like this blog?

Stumble It!

W

In fear of my life, I admit: I don't hate George Bush.

I went to see W last night. I was expecting a Michael Moore type laugh-a-minute film, but that wasn't it at all...

Overall, I found the movie quite boring; it was pretty much a biopic - but who wants to see a biopic about a man still alive and about events which occurred less than ten years ago? Not me.

Josh Brolin is completely excellent as Bush. Not only has he captured the mannerisms exactly, but he is funny, and quite likeable. In my opinion the film tries to portray the complex relationship between George Bush Sr and Jr, both powerful statesmen (obviously) but also confused in their relationship as father and son. Unfortunately, the portrayal lacks any depth and basically swings around from Sr being the one to blame, to Jr and so on. And I'm not saying I would have wanted more depth - no, no. In fact the father-son moments were, in my opinion, the most boring parts of the film.

Most compelling were the White House scenes, where I could simultaneously enjoy guessing who was supposed to be who and laugh my head off at Thandie Newton's portrayal of Condoleeza Rice. Surely it was a joke performance?? Newton looked like a puppet on a string; a figure straight from Team America! I spent an alarming amount of time cracking up at her imitation of Rice's speaking voice instead of concentrating on why exactly America went to war with Iraq.

And now for the political analysis: I seem to differ from the rest of the world in my views, but I was a supporter of the Iraq war (at least initially). I will admit, I am not too involved, or even interested, in politics, with the exception of my West Wing obsession. But I remember back in 2003 that I believed it was necessary to invade a hostile country if it was certain they had WMDs.

I know it has since been revealed that the intelligence regarding the location of, nay existence of, WMDs was shady to say the least. And obviously I don't support a war based on false evidence. However, according to the film (again, I am unsure of how much of it is actually true) Bush and some of his advisors really did believe that Iraq posed an imminent threat to global security. I have not a single doubt that Bush acted for the correct reasons. It seems that either he was misled or his advisors and their intelligence providers got it wrong. Dramatically wrong.

This does not exonerate Bush. Obviously his administration was in a bad way if they were receiving false intelligence AND believing it. But Bush, as President, cannot have been expected to research the matter himself. He relied upon advice from those highest in their fields. That their advice was wrong, does indeed refelct on Bush, but it should not make him hated by all living beings. I truly believe (and not just because of the film) that he was trying to do the right thing.

I also believe that that alone is not enough. A President should be better than everyone else nd not make such mistakes.

A moment in the film seemed to bring it home to me. At one point, Bush is asking his advisors who is searching for the WMDs in Iraq. They all point at each other, saying the responsibility was passed to someone else. Bush fumes, "Why wasn't I told?" etc etc. But then he shouts out, "Who is in control here?" (or something along those lines) And although noone answers, it is painfully clear that the one who should be in control is Bush himself. That he has lost command of the entire operation.

I thought the ending of W was thought-provoking, and I definitely believe that Oliver Stone has portrayed Bush as decent but flawed. Brolin charms the audience, and although Bush may have choked on a pretzel, he somehow has always charmed me.

007. Heaven?

James Bond is not back in business people. I saw Quantum of Solace the other night and was rather disappointed. I mean, it was a generally good action film. Blockbusting fight scenes and set pieces, some great effects and beautiful shots of silhouettes through fire in a buring desert hotel and all, but there was something... missing.

And after much consideration I have discovered what. Bondage. No, not some dirty, kirky sex scenes (although these were notably lacking as well), but the essence of Bond: the wit, the charm, the slight cheesiness that makes Bond Bond: Bondage.

Think of old Bond films, when Bond wades through the black ocean waters in a wetsuit, crawling across the beach and then stripping off to reveal and tuxedo underneath, in which he suavely slips into a cocktail party. Or when he jumps or skis off something or other and his parachute opens revealing a British flag. Now that's Bond. He's so cool he doesn't need muscles. He doesn't have to be able to beat baddies up with just a fist while they wield axes or missile launchers; he just has to use a gadget/his brains/a witty joke to get out of a sticky situation.

