110 posts tagged “movies”

Some recent movie viewings:

Duck Season (or, in its native language, Temporada de patos) tells the story of 3 teenagers stuck in a Mexico City apartment complex when the power goes out. The two boys are 14, and long time friends, while a neighboring girl, Rita, 16, comes over to try some cooking. Filmed in black and white, it's a very funny little comedy about life as a teenager, generally not something I find all that attractive. I love the little vignettes of life, the pizza guy, and the flirting that Rita does with Moko. It has been showing on Sundance recently and I highly recommend checking it out.

The Bourne Ultimatum is at the other end of the movie making spectrum - a megamovie with mega superstars like Matt Damon, and plenty of car chases and explosions. This third (and final?) chapter of the Bourne series starts literally minutes after the second one (The Bourne Supremacy, as Jason Bourne is limping out of the Russian girl's apartment. Thus begins another high speed action movie, as Bourne tries to uncover his nearly forgotten past and the CIA tries to erase their mistake.

A little too preachy for me, although it featured plenty of the Bourne touches, like trains and foot chases. A solid car chase, with a real bang up ending, although it didn't feel as wild as the one through Moscow in Supremacy. I also like the shtick where he shows how he is watching over them. This time it was something like

If you were in your office right now we'd be having this conversation face-to-face.

Those are always fun! Lots of exras on this Blu-ray disc, that's for sure. I like the 'backtracking' ones, that will fill in back story from the previous films when you select the icon. All in all, a good entry in the Bourne series, although it didn't have the standout moments of the previous two. I did finally get The Bourne Identity out of the library - it was an all time favorite book, but I haven't read it in quite some time. Wonder if I'll still like it after having been soured on Ludlum books?

Man on Wire is the fascinating Oscar-winning documentary on tightrope walker Philippe Petit's high wire crossing between the twin towers of the World Trade Center in 1974. It created quite the sensation, especially after he was arrested. The film does a great job of recreating the now 35 year old scene, as they snuck up the stairs and illegally set up the high wire between the towers using a bow and arrow. I would have liked to know more about what happened afterwards, as it seems the entire crew had a falling out, especially between Phillipe and his girlfriend. Phillipe, I guess, enjoyed the spotlight a little too much.
I was looking for a little light viewing late one night, so I flipped on The Devil Came on Horseback, a documentary on the genocide in Darfur - oops! It features Brian Steidle, an ex-Marine who went to work for the UN peacekeeping force in Sudan. He documents just sickening atrocities by the ruling military junta and tries to bring it to the attention of the American people and its ruling class, to little or no avail. The story is just incredibly tragic and yet hauntingly familiar. In the end, I just don't know what to think. Yes, it's an amazingly sad story, but just how many places in the world can we as a country rescue? Why do these awful things happen anyway? Just too sad. Not what I should have been watching at 1am on a Friday night! See it and be moved nearly to tears, trust me.
A friend and I saw Star Trek (aka the Reboot) at the local iMax theater. It wasn't 3d but it sure was big! The director Abrams loves his closeups, and I felt like a few times I was going to be sucked into someone's nostrils! The movie was a fun, mostly brainless, action sci-fi movie, with humor in all the right places. I'm by no means a Star Trek fanatic, so I just watched it as a movie, not a movement. It had the typically annoying Star Trek techno-mumble, and time travel just can't be pulled off without feeling broken, but I enjoyed it and you probably would too.
As opposed to Night At The Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian, which was even worse than the first one, which I found only barely survivable. This one felt forced all around, as they struggled to find another way to get Stiller into a museum. The hook? He's not happy as the president and founder of his own very successful knick-knack company, he'd be much happier back as a museum guard - yup, it makes as much sense as all that. Nosiy, loud, and pointless, with only a very sexy looking Amy Adams in tight knickers as Amelia Earhart to redeem it. I saw this also at the iMax with my almost 9 year old daughter, but yet it wasn't in 3d. She wasn't even that impressed with it.
And finally, I tried Wall-E again and, once again, I just don't get the accolades. We (Mark, Marta and I) watched it via Netflix Instant on my Roku box. Neither Mark nor Marta had seen it before, while I had seen it in the movie theaters with my family when it first came out. I wasn't all that impressed the first time with the story of the little cleanup robot, his EVE friend who showed up looking for a plant, and the fat humans adrift in space waiting to come home again. And I wasn't moved this time either. A few giggles, some nice animation and a heavy handed point of view is really all that remains.

