Memento Mori, The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, & Elevator to the Gallows

Memento Mori is actually not a horror story. Unless you think sympathetic portrayals of Korean schoolgirl lesbians is horrific. Which basically means I'm clearly out of that group. It's a sort of sequel to Whispering Corridors, but only in the sense that they're both about Korean schoolgirls and are sort of ghost stories. Whereas Whispering Corridors was more about the actual horror film aspects of it, Memento Mori was almost entirely about the relationship. Which was, of course, a complete shock to the backwardsness of Korean society. Because apparently, they measure heights, weights, and breast size in class and announce numbers in front of everyone. And 71 cm? That's frickin' tiny, even for a 17 year old Asian girl. It just seems like the uber-repressive society is just backwards when it comes to how to not have a lot of teenage girl suicides. And, again, there's a bit of teacher-on-student violence. Is this acceptable? And if so, what the hell, South Korea? Seriously, that's just really messed up. Maybe you should be a little less repressed and then you'll have more sex. Even if [redacted] is what caused the major problems in the story in the first place. Anyway, it's very good, very good at building suspense, only occasionally confusing near the beginning (it's those damn uniforms, I really can't tell them apart when they all dress the same), very much about the characters, and only the ending, which makes the ghost story aspect explicit, has anything I didn't entirely care for. Apparently there's a six-disc set of the movie, with an edit of the film that's about twice as long as the one released here. I can't imagine. Well, actually, I can, because the movie originally was much more explicit in the treatment of the physicalness of the lesbian relationship (note that it's a Korean movie, so it's not really explicit nudity, if any at all). So you'd have more kissing and touching and probably even more dealing with the societal backlash against their holding hands and kissing in public. Or maybe just more of them on the roof. Either way, I think it works very very well as it is.

The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie has an outstanding performance from Maggie Smith in the lead, and a good performance from Pamela Franklin as one of her students. I was bothered by the apparent love of fascism, but then again, I think it was supposed to be bothersome. Definitely a movie worth watching.

Elevator to the Gallows is both Louis Malle's first film, and it has a score by Miles Davis. One of those is just of some interest, and the other is absolutely imperative. Miles Davis was just reaching the height of his talent, and while it wasn't his best backing band, it wasn't too shabby. As an early French New Wave film, it's a very strong little thriller, and while it's not quite as visually stylish as some of the later movies, the score and performances are very much worth it.

Finding Neverland & F for Fake

Finding Neverland was much better than I was expecting. Very emotional movie, and my biggest complaint about it is the fact that it's not really true. It's more effective in the fictionalized version of the events than in the true story, so it's not a big problem. Depp is, of course, amazing. What the hell was he doing for all those years of not acting well? Oh, that's right, he was just picking some bad movies. It's also nice to see Kelly Macdonald in a role, and Ian Hart. This was a much better film than Monster's ball, so at least that movie did one good thing.

F for Fake is outstanding. There is nothing at all wrong with it. It's a masterpiece of editing, fakery, storytelling, and just overall awesomeness. It's a shame that F for Fake isn't up there with Touch of Evil and Citizen Kane as Orson Welles's best films. Or maybe it is, and I'm just not up on the general consensus of film critics on Welles's films. It's just a magnificent little film, well worth watching. Just don't trust anything. Which Welles himself says early and often in the film. The use of his own history in the film, and his referring to filmmaking as the ultimate fakery just adds another level, along with his illumination that Citizen Kane was originally about Howard Hughes rather than William Randolph Hearst. Well, possibly, because why should we believe anything that Welles says in this film. I'm not really familiar with the Elmyr de Hory and Clifford Irving stories, beyond the very basic parts. I watched it on TCM, on a special night picked by Penn & Teller, meaning that they had both an intro and exit by them. Pretty interesting, and it really does fit in perfectly with their show. Their show is like little half-hour bits of them both exposing as fakes and completely misrepresenting everything in it, just like the 85 minutes of F for Fake. And I just love that it's an ostensibly true story, and a documentary, but so much of it is from such a biased vantage point, that it actually feels just like a normal political documentary of today. If Michael Moore hadn't seen this film, I'd be amazed.

