jtprius510 Reviews

A Dangerous Method (2011)

A Permanent Step Away From His Old Methods

[22 December 2011]

The whole idea of Freud, psychoanalysis, dream and hypno-therapy seems and feels a lot more like a playground that Director David Croenenberg fortifies for his cast of A Dangerous Method but never allows them or himself as a director to play on or explore.

With that said Viggo Mortenson is hired, more or less to pose as a stand in model for Sigmund Freud.

A Dangerous Method isn't as much about Sigmund Freud as it is about two psychologists, Sabina Spielrein (Keira Knightley) and Carl Jung (Michael Fassbender) trying to disprove his theory as they end up partaking in it, in the same process. Therefore, you can't step into a theater without any background on the first stages of psychoanalysis because this is about why most modern psychologists of today hate Freud. And with that said it is interesting.

Only For a movie about some of the first psychologists, dealing with one on one dream and hypno-therapy sessions at very close hand, Croenenberg doesn't give as many dream sequences as we hear about them through several of Carl Jung's reiterations.

Aesthetically Croenenberg takes numerous liberties with Michael Fassbender and Kiera Knightley's exploration of Freud's dangerous methods. The closest we come to anything dream like or something we can see as a trace of some of Croenenberg's old-fashioned occultist methods - that cemented his name into cult-cinema forever in the first place - are a number of masochistic sex scenes between Knightley and Fassbender that include him either whipping her or standing over her after he just finished whipping her, looking indifferent, detached or ashamed of either one out of these dangerous methods. There is also another take that includes Vincent Cassell as Freud's son, giving it to a maid in some yard next door to the mental hospital he is currently occupying, only that scene seemed more like Croenenberg's attempt at trying to communicate to some of his first audiences how well he still knows and loves to shoot sex scenes such as these.

Aside from that, A Dangerous Method, is heavily narrated by time lapses and letters going back and forth between Freud and Jung. The time lapses make developing any sort of attachment to the story or characters difficult and once I gained a recognition of the story-telling pattern being wrought by the letters sent back and forth between Freud and Jung, I wanted a narrative voice to come out and say during the last exchange of written words, 'and so that's why they stopped being friends.' Altogether I think Croenenberg's latest A Dangerous Method is even further proof of Croenenberg's permanent step away from his old methodical usage of the stop-motion sci-fi effect and gimmick.

The Last Ride (2011)

Western Revisionist

[15 December 2011]

Harry Thomason's The Last Ride made me very self and health conscious.

My mind wondered throughout most of its' transitions about my own health, as the driver Silas - played by Henry Thomas - throughout most of the ride there, gradually became less and less of a chronic cigarette smoker as a result of seeing his mysterious passenger in the backseat slowly coughing and struggling to death more and more for fresh air, a pack of smokes, or newer bottles of alcohol.

By the time they get to the last gas station, before The Last Ride's ultimate climax, I think Silas, unnoticeably quits smoking, before a girl at the pump tells him he is this gas stations last customer. The owner of it died last year of a black lung so this is the gas stations last night of being open for business.

The Last Ride starring – that's right – Jesse James as Hank Williams is about Hank Williams' last ride out, to a show somewhere in West Virginia. Two things I considered high brow about The Last Ride are as follows. One thing was The Last Ride, wasn't nearly as autobiographical as you could imagine any movie about a legendary country singer like, say Ray Charles, or Johnny Cash being, as much as it was more so about his last ride, in a literal sense, out to some gig he had in a random place and the relationship he developed with the young man, Silas, employed to get him out there safely.

Williams was an alcoholic and chronic cigarette smoker too so it was the drivers' responsibility to get out there sober, while Silas is already worried about getting him out there alive. Another thing was how obvious Thomason didn't make the identity of Williams as a legendary country singer. I had to get out my laptop for research on the last ride to figure out who the mysterious passenger was because I don't think they ever tell you throughout this picture.

Altogether I would say the last ride is about Hank William's posthumous fame.

Silas doesn't listen to the radio so all he knows about his mysterious passenger the whole way there is that he is an alcoholic musician that carries a gun and won't stop being incredibly mean to him, while scolding him all of the time for calling him sir. But the funnier thing about that is Williams won't give Silas any other name to refer to him as.

I think Silas learns of his passenger's traveling name by accident through a long distance phone call he has with an employer who is supposedly his employer, played by some guy whose been a senator for Tennessee for a couple of years and he didn't even mean to give Silas that information. Silas wasn't even supposed to have this guy's number because he is not in fact who originally hired this driver. It's just a weird movie, whose overall story structure run on a lot of obscure Lynchian fuel that you may have seen in either Lost Highway or Refn' latest nominated Drive, starring Ryan Gosling.

