A real moviegeek or a tired old cynic?

April 25, 2011 6 Comments

Some of you have pointed out that in the last few months it seems like I was disappointed by most of the stuff I saw in the cinema.

This came just at the time when I was about to choose which film to review next, of the ones I’ve seen in the last couple of days: “The Roommate” (A thriller, which is usually a genre I love), “the extraordinary adventures of Adele Blanc-Sec” (By Luc Besson who made La Femme Nikita and leon, 2 of my favourites ever!), or “Hachi” (By the director of one of the film I love the most, What’s eating Gilbert Grape)… And you know what?! I really didn’t like any of them!

It made me think: when did I become such a cynic?

It is so unlike me… I’ve always been the positive one, the smiley person who tries to look for bright side…

I love going to the movies and there’s nothing I cherish more than loosing myself in a good flick.

Whenever I go and watch something, I’m always hoping this might be the one that makes me go back to being a kid, or makes me cry or laugh with tears in my eyes, or forget about my deadlines at work and my worries at home…

The fact that I have not liked a lot films recently is probably indicative of the way cinema is today. Most of these films are just products”: they are made by a committee of advertisers, or people who need to balance their books at the end of the year.

There are very few mavericks, or real storytellers out there… Most of them prefer to play it safe and give us what their recent surveys told them they should give us.

Or is it me who is just getting pickier and pickier? Why do I seem to be the only one who thought “The King’s Speech” was a pretty average film crowd pleaser?

Why didn’t I like Scream 4, when in fact it did exactly what the “tin” said?

Should I have got lost in the colours of “Rio”, forgetting about the fact that the story line was so damn predictable?

Why wasn’t I swept away by the quirkiness of “Rubber“?

Why was I so cold in front of that tragedy that was “Rabbit hole“?

Why couldn’t I just laugh watching “The Dilemma” while everybody else was in tears around me in the theatre?

Why couldn’t I just go with “The Adjustment Bureau“, instead of looking for all the plot holes?

Why wasn’t I enchanted by Submarine?

And why am I more terrorized than excited by the idea of the forthcoming Tintin movie by Spielberg (a director I love making a film about my ultimate childhood hero?) … Why am I so afraid I’ll be disappointed?

Am I growing old and just tired of movies or are there just fewer and fewer fresh good things our there?

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Source Code – Review

April 3, 2011 6 Comments

Source Code (2011) 

Directed by Duncan Jones. Starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Michelle Monaghan, Vera Farmiga

Source Code is a smart, suspenseful Sci-Fi action/thriller which takes the concept behind the hit comedy “Groudhog Day” and mixes it with some Twilight-Zone-Style elements in Hollywood style, for the post “Inception” era  (I know it sounds like a weird hybrid…) and somehow makes it the most exciting and original film I’ve seen this year.

As always the least you know about the film the better it is, but having said that, there are so many facets to Source Code, so many twists and turns that unless I sit down and tell you everything about it, you’ll still be surprised. But let me just tell you the rough plot, or at least the first few minutes.

Capt. Colter Stevens (Jake Gyllenhaal) suddenly wakes up on a train in a state of complete confusion: the last thing he remembers is crashing his plane in Afghanistan and yet know he’s inside the body of a man named Sean. Across from him is Christina (Michelle Monaghan) who clearly knows him and yet he has no memory of her or any of the other people on the train heading to Chicago. Eight minutes later a bomb goes off and everyone on the train dies.

Colter wakes up again, this time he’s in a dark pod-like structure looking at a monitor with the face of a superior officer (Vera Farmiga), explaining to him that he’s part of a government experiment used to stop terrorism. Through a process called “Source Code”, Colter gets sent back (again and again and again) eight minutes before the moment before the explosion went off, find out where the bomb is and who set it and prevent a later and far greater attack by the same person in downtown Chicago.

Part of the fun of “Source Code” is watching our hero (Jake Gyllenhaal) re-live the same 8 minutes over and over again, each time in a slightly different way, each time getting closer and closer to the truth!

There are a couple of small clunky moments here and there (the biggest of which, is the scene, full of exposition, where we get told what “source code” is), but the sheer inventiveness, the fast pace and the emotional burden that the film carries are far greater that those little imperfections.

