Starring Brit Marling, Matthew-Lee Erlbach, DJ Flava, William Mapother, Meggan Lennon, AJ Diana, Bruce Colbert, Paul Mezey, Ana Valle, Jeffrey Goldenberg, Joseph A. Bove
Directed by Mike Cahill
Expectations: Moderate. The sci-fi angle might be cool… I’m cautious though.
I love science fiction, and sometimes it leads me down paths that I’d rather have avoided. Another Earth is one of those experiences, and I am hard pressed to find any worthwhile point of the film to validate its existence, let alone its place on some lists as one of the year’s best. Everyone has their own viewpoint so I can’t begin to theorize as to why this film resonates with some people, but it definitely left me cold and bored.
Another Earth tells the story of Rhoda, a promising high school student recently accepted to MIT. Around the same time, a heretofore unknown planet has appeared in the sky and while driving at night, a radio DJ informs his audience that they can make it out as a small blue dot, near the North star. Rhoda, preoccupied with her thoughts of the planet, cranes her head out of the car’s window to see it… and promptly smashes into a car holding a family waiting at a stop sign. Four years pass and Rhoda is a mere shell of the girl she could have been. Earth 2 (as it’s now known, and no, it’s not this Earth 2) has gotten a bit closer and Rhoda still wonders if there’s life on this habitable planet.
It’s important not to get excited for any of those sci-fi elements to pay off in any meaningful way, because they don’t. Another Earth is only a science fiction movie because without that added element, it’d be just another in a long string of tortured love stories where the perp and the victim become entangled in each other’s lives without the victim knowing it. It’s remarkably similar to Melancholia in using a science fiction backdrop for a character study, and both films feature a new planet springing up out of nowhere, but where Melancholia is about the end of the world and handling depression, Another Earth is about consequences. It’s not compelling though, and it’s painfully slow.
It’s not all that well-shot either. It takes on something of a Lars Von Trier vibe in the camerawork, as it’s all shot on video and lots of it is handheld with zoom adjustments mid-shot. This is director Mike Cahill’s first feature though, so many of the visual choices feel like he’s trying hard to be artful and meaningful, but for me they nearly all fell flat. I will say that I see a lot of potential here, and Cahill could easily deliver a quality film later on down the road. I don’t know that I’d jump at the chance to see it based on this disappointment, but I’ll try to keep my mind open.
The quick version: It’s slow, it’s boring, it’s not worth your time.
Starring Ben Kingsley, Sacha Baron Cohen, Asa Butterfield, Chloë Grace Moretz, Ray Winstone, Emily Mortimer, Christopher Lee, Helen McCrory, Michael Stuhlbarg, Frances de la Tour, Richard Griffiths, Jude Law
Directed by Martin Scorsese
Expectations: High, but really cautious. Everything I hear sounds good, but whenever I see footage it looks dumb.
OK, I’m going to try and rein in my negativity. I did like Hugo, but I take issue with much of it as a film. With all the film history stuff contained in the film Scorsese is preaching to the choir with me, and I doubt that any kids in the audience are going to take the film’s look back at the life’s work of George Méliès and run with it to their nearest DVD retailer to snatch up a copy of A Trip to the Moon. I don’t know… I think this is another case of me just being too jaded to truly appreciate the film at hand, although I have to say that I don’t think it’s an entirely well made film. For Scorsese to get so much respect for this movie is ridiculous as it shows very little of the clever, powerful director he once was. I have to imagine it’s because this is easily one of the safest and most boringly mainstream movies of his entire career, but hey, I generally hate movies about movies, so your mileage may vary.
Hugo is about a boy name Hugo who lives in the crawlspaces of the train station. He winds the clocks and pretty much keeps to himself, except to steal a little clockwork gear every once in a while. He does this because he’s got an automaton stashed away in his home, and he’s desperately trying to fix it. Despite this fantasy setup, the film is a lot more grounded than you’d expect it to be from the marketing. Don’t get me wrong, everything plays out in somewhat comical, ridiculous ways, but it still feels tied to our reality by all the film history lessons sprinkled throughout.
Allow me to introduce my buddy, Stephen. He’s gonna chime in from time to time with an anime review, so give him a big welcome. First up, it’s the newest Studio Ghibli film to hit US shores!
