Friday, December 30, 2011
Following - 1998
"You take it away... to show them what they had."
Christopher Nolan (Memento, The Dark Knight) writes and directs this odd, claustrophobic neo-noir film about a seedy young Brit (Jeremy Theobald) who's obsessed with following people -- albeit harmlessly at first. After meeting a like-minded bloke (Alex Haw), the twosome graduate to breaking and entering -- but meet their match in a tough blonde dame (Lucy Russell) who may have dubious plans of her own.
This is Christopher Nolan's directorial debut with a feature-length film. He came up with the idea for the film because he had his home broken into and wondered what the people thought as they went around looking at his belongings.
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Read My Lips - 2001
"Don't believe everything you hear."
She is almost deaf and she lip-reads. He is an ex-convict. She wants to help him. He thinks no one can help except himself.
Young secretary Carla(Emmanuelle Devos) is a long-time employee of a property development company. Loyal and hardworking, first to arrive and last to leave, Carla is beginning to chafe at the limitations of her career and is looking to move up. But as a 35-five-year-old woman with a hearing deficiency, she is not sure how to climb out of her humdrum life, though she is confident in her own abilities. Into her life comes Paul Angeli(Vincent Cassel), a new trainee she decides to hire. Paul is 25 years old and completely unskilled, but Carla covers for him when the need arises because of his other qualities - he's a thief, fresh out of jail and very good-looking.
Sunday, November 27, 2011
Catch Me if You Can - 2002
"Ah, people only know what you tell them, Carl."
A true story about Frank Abagnale Jr. who, before his 19th birthday, successfully conned millions of dollars worth of checks as a Pan Am pilot, doctor, and legal prosecutor.
Frank William Abagnale, Jr. (born April 27, 1948) is an American security consultant known for his history as a former confidence trickster, check forger, impostor, and escape artist. He became notorious in the 1960s for passing $2.5 million worth of meticulously forged checks across 26 countries over the course of five years, beginning when he was 16 years old.
In the process, he became one of the most famous impostors ever,[3] claiming to have assumed no fewer than eight separate identities as an airline pilot, a doctor, a U.S. Bureau of Prisons agent, and a lawyer. He escaped from police custody twice (once from a taxiing airliner and once from a U.S. federal penitentiary), before he was 21 years old.[4]
He served fewer than five years in prison before starting to work for the federal government. He is a consultant and lecturer at the academy and field offices for the FBI. He also runs Abagnale & Associates, a financial fraud consultancy company
Labels:
biographical,
con artist,
crime,
drama,
escape,
FBI,
Fraud
Rain Man - 1988
"What you have to understand is, four days ago he was only my brother in name. And this morning we had pancakes."
Winner of both an Academy Award and the Golden Globe for best picture this film is a heartwarming look at family and how two brothers suddenly brought together by life's circumstances save each other.
Fast-talking yuppie Charlie Babbitt is forced to slow down when he meets a brother he never knew he had, an autistic savant named Raymond (Dustin Hoffman, in an Oscar-winning role) who's spent most of his life in an institution. When their wealthy father dies, leaving everything to Raymond, Charlie takes his unusually gifted older brother on a life-changing cross-country odyssey that neither is likely to forget.
Dustin Hoffman was originally supposed to play Charlie, but he wanted to play Raymond. Raymond was also supposed to be mentally retarded, but Hoffman changed it to an autistic savant.
Holds the unique distinction of being the only film to have won the Berlin Film Festival Golden Bear and a best picture Academy Award.
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
All The President's Men - 1976
"Woodward. Bernstein. You're both on the story. Now don't fuck it up."
The film that launched a thousand journalism school students.
In the run-up to the 1972 elections, Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward covers what seems to be a minor break-in at the Democratic Party National headquarters. He is surprised to find top lawyers already on the defense case, and the discovery of names and addresses of Republican fund organizers on the accused further arouses his suspicions. The editor of the Post is prepared to run with the story and assigns Woodward and Carl Bernstein to it. They find the trail leading higher and higher in the Republican Party, and eventually into the White House itself.
Friday, November 18, 2011
The Falcon and the Snowman - 1985
"They're just as paranoid and dangerous as we are. I don't know why I ever thought any differently."
Don't let the quirky trailer fool you, this is a really great film that tells the true story of a disillusioned military contractor employee and his drug pusher childhood friend who became walk-in spies for the Soviet Union.
As a CIA employee in charge of guarding top secret documents, all-American Christopher Boyce (Timothy Hutton) becomes disillusioned with his country and decides to make a deal with the Soviet Union. Boyce drags his childhood friend Daulton Lee (Sean Penn) into the arrangement, but the drug-addicted Lee's reasons for committing espionage are strictly monetary. John Schlesinger directs this provocative and sometimes humorous account.
Wednesday, November 16, 2011
An Officer and a Gentleman - 1982
"In every class, there's always one joker who thinks that he's smarter than me. In this class, that happens to be you. Isn't it, Mayonnaise?"
Dreams of being a Navy pilot prompt Zack Mayo (Richard Gere) to enroll in officer training school, where he runs afoul of a drill instructor (Oscar winner Louis Gossett Jr.) who senses the cadet's loner instinct and aims to school him on the importance of teamwork -- or break him in the process. In the meantime, Mayo romances a working girl (Debra Winger), ignoring warnings to steer clear of the local lasses out to bag hotshot Navy flyboys.
It is a Navy tradition for newly-commissioned officers to give a silver dollar to the person who gives them their first salute. In the scene where the new graduates of Foley's class receive their "first salutes," you can see them giving Foley a silver dollar prior to each salute. It is also a tradition for the D.I. to place the silver dollar of his memorable students in his right pocket; you can see that Mayo's dollar is placed in Foley's right pocket, rather than the left pocket as it is for, for example, Ensign Della Serra.