So when the husband and I saw Casino Royale back when it came out, he (a Bond aficionado) was outraged at Daniel Craig's Bond's rawness and roughness. "He's not suave, he's not cultured," he complained endlessly. I reassured him that this was all part of the plan. Casino Royale, I explained, was the Batman Begins of the Bond franchise. It shows his beginnings, his genesis. How a betrayal by the woman he loved made him reject women as objects of worth and form a shell around his persona where he could detach himself from anything emotional or painful. In Casino Royale, Bond couldn't care less if his martini was shaken or stirred. But after this betrayal he changes, becomes the cool as a cucumber spy we all know and love. He becomes, in the final scene of the film, Bond, James Bond.

So we entered the cinema with baited breath, expecting to see the Bond we used to know, shameless womaniser, cultured European and witty charmer. But along comes Craig, still muscly (I guess we can't do anything about that though, can we?) but still angry, still brutish and still not witty. There are admittedly a couple of "amusing" lines in Quantum, but that's it. Literally two. The rest of the film is a mixture of Bourne-inspired fight scenes and automobile chases.

There is nothing inherently charming or British about Bond anymore. And unless the producers return Bond to his former incarnation, I can't imagination the franchise will stick around much longer.

Movie Moments

Best movie moments. That make us feel something unusually strong, or make us laugh, or tie the whole film together, or represent a phenomenal example of cinematography or editing. Something special:

The Godfather II - Christening/assassination scene

Blue Velvet - In Dreams scene

In The Mood For Love - Long score/montage scene

Smokin' Aces - Final scene

Requiem for a Dream - Final scene

Moulin Rouge - Final scene

Star Wars V - "I am your father" scene (first time viewing only)

What's Cooking

There are a couple of upcoming films that look absolutely amazing. I'm planning on booking my ticket as soon as I can purely based on the trailers.

Ok, ok, one of them is the new Bond film, Quantum of Solace, which, despite its ridiculous title, looks absolutely fantastic. The other is Righteous Kill, the De Niro/Pacino collaboration. If my memory serves me correctly, the dynamic duo have only actually been in two movies together until now. The Godfather II and Heat - and they only shared the screen for those two scenes in Heat. In Godfather II they didn't even share time zones. Talk about elusive!

And here they are now, offering plenty of shared screentime as cops fighting for what's right. I never really like to find out too much about a film before I see it because I find it ruins my enjoyment. But my husband made me watch the trailer (I mean, I didn't have much choice - he was watching it over and over on YouTube all day long!) and it looks fantastic.

And Quantum of Solace - what a trailer. Firstly, the song used as background music is just perfect. It seems just that the band have based their name on the first ever Bond girl Honey Rider. The song is called numb, and it's well worth a listen, especially because only the instrumental bits are used in the trailer.

But I'm telling you, these new Bond films are right up my street. Casino Royale is my favourite Bond film of all time - so far. (I know, I'm not a purist!) I think it's because it's less cheesy and sleazy than its predecessors. Daniel Craig is just what we want from Bond: hard, chiselled and tough as nails.

I also really liked that it was the Bond equivalent of Batman Begins, showing us Bond before he became 007, when he doesn't care how his martini is served. Only at the end, after Vesper's betrayal and Bond's loss of faith, does James become Bond, James Bond.

And now we get to see what happens next: how Bond becomes cultured to the superficial extent of erasing all emotion. Becoming the lethal killing machine we all know and (oddly) love.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who's excited. But boy am I!

Housewife on Housewives

The first new episode of Desperate Housewives was finally screened last night in the UK (episode 11). I'm still not sure exactly why there was a whole long break. Someone told me it was because of Big Brother but I can't believe someone would choose to put off Desperate Housewives for the unbelievable tat that is Big Brother.

But anyway, I watched it. There were quite a few funny bits, which I found unusual. I don't normally laugh out loud, but I did. Twice. One when Gaby was talking to the priest about getting married again and the second time when she was leading a poor, blind Carlos round the house, tripping him up and throwing apples at him.

