La science des rêves (2006)

Director:

Michel Gondry (2007) From the director of "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind " another film that finds relationships stuck somewhere between reality and fiction. I find it "bolder" than "Eternal..." in terms of assuming a surrealist type of storytelling but somewhat of a lesser story. It seems that the director himself was a bit lost ...probably because this film is more personal than the other. [at least that`s my impression]. But still, it has a diary like feeling, that makes it charming and makes the character very loveable in his confusion .

This is England (2006)

Director:

Shane Meadows

Writer:

Shane Meadows

Release Date: 27 April 2007 (UK)

Some say that this is a skinhead film whatever that means...and reading some of these "skinhead theory" reviews I was obviously expecting raw violence, spilled blood etc. etc.

But this is actually a film about growing up in England when your father is dead in a war overseas that you cannot understand, about confused rebellious and frustrated young people, a weird combination of skinheads and hippies, people that don`t know what to believe in...it`s a film about truly living the words "who the f*** knows?".

But most of all, it`s the honest, moving story of a kid that goes through all these problems because he lives in England and...this IS England.

What I really liked is that you can feel that the story is told by someone who went through all that and I was not surprised to find out that the film is inspired from the director`s actual life.

It has the feeling of a story told in a circle of friends but still has the power to ask important questions and that is quite rare in films these days.

I definitely recommend this film.

Blood Diamond (2006)

People say 'Blood diamond' is a good movie and DiCaprio is a great actor. That may be true for them but I beg to disagree: I do not know who to blame for the movie so I will pick on just a few things like lDiCaprio. The movie is supposed to be close to others like Hotel Rwanda, Munich etc. capturing supposedly a tragic story of Sierra Leone. I usually get all emotional in front of such things even when badly made but this time all the questions I had in the first place about this type of theme gave me an unpleasant visceral reaction. Why are we making entertainment out of such things? It is almost as if the movie presents an extended version of the five o'clock violent news bulleting. It achieves exactly the same: we say 'poor people' and think 'why is this news?'. After all there is no news that people die and that we can be incredible cruel to each other. I have no idea what I am talking about but I see what we do without being in a war, even to people we call friends. I would like to see totally insane scenarios where diamonds do not matter to anyone and where people live in pace and harmony. That would be some news and I would run up to the first person on the street and I would slap them hard in the face just to see how they turn the other cheek and hug me in tears. I will then go off to make trouble to the establishment by hiding the salt at the table, the paper from the toilets and inject silicon in random faces to confuse the hell out of interpersonal communication. Until these fun times I will be doubtful of movies eliciting cheap emotional flow. DiCaprio. I do not know what I miss in this guy. Wait. I know. I do not 'believe' his manliness. It might be his voice but I really do not really believe he smokes. He is just ridiculous when he does the rough killer as kindergarten children planing a terrorist attack on some cherry tree in the neighborhood. His death manages to light a generous smirk if not a honest grin. He boldly claims without any relevant context 'I like to get kissed before I get fucked'. Does it ring any (better sounding) bell? I mean... Sonny (Al Pacino 1975) and Danny Archer (DiCaprio 2006) have exactly this line in common and there is nothing but a glaring confirmation of the two movies and actors' quality. I will add (to be fair) that DiCaprio did a good job in Catch Me If You Can (2002) and very good as Rimbaud in Total Eclipse (1995). Another ludicrous part: Amsterdam Vallon in Gangs of New York (2002). Is there a pattern? Take a look at the picture – is he to be taken seriously? I would not watch Blood Diamond again even if Djimon Hounsou makes a nice Solomon Vandy and even if I like Jennifer Connelly. As a girl. Which makes me think there is more potential in her that I could see so far.

