Quick notes on the movies that I've watched this past week:Talladega Nights wasn't as funny as it could have been. I think that for the most part, Will Ferrell wasn't the funny one in the movie--it was everyone around him that made me laugh. I especially liked the kids, Walker and Texas Ranger, and how they reformed under "Granny Law." They were humorously disturbing when they were foul-mouthed, but absolutely hysterical when they were doing tai chi with their grandmother.
Rating: 2 stars out of 5
Happy Feet was pretty bad, to be honest. Its biggest problem is that it couldn't decide what it wanted to be. A musical? A movie to inspire environmentalism? A movie about being yourself, no matter what the cost? It bounced from one to the other, leaving gaps where you thought, "But I thought this movie was about..." I also wasn't really impressed with the music. While the songs in the Disney movies usually forward the plot, the songs in Happy Feet were pop songs, often jumbled together. They didn't do a whole lot for me. The exile scene was also really very heavy, and came across sounding preachy. But I did really like the little Latino penguins; they made me laugh quite a bit, as did the humans dancing at the end.Rating: 2 stars out of 5
Pan's Labyrinth is the best movie that I've seen in a long time. The special effects were integrated seamlessly into the movie, the lighting shifted in amazing ways, based on what was happening (I really want to go back and watch it more closely to see exactly how this is done), and the juxtaposition of a fantasy story against the horrors of war was an incredibly poignant way to highlight the different worldviews of the different characters. Ivana Baquero, who plays Ofelia, does a fabulous job, but the movie is so incredible because each of the main characters creates a person that is believable, and, even at times for the Captain, sympathetic. I absolutely loved it and think it is a great contribution to the genre of fantasy literature and film.Rating: 5+ stars out of 5
Love Actually came out a while ago, but I recently rewatched it. Yes, it fits into the genre of chick flick, but the interwoven story lines makes it a more interesting movie than most. I really enjoy movies where seemingly separate plots somehow come together, or are at least peripherally connected. I also think that the movie does a pretty good job of showing many aspects of love--including love with the possibility of betrayal and love of someone who has died--in a more honest way than many romantic comedies.
Rating: 4 stars out of 5
And as a side note...I'm a little crabby with Netflix right now, to be honest. I loved their service when it first came out. We took a break from our subscription to play World of Warcraft, and we just recently renewed it. But now that all the disks aren't brand new, I've been noticing a LOT more performance issues on the DVDs we've rented. Since we renewed our subscription (about 2 weeks), I've had 2 movies that hang up so badly I can't understand the dialogue, and one of them even needed to skip the chapter before the movie would continue playing. I know that I can send the movie back and get a different copy, but that doesn't do anything for me when I want to see the last 15 minutes of Love Actually right now.
/sigh. Here's hoping Netflix works harder in the future to screen movies that are becoming unplayable.
3 comments:
Does this mean we can finally be Netflix friends? Yippie. Email me if you want to add me and I'll give you the address I use for them.
...Netflix friends? I never knew there was such a thing. And what does this so called "friendship" entail?
it let's you send notes back and forth to each other about films, see what's in the other person's queue...you get to see a % of how close your tastes are based on the way you both rated movies, it's kind of fun.
Do you have the flix of the net as well?
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