Still, I'm not really that intrigued about the whole Katharine thing and who killed who and what now. I just don't really care.

More importantly, Prison Break has been out for two whole days now and I haven't seen it yet! My parents have Sky+ so they've recorded it for me, but I haven't been bothered to go over and watch it there yet.

Last night Si and I finished season 2 of the West Wing. Oooh, it was amazing! It was a fantastic episode, especially the song at the end, Brothers in Arms by Dire Straits. We've just ordered season 3 on Amazon. Hopefully it'll come tomorrow. We should have thought further in advance.

We have a friend who has all 7 seasons on DVD - it was him who lent us season 1. But then another friend of ours also watched season 1 at the same time and then borrowed season 2 a day before we asked friend 1 for it! Grr. And then, just as we though yesterday that we should get in there first and request season 3, we get a text saying that friend 2 got in there first!! Double Grrrrr.

But it's ok, we've already shotgunned seasons 4-7. Beat that sucker!

West Wing or 24?

My husband and I watched 24 together. We heard about a special deal on the 6-season box set, realised it was nearly our birthdays and whimsically spent what we thought we'd get for birthday money on the boxset. And was it an investment??! I'll say.

For a solid two months we spent every evening and weekend glued to the telly, following Jack on his toilet-break-free pursuits.

108 hours later (remember, without the advert breaks, each episode is only about 45 minutes) we were pretty much exhausted, but gagging for season 7. When's that coming out by the way?

Anyway, after that our friends instructed us that we just HAVE to watch The West Wing - one even going as far as to tell us that it is better than 24. "Blasphemy!" we cried. But no, apparently it is not blasphemy. So we have begun our journey through the lives of Sam, Toby, Josh, Leo, CJ, Charlie and Jed. And I'll admit, halfway through season 2, it is good. Damn good. But it hasn't overtaken 24 yet.

24 was addictive. I haven't gone to bed at 4am yet because I couldn't turn off West Wing. However, whereas watching 24 made me admire how clever the writers must be to work everything out and keep us entertained to constantly, watching West Wing actually makes me feel clever. When I've come to the end of an episode and actually know what's happened throughout, I feel I've done my mental exercise for the day.

But at the moment I really can't believe anyone can say 24 isn't better. It has a mixture of politics and action. Yes, West Wing is sharply written. I might go so far as to say it's the best screen-writing I've ever come across. But does that make it better?

I'll have to reserve my final judgement when I'm up to date with West Wing. Anyone got any preferences?

Correction(al Facility)

Prison Break Alert! Despite a previous post, Season 4 of Prison Break is airing on Sky One (in the UK) TONIGHT! With a 2-hour episode! Yippee! Strange how happy I am considering I don't even have that channel. But at least it's coming!

No spoilers please but I wonder what happens to Sucre!!!

Movie wish list

Calling all movie buffs and fans! I need recommendations for the best movie ever to add to my list of films to watch next.

The top films I want to see (that I haven't seen before) are: The Orphanage, The Fountain, A Clockwork Orange, Reservoir Dogs and American Graffiti.

I need more for my list.

Classic Film Club

I guess it's time to talk about one of my geekiest pursuits.... a Classic Film Club organised by a group of my friends. Now this might initially sound like quite a cultured activity for a group of intellectual young professionals, right?

Wrong. It's official title is: Classic Film Appreciation and Rinsing Society. Shortened to CFARS, it indicates the fact that not only do we watch a pre-selected classic film, but we then debate and rate it afterward. We even have categories in which we rate the film, including "Impact", "Let-down factor" and "Enjoyability" - which, oddly enough, is a separate category from "Overall".

And how do we choose the film? Well, the organiser of the group, President (well, the guy who came up with idea originally), has compiled a list. It's more like a spreadsheet containing an expanding list of films put forward by participants and sorted by which DVDs someone possesses and which we are still to acquire. Whoever attends a screening gets to nominate a film and all those present vote and choose the film for the next meeting.

