January Wrap-Up and February Look Ahead

This is something I have decided to do and I will do it at the end of every month.

So, January. Normally January and February are throw away months, where studios toss out movies they don't anticipate making much money. However, there was an incredible flux of December independents and movies that made Oscar runs early that came out in January which lended to a month of incredible quality. I'm also lucky the Wexner Center chose to play The Aura. But being able to see Children of Men, Little Children, Pan's Labyrinth, The Aura, Smokin' Aces, and Notes on a Scandal among so many others is awesome. Sure, I probably saw TOO many movies this month, and it was overwhelming, but the only one that I rated low was We Are Marshall, and even that wasn't awful. Of course, I only saw two movies that were actual 2007 releases this month, those being Alpha Dog and Smokin' Aces, so the quality of this month doesn't say much for the quality of 2007, though both Dog and Aces were pretty good movies. I'll review them here in the coming days. But yeah, it was a good month.

And now for February.
This upcoming month, there isn't as much coming out that interests me. I still am going to see Letters from Iwo Jima, the Academy Award contender. There is also The Good German, a post WW2 era mystery, filmed in black and white, and starring George Clooney, Cate Blanchett, and Tobey Maguire.

There are three larger studio releases that I think could either be very enjoyable and very bad, those being Ghost Rider, Breach, and The Number 23.

I am just hoping Ghost Rider is fun, like Constantine. I really dug Constantine, it wasn't amazing, but it was an effective dark comic book movie. Then again, I don't think Nic Cage is Keanu Reeves, who was a superb Constantine. Nic Cage just seems cheesy as the Ghost Rider, but Sam Elliot is one of the main reasons I am going to see it. I think there are three different times in the trailer where somebodies' face becomes transluscent so you can see their fangs underneath, which, as a note to the editors of the trailers, is not scary.

Breach is starring Ryan Phillippe, Laura Linney, and Chris Cooper is about an FBI agent that is possibly selling American secrets to the Soviets, and a new agent needs to investigate him. It looks good, but we'll see.

And then Number 23, starring Jim Carrey and Virginia Madsen, about a guy that discovers that the number 23 is everywhere, and thus goes insane. I don't much care what movies are rated, but the preview screamed PG13 at me, and it was rated R so that's interesting. I heard a rumor that after seeing a screening of this movie, Carrey fired his agent, so that's not good. Joel Schumacher is directing.

Finally, we have two indies that might not even come to Columbus.

Seraphim Falls I don't think is going to but I'll hold out hope. It stars Liam Neeson and Pierce Brosnan as two men with a blood vendetta against one another during the Civil War. The former goes chasing after the latter in the West. I like westerns.

Breaking and Entering, starring Jude Law and Juliette Binoche, is another adultery thriller, but I've read some pretty good things about it. I have a good feeling this will make it here.

So yeah, only six, maybe seven movies this month. March picks back up, but I will welcome this break. See you soon with my reviews of Alpha Dog and Smokin' Aces.

Pan's Labyrinth (8 out of 10)

Pan's Labyrinth, by acclaimed director Guillermo Del Toro, is a Spanish film set during the Spanish Civil War. Ofelia, a young girl, and her mother are moving to a villa in the forest to stay with her mother's new husband, Captain Vidal, an officer of the Fascist army. The Fascists are battling the Resistance in these very woods. Ofelia finds out she is the reborn princess of a king and must complete three tasks in order to be taken back to her kingdom.

If that sounds like a lot, it's because it is. For the first half of the movie, a number of different plotlines are threaded together, and it feels garbled. You can easily tell what each thread has to do with one another, but there is no real cohesion. Rather, it feels TOO epic. You are seeing the lives of about a dozen different characters and it can become overwhelming. One thing you need to realize is that this movie is not what the preview makes it look like. It's not 100 percent "adult fairy tale". That makes up a small fraction of this film. In fact, it is more a war drama than adult fairy tale. But the reason I start with this is that I just wanted to get out of the way the reason I didn't absolutely adore this movie like so many others have. For the first half, there was just so much going on and I was having trouble getting adjusted to any single thread.