The aesthetic liberties taken with the mechanics of The Last Ride's story structure is what I think makes up for all that it lacks in cinematography. You can tell they had a budget during the filming of The Last Ride. Altogether in retrospect I see The Last Ride as a hood classic whose mystery comes from what the film doesn't tell you throughout its' duration, about what is actually taking place.

Audiences shouldn't go into the last ride knowing who that mysterious musician alcoholic passenger is. Aside from all of the mystery, movies like that about people with fighting chances that they can't stop blowing are usually touching to general audiences because the premise of them is normally in regards to their last chance and the main character of every movie like that never knows how close he is to that last breath, much like each and every one of us.

The conservative nature of The Last Ride's scheme is what I think keeps it from venturing too far into anything sentimental or philosophical so its' a lot more chill and a lot less bias than most autobiographical films usually are.

Shame (2011)

A Dramatically Ironic Look At Today's Culture

[4 December 2011]

Steve McQueen's Shame is a brave, and originally cultured look into masculinity and humanity at its' worse.

Living in New York City, a place where 'cynicism is turning into all,' Michael Fassbender plays Brandon, a full-time employee and sex addict, whose living is for the most part comfortable, and almost entirely led by leisure, until his sister, Cissy, played by Carey Mulligan, comes to pay him an unexpected visit.

On a surface level McQueen takes us to the streets of New York City, while in the same vain exploiting its' landscape for all of its cool grey and blue undertones, which is basically what makes for an illuminating look at this concrete jungle. Even from the highest floor of whatever room Brandon is occupying, all of the cities' industrial beauty that McQueen is capturing through his eyes is something Brandon sees as simple everyday stuff. Brandon would rather be searching for cheap thrills on his laptop.

The first way I think most people would expect a story line dealing with an addiction to sex is down a road of some sort of intervention imposed on Brandon's character by all of his external influences; family, co-workers, actual love interests, but McQueen kept everything, from the time these characters are living in, to the environment in mind, and with that said everyone Brandon knows is just as jaded as he is.

While Brandon plays an accessory to most of his bosses' affairs, he also does his best to ignore how much his sister suffers a longing for people that just do not love her. Brandon doesn't wear his problems as openly as everyone else and all of these elements within his relationships is what stockpiles this story with a very cerebral sense of dramatic irony.

Another thing that deserves a second look is the heavily criticized and jaded sibling relationship Brandon has with his sister that pretty much makes up the entire heart of Shame's unyielding plot.

Where most siblings would slam any door immediately after finding their nude brother or sister on the other side, Brandon and Cissy would square up to argue their differences, and this led a lot of critics to the allusion of an incestuous relationship between them, though I don't think that is what McQueen meant to allude to at all. McQueen tested the waters of American cinema with this rare portrayal of a sibling relationship to show the level of comfort these siblings had with one another, and by the criticism and branding of an NC-17 rating, American cinema failed at showing McQueen how much they understand different cultures.

With all of the cinematic and dramatically well-drawn out ironic elements in Shame McQueen is showing audiences how blurred the division between right and wrong is in our culture today. And in the end our existence is still justified by what I think is the movies tag line, said by Mulligan: 'We are not bad people. We just come from a bad place'

Immortals (2011)

A More Ambitious 300

[6/10 · 14 November 2011]

While fans of 300 might like Tarsem Singh's Immortals, I highly doubt they will be able to say that they liked it just as much or more than.

Singh went for something more ambitious than 300 with Immortals. A film of this Greek epic nature always seem like they are meant for one audience and that is primarily an audience who can't stop watching to this day films like gladiator, 300, Troy and Alexander. You can probably even mark a divide between those four films because the difference between them is the difference between action and story. One group has more story than the other, while the other's actions are enough to make up for it's lack of story, unless it's gladiator and the story just had enough to combine these two basic elements. Either way all four of these films have straight forward stories in common. And The Immortals does have this quality in common, however only with the exception of one thing and that is it's over reliance upon the oracle.

With the oracle, Immortals sort of wanders; almost trails off into a journey path paved most by surrealistic images that just doesn't go much further than s-m involving Mickey Rourke as Hyperion in some distracting head piece viciously eating an apple and acting like Sin City's Marv, only if he existed in appropriate times, surrounded by masked and malnourished slaves and prisoners. While all of this imagery that Singh so often relies upon for most of his films might be shocking at first, after a while, you grow numb to their appearance. It's like you find yourself suddenly asking for less oracle and Hyperion and more immortals.

From movies like The Cell to The Fall you can see Singh's ambition. You can tell that Singh appeals to any aesthetic quality he can take and exploit from anything psychological or epic. But I think Singh wanted to do the same thing with his latest Immortals. Only problem with that is that ambition towards achieving some sort of a groundbreaking aesthetic is something that Immortals doesn't call for. The fact of that matter is what forces Singh to hold back in both respects to fans of 300 and to fans of art or fans of Singh.

