What movies did you see last week? (12/31-1/6)
Jan 7, 2019 17:24:27 GMT
Johnny_Hellzapoppin likes this
Post by Martin Stett on Jan 7, 2019 17:24:27 GMT
Oldboy (2003) -- I expected a morally bankrupt torture like I Saw the Devil, but Park packs this with weirdness and tenderness, focusing not on the violence, but on the characters at its heart. Not saying that it's deep or anything, just that the characters are sympathetic enough that the indulgent screwiness of it all doesn't alienate. 7/10
A Prayer Before Dawn (2017) -- I don't like this new trend in "YOU ARE IN THE EXPERIENCE" filmmaking. I mean movies like Son of Saul, You Were Never Really Here or Dunkirk: stuff that tries to get you inside of the characters' minds by using tricks to make you "experience" exactly what the characters are seeing and feeling. APBD is probably the best of this trend at the moment: it uses the sound mixing and the lack of English to get inside the experience of Billy's descent into hell very effectively... but it also has a script. A fairly rote and cliche one when we get down to it, but that's better than just watching Geza Rohrig or Joaquin Phoenix walking around looking anguished for a whole movie. It marries the traditional sports drama and addiction drama with the newfangled "experiential" cinema, and for the most part it works. 6/10
First Reformed (2017) -- This movie isn't about faith or religion. It's about a self-centered prick that throws a tantrum if he doesn't get his way all the time. And that self-centered prick seems to be a stand-in for the writer, who thinks that this man is the hero of the story instead of a whiny little bitch. 3/10
Stalker (1979 rewatch) -- Now THIS is a movie about faith. First thing I want to say is that the plot allows the story to have an endpoint it is working towards, and that is a lifesaver for something as long and slow as this; other long movies meander about and I lose interest because they don't seem to be going anywhere. In this case, the characters are literally walking their way towards a goal. But more importantly, this goal is only used for keeping a forward momentum to the story: it is really about these three men and their differing ideologies when faced with what the Room can bring. Faith, Reason, Emotion, all of them being forced to face these things in the face of having their wishes granted. I'm not going to get into how stunning this whole thing looks, that's just cheating. 9/10, which is up from my first watch... and it may go up yet. This movie keeps offering more the more I look at it.
Apostasy (2017) -- Hey Schrader! Here's another one for you! This is how you do a movie about religion, folks: you make it about people and their god, and what happens when it seems that their god abandons them. The three women at the heart of this are not bad people: they're good people tortured by their guilt and their fear and their love for each other, questioning God's commands when he tells them to abandon the love that he gave them. It is fading a tiny little bit in the past fifteen hours or so, but it's still quite a movie. 8/10
A Prayer Before Dawn (2017) -- I don't like this new trend in "YOU ARE IN THE EXPERIENCE" filmmaking. I mean movies like Son of Saul, You Were Never Really Here or Dunkirk: stuff that tries to get you inside of the characters' minds by using tricks to make you "experience" exactly what the characters are seeing and feeling. APBD is probably the best of this trend at the moment: it uses the sound mixing and the lack of English to get inside the experience of Billy's descent into hell very effectively... but it also has a script. A fairly rote and cliche one when we get down to it, but that's better than just watching Geza Rohrig or Joaquin Phoenix walking around looking anguished for a whole movie. It marries the traditional sports drama and addiction drama with the newfangled "experiential" cinema, and for the most part it works. 6/10
First Reformed (2017) -- This movie isn't about faith or religion. It's about a self-centered prick that throws a tantrum if he doesn't get his way all the time. And that self-centered prick seems to be a stand-in for the writer, who thinks that this man is the hero of the story instead of a whiny little bitch. 3/10
Stalker (1979 rewatch) -- Now THIS is a movie about faith. First thing I want to say is that the plot allows the story to have an endpoint it is working towards, and that is a lifesaver for something as long and slow as this; other long movies meander about and I lose interest because they don't seem to be going anywhere. In this case, the characters are literally walking their way towards a goal. But more importantly, this goal is only used for keeping a forward momentum to the story: it is really about these three men and their differing ideologies when faced with what the Room can bring. Faith, Reason, Emotion, all of them being forced to face these things in the face of having their wishes granted. I'm not going to get into how stunning this whole thing looks, that's just cheating. 9/10, which is up from my first watch... and it may go up yet. This movie keeps offering more the more I look at it.
Apostasy (2017) -- Hey Schrader! Here's another one for you! This is how you do a movie about religion, folks: you make it about people and their god, and what happens when it seems that their god abandons them. The three women at the heart of this are not bad people: they're good people tortured by their guilt and their fear and their love for each other, questioning God's commands when he tells them to abandon the love that he gave them. It is fading a tiny little bit in the past fifteen hours or so, but it's still quite a movie. 8/10
