Mr. Nobody

"is it a compliment that Mr.Nobody could arguably sit alongside Terrance Malick's Tree Of Life with everything its trying to say?"

During the run up to the Reading Festival this year Kerrang magazine promoted the dvd release of Jared Leto's new film Mr. Nobody (although had a limited release as far back as September 2009) giving his acting career as much emphasis as his band 30 Seconds to Mars. While Leto's band played the main stage at Reading and Leeds this year his acting career in recent years has been infrequent yet aroused much recognition. Personally I always see Leto either singing heavy repetitive rock or next to Edward Norton and Brad Pitt in Fight Club - surely everyone's favourite film.

Mr. Nobody is a surreal sci-fi dram which centres on Leto's character Nemo Nobody, Leto plays both the 34 and 118 year old version of Nemo - It sounds like it shouldn't work, but it weirdly does. Nemo finds himself in the strange new world of 2092 where he is the last living mortal human alive, (for reasons that are far too boring and complicated to elaborate on) Nemo recounts his life to a a young journalist played by British actor Daniel Mays. Nemo tells the story of key events in his life, such as the moment when his parents split up and Nemo's complicated love life, however as Nemo faces tough decision like which parents to stay with, we see the consequences of both. Like the journalist interviewing Nemo years later we're left wondering "so which one did you pick your Mother or your Father?" Nemo answers "...Both"


Director Jaco Van Dormael has made a quirky film about life and fate and the choices we make, is it a compliment that Mr.Nobody could arguably sit alongside Terrance Malick's Tree Of Life with everything its trying to say? I'm certainly not one to demand a linear narrative and I enjoyed the way this one came together. Some people may have disliked them, but the moments when Nemo has monologues in front of a green screen about the meaning and the strangeness of life I found to be both insightful and  a welcome break from the story which seemed to drag on . Nemo in one of these monologues asks such rhetorial question as "Why does smoke leave the cigarette? Why do bacteria cells multiple away from each other?". Mr. Nobody will have been off the radar for most people but it's certainly worth checking out, although I know a slice of you with dislike it and may review it words such as "meaningless" and "preachy". 

Los ojos de Julia/Julia's Eyes

"It took its time but I think that's why I loved it so much, when it finally came good it packed one of the best punches of the year."

 Following on from the well liked blog of Spanish film The Skin I Live In here are my thoughts on Julia's Eyes. The film is another collaboration between Guillermo del Toro (Producer) and actress Belén Rueda, following on from The Orphanage.  Unlike the last few reviews I have posted on here I can not soak Julia's Eyes with enough praise. 


Julia's Eyes starts with a very iconic scene when Julia's sister that has become blind mounts a stall to commit suicide and has the stall knocked away from a mystery invisible man (this features heavily in the trailers).  Julia then takes on the mystery and tackles what she believes to be a murder and not the suicide the police and her husband are convinced it is. It may have been my knowledge of del Toro's involvement but it seemed to have his stamp all over it. I started to worry that as the film progressed and the suspension of horror built it would never deliver the killer punch.


It took its time but I think that's why I loved it so much, when it finally came good it packed one of the best punches of the year. Julia's Eyes started to remind me of The Shining, especially as I began to shout at the screen maybe it was because I  just saw people running after each other with crazed looks and knives. Julia's Eyes made me fall in love with world cinema all over again and further ignite my passion for Spanish language films. I concede that del Toro may have now found his perfect range but if it provokes films such as Julia's Eyes bring them on thick and fast. Julia's Eyes is without question one of my films of 2011. 

Insidious

"the first half the film jabs you in the face with the freakishness of the house and the child yet as it moved onto the second half it lacked a knock-out punch"

 I'm back from a working weekend, with another on the horizon I've been struggling to both watch films and upload reviews. I've been a bit fixated on The Killing series one after watching the first four episodes in one afternoon, should upload a review?

Anyway, new dvd release Insidious is meant to be the main attraction here and it's definitely worth letting it give you a scare. Insidious is basically a hunted house horror film with a twist, the twist being that its in fact the child that is hunted. In the first half the film jabs you in the face with the freakishness of the house and the child yet as it moved onto the second half it lacked a knock-out punch and left me wanting them to re-do certain parts.

In my opinion the horror genre is the most difficult to get right and so many have fallen short, I recommend Last House on the Left, The Silent House and Creep. Insidious is a very attempt and I can see why many people have expressed how much they liked it to me although the critics had a mixed opinion. I most enjoyed such highlights as the possibility the child was going to go on a crazy hunted rampage and felt let down when this did not happen.

Point of interest - Tiny Tim and the song Tip Toe through the Tulips - This song is heard a lot in the film and is probably one of the spookiest things in the film.

