Blindsight

The word 'touching' is often overplayed to the point of simply sounding cliche to describe a film, but this documentary really is. It is the kind of movie to make you reflect upon your own life and achievements. In Tibet blindness is treated as a curse and means you must have done something wrong in a previous life. Sally, a blind woman traveled to Tibet and on a donkey rode around rural towns recruiting blind children to set up the first blind school. You may think that is amazing but it goes further. She contacts Eric, a blind mountain climber who has even reached the top of Everest. Together with a group of climbing experts that Eric has previously walked with they take 6 children from the school to reach a 27,000 feet height at one of the summits of Everest. The fact that they have no prior climbing experience and are children would be reason enough for this to be a huge feat. The documentary does not waste time showing endless footage of them climbing. Instead it focuses on their stories, their families and the trust and team work it takes for them to accomplish this together.

The Lake House

Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock appear to have simply turned up to receive their paychecks on this movie and not a lot more. Even though the movie has little to offer these two are capable of making it a note worthy film through their performances. It really seems as if both actors checked out for The Lake House and as a result I am bitter that it stole time from my life.

Death to the Remake

Going slightly sideways into television I have to air my distress at yet another horrific idea for a remake. Not only is it bad enough that English comedy Absolutely Fabulous is going to be remade in America (when half the humor is overly posh drunkenness.) but now they're getting their grubby mitts on Peep Show. Peep Show is truly unique and comedic genius. Every episode is quotable from start to finish. Like the English version of The Office (don't even get me started on that blood bath of a remake) it is carefully crafted with quality as the most important aspect. Rather than create a 23 episode series with a few jokes in each, only 6 episodes are required in each series but with every single moment, a moment of comedic perfection. I dread to imagine what will happen to this show once it gets torn apart. I imagine it will be a lot like a car crash...but one that you can help but look at.

Yes Men

Everyone should leave this movie wanting to be a yes man. What exactly does this entail? Intelligent pranks to put it simply. The Yes Men look for companies who are not ethically responsible and through a little misguidance of identity seek to point this out through posing as industry heads at conferences and even on national and international news channels. So successful have the Yes Men been at their ethical pranks that another movie has already been spurned, Yes Men Fix the World. Amazingly they have not been sued for everything despite during the second documentary causing a company's shares to drop by the million. But perhaps this just goes to show that is because the Yes Men are just pointing out what these corporations know deep down inside already.

Tell No One

The tagline admittedly previously put me off the movie. Bla bla bla murdered wife e-mailing 8 years on sounds a bit crap basically. Don't make this mistake. Instead of being a crap oh is it my wife actually alive or just someone pretending to be her movie it becomes an intelligent mystery of what really transpired on the night she was supposedly murdered. They never try to pull the cheap stunt of making you guess whether she is alive or not. Her husband believes and that is all the belief that we need. At moments the mystery appears to be going nowhere and it does wrap everything up nicely but not in a way that you feel cheated by the story.

2 Days in Paris

If you have (which hopefully you have) experienced the joyous cinematic experience of Richard Linklater's Before Sunset and Before Sunrise starring one July Delpy, then you cannot but feel that her writing/directorial/starring effort is somewhat an imitation of this. Perhaps it is the relationship that she found herself in at some point between the two meetings. There is also a slight feel of Woody Allen through Adam Goldberg's overly analytical character as Delpy's boyfriend. An enjoyable element of the film is knowing that Delpy dragged her own parents into the film to play, who else, her parents. Overall it is an interesting study of a relationship as cracks begin to surface in a surreal 2 days in Paris.

Dark Days

This movie will not bowl you over but for the 80 minutes of your life it will take to casually watch it you learn of another life. A group of people set up their own community in a tunnel by Penn Station in Manhattan. Each person is there for a different reason. Some are more alert than others. Yet you see how they have become a family. We learn about their pets that they brought in to share their homes, built from scrap wood. Some pets thrive and others simply did not acclimatise to the living quarters. Yet you have to admire the ingenuity of getting a cat when your 'town' is rat infested. Take a moment to find the human element.

From Dust to Glory

I can honestly say that I have never held even a remote interest in any sort of car or motorbike racing.....until watching this documentary. The beginning feels very standard with the who's who of the Baha 1000 mile race. About half an hour in when considering switching to something else all of a sudden this became a great human piece where a knowledge or interest in racing suddenly was of no consequence. When you meet people like Weather Man who sets up a broadcast station high up to help combat the lack of communication and Mouse who intends to complete 1000 miles himself on a motorbike as opposed to the traditional team relay method it is impossible to not care. All of a sudden these are great guys sitting reminiscing about the amazing experiences they have encountered and shared whether it be their first race or their 20th completing such a mammoth track. The reality of danger is there ever moment with the death of a spectator which could happen at any moment when there is no barrier to separate the racers from the fans. It doesn't matter what anybody's involvement is, they all have this humungous near death speed thrill that will bond them for life.

