Full disclosure, I was and am a HUGE fan of the 1961 WEST SIDE STORY. I know it’s every detail, every word of every lyric, every emotional cue. Rita Moreno was the iconic Rita. So, I went to see this new Spielberg directed, Moreno produced, 2021 version with more curiosity than expectation. Not forgetting that WEST SIDE STORY was inspired by Shakespeare’s ROMEO AND JULIET, the general structure of the movies is the same yet contemporary and musical. The 2021 version is grittier. The context of the drama is more developed, setting it in a disappearing New York neighbourhood, which makes the rivalry of the street gangs more a matter of life and death that either the play or the first movie. Rita Moreno is very much celebrated in this new film, with a newly created character and a reallocation of a song. Two musical numbers in the 2021 version paled when compared to the 1961: (1) the dance at the gym didn’t have the battle fever of the original (probably solely due to the incomparable Rita Moreno in 1961) and by moving Tony and Maria’s first meeting from the actual dance to behind the bleachers it lost the transcendent quality of their love at first sight; and (2) Maria’s “I Feel Pretty” scene being moved from a Dress Shop (where the girls worked) to a department store (where they were but a small part of a cleaning crew), despite the clever use of store displays, changed the context from dreaming of a wedding to dreaming of blending into Americana. I also felt that 2021 suffered from the loss of (a) priest, which stripped away marriage vows in a church for promises in a museum (??), and (b) the the loss of the potion separated the lovers and the tragic death of love at the end. HOWEVER, ALL COMPARISONS OR DISAPPOINTMENTS EVAPORATED when Rachel Zegler’s soaring soprano lifted Maria’s first note. It was so beautiful I had to remind myself to breath. Her duets with Amsel Elgort were transporting. What would have been a rating of 7 (good) was made 9 (superb) by Zegler’s performance, making this a must see film. [Musical Drama]
Unexpectedly theatrical and with substance - like gothic thrilling vice laden modern Shakespeare. This is a film about consumption, the weakness and naivety of arrogance, and a complex first love emotion rolling obsession/jealousy/narcissism into one driving force.
There are three acts for me: Oxford, Saltburn, & madness.
The first act didn't work for me till the second act kicked in. I was worried about a overly-parody-fied and caricatured script. Whilst I recognised the feelings and experiences of Oliver at Oxford, the people were too larger than life and the early laughs didn't land properly for me. Laughing at silly posh young people or uber geeks just wasn't my thing. Some of the cruelty and snobbery played out well though.
The second act puts the first into perspective. The first act which shows an alienated and floundering Oliver gain acceptance from a dislikeable group through the actually sane, kind-ish and likeable Felix sets up for the second act. More unlikeable rich people consuming each other and tossing people away like toys. But Oliver has Felix now and has picked up skills in getting things his way, seduction and sweet talking. But the acting from everyone at Saltburn estate is spot on - I properly laughed at Rosamund pikes and Richard e grants moments. Even though they are all spoilt, sheltered, unwittingly arrogant and judgemental - these characters you like, you see their vulnerabilities and insecurities - you have fun when they have fun.
Things start looking beautiful in the second act. Sometimes distractingly so. The light play, framing, and camera work are stunning. You feel you are in the throws of first love in the best summer of your life. Sometimes this was at odds with the drama or tension in the story.
Final act madness. The sympathy built up for the family now leads into the thrilling dramatic unwinding. The consumers become the consumed. Arrogance and haughty ideas of invincibility led to weakness and fractures.
This isn't an overly cohesive film for me, but I think that's intentional as mis direction. Clues for the real story are laid throughout and I had guessed the ending about two thirds of the way in. I really enjoyed the moments of summer headiness, where everyone is enjoying each other's company. Sometimes the inter-character drama and tensions were too much for me - almost descending into reality tv pettiness. I think thats intentional to show the unsympathetic side of the upper class and olivers push back - I just don't think it needed so much.
The pacing and focus was a little off for me at times. The film was full of symbolism and clever lines but it almost felt too full sometimes. Like vacillating rapidly between moods. There was a moment where I was full of tears at portrayal of grief when others were laughing - very interesting but it left me feeling a bit all Over the place. But excited!
The score and the setting and sterling acting efforts lift the film up into a grand feeling vision. I was a little disappointed that the tone of the trailers wasn't present in the film at all (bloc party song teaser trailer was amazing) . But the score takes this to a different place - British, establishment, old money, young love, hubris and longing - great score.
The film is exciting and there are unexpected moments and some brave choices too. I enjoyed watching this a lot and am excited for more films. There's a lot to enjoy here. Barry keoghans metamorphosis through the film is really really thrilling. Reliving 2006 is fun too - wish just a bit more was done with the music and feeling of that time. Some duff moments for me too so a 7.
Recommend
Yikes. Seems like I'm solidly in the minority here. I have not read the book, but the show is not great, not as good as I was expecting.
I have problems with a few choices:
All the Light We Cannot is too over the top, saccharine, cheesy, and cringy. Feels like a WW2 show made for 12 year old girls. It has 0 subtlety.
Character build up is so not smooth. Like I'm expected to believe in seconds that Werner is this intelligent, warm and sensitive kid who's just stuck in the war. Not to mention the kiss in the last episode, it was unnecessary and unbelievable. Especially when Marie instigated it, she'd only known him for like 5 minutes.
Common tropes and clichés everywhere. Werner is only one to survive the bombing of the hotel and just waltzes out of the rummage barely hurt at all. I cannot believe Marie is walking barefoot around a bombed out house, let alone a bombed out city. I am wondering if those scenes were accurate to the book.
It's so jarring to see foreign stories staring Anglos. I don't understand why they use these strange accents, that are neither really French or English, or whatever they were supposed to be. Mark Ruffalo's was particularly awful.
American storytelling needs to stop making Nazism cartoonish, it is bad writing. The gem obsessed Nazi was the worst. I don't know if it was the actor, or if he just got terrible directions.
