So, yeah. I was lazy. I was out of town then it was Christmas then it was New Year's then it was . . . Yeah, nope, just me being lazy. So here's the catch-up blog entry. I'll try to keep it short.
1. The Visitor (2007): Brilliant, inspiring, and heartbreaking. It manages to make the issue of illegal immigrants pertinent and get the viewer emotionally involved without resorting to cheap tricks or cheesy plot lines or ranting at the system.
2. Good Night, and Good Luck (2005): My apologies to Clooney but I found this one a tad lifeless. To be so concerned with the impact of McCarthy's political reach, the film folds itself into this one news show without showing the viewer the wider implications. While I know a good bit of the history, the movie should allow me to use that a supplement, not the primary source for information. Meanwhile, that info could have been added in if other, superfluous, aspects were removed (the Patricia Clarkson/Robert Downey Jr storyline was sweet but carried no importance for the larger plot, for example). It's fine but I'm baffled at the hoopla about it when it was released.
3. Madagascar:Escape 2 Africa (2008): I LOVE dancing animals. That's it.
4. Jane Austen Book Club (2007): A movie like this can pass for cute because I don't expect the same things from it as I do, say, Good Night, and Good Luck. It's fluff and it's fun and it makes me wish I had a book club. My only complaint: Jimmy Smits.
5. The Hustler (1961): This just makes me sad that Paul Newman will never make another movie. It's good. I'm not in love with it and it has it's problems (the female character is not what we'd call, oh, I don't know, good for women) but Newman is wonderful as usual as is Jackie Gleason. It does offer an interesting look into the "tough guy" and the (d)evolution of such a character, especially when that tough guy is ultimately being controlled by, not only his addiction to his profession/hobby (pool and gambling on the game), but by the machinations of that corner of society (the hierarchy of tough guys so to speak). So, yeah, an interesting glimpse into that sort of masculinity.
6. Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953): I've seen this movie a bazillion times but I still love Marilyn Monroe and Jane Russell. Yes, it's a tad dated. Yes, it's a tad sexist. But it's still a solid, fun comedy musical.
7. Christmas in Connecticut (1945): A cute Barbara Stanwyck movie in which she's a domestic goddess in print: writing essays with decorating, child rearing, and cooking tips about her life on a farm in Connecticut with her husband and newborn baby. The man who owns Stanwyck's publication demands that she give a soldier a proper Christmas at her home which, of course, the owner will also attend. The problem? Stanwyck is a single, childless woman living in a tiny New York apartment and her uncle, who owns a restaurant, provides all of the recipes for her writing. Mayhem ensues during which a male pursuer of Stanwyk proposes marriage (again) and offers his Connecticut farm for a cover-up scheme and, of course, Stanwyk and the soldier fall in love. It sounds more confusing than it is. The movie is a fun, false identity movie (that was strangely and probably tragically, remade in 1992 for tv with Dyan Cannon and Kris Kristofferson, directed by Arnold Schwarzenegger).
8. 3:10 to Yuma (1957): YAWN. Watch the newer one.
9. Evening (2007): I didn't expect this to be good but I did not expect it to be so bad. Now that I see it was co-written by Michael Cunningham, I'm even more baffled. I did not like The Hours (novel or movie) or A Home at the End of the World but I disliked those three things for very different reasons. It seems as if Cunningham is making a study out of how to just miss the mark in a variety of ways. Amazing. Anyway, the movie is just dull and I think completely fails to do what it sets out to do. And then end. Ugh. The end is just a cheap attempt to make everyone cry.
10. Sabotage (1936): Supposedly the first film to be made about terrorism, this one is not your typical Hitchcock. It's fine but it's a little dull and slow.
11. Adaptation (2002): Things I do not need to see in a movie: a crowning baby, Nicolas Cage masturbating (especially more than once). Otherwise, the film was an interesting look at meta-narratives and the process of adapting a book to film. I have the book but haven't read it so I'd be interested to see how it ties together. I'm glad to have seen it but won't watch it again unless I teach it.
