Chloe

Chloe is directed by Atom Egoyan. Egoyan is a master of sexual thrillers, especially when they go kind of crazy--like this movie does. In Chloe Julianne Moore is a not so happy wife to Liam Neeson. She has been setting up his birthday party for months and has spent thousands of dollars collecting all of their friends and crafting the perfect birthday. Neeson is out of town and is due to fly in in time for the surprise party. However, he misses his flight, and Moore is devastated. The next morning after he has returned, Moore snoops around and discovers a scandalous photo on his phone. In a fury, she hires a call girl named Chloe (Amanda Seyfried) to seduce her husband. She just wants to know if he'll go for Chloe, instead of staying away. From this point the story takes many twists and turns, most of which I found plausible and comprehensive given the background story of the Julianne Moore character. While I was watching Chloe, the storyline actually didn't seem so nuts, but when I had heard about it from reading reviews earlier this year, I had admittedly thought: well this sounds dumb. But I think its the way the Egoyan directs the picture and Julianne Moore's acting that made it worthwhile. For, Moore's character becomes so devastated and desperate that all of her actions kind of do make sense. Now, the end is a cliché and it also comes with one of the more pleasant revelations about the movie. Thus, Chloe is no triumph for Atom Egoyan, but it's a decent film.
Chloe: ★★★

Three Days of the Condor

The Three Days of the Condor was directed by Sidney Pollack. Pollack usually makes good films (Tootsie, Out of Africa) and this stands as one of his better ones. It's really just a political thriller, but it's done in a classic tradition that leaves out explosions and leaves it to high tension and the power of the actors to churn out a decent film. Robert Redford is the hero here. He works as a bookworm for the CIA. That means that he reads everything and uses what he reads to come up with ideas for the CIA. The film opens with Redford going out to lunch through the back entrance to his workplace. However, by doing this he doesn't realize that he's evading the outside mercaneries who kill everyone in the building. Redford returns from lunch and to discover the disaster. In a frenzy, he calls up his commanding section officer and is met with terse conversations and shady meeting places. He goes to an alley to meet with his officer and is almost killed. The people from before are trying to kill him, for he's the only one who escaped the previous massacre. He ends up hiding out with a kidnapped girl (Faye Dunaway) and cultivates a relationship with her. The Three Days of the Condor succeeds because of three things. The first is that Robert Redford is a very appealing actor, and his character, who at first attempts to fix everything in the standard hollywood tough way, realizes that its his smarts that will end up saving him. The second thing this film has going for it is the direction, for Sidney Pollack has a very careful hand with the pace of the film, and all the twists and turns. The third thing that makes Three Days of the Condor more than just a standard thriller is that it came out post-Watergate, when the plot didn't really seem so extraordinary. Now, some of the dialogue in the film gets silly, and part of the end really does go off the deep end, but that doesn't keep the movie from being enjoyable and captivating.
The Three Days of the Condor: ★★★1/2

True Grit

True Grit is a remake of an overly praised but still decent John Wayne parody film. It's directed by the Coen Brothers, who together are one of the biggest powers in Hollywood. They make great films year after year. This is not one of them, but that doesn't mean that it isn't a very, very entertaining and satisfying western. We open with the voice of Mattie Ross (Hailee Steinfeld) informing us her father has been killed in cold blood by a drunk called Tom Cheney (Josh Brolin). She wants to avenge his death, and so she seeks out a man with real grit, and finds him with Rooster Cogburn, a quick-shooting, mean, drunk, son-of-a-bitch played by Jeff Bridges. Cogburn is at first reluctant to have Mattie accompany him, but Mattie quickly proves herself to be a competent, witty, and realistic young girl. They are accompanied by a Texas Ranger (Matt Damon) who is in constant verbal war with Cogburn. True Grit is at times pretty funny, and at others explosive as a Scorsese film in its violence. It's photographed beautifully by the frequent Coen brother collaborator Roger Deakins, and not only the land but the texture of the Western is very well captured. This is not the original True Grit which is cherished because it won John Wayne an Oscar. However, this version is the upgrade to that, its far superior. And truth be told, John Wayne got the Oscar for True Grit just because they thought he was due, not because it was a great performance. True Grit is quite the entertaining western. It's a pretty perfect holiday movie. It's fun and it's well told. It may be a minor work within the body of the Coen Brothers, but who gives a damn as long as they've accomplished what they set out to do: make a damn good western.
True Grit: ★★★