And how did this incredibly cool group even come into being? I'll tell you: Our President sent an email to everyone he knows (which is a lot), asking people to opt out of the mailing list if they don't want to be part of the club, and to forward the email to anyone who does (we're not elitist). He now has a rather sizeable list of interested parties. However, I would say the average turnout is between 3 and 8 people! I think most people like being on the email list because a) they think they will one day come and b) the emails are hilarious; the President is something of a comic genius.

And what do we classify a classic film?

It has to be pre-2000 as a general rule, as well as being a film that "everyone should have seen - but hasn't." I like to credit myself with coming up with that succinct definition.

Films we have watched so far have included: Casablanca, Chinatown, Leon, The Godfather, The Godfather II, Chariots of Fire, North by Northwest, Taxi Driver, Duck Soup, Dr Strangelove, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Heat and This is Spinal Tap.

Interestingly Leon has come out top in the polls out of all films. I loved Chinatown - partly because I studied it at uni and really enjoyed writing an essay on it - but everyone else hated it. I was very upset. Generally though, most of the films have been surprisingly good.

Although it's totally loserish, it's a real laugh, especially the time spent arguing over where to order food from before we start the film. I recommend starting up a group like this with a group of friends and seeing where you end up!

Zohan and Step Brothers

Having been on holiday and with my husband having exams over the last few weeks, we haven't gone to the cinema at all, as far as I can remember. So now, while we're both sitting around all day we've gone to a coule of late-night showings.

Last week we saw You Don't Mess with the Zohan. Now, we hadn't heard particularly good things about this movie, but there wasn't much else on, and we were truly craving the cinema (and the ice cream we like to accompany our cinema visits with).

The film starts out on Tel Aviv beach, with Israelis partying away and Adam Sandler - naked or semi-naked (I can't remember) - raving about cooking fish and the greatness of hummus. I felt an almost collective groan from the rest of the audience as they realised what they were in for during the next two hours. I however, was laughing my head off. Having just returned from Israel, where we had spent a couple of days exactly there on Tel Aviv beach, I was loving the unashamed mockery of Israelis. Because they are just so funny.

The film is Billy Elliot meets Borat. Adam Sandler is a fearless IDF soldier, top in his unit/country/the world, but what he desperately wants is to be a hairdresser and make hair "silky smooth". So after being ridiculed by his hummus-scoffing parents, Zohan goes to New York to work his magic.

The jokes do wear a bit thin as the film continues, but don't think it's a one-sided movie: it doesn't just mock Israelis, it rips it out of the Arabs too.

I read an opinion piece somewhere that Adam Sandler is the new epitome of the Jew. Woody Allen's successor. I'm not sure I agree, but his reasoning wasn't bad at all. The writer mentioned the Sandler film 50 First Dates, starring him and Drew Barrymore as the amnesiac love interest. Although Sandler's character is meant to be Jewish throughout the film, no mention or jones are made of this... until the final scene where [SPOILER ALERT!] Adam and Drew stand beneath a chuppah, and have a fully Jewish wedding ceremony. This, the opinion-piece writer claimed, is the new type of Jew: pretty assimilated, not actively religious, but unafraid to identify himself as a Jew, and still in keeping with Jewish traditions. There are no jokes about the Jewish wedding; it is not gag, just the setting.

Watching Zohan, despite its huge stereotypes and ridiculous jokes (such as that Israelis use hummus for everything: from toothpaste to fire extinguishers), I could not help thinking about the idea of Adam Sandler, Every Jew. Zohan is a mainstream film, yet is completely immersed in Israeli language and mannerisms. Although a few people left the cinema before the film ended, I enjoyed seeing Israeli culture joked about - but not belittled - on the big screen.

Moving on from such deep musings, last night we saw Step Brothers, starring Will Ferrell and John C Reilly as two forty-year-old step brothers thrown together when their parents marry.

And, expectedly, it was hilarious. Will Ferrell is surely a comic genius, both in his scriptwriting abilities and ideas and in his facial expressions. Reilly is less known to me. I think he was in Chicago. But he was also extremely funny.