Eventually, things start coming together, and while the pace quickens and the plot thickens, it became a lot easier to become absorbed into the movie. On a technical and artistic level, this movie is beautiful. The colors are dream-like, and the design of the entire film is amazing. The fantasy portions are in a league of their own, I don't think I can name anything that has the beauty and originality displayed here. There is a bit of gore, so if the presence of the fantasy element makes you think it is childish, think again. It's definitely deserving of it's R rating.

In the end, I really ended up liking this movie a lot. It is as well told a story as they come, and it is at once happy and unbelievably tragic. The ending gave me chills for days after. All of the characters are thought out and interesting. The protagonists and antagonists are so well drawn and convincing in their roles, adding to an already impressive wartime landscape.

Mini DVD Review- The Architect (3 out of 10)

So I rented The Architect, a film starring Anthony LaPaglia as the titular character and Isabella Rossellini as his wife namely. It is a densely layered story, telling about the problems each member of LaPaglia's family is having, as well as the primary conflict wherein an activist is trying to get LaPaglia to sign a petition to knock down some apartments he designed. There are also some plots following denizens of the aforementioned apartment buildings. And this is an 82 minute film. So each plotline is really only covered rather shallowly.

I never really got into this movie, no matter how interested I tried to be in it. LaPaglia's two children both are having sexual problems, and like I said before, you never really understand why. I swear, the director just wanted to be edgy, but there is no explanation, no real substance. The daughter, played by Hayden Panettiere (the cheerleader from Heroes), developed at an early age and thus wants to be loved by a truck driver? Point A does not logically go to Point B right there.

Unfortunately for Isabella Rossellini, it is hard to tell her apart from Anthony LaPaglia. They have the same hair-do and body build and facial structure. Her character is also insane and I got the vibe that she was supposed to be like Juliette Binoche's character from Bee Season, but again, much less fleshed out.

There really is no humor in the movie, but the score makes this film seem like some happy-go-lucky family comedy with the way it marches happily along. It also sounds like a cheap Midi file at times.

The movie covers gentrification in a very interesting way, but it is often overshadowed by the melodrama that this movie wallows in.

The Architect ends strong, with a couple very good scenes, but it does nothing to save this boring, tepid affair.

The Painted Veil (7 out of 10) and other stuff

First, the other stuff. We have Oscar Nominations just released, and Sundance Film Festival is currently going on (actually close to over with) in Park City, Utah. I am so happy Dreamgirls did not get nominated for best film, maybe the Academy is getting over their love affair with musicals. I am going to see Letters from Iwo Jima soon, and after that, I will have seen four of the five best picture nominees. I'm not going to see The Queen because I can fall asleep on my own, don't need a sedative. After I see LFIJ, I can better determine who I think should win, but as of right now I'm pulling for Departed, and wouldn't mind seeing Babel win, but Little Miss Sunshine, while a fun movie, is nowhere near an Academy Award worthy film. And Abigail Breslin one of the top five female performances of the year? Not at all. I mean, I liked the movie, it deserves its screenplay nomination and Alan Arkin deserves his nomination, but come on.

Pan's Labyrinth got six nominations, so that's amazing, and I'll be rooting for Children of Men to win cinematography and film editing.

For anyone that saw Click, maybe you can explain to me how it got nominated for Best Makeup, because I really need to know.

I thought Leo DiCaprio should've been nominated for Departed instead of Blood Diamond and that Jack Nicholson should've been nominated over Mark Wahlberg for Departed.

Forrest Whitaker, Helen Mirren, and Jennifer Hudson are all pretty much locks to win from what I've read.

I haven't seen any of the docs except for Jesus Camp, so I will root for that one because I loved it.

Otherwise, with the exception of Ellen Degeneres hosting, it should be fun, I love the Oscars, it's on February 25th at 8 pm, on ABC I believe but don't hold me to that.

So now for my Painted Veil review.

