I started with "The Simpsons Movie" which, I am glad I did not pay to see in a theatre as it comes nowhere near any of the great Simpson episodes. It is, however, the environmental movie with the largest box office, thus far: $525,797,315 (as much of an inconvenient truth as that may be for Nobel laureate Al Gore).
I followed that with "Children of Men," which I have had forever, but just now got around to seeing. Keith, this is a marvelous movie. Alphonso Cuaron's film is so organic and fully realized, it is like you are not even watching a movie. Paul Greengrass gets lots of press for the immediacy of his handheld camera style in the Bourne sequels but he has nothing on Cuaron. One of the lovely things about watching DVDs at home, besides the ability to pause, rewind and fast forward, is the ability to go on-line while you are watching. When the question "who is that?" popped into my head, I could go to IMDB and find out "who dat was." I spent another two hours online researching "Children of Men" while I let the movie play through again. Chocked full visually, "Childrn" rewards frequent viewing (you'll be surprised what you missed the first time). I followed "Children" with "Eastern Promises." I wanted to see "Eastern Promises" because I simply adore David Cronenberg's last film, "A History of Violence." "History" was the movie where I first became aware of how far Cronenberg had come as a filmmaker. Cronenberg is a visual artist fully in charge of his filmmaking gifts. And he brings these gifts to "Promises." The film is a sumptuous view of London. Everything seems to be informed by the high end Russian Restaurant that is at the heart of the evil that saturates this film. I did not enjoy "Promises" on anywhere near the visceral level I enjoyed "History." "History" contains two of the hottest sex scenes in film history. "Promises" contains one of the most desultory ones. Viggo Mortensen and Mario Bello have tangible heat in "History." Mortensen and Naomi Watts barely glance off one another in "Promises." Both the Tom Stall/Joey Cusack character played by Mortensen in "Violence" and the Nikolai character he plays in "Promises" are avenging angels. In fact, "Eastern Promises" is virtually an inside-out version of "Violence," with the heroes on a similar though inverse journies toward redemption. I was annoyed and disappointed by "Ratoutille." Although critics hailed it, to me it seems like the lesser of a string of great Brad Bird animated movies, starting with "the Iron Giant." Part of my problem was the old school 2-D animation. Part of my problem is the needed suspension of belief. EYE was never able to get past the premise of that fat rat preparing food in the kitchen. YEEECH! ~rave! --- In scifinoir2@yahoogroups.com, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > > wow! That is quite a feat.How do you process them. I reviewed "Eastern Promises", you remember. A good but rather dreary and oppressive feeling movie. I guess you'd have to cleanse your mind with "The Simpsons" after that, then watch "Children of Men", which I hear i good, then use "Ratatouille" to give you a light heart again. > Did you watch 'em like that, alternating the serious with the comedic, ending on a happy note? How were "Children of Men" and "Ratatouille"? Never seen them > > -------------- Original message -------------- > From: "ravenadal" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Today I watched "the Simpsons Movie," "Children of Men," "Eastern > Promises" and "Ratatouille," back to back to back and, right now, they > are not all getting along inside my head. > > ~rave! > > > > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] >
