The Oscars

Well, faithful readers, it has been a bit of time since my last post. I apologize for the delay, but the fact is, there just hasn’t been much to write about recently. However, several of you have mentioned it to me, so I at least wanted to post a few thoughts to keep things moving.

Awards season is drawing to a close, with the Spirit Awards last night, as well as the Academy Awards tomorrow night, and I am almost ready to make my final predictions. Of course the award that means to most is Best Picture, and I’m still not sure how I feel about the expanded category this year. While I appreciate the idea that more films can be included, (films I loved, like District 9 and Up, which would normally not be nominated), I’m not sure how this will affect the voting process. However, we are dealing with 10 nominees, and as of this writing, I have seen 9 of those 10. (I have a copy of Precious, I just have to find the time between now and tomorrow night to watch it.) My vote is still firmly behind The Hurt Locker, but I’m afraid that because of the changes in the system, Avatar may walk away with an award that it clearly doesn’t deserve. We shall see.

But aside from the anticipation of who will be the big winners on Oscar night, awards season always brings to mind all of the things that I love about good movies as well. This week, I’ve caught bits and pieces of Dances With Wolves on television, and this movie has always held a special place with me. Special, because seeing it when I was young, it was the first time that I understood what a “good” movie was. I remember going to see it in the theater when I was a young boy, and all I understood going in was that it was a western, and I had always loved westerns. But until I saw Dances With Wolves, my idea of a “good” movie was Ghostbusters or Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. (Don’t get me wrong, I still love those movies. But they didn’t win Oscars.) It was the first time I was able to grasp the concept of “Best Picture,” and my life as a movie-lover hasn’t been the same since. “You mean they give out awards for movies?” It was a big moment for me. (It was also one of the few Best Picture winners of that time you could take a young kid to. I also remember wanting to see Silence of the Lambs the following year because it had won Best Picture, and my mother very emphatically forbidding it.)

So here’s to another big night for movies and the people who love them. I hope you’ll all be watching with me.

I'm Danny, and I love the Oscars.

DVD Recommendation

Death at a Funeral

It is no secret that one of the best parts of going to the theater is the previews. And just about everyone agrees. We all love to turn to the next person and give a thumbs up or down to the trailer we just saw. On one recent visit to the local theater, we were treated to a preview of the upcoming Death at a Funeral, and the friend next to me really seemed to enjoy it, but I was disappointed. Unlike my friend, I was aware that this new film is actually a remake of a movie from a couple of years ago. (Also called Death at a Funeral.) And I couldn’t wait to recommend to my friend that he go out and rent the original version instead.

Not that the new one looks bad. In fact, it looks mostly the same except with black actors instead of British ones. However, as much as I enjoy Chris Rock and Martin Lawrence from time to time, I thought that the first Death was pure genius. Directed by Frank Oz, better known as the voice of Yoda from Star Wars as well as countless Muppets, but also a fine comedic director of films like What About Bob? and Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, the original Death had me laughing uncontrollably. It was a movie that I had to watch several times because I just couldn’t stop enjoying it. It features a host of British talent, including Matthew Macfayden and Rupert Graves as the two brothers trying to keep the day of their father’s funeral from falling into complete and utter chaos. (And of course, failing to do so.) It is a thoroughly hilarious film, and while I have yet to see the remake, I find it hard to believe that it can top the original. So for my first official DVD recommendation, I urge you to go out and get Death at a Funeral. You’ll thank me.

Review: Youth In Revolt

Michael Cera has made a blossoming career out of being able to portray both awkward and nerdy while appearing lovable and endearing, and Youth In Revolt is the latest vehicle in which this is evident. The film is an attempt at a charming look at young love and sexuality, but does very little that is different, and aside from the rare funny moment, is boring and forgettable.

Cera plays Nick Twisp, the bumbling virgin who falls in love with young Sheeni Saunders played by the charming Portia Doubleday. (For reasons that are still unclear to me. Is it only because she is the first girl to ever show him any attention? The first girl that he might have a chance with? That’s not pathetic in a cute way, it’s just plain sad.) In addition to Nick, Cera also plays Francois Dillinger, the “bad boy” alter-ego that he creates in an attempt to get Sheeni to fall in love with him. What happens after that is predictable, and the story turns into a bland rendition of things we have seen before.

There are a few high points, however. First, I loved the random animation sequences. It was reminiscent of some of the great teen comedies of the 80s, like the movies of Savage Steve Holland. Also, Fred Willard steals the show every time he is on screen, and his show of “solidarity” in the film is both genuinely funny and creepy.

This movie didn’t affect me one way or another. It’s a pretentious attempt to be both funny and meaningful, yet I didn’t find myself laughing often, and I certainly found very little meaning. Dear Michael Cera, we get it. You do a good job of being awkward and adorable. Now do something different. Give me an entire movie where you play a character like Francois Dillinger. You don’t have to be serious, (After all, the alter-ego in this film was played with a bit of humor and irony.) you just need to do something new.