11:14

There is very little to say about this movie. You will find yourself intrigued as to the connection amongst the stories but more just to say you figured it out than you actually care. Three stories occur in an evening which all are inevitably intertwined. A drunk driver, a young girl and a group of teenagers in their car form the basis of the movie with many others coming in and out. The scenarios which occur honestly should be hilarious. Yet I was left without laughter throughout the entire film. The only thing which stopped me switching off was figuring out the story which plays back and forth with time until the end when all the loose ends are tied up. With such a decent cast and potential for great black humour this film fell far below par in relation to expectations.

Delirious

Delirious is a movie which proves choosing to watch something based on Steve Buscemi is usually a good decision (with the exception of Interview.) He stars alongside Michael Pitt and Alison Lohman. Buscemi shines as an incredibly unlikeable paparazzo with very few redeeming qualities, in fact almost none. Michael Pitt plays the a homeless person who by chance encounters pop star Alison Lohman and Steve Buscemi on the same day. Working as an assistant to Buscemi for free in exchange for a place to stay he finds opportunities in life. Michael Pitt has always had an off beat quality to him, none to unlike Buscemi. With the way Pitt shies away from main stream movies to work with the Gus Van Sants of the world he could very well become the 'next' Buscemi. He has an eye for interesting movies such as Funny Games and a quiet intensity.
Right from the title sequence with a shot of Pitt looking as if he were a stock motion puppet this film stood out and by the end will prove to be everything you expect of it. More than worth taking the time out of life for.

Marvin's Room

Having seen this movie several years ago as a young kid who just wanted to watch Leonardo DiCaprio's movies because he was good looking, I had a feeling that being a little older and (hopefully) a little wiser, I may truly appreciate it this time around. I forgot just how subtle but powerful this movie is. There are no cheap tricks and cheap emotions. Instead a slow build on characters makes the people real. A steady creation of humans we can connect with will always evoke more emotion than some stereotypical moments of sadness with a 50 piece orchestral soundtrack. Those movies may make us feel something in the moment, but movies such as Marvin's Room are the kind that stay with you long beyond the credits.

Seventh Seal

A movie that is more for educational purposes than sheer enjoyment. Initially I planned to switch it off after an hour assuming that two thirds of the film would be enough to give me a fair assessment. However once things began to make sense and fit together you do become invested. It goes to show how great Bergman was and how much the film industry loses when it loses a great filmmaker. Who else could make the point so beautifully and intelligently that 'love is perfect in its imperfection.' The message comes across far more powerful in a forum such as this than through whoever happens to currently be hot in Hollywood taking yet another paycheck movie hacked out in 6 months.

A brief thought on comedy movies : I managed to watch two movies today. When I first arose I was feeling particularly brain dead so I watched Stepford Wives (the remake) I watched the original a couple of weeks ago so it was kind of fun to watch the remake after that. Original definately much better though. It was a better constructed story and based on that rather than trying to be funny. I think that's the problem with most comedies. They just try to hard. I really do fail to laugh at the majority of them. They try to hard to be funny that it's not about the character or the story and if you don't care and invest yourself in those then nothing matters as much. Also because they just go for the cheap laughs anything that is funny just vanishes on the second viewing. The few movies that I find really funny are incredibly well crafted with superb writing. This is Spinal Tap is 100% the funniest movie of all time, one of the few that could make me laugh, let alone that hard and that frequently.

Postcards From the Edge

The story could have been stronger, but with Meryl Streep and Shirley MacLaine it was definately worth the watch. A few good film industry in jokes as well. Meryl Streep being told the insurance companies won't back her for her next movie after having had an OD unless she stays somewhere suitable responds wittily with 'What am I supposed to do, stay in a halfway house for wayward SAG members?' Meryl shows that she has an impresive singing voice performing two songs and they're both fantastic for completely different reasons. All in all this movie won't change your life but if you have a lazy Sunday afternoon, stick it in.

