CAST Chris Bauer (Snow White: A Tale of Terror, 1997) Caprice Benedetti (Practical Magic, 1998) Kim Chan (Desperately Seeking Susan, 1985) Marcia DeBonis (The Truman Show, 1998) Tom Riis Farrell (Sleepless in Seattle, 1993) Charles A. Gargan (Serendipity, 2001) Juan Carlos Hernandez (War of the Worlds, 2005) William Hill (Analyze This, 1999) Judith Ivey (A Life Less Ordinary, 1997) Jeffrey Jones (Ferris Bueller's Day Off, 1986) Monica Keena (Orange County, 2002) Susan Kellermann (Planes, Trains and Automobiles, 1987) Vincent Laresca (The Associate, 1996) Heather Matarazzo (Welcome to the Dollhouse, 1995) Debra Monk (The First Wives Club, 1996) Craig T. Nelson (Troop Beverley Hills, 1989) Novella Nelson (It's Kind of a Funny Story, 2010) Connie Nielsen (Rushmore, 1998) Benny Nieves (Miss Congeniality 2: Armed and Fabulous, 2005) Al Pacino (Heat, 1995) Keanu Reeves (Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, 1989) John Rothman (Ghostbusters, 1984) Vyto Ruginis (Cliffhanger, 1993) Charlize Theron (The Burning Plain, 2008) George Wyner (Spaceballs, 1987)
I'm swiftly developing an inordinate fondness for Al Pacino, because even though I used to think he was only in boringsnoring mafia movies, but now I see he can be a crazy wild card addition to a cast, and I like that. On the other hand, Keanu Reeves is about as charismatic as a baked potato, but he is clean looking and inoffensive enough to reasonably play the easily manipulated Southern hotshot lawyer Kevin Lomax. In the climatic scene, however, when Lomax is supposed to assert himself and, I dunno, express an emotion maybe, Keanu fell way flat. It was pretty uninspiring.
Charlize Theron was better than I expected, mostly because she still wasn't really on the radar when she did The Devil's Advocate. But she very convincingly fell into a maddening descent. I don't really know what else to say about this movie. It wasn't very remarkable, I guess.
CAST Patrick Fabian (Must Love Dogs, 2005) Becky Fly Victoria Patenaude
I've read a lot of articles about The Last Exorcism already, so I'm going to try and not repeat any of those critiques. However, I don't think that will be too hard because nothing I read about The Last Exorcism prepared me for the actually movie, which pleasantly defied expectation.
So what I heard was that this movie was about an exorcist who really doesn't believe in demonic possession and just provides a cathartic performance to superstitious rubes. Of course, in this last case all is not as it seems, and it starts to become difficult to figure out who is playing who, and what are the motivations. I guess you could say it was a twist ending, but it was the clever kind that I like. Looking back, I think the biggest tell was the suffering girl's brother, when he told the preacher that he saw the trick that made it look like the water was miraculously boiling, and that meant the preacher was "alright in my book."
See, he was in on it the whole time. And I know the father was genuinely trying to save his daughter, but I can't decide whether the girl was a willing sacrificial lamb or not. At times it seemed like she genuinely wanted to be saved, but at other times she appeared to be putting on her own "show" of possession, acting like a parody of Regan MacNeil (oblique reference!) and lying intentionally about where she had gone and what she had done. But on the other hand, she had moments of precognition which at first seemed to reveal sinister intent, like a picture of the preacher and his film crew being slaughtered, but may have also served as a warning. Maybe she wanted to protect the exorcisors? This may warrant a second viewing.
