#32 - True Grit

The Coen brothers' 2010 remake of a 1969 John Wayne film, True Grit takes us to the wild west, where a farmer named Frank Ross has been shot dead and swindled by his hired hand, Tom Chaney.  Enlisting the help of US Marshal "Rooster" Cogburn (Jeff Bridges) and Texas Ranger LaBoeuf (Matt Damon), Frank's spirited 14-year-old daughter Mattie (newcomer Hailee Steinfeld) rides into Indian country in pursuit of Chaney and justice for her father.  

First and foremost, Mattie is the type of heroine I want to see more often, one who I think has appeal for viewers of both genders.  She's brave and smart with a brazenness that for once doesn't manifest as a hair-trigger temper, willing and able to fend for herself.  Indeed, Mattie is that rare protagonist who is never thrust into the world of the plot but instead drives the action with her own choices and deeds.

Unfortunately, the action in question is slow to take off, with the first half of the movie consisting largely of dull dialogue.  It's a bit of a let-down from the promise of a Western adventure.  Though the climax is as gripping as anyone could hope for, you'll have to count on not being asleep by the time you get there.  The tedium is occasionally broken by humor, which especially comes out when Bridges and Damon interact.  I wouldn't have minded more banter between the two of them.  Or more than just the few glimpses we got of the beauty of the pre-industrial West, which would have helped flesh out the world and the mood of the film overall.

I'm not sure how I feel about the movie's non-resolution of an ending, it's a somewhat refreshing break from the idea that all endings have to be either perfect and neat or apocalyptically tragic but it somehow didn't seem to fit in with the tone of the movie.  Interestingly enough certain aspects of the ending were changed from the original film.  Notably I'm not sure the conceit of having a 40-year-old Mattie recollecting her exploits really works or adds anything, even though it is true to the novel.  

#31 - Tron Legacy

After his defeat of the Master Computer in 1982's Tron, genius game programmer Kevin Flynn goes missing, leaving behind his son Sam as his reluctant heir.  Rather than taking the helm of the ENCOM company, Sam spends his days hanging out in his garage-turned-loft and getting speeding tickets on his Ducati.  All of this changes however when Kevin's old partner Alan receives a page originating in Kevin's office, and Sam follows his father into the digital world of TRON.

I had three reasons for wanting to see Tron Legacy.

1. I felt something of a duty as a fan of the original Tron.
2. I wanted to see 'the grid' rendered with modern CG techniques.
3. Daft Punk soundtrack!

On these particular counts, Tron Legacy did not disappoint.  The visuals are expansive and exquisite; the is CG sharp and sleek and at times indistinguishable from actual actors and set pieces.  Tron Legacy, like its forerunner, is a sort of runway show, a gratifyingly over-the-top display of the possibilities of modern digital artistry.  The soundtrack is fittingly sweeping and its electronic groove matches perfectly with the movie's computer game setting.  And as a sequel to Tron, it is fittingly camp and glorifying of renegade geekery (with the 21st century reference point of the open vs. closed source debate to carry it home).

Tron Legacy's script is a haphazard collection of vague leads and storylines that attempt to collude in a rushed finale.  It frequently pushes aside characterization and coherency for the sake of visual showcase, but also, and less reasonably, for conversations and fights that drag on too long and could have used some tightening.  This might have also helped to reduce the movie's somewhat excessive runtime.  However, at least Tron Legacy seems to revel in its incoherency, foregoing movie cliches for psychedelia and bizarreness.  Which again provides ample opportunity for gorgeous visuals, and that is certainly what Tron Legacy has going for it.

#30 - Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Pt. 1

This is kind of cool.  I'm reviewing a movie before it's been officially released in certain parts of the US, and certainly before most of the US official releases have finished showing.  This is because a number of houses (dorms) at my university pooled together and booked a 9pm 'pre-premiere' over at Navy Pier.  That is, over at Navy Pier's IMAX theater, the biggest of big screens.  Definitely how I think this movie should be seen.

Anyway, enough bragging.

As the last chapter of the Harry Potter story unfolds, our heroes are no longer heading off to the hallowed halls of Hogwarts but instead are refugees, fleeing persecution from both the dark army of Voldemort but also from the corrupt Ministry of Magic.  Aided by trusty pals Ron and Hermione, Harry's task is to find the seven Horcruxes - artifacts where Voldemort has hidden pieces of his soul so as to make himself difficult to kill - and destroy them.

I would say that Deathly Hallows suffers from the usual issues of the Harry Potter movie series - it's uncertain as to what sort of movie it's trying to be.  I think there's a great deal of pressure to include the most well-loved parts of the books, or to somehow summarize the books, and what results is what our friends at TV Tropes call 'mood whiplash'.  One moment there are massive car wrecks and spells flying left and right, the next we roll our eyes as the three teenaged stars turn up the romance/angst/drama level.   Furthermore, are we watching a children's movie about magical wizards, where heavy-handed acting is par for the course?  Or is this a very serious Issue Movie, as the constant barrage of Nazi symbolism seems to be trying to pound into our heads?  Even at a 146 minute runtime there isn't room for it to be all of these things at once.

But do note that when it succeeds, it succeeds.  Helena Bonham-Carter finally proves that her Bellatrix Lestrange is not just a 'wacky' gothed-out cartoon but a seriously deranged and actually frightening nemesis.  The movie's climax is just as emotionally hard-hitting as it should be.  The characters do sometimes break out of their cardboard packaging and show some real humanity.  The action sequences are a visual delight, and the expansive wide-angle shots of the gorgeous British landscapes through which our heroes travel in search of the Horcruxes.  So even if Hallows may not hold up under a detailed analysis, it is an enjoyable experience from within the moment of its viewing, and did an excellent job of getting me antsy for Part 2.

#29 - Dog Sweat

Today we travel to smoggy Tehran, Iran, where director Hossein Keshavarz covertly filmed without a license in order to place Dog Sweat in front of its true backdrop.  The film follows five stories which connect at various points: a singer who sneaks out of her house to illegally record pop music, a gay man facing the pressures of a hostile and prejudiced environment, a girl carrying out an affair with her cousin's husband, a young couple trying to escape the boredom of their regimented lifestyle, and a young man - with a craving for the bootleg liquor that gives the film its title - who is finding himself increasingly frustrated at the Iranian government's inability to keep its citizens from falling through the cracks.

We seem to have a theme this week: Dog Sweat, like Let the Right One In, is a film about what happens to the people who don't fit into their society's mold.  Without the supernatural elements of Let the Right One In, Dog Sweat is real in such a way that it is brutal.  It is quiet, not flashy, filmed almost like a home movie, rarely overt and as such doesn't call attention to itself, leaving room for its scathing commentary on the Iranian situation.  It isn't really a politically charged film and in fact tends to leave viewers to make their own conclusions, which I appreciated.

