February 2012
19 posts
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#036: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011)
I wish I could have left more time before watching this after the original, but I think Fincher did an unsurprisingly good job. For a start, I thought a lot of the changes in the screenplay worked really well. I mean, I have no idea which is more faithful to the book - I’m going to guess the original - but I liked Daniel Craig’s Blomkvist more and the way the mystery was handled...
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#035: The Muppets
There was a fairly big part of me that feared disappointment with this one, but nah… it’s really everything most of the reviews have said. It maybe sags a little toward the end, but on the whole it’s super fun, super joyful and everything you could hope for from The Muppets. A lot of the music reeks of Flight of the Conchords, too, so that can only be a good thing.
...
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#034: Margin Call
I thought this was pretty great. For all I’ve learned from reading about it, watching Inside Job and listening to loads of This American Life episodes devoted to the matter, this was the first time I’ve seen the financial crisis presented with such spark and drama.
The screenplay is just fantastic. It’s tight, it’s tense, it’s full of character and dynamism,...
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#033: Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close
I think this was okay. The knock on it seems to be that it’s too schmaltzy and sweet for what it is but, to be honest, they were probably the qualities I liked most about it. The movie basically seems split between wanting to be an emotionally manipulative, heavy-handed crowd-pleaser and something more poetic and worthy, and the constant shift is where it struggles. The big emotional...
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#032: Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
I thought this was very good. Even after all the talk about how it was a more mature, considered thriller I was still taken aback by how slow it was, but it does work in its favour. Everything is really deliberate, the pace allows the performances to shine and it makes a nice change from other spy dramas you’ll see. I can’t say I was too emotionally invested in it, which is fairly...
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#031: Arthur Christmas
It probably doesn’t help that I was really tired and not exactly in the Christmas spirit when I watched this, but I didn’t really enjoy it very much. One of the things I remember hearing about it was how unique it was for not having a villain, but I didn’t think it had many likeable characters either. Usually good children’s movies make up for being predictable and...
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#030: Albert Nobbs
Considering “period drama in which Glenn Close disguises herself as a man to keep employment in 19th century Ireland” sounds as dull as it gets, I guess this was alright. It starts out nicely enough, much breezier than expected, but eventually the sadness of the story drowns everything else out and by the end I was kind of happy for it to be over. Not great, but elevated slightly by...
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#029: A Separation
I thought this was really good. I’d assumed it was going to be heavy tale about divorce in Iran but it’s actually a really fascinating, complex courtroom drama full of twists and moral quandaries. A part of me wonders whether the story would work as well were it an American or British film, whether it just seems better because it’s foreign and interesting, but I guess the...
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#028: Beginners
I guess this was okay. It’s obviously a very heartfelt movie about love and life and loss and overcoming obstacles, but it didn’t really manage to move me. There’s a quietness to it that evokes Sofia Coppola but it falls short in terms of emotional clarity and poignancy. It was interesting, yes, but not quite as affecting as I would have imagined.
Grade: ***
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#027: War Horse
It’s a tough one to judge, this. On one hand, it’s Spielberg and it comes with all the class you’d expect. The production is fantastic, from sets to score, and the story provides a palatable, enjoyable tapestry view of World War I. There’s an undeniable timeless quality to it. Having said that, however, on the other hand, it’s lead character is a bloody horse.
I...
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#026: A Dangerous Method
This was okay. There’s a lot of interesting talk for the psychoanalytically inclined - of which I am - and it’s all very well-performed and polished, but there’s not really much in way of story. It just kind of drifts along until the conversation abruptly stops with no real resolution or focus. And, y’know, that’s not necessarily the worst thing ever - I quite...
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#025: The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 1
I’m not going to say anything surprising about this. I stopped reading the first book shortly after starting because I couldn’t handle the writing and the movie dialogue doesn’t fare much better. Truly, some of it borders on self-parody and yet it’s completely lacking self-awareness. The only really fun part was seeing Kristen Stewart become an emaciated wreck. Those...
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#024: The Iron Lady
It’s pretty grim, this. A tale of tough times, reflecting today’s tough times, as told through the prism of a sad, haunted old woman. It’s not a bad movie or anything, and Streep is inevitably very good, but there’s not a lot in terms of new insight or entertainment. It’s a tidy little biopic, but it doesn’t manage to convey quite completely the weight of all...