The Painted Veil stars Edward Norton as a doctor working in China, and Naomi Watts as his wife. The two marry early in the film, but Watts does it not out of love, but only to get away from her awful parents. It isn't long before Watts is being an adultress, and Norton finds out. He tells her to either go to a cholera outbreak in a small village, or be divorced which would be both embarassing and social-life ending for Watts. So she chooses the former and off they go to fall back in love.

This movie could easily have suffered from being standard fare, but it is saved by the performances of Norton and Watts. Norton is very formal, but shows a lot of emotion for playing the stiff doctor, and Watts is wonderful. The movie often looks as if it's going to go off the tracks and become mired in cliche, but it narrowly avoids this. Frequently there are moments when the two begin falling back in love that I've seen so often before and are so sappy, like Watts is playing the piano for some Chinese children and Norton walks in and suddenly this is an excuse to love her again. I feared this was going to continue, but it never becomes overwhelming.

The film is also helped by being beautifully photographed. The village is nestled in a misty valley, and the landscape is truly something to behold. The overarching plot itself. of the cholera epidemic, is also pretty interesting, if a little watered down.

All in all, while at times a bit banal and ordinary, the movie does a good job becoming it's own piece due to the setting, mood, and performances of the leads.

The Aura (9 out of 10)

Last night, I saw The Aura, an Argentinian film by recently deceased director, Fabien Bielinsky. It stars Ricardo Darin, and is about a reclusive taxidermist that has a photographic memory, and fantasizes about staging the perfect heist. He goes on a hunting trip with a buddy, and from there, the opportunity presents itself.

I loved this film. It is so dark and quiet, and I loved Darin's character so much. He plays the part so well. I have not seen Ricardo Darin in any other movies, so I don't know if this was a big turn for him, but The Taxidermist (as he is called in the movie, doesn't have a name, a la Fight Club) is such a fascinating character. He is so quiet, a 40 something year old almost-loser, that has a hard time sticking up for himself. He's not overweight or overtly nerdy looking, but he just looks like he is so miserable.

The plotline is original and great fun. I love crime movies more than any other, so of course if it was going to work, it would automatically hold a special place in my heart, and oh man did this one work. I'd say Bielinsky did for a crime story set in the wilderness what Michael Mann does for crime stories such in cities a la LA or Miami. I hate using words I've read in other reviews, but two I've seen a lot are "Atmospheric' and "Moody", and those are exactly right. The ending is wonderful and makes sense, and doesn't do what you would expect.

The title comes from the fact that The Taxidermist is epileptic and right before a seizure sets in, he gets an aura, a moment of clarity right before it hits. This happens a couple times in a movie, and is done very well.

There are some minor plot holes, nothing that takes away from the plot, and some scenes are overly and unnecessarily long. For example, The Taxidermist is explaining the aura he gets, and 10 second pauses are inserted after every sentence in his already long explanation. Or he is following a man after a robbery, and this is a ridiculously drawn out scene.

Still, this is one of the most original and intense crime movies I've seen in a while.

Notes on a Scandal (7 out of 10)

Notes on a Scandal stars Cate Blanchett, Judi Dench, and Bill Nighy in a movie about a young teacher that becomes involved with a student and is basically blackmailed by an older teacher who finds out about it.

NoaS starts off and ends incredibly paced. For the beginning and end, the score, acting, and Judi Dench's narration all add together to create an intensely told story. Understandably, the movie slows down in the middle to allow the dread and suspense to mount as Dench finds out about Blanchett's affair and thus, manipulates her as a result.

The acting is superb by the three leads, but the boy involved in the affair is not realistically portrayed, and acts like more like a 35 year old than a 15 year old. The headmaster of the school also overacts greatly in his few scenes.

However, for as intense of a thriller as this is, as well done as it is for the most part, it ends so anti-climactically and poorly, it's something of a shock. I was so surprised when the film ended, all the buildup and what happens is so "meh". I also felt more could have been done to show Dench's manipulative behavior. We're given a lot of evidence she's somewhat crazy and obsessive, but no sooner does she learn of the affair, than the event which leads her to let the affair be known to the rest of the world occurs.

