My Top 5 Movies of 2011 (so far)
Here it is, my top 5 movies of the year of 2011. I may have included a couple of films that technically are from the year before, but I did see them in the Cinema this year, so therefore, they count. I included so far in brackets as I am aware that there are many other great films I still have not seen in 2011 which I will rent on DVD sometime, so the list is subject to change!
5/ Blue Valentine
A very tragic love story, expertly structured. It shows the passionate origins of the portrayed relationship interspersed with the latter part of the relationship on the brink of collapse. It is dramatic, engrossing and brilliantly acted. Ryan Gosling proves himself he is not just the new hollywood pretty boy, but a credible actor of raw talent.
4/ Black Swan
For me, one of the most enjoyable movies of the year. Darren Aronofsky takes on the same theme as his previous film ‘The Wrestler’ and goes further into the dark macchinations of human conciousness. I was blown away!
3/ Melancholia
One of the most spectacular and visually stunning film to come out in recent years, Lars Von Trier makes a compelling and sad tale of the complete destruction of the world without all the global CGI explosions and awful cliches. He simply tells the story from the point of view of 2 sisters and makes something far more interesting than any big budget horseshit!
2/ Buitiful
A powerful and dark film showing the corrupt and ugly side of Barcelona and how harsh and cruel life can be, but underneath all the bad, good things can come. Javier Bardem gives a mesmerising performance which goes head and shoulders above anyone. He was frankly robbed of an oscar, instead losing out to Coling Firth for his performance in the popular and slightly overrated film ‘The Kings Speech’.
1/ The Tree of Life
One of the most memorable Cinematic experiences I have ever had. It was one of those films I was amazed by and was not sure why. A film that will enjoy repeated viewings where I will notice something new with each viewing. It covers so much including the creation of the universe and how Human nature has existed pretty much since the dawn of time. Beautiful!
Other great films which narrowly missed my Top 5
Drive, Midnight in Paris, The Orator, Incendies.
Film Review – Inbetweeners the Movie
After watching the tv series and laughing consistantly through their pathetic attempts at fitting in, impressing women and going on adventures which seem to end in disaster, I pretty much had to watch the movie for closure. I had a feeling it was going to be a rather average movie experience, but it just might be brilliant and a sure fire way to laugh for a couple of hours. What I got was the former, which was not quite as funny as the tv series.
The basic premise involves the same four boys who have just finished school. Simon, the character who is generally respectful towards women but has no clue how to act around them, suffers a bad break up with Carly, a girl he has fancied since he was a kid. And so Simon and his friends decide to go on a lads holiday together to Malia for 2 weeks of the usual sun, booze and sex! When they get there, Simon discovers that Carly has gone to the same destination, which his not-so-bright mate Neil neglected to tell him. They do the usual thing on a lads holiday like meet a group of girls and get themselves into many amusing and crass situations which test their friendship and themselves as they go through their right of passage into adulthood.
I related to the film in many ways as I myself have been to a couple of destinations where annoying British tourists flock in their thousands to act like idiots in a foriegn country and do the same things they do in their hometown only in a a hot climate. Many scenes reminded me of being in Tenerife. Groups of lads wearing the same offensive t shirts, flirtatious reps luring you into a bar where they work for comission, football fans singing at the back of the bus, run down hotels which look better on the travel brochure….all the cliches which were quite accurate. A key hilarious scen is when the four boys get up and dance in an empty bar. It reminded me of my formative years when me and my friends would frequently take to the dance floor, knowing that we all had two left feet and clearly couldn’t dance. We possibly looked just as ridiculous as the main characters, and that alone made me cringe!
While some scenes did make me laugh quite often, I found some of the humour a bit too crass. Most jokes seemed to stick to vomit, nudity and poo gags for easy laughs. There was a bit of heart in the story, but there could have been more. I found the ending came suddenly, and while the story was rapped up, it did seem a bit of an anticlimax. Having said that, I do realise it is a difficult task to make a movie that matches the quality of the tv series it is based on. It was a good effort, but not an excellent one.
***
Film Review – The Trip
Days after watching this film, I found out this was a TV series made by Michael Winterbottom which clocked up to 180 minutes. This film is basically an edited version of the TV series which lasted 107 minutes and I’m glad to say it really did work.
Michael Winterbottom continues his diverse career aftet the sadistic and mysogynistic ‘The Killer Inside Me.’ Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon star in the third Michael Winterbottom movie together after ’24 Hour Party People’ and Cock and Bull Story.’ In past movies, their mainly improvised dialogue and constant witty berating of each other has worked so well that this time, they spend the whole movie together. Playing themselves again, the comedians take a road trip and across the lake district and stopping in classy restaurants to review the gourmet food for the Observer. Most of the time, they do not pay much attention to the food and instead try and outdo each other in regard to how accurate their impressions of actors like Michael Caine, Al Pacino and Anthony Hopkins.