Labels:
80s,
bootcamp,
drama,
heartbreak,
heartfelt,
military,
Navy,
relationships,
romance,
suicide,
survival,
teacher,
tearjerker,
triumph
Monday, November 14, 2011
MEMENTO - 2000
"Memory can change the shape of a room; it can change the color of a car. And memories can be distorted. They're just an interpretation, they're not a record, and they're irrelevant if you have the facts."
Suffering short-term memory loss after a head injury, Leonard Shelby (Guy Pearce) embarks on a grim quest to find the lowlife who murdered his wife in this gritty, complex thriller that packs more knots than a hangman's noose. To carry out his plan, Shelby snaps Polaroids of people and places, jotting down contextual notes on the backs of photos to aid in his search and jog his memory. He even tattoos his own body in a desperate bid to remember.
The medical condition experienced by Leonard in this film is a real condition called Anterograde Amnesia - the inability to form new memories after damage to the hippocampus. During the 1950s, doctors treated some forms of epilepsy by removing parts of the temporal lobe, resulting in the same memory problems.
Sunday, November 13, 2011
Casino - 1995
Martin Scorsese draws on Nicholas Pileggi's book about Las Vegas in the 1970s and '80s as inspiration for his tale contrasting the city's glamorous exterior with its sordid interior fueled by excess -- and the mob. Against this backdrop, the story chronicles the rise and fall of a casino owner with mob connections (Robert De Niro), his friend and Mafia underboss (Joe Pesci) and an ex-prostitute with expensive taste and a driving will (Sharon Stone).
Thursday, November 10, 2011
SEVEN - 1995
The psychological/thriller, one of my favorite genres and this film delivers. The cinematography and editing only add to the darkness this film conveys. A realistic portrayal of two detective's (Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman) investigation into the undescribable world of a serial killer.
On a desperate hunt for a serial killer (Kevin Spacey), whose crimes are based on the "seven deadly sins" in this dark and haunting film that takes viewers from the tortured remains of one victim to the next, the seasoned Det. Sommerset (Morgan Freeman) researches each sin in an effort to get inside the killer's mind, while his novice partner, Mills (Brad Pitt), scoffs at his efforts to unravel the case.
Andrew Kevin Walker had enormous difficulty getting a studio to buy the rights to his script because he was a complete unknown in Hollywood. Allegedly he put together a list of agents that represented writers that work in the crime and thriller genres, and just called each one up until he got a positive response.
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
Pulp Fiction - 1994
Quentin Tarantino lives in another world and this is, by far, one of it's best imports. An all star cast and a lot of fun this film marks the comeback of John Travolta in a big way.
This film garnered Tarantino and the cast multiple nominations for The Academy Awards, The Golden Globe Awards, The Independent Spirit Awards, and BAFTA placing in on TIME's ALL TIME 100 Movies List.
In 2007, the American Film Institute ranked this as the #94 Greatest Movie of All Time.
Ranked #7 on the American Film Institute's list of the 10 greatest films in the genre "Gangster" in June 2008.
Ranked #1 movie in Entertainment Weekly's "The New Classics: Movies" (issue #1000, July 4, 2008).
Voted #9 on Empire magazine's 500 Greatest Movies Of All Time (September 2008).
A burger-loving hit man (John Travolta), his philosophical partner (Samuel L. Jackson), a drug-addled gangster's moll (Uma Thurman) and a washed-up boxer (Bruce Willis) converge in this sprawling, comedic crime caper fueled by director and co-writer Quentin Tarantino's whip-smart dialogue. Their adventures unfurl in three stories that ingeniously trip back and forth in time, resulting in one of the most audacious and imitated films of the 1990s.
Monday, November 7, 2011
The Valet - 2006
This lighthearted little film stars Kristin Scott Thomas and Danny Auteuil but it is Gad Elmaleh as The Valet who will steal your heart.
A Parisian valet loves a woman who rejects him: she's in debt to open a bookshop, and he's not her ideal man. A billionaire two-times his wealthy wife with his beautiful mistress, a young supermodel. To draw the paparazzi and his wife off the trail of adultery, and to give his lawyer time to arrange a divorce that won't cost him a fortune, the billionaire pays the supermodel and the valet to pretend for a month to be a couple. Within days, the bookshop owner and the billionaire are jealous, the supermodel experiences life with a nice guy, and the valet has status and self-confidence. What will each do with newfound wisdom?
Friday, November 4, 2011
Strictly Ballroom - 1992
This is one of those films you either love or turn off in the first 15 minutes. An over the top look behind-the-scenes of ballroom dancing, this movie had me smiling from beginning to end.
Scott Hastings is a champion caliber ballroom dancer, but much to the chagrin of the Australian ballroom dance community, Scott believes in dancing "his own steps". Fran is a beginning dancer and a bit of an ugly duckly who has the audacity to ask to be Scott's partner after his unorthodox style causes his regular partner to dance out of his life. Together, these two misfits try to win the Australian Pan Pacific Championships and show the Ballroom Confederation that they are wrong when they say, "there are no new steps!"
The Counterfeiters - 2007
First Austrian film to win an Academy Award in the Best Foreign Language Film Category.