Why are 30 year olds playing teenagers? The lead guy playing an early teen in the boarding school was simply absurd. Also young Marie and adult Marie are different races? Like we get it, Hollywood needs more diversity but you can't change the race of someone mid story in a historical fiction that’s based on actual events where race was a huge factor.
With its dirty glam sheen, bright chunks of color floating in filth, and an odor you can feel wafting off the screen, After Blue is all about making vomit cool again.
To be incoherent means to have faith in cinema, it means to have a romantic approach, unformatted, free, disturbed and dreamlike, cinegenic, an epic narration.
-Writer / Director Bertrand Mandico in his Incoherence Manifesto (2012)
After Blue is a surreal road trip where, if you aren't sure you're going to like it before you see it, then you're going to hate it. Fortunately, I knew I was going to like it because I'm a big fan of Bertrand Mandico after seeing his The Wild Boys (2017).
As someone who sees a movie everyday, a filmmaker who goes all out, who commits 100% to the bit and turns the style up to 11, makes the kind of movies I want to see because they're going to stand far out from the dump of rom-coms and family dramas that litter the cinema every week.
Look, let's be honest, you're not going to like After Blue so I can't recommend seeing it. It's just too weird. But if you want to watch a technicolor burp spew across the screen, if you like movies with a trippy 70's vibe, if you're into Ken Russell pompous extravagance then you might like After Blue but don't blame me if you don't.
(Mini-rant you don't need to read: Honestly, I don't get the criticisms saying After Blue is 'unintelligible' . Hell, I can tell you what it's about and I'm not even a native French speaker! In a post-apocalyptic world, a young woman (Roxy, or 'Toxic' to the people of the village) finds a woman buried up to her neck in the ground. Roxy helps the woman out of the sand, only to learn this woman (Kate(rina) Bush(owsky)) was buried there to be executed when the tide rose. 'Kate Bush' gives her three wishes, but the women of the village tell Roxy and her mother that they have to go on a road trip, find Kate and kill her. Yes, it's a surreal film, but those who say there isn't a story either didn't pay attention or they wrote a review based only on other critics' articles because they didn't see the film themselves.)
The fact that the entire asylum system in the EU does not really work is common knowledge. People fleeing war and oppression are very likely to be granted asylum or at least subsidiary protection, but they must still endure the perilous journey to Europe. Only after surviving traffickers, slave traders, and harsh environmental conditions can they hope for protection.
However, "Io capitano" is not about people who "have" to flee but rather "want" to take on the dangerous journey due to the rather bleak prospects for their future. The film follows two Senegalese teenagers, Seydou and Moussa, who dream of a better life in Europe. They soon have to abandon their naivety, as nothing goes as they had imagined during their journey. This whole ordeal is also staged quite effectively by director Matteo Garrone.
Overall, however, I find "Io capitano" somewhat misguided in its hopeful tone. The escape is somewhat turned into an adventure. And at the end, we don't find out what happens to the two boys after their journey. However, the likelihood of them being able to stay in the EU is probably pretty slim. In Germany at least, Senegal is considered a "safe country of origin," which means that the asylum recognition rate is extremely low and, in almost all cases, there is a threat of deportation back home. It would be interesting to know whether the boys would have made the journey with this knowledge.
One could certainly argue that the EU should open up legal possibilities for this kind of migration. In any case, it is indisputable that action must be taken against the criminal trafficking gangs that shamelessly exploit desperate people on the run.
But Garrone doesn't have much to say about this whole matter. The film's contribution to the debate is rather small. The strong performance of young actor Seydou Sarr in the leading role is impressive, and there are some depressing images in the middle of the film, but ultimately, it was all a bit too watered down for me. In real life, the escape does not end just off the Italian coast, as the film would have us believe.
This fascinating, excellent, intellectual, thoughtful piece of art has to be a "must see" and a mandatory viewing for all religious people. All these poor souls who think there's a merciful God who nontheless permits an Holocaust of 6.000.000 innocent souls in WWII's Germany, or a genocide of a million+ in Rwanda, or a massacre of 8.372 in Srebrenica or even an earthquake with 50.000 victims in Turkey. As an atheist, I can only repeat and say again and again my opposition to this Mormons' religion's doctrine, which happens to be all religions' doctrine:
- If they tell you to put your questions on the shelf, never put your questions on the shelf.
This is the only way to honor the memory of this poor mother Brenda Laferty and her poor 15 months old baby, victims of the fundamentalism of some half lunatics bigots fanatics who think God told them to spill blood, in order to save some other people by killing them.
As the Indian detective says "religion is allergic to the facts, because facts lead to truth".
I didn't realize this was a Predator movie the first time I saw the poster and thought this was some random horror movie but the positive buzz certainly didn't pass me by so here we are again. After watching it I'm certainly... shocked?
From the get go this did very little to pull me in, be it the CG animals, one-dimensional plot or the the selfish attitude of our heroine. Now obviously one can argue how much that all matters when the action is good but it didn't really scratch that itch for me either... the Predator fighting with the animals was certainly entertaining but random guys biting the bullet with mostly offcam/unclear CG gore not so much. Would have been nice if they showed some wits when they fought him at the camp but somehow him going invisible is enough reason to lower their weapons and start talking to each other. She saw how the camouflage works multiple times in action already..?!!
What all those scenes, and the movie poster for that matter, certainly established, is that our protagonist has little to worry and that a showdown was coming but I would never have predicted the amounts of bullshit that would contain:
- Somehow becomes a baller and expert in alien technology. Knows when the Predator is coming, takes her magic herbs to immediately lower her blood temperature (but is not shivering and still standing up) and is in the Predators path who obviously doesn't see a standing corpse right in front of it or notices her moving out of the way...
- Never used the gun but knows the right angle to shoot and remove his mask (betting on this being a weakness when this did little to stop it before).
- Gets to conveniently escape for the n-th time and has enough time to finish up some traps (which the Predator even hit on some random tree lol).
- Gets hit to the head twice from the shield that cut through the Predators limbs, spear and even stone but is unscathed.
- Can easily remove a fang attached to it's face to save herself just in time.
- GPS dog that always magically reappears is ready to bring her the tomahawk...