So I finally watched a couple of the new Batman movies. I don't think I've seen any since the first Tim Burton / Michael Keaton affair oh so many years ago. In general, most superhero movies leave me cold. I'm not a comic book fan (there goes my geek cred right out the window) and all the efforts to "ground" the superhero's story in some sort of reality just leave me cold and bored.

But I had been hearing so many good things about The Dark Knight, and I had a "free" coupon (oh, that reminds me - I need to fill that out and get it in the mail!) for a movie so I figured I'd give The Dark Knight a try using OnDemand HD. Big sound, big picture, lots of action, figured it would work well.

And it did. The movie goes on for about 30 minutes too long - 152 minutes of crash/bang action is a little over the top. No, make that a lot over the top. And while the Nolan brothers did a good job of infusing some strains of seriousness into the proceedings, at times it got a little too ponderous for its own good.

But enough niggling, it was still pretty good, for a superhero movie. And the accolades for Heath Ledger's final performance were certainly deserved - he was simply amazing as The Joker, infusing the character with a barely restrained insanity that was mesmerizing to watch. Wow, what an acting job! Christian Bale was solid, or even stolid, as Batman, but Michael Caine is perfect as Alfred.

The picture and sound were pretty amazing. Good thing my home theater is way downstairs, as I'm sure I would have woken up someone otherwise. As it was, the floor was almost certainly shaking upstairs!

So an enjoyable if a bit lengthy evening, with perhaps the highest body count of any movie I have seen recently!

And my first DVD from LendAround was the Blu-ray version of Batman Begins, the movie just before The Dark Knight, also starring Christian Bale as the Batman. This one describes how Batman came to be, from a somewhat spoiled rich boy who was bent on destruction after witnessing the cold blooded murder of his parents, to his brutal training in the Himalayan Mountains at the hand of a mysterious ninja cult leader. He breaks from the cult in an explosive fashion, then tries to defend Gotham City from destruction by the cult.

Much less frenetic movie than The Dark Knight and the better for it. Still a little overlong at 140 minutes. And I'm not convinced the DVD I got was really Blu-ray, as it didn't say it on the DVD anywhere and the normal red/blue/yellow/green buttons on my remote didn't do anything. But picture and sound were solid nonetheless.

In some ways, I enjoyed it more than The Dark Knight. It was more of a movie and less of an event. Liam Neeson, however, is no match for Heath Ledger in the villan department, although he did lend the character a certain debonair charm.

Neither movie has caused me to rethink my natural antipathy towards superhero movies. They are good for a quick (please be shorter next time!) action fix, but nothing really sticks. I don't get that involved, as, in the end, it'll all work out. So a lukewarm thumbs up for both of them, which is actually pretty good coming from me!

As far as movies goes, there's been a couple on the menu:

I finally watch Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and, despite dire warnings against it, I simply loved it. Now maybe it is because I am such an Indiana Jones fan boy, but Skull just resonated with me right from the beginning. It just *felt* like an Indiana Jones movie to me.

The basic synopsis, as if that matters, is that Indiana Jones, after getting fired from his job due to "Red" worries, gets conscripted into looking for the crystal skull because it was an old colleague's obsession (sound like any of the other movies, eh?). Of course, this being the 50s, the Russians are after it too and the chase is on.

