#6 - Mala Noche

I (Andrina) watched this without Tim on January 5, 2010. Netflix instant streaming is mankind's greatest achievement.

Watch the trailer

Directed by: Gus Van Sant

Written by: Walt Curtis (story)

                 Gus Van Sant

Starring: Tim Streeter

              Doug Cooeyate

              Ray Monge

              Nyla McCarthy

Plot synopsis:
Mala Noche is based on an autobiographical story by Walt Curtis and takes place in Portland, Oregon. Walt ,who is kind of an asshole, is a convenience store clerk and totally gay for Johnny, a illegal Mexican immigrant who doesn't speak English, and is also kind of an asshole. Johnny is weirded out by Walt and refuses all of his advances. Walt ends up having sex with Johnny's friend Pepper, who is yet another asshole. Johnny goes missing, Pepper gets sick, Walt remains an asshole....and some other shit happens.

Review:
Everyone in this movie is an asshole. I don't care what happens to any of these people because they are all selfish and arrogant. The acting is bad. The pacing is tedious. I have no idea how much time is going by. I could give a fuck less about the story. This is one of Gus Van Sant's first movies so I don't want to judge it too harshly. It feels like a first movie. I didn't expect anything amazing going in so I wasn't necessarily disappointed by it. But I'd definitely watch it again. I'm a sucker for black and white photography. I'm an even bigger sucker for hard shadows, high contrast, and dramatic lighting and focus. This movie is fucking gorgeous. Every shot would make a beautiful photograph. It's not for everybody but for me it's a complete visual-orgy-gasm. So if you ever watch it just watch it with the sound off. I will end this some stills from the movie so you can relish in the beauty.

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#4 - The Lovely Bones

We watched this somewhere around January 2, 2010.

 

                                        Watch the trailer

Directed by: Peter Jackson

Written by: Alice Sebold
                 (novel)             
                 Fran Walsh
                 & Philippa Boyens
                 & Peter Jackson
                 (screenplay)

Starring: Saoirse Ronan
             Mark Wahlberg
             Stanley Tucci
             Rachel Weisz
             Susan Sarandon
             Rose McIver
             Reece Ritchie


Plot Synopsis
(of the movie not the book)
So, there's this naive 14 year old girl and this creepy serial killer who fancies her. While she fancies this one boy from school and taking photos of her creepy neighbor. One day on her way home from school she gets murdered and probably raped and dismembered not necessarily in that order. She goes to....heaven? I guess it's more like a pre-heaven heaven until she can face her own death or something of that nature. While in this place she can watch over her family and friends as they are emotionally torn apart by her horrific death.

Review
Let me start by saying I haven't read the book. It seems like there's been quite a bit of hate for this movie and it's mainly from people who have read the book. I didn't hate this movie. I didn't love it either but I definitely liked it. It seems the biggest complaints have been that too much effort was put into the visuals and not enough into the story. Aside from the surrealistic "heaven" stuff the "real world" was also beautifully shot. The "heaven" scenes were indisputably stunning but that's not what I think about when I think back on this movie. I mainly think about the performances of Saoirse Ronan as Susie Salmon and Stanley Tucci as George Harvey. I think it's worth seeing just for them. I also really liked the character of  Jack Salmon, Susie's dad, and I think Mark Wahlberg did a good job. I liked his OCD, his obsession with finding the killer, the totally irrational logic of his rational problem solving. Okay so here's the things that bothered me. I don't get why the boy she was crushing on when she was 14 was still hung up on her however-many-indeterminate-amount-of years after she died even though they never actually had any real connection. Also Susan Sarandon. I guess I shouldn't say that because she was good as the grandmother but I didn't like the character of the grandmother. She probably would have been my favorite character if it weren't for one thing. She never shows any sign of grief over her murdered granddaughter. There's one scene where she's talking to her young grandson about Susie being dead and it's unnecessarily mean. She's willing to come live with the family to help them get their lives back in order and take care of the children so why is she so cold hearted when it comes to Susie? Maybe that's the way it is in the book, I don't know but it bothered me. Lastly, there's this really weird montage where the wacky grandma has to take care of the children and do the house work and...awkwardness ensues. I think it's suppose to be cute and funny but given the gravity of what this family has just been through it's kind of hard to watch. We don't want to be quirky and lighthearted when someone has been brutally murdered. Especially if that someone is our beloved 14 year old granddaughter. But all in all I still think It's a good movie, not great but good. I'm glad I saw it and in the future if I ever get a working TV and it happens to be on I just might watch it again.

#3 - Invictus

I'm not completely sure about the date but I'm thinking it was January 1st when we watched this.

