The Island – 2005, Michael Bay
The right people must like Michael Bay to let him make films in the first place, let alone to have continued after the box office flop that was The Island. I know it’s easy to rip it out of Michael Bay, but he is crap, especially when he does the ‘spin the camera around the actor’ bullshit.
So why did I watch The Island? ‘Cos I like Sci-Fi. And Sean Bean.
‘Gattica’ meets ‘Minority Report’ with more product placement than ‘I,Robot’. The whole story about clones raised to donate body parts was taken from a 1979 film and DreamWorks had to pay a million bucks after libel action was taken. There’s a good cast including Sean Bean as the bad guy and that moody looking black dude from ‘Blood Diamond’. Lots of nice sets and props, but still not really worth putting on your list.
Bad Trailer = Poor Box Office
Friday 30 April 2010
The Red Shoes
The Red Shoes - 1948, Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger
One of those films that you only ever hear of when it appears on ‘Best Films Ever Made’ lists, easily the best film about ballet ever made, probably the best film made in 1948.
The Red Shoes takes the fairytale by Hans Christian Anderson and cleverly interprets it in two completely different ways. The film tells the story of a ballet company that puts on a production of a ballet of The Red Shoes starring an aspiring young dancer called Vicky. In the ballet, Vicky plays the part of a girl who dons a pair of red shoes and starts to dance, and she can’t stop dancing. The enchanted red shoes cause her to dance herself to death. The plot of the film revolves around the ballet/fairytale and mirrors the story.
The film could be considered to be two films in one due to an inspired fantasy sequence that takes place in the middle of the film. The film is based in reality, but when the ballet of The Red Shoes starts, we are taken away from the stage in the theatre where the ballet is premiering and shown a belletic creation of Powell and Pressburger’s vision. The sequence uses special effects and large sets and background mattes that are impossible in a conventional ballet. The film goes from reality to fantasy to reality again, and it works brilliantly.
The non fantasy elements are almost too good to be true. Every shot and every scene is flawlessly composed and directed. The disappointing ending is the only thing that stops The Red Shoes being perfect.
So that’s where they got the idea for ‘Thriller’.
http://www.theauteurs.com/films/233/
One of those films that you only ever hear of when it appears on ‘Best Films Ever Made’ lists, easily the best film about ballet ever made, probably the best film made in 1948.
The Red Shoes takes the fairytale by Hans Christian Anderson and cleverly interprets it in two completely different ways. The film tells the story of a ballet company that puts on a production of a ballet of The Red Shoes starring an aspiring young dancer called Vicky. In the ballet, Vicky plays the part of a girl who dons a pair of red shoes and starts to dance, and she can’t stop dancing. The enchanted red shoes cause her to dance herself to death. The plot of the film revolves around the ballet/fairytale and mirrors the story.
The film could be considered to be two films in one due to an inspired fantasy sequence that takes place in the middle of the film. The film is based in reality, but when the ballet of The Red Shoes starts, we are taken away from the stage in the theatre where the ballet is premiering and shown a belletic creation of Powell and Pressburger’s vision. The sequence uses special effects and large sets and background mattes that are impossible in a conventional ballet. The film goes from reality to fantasy to reality again, and it works brilliantly.
The non fantasy elements are almost too good to be true. Every shot and every scene is flawlessly composed and directed. The disappointing ending is the only thing that stops The Red Shoes being perfect.
So that’s where they got the idea for ‘Thriller’.
http://www.theauteurs.com/films/233/
Chungking Express
Chungking Express – 1994, Wong Kar-wai
As a ‘bro who loves films’, and considers himself knowledgeable on the subject of cinema, I feel pressured into liking Wong’s modern Honk Kong classic.
I watched it for the first time yesterday and after a few minutes I felt like it was all very familiar. There are two reasons for this. One is that the style of the film has been copied in a lot of other Chinese and Western films made since (the fact that filmmakers are still taking obvious cues from Chungking Express means the film still feels fresh 16 years on). The other is that the way that Wong took the energy and pace that was common in contemporary Honk Kong films, but gave it a New Wave twist with it’s unconventional (at the time) narrative structure.
Chungking Express is split into two separate stories that have a couple of overlapping characters and locations. 1994 also saw the release of Pulp Fiction (the two films played the international movie festival circuit together). Every year since then seems to have featured at least one prominent film (independent or otherwise) with irregular or multiple plots..