I was expecting it to be very witty and funny, which it was, but what I was not expecting was the depth of the characters and the underlying sadness in Steve Coogans character. In between the constant competition of impressions, there seems to be many insecurities with Steve Coogan which is subtly addressed. He seems to be the type of guy who has had a successful career with his many comedy characters and movies, but he is not entirely satisfied and wants more. He is hailed as a comic genius but is lonely and has relationship issues. Rob Brydon is the less successful comedian, because he is a man who started doing impressions, and that is pretty much what he has been known for throughout his career. He posesses a positive outlook and a happy homelife as a father and husband, something which Steve Coogan does not have. Aside from all that, Rob Brydon is the more annoying character.
There is a scene that illustrates these characteristics brilliantly. Rob Brydon is walking across a bridge and Steve Coogan attempts to walk across the stepping stones. This is a metaphor for Robs choice of security of his career and home life. Steve Coogan chose the more dangerous route of raising the bar of British comedy and failed relationships in which he ends up falling in the water which I think, signifies his failing career and his increasing discontent.
What really makes the film work as afore mentioned is the pairing of Rob Brydon and Steve Coogan. Their improvised dialogue and general interaction is very witty at times and their relationship as close friends, so close that they want to kill each other is very convincing. The only flaw is that there are too many segments in the film with both characters doing impressions, but apart from that, generally hilarious and rather sad. May they do more work together!
Film Review – Crazy, Stupid Love
A TALENTED CAST GONE TO WASTE
Predictable romantic comedies continue to spew their formulaic drivel far too often, and for some reason, hordes of people continue to flock to the cinemas to watch the same cliche characters going through the same predictable story over and over again. Do people really want to punish themselves that much? This film is a little different though. This time, there is no Katherine Heigl or the universally talentless Ashton Kutcher in sight, instead opting for a more talented cast including Ryan Gosling, who has been proving himself lately to be a credible actor, Marisa Tomei, Julianne Moore and Kevin Bacon. Given the roles these actors have played recently (maybe not so much for Kevin Bacon), you can’t help thinking that these actors deserve better. After watching Ryan Gosling’s extraordinary performance in Blue Valentine and then watching play the ultra smooth and womanising Jacob Palmer hanging around the same pretentious bar using his confidence and cliche pick up lines to sleep with as many woman as possible is quite disappointing to watch. While hanging around this bar which seems to be every night, he takes Carl Weaver (Steve Carrell), a man recently seperated from his wife Emily (a forgettable performance by Julianne Moore) under his wing and decides to help him get his confidence back. This involves going to shopping malls to buy designer clothes, lots of slow motion shots of Ryan Gosling with his perfect designer stubble and not a hair out of place, and more hanging around the same bar every night to pick up women. Where do they find the time and stamina?
Steve Carrell does his normal schtick as Mr Awkward making a fool of himself while attempting to pick up women. He really wants to get back to his wife, but meets Kate (Marisa Tomei), who he ends up having a one night stand with. She serves as merely a plot device of acting like a neurotic bitch for cheap laughs and openly telling Cal’s wife that they slept together, therefore temporarily jeopordising any hope of getting back together with Emily. Marisa Tomei, you can do better than that!
Another thing which makes this film slightly different is that it is not quite as predictable as other predictable romantic comedies. The second half of the film improves greatly after a slow first hour. A lot of that is to do with Emma Stone, a fresh face who somehow outshines the talented cast in this movie. Her character is the most likeable and she starts to expose the flaws of Jacob Palmer when he unexpectantly and instantly falls in love with her. She is not submissive and has a lot more self respect compared to the women that Jacob is used to bedding and there is belivable chemistry when they get together. What follows is a twist which I shall not spoil, but it certainly took me by surprise. I have a feeling we’ll see a lot more of Emma Stone in forthcoming romantic comedies!
So not all is bad here, it could have been a lot better and maybe a lot funnier.
Film Review – The Tree of Life
A Philisophical Meditation on Nature, Grace and the Origins of the Universe. (Contains Spoilers)
Sometimes, a movie really does require a second viewing to truelly take in from what I found in the first viewing to be a intensely heavy going. When I first saw ‘The Tree of Life’ at the Civic Theatre as part of the Auckland film festival, I felt bombarded with such lofty metaphysical concepts which stretched far beyond what my limited craniul capacity can handle, to the point were I could not decide what to make of it. Visually, I could not tear my eyes away from the screen as I was so mesmerised and immersed in image after image of intense beauty. I came out of the theatre with a thought of how this was one of the most unique cinematic experiences along with David Lynch’s last two features, ‘Mulholland Drive’ and ‘INLAND EMPIRE.’