The Counterfeiters is the true story of the largest counterfeiting operation in history, set up by the Nazis in 1936. Salomon "Sally" Sorowitsch is the king of counterfeiters. He lives a mischievous life of cards, booze, and women in Berlin during the Nazi-era. Suddenly his luck runs dry when arrested by Superintendent Friedrich Herzog. Immediately thrown into the Mauthausen concentration camp, Salomon exhibits exceptional skills there and is soon transferred to the upgraded camp of Sachsenhausen. Upon his arrival, he once again comes face to face with Herzog, who is there on a secret mission. Hand-picked for his unique skill, Salomon and a group of professionals are forced to produce fake foreign currency under the program Operation Bernhard. The team, which also includes detainee Adolf Burger, is given luxury barracks for their assistance. But while Salomon attempts to weaken the economy of Germany's allied opponents, Adolf refuses to use his skills for Nazi profit and would like to do something to stop Operation Bernhard's aid to the war effort. Faced with a moral dilemma, Salomon must decide whether his actions, which could prolong the war and risk the lives of fellow prisoners, are ultimately the right ones.
Labels:
2007,
Berlin,
concentration camp,
counterfeiting,
drama,
history,
nazi,
survival,
true,
war
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Man on the Train - (L'homme du Train) - 2002
Hollywood's recent remake of this film reminded me of the original French film from 2002. Johnny Hallyday and Jean Rochefort are quite good as two men who find themselves intrigued with each other's life.
A poet. A thief. Two strangers with nothing in common are about to trade their lives for a chance to cheat their destinies.
A weathered old gangster (Johnny Hallyday) arrives by train at a small French town to rob the local bank. But he soon discovers there's no room at the local inn in which he'd hoped to stay while he plans his crime. Taking up the kind offer of an elderly teacher (Jean Rochefort) to stay in his mansion, the two men soon discover that they each might have been better suited for the other man's way of life.
Wednesday, November 2, 2011
Snow Cake - 2006
Filmed in Wawa, Ontario, Snow Cake is a drama about the friendship between Linda, a woman with autism (Weaver), and Alex (Rickman) who is traumatized after a car accident involving himself and Linda's daughter (Hampshire).
The movie was screened and discussed at Autism Cymru 2nd international conference in May 2006 as well as the Edinburgh International Film Festival, Tribeca Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival, Seattle International Film Festival, among others. It was the opening night screening for the Berlin Film Festival as well.
The screenwriter, Angela Pell, wrote the role of Alex Hughes with Rickman in mind. It was also Rickman who read the script and made sure Sigourney Weaver (with whom he had previously starred in Galaxy Quest) was contacted about the role of Linda. Both Rickman and Weaver were runners-up at the Seattle International Film Festival for the respective prizes of Best Actor and Best Actress.
During the course of making the movie, Sigourney Weaver (Linda) researched the subject of autism and was coached by Ros Blackburn, a woman with the condition who is also an author and speaker about autism and aspergers syndrome. Alan Rickman chose not to research the subject of autism in order to make his character have an impact/shock when facing Linda.
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
Eating Raoul - 1982
The writers also commissioned a single-issue comic book based on the movie for promotion; it was created by underground comics creator Kim Deitch. Eating Raoul, a stage musical adaptation, was presented off-Broadway in 1992, and also played at the Bridewell Theatre, London, in 2000.
On April 13, 2004, the long out of print film was released on DVD by Columbia TriStar Home Entertainment.
Damage - 1992
Miranda Richardson was nominated for an Academy Award and won a BAFTA in the category of Best Supporting Actress for her performance as the aggrieved wife of the film's main character.
Dr. Stephen Fleming, a British cabinet minister, lives a pleasant life with wife Ingrid and young daughter Sally. His older son, Martyn, is a rising journalist. At a party, Stephen meets a young half-French woman named Anna Barton, who introduces herself as a close friend of Martyn's; it is immediately apparent, however, that Stephen and Anna are intensely attracted to each other. When Martyn visits his parents in London, he brings Anna with him; they are romantically involved. The sexual tension between Stephen and Anna is clear, though their respective mates are oblivious to this.
Despite her relationship with Martyn, Anna arranges a tryst with Stephen at her apartment. Stephen becomes obsessed with Anna. After an international summit adjourns in Brussels, he travels to Paris to meet her instead of going home. While Martyn is still sleeping in a Paris hotel room, Stephen and Anna have sex in an open doorway in broad daylight. Afterwards, Stephen checks into a hotel across the street from Anna's, so he can spy on her and Martyn through his window. Eventually, Stephen's infatuation with Anna reaches a point where he desires to be with her permanently, even at the risk of destroying his relationship with his son. Anna dissuades Stephen from doing this, reassuring him that as long as she is with Martyn, he will always have access to her.
Labels:
90s,
affair,
attraction,
control,
drama,
family,
love,
romance,
romantic,
scandal,
seduction,
suspense
Friday, October 28, 2011
Gods And Monsters - 1998
The film won the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay, and was nominated for Best Actor in a Leading Role (Ian McKellen) and Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Lynn Redgrave).
The film features reconstructions of the filming of Bride of Frankenstein, a movie Whale directed. The title comes from a line in Bride of Frankenstein, in which the character Dr. Pretorius toasts Dr. Frankenstein, "To a new world of gods and monsters."
Labels:
90s,
award-winning,
drama,
film,
homosexuality,
hope,
love,
novel,
sadness,
struggle
A Girl Named Rosemary - 1996
In 1997 Nina Hoss graduated from the Drama School "Ernst Busch" in Berlin. Her first major success was the title role of Bernd Eichinger’s "A Girl Called Rosemarie" in 1996. In 2000 she was one of the Shooting Stars at the Berlinale. Her close collaboration with director Christian Petzold has been extremely successful: she won the 2003 Adolf Grimme Award for her role in his film "Something To Remind Me" and two years later the Adolf Grimme Award in Gold for Wolfsburg.
