saw Nightcrawler a few days back in the theatre
it was very good
if they fleshed out weirdness of the main character and why he was the way he was instead of the amoral things he did it probably would have been one of the best movies ever made.
I guess the problem is (spoilers) he gets away with everything in the end and only fucks up like once the whole movie.
jake gyllenhaal kills it at acting tho, fo reals
Under the Skin | Jonathan Glazer | 2013 | UK | 108 min | AVI | Drama | Sci-Fi | Thriller | Stimulating
I’m not sure what to say about Under the Skin. I like movies that lure me into their strange spaces and trick me into taking off all my clothes… no, wait! I mean, the enveloping colors and sounds, the things noticed and things ignored – all of it here invites me to sink into a thick goo of alien perception. And it worked for me, especially the sound. That amazing score! I think it’s interesting that people are divided as to whether Johansson’s character is feeling something like human emotions. We’re led into that trap, of course, by ‘her’ very human appearance, though there’s very little in the way of expression on her face. We’re directed to presume her thoughts with sound cues and, more daringly, colors. Personally, I think those thoughts are more ethical than than emotional, but who knows? Is curiosity an emotion? Fear, now, that’s an emotion I think she definitely feels, and it’s not hard to imagine that particular emotion bridging species.
Star Wars Episode I and II. Yeah, the old ones.
First one was so bad, it was comical. Too funny to take seriously. I enjoyed it in that way.
Second one is much better than the first one, it was more enjoyable to watch and I’m actually looking forward to episode III and the new ones.
Interstellar | Christopher Nolan | 2014 | USA | 169 min | IMAX | Adventure | Sci-Fi | I don’t even
A few script niggles aside, mostly in the third act, I thought Interstellar was very strong. Pacing was better than his last two. I need some time to process everything and articulate my thoughts though.
Breath of fresh air. Loved it. Some story issues indeed but I don’t care. it was a beautiful movie.
And I hate movies.
let’s see, what have I recently seen. oh yes
##The Imitation Game
Well, this was actually okay. Certainly better than one example of this year’s blockbusters.
The Bad
Well, it was basically A Beautiful Mind. Lots of clichés, like “clever people are autistic”, “clever people torture themselves”, “clever people are destroyed by the evil society” et cetera. Bottom line: the movie broke with what actually happened in order to generate pathos so it would be a more engaging movie. And hey it probably worked.
Keira Knightley also did a bit of a Liv Tyler and ended up having far too significant a role for her character, who was all but irrelevant in reality.
The Good
Cumberbatch does a good job. The movie is not turned into a gay pride propaganda piece and quite rightly downplays avoids emphasising Alan Turing’s homosexuality. He was homosexual, and the movie made ample acknowledgement of that. His heroism is clearly established throughout, no matter what his sexuality was, and yet unlike so many edgier movies we didn’t have to sit through a sex scene.
This isn’t a question of homosexuality. This is just an issue I have with gratuitous/obligatory sex scenes in general. Movies these days just throw in sex scenes whenever they can and it’s getting pretty old. Interstellar and The Imitation Game do well to avoid unnecessary sex scenes, meanwhile in Mr. Turner we have the joy of watching a fat prick sodomise his housekeeper.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for sick shit on screen, but I prefer sick shit to be in a sick movie. I don’t really want to take my wife to see a movie about a painter she likes, only to discover that he was apparently a grunting buffoon who used women as semen-receptacles in between bouts of painting. Pretentious edgy-as-fuck movie.
But I digress. Imitation Game was good because it had a degree of decency while not exactly hiding from the important issue of Turing’s persecution and ruin at the hands of a stupid and cruel government.
Out of 10
7
Uninspired but well executed. Cumberbatch makes the movie. When an actor makes a movie, or rather saves it, it can’t be that great a movie.
Compare: A Beautiful Mind gets 7, π gets 10.
This really was the year of Scarlett Johansson, wasn’t it? 
Lucy | Luc Besson | 2014 | USA | 89 min | MP4 | Science Fiction | Action | Disenchanting
Lucy (the movie) does not do a great job of engaging the audience with the lead character. Lucy (the character) starts out as an annoying stereotype that we spend 20ish minutes with and becomes an another annoying stereotype that we spend the rest of the movie with. It is the typical “woman gains power after being disempowered” story, but neither of the versions of Lucy (the character) have qualities that engages the viewer to give a damn whether she finds succeed at the end of the film. In fact, once Lucy (the character) gains her powers, the script drives her toward being disengaging and solemn to a fault. It makes her an uninteresting character and uncaring of what she does or her final goal.
Tack on an unresearched concept dealing with the percent of the mind humans use and Asian gangsters that quickly become unthreatening mid-way through, Lucy (the movie) is a candy coated film with a few action sequences, and a narrative center that is as palatable as black licorice.
It honestly felt like someone took the idea that humans only use 10% of their brain, and decided to write a script that dreams up what we could do if we used more. I wanted to ignore how absurd the premise is, since a lot of good movies have insane premises and are clearly sci-fi/fantasy. This movie though, it took the absurdity to a new level and didn’t leave anything worth watching, not for the characters, not for the plot, not for the power fantasy. 
