WeatherGirl’s Station

So The Assassination of Jesse James… arrived in Colchester just as things went completely pear shaped, what with our trip to London and then our attempt to head north for the Christmas break. So, silly us, we assumed we could travel to my mum’s part of the world and watch it there. No such luck. It’s not even a case of, it’s been and gone, they just aren’t going to show it at all. Drat. Double drat. And language much worse than that. I was really looking forward to watching this one.

Current temperature: here 9C/48F, there 14F/-10C

Beautiful. A much better film than the critics seem to think IMHO. Visually interesting and beautiful to watch, it moved with enough pace to keep your interest and didn’t botch the book. Yes, it’s not as good as the book (and I would highly recommend the three novels, they are excellent) but I think that was to be expected with a book that is inherently about ideas rather than plot. The armoured bears were spectacular and worth the price of admission on their own.

Current temperature: here 9C/48F, there 14F/-10C

Trash. Oh, wow, that was bad. Was the script writer asleep at his desk? Whole stretches were so underwritten it was scary. Also, the production was so cheap they used footage from the TV show Dark Angel to fill in the back story. Then there was the huge honking plot hole of having a hitman, dressed dapperly, with a bald head that shows off his tat bar code id, wandering around in full view of all unsundry. Way to keep a low profile!

Current temperature: here 9C/48F, there 0F/-18C

Blah. I fell asleep watching this movie. The script was the same old same old and I just didn’t give a rip about anything they had to say. This was oh so Disney and not so much Pixar.

Current temperature: here 8C/46F, there 23F/-5C

Scary. Scratch that, better make it really damn scary. This has such a cool premise and you really believe the local inhabitants of a northern Alaska community would have the wherewithal to put up a fight and see off the vampire hoard. The fractured relationship between the leads is explored in an interesting way without relying on huge amounts of exposition. The vampires just look so cool and are way frightening. There are lots of averting one’s eyes scenes and the tension keeps on ratcheting up until the end. The ending was unexpected and really got to me. So, yeah, I liked it.

Current temperature: here 8C/46F, there 23F/-5C

Tiredish. Not bad, but then not exactly good. An excuse to eat your favourite movie snacks really. I’ll admit to mostly enjoying the ride while it lasted but it did teeter just the wrong side of that believability line. Die Hard the first and the third are the ones to watch.

Current temperature: here 7C/45F, there 41F/5C

Fun. So it isn’t perfect and could have done with a firmer hand in the editing room, but I enjoyed this movie. Neil Gaiman just rocks so a movie based on one of his books has got to have a good chance of succeeding if you give it half a chance.

Current temperature: here 6C/43F, there 36F/2C

Thought provoking. Rendition was rated 15 but after watching I would have put it in the 18 category, along with Eastern Promises, just on the torture scenes alone. Rendition tells a good story that has a sound moral purpose and does so in an emotionally engaging way.

For me the big a-ha moment came when the terror suspect confesses under torture. I had a flashback to reading, The Crucible, by Arthur Miller in school. All you had to do to save yourself and stop the torture was confess your guilt and name names. The innocent, who protested their innocence, paid with their lives. If it was true in the 1600s why the hell can’t we see that it’s still true today?

The ending of the main story line was a mite twee but I will forgive the movie that since it’s heart was in the right place. Rendition reinforced for me the fact that torturing people only makes more terrorists, it doesn’t solve a damn thing and it only demeans and dehumanises us all.

Current temperature: here 6C/43F, there 36F/2C

Thinky. This movie has many attributes to recommend it. Only six main characters who are interesting to watch. A short running time. Thought provoking. Straightforward yet not simplistic. And it’s going to irritate the hell out of the American neocons. What more could one ask?

For discussion on where the film’s title came from check out this wikipedia article.

Current temperature: here 7C/45F, there 28F/-2C

Engrossing. Apparently, despite the 18 rating and the quite explicit advertising, customers at the theatre we attend, had been complaining over the content of this movie. It’s a Russian mob movie. Do you expect peaches and cream? There were several hiding behind my hands moments, most especially when the knives and razors come out. The violence was mainly explosive and fleeting with the exception of the bath house scene which lasted for several minutes. That scene in particular had a very overt sexual dynamic. The homoeroticism was effectively used to exaggerate the vulnerability of Viggo’s character at the same time as threatening the machismo of the clothed assassins. This isn’t a movie I’d say I ‘enjoyed’ but I found certain performances compelling and the meandering way the tale is told with flashes of extreme violence sucked me right in.

Viggo Mortensen was so scary yet there was an under current of warmth and human affection running under the surface that it was quite a surprise to think about just how nuanced a character he was playing. Armin Mueller-Stahl was disgustingly good as the fatherly mob boss who is really utterly evil. Naomi Watts had the most thankless role in the movie but acquitted herself well. As for Vincent Cassel, isn’t this baffoonish drunken lout he continually plays becoming a bit trite? The sexual tension between Cassel and Mortensen was well leveraged to great effect and watching them prowl around, each manipulating the other just by their mere physical presence, in an attempt to get what they need, kept me engaged.

Current temperature: here 3C/37F, there 39F/4C