Flipside Movie Emporium

Monkeypox · Posted: 11.18.2006 10:30 am Post subject:

Lucky Number Slevin - C+. Am I getting smarter? Is the world getting dumber? I swear to Jeebus, I don't even have to try anymore. In fact, see my review for "The Prestige." Same fundamental problems. The only difference is that that film had other things going on than just mechanical plottery.

Now, to be completely fair, this was a fun movie. The dialogue might be stylized in that "oh so clever" way, but they've put together the perfect cast make it work, and they perform admirably. This is a DVD I would buy. And then I wouldn't unwrap it. And then I'd wonder why I bought it. And then I'd give it to a family member for Christmas when I'm broke.
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Danny Baldwin · Posted: 11.24.2006 5:21 pm Post subject:

11/17-11/23

In preferential order:

Volver (Almodovar, 2006)

Casino Royale (Campbell, 2006)

Flushed Away (Bowers, Fell; 2006)

Art School Confidential (Zwigoff, 2006)

Volver is Almodovar's best film and may be my favorite of the year. I was dead set on Helen Mirren for the Oscar, but now that I've seen Penelope Cruz' work, I'm not so sure.

Forget The Departed when it comes to grand entertainments for the adult crowd; the new Bond film is as stylish, gritty, and intense as a Bond film has ever been.

And as much as I love Terry Zwigoff, Art School Confidential is a stale, rusty failure at best.
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xAndyx · Posted: 11.28.2006 2:57 am Post subject:

In preferential order:

Casino Royale

Lucky Number Sleven

Tristan & Isolde

United 93

Syriana
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One day you will look behind you and you will see we three, and on that day, you will repent, and we will send you to whatever god you wish.

-The Boondock Saints

Danny Baldwin · Posted: 11.28.2006 3:01 am Post subject:

xAndyx · Posted: 11.28.2006 7:43 pm Post subject:

Yes I did. I actually enjoyed all of them pretty equally other than Syriana. I wanted to like it, I tried to force myself into thinking I did, but in my opinion the movies great message is lost in poor delivery.

I also forgot to add that I saw Tenacious D and The Pick of Destiny. It was a fun movie, but nothing great.
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One day you will look behind you and you will see we three, and on that day, you will repent, and we will send you to whatever god you wish.

-The Boondock Saints

Michael Scrutchin · Posted: 11.28.2006 10:14 pm Post subject:

Danny Baldwin · Posted: 11.28.2006 11:27 pm Post subject:

Danny Baldwin · Posted: 11.30.2006 2:24 am Post subject:

Today:

Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus (Shainberg, 2006)

I suppose it's okay when viewed as a low-budget experimentalist piece about repressed eroticism in the 1950's, but I give it my fullest recommendation if your crowd is anything like mine. Twenty women over the age of seventy attended this weekday matinee and their gasps reflected that the unafraid imagery of independent-filmmaking may just have scarred them for life.
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Danny Baldwin

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beltmann · Posted: 11.30.2006 2:56 am Post subject:

Danny Baldwin · Posted: 11.30.2006 3:18 am Post subject:

Well, given the reaction of the crowd, maybe it is a good thing only us film geeks know about the Michael Hanekes or the Gaspar Noes. Heart-attacks might become more common.
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Danny Baldwin

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Monkeypox · Posted: 11.30.2006 6:13 am Post subject:

beltmann · Posted: 11.30.2006 10:45 pm Post subject:

xAndyx · Posted: 12.03.2006 10:51 pm Post subject:

I saw Borat this week. I did enjoy it, but I thought it would be better. Either way, there are moments I will never forget...although I want to with every atom of my being.
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One day you will look behind you and you will see we three, and on that day, you will repent, and we will send you to whatever god you wish.

-The Boondock Saints

Danny Baldwin · Posted: 12.04.2006 1:52 am Post subject:

In addition to earlier this week's Fur, I caught:

Babel (Inarritu, 2006)

Little Children (Field, 2006)

The former had a projection failure with a mere three minutes left in the movie, so I didn't feel too bad (as I usually would) about obtaining a, well, illegitamite copy to watch the small portion that Regal Cinemas prohibited me from seeing. That said, even after viewing it, I can't help but feel as though I have some unconfronted malice towards the movie due to its very melodic flow being ruined so late in the game. I still enoyed the film, but I do think that the Gael Garcia Bernal/Elle Fanning/etc. thread is highly exploitational and prevents the whole from ever reaching a degree of mastery.

The latter, on the other hand, is thoroughly masterful and one of my favorite pictures of the year. Leave it to Todd Field to give us an unflinching look at suburbia, a rare insight that dwarfs all other indies of the sort that we regularly call "perceptive". The film almost functions simply by conjuring up memories of identfiable sounds and settings: gossiping mothers on playgrounds, warped media pedophilia scandals, and early mid-life crises hindering distressed parenthoods. Kate Winslet and Patrick Wilson aren't exactly the most likable pair of the year, but I connected with them far more in these roles than most other performers this year. And even so, despite said connection, there's a lingering sense of removal driven by the third-person voice-over that piles onto the tragedy that makes it all feel fatefully heartwrenching. It's brilliant.
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Danny Baldwin

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Danny Baldwin · Posted: 12.12.2006 2:02 am Post subject:

12/5 - 12/11

In preferential order:

Bobby (Estevez, 2006)

Tenacious D in: The Pick of Destiny (Lynch, 2006)

Idlewild (Barber, 2006)

Pulse (Sonzero, 2006)

Bobby is kind of pick-and-choose buffet from Emilio Estevez, which both works in its favor and against it. I didn't much get out of the older characters' stories--save for that of brilliant-as-always Anthony Hopkins, whose gaze after discovering of Kennedy's assassination is incredible in and of itself--but the younger cast did resonate with me. Whether this is because of my ability to identify with the younger characters or simply because they embody better-written stories, I dunno. Either way, it offers an absorbing, Altmanesque potpourri of personalities which Estevez manages honorably (even though his approach lacks subtlety in certain cases). I dug it.

Jack Black and Kyle Gass may just be the greatest self-indulgent pair of geniuses the New Millenium has thus far witnessed, but their latest project is so bogged down in bawdy, low-brow humor designed to draw in The Teenagers that it lacks much of a punch.

And don't even get me started on Pulse. Uwe Boll routinely displays more coherancy.
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Danny Baldwin

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