Undercover Brother

Undercover Brother is either a spoof or an homage to blaxploitation films. It's witty and knows all the right ways to make fun of black people. But its the blacks making fun of themselves, and it works. Dave Chappelle especially (who proved on his Comedy Central show that he knows racial comedy) as well as a plethora of black actors who know what they're doing and deliver. The movie is pretty stupid though, its about a black resistance group kind of like a C.I.A. called the B.R.O.T.H.E.R.H.O.O.D. who protect and preserve blackness across the world. But there's The Man who tries to use a fried chicken chain to ruin and assimilate the blacks into boring white people who know what was on Ross's bedside table before he kisses Rachel in the season finale of season three. So, the Brotherhood gets the Undercover Brother (Eddie Griffin) to infiltrate The Man's company and stir up some heavy shit. Denise Richards appears as the White She Devil who tries to turn Undercover Brother into one of these boring losers. The whole movie is pretty funny, especially because it knows its stupid and its pretty creative. Undercover Brother was directed by Malcolm D. Lee and it ends up being a decent comedy.
Undercover Brother: ★★★

Mississippi Burning

Mississippi Burning begins with three civil rights workers in a car. Two are white and one of them is black. They are flagged down by who appear to be the police, and all three are shot dead. This is a true story. The FBI is called in. One is down and dirty, he's old fashioned and played by Gene Hackman. Willem Dafoe plays the more intellectual and optimistic agent. Together, they attempt to uncover who the killer or killers are. But Mississippi Burning isn't just some standard "who done it", but rather a realistic look at racism. Using scenes that feel like documentary footage and long conversations and three dimensional characters, the director: Alan Parker evokes a time and a mood with perfection. There's a great scene is Mississippi Burning where Hackman tells Dafoe what the heart of racism is. It all comes down to: My life may be shit, but at least I'm not a nigger. Parker handles this scene and many others like it with such cinematographically minded and character adhered camera work and pace, that Mississippi Burning becomes what was probably the best movie in 1988. I haven't seen one better and I doubt I will.
Mississippi Burning: ★★★★

The King's Speech

The King's Speech is about just that. It does what so many other films have done this year, and filmed what should be unfilmable. One might think that a movie about speech therapy would get awful dull, but this does not. It is the pacing and the pauses that the film takes which makes it so good. That, and the performance (not to mention the gorgeous production value). Here, Colin Firth as King Henry VI delivers what should win him the Oscar. Every bit of his being is immersed in this character. He plays King Henry VI, who was a stammerer. ...And he was to be king. This caused quite the dilemma for him, he was neglected and considered a little dimwitted as a child for his condition, and as an adult, he must inspire a nation with words---but he can't speak. World War II is looming above Henry's head. It's about to come crashing down on him, and he's afraid. Anyone would be. His wife (played sweetly by Helena Bonham Carter) seeks out a speech therapist to assist him. She discovers Lionel Logue (Geoffrey Rush) who says with confidence that he can cure her husband. What ensues is slow and amusing, contemplative and interesting. From The King's Speech we do not get an inspirational story alone, but a much more important and significant portrait of imperfection within the royal family. So often they are portrayed as infallible, but with Henry VI, we see a man who is practically masochistic and self-hating. And yet, he overcomes, and he befriends Logue as an equal. One of my favorite scenes in the movie is where Henry VI is watching Hitler speak and his daughter asks him "What is he saying?" Henry replies, "I don't know, but he seems to be saying it rather well". And there is a look on Henry's face of complete understanding of the world. He realizes the enormity of his situation, and he realizes what it will take to be able to convince a nation. The King's Speech is directed by the englishman Tom Hooper (John Adams, The Damned United). He's a director who specializes in historical drama, especially when it's British. I expect that The King's Speech will stand as his enduring work. It's a great film.
The King's Speech: ★★★★

