(no subject)
My top eleven (because ten is never enough) film list of '05-
1.Sin City-every comic book fanboys wet dream, both literally and figuratively when you consider the actreses featured and the faithfullness to source material. props to Robert Rodriguez for assembling that cast for less than 40 mil. Sidenote: probably the only movie with four(count 'em) castrations.
2.Jarhead-I saw the trailer, got juiced up by reading the book and then was blown away at 3 in the morning (after a long day of work but hey, pre-screening) by the most faithful translation of words to images ever (can you see a pattern here?).
Plus Jake Gyllenhaal is tha absolute shit. I mean Donnie Darko, October Sky Brokeback Mountain now this. The guy can do no wrong... Please do not bring up that fucking disaster movie.
3.King Kong-the original was my favorite movie until the day I first saw Star Wars. I think it is one of the most important landmarks in the realm of cinema, both for its achievements in visual effects and for birthing the adventure movie/blockbuster.
The new one is ten time's as good.And not just in the special effects department although Damn! Is that one beautifully scarred ape or what? THe plots better, acting better, scripting better. Fuck the ringnuts. My Jackson-love goes to the Primate romance side of his psyche.
4.Serenity-Five words, Can't,Stop,The,Signal...Bitch,in the paraphrased words of my peroxide-haired vampiric friend Spike (TPTB help you if you don't know who that is). Serenity should win an award for firing on all emotional cylinders and serving up a big fat helping of genius comedy on the side.
If Lucas had gotten Whedon to write his prequels every sci-fi fan boy from here to Tatooine would still have the stones to wear a plastic lightsaber every now and again. May the Fillion be with you!
5.Constantine-Fuck every pretentious prick who claims Keanu Reeves can't act and that the Matrix is like the Godfather compared to its sequels. They both have more than their fair share of extraneous psycho-babble. And that's just fine with this Coppertop...Ahem...back to Constantine.
Tilda Swinton as an androgenous angel (alliteration!), Djimon Hounsou as a disallusioned witch-docter turned bar keep, a holy shotgun and a corporate demon played to the hilt by none other than the Stefani-spouse himself Gavin Rossdale!
Not to mention the fact that this is one layered movie. A minimum of shitty expostion and a maximum of brain tickling story-telling. ALso no "action" sequences. Just good old-fashioned, down-to-hell-on-earth violence.
Fuck it. I'll write a full review later.
6.Unleashed-Combine the most amazingly beautiful yet magnificently brutal martial arts fight sequences (outside of Ong-Bak) with a superb cast giving the performances of their lives and you have Unleahed. Watch "Hook" right before this toget an idea of Bob Hoskins acting range.
Simply a seamless movie-free of fat and unnesscesary scenes.
7.Walk the Line-Joaquin Phoenix really is as good they say. And Reese Witherspoon is even better. If you don't tear up during their rendition of "It ain't me babe" then you should end up at Folsom. Listen closely to the backround of a fateful confrontation between husband and wife to hear snatches of a Bob Dylan Song.
8.Kung Fu Hustle- First a one sentence summary. The "Bohemian Rhapsody" of movies.
Spoiler alert
Now a more tangible description. A young boy spends his savings on a ten-cent karate handbook, gets the shit kicked out of him for trying to use the legendery "Buhdda's Plam" Technique against some bullys, decides evil is where it's at, tries to join the Axe gang, brings it's leaders anger down on a slum, frees the "Beast" from prison, realizes his true calling towards good, gets killed, gets resurrected, saves slum using Buhdda's Palm, wins heart of the mute girl he originally tried to defend.
Yeah, Stephen Chow (writer,director,producer,star) rocks.
9.Hotel Rwanda-The only movie that ever made me get supremely pissed off and cry at the exact same moment. Fuck the UN for not doing exactly the thing it was created to and Fuck The Academy for giving Jamie Foxx the award over Don Cheadle.
Ray Charles was a pioneer of blues. Paul Ruseabagina saved over 1,000 people from certain death. No contest. Plus Cheadle's a better actor. But the Academy was to busy heaping praise on Foxx too notice. I mean come on. They nominated him for best supporting actor for Collateral. Not only was Tom Cruise better but Jamie Fox got more screentime than any other actor in that film. Making him the fucking lead!
10.BrokeBack Mountain-Gyllenhaal!GyllenHaal!Gyllenhaal!
11.Batman Begins-Where it began so shall it end, with comic books. Or comic book films that is. As faithful to the source material as Sin City and featuring just as strong a cast. The only difference is 110 million dollars of production budget and the fact that BB's goal of bring realism to comic books is not as interesting as Sin City's attempt to turn a film into a comic book.
But hey this Film rescued the greatest DC character ever from the abyss created by Batman And Robin. It deserves all the praise it gets.