that?  possible indication of the huge and persistent wealth gap there?  anyway, the film looks gorgeous due in no small part to the production design of the pristine, austere and art-like house that drips money where most of the film is shot.  it also captures that infuriating sense of systematic injustice that is bound to erupt in this sort of scenario.  the story and performances were over-the-top though and that was its downfall, as the characters are all so exaggerated that they seem like fun house mirror versions of actual people.  it’s also a pretty damn misogynistic film.  2 stars

  
  

  Animal Kingdom (2010) – australian film, nominated for a best supporting actress oscar.  a teenager seeks refuge at his grandmother’s house after his single mother overdoses and dies and he has nowhere else to go.  the only problem is that his grandmother is the knowing mother of three armed robbers, the kid’s uncles, at least two of which are completely screwy in the noggin.  welcome to your new life, kid!  it’s a pretty damn engaging crime drama about this somewhat unwilling kid sunk into his manipulative and amoral family.  this film, like many australian films, walks around with a few surprises falling out of its pockets.  3.5 stars

  
  

  A Town Called Panic (2009) – french stop-motion animated short-ish film about…  goodness, wtf was it about?  there’s a talking horse, a cowboy and indian, and some other weird action figures on some wacked out adventure started when they mistakenly order 50 million bricks.  this is easily the most silly, bizarre and absurd thing i saw all year.  3 stars.

  
  

  Red Riding Trilogy (2009) – british tv mini-series about Yorkshire, a smaller northern UK city, and a series of female abductions there spanning the 1970s and 1980s.  a journalist, a cop and a lawyer each make separate efforts to follow the trail of crimes through the growingly murky political and social hierarchy of Yorkshire.  a lot of this series’ charm is in its complete submersion into the local flavor and one unfortunate result is that the characters all speak with a full on marbles-in-their-mouths heavy accent and dialect making their speech hard to decipher at first.  getting past that though opens up a ballsy, sprawling story about an insular community and its spectacular corruption.  3.5 stars.

  
  

  Firefly: The Complete Series – joss whedon’s awesome sci-fi series.  it’s a western in space with a great sense of humor and a cast of characters that are completely lovable.  it’s a tried and true formula about a band of outlaws with a heart of gold.  the real gem here is the comfortable humor traded between the characters and the sentimental heart of the show.  but it only lasted one season!  wtf man!!!  4 stars.

  
  

  Dollhouse: The Complete Series – joss whedon’s other series.  a lot more serious, and imo a lot less awesome.  it’s ultimately hobbled by Eliza Duchku, the star of the show, who is a pretty awful actor, but alas, she’s one of the producers, so therefore cannot be fired.  but after a slow start the show definitely starting cooking and got straight to the red meat since it’s only two seasons long.  there’s definitely an end game and it got there in a hurry, which is cool.  3.1 stars.

  
  

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