Its simplistic style doesn't always work in its favor; certain scenes seem randomly inserted and unnecessary - perhaps Keshavarz was simply going for verisimilitude, but real life doesn't always make good cinema.  I am still trying to decide whether the fact that I constantly fluctuated between sympathizing with and disliking its characters was a good point (neutrality) or a bad point (not always fleshing out the characters enough to make them understandable).  I am certain though that the film's silence - there's rarely any music or background sound except when very specifically relevant to the plot - was intended to be jarring, so even though at times Dog Sweat is hard to watch, I wouldn't call this a criticism.  It's something I wouldn't watch again; it's far too emotional, but it definitely drew me into its world and made me think about the complicated issues it portrays.

#28 - Let the Right One In (Låt den rätte komma in)

Let the Right One In is the story of Oskar, a young misfit living in a town in Sweden who is driven by bullying to thoughts of revenge.  Oskar finally finds meaning in his life when he is befriended by Eli, a young girl who also happens to be the vampire whose lust for blood is behind the town's recent spate of bizarre murders.  Together, the two of them try to navigate a confusing and lonely world ravaged by the forces of love and death.

Let the Right One In is a quietly intense film, with a narrow enough scope to allow us to go deep into its complex issues.  It is shot largely in darkness, with few bright colors, echoing the bleak solitude of its characters and setting.  And yet every frame is gorgeous and perfectly aligned - it is the kind of film that truly justifies the existence of cameras.  While violent, it is never gory or gratuitous; while suspenseful, it does not aim to be frightening.  Its supernatural elements belie the film's true center, which is the connection forged between two of the people that the rest of the world forgot.

#27: Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb

In the height of the Cold War, tensions run high and eventually something snaps.  Deeply unstable General Jack D. Ripper gives the order to the US Air Force to drop the hydrogen bomb on Russian targets, setting off a frenzied chain of events as both the United States and the USSR realize the horror of their impending doom through mutually assured destruction.  Meanwhile, the intrepid crew of one B-52 aircraft, under the command of Major T.J. "King" Kong, head toward their target, determined to serve their country despite any setbacks.

Director Stanley Kubrick originally planned to create a serious, sober adaptation of the Cold War thriller novel Red Alert, but while putting together plans to make the film began to see through to the absurdity inherent in the nuclear scare, and instead created the bizarre, off-the-wall satire that is Dr. Strangelove.  Kubrick was living in England at the time, and the influence of British comedy shows through clearly, albeit dissolved somewhat in American cultural themes.  Dr. Strangelove - except for "King" Kong's perfect, climactic exit near the end of the film - is a movie without punchlines, just an ever-creeping horror that continually builds even as the credits roll.

Oh, and it's funny, too.  The acting (by Peter Sellers in three roles including the titular mad scientist, Slim Pickens as Major Kong the Texan, George C. Scott as General Buck Turgidson, and a myriad of other skilled actors playing characters with punnish names) is spot-on and just barely over-the-top, not ridiculous enough to go flat.  The script's inside jokes and one-liners are perfectly timed.  And somehow in showing the extent of the madness that results from Armageddon, Kubrick brings the end of the world down to a level where it can be ridiculed.

I imagine that as a member of Gen Y, and someone who hasn't watched a great deal of war movies, to some extent the jokes went over my head.  Dr. Strangelove does still work today as a comedy but only when observed from a historical context; while we still see this trigger-happy paranoia in the post-9/11 world, schoolchildren are no longer watching 'duck and cover' videos, Europe is no longer a foreign wilderness, and most people alive today don't remember World War II.  Yet Kubrick is an artist - and even at those moments when the tension goes slack (because we've all come out on the other end of the Cold War) this film can be enjoyed for the beauty of its shots, the use of light and shadow, and the way Kubrick and his actors work together to portray the darkest depths of the human psyche.

...No, really, this is a comedy, I promise!

#26: My Neighbor Totoro (Tonari no Totoro)

In mid-20th-century Japan, young sisters Satsuki and Mei Kusakabe, along with their professor father, move into a new house in the country near the hospital where their mother is recovering from a long-term illness.  The house has been uninhabited for years, and as Satsuki and Mei explore their new home and the surrounding forest and fields they discover that the area is inhabited by several woodland spirits.  My Neighbor Totoro follows the two girls as they settle in to their rural home and befriend the spirits of the forest.

My Neighbor Totoro was one of Hayao Miyazaki's first productions for Studio Ghibli, the start of a long and successful career in creating gorgeous animated films that explore the mythology of Japan.  Totoro is the epitome of this genre.  Its subtle and quiet form of storytelling lets the tale and its characters unfold slowly in front of our eyes, at times delving very deep into its emotional center and at other times utterly light and carefree.  The whimsical animation is a trip back to childhood, when the line between reality and imagination is arbitrary and unimportant, and the simplest things in the world are full of wonder and awe.

With that said, it does take a while to unfold, and will require patience on the part of adult viewers for about forty minutes of childlike antics before the real magic starts to happen.  It is definitely a story with a slow fuse, if you are willing to accept this.  My only real complaint is related to the English dub, which as far as these things go is almost entirely excellent.  It rejects the general trend of early anime dubs to stamp out all references to Japanese culture, preserving everything (names, locations, orthography, superstitions) except a couple instances of Buddhist prayer and referring to what I could easily see was mochi as 'cake'.  However the title and ending themes are abysmal - I cringed.  Otherwise this is yet another wonderful work of art from Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli.

#25 - The Soloist

LA Times columnist Steve Lopez (Robert Downey, Jr.) is looking for a new story to write when he chances upon a surprisingly talented street musician, Nathaniel Ayers, Jr. (Jamie Foxx), and discovers that Ayers is a brilliant multi-instrumentalist whose schizophrenia eventually caused him to drop out of Julliard and abandon a potential career to live on the streets.  What begins as a story for the paper soon leads to a close and unlikely friendship between the two men that changes the lives of both.

Sigh.  Here's another film about a privileged white* person's deep and important emotional journey as he plays the father figure and helps out all the poor homeless people.  The film is based on the real Lopez's book about this relationship, with all the egotism that one might expect from someone who would use the life stories of the less fortunate to propel himself to fame.  The Soloist is frequently unbelievable and almost entirely cringeworthy (and the 'comic relief' provided by scatological humor doesn't help).  It would have still irked me a little with its tendency to put Ayers and the other street people of Los Angeles in the position of the other and the naive child, but a film about Lopez coming down from his pedestal a little and realizing that offering endless handouts to his favorite homeless person for being so, I don't know, noble or whatever, is nothing short of insulting might have been a bit more forgivable.  Unfortunately this isn't it, and Lopez walks away a hero.