With all of that said, in the end Immortals does have a finale worth seeing on the big screen, only it takes a longer time to get to.

Never Let Me Go (2010)

Existential Stirring Romantic Science Fiction

[9/10 · 3 November 2011]

The romantic characteristics of this journey through life are driven by the wheel of a very science fictional sub plot, making this one of the most heart wrenching sci-fi romances I've ever seen about nothingness.

While a part of me wants to say that this can be considered another for fans of maybe The Notebook, Mark Romanek's Never Let Me Go goes beyond the boundaries of even today's most conventional romances, by pitting woman against woman, and man against environment, fate.

On a surface level let's take an Orwellian, in some way utopist, out of this world concept into perspective and believe in a place where children are bred and raised to be vital organ donors. By a certain age these vital organ donors are expected to start donating until they have in their terms 'completed' their life spans. As vital organ donors neither of these three out of Andrew Garfield, Carrie Mulligan and Keira Knightly has much time left so while these two women Ruth and Cathy H already have their hearts set on who they want to die with, Tommy has to make a decision, a fact even he is oblivious to. The science fictional circumstances of its' plot are what allows Romanek along with his triangular cast to take subtle aesthetic liberties with both the film and acting.

Out of Romanek's science fictional surrealistic imagery and the moving performances given by Garfield, Mulligan and Knightly I can't decide which out of these two keep me coming back to this film. All I know is that whenever I do I leave with something new. For something so simple, never let me go is heavy and this isn't the type of picture that you need any mental preparation to sit yourself down to.

It just touches something deep, philosophically moving.

The Rum Diary (2011)

Confused Narrative

[7/10 · 1 November 2011]

Somewhere towards the end, the narrative of Bruce Robinson's The Rum Diary loses faith in itself.

Up until this happened it felt so much more episodically close to its' novel adaptation, fast paced and fun but at a certain point the actors involved in The Rum Diary sort of start coming out of their characters.

Just an assumption, but Robinson's nostalgia for Terrance Gilliam's Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas must have been what forced him to gradually break away from his commitment to his own linear narrative. Throughout the first hour and a half we didn't have Hunter S Thompson narrating this story. And I don't think Robinson realized that until the last thirty minutes of the feature.

In Fear and Loathing Gilliam made a commitment to exploiting the drug abusing nature of HST. But Robinson couldn't do that as much in The Rum Diary and I think he wanted to, badly because that's what the last 30 minutes told me.

As much as Robinson wanted to make this journey through Puerto Rico hallucinogenic the novel he was trying to adapt didn't call for it. And all that from Fear and Loathing is probably what really inspired Robinson to direct The Rum Diary in the first place. So toward the end it's kind of like Robinson thought 'wait, we still haven't shown them enough surrealistic hallucinations narrated by Thompson so he tacked on another thirty minutes of a possible story line.

Up until that point we almost got somewhat of an authentic autobiographical epic of the late author obviously told from the perspective of someone besides. But that also meant by this point it was too late for the director to just suddenly turn over the narrative to Johnny Depp from behind the type writer of Thompson.

At this point I began to feel like the words coming out of Johnny Depp's mouth were not the words of HST.

If this was supposed to be a close adaptation to the book it didn't feel that way in the end.

Valhalla Rising (2009)

A Still Life Image Of A Hero

[8/10 · 31 October 2011]

With movies like Valhalla Rising, Bronson and Drive, Nicolas Winding Refn is creating his own strand of anti-heroes.

And through a full advantage taken of a vast landscape Refn defines his own concept of a Valhalla. And with the help of a certain One Eyed warrior runaway slave, Refn also subliminally reinforces his definition of a man.

In a world possessed currently by pagans and Christians, movies like Valhalla Rising are what is going to separate Nicolas Winding Refn from other directors that are known for shooting films that inevitably fall into that cult genre for men.

From the abilities of this violent when necessary protagonist Refn's definition of today's man is a man who can kill without saying anything. With Refn's own way of minimalist dialog he tells of exactly what he thinks should be opposed of by most men. In that process and through the actions of its protagonist done in complete silence, a firm stance is taken against dialog throughout Valhalla Rising.

If you keep a mental count of the men killed in Valhalla, the majority of them are chumps who are plain asking it of our protagonist by talking. In that way one eye should be seen as a symbolic metaphor of what a force against all chumps looks like. You can call one eye a broom that is used best for sweeping chumps. The child whose father is killed in the beginning by one eye before he brings him along for the adventure can be seen as a symbol of One Eye's conscience.

Not so sure as to how much of this picture if any at all was inspired by Alejandro Jodorowsky, the dependent nature of the relationship between One-Eye and the child he brings along with him for the ride can be compared to the relationships that are formed in movies like El Topo and Fando y Lis.

