Green Zone

Green Zone doesn't move out of the broad "Iraq war film and not much else" category that is taking up a huge niche in American filmmaking right now. It's a very serviceable war film, albeit one that drags on too long, and sometimes sacrifices interesting implications for ones that carry more metaphorical weight. It's one of the more anti-war films I've seen lately, but that gets muddled by a sort of suspense plot that paradoxically is less interesting, and in the end, it doesn't make much of an impression in the huge canon it has fallen into.

2.5/5

Gummo

I'm going to show my stodgy side, but any film that takes a long time focusing on killing cats to make a quick buck is not going to be my kind of film. Neither will a film focusing on prostituting a mentally disabled girl, on killing a woman on life support, on the lack of morals or control in a town burdened with tragedy and idiocy. I was often interested in Gummo, but a lot of that interest was disgust.

1/5

Once

I appreciate Once's absolute refusal of many of the romantic tropes it could have easily fallen into, but in sacrificing that, and yet still remaining somewhat sentimental, Once loses both the romance and the edge it could have contained. Once sacrifices the romance but not the sentimentality, and as a result, it is somewhat muddled as an effort.

2.5/5

The Hurt Locker

Hurt Locker is rendered in a world of beige, taupe and tan, a world that seems washed out, which works wonderfully with its narrative. In this bleached world, slow moving and then frenetic with motion, every action has extreme importance, except when it doesn't. My favourite moment, a moment in a grocery store washed in brilliant colours, shows how out of place soldiers are in that world, busy with nothing meaningful, and this moment serves as an allegory for what is an extremely rich study of monotony and danger, often at the same time.

4/5

The Far Side of the Moon

This was a joy to watch, written by, directed by, and starring Robert Lepage, who I am now in love with, unfortunately, since it seems like it’s going to be difficult to get my hands on his works. It’s a fairly typical story of failure and fraught family relations, but Lepage imbues it with such humour and such a deft hand that there is something in it that always strikes the viewer as absolutely original.

5/5

Rachel Getting Married

I have a really problem watching people embarrass themselves, which made Rachel Getting Married the rough equivalent of a horror film to me at times. Despite that, it’s a great film, certainly a retread of other indie “the addict/eccentric comes and ruins everything” films, of which I can name many. However, it’s a well done version of that cliché, and Anne Hathaway really was fantastic in it.

3.5/5

9

I could have guessed pretty much every single plot point of this film far before they occurred, but that wasn’t really the point of this film. The plot was a typical kid’s adventure sort of thing, with a darker edge, but it’s the animation you should watch it for. It’s a staggeringly beautiful dystopia, with such attention given to the landscape that it’s worth it just to watch that.

3.5/5

Shutter Island

I had such high hopes for this. Adapted from a novel by Dennis Lehane, whose “ “ I loved, and directed by Martin Scorsese, who I generally enjoy. I am not the best at guessing twists, which is great, actually, so when I say that I guessed the twist, then discarded that option as too obvious, that I am saying that this film has possibly the most obvious twist in the entire world. And that greatly hindered my general enjoyment of the film.

2/5

Crash

This certanly isn't the generic, shallow 2005 Haggis "Racism is bad" film. Cronenberg has always been absolutely obsessed with technology, and this manifests itself not in the sexiness of ars, or sex in cars, which is generally accepted, especially in Hollywood, but in the fetishization of car crashes. This leads to a lot of gratuitious imagery, particularly involving scars and wounds. I had a lot of strong reactions to the imagery (primarily disgust and repulsion, particularly because I'm squeamish), however, I was mostly bored. Cronenberg created a lot of controversy over his imagery, but thematically, this isn't all that interesting.

1/5

The Hanging Garden

This is a prime example of over the top Canadian melodrama, where you can hardly hear dialogue over overlapping shouting. The supernatural elements are fairly confusing and add little to what is a pretty typical Irish--specifically Cape Breton Irish--family drama. The characters are not particularly believable, nor are any motivations particularly believable themselves. This film adds little to a very common Canadian genre.