At least The Soloist does know what it has going for it.  For one thing, it is gorgeously filmed, with evocative use of light and shadow, echoing the contrast between the worlds of Lopez and Ayers.  For another, Downey manages to find the heart of the role of Lopez, and if nothing else this is an interesting character study of someone who tries to change the world in order to escape from his own personal problems.  Then when Lopez and Ayers attend a rehearsal of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the scenery fades to a display of color and light and the music takes center stage.  Maybe it should have from the start.  Maybe this should have told the story of a gifted, yet troubled man trying to keep his dignity and express himself through music**.  But again.  Not this film.

*Wikipedia tells me that Lopez is "the son of Spanish and Italian immigrants", but in the film, the surname is the only indication of this.
**Which would make this an oddly themed week of movie-watching for yours truly.

#24 - The Devil and Daniel Johnston

The Devil and Daniel Johnston tells the story of the titular Daniel Johnston - music's eternal outsider - as he ascends to (niche) fame and descends into a spiral of mania, Christian fanaticism, and mental breakdowns, constantly producing reams of drawings and stacks of cassette tapes of music.  Johnston himself, though he is still alive and (relatively) well, is elusive and at times opaque, and so the story is told through the words of family and friends, over the soundtrack of his musical recordings, which are simple and yet haunting.

Though the film gets off to a rocky start by describing Johnston's fairly unremarkable childhood, the story quickly picks up to the point where it would be impossible to create something uninteresting about this man.  Johnston - and his illness - is fairly presented: he seems at times to be the mythical figure, the childlike mad genius in his world of delusions, unreachable and prone to outbursts, but always cutting through the mystique is Johnston's sardonic self-awareness.  There is a great story here, and the production team were successful in finding the right people to tell it and to bring it out, and in showing us, gently, the strange and at times wonderful contents of Johnston's teeming mind.

And yet I wonder - if this story is so perfectly cinematic, why didn't anyone think to make cinema out of it?  When so many scenes, excellently articulated, would be fantastic to see acted out by a talented cast, this documentary's choice of sort of 'reenactments' (where we inhabit a camera as it supposedly follows Johnston's footsteps into the settings of the film's events) not only fall flat but seem almost disrespectful to Johnston's life in their sensationalism.  But if the team weren't going to find actors to actually bring these scenes to life, it should have remained as it was without the reenactment scenes: a collection of interviews (and tape recordings and archival footage) that present reality as it actually was, not as a lurid tabloid fantasy.  And at the times when The Devil and Daniel Johnston sticks to reality, it is solid and painfully, gorgeously true.

#23: Blade Runner

Important note for those who are keeping score: we watched the Final Cut edition.  (And based on what I hear about the other editions, I am very glad we did.)

In the metropolitan labyrinth of 2019 Los Angeles, 'blade runner' Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford) hunts down genetically-engineered humanoids - 'replicants' who have broken free from off-world labor colonies and run loose in the streets where their supreme intelligence and physical abilities make them highly dangerous to the human race they rebel against.  Deckard's mission: to recognize them and take them down.  And yet, that pervasive ethical dilemma...

Director Ridley Scott achieves a sort of nirvana for the top elite here.  In an almost MacGuyver-esque turn, he takes a very tired and overdone concept with heavy-hanging morals, a clumsily unsubtle script, and a cast who can't seem to muster up the energy to care about their characters...and not only manages to spin them into a tapestry of gorgeous-and-painful-and-painfully-gorgeous images and almost impenetrable layers of meaning, but also to use them to his advantage in setting the film's dystopian tone.  Blade Runner plays out like a dream, with disorienting cuts and surreal, kaleidoscopic imagery.

We couldn't stop talking about it afterward.  In this cut particularly, Scott leaves several important questions left hanging.  The answers are all buried somewhere in the film, but there are more answers than there are questions.  A narrative that appears to be straightforward can be reanalyzed and restructured to give each scene new context and meaning.  And at the same time, the expansive and dizzying futuristic cityscapes and high-octane action scenes are also a visual delight, so I can turn my inner academic off and yes, still enjoy the ride.

#22 - Kung Pow!: Enter the Fist

Steve Oedekerk's Kung Pow! is something of an experimental comedy.  The premise: a parody of kung fu action movies.  The gimmick: splicing together shots from Hong Kong martial arts film Tiger and Crane Fist with original footage, sometimes using greenscreen to bridge the gap.  The story: fairly simple - a young man, Chosen One, seeks to avenge the murder of his parents by members of the mysterious Evil Council in hand-to-hand combat.

My friends and I put on this movie because we had remembered it being uproariously funny.  We are fairly sure now that the reason we remembered it that way is because the last time we saw it, we were twelve.  A fairly intriguing concept crumbles in Oedekerk's hands.  The humor consists of a series of sophomoric gross-out gags, and even the few shining moments in this rotten script are dragged out until they no longer induce laughter.  This is the pitfall of allowing one individual to take on the roles of writer, director, and lead actor.  (Unless you're Tommy Wiseau and the result is unintentionally funny.)

Moreover, Oedekerk's treatment of the Tiger and Crane Fist footage lacks true heart, the ingredient necessary to bring a parody beyond mocking and into the realm of enjoyable entertainment.  In order to make this concept work, we need to understand why it is that kung fu films, in all their over-the-top splendor, are nonetheless captivating.  Had it been the center of gravity of the film, we could have then gotten the chance to laugh at its overindulgence and melodrama while simultaneously enjoying its exuberance.  Choosing instead to deface the footage with scatological humor and slapstick renders it irrelevant: this would have been the same film had Oedekerk used 100% original footage, and it would have been similarly dull.

#21: Borat

In which Sacha Baron Cohen introduces America to his alter ego Borat Sagdiyev, a television reporter from a small town in rural Kazakhstan.  To learn about American culture, Borat and his producer Azamat Bagatov travel to New York City, where Borat falls in love with CJ, the beautiful blonde... er... character played by Pamela Anderson on Baywatch.  While Borat pursues Pam Anderson across the country, Cohen plays Borat's 'foreign' quirks off against the bizarre undercurrents of American society.