Through this depiction of a viking's heaven I think Refn is telling one of many stories he has always wanted to tell about a hero, starting with a still life image of what a hero is to him when it is stripped down to the bare fundamentals. That in itself is the soul of Refn's ambitious purpose towards recreating in his mind what he sees as a Valhalla.

Martha Marcy May Marlene (2011)

Most Innovative And Contemporary In Horror Today

[9/10 · 28 October 2011]

As both a dynamically innovative and pulse pounding directorial and acting debut, there is no pun intended when I say that Sean Durkin's Martha Marcy May Marlene is today's most contemporary cult classic.

As difficult as the title might seem to remember, the lasting impression this film has left on me makes forgetting it, now impossible. Definitely the second best film I've seen all year about a rare and unique type of nothingness inducing experience. Elizabeth Olsen is a real punk for doing this one and I mean that in the best way possible.

The ambition of this film lies most in its' complex narrative between her life in its' present state and its' moonlighting over her past experiences with this cult and that to me is what makes it so smart. Olsen's stoned wall facial expression makes it impossible to tell whether she is longing for these past experiences or actually trying to forget them.

And with Durkin filming this cult life from a neutrally pastel colored perspective, from far away these cult members just look like a group of children hanging out. Durkin almost makes cult living look like an alternative life style choice. In addition to that look is several conversations about existence that lean something horrific more towards something philosophically enlightening.

None out of any of these debuts in film and acting combined are in competition with one another in this film as much as they are working together harmoniously. Combining the elements of all it takes to make a great film, Durkin spread his direction evenly over all of this debut production.

So the way leaving Durkin and Olsen's directorial and acting debut felt a lot like it does normally when it comes to leaving behind such a horrifying experience, only with a little something extra; enlightened, like you really conquered something.

Enter the Void (2009)

A Unique Look At Death

[7/10 · 20 October 2011]

Years from now, Gaspar Noe's Enter The Void is going to be that film that everyone loves to hate.

Lovers of this instant cult classic are going to have trouble finding reasons in their heads to watch it over again. And for those that need help finding one, my top three reasons to watch this over again are probably going to be either to host a party, show somebody a film they have never seen before, or to give that special someone a reason to remember you by, or a reason to leave you where you stand altogether. This is definitely a film that will stick to anyone you show it to, and if your name is what you want associated with Enter The Void, be the first to show your friends Noe's latest film.

Set in the underworld of Tokyo Japan, the engine of Enter The Void's story line is driven purely by the event of the protagonists death. With that said besides a few lines uttered by him at the beginning of this film, the main character has no lines, so all we have left as an audience to judge him by are his actions and Noe shows his actions through the memories he has of his own life which inevitably lead up to the beginning of this film.

With his shots made from an all knowing type of helicopter perspective Noe's style of direction is something of an eccentric taste, yet at the same time there is still something in Enter The Void that you have to be patient with. A lot like David Lynch's Inland Empire it's easy to forget that you are watching this movie to all of the hallucinogenic images our protagonist sees through his transcendence into the after life, and the life he observes after his own is something almost tough to swallow.

Besides the numerous, at times arbitrary disruptive mourning of the one's he once knew, Noe's direction from the perspective of this silent recently deceased protagonist leaves very little to his cast to take care of. And as you would expect of most new actors, they take full advantage of the time they are allotted to throw an authentic fit before Noe's lens.

Noe's Enter The Void is a hallucinogenic hypothesis on death, a meditation, an experiment that only certain audiences will understand, recognize and appreciate as a brutally honest attempt at an unyielding aesthetic. Though due to the graphic nature of every depraved act, Enter The Void may still be too much for the even this specific audience Noe is aiming for. I want to say it's something sort of like a Requiem For A Dream, only with the absence of dialogue, the anti-drug campaign and ironically the elements of your usual tragedy. If you can make your way through all of the grit and grime of this hell-ish sort of environment Noe does say something about death that can be taken as something sort of optimistic and for that reason I think Enter The Void is one the most unique looks at death in film today.

Enter The Void is just that type of experimental film that you really have to have a stomach for to watch in excess, or at all for that matter.

The Ides of March (2011)

Politically Charged Stage Play

[7/10 · 14 October 2011]

Audiences leaving George Clooney's latest Ides Of March will feel like they've just finished a watching a really good play.

What makes sense of this is the fact Ides Of March was adapted from a play. In a play telling an audience everything they need to know always helps, especially when the majority of it are only going to see it once. However the difference in film is the aesthetic liberties it allows its' director and I don't think in this Clooney took enough advantage of that.

There is a part to this movie where a business exchange takes place inside of an escalade parked outside of a barbershop. The words being exchanged within that escalade are left to the audience's imagination because the camera never goes inside, but stands staring at it from across the street. Ides of March could've used a lot more scenes like this, but Clooney played it safe with a conventionally linear story line. And I think Clooney put so much more into the story line than he needed to for the audience's sake.