Me and Orson Welles

Don't be mistaken by the title which makes it sound like someone dustily recounting the time they once got to spend with the young Mr Welles. Richard Linklater's latest offering is everything but this. Zac Efron may be the star who has all the girls running after him, but Christian Mckay as Orson Welles is the real star of this movie. He plays a character who thanks to Citizen Kane, we are all aware of and does this perfectly. This is a great case of a director casting an unknown, knowing that a name celebrity would be far too distracting. Within this movie we are truly transported into believing we are watching the Orson Welles. His appearance seems as if it were created for this role and the voice is flawless. We see a Welles who is young and full of arrogance, and he knows it. You are left never entirely sure what is a performance in his life. There are moments where he lets his emotions show, only ever in intimate settings. At the end you never truly know which of these moments were real, and which were simply creations of his mind to achieve his goal. The main focus is on a high school student, in the right place, at the right time, who finds himself drafted into a performance of Julius Ceasar. This young teenager played by Zac Efron, you cannot help but laugh when a young girl asks if he sings or if he has done any plays before. His response? A little, and just a few high school plays. Efron still has a lot to learn as a performer but this film gives him the chance to show his potential aside from his American Idol styled singing performance on the stage, which is exactly what you expect it would be.
An incredibly well crafted film with an Oscar worth performance of Welles. Hopefully his stature as an unknown will not cause him to be overlooked.

My Suicide

This movie has cult teen phenomenon written all over it. With a mix of movie satire and heavy animation at the beginning, sure to attract all its followers, the film moves gently into darker water without ever leaving the former behind completely. Every single teenager seems to have the thought at some point 'what if I killed myself.' Sometimes it is even the people you would least expect to have reason to feel this way. As teenagers we are all so self consumed with what we don't have, too busy noticing what everyone else has, that it takes something like a kid proclaiming they will kill themselves on film for a school project to make everyone aware of everything they already have. At the beginning, the film passes itself off in a documentary style with camera style and plausible animation to assist. The only fault with this film is the end. By that I don't mean what happens. It is the victim of too many moments where the film feels like it is the end but then it continues. This leads to a feeling of the last moment being tacked on but in the grand scheme of things it doesn't take away from what it is a great film. With the right marketing and release strategy, this film has the potential to become huge and stick around for a long time. As long as their are unhappy teenagers in the world, this movie will have a place.

Palookaville - I had very high hopes for this film. It should be one of those films inclusive of the line 'with hilarious consequences' included in the byline. The idea of three guys who know nothing attempting crime should be easy enough to be well executed. Unfortunately aside from an accidental bakery robbery instead of the jewelery store next door and a mix up at the end there's very little to be amused at in this film. The acting is by no means at fault, the movie just seems unsure of the tone it wishes to take at times. Unfortunately in its effort to spike both humour through human idiocracy and real personal moments it never quite reaches either successfully. That is not to say that this film is not worth viewing entirely, just more background watching than anything else.

Sixteen Candles - Now I have to admit to never having seen Sixteen Candles before. Blasphemy I know, but maybe it means more as a restrospective than it would have at a younger age. If I had seen this in high school then it may have been a movie that gave me false hope for what, or should I say who, I aspired to have. This movie hits perfectly on the sheer embarassment of everything high school had to offer without ever going overboard enough to make it seem unrealistic. I know I'm a little late on the bandwagon with this one but it was definately worth the wait to understand and appreciate every little nuance whilst associating characters with people I once knew. See if you can spot the number of songs in the soundtrack which have appeared in movies since with similar settings....

Kicking and Screaming - No no no, not the Will Ferrell atrocity. Noah Baumbach of Squid and the Whale, and Margot at the Wedding. Already being a huge fan of his other works, maybe my expectations were a little high. The tagline of characters who talk a lot and never do anything after graduation says it all really. There are some great moments in this movie and it was enjoyable to watch but nothing ever really changed. All the way through the characters spoke and behaved exactly as in the initial scene taking place during their College graduation party. It is definately interesting to watch as it is indicitive of Baumbachs more recent work. I fully applaud a man who so constantly creates characters that we have no reason to like, yet cannot help watching.

Anvil! The Story of Anvil! - My favourite film at this years Sxsw festival, it received a standing ovation with not a single person leaving before the end of the credits. It didn't matter where I had to be at that moment in time, everything inside me was caught up applauding with all my might for those we had all spent the last hour and a bit getting to know. This is a documentary of a band who should have made it big a long time ago, but missed their chance somehow. It is sadly a representation of what most bands in the music industry go through for their dream. However, few want it as much as Anvil who have been going for 30 years and are now in the stages of recording their 14th studio album. Every time they play, even if only to 15 people, they give everything inside of them in case their opportunity is in that moment. Robb Reiner and Lips are the two founding members of the band. You may be mistaken for thinking it is a new version of This is Spinal Tap at first but by the end there is no doubt that these are heartwarming people and with all your might you will want them to suceed. These two guys know each other so well that they break up the band and put it back together every five minutes because they are as close as brothers where the argument never lasts long. The humour finds place in an amp which really does go to 11 and a conversation about their first song they wrote along with the concept for another called thumb hanging. It doesn't matter if you like metal music or despise it. This documentary shows two people who give every single part of themselves to achieving their dream, something which many of us in todays society are too gutless to attempt, for this alone they should receive success. If you see one documentary this year make sure it is this one.