If your premise is terrible, don’t remind people of it every five minutes. Lucy does that. I think the problem is not that the premise is not realistic, but that it’s not interesting. And yet, it receives extended and solemn pseudo-academic explanations. it’s not so much what your premise is, but what you do with your premise, what kind of rules you set up for yourself within your narrative and how you maneuver around them. Now, if your terrible premise sets up no rules, because the consequences of your premise are, basically, “whatever,” then that’s not interesting. And that seems to me to be the real problem.
Nightcrawler | Dan Gilroy | 2014 | USA | 117 min | AVI | Crime | Thriller | Dark but fascinating
Had lots of fun with Gilroy’s Nightcrawler last night, mainly thanks to Gyllenhaal’s stunning performance. Goofy and naive, similar in some ways to his bumbling character in Zodiac, only full of misplaced confidence; lean and wiry, with the slick hair and ominous grin of a Western villain; the sunken eyes of an insomniac that at the same time seem to bulge out in anticipation. All of this very much reflecting his new-found career path as a vulture of the night, stalking the highways in search of some bloody aftermath to film - crime or collision, it really doesn’t matter just as long as it horrifies suburban viewers. And Elswit’s humming, neon-lit L.A. acts as a wonderful backdrop to these seedy, immoral movements and actions. Film is a lot like Drive in its following of one nocturnal, unscrupulous individual - though, there’s less of the brooding and preening. Just as slick but with less style, and much more cynical humour.
##The Haunting (1999)
4/10
4 points for the set design (seriously, I wish the house existed so I could squat there).
that’s it.
The Wind Rises (2013, dir. Hayao Miyazaki) und The Kingdom of Dreams and Madness (2013, dir. Mami Sunada).
Watching both of these in succession is perhaps the best possible way to experience each of them, and honestly an unique sight into Ghibli unlike anything i’ve ever seen. I was nearly bought to tears by both of them, Miyazaki has one particular speech near the end of Kingdom that could almost be considered the most succinct and passionate appreciation of animation. The Wind Rises, too, seems to somehow be particularly telling of Ghibli’s fascination with fantasy, not in the same sense that their other films are, but in the sheer acceptance that fantasy is life, melding a true story with a fictional one, adapting two utterly different stories into one incredibly strong and moving film.
Oh god yeah, The Wind Rises is staggering. Miyazaki as his most elliptical; some of the deftest handling of the passage of time I’ve seen done in cinema in ages. You can tell how deliberately storyboarded and conceived this was, in terms of matching of motion and space from shot to shot, extremely sophisticated layering of ideas. Especially by the end, this film is really refreshing and sometimes brave in what it decides not to provide us, narratively and structurally. The animation is second to none of course, and oh my I’m so glad I got to see this subtitles in theaters, because Hideaki Anno’s performance is astounding and unique. This is like all my respective favorite qualities of Princess Mononoke, My Neighbor Totoro and Ponyo all mixed together, with a new ruminative element as the backbone.
This week I have had time for more movies than usual. The Last Boy Scout (1991) was a really good action movie that I somehow missed in the 90’s. It doesn’t waste time with exposition and it’s filled with cheesy one liners. Some of the action scenes are mediocre compared to modern movies though.
I had never heard of Looper (2012) before, but it turns out that it’s an excellent sci-fi flick with several famous actors (Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Bruce Willis, Emily Blunt, Jeff Daniels). Two thumbs up.
As Good as It Gets (1997) was one of the top ranked movies at IMDB that I hadn’t seen. It’s apparently one of my girlfriend’s favorites so she insisted that we would watch it together. I wouldn’t rank it in a personal top 250 of all time, but nevertheless it’s a very solid movie that everyone should watch.
Cars (2006) was a disappointment. I had heard so many positive impressions about it and I personally found it very average.
We also rewatched The Truman Show (1998) which is one of my old favorites.
I’ve never heard of that either. Thanks for the suggestion! I mostly associate Joseph Gordon-Levitt with 3rd Rock from the Sun and it’s a bit weird seeing him in more serious roles.
http://i.minus.com/iYowqKY22GuPw.jpg
Predestination
This movie was a mind boggle from beginning to end. At the end, you’re going to think “…what the fuck?” It’s so bizarre. I’m going to keep the plot intentionally vague because if anyone chooses to watch it, it’s more fun when you don’t know too much about it. Basically, an agent time travels to catch a criminal who has escaped him throughout time. There is much more to it than that. I implore everyone to watch this.
###End of Evangelion
i don’t need to say anything more. probably the 20th time i’ve watched it. still enjoyable.
iso’s animation is some of the best ever, i mean it’s so good that i actually enjoy recording it to GIF form
Gone Girl | David Fincher | 2014 | USA | 149 min | HD | Drama | Thriller | Probably the best film of the year.
Fincher loves to play in the deep, scummy sandbox of the worst portions of the human condition. Gone Girl pushes that further and most terrifying, the setting of a middle class marriage/domestic home is a place all too familiar. The commentary of the recession and media sensualization hammer home a disappointing truth as well. Top notch work from Ben Affleck, Rosemund Pike, Tyler Perry, Carrie Coon, Kim Dickens (and her endless coffee cups), and the other usual Fincher collaborators in the crew.