This film didn't leave enough to the imagination of its' audience. While the actors carried out every single demand of this script, the film itself doesn't leave its' audience with enough to make them want to watch it again. The amount of telling done over this show leaves little to no replay value. It feels like the majority of the aesthetic was put into the script when I think a minimum would've been more than enough. Ides of March's script told me a lot more than I needed to know. It feels like the script told me so much that I forgot some key elements to the story. Then again the liberties he took with the script is exactly what allowed Ryan Gosling to take his character to some extremes.

In terms of acting, with names like Ryan Gosling, Philip Seymour Hoffman, and Paul Giamatti, Clooney delivers an all-star studded Sega Dream-Cast. And in terms of his direction, Clooney really leaves Ides Of March to his roots in the stage. However with that said I'm afraid it all felt a little too staged for the silver screen.

For the sake of cinema I think Clooney could've taken a little more of an aesthetic liberty with this project.

Biutiful (2010)

Bunuelian Odyssey

[8/10 · 11 October 2011]

Before seeing Alejandro Inarritu's Biutiful, you might want to watch Luis Bunuel's Milky Way.

What you might see first as a similarity between these two films is a depth in their subject choices from religion to death. Second thing might be a similarity in the way their themes are posed as questions in regards to religion and death. Last similarity, which also constitutes its' contrast is the way it handles their approach to answering such questions.

Where Bunuel's theme of religious question is answered by comedic, symbolic and surrealistic imagery alone, Inarritu's exploration of death is handled by more a less of the same, but with a little something extra.

In one of Biutiful's first scenes we have Javier Bardem as Uxbal sitting across from the ghost of a young boy, asking what exactly is disabling him from moving on into the next life.

The scene cuts before this question is answered by the ghost, but the answer should be obvious and if it's not, then this scene is something to think about, even long after you've watched Biutiful. Ironic, yet essential, even as one of many small symbolic details written into Uxbal's character description is his ability to communicate with death immediately after it's happened because the first question coming from Uxbal in that funeral home is a foreshadowing of what he will be in about ten minutes asking himself for the next two hours.

Besides the images of ghosts and moths he sees in the ceiling, a lot of surrealistic symbolism can be found in the details written into Uxbal's story. Every detail of Uxbal's existence that critics may see as pointless are actually symbols, essential to Biutiful's theme of death and how we should live before it happens.

Before he can move on into the next life he's got things to settle from the company getting ready to build over their past father's burial, to his own two children, along with finally the two immigrant groups he aims to protect from exploitation. With all of this to handle and with only so much time left Uxbal doesn't even have time to tell anybody he is leaving so nobody knows.

All of these ironic details can be seen as another form of symbolism being implemented by Inarritu's style of film and I think it is the closest anybody has come in a long time to a Bunuelian odyssey.

Take Shelter (2011)

A Post-Apocalyptic Mid-Western Nightmare

[8/10 · 8 October 2011]

While this is not one of those movies you necessarily seek out, Jeff Nichols' Take Shelter is one of those post-apocalyptic absurdist psychological thrillers that you don't see coming.

Take Shelter is by far the most original case of paranoid schizophrenia I've ever seen filmed in the mid-west. While the problems Curtis (Michael Shannon) is having with his nightmares seems almost trivial, the length to which he is taking these problems is what is most unbelievable about the character of Take Shelter. And a nice touch to this mid-western drama is the interplay Nichols shoots between Curtis' realities, and his post-apocalyptic nightmares, because until you are used to Nichols' scheme you can never tell which is which.

Having nightmares, waking up, and talking about them with your loved ones is one thing, but to involve other people in your reactions to the nightmares you've been having is just plain psychotic, a nightmare in itself, and that is exactly what's happening in Take Shelter. Curtis doesn't discuss the nightmares he's been having with people. Instead, Curtis is making drastic decisions that directly affect the lives of his loved ones based on his own nightmares.

Also for those that have not ever seen Shannon act, Take Shelter is definitely a great place to start. The transition Shannon's character Curtis makes from traditional family man to a paranoid schizophrenic is immediate, yet casual, in a way that is almost funny. In Take Shelter, Shannon as Curtis, embodies all of the characteristics you could see in your neighbor organizing his garage, or working on his car at 2:30 in the morning. The writing of Curtis' character feels like it was written for Shannon.

The long-term decisions Curtis is making throughout Take Shelter are affecting his personal life, not only mentally, and physically but financially, and that is in fact the most horrifying quality of Take Shelter. Jessica Chastain as Samantha plays as a compliment to Curtis' self-destructive behavior. If it weren't for the nightmares provided by Nichols and Chastain's presence as Curtis' tolerant wife, then I'm afraid the character of Take Shelter would've lost all of its' credibility.