The two tales each involve a lovelorn policeman involved with a woman, but never as involved as he’d like to be. The two halves of the film each have a certain structure (beginning /middle/end) but the endings are typically ambiguous and leave the audience wanting to know more. The first story in particular has an interesting premise and could have been expanded into a 90 minute film, but we are left wondering who that woman is and why she did it.
The second story features a less compelling plot but more compelling characters, one of them played by The Worlds Finest Actor Tony Leung, the other by ‘The Chinese Madonna’ Faye Wong. The second part is better that the first almost to the point that it is tempting to recommend skipping the first all together. So in that sense it’s a very uneven film.
But as with the best ‘art house’ cinema, the story is not the most important thing. Wong wants the audience to enjoy what they are watching. He wants you to be happy, and a brief look at the general opinion on the web proves that this film does make people happy. Though I suspect that’s because they all want to be Faye Wong’s character.
So give it a go. Enjoy the obvious beauty of it all. But don’t feel too bad if you’re not too keen.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3hHznB-_Gbs&feature=related
As with a most films shot in Hong Kong, the city is a character in itself. The locations add a lot of atmosphere. I found it a little depressing that the two male protagonists live in such crappy apartments. Are HK policemen paid so little?
As a ‘bro who loves films’, and considers himself knowledgeable on the subject of cinema, I feel pressured into liking Wong’s modern Honk Kong classic.
I watched it for the first time yesterday and after a few minutes I felt like it was all very familiar. There are two reasons for this. One is that the style of the film has been copied in a lot of other Chinese and Western films made since (the fact that filmmakers are still taking obvious cues from Chungking Express means the film still feels fresh 16 years on). The other is that the way that Wong took the energy and pace that was common in contemporary Honk Kong films, but gave it a New Wave twist with it’s unconventional (at the time) narrative structure.
Chungking Express is split into two separate stories that have a couple of overlapping characters and locations. 1994 also saw the release of Pulp Fiction (the two films played the international movie festival circuit together). Every year since then seems to have featured at least one prominent film (independent or otherwise) with irregular or multiple plots..
The two tales each involve a lovelorn policeman involved with a woman, but never as involved as he’d like to be. The two halves of the film each have a certain structure (beginning /middle/end) but the endings are typically ambiguous and leave the audience wanting to know more. The first story in particular has an interesting premise and could have been expanded into a 90 minute film, but we are left wondering who that woman is and why she did it.
The second story features a less compelling plot but more compelling characters, one of them played by The Worlds Finest Actor Tony Leung, the other by ‘The Chinese Madonna’ Faye Wong. The second part is better that the first almost to the point that it is tempting to recommend skipping the first all together. So in that sense it’s a very uneven film.
But as with the best ‘art house’ cinema, the story is not the most important thing. Wong wants the audience to enjoy what they are watching. He wants you to be happy, and a brief look at the general opinion on the web proves that this film does make people happy. Though I suspect that’s because they all want to be Faye Wong’s character.
So give it a go. Enjoy the obvious beauty of it all. But don’t feel too bad if you’re not too keen.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3hHznB-_Gbs&feature=related
As with a most films shot in Hong Kong, the city is a character in itself. The locations add a lot of atmosphere. I found it a little depressing that the two male protagonists live in such crappy apartments. Are HK policemen paid so little?
Primer
Primer – 2004, Shane Carruth
Very clever Sci-Fi film made for $7,000. An excellent example of what you can do with a little money and a lot of imagination/hard work/a degree in mathematics. Basically it’s about a dude who invents a time machine, so naturally it all goes wrong and gets very hard to follow. Definitely the type of film you’d want to read about on Wikipedia afterwards.
It’s full of techy guys mumbling about physics, and if you stop listening at the wrong moment, you’ll lose track of what’s going on sooner than if you’d been listening intently, but you’ll lose track either way.
That may not sound like much of an endorsement, but I would recommend Primer to anyone who likes a film they have to pay attention to. If you liked ‘Brick’ you’ll like Primer.
Very clever Sci-Fi film made for $7,000. An excellent example of what you can do with a little money and a lot of imagination/hard work/a degree in mathematics. Basically it’s about a dude who invents a time machine, so naturally it all goes wrong and gets very hard to follow. Definitely the type of film you’d want to read about on Wikipedia afterwards.
It’s full of techy guys mumbling about physics, and if you stop listening at the wrong moment, you’ll lose track of what’s going on sooner than if you’d been listening intently, but you’ll lose track either way.
