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The "Must Watch" of the 1990s and 2000s, IMO
100 MUST watch movies from the 2010s
2014, the MUST WATCH
2012, the MUST watch
Reviews
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
I dont like the cinematography
Everything else is either perfect or almost perfect
Ida (2013)
Here's an idea. let's use every off-the-shelf Oscar bait and put them all in one movie
Don't be insulted, it's a nice movie, it's shot and designed very well, characters are nicely written, actors are beautiful, and the script is well constructed. So what's the issue, exactly this review's title, from my perspective, it seems that the filmmakers wanted an Oscar so bad (I don't blame them, who doesn't) that they just used every element they could fit into this story that is known to give a movie better chance at winning. It's about a young orphan novitiate nun who is about to take her vows when suddenly she discovers that she is descended of a Jewish family that was murdered by the Nazis, and during the same journey she starts to have feelings towards a Jazz musician and begins to doubt whether being a nun is really the path she wants. Both elements are severely overplayed, and both are elements are the very foundation of this movie. I cannot but think that Ida was not made so that the filmmaker deliver to us a vision that he wants to share, but instead was designed specifically to allure to film festivals and awards committees.
Skyfall (2012)
Bold and original, but not the best of Craig's 007s
MINOR SPOILERS
Sam Mendes's take on 007 is a remarkably well done film, both technically and entertainment-wise, it has the characters, the action, and the Bond allure which is a constant throughout the movie.
It captures you right with the opening sequence, which is absolutely thrilling and beautifully choreographed, the whole movie is nicely choreographed and very well shot (Roger Deakins's cinematography is a stand out). The key characters are well presented, with each of them having their own layers, and the movie dives specifically into Bond's psyche, which gave us on the way, the right dose of Bond origins (not too much, not too little). The lead acting is fantastic, Craig as Bond, which in my opinion is the best who portrayed the Iconic spy, Dench as M, and Bardem as Silva, which by himself takes the movie to a whole new level both as an actor and the character itself, since among the Daniel Craig-led 007's, Skyfall is the first film to bring us a true villain, an archenemy, one that is actually in-par to Bond himself. Skyfall also brings new additions and takes some out that leaves a lot to be explored in sequels (several new characters that will most probably be reprised again, and yes, there is death). And there is a very, very nice retro touch to the film that pays homage to 50 years of James Bond.
This however does not mean the film is perfect at all, it does have several issues of its own, issues that stand out. The overall story does not hold itself very well, specifically the final act, which might be considered a bit... stupid. Some characters and the architecture surrounding them did not Solid nor necessary, the whole Sévérine (Bérénice Marlohe) charade felt imposed and like a plot device just to introduce a an action sequence, a fling, and shed a little light on the villain. To me, the most un-Bond thing about Skyfall was that, 007 was more of a hit-man than a spy, he had one, maybe two "spying" missions, which included lots of killing, the rest was a shoot-em up, more like an open war movie than an espionage one.
And as for the temporary feel of the film (in the time of its release), the trailer had a very negative effect, it gave out almost every key scene and one liner in the film, leaving almost nothing to surprise you at the theater, this however cannot be held against the movie's lifetime position since trailers do not live forever, opposing to Bond films which actually do seem to live forever.
If I have to place this film among the other Craig-led Bond movies, it falls somewhere between "Casino Royale" and "Quantum Of Solace"
Prometheus (2012)
Watchout for the director's cut
Prometheus has several on its side and several against it, but above all, Prometheus suffers from the ridiculously high-set expectations, being a film that was perceived as both (the long awaited prequel/spin off to "Alien") and (the long awaited return to Sci/Fi of Ridley Scott), add to that the breath-taking trailers, footage and viral videos, and there is no way anyone could walk out of that theater pleased.
Prometheus puts you on the edge of your seat from its first scene, where we see a humanoid looking alien creature disintegrating into nature of planet earth, and thereby its DNA starts off the chain-reactions that inevitably lead up with the creation of the man kind. And then it swiftly jumps into the future to introduce our characters and keeps building on that mystery in a perfectly paced manner, and there is so much mystery in the air that you feel it in your stomach. Add to that the overwhelming art design, scenery and VFX of the film, and the straight to the bone performances by our the cast, and especially, Michael Fassbender as "David", which is by far the most established and interesting character and the most outstanding performance in the film.