Where we do not want this beautiful marriage to be broken up by these post-apocalyptic visionary nightmares, we cannot help but to feel like we are just waiting for it to happen. If not the divorce of his marriage, at least the storm he's been seeing in his nightmares must. Wondering which out of these two things are going to happen in Take Shelter is the largest suspense factor being played throughout this picture.

50/50 (2011)

Another Bromantic Classic

[6/10 · 4 October 2011]

In terms of subject matter Director Jonathan Levine's 50/50 is similar to Funny People, minus the 45 minutes they take out to Monterey to see about Adam Sandler's married ex-girlfriend. Subtract that 45 minutes from Funny People and we would've had the pinnacle of comedic drama in what we know today as a bromantic comedy.

Besides Click, Funny People allowed Sandler to provoke an eye socket warming cathartic reaction. Now subtract Sandler's sense of humor from that movie along with the 45 minutes he takes aside from the most dramatic feature of the film, which altogether ruined Funny People's chances and you have Joseph Gordon-Levitt with Seth Rogen alongside as a 50/50 chance of landing somewhere closer to this type of comedic drama's intended goal.

By now since Inception, and 500 Days Of Summer, everyone likes Levitt enough to not only pay closer attention to such a complex illness, but to also empathize with his metamorphosis from a no license having health nut, to a balding thin medicinal marijuana smoking, cancer patient.

Rogen lends himself to this feature as merely a helping hand with just enough comedic quips and antidotes to help Levitt through this illness without letting the audience forget exactly what they are dealing with. The occupations of these characters take a sideline to this disease. Levitt's reaction to this illness is certainly something real enough to set things off with. Cinematically the trip his mind takes over the edibles and the chemotherapy is definitely something new introduced to this genre of bromantic comedies as it is also something enough to keep every one's attention.

Funny thing about these comedies that intertwine themselves with drama is how much it constitutes and dignifies what is basically a romantic comedy for bros. Other films of this genre are Along Came Polly, 40-Year-Old Virgin, Knocked Up, Funny People, etc. It must have been this type of feature that inspired movies like I Love You Man, movies like this years' 50/50. By leaving out the potty humor 50/50 is the closest this genre of bromantic comedy has gotten to what it has always lacked in subtlety. Something about this attempt at such a style is what makes me wonder where this type of comedy is headed.

As far as 50/50's release in theaters, I say see it, if you've already seen everything else that American cinema has to offer, from Drive, Moneyball, and Warrior. Otherwise it makes for a great date.

Blue Valentine (2010)

A Painfully Effective Ironic Backlash

[8/10 · 3 October 2011]

People keep writing articles about Ryan Gosling on Thought Catalog. In the last two weeks I've seen two. One is about Gosling's eligibility as today's bachelor while the other brings about a question of why everyone is so obsessed with him. The article discloses some fine points, with the exception of two very important details, movies, and they are Blue Valentine and Drive.

As an actor Gosling produced Blue Valentine and hand picked the director for Drive. With Drive Gosling really snuck one under the radar with his choice of director Nicolas Winding Refn, while Blue Valentine received minimal recognition at the academy awards last year for how much it depressed everyone.

It affected audiences in ways that they didn't want to be so nobody knew what to say about it besides Michelle Williams. Besides Williams' performance nobody said it was bad but nobody could say it was good. Nobody could say that they liked Blue Valentine. In a nutshell, Dereck Cianfrance's Blue Valentine is a brutally honest story about that point in a relationship where love no longer matters.

The reason why I think this movie gets such mixed reviews is because probably half the critics that saw it last year were going through something similar. I know I was and like them throughout Blue Valentine I myself tried to deny it. You can say the protagonist in Blue Valentine is a dying relationship.

In the first scene we have the daughter making an entrance through the dog's door to tell her sleeping father that their dog is missing. With a receding hairline over a pair of sunglasses on that might be prescription, Gosling picks up his daughter to have a look around outside with a cigarette ready for lighting hanging off of his lips. After waking up Williams she prepares breakfast for them, when gosling makes a comment on how long she let the oats soak in milk, then sprinkles some raisins on the table for them to eat off of like leopards before Williams says that the last thing she wants to do is clean up after two children. Everyone, from Williams, to her parents, to the audience sees what's happening; everybody except for gosling.

Detail by detail Blue Valentine is about getting to that point of the inevitable and there is something surrealistically sad and ironic in that which earns Blue Valentine its' cult following. Most people involved in something like that do not see or ignore the inevitable. Worse case scenario would be only one out of those two going through the motions ability to acknowledge it and that is exactly what's taking place in CianFrance's Blue Valentine.

