Some characters didn't get their fair mention. To begin with, Jon Kortarena, about whom all you need to know is that he was born in 1985, 10 long years after yours truly:
Then you have, yes indeed, no introduction needed:
As for the third mention, Nicholas Hoult: I am sorry, not really worthy of my blog. That fluffy jumper was just too offputting. And he still looks like a child!!
Astounding. Beautiful. It made me fall in love with Colin Firth (whom I never really liked). It made me want to live with Juliane Moore (hang on, I AM going to live with her, at least with a shorter version of her character!!). And it made me want to be Tom Ford's best friend.
I will start wearing only black and white from now on.
Wonderful. Already iconic.
And I cannot feel an immense sense of underachievement for not having yet written, directed or produced such a great piece of art...!!! What have I been doing all along? Time to change my life...
It has been so long this almost feels like that moment in life when you are welcomed into the wonderful world of blogging with that ridiculous cry. Hello World? Oh fuck off. No one's listening, dude.
And yes it is shameful, such a long silence, but my life has been rather difficult and I didn't have anything to say. I won't use this as an excuse, however, so here we go with my top 20 list of the 2000s. No, they are not the best. They are the ones I loved. So to Tot F: no one is right!
1. Donnie Darko - no explanation required.
2. The Dark Knight - just mindblowing.
3. The Incredibles - so perfect it almost hurts.
4. Spirited Away - visionary
5. Amores Perros - what cinema should be like
6. Bamako - what cinema can be like
7. Mysterious Skin - painfully beautiful
8. Les Triplettes de Belville - a stroke of genius
9. 2046 - luscious
10. Chicken Run - weightless joy
11. Le fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain - a lesson in love
In anticipation of this weekend's Tuscan shenanigans, I spent a little fortune on this complete boxset of the TV series Rome. I saw a couple of episodes in the past and I can assure you you will all find it highly entertaining. There is of course much nudity, as well as badly-behaved characters, lavish costumes, excellent characterisation, not too many historical abuses, and most importantly INCEST. What is there not to like?
There are moments in our lives when we rather shy away from the world and lock ourselves up in a dark room, watching tens of movies which will transport us away from it all. It's something that happens to all of us, at different times. To all except Le Duc. For him, this is a permanent state of being.
Well, for me it isn't but when it arrives it's wonderful and I cherish every minute of it. Thus is the case of the last few days, including in NYC, where I saw some extraordinary films.
First: Coraline, the most inspired and somewhat darkest of them all. It has all the elements of a Grimm tale, including Freudian elements of girl-wanting-to-kill-her-parents-and-then-feeling-overwhelming-guilt-over-her-thoughts. But mostly, it's a beautifully-animated story about overcoming fear. I got out very happy and with a newly-developed terror towards buttons.
Second: Watchmen. While it was supposed to be "possibly one of the best comic adaptations" of all times (notice the premonitory doubt in the words chosen by the writer), it was overall pleasant but not quite what I had hoped for. I was hoping to remain glued to the seat for the full 2:20 hours of film. Instead, I found my mind drifting away, towards the sunny landscape of Manhattan, which I had just cycled across in fully view of Tot T's wonderful backside. That dominated my thoughts throughout the movie. Not The Comedian's shenanigans or whatever-his-name-is' attempts at being the gayest scoundrel in the history of cinema. Nope. Didn't beat the T-butt test.
And then, on the plane back to London, in the middle of the night, I saw Control.
I don't know why this film left me so deeply impressed and moved. On the surface, it would seem like just another British Grim Flick about the Grim North. They even gave up colour filming, to add to the monochrome dullness of the English Northern estates, where Joy Division's Ian Curtis was born, and whose life was here turned into cinematic wonder.
And yet, for every minute the film rolled, I was increasingly engrossed in the lives of the characters, utterly mesmerised by their fate. Of course, Anton Corbijn's amazing direction... Of course, Samantha Morton brilliant performance as Ian's wife, Debbie... and so on...
But above all, undoubdetly, Sam Riley's engrossing intepretation. Yes. It beat the T-butt Test. There. I've said it. I've marked it on paper. Don't hate me for this T. Loosing to Sam/Ian is no defeat, just valiant surrender in the face of the supernatural. Now we can both move on.