Zwartboek (2006)

'Black Book' is the work of Paul Verhoeven and Gerard Soeteman. The word goes they worked for more then twenty years to what became a description of the essence of the Second World war in Holland. For example the main performer, Carice van Houten, builds a mixture of Anne Frank, Dora Paulsen, Kitty van der Have and Ans van Dijk. (for a review covering the historical aspect check here) The film reminds me of a discussion about realism: Dostoyevsky believed he was a ' higher realist' because he would try to get to the essence of the real and not necessarily describe everyday events. Here too the story is stylized and as if abstract but pressures successfully the reality it points to. The movie shows quality all over and the big budget could be part of the explanation. On the other hand, a big budget was never enough for a good movie and this one is good. Carice van Houten, Sebastian Koch, Thom Hoffman, Halina Reijn, Derek de Lint, Waldemar Kobus all do a clean job, the image is sparkling, the sound is crystal. The characters (like Ronnie) sometimes appear to be one sided and superficial but it looks as if they are pushed by the events to be depthless and they struggle in their own trimmed features. The movie is plot driven and that gives it a Hollywood scent but its structure reminds me more of David Lynch because of the heavy clarity; things appear to be going on at several levels all the time and the action springs from various depths creating a multi layered web that is both easy to follow and difficult to analyze. Nice.

The Pursuit of Happyness (2006)

It is not a bad movie. At least because Will Smith does a great Chris Gardner and the directors also has a lot to say with the images. Having the chance to watch some European movies lately I would say this film lacks depth in spite of Muccino's Italian origin. The acting creates the tension but the plot just solves everything in ridiculous ways such that at some point I had a feeling that nothing bad really happens. For example I learned after the movie that most of the homeless people were real, taken..well..of the streets. They actually made some money of this gig. I was more impressed by this fact than by the situations they were in the movie. I think here it is mostly the plot to blame because it is so focused on the central characters that the context is a distanced background. In this respect European movies seem to use more of a sfumato. PS: Will Smith's son is really his son, Jaden Smith

Casino Royale (2006)

I had low expectations before the movie so guess what...I liked it. I think it is one of the best Bond movies I've seen. It uses modern techniques and it is very dynamic. The story moves fast, there is plenty of tension right from the beginning, Eva Green (of The Dreamers)is simply bellissima; her falling in love scene almost made me reciprocate. Daniel Craig does a good job at being the new Bond, James Bond. It is interesting to see how (yet again) a 'really' strong man has a marshmallow core. But not too much; the character receives some humane features to be sure - see the shower scene...he might be J. Bond but he got the basic knowledge that in order to warm someone under the shower it just might be useful/helpfull to turn on the hot watter. Most of all I noticed the way the narrative focuses on the main character which directs our attention to what is important in the scene. There is something new about the types of cuts and the mixture of images Martin Campbell organized in Casino Royal. It may be that the lines were not that great, that some things could have been left for us to understand and this makes the whole movie based only on the dynamic; it does not matter what happens (I actually don't remember a lot of the story) but the way things move is well done and at least entertaining. I also have to mention the performances of Mads Mikkelsen as Le Chiffre and Judi Dench as M. In this context the bad guy was quite good moving from one extreme state to the other within a very restricted area, and M was the perfect mom/accomplished business woman/wise person/stern but kind and understanding. Yeap...it's a movie to share with friends.

300 (2006)

Too long, too explicit, far too easy. The story teller's voice is booming comenting what I can see or I should be able to see. These devices make less of a possible interesting plot. It is as if everything about people happens in public, in the open. There is no depth to it except maybe Xerses's generated and godly voice. Also 300 looks clearly like a post-Matrix movie: the battle scenes are all peppered with the fast-slow technique used in Matrix. It doesn't look that bad but it's been done to death and it doesn't show even an attempt to make it appriate for the context. It is copy-pasting like the structure of the plot. Overall...I did not like it.