Also, Bill Nighy, who plays Cate Blanchett's husband, apparently doesn't like Judi Dench's character, but again, there is no background into this, and rather he goes from enjoying her company to calling her a witch in no time.

NoaS works as a superb thriller, but is also something of an incomplete movie. There should have been more to it I think, but the acting and pacing until the end make for a pretty fun time.

Volver (6 out of 10)

Volver, the newest Pedro Almodovar movie, stars Penelope Cruz, and is about some Spanish women. Cruz and her sister, played by Lola Duenas, are just living their lives in the wake of their mothers' passing in a fire. Cruz gets involved in a bit of a crime, while the "ghost" of the mother returns to Duenas. I don't want to go into too many details at this time if you're planning on seeing it. But this review will get spoilery, so I'll let you know when.

I can tell you what I liked about the movie. The interplay between the sisters and the women of the neighborhood was great to watch. It seemed very natural. Also, at the beginning, the movie almost seemed to start getting Hitchcockian, and it was interesting for a while, but this didn't last long.

Penelope Cruz is amazing in this movie. I have seen her in a number of her English language movies and she is only so-so, but she shines in this movie.

Ok, now for the spoilers.


My biggest problem came with the plot. It just seemed so unrealistic at times, and mundane at others. For example, when the ghost of the mother returns, everyone believes it's a ghost. You can argue, come on, they didn't actually believe it was a ghost, but they kept saying that it was her ghost. However, she goes by no ghostly rules. She actually sleeps and eats, and everyone can see her, and she has no ghostly powers like flying through walls or anything. So she was definitely not a ghost. But the characters of the movie keep saying "She's a ghost." This killed the movie for me. If you know she's not a ghost, say so. Otherwise, you have me believing you honestly think she's a ghost. It killed the realism of this movie.

The plotline just moved along so humdrummingly (I don't know if that's a word). There was never any real revelations until the end, and even then, they just seemed forced. For example, it turns out Penelope Cruz's daughter is actually also her sister (conceived it with her father via rape). This is just said for no real reason, it was never an issue earlier in this movie, and it's pretty much forgotten afterwards.

Penelope Cruz also opens up a restaurant for a time to feed a film crew. This takes up a lot of time in the movie, and little happens.

So back to the ghost thing, since that really took me out of this movie. Dina has said that Lola Duenas didn't actually think she was a ghost, and I can somewhat believe this. Maybe I missed a subtitle that said that. But I was watching a great portion of the movie thinking to myself "Come On People, You don't honestly think she's a ghost do you?"

Even if I ignore that aspect completely, thinking maybe I didn't understand that part and that's my fault, I still was bored by the plot of the movie. There was nothing in the technical side of the movie that was stunning either. It was buoyed by strong performances, but otherwise, the fact that I'm a male and this movie is decidedly for and about females didn't help. This movie doesn't have me dying to see any more Almodovar movies either.

Perfume: The Story of a Murderer (8 out of 10)

I just saw Perfume: The Story of a Murderer. This is directed by Tom Tykwer, the guy that did Run Lola Run. It stars Ben Whishaw, Dustin Hoffman, and Alan Rickman namely. It is based in 18th century France, and it is a mix of thriller, mystery, fantasy, and a bit of black comedy. Mainly, Jean-Baptiste Grenouille (Ben Whishaw), is born with an incredible sense of smell. He can smell anything and everything, and one of his talents is being to tell the types and amounts of oils within perfumes. Therefore, he begins his job as an apprentice perfumier. However, he finds the most beautiful of scents comes from women, and in order to preserve their scent and make the most amazing perfume, he starts murdering them.

This movie is based off of a book even Stanley Kubrick believed was unadaptable (I got that tidbit off of IMDB). Tykwer does a wonderful job here though. The premise alone is original and interesting, but the movie is so vibrant and interesting. Ben Whishaw, who plays the lead, looks like a more disturbing Hayden Christensen in a way, though Ben Whishaw can actually act. He does a great job in this movie, acting so incredibly eerie.