With comedy ranging from slapstick, to toilet humour, to satire, the film is pretty much amusing all the way through.

From West Wing to Facebook

I just heard that West Wing creator Aaron Sorkin has switched his attention to an entirely new area in filmmaking: the social network site Facebook. Hmmm.

Seems a bit of a strange topic to make a film about. According to the great man himself, "I've just agreed to write a movie for Sony and producer Scott Rudin about how Facebook was invented." I would've thought a Facebook film would focus on the dangers of digital identity theft and cyber-stalking. But that's a bit too immature for Sorkin.

He's definitely my definition of a mature creator. Consider West Wing compared to all other TV shows. It's much faster, much cleverer and demands so much more from the viewers. Imagine watching Desperate Housewives and still being unsure what is going on halfway though. Well, in West Wing, that's not so uncommon. Oh wait, is that just me?

By the way, I'm only partway through Season 2. Yes, I'm a bit behind. It took me ages to jump on the West Wing Train. But now I'm loving it. If Facebook: The Movie is anywhere near as good, I'll be first in line.

Serpico

Serpico was next on the movie menu for me and the husband. He's really loving his freedom!

It's a really great film, based on a true story, about a young cop in the Bronx who is a "good" cop, an "Honest" cop, ie all the other police officers are corrupt and take bribes and pay-offs from local felons instead of arresting them. At first Serpico (Al Pacino) just wants to do his job without accepting bribes. But his colleagues all become suspicious that he will rat them out, or more generally, they just think he's a weirdo for not taking easy money.

Eventually, Serpico fears for his safety because of his strange it appears to everyone that he won't take the money. He tries to report it to his superiors, but he hasn't yet realised how deep the corruption goes.

It may seem quite a typical story, but watching this film is very refreshing. I know that's an odd thing to say about a film from 1973, but the story unfolds very naturally, and information isn't spoonfed to you. And of course Pacino is excellent as the hippie, dedicated, undercover cop. His facial hair indicates the passage of time as he transforms from a clean-shaven youngster, full of hope, to a bearded, long-haired jaded man, bordering on paranoia.

They must have filmed everything in reverse, presumably preferring to shave his face bit by bit rather than wait for it to grow each time.

Pining for Prison Break

Is anyone else really looking forward to the new episodes of Prison Break? Season 4 begins on Fox on Monday 1st September!

Now don't get me wrong, I'm not a thicko, but did anyone else not realise that Season 3 had ended? It seemed to just stop right in the middle of the action. And there was still talk about that bloody writers' strike, but that had been done and dusted ages before.

But anyway, I am so excited to get back to the crazy and somewhat miraculous exploits of Michael and pals.

Unfortunately for me, I live in rainy London. (Just so you get the picture, it's August and I haven't seen any sun in this country for weeks!) But, in this case, I'm not here to complain about the weather. I'm here to moan that it only begins in the UK a week later! Grrr. And to make matters worse, it's on Sky One. And I don't have that channel!

Don't tell anyone, but I might have to watch it online. And sometimes the US channels have episodes available on their websites, but they don't play for viewers not in the US!

What will I do?? Michael... I miss you!

Film spree

My husband and I have been on quite a film spree lately (me being slightly unemployed, him being on holiday from med school). In the last two days we thought we should start making some headway through our DVD collection.

So we started with the Bourne trilogy which I must say are very good, but not amazing. Even though Ultimatum was definitely the best of the three, the final revelation wasn't quite as dramatic as the climax of a trilogy should be. I reckon it worked better in the book. Or maybe the film just underplayed it, opting instead for some rather glorious - if not a bit jumpy - fight scenes. Although I enjoyed watching the three Bourne films, the editing gave me a bit of a headache, and I know I sound like a grandma.