CAST George Clooney (Burn After Reading, 2008) Ewan McGregor (Miss Potter, 2006) Jeff Bridges (The Last Unicorn (voice), 1982) Kevin Spacey (Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, 1997) Stephen Lang (Avatar, 2009) Robert Patrick(Terminator 2: Judgement Day, 1991) Stephen Root (Rango(voice), 2011) Tim Griffin (The Bourne Supremacy, 2004) Nick Offerman (Stealing Harvard, 2002) Glenn Morshower (The River Wild, 1994) Rebecca Mader (The Devil Wears Prada, 2006)
I dunno what it is, I just didn't really like this movie either. It seems like it's been a while since I saw something that really wowed me. I'll be honest, I'm starting to lose enthusiasm for this whole blog thing. I'm starting to lose enthusiasm for a lot of things. I just didn't think it was that funny, or maybe it was just that I couldn't really get into sitting still while I was watching it.
Here's one thing that I thought could have been better, though. For most of the movie, it was ambiguous whether these guys were fooling themselves or not, but then it started to toe the line of 'no wait, we are serious about these powers' and then it wasn't so funny anymore. The mass delusion is what it makes it interesting and funny, and when Ewan McGregor's character starts buying into it--because who DOESN'T want to believe he or she has super powers?--it's even better. Honestly, the second half of the movie is a total blur.
Case 39 (2009)
dir. Christian Alvart (Pandorum, 2009)
CAST Renée Zellweger (Appaloosa, 2008) Jodelle Ferland (Girl Fight, TV 2011) Ian McShane (Coraline (voice), 2009) Bradley Cooper (Valentine's Day, 2010/1) Callum Keith Rennie (Blade: Trinity, 2004) Adrian Lester (The Day After Tomorrow, 2004) Kerry O'Malley (The Happening, 2008) Cynthia Stevenson (Air Bud: Golden Reciever, 1998) Alexander Conti (Cheaper by the Dozen 2, 2005) Mary Black (The Wicker Man, 2006) Benita Ha (X-Men: The Last Stand, 2006) Fulvio Cecere (Watchmen, 2009) Colin Lawrence (Fantastic Four, 2005) Dagmar Midcap (The Last Mimzy, 2007) Bill Mondy (The Day the Earth Stood Still, 2008) Andrew Arlie(Final Destination 2, 2003) Sarah-Jane Redmond (The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, 2005) Daniel Bacon(The Day the Earth Stood Still, 2008) Dalias Blake (Red Riding Hood, 2011) Phillip Mitchell
I expressed trepidation towards this movie a while ago but I decided to go for it anyway because I felt like watching a movie about possession. Turns out I might have been better served by checking out The Rite, The Last Exorcism,or finally getting around to The Exorcism of Emily Rose. This movie is about a well meaning social worker who takes in a child seemingly abused by her parents only to discover that all is not as it seems. This movie was hard to get through because Renee Zellweger sort of rubs me the wrong way, and it was one of those movies where the protagonist never does what I would do in that situation, and that just seems stupid.
The little girl was also sort of confusing because I was unclear on whether she was killing people expressly to make Renee's character unhappy or just to manipulate her into playing happy family or just because she was crazy demon-spawn. It was also unclear why she was so desperate to have a loving caretaker.
The ending was hectic, it seems that the evil was defeated, but is the social worker going to prison now? What will the official report say? I'd also like to say that I feel a lot of this was lifted from old episodes of the X-files, especially the parts where the adults are forced to cater to the untenable whims of an implacable child.
On the other hand, it was interesting to see how the possession theme was treated without any religious overtones. There was no priest or exorcism or ceremonies. The kid was just a demon. Case closed. It's true enough that the exorcism narrative has been beaten to death, but I'm not sure the attempt to circumvent those themes was effective here. One thing that religion always gives us in movies is the potential for redemption. In Case 39, not only was the child destroyed, but it seems that the heroine is also slated for demise, as is everyone else the girl came into contact with. I don't really enjoy it when a movie doesn't have any winners.
CAST Otto Jespersen Glenn Erland Tosterud Johanna Mørck Tomas Alf Larsen
This movie was great! Another wonderful picture out of Scandinavia! This was a camcorder-style movie in the tradition of The Blairwitch Project or Cloverfield, but although the monsters do threaten our film crew of spunky young college students, there is no threat of imminent disaster as in those films. Instead of horror, the trolls are more like revelations, almost delightful in that you had not previously considered that such fantastic things could even exist.
