Actors: Ron Moody, Frank Langella
Director: Mel Brooks
Mel Brooks films don't often have tonal issues - they are usually straight comedies. Perhaps this film is also a straight comedy, but the film functions as a mismatched buddy comedy where we don't know enough about either person to say how mismatched they are. I love Mel Brooks and I like what he's trying to do here, but either the humor is too old-fashioned or the film doesn't succeed at what it's trying to do. There are still some solid scenes, but ultimately it feels like a mish-mash. And I like using the word 'but' to contrast the beginning of the sentence with the end.
Wednesday, October 23, 2013
Thursday, October 17, 2013
The Raid: Redemption - 2011 - 3½ Stars
Actors: Iko Uwais, Joe Taslim
Director: Gareth Evans
One of the virtues of a great action film is lack of exposition - I always admired Predator's ability to get us right into the chopper with Arnold, Jesse, Carl, and all the rest in less than five minutes. The Raid: Redemption doesn't quite achieve that level of elegance, but it's awful close. What follows that tiny bloodless beginning is a smorgasboard of punches, kicks, stabs, and gunshots. All manner of death and dismemberment are on display. The film throws in some exposition midway through and it becomes a bit of a grind at the end - likely a product of the lack of character development at the beginning. Still, American action films should take a hint - your movie doesn't need to be 150 minutes to be awesome.
This is an Indonesian film - make sure you see this before you see An Act Of Killing, or you'll think Indonesia is filled with bloodthirsty monsters.
Director: Gareth Evans
One of the virtues of a great action film is lack of exposition - I always admired Predator's ability to get us right into the chopper with Arnold, Jesse, Carl, and all the rest in less than five minutes. The Raid: Redemption doesn't quite achieve that level of elegance, but it's awful close. What follows that tiny bloodless beginning is a smorgasboard of punches, kicks, stabs, and gunshots. All manner of death and dismemberment are on display. The film throws in some exposition midway through and it becomes a bit of a grind at the end - likely a product of the lack of character development at the beginning. Still, American action films should take a hint - your movie doesn't need to be 150 minutes to be awesome.
This is an Indonesian film - make sure you see this before you see An Act Of Killing, or you'll think Indonesia is filled with bloodthirsty monsters.
Cosmopolis - 2012 - 4 Stars
Actors: Robert Pattinson, Sarah Gadon
Director: David Cronenberg
Cosmopolis is an ideas movie, so even though it has way too many ideas, I love it anyway. Featuring Pattinson as a brooding financial wunderkind eking through Manhattan traffic in his limousine, the film manages to be visually interesting and does not induce claustrophobia. I imagine the novel's ideas are more fully fleshed out, but as an 100 minute discourse on our techno-dystopia and how the whims of a few affect the bottom lines of many, you can't do much worse. I also have an affinity for films who suggest infinities outside of themselves - this one sprawls out in all directions.
Director: David Cronenberg
Cosmopolis is an ideas movie, so even though it has way too many ideas, I love it anyway. Featuring Pattinson as a brooding financial wunderkind eking through Manhattan traffic in his limousine, the film manages to be visually interesting and does not induce claustrophobia. I imagine the novel's ideas are more fully fleshed out, but as an 100 minute discourse on our techno-dystopia and how the whims of a few affect the bottom lines of many, you can't do much worse. I also have an affinity for films who suggest infinities outside of themselves - this one sprawls out in all directions.
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