- Manages to sit on top of the Predator and even pull him into the bog with a tiny rope and a much much smaller statue.
- The Predator obviously submerges immediately, but little does it know of her the grand plan to have him placed at that exact LOS of the mask in anticipation that he is gonna fire from his gun (despite not having had his mask for the whole time) while he is already targeted by the laser the entire time... b r a v o. Obviously that one shot was also enough to kill it.
...
Honest to god - how does a movie with such a contrived finale get so much praise, or even leave the script writing phase??
Vastly overrated.
This is basically just a Nancy Drew, Veronica Mars style murder mystery, but placed in a supernatural school.
If you're a 30-40-something year old looking to revisit the Addams Family for some creepy capers and what-not. This isn't for you. This is written for alt-teens who grew up on Disney Channel movies and are now at the point in life where they are trying to rebel. The only thing here for the older crowd is Christina Ricci popping up in a new role.
The show is entirely predictable from the moment the "Hyde" (monster) is introduced. Ask yourself, why are certain character 1 and 2 so prominent in the story? What are they seriously offering?... Oh, it's because they're the bad guy and whoever are the bad guys at the start obviously won't end up being so. There are zero surprises here.
Despite the world it's set in, werewolves, sirens etc., it's entirely unimaginative and lacking in any real depth. Wednesday is just a 15/16 year old kid trying to be a detective and sticking her nose in where she has no business. Everyone keeps telling her to go away and stop and she is just annoying as anything. She also just isn't creepy and at all threatening like Christina Ricci was in the 90s. Jenna Ortega seems to act like she's watched one too many movies of Hollywood depicting an autistic kid and rolled it all into one reclusive bundle. It doesn't help that the script is bad and cheesey to be fair to her but again, she's just a kid devoid of giving a crap... with some one liners thrown in to make her sound like she's threatening or creepy here and there just to remind you she's Wednesday Addams and not Veronica Mars.
I fell asleep three times trying to watch through some of the middle episodes.
Oh... and the CGI on the Hyde monster. HORRIBLE. So cartoon. If you want to be reminded "this is definitely not realistic", that CGI covers it off nicely for you.
"Time travellers. Assemble!"
Before I start rambling on I've gotta say that the final 10-minute montage, the music, the rhythm, the parallels up to a t, was one of the best in the whole show.
After the episode, I've got one question. How the hell are they gonna wrap this up in just two episodes?
Honestly, I can't believe I'm saying this but I'm team Adam. This suffering is too harsh and too confusing for me to keep track. I'd rather everyone dies than keep track of how many Marthas are there.
In total this episode, we've seen 5 Marthas, plus original world Martha. And what probably looks like an Entanglement Martha.
There're two Jonas, one who goes to world B with alt short hair Martha, and another Jonas (adult Jonas/Adam) who stays in the bunker. Like Schrödiger Jonas.
Alt short hair Martha brings Jonas to World B. Then, she goes back to 1888 to meet adult Jonas and give him the cesium he needs to open the portal. Then, she goes back to Adam in the future and gets locked up in a cage only to, moments later, be sat up right under the portal and for Adam to kill her son via Apocalypse in both worlds.
In World B, Jonas (who has no idea of what's going on) goes to see alt long-haired Martha (who has no idea what's going on), she basically tells him to cool it and Jonas meets Eva, who brings him to her secret bunker and tells him that she wants to save both worlds.
Then, this Jonas decides to insist and, since long-haired Martha doesn't believe him, he brings her to the future where they meet adult Martha, who then sets them back to have sex and conceive the child that will be the key to the family tree.
Long-haired Martha and Jonas go to the nuclear plant, where long-haired Martha gets a cut, similar to the one adult Martha has, which triggers Jonas' alarms and discovers everyone is lying to him. So, he decides to go back and demand answers from Eva. When they get to Eva's secret bunker, another Martha (big scar Martha) emerges from the shadows and kills Jonas, thus living long-haired Martha sobbing and confused. Big scar Martha ends up writing a letter to Jonas that is delivered by adult Martha in 1888.
After that, long-haired Martha goes back home and cuts her hair, thus becoming short-haired Martha, she goes with Bartosz to the nuclear plant but are intercepted by adult Magnus and Franziska, who give short-haired Martha the apple device to go to our worlds and save Jonas so that he could go to alt world and long-haired Martha can learn it all.
The thing that strikes me is that Adam wants to destroy the origin of the entanglement (that's alt Martha and early-expired Jonas), but he's the one who creates it in the first place by sending Magnus and Franziska to give alt Martha the apple device, right? That makes no sense to me because, if alt Martha doesn't save Jonas, they don't conceive a child, so no one would exist. But (and that's a big but) "der Anfang ist das Ende, und das Ende ist der Anfang", which literally means that Adam has to make sure that everyone exists and that the origin (Martha and Jonas' son) is born so that he can break the cycle. Also, if big scar Martha is pregnant, that means there's another Martha. Like Entanglement Martha. So, in some point in the past, short hair Martha had to made a decision (similar to Schrödinger Jonas) and thus, create two pregnant Marthas.
This episode was, by far, the most confusing one, not because of not being able to follow or understand what's going on, but because there're way too many Marthas and that's confusing the shit ourñt of me. Of course, as soon as I see more episodes, I'll probably realize I'm completely wrong in everything I've said.
I have to admit, I got tired of the Carmella-Furio storyline. They make goo goo eyes at each other, mope, and nothing really happens. This is the would-be culmination of that storyline, with Furio coming the closest he ever would to taking out a soused Tony. And then leaving forever. But as usual Edie Falco makes it great, with her funk and sickness afterwards. Her two meals with Meadow were amazing scenes of with blistering text and heartbreaking subtext.