Her performance of "Yella" earned her the Silver Bear for Best Actress at the Berlin International Film Festival in 2007 and the German Film Award in 2008. Hoss has been a member of the Juries of the Locarno International Film Festival in 2009, and the Berlin International Film Festival in 2011. She has been an ensemble member at the Deutsches Theater in Berlin since 1998, where she appeared as Medea.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
"What's Eating Gilbert Grape?" - 1993
In a small town of Endora, Gilbert Grape (Johnny Depp) is busy caring for his mentally challenged brother Arnie (Leonardo DiCaprio) as they wait for the many tourists' trailers to pass through town during their yearly camp ritual at a nearby recreational area. His mother, Bonnie (Darlene Cates) is morbidly obese after years of depression following her husband's suicide. With Bonnie unable to care for them by herself, Gilbert has taken responsibility for repairing their shanty of farmhouse and looking after Arnie, who has a habit of climbing up the town water tower (like Spider-Man) if he is left unsupervised for too long, while his older sister Amy (Laura Harrington) and younger sister Ellen (Mary Kate Schellhardt) slave away in the kitchen. The relationship between the brothers is one of care and protection. In order to cope with his frenetic life, Gilbert has taken on a secret love affair with a housewife, Betty (Mary Steenburgen), whilst her insensitive, unsuspecting husband Ken (Kevin Tighe), is fully intent on selling Gilbert insurance for his family. A new chain supermarket has opened, threatening the small Lamson's Grocery store where Gilbert works, as well as threatening all the other small-time businesses in Endora. The chain supermarket stocks all kinds of goods, rendering many of the local shops redundant. This is a key theme in the film - which constantly portrays the futility of goods made with love in light of ever sweeping corporate greed.
Friday, October 21, 2011
Attack of the Puppet People - 1958
It stars John Hoyt as an eccentric doll maker. It was produced by Alta Vista Productions and distributed by American International Pictures. The film was rushed into production by American International Pictures and Bert I. Gordon to capitalise on the success of The Incredible Shrinking Man, which had been released in 1957.
The film begins with a Brownie troop visiting a doll manufacturing company called Dolls Inc., owned and operated by the seemingly kindly Mr. Franz (John Hoyt). As the girls tour the factory, they see a number of very lifelike dolls stored in glass canisters locked in a display case on the wall. These are part of Mr. Franz’s special collection. Sally Reynolds (June Kenney) answers a newspaper advertisement for a secretary; Franz's previous one has mysteriously vanished. Although she is concerned about his obsession with his dolls, she reluctantly agrees to take the job. She soon meets a traveling salesman, Bob Westley (John Agar), who introduces himself as the best salesman in St. Louis and immediately sets about attempting to seduce her. Their relationship become serious enough that Bob persuades Sally to quit her job, promising to break the news to Franz.
The next day however, Franz informs Sally that Bob has gone back home to take care of business and that she should forget him. She, however, is unwilling to accept this and goes to the police with a theory about Franz' role in her boyfriend's disappearance ("He made Bob into a doll!"), but Sergeant Paterson (Jack Kosslyn) is skeptical. Franz has developed a machine which can shrink people down to a sixth of their original size. He then uses it on anyone who tries to leave him. When he finds that Sally plans to quit, she becomes his latest victim.
Thursday, October 20, 2011
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button - 2008
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
The Blue Lagoon - 1980
Heartbreaker - 2010
Heartbreaker (French: L'arnacœur) is a 2010 French romantic comedy film starring Romain Duris, Vanessa Paradis, Julie Ferrier and Andrew Lincoln. The bulk of the story takes place in Monaco.
The plot is centered around Alex (Romain Duris), his sister (Julie Ferrier) and her husband (François Damiens), who operate a business designed to break up relationships, but only where the woman is "not knowingly unhappy." The trio concoct elaborate, custom ruses to deceive the women. After each woman has fallen for his act, Alex tells her she has made him come alive again, but that it is too late for him. The women presumably each leave their relationships to seek men who makes them feel as Alex has. They are hired by a wealthy man (Jacques Frantz), who is a florist and possible gangster, to prevent the wedding of his daughter Juliette (Vanessa Paradis) to Englishman Jonathan (Andrew Lincoln).
The problem is that they only have 10 days to do so before the wedding. The task is further complicated because the couple appear to be in love and absolutely perfect for each other. They also could not find the usual "flaws" in the couple that they are used to looking for in couples to break them up. Alex, massively in debt to a loan shark through his own lavish spending on the business, is pressured into putting aside his honourable principles to complete the seemingly impossible job with only five days till the wedding.
Monday, October 17, 2011
The Ghost Writer - 2010
When a successful British ghostwriter (Ewan McGregor) agrees to complete the memoirs of former British Prime Minister Adam Lang (Pierce Brosnan), his agent, Rick Ricardelli (Jon Bernthal), assures him it is the opportunity of a lifetime. But the project seems doomed from the start, not least because his predecessor on the project, Mike McAra, Lang's long-term aide, died in an apparent accident.
The ghostwriter flies out to work on the project, in the middle of winter, at an oceanfront house in the fictional American village of Old Haven (an allusion to Vineyard Haven) on Martha's Vineyard. But the day he arrives, a former British foreign minister named Richard Rycart (Robert Pugh) accuses Lang of authorizing the illegal seizure of suspected terrorists and handing them over for torture by the CIA, a possible war crime. Lang faces the threat of prosecution by the International Criminal Court, unless he stays in the U.S. or goes to another country that does not recognize the court's jurisdiction.
