| Movie | Rating | Review | Date | Your Rating | Match | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hannah Montana: The Movie - G | February 7, 2009 | N/A | ||||
| Friday the 13th - R | February 7, 2009 | N/A | ||||
| X-Men Origins - Wolverine - PG-13 | February 7, 2009 | N/A | ||||
| The Day the Earth Stood Still - PG-13 | This is the longest product-placement ad (I won't grace it with the word "movie") I have seen in ages. Save a couple moments of good effects, the rest of the movie is an insult to intelligence... And the ending... ah the ending... It should deserved a title of its own: "The Night the Audience Stood Still". A classic use of "deux ex machina" that leaves EVERYONE cold. Save yourself. | February 7, 2009 | N/A | |||
| The Curious Case of Benjamin Button - PG-13 | Funny how such an interesting life is journaled by such an uninteresting fellow. That is basically the story of this otherwise amazing tour of reverse-aging. Besides the sublime special effects, the story is more of a travel diary full of the snippets about curious characters, as witnessed by a rather dull Brad Pitt. The movie is still worth watching, as it forces you to ponder for a couple hours about the inscrutable purpose of life. | February 7, 2009 | N/A | |||
| Doubt - PG-13 | Excellent acting match between Meryl Streep and Philip Seymour Hoffman... Those two are giants of their own right. The plot is interesting although a bit narrow, the sets a bit limited (mostly indoors). In general it feels like you are watching good theater, rather than a film. | February 7, 2009 | N/A | |||
| Gran Torino - R | I heard so many raves about this movie that I went to see it. What a great disappointment! The only reason I think people find this amateurish movie remotely interesting is because the respect they have for Clint Eastwood mythical career... Other than that, the overall acting is terrible. The pubescent priest is not believable from the moment he opened his mouth, the protege kid is barely coherent (let alone an actor) the photography is mediocre and in general the movie left me quite empty despite its dramatic underpinnings. Only redeeming value has been to expose the existence of Hmong culture within America. A Discovery Channel documentary would have done it better though. | February 7, 2009 | N/A | |||
| Bullitt - PG |
This movie comes from the era when American film making was at its best... With Robert Alman-like sensibilities of elongated quiet, restrained yet intense face-acting, natural background noise & conversation, and plentiful of similar subtleties unavailable on today's Hollywood fare. I also enjoyed recognizing San Francisco in its timeless features (light, hills, architecture) with a few remarkable changes like the now-gone Embarcadero overpass, the cool fashion, and the quaint obsolete technologies, like the "telecopier". I enjoyed this movie it in a quiet way. Not a movie to expand your intellect, but perhaps your sense of timing and narrative pace. |
January 11, 2009 | N/A | |||
| The Assassination of Richard Nixon - R | Estupendous performance by Sean Penn (as usual), in this quiet, subtle movie with a loud and sordid finale. An analytical flick on the life of your average sideline wacko (the ones that briefly pop in the evening news, make you go "gosh!" and instantly forget to make room for the next one. | January 6, 2009 | N/A | |||
| O' Horten - PG-13 | November 28, 2008 | N/A | ||||
| 12 - PG-13 | November 16, 2008 | N/A | ||||
| Synecdoche, New York - R | October 4, 2008 | N/A | ||||
| Kung Fu Panda - PG |
Hilarious script (mixing Asian ancient rituals with American modern casualness). Artful drawings (pushing the envelope of standard styling). Mesmerizing action (dizzying changes of body movement and camera perspective). I am just in awe on the imagination prowess of today's animators. Had a GOOD time watching it. |
July 22, 2008 | N/A | |||
| WALL-E - G | Can’t wait for my baby boy to start watching these movies with me... It would somehow justify my enthusiasm. In any case, anyone with a sense for design will appreciate the candy-like (iPod-like?) forms of the modern robots and ethereal interfaces, anyone appreciative for architecture will enjoy the renderings of city infrastructures in ruin, anyone with a passion for photography will be delighted by the control of light and scene, anyone with a thirst for archetypal stories will enjoy the premises of a oedipal story told in bips and bells. Fun for the whole family. Another Pixar outstanding masterpiece! | July 22, 2008 | N/A | |||
| Iron Man - PG-13 | Usual summer hero blockbuster formula... But with beautiful GGI tech and flight scenes (OK, I guess that IS the formula). I also cracked a few laughs on the "debugging" process of the exoskeleton (Truly the best part). Within genre parameters, Robert Downey Jr. does not disappoint. | May 5, 2008 | N/A | |||
| Shoot 'Em Up - R |
