Category: Film Page 23 of 101

Challenge Week 2: My Cousin Vinny

On January 14, 2016

In 2016 Movie Challenge

How have I never seen this movie before?! I’ve heard of it for a long time, of course, because I used to be a huge Oscar history aficionado and I knew Marisa Tomei had won a Best Supporting Award for it, but I really knew absolutely nothing else about it. I think I assumed it was something to do with the mob, because Joe Pesci is always something to do with the mob, right?

Turns out it’s about a couple of college kids from New York road-tripping through Alabama; they stop in a convenience store, accidentally shoplift, then get arrested…for the murder of the convenience store clerk. In a panic, one of them (played by The Karate Kid), calls home and gets his Cousin Vinny (Pesci), a lawyer, to come down and help them out. Except Cousin Vinny is BARELY a lawyer, spent six years trying to pass the bar, and has never had a real case in court. What he does have, however, is a whole lot of attitude, which doesn’t always go down well with the very by-the-book judge (a wonderful turn from The Munsters‘ Fred Gwynne).

Challenge Week 1: Stray Dog

By Jandy

On January 9, 2016

In 2016 Movie Challenge

I mentioned on my post about Babette’s Feast that I wasn’t inherently that excited about seeing it, though I ended up very glad I had. I was very excited about Stray Dog, and I wasn’t let down a bit. I typically have some trouble connecting with Japanese film, even Kurosawa, who’s generally considered to be among the most Western-accessible Japanese filmmakers. Though someday I’m going to have to stop saying that, as I’m getting more and more acclimated to Japanese filmmaking – the real test will be Tokyo Story, which is coming up later in the challenge.

Anyway, I was hoping Stray Dog would work well for me because it’s basically a noir, and noir is one of my favorite genres. And now I totally understand the thing about Kurosawa being more influenced by Western film than many other Japanese directors. It shows through much more clearly in this modern day detective drama than it does in, say, his samurai films, right down to the chorus girls that would fit in any 1940s American nightclub. Yet it still shares stylistic and thematic concerns found in other Kurosawa films, especially High and Low, also a modern-day crime film that I enjoyed quite a bit.

In Stray Dog, Toshiro Mifune is rookie policeman Murakami who gets his gun pickpocketed on the bus. Desperate to get it back, he infiltrates the underworld and gets some leads, but soon finds that it was used in a robbery and homicide. Wracked with guilt, he and veteran cop Sato (Takashi Shimura) team up to find the suspect. The detective work itself is a lot of fun to watch, but the whole thing has a depth due to Murakami’s guilt first over just losing his gun, then having it be used to kill.

Challenge Week 1: Babette’s Feast

By Jandy

On January 9, 2016

In 2016 Movie Challenge

Despite having heard Babette’s Feast raved about by a lot of different people, I had never drummed up the motivation to see it myself. Here’s the description from HuluPlus: “Two devout and elderly sisters allow their cook, a French refugee, to prepare a feast in honor of their late father’s 100th birthday, despite their spiritual concerns over the sensuality and decadence of French cuisine.” It doesn’t exactly sound thrill-a-minute, does it? Of course, the best movies often aren’t high concept and defy quick and easy descriptions, and I knew that would likely be the case with this one.

And indeed it was. The religious aspects of the film were pretty fascinating, as I have a Protestant (but not pietistic) background myself. I have to admit I paused the film at one point just to look up who these folks were, as the subtitles kept calling them “puritan” but the actual Puritan movement is generally considered to be an English and American thing, not Danish. Anyway, that’s kind of beside the point, but I needed to locate this theology for my own understanding – they’re a pietistic sect, a group of believers not affiliated with a larger body, led by a charismatic spiritual leader.