That may not sound like much of an endorsement, but I would recommend Primer to anyone who likes a film they have to pay attention to. If you liked ‘Brick’ you’ll like Primer.
No Retreat No Surrender
No Retreat No Surrender – 1986, Corey Yeun
After watching JCVD I decided to go back and see how many of Jean-Claude’s films I could stomach, so I started at the beginning with ‘No Retreat No Surrender’.
NRNS is a JCVD film in so much as ‘Executive Decision’ is a Steven Segal film.
Jean-Claude’s character doesn’t die after 15 minutes, but he is only in the film for a total of 20 minutes or so, mainly at the end as the Big Bad Guy that the young hero has to take on.
NRNS has a cult following as one of those ‘so bad it’s good’ films due to the low budget and incredibly bad acting by every actor without exception. The story goes that Corey Yeun saw The Karate Kid and decided that he could do better, so he went over to America from Hong Kong and gave it a go.
Even though he was in America with English speaking actors making an American film, Yeun and his Hong Kong production team made a Hong Kong film, complete with the horrendous overacting associated with it. If you watch films like ‘Fist of Fury’ or ‘The Young Master’, or any Hong Kong kung-fu flick from the Bruce Lee/Jacky Chan period, all of the actors ham it up and over-emphases like crazy. But because you’re watching Chinese actors, and particularly if you’re watching a non-dubbed version, it’s not intolerable, in fact it seems normal. It was how (action) films were made in Hong Kong at the time.
Corey Yeun was just doing what he had always done, perhaps to the bewilderment of the cast. The story is bonkers and plays out like a spoof of eighties films in the same way that ‘Totally Awesome’ does, only of course it is played completely straight.
I wouldn’t suggest you add No Retreat No Surrender to your Love Film list, but if it happens to be on TV one night, you could do worse.
Not sure if I’ll get far beyond Bloodsport.
After watching JCVD I decided to go back and see how many of Jean-Claude’s films I could stomach, so I started at the beginning with ‘No Retreat No Surrender’.
NRNS is a JCVD film in so much as ‘Executive Decision’ is a Steven Segal film.
Jean-Claude’s character doesn’t die after 15 minutes, but he is only in the film for a total of 20 minutes or so, mainly at the end as the Big Bad Guy that the young hero has to take on.
NRNS has a cult following as one of those ‘so bad it’s good’ films due to the low budget and incredibly bad acting by every actor without exception. The story goes that Corey Yeun saw The Karate Kid and decided that he could do better, so he went over to America from Hong Kong and gave it a go.
Even though he was in America with English speaking actors making an American film, Yeun and his Hong Kong production team made a Hong Kong film, complete with the horrendous overacting associated with it. If you watch films like ‘Fist of Fury’ or ‘The Young Master’, or any Hong Kong kung-fu flick from the Bruce Lee/Jacky Chan period, all of the actors ham it up and over-emphases like crazy. But because you’re watching Chinese actors, and particularly if you’re watching a non-dubbed version, it’s not intolerable, in fact it seems normal. It was how (action) films were made in Hong Kong at the time.
Corey Yeun was just doing what he had always done, perhaps to the bewilderment of the cast. The story is bonkers and plays out like a spoof of eighties films in the same way that ‘Totally Awesome’ does, only of course it is played completely straight.
I wouldn’t suggest you add No Retreat No Surrender to your Love Film list, but if it happens to be on TV one night, you could do worse.
Not sure if I’ll get far beyond Bloodsport.
A Single Man
A Single Man – 2010, Tom Ford
Colin Firth achieves every actor’s fantasy in this adaptation of Christopher Isherwood’s 1964 novel; he gets to perform a scene in which his Character, George, is alone in his home when he receives a phone call bringing bad news:
Jim, George’s lover for the last sixteen years, has died in a car crash. Jim’s cousin called to let George know, (no one else in the family wanted to call him) and what with this being 1962, gay George is not invited to the funeral.
Cue Colin Firth’s finest hour; he can sit holding the receiver, his face in screen filling close up, and react to tragic news. The faraway look, the waver in his voice, the wait before the inevitable tears, but then the restraint in not breaking down completely. It may seem cynical to accuse Firth and Ford of Oscar Baiting, but that’s just what they’re doing. It’s cheap and it detracts from the rest of the film.