Labels:
2010s,
CIA,
England,
illegal,
intrigue,
London,
Polanski,
political,
suspense,
terrorists,
thriller,
writer
Friday, October 14, 2011
First Wives Club - 1996
The film became a surprise box-office hit following its North American release, eventually grossing $181,490,000 worldwide, mostly from its domestic run, despite receiving mediocre reviews. Developing a cult following among middle-aged women, the actresses' highest-grossing project of the decade helped revitalize their careers in film and television. Composer Marc Shaiman was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Music Score, while Hawn was awarded a Blockbuster Entertainment Award and both Midler and Parker received Satellite Award nominations for their portrayals.
Monday, October 10, 2011
The Good Earth - 1937
The film starred Paul Muni as Wang Lung. For her role as his wife O-Lan, Luise Rainer won an Academy Award for Best Actress. The film also won the Academy Award for Best Cinematography for Karl Freund. It was nominated for Best Director, Best Film Editing and Best Picture. Its world premiere was at the elegant Carthay Circle Theatre in Los Angeles.
Farmer Wang Lung (Paul Muni) marries O-Lan (Luise Rainer), a lowly servant at the Great House, the residence of the most powerful family in their village. O-Lan proves to be an excellent wife, hard working and uncomplaining. Wang Lung prospers. He buys more land, and O-Lan gives birth to two sons and a daughter. Meanwhile, the Great House begins to decline.
All is well until a drought and the resulting famine drive the family to the brink. Desperate, Wang Lung considers the advice of his pessimistic, worthless uncle (Walter Connolly) to sell his land for food, but O-Lan opposes it. Instead, they travel south to a city in search of work. The family survives by begging and stealing. When a revolutionary gives a speech to try to drum up support for the army approaching despite rain in the north, Wang Lung and O-Lan realize the drought is over. They long to return to their farm, but they have no money for an ox, seed, and food. The city changes hands and O-Lan joins a mob looting a mansion. However, she is knocked down and trampled upon. When she comes to, she finds a bag of jewels overlooked in the confusion. This windfall allows the family to go home and prosper once more. O-Lan asks only to keep two pearls for herself.
Years pass...
Billy Elliot - 2000
The film is set during the 1984–1985 UK miners' strike, and centres on the character of 11-year-old Billy Elliot (Jamie Bell), his love of dance, and his hope to become a professional ballet dancer. Billy lives with his widowed father, Jackie (Gary Lewis), older brother, Tony (Jamie Draven), and his invalid Nan (Jean Heywood), who once aspired to be a professional dancer. Both Jackie and Tony are coal miners out on strike.
Jackie takes Billy to the Sports Centre to learn boxing like his father's dad, but Billy struggles and dislikes the sport. He then happens upon a ballet class that is using the gym while their usual basement studio in the Sports Centre is temporarily being used as a soup kitchen for the striking miners. Unknown to Billy's father, he joins the ballet class. When Jackie discovers this after the boxing coach mentions Billy's absence, he forbids Billy to take any more ballet. But, passionate about dancing, Billy secretly continues his lessons with his dance teacher Georgia Wilkinson's (Julie Walters) help.
Georgia believes Billy is talented enough to study at the Royal Ballet School in London, but due to Tony's arrest during a skirmish between police and striking miners, Billy misses the audition. Georgia goes to Billy's house to tell Jackie about the missed opportunity. Jackie and Tony, fearing that Billy will be considered a "poof", are outraged at the prospect of him becoming a professional ballet dancer.
The Power Of One - 1992
Born in 1930 to a recently widowed British-born mother on a farm in rural South Africa, P.K. leads a simple life initially, learning the ways of England from his mother and the ways of Africa from his Zulu nanny (Nomadlozi Kubheka), whose son Tonderai is his best friend. However everything changes for the worse for P.K. when the cattle are struck down by plague, causing his mother to have a nervous breakdown. While his mother is recovering, PK is sent to an Afrikaner boarding school. Being the only English boy, he soon becomes the target of serious bullying: Fellow students claim to hold him responsible for the deaths of thousands of Afrikaners during the Second Anglo-Boer War and vow to punish him accordingly.
PK is victimised by all the boys at the school, but most of all by the older boys, led by a teen known as Jaapie Botha or "The Judge." In one incident, PK is urinated on by Botha and other students, earning the name "Pisskop" (pisshead in Afrikaans) and causing him to wet his bed often to avoid confronting the teens. Later when he goes home to attend his mother's funeral, he tells Nanny about the bedwetting. She arranges for the Zulu medicine man Dabula Manzi to come and cure PK of his bedwetting. Dabula Manzi helps PK to conquer his fears by leading him into the dreamworld (he touches the trunk of a charging elephant, causing it to be docile). PK is given a chicken, which he names Mother Courage, and becomes possibly PK's best friend he'll ever have during his childhood.
Labels:
30s,
40s,
90s,
apartheid,
boxing,
bullying,
childhood,
drama,
growing up,
novel,
South Africa
Eye Of The Needle - 1981
Sunday, October 9, 2011
Viva Las Vegas - 1964
Friday, October 7, 2011
Ten Little Indians - 1965
Thursday, October 6, 2011
American Graffiti - 1973
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
Stand By Me - 1986
Labels:
1959,
80s,
accident,
childhood,
death,
discovery,
drama,
friends,
growing up,
memoir,
small town,
youth
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
The Notebook - 2004
Monday, October 3, 2011
Being Julia - 2004
Sunday, October 2, 2011
Scared Stiff - 1953
Saturday, October 1, 2011
Avatar - 2009
Friday, September 30, 2011
The Heartbreak Kid - 1972
Thursday, September 29, 2011
One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest - 1975
Labels:
70s,
drama,
hope,
mental,
novel,
Oscar winner,
sentimental
Monday, September 26, 2011
The Red and The Black - 1997
Labels:
1800s,
90s,
analytic,
deception,
drama,
French,
hypocrisy,
novel,
passion,
period,
psychological,
romance,
seminary,
sociological
Wednesday, September 21, 2011
Seven Beauties - 1975 (Italian)
Labels:
70s,
hoodlum,
italian,
italy,
manipulation,
prison,
prisoner,
psychotic,
sexual,
war,
Wertmuller
Friday, September 16, 2011
Firelight - 1997
Labels:
1800s,
90s,
diary,
drama,
English,
journalist,
period,
relationship,
romance,
Swiss
The Color Purple - 1985
Sliding Doors - 1998
I love this film. It makes you wonder what might have been in your own life. It's funny in parts and quite dramatic in others. Outstanding.