Small Films For Big Cinemas

"In a time when we have lost the UK Film Council we should be championing great British films, instead we are being swamped by the left overs of the summer blockbusters. "

Fancy going to see a great new film this weekend? Well I hope you live in a big city or you may be in for a lengthy car journey, this is what many will face this weekend with the apparent non-release of Kill List and The Skin I Live In. I know there are some great independent cinemas around the country that need out much needed attention, however the this post concentrates on the distribution of films by Odeon Cinemas, this should not be viewed as an attack on them but a question of how one of the largest cinema companies in Europe decides what films to screen.

After the great reviews Kill List has been getting I planned to book tickets for its opening weekend at my local Odeon (Coventry) however I soon discovered the film is not been shown at all. Instead my local Odeon is screening Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows Part 2 now in its 8th week and dominated by hits such as The Smurfs 3D and new release Friends With Benefits. After searching the Odeon cinemas where I could watch Kill List I found out it is only being shown at only 10 Odeon cinemas. In fact the nearest Odeon showing Kill List is in Manchester roughly 78.29 miles from my house. In a time when we have lost the UK Film Council we should be championing great British films, instead we are being swamped by the left overs of the summer blockbusters. The same applies with The Skin I Live In, although I put its marginalisation down to it being a foreign language film (Spanish) even the stardom of Antonio Banderas could not give it a bigger presence in Odeon cinemas.

Although I am not a professional film critic or do I work in any capacity for the film industry, I do know that the screening and distribution of films works on a supply and demand system and that Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows Part 2's long run this summer is a testament to its box office success. The box office takings both Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows Part 2 and The Smurfs 3D can in my opinion be partly explained by their 3D versions. I urge you people in such "big cities" (Manchester,Liverpool, London, Edinburgh) to go and see the films that are slipping under the Odeon radar.

Trust

Just a quick message before I get going -
Further to the notes in the description in this blog, I will be trying to post a new review if not every day, every other day. If for some reason you don't hear from me you could either send out a search party or congratulate me for getting a "proper" job. Like already stated in the description most reviews will be a result of the latest lovefilm dvd rental and if I'm waiting on the post then I'll try and post a review I did that currently sits on another dormant blog. - Hope that makes things nice and clear for everyone. Now for the main attraction.

Following the theme of reviews on new DVD releases (Little White Lies) I recently watched Trust (2010). The film is directed by David Schwimmer aka Ross from friends and is based on a screenplay by Andy Bellin and Robert Festinger. The film stars Liana Liberato as Annie Cameron a 14 year old girl that becomes close to a boy called Charlie that she befriends online played by Chris Henry Coffey. As a young innocent Annie becomes close to Charlie her parents played by Clive Owen and Catherine Keener seem to humour their daughters new found friend while both seem distant. Owen's character Will is heavily wrapped in his work while Keener's character Lynn has her attention on her son, who is moving away to college.. These circumstances push Annie to further interact with Charlie and their online relationship grows. However, as Charlie tells Annie his real age is 20, which then he admits is actually 24, Annie becomes unsure of her new found friend.

Charlie pushes forward relentlessly and arranges to meet Annie, who upon meeting him discovers Charlie's real age is 35. He nevertheless convinces her to come to his motel room, where he rapes her. Even after Annie's awful attack she believes Charlie and her are soul mates and he loves her. The majority of the film focuses then on the aftermath of the attack dealing with both Annie's relationship with Charlie and her father's attempt to understand and deal with the attack. However the middle part of the film seems to fall down after the interesting early development of the relationship between Annie and Charlie, although it does find its feet once again towards the end.

Schwimmer's intention for the film comes across as a film to educate adults on the difficult subject of Internet grooming, and although the topic seems to have lost media attention in the past couple of years, it is a worthy portrayal of a uncomfortable topic. Its cinema presence seems awkward and by accident and may end up finding its true calling on the small screen (or at parent education classes). It tackles the subject in the most clichéd way possible but clichés are clichés for a reason, I guess! Anyway, they do become slightly obvious and the whole film seems to lack subtlety at times.

Verdict It's interesting to see a difficult subject such as this on the big screen and we should credit Schwimmer for its quality and his conviction to bring it to life -- it tackles it head on but does it well.

Scream 4

A horror franchise getting a sequel, yes yes we've been here before. Saw has been dominating the Halloween cinema box office for the past few years, how many squeals are we up to with that again? - 7 right? I must admit a certain likeness for the Scream series and the fact that this sequel comes a decade after the last gives it some validity unlike the mere 12 month gap for other horror sequel's.

I might have been me but the plot caught me off guard, by the end of it I think I had just managed to get my head around the "stabathon" films concept. My defence is that most of the horror sequels allow the viewer to take a short nap between scenes and still feel totally capable of writing a review.

The Scream series can be cited as the father of slasher films and should be admired. However does a fourth film add anything to the series? not really, yet its not altogether pointless, at least it gives the cast the chance to make up to date references (the video blogs being a cornerstone of the plot)

Someone should have told Wes Craven to put the three original films in a pretty new dvd boxset to up his cash fund instead, just because a decade has gone by does not mean classics should be wheeled out of retirement.