Wednesday, October 08, 2003
American Wedding
Directed by Jesse Dylan
Ok. I did laugh at some of the stupid senseless crude jokes which when all piled up adds up to nothing. Just a farce. American wedding is those kind of teen flicks movies which do well because it appeals to the lowest common denomination. The marriage between Jim Levenstein: (Jason Biggs) and Michelle Flaherty (Alyson Hannigan) after surviving college education and coming together has decided to tie the knot! Their marriage is however just a backdrop for Dylan to create a sequel to entice audience to come back and make fun of the characters in the show.
I was shocked to read a few reputable American critics giving the wedding medium ratings. I suppose Dylan wouldn’t care too much either about critics reviews because he was merely writing for the audience and all he cared about is making laughs.
Therefore, I’m not going to even provide a decent synopsis because the papers are doing a better job singing the half-baked attempts at praising American Wedding.
Directed by Jesse Dylan
Ok. I did laugh at some of the stupid senseless crude jokes which when all piled up adds up to nothing. Just a farce. American wedding is those kind of teen flicks movies which do well because it appeals to the lowest common denomination. The marriage between Jim Levenstein: (Jason Biggs) and Michelle Flaherty (Alyson Hannigan) after surviving college education and coming together has decided to tie the knot! Their marriage is however just a backdrop for Dylan to create a sequel to entice audience to come back and make fun of the characters in the show.
I was shocked to read a few reputable American critics giving the wedding medium ratings. I suppose Dylan wouldn’t care too much either about critics reviews because he was merely writing for the audience and all he cared about is making laughs.
Therefore, I’m not going to even provide a decent synopsis because the papers are doing a better job singing the half-baked attempts at praising American Wedding.
Monday, October 06, 2003
Gold Rush, The (1925)
Directed by Charles Chaplin
Like the Modern Times DVD I reviewed earlier, The Gold Rush is a worthy collector’s item. The first DVD features the movie with running commentary by Charlie Chaplin, which was a re released update as compared to the first silent version released in 1925.
The movie is inspired by a real life story of a group of travellers who are cut off from the real world after being caught in a snowstorm. In the Gold Rush, Chaplin is the lone prospector who went searching for gold. He was soon trapped by a blizzard in a little hut with the owner, Black Larsen (Tom Murray) and a miner, Big Jim McKay (Mack Swain) who has dug gold and deposited it in a secret hideout. Unable to get out of the house and hungry, they sent Larsens out to search for food. Meanwhile, the little fellow as he was called, cooks one of his shoes to devour.
Like many of his other movies, Chaplin funny scenes are riddled. Chaplin films the eating of his shoe as if they