Probably the best way to view Borat, if like me you tend to be a fairly sensitive and caring individual, is to remember that every single event that occurred in the movie occurred in front of a camera and was as likely to have been staged as any other.  (And most of the 'Kazakh' is actually Hebrew, with a little Polish thrown in every once in a while.)  With that out of the way, one can allow oneself to collapse with laughter at Borat's hilariously crude antics and the terrifyingly bigoted statements he manages to bring forth from the Americans he meets without even trying. Because none of it is real, right?

No, it's true - Borat is uncomfortable and exploitative at several moments, and sometimes ditches its explorations of the darker side of American culture for slapstick gags and gross-out humor.  But what I took away from Borat is that it is viewable on three levels.  First there is 'reality': Cohen's disturbing exposé on American bigotry.  Second, as I mentioned before, in the mental realm where none of it is 'really' 'real', there is the slapstick comedy, with gags and shenanigans and a great deal of sex jokes.  Third... if you're really willing to go the extra mile with suspension of disbelief and take the film at face value, Cohen has ultimately created a film with a coherent storyline, in which the small-town reporter learns some valuable lessons about friendship, kindness, and the meaning of real love.  It's actually almost heartwarming.

#20 - The Songcatcher

Denied her full professorship by the machinations of academic bureaucracy, musicologist Lily Penleric is at a loss for what to do with herself.  While staying with her sister Eleanor in her school in a small Appalachian town, Lily discovers that the British folk ballads she studied in her classroom are alive and well, carried down from generation to generation among the mountain people.  And thus she begins a project to collect and record the music of the mountains.

I had been wanting to see The Songcatcher for quite a while after listening to the soundtrack over and over, despite being annoyed with some of the country-fied versions of the ballads recorded by Dolly Parton and her ilk.  I was pleased to discover that none of those versions were actually in the movie.  Instead, the music that can be heard on the soundtrack is the real deal, with all the raw emotion of music that exists to bring hope and life to the people who make it.

The Songcatcher doesn't take a completely traditional approach to storytelling.  Many of the plot's loose ends are left open.  Sometimes I was left wondering when I would get closure.  Other times, I felt like what I was seeing on screen was...life.  While a large portion of the dialogue, plot points, and characters feel hollow and cliché, this film is infused with the same love of traditional music that drove me to watch it in the first place.  And with performances like Janet McTeer's as Lily and Aidan Quinn's as Tom, the mountain musician who eventually becomes her lover, a few of these stereotypes burst into life, with magnificent depth that almost manages to match the stunning glory of the Appalachian landscape and of course, the music that fills it.

#19 - Inception

Dominic Cobb (Leonardo diCaprio) sees a lot more action than your average white-collar criminal.  Why?  Because the setting for his thefts is the subconscious, where everyone's secrets may be laid bare.  Trouble is, no matter whose dream Cobb is breaking into, his own deep dark secret - a dangerous lost love - keeps getting in the way.  When Cobb's team takes the biggest assignment of their lives, their new architect (Ariadne, played by Ellen Page), in charge of designing the layout of the dream, may endanger the job with her curiosity - or perhaps she'll save Cobb from himself after all.

Everything you've been told about Inception is wrong.  Okay, not everything - I'm just being a bit overdramatic - but this film keeps getting billed as a mind bending psychological thriller.  It's not.  It's an action movie.  It's an action movie with a gorgeous, indulgent backdrop of expansive dream-scapes, made tangible partially due to director Christopher Nolan's preference for real sets over CG.  An action movie with a cast good enough to instill a lifeless script full of stock characters with real depth.  An action movie rich in imagery, with carefully designed lighting and color palettes.  Its strength is that it believes in itself, in its own complete fantasy of a premise, with the gravitas required for the audience to suspend disbelief.

...Well, sort of.  Because Inception dreams are not like your dreams or mine.  They are lush, on a larger-than-life scale.  They have more or less complete internal coherency, interrupted only by big stuff - explosions, freight trains, entire armies.  What happened to the dreams I know, where individual identities shift and reform?  And why does everyone's secret always appear in a really obvious place?  (There may be an explanation for this one in-movie.  Maybe.)  In-movie, the further you go into someone's subconscious, into dreams within dreams, the larger amount of time passes within the dream.  This completely falls apart when you realize that dreams actually only seem to involve a large time scale because the dreamer fill in the gaps in the dream.  Well, okay, you say, maybe that's just not how dreams work in this universe - but unfortunately, they do, because one of Cobb's tricks for determining whether he's in a dream is trying to remember how he got to where he currently is.  An actual knowledge of dreams completely shatters the plot and the premise of this film.  Enjoyment will hinge on how much you can sit back, ignore reality, allow for the probably 30 minutes' worth of unnecessary action sequences, and just enjoy the fun story and the big shiny scenery.

#18 - A Knight's Tale

William Thatcher has always dreamed of being a knight.  After he wins his first tournament in place of his dead master, he decides, along with buddies Roland and Wat, to train and become a professional jouster.  He is soon joined by Kate, the blacksmith who forges his armor, and this guy named Geoff Chaucer who likes to write or something.  Of course, even with all of William's skills and determination, it won't be easy.  First there's the matter of his parentage.  Then there's his rival.  Oh, and then he falls in love.

So A Knight's Tale is pretty formulaic, and totally simplistic.  William is brave and honest and made of the pure essence of goodness.  Roland and Wat are goofy.  Kate is witty and defiant.  Jocelyn (the love interest) is beautiful and madly in love with William.  Adhemar (the rival) is pure evil.  I could have predicted the plot events of the movie blindfolded with one hand tied behind my back.  Director Brian Helgeland had a little bit of fun by introducing anachronisms - modern music, modern fashion, modern dancing, 21st century humor - which sometimes make sense within the framework of the film (mainly the use of Thin Lizzy's "The Boys are Back in Town"), but often fall completely flat.

So thank god for Paul Bettany.  I would watch this film again and again just to see his performance as Geoffrey Chaucer.  While the film does decide to mostly ignore Chaucer's reputation as a huge pervert and focus instead on him as an arrogant, brilliant, passionate artist, who is also plagued by a gambling problem, and maybe even, in Bettany's capable hands, has some kind of loneliness inside him that is gradually eroded by the company of William, Roland, Wat, and Kate.  There are also some incredible moments toward the end of the film where by sheer force of acting, the magic feels almost real.  So often, the difference between a good film and a bad film is the cast.  This usually goes in the direction of a great script being ruined by heavy-handed acting.  Thankfully, A Knight's Tale is the opposite - what would have been a silly, childish rehashing of a well-worn formula instead becomes, well, I wouldn't call it a work of art per se, but whatever it is, I like it.

#17: Iron Man

Because I did promise this would be all the movies I saw in 2010, we have now run into the rather unusual situation of having a writeup on the original posted after the writeup on the sequel.  But well, sometimes that's just how it goes.