The next film we watched was Goodfellas. And that is a great film. I think I prefer it even to the Godfather saga. I don't know why, because objectively Godfather II is really a spectacular movie. The bit with the christening and the murders is one of the most wonderful of all film moments, I think (which gives me an idea for another post someday). However, altogether, I think the Godfather movies are just too... long. I know that sounds shallow for a piece of criticism but materialistic factors are still factors. Goodfellas is more contained and more of a life story. Perhaps I prefer it because it's more straightforward. Usually I like complex films but maybe because I've only watched the Godfather films after I've forgotten what's happened in the last one, I just get confused.

Ray Liotta is excellent in Goodfellas, but it's really all about the scenes with Joe Pesci. He's just a car crash waiting to happen, isn't he?

Next we watched Dirty Harry. My dad always goes on about 'Clint', and he was very cool. But that villain! Hilarious! Loved watching him become this limping, murdering, paedophile rapist - he doesn't really fit a profile does he? He's just EVIL. I think I was laughing at that film more than I was supposed to.

Last night we watched Rain Man. I know, I know, I can't believe I've never seen it before either! My friends always go on about it to me: "A film major who hasn't seen Rain Man...?!"

So now I've seen it. And it was great. Dustin Hoffman is my new hero. He's just so good in it. In fact Tom Cruise was excellent too. What's happened to him nowadays?

Following in the Hoffman vein, we just watched Midnight Cowboy, with Hoffman and Jon Voigt (who I still can't believe fathered the big-lipped alien that is Angelina Jolie). It was a really weird film. Apparently the only X-rated film to have won a Best Picture Oscar. Not that we have X-rated in England, but it wasn't that bad was it? Only a bit of nudity, drugs and prostitution, right?

It's one of those films I think of as snapshots: they're just a really random portrait of a certain time in the protagonists's life. Memories of before are shown but not fully explained, and then it just ends. It's a good but terrible film. Just so sad. I really liked it.

So what's next? I'll keep you posted.

First post

Wow. My first post. This is something of an exciting moment! The pressure has really mounted... will anyone ever read this? And even more fearsome, will anyone actually enjoy reading this?

The pressures of a first-time blogger.

Anyway, I'll introduce myself. I'm 24, Jewish, been married for just over a year, I live in London and am as unemployed as can be. Well, to be fair, I have had a job for the past year but I hated it so much that I've been job-hunting for almost a year to escape it. I was employed as the youth director of my local synagogue, which meant I was in charge of loads of horrible teenagers who had no intention of participating in any of the events or activities I organised. Nightmare.

The job didn't really require much work, just a couple of hours a day or less. So my full-time salary ensured that there was plenty of time to watch TV all day long. And watch TV I did.

I am now qualified to talk about pretty much any TV show in the world. I say qualified, I mean, I would very much like to. If you'd be interested.

Firstly, Lost: I LOVE Lost. Nobody I know really watches it. I remember when it first aired I watched a few episodes but got a bit bored and stopped. When the trailers for the fourth series started appearing recently, I became intrigued again and began watching it from the beginning online.

Despite still not being completely sure of the difference between DIVX and Flash HD, I am now up to date with the series. And wow! It rocks!

What's going on? Where did the Island go? And who is Ben? Can he travel through time? Why's he got so much money? And what's the dealio with the British girl Charlotte? She's so been to the Island before!

Anyone got any ideas? But no spoilers - only guesses! (I hate spoilers)

That question

If anyone's ever expressed an interest in film to another living human, it is likely they've been asked THAT question: What is your favourite film?

As a former film student and current film writer, I cannot count the times I've been asked the question. I've even gotten it in a job interview. (Me: "Erm... The Matrix?" Interviewer: "I see...") And I never have a good answer ready. The truth is, I don't know. There are so many genres and styles that I sometimes can't place one above another.

But here is a list of my top films. In no particular order, just the order I am thinking of them. Read into it what you will...

The Matrix

Evita

Requiem for a Dream

The Prestige

Gladiator

Kiss Me Deadly

LA Confidential

Rain Man

Kill Bill Vol 1

Donnie Darko

American History X

Arlington Road

Con Air

The Rock

Face/Off

The Thin Blue Line

Dogville