                                            Watch the trailer 

Directed by: Clint Eastwood

Written by: Anthony Peckham
                  (screenplay)

                  John Carlin (book)

Starring: Morgan Freeman

             Matt Damon

Plot Synopsis

South Africa is very racially divided and Nelson Mandela being elected president only seems to add fuel to the fire. Being Nelson Mandela he wants to bring an end to this shiz. When he hears that the nation's rugby team The Springboks is going to be replaced with a new team he "spring(bok)s" into action. I'm sorry....I'm so sorry about that. Please don't hit me. Despite the team's suckiness the white population still support them mainly because it's part of their European roots. He knows that disbanding the team will only alienate and anger these people, furthering the divide. So he meets with Fancois, the captain of the rugby team, to try to motivate him into motivating his team into maybe thinking about trying to actually win enough games to get to the World Cup.

Review

I love Clint Eastwood. I love everything he's ever done. He drips sweat drops of perfection from his grizzled old face! I would have loved to see a Mandela biopic but I think this rugby junk made for a better movie. I'm American so I don't know anything about rugby. Is it like soccer-football only stupider? Also, I'm not proud to admit this, but I don't know much about Mandela either, except that he spent a long ass time in prison then became president of South Africa. The reason I like the rugby angle over the biopic is that it's relatable and it makes Mandela human instead of Super Jesus. (I stole that Jesus thing from Dylan Moran )  He seems like he could be your dad. Is that weird? I guess he just kinda reminded me of my dad and the way he likes football and baseball. I will never care about sports. I obsess over different things like movies and bands. I love Placebo like my dad loves The Greenbay Packers. People are passionate about sports, it unites people like nothing else. Finding out that someone supports the same team as you instantly makes you like them more. This movie shows Mandela's brilliance and humanity without having to resort to a heart wrenching tale of hard work and suffering. It's a rather simple but nonetheless passionate and uplifting story. If it wasn't true I would think it was cliche and corny. The fact that I don't care about sports that I know about, let alone rugby, and this movie made me care, is a testament to how good it is. Because it's not actually about the game it's about the importance of unity on a level that everyone can understand. Go see it! It's fucking brilliant.

 

#2 - The Birds

Tim and I watched The Birds on New Years day. We just recently watched Psycho and North By Northwest for the first time so we're on a bit of a Hitchcock kick. That there Alfred Hitchcock was a pretty darn good film maker. Did you know that? I think I saw it when I was little but the only thing I remember is the phone booth scene and that's most likely just because it has been parodied so many times.
 

Watch the trailer  

Directed by: Alfred Hitchcock

Written By: Daphne Du Maurier
                  (story)

                  Evan Hunter
                  (screenplay)

Starring: Rod Taylor
             Tippi Hedren
             Jessica Tandy
             Suzanne Pleshette
             Veronica Cartwright


Plot Synopsis
Melanie Daniels is a spoiled bitch with an undeserved sense of entitlement. She is the daughter of a wealthy newspaper tycoon in San Francisco and is often the subject of scandal. So she's essentially Paris Hilton, she even kinda looks like her. So bitch-face is in a pet store being horrible when she runs into Mitch Brenner who is looking for love birds for his younger sister's birthday. He calls her out on her shit which intrigues her for some reason. So Melanie stalks Mitch all the way to Bodega Bay, which is unbelievably beautiful, where he is visiting his mother and sister. She brings the love birds to his house and he invites her to dinner. She meets his much younger sister Cathy and his creepy mother Lydia. Cathy wants Melanie to come to her birthday party so she needs a place to stay for the night. She shacks up with Cathy's teacher Annie, who was an old girlfriend of Mitch's and Oh yeah birds are attacking and killing everyone!

Review
The Birds is set in Bodega Bay which is absolutely breathtaking. Tim and I were saying we'd love to visit. But I was feeling disheartened about it because I was worried that the lush green hills had been ruined with commercial and domestic development. Tim looked it up to see if it was still as beautiful today and it is thankfully intact. I've only watched 3 Hitchcock films so far so I'm not claiming to be an expert on his work but that's not going to stop me from pretending that I am. He gets the best performances out of his actors. The characters are charming and you empathize with them even if you think they're spoiled bitches. God fucking dammit writing movie reviews is hard! It's The Birds, of course it's amazing! Okay how about this? Even if there were no killer birds it would still be an amazing movie. I love the way the looming terror of the birds slowing builds. The first hour of the movie barely has any mention of them. The subtlety of Melanie looking up at some rather normal birds and feeling like there's something slightly odd about them for no overt reason is genius. No reason is ever given for the murderous behavior of the birds. Can you imagine how potentially awful a reason could have been? I very much appreciate that level of mystery and the room for speculation. The "why?" makes it all the more terrifying. The threat of the birds can be summed up in one brilliant scene. Melanie is waiting outside the schoolhouse for Cathy. She's sitting on a bench with her back to an empty jungle gym. We see one crow fly up and land on it. Then another. Then one more.....until we go to a shocking establishing shot of the jungle gym completely covered with crows. It seriously made me make an audible terrified noise. The fact that the birds are often puppets or animated doesn't take anything away. I guess it's kind of needless to say that there are countless beautiful shots seeing as how it's Hitchcock. The last shot being possibly the most stunning shot I've ever seen. I'm going to end it here because I'm beating myself up over this for no real reason.