There are no heroes in Blue Valentine, only villains and victims. The roles switch throughout Blue Valentine between Williams and Gosling. Things from each of their pasts are finally catching up to them. Things that each of them should've realized ever since they had met. Two words to describe this movie are sad and true because it chronicles a metamorphosis of those sweet things we remember about each other first before they become sour.

Sadly one of the first things Gosling ever said about her in a flashback to his co worker is that she makes him feel like he knows her. What is so true about Gosling's first statement on Williams' character is how universal that is to any man that has ever tried to talk to a girl he didn't know.

In so many more ways than what I have mentioned Blue valentine is everyone's story. If we haven't been through this we've seen it. And while this could bring back painful memories of the last thing you did before it all finally ended, having gone through it makes appreciating Blue Valentine so much easier. Aristotle once said that tragedies are the best kinds of drama because we learn the most from them.

Cinematically Blue Valentine is a painfully effective ironic backlash on everything we have ever romanticized about love.

Bronson (2008)

An Incorrigible, Schizophrenic, Testosterone Fueled, Massacre

[8/10 · 28 September 2011]

Besides being the most violent prisoner in Britain's system, tom hardy as Charles Bronson in Nicolas Winding Refn's Bronson is by far the most eccentric fighter I have ever seen filmed.

When a friend of mine described a scene from Bronson to me, he made Hardy sound like ten times the beast that he actually is in this film so when I bought it and popped it in to the player expecting Jackie Chan, I was pleasantly surprised by how much of the opposite I got.

Unless he is tussling one on one with somebody probably defenseless almost every single one of his brawls end in the same results. He might plan a strategic response to the guards' entrance of waving batons' different, but the numbers they come in are always prepared for whatever he has ready. He never wins and it's this confidence in his character to every one of their entrances that makes Hardy as Charles Bronson hilarious.

The actions of Charles Bronson do not change nearly as much as the settings he is placed in. And the places do not change progressively. By that I mean the places only change between the cells colored by either red or blue, unless he is in an underground fight or dance club ran by one of his eccentric connections. The color scheme of Bronson has to be the only thing I took seriously.

Besides all of Refn's trademarks in film, this is a just a charismatic brute comedy about somebody trying to substantiate a meaning to his violent existence by telling his story.

From behind the lens of Refn this is depicted as both funny yet sad. Funny first in the way most people that like beating the crap out of every person they see usually is yet sad in the same way as there are only so many places that road can lead. I hardly think Refn is condoning the character of Charles Bronson as much as he is examining it in this humorous character study.

His real name is Michael Peters but Charlie Bronson is his fighting name. Tom hardy as Michael Peters wants to die as Charles Bronson. He's always wanted to be famous, and he becomes just that, no matter how ill that fame is.

Moneyball (2011)

Best Written Sports Film

[8/10 · 27 September 2011]

While Moneyball is by far the most original take on America's favorite pass time, it is not exactly what you would expect from a movie about baseball.

Two things Aaron Sorkin knows how to write are controversial figures and excessive amounts of jargon.

If you have ever tried playing a video game of baseball with your friends, but then gave up trying to play after you noticed how long they were taking and how excited they were getting to build up an empire in the franchise mode, then you should know exactly what to expect from Moneyball. The language and mathematics of Americas favorite pass time is put before everything including the actual game itself, which is both the solution and problem to the film in general. The writing of the script does not loan itself as much to the game as it does to the politics behind it.

Therefore the commitment Sorkin makes to the characters of Brad Pitt as Billy Beane and Jonas Hill as his assistant Peter makes this a lot more of a sports drama than an actual sports movie, which almost makes for poor casting of Phillip Seymour Hoffman as the head coach of the Oakland A's. All Hoffman does as the head coach in Moneyball is pout around the office over every decision Pitt makes, which he does well. But Hoffman could've played anybody else besides the head coach while anybody else, including the actual head coach who was actually considered for the role could've played the head coach because the head coach doesn't really do much in Moneyball.

However the story of Moneyball isn't about the head coach of the Oakland Athletics. Moneyball is about the Oakland Athletics Manager Beane and how Beane replaced three key players in his franchise. The kind of pressure that position comes with is a side of the game that fans of baseball do not get to see and either that's entertaining to you or it's not. For me this is probably one of the best written major league baseball movies I've ever seen.

Every decision made by Beane is made with an authoritative confidence that is difficult to argue. The only person backing Beane's decisions in Moneyball is the assistant, helping him make them with his thorough evaluation of statistics. These two together are what also makes Moneyball fun to watch for the risk factor involved in every decision they make as a bizarre series of trial and error. With Peter as Beane's assistant and Kerris Dorsey as his daughter, Pitt as Oakland Athletics Manager Beane has more than enough support, on or off of the field.