Wet Hot American Summer

This is one of the better comedies of the 2000's. It's funny as hell, kind of stupid, and doesn't have a bunch of stoners. It's part of a tradition of comedy that insists that slapstick is still funny and weirdos are even funnier (the Farrelly brothers often use it). It tells the story of the last day at camp. Everyone is already familiar with each other and everything that's been welling up over the last however-many-weeks is about to come out. And this comes out with great and colorful characters. Wet Hot American Summer has probably the best comedic cast in recent memory. Everyone in it is so good at what they do, and they all work well together in an oddball way. There's such a variety of weird characters, and the movie moves so quickly to the next one and then back to that weirdo we forgot about that it is always entertaining. Because these characters are so good, the whole movie benefits, and it stays funny, keeps funny, gets more funny. It's a damn good comedy.
Wet Hot American Summer: ★★★1/2

21 Grams

21 Grams is the second movie in a trilogy (only in theme) by Alejandro González Iñárritu. The first was Amores Perros and the last is Babel. All of these films are non-linear and tell of interconnected people who experience tragedy. The first character is Jack (Benicio del Toro). He's a drug addict and kills the husband and children of the second character Christina (Naomi Watts). The third character is Paul (Sean Penn) and he receives the heart of Christina's husband. From there, the characters converge, Paul and Christina might be in love and Jack might be totally fucked for the rest of his life. It is the way Iñárritu tells this story that makes it so good. At first we don't know everything, we're not sure why characters are doing what they're doing until we see a flashback, and then we don't know the middle, and then we do and it makes the end not make any sense. This is a complex and demanding movie. The acting is top notch, the visuals are sad and dreary. It has to do with the soul, and how much it can endure, how much guilt it can take, how long it can linger, how much pain it can take. 21 Grams solidifies not only Iñárritu's power as a director but also Naomi Watts' star power--she totally evokes the desperation and sadness of her character. This a pretty great movie.
21 Grams: ★★★★

Charlotte's Web

Ahh, here's a good movie. Charlotte's Web is the tale of a pig who was saved from being eaten or killed as a runt by a girl named Fern. His name is Wilbur, and, being a pig, he has to fear that he will one day become the Christmas ham. As his life progresses, he begins to notice the girl who saved him (Fern) is starting to become an adult and she's slowly forgetting about him. Wilbur fears that this might result in his death, for he will have no protector. However, Wilbur is granted kindness once again by a spider named Charlotte who lives above his pen. They scheme and scheme and Charlotte comes up with a plan to save Wilbur. Using her web, Charlotte writes words that gratify Wilbur. The entire town is amazed (at the pig) and they come from miles around to view him. The end of the story is sad, but puts a close to the fable, which is told so warmly by E.B. White in his book, and is translated very well to a fine looking animated movie. It's not great, but it follows the book to well to not be good. It's got some good qualities to it, it's nice and slow and doesn't demand stupid jokes or bursts of action to tell it's story.
Charlotte's Web: ★★★

E.T. The Extra Terrestrial

     They call Steven Spielberg, the director of E.T., the most succesful movie maker ever. For he makes films ranging from the silly and fun to the serious and brooding (Munich). Most people have seen his best films. This is one of them. ET is about childhood, even Spielberg's childhood. Its main character Elliot (Henry Thomas) is the standard young boy, he looks and acts like one. But then something very strange happens to Elliot. He finds an alien, an extra-terrestrial who he refers to as E.T. Only Elliot and his younger sister (Drew Barrymore) know E.T. exists, and they hide him from the rest of the world in a closet (somehow knowing that ET would be in danger otherwise).
     That is the story, it almost sounds silly and like an idea for a bad and campy fifties movie, but what results is one of the best movies of the '80's. For, Spielberg knows how to deal with the material. He allows it to swell and to astound the audience, and then brings it down to quieter and simpler moments. Even the character of the younger sister is played with such appealing qualities by Drew Barrymore that those moments seem special. The entire films feels like we are getting to witness something. We are in on the secret with Elliot and his sister. There's a lot of nostalgia in ET, and a lot of heartwarming moments. This is the movie that set the template for that kind of thing. Unfortunately, a hell of a lot of shit has resulted from that. However, ET must be enjoyed for what it is, a grossly entertaining and generally great films.
E.T: ★★★★