The movie dragged as it came closer to the ending, but it was all brought together satisfyingly. Perfume is so colorful and beautiful to watch in that so much attention is paid to the details of what you are seeing. It's as if the makers wanted the audience to see the way Grenouille smells. Therefore, at it's dirtiest and it's most elegant, the film is a wonder to watch.

The ending is hilarious, and definitely puts this movie into the "fantasy" realm, if the Super Sense of Smell did not do that already. I loved the ending in that it did not go down safer, oft-travelled roads, but rather did it's own shocking thing. It's get more and more out there, and culminates superbly.

Perfume is a fun movie on many levels, and is wholly original. It has a number of great performances, and is only harmed by the pacing, as, like I said before, it gets somewhat bogged down as it reaches the end.

I am movied out. I have a review for Volver, but I will do that tomorrow. I'm taking a small break from seeing movies, but I'll be back at it soon. Columbus is getting a lot of great limited releases this month.

The Good Shepherd- (6 out of 10)

I just saw The Good Shepherd, starring Matt Damon, Angelina Jolie, William Hurt, and Robert DeNiro among others. It was also directed by Robert DeNiro. It is "The Story of the Birth of the CIA", as is stated in the preview, and it centers on Edward Wilson (Matt Damon's character).

The story is told in the present time of the movie, 1961, following the Bay of Pigs, and in flashbacks from 1939 to 1960. Now, try as I might, I cannot confirm whether or not this is really a true story. I'm looking up information on the CIA, and I'm not sure where Edward Wilson fits into all of this. So it might possibly be that Wilson is a made up character used to help push forward this story.

While TGS has a long runtime (160 minutes), it actually moves along at a very brisk pace, moving quickly between scenes. At the same time, the movie did not need to be 160 minutes. There is a lot of chaff in this movie, which brings me to my biggest gripe (I use this a lot, so I should trademark it). The movie cannot select a story it wants to follow. There is the Birth of the CIA and there is the Edward Wilson's Life story. I have nothing against telling both, but the former is almost buried beneath the latter. You get the general gist of how the CIA was brought about, but it's not in depth or informative at all. You see the OSS in action during and after WWII, and you see some interaction with Soviets, but really the movie focuses a little more broadly on Wilson's personal life and problems. This would've been fine it was more enjoyable to watch, or if I had been expecting this, but the previews said "The Good Shepherd: The Untold Story of the Birth of the CIA." So that's what I was expecting.

Matt Damon gives a pretty good performance as the austere and silent Edward Wilson, though his makeup when he is supposed to look like he's in his 40s is awful. It's like they just covered his face in a purple tint. Eddie Redmayne plays his son at the age of 20 or so, and I never want to see him in a movie again. He was terrible, overplayed his role, and I never bought into the fact that he could or would ever join a secret society at Yale. However, the separate casting of the son as a 20 year old and as a 7 year old was remarkable. The older looked exactly like the younger, just... older.

Joe Pesci has a very small role, and I have missed him. However, his role in this movie is pointless. It has nothing to do with the story, but is rather there to give Edward Wilson and the CIA a meaner looking side. It's like the writer didn't feel like he was getting the uglier side of the CIA across to the audience, so he stuck that scene in there with it's "beat you over the head" dialogue, which I still liked, there were some good lines said in that scene.

So, The Good Shepherd I think suffered from spending too much time on Edward Wilson's personal affairs, and not on the reason for the movie, that being the CIA. It's almost more of a family drama at times than it is a political/espionage type of movie. I took a class in school on the Cold War, and I was hoping there'd be more of that in this movie, but it wasn't there. Still, it's an alright movie, that has some interesting tidbits in it.

I wanted to close with a discussion of the ending, but there are spoilers, so skip this if you plan on seeing this movie.

SPOILERS!!

I did not like the ending. I highly doubt the reason the Bay of Pigs was blown was because Edward Wilson's son let the info of the raid slip to a Congolese spy for the KGB. That was an unnecessary add. That's something I'd expect out of Oliver Stone. There's no need to add such a twist to an important event like that. This also pushed Wilson's son to the forefront of the movie, and he was truly painful to watch.