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#023: The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest
Oh, I thought this was a bit of a damp squib, to be honest.
The first movie reminded me of Silence of the Lambs, the second one reminded me of a Prime Suspect and this one reminded me of an episode of Law & Order: UK or something. It’s actually kind of remarkable how, by this point in the trilogy, all the spark and atmosphere seems to be gone. Blomkvist spends the whole thing...
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#022: The Girl Who Played With Fire
Hmm. This was less good than the first movie. I still thought it was alright, but it kind of feels a bit less cinematic and a bit more like watching the first half of a Prime Suspect or some other TV crime miniseries. Also, because Lisbeth and Blomkvist are practically never on the screen together, everyone’s kind of isolated and it consequently becomes very plot-driven. A lot of the...
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#021: The Man From Earth
I thought this was alright. It’s the kind of movie I love in that it all takes place in one room and is completely dialogue driven, but I found it a little hard to get past the dodgy filmmaking. I mean, the idea and the discussion of it, on the whole, was really compelling and so I did enjoy the movie, but aesthetically it feels like it was made by someone who’s used to directing bad...
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#020: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
When everyone started raving about the original Danish version of The Killing, I decided I’d watch that before the American remake. What happened, though, was that before I’d gotten around to making the effort to get my hands on the Danish version, the American one started on TV and I thought, “oh, I’ll make do with this”. It was a big mistake. So although a big part of me was tempted to allow...
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#019: The Artist
Yeah, I thought this was pretty excellent. I did wonder whether the hype might hurt it, but where it surprised me was in how complete it all feels. It doesn’t feel like a novelty silent film at all. It has comedy, romance, drama and it’s all very emotionally potent as well as technically impressive.
It’s probably not my personal favourite of the year, but it’s probably...
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#018: Young Adult
I thought this was good - probably better than my grade suggests - but the thing is I just couldn’t enjoy it like the people around me seemed to. It was just too sad.
I remember calling Lars and the Real Girl “a modern age fairy tale for the damaged, not quite grown-up” and I love it for that. This is pretty much the opposite. Charlize Theron’s character is fucked up in...
January 2012
18 posts
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#017: Warrior
I thought this was pretty enjoyable. It’s really about as predictable as it gets - to the point where even a bare outline of what it’s about tells the whole story - but as a guy who grew up loving movies like Best of the Best and other martial arts tournament movies, it’s a fun return to a genre I once loved, set inside a sport I still do.
One thing that bugged me slightly as...
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#016: Moneyball
After I saw this the first time a friend asked about it and I said, after gushing a bit about I felt about it, that I thought it was “good, but probably not Oscar good”. But, y’know, now I’ve started watching some of the other Oscar crop, I may rethink that opinion. It really is a very tight, smartly written movie that offers both emotion and insight. And, true, I’m...
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#015: The Descendants
This was good. Of course it was. Best Picture nominee, Golden Globe winner… obviously there’s quality there. Yet I have to admit I’m finding myself slightly bored by the Oscar crop that is is popping up every year of which this movie is quite representative. There are so many movies like this; that drip with class and quality and yet never really move or affect me in any way....
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#014: Troll Hunter
This was pretty fun. There’s a lot about it that’s not particularly original - in fact, “foreign, first person, found footage” sounds like the blueprint for overhyped - but the whole premise of the trolls and the execution is cool enough to make it feel fresh despite that. It creates that sense of wonder, you know? And that feeling will trump anything I see in most modern...
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#013: The Help
Blargh! I guess because I was sick at the time and I’d already seen it I forgot to include this on the blog. And, y’know, if I were a sane person - not so anal, not so fastidious - I suppose I could have just let this go and not bother to include it a second time. After all, who needs to hear me talk about The Help once, let alone twice? But unfortunately that is not the case and now...
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#012: Paranormal Activity 3
I guess they would call it “building anticipation and/or suspense”, but as with Paranormal Activity 2, so long goes by without anything happening that I was utterly disconnected by the time everything starts to kick off. Too long goes into justifying the existence of the footage and not enough time goes into making me care about any of it. I think if I just turned off my power for...
