“If I wasn’t a girl … would you like me anyway?” — Lina Leandersson as Eli in Let the Right One In
Dear readers: I hardly believe it myself, but I’ve finally exhausted my backlog of DVD movie reviews. It’ll probably be a while before I post another collection of reviews. Now that I think about it, though, I recently goosed my Netflix plan to three at a time, so maybe it won’t be so long after all!
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Win Win (2011, USA) Thoroughly enjoyable suburban drama with strong characters and good acting. A bumbling attorney struggling to make ends meet takes advantage of an elderly man with dementia and complications ensue. There are sitcom-like elements to the story, but it runs deeper than that — the complications are, first, the elderly man’s grandson, who winds up living with the attorney and his family and enriching their lives, and second, the elderly man’s daughter, who threatens to bring the house of cards down. Giamatti is marvelous. We loved this movie. |
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Meek’s Cutoff (2010, USA) It’s 1845 and a small party of pioneers and their guide have missed a turn along the Oregon Trail. They’re trudging through a beautifully-filmed but barren desert, water running low. Meek’s Cutoff is a super-realistic depiction of the lonely, dangerous, monotonous overland walk settlers undertook to reach the promised lands of the American West. For the first half of the movie there isn’t even any background music, just the creaking of wagon axles and the occasional snort of tired horses and oxen. Everyone is dirty, ragged, worn out, discouraged … and equally stoic and determined. Gradually things get worse, their situation more dire. And then they capture an Indian and force him to lead them to water. Can they trust him? Somewhere in the middle of nowhere, water promisingly close (or is it?), the movie just ends. What? I watched an earlier film of Kelly Reichardt’s, Wendy and Lucy; it too was suicidally depressing. Meek’s Cutoff delivers dreariness with a sneer, almost as if the director’s purpose is to smugly rub our noses in reality. I felt as if Kelly Reichardt had condemned me for having middle class values and living a happy life. Well, good for her, and I hope she has a devoted following. |
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Fish Tank (2009, UK) One of the professional critics has the right description of this gritty British movie: disquieting social realism. Mia is a 15-year-old girl living in a housing project in Essex. She’s been tossed out of school and is on the outs with her mother and her former friends. She dreams of becoming a hip-hop dancer and practices in an abandoned room for hours on end. Her slutty mother brings home a sexy man. Predictably disturbing consequences ensue. Mia faces crushing disappointment after crushing disappointment, but holds it all together right up until an old horse belonging to some nearby gypsies dies … for all her adult posturing, she’s still a child. The movie immerses you in lower-class British life. Nothing is prettied up or given the Hollywood treatment. If it sounds depressing … and believe me, it is … it’s also fascinating, and if your heart still beats you’ll fall for Mia. I read that the actress, Katie Jarvis, was a total novice when she played Mia. I really find that hard to believe. She’s fabulous. |
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Hanna (2011, USA) This movie is great. Hanna is a wild child, raised in isolation by her father, deep in the woods near the Arctic Circle. Her education? Survival. Fighting. Assassination. She can gut a moose and kick your ass. And once she’s out in the world, it turns out everyone is after her. Seriously, this movie is so much fun — it’s a spy thriller, it’s science fiction, it’s coming of age – you can’t take anything in it seriously, but it’ll still pull you in and have you rooting for Hanna. I loved every minute of it. |
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I Am Love (2009, Italy) This isn’t my kind of movie at all. It starts with pampered rich people doing rich people things, and I wanted to turn away but for some reason didn’t. It’s slow to get started, and I almost turned away but for some reason didn’t. And then, after 30 or 40 minutes of scene setting, it gets to cracking and I said Holy Shit and was glad I decided to stick with it. There were times when I felt I was watching a soap opera, times I felt I was watching a modern version of a Shakespeare play, times I felt I was watching a remake of Lady Chatterley’s Lover, times I felt I was watching a really classy travel and food show. But what really carried me along was Tilda Swinton. That woman is a beast … and I mean that in the most reverential way imaginable. Really, in the end, the movie is just a story about a middle aged woman finding love, and I should have rated it 3 stars instead of 3.5 … but Tilda Swinton’s excellence here makes me almost sorry I didn’t give it 4 stars. |
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The Perfect Host (2010, USA) Quite a good twisty film, with David Hyde Pierce playing a most unconventional character. It’s not to be taken seriously … there are far too many unlikely, even impossible, plot turns to be believable, and the ending is perhaps a little overdone … but for pure entertainment value it’s hard to beat. The Perfect Host is billed as a thriller, but I’d classify it as dark comedy. It’s a hoot … it made me laugh, not once but several times. |
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Exporting Raymond (2010, USA) I never watched the TV sitcom Everyone Loves Raymond, and knew less about it than the Moscow television people who wanted to make a Russian version of it. The documentary, about the troubles of the American show’s creator in trying to get the Russians to do things his way, is mildly interesting (probably far more so if you are a fan of the sitcom). I found the movie off-putting. The Russian’s American guest comes across as a prissy fussbudget, and most of the laughs are clearly supposed to come at the expense of the “backward” Russians. |
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Jane Eyre (2011, UK) Among the gaps in my education is a large one where 19th century English women novelists should be. I never read Austen; I never read the Brontes. I never read Jane Eyre. I’m unqualified to offer an opinion on the faithfulness of this adaptation … but I can say I thought it a fine, fine movie, and a hell of an interesting story. The trailers so played up the few eerie scenes, I almost expected something supernatural to happen. Thankfully, the movie (as does the novel, I’m sure) deals with reality. Mia Wasikowska and Michael Fassbender are perfect in their roles. I love it that movies like this can still be made and can still find a wide audience. This was a positive and moving experience. |
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Incendies (2010, Canada) This is a fascinating film, but it demands patience on the part of the audience. It’s very long and the pacing is slow, but as the story builds it hooks you, and your patience is rewarded. As the mystery of the mother’s past is slowly revealed, layer by layer, you learn about the troubles in Lebanon in the 1980s — for me at least, filling in many gaps in my knowledge of the Middle East. As for the mother herself, Nawal Marwan, holy cow — I don’t want to spoil the story for you, so I’ll just say she is a memorable and heroic character. Do see it. It’s worth the demands it makes of you. |
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Let the Right One In (2008, Sweden) Here are two words that don’t normally go together: endearing and horrifying. This is a perfect little vampire film. I rarely watch movies twice and have never reviewed one twice, but I’m making an exception for this one. Here’s what I said last time around:
As promised, this time around I watched it in Swedish with English subtitles. The sound quality is far superior this way, and the movie is perhaps even more endearing and horrifying. Also, this time I treated myself to the extras included on the DVD. I could watch this movie again and again, and if Eli showed up at my door, I’d certainly let her/him/it in! |
New: Paul’s DVD Hall of Shame
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Dogville (2003, Denmark) Dogville is pretentious, wooden, and embarrassingly awkward, like an experimental stage production you might see at your local community college. |
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Young Adam (2003, UK) Guests started watching Young Adam while I was busy doing something else. I walked into the room after it had started and thought they’d put on a snuff flick: a young woman was kneeling naked on the floor, covered in blood and screaming as a man brutally whipped, kicked, and punched her. It wasn’t a short scene, either. This is pervert stuff, something only a serial killer could watch. |
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The Disappearance of Alice Creed (2009, UK) I got through 30 minutes and couldn’t go on. I can see where you could use a kidnapping storyline as an excuse to create a fetish torture and bondage film … but why would you? |