I was very surprised to learn that the contemporaneous fans of the show didn't like Carmela. I understand that she's an obstacle to Tony and that audiences rarely like to see their protagonists thwarted, no matter how bad that protagonist may be, but I've always enjoyed her arc of trying to resolve who she is and where her lifestyle comes from with the fact that she's removed from it and powerless in a way Tony isn't. Her only option is, as the psychiatrist Melfi recommended notes, just leaving and taking the kids with her. Tony, on the other hand, could maybe never join witness protection, but he at least makes more deliberate choices in who he is and what his business entails (though prior episodes like "College" suggest that he was more or less led by the nose into the mob from family and community expectations. I'm not saying that either character's arcs in this vein are better than the other's, but they're different, and I always appreciated the exploration of Carmela's position as much as I did Tony's.
If anything, my only beef was that they tended to hit the same notes repeatedly with Carmela, without really letting the story progress and change. But here, we start to finally see things boiling over for her. Her scenes with Meadow, where she so clearly resents her daughter for being the type of person on the cusp of the kind of life that Carmela always wanted for herself is striking. The effect that Furio's leaving has on Carmella, where she's clearly devastated but in a way she can't vocalize to anyone but Rosalie, and so her heartbreak comes out in other ways, is remarkable writing, that still wouldn't work without the supreme talent of Edie Falco.
On a very different note, Paulie is hilarious and awful at the same time. His mannerisms never cease to make me chuckle, but he does such ridiculous, awful stuff. The way he realizes that Johnny Sac has been buttering him up this whole time and changes his tune so quickly in response is great stuff. And all the business with the old ladies is quality as well. Paulie is always horrible, and the show tries to have the audience see that fact, but damnit, it's all so Paulie.
I also loved the scene with Carmine Jr., and how he started trying to mend things with his Dad and how quickly he turned on Tony after he heard his father compliment Tony by saying he wishes he had a son like that. John Sac's eyes told the story.
People discovering they have psychic powers, experimenting with it, growing stronger, then falling out and confronting each other. Known story, except this time it's with very young children.
It's actually funny because every little plot issue made to keep the story go on that would normally be very easily spotted and annoying (like "why the hell is this character acting like that, that's so stupid, of course there will be consequences") is washed away by "of course they're children". For instance, Aisha's death was easily preventable, but they just weren't allowed to go out. Though why didn't she take precautions against her mother ? Ida did.
The whole story takes place out of sight of adults, they're just accessories. So much that you're kinda wondering what they're doing. Children are out all the time, unsupervised, even if one is autistic, left to the supervision of her 9yo sister, even when a teenager got killed. No one seems to be noticing Ben's mother absence either. It's an interesting take on the theme, the way the children experiment with their power is totally different from what adults would do, simpler, funnier, in the beginning, and rapidly more cruel too. Even the simple fact that they just simply accept the existence of these powers.
Not a fan of "the innocents" concept. These children are not innocents, it usually implies they wouldn't know the difference between good and evil, but they clearly do, they know what they're doing is bad. Even less a fan of the cliche of the psychopath child killing a cat.
Here it's still important, it's Ida's turning point but still would have rather not see it. Before that she's pretty bad herself, specially with her sister. I mean the broken glass in the shoe ? When she knows that Anna won't say anything and keep hurting herself for a long time, that was pretty hardcore. She was also ok with throwing the cat from the 10th floor, and just drew the limit at crushing his skull afterwards...
I like that we have no idea where these powers came from, and even if the last fight show us that lots of children are at least able to feel what's happening, it's not even a subject, clearly still a secret from adults, and they never interacted with others.
Anyway, even if it's pretty expected the story works, and the tension is still there, the children are actually quite good, specially Anna, and they have a lot of evolution during the story.
Ben is a solid antagonist. It's shown early that he's a psychopath but the getting worse part is well done and you rapidly have no issue accepting that this child must be killed.
Everyone in Spain (and many Latin American countries) knows who Cristina "La Veneno" (Poison) was, to a greater or lesser extent. Many will remember her for her famous intervention in the long-gone "DEC" hosted by Jaime Cantizano on Antena 3 and the iconic phone prank she was played there, in which a woman posing as her neighbor insulted her to piss her off. I certainly recall the times in which she faced Nova, another trans woman who criticized Cristina for not standing up for Trans rights. Others may remember her for her appearances on "Esta Noche Cruzamos el Mississippi" (Tonight we cross the Mississippi), Pepe Navarro's well-known program thanks to which she came out of her anonymity.
From her first appearance on television until her death in 2016 under strange circumstances, many things have been said and published about the life of Cristina Ortiz, but the truth is that they have never been told with such sensitivity and respect for her figure. Cristina worked as a streetwalker, one of the few outlets that hundreds of trans women in Spain were forced to go to in order to make a living.
Inspired by the book of her memoirs: "¡Digo! Ni puta ni Santa: Memorias de la Veneno" (I Say! Neither a whore nor a saint. The memoirs of La Veneno), "Veneno" is much more than an autobiographical show about the life of Spain's most famous trans woman. The mini-series, of 8 one-hour episodes, paints a faithful portrait of the skeevy, homophobic, and ultra catholic Spain of the late Francoism that mistreated and humiliated anyone who did not meet or fit certain standards. The series is a work of great maturity that mixes comedy, tragedy, and kindness in just the right doses to create a cocktail that, as a whole, is balanced and satisfactory.
One of the highlights of "Veneno" is in the successful cast of actresses who give life to Cristina throughout her life (from younger to older; Jedet, Daniela Santiago and Isabel Torres), as well as Paca la Piraña (played by herself), a mythical friend of Cristina's, who provides the comic relief of the series. Special mention should be made of the young Guille Márquez and Marcos Sotkovski who bring to life the Cristina of childhood when she was still known as Joselito; and of course Lola Rodríguez and Mariona Terés, two actors who grow up and shine even more with the course of each episode.
This new series by "The Two Javis" (Javier Ambrossi and Javier Calvo) is certainly the most original and groundbreaking work they have done to date, both in terms of script and production. The fact that a series like "Veneno" has managed to see the light (and even reach the big screen) is a milestone in the Spanish audiovisual scene. Because although it is true that we see more and more gays or lesbians or bisexuals in series and films, we finally find a series that features transgendered people as the main event. Equally or more important is the openness with which the series shows and raises awareness about this reality that is so important and so mistreated: transgender issues.