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#011: The Ides of March
This was pretty good. The cool thing about Clooney as an actor is that he has a very old-school look and style to him, sometimes reminiscent of the likes of Cary Grant, and it’s a quality I think that has carried over to his directing too. The movie starts by scanning over newsreels, the movie ends on a very tight close-up; I watched it and thought, “this is like something from the...
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#010: Kill List
It’s a weird movie, this. There are a lot of positive things I could say about it in terms of the experience it offers. It’s tense, atmospheric, mysterious, jarringly violent and it keeps you off balance the whole time. But in terms of narrative it leaves you wanting in such a big way that it’s maybe the most frustrated I’ve been by a movie in a long time.
I...
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#009: Real Steel
When I first saw the trailer for this I thought it looked unbearably stupid, but it actually wasn’t so bad. Nothing about it is unfamiliar, you know how the whole thing is going to play out without even thinking, but it’s all very nice. And seeing as I watched it with my parents and we all kind of enjoyed it, I guess I can say definitively that it makes the grade as a family film....
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#008: Colombiana
Most of the time I’d choose the poster, but this image says so much more about what Colombiana is. It’s a sexy girl, with a fuckload of guns, often in her underwear. And, y’know, I won’t run it down completely, because essentially it’s a revenge thriller like 90% of revenge thrillers, but it lives well inside its limits and there’s nothing about it that...
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#007: My Week With Marilyn
I have to admit I found this pretty delightful. Movies like this, so very British and soft and charming, used to bug the hell out of me, but suddenly I find myself very into them. It’s all very small and human, even though it’s about one of the biggest stars the world has ever seen. And Michelle Williams is fantastic. I’ve seen her in so many things and yet for 90% of this...
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#006: Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of...
I didn’t hate this, but there’s nothing about it to especially recommend. There are good owls, some bad ones, they fight, it’s… whatever. I only watched it because I was curious about what a Zack Snyder children’s movie might look like, and what I find myself thinking now is that I’m getting a little bored of his visual style. So much slow-motion flying and...
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#005: The Philadelphia Story
It’s funny, seeing this movie again, how much of it is just Katherine Hepburn’s character being absolutely torn apart in a very cruel and personal manner on the eve of her wedding. The lesson and the message is a good one, and it’s a huge part of why I love the movie, but the frankness and insensitivity with which it’s delivered is insane. Still, I guess when Cary Grant...
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#004: The Hangover Part II
I don’t know. I said only a couple of posts ago that I wouldn’t be more discriminating about what I watch and generally I feel okay about that, but then I watch something like this and I feel like I have to make a change. I didn’t like the first movie, I didn’t care about watching this one, and yet somehow it felt like something I should see just because of its place in...
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#003: The Music Man
If you’d asked me halfway through how good I thought this was, I’d have said it was on its way to being my favourite musical, but sweet damn… why do so many musicals insist on being so infernally long? As charmed as I was by Robert Preston’s conman and Shirley Jones’ “sadder but wiser girl”, by the time the first two hours had passed I was fairly worn...
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#002: Anastasia
So yeah, if you thought by any chance a new year would mean I’d start being more discriminating about what I watch, you were obviously wrong. I saw the above image posted on someone’s Tumblr ages ago and I’ve wanted to see the movie ever since. That single line resonated loudly enough to sell it to me.
And y’know what? I actually thought it was pretty good. I mean,...
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#001: Love Actually
Y’know, my original idea for writing about this was to make a chart of my favourite story threads, but as I thought about it I realised I couldn’t decide which ones I liked best. Colin Firth and Aurelia, Hugh Grant and Martin McCutcheon, Liam Neeson and the boy, Emma Thompson and Alan Rickman, Bill Nighy shooting up the charts: who could decide? It’s a soft, easy, lovely watch...
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Final Score 2011
Another year, another failure to reach 365, but that’s okay. I didn’t go into the project this time with 365 as a goal. I’ve just rediscovered my love for watching movies in the past couple of years and I figure I’ll keep writing about them here until I get bored.
So here are 2011’s final numbers…
Movies watched: 256 Movies watched for the first time: 221...
December 2011
13 posts
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#256: About a Boy
“It was torture. For five minutes I realised what life would be like if I were, in any way, interesting. If I had anything to say for myself, if I did anything. But I didn’t do anything. And in about thirty seconds she’d know and she’d be gone like a shot”
I really do like this movie a lot. There’s so much I relate to in it. Trying to live your life as an...