Munich, Soldier's Girl, The Horseman on the Roof, & The Assassination of Richard Nixon

Munich is now the best movie of last year I've seen. At least, until I think of something else. Syriana, A History of Violence, The Constant Gardener, Pride & Prejudice, Match Point, The Squid and the Whale, The New World, and probably a few others also would have been good movies to be nominated for Oscars over Crash (which still sucks), Capote, and Good Night, & Good Luck, none of which were particularly amazing movies. I still haven't seen Brokeback Mountain, but I'm pretty damn sure I'm not going to enjoy it as much as my list of great films of last year. Munich was a little long for my tastes, but it's a damn good movie anyway, and it's got an amazing central performance from Eric Bana. I'm not sure that Spielberg made quite the movie with no real moral judgments on terrorism and the responses to them that he says he did. The final shot sort of belies that doesn't it? Anyway, it's Spielberg's best film in years.

Soldier's Girl is really good. Too bad the DVD I got had no menu, frequently popped up a "Property of Showtime" message and just sucked. What the hell? Apparently, this has happened to a few others, who've purchased the DVD. What the hell Showtime? You make this good movie about a transsexual and the soldier who loved him/her and how the military is seriously messed up with respect to sexuality. Andre Braugher, Shawn Hatosy, and Troy Garity are all good, but Lee Pace is amazing. If I didn't know that Lee Pace was a guy (from the very excellent Wonderfalls, no less), I would have been shocked to find that out. Not an amazingly attractive woman, but still pretty good.

The Horseman on the Roof was weak. There are times when I just randomly added movies to my queue based on good reviews from the NY Times. This was clearly one of them. Sure, a story about cholera and revolutionaries in post-Napoleonic Europe sounds like a fascinating story, and Juliette Binoche and Olivier Martinez are both attractive, but there was just no there there in the movie.

The Assassination of Richard Nixon just sounded like too interesting of a movie to skip out on. Based on a true story of a guy who wanted to hijack a plane to fly it into the White House and kill Nixon? Sean Penn, Naomi Watts, Don Cheadle? Where did it go wrong? Probably because I don't really care to see a man broken down throughout the entire film.

The Naked Kiss & Whispering Corridors

The Naked Kiss is a great Samuel Fuller trashy movie. That ends up being something much more than the sum of its parts, mainly because Fuller is so capable of turning the myriad clichés in the film on their head. A prostitute beats the crap out of her pimp with a shoe (very effectively filmed) and then two years later tries to go straight after sleeping with a cop and then plans on marrying a pillar of the community? Seems sort of cliché, but then the little twists, the little strange bits start coming up and you realize that it's a great feminist movie. And that murder can be justified if the murderee is evil enough. And there's Charlie, something that struck me as bizarre from the opening credits where he was credited as himself. That's usually a dog or a horse or some other type of animal. Not in Fuller's movie though.

Whispering Corridors has a lot of Korean schoolgirls in uniforms. If that does it for you, you will love this movie. And if you like Korean schoolgirls in uniforms and creepy horror films that are actually somewhat scary, then you will love this. And since it's me, I enjoyed it. A little difficult to tell the many many different schoolgirls apart, except for a couple of them. And it certainly wasn't a great film, or anything, but it was much better than a lot of the more highly regarded Asian horror films I've seen, since it doesn't just repeat what's been done before. Well, at least not as much as most of the other ones I've seen. The DVD was a little on the weak side, with pretty weak video and little to no extra content, as I'd be sort of interested to know if it's common for male teachers to be so sexually suggestive with their young female students or even have them beat the crap out of them. Anyway, it's fun that I went on a journey into my feminine side last night.

V for Vendetta, Waterland, & The King of Comedy

V for Vendetta is a problem for me, because the movie is actually pretty good, manages to fit in a lot of plot points from the comic, and doesn't mess around too much with it. That said, it does mess around enough that it bothered me about a few things. Why didn't they destroy 10 Downing Street at the end, not the Houses of Parliament? I know that Americans don't know what 10 Downing Street is and... Oh, yeah, it's the Americanization that bothers me. And it doesn't capture the spirit of it quite well enough to make the changes it does make to have it fit more as an American version of the story work. And I don't like the different ending at all. The ending to the comic fits much better with the previous story. The ending to the movie just doesn't work. Natalie Portman also is too old for Evey. And I didn't like the retelling of Guy Fawkes, which was just a blatant tip to the non-English audiences who wouldn't be familiar with him. Why should that matter? And no LSD trip? And nothing about how V blew up the camp or the poetic justice deaths for the torturers? And Susan is a bad name? And the simplification of everything in it bothers me. I agree with Moore that movies of his works generally don't work out. I really am not looking forward to The Watchmen movie. That will inevitably suck. Then again, I didn't hate this at all, and I feel that almost every one of my complaints is due to how much I really enjoyed the comic and that the movie succeeds on its own. Still a somewhat mindless action flick, but not too bad. And I wanted more Storm Saxon. So ridiculous in the comic.