Both of these relationships are what allow us to like Pitt as Beane, an under dog in this game of Moneyball, even though nobody else does. And that seems to be a characteristic trait of Sorkin's hand in script writing so far besides politics.

Nobody close to Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network liked any of the decisions he was making neither. But Zuckerberg's decisions are exactly what gave birth to Facebook while the movie about him written by Sorkin got him nominated for an academy award.

Drive (I) (2011)

Breathtaking Minimalist Thrill Ride

[8/10 · 24 September 2011]

With a pulse driven soundtrack pumping from the speakers of Ryan Gosling's GT, Nicolas Winding Refn's Drive is instantly a contemporary cult classic thrill ride written in blood stains and pink.

The color of Drive brings to mind a quote made by Cameron Diaz as the femme fatale in 'The Mask that she addresses towards Jim Carrey during one of their first meetings. It brings to our attention the polluted skies she admires so much for its' accumulation of purples, pinks and greens. In retrospect this quote can now be considered a foreshadowing of what would later become a tradition in twenty first century film.

Not only does Refn follow this foreshadowed tradition, but he sets a new bar for it by using this scope to create a new-wave, stylistic action thriller. Drive is a crash collision of vibrant colors inspired possibly by video games like Grand Theft Auto's Vice City, movies like Scarface, and maybe the minimalist script and shot decisions of Andrei Tarkovsky. For those that are unfamiliar with the last name, think of David Lynch or more recent films like 'Enter The Void,' 'Biutiful,' 'Blue Valentine,' or 'Tree Of Life.' The broad pov shot from Ryan Gosling's windshield creates something special. By the street lit product placement of names like rite aid, Ross, and Food 4 Less Refn's Drive puts me in an all too familiar place of oppression. However, seeing it from the perspective of Refn and Gosling illuminates and exposes it for all of its color and possibility. Refin knows how to capture optimism. Its one of those films that makes you proud to be a part of these fluorescent polluted times we are living in.

With direction this good, the characters do not need to say anything. Drive's main character has no name. Everyone surrounding him has a name. Some of these circumstantial misfits are titled that way by choice, or just plain circumstances and all of them want some type of favor from our hero. And our hero will do it, no matter how absurd, without any questioning of things like what is in it for the misfit asking this favor of our hero.

There are no hidden agendas behind anything that he says or does. Everything he does is done because it is the right thing to do. College's theme 'Real Hero' fits into this so well because it echoes exactly what this movie is all about and that is real people and real heroes. In this way Drive's main character is an example of a cinematic hero that can and should be followed.

Less is more in 'Drive.' Their actions in this post apocalypse are what speak volume for their characters. Move over Emilio Estevez and Robert Deniro because Gosling is this years 'Repo Man' and 'Taxi Driver.' And while Gosling is today's hero in film, Refn is our post-modern and apocalyptic philanthropist.

Warrior (2011)

Most Contemporary Fighter

[7/10 · 24 September 2011]

When I had first seen the preview for Gavin O'Connor's 'Warrior' I wanted to say that this is going to be a post - any idea we have ever had of any fighter from 'Rocky' to last years 'The Fighter' starring Mark Wahlberg and Christian Bale. Now, after seeing it I'm not so sure if that statement holds the same amount of weight.

This isn't your typical fighter. This is also a long distance sibling rivalry between Tommy (Tom Hardy) and Brandon (Joel Edgerton). The fighters trade their stories in the same way we've seen done in movies like 'American Gangster' and 'Brooklyn's Finest' only with different bumps in the road that are just as contemporary as threatening home foreclosures and trying to outrun demons, people have recorded and posted on youtube.

American Gangster also made caring equally, for both characters so much easier, whereas in Warrior you really can't know enough about Hardy's character.

In between these stories is another one about a father (Nick Nolte) trying to rekindle his relationship with these two fighters, but the most I really want to say about that is from the beginning of the film Hardy almost brought me to tears with his first monologue. The relationship Hardy has with his father is what makes his story so much better than his counterpart's. Until then, both men are in training for the main event Sparta that could possibly be fought against each other.

With all of that, it takes about maybe an hour and twenty minutes to get to any real fighting. But I think O'Connor wanted to give us everything he had to offer in cinema before this pay-per view. A taste of what Hardy can do in that ring is given here and there throughout, but it isn't until Sparta do we see exactly what we have been waiting for. I don't really know how much more I need to say to tell you that this is what makes Warrior Tom Hardy's film.

Man to man, Tom Hardy as Tommy, in O'Connor's 'Warrior' is the post apocalyptic beast that I have always wanted to be.

Now, I can see why Christopher Nolan cast him as Bane in next summer's final installment to the Dark Knight series. And by 'Bronson,' Nolan probably knew this long before Warrior. However it's this one that showed me what Bane has in store for Batman next summer. For those that have not seen Bronson it will certainly show you.