(no subject)
Tomorrow four new X-Men issues come out and I'm so excited about it it's almost obscene. And very very sad. I decided to distract myself with movies, then. Well, truthfully, these are the movies that I saw two weeks ago, but, since writing movie reviews has been like pulling teeth lately, it took me some time to get down to them.
Quentin Tarantino's 'Death Proof'
I don't really have much to say about this movie. It was just - and very rarely this phrase ever fitted so perfectly - totally awesome. So perhaps it doesn't carry any deep messages. It doen't move you to tears. It doesn't have a tremendous impact on your worldview. But I virtually can't remember the last time I had this much fun in the cinema and that trumps everything else.
And the first segment isn't perhaps as wildly entertaining as the second, but it works very nicely for the overall thrills gradation so it really is quite alright. And now I want to see 'Planet Terror' so very very much. Like, right now. Curse the bizarre release schedules.
Len Wiseman's 'Die Hard 4'
'Die Hard' had the single most unappealing trailer I've seen this year. It starts out quite intriguingly, mostly because it's hard to tell what movie that actually is but then there's the bored-looking Bruce Willis and the uninspired one-liners and a string of never-ending explosions and this deal with Bruce Willis taking out a chopper with a car which is just wrong. And I only say 'wrong' because I can't think of a stronger word.
These two minutes were so bad that I certainly had no intention whatsoever of sitting though the whole two hours. In fact, I can hardly remember when I was so negatively predisposed towards an action movie. I even avoided every mention of it in the media (and if I didn't I would have probably given in much earlier because I'm a sucker for good reviews). If I hadn't been told specifically that the movie is, against all reason, loads of fun I'd have just ignored it until it quietly slipped off the cinema rosters. I'm really really glad it hadn't come to that. And thanks, roguem.
'Die Hard 4' (I am not calling it 'Live Free or Die Hard' because that title is just stupid) seriously is loads of fun. And John McClane, to my endless surprise, is a perfectly believable character. He is really nothing that special, not extraordinarily smart, no show-off fighting skills. He is no superhero. He is just doggedly persistent and has an indomitable will to go on. Which is exactly what makes him so great. I'm so glad it wasn't lost over the years.
Justin Long makes for one of the most delightful sidekicks I've ever seen. Timothy Olyphant has quite unfortunate make-up and overacts a bit but his character has really well presented background and motives and you really don't get that very often in a villain. Mary Elizabeth Winstead is, unexpectedly, not annoying, even though her character is very obviously a Tough Girl, which usually is bound to antagonize me (now that I think about it, it might have been because 'Death Proof' was still freshly in my mind, and it was freaking awesome, and she was in it, and, well, it's sorta like, quoting Pratchett, 'gilt by association'). Kevin Smith didn't leave much of an impression but he was onscreen for about seven minutes so that's ok. And practically all I remember of Maggie Q is that she's one hot pistol but that's ok too. However, I totally loved the French parkour guy, even though I'm not entirely sure if he actually had any lines.
Alright, time to grumble. They really went over the top with the freeway scenes. No, not even Bruce Willis is allowed to win against a fighter plane. That's just not acceptable. And the lack of injury realism went too far. If you don't want to have your character out of the game because he was shot in the kneecap, just don't shoot him in the kneecap. It really is that simple, Len Wiseman. But I admit you get points for having one of the primary characters mention he's asthmatic and not throwing an 'I can't breathe and I have no medication' scene. That's practically a first in the action genre.
Oh, and just for the record, Bruce Willis shooting a car into a helicopter looks just as ridiculous in the movie as it did in the trailer. The rest is pretty much just cool, though.
David Fincher's 'Zodiac'
Great performances, smart script, everything holds together very nicely. However, the movie falters at an obstacle that really couldn't imaginably be avoided. It's a thriller about a serial killer who, as is widely known, has never been caught. Meaning that you call only dial up the tension - and the thrills - so far.
Fincher does a good job here. He cleverly pulls away from the actual chase and focuses on the pursuers and how their life crumbles under the weight of the Zodiac obsession (especially nice work with the Jake Gyllenhaal character, a kind, earnest man who can't keep together any of his marriages). Fincher doesn't quite dodge the bullet, though. I'm fairly certain it's was impossible anyway. He builds up the atmosphere very skillfully, but there's just no climax to follow into. As a result you leave the cinema, very acutely aware that you've just seen a very good motion picture but you are still this tiny bit disappointed. An admirable effort, Fincher, honestly. It wasn't your fault.
By the way, I caught all these movies when I was still in Wrocław because when the film festival came to an end and I still had two prepaid days left at the hostel and my friend was not coming over as was previously arranged because she very untimely broke her leg and I just refused to go clubbing in a strange city alone, after a day full of obligatory sight-seeing and shop-traipsing when I asked myself 'How shall I amuse myself in the evenings?' there wasn't even a moment's hesitation before 'oooooh, more movies' popped up. Which I suppose puts the final tally at 47 full-lengths and 74 shorts. All that in thirteen days, mind you.