Tony Stark (Robert Downey, Jr.) is the world's foremost weapons developer, known as much for his caustic personality and hedonistic lifestyle as his technological genius.  But a stay in Afghanistan, held captive by the mysterious Ten Rings cabal, will change all that, as Tony gets to see the destruction his inventions cause firsthand, and decides instead to focus his energy on a new project: Iron Man.  Unfortunately, Tony's business partner Obadiah Stane (Jeff Bridges) is none too fond of the new direction of the Stark Corporation...

Iron Man is a movie without a dull moment.  From the beginning scenes of torture in a remote Afghan prison to the final battle as Tony's life ticks away inside his Iron Man suit, the film is constantly tense, keeping the adrenaline flowing.  The banter between Tony and (pick your favorite) his best friend "Rhodey" Rhodes (Terrence Howard) and assistant/secret crush "Pepper" Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow) provide comic relief, and the antics of Tony's adorable crew of robots also stand between the audience and cardiac arrest at certain points.  As a film adaption of a comic series, Jon Favreau's Iron Man does not disappoint: he superpowers are super, the characters are larger-than-life, and the explosions are Trinity-level at least.

Of course, on the other hand, maybe you're like me and you didn't grow up reading the Iron Man comics.  Iron Man runs into some problems trying desperately to please the Marvel fanboys and girls (and 'hint' in giant neon letters at a forthcoming sequel/franchise), shoehorning in references wherever available.  For instance, it's obvious that the "Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division" initializes to SHIELD, but the film drags it out just for the final payoff when we hear it.  A payoff that means nothing to non-Marvel geeks.  There are several moments during the film where I felt this way.  If Favreau had focused instead on just making a solid movie, not trying to please everyone, this would go from a really fantastic movie to—pretty much perfect.  For now, though, your author clearly liked it well enough to watch it a third time, so that should tell you something.

#16: Iron Man 2

As 2008's Iron Man concludes, millionaire genius brat Tony Stark has just confirmed to the general public that he is the man in the super-powered Iron Man suit.  Now as expected, everything is blowing up in his face.  The United States military wants to get its hands on as powerful as weapon as Iron Man.  And then there's the matter of Ivan Vanko, who aims to avenge his father's untimely ejection from his place as Tony's father's partner in business and invention.

If you like action movies, race cars, explosions, huge weapons, robots, and/or cockatiels (and your humble author enjoys all of the above from time to time), Iron Man 2 delivers.  If something isn't being turned into a gigantic fireball or Scarlet Johansson isn't roundhouse kicking someone in the head onscreen, you can also bet that Robert Downey, Jr. is getting in some scathing wit onscreen as Tony Stark, vying with Sam Rockwell's Justin Hammer to see who can be more obnoxious, or engaging in some delicious sexual tension with Gwyneth Paltrow's "Pepper" Potts, Stark's...well, she used to be his assistant but she gets a big promotion in this sequel.  An entertaining cast of comic characters is exquisitely translated to the screen in a thoroughly enjoyable summer movie.

The first Iron Man definitely had your author biting her nails on many an occasion, while Stark is tortured in Afghanistan and then later when he fights to survive as he battles Obadiah Stane in matching iron suits.  This sequel is a little bit more predictable; never did I feel a twinge of heartstring-tugging uncertainty as to Stark's fate (and yes, I know the good guys always have to win even in the first one), even when plot contrivances such as Stark's rising level of blood toxicity attempted to make me nervous. Stark's solution to this problem, as well as his victory over Vanko, just seems too easy - and as for the latter, while I was very pleased by Vanko's character depth and highly legitimate reason for trying to defeat Tony Stark, I felt like the resolution of his arc was rushed and underwhelming.  However, it's a summer superhero sequel, and a good one at that, so what can you really expect?

#15 - Pirate Radio (The Boat That Rocked)

In 1966, a year when the British Invasion is exploding onto the foreground of the musical world, there is still not a single British radio station devoted to playing rock music.  Not an official one, that is.  Pirate radio ships, anchored in Britain's ports, broadcast the newest sounds all day and all night, and at their head is a boat called Radio Rock.  Radio Rock becomes the new home of Carl, a young man kicked out of school and lacking in purpose.  While a few devoted cabinet members pull all the strings to make pirate radio illegal, Carl becomes a part of the Radio Rock family, a crew of motley characters devoted to each other and of course, to the music.

As my roommate and I discussed beforehand, if I somehow didn't fall in love with the movie itself - a British rock'n'roll film about the 1960s directed by Love Actually's Richard Curtis - I could just close my eyes and enjoy the soundtrack.  Which was true enough, but there was nothing to worry about.  The music hits immediately and so does the joy.  This movie is full of love, love for life and music and fighting the power and humanity.  While there is no one defining, clear storyline, the events that transpire are nonetheless hilarious, emotional, and fun.  Sheer fun, that's what Pirate Radio is: it's irreverent and a little bit lewd and completely over-the-top.  But I think it represents the absolute truth of the way it feels to discover music for the first time and to fall in love.

I have no criticisms, no complaints.  I realize this is quite unusual.  I realize this review is rather unprofessional.  This isn't the greatest film anyone has ever made, it's just really, really good and a really good time.  The characters are instantly lovable, their struggles and their passions recognizable and real, their relationships perfectly crafted.  There are moments where I was literally on the edge of my seat, and other moments where I was doubled over laughing.  Pirate Radio is energetic, inspirational, exuberant.  Go see it now.

#14 - The Maltese Falcon

I always have trouble summarizing movies that rely entirely on suspense without spoiling anything.  If I were to go beyond, say, the first ten minutes, I would reveal major plot points.  So I'll say this: The Maltese Falcon is perhaps the first example of film noir.  Its story begins when a client comes to see private eye Sam Spade about the man her sister has run off with.  But Sam quickly finds himself tangled up in something much larger - the dark world of assassins and international crime.

I was expecting to have to suspend disbelief whenever The Maltese Falcon showed its age, but ended up doing nothing of the sort.  After 69 years, this movie is still completely fresh (if you can brush aside the era's characteristic misogyny, though this one does make a few strides in a positive direction) and kept me on the edge of my seat all the way through.  There is a perfect balance of information known to the viewer and cards in the hands of the characters.  Bogart's Spade isn't necessarily a likable man, more of the antihero, but you don't even need to like him, because the intrigue is sufficiently intriguing that you'll hope he figures everything out just so we can get all the answers.