"Veneno" is an unprecedented revolution in the Spanish audiovisual industry. It gives us sex, violence, and insecurities without any concealment, with all the rawness with which it is sometimes associated, without leaving room for imagination. Probably, this series has also achieved more than any public awareness campaign promoted by many NGOs.
But the important thing is that "Veneno" exists and is necessary. You should see it, regardless of whether you like the character of La Veneno or not. Cristina Ortiz is just one more example of how much trans people suffer throughout their lives, of how difficult it is for them, physically and emotionally, and of the challenges they face every day. And so I would like to end by congratulating Javier Ambrossi and Javier Calvo for making this series that brings to light a reality that, unfortunately, many still see as taboo.
If you enjoyed the TV show... DO NOT WATCH THIS.
It's crap.
There are shows and movies that you have to detach reality when watching them.. Spiderman, Batman etc. But you shouldn't have to detach reality for an entire 2-hour cop show set in London!!
There are so many bad scenes in this, there's no way a serious actor would have agreed to be in it unless it was solely for the $$$$$$$$$ offered if they had read the script prior to signing on.
I could list the bad stuff but it would take longer than watching the movie all over again. Here's one that won't ruin the plot....
Driving in the middle of nowhere - literally, there is nothing there. She folds the paper map and says "We're 3 miles out." They have to abandon the car minutes later (this scene is so impossibly stupid you have to see it to believe it). They get out and she says "We're 1 1/2 miles out." They walk for a bit, come over a crest and see their destination - about 2 miles away.
I won't even go into the absolute moronic things that happen from that point on.
Based on the final scene I think think this is going to turn into a James Bond type franchise going forward... and that's why this movie was made. I won't be watching it.
2/10
I think the very best films are those that are able to speak to us, without being showy, of the rhythms and undercurrents that underpin our own lives. Sweeping emotional climaxes have never appealed to me as much as slow-burning, subtle explorations of our relationships with ourselves and others. Joanna Hogg's The Souvenir contains no grand climax, no catharsis, no resolutions. Instead it flows, shifting direction, twisting ever so slightly, looping back on itself and moving on anew. From reading the reactions to it, some have objected to its lack of obvious plot or its intensely personal nature, but these are the qualities I found myself relishing.
It's beautifully shot, full of muted tones and the grain of 16mm, and the use of space and light are remarkable—the feeling of a cramped student flat is captured perfectly. We move constantly back and forward between the living room, the bedroom, the stairwell. When Julie and Anthony are out for dinner they're shot from a low position, just a table in amongst the others. Close-ups are rare and all the more impactful for when they do appear.
What resonated deeply with me is the sense of being in a relationship that clearly isn't healthy but has enough charm, enough life, in it that it seems as if there really is no alternative. I have had relationships like that, where my partner would be equally controlling and encouraging. I was young and impressionable and even after it became clear to everyone else that there was only one way things could end I clung to it. I understand Julie: I understand why she stays with Anthony and goes back to him and indulges him; I understand it when she apologises to him for his bad behaviour; I understand it when she begins to borrow money from her parents to fund his lifestyle, remaining wilfully ignorant of its realities. There are seldom great, dramatic ruptures in real-life relationships and so it is here.
The performances from all of the actors involved are astonishingly good. Hogg spoke about casting Swinton Byrne because she seemed uncomfortable in front of the camera, like an artist and not an actor. This has proved to work very well as Julie seems, genuinely, like a young woman who hasn't figured out who she is personally or artistically. Tom Burke's arrogant, golden-tongued Anthony has a sort of feline character to him, sly and charming and managing to convey much with just his eyes. He worms his way into Julie's life, setting boundaries and then breaking them, pushing her far beyond what any partner should have to do. He encourages her, cajoles her, bullies her and it fills the heart with despair to see the relationship go where he directs it. Richard Ayoade has a memorable cameo and Tilda Swinton is typically magnificent as Julie's mother—a highly-strung parent who gets 'shopping headaches' and makes Julie and Anthony sleep in separate rooms.
Hogg also spoke of her lack of desire to make a film about class and yet class is everywhere in The Souvenir. It's in the sets, the clothes, the accents. It's in Julie's desire to make films about dockworkers in Sunderland, shown disdain by working-class and bourgeois characters alike. It's in the family dynamics, the parties, the cheques that pay for the dinners. It hangs obliquely over everything, and while Julie is often quick to acknowledge her own privilege it is clear that she occupies a rarefied existence.
The film's close comes almost delicately, and without the sweep that might be expected from a lesser, more obvious picture. It made me feel a quiet, deep sense of loss that I'm still thinking about days later. I will come back to it, revisit it, think about it. That is what I want from cinema.
While the single take execution on display here is certainly deserving of praise, I can't help but think of it as the cherry on top of an already great film. The writing and performances are brilliant. The efficiency of character development is absolutely masterful, as the film somehow manages to juggle a large ensemble cast in 90 minutes. Some of these characters don't get more than a few minutes of focus and a few lines of dialogue, but that's all this film needs to make them feel real. This is all anchored and elevated by the powerhouse central performance of Stephen Graham. I am so impressed with the writing and execution of this character. It would have been easy to turn him into a very non-sympathetic caricature of the angry chef, but that's not what we get here. Yes, we get some profanity laced outbursts, but we also get heartfelt apologies and acknowledgements of his own responsibility. This is a man whose life is spiraling out of control and he knows exactly who is to blame: himself. This makes his interactions with his staff all the more tragic. Every time they are caught in the fallout of his mistakes he hates himself all the more. It's an effective portrait of someone who is desperately trying to be a good person, but addiction and self-sabotage are making that an impossible task.
My only critiques would perhaps be that the ending felt a little rushed and that the Alastair Sky storyline didn't feel quite as natural as everything else.
An update that fundamentally lacks the essential element that allowed the original to exist at all.
What's missing? (Spoiler: It's intelligence)
It's a dumb action show with philosophical pretentions, that sometimes manages compelling scenes, with extremely expensive visuals that show off truly excellent CGI (because it doesn't 'look like' CGI), and has some great cinematography and production design (but also some pretty weak/generic/nonsensical production design, mainly in the abysmally stupid Hardin/Terminus bits.)