DVD Quick Review- Idiocracy (6 out of 10)

Idiocracy, starring Luke Wilson, is the new Mike Judge movie. He made Office Space. This movie got screwed pretty bad in marketing and release, and was pretty much straight to video.

The basic premise is that Wilson is a military pilot that undergoes a hibernation experiment, only to wake up 500 years later when the experiment is forgotten about. He learns that the world has become unbelievably stupid, and he is now the smartest man on the planet.

I want to keep this quick, so I'll just say that the movie depicts a very scathing look at the future, in which man has become progressively more stupid. Take the dumbest person you know, and dumb them down some more.

The movie starts off great, with that really goofy humor you can only find in Office Space, and with some great jokes about a pimp and a military guy. Then Luke awakes in the future, and for a while, it's funny just seeing how things have changed, and the ways Judge rips on current American culture. However, after a while, the novelty wears off, and the movie definitely becomes a lot less funny. While I was rolling for the first half, I was sitting silently for the latter half, still enjoying the movie, but somewhat disappointed at the turns the plot had taken.

The special effects in this movie are also terrible. I don't care if it's low budget, if you can't afford to make something NOT look like it belongs on Playstation One, don't add it into the movie.

So, I recommend the movie as a cheap rental, it's fun, but it could've been a lot better. There was so much more that could've been done.

Little Children- 8 out of 10

This review will be a quickie.

Little Children, starring Kate Winslet, Jackie Earle Haley, Jennifer Connelly, and Patrick Wilson, centers on a suburb and its' denizens. It covers the issues of adultery, sex offenders, and happiness. To bring you up to speed, Kate Winslet is a stay at home mom, and Patrick Wilson is a stay at home dad. Neither are entirely happy with their married lives, so they begin to have an affair with one another. Jackie Earle Haley is an sex offender recently out of prison, and living at his mothers. An ex-cop, played by Noah Emmerich, spends his time harassing Haley.

So half the movie is basically about living the middle class suburban life and finding happiness with it, and the other half is about the fear going through the neighborhood what with the sex offender having moved in. I'm always up for a movie discussion with anyone that might have seen this movie, but since this is only a little review, I'm not going to get into the themes and ideas of the movie. However, they are covered so dramatically and wonderfully, even if you think you've seen this type of movie so often before. The affair movie never really entices me, but I really like the way it was done here.

Tom Perrotta, the author that wrote Little Children, also wrote Election, which was made into a movie, and if you've seen Election, you can expect much of the same black humor and sharp wit in this movie. There is a great narration to the movie as well, done by Will Lyman, that adds to the dry humor of the movie.

My only gripe comes that even with the humor involved in the movie, and that the slow pace added to the film so well, sometimes the movie still is not unlike anything you've ever seen before. At times in the movie, it becomes your basic marriage-affair film. It's not incredibly often, but it still takes away from the whole package. This of course goes back my own personal preference in that I do not typically enjoy affair movies. Luckily however, the movie concentrates more on the why of the affair between Winslet and Wilson instead of the "how are they going to cover it up."

Another interesting thing that at least I felt was that, with affair movies I've seen before, the main conflict I feel is "Oh dear, how and when is the hubby going to find out, and what will happen then?". I never felt that with this movie. Instead, the main conflict was how were the lives of Winslet and Wilson going to turn out. Such a nice job is done with making the affair between these two seem so necessary and natural, that whether or not their hubbies find out becomes irrelevant, but rather that the two find happiness, however temporary.

So in the end, this is a really great movie with wonderful performances by everyone, and I absolutely loved the arcs of the characters and how much they made sense. Jackie Earle Haley puts on a great subdued performance as the sexual deviant, Ronald McGorvey. He was apparently in Bad News Bears years ago, but I barely remember that movie.