Nothing Earth shattering about the plot but the execution was exquisite. Every few minutes was a reminder of the past, from the subtle (a huge, endless wharehouse anyone?) to the obvious (pictures and remincsing about Marcus and Dad). Plenty of Indiana Jones action, with perhaps the biggest flaw being that there was just too much. Some of the action scenes could have been cut by a bit without a loss. But that is a minor quibble.

I really wish I had seen this in the theaters when it first came out, as some of the surprises were no longer surprises. The sound and picture on the Comcast HD Movie channel were just swell, but I really want the BluRay version of it. That's how much I liked it.

The next evening, my wife and I actually went to a movie theater to watch a movie. Burn After Reading is a the latest Coen brothers movie and features such stalwarts as George Clooney, Brad Pit, and of course Frances McDormand. In it, Pitt and McDormand play a couple of fitness center losers who try to capitalize on a lost CD of information and get it all wrong.

The movie depended far too much on coincidences that just seemed far too unlikely. A very slight Coen Brothers effort, it did feature the typically stellar work from Brad Pitt, who really gave his character some depth, which is probably more than he deserved! There were a few twists and turns but nothing too hard too follow and, in the end, everyone got what they deserved, I guess.

The funny part about going to watch the movie is that I'm pretty sure a better experience would have occured in my home theater. It was a discount movie theater that had split its once grandiose theater into 7 or 8 tiny theater boxes. Only about 8 seats in each row, a screen only slightly larger than my relatively small 50" HDTV, a scratchy print and sorrowful sound all lent itself to wondering just why we would bother paying US$8 to see it. It worked, but only just barely!

I haven't been completely out of the movie watching loop, although there hasn't been much. Here's what I've watched over the past couple of weeks:

Doomsday, a BluRay movie, was a pretty reasonable, fast playing, end of the world viral outbreak movie. A quick acting virus that pretty instantly kills those infected strikes Scotland, so the British authorities move to cordon off the entire country. They end up building a huge wall and forgetting about the place. But when the virus shows up again in London, and it looks like there were survivors after all in Scotland, a small team, lead by a Scottish survivor herself, are sent to investigate.

They come across a very "Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome" kind of place, ruled by Sol (played with over the top manic energy by Craig Conway). Much mayhem ensues, as the small group, led by Maj. Eden Sinclair, Scottish survivor and borderline psychopath herself. Rhona Mitra, who looks like a new female action hero, shows enough swagger to carry off this very macho part.

While sufficiently action packed, and looking and sounding wonderful in BluRay, it wasn't really all that compelling. If beheadings are your thing, then this is your movie, as I lost track of the number of chopped off heads. A pretty star studded cast includes Bob Hoskins and Malcolm McDowell anchors the movie with sufficient gravitas, but I never really cared about any of the characters and Sinclair's revenge motive was rang strangely hollow. But worth a viewing if you're into a nice violent, apocalyptic show.

On the other end of the action scale was the heartfelt indie, Wilby Wonderful. Featuring a great cast including Sandra Oh, Maury Chaykin and Ellen Page, Wilby Wonderful tells the story of a tumultuous 24 hours in a small Canadian town on an island. The stories of a dozen or so characters are interwoven as secrets are unearthed, lives are forever altered and affairs grind to a halt. A nice little movie, perhaps a little too earnest but with some light touches, it reminded me of one of my favorite movies, The Station Agent, in the way it told its story. Not quite to that high level, but still a highly recommended, quiet little film.

Me and the girls watched The Kid, Charlie Chaplin's first "full length" movie. It clocks in at only a little more than an hour, but still far longer than his previous comedic shorts. The Kid tells the story of an abandoned child that The Tramp ends up raising. The Kid, played by a very young Jackie Coogan, who Chaplin discovered at a vaudeville show he was playing in, helps out The Tramp with his small swindles, like throwing a rock to break a window that the Tramp replaces. But he gets sick and then the Authorities try to take him away but alls well that ends well.