The Man In The Moon - 1991
The Man in the Moon is a 1991 American drama film, directed by Robert Mulligan and starring Sam Waterston, Reese Witherspoon and Jason London. It was Mulligan's last film and Waterston's last theatrical movie before he moved to Law & Order, as well as Witherspoon's first film.
The story, set in 1950s Louisiana, tells of a 14-year-old girl named Dani (Reese Witherspoon) who falls in love with a boy three years older than she is, a senior named Court Foster (Jason London). Just as Court begins to reciprocate Dani's feelings, even giving her her first kiss, and their relationship begins to develop, he meets and becomes more attracted to Dani's older sister, Maureen (Emily Warfield). Unbeknownst to Dani, Maureen and Court begin to see each other and fall in love. However Court still cares for Dani, and Maureen loves her sister and neither can bring themselves to reveal the relationship.
Room With A View - 1986
Finding Nemo - 2003
Along the way, Marlin learns to take risks and to let Nemo take care of himself. The film received overwhelmingly positive reviews and won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. It was the 2nd highest-grossing film of 2003, behind The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, earning a total of $868 million worldwide.
Finding Nemo is also the best-selling DVD of all time, with over 40 million copies sold as of 2006 and it was the highest-grossing G-rated movie of all time, before Pixar's own Toy Story 3 overtook it. It is also the 4th highest grossing animated film of all time. It is currently the 25th highest grossing film of all time.
In 2008, the American Film Institute named it the 10th greatest animated film ever made during their 10 Top 10.
The inspiration for Nemo was made up of multiple experiences. The idea goes back to when director Andrew Stanton was a child, when he loved going to the dentist to see the fish tank, assuming that the fish were from the ocean and wanted to go home. In 1992 shortly after his son was born, he and his family took a trip to Six Flags Discovery Kingdom (which was called Marine World at the time). There he saw the shark tube and various exhibits he felt that the underwater world could be done beautifully in computer animation. Later, in 1997 he took his son for a walk in the park, but found that he was over protecting him constantly and lost an opportunity to have any "father-son experiences" on that day. In an interview with National Geographic Magazine, he stated that the idea for the characters of Marlin and Nemo came from a photograph of two clownfish peeking out of an anemone:
"It was so arresting. I had no idea what kind of fish they were, but I couldn't take my eyes off them. And as an entertainer, the fact that they were called clownfish—it was perfect. There's almost nothing more appealing than these little fish that want to play peekaboo with you."
Thursday, September 15, 2011
The Crying Game - 1992
The Crying Game is about the experiences of the main character, Fergus (Stephen Rea), as a member of the IRA, his brief but meaningful encounter with Jody (Forest Whitaker) who is held prisoner by the group, and his unexpected romantic relationship with Jody's girlfriend, Dil (Jaye Davidson) whom Fergus promised Jody he would protect. However, unexpected events force Fergus to decide what he wants for the future, and ultimately what his nature dictates he must do.
The film opens as a psychological thriller - IRA foot soldier Fergus and a unit of other IRA fighters, including a woman named Jude and led by Maguire, kidnap Jody, a black British soldier. The IRA demands the release of other jailed IRA members, threatening to execute Jody in three days if their demands are not met. While the amiable Fergus guards Jody, they develop a bond - much to the chagrin of the other IRA men. During this time, Jody tells Fergus the story about the frog and the scorpion.
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
Midnight In Paris - 2011
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Cinema Paradiso - 1988
Monday, September 12, 2011
The Time Machine - 2002
The Time Machine is a 2002 American science fiction film loosely adapted from the 1895 novel of the same name by H. G. Wells, and the 1960 film screenplay by David Duncan. It was executive-produced by Arnold Leibovit and directed by Simon Wells, who is the great-grandson of the original author, and stars Guy Pearce, Jeremy Irons, Orlando Jones, Samantha Mumba, Mark Addy, Sienna Guillory, and Phyllida Law with a cameo by Alan Young, who also appeared in the 1960 film adaptation.
The 2002 film is set in New York City instead of London and contains new story elements not present in the original novel, including a romantic backstory, a new scenario about how civilization was destroyed, and several new characters, such as an intelligent hologram played by Orlando Jones and a Morlock leader played by Jeremy Irons.
Director Gore Verbinski was brought in to take over the last 18 days of shooting, as Wells was suffering from "extreme exhaustion". Wells returned for post-production.
The 2002 film is set in New York City instead of London and contains new story elements not present in the original novel, including a romantic backstory, a new scenario about how civilization was destroyed, and several new characters, such as an intelligent hologram played by Orlando Jones and a Morlock leader played by Jeremy Irons.
Director Gore Verbinski was brought in to take over the last 18 days of shooting, as Wells was suffering from "extreme exhaustion". Wells returned for post-production.
Saturday, September 10, 2011
Excalibur - 1981
Excalibur is the legendary sword of King Arthur, sometimes attributed with magical powers or associated with the rightful sovereignty of Great Britain. Sometimes Excalibur and the Sword in the Stone (the proof of Arthur's lineage) are said to be the same weapon, but in most versions they are considered separate. The sword was associated with the Arthurian legend very early. In Welsh, the sword is called Caledfwlch.