Children of Men (10 out of 10)

So this week a number of the limited movies that have been lingering in NY and LA finally came to Columbus, and while I plan on seeing all of them, it was a tough decision to pick which would be seen tonight. Eventually, we chose Children of Men, which I was kind of iffy not. Not because I didn't want to see Children of Men, but because of the onslaught of movies coming up in January, I didn't want to have to compare everything to Children of Men, I would rather give some other films the chance of being the best film of the year, if only for a few days.

I anticipated this movie greatly and rarely when I anticipate does it pay off.

Children of Men is a dystopian view of the future, wherein all women are infertile for the past 18 years and thus, the world has taken on a very nihilistic point of view. Britain is one of the last bastions of "functioning" civilization, though they deport refugees and treat them inhumanely in order to maintain their status as best remaining place on Earth. Clive Owen is a London citizen, just living his life, somewhat cynical, and complacent considering how far the world has fallen. He is asked by his ex-wife and freedom-fighter/terrorist leader, played by Julianne Moore, to transport a young woman to the coast to meet up with a boat to get her out of the country. It turns out this young woman is pregnant, the first pregnant woman in 18-plus years.

This movie is brilliant. It is unbelievable. I don't want to start listing positive adjectives or I'll be here all night. Let me just say that I can nary find a flaw with the movie. It is the best directed film I've seen in a long time. There are a number of scenes where the camera shot goes unedited for minutes and minutes. I still don't know how that was done.

I don't really want to spoil anything, but this is by far one of the best films I have ever seen. Going into the movie, I had read that the direction and camerawork was superb, so I was looking forward to it and prepared. I did not expect Clive Owen's acting performance, Michael Caine's goofy character, the raw emotion conveyed so well, and how hopeful the movie is, no matter how desolate the landscape. It is incredible how deftly the movie can switch from happy-go-lucky to deathly serious and intense. There will be joking and laughing, and then suddenly an action sequence in the matter of seconds, and it all works. Multiple times I could barely breathe because every scene was being done so well. This isn't hyperbole either, this movie was just that good.

Of course, as I do so often, I need to laud the music for being great. I love movies with good music, and this has a great original score, which emphasizes opera vocals, as well as a lot of 60's and 70's acoustic soft rock that goes so well with the movie.

This movie does fall into the realm of science fiction, but don't let that hold you back from seeing this. It is very realistic and believable.

As I was leaving the theater, I overheard two people say "That was weird." ... " Yeah, that was SO weird." Weird? WEIRD? I mean, you can dislike the movie, that is your prerogative. But it wasn't an art movie. There wasn't any blatant metaphor(although there was a great nod of the head to Pink Floyd's Animals album art). It wasn't a WEIRD movie. It depicted a fictional future, but everything that happens in the movie is completely realistic with realistic human characters. I mean, 1984 was a "weirder" dystopic future scifi movie, as was 2001. Heck, Blade Runner could even be considered weirder than this, this movie is that not-weird.

Anyways, I digress.

I will talk to everyone later, Go Bucks.

We Are Marshall- 5 out of 10

Starting this year, I am going to start putting numerical ratings on my reviews, so if you don't want to read the whole thing, you can get an idea of what I thought of the movie by just reading the number I gave it.

We Are Marshall is the new movie about the aftermath of the 1970 plane crash that killed the entire University of Marshall football team and coaching staff. It stars Matt McConaughey, Matthew Fox, David Strathairn and Ian McShane among others.

After the plane crash, the university is thinking of shutting down the football program, but in comes McConaughey, who becomes the new head coach.

I cannot say I really liked this movie too much. It did not resonate with me at all. I didn't find it to be particularly emotional, true story or not. I understand it's a sad event, but there are all sorts of sad movies out there, some that are effective, some that aren't, and this just was one of the latter to me. To be honest, I was rather bored with it at times, and there was nothing unique to this movie save the event itself. But a movie can't just be sad and get away with being mediocre as a result. Pearl Harbor was a terrible event, but the movie was one of the worst affronts to American cinema. I think McG (the director) took the easy way out, and made a very homogenized movie about a tragedy.