The girls really enjoyed this silent movie, recorded from TMC's "Silent Sunday Night", which I found heartening. I think they enjoyed filling in the blanks between the story cards and it was a good story too. The Roku box has some early Keaton movies that I think I'll try on them next.

Just lazing around last night, so I quickly scanned the list of free HD movies found OnDemand from Comcast. Nothing too intriguing until I hit GoldenEye. As I mentioned in my review of Casino Royale that I hadn't seen any of the Pierce Brosnan Bond movies, thus I didn't know that Judi Dench had taken over as "M". Coincidentally enough, GoldenEye (sic) was the Bond debut for both of them, so it was a good opportunity to catch a Brosnan Bond.

I can remember saying back in the day when I was a Remington Steele fan that Brosnan would make an excellent Bond. And he did, although the performance felt a little stiff and forced. Perhaps he does a better job in later movies, although this wasn't too bad. He sure looks the part.

In GoldenEye, Bond goes up against some Russian treachery, as the unbelievably wild and sexy Xenia Zirgavna Onatopp (played with stylish pizazz by Famke Janssen) steals a helicopter and helps hijack a secret Russian super EMP (Electro Magnetic Pulse) bomb that can knock out the electrical devices in an entire city. Bond obviously gets in the way, rescuing a beautiful Russian technologist in the process.

Not too bad, although the violence was pretty overwhelming. I always thought of the Bond sagas as having more subtlety than just having him machine gun down hordes of faceless foot soliders, which happened on several occasions. And the baddy kept having these wacky setups to try and kill Bond with panache, which were as annoying as ever. Oh, Hollywood still can't do fake snow that is in the slightest way believable.

The picture quality was really nice, but the sound was only in stereo, which is often the case for the free ones. I'll bet it would have given the subwoofer a real work out. Tina Turner's theme song was good, as was the opening montage. And it had an excellent car race along the twisty mountain roads.

But in the end, it was about all that you could hope for from a Bond - delicious women, exhilirating escapes, solid supporting cast and wildly implausible plots! There are worse ways to spend a couple of hours.

I enjoyed Dead Reckoning via my Roku Netflix box last night. A solid Bogart film noir, it featured some snappy dialog, a femme fatale and nicely ambiguous ending.

Bogart plays Capt. Rip Murdock, fresh from the paratroops in WW II, trying to figure out why his sidekick, Sgt. Johnny Drake, slipped out before getting the Congressional Medal of Honor for his war time heroics. When he turns up dead, Murdock swears to get to the bottom of it.

Of course, "it" involves a femme fatale, this time a slinky blonde named 'Dusty' Chandler, played by Lizabeth Scott, a relative newcomer to the film scene. Confusion reigns, as her part in the plot that implicated her star struck lover Drake is never quite clear. Drake took the fall for the death of Chandler's husband and went on the lam, joing the Army. By the time Murdock gets to the bottom of it, things have swung around several times.

Like I said, a pretty solid 40s film noir, although I don't feel that Scott is a particular standout as the prototypical femme fatale. She only appeared in a few more movies, then rumors of her lesbian tendencies ended up forcing her out of the biz. But Bogart was excellent (as usual) as the bulldog friend, and there are several excellent repartees, especially with the head detective and some of the slower cops.

A couple of movies have been watched around here, although the craziness that is summer kind of cuts down on the viewing time:

Rivers and Tides : An pretty amazing documentary about Andy Goldsworthy, a British artist who does ephemeral sculptures using natural objects like sticks, hay, and rocks. I know, it sounds boring but it is simply remarkable what he can create. The passion and patience Goldsworthy exhibits is also pretty amazing. The film shows his creations which can sometimes only last until the tide comes in. Goldsworthy  "specializes" in these egg-shaped rock cairns, which of course can last much longer. Well worth tracking down this documentary (I watched it on Netflix Instant via my Roku box).

