Archive for April, 2008
I was 11 when this came out and I can remember reading all the controversy around it - the nudity, and how “adult” and “frank” it was. It says something about the presentation of sex in cinema that it still seems that way.
Sharp, creative cinematography and editing, and some remarkable images. But [...]
I’d seen an awful print of this years ago on television and wasn’t particularly impressed; the sharpness of the Criterion restoration foregrounds the ugliness a little more forcefully. That showing was also, I think, missing the murderous protagonist Mark slumping, spent, after seeing the climax of the [...]
Watching this was like watching a really, really great episode of Law and Order. Given that it spawned an apparently great New York cop show, I suppose it could be the progenitor of all subsequent TV cop shows. It’s certainly a lot more laid back and humorous than most noir or crime films of the [...]
Park Chan-Wook’s precursor to Oldboy is gorgeously shot and stunningly composed – I was thinking as I was watching it that is was one of the most beautiful films I’d ever seen – but I didn’t think the story merited it. You can see where it’s going after a while, and [...]
Entertaining monster-in-the-city movie that hits all the marks one expects from the genre while also managing to be a well-acted and interestingly offbeat dysfunctional-family narrative. Director Bong Joon-Ho also did Memories of Murder and this features the same lead actor: Song Kang-ho, who is again excellent.
I’ve liked both films I’ve [...]
Fact-based 1988 TV movie chronicling a crime spree by two heavily-armed and apparently psychopathic Florida bank robbers. The reason the episode gained notoriety was because the eventual FBI stop of their car went so cataclysmically wrong. The resultant close-quarters gun battle as detailed herein is one of the most hellish [...]
Odd black comedy from Polanski. Donald Pleasence is a neurotic egghead with a French trophy wife (Françoise Dorléac) and Lionel Stander is the American gangster who shows up at their 11th-century castle.
Sometimes drags a bit, but the humor – a lot deriving from the contrast between the male characters, although [...]
A long, slow film with few dramatic moments, low-key performances, and an unsatisfying not-really-resolution. Very good. The film was compelling almost because of the lack of fireworks, although some of the establishing shots - Sacramento Airport, Golden Gate Bridge - were hilariously beautiful. I particularly liked Mark Ruffalo, doing one of his angry, quiet men, [...]
A fascinating and affecting Herzog documentary on Dieter Dengler, who as a German youth becomed obsessed with the dream of being a pilot and who as a young man was shot down over Laos during the Vietnam war. Dengler recounts (and occasionally reenacts) the remarkable story - his capture, torture, escape - in an [...]
Pretty good all-out horror film. It combined some great shock moments with an overall feeling of dread. Unlike a lot of poorly thought out horrors it actually had a frightening concept: the descent was physical and psychological. The lighting was especially effective: due to the tiny crawlspaces and the limited light sources, a great number [...]