There are some debates about its ending (don’t worry, I’m not going to reveal it here). There is a point where you might think the film has actually ended: I’m referring to the long freeze frame (you’ll know what I mean when you see the film) and in fact it could have easily ended there, which would have made the film much more poignant and arguably better, but then the film carries on… and just when you think “Oh no, another Hollywood ending), the film takes a surprising final turn and gives you a few (slightly) unexpected twists right till the last moment and makes up for what you thought it was one of those “re-filmed-ending” after failed test screening.

There’s nothing better than a good unexpected ending! In the theatre where I watched it, it got everybody talking!

I haven’t had such fun watching a film in a very long time.

It’s a bit unfair to compare this with Inception (but it seems like everybody else is doing it). They are two completely different films and their only similarity is the fact that they both make you think and requires you to do some work while watching the story unfold.

However “Source Code” is an emotionally charged film too (while Inception, as we’ve  all noticed, was a tiny bit cold); I was almost moved to tears in couple of scenes and yet, the film still managed to have a lot of humor throughout (courtesy of Mr Gyllenhaal’s perfectly pitched performance).

What else can I say? I loved it! It might not be as stylish and fresh as Moon was (Duncan Jones’s previous film). This is certainly a bigger Hollywood fair, and a much more crowd-pleasing roller-coaster, but if you regard cinema as entertainment, you can’t get better than this!

9/10

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Loose Cannons – Review

January 29, 2011 5 Comments

Loose Cannons (2010) 

(Mine vaganti: Original Title)

Directed by Ferzan Ozpetek. Starring Riccardo Scamarcio, Nicole Grimaudo, Alessandro Preziosi, Elena Sofia Ricci, Ilaria Occhini.

Italo-Turkish director Ferzan Ozpetek goes back to what he knows and does best: a”coming-out” comedy” about homosexuality and family values, full of memorable quirky characters, laugh out-loud moments mixed with bittersweet and poignant reflections.

These are also the themes of one of my old favorite Ozpetek’s film, the Ignorant Fairies (Le fate Ignoranti), made 10 years ago.


It is all fairly watchable stuff and it sort of works as long as it’s on the screen. However, any attempt of social comment or critique at any serious issue (the close mindedness of the South of Italy, and the way Italians like to appear which is more important than the way they are, among the others) quickly fades away and gets diluted in the pursuit of easy laughers and in the over-the-top, almost caricatural depictions of the characters. Of course, it is supposed be a comedy… but sadly that’s all it is.


The story is set in Lecce, a city in the heel of the Italian boot, in the deep south. and it focuses on the large Cantone family (so large that it took me a while to work out who was who). Tommaso, is about to come out to his parents. One night, at the dinner table, just when he’s about to break the news to the family, his older brother, Antonio announces himself to everyone that he’s gay.

The father’s refusal to accept or understand his older brother’s sexuality gives him a heart attack and leaving Tommaso at the helm of the family pasta making business, whilst at the same time trying to deal with his own hidden truth (fearing that his father won’t survive the news of both of his 2 sons being gay).

There are a lot of other storylines, and the family is certainly large enough to offer several opportunities for sub-plots. Unfortunately most of the characters remain just superficial caricatures (the wise grandmother, the loony aunt, the apprehensive mother, the homophobic father, the girl in love with the gay man and so on…) and in the end the film falls into the same clichés the director is trying to ridicule in the film.

In a way, there’s nothing here we haven’t seen before, (funnily enough even within Ozpetek’s previous films too) but it’s good to see the overshadowed-by-the-Vatican-Italy finally arriving there too.


The film is handsomely filmed and the great looking, almost-perfect settings only seem to enhanced the imperfections of the family itself.

The editing (and direction) both seem a bit too pleased with themselves: some scenes could have gained something by being trimmed a bit. Even the most emotional moments always seem to go on for a bit too much than it’s needed (I’m thinking of the scenes around the tables, or more crucially – SPOILER COMING –  the one where the grandmother decides to go for her cakes, or even the one at the beach. You get the point after a few seconds and yet both scenes go on and on and on).