Beautiful Girls

Here's a movie filled with good actors who elevate the caliber of a semi-good script. It perfectly evokes the small town group of buddies, and they are all sort of still living as kids. They all have nice girlfriends, but they have an unrealistic dream that some great beauty will come across some day. Because of this, they take what they have for granted, and almost lose it. It is only when one of the men (Tim Hutton) meets a 13-year-old neighbor girl (Natalie Portman) when he starts to realize the power of just a nice girl. It takes a while for this idea to seep into the mind of all the other men, but it eventually does so in clever and amusing ways. This is a good movie. However, it could have been a lot more, for the film tends to drop plot lines and draw meaning from metaphors that don't really fit. There's a lot to love though, and its a damn good holiday film. (It has that quality of people "finding" themselves).
Beautiful Girls: ★★★

I Am Love

I Am Love is a melodramatic wet dream. It seeps with color and life, it brims with culture and languid taste. It's immediately gorgeous and creative--if it had had a shit storyline, I would still have had to recommend it based upon the artistic acheivment. However, the story is pretty damn good. It tells of a family, Italian, and the mother of successful children at the head of a sort of empire. She is played by Tilda Swinton (Burn After Reading, Michael Clayton) and she is the heart of the story. She speaks Italian with a Russian accent, and she is an outsider to this world. She should be at the head of it, but she is not fully Italian and will never be wholly integral to the family. She falls in love with her son's good friend, and they have an affair. Swinton so perfectly evokes a character who is rediscovering what it is to be herself, and not have to live under the guidelines of a prestigious family. It's one of the best movies of 2010.
I Am Love: ★★★★

Exit Through the Gift Shop

Exit Through the Gift Shop is a sort of quasi-documentary. It's half about human nature and oddity and half about the world of street artists. Both halves are sort of fascinating and quite entertaining. Thierry Guetta is a filmmaker, except that he is inept at actually making film, but rather shoots thousands of hours of tape that he never looks at again. He films everything from his family eating to people in the street. One day, Thierry meets Space Invader, who is a street artist who assembles tiles of space invader creatures from old rubics cubes. Here, Thierry finds his calling, and for something like eight years he shoots and captures the world of the street artists. From Space Invader, Thierry learns the art, the craft, and the danger of street art. In years to come, Thierry joins many other street artists, capturing them all, but looking endlessly for the elusive Banksy (the sort of king of street art). The footage is pretty fascinating, and the art is kind of beautiful in a grungy sort of way. Thierry is considered to be a little retarded by the street artists, but he promises to one day turn his footage into a documentary about street art. However, Thierry sucks at making movies, and Banksy takes over the film. This is that film, and I have barely even mentioned the weirdness and spontaneity of Thierry. This is a fascinating documentary, and shows that they can be grossly entertaining and reflective of human nature. It's the best documentary of 2010.
Exit Through the Gift Shop: ★★★★

Twilight

And now for a movie that truly sucks. Twilight is a film about a teenage girl living in the rainiest bit of land in this United States. It's dark and dreary and the characters and drearier. Bella (Kristen Stewart who is actually a damn fine actress) is enamored by the pasty (but hot) teenage boy at school. She moves through her classes lazily except when she sees him (Robert Pattinson). She discovers that his name is Edward and that, holey moley, he's a vampire. But this news does not dissuade Bella from her ventures with the dashing Edward. And of course something gets in the way of their love. It's more vampires! For, I've forgotten to mention that Edward and his family are a sort of vegan vampire group, and that the other (more devious) vampires are now after Bella because, hell, she looks like a fine piece of meat. And now for why this movie sucks, if the plot has not been convincing enough. From a technological point of view, it's extremely campy and silly (but it isn't aware of that). Each scene looks gloomy (and not in the gorgeous camerawork sort of way) and the lines of professing love are ultimately ridiculous and wooden (not the good type). Twilight is so amateurish in every way that it almost becomes a little enjoyable, because its so funny. That seems to be its stature among fans of the series, but there was a sort of last nail in the coffin for this movie (ha!) or two. The first was that the scene where the vampires fight it out for Bella was absolutely ridiculous. It's probably the biggest anti-climax of all time. It sucks. The second is that the entire story is a metaphor for abstinence. Edward will not have sex with Bella and will not turn her into a vampire (consummating their...vampiric conjunction). And oh how Bella is the number one loser of all time, I don't think in any of the books does she actually do something for herself, but she is the ultimate weepy housewife sort of girl. Her idea of taking matters into her own hands is to cry. Goddammit this movie is a fucking waste of time and energy. Kristen Stewart can do better than this (Yellow Handkerchief, Welcome to the Riley's, Adventureland).
Twilight:★★