The scene described above happens very early on and occurs as one of many flashbacks to George’s life with, and immediately without Jim. The film follows George over the course of one last day, at the end of which he intends to commit suicide.
After Colin Firth achieves his acting fantasy, Tom Ford’s film plays out like a morbid gay fantasy. George is an Englishman living in Southern California working as a professor of English Literature. His dear departed lover Jim was an architect who designed the incredibly tasteful house they shared. George drives a lovely Mercedes Benz and lives surrounded by all the aspects of 60’s Americana, tasteful and tacky, that will forever be in fashion.
George gets to talk to his halfwit Yankee colleagues about the cold war and the Cuban Missile crisis, which provides plenty of opportunity for witty, glib closing remarks. He mopes around sorrowfully whilst gorgeous young men throw themselves at him, but he ignores their advances. His heart is broken, and no pair of smooth, pert buttocks can fix it, not even Nicholas Hoult’s.
George hangs out and boozes with fellow ex-pat and old flame Charley (Julianne Moore aka Maude Lebowski) creating a kind of self satisfied ‘Englishman Abroad’ vibe reminiscent of Evelyn Waugh’s ‘The Loved One’ (that’s right, literary reference y’all).
Tom Ford had a clear vision and he has achieved it, but he owes a lot to the production team he worked with – the same people who work on Mad Men. A Single Man is stylishly and tastefully directed, but not as subtle as Tom thinks it is. It’s an impressive debut by a fashion designer who has obviously watched a lot of critically acclaimed European film. But the result is a film that’s too conscious of its own style. There’s not much to the story that takes place within the elegant design of the rest of the film. ‘Designed by Tom Ford’ would be amore accurate credit.
The biggest problem with the film was the dialogue. Maybe the script is taken directly from the book, and this may be how Californians spoke 50 years ago, but said out loud it sounds clichéd and unconvincing. Perhaps the soulless superficiality of it all was intended as a comment on 60’s America, but I doubt it.
The European cinema influence even extends as far as the trailer. Trailers for foreign films often do not feature dialogue to disguise the fact they are not in English.
http://mensfashionblips.dailyradar.com/video/youtube-a-single-man-2009-movie-trailer-directed-by/
And just to let you know, I though Brokeback Mountain was awesome.
Colin Firth achieves every actor’s fantasy in this adaptation of Christopher Isherwood’s 1964 novel; he gets to perform a scene in which his Character, George, is alone in his home when he receives a phone call bringing bad news:
Jim, George’s lover for the last sixteen years, has died in a car crash. Jim’s cousin called to let George know, (no one else in the family wanted to call him) and what with this being 1962, gay George is not invited to the funeral.
Cue Colin Firth’s finest hour; he can sit holding the receiver, his face in screen filling close up, and react to tragic news. The faraway look, the waver in his voice, the wait before the inevitable tears, but then the restraint in not breaking down completely. It may seem cynical to accuse Firth and Ford of Oscar Baiting, but that’s just what they’re doing. It’s cheap and it detracts from the rest of the film.
The scene described above happens very early on and occurs as one of many flashbacks to George’s life with, and immediately without Jim. The film follows George over the course of one last day, at the end of which he intends to commit suicide.
After Colin Firth achieves his acting fantasy, Tom Ford’s film plays out like a morbid gay fantasy. George is an Englishman living in Southern California working as a professor of English Literature. His dear departed lover Jim was an architect who designed the incredibly tasteful house they shared. George drives a lovely Mercedes Benz and lives surrounded by all the aspects of 60’s Americana, tasteful and tacky, that will forever be in fashion.
George gets to talk to his halfwit Yankee colleagues about the cold war and the Cuban Missile crisis, which provides plenty of opportunity for witty, glib closing remarks. He mopes around sorrowfully whilst gorgeous young men throw themselves at him, but he ignores their advances. His heart is broken, and no pair of smooth, pert buttocks can fix it, not even Nicholas Hoult’s.
George hangs out and boozes with fellow ex-pat and old flame Charley (Julianne Moore aka Maude Lebowski) creating a kind of self satisfied ‘Englishman Abroad’ vibe reminiscent of Evelyn Waugh’s ‘The Loved One’ (that’s right, literary reference y’all).