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#255: The Lost World: Jurassic Park
Watching this one again made me really want to read the book again. I remember barely anything from it except that it’s really different and probably much better. Still, overhead shot of raptors running through the long grass? There’s cool stuff like that.
Also, since I last watched these movies I’ve become aware of some new dinosaur species that hadn’t been discovered...
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#254: Jurassic Park
I watched this last year but I looked back and I noticed I didn’t really write anything about it. Here are my Top 3 moments (with animated GIF’s!):
#3: Dilophosaurus
It goes from super cute to super terrifying in an instant, it looks amazing, the sound design is fantastic and Nedry’s a bastard who gets what he deserves. It’s plainly super awesome.
#2:...
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#253: Jackass 3.5
I woudn’t usually count a movie that I didn’t watch in one sitting, but with something like this I think it’s probably acceptable. I did it in three shifts. The first time it was my mum who put it on, the second time I think it was my dad and the third I just did to round it off and include it here. Anyway, I haven’t really watched any Jackass stuff since the first...
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#252: The Spiderwick Chronicles
I thought this was alright. I never really saw much in the way of advertising when it came out and I’ve never read the book(s), so I was kind of caught off-guard by the pace of it. For some reason I was expecting something slower, but it’s kind of like Labyrinth mixed with a dash of Assault on Precinct 13. With creatures that happily remind me of Critters.
I didn’t really...
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#251: Another Earth
Can you see that quote from The Hollywood Reporter on that poster? Bleeeuuurrrgh!
But anyway…
I was listening to the Nerdist podcast with J.J. Abrams earlier and they were talking about The Twilight Zone and clever sci-fi in general. This seems very much in touch with that kind of thing, albeit with a slightly more ethereal, arty, cinematic vibe. It was good. Inventive, smart,...
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#250: The Inbetweeners Movie
I really have no idea how someone who doesn’t watch the show would react to it, but as a fan I’d say it plays like a good extended episode. There’s nothing about it that will come as a surprise, but I laughed a lot and now I probably won’t think much about it again.
Frothy, lewd, silly fun.
Grade: ***
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#249: The Tree of Life
Yeah, this was very good. The bulk of the movie is about what I expected: beautiful, subtle, sad, truthful. But what surprised me most was the way in which the artier, more abstract interludes affected me. I think usually my response to scenes like that is a kind of disaffected, critical respect. In this case I honestly found myself quite moved. I mean, the whole thing’s a visual feast,...
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#248: Serendipity
Even though I pretty much hated this movie the first time I saw it, watching it again now I can see how I’ve seen it so many times since. Most rom-coms I like are defined by specific moments - most often big romantic speeches - and this has those, but around them everything’s so light and fluffy and breezy it all just buzzes by in a heartbeat. It’s dumb and it’s...
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#247: Hugo 3D
I have to admit I was a bit disappointed with this. I wasn’t a massive fan of the book and, because it’s about cinema, I thought there was a real chance this would be one of those rare occasions where the movie adaptation could be better than the book. Not so.
I’ll give Scorcese credit for making it look awesome - it’s maybe the first time I’ve felt 3D was being...
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#246: Hercules
I quite liked this actually. It’s not quite as smooth as most of Disney’s better efforts, but it’s funnier than most and, like I may have mentioned before (see: Percy Jackson…, Clash of the Titans), I do kinda dig seeing Greek mythology on screen. And in this case it brings a slightly more adult edge to the table. Attempted infanticide, heads being lopped off, an...
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#245: Gremlins
“While everybody else is opening their presents, they’re opening up their wrists.”
Oh, Gremlins. How delightfully dark you are.
Watching this again actually made me realise how seminal it this movie might have been in terms of my taste. Everything that’s good about it - from the smalltown nostalgia to the violence to the wicked sense of humour - represents...
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#244: The Station Agent
I’ve seen quite a few indie dramas this year that have felt lacking somehow. They have the tone right - they’re not flashy, they strive for realism, warmth, humour and poignancy in small moments - but they never seem to quite reach what they’re aiming for. This one did.
And, y’know, when I think of buddy movies I usually think of 80’s action comedies, but this...