The Secret in their Eyes

The Secret in Their Eyes won Best Foreign Film Academy Award for 2009. But it wasn't released at all in the United States until this year, so it counts as a 2010 film. It's also, quite simply, one of the best movies of the year. It's gorgeous, sad, and intriguing, spanning the years 1974-2000. The movie is about a rape, and looking for the culprit. But everyone is uncooperative. The police and even the judges have terrible grudges, and justice is but an afterthought to them. But Esposito (the main character) is a determined man. He works with his friend (a female judge) and the husband of the raped and murdered woman. For years they search and search, and the whole thing plays like a damn good mystery. The way that information is seeped out to us through the camera is wondrous, and it's constantly engaging. Don't let the idea that it's an Argentinean movie in Spanish dismay you, for the way the spanish is spoken makes some scenes sound less corny, and rather, completely engrossing and languid. I think the film is about assumptions and the span of life. In the end, each character has fully defined themselves based upon a rape and murder twenty five years ago. It's great.
The Secret in Their Eyes: ★★★★

Solitary Man

This movie is a wonder. Its main character is a real bastard (clever, but cruel) and he's just about coming to the end of his life (his heart may be starting to give out and he sleeps with 19 year olds). He's played by Michael Douglas in a performance that marks a real milestone for the actor. He's an ex-car salesman and often lets his escapades with women get in the way of his friendships and family. Now, this seemingly silly script would have made for a pretty bad movie, but all of the actors in the film (especially Douglas) make it an excellent movie. I think that its about the decisions people make, and whether primal desire and instinct can be overcome by love. That sounds sappy, but it doesn't seem that way in the film, for it lets us reach our own conclusions and our own idea of what path Douglas takes after the film is over. It's one of those movies where you watch these characters have a Monday, and you just know what their Tuesday will be like.
Solitary Man: ★★★1/2

Homicide

Homicide is about racism. Two cops on homicide are going after a notorious and elusive black criminal. They are played by William H. Macy (Fargo) and David Mantegna (House of Games; he's a master at the repetitive Mamet dialogue). They are met with a lot of disapproval in their venture by black rights organizations and the black community. They are accused of racism and working in the assassination techniques of 60's cops during Civil Rights. However, when Mantegna is attempting to converse with a black community head, the man calls him a kike, and so the snowball begins to roll. Mantegna is taken off the case, and put on a lame and easy one: finding out who killed an old jewish woman in a black neighborhood. Mantegna is consumed by his feelings of racism against jews (just as the black communities allegations are misplaced, so is Mantegna's). He gets mixed up with a Jewish resistance force who believe it was a mass conspiracy to kill the old woman (for she was an arms dealer for jews way back when) and he becomes totally obsessed by supposed hatred towards jews. If this plot sounds complicated, it is. But its the downward spiral of Mantegna that makes the film so interesting. It's awing to watch him believe things that are totally unbelievable just based on the idea that someone might have hated jews. It's damn good, interesting.
Homicide: ★★★1/2

The Wrestler

The Wrestler almost plays like a documentary at parts, and in a way it is. It shows the way of life for a group of people in the sports world. Their story is mostly untold, and here (using real-life wrestlers) a world is uncovered. It's a trashy world, filled with whores and blood, losers and drug addicted friends. But there's a certain nobility to the wrestlers. They take a hell-of-a-lot-of pain, and (as in most professions like it) their bodies start to break down. Randy "The Ram" Robinson is the hero, played in a career turning performance by Mickey Rourke (Sin City). He's one tough son-of-a-bitch, but he's coming to the end of his career (and possibly his life). His heart is having troubles, his daughter despises him, and his only friend is a dubious stripper played by Marissa Tomei (My Cousin Vinny). But it's not just the performance of Rourke and the realness within the entire film that makes it so good. There's a certain style and melancholly to it. It represents not just wrestlers at the end of their line, but people. If Randy is unable to be a wrestler, and everything else in his life is essentially shit, then what is left for him? What does he have to hold onto? The Wrestler is electrifying.
The Wrestler: ★★★★