Tom Ford had a clear vision and he has achieved it, but he owes a lot to the production team he worked with – the same people who work on Mad Men. A Single Man is stylishly and tastefully directed, but not as subtle as Tom thinks it is. It’s an impressive debut by a fashion designer who has obviously watched a lot of critically acclaimed European film. But the result is a film that’s too conscious of its own style. There’s not much to the story that takes place within the elegant design of the rest of the film. ‘Designed by Tom Ford’ would be amore accurate credit.
The biggest problem with the film was the dialogue. Maybe the script is taken directly from the book, and this may be how Californians spoke 50 years ago, but said out loud it sounds clichéd and unconvincing. Perhaps the soulless superficiality of it all was intended as a comment on 60’s America, but I doubt it.
The European cinema influence even extends as far as the trailer. Trailers for foreign films often do not feature dialogue to disguise the fact they are not in English.
http://mensfashionblips.dailyradar.com/video/youtube-a-single-man-2009-movie-trailer-directed-by/
And just to let you know, I though Brokeback Mountain was awesome.
A Prophet
A Prophet – 2009, Jacques Audiard
Can you really go wrong with gritty French prison drama? Probably not. French cinema has been turning to France’s under-privileged ethnic population for stories for a few years now, but it’s not getting old. La Haine, Caché and now Un Prophete all take a different take on the French migrant underbelly; street urchins, foreign labour/xenophobia and organised crime respectively.
Without giving the plot away, the film follows the six year prison sentence of a young illiterate Arabian dude, Malik. He doesn’t want to pick a side in the prison yard, he wants to keep himself to himself, but that’s not how prison movies work. Inevitably he ends up being involved with/protected by a group of Corsican Mafia types. As time goes by Malik slowly, bravely and ingeniously becomes a player in French crime circles. Refreshingly it’s not a story about redemption.
The title refers to the spiritual and religious aura that seems to surround Malik. He’s very lucky and makes all the right moves. The whole ‘divine guidance’ thing seems a little forced, even though the director has obviously tried to do it subtly.
French prison life is depicted in all the filthy realism you’d expect. Real life ex-cons were cast as extras, and every member of the cast looks like they belong on the inside. The life of those involved in organised crime is exposed as being far from glamorous, and although other films have been showing us this fact for a while now (Gomorra in particular), A Prophet doesn’t suffer for it.
I don’t mean to say that the plot is predictable or clichéd, it certainly isn’t, but... ...there’s something about watching ‘a criminal play one group of criminals off against another in order to get one over everyone’ that seems very familiar. Maybe that’s just because I’ve spent so long watching The Shield and The Wire?
I saw the film without having seen a trailer first, which was good because the trailer gives too much away, this little clip doesn’t reveal too much; only that Malik looks a bit like the guy from Stereophonics crossed with Keanu Reeves.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=12SjQ5u7XtE
Can you really go wrong with gritty French prison drama? Probably not. French cinema has been turning to France’s under-privileged ethnic population for stories for a few years now, but it’s not getting old. La Haine, Caché and now Un Prophete all take a different take on the French migrant underbelly; street urchins, foreign labour/xenophobia and organised crime respectively.
Without giving the plot away, the film follows the six year prison sentence of a young illiterate Arabian dude, Malik. He doesn’t want to pick a side in the prison yard, he wants to keep himself to himself, but that’s not how prison movies work. Inevitably he ends up being involved with/protected by a group of Corsican Mafia types. As time goes by Malik slowly, bravely and ingeniously becomes a player in French crime circles. Refreshingly it’s not a story about redemption.
The title refers to the spiritual and religious aura that seems to surround Malik. He’s very lucky and makes all the right moves. The whole ‘divine guidance’ thing seems a little forced, even though the director has obviously tried to do it subtly.
French prison life is depicted in all the filthy realism you’d expect. Real life ex-cons were cast as extras, and every member of the cast looks like they belong on the inside. The life of those involved in organised crime is exposed as being far from glamorous, and although other films have been showing us this fact for a while now (Gomorra in particular), A Prophet doesn’t suffer for it.
I don’t mean to say that the plot is predictable or clichéd, it certainly isn’t, but... ...there’s something about watching ‘a criminal play one group of criminals off against another in order to get one over everyone’ that seems very familiar. Maybe that’s just because I’ve spent so long watching The Shield and The Wire?
I saw the film without having seen a trailer first, which was good because the trailer gives too much away, this little clip doesn’t reveal too much; only that Malik looks a bit like the guy from Stereophonics crossed with Keanu Reeves.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=12SjQ5u7XtE
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