To Radiohead covering Joy Division's Ceremony. Oh. My. God.
Sometimes things slip besides us, we know they are approaching, we know they are just within reach, and then they are gone. The sand trickles. Time erases resolutions.
And sometimes things come back. Such is the case of Weir's Truman Show, which I had never seen before - perhaps because of a silly prejudice regarding Jim Carrey, which I just coudn't imagine starring in a 'serious' movie. And thank god they do.
No review this time. Slightly too late for that. But a big THANK YOU to Peter Weir for giving us another magical film, after Picnic at Hanging Rock, Witness and Dead Poets' Society (yes, I LOVE that movie, no comment please).
I shed a little tear (not publicly, since mother was next to me and didn't want to give her reason to worry her son was a little queer... oooops, too late for that I guess...). I am going to bed happy.
Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. The Coen brothers are just on fire these days. One just wonders: with so many disfunctional families around, how did these two get it SO right?
What struck me most about the movie was how incredibly good all the acting was. EVERYONE in the film was PERFECTLY cast, and EVERYONE was just so brilliant.
From Brad Pitt (yes, I know, I have a weak spot there, but ask Lady V, he was GOOD!!!) playing the dumb gym instructor (probably his most fitting role since Thelma & Louise) to Tilda Swinton playing the hardened middle class wife (much dribbling from Lady V), each character was just perfect.
Above all, I loved good ol' George in the role of a controlling and gym-obsessed middle-aged man who is trying to keep the positive wheel spinning, only to come crashing down and catch the first flight to Venezuela.
Flying back from New York, as Lady V grasped my arm in terror at the horrid turbulence we had to endure for some 2 hours, I lazily selected a film on the screen in front of me, about which I had heard little, and from which I expected even less: The Visitor.
The trailer barely does it justice. This is a complex, profound drama about intertwined destinies in a fragmented world, in which the characters move aimlessly in search of meaning and human touch. Above all, it is about the insanity of immigration policies in a post-9/11 world, were security concerns are able crush people's lives in a web of Kafkian consequences. The set is New York, but it could easily be London or Rome.
I cried when the film ended. Not many have achieved this. Astonishing.
He's gorgeous and a good actor too, so will someone please tell me why, oh why did they cast him in Wanted? Honestly, it's just not funny. Film people, what were you thinking? Next to her
who by the way is married to him
he simply looks like a child. As a result the kiss scene is just disturbing. And what was this all about?
Proving that even the most expensive trainers in LA can't turn you into a fit man if you are born short and Scottish. Bless.
Losey's cinematographic interpretation of Don Giovanni, entirely filmed at La Rotonda near Vicenza. Breathtaking. To be screened immediately after Don Giovanni, and immediately before 'Tis a Pity...
My friend Le Duc summed up the strange empty feeling left inside me after seeing Persepolis, one of the most celebrated animated films of recent times: 'it was a bit like a soap opera'.
This might come as an anathema to those who loved it, especially when backed by pretty much EVERY critic in the world. But I am with him on this one (as on many other things). Maybe I disliked it because of the hype surrounding it, or maybe simply because I had a bad day at work (there was a session of compulsory fun, you see, which extinguished all remains of my pleasant weekend - not the organiser's fault, I just hate group activities). Whatever the reason, I just walked out in a sour state.
The film gets off to a good start, with some beautiful characters that conquer your imagination, especially the old generation of idealist revolutionaries and good-hearted Communists who are depicted through the loving eyes of a young and impressionable Marjane Satrapi.
But somewhere between the time when she leaves the country to live in Austria, and the time when she returns to post-war Iran, the connection with the viewer is lost, and one is left following the twists of her life - into and out of depression/rebellion at regular intervals - like those of a goldfish in a water tank.
Perhaps this is precisely Satrapi's purpose: to give us a glimpse into a world that has no hope for change. This would be a terrifying picture, were it allowed to sink into the viewer's mind. But not all of us have lived through a war AND a revolution, as one of the characters puts it. Therefore, staring impotently at the unfolding of this drama is only going leave an empty feeling inside.
Perhaps I should avoid group activities at work in the future...