The Kids Are All Right

I thought I was going to hate this movie. It may be cynical on my part, but when I read a review describing it as a "heart warming family adventure" I sort of cringe. I am glad to say that I was pleasantly surprised. It is not the heart warming family adventure I read about, but a sort of interestingly perceptive film. It's about two kids who've been raised by a lesbian couple. The kids have sought out their biological father (through the sperm donation facility) and he turns out to be a hippie gardener dude. He's definitely a dude. He's pretty laid back (played by Mark Ruffalo of Shutter Island) and thinks its pretty groovy that he's found these kids (played by Mia Wasikowska of Alice in Wonderland and Josh Hutchinson of countless Disney ventures; they're both very good). The lesbian couple is going through hard times, their daughter is going off to college soon, this man has entered into their lives, and they aren't getting along as well as they used to (Julianne Moore and Anette Bening play the couple extraordinarily well). From that point onward, paranoia and child rebellion begin, and that's what makes the movie better than some quirky indie dramedy. For, the film is very good at picking up on family situations that actually exist. One terrific scene has a livid Anette Bening freaking out at dinner with another couple and walking off telling her partner to fuck off. The partner (Moore) then gets up and goes to console Bening. It is clear from a scene like that that there's a certain way these people deal with problems, and that they know it is good enough for me. From the way the kids act to the way the mothers can be total bitches, it's an honest movie. And pretty damn good.
The Kids Are All Right (how many more shitty titles will this year churn out?): ★★★

Goin' South

This movie was directed by Jack Nicholson (one of the best actors alive) and he stars in it. It's about an outlaw who becomes the wife (and essentially the bitch to) the woman who saves him from execution. She makes him work in her gold mine that produces no gold (is it safe to assume or divulge that it will see a brighter day?) and tend to anything else she can. It's supposed to be a comedy. But the whole idea is kind of stupid, so it's just not funny. But they [the filmmakers] keep on plowing this idea into our heads. Isn't it hilarious that the outlaw is really dumb and dirty and the woman is very refined! How many times have we not see that before! There are some interesting lines here and there in Goin' South and some worthwhile supporting performances (most notably with John Belushi) but it just keeps on getting more boring, more predictable and stupider. It sucks.
Goin' South: ★★

∏

∏ or Pi is a film about madness, the first from Darren Aronofsky. It's about math, and that seems dull, but this movie is anything but. It's shot in black and white (very high contrast), and appears quite grainy and dreamlike. The main character is not unfamiliar to the movies, he's a brilliant young jew, Max Cohen, who keeps to himself and can tell you in an instant what 6670 times 34 equals. He's had a strange past, he has frequent, painful headaches (as if his head were splitting open) and everyone wants his talent. He's been working on probability and how to predict the stock market. He believes that math is everywhere in life, and most often in patterns, thus there should be an attainable and usable pattern with the stock market. Hasidic Jews are after him so that he can crack the numerical codes within the Torah, Stock Market moguls are after him (if they can discover a way to predict stocks, they'll get rich), but he just wants to crack the code. He goes crazy. From his headaches and obsessing over the specific number 216 (which he thinks is the key to the universe) he starts to see numbers everywhere. This is done is such a hypnotic and convincing way that the film becomes riveting. The film is not about math (although that is also quite interesting) but about the obsession of this antisocial Max Cohen to discover the answer to the universe. The answers are, of course, illusory, and he's doomed from the start. The journey that you go through with the character (excited that he may actually be on to something) is awing.
∏: ★★★

Winter's Bone

           Movies like this one are becoming their own sort of genre. They're quiet and sad and deal with people on the verge of death or breakdown (see: That Evening Sun, Frozen River). This film is about a seventeen year old girl (a sublime Jennifer Lawrence) in the Ozarks who has to take care of two much younger siblings. Her parents are absent. The mother is insane--practically catatonic, and her father has skipped out on his bail bond after imprisonment for cooking meth. In order to keep her house, which the father has put up as the bond, Lawrence must find her father. But trouble is afoot, for there's a mafia-esque quality to the white trash of the Ozarks: all the men cook meth and all the women stay out of their way. The landscape is devastating, it's cold and dark, it isn't a town and it looks like its been simmering there for hundreds of years.
         The strength in Winter's Bone is in the characters, for they seem to have been absent from American movies until now, finally breaking out. Perhaps these were the same tough-as-nails characters in the old westerns, but in this time are crazy meth dealing sons-of-bitches. They are fucking scary. And very well acted. The grittiness of these characters is what's so surprising, and how they try to corrupt Lawrence (whose performance is also wonderful).
Winter's Bone: ★★★★

