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intertribalHarry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (2009)
Premise: Another year at Hogwarts, and as always Voldemort comes closer to executing his Evil Plan, all with the speed of a Mary Worth comic strip. Oh, and the Half-Blood Prince is totally unimportant so don't even worry about the title.
Execution: HP VI is an exercise in extremes - from quite funny to almost grim with a one-second transition. Real fear and suspense remains a no-no in the interest of the kiddies. Harry, Hermione, and regrettably, Ron, solidify their positions as the most important and popular students in Hogwarts history to be so boring, while the more fascinating characters like Luna, Bellatrix, Snape, and even Draco and Voldemort languish in the hallowed corridors. Special effects remain top-notch.
Moon (2009)
Premise: A worker for Lunar Industries is finishing up his three-year contract as the sole overseer for uranium shipments to Earth when strange things begin happening in his little not-quite-sterilized base.
Execution: Sort of 2001: A Space Odyssey in realistic, almost noir form (complete with blood). There are some dark psychological themes (mostly loneliness, some ghosts) left unresolved and some strong imagery, but this is basically a hard, practical science fiction movie: futuristic, technologically-heavy setting + problem in the system = how will the jaded hero reach greener country? Good movie that most adults will probably approve of in some way, though not a mind-blower per se. But Clint Mansell hit a real slam-dunk on the score.
Public Enemies (2009)
Premise: John Dillinger, '30s bank-robber-extraordinaire, keeps breaking out of prison to be with Billie Frechette, robbing more banks, and being chased by the FBI's J. Edgar Hoover and Christian Bale. No, the character's name was not Christian Bale, but you know how it is.
Execution: Shaky camera goes historic! A good old fashioned crime movie, fairly intense, well-acted, and sensitively wrought with slight tension. Some nice on-screen strategery. Might get some push in awards season. Reminded me of O'Connor's "A Good Man is Hard To Find" at times, but conventional character pigeonholes - at least for this genre, in which making your criminal your hero is not original - kept this short of anything as sharp and brutal as "Good Man."
The White Diamond (2004)
Premise: A head-in-the-clouds British aeronautics physicist goes to Guyana to fly his "White Diamond," an adorable teardrop-shaped airship. Documentarian Werner Herzog follows him with a camera crew and talks to the Guyanese instead.
Execution: One of Herzog's quieter, softer movies, armed with spectacular aerial footage taken because Herzog forces the physicist to take on a camera and the White Diamond descends into the green peaks and momentarily intrigues the villagers. As always, Herzog gets phenomenal psychological confessions from his subjects - like the haunting fact that an accident on one of this guy's earlier airships killed one of his friends, a nature filmmaker, in Sumatra. A great example of Herzog making a sensitive meditation on ascension, home, and peace out of a movie that most directors would run the hell away from. While it didn't resonate with me like "Encounters at the End of the World" and "Grizzly Man," this is still a thing of "truth and beauty."
Premise: Another year at Hogwarts, and as always Voldemort comes closer to executing his Evil Plan, all with the speed of a Mary Worth comic strip. Oh, and the Half-Blood Prince is totally unimportant so don't even worry about the title.
Execution: HP VI is an exercise in extremes - from quite funny to almost grim with a one-second transition. Real fear and suspense remains a no-no in the interest of the kiddies. Harry, Hermione, and regrettably, Ron, solidify their positions as the most important and popular students in Hogwarts history to be so boring, while the more fascinating characters like Luna, Bellatrix, Snape, and even Draco and Voldemort languish in the hallowed corridors. Special effects remain top-notch.
Moon (2009)
Premise: A worker for Lunar Industries is finishing up his three-year contract as the sole overseer for uranium shipments to Earth when strange things begin happening in his little not-quite-sterilized base.
Execution: Sort of 2001: A Space Odyssey in realistic, almost noir form (complete with blood). There are some dark psychological themes (mostly loneliness, some ghosts) left unresolved and some strong imagery, but this is basically a hard, practical science fiction movie: futuristic, technologically-heavy setting + problem in the system = how will the jaded hero reach greener country? Good movie that most adults will probably approve of in some way, though not a mind-blower per se. But Clint Mansell hit a real slam-dunk on the score.
Public Enemies (2009)
Premise: John Dillinger, '30s bank-robber-extraordinaire, keeps breaking out of prison to be with Billie Frechette, robbing more banks, and being chased by the FBI's J. Edgar Hoover and Christian Bale. No, the character's name was not Christian Bale, but you know how it is.
Execution: Shaky camera goes historic! A good old fashioned crime movie, fairly intense, well-acted, and sensitively wrought with slight tension. Some nice on-screen strategery. Might get some push in awards season. Reminded me of O'Connor's "A Good Man is Hard To Find" at times, but conventional character pigeonholes - at least for this genre, in which making your criminal your hero is not original - kept this short of anything as sharp and brutal as "Good Man."
The White Diamond (2004)
Premise: A head-in-the-clouds British aeronautics physicist goes to Guyana to fly his "White Diamond," an adorable teardrop-shaped airship. Documentarian Werner Herzog follows him with a camera crew and talks to the Guyanese instead.
Execution: One of Herzog's quieter, softer movies, armed with spectacular aerial footage taken because Herzog forces the physicist to take on a camera and the White Diamond descends into the green peaks and momentarily intrigues the villagers. As always, Herzog gets phenomenal psychological confessions from his subjects - like the haunting fact that an accident on one of this guy's earlier airships killed one of his friends, a nature filmmaker, in Sumatra. A great example of Herzog making a sensitive meditation on ascension, home, and peace out of a movie that most directors would run the hell away from. While it didn't resonate with me like "Encounters at the End of the World" and "Grizzly Man," this is still a thing of "truth and beauty."
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no subject
Date: 2009-07-22 07:58 pm (UTC)And I hate "Public Enemy" from the trailer due to the shitty digital camera effect. It looks cheap!
no subject
Date: 2009-07-22 08:24 pm (UTC)Yeah, it's not like 28 Days Later cheap, but there's definitely a few scenes with uncomfortably bad video quality.
no subject
Date: 2009-07-22 10:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-07-22 11:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-07-23 01:05 am (UTC)