That being said, Prometheus is far from being perfect, as it was after all, a movie designed (and edited) more as a "summer block buster" than than a movie to tangle with your intellect. Just as soon as our team reaches their destination planet to uncover the truth about our creators, you start feeling the film maker loosing his grip over the film to the studio execs, the film starts jumping off from one story element to the other with no warning, paying little-to-no attention to details to the point that you cannot not notice it anymore, and the pace starts picking up so quickly that it leads to a no-more than a standard Hollywood ending :(
The film tone changes noticeably right about the third act, from the focused, mysterious character-driven plot, to something that is random, broad and grand in scale and does not give enough attention to its character's stories, most events start serving as plot devices (with more gaps between them than solid grounds) to an ending that looks to be decided by the studio board. Oh and I almost forgot, throwing in 3-D into that blend and in a movie that has a rather-dark color pallet just to sell tickets with a higher price was, as always, more annoying than anything else.
There definitely will be a director's cut release that will give us a more settled version and give the franchise fans much more of what they deserve, but this is a review of the theatrical release, and I have to say, in the end, as good as it is, was rather disappointing.
Letters from Iwo Jima (2006)
The film hits in almost every aspect, except it misses in
the entertainment aspect.
While "Letters from Iwo Jima" is truly a great achievement is several ways, the script is powerful, the production is superb, all the technical departments almost perfected their jobs, there is some really good acting as well, and Eastwood's touch as a director is very visible, and its beautiful, it flaws almost flawlessly in this regard.
Well, what's wrong then? It simply lacks what makes it a really interesting movie. "Letters" starts with a present day scene of excavators digging up remains of the war in Iwo Jima, and finding letters in a cave that were written by Japanese soldiers and officers during the war on Iwo Jima island, it then travels back in time to WWII and story revolves around those whom their letters were found during the dawn of the American invasion on that island. Slowly, the movie loses its grip over its audience, becoming something closer to an audio book, and survival becomes a repetitive process!!!
Everyone seem to be praising the film for being told from the other side, and its true you don't see that many American film makers do that, and although the film didn't just speak Japanese, it lived and breathed Japanese, it couldn't escape the limited framework of Hollywood, this is very visible through the "good" characters, all the good, honest or lovable Japanese characters were either American sympathizers who lived in the US for a while and kept saying how a great nation the US is, or are Japanese people that do not care for the Imperial system and would not mind handing over the island to their rival Americans. On the other hand, all Japanese loyalists were mean American haters. Even the resolution of the strict Imperial soldiers was that the Americans were not as evil as they were told. But still, everyone was very fond of the fact that the movie was told completely from a Japanese point of view. However, just because Eastwood is an American film maker making a Japanese-point-of-view movie, doesn't make the film any better than what it really is, the film's ratings seem to be getting higher just because there is an American film maker behind it and I disagree, it is what it is regardless who the people behind it were.
The film was also highly praised as a companion film to "Flags", and while together they form a great duo, on its own, "Letters" does not achieve greatness.
Why did Eastwood and Spielberg decide to make "Letters from Iwo Jima" this calm instead of making an adrenaline-pumping film? My guess is that they did not care about the average audience and the commercial success as much as they did care for the story's integrity.
Majd Selbi
Spider-Man 3 (2007)
Spider Man 3 SUCKS!!
I don't mean to be rude or anything, actually I was really waiting for this one to come out, when I saw the 1st spider man, I thought it was cool, when I saw the 2nd part, I though it was really great and I really enjoyed it, the effects and the story line were just great. But then comes the 3rd one, a stupid mistake by Sam Raimi and the producers, god and how the different stories of different people are put together, it makes me wanna puke. Simply put, if it was a low budget cartoon show and the 3rd spider man is made as an episode in it, children would think that it is a very stupid episode filling a place. There are many directional flaws in the movie, but they can be lived with, but there are like a 100 flaws in the story, a weird creature falls from the sky onto earth, leaving all the places in the world and falling right beside Peter Parker (talk about irony), a convict that is running away falls in a testing pit for some corporation, turning him into some creature, and then nobody even notices that something went wrong (and then the guy seems to have history with Parker, again, talk about irony), and a cute girl that attends classes with Parker is saved by spider man, she is the daughter of the city's head of police, and the girlfriend of Parker's competitor at work (and again, talk about irony). and many many other stupid moves that cant be tolerated, no offense, but people started to leave the theater before the movie's end.
Simply put, Spider man 3 is an abomination