Black Swan

Fair warning now: most people will hate this movie. It is over the top (but it knows it) it is even clichéd (until you see past it) and it is grotesque. It is about the hell that a dancer, Nina Sayers (Natalie Portman) goes through on her road to the Swan Queen in the New York ballet production of Swan Lake. It is devastating. In the movie, Portman is bulimic, she cuts, she fantasizes, she goes crazy, she revolts against her oppressive mother, her feet split all in and for pain of ballet. She wants to be perfect. That is the movie. It is great, of that I have no doubt, although in the middle I did feel some reluctance to like it based upon the clichés of the script. However, if you pay attention while you watch a movie, there's a scene that tells you what is real and what was not, and all those clichés become elevated. You realize that all of the freak outs of Portman are what she thought she was supposed to feel. And that they were all coming out of the back of her mind, she was going crazy so she experienced crazy thoughts and psycho-sexual moments like people (in the movies do). But she knows they never happened. Rather, she made those things happen so that she could believe certain things so that she could do certain things (torture her body, torture her mind).
       A lot has been said that this movie isn't very good by dancers. I attack this now: the movie is about the pain dancers put them through because of pressure. I argue that a dancer either doens't like the movie because the themes come too close to home or that the pressure seems silly (Oh please, she [Portman] is so whiny! When I was a dancer the pressure was so much higher and we didn't do stupid shit like that). But this is the quintessential dancer movie. It shows the dark side of perfectionsim, the dark side of the soul. It should also be admired by dancers for the following reasons: Dancing is shot on stage, the strains of the dancers (their breathing, their frightened eyes) are shown up close. Especially one scene where Portman is doing turns is breathtaking, for in slow motion you see how every time she has to jump up on her toes.
      A last note: Portman spent 5-8 hours a day for a year training for this role. It's one of the best performances of all time.
Black Swan: ★★★★

Dark City

Dark City was directed by Alex Proyas (Knowing, The Crow) and in it are Jennifer Connelly (Requiem for a Dream) and Kiefer Sutherland (24). This is a weird movie. It's not different, it's weird. Everyone in the movie seems like their in a daze. They're all hapless but proceeding. It's also strangely beautiful. The story revolves around a city in the middle of nowhere (literally) where it is always night and people change to different people every night at midnight. This is all orchestrated by The Strangers, a race of bald, pale aliens who know the ways of the human mind, and are looking for the soul. Every night the city changes, every night the people do too. And it's wonderful. To watch this movie is to delve into the grungy bits of the mind, evil, and assumptions that are so often made. If it sounds weird, or too weird, it should, and it takes a while for the majesty of the film to seep in, but once it does, it's a glorious thing. The prime question posed by the film is that, if our surroundings and occupations, pasts and futures were all changed, would life as we know it be the same--would we still end up with the people we would with a different house, a different job, a different past? And do all or any of those things matter, really, when we end up at that same place, a shore or a beach, a place we imagined as the end or the beginning, would it really matter at all?
Dark City: ★★★★

The Ghost Writer

To start off, the director of The Ghost Writer is a biggie. He's done great films, and he continues to make them (Chinatown, The Pianist, Rosemary's Baby). This movie proves it. It is about an unnamed ghost writer who is tasked with editing and reestablishing the memoir of the former British Prime Minister. It's eery, the way he goes about it, in the winter Martha's Vineyard in the room of the former ghost writer (who turned up dead). The movie is about this man's search for the truth within the dark past of the the Prime Minister. It is the way this movie goes about it's story that makes it so worthwhile. In the majority of American movies, suspense is characterized as some shit blowing up. But in this movie (as Hitchcock said) it is the shit not blowing up that causes suspense. It is quiet and scary, well acted all around. There are also a lot of "aww shit" moments. It's well done, worth seeing, quick, and places with some of the best thrillers of all time.
The Ghost Writer: ★★★★