When I screened the movie at Waiheke Community Cinema, I started to make more sense of what visionary Director Terence Malick was trying to say. I could be completely out of my depth here, but this is what the movie means to me personally, which I can imagine is what is intended and encouraged by the Director.
The central theme to this film is what is said at the start of the movie by the mother of the central family (the O Briens) played by Jessica Chastain. She gives a brief explanation through voice over of the Universal dichotomy of Nature and Grace. What I get from this central philosophy is a metaphor of the Mother and Father’s outlook on life. Nature, I find, refers to the Father, Mr O Brien (wonderfully played by Brad Pitt) who seems to have a more ‘rational’ approach to life. He sees his fellow human beings as mere obstacles or competitors, people to please or who’s expectations are to be met. He has a more stern approach in comparison to the mother when it comes to raising his children. There are some scenes where he tries his best to express his feelings of love, which leads to painting him as a loving father with inner conflicts of his own, perhaps handed down from his Father!
Grace refers to the Mother, Mrs O Brien, who seems to have a more caring and gentle approach to her children and looks lovingly at the nature and people around her, showing unconditional love for all creation. She says herself that love and forgiveness are the main components to true happiness. This is seen as generally a more naive view even to this day, and the Mr O Brien clearly expresses this to his children.
This dichotomy is taken to the extreme limit as it not only shows how it deeply affects the central character Jack (played by Sean Penn and Hunter McCracken as the younger Jack), but how it has existed since the dawn of time. We see Sean Penn in his spacious, postmodern apartment looking rather morose. You can tell by his apartment that he has taken his fathers life lessons by working hard on his career to the point of being able to afford such a high standard of living. He seems distant from his wife which suggests an unhappy marraige or they simply do not have much time together as she looks like she has a high flying career also. The unhappiness of Jack is most likely to be caused by a multitude of problems, mainly the death of his brother which still haunts him. Also his career which seems to lack meaning. This is shown through shots of eloborate office buildings which shows the greed of the corporotists that he serves on a daily basis. It shows imprisonment and repitition in comparison to the freedom with surrounding beauty experience in his childhood. Also, lets not forget the issues with his father who we see him speaking to over the phone for the first time probably since the death of his brother. He is searching for something, most likely inner peace and happiness which can be found through forgiveness and unconditional love as aforementioned.
From a structural standpoint, the movie does not really have any. The films main bodyconsists of many short scenes Jacks intimate moments with his younger brother who died and his parents. The diologue is very minimal, subtituted with imigary and symbolism telling the majority of the story. All of this is shot beautifully by by Emmanuel Lubezki and edited seemlessly along with grandiose music which adds to loftiness of the concepts it is portraying. He shows nature as a benevolent and powerful force as to which we have a strong connection to. We see many shots of a tree in the O Brien family’s garden with the sun shining through which reminds us of the creation of all nature. Between the main body of the film and after we find out about the death of the son near the beginning of the film, we get to witness the origins of the Universe. We see how beauty is created by destruction and we see Nature and Grace apply itself to the first living mammals. A sea creature crawls out of the ocean badly wounded by the predators that dominate the ocean. This represents Mrs O Brien who I see as the gentle and loving being in a world increasingly dominated by predators. After that, we see an injured dinosaur lying next to a river. A larger more dominant carnivor approaches it and starts holding its head down. He then looks at the injured herbivor with sympathy and walks off. For me this represents the inner conflict of the father who’s belief in iron will and oneupmanship is the way to survive, but is a loving person inside at the same time. The negative aspects of his personallity were most likely drummed into him by his Father and this very subtly hints how this has been happening for generations and other species.
After all the family drama in relation to the origins of the universe in the final moments of the movie, we see Sean Penn wondering through a doorway to a picturesque, idyllic beach where he sees his family as they were in the 50′s (including himself). I think that this is going deep into the imagination of Jack who is in search for closure. We see him reunited with his family and adopting his mothers approach on life of forgiveness and acceptance. I think it is in a profound Christian sense as it is something that is often taught in Christianity. He sees his mother looking into the heavens and saying ‘I give my son to you.’ What she means by the word ‘you’ is God, which is all creation, which is all the grass and trees which the camera reveres and admires, it is what drove the origins of the universe and created all these sentient beings with such endless potential to create and explore. At this moment, Jack lets go of all the hurt, the hate and the sorrow he has felt for all those years and finally cracks a smile.
What Terence Malick has achieved here is something extraordinary and ambitious. He has recreated his own childhood, thus making it a deeply personal film as well. For me it has paid off to a tremendous effect to me personally. It is a film that has and will keep playing on my mind in the years to come. From reading so many diverse reviews and speaking to other people who have seen ‘The Tree of Life’ it seems to be one of those films that will be equally loved and hated. But that is their prerogative. I challenge the haters to find a film which explores such lofty concepts so beautifully, as I cenrtainly struggle to think of one.