Starship Troopers : A very schizophrenic "rah rah" military movie by Paul Verhoeven, of Robocop fame. Based on the Robert Heinlein novel about a futuristic war against bug-like aliens, bent on destroying the human race, it follows a trio from high school graduation through a climatic battle to capture a Bug queen. I call it Schizophrenic because I don't think he could decide if war was a Good Thing or a Bad Thing. The movie certainly didn't shy away from showing us gruesome and graphic deaths (particularly when the bug sucks out the brains), but mostly the militaristic mindset was glorified.

The movie, which I watched in HD (with, sadly, only stereo sound) on Comcast OnDemand for free, sure looked good anyway. Denise Richards, as the hot shot pilot love interest, sure was easy to look at as well. The technology sure didn't make much sense though, at least as far as the infantry was concerned. Here it is, hundreds of years in the future, and they are still firing fancy automatic rifles, shooting projectiles with almost no killing power, sadly undergunned against even a single Bug. But all in all, the movie wasn't a total waste of time and fit the bill perfectly, as I was just looking to veg at the end of a long week.

I have recently viewed a couple of movies that could not have been more different!

First up was the documentary Helvetica on the Netflix Roku box and yes, it's all about the font. Actually, it was about the ubiquitous typeface and a whole lot more, including design, marketing and the psychology f typography. They interviewed a bunch of passionate folks, both pro Helvetica and the virulent anti-establishment designers who wouldn't use Helvetica if their life depended on it. I loved the passion these folks bring to both typeface design, as well as the graphic artists who both use and despise Helvetica.

The film also shows just how prevalent Helvetica has become, as it shows logo, signs and magazine covers just rotten with it, for better or for worse. It also tells the story of Helvetica, how it was invented in the 1950s as well as how it became so popular. Did you know there are directors of marketing for typeface companies? Exactly how do you sell a font anyway?

But the passion the interviewees bring to the table is very evident. I especially liked the anti crowd, like Stefan Sagmeister and David Carson, famous in the graphic design field for their wild, boundary straining covers. Carson even went so far as to use the Dingbats font for an article in his magazine that he wasn't all that happy with! Very interesting documentary.

On the opposite side of the film world came I Am Legend, viewed in its BluRay incarnation in all its 1080p, Dolby Digital glory. Will Smith stars as the last man standing in an apocalyptic world after some unnamed virus (related to rabies?), used as a cure for cancer, goes rogue and kills nearly everyone while turning a select few into raving, rabid lunatics afraid of the dark. Robert Neville, alone out of everyone in the world (somehow he knows this) is immune and searches for a cure, while prowling the abandoned streets of New York City with his dog.

All I can say is, why bother having it titled after a book if you aren't going to use it at all? While the novella by Richard Matheson had its problems, this movie had about as much to do with it as a Sean Connery James Bond had to do with the Ian Fleming book it shared a title with. Matheson's Neville is an ordinary guy caught up in extraordinary circumstances, a vigilante during the day and a whiner and drunkard at night, as he holes up in his fortified home. Smith's Neville is a heroic survivor trying desperately to find a cure. Heck, he doesn't even kill any of the mutants!

Some folks complained that the ending was too optimistic as compared to the book but given the entire disregard for the source material rampant in the movie, it seems like a hollow complaint. Maybe the movie would be better for you if you don't read the book first, but my parents who watched it didn't know the book and I don't think they were all that impressed by it either.

It sure looked nice though. Some scenes of Smith walking through overgrown fields in New York City came through crisp and clear. The soundtrack didn't really stress the speakers too much though. All in all, a very average adventure flick that goes to disappointing if you read the book. 28 Days Later did viral, apocalyptic horror much better.

I have watched a few movies using my Roku Netflix player , although mostly I have been sampling some series viewing and concert listening. Despite the relatively weak audio performance (just stereo), it works pretty well playing in the background as I slave away at the keyboard.