The Town

In 2007, Ben Affleck (a generally bad actor in stupid movies) made a great movie. That movie was Gone Baby, Gone. It was gritty, sad, and complicated. It was also criminally overlooked. Now Affleck has released The Town, and it is no Gone Baby, Gone. It is, rather, a whiny unrealistic movie. The first mistake in the Town was the casting (the last was the title). By casting, I mean that it's ridiculous that he (Affleck) should place himself as the star. He doesn't look right, he doesn't look like the kind of guy who'll beat the shit out of you, but rather a guy at Starbucks whose order is too long. This gets worse. Affleck is so in love with his character that he makes him sort of the reluctant criminal. He pleads to his girlfriend who he earlier kidnapped and fell in love with while stalking her (are you fucking kidding me?) that he's never killed anyone. But he doesn't consider taking a machine gun and opening fire at cops as murder. Or when murder's good. This character ruins the movie. The rest of it is fine, the characters, even the ridiculous story is pretty fun. But Affleck is trying to put a romance in this crime movie. But you can't have a heartbroken sappy dude in the middle of it. You can't be a mastermind of crime and escape in a Shawshank Redemption-esque way. This movie is a big disappointment. It is the prime example of the director in love with his character. That makes it kind of stupid. The rest of The Town is well done, but it all gets pretty undermined by stupidity.
The Town: ★★

127 Hours

127 Hours is the tale of a man unafraid who gets himself in a frightening situation. He is Aron Ralston, a lover of the outdoors. In the opening sequence (one of the best ever) he fancifully plays with danger and goes diving with two girls. On his own once more, he falls into a crevice. A massive rock has fallen with him and pinned his arm to the side of the crevice. He is stuck. 127 Hours chronicles his time there, his attempts to get out and finally his escape by cutting his own arm off with a dull knife. This is no spoiler, for by the title it is clear that he makes it out. In his time in the crevice, Ralston (played in what will probably win the Oscar by James Franco of Pineapple Express) thinks about the people outside of his hell. He thinks of all the things back home that he would love to return to, old memories and what he could be doing instead. His escape is miraculous. The pain and self-convincing is also astounding. He is a very lucky man. But, that is really just what this movie is about. How it is about, makes the film great. It is shot beautifully, never boring for even a moment (people were carried out on stretchers at Telluride Film Festival who could not bear the intensity), and extremely moving. Franco's best line in the whole movie is about how it is himself who made the choices to put himself in every single situation in his life. How he is ultimately responsible. The director of 127 Hours, Danny Boyle, deserves the Oscar for this movie. But only for direction, for the best film of the year is a different film. But Boyle has masterfully directed this movie, and filmed the un-filmable. It is by far his best film. It surpasses the popular Slumdog Millionaire and the trippy cult classic: Trainspotting. 127 Hours is a great achievement: entertaining, unpretentious, and moving.
127 Hours: ★★★★

Alice in Wonderland

Alice in Wonderland is an easily commendable film. It has elaborate scenery (which is Tim Burton's specialty), it's dark, and it's pretty weird. The movie is not really a remake of the various other Alice's in Wonderland, but rather a sequel to the Disney 1950's version. In that version, Alice was a child who underwent all of the strange experiences of wonderland. This 2010 version seems to want to convince us that Alice has forgotten her original trip, and in her teenage years (forced to wed someone she doesn't want to) she regresses and returns to Wonderland. This is an interesting idea, but the movie makes a few missteps. The worst of these is that even though it's a sequel, many scenes seem to just be the live-action shot-by-shot replica's of scenes from the 50's movie. Also, the movie can be too silly, like when Alice expounds her individuality by doing a silly little jig. Yet another problem is the ubiquitous fight scene at the end, where it's war in wonderland! It's jumbled, silly, and weird. Now, the scenery is quite amazing, but how stupid is it for a master like Burton to use pretty much the same damn scenery for every scene of the entire film! Not like in last years Avatar where every scene had its own specific tinge of creativity. I also mention that Mia Wasikowska is very good in the movie, and Depp is slightly disappointing as a much too nice and not very mad Mad-Hatter. The story of Alice in Wonderland is fine, and there is a lot to like in the middle of the film, near the end it starts to make a lot of mistakes, but it's solid, but not great by any stretch of the imagination.

Alice in Wonderland: ★★★