A great couple a weeks of seeing movies

Posted by sjb (A) on December 30, 2002 at 22:52:52

Having time off, being in the mood to see movies and and having so many movies open has led to a flurry of screenings....and I've enjoyed every one of them.

Adaptation: In movie reviewer parlance I would call it funny while remaining intelligent and touching without being sappy. Sure the whole thing is ultimately kind of a joke but the ride is great, the performances are fantastic (Chris Cooper for sure deserves the Best Supporting Actor Oscar and Meryl Streep being stoned is worth the price of admission all by itself) and the writing, directing and editing are all very very good.

The Two Towers: I LOVED this movie (never read the books)....who could deny that the (dark cloud spreading over the land) evil in this trilogy is (inadvertently) a direct reflection of the Bush administration and their backers. The problem is we don't have a wizard and an army of elves coming to save us. I applaud Peter Jackson...it can't be easy trying to portray this story on film; especially since it brings out all the line by line nitpicking story police that have read the book 5 - 20 times :-))

About Schmidt: This was my least favorite of the bunch. I thought it was just a bit too slow (although Kathy Bates saves the day just as the movies about to collapse under its own weight). Nicholson was good and the ending was touching but the running joke wears a little thin after the 4th time. All in all it was entertaining but I just don't see how it deserves all the Oscar talk.

Talk To Her: A strange, interesting movie with excellent performances and a story that is touching and uncomfortable at the same time. It looks at what it means to love from many different angles without any of them being too much of a clichÃ©.

Max: A little hard to take (when it was over the audience just kind of sat quietly) as it depicts Hitler before W.W.II just as he was forming his socio political views AND trying to have is art career take off. The whole time he is being encouraged in his art by a Jewish art dealer and encouraged in his politics by some very dark men. The battle - both internal and external - for how he will ultimately express himself is very compelling and the portrayal of his growing sense of power and madness is disturbing.

Love Liza: What do you do when your wife kills herself? Lets hope none of us ever has to find out but this movie portrays one of the possibilities and it pulls no punches in doing so. For people who like Hollywood movies it would be frustrating as there's no real resolution (well, there is, but it's not neat and tidy).

Catch Me If You Can: It was good clean fun. Better than I expected and I didn't feel like I wasted my money.

Star Trek Nemesis: I really liked this....sure it was a cheesy clichÃ© with bad special effects and (a lot of) bad acting but that's what Star Trek has always been. I was into it the whole time and thought it was at times fairly exciting and at others reasonably touching.

Solaris: Call me crazy but I loved this movie. It created a mood from the very beginning that took hold of me and didn't let go the whole time (I hardly blinked). It was visually beautiful, the acting was very good (GC surprised me) and I always love movies (or stories) that ask metaphysical questions. It's too bad that it wound up in no mans land as it was too slow and too deep for the average American sci fi (or George Clooney) fan, and didn't have enough credibility to draw the art film fan.

Rabbit Proof Fence: Devastating true story of Aboriginal "half-castes" who are taken from their mothers to have their "blackness" trained and bred out of them (for their own good of course). Somehow the movie doesn't glorify the girls journey (1,500 by foot) home - or their arrival there - but it still captures the power of their spirits and love. The girl who played the lead, although quite young and without much dialogue, gives a tremendous performance (among the best I've seen....ever) and the performances of the mother and grandmother were also very very good. The things you find out at the end aren't pleasant and the audience was clearly moved and a bit stunned.

"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism, since it is the merger of state and corporate power." â€” Benito Mussolini.
"When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the American flag." - Huey Long

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Topic - A great couple a weeks of seeing movies - sjb 22:52:52 12/30/02 (16)

Maybe that dark cloud... - mishmashmusic 12:35:32 12/31/02 (1)

Re: Maybe that dark cloud... - sjb 12:49:24 12/31/02 (0)

Catch Me was surprisingly entertaining . . - rufus 10:42:36 12/31/02 (0)

Interesting.... - Joe S 10:40:05 12/31/02 (5)

Re: Interesting.... - joe2coold@icqmail.com 19:24:54 01/13/03 (0)

"...give me a break" - sjb 11:20:21 12/31/02 (0)

LOtR: TTT was an inspired film, forgoing sjb's interesting alegory. - Audiophilander 10:48:25 12/31/02 (2)

An inability to.... - Joe S 09:26:41 01/02/03 (1)

Well, I've got the film for you: - Audiophilander 14:32:52 01/02/03 (0)

"Call me crazy." Glad to oblige. YOU'RE CRAZY! nt - clarkjohnsen 08:27:53 12/31/02 (2)

Re: "Call me crazy." Glad to oblige. YOU'RE CRAZY! nt - R1Racer 21:29:44 02/27/03 (0)

... like a fox (i.e., NOT the Faux Snooze Network, either!) - Audiophilander 09:53:34 12/31/02 (0)

Thanks,esp. liked Bush the Dark Lord, careful with LOTR,it can be Hobbit forming..nt.. :) - late 05:57:04 12/31/02 (2)

hobbit forming? - chiggy 12:01:35 12/31/02 (1)

Hey, I was flattered! (14691) - Audiophilander 23:08:45 12/31/02 (0)

Great reviews, sjb! - Audiophilander 23:43:02 12/30/02 (0)

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