Nevertheless, there's a modest death count.
As far as characterization goes, I was about as invested in the college kids as I was in those kids from Blairwitch, in that I can't remember their names or what they look like but I shared a mild concern for their safety in the high suspense parts. One of them begins to develop a mysterious illness which I thought was going to lead to something good but it turned out to just be rabies. I'm not sure what they intended with that, since it's not really life threatening once it's correctly diagnosed? Right? Maybe it was supposed to be foreshadowing, but I'm not sure. On the other hand, Hans, the title character, was able to achieve a little depth for me. You got the feeling he was tired and worn out from all of the killing. It seemed like he didn't really want to kill the trolls at all, which provided the element of sensitivity that the college students weren't able to provide.
On the whole, very pleasant. I will probably watch this movie again sometime, I'd like to share it with some buddies.
Here's another spooky movie I watched before Halloween. It's about Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, from the perspective of the good doctor's maid, the title character. The twist is that it's also sort of a love story. Jekyll/Hyde loves Mary because of her innocence, and Mary loves Dr. Jekyll as well as his evil incarnation. The big question is why, and how is Mary able to love Dr. Hyde even when she knows that he is a vicious heartless killer. Part of it must have something to do with her abusive father. A connection is established when Mary describes him as having a peculiar way of walking, not quite a limp, and later the housekeeper uses almost the same words to describe the gait of Mr. Hyde. At the end of the movie, however, Mary is unable to forgive her father for his sins, but she has no hesitancy in forgiving Dr. Jekyll. I haven't quite figured that out yet.
I read The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and I remember that no symbolism was more salient than the description of the architecture. Luckily, the filmmakers behind Mary Reilly acknowledged this importance and even amped it up a little. Dr. Jekyll's main house is separated from the laboratory by a small courtyard. The laboratory represents the cruelly analytical and mysterious person of Mr. Hyde. However, in the movie the courtyard space itself takes on a symbolic form. Mary Reilly asks if she can plant some flowers in that area, to brighten it up a little. When the flowers finally show up, they are terribly depressing little colorful things barely penetrating the heavy gloom that seems to hang perpetually over Victorian Era England. Thus Mary herself assumes the role of the bridge that connects Jekyll and Hyde int one man.
What I never figured out, or forgot, about the story is whether Dr. Jekyll was attempting to isolate his dark side in order to attain pure morality in his actual person, or whether he was seeking a release from the enforced sociality of his culture. Either way, I do remember that he is seduced by the apparent freedom of Mr. Hyde and his lack of conscience, but as Mary points to the good doctor, there are no actions without consequences and the burden of Mr. Hyde's crimes, combined with Dr. Jekyll's even weakening resolve to remain his true self, ultimately destroys the man.
This movie is about a small, intensely Christian town which becomes subject to a series of apparent suicides. It is soon revealed, however, that the true cause is a curse cast by the vengeful sons of a pagan woman who was lynched for a crime she did not commit. The protagonist is a girl who is dating the pastor's son, but dumps him for the sensitive bad-boy. There's a race to undo the curse before the angry townsfolk kill the cute boy, while our Heroine races to save her new BF and her town, and not strangle herself death in the process.
No character was more irritating in this movie than the pastor's son, who, as the token best friend points out, "is the closest thing to royalty in this town." His radical turnover from a pleasant, trust-in-God's-will, sort of Christian to a kill-all-infidels sort of zealot is alarming and unexplained. By the end, he has replaced his father as the leader of the community and is willing to kill anyone and break any rule in the pursuit of his goal, which is to destroy the sensitive bad-boy who practices an alternative religion.
I can't help but point out that of the six possessions that occurred in this movie, only one of them was a man, and his "suicide" wasn't even an articulated scene, just a cutaway to a pair of hanging feet. I guess I won't go further into that because apparently some people get a little uncomfortable when I discuss the representation of gender in horror movies, and I'd hate for anyone to start thinking I was one of those "uppity" sorts of women that points out totally obvious patterns such as this and asks, why? Why is it so much more fascinating to see a girl covered in blood? Why does it seem so much more insidious when a girl is penetrated by a dark, uncontrollable force?