What about the actual source material?
Asimov grew considerably as a writer throughout his career, addressing his weaknesses of having rather dry dialogue and matter-of-fact storytelling, and, more specifically, kind of flat characters, and weak female characters. Foundation itself saw a considerable upgrade in its depth and focus on women and girls as main characters, as it went on, but it is still dry by comparison to his later works such as Nemesis, which is still one of my favorite books (the main characters of Nemesis are a plain, probably autistic teenage girl and her mother. So, yes, there are a number of different ways a Foundation adaptation could have gone, stylistically. Although, there's really only one option nowadays with the current trend of dark, overly self-serious, and frankly suffocating mid-brow pretension in "serious" "science fiction", the formula could have definitely benefitted from a transfusion of dramatic lifeblood.
The problem is that they forgot (actually, never understood) the core ethics and dynamics of the story, and the story told therein ends up as a confused mess of incoherent melodrama that completely and utterly slanders and wastes its core concepts. They also frontload and spoil two of the biggest reveals of the book series within the first few episodes, for absolutely no narrative reason, and absolutely zero payoff. They also utterly assassinate every single aspect of arguably the most important character to the centuries-spanning plot as a whole. So do yourself a favor and read the books before getting more than five episodes or so in.
Yeah, Lee Pace is a dead sexy beast as a charasmatically domineering and ever-young Cleon. Lou Lloubell is also a great actress and Gaal and Hari compelling characters until they make her and Hari into idiotic telenovela characters because modern Hollywood (non)writers don't understand how to write stories about the conflict of empirical and religious values without making it into incoherent emotional nonsense, likely due to working out their own personal issues without actually having read or understood, or likely even been exposed to decades-old knowledge and exegesis on the subject.
And it was predictable. Friedman showed he had a surface-level attention to and understating of SF concepts with his Sarah Connor series. I liked that at the time, but even as a twenty-something I could tell he didn't understand basic computer science, and didn't bother to consult with anyone to write it properly. One look at Goyer's filmography and it's clear that he doesn't do anything but dark, pulpy action fantasy. We got children without sea legs and hacks sailing this boat.
[7.8/10] Great follow-up to the season premiere, which sets the course of the season off right.
I love the fact that they pay off the “stealing a truck full of chips” bit from the very first episode of the series. The driver getting to keep his job, and not putting Bear in jail because there’s too many young people there already, is such an uplifting place to take this loose thread in the series. But it comes at a cost -- the driver cautioning, practically commanding, Bear to take this as a second chance and build things rather than tear them down. There’s something wholesome, even inspiring about that idea, particularly how an otherwise despondent Bear takes his good fortune and better advice to heart.
I also laughed my ass off at Brownie and Bucky using their prayer to the creator to lift the curse on the kids as a means to settle their decades-old beef over a girl in comically grandiose fashion. Willie Jack wondering what the hell just happened and Cheese explaining that older folks’ business is complicated was quite laugh-worthy. And the fact that they resort to singing Tom Petty’s “Free Fallin’” to seal the deal, replete with the spirit guide singing along in his way, was brilliant and side-splitting.
The other glimpses we get of Elora and Jackie’s star-crossed road trip are good too. Them getting away from the shotgun-wielding bumpkins is a bit of a cheat. But their scenes with Megan Mullaly as a newly-liberated divorcee have that awkward observational humor that the show does really well.
It compliments the heavy stuff in the episode. Elora is still mourning Daniel in all the running away, and feels guilt over not taking Bear with her, leading to her tears. You feel for the poor girl, who had her reasons for leaving the Rez Dogs behind, but is also still tied to that place and these people. Likewise, Jackie comes this close to bailing on her own, but eventually takes Elora with her as they steal their benefactor’s truck, an act that is both contemptible and a little sweet. We see a glimpse of Jackie’s home life before the reservation, and her own devotion to building things back up as they tow Elora’s grandmother’s car back home.
I’m glad that the show devoted two episodes to the California trip that had so consumed the kids’ dreams last season, but also that they spend the time justifying why Elora and Jackie would come back -- personally and spiritually.
Overall, a promising start to the new season which brings laughs, pathos, and heart in equal measure.
That was a heavy ride! I would encourage everyone to watch this limited series. It's one of the best I've seen in recent years. On every level! Cinematography, performances and especially the sound design which I wasn't expecting due to the shows topic! Masterfully crafted, intense, heavy, necessary!
I'm german, so I'm looking into this story from the outside. (even though germans obviously had similar problems in this era and especially later)
But I think with this series, I have gotten the best impression of black peoples' lives in this era and how their story continues throughout today.
I have not read the book, but the concept of an underground railroad is genius. Connecting different states and by that also different types of racism. In the show it is made clear, that this railroad didn't exist in reality. Under ground it almost feels like a dream, which it unfortunately was. But I also felt that this show was giving the black community so much dignity by implementing this into the story. To me it felt a lot like they were building a foundation of this country down there, which was just powerful to see.
I always thought about America as a whole. The "United States" of America. Turns out: Life in the different states that are even right next to each other, was quite different (duh). The main thing that these states (that were shown) "united", was basically some form of racism.
That's obviously not all, but that's what this show focuses on. And that is heartbreaking and horrible to see.
Yes, this show is more of a slow burn, but the emotions I've gotten from this type of pacing were truly worth it. It is not an easy watch, but I strongly believe, that not everything should be an easy watch. And this shouldn't be one either.
Go watch it!
Oh and I wrote this right after finishing the show. So I'm still thinking about it. These are just my first impressions I could turn into words. :smile:
Full of gorgeous cinematography and some tear-inducing acting by its cast, especially a surprising breakout performance by Alice Halsey, Lessons in Chemistry is a better-than-serviceable but too-trite-to-be-great miniseries that is, despite its faults, absolutely worth your valuable time.