The minister of this little group of Jutland pietists is already dead for most of the movie, but his influence continues to guide his two unmarried daughters, who rejected worldly suitors in order to serve his ministry and continue it after his death, to an aging and dwindling group of adherents. Then Babette arrives on their doorstep, with a letter from one of the sister’s former suitors, a Parisian opera singer – she’s a refugee from counterrevolutionary activity in Paris, and becomes their housekeeper and cook in exchange for safety. Flashforward fourteen years, and the sisters and their remaining congregants plan a celebration in honor of what would have been their minister’s 100th birthday. Babette begs one favor: to prepare a real French meal for the celebration instead of the plain, bland food that the sisters have had her cooking for fourteen years.

The 2016 Movie Challenge: A Preview

By Jandy

On January 3, 2016

In 2016 Movie Challenge

Because I can’t leave well enough alone, here’s a brief rundown of (some of) what I’ll be watching in 2016 for this crazy challenge. I currently have 50 people signed up to recommend me movies, and all but a handful have already chosen their picks, so this thing is scheduled and locked in through September, with plenty of time for everyone else to decide what they want me to watch. So I’ll have a few more weeks worth of recommendations coming in, but here’s what I’ve got so far, with some upfront confessions on what I’m looking forward to and what I’m…not. :)

Really Excited to See

Several of these have been on my own to-see lists for quite a while and I’ve never gotten around to them. I’m really glad to get some external motivation to finally see them. Others have only recently come to my attention but sound so much up my alley that I can’t wait to get to them. In either case, these have the weight of expectations riding on them, which can be a double-edged sword.

The Abyss (1989)
Army of Darkness (1992)
Before Midnight (2013)
The Blues Brothers (1980)
Fail Safe (1964)
Grosse Pointe Blank (1997)
Harakiri (1962)
Heat (1995)
I Confess (1953)
The Last Five Years (2014)
The Last Waltz (1978)
Mr. Nobody (2009)
My Best Girl (1927)
Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind (1984)
Paris, Texas (1984)
The Punk Singer (2013)
Stray Dog (1949)
Tokyo Story (1953)
Whiplash (2014)
Why Don’t You Play In Hell (2013)

2015: The Year in Movies

By Jandy

On January 2, 2016

In Film

The end of the year really snuck up on me this year! I’ve actually had end of the year posts started since January that I meant to just add to throughout the year and then have an easy time of it in December. I, uh, did not do that. So I quickly threw this together based on last year’s awards-style template but didn’t have time to make pretty graphics and stuff like I did in the past. Sorry!

Here’s a brief look at what I’ve been enjoying this year:

Favorite Side Characters

These supporting or bit roles stole the show!

BB-8 in Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015) – this little guy was just endlessly adorable and stole every scene he was in, which was a lot!
Tallulah Hope (Una Merkel) in Don’t Bet on Women (1931) – the spunky and sexually liberated best friend is a staple of Pre-Code comedy, and Tallulah Hope is one of the greatest ones I’ve ever seen.
The Stranger (Peter Lorre) in Stranger on the Third Floor (1940) – part intruder, part exaggeration of our hero’s imagination, and part stalker, Lorre’s role is almost silent but highly effective.
Guitar Hero in Mad Max: Fury Road (2015) – you wouldn’t think a desert warlord would need a guitar shredder with giant loudspeakers in his gang of war boys, but you’d think wrong; this guy is emblematic of Fury Road‘s unabashedly OTT aesthetic.
Rommel (Erich von Stroheim) in Five Graves to Cairo (1943) – pretty big coup on Billy Wilder’s part to get Erich von Stroheim in his second film, but it was worth it; he’s not quite as memorable as he was in Grand Illusion, but it’s pretty close.

Most Thought-Provoking

Androids, AI, moral gray areas, unusual cinematic approaches, interesting entries in a director’s filmography – for whatever reason, these films held my attention and kept me pondering for a long time after seeing them.

Her (2013)
Ex Machina (2015)
Winter Sleep (2014)
Nightcrawler (2014)
High and Low (1963)
La Notte (1961)
Fedora (1978)
The Decline of Western Civilization (1981)