In 1981 dramatic fantasy film of EXCALIBUR was directed, produced and co-written by John Boorman that retells the legend of King Arthur and the knights of the Round Table. Adapted from the 15th century Arthurian romance, Le Morte d'Arthur by Thomas Malory, Excalibur features the music of Richard Wagner and Carl Orff, along with an original score by Trevor Jones. It stars Nigel Terry as Arthur, Nicholas Clay as Lancelot, Helen Mirren as Morgana, Liam Neeson as Gawain, Nicol Williamson as Merlin and a relatively unknown Patrick Stewart as Leondegrance. The film is named for the legendary sword of King Arthur that features prominently in Arthurian literature.
Shot entirely on location in Ireland and employing Irish actors and crew, the film has been acknowledged for its importance to the Irish filmmaking industry and for helping launch the film careers of Neeson, as well as Gabriel Byrne, Neil Jordan and Ciarán Hinds.
Excalibur achieved moderate box office success while receiving mixed reviews. Although film critics Roger Ebert and Vincent Canby criticized the film's plot and characters, they, along with other reviewers, praised it visually. Excalibur opened at number one in the United States, eventually grossing $34,967,437 on a budget of around USD $11 million, to rank 18th in that year's receipts.
In 1981 dramatic fantasy film of EXCALIBUR was directed, produced and co-written by John Boorman that retells the legend of King Arthur and the knights of the Round Table. Adapted from the 15th century Arthurian romance, Le Morte d'Arthur by Thomas Malory, Excalibur features the music of Richard Wagner and Carl Orff, along with an original score by Trevor Jones. It stars Nigel Terry as Arthur, Nicholas Clay as Lancelot, Helen Mirren as Morgana, Liam Neeson as Gawain, Nicol Williamson as Merlin and a relatively unknown Patrick Stewart as Leondegrance. The film is named for the legendary sword of King Arthur that features prominently in Arthurian literature.
Shot entirely on location in Ireland and employing Irish actors and crew, the film has been acknowledged for its importance to the Irish filmmaking industry and for helping launch the film careers of Neeson, as well as Gabriel Byrne, Neil Jordan and Ciarán Hinds.
Excalibur achieved moderate box office success while receiving mixed reviews. Although film critics Roger Ebert and Vincent Canby criticized the film's plot and characters, they, along with other reviewers, praised it visually. Excalibur opened at number one in the United States, eventually grossing $34,967,437 on a budget of around USD $11 million, to rank 18th in that year's receipts.
Friday, September 9, 2011
Leon: The Professional - 1994
Léon (also known as The Professional and Léon: The Professional) is a 1994 French/American thriller film written and directed by Luc Besson. It stars Jean Reno as a mob hitman, Gary Oldman as a corrupt DEA agent, and a young Natalie Portman, in her feature film debut, as a 12-year-old girl who is taken in by the hitman after her family is murdered.
Léon is to some extent an expansion of an idea in Besson's earlier 1990 film, La Femme Nikita (in some countries Nikita). In La Femme Nikita Jean Reno plays a similar character named Victor. Besson described Léon as "Now maybe Jean is playing the American cousin of Victor. This time he's more human."
While most of the interior footage was shot in France, the rest of the film was shot on location in New York. The final scene at the school was filmed at Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, New Jersey
Léon is to some extent an expansion of an idea in Besson's earlier 1990 film, La Femme Nikita (in some countries Nikita). In La Femme Nikita Jean Reno plays a similar character named Victor. Besson described Léon as "Now maybe Jean is playing the American cousin of Victor. This time he's more human."
While most of the interior footage was shot in France, the rest of the film was shot on location in New York. The final scene at the school was filmed at Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, New Jersey
Thursday, September 8, 2011
The Elephant Man - 1980
The Elephant Man is a 1980 American drama film based on the true story of Joseph Merrick (called John Merrick in the film), a severely deformed man in 19th century London. The film was directed by David Lynch and stars John Hurt, Anthony Hopkins, Anne Bancroft, John Gielgud, Wendy Hiller, Michael Elphick, Hannah Gordon, and Freddie Jones.
The screenplay was adapted by Lynch, Christopher De Vore, and Eric Bergren from the books The Elephant Man and Other Reminiscences (1923) by Sir Frederick Treves and The Elephant Man: A Study in Human Dignity by Ashley Montagu. It was shot in black-and-white.
The Elephant Man was a critical and commercial success, and received eight Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture in 1980. Thank you film director, David Lynch.
The screenplay was adapted by Lynch, Christopher De Vore, and Eric Bergren from the books The Elephant Man and Other Reminiscences (1923) by Sir Frederick Treves and The Elephant Man: A Study in Human Dignity by Ashley Montagu. It was shot in black-and-white.
The Elephant Man was a critical and commercial success, and received eight Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture in 1980. Thank you film director, David Lynch.
Tuesday, September 6, 2011
Beyond Rangoon - 1995
Beyond Rangoon is a 1995 drama film directed by John Boorman about Laura Bowman (played by Patricia Arquette), an American tourist who vacations in Burma (Myanmar) in 1988, the year in which the 8888 Uprising takes place. The film was mostly filmed in Malaysia, and, though a work of fiction, was inspired by real people and real events.
Bowman joins, albeit initially unintentionally, political rallies with university students protesting for democracy, and travels with the student leader U Aung Ko throughout Burma. There, they see the brutality of the military dictators of the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC), and attempt to escape to Thailand.
The film was an official selection at the 1995 Cannes Film Festival, where it was one of the popular hits of the event.