Brie Larson is magnetic as Elizabeth Zott, a brilliant wishcast of a woman whose talent and ambition are stifled by all of the sexism and ignorance of 1950s America. As insidious as all of the offenses against her are, and as affecting as her performance navigating them is, at times the scenes feel like a checklist of problems that women trying to break through into male-dominated workplaces in a male-centric society face. Ironically, it's during her scenes with other women when the real malevolence of gender discrimination comes through and when she loses many of her battles.
But what starts out as the premise of the show is quickly overshadowed by the love story between Larson's Zott and Lewis Pullman's Calvin Evans. They have a wonderful, um, chemistry, and the twist that sends the show down a totally different pathway is gut-wrenching, to say the least.
The appearance of Madeline gives the show another boost, and Alice Halsey simply mesmerizes in the role. Her brilliance and precociousness suck up every scene that she's in to the point where the parts that she wasn't in felt unnecessary. Who cares what happens to Elizabeth's show? I want to see what Mad is up to!
And that's the irony of this show: The parts that are good are startingly good; they make the parts that feel too contrived or too convenient, or too formulaic stand out all the more. There's a great show buried within the series, but it's surrounded by to much fluff to ever break out and truly shine.
“I've heard that there's a kind of bird without legs that can only fly and fly, and sleep in the wind when it is tired. The bird only lands once in its life... that's when it dies.”
Each person will come out of this film with a different interpretation for this quote, for me the bird symbolises those who are too terrified of feeling anything real, and so spend their whole lives distracting themselves with anything that will disconnect them from the ground, because they know if they ever come back down, the pain will be too great to bare.
In the first two acts of the film, we see the protagonist attempt to drown the grief that comes from not knowing who his parents are with flings with women (that he never allows to become anything real), sex and occasional violence. It’s only when his adoptive mother finally tells him where his birth mother is that he finally allows himself to face that hurt, which ultimately gets him killed. Like his adoptive mother said, all his life he used not knowing his parents as an excuse for “years of running wild” (like the bird that always flies), but the minute he’d know their identity he would no longer have an excuse for his behaviour and, much like the bird, would be forced to finally ground himself, face his complicated feelings and grow up.
Wong’s ability to explore such complicated human emotions through the story of a man and that specific metaphor is wonderful.
No one does atmosphere, nostalgia and longing quite like the Chinese filmmaker and Days of Being Wild is no exception. The beautiful, intriguing and often suffocating mise-en-scène, the delicious score, and the tantalising use of colour and light make this film yet another dreamy escape for hopeless romantics who just want to understand the pain in their hearts a little better, or rather sit with it for an hour and a half.
The ending feels out of place, but the fact that it eventually functioned as a link into his later film In The Mood For Love, makes the unofficial Love Trilogy all the more fun to experience.
sigh It was ok. It started off very well, then a few episodes of dragging, but in the last two episodes, the plot became cheesy and forced. Every cop suspense show needs characters to make stupid mistakes they wouldn't make in real life, but by the end of this series, the writers were depending too much on stupid errors to keep the plot moving along. Yes, the ending was satisfying, but it didn't match the clever opening setup of this miniseries. It turns out that episodes 1-2 were by one writer, and 3-6 were by another; they should have stuck with the first writer. I'm sure that a script doctor could use the right language to describe what was wrong about this series; I don't have the ability; but there certainly was potential which fell apart.
I like spy thrillers, and good ones receive an 8 from me. My 6 here is due to over-reliance on character stupidity, terribly ragged pacing and writing, and inclusion of a romance which Eva Green did not present in a believable fashion.
One thing I loved about this show was the mercenary Delage, well-acted by Vincent Cassel. Thanks to his experience working for all the countries involved in this plot over his career, and his loyalty to each when they were paying him, we could never make assumptions about which side he would prefer in a given moment. The viewer expects betrayal by one or two peripheral characters in a series of this type, but when the central character is of uncertain fidelity, the suspense level increases tremendously (in a good way)!
The watershed moment of the Italian Republic, its fundamental importance for what it produced in the following years highlighted in the incipit, which is the alternative ending of the true story. A film that does not save anything, neither terrorists nor institutions, much less their ideals. The protagonists of those weeks on both sides are all equally condemned, yet for them it is impossible not to feel pity, their more human side being dramatically exposed.
After the devaluation of the institutions from the point of view of its exponents, Cossiga / Alesi and Paolo VI / Servillo reduced to little men in the 1st part... there it is the identity crisis of the others men in the 2nd, Faranda / Marra and Nora Moro / Buy both executioners in spite of themselves, both who struggle to recognize themselves in a photo-sign and on television. Both witnessing the collapse of the foundations of their social life, the surreal vanity of the armed revolution and the facade hypocrisy of Catholic marriage. Collapse to which they react by shedding a single tear, only when faced with the responsibility for their actions, which they will try to remedy until the very end.
Everything closes by returning to the first point of view with Aldo Moro / Gifuni, however radically another person compared to the one in the 1st part: not the "crazy kidnapper" touted by "ex-friends" but rather lucid as never before, ready to confess the guilty indulgence of the already deceased 'free-Aldo' towards the aforementioned, Andreotti in particular being targeted by a ruthless final invective which bitter mouth considering what the post-Moro Italy's First Republic was and what it could have been without this watershed.
6 episodes to watch at all cost. Despite the television weakening compared to the big screen, the value of many scenes will still shine through their very strong visual and narrative symbolism, Cossiga's 'cyclothymic photography', Paul VI's martyrizing obsession, Faranda's maternal remorse, Noretta's dreamlike affection for a ghost that is finally palpable after 30 years of marriage. And the acting... in particular for Gifuni and Buy, I had no doubts even for a second that they were the real Moro spouses. Extraordinary interpretations compared to a cast that is already beyond the ordinary.
That 'Dear Friend' stuff was a spit in the face. I'd have rathered they just never included it.