But we're not going to worry about those uncomfortable ideas, even though there's barely a point in blogging about movies if we aren't going to acknowledge such a blatant recurring theme.
It's a shame that I got all passive-aggressive here. I had some points to make about the title's metaphor. How the destruction manifested by the curse was actually a reflection of the town's dark secret, the murder of pagan woman referred to earlier, and the truth behind the murder she was killed for. She was scapegoated, sacrificed so the town, as an entity, could persevere in the face of irreconcilable iniquity. In turn, the nature of curse is that can only drive you to destroy yourself, it has no power beyond that. So the townsfolk are forced to turn their destruction back upon themselves in order to atone for the violence that came from within. Bang! I figured it out.
Ghost (1990) dir. Jerry Zucker (Rat Race, 2001) starring Patrick Swayze (Tall Tale, 1995) Demi Moore (The Scarlet Letter, 1995) Whoopi Goldberg (The Associate, 1996) Tony Goldwyn (The Last Samurai, 2003) Vincent Schiavelli (A Little Princess, 1995) Stephen Root (Crocodile Dundee 2, 1988)
When I'm feeling down, there's really only a handful of movies I feel like watching, depending with the source of anxiety. When challenged by matters of the heart, I think Ghost is a pretty obvious route to catharsis, unless you're like some anti-geeks who can't stand supernatural themes, then I guess you might watch Notebook (still haven't seen it!) or some other Nicholas Sparks crap. I like Ghost.
First of all, and this used to be privileged knowledge, "Unchained Melody" is my favorite love song. It really slays me. Right in the guts, and the version by Il Divo sung in Italian is impossible to sit through without at least a little wistful sniffing. Here we get the Righteous Brothers version, which is the most familiar to everyone. I think it's the part where the lyrics stutter a little "I-i-i need your love."
Gosh.
Here's another thing: I think Whoopi is awesome. I'm a big fan, I think she's the real deal. Class act all the way. I love the scene where Sam takes her to the bank and she's trying to act all cool and casual, although I would think that a professional con artiste would have more grace under pressure and be able to roll with the punches. I wish I were psychic.
The whole initiative may have gone better if my momma didn't ruin the MOST PIVOTAL SCENE (besides when Sam spooks out on his frenemy Carl) by pointing out that the in the scene where Sam and his girl reunite from beyond the grave! (and Unchained Melody is crooning full blast) and I'm supposed to be all impressed because their LOVE TRANSCENDS THE BOUNDARIES OF THIS MORTAL COIL-- my mom points out that even though Patrick Swayze is getting all intimate with Demi Moore on the screen, in the story world it's really a possessed Whoopi Goldberg doing all the cuddles, and wouldn't that feel weird to Molly?
Scrooged (1988)
dir. Richard Donner (The Goonies, 1985)
CAST Bill Murray (City of Ember, 2008) Karen Allen (Raiders of the Lost Ark, 1981) Carol Kane (Jawbreaker, 1999) Robert Mitchum (Out of the Past, 1947) Sachi Parker (Back to the Future, 1985)
On the list of underrated Christmas movies, Scrooged tops the chart. Of course, everything Bill Murray is in (besides Garfield) is worth watching several times over, he probably has other Christmas movies that I can't even remember right now. This one is about a dickish guy who gets visited by three ghosts on Christmas Eve and subsequently decides to change the way he lives his life, who can't get behind that? My favorite ghost was always the Ghost of Christmas Present, and Carol Kane plays that one very well. She's funny and she hits Bill Murray a lot. I presume you all know about A Christmas Carol, so I don't think i need to go into any great detail. It's December, so everyone needs to be watching Christmas movies. Try this one.
I saw Pan's Labyrinth in Ithaca's Cinemopolis a long time ago. I guess that's when it first came out, but now i can't remember if I saw it twice in theaters or not. I don't usually do that.