The same goes for the over-used music, both in terms of the actual score (which once again stresses the slapstick aspect of the film) and known songs, most of which seem rather random and a bit intrusive.

Most of the acting is very good especially the woman grandmother (Ilaria Occhini) who seems to be the only one really sees what’s happening within her family.


In the end I am happy I saw this film, and I did enjoy it, but I’m still longing for the return of the real Commedia all’Italiana of the 50s and 60s (and to a degree the 70s too) which really provided a mirror of Italian customs and values, attacking prejudices and questioning the general thinking of elites and institutions in a much more subtle way. The sometimes dark and bleak vision of the society and the bittersweet laughers those films provoked, felt a lot less forced than they are in this film which is clearly trying to be bit more commercial. Still, we’re probably heading towards the right direction.

7/10

You can read more about “Commedia all’Italiana” on my previous post on Mario Monicelli

Mario Monicelli (1915 – 2010)

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Buried – Review

January 20, 2011 5 Comments

Buried (8.5/10) 

Directed by Rodrigo Cortés. Starring Ryan Reynolds, Stephen Tobolowsky, Samantha Mathis.

Let me just start by saying that this film is brilliant!! I had heard about the concept (90 minutes with a man stuck in a box/coffin with a lighter and a cell phone) and I was already waiting for pretty claustrophobic experience. However, what I also found was an incredible roller-coaster of an action movie, wonderfully told, constructed, directed and perfectly balanced. And, more importantly, despite its premise, it was never boring, slow or repetitious (I don’t think there’s a single shot being repeated twice). In fact, they even managed to have a couple of really tense action scenes: yes action scenes within a box!!!

The director has been very brave to even attempt something like this, but he’s also been able to play the game within the rules he had set up and never cheat: the camera never leaves the confinements of the coffin. This is a film that Hitchcock could have made, and he would have made him proud!

You know you’re in for something quite interesting from the title sequence itself, which once again is reminiscent of those Saul Bass titles in a Hitchcock’s movies. They’re beautifully designed, perfectly paced and they’re accompanied by a sort of “Hermanesque”score that you would probably expect from an action movies, but not from a movie which you know it’s going to take place inside a coffin.

And that pace, energy and inventiveness permeates the whole film from there onwards.

The first few minutes are probably the toughest to watch (well, in fact there’s very little to watch since most of that time is spent on a black screen): it’s the moment when our character realizes he is “buried” alive.  It’s a claustrophobic experience, beautifully orchestrated just with simple sound effects of his body moving around, thumping against the side of the coffin (the use of the 5.1 sound is impressive), breathing heavily and then finally screaming. It is excruciating! At one point I remember thinking to myself: “If it is all like this I don’t know if I’ll be able to take it…”.

But somehow, once the film gets going and the mystery unravels, then you almost became used to the settings, just like the main characters gets used to it too.

I don’t really want to give away too much, because part of the fun is discovering what’s going as the story unfolds. The script is beautifully constructed,  giving the audience new and interesting clues every few minutes, thus making us always intrigued and, as I said before never bored.

There’s a sequence involving a snake at some point, that might be a bit of a cheap trick but actually ends up being one of the most accomplished action-packed moment I’ve seen in any action film this season. To be able to pull something like that off, it is an achievement indeed!!

And just when you think the film may run out steam, here comes a new idea and a new trick in the bag. I may even go as far as saying that despite the overall silliness of this movie, it is at the same time one of the most accomplished and inventive I’ve seen in a while.

Technically it is pretty much faultless too: the camera swoops around the box showing you the action from any conceivable point of view and using pretty much any every trick in the book (zooms, tracks, extreme close-ups and so on). The sound design and sound mix on this film are both just as important and they are both top-notch, as they’re so carefully balanced to making you really feel you’re in there inside the box.

I am looking forward to seeing what the BluRay will look and sound like (This will be coming out around Valentine’s Day, although I cannot think of a worse date movie…).

I should also spend a couple of words praising Ryan Renolds, who literally carries the whole film on his shoulders as he’s on screen from every single second.