Final Grade: C

Top Films of 2009. (So far)

As 2009 is now finished, I have started to get requests from readers for my “Top Movies” of the past year. While I would love to write an entire post about my favourites from last year, the fact of the matter is that I haven’t yet seen all the 2009 films that I want to see. (I have a long list of flicks that I’ll have to wait to see until I can get my hands on a dvd.) However, I have seen several amazing movies, so I’ve decided to take a moment and let you know what I thought were the best that I have seen so far. (Since this list is incomplete, I’m limiting my list to only 5 instead of the usual 10.) Here we go:

1. The Hurt Locker
Not only is this the best movie of the year, but it is one of the finest war movies ever made. The suspense, the drama, and the characters all feel incredibly real, and you should definitely see this movie.

2. Where the Wild Things Are
A beloved children’s book comes to life in a way that truly inspires the imagination. Spike Jonze shows us a world where things are very beautiful and serene and at times, frighteningly… wild.

3. Up In the Air
This is the best that George Clooney has ever been, and with his resume, that is saying something. The life of Ryan Bingham is both enticing and repulsive, and it leads to a movie that is sometimes funny and sometimes depressing, but always realistic and moving.

4. Up
Pixar has a history of making great movies, but Up is something else. It transcends its animated origins, and becomes a film that is so heartbreakingly emotional, you can’t help but feel something. It is profoundly sad, and it is a great adventure, but at its heart is one of the best love stories of 2009.

5. District 9
There were a few good sci-fi films in 2009, but District 9 is a stand out in a genre that usually brings nothing new beyond the typical genre clichés. However, this movie is anything but a cliché, and the political allegory of the story is more thought-provoking than one would normally expect from a movie with aliens and spaceships in it.

Well, there you go. Stay tuned for more as I get around to the others on my list, and stay tuned for another post that will be coming soon as I unveil my Top Films of the DECADE! Which movie was my favourite of the last 10 years? You’ll find out soon.

My name is Danny, and I loved 2009.

Review: Invictus

Director Clint Eastwood is known for crafting moving and poignant films, but he also has a history of films which fail to stand out and are a general disappointment. Unfortunately for this viewer, Invictus falls into the latter category. It is a movie that aspires to recreate an amazing moment in history, but the story lacks direction and struggles with its identity. Invictus is the story of the South African rugby team, which against all odds won the 1995 Rugby World Cup as the host nation. However, it is also about Nelson Mandela, a great man, who was at the time newly elected as the first black president of South Africa, and was faced with the task of leading a severely divided, post-apartheid nation. And therein lays the problem. Is this a movie about Mandela, or a movie about a rugby team? It attempts to bring the two of them together, but the result is a film that lacks purpose or impact.

Morgan Freeman is of course fantastic as Mandela, and I can think of no one else who could have played him. But the end result turns out to be exactly what you would expect. We’ve seen Freeman play kind, wise gentlemen in the past, the only difference here was his need to learn the accent and peculiar way of speech that Mandela possesses. Matt Damon is passable in his role as Francois Pienaar, the captain of the rugby team (Providing you can suspend your disbelief for a bit. Damon is 5’7” or 8” tops, while the actual Pienaar was 6’3” and stood like a mountain on the rugby field.), but the rugby scenes themselves are an absolute bore to watch. The match scenes lack any sort of energy, and the final game is about 15-20 minutes of poor angles, close-ups, and slow motion, all of which fail to give you any sense of what a rugby match is really like. Not only that, but there is little explanation of the action beyond the occasional glimpse at a scoreboard, so it becomes tough at times to even know what’s going on. And I’m one of a small percentage of Americans who actually know the rules to the sport. I can’t imagine what the match scenes were like for someone who doesn’t know a scrum from a try.

In the end, I think I would have enjoyed this film much more if it were a movie solely about the life and person of Mandela. I probably would have also preferred if it were more focused towards the rugby team, as we don’t get to know anything about any of the other players on the team. (What about the lone black player? We don’t hear anything about him in this movie, and that’s a shame.) However, with this film attempting to juxtapose these two subjects, what we are left with is a movie that tries to inspire, but lacks any sort of inspiration beyond the character of Mandela, which often speaks for itself.

Final Grade: C+

Review: Avatar

I have had several requests concerning my thoughts on the movie Avatar, so I figured I would oblige those few individuals, and post a few things I took away from the film.

First off, let it be said that this movie is a technological marvel. Visually, it is hands down the greatest thing I have ever seen on screen. It is rare that a movie is able to really “wow” me anymore, especially from a technical standpoint, but director James Cameron certainly succeeded. I was consistently amazed at the variety of flora and fauna that call the world of Pandora their home, and my only regret is that I was not able to view the movie on an IMAX screen. I did however see it in 3D, and I would recommend this to any potential viewers. This movie was made to be a visual spectacle, and though the first 30 minutes of the film were a bit disorienting, I eventually overcame it and settled into a comfortable viewing experience.

Apart from the visual experience however, there is little to recommend about this film. The story is recycled from various other sources, and the characters are such clichés that at times they become exaggerated caricatures. That isn’t to say that the story is bad, it just brings nothing new to the table. It’s clear that Cameron wanted his film to have a message, it’s simply unclear what that message should be. Is this a film about the environment? Is it about oppression? I’m unsure. In conversations with friends recently, I’ve summarized the plot as Ferngully meets Dances With Wolves, and I feel that’s a pretty accurate description. Concerning the latter, Avatar definitely exhibits all the wonderful clichés of a story about the guilt of the white man, in which he identifies with an oppressed people and becomes a race-traitor. (Yet he still maintains his superiority becoming not only part of the native tribe, but their greatest champion and savior, without whom they are doomed.)

For the most part, I found the acting to be passable. It was difficult to identify with, or relate to, most of the cast because as I mentioned earlier, it is all played a bit too far. However, I enjoyed the character of Neytiri (Zoe Saldana), and I thought she made an excellent guide into the life of the Na’vi people. She played her part with kindness as well as a feral animosity that made me like her, and at times fear her.

In the end, I did enjoy this movie. It became easy to overlook the story because it is such a beautiful movie to look at. (Perhaps that’s my ADD kicking in. I’m always distracted by bright lights and pretty colors.) And I would recommend seeing this in the theater. I just can’t imagine that it will translate to home viewing well, and I feel that without the visuals holding it up, the flaws in story and character will be much more apparent.

Final Grade: B-


In other news, this blog has been up and running for 3 days now, and we are already up to almost 100 hits. So thank you, all of you, for stopping by and checking it out. Be sure and let me know what you think of the films I’ve reviewed, and feel free to add suggestions of your own. (A few of you already have, and thank you to those who have left comments, as well as those who have emailed me.) And please help spread the word! If you like this blog, tell your friends. Let’s see how quickly we can get that counter up to 1000. This is the last post for 2009, so have a safe and happy New Years, and I’ll see you again in 2010.

Danny

Trailer Reviews

Well friends, 2010 is only a few days away, which means that the first trailers for some of the biggest movies of the next year are already finding their way to us. It is time now for what will be a regular feature on this blog, and I hope you enjoy it. It's time to review some trailers. (Click on the movie titles for a link to the trailers.)

1. Iron Man 2 (scheduled release: May 7, 2010)

Let's face it, you could just show me the words "Iron Man 2" on the screen and I would automatically get excited. This is probably the flick that I am most looking forward to, and I'm sure many of my fellow geeks share my anticipation. As for the trailer itself, it gives us great looks at new heroes and villains (Whiplash, War Machine, and Black Widow especially), but not much detail on the actual plot of the movie. Let's just hope that with all the star-studded superhero power, director Jon Favreau will not fall into the trap of "more is better." (*ahem* Batman and Robin *cough*) Still, Robert Downey Jr. looks as good as ever as the charming, boozing, warmongering Tony Stark, and this is one 2010 blockbuster that I will not be missing.
Trailer Grade: A-

2. Alice in Wonderland (scheduled release: March 5, 2010)

Tim Burton is known for the creepy and weird, and the trailer for his retelling of this classic story appears to be no exception. Johnny Depp's Mad Hatter has been the focal point of much of the speculation about the film, and the trailer pays a good amount of attention to his portrayal. (He is even doing the voice-over.) However, the trailer is short, and while we catch brief glimpses of some of our favourite characters, we see very little of them. The cast list for this film is superb with names such as Alan Rickman, Stephen Fry, Michael Sheen, and Christopher Lee, and their absence from the trailer is disappointing. Not so much so as the absence of anything substantial from relative unknown Mia Wasikowska as Alice, who we see, but never hear from. All in all, this movie appears to be what I have come to expect from Burton and Depp, and as such, gives me little to look forward to.
Trailer Grade: C

3. Robin Hood (scheduled release: May 14, 2010)

From Ridley Scott, the director of Gladiator, and Russell Crowe, the star of Gladiator, comes Robin Hood. Or as it looks from the trailer: "Gladiator in the woods with more horses." Everything about this trailer is bland. There of course is no plot reveal (to be fair, this is just the teaser), but the direction looks bland. Russell Crowe looks bland, and may be the worst choice to play Robin Hood since...well, since Kevin Costner. (Is Crowe the antithesis of the great Errol Flynn?) At least Costner had an awesome Bryan Adams song in his movie. I'm not sure what song is playing during this trailer, but it's garbage. I understand that they're trying to go in a more "gritty and real" direction, but I myself could use a bit more "merry men."
Trailer Grade: D+

That's it for now, thanks for stopping by. Have anything to say about these three trailers? Leave comments. Seen a good movie trailer recently and want me to check it out? Email me: dannylovesmovies@gmail.com

I'm Danny, and I love movie trailers.