Two Movies in one Day

Today I went to Ides of March and was told that with my ticket I could also go to Moneyball for free. It seems excessive to go to two movies in the theater in one day I know, but what the heck. And I must say I enjoyed myself a lot. Both movies are good.

Ides of March has everything I like in a movie: politics, character-driven drama, and, of course, Ryan Gosling. And it is also unpredictable. In the beginning Ryan Gosling’s character is idealistic claiming he has to believe in the candidate he’s working for. Gosling’s character Stephen Meyers, is working for presidential candidate is the seemingly virtuous Governor Mike Morris played by George Clooney. The outcome, I thought, will be obvious: something will happen to shake his belief in the governor - - he will betray him (et Brutus, anyone?) and then come out the other side scathed but repentant having learned a valuable lesson. But, happily, the end came as a surprise when our dear campaign worker takes an unexpected turn, and it’s fascinating to watch. The movie is a bit too long, but overall a great story with great acting.

Moneyball, the movie I was not intending to watch (It’s rarely my first choice to watch a sports’ movie), was unexpectedly charming and equally as compelling – and too long in parts too! Why are movies these days always too long? Anyway that’s another topic. I liked Brad Pitt in this movie – He plays the general manager of the Oakland As who employs a nerdy statistician from Yale to help him hire unappreciated but potentially valuable players. The movie has its sports clichés for sure – underdogs get beat up but triumph against all odds, blah, blah … but the character that Brad Pitt plays, Billy Beane who is based on a real guy, is given more to do than give inspirational speeches and look pretty; he makes the character believable and real.

On a side note, the commonality between the two movies, besides being two well acted realistic dramas, is Philip Seymour Hoffman. In Ides of March he plays the campaign manager who’s jaded but has integrity and in Moneyball he plays the constantly pissed off manager of the As who’s made to look like a jerk. He’s good in both and his presence always a good sign in a movie, I think.

Catch Up

What? Is it November already? School started and I became engulfed by work, work, work. I hardly got a chance to go to any movies or see any at home. Poor me. I thought about abandoning this List altogether – I mean really what’s the point? But, I guess there must some point because here I go with a few brief thoughts about the movies I saw in the past few months.
The Greatest Movie Ever Sold: This Morgan Spurlock documentary examines the pervasiveness of advertising in our world today. Even though this is a topic that has always interested me, I did think the movie revealed anything that new or interesting.
Everything Must Go: Will Ferrel plays a sad sack kicked out of his house and living in his front yard. There’s a cute kid a beautiful woman (the lovely Rebecca Hall) and a meager plot and yet I liked it, but not wowed.
Barney’s Version: life story of an unlikeable guy (Paul Giamatti) doing unlikeable things, blah.
The Conspirator: I like historical fiction and historical movies. The tale of one woman who was associated with the assassination of Lincoln sounds pretty good, eh? Despite having super cute James McAvoy, this movie too, is kinda blah.
I also watched Dexter season 4 (creepy), Treme, Season 1 (Not the Wire, but good), Lark Rise to Candleford (BBC miniseries, schlocky)

A Serious Man

A Serious Man, the Cohen brother’s forage into a 1960s Minneapolis Jewish community, is serious! And the movie asks some serious questions about a man’s worth. Larry Gopnick is put through the mill while facing moral dilemmas like should he pay for your wife’s boyfriend’s funeral, change a student’s grade for money, lust after his neighbor’s wife. He lets everyone kick him around throughout the movie until, it seems, after he gives advice to his even more hapless brother and says, “Sometimes you have to help yourself.” I said yes, Larry, help yourself! So towards the end of the movie he seems to gain a little more strength, but since it’s a Cohen Brother’s movie, he keeps getting slapped around. A Serious Man gives a lot of food for thought while being mostly drudgery to sit through.

The Help

I’m back in the big city (actually the smallish city) where I have more moving going opportunities. Today I saw The Help which I have wanted to see after having read the book even though I didn’t think the book was the greatest or anything, but it was a good and fast read. I enjoyed the glimpse into the early 60s of socialites and the beleaguered maids who serve them. The movie, while sentimental and a bit manipulative, was I think better than the book. I think it was better probably because of some good acting especially the maids who play Aibileen and Minny (Viola Davis and Octavia Spencer) and Emma Stone was cute and perky and likable as she was in Crazy Stupid Love, but the highlight for me was the beautifully vicious Hilly played by Bryce Dallas Howard. She was a joy to hate. The movie was too long, as many movies are nowadays, but worth seeing, especially if you read the book.

2011 Foreign Language Oscar movies Update

I am still slowly working on seeing all five 2011 Best Foreign language film nominated for an Oscar. I saw and previously wrote about I am Love (see below) and this summer I have also seen Biutiful, the Mexican nominee, even though it takes place in Barcelona. Javier Bardem plays a father who is dying and tries to figure out a way to help his children after he is gone. This movie is wrenching. It takes you into the underbelly of Barcelona where foreign workers are treated like animals and making it through life involves despair and anguish. I can see why it was so acclaimed when it came out, but it is really hard to watch.

The Concert -- I also saw The Concert which was nominated for a Golden Globe. When a former Russian conductor, who is now working as a janitor, decides to get the old crew together for a concert in Paris, he is met with many difficulties. He was fired many years earlier because he hired Jewish musicians. While there are moments of sweetness in this movie, overall it fails because it becomes too ridiculous, full of slapstick moments and some bad acting.

I am Love
is the Italian nominated film with Tilda Swinton, speaking Italian. It’s a doozy! It begins with a formal family dinner with the mega-rich Reccci family where cracks in the beautiful family demeanor become apparent. The cracks become chasms as the film progresses. The way the movie is filmed is interesting. Long, languorous shots of empty rooms or bees buzzing over flowers, for example. It also a lot about passion and love as the title suggests, but it all seems very chaste, until whoza, a very revealing sex scene, which seemed out of place, I thought. It’s a pretty fascinating film, overall, and it’s good to watch a movie that pushes the boundaries of what you think film should do.

A few more Ryan Gosling Movies

I watch a lot of movies because this or that actor is in it. Of course, I have my favorites (criteria for a favorite has to do with my belief that this actor is a very talented and he or she has some quality, some je ne sais quoi quality that makes him so captivating on screen – this list does not include my favorite comedians btw) Here are some of my favorite dramatic actors, in no particular order:

Carey Mulligan: a new favorite, great in An Education
Claire Danes: I’ve always loved her starting with My So Called Life
Colin Firth: the best Darcy ever! Need I say more
James Franco: my love for him is waning, but 127 Hours, great – I even saw him in Howl
Keira Knightly: thought she was great in Atonement
Clive Owen: he made apocalyptic cinema great in Children of Men
Mark Ruffalo: ever since You Can Count on Me, I’ve been smitten
Viggo Mortenson: kinda scary sometimes, I even suffered through A History of Violence to see him
Laura Linney: so great in so many things, but first loved her in You Can Count on Me
James McAvoy: Last King of Scotland, adorable and a great actor

However, the actor whose films I rarely miss would have to be Ryan Gosling. I haven’t seen all of his films and even I won’t go to ones that are supposed to be terrible, but I've seen most (see Ryan Gosling movies listed on the side). With that in mind I have see two of his movies recently. Both not great, but worth a look if you are a fan like me:

All Good Things All Good Things: All Good Things tells about the fascinating real life story of a wealthy New York family and a creepy murder. It is based on a real story of Robert Durst. Ryan Gosling plays the put upon son and Kristen Dunst his hapless wife. Here's a fascinating link to a New York Times article about the real-life murders.


Crazy Stupid Love – This ensemble romantic comedy was, as my friend said when we came out of the theater, pretty stupid. But I got a lot of laughs out of Ryan Goslings’ gigolo character and guess what, the actor who can do it all can also be really funny. Emma Stone I thought was pretty good in it too.

Summer Update

My gosh, is it August already? I have not written one blog entry this whole summer! What’s wrong with me? It’s paradoxical that I am more productive during the school year than my work free days in the summer, but sometimes the lazy days of summer get away from me and I find it’s almost dinner time and all I did for the day was pick raspberries and go on a walk (oh and other trivial activities like that). Or watch movies which I have been doing. Here are comments about some of the movies I’ve seen since the end of May.

Midnight in Paris – I really enjoyed Midnight in Paris especially after having just visited Paris. Woody Allen depicts a beautiful world of artists and writers amid romantic nostalgic Paris. How could I, Parisophile/ Francophile that I am, not like immersing myself in this romantic world of intellectual Paris?

Bridesmaids – I wanted to say so much about this movie – I had a whole diatribe rehearsed in my head, but sadly I did not get it written down. Because of its novelty, a female buddy comedy movie, I was excited to see it and while it’s hilarious in parts and original in other ways, I think they really botched it in the area of female friends. The long standing cliché about women is that they’re catty back biters who sabotage other women for self-serving reasons – usually having to do with a guy. And sure there were some nice friend moments that seemed real in Bridesmaids, though mostly I didn’t recognize these childish women. I love comedy, I love women comedians, but I didn’t love where they took this movie. Can’t women be funny and act like grownups at the same time?

Never Let me Go – based on a Kazuo Ishiguro novel, a stark look at a world where children are raised to be organ donors. It’s disturbing and very well acted especially by Carey Mulligan.

The Tillman Story – great documentary about professional football player and soldier Pat Tilman and his mysterious death in Afghanistan. This movie, like Fair Game which tells the story of Valerie Plame, makes you seriously question the integrity of our national government. Can there be that much subterfuge and hypocrisy in Washington and in our military? I don’t like to believe it, but this movie makes you wonder.

The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters (2007) – This movie definitely belongs in my list of quirky documentaries (see below because I just added it to the list). It’s about two middle aged guys who pursue a Donkey Kong high score. It’s weirdly wonderful and takes me back to my days of having the high score on the Donkey Kong game at the Bayfield arcade (it’s true!)

Super 8 – Kyle Chandler and references to Stand by Me got me to see this movie and while it wasn’t entirely what I expected nor my “type” of movie, I’m glad I went. The cute earnest kid ensemble was great and the nostalgic take on the late 70s made the movie worth seeing, oh and Kyle Chandler.

The Yellow Handkerchief – forgot it -- does that mean it is forgettable? Maybe it was good?


The Switch – another stupid romantic comedy by Jennifer Anniston. I like Justin Bateman so I thought, well maybe, but no, maybe not.