*Movies I saw twice in theaters*
1) Superman Returns (2006)
Tragic, and not worthwhile, I know. I saw it the first for shits and giggles, was horribly disappointed, but then I went to see it again because a boy I liked asked me to (pretending it was the first time!)
2) The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the witch, and the wardrobe
You guys, I flipped out when I saw this movie. I was so excited and happy. I had to find more buddies to watch it again and again (I might have seen it 3 times). Now I'm kind of over it. Will I go see Voyage of the Dawn Treader? Yes, because that's the best one - except for maybe The Horse and His Boy, which I don't believe they are planning to make a movie of because it's sort of the outlier in the Narnia series (Much like Farmer Boy for the Little House on the Prairie novels).
3) You know, that's all I can think of right now. Seeing movies 2ce in theaters is sort of lame. Generally, it stresses me out to sit still for that long. When I watch movies at home I have to mend pillowcases or paint my nails or something.
What was I talking about? OK - tonight my little brother picked out Pan's Labyrinth for him and my mom and I to watch together. Sucks for him because we forgot that this movie is subtitled (isn't it awesome when you don't even notice that you have no idea what the actors are saying?) and once it had started we didn't really feel like taking it out again. So I guess he was playing with his toys or something during this thing. Although occasionally he interrupted with a question so maybe he was attending more than I thought. When my older brother saw this movie, he called me and said, "So it was just a desperate fantasy and she dies at the end? That sucks!" But I say that it wasn't a fantasy, it was magic, and she goes to the magic underground kingdom at the end after she sheds her earthly body. She's not dead! She gets ETERNAL LIFE (omigosh Christ metaphor!) Here is what i submit as evidence:
1) Captain Vidal sees Ofelia talking to the Faun in the Labyrinth. He doesn't see the Faun, but he hears her shouting. There's a difference between pretending and whackadoodle crazy. Ofelia was having a REAL conversation (with a Faun that only she could see)
2) The Chalk: The Faun gives Ofelia a magic piece of chalk which Captain Vidal SEES and TOUCHES. She uses it to escape her room with a LOCKED DOOR and GUARD.
3)Ofelia disobeys the Faun. If it was a fantasy, then Ofelia wouldn't have imagined that the Faun ordered her to do something which she would refuse. OBVIOUSLY!
Daniel Radcliffe Alan Rickman (Love Actually, 2003)
Fiona Shaw (Super Mario Bros., 1993)
Maggie Smith (The First Wives Club, 1996)
Timothy Spall (Enchanted, 2007)
Richard Strange (Batman, 1989)
David Thewlis (The New World, 2005)
Julie Walters (Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, 2001)
Emma Watson (The Tale of Desperaux (voice), 2008)
Mark Williams (Stardust, 2007)
OK - a friend got me to go with her. And so she's already heard my Harry Potter rant but I'll hash it out again for you all, my dozens of readers.
The problem with a magical story world is that you've created a premise which supercedes any and all plot challenges. THEY HAVE MAGIC POWERS!! Something impossible needs to be accomplished? There is a magic spell for that! Not only that, but magic spells are incredibly easy to perform. Hermione erases her own existence with a single word! She re-attaches Ron's arm with a few drops of essence-of-dittany, but she can't heal Dobby's knife wound? She can't even think of something to try??? She can build a tent that's bigger on the inside than the outside, but she can't slow down the bleeding? She can't even put pressure on the wound!!!??? What's the deal??
I like Dobby.
Here's the other problem. I get that it's a treasured piece of literature and such, but do you all rememeber my rant about too many damn characters? I haven't read Harry Potter in a super long time and it confuses me and I couldn't keep all those whacky names straight back then and I'm not going to get myself all invested in them now. Am I supposed to be sad that Mad-Eye Moody died? We didn't even meet the REAL Mad Eye Moody until the end of the last movie (I think). And you're killing him off right away and expect me to give a shit? UNlikely. It's like in LOTR when Haldir died (who I thought was the same guy as Jason Isaacs, who plays Lucius Malfoy, but he's actually Craig Parker.)