10 minutes into the first episode, and the thing that strikes me most is just how off the tone of this show is compared to the source material. It has been a while since I saw season 2, but it feels like the tone is veering further and further into the YA sort of genre with every season. Even the action feels off to me. All the weird slow-motion effects and style to it... it just doesn't feel like I think The Witcher should feel. It seems entertaining enough, I guess, but it's just so frustrating and depressing to think how good this stuff could have been if they just kept the vision of the books rather than putting so many distant filters over it.
I'm also really struggling with Yen at the moment. I knew Anya was kind of too young already and not an imposing enough presence in previous seasons. But this is even more apparent as she's spending time with Ciri and trying to teach her magic. She simply isn't Geralt's equivalent in any way in this show. Henry has such gravitas and presence on screen, but Anya is just kinda... there. She looks like Ciri's sister, and it's not at all believable that she could ever be a mother figure to her. She's supposed to be a big presence - someone who Ciri looks up to and respects, not some young girl who is basically on her level. This isn't a knock against Anya (I think she's a great actress), it's just maybe a bit of a miscast. It probably wouldn't be bad if Ciri was younger and more accurate to how old she should look at this point. But as of now, Ciri looks the same age, if not older than she should at the end of the final Witcher book. Quite concerning considering how early on in the story we are.
Dijkstra and Philippa are kinda weird, and I definitely wouldn't say they were true to the source. But I don't actually mind them. I'll reserve judgement until I see more of them.
The scene in the maze missed the mark entirely for me. I'm really not enjoying any of the action thus far. I feel like the action peaked in the very first episode of season 1, and it has been all downhill ever since.
Although the music in the show has always been mostly pretty good, I think they use way too much of it. Every scene, every piece of action, everything just seems to be undercut with sudden dramatic music.
The Jaskier/Radovid stuff is truly abhorrent. Feels so wrong and out of place. It makes no sense.
Almost everything that comes out of anyone other than Geralt's mouth just sounds so generic, bland, and badly written. Ciri's speech at Sheaerrawedd felt so out of place, and the fight right after wasn't good. All the Rience stuff just makes me cringe. None of it even makes any sense. It's like they keep trying to have these big dramatic moments, but they just don't work because they haven't been earned. We're just jumping from big moment to big moment with subpar and rushed setups in between them. This would be less of an issue if they had actually just stuck to the books last season rather than having 95% of it be literal fanfiction. Instead, they've spent this entire first episode condensing all the big moments from Blood of Elves into 60 minutes. They literally had 8 episodes last season to fit this stuff in, but instead, the showrunner kept giving interviews about how "Blood of Elves doesn't have much content to adapt." Yeah, okay. If that's the case, why are you rushing and struggling to do it well or coherently in a single episode at the start of the next season? It's so frustrating.
Overall, this episode wasn't good. As an adaption of the source material? It'd be lucky to get a 2 or 3 out of 10. As a standalone episode of TV that is unrelated to The Witcher IP? A 5/10 is probably more than generous.
I rarely give anything a 10/10, but how can I not when it comes to Peter Jackson’s «Get Back»?
Casual viewers are not the target audience here. This is, however, absolutely perfect for anyone who wants to be a fly on the wall while The Beatles are writing songs, rehearsing, discussing, kidding around, rewriting songs, smoking, arranging songs, reading newspapers, tuning instruments, looking back and planning ahead. Oh yeah, and they also perform a spectacular 42-minute gig on a London rooftop at the end.
I’ve been waiting for something like this since 1993 (when the first rumours about a remastered «Let It Be» movie surfaced) and I went in watching «Get Back» with sky-high – really absurd – expectations. «Get Back» not only fulfilled my expectations, but surpassed them. Jackson and his team have done a spectacular job! The series even has a happy ending!
Any bad parts, you ask? Well, the intro in the first episode has a few factual errors, f.ex. that John and Paul first met in 1956 (it was 1957) and that Ringo joined The Beatles before Brian Epstein became their manager (he didn't). It doesn't affect my 10/10, though, because... well, because the rest was so fantastic.
This is The Beatles as we have never seen them before. A splendid time is guaranteed for… some.
MY THOUGHTS ON SEASON 10:
-WARNING: Spoilers Below-
Well this was long... Very long. As a whole the Season was decent, wasn't anything special but it wasn't awful. It had some really good moments and some really boring moments, unfortunately to me they all ended up being a tad bit unmemorable. You can tell they've started trying to make the show a lot more horror again and its definitely a good thing, in fact it's one of the saving graces for season 10.
With Daryl now the central character and having a lot more screen time I've come to realise he's not too good as the main character. Whenever he's given long talks or people look at him as the leader it seems way, way too forced. He comes across as cringe and uncomfortable. If anything they should have given the main character role to Jeffrey Dean Morgan's Negan, I feel like that would have been a lot better for conversation and storytelling.
If I'm honest I can't remember much of Season 10 due to the ridiculous gaps, this season just felt like a massive blur and the only emotion that sparks when I think back on it is boredom. The season pretty much ended on episode 15, the unnecessary wait for the finale (due to covid - weird how no other show struggled with the things TWD struggled with huh?) caused a lot of hype for me to die down. I remember finding out it was delayed and then just completely forgetting about the show.
With this season I'd say the best moments are when Alpha dies and finally when Beta dies... Conveniently two moments where Negan is involved. Jeffrey Dean Morgan absolutely carries this show and without him it'd be an even bigger disaster. The scene where he killed Alpha was executed to perfection, I had slowly started to actually like Alpha and seeing her have her head chopped off was crazy. I loved Negan's smug little face afterwards. With the finale fight scene with Negan & Daryl vs Beta I was incredibly disappointed with how short it was BUT seeing as there wasn't much else to compare it too in this season it ended up standing out.
Overall this season was OK. In my eyes its a highly forgettable season and when you look back on The Walking Dead this won't be a season that will be a big conversation topic. Honestly it's a shame its gone downhill like this because I really do love The Walking Dead but this season was yet another snoozefest and I kept finding myself not wanting to watch certain episodes or losing my focus half way through.
This Season proves that The Walking Dead is in fact a Zombie of its former self and thankfully the end is near with Season 11 being its final. Part of me can really understand why certain actors have left. Its a shame that this season was an improvement compared to others.