The Borrower Arrietty [借りぐらしのアリエッティ, Kari Gurashi no Arietti]
AKA Arrietty,Arrietty: Le Petit Monde des Chapardeurs
Original Release 2010 in Japan, US Theatrical Release 2012
Starring Bridget Mendler, David Henrie, Amy Poehler, Gracie Poletti, Moisés Arias, Will Arnett, Carol Burnett
Directed by Hiromasa Yonebayashi
Lately, Studio Ghibli has made quite a few adaptations of children’s fantasy stories. This one is based upon The Borrowers by Mary Norton. The book was written in 1952 and set in the English countryside, so the film’s setting of modern-day Japan is obviously a bit of a change. To further muddy the waters, the character names were changed in the Disney release of the film to make them more familiar to Western audiences, or perhaps to match with the original book. Since I have never read the source material, I can’t say how much the plot was altered for The Secret World of Arrietty, but anyone who read the book should go in expecting something a little different from the original.
The film starts off with a boy named Shawn, who has a heart condition, and he has been sent to an old house in the country to get some rest. When he arrives, he catches sight of young Arrietty, a miniscule girl who is one of the Borrowers that live under the house. Borrowers are only a few inches tall, and slink around the house at night, “borrowing” what they need from the humans. They bear quite a few similarities to various creatures of English folklore, most notably Brownies. Shawn has arrived on the eve of Arrietty’s first borrowing, and she is eager to prove herself, despite the new human who makes sneaking around the house riskier.
Starring Johnny Depp, Aaron Eckhart, Michael Rispoli, Amber Heard, Richard Jenkins, Giovanni Ribisi, Amaury Nolasco, Marshall Bell, Bill Smitrovich, Julian Holloway, Karen Austin
Directed by Bruce Robinson
Expectations: Low. Heard bad things, but my love for Hunter S. Thompson is enough to get me to watch this.
I can now fully understand the negative backlash to The Rum Diary. When it released into theaters I decided against heading out to see it, despite a high interest. I did that because I’ve read Hunter S. Thompson’s The Rum Diary, and I enjoyed it, but when I finally saw the trailer for this adaptation it looked as if they had taken the rather different source material and gave it a heavy dose of Fear and Loathing’s manic energy. I called bullshit and said I’d catch it on DVD. Well here I am a few months later, DVD in hand, and damn if the movie isn’t pretty close to the book. What we have here is a case of poor marketing. The film was marketed as a non-stop rush of waggling devil tongues and slurred words, so obviously people who bought into that in the trailer were disappointed when they saw the subtly chaotic piece on the discovery of a journalist’s craft. And conversely, I am pleasantly surprised by the shift in tone and focus from the marketing. So in effect the marketing is specifically targeting non-fans by drawing them in with empty promises, but turning off fans who know the book in the same stroke. The film is quite reverent of Thompson and his ideals, so I can only imagine the shitstorm that went down between the marketing department and the filmmakers. Or perhaps I’d just like to imagine something similar to the events of The Rum Diary surrounding the production of The Rum Diary.
It’s that time of year again! I honestly haven’t seen a good majority of the big films released this year, but it’s already mid-February so I figure I should get this up before nobody cares. Below is my list of the 2011 films that have left an impact on me, either good or bad.
My usual end-of-year list disclaimer: I have a serious complex about trying to categorize and list my top movies of the year, therefore I refuse to do so. Lists are arbitrary and mean next to nothing to anyone but the one who makes them, so if the list means nothing to me, then it becomes worthless. I’ve tried to figure out a good way to do this so that films I truly enjoyed could get a year-end nod without me having to break anything down and decide any sort of order. The list is completely subjective and I purposefully called this “Favorite Films” so that the focus is on my enjoyment and not simply filmmaking quality. So with that said, here’s a quick glance at my favorite and least favorite films of 2011. This is by no means definitive.
2011 Movies I still plan to see that might be good: Season of the Witch (Hahaha, yeah I know…)
I Saw the Devil
Another Earth
The Guard
Straw Dogs
Red State
The Rum Diary
The Descendants
Hugo
The Muppets
Shame
Flying Swords of Dragon Gate
The Sorcerer and the White Snake
Wu Xia
From Up on Poppy Hill
Think I got it wrong? Wondering why a certain favorite film isn’t on the list? Drop a comment below!
Will, on March 22, 2012, 5:20 am
Starring Brit Marling, Matthew-Lee Erlbach, DJ Flava, William Mapother, Meggan Lennon, AJ Diana, Bruce Colbert, Paul Mezey, Ana Valle, Jeffrey Goldenberg, Joseph A. Bove
Starring Ben Kingsley, Sacha Baron Cohen, Asa Butterfield, Chloë Grace Moretz, Ray Winstone, Emily Mortimer, Christopher Lee, Helen McCrory, Michael Stuhlbarg, Frances de la Tour, Richard Griffiths, Jude Law
Stephen, on March 7, 2012, 5:20 am
Starring Johnny Depp, Aaron Eckhart, Michael Rispoli, Amber Heard, Richard Jenkins, Giovanni Ribisi, Amaury Nolasco, Marshall Bell, Bill Smitrovich, Julian Holloway, Karen Austin
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