The good... well the performances were great, the two Matthews and David Strathairn were a lot of fun to watch, and the movie offered a pretty in-depth look at the running of a football team and team strategy during the middle portion, much more than what a lot of other football movies will give you. There's also a part with Bobby Bowden that I liked. Having lived outside of Huntington, it was neat seeing places I recognized, but that novelty can only carry you so far.

I don't think this movie ranks near Rudy or Remember the Titans in terms of emotional sports movies, or Hoosiers or Friday Night Lights in terms of an in-depth realistic look at a sports team. Perhaps in the hands of someone different, but as it was, it is no different than any other inspirational sports movie. Like I said before, it's worth going to see for the performances of the main three actors in the movie, but the scenes involving Ian McShane are painful at best, in a bad way. I don't know if that's his American accent, or his West Virginian accent, but either way, it sounded awful.

Most Anticipated Movies of 2007

I saw some sites doing this, so I thought I'd put in what I am looking forward to.

Movies that I am so incredibly pumped for that are 2006 movies-
Children of Men and Pan's Labyrinth (these are coming out this month, so you will see my reviews soon, I won't say anything more about them)

Movies that I am so incredibly pumped for that are 2007 movies-
300- If you have seen a single trailer for this movie, you will understand why, it looks incredible
Zodiac- David Fincher's return to the serial killer movie, about the Zodiac Killer of San Fran
Smokin Aces- great cast, great looking zany action movie
Grindhouse- Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez doing 70's style horror
Sunshine- another Danny Boyle (trainspotting, 28 days later) movie
stardust- based off of the Neil Gaiman book, my favorite author, fantastic book by the way
I AM Legend- based off the Richard Matheson book, but they are changing the vampires to vampire-zombies, so hmmmm
Shoot em up- buzz is that it will be one of the best action movies ever
3:10 to Yuma- never saw the original, but it has Christian Bale, Russell Crowe and Peter Fonda, directed by James Mangold
American Gangster- Russell Crowe, Denzel Washington and Ridley Scott in a movie about a drug dealer in the 70s
the mist- Frank Darabont, the guy that did Shawshank Redemption and Green Mile, doing a Stephen King horror movie about monsters
beowulf- take the animation quality of Polar Express, the direction of Robert Zemeckis, and a great voice cast, and the story of beowulf

Summer Blockbusters that look great-
Spiderman 3- I love the Spiderman movies, and Venom is my favorite villain
Transformers- I hope it's just a fun mindless action movie with robots
die hard 4
Pirates of the Caribbean 3- lets hope it's better than 2, it's based in Asia, it has Chow Yun Fat
Harry Potter 5
The Simpsons

Political/Espionage/Movies based in Middle East- Big year for this genre
Vantage Point/Rendition- Very similar in that they will employ the Rashomon many POV of one event plot device, both based in Middle East, both with great casts
Charlie Wilson's War- Tom Hanks in a movie about a congressman that helped fund the Mujaheedin of Afghanistan against the soviets
Breach- movie about a CIA operative that helped the Soviets
the garden of elah
Lions for Lambs- Cruise, Meryl Streep and Robert Redford
The Kingdom

Movies you could be seeing at Next Years oscars and Independents- Other movies i listed above could be there too, but these didn't fit in those categories
Reservation Road- Mark Ruffalo kills Joaquin Phoenix's son in a hit and run, about the aftermath
Margot at the Wedding- Noah Baumbach did The Squid and The Whale and this is his next
My Blueberry Nights- Wong Kar Wai's first American film, great cast
Eastern Promises- David Cronenberg's next
Paris, Je t'aime- 20 different directors direct five minutes of a movie about Paris
The Kite Runner
Michael Clayton- George Clooney movie
The Golden Compass- based off the Philip Pullman fantasy series, His Dark Materials, has a promising cast and the series is supposed to be real good
No Country for Old Men- The next Coen Brothers movie
There Will Be Blood- The next PT Anderson movie
Before the Devil knows your dead
Synecdoche- the next Charlie Kaufmann movie

I think that is good, there is a lot that looks good this year, more than what it on this list... there is also Sundance coming up, but who knows what will be purchased there