THE ARTIST [2011] movie review
February 3, 2012
It is a rare pleasure to view of movie that appears to be what I call, “handmade.” THE ARTIST is such a movie, and not just because it is the first silent film I have ever seen in my life nor because it is in black and white, but because every frame on screen is on purpose, crafted, and punctuated by a score that provides emotion so differently than endless dialogue does.
BULLHEAD ( RUNDSKOP ) [2011] movie review
February 2, 2012
If you do not enjoy watching movies with characters that are hard to physically tell apart from each other for much of the beginning of the movie, lack any and all narrative drive, seem to have absolutely no point, then end as ambiguously as possible with no explanation, then you will definitely not like BULLHEAD (Belgian title RUNDSKOP). I know I could not really follow the movie at all, then I realized there was nothing to follow.
MARGIN CALL [2011] movie review
February 1, 2012
I learned about MARGIN CALL because of its nomination for a best writing Oscar (J.C. Chandor also directed). The movie is described as a thriller about the start of the financial crisis on Wall Street, but it would be better classified as a drama with political overtones.
WAR HORSE [2011] movie review
January 28, 2012
If you do not think a person can believe in something so strongly that no matter how astronomically improbably it is, it can still happen, then you need not see WAR HORSE. If you are, however, a person who does, as I am, then you will find WAR HORSE inspiring and raising your own confidence that what you are trying to believe in can be done.
A BETTER LIFE [2011] movie review
January 28, 2012
If not for Demian Bichir getting nominated for the Best Actor Oscar, and deservedly so, I may never have watched A BETTER LIFE because up until then I had not even heard of it. I hope this review helps people find this movie about a father wanting for his son exactly what the title says. This movie is incredibly sincere and real, and therefore on those accounts alone, one of the ten best movies of 2011.
THE DESCENDANTS [2011] movie review
January 27, 2012
I feel like the main character of THE DESCENDANTS is Hawaii itself. For a number of reasons, this movie could not have worked anywhere else. Alexander Payne directs a film that makes Hawaii seem as much like the paradise everyone thinks it is, as well as a real place with the same problems life on the mainland has.
ANOTHER EARTH [2011] movie review
January 22, 2012
It amazes me how in some many individual calendar years two movies of the same small niche come out (think Armageddon/Deep Impact, Dante’s Peak/Volcano). For 2011 it was movies about large planetary objects approaching Earth in small, ordinary person films. Exactly two weeks ago I saw MELANCHOLIA and tonight I saw the perhaps superior ANOTHER EARTH.
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