The Good German is a black and white Steven Soderbergh production, starring George Clooney, Tobey Maguire and Cate Blanchett in a story of romance, intrigue and murder set during the post war occupation of Berlin, as the Allied powers tried to figure out how to split it up. Clooney plays a weary journalist covering the events, although he is really searching out his ex-lover, Blanchett's Lena Brandt. Maguire complicates things and then things get really sticky.

Soderbergh strove for and attained a real 40s drama feel, from the obvious black and white connection, to the scene right out of Casablanca, right down to the (Oscar nominated) score. While some of the coincindences were explained later on, I still didn't completely buy the plot.  It all felt a little scattershot, unconnected and uninvolving. It wasn't helped by the presence of Maguire, who just doesn't inspire me as an actor.

I also watched 5 Steps to Danger, a 1957 cold war noir/thriller starring the vastly underappeciated Sterling Hayden. Hayden gets picked up by a damsel in distress, which involves him in a spy plot, again hinging on post-ware Berlin. I really enjoyed this flick and, seeing as it isn't available on either tape or DVD, makes the Instant Watching of this all the more precious.

I played KOYAANISQATSI (life out of blalance) in the background one day, but it proved to be too interesting to just listen to. It kept pulling me away from the keyboard to watch its incredible images which match the classic Phillip Glass score impeccably. I was so enthralled with it that I immediately added both its sequel (POWAQQATSI - life in transformation) and Ron Fricke's (a writer/editor for th QATSI trilogy) Chronos. I am particularly intriqued by Chronos because it is available in hi-def BluRay, a treatment for which the QATSI trilogy cries out for. Great stuff, for sure.

My Roku Netflix Player showed up Thursday evening and I of course immediately set about installing it.

I ordered the cable package with it, as an HDMI, optical audio and component video cable, all for US$20, was a pretty good deal. Of course, I only really needed the HDMI cable, but having the optical audio cable can't hurt. It all came in one box, which took about a week to get here:

And here's what it looks like with the three cables, the simple "Getting Started" guide and the box with the remote and Roku box:
Probably should have put something down for scale, but here is the contents of the Roku box, including batteries for the remote, composite (sic) cables and a power adapter:
Setup was very speedy. It would have been even faster had I done a better job of inserting the batteries in the correct orientation, but even given that brain cramp, it still took almost no time at all. After typing in my WiFi password, it downloaded a software update (I had to power cycle to get it to find the wireless network after the update) and then it prompted me to add the code to the Netflix page. Within minutes, my Instant queue was downloaded and I was off and running. Some initial impressions, after watching some movies and some TV shows:

 
• The first time I ran it, there were four white dots to the left of the word "quality" while it buffered the content. I really had no idea if this was good or bad. But after watching about 5 minutes of The Story of the Weeping Camel with my daughter, it reloaded the buffer, this time showing two white dots, followed by two white circles. So I guess the white dots are good and white circles are not. Although in neither case did I notice much difference. But I may try running a (long) wire to the back of the box.
  
• Speaking of The Weeping Camel, it looks like the box remembers your position when you stop viewing, as we only watched about 45 minutes of it, yet it still says "Continue viewing"
  
 
• Video quality is just fine, and this on a 50in hi-def Sony tv. Nothing to write home about, but not bad enough to be distracting
  
 
• Audio quality has only been stereo, which is probably more disappointing than the video quality. The Player FAQ doesn't say anything about the audio quality, unfortunately, so I don't know if I just haven't seen anything in 5.1 or if it just isn't there.
  
 
• It's truly addicting to just watch bits and pieces of movies. I did watch all of The Good German, but after that, I dabbled in a few movies. I also watched two episodes of Bullshit, the Penn and Teller series, and had a great time.
  
 
• No power button, which is annoying.
  

The early line? So far, so good. Good enough for now, but I hope the quality of the video and, especially, the audio improves soon.