The cinematography is subtle and exquisite, and the acting is right on target.  The characters are absolutely archetypes, but I found myself loving that they were archetypes, that the cast embodied these stock characters through and through and infused them with life and energy.  The screenplay is well-paced, comical just when the audience needs relief, and intelligent enough at times that it left me with plenty to think about after it was over.

#13 - Crossing the Bridge

When Einstürzende Neubauten's Alex Hacke first traveled to Istanbul and heard its sound, he knew he couldn't stay away forever.  Along with director Fatih Akın, Hacke makes his return, traveling around the city and its surrounding towns with recording equipment, delving deep into the rich world of Turkish music, young and old, rich and poor, rap and rock and folk dances.  From a teenage gypsy band to an 82-year-old singer and everywhere in between, Hacke and Akın let us hear the voice of the city.

From the very beginning of Crossing the Bridge, we are thrust immediately into the teeming world of Istanbul.  This film is in your face, it is loud and raucous and doesn't apologize.  We travel with Hacke and Akın on a boat across the Bosporus, into a tiny recording studio in the basement of a tattoo parlor, and into Istanbul's slums and minority neighborhoods.  The first thing we are faced with is sensory overload.  Sound that reverberates in one's rib cage.  A dizzying panoply of sights.  Akın shows incredible skill both when focusing on tiny details - the lettering on a set list, the strings of a dulcimer - and sweeping cityscapes.  But Crossing the Bridge is also, at times, tender.  It's about the love the artists of Istanbul have for what they do, their song and dance and culture.  Akın's take is that Turkish music is all about heritage, and we see this very clearly when footage of rock gods like Erkin Koray is interspersed with young musicians talking about how the music of their childhood inspired them.

I think what really sells Crossing the Bridge for me is that for Hacke, it's also a labor of love.  Rather than be the observer, rather than be the explorer documenting an unfamiliar and exotic culture, Hacke immerses himself in the music.  He plays his bass with the bands.  He shares his love of the music with them, and they with him.  And in doing that, Hacke lets us interact too, brings us in, makes us all insiders for a little while.  As Sertab Erener sings in a Turkish-infused Madonna cover as the credits roll, "music makes the people come together" - the message of unity and shared culture isn't trite or cloying but makes sense, because on screen we are seeing everyone brought together by music.  I walked out of the theater feeling electrified, and hoping someday I could visit (or come back to?) Istanbul myself and experience these sounds anew.

#12 - The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

So Dr. Parnassus has a gambling problem.  He just can't seem to stop making deals with the devil. First he won himself eternal life, then true love.  Except in order to achieve the latter, he had to make a bargain: the devil would get the doctor's daughter on her sixteenth birthday.  As the lovely young Valentina rapidly approaches that age, it seems like all hope is lost until a stranger stumbles upon Parnassus and his traveling show, a stranger with many secrets - and plans that may save Valentina after all.

Visually, this movie is a psychedelic trip.  The gimmick is that Parnassus, once he goes into a trance, can send people into a world of their own imagination, and as you might surmise, no matter how dull a person may seem, his or her imagination is generally a rich and dazzling place.  Also a very, very weird place.  Amidst all this phantasmagoria, there are madcap adventures aplenty and possibly also some philosophical questions about the nature of destiny and choice and the power of stories.  Possibly.

I say possibly because most of the time I was trying to figure out what was even going on.  There are a lot of interesting threads here, but director Terry Gilliam seems to have opted for handing us the work of tying the ends together and choosing to focus - at the expense of, you know, plot and characterization - on imagery.  The film's focus is confused, giving us no obvious lens or point of view through which to see the events.  We're instead left watching a group of insiders, people who always know exactly or near exactly what is going on and are not telling us.  They are dressed in beautiful glitzy clothing and they draw us briefly into their imaginary world with expert performances and promises of magic.  And they take us somewhere, just not all the way there.

#11 - An Education

Jenny is an exceptionally bright schoolgirl in Cold War England. With her love of long novels, French records, and the Pre-Raphaelites, she feels as though no one understands her - until David comes into her life. A man in his thirties, David loves the arts and society and offers Jenny a chance to discover the parts of the world she always expected were out there. But things are not always what they seem, and nothing comes for free.

An Education is a somewhat formulaic film. I've seen this story before - young woman has to choose between intellectual passions and romantic ones - and of course David is just the sort of rebellious choice of men that would appeal to a young girl in a society that abhors rebellion. I think An Education goes a bit further than other movies have into the implications of its events - it asks some questions and purposely doesn't give answers about the role of women in society and the attitudes and ideals of British culture (which have probably changed since the 1960s but probably not entirely, because I see the echoes of a lot of these questions in my own, American, culture).

There isn't a lot of chemistry between Jenny and David - but I really want to give An Education the benefit of the doubt here. The attraction between them is not personal, it's not about who they are as individuals and more about what they represent to each other. However, I think if he had just been a tiny bit more physically attractive, I would have felt more involved in the relationship. I had issues with most of the other characters too; in a lot of cases, they were stereotypes or at least archetypes. The magical moments in this movie - and it does have its magical moments - occur when they step out of their thickly drawn boundaries and reveal unexpected sides to their personality. Which didn't happen quite often enough.

#10 - The Breakfast Club

The Breakfast Club tells the story of an unlikely group of five high school students, brought together by the fact that they are all to spend a Saturday in detention.  The teacher in charge expects them to sit still at their desks and write papers - not likely.


(I can't do an entire paragraph for the plot.  That is the whole plot.)


The movie starts off with a bit of physical comedy and then descends into a series of non-sequiturs.  Director John Hughes seems to want to take us into the minds of the kids who we think we know inside and out: the popular girl, the jock, the nerd, the ne'er-do-well, the weird kid who doesn't talk to anyone.  Unfortunately what we find there is emptiness.  


I think the largest criticism I've leveled so far - that the sequence of events is haphazard and nonsensical - could also be said about Empire Records, a movie I really liked.  But the difference between Empire Records and The Breakfast Club is that in the latter, the characters don't care about anything.  Or want to be anything.  It's suggested in the end that they care about at least each other, which certainly surprised me after they spent the entire eight hours of their confinement bullying and intimidating each other.  In fact, (and I'll be deliberately vague to avoid spoiling anything) a 'romance' emerges after a male character basically sexually harasses a female character until she breaks.  Gotta love it.  I found nothing to sympathize with in any of these five miserable people, and I think that while the actors did the best work they could manage, they didn't have a lot to work with.