.
Quentin Tarantino's 'Death Proof'
I don't really have much to say about this movie. It was just - and very rarely this phrase ever fitted so perfectly - totally awesome. So perhaps it doesn't carry any deep messages. It doen't move you to tears. It doesn't have a tremendous impact on your worldview. But I virtually can't remember the last time I had this much fun in the cinema and that trumps everything else.
And the first segment isn't perhaps as wildly entertaining as the second, but it works very nicely for the overall thrills gradation so it really is quite alright. And now I want to see 'Planet Terror' so very very much. Like, right now. Curse the bizarre release schedules.
Len Wiseman's 'Die Hard 4'
'Die Hard' had the single most unappealing trailer I've seen this year. It starts out quite intriguingly, mostly because it's hard to tell what movie that actually is but then there's the bored-looking Bruce Willis and the uninspired one-liners and a string of never-ending explosions and this deal with Bruce Willis taking out a chopper with a car which is just wrong. And I only say 'wrong' because I can't think of a stronger word.
These two minutes were so bad that I certainly had no intention whatsoever of sitting though the whole two hours. In fact, I can hardly remember when I was so negatively predisposed towards an action movie. I even avoided every mention of it in the media (and if I didn't I would have probably given in much earlier because I'm a sucker for good reviews). If I hadn't been told specifically that the movie is, against all reason, loads of fun I'd have just ignored it until it quietly slipped off the cinema rosters. I'm really really glad it hadn't come to that. And thanks, roguem.
'Die Hard 4' (I am not calling it 'Live Free or Die Hard' because that title is just stupid) seriously is loads of fun. And John McClane, to my endless surprise, is a perfectly believable character. He is really nothing that special, not extraordinarily smart, no show-off fighting skills. He is no superhero. He is just doggedly persistent and has an indomitable will to go on. Which is exactly what makes him so great. I'm so glad it wasn't lost over the years.
Justin Long makes for one of the most delightful sidekicks I've ever seen. Timothy Olyphant has quite unfortunate make-up and overacts a bit but his character has really well presented background and motives and you really don't get that very often in a villain. Mary Elizabeth Winstead is, unexpectedly, not annoying, even though her character is very obviously a Tough Girl, which usually is bound to antagonize me (now that I think about it, it might have been because 'Death Proof' was still freshly in my mind, and it was freaking awesome, and she was in it, and, well, it's sorta like, quoting Pratchett, 'gilt by association'). Kevin Smith didn't leave much of an impression but he was onscreen for about seven minutes so that's ok. And practically all I remember of Maggie Q is that she's one hot pistol but that's ok too. However, I totally loved the French parkour guy, even though I'm not entirely sure if he actually had any lines.
Alright, time to grumble. They really went over the top with the freeway scenes. No, not even Bruce Willis is allowed to win against a fighter plane. That's just not acceptable. And the lack of injury realism went too far. If you don't want to have your character out of the game because he was shot in the kneecap, just don't shoot him in the kneecap. It really is that simple, Len Wiseman. But I admit you get points for having one of the primary characters mention he's asthmatic and not throwing an 'I can't breathe and I have no medication' scene. That's practically a first in the action genre.
Oh, and just for the record, Bruce Willis shooting a car into a helicopter looks just as ridiculous in the movie as it did in the trailer. The rest is pretty much just cool, though.
David Fincher's 'Zodiac'
Great performances, smart script, everything holds together very nicely. However, the movie falters at an obstacle that really couldn't imaginably be avoided. It's a thriller about a serial killer who, as is widely known, has never been caught. Meaning that you call only dial up the tension - and the thrills - so far.
Fincher does a good job here. He cleverly pulls away from the actual chase and focuses on the pursuers and how their life crumbles under the weight of the Zodiac obsession (especially nice work with the Jake Gyllenhaal character, a kind, earnest man who can't keep together any of his marriages). Fincher doesn't quite dodge the bullet, though. I'm fairly certain it's was impossible anyway. He builds up the atmosphere very skillfully, but there's just no climax to follow into. As a result you leave the cinema, very acutely aware that you've just seen a very good motion picture but you are still this tiny bit disappointed. An admirable effort, Fincher, honestly. It wasn't your fault.
By the way, I caught all these movies when I was still in Wrocław because when the film festival came to an end and I still had two prepaid days left at the hostel and my friend was not coming over as was previously arranged because she very untimely broke her leg and I just refused to go clubbing in a strange city alone, after a day full of obligatory sight-seeing and shop-traipsing when I asked myself 'How shall I amuse myself in the evenings?' there wasn't even a moment's hesitation before 'oooooh, more movies' popped up. Which I suppose puts the final tally at 47 full-lengths and 74 shorts. All that in thirteen days, mind you.
.