1/5

Sherlock Holmes

I have always associated Guy Ritchie with gritty films. And while the mis-en-scene was there, regardless of a downright silly Naziesque get-up for the--Pre-Nazi--villian, the way the film was carried out was downright silly. Gratuitious slow-motion, expensive fight scenes that fail to compell, and a boring case don't do Jude Law and Robert Downey Jr any favours, despite their effortless rapport with one another. Sadly forgettable.

2/5

Up in the Air

This was well done, if a little empty. The humour is well executed, cameos are funny, Clooney is, as always, a likeable rogue, and I was pleased they did not end with the easy, annoying happy ending. But, like Reitman's Thank You For Smoking and Juno, there isn't much substance under the surface.

3/5

Dead Snow

I hate horror films. I’m a wimp, I’ll admit it, but Dead Snow, a campy film about zombie Nazis, didn’t scare me. It made me laugh quite a bit and compare it to Evil Dead, but it didn’t scare me. And in the end, despite the fact I was dreading being scared, I was a little disappointed that it didn’t deliver.

2/5

Naked

Lord I dislike this film. We begin with sexual assault in an alley-way, and discover, within minutes, that the one committing this act is, hey, our protagonist! And we’re supposed to sympathize with him! Save it. I found almost every single character inhabiting this film intolerable, and while much of that was purposeful, I believe I was supposed to find small grains of empathy, or at least tolerance, for them. Well, I didn’t.

1/5

I am Curious (Yellow)

I wasn’t expecting to like this; it’s an extremely political film, to the point of bordering on manifesto, and centres on a supremely obnoxious character. And yet, I did like it. I really did. Reality and film blends, person and character blends, and it’s such an intelligent, but delightful romp, that I really couldn’t help enjoying it.

4/5

Surviving Desire

I’m unsure if this was adapted from a play, because if it wasn’t, it should certainly be revised and performed theatrically. The entire thing smacked of theatre, down to overblown gestures that would have been much more acceptable on a stage. While I understand that this was a purposeful move by the director, it was still jarring, and the slim amount of plot was not enough to carry the hour long short film. There were inspired moments, but that too was not enough to sustain this.

2.5/5

Death at a Funeral

If this was a Hollywood film, it would be awful. The script is certainly not the strong point. What is, is the British sensibility that permeates the film. There are some very strong performances, Alan Tudyk's springing to mind, but really, at its heart, this is just a slightly dark, very British comedy.

3/5

Waking Life

Apparently, Waking Life was very well received. I really don't understand it. Waking Life is a mess of extremely pretentious monologues, seemingly only held together by the filmmaker's desire to show off. Obstensibly, it's held together by rhetoric involving dreams, but really, it only hangs together in the loosest sense, and bores the shit out of the audience before finally reaching its point. Masturbatory cinema at its worst.

1/5

Die Welle

German films tend to be hit or miss for me; that is to say, I cannot think of a single German film I have been ambivalent or apathetic about. I love them or hate them, with little room between. I am lucky, then, that this would be one of the films to love.

Die Welle (or, in English, The Wave), explores autocracy (and not necessarily Third Reich autocracy, though that is certainly a shadow over the film) in a high school context, which works marvellously, without simplifying the issue. Instead, the subject is handled deftly, with loaded dialogue, and even more so loaded concepts.

Die Welle doesn't buckle under the pressure of the concepts it explores, and while occasionally the film seems a little obvious, a little heavy-handed, that is likely because we, as a society, have spent so much time discussing these issues. That doesn't make Die Welle less important; in fact, its fresh take on the issue is perhaps even more important in light of the ham-fisted efforts that precede it.

4/5

9 Songs

While 9 Songs works more as a work of eroticism than say, Salo, as a film, it consistently falls short. The few mentions of a world outside of the relationship of the leads, specifically, the sexual relationship, is rarely mentioned, and when it is, it feels out of place, added for no discernable reason. There is supposed to be some relevance that one lead studies Antarctic ice; if there is, it is out of my grip. Such analogous moments only make the film appear pretentious, not fleshed out.

The nine songs the film is named for have no bearing on the events. If the songs connected thematically, there would be a reason for their appearance, but instead it is concert footage for, again, no discernable reason. If this film had shucked its pretensions and merely existed as an erotic work, it would certainly more easily succeed, as the material is far more erotic than the standard porn film. However, as an actual film in general, it falls very much short of the mark.

2/5