Critical reaction was mixed. Time, Rolling Stone, and Entertainment Weekly wrote negative reviews, while the critic for The New Yorker called the film a "fearless masterpiece" and Andrew Sarris declared himself "awestruck" by the film. The film was a financial success only in France (where it opened number one and gained 442,793 visitors), though it was screened in many European countries. Film critic Tullio Kezich compared the film to Rossellini's classic, Paisà, regretting that it was marred by certain directorial touches.
The film may have had an impact beyond movie screens, however. Only weeks into its European run, the Burmese military junta freed Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi (depicted in the film) after several years under strict house arrest. The celebrated democracy leader thanked the filmmakers in her first interview with the BBC. Suu Kyi was re-arrested a few years later, but Beyond Rangoon had already helped raise world attention on a previously "invisible" tragedy: the massacres of 1988 and the cruelty of her country's military rulers.
Bowman joins, albeit initially unintentionally, political rallies with university students protesting for democracy, and travels with the student leader U Aung Ko throughout Burma. There, they see the brutality of the military dictators of the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC), and attempt to escape to Thailand.
The film was an official selection at the 1995 Cannes Film Festival, where it was one of the popular hits of the event.
Critical reaction was mixed. Time, Rolling Stone, and Entertainment Weekly wrote negative reviews, while the critic for The New Yorker called the film a "fearless masterpiece" and Andrew Sarris declared himself "awestruck" by the film. The film was a financial success only in France (where it opened number one and gained 442,793 visitors), though it was screened in many European countries. Film critic Tullio Kezich compared the film to Rossellini's classic, Paisà, regretting that it was marred by certain directorial touches.
The film may have had an impact beyond movie screens, however. Only weeks into its European run, the Burmese military junta freed Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi (depicted in the film) after several years under strict house arrest. The celebrated democracy leader thanked the filmmakers in her first interview with the BBC. Suu Kyi was re-arrested a few years later, but Beyond Rangoon had already helped raise world attention on a previously "invisible" tragedy: the massacres of 1988 and the cruelty of her country's military rulers.
Monday, August 29, 2011
ROPE - 1948
Rope is a 1948 American crime film based on the play Rope (1929) by Patrick Hamilton and adapted by Hume Cronyn (treatment)[2] and Arthur Laurents, directed by Alfred Hitchcock and produced by Sidney Bernstein and Hitchcock as the first of their Transatlantic Pictures productions. Starring James Stewart, John Dall and Farley Granger, it is the first of Hitchcock's Technicolor films, and is notable for taking place in real time and being edited so as to appear as a single continuous shot through the use of long takes.
The original play was said to be inspired by the real-life murder of 14-year-old Bobby Franks in 1924 by University of Chicago students Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb.
On a late afternoon, two brilliant young aesthetes, Brandon Shaw (Dall) and Phillip Morgan (Granger), murder a former classmate, David Kentley (Dick Hogan), in their apartment. They commit the crime as an intellectual exercise: they want to prove their superiority by committing the "perfect murder".
After hiding the body in a large antique wooden chest, Brandon and Phillip host a dinner party at the apartment which has a panoramic view of Manhattan's skyline. The guests, unaware of what has happened, include the victim's father Mr. Kentley (Cedric Hardwicke) and aunt Mrs. Atwater (Constance Collier) (his mother is not able to attend). Also there is his fiancee, Janet Walker (Joan Chandler) and her former lover Kenneth Lawrence (Douglas Dick), who was once David's close friend.
The film is one of Hitchcock's most experimental and "one of the most interesting experiments ever attempted by a major director working with big box-office names", abandoning many standard film techniques to allow for the long unbroken scenes. Each shot ran continuously for up to ten minutes without interruption. It was shot on a single set, aside from the opening establishing shot street scene under the credits. Camera moves were carefully planned and there was almost no editing.
The walls of the set were on rollers and could silently be moved out of the way to make way for the camera and then replaced when they were to come back into shot. Prop men constantly had to move the furniture and other props out of the way of the large Technicolor camera, and then ensure they were replaced in the correct location. A team of soundmen and camera operators kept the camera and microphones in constant motion, as the actors kept to a carefully choreographed set of cues
The original play was said to be inspired by the real-life murder of 14-year-old Bobby Franks in 1924 by University of Chicago students Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb.
On a late afternoon, two brilliant young aesthetes, Brandon Shaw (Dall) and Phillip Morgan (Granger), murder a former classmate, David Kentley (Dick Hogan), in their apartment. They commit the crime as an intellectual exercise: they want to prove their superiority by committing the "perfect murder".
After hiding the body in a large antique wooden chest, Brandon and Phillip host a dinner party at the apartment which has a panoramic view of Manhattan's skyline. The guests, unaware of what has happened, include the victim's father Mr. Kentley (Cedric Hardwicke) and aunt Mrs. Atwater (Constance Collier) (his mother is not able to attend). Also there is his fiancee, Janet Walker (Joan Chandler) and her former lover Kenneth Lawrence (Douglas Dick), who was once David's close friend.
The film is one of Hitchcock's most experimental and "one of the most interesting experiments ever attempted by a major director working with big box-office names", abandoning many standard film techniques to allow for the long unbroken scenes. Each shot ran continuously for up to ten minutes without interruption. It was shot on a single set, aside from the opening establishing shot street scene under the credits. Camera moves were carefully planned and there was almost no editing.
The walls of the set were on rollers and could silently be moved out of the way to make way for the camera and then replaced when they were to come back into shot. Prop men constantly had to move the furniture and other props out of the way of the large Technicolor camera, and then ensure they were replaced in the correct location. A team of soundmen and camera operators kept the camera and microphones in constant motion, as the actors kept to a carefully choreographed set of cues
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)