Waterland isn't as good as the book. That said, it does somewhat capture the spirit of the book. And it has Maggie Gyllenhaal's first performance. Which was just a "Hey, that's Maggie Gyllenhaal. How'd she get that part? Oh, yeah, her dad directed the movie..." part. It's weird that I had a little unintentional Sinéad Cusack film fest yesterday. Didn't realize that was going to happen. I really liked the book, and I really recommend it to all. The weird bits of the merging of the past and the present sort of make the theme of the book obvious, and therefore don't bother me at all. I also liked that Jeremy Irons played a creepy old guy again. Seriously, he always does that. It's like he stepped out of the womb a fully formed old creepy guy. It's a good thing that he has already played Humbert Humbert, otherwise there'd be a serious deficiency in his filmography. At least he's married to Sinéad Cusack. That helps a little.

The King of Comedy doesn't work as well as I think it should have. I think the identification with the evil people has something to do with it. I don't like Sandra Bernhard at all, that also sort of hurts it. However, it's a good biting satire of the society that we really have become. Much better than Natural Born Killers. And it has Jerry Lewis's best performance ever. Well, according to Netflix, I've never seen a Jerry Lewis movie. So at least it's the best one I've ever seen. Much better than his weak performances on all those telethons. I couldn't believe he actually cared about all those kids. Just seemed fake. Good thing I don't believe in hell, or else I'm sure to go there for that crack.

Pom Poko

Pom Poko suffers from overlength, its episodic nature, and an obsession with raccoon testicles. But the ending is surprisingly touching, after I felt like the movie just wouldn't end. Plus, the movie is utterly obsessed with raccoon testicles. And their use as weapons. If I were a person, attacked by raccoon testicles, I would freak out. There are some very funny things, and the ending is great. It's just the long, episodic film beginning and middle that detract. Unless I hadn't become familiar with the signifigance of Tanuki after the bizarre (from a non-Japanese standpoint) use in Super Mario Brothers 3 (plus the leaves), I would probably have been entirely confused. The message of the film, that protecting the environment is important, is a very important message, and if you can handle the use of testicles as weapons, and you think that your kids could handle it, then it's great. I probably could have mentioned raccoon testicles being used as weapons a few more times.

Pennies from Heaven, Battle Hymn, & The Five Obstructions

Pennies from Heaven isn't as good as The Singing Detective. The songs aren't as organic, there are too many times when the song happens, and then the characters go back directly to what they were doing before, with little new information about the plot or even their motivations. The repetition of this process, completely unnoticed in The Singing Detective begins to drag down the movie. Plus, I'm really not sure about some of the completely unnecessary special effects at the end of the fourth episode. What was up with the record in space? The occasionally extremely distracting effects from using video also detract from the performances, which, from Bob Hoskins and Cheryl Campbell at least, are outstanding. And it is weird to see Kenneth Colley do anything other than kowtow to Darth Vader. It's pretty amazing that you can tell it's him at some times, and at others that he completely hides behind that scraggly hair.

Battle Hymn is... strange, in that, the main Korean-Indian is played by a Welshwoman. And it's also fun to see Rock Hudson act straight. I just kept screaming (in my head) "HE'S GAY!!!!" Oh well. The movie itself was horribly melodramatic, which is exactly what you'd expect from Douglas Sirk. It's fairly effective melodrama, but I don't like it nearly as much as the rest of his stuff. And I'm not sure why the hell they decided to have that soldier at the beginning saying "This is a true story". He was very awkward.

The Five Obstructions is actually interesting. It is a Lars Von Trier film I don't get angry watching. Mainly because Lars admits he's an asshole. Which he is. Such an annoying guy, gets to be annoying in this as well. But at least there's Leth to make it all better, and actually have a human being at the middle of it. I also thought the first four obstructions were actually interesting movies, while the fifth, of course, just apologizes for the earlier junk. Well, the second time was sort of weak, but the first was hypnotic, the fourth was amazing, and the third was interesting. Not really something I'd watch over and over again. But it's still worth seeing, especially if you are interested in filmmaking.