#9 - Sherlock Holmes

Guy Ritchie's vision of the world of Sherlock Holmes is perhaps a bit different from what you're accustomed to.  In this seedy Victorian London, Holmes (Robert Downey, Jr.) and Watson (Jude Law) are not just brainy professionals, they are also action heroes, fighting with fists, pistols, and even swords to solve the mystery of how cult leader Lord Blackwood (Mark Strong) could come back from the grave - and they must do it before he uses his powers to take over all of London.  At the same time, Ritchie explores the complex dynamics of the relationship between the doctor and the detective, and the women in their lives.

Like Holmes's detective method, the key to Sherlock Holmes is in paying attention to the details.  The intricacy of the sets, which will take you into some of the most gorgeous rooms imaginable.  The soundtrack, featuring some fiddling that almost made me want to jump out of my seat and dance - I walked out of the theater humming the theme.  The little moments of brilliant acting between Downey and Law where facial expressions communicate everything (yes, anyone looking out for slash potential will be thoroughly pleased).

This was my second viewing of this movie (I'm starting to sound like a broken record here, aren't I?) and I loved it no less upon re-evaluation.  No, it's not an intellectual thriller, it's just a ridiculously fun movie, with tight corsets, secret societies, almost-but-not-quite-gratuitously drawn out action sequences, and a bit of French dialogue here and there.  Though I'm not the best authority - I loved the stories when I was a kid but haven't read them in a while - my Arthur Conan Doyle-aficionado roommate confirms my suspicion that Ritchie has the characters down perfectly.  Even if I were to be charitable, I wouldn't say that this reads like a classic Holmes story: the scope is greatly expanded and the film emphasizes wit and a bit of situational humor.  So if that's what you're expecting, this is probably not the best choice of film.  If you want a movie that is slightly violent, tastefully sexy, suspenseful but not scary, and definitely not taking itself too seriously to delight in its own extravagance - then, best choice - yes!

#8 - Ferris Bueller's Day Off

High school senior Ferris Bueller knows he's pushing it by his 9th "sick day" absence from school, so he's determined to make this one last.  With his best friend Cameron and his girlfriend Sloane he takes a whirlwind tour of the best things about Chicago, meanwhile trying to escape the clutches of his suspicious principal and vengeful older sister Jeanie.  

I was poised to hate Ferris Bueller.  At the beginning I saw things from Jeanie's perspective.  Why should somebody get to break the rules without consequences?  And moreover, why should this be the film's protagonist?  Do we want to get inside this person's head?  Well, yes.  The real message behind this film is laid out heavily and directly, as Ferris breaks the fourth wall to tell us not to let life pass us by.  This isn't really about the benefits of skipping school and breaking rules.  It's about the dangers of not letting yourself be happy and enjoy the great things about the world.  Everyone who goes along with Ferris has the best day of their life, and director John Hughes lets us join in the fun.

The acting in this movie is something you could take or leave, except for Jeffrey Jones's fantastic performance as the neurotic principal Ed Rooney.  The sets and costumes are nothing special but if I weren't already in love with this city I certainly would be now.  The best things are the script and Hughes's knack for little moments of absurdity amongst what is mostly straightforward comedy.  Scenes to look out for: the series of phone calls that gets Sloane out of school - Cameron discovers Seurat at the Art Institute - Jeanie in the police department.

#7 - Alice in Wonderland

Some 10 years after the events of Disney's animated classic of the same name, our heroine is a young woman on the verge of being married off to a man she's just met, tormented by the idea that she may be a bit not right in the head.  Without the guidance of her late father, Alice Kingsley is a bit lost in Victorian society.  However, she soon finds herself returning to the world of her dreams (it shouldn't be too much of a spoiler to say But It Wasn't Really A Dream, Or Was It?) where much more is at stake than last time.

Alice in Wonderland is a movie with a lot of problems.  There are many potentially interesting threads of plot woven through the story, but none of them are brought to really satisfying conclusions.  The struggle for women's individuality in a conformist era is ostensibly a theme, but is dealt with in a way that comes across as trite and redundant - in both the realm of the 'real' world and in Alice's fantasy world.  Instead of personalities, the characters are given certain traits and mannerisms which are intended to define them.  Audiences are given no legitimate reasons to prefer the 'good' side to the 'evil' side - and while this could lead to a wonderful exploration of the dangers of polarized conflict, we're just told to accept that some people are 'better' than others and are worth fighting for even when nothing is at stake for us*.  Perhaps it's a good moral for an era of twisted morals - colonialism is even tied in and shown in a positive light, barf - but not so much when it comes to teaching children about ethics, respect, and critical thinking, and this is supposed to be a children's movie.

But enough about the plot!  The real reason to watch this film is the same as the reason why any Tim Burton film is worth watching: it is a visual treat.  The animated effects, the lush set, the costumes - oh, the costumes!  I saw it in 3D and I thought the use of 3D was very tasteful - it's rarely used to make things pop out and startle viewers, but rather it gives the images on screen depth and the same surreal feeling that I think Lewis Carroll's writing conveyed.  Which does remind me - this movie was basically just an orgy of Lewis Carroll worship (with, oddly, more than a small amount of Phillip Pullman tossed in) - references to Carroll's work were shoehorned in even where they felt awkward and unnecessary - but now I'm getting back to my complaints....

*I feel it's worth mentioning here that the original Alice in Wonderland shows no desire to condescend to viewers this way, and in fact concludes that Alice should trust no one but herself to be completely reliable.  Apparently the 19-year-old Alice has forgotten this message.

#6 - Milk

Milk (directed by Gus van Sant) tells the story of the career of the first openly gay man to hold public office in the United States.  Harvey Milk begins as a nervous, firmly closeted man in New York and ends the story as one of the gay rights movement's celebrated heroes.  Milk chronicles his life in bustling San Francisco, his personal relationships, and his constant battle against opposing forces that aren't afraid to fight dirty.

Again, Milk is a film I had already seen before 2010, but well worth a second viewing.  It's a beautifully crafted piece of work.  Sean Penn immerses himself one hundred percent in the title role.  There are moments of agony and moments of bliss so exquisite that I felt them all even in the comfort of my suburban living room.  As I watched Milk for the second time, I was kind of bothered by the way it plunges viewers who might be unfamiliar or uncomfortable with the subject matter directly and harshly into gay culture, but as the action progressed, I realized this might very well be intentional.  Milk doesn't ask you to love Harvey Milk right from the start, nor does it ask you to forgive him for his errors.  But I think it will inspire you by the end, no matter who you are and where you come from, unless you refuse to be anything but hostile.