The Devil's Den (2006)

This is probably a low budget movie and I would include it in the B/rented-VHS class - meaning movies you might watch with your friends to be with your friends and have some (gory) fun. For its class The Devil's Den is quite good: there are some collage segments, some acceptable self-ironic one liners, even some turns of plot unexpected for the class. For me it is quite a revelation that certain techniques penetrated down to this type. It is almost as if you watch a Jean-Claude Van Damme movie with a (post)modern touch.

Esma's Secret - Grbavica (2006)

Nothing extraordinary happens in this film but there is something that makes me feel all the movies to be like this. I also remembered that there are things I will never know. Not because lack of time or resources but simply because I am me and nobody else. It makes me feel generaly alone and appreciate moments when I feel togetherness even if it is over trivial things like asking for a bier and getting the bier. 'Grbavica' won the Golden Berlin Bear in 2006.

Little Miss Sunshine (2006)

The movie is about how hard is to get there even when 'there' is nowhere important. I would probably like the movie if it would be less pretentious: there are times when the cheesiest things happen and I am just not there. I know that in 'real life' cheesy things happen all the time and I am fine with that. But this is a movie and I want them to acknowledge that and cover the very obvious morals. I am not the kind of public that appreciates it. Otherwise the movie is almost nice, a normal life type of surreal suffuses the events in spite of the happy end. I would be curious what other people feel/think about it. It won two Oscars one of which for the screenplay - was Babel or El laberinto del fauno or The queen worse than this one? I am not sure. All I can say is that the movie appeals to imdbs.

Das Leben der Anderen (2006)

Tanja reminded me that I wanted for a long time to write about several German movies. 'The life of others' (I assume this would be an acceptable translation - if not, German friends, bitte, hilfe) won the 2007 Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film of the Year and it is arguably a better film than The Departed. I also liked it very much. Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck is the director and the writer of this East-German story and he does it all quite well. I like how the moments develop in measured military step to a culminating double-beat ending and I love the fact that the tension is never (not even at the very end) completely released. Fact which probably makes the Film stay with you as well as the clear lines that shape de characters. Most of all I love the way characters shift. For this I have to thank also to Martina Gedeck, Sebastian Koch and especially Ulrich Mühe. Hauptmann Gerd Wiesler is a complex part and U. Mühe does it with the right tension. It almost appears that the character is always surprised by his own change but this surprise stays well inside the part of STASI officer who deals with it...professionally. Thanks to Kaspar for recommending it.

Pulse (2006)

A 'horror' one this time. Or in any case terrible. I am not so sure how the green hue that pervades the film is supposed to make it scary or technical or smth. I noticed that some of the sci-fi/computer/electricity centered pieces tend to be greenish. Why is that? Is electricity supposed to be green, does one feel green when electrocuted? I never did and I had my share but the colour is always indeterminate. There might be a taste but it wouldn't be green. In any case, the movie electrocuted me into boredom which might as well be of that tone of green. I disliked the acting a lot. It's not that the people are not good actors (I have no idea about that) it's just this movie and the parts they did in general. Some of the scenes were terribly stereotypical..you have to be a genius to get out of there in one piece. I found the directing (or the editing-who knows which is which) not only wrongly paced but also simply mistaken. I call mistakes things that do not amount to something appear to be in contradiction with the 'whole' in that they disturb what appears to 'support' the 'whole'. An example here would be the number of times when a tension was broken a bit too early or could not be build because of the 'noise' around. As about the 'whole'- don't bother. Unless you want to comment me.