12. 4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days (2007): What? The title refers to how pregnant one of the main characters is when she goes to an rendezvous for an illegal abortion. One ginormous problem with the film is that it is subtitled in white letters against an often light background making the Romanian impossible to translate. So half the time I had no idea what was being said. The other problem is that I can't imagine being impressed with the film had I been able to understand every syllable. It seemed to function on characters emotions that were not explored or developed. But, again, maybe one line of subtitles would have solved that problem.
13. The Reader (2007): Genius. Clint Eastwood should watch this movie over and over until he can learn to make a mid-film thematic and tonal transition without making it look and feel like two disparate movies jammed together at the middle. Kate Winslet is brilliant as usual and the actor playing the boy convincingly ages into Ralph Fiennes who is also wonderful. My one tiny complaint is a tiny lack of exposition when she is offered a promotion to distinguish it from the earlier, more life-changing promotion. One little line would have helped me immensely. Otherwise, virtually flawless.
14. The Lost Weekend (1945): I lost 101 minutes watching this poor excuse for an anti-drinking PSA. Sad.
15. The Man who Knew Too Much (1956): Strangely, a remake of a 1934 Hitchcock, by Hitchcock, this time with James Stewart and Doris Day. It's definitely interesting. It kept my attention but a few threads were left hanging loose (the taxidermist, for example) that I would have preferred tied up.
16. Marley and Me (2007): That sound you hear is an audible scoff at the idea that this is anything like a family film about a rambunctious puppy. I'll save you the rant and just say this: at least the last 20 minutes of the film are devoted to an almost pornographic look at this poor dog dying, including the euthanasia syringe being inserted and drained of drugs. Terrible.
17. Goya's Ghosts (2006): This movie is not so much about Goya but more about a scandal into which he is pulled revolving around a monk who has Goya's muse imprisoned under (false) charges of being a heretic (we're talking the Spanish Inquisition here) and then that monk is shamed and flees only to return under the guise of a rational man working under the banner of Napoleon. It has some flaws (Natalie Portman playing two characters, for one) but it's watchable.
18. The Other Boleyn Girl (2008): This one isn't even worth a review. Just watch The Tudors.
19. The Red Shoes (1948): I have mixed feelings about this one. It's a tad long (a little over two hours) to tell what should be a concise, compact story. Quite a lot of time is performance footage which is not especially compelling even as much as I love dancing movies. But the story is interesting in that it centers on a retold ballet version of the Hans Christian Anderson fairy tale, "The Red Shoes," while the larger story is also a retelling of the same story. So, eh. It's on the list and I like the layered meta-narratives.
20. Wife for a Night (1952): A strange little Italian mixed-up identity movie that will only suffer if I attempt a plot summary. But it's cute and fun.
21. Smart People (2008): Unfortunately not written by smart people.
22. Brideshead Revisited (1981, miniseries): This should really count as about 5 movies since it was almost 11 hours long. Regardless, I liked it but think it a few things crammed together. There is the war frame, the Sebastian/Charles college story, some sort of transitional period, and a Charles/Julia story. Individually, they all work but I found myself forgetting entirely about the frame until it came up again at the end and then not being interested in it because it skipped information I wanted to know. And I loved the Sebastian/Charles and Charles/Julia stories but did not care for the circumstances that removed Sebastian from the story. I found myself wanting more Julia in the first half and more Sebastian in the second. It's as if they couldn't really appear as full characters in the same scene. Oh, and I found the whole parents' dying parts not well incorporated which could be the point, that adults don't necessarily come into our lives until there is a serious problem, but still.
23. And the book! Vacation (2008) Deb Olin Unferth: I bought this one (for my birthday) largely because it's a pretty hardcover sans dust jacket published by McSweeney's. This is a strange book to me because I found myself not really caring about what happened or about the characters when I first started reading it (which, of course, relegated it to the pile while I finished Calamity Physics) but somewhere in the middle-ish of the book, I cared. And by the end, I really wanted the book to continue. It's a strange plot-line with a few subplots so I can't really summarize it with any efficiency or, ultimately, veracity but I do recommend it. I'm not sure why but I do like it, kind of a lot.
Ok, that's done. Hopefully, I can stay on top of things a little better now ;)
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