Probably the second best thing about Milk (with the first being Sean Penn of course) is the fact that it's historically accurate.  When I first saw Milk someone told me that if I really wanted to know the story, I should watch the documentary The Times of Harvey Milk - guess what, it's the same story.  Every moment of joy and fear is made more potent by the fact that they were experienced by real people.  Milk proves that a story doesn't have to be embellished or exaggerated to be powerful.  Despite my own involvement with the LGBT rights movement I knew very little about the details of this story before I saw Milk.  And this one is a story that should be heard.

#5 - Casablanca

Casablanca
Casablanca is the story of a little café in 1941(?) Morocco, a country where everyone in is dying to get out and flee to then-neutral America for the promise of safety and opportunity.  After their bearers are murdered, two travel visas find their way - somewhat accidentally - into the hands of the café's owner, Rick.  And that wouldn't be a problem, except that the former love of Rick's life appears on the scene and suddenly there might be a reason for those visas to be used.


My roommate has been trying to get me to see this movie probably since the week we moved in.  Casablanca is a classic, and I understand why.  I think it's one of the few films that to me captured the feeling of what it is to be in love, and so in love that you're willing to do things that have no benefit for you because of it.  I loved the way the music was intricately woven throughout the storyline, which was far beyond just being a love story, but a tale of murder, corruption, and intrigue on the backdrop of World War II.  Not a new favorite, but definitely a good use of an evening.

#4 Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back

The Empire Strikes Back
So (again, if you live under a rock) the adventure continues, as Luke and his newfound friends (the smuggler Han Solo and his copilot Chewbacca, rebel leader Leia Organa, and the droids (aka robots) R2-D2 and C-3PO) keep fighting the good fight against the evil Empire.  The Empire Strikes Back is a story of love and loss and betrayal, taking its heroes even further into the remote parts of the galaxy far, far away...

This was my favorite film in the trilogy (shut up, Star Wars is a trilogy) when I was younger and an obsessed fan.  It's much less conventional than the first, and the developing relationships between the characters - ooh, that Han Solo is so dashing - are very enticing indeed.  Some of the more memorable characters from the franchise (Yoda, Lando Calrissian, and my first ever crush, Boba Fett - I kid you not) show up here for the first time, and we also get a sense that the war being fought is of a much larger scale than the first movie would have us believe.  So, exciting indeed.  Probably the best part about seeing this was that it was a first viewing for Michael, who is 2 years old and change.  Hearing a small child gleefully say "bye bye Lando!" when the Millenium Falcon leaves Cloud City pretty much made my day.

#3 - Star Wars

Star Wars
(aka Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope)
Well, what can I say about this movie that hasn't already been said?  If you are living under a rock and have not yet seen Star Wars...It is the story of a young farm boy named Luke Skywalker, who lives on a remote and barren planet with his aunt and uncle, having been orphaned at a young age.  He yearns for adventure but lives a life of tiresome routine.  That is, until he accidentally intercepts a message intended for his neighbor, Ben Kenobi, a man who has been trained (it is said) in the mystic arts of the Jedi Knights, and is thrust into a war that will determine the destiny of the entire galaxy, and which has much more to do with him than he could possibly guess.

Anyway, this is one of my favorite movies of all time, if not my favorite.  There is very little about it that I do not consider perfect.  The rich unfolding mythology and strange cast of characters that populate the 'galaxy far, far away'.  The perfection of every shot.  The moments of pain and wonder.  When Luke "has taken his first step into a larger world".  The epic soundtrack by John Williams.  The way that watching Star Wars, I always feel drawn into this world, feel as if I have become a part of it.

#2 - Julie & Julia

Julie & Julia
Look, a blog post about a movie about a blog!  How very novel!

Anyhow, Julie (Powell, Amy Adams) & Julia (Child, Meryl Streep) tells two parallel stories, each about a married woman, unsure what to do with her life, who decides to write about cooking.  One of them is in 2000's Queens, and the other is in 1950's Paris, writing the cookbook that will inspire the first to write a blog (which inspired the movie) about cooking all the recipes in it.  (Trippy, huh?)  Adams' Julie Powell is sweet on the surface but prone to histrionics, and Streep's Julia Child is smotheringly exuberant.  From beginning to end, I pretty much hated them both.

But that's okay, in a way.  Because their stories, if you can call them that - for this movie had nearly no plot, and only once (after about an hour and ten minutes) had me unsure about what would happen next - are merely furnishings.  Julie & Julia is a visual delight.  Many have said that the recipes are the true star of this film, and they would be close, but not quite on target.  They actually share the spotlight with the sets, the costumes, and the wonderful cinematography that made me want to be there, in New York, in Paris, in gorgeous kitchens and front rooms and restaurants.  And eating delicious French food, of course.

I think Meryl Streep has been unfairly praised for her performance.  In the middle of the movie, Julie and her husband watch a classic (and rather gruesome) Dan Akroyd skit that appears to be the source of Streep's Julia Child, rather than the real Julia.  Amy Adams I must praise simply because she is not the usual perky, childlike Amy Adams character, but that isn't saying much.  The best performance, in my opinion, was by a cute ginger cat.

There is also a hilarious scene involving lobsters that is not to be missed.

#1 - The Science of Sleep

The Science of Sleep


I had already seen this movie, but I wanted to show it to Sheila, because she loves Amélie, which reminded me of The Science of Sleep when I saw it.  Like everything Michel Gondry touches, The Science of Sleep is full of whimsical artistic touches, with animation that makes you gasp at how well it works and wonder why no one ever thought of it before.  Except I think Sleep was Gondry's baby, because the art, and the strange wonder of the process, and the strange magic of dreams are all tied together and threaded through the narrative.  At its heart, The Science of Sleep is a love story, but it takes place in a world where things don't always turn out okay - it isn't about happiness, it's about hope.

I liked watching it for a second time because it's such a rich and - well, I don't want to say cluttered world, but it's a visual assault at times of tiny details, and it opens itself up a little more with each viewing.  I love the almost-clumsy realness of the characters, I love seeing how friendships form and I get a little window into the lives of ordinary people with strange and wonderful inner landscapes.

Quick rundown of plot: this movie, which is in three languages (French, English, Spanish) is about a charming but staggeringly naïve young man named Stéphane Miroux (played by the cause-you-to-spontaneously-burst-into-flames-and-drop-dead sexy Gael García Bernal), who is returning to France to live with his mother after his Mexican father dies of cancer.  He loves to invent things and create art, and he is extremely fascinated by mental phenomena, by dreams and the connections between people.  Since childhood, he has had trouble distinguishing dreams from reality.  He meets Stéphanie (quiet and graceful Charlotte Gainsbourg), a fellow artist whose apartment is across the hall from his.  Unfortunately, nothing in Stéphane's life is simple, except his memories.