revolutionary road (2009)
kate winslett and leonardo dicaprio are reunited 12 years after ”titanic” in sam mendes’ adaptation of richard yates’ 1961 novel. i found it interesting to discover that the novel was written so closely to the time of the films setting (1955), as it genuinely felt like a post-modern take on the subject matter, akin highly … Read more
transformers (2007)
michael bay’s magnum opus has the honour of being the sole film i have walked out of a cinema screening of. i just found it to be a horribly slow and dull film, with poor special effects and no plot. for the sakes of my current studies i decided to give it another chance on … Read more
the rock (1996)
once again my studies dictate that i must head into unchartered territory, and an unattractive challenge lies ahead. michael bay is perhaps the opposite to what i love about cinema. his “edit-so-fast-and-you-wont-have-chance-to-see-any-problems” attitude of filmmaking jars with my usual preferences, but in an attempt to understand just exactly what it is about his work that … Read more
the curious case of benjamin button (2009)
at first glance, “the curious case of benjamin button” may seem like an odd direction for the director of “fight club” “se7en” to go in, but rest assured that “the curious case of benjamin button” is very much a david fincher film. the bittersweet story of a man who ages backwards, whom falls in love … Read more
star trek – the motion picture (1979)
i have never been a huge fan of star trek. as a child i was way into star wars and so drew my allegiance to that side of casual science fiction at an early age. a couple of years back i saw “star trek 2 : the wrath of khan” on late night television and … Read more
the usual suspects (1994)
and now, ladies and gentlemen, a confession. despite my keen interest in all things cinerama i have never, until now that is, seen bryan singer’s seminal ”the usual suspects”. i have no excuses, this situation came down to nothing but a lapse in my studies, its no one else’s fault, only my own. i take … Read more
frost/nixon (2009)
as someone who is a bit of an obsessive with this political era in general i entered ‘frost/nixon’ with may doubts. ron howard is perhaps the epitome of ”safe” filmmaking, hes hardly known for his visual flare or even his political gravitas (although the recent ‘happy days’-themed obama campaign video he did with henry winkler … Read more
se7en (1995)
david fincher’s creative debut (some of us dont like to talk about alien3!) represents, for this viewer at least, one of the highlights of the cinema of the 1990′s. the pacing, the style, the performances all represent what i would consider to be the ultimate in cinematic expectation. stylistically the film shows the streets and … Read more
valkyrie (2009)
a lot of criticism has been levelled at the use of the respective actors own accent in bryan singer’s “valkyrie”, yet i feel this is a fairly trivial criticism. if anything the dropping of german accents actively helps the performances, pushing the accessibility whilst dropping any form of distraction. i think a lot of people … Read more
monty python’s life of brian (1979)
the second of the monty python film’s is generally considered to be the best of the series, although this was actually the first time iv seen the film in its entirety. personally i think the film suffers a little from the focus on the narrative, it didnt feel as scattershot as “the holy grail”, which … Read more