Bypassing any diplomatic euphemisms: This "movie" is disgustingly utter CRAPOLA. It is so bad and amateurish it does not warrant my time criticizing it... Just let me capitalize that this mess is unfunny, witless, insulting and moronic (despite trying to disguise under "smart cynicism on genre clichés" ) and I cannot believe they give someone money to make this bore of unoriginal badness. So there... I am done with this review. Don't even rent it. Waste of neurons, really. |
March 2, 2008 | N/A | |||
| There Will Be Blood - R |
WONDROUS, wondrous movie.... It single-handedly restored my faith in American cinema. A masterpiece of movie-making on all accounts: Story, script, acting, photography, lightning, music, sound, staging, location, casting, wardrobe, makeup... Nothing left to inertia or careless overlook. It is utterly beyond anything I have seen in, lets say, the past two decades. I am serious people. I am even considering reducing all my ratings (several hundred) by one star so this one deservingly stands-out. You see, there was a time, lets say the seventies, when American film making had something new to say, something that even European cinema was desperately trying to mimic... Yes, even the French looked up to us. Then came Steven Spielberg and Hollywood has never been the same again. Since then, the studios brought us colorful effects, cheap thrills and laughs... But nothing as sensibly well-rounded as, lets say, what Robert Altman was capable of with "3 Women" or "McCabe & Mrs. Miller", Sidney Lumet with "Dog Day Afternoon", Terrence Malick with "Days of Heaven" or the best first half of Michael Cimino's "Heaven's Gate". That way of visual storytelling paid attention to the charged loudness of a extended pause, to the mastery behind long, single takes, to the worship for a steady camera and focus on subtle acting, to the faithful reenactment (not trendy interpretations) of historical artifacts. On those times a wink of an eye was so loaded with meaning, a single note so fully embodied with tension, a prop utensil so lovingly reproduced... There was complexity and thick, layered stories. I loved that period of narrative introspection. This is what "There Will be Blood" brings back: True purpose on its enactment: Archetypal plots with humble stories of epic proportions. Evil and good intertwined. God through the symbiosis of human ambition and frailty. Open endings, interpretative meaning... Love for storytelling, not the pursuit of lowly bucks behind mass-produced "blockbustering" science. I am so happy today... This movie is truly a gem to my eyes. Please visit it with open ones, and yes, an open mind perhaps already narrowed and pre-conditioned to the "expected". But please do visit. Only the symbolic end scene can be judged as overplayed somehow... The rest is beyond reproach. This movie is a demonstration of what cinema should be all about. A textbook classic to be taught to future generations of filmmakers. I hope. |
January 15, 2008 | N/A | |||
| Vengo - Unrated |
Deep Spain, in all its scary glory. The music is truly authentic, the attitudes as well. The under-current subtle explorations with the Arab world are beautiful exposed. Amazing fact is that although the main actor (Antonio Canales) is one of the best Flamenco dancers in Spain, he is restrained not to perform his art in the movie even once... Other will do it for him just fine. Warning: Non Spanish-speaking viewers may loose the message carried through the actors accents, and lose 50% of what makes the movie special... they will be left with an extremely slow, surreal and perhaps apparently incoherent storyline. Approach with care. Para el resto: Una gozada de pelicula. Te mantiene tenso y no sabes por que. Los caracteres son creibles, y la musica y el baile de lo mejor. |
December 22, 2007 | N/A | |||
| Juno - PG-13 | If you like cynic, cloaked in in cute... this is your movie. Very, very good a that particular combo. Reminiscent of Wes Anderson's movies. I also liked the soundtrack, I am embarrassed to say, and I was moved by the wanna-be adopting mother played by Jennifer Garner (Can relate to the desperation). On the other hand, I think Ellen Page overdoes the self-assurance detachment a bit. Is not always believable to the situations at hand. | December 22, 2007 | N/A | |||
| Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story - R | December 22, 2007 | N/A | ||||
| Awake - R | December 22, 2007 | N/A | ||||
| The Perfect Holiday - PG | December 22, 2007 | N/A | ||||
| Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street - R | December 22, 2007 | N/A | ||||
| The Brothers Grimm - PG-13 | Bad stuff... cannot believe Gillian was even remotely involved with this. It seems straight out of Producer's Formula can. Only explanation: he was forced to it by millions of dollars. | December 22, 2007 | N/A | |||
| License to Wed - PG-13 | Seen it. Done it. Unfunny (both) | December 22, 2007 | N/A |
221 ratings
151 reviews