The music, as I mentioned before for the title sequence, treats it all like a real action movie and to me that was probably slightly overdone. It works for most of the film, but I can’t help thinking it was a bit too bombastic in a few other places.

But I am really picking needles here and I shouldn’t, because this is a little MASTERPIECE: it’s not just a tagline or a gimmicky one-trick-movie, but it’s a true lesson on creating and building tension in a movie.

Rodrigo Cortes understand film-making, how to build tension and how to sustain it throughout. He’s been able to create an action film which is also, moving and funny in places. I can’t wait what he’s going to do next.

I can see that “Buried” might not be for everyone, and it’s definetely not for the faint-hearted or those people who suffers from claustrophobia, but if you like tension, thrillers, action romps or simply good film-making and pure cinema this is for you!

8.5/10

OTHER RELATED REVIEWS:

 127 Hours

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The Next Three Days – Review

December 19, 2010 5 Comments

The Next Three Days (2010) 

Director: Paul Haggis With: Russell Crowe, Elizabeth Banks and Liam Neeson, Michael Buie

This movie has been out in the US for a while, but for some reason somebody decided to release it against Harry Potter (I call it suicide) and it seems to have gone by without much attention from anyone. It’ll come out in the UK in January 2011 in the hope to get noticed for the forthcoming Award season mainly for Russell Crowe’s performance, but also because it’s been directed by an Oscar favorite, Paul Haggis (from Crash).

Hopefully if it doesn’t get noticed in the theaters, it’ll have a second life on DVD and Blu-ray, because it truly deserves to be seen.

Now, I know I am not going to say anything new here, but I’d like to stress that, like many others, this film is better enjoyed if you don’t know anything about it.

Keeping that in mind, I will try to spoil as little as I possibly can as I encourage you to go and watch it, especially if you like good thrillers. The trailer for “The Next Three Days” gives away 9/10 of the movie so stay away from it (thankfully I hadn’t seen it). It’s a real shame they decide to show that much in the trailer because some of the beauty of the film is actually not knowing where the whole thing heading to.

The basic plot is nothing new, in fact the film itself is a remake of the French”Pour Elle”: a normal family shaken by the sudden arrest of Russel Crowe’s wife, accused of murder. It all happens within the first few minutes so don’t worry about having that spoiled.

However, Haggis has managed to improve over the French film, not only by filling all the plot holes of the previous version but also by tinkering with the poor original ending, making it a lot better.

Every twist and turn in the movie comes as a surprise, whether it’s about the plot itself or the way the characters react to a certain situation. The film challenges any preconceptions the audience might have by  being constantly surprising and by making us change our minds on the crucial question running thorough “Is the wife guilty or is she innocent?”.

It’s all very skillfully handled, in its construction and its pace.

The film starts off deliberately slowly to allow us to get closer to the characters and then gets faster and faster towards the final act which ends up being a real edge-of-your-seat-thrill. It almost feels like one of those solid thrillers from the 80s or early 90s, more concerned about creating an atmosphere that having big chase sequences and explosions or shootouts. However when they finally do come, the tension has been so enhanced because of your emotional investment up until that point, that it all works perfectly.

It’s interesting to see Russell Crowe playing against type. We are so used to see him as the “Gladiator type”, looking for revenge, or simply for a fight, as his off-screen infamous personality merges into his characters. Yet in this film Russell Crowe is the sweetest man ever: a loyal husband, a great father… and basically just a good man. I have to confess I don’t really like the guy, and yet once again in this film I have to bow to actor’s ability to morph himself into the character. His intensity and charisma is undeniable and at the end the film works 10 times more than it should because of his bravura. His depiction of a good husband is all very carefully (and intentionally) done to make you sympathize and care for the character even if at some point in the movie he behaves pretty badly…

The supporting cast all all top class too, including an unexpected appearance by Liam Neeson.

It all probably takes itself a bit too seriously, almost trying to be more like “Conviction” than “Prison break”. There’s hardly any laugh in the whole film and at the end of the day this is a thriller and it’s not meant to change anyone’s life, but while you’re with it, you’ll certainly enjoy it.

8/10 (if you haven’t seen the trailer… a lot less if you have).

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