#1 - Thirst

Tim and I watched Thirst on New Year's Eve. It ended  right at midnight so it was technically 2009 but we'll count it anyway because I said so. Tim thinks I should write a review of every movie we/I watch. I think that's going to be a lot of pointless work. I have the lazy....

                                                    Watch the trailer 

 

Thirst is a Korean movie directed by Chan-wook Park . He's the man who brought us Old Boy so you just know Thirst is going to be fucked up.

Plot Synopsis
A priest volunteers for a clinical study for some vaccine for some virus which results in him contracting said virus which is something not too unlike leprosy. He receives a blood transfusion to try and rid himself of the virus. But apparently the blood was from a vampire so now he's a vampire. Bum Bum Bum. He falls in love with an old childhood friend after they become reacquainted. She thinks she's trapped in an abusive home environment and a loveless marriage. She sees Mr. vampire/priest as an escape. All the while he struggles with his faith seeing as how he's a creature of evil and shit.

Review
Tim and I heard vampire movies were all the rage so we wanted to see what all the hubbub was about. In short, I loved it. Thirst is incredibly original. Visually speaking, it's beautiful. It explores ideas I've never seen in any other vampire movie, hell, in any other movie period. The characters are complex, flawed, and likeable. There are a few stand out scenes which are some of the best I've ever seen in any movie ever....ever. The one that sticks with me the most is when the girl is running down the street at night on her bare feet and the priest comes out of nowhere, picks up the girl, slips his shoes off, and places her in them.
I have spent way too much time on this already. I have so many to do before I catch up to today. I seriously watch like 2 movies a day. There's no way I'm going to keep this up for a whole year. I've been staring at the screen erasing then retyping the same sentences over and over. I've never written a movie review before. I don't know what to talk about. So let's say that this is good enough for now.
I highly recommend Thirst. It's touching and smart and fun and fucked up.

Movies Watched in January 2010

Movies watched in January 2010

   * = Unsure about the date        

T = Tim watched the movie       A = Andrina watched the movie

 X = No movies watched that day

 ==============================================

Thursday - December 31 --- 1) - Thirst (TA)


Friday - January 01 --------- 2) - The Birds (TA)
                                         3) - Invictus * (TA)

Saturday - January 02 ------ 4) - The Lovely Bones * (TA)

Sunday - January 03 -------- 5) - The Hurt Locker * (TA)

Monday - January 04 ------- X

Tuesday - January 05 ------- 6) - Mala Noche (A)
                                          7) - The Visitor (A)

Wednesday - January 06 --- 8) - Up In The Air * (TA)
                                          9) - The Core (A)

Thursday - January 07 ------ 10) - Broken Flowers (A)
                                          11) - An Education * (TA)

Friday - January 08 --------- 12) - Vertigo (TA)
                                          13) - A Streetcar Named Desire (A)
                                          xx) - East Of Eden - (half) (A)

Saturday - January 09 ------ 14) - Stage Beauty (A)
                                          15) - The Road (TA)

Sunday - January 10 -------- 16) - A Serious Man (TA)
                                          17) - Whip It (A)

Monday - January 11 ------- 18) - 500 Days Of Summer (A)

Tuesday - January 12 ------- X


Wednesday - January 13 --- X

Thursday - January 14 ------ 19) - Deep Blue Sea (TA)

Friday - January 15 --------- 20) - East Of Eden (finished) (A)
                                          xx) - Rebel without a cause (half) (A)

Saturday - January 16 ------ 21) - Rebel Without A Cause (finished) (A)

Sunday - January 17 ------- X

Monday - January 18 ------ X     
                                                      I spent this time
Tuesday - January 19 ------ X        watching The Tudors.
                                                      Shut up I like
Wednesday - January 20 -- X        Jonathan Rhys Meyer.
                                                    
Thursday - January 21 ----- X

Friday - January 22 -------- X

Saturday - January 23 ---- 22) The James Dean Story (A)

Sunday - January 24 ------ 23) loudQUIETloud: A Film About 
                                                The Pixies (A)
Monday - January 25 ----- X

Tuesday - January 26 ----- X
                                                      This time was spent
Wednesday - January 27 -- X         finally finishing
                                                       Battlestar Galactica.
Thusrday - January 28 ---- X          We're almost done
                                                       Just 6 episodes to go.
Friday - January 29 -------- X

Saturday - January 30 ----- X

Sunday - January 31 ------- 24) Parting Glances (A)

=============================================

Total movies watched by Andrina:  Month - 24  / Year - 24
Total movies watched by Tim: Month - 11 / Year - 11
Total movies watched together: Month - 11 / Year - 11
Total movies watched: Month - 24 / Year - 24