Freedomland (2006)

     I hear this movie is advertised as a thriller and the tag line going with is "His streets. His rules." There is nothing more misleading than these labels. The movie is 'thrilling' but it is marginal to what I understand to be that genre - not much action, not enough explosions of all sorts...raising definitely not the same kind of emotions.      I mostly liked Julianne Moore who does a great job at creating tensions: there is even a surprisingly long monologue that she sustains brilliantly. I read a review saying she does not fit the character in the book (there seems to be a book about this) because she is too week when she should have been stronger because 'she lived in that neighbourhood'. There is a point there but I can also go for the crashed, bordering insane mother who lost her child. Bottom line - I liked what she did. I would also mention Edie Falco. She acts the rough women, very close to vigilante type. I find her a bit inflexible but I can see her as type of Brenda (Julianne Moore) ten years later.     The story is of some interest to me also because it touches upon issues like racism and justice. This secondary line has enough power to come through and it almost feels like the emotional release from the tension that J. Moore and Samuel L. Jackson create.... which I find particularly interesting since it is a tensed situation in itself. The plot is nicely interwoven such that connections appear when you least expected and (some) things are fused together which gives more weight to individual threads.      Yeap...I'd watch it again.

Babel (2006)

      Alejandro González Iñárritu is also the director of 2003 movie '21 Grams' (which I could not bring myself to watch yet, even if I hear good things about it). I liked Babel. It is clean and it has great pacing. I liked most of all the way the stories move in the plot, the fact that even if loosely connected the three stories are given different weight. There is some sort of a central story (with Brad Pitt in it) but I watched with even more interest the story from Japan which is almost not connected by solid links to the rest but mainly by a whole atmosphere. The characters in all the story share something else than things and family or social relationships.      The moral of the whole thing has been criticised to be a little too obvious but the movie is done so well that I couldn't care less. One issue that can be discussed is why would you cast known actors in a movie where they can hinder the message if the moral is supposed to be the one stated above. Surely, I can perfectly imagine this film completely with unknown actors. On the other hand, one can say that this is exactly the point: (film)stars are connected to the rest in the same way. And 'American citizens' are in any case a type of star nowadays so it might be that Americans as a people are connected to Muslims and Japanese. In any case, this movie is much more about the whole world then about particular actors.      When you watch this one also listen to its music. Gustavo Santaolalla wrote the music as well for 21 Grams and for Amores perros (2000) and this would probably be another good reason to check out these movies.

Pan´s Labyrinth

This sad, brutal and mystical story is taking place 1944 in the north of spain, directly after Francos victory. Ofélia, a littel girl, arrives with her pregnant mother at the place where her stepfather got the order to fight the republic rebellions. She starts to dream herself away from the unbearable reality into a world, where fantastic creatures are searching for the lost soul of the princess, Ofélia. But she has to prove that she didn´t change after the long time she was living among the human beings. Ofélia has to go through three tests. So while the horror of war goes on for the girl the fantasy becomes more and more part of her real life. This movie is a dark and powerful. Somehow it is very close to the characters, to their fears, wishes, or hopes. The stepfather that punishes rebellions with a cold satisfaction, the mother that suffers because of the pregnancy, the brave servant Mercedes. Watch it.

Borat! (2006)

"Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan". I have something against slapstick comedies but this one is particularly brainless. There is nothing funny in it except for drunken high school teens or people remembering that mindless period of their life. I could not find any line or situation worth mentioning. I am not especially against Jews jokes unless they are really tasteless and completely predictable like the rest of the 'jokes' in the movie. It definitely was a waste of time to watch it.

Jackass Number Two (2006)

This movie made 29M this weekend. I don't know whether Freud would have dealt with this decently. I know I cannot - I could only skip through some of it always close to vomit. I thought it is decadence but it's quite a lot beyond that. It shows so many things at the same time that I won't even bother to analyse it. If you get a chance to see this give it a look - it's bound to be puzzling trying to figure out why would a 'normal' guy drink some fresh sperm coming from a horse he just masturbated...I'll tell you why - it's fun. I wouldn't pay to actually go to the cinema to see this movie because I have a weak heart and I would be out very early in the screening. But I see how I would watch it, with moderation, in certain situations in life. Let me put in some more info: you'll empathize with people stuck in a limo with a bunch of crazy bees or how it feels to have ice-testicles. Not to mention some of the snakes and the fart-mask and planty of other pranks. I'm not sure you can get a kick out of it but...