Dr. Lamb & Corpse Bride

Dr. Lamb is a movie I've been meaning to see since I first heard about it back in college. Which is strange that it took so long to actually get to it. However, maybe I should have waited a little longer. It was brought up in my true film class, as it's based on a true story of Hong Kong's first serial killer. And it was made in the heyday of Category III shockers. So there's a lot of nudity and gore, but this one adds in necrophilia. So yay for that, I guess. Considering how crappy the movie looks, how terrible the subtitles were (admittedly, it was an all-region DVD, so it clearly was not translated by someone for whom English was their first language), and how misogynistic the movie is (a recurring theme throughout Category III Hong Kong films), the only thing that makes it worth watching (unless you like severed breasts) is Simon Yam, who is very good as the over-the-top killer. Well, depending on your ability to handle crazy, you might think he's terrible. But for a Hong Kong film, he's actually occasionally restrained. Which is almost all you need in a movie like this. Also, what the hell's up with the title? I seem to have entirely missed the reason for it being called Dr. Lamb (apparently, the character is named Lam, which gives sort of half the title). And I just wanted to say that if you're going to use a camera on a tripod, don't act like there's a cameraman who's moving around during a murder scene video when you actually know that the murderer is alone with the victim and a camera on a tripod. Seriously, that just takes me out of a film. Pay attention and try not to screw up. Oh, and seriously, was that child porn? I think it was. What the hell?

Corpse Bride is a very different brand of horror, in that it's horror for the younguns. No gore, no nudity here. Still, the vague sense of darkness is something that Burton's other stop-motion films do perfectly. About the only thing I didn't enjoy immensely in it is the music, which is really not special at all. That said, it's not terrible, nor does it stick out horribly, it's just sort of there. Voice acting was good, Depp didn't seem too Depp-y, Helena Bonham-Carter was only recognizable because I'm very familiar with her voice, and about the only one I didn't like was the Peter Lorre maggot. But that's because Peter Lorre should be the only one who is allowed to do Peter Lorre voices. Meaning no one should do him. Such a cliche. Pick someone else, or, even better, just create a real character. It adds nothing to make the reference.

The Hills Have Eyes, Wedding Crashers, & random Alan Moore and other comics

The Hills Have Eyes was bland 70s horror. I am tired of movies being called horror classics when they just are boring. Plus, I wanted everyone to die. I hate crappy 70s crap. And this was full of it. So many better movies that could be called classics. Why is crap like this revered when much better movies are forgotten? Sad state of affairs.

The Wedding Crashers... well, speaking of sad states of affairs, why is it that I can watch what is praised by so many people as being hilarious and not laugh? At all? It's just like with Old School. It's not like I don't like movies in this new wave of comedies, as I really liked The 40-Year Old Virgin, and I like Rachel McAdams. Why is it that I didn't like this? Oh yeah, it's because, again, I don't actually care for any of the characters besides Rachel, and she was utterly wasted. I think I just don't like Vince Vaughn. I hated Starsky & Hutch, Dodgeball was utterly worthless, and maybe it's just him. Can't quite figure out why, since I did like Swingers. Then again, the only people in the cast who've really done anything worth watching since are Ron Livingston and Heather Graham. They wasted Bradley Cooper. Damnit, he needs good roles. So good in Alias. When they got rid of him, the show began a very fast descent. Also... I think the Wilsons' need to stick very close to Wes Anderson. And movies directed by Ben Stiller. Damn shame...

I've also spent this weekend reading comics. Here're my quick reviews: Serenity bridge comic between the show and the movie was nice to read, finally; The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen was great, and really makes me wish I had never seen the movie, and that it never existed; V for Vendetta makes me want to watch the movie a lot, because it was very good; The Watchmen was interesting, but would make a terrible movie. I also tried to read From Hell, but it was very amateurishly drawn. I will have to retry it a little later.