Ok - different guys. but my point is, and I hope you felt the same, that there's this awesome death scene and I'm trying to be moved but I'm all distracted because who is this guy??? I had to look up his name right now! I vaguely recalled the character from reading the book at summer camp when I was 11, but for serious, this is why it's important to be conservative with your characters: because I didn't give a shit about Haldir's death because you didn't spend enough time developing his character, Peter Jackson!
HP has a different take on elves, am I right?
Aww. He's a cutie.
Why do I bring this up? There are too many stupid characters in Harry Potter and I can't keep them straight and they are trying to address all these side plots but it's unnecessary. Just tell the stupid story without them. And what's the deal with Harry following stuff all the time? Why would you follow a ghostly deer into the forest when magical villains are after you? Didn't you learn your lesson when the silent old woman you followed home turned into a snake? You wanna stop being stupid, HARRY POTTER?
Dobby got some good reflection time on his death. But that's cool. Dobby was a decent dude. One thing I noticed while doing my customary background research on the stars is that this franchise has kept those kids pretty busy - because they have NOTHING going on in the their resumes. That must suck a bit. It's been like ten years and they can't get an outside acting gig? That's worse than Disney channel, but hopefully those little English kids won't end up all coked out and in jail. I could go on but I have to do some homework. Next I'm going to do something with the trailer for Cowboys and Aliens, so watch out.
Ondine (2009)
dir. Neil Jordan (The Brave One, 2007)
CAST Colin Farrell (The New World, 2005) Alicja Bachleda
Tony Curran (Blade II, 2002)
The problem with Colin Farrell is that I can never decide whether he's attractive or not. This movie was good -for a lot of reasons- because Farrell plays a salty fisherman who's a recovering alcoholic so he's supposed to be a bit worn out and ragged, but IS good looking enough to be a compelling romantic lead. That being said, Ondine is not all the way in your face romance. There's only one kissing/sexytime scene and it's a classy, pan out and then return once they're fully dressed deal.
So the theme of the story centers around the Irish Selkie legend. Basically, a selkie is like a mermaid, except they can appear as either a seal or a person. In the fairy tale, the fisherman steals the selkie's seal-skin and makes her be his wife. They have lots of children and are very happy, but one day the oldest daughter asks her mom why the father hides an old leather coat in the roof of their house. And then the selkie gets her skin back, and even though she promises that she's only going for a quick swim, to say hi to her parents and whatnot, she never comes back again and it's sad.
So Ondine starts with Farrell's fisherman, Syracuse, hauling up this girl in his fishing net. Ondine ends of paralleling the selkie legend in more ways than one, but something more sinister is actually going on. That's why I don't understand why netflix sorted this as a fantasy - obviously someone didn't watch until the end. It reminds me of how the cable company used to summarize episodes of the Simpsons after they had clearly only watched the first two minutes. Do you all remember how the Simpsons used to start with one storyline and then go in a completely different direction after the first commercial break?
Paranormal Activity(2007) dir. Oren Peli starring No one on the cast had any significant credits. So :P
Yeah, it was pretty scary. I coped with this in various ways, as you'll see below. I hope I don't have trouble sleeping tonight - 'cause that would be lousy.I'm not really sure what else to say, as significant critique seems unnecessary. Anyway, I don't want to piss off the demon.
I thought maybe it would be better to put a screen shot from the movie as the leading image rather than the movie poster. I don't know if anyone cares about that.
Last Tuesday I did an imaginary synopsis of Chain Letter, and I thought that was amusing so this week I decided to guess the plot of a more intellectual piece of film.
Hereafter is a supernatural thriller starring Matt Damon. Mattie is having problems coping with his superpower, much like Whoopi Goldberg in Ghost. He pisses a lot of people off by refusing to communicate with their loved ones until his GF is killed in a tsunami with a bunch of other loosely associated characters as well. Matt finally understands the nature of his gift and then DIES!@!!!
