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Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith (2005)
Klimt repenting,
In a post-Trump world, the essence of the post-post-post-Ironic. moment is the admittance of the bankruptcy of the Senate. It is the purpose of this friendly reminder to recall that four times REALLY MEAN something. Having lost sight of the invisibility cloak that is Ironic. newspeak, we who were too nice to bother struggle to disagree with our internaL flame - the hopeless need to express yourself. Mashed potatoes are the top v1 course of non-action; the medicine is never at a standstill, it is morphing, subtly out of reach. The rest is Gungun.
We are part of a brand new world. Don't hurt yourself.
Salad Fingers (2004)
Alone with the Shadow
The reviewer at the bottom of this list had it right. Salad Fingers is great mood. But what does it actually show? The world it portrays is a world of ONLY the Shadow; The Shadow and isolation - nothing more. But this is a purge: it does not show the truth of the world: only Miyazaki does that. Spirited Away does it best.
A world of only shadow appeals only to those who blind themselves to light.
*** I still give this 7 for the mood and for nostalgic reasons. I like it when the red water comes out.
**** I refer to the Shadow as Jung described it; that hidden, darker aspect of the unconscious.
The Blair Witch Project (1999)
So you're lost in the woods.
So you're lost in the woods.
"It" is haunting you. "It" shouldn't exist according to conventional wisdom. Perhaps "it" is an illusion constructed by the locals to scare you. Perhaps "it" is real. You never find out before it is too late. "It" draws you to that basement. "It" is inevitable.
Friendships fall apart, along with the "cool" you tried to muster. Your idea of "control" is revealed to be the illusion it always was. Someone kicks the map into the river. Why not? It was useless. The map is another illusory weapon of control. But "It" goes beyond humanity's control of anything.
Still, you obsessively film the events, even as you begin to lose your sanity – or rather, begin to truly realize the above facts. "It's the only thing I have left!" Even if everything is falling apart, it needs to be catalogued and savored. You must document the madness and the end.
Nature all around you, you are walking in circles. Blame quickly becomes childish and meaningless. Symbols you do not understand begin to appear around the thin walls of your hideout, sounds that shouldn't exist begin to keep you awake at night. You are so far away from home. This is the primal reality that humanity cannot forget. It is ingrained in us. In the woods, it becomes impossible to look away from it. We are lost and left at the mercy of forces we cannot understand. The darkness is complete.
"I can see why you like this thing. It's like filtered Reality."
It strikes me upon second viewing how this may be one of the essential films. It's brutal in its unpretentious, short, and effective display of our condition.
Akira (1988)
Astounding and complete.
I recently watched Akira again, unsure if it would hold up after so many viewings. It did.
The animation and music is fantastic. Tetsuo's "nightmare scene" in his cell is a masterpiece on its own. The way it builds its music from tiny noises to a full-blown surrealistic symphony couldn't have been better.
Akira successfully realizes more than an adventure, more than a story, more than just a movie - a vision. The world it creates is fleshed out and complex. Still, with all the politics going on in Neo-Tokyo, the film never loses focus from the heart of it all - the friendship between Kaneda and Tetsuo. The side characters are all memorable to some degree - the Colonel is one of my favourite characters of any movie. However, characters and character development is not the main focus of the film, the story is what's important. And it's a great story.
I have to mention the animation again because it is just incredible. If not as flawless and glossy as that in modern anime, the style of the city and the characters still make it the downright coolest animation I've seen. The film is, if nothing else, a visual (and aural) masterpiece. On top of this, it's just so damn entertaining. Well worth seeing several times, which isn't something you can say about any movie.
I love the iconic imagery, the well-needed humour provided by Kaneda's likable biker gang, and most of all, the gloriously apocalyptic conclusion. Akira is an essential film, one of a kind, and the very idea of a remake is laughable. A must-see.
Mr. Popper's Penguins (2011)
Hideous
As a big fan of Carrey, watching this mainly made me angry. His decision to appear in something this cynical, manipulative, predictable and hopelessly lacking in both hilarity and humanity makes little sense at all.
He's one of the most charismatic and universally liked actors working today. He's proved several times that he can handle both comedy (Liar Liar, Dumb and Dumber, Ace Ventura, the list goes on), drama (Eternal Sunshine...) and the roles in between (The Truman Show). Now, however, it seems as if he's just stopped trying. In "Penguins", he never really starts being funny – although he certainly tries. For all his efforts, he is mostly upstaged by the CGI penguins.
The main problem with the film is the poorly written, almost entirely laugh-less script. Throughout the film, Popper himself is by far the most sympathetic character. The scriptwriters, however, clearly want us to side with his insufferable, needy, sarcastic children and ridiculously demanding ex-wife. Then we're supposed to cheer when mom and dad get back together, leaving mom's partner in the dust. Why shouldn't mom be with New Dad? We don't know. We're never told much about him, we're just supposed to dislike him. These are examples of how nonsensical the script is.
I suppose there is some moral lesson at its core about the value of monogamy as represented by the penguin circle of life, in which the mother and father stick together for good. But whatever message it may have been trying to send gets buried under an avalanche of scenes featuring penguins pooping, farting and running headfirst into things (as a side note, this is also the first Carrey comedy in which someone taking a ball to the groin is an actual joke).
Now, normally I wouldn't mind a movie like this. There are many other family films out there that are nearly identical to "Penguins". But I do love Jim Carrey, and it bothers me to see him in the same old Hollywood "family" garbage everyone's already seen countless times before. He's so much better than this.
It's just sad.
The Machinist (2004)
Very good
More than just a showcase for Christian Bale's acting talent and frightening dedication to his work, The Machinist is a thriller that is truly atmospheric, and worth watching more than once.
I would be doing anyone who hasn't seen the film a disservice by explaining too much about the plot. Simply put, Bale's Trevor Reznik is a malnourished insomniac who gets increasingly paranoid. And boy, is he thin. A real-life mirror image of the eerie hangman doodles that pop up throughout the film, Bale's body makes for half of The Machinist's disturbing quality. The other half comes from Brad Anderson's direction. An atmosphere of unease and paranoia runs throughout pretty much every scene, and Anderson just nails it. It's confusing how relatively little attention he seems to have garnered after the release of this movie. His talent is undeniable.
The cast fit into their roles nicely, with Bale taking good material and doing amazing things with it in a performance second only to Bateman. Reznik's fatigue and subsequent disconnection from reality is often painfully convincing.
Perhaps the way the film piles disturbing event on top of disturbing event gets to be a bit too much after a while, but none of what is shown on screen is unnecessary or irrelevant. And although the ending isn't wholly unpredictable, the final revelation, and Reznik's reaction to it, is moving and rewarding. The ending, in which we see this broken-down shell of a person find some kind of peace, makes the long, grueling journey leading up to it worthwhile. An engaging film, well worth your time.
Oldeuboi (2003)
A modern classic.
Oldboy is a great film. Not only did it put South Korea on the cinematic map, it did so while delivering a great, psychological horror story, told with a completely fresh flair and style.
It is a violent film. The violence is over-the-top and shocking, with scenes of torture and bloodletting that are grotesque and wince-inducing. However, Oldboy has little in common with the stereotypical action or gore movie, in which the focus is on the violence itself rather than trivialities like plot, characters and themes. In such works, the events in the film function mostly as a tiresome haul that needs to be completed before the satisfying arrival at the blood-splattered money shot. Oldboy, on the other hand, smoothly weaves the violence into its story in a natural and unforced manner. Also, by refusing to shy away from the images of obscene violence, the film puts an uncomfortable magnifying glass over the ugly side of revenge. Showing the disturbing violence for what it is rather than glorifying it, it makes an impression that lasts far longer than that of Tarantino's shallow revenge fantasies.
After his previous work, Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance, director Park Chan-Wook went a whole new direction. While that film was slow-paced to the point of being meditative, and had stylistic touches but maintained a cold realism, Oldboy is fast and stylish and bursting at the seams with cinematic ideas. Film-wise it follows an anything-goes principle, and it does so without ever feeling silly or excessive. The unexpected use of CGI, unexpected violence, unexpected turns of the story – everything is designed to catch the first-time viewer off-guard. Yet despite this, the film flows beautifully and makes perfect sense.
The combination of music – everything from low-key electronic loops to intense Vivaldi pieces – and images is simply fantastic. Every shot is eye-catching, from the dark and crumbling slums of the city to the antagonist's sterile penthouse and the final scenes' snow-covered mountain tops. It is a film that is great both to look at and listen to. Even so, it avoids making Tarsem Singh's (director of The Cell and The Fall) mistake of letting the images be the entire film. Instead, Oldboy's story more than holds its own against the visuals and soundtrack. When the film's final revelation comes crashing down, it is as shocking to the audience as it is to the protagonist. This "twist" scene also has one of the movie's greatest, tensest build-ups; if only for this single moment, the movie is well worth watching.
Oldboy is an example of a filmmaker having a good vision, the means to make it a reality, and the dedication and talent to pull it off. Direction, story and actors work together so well, it makes creating something like this look easy. If you can handle the violence, you will find an extremely well-written, creative, dramatic, humorous, original and entertaining film, one that takes you for a cinematic roller-coaster ride in its truest sense. A must-see.
Vanilla Sky (2001)
Outstanding
Probably one of the most criminally underrated films of all time, Vanilla Sky is beyond any doubt a great movie, and a truly original exploration of life, death, love, dreams and reality. Much like the American version of "The Office", it is that rare creation that steps out of the shadow of its predecessor and takes on a life all its own. This is largely thanks to writer / director Cameron Crowe, who has managed to pull off something very unlikely – a remake that is superior to the original.
Based on the cult film Abre Los Ojos by Alejandro Amenábar, "Sky" has little in common with the lackluster carbon copies Hollywood usually churns out when remaking foreign movies. It is obvious that a lot of care went into the making of "Sky", and my impression is that Crowe found true inspiration in Amenábar's movie and strongly wanted to tell the story in his own words. While Crowe doesn't stray very far from the source material, to the point of some scenes being almost identical to those of the original, he has added a myriad of his own creative influences and personal touches, creating a true cinematic experience that is captivating and memorable in its own right. Despite the similarities, "Sky" stands on its own.
The film's most striking quality is the use of music and sound, both of which are superb. Crowe has picked out a selection of popular tracks of various genres and found unexpected, yet pitch-perfect, moments to unleash them. Key scenes will make you listen to songs by Joan Osbourne, Underworld, Todd Rundgren, The Beach Boys, Freur and Sigur Rós in a whole new way. And Radiohead has seldom sounded better than in the opening scenes. This is one of those films where, if nothing else, the soundtrack alone would make the whole production worthwhile. The music and sound create a distinct and difficult-to-explain atmosphere, one that is unique to this film. You have to see it to understand.
The casting is nothing short of genius. In four of the five main parts, it seems like every actor was born for their role. Cruise as the man who has it all, but falls victim to his own vain selfishness. Lee as his best friend, charming but maybe not who he appears to be. Russell as the humble father figure. And Diaz, who shows a whole new side of herself and stands for some of the film's more disturbing moments. The weak link is Cruz as the love interest. Her flawlessness becomes overbearing at times, although this could have more to do with how her character is written than the actress herself.
It is a film with a twist ending, but it doesn't rely on this twist to work. In fact, knowing the twist beforehand, or re-watching the film knowing how it will end, in no way takes away from the experience. This is because the film is so solidly constructed, so well acted, and set to such an incredible soundtrack. The final elevator scenes have, at least for me, lost none of their beauty, even though I know the script almost word for word and there are no surprises left.
Vanilla Sky is romantic and sad, sometimes horrifying and other times beautiful. It is easily a career high-point for all involved. A must-see.