The Killers x3, The New World, & A Woman Is a Woman

The Killers is an interesting remake of the earlier movies, in that it doesn't even really use Hemingway's story at all. It just kept the very basic idea of it, and then sort of futzed around similar to the 1946 version, except with car racing rather than boxing. Plus, this one had a really really evil Ronald Reagan, in his last performance before going into politics. I'd like to think that this type of role is why he left movies. Because he was pretty bad. Then again, I vastly preferred using the Hemingway story rather than beating up a blind lady, but the rest of the movie was actually pretty much better than the earlier one, although the Lee Marvin-Angie Dickinson pairing was much better three years later in the amazingly good Point Blank. That movie, by the way, is my favorite Lee Marvin film. Yes, ahead of The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, The Dirty Dozen, and The Big Heat. All of which are classics. You know, the problem with Ronald Reagan in a movie is that all I can think about is Nancy Reagan, married to Ronald Reagan while she was three months pregnant, and famous in Hollywood for giving the best head anywhere. Once you hear something like that, it realy does ruin any positive view you have of their "moral cleanliness". Stupid hypocrites. At least Democrats are the pro-sex party. Yay for us!

You know, I also saw the earlier version of the Killers and Tarkovsky's version as well. Those followed Hemingway's story better, but were just not as good as Siegel's version. Well, Tarkovsky's version was only of Hemingway's story. Doesn't work as well in Russian as it does in English.

The New World is exactly what you'd expect from Malick. Dear god, it is the most beautiful film I've seen in a long long long time. I still hate Colin Farrell with a deep passion. At least Christian Bale gets the girl. Who is hot. Very hot. And way illegal, damnit. More people, however, should look as good as she does. Ignore the IMDB photo galleries, because she's wearing too much makeup. Most people, in my opinion, look better without makeup. Or at least the extremely attractive people do. Anyway, more miscegenation, especially when they can give us beauty like Q'Orianka Kilcher, a mix of Swiss and Quechua.

A Woman Is a Woman really messes with your head, which is, of course, what Godard is trying to do. The whole soundtrack dropping out entirely is very disconcerting. Very disconcerting. Especially when it's playing a good tune, and then it goes out. And the jump cuts, and other cuts where clearly more time takes place than the cut would suggest are just really all about Godard being all "I'm better at messing with you than you are about figuring out what's going on". And of course, he's Godard and clearly is. It never feels anything less than a film, with even multiple breakings of the fourth wall. Bizarre. It's a great movie though, alternately hilarious and depressing. Not as good as Godard's best films, but it's better than some of his others.

Brother's Keeper & Good Morning

Brother's Keeper is a depressing little documentary, because it's about a family of four brothers, and when one dies in slightly interesting circumstances, one is arrested for the murder. Then it gets horribly depressing in just how screwed up everything becomes when the prosecution horribly botches the investigation and the local community rallies around the brothers.

Good Morning has some of the most immature fart jokes in a movie. What the hell was the point? Shame that they were in an otherwise interesting Ozu movie about petty jealousy, Japanese culture, and television. Plus an almost constant string of fart and poo jokes. It also has a completely immobile camera. Which isn't apparent at all. Lots more cuts in this than in Tokyo Story.

Confessions of a Nazi Spy & Stick It

Confessions of a Nazi Spy is extremely dated, and it feels almost like a documentary rather than a fiction film. But the problem is that it never actually feels like any type of film, rather a warning shot across the American bow in an attempt to make them be sufficiently anti-Nazi. Some of the problem there is that it's so comically done that I don't think it's effective enough in the portrayal of Nazis as evil. Plus, Edward G. Robinson gets a crap role. All he does is play the FBI agent as smarter than everyone else in the film, and plays a few scenes silently because the narrator is telling the audience what the movie isn't good enough to show. It was also strange to see George Sanders play a Nazi. Just a whole bunch of strange in the film. At least it was an anti-Nazi film produced before WWII started, even though the extra scenes at the end, added after the re-release in 1940, put that added bit of anti-Nazi kick that the previous 100 minutes were missing. Because really, Confessions of a Nazi Spy just wasn't anti-Nazi enough. It's like the Diet Coke of anti-Nazi films. Just not anti-Nazi enough. And now I will shoot myself for not only thinking of ripping off Austin Powers, but then doing so.

Stick It suffers because of a horrible visual sense. I'm not even sure that most of the bits of the gymnastic routines can be done. I'm also pretty sure that the judging is about as stupid as it is portrayed. And what the hell was up with the crazy visual effects during the first meet? Why the hell was the kaleidoscope effect used? Why do I get embarrassed for characters who dance crappily? It suffers also because it isn't nearly as trashy fun as Bring It On. It's still trashy fun, but it isn't nearly as good. That said, it's so freakin' ridiculous that if you aren't leaving the theater just bouncing and making devil horns (possibly with two hands because this movie rocked too much for one hand), you suck. Seriously, this movie is ridiculous fun.