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WolfWalkers (2020)
Another masterpiece by Cartoon Saloon
In short, the story and characters isn't as good as The Secret of Kells but the art-style, animation and action scenes are pushed next level, it comes together with the music to create something really magical and overwhelming. It's a bit more bombastic, less nuanced and straight-forward that previous Cartoon Saloon movies but when it's that good it's hard to complain about it.
Tout en haut du monde (2015)
Pretty solid movie with a few flaws
Overall the movie was lovely, but it had a couple of issues in my opinion:
- The French voices were not very good (that might not be very perceptible to a non-native speaker though).
- The animation and art was a bit bare sometimes (some of the sea and north scenes). That said, given that they probably didn't have a huge budget, the art was still very good overall.
- I didn't liked the ending much, the struggle part was really good and building tension, but her randomly finding her grandpa journal was an immersion breaker to me, and lead to a resolution that was too easy and not very satisfying.
As I Was Moving Ahead Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty (2000)
Interesting idea but execution isn't great.
The concept of the movie works, the image are sometimes mesmerizing and the comments interesting and funny. When the right combination of music and shots come together it is very nice.
That said it could have been shorter, some parts are quite repetitive, there's like 5 "ecstasy of summer in NYC", several shots of winters that are very similar, etc. And while the shaky, unfocused shots have their charm, they can become tedious. Jonas Mekas does tell you at some point he's not a film maker, but that's a sometimes a bit too apparent in the work itself.
That said it's really good material if you want to zone out, you can watch this with fleeting attention and not miss much of the experience.
Only Lovers Left Alive (2013)
Emo vampire likes Jack White
The movie has all the ingredients to be a great sidestep from the traditional vampire movies but sadly it comes through as pretentious ; the constant - and disputable - cultural references and ideas (why would they discuss quantum entanglement in the 2000's, and what is this pseudo-science wave garbabe?) looks more like what an old american director think is cool than to what actual century old beings would be into. Despite the nice visual, mood and actor performance, I couldn't really get into the movie.
Mandy (2018)
Panos Cosmatos makes the same mistake as in Beyond the Dark Rainbow
The main problem with BtDR was its ending, the movie made a great job at building atmosphere and mystery but finished on a cheap horror movie scene that felt completely at odds with the rest of the movie.
In Mandy he makes the same mistake but on a much larger scale. The first part of the movie makes a great job at establishing a fantastic atmosphere with elements of psychological and existential horror. Everything, from visual, characters, acting and sound design comes together to produce a compelling experience.
Then the movie devolve into a cheap, explicit horror movie, with a subpar revenge plot and action scenes, effectively destroying most of the elements that were build in the first part of the movie. It's like if Cosmatos couldn't decide which kind of movie he wanted to make and tried to do cram both types in the same movie.
While BtDR only did the mistake in the very last part of the movie, Mandy does it to a much larger extend, which makes it an inferior work.
Blade Runner 2049 (2017)
Average
There's a few cool scenes (like the sex one) but overall the movie isn't that great. The actions scenes feel unnecessary and are not very good, the plot is a bit wonky, the bad guys are Hollywood clichés, etc. The visuals are good but nothing extraordinary either. Overall this fits well with Denis Villeneuve's downward trajectory towards cookie-cutter Hollywood block busters.
Beyond the Black Rainbow (2010)
Great movie with a weak ending
Great photography, editing, sound design and acting and a real scary villain, this movie is a breath of fresh air. Although the story might look a bit confused at first, most of the shots have a purpose in advancing the plot or developing the characters For example instead of having a minor character explaining how the facility controls Elena's power, the movie uses tasty visuals and sounds to the same effect, in a masterful demonstration of "show, don't tell".
While I don't mind the change of mood in the ending, I still think it's by far the weakest part of the movie. Still a fantastic work overall.
Lady Bird (2017)
Not much to be seen here
This movie is average at best. The story is full of cliches and the characters are not very interesting; they try very hard to make them pass as quirky but it feels fake (the "emo" brother with piercing that never smile, the "tortured" musician, c'mon). This is a normal man idea of an indie movie.
The production is alright and the acting is good, but that doesn't save the movie from mediocrity.