I remember the earlier Shrek installments as being funnier, but it is hard to say with certainty. This one was reasonably enjoyable, and the gingerbread man’s sequence was downright hilarious.
Archive for the ‘movies’ Category
Hot Fuzz
This documentary is a shocking expose of what is hidden behind the carefully crafted facade of English country villages.
While a bit gory at times it was hilarious — better than Shawn of the Dead. Of course, I loved Super Troopers, so calibrate your expectations accordingly.
Lost in La Mancha
Elyn doesn’t really enjoy documentaries, so I don’t watch them as often as I’d like. However, Steve and Chrissy came over the other night, and as far as I can tell they only watch documentaries, so we ended up watching Lost in La Mancha.
This movie records Terry Gilliam’s attempt to film his version of Don Quixote. It turns out to be a comedy of errors, and most of the emotional hooks in the movie are laughs at the absurdity of their situation; otherwise the movie failed to connect.
Content-wise what impressed me the most was the seeming lack of knowledge that Gilliam had about his own enterprise. He didn’t know the status of contracts, there was a huge oversight in location choice, etc… I would have liked to have seen more about how these failures came to be.
In sum this was an interesting — but not gripping — behind-the-scenes look at a failed film.
Whither Movies?
Benjamin has been asking me about my mini movie reviews, and I’ve been basically ignoring him.
The sad truth is, the movie situation in Boulder sucks right now. They’re building a new movie theater at 29th Street (which is what replaced the old mall), but it won’t be done for months and months. However, anticipating this, one of the two remaining theaters shut its doors. The theater that is left only plays “art house” movies, which ordinarily aren’t what I’m interested in — I mean, I enjoy them, but in times of flux like this one, I am going to the theater to escape, not to plumb the depths of my ongoing existential crisis. Call me shallow.
IFS is still open but for some reason I never quite manage to read their schedule on time. I’m still hoping to get them to publish an ical feed (I seem to have gotten KGNU to do this… yay!).
When I was sick and couch-ridden a couple weeks ago I tried to watch old Stephen Chow movies. I forced myself through both volumes of Royal Tramp, but couldn’t watch Chinese Odyssey… both of these movies really sucked, I’m sorry to say.
Next week is the Conference on World Affairs, and even though Ebert called in sick, I will probably drop by to watch the movie straight through. They’re showing Chinatown this year — not exactly escapism, but I haven’t seen it on the big screen.
2 films
It is French comedy week at IFS.
On Wednesday we went to see Les Bronzés. This has been on my list of films to see for a few years; Video Station doesn’t have it. I suppose I should have been warned by the English title, “French Fried Vacation”. Anyway, it was a very 70s, plotless sex comedy set at a tropical resort. It was not very funny.
Last night we went to see Bernie. But after a few scenes of violence, we left. I hate going to a movie expecting one thing, and then getting something very different. This was much too dark for the mood we were in.
So, we watched Trekkies on DVD instead. This is a sweet film that made me feel a bit better about humanity again.
Smoke-n-Aces
In this long-awaited final episode in the Smoke trilogy, Harvey Keitel reprises his role as Auggie Wren, and Roberto Benigni joins the cast as the failed carnival clown Oliver Banjo. Together with a miniature — and perhaps imaginary — elephant, the two enter an epic but doomed quest to win the world series of poker.
Talladega Nights
We were in the mood to see something silly, so last night we rented Talladega Nights.
This movie is really long. The funniest part was after it ended, when I started dreaming up ways to get my revenge on Will Ferrell.
Little Miss Sunshine
We rented Little Miss Sunshine the other day. This is the funniest movie I’ve seen in a long time. I think I’m going to watch it a second time.
Casino Royale
This latest Bond film makes a few long-needed changes to the formula.Historically I think the Bond franchise has been successful because, like McDonald’s, it delivers a fairly standard product which is “good enough”. The typical Bond film involves an action-packed opening sequence, silly dialog, pretty women with ridiculous names, gadgetry, and a bad-guy blood bath. Furthermore they tend to be stylish without being cutting edge — they have a sort of “last year’s runway” conservatism.
The latest Bond film dispenses with the gadgetry — and thank goodness, I’m still reeling from the invisible car. It mildly mocks other Bond standbyes, such as the infamous shaken martini, or the absurd names for the women characters. However, it does keep to Bond’s essential filmmaking conservatism, being fashionably gritty and soulless but not as outrageously so as Miami Vice or Crank. Likewise it incorporates some cool parkour moves (and again mildly mocks parkour via the Bond character), without wholly giving in — the cutting in this section de-emphasized the coolness of the chase, making it a bit hard to fully follow.
Overall I thought this was the best Bond flick in a number of years, thought it wouldn’t play as well without the background of other Bond movies (for one thing it attempts to be the “first” Bond movie, explaining various things about the man — retroactive character development). I enjoyed it and only had to close my eyes a couple of times (I have a deep fear of drowning… ugh).
District B13
Since hearing about parkour somewhere I was interested in seeing District B13 (btw I never liked making imdb links for films, but I found wikipedia — of course — has a film project so I plan to make links there). It finally came out on DVD and I rented it the other night.
First, it was dubbed, which is really bad. The voices didn’t really match the characters too well, so some of it sounded very silly. I suppose there was probably subtitling on the DVD, but I was feeling pretty lazy so I just let it play.
The plot is lame, as you might expect. And it was even funnier to watch the “making of” special feature and hear a couple actors talk about the social impact of the film. Funnier in a sad sort of way; I felt embarrassed for them.
Of course, you aren’t going to watch this film to be dazzled by its intricate plot, or to hear its witty dialog, or to see the characters grow and change. Instead you’re watching for the choreography, hoping to see a violent and hypercool Fred Astaire. The parkour practitioners don’t disappoint. The first chase scene was the best (really you could stop after this and not miss anything); it was delightful to watch.
The other sad thing about the “making of” clip was hearing David Belle talk a bit about parkour. As he talked I thought about punk rock, or the early free software movement, or all the other things I’ve occasionally wished were never commoditized; and I wondered whether he struggles through the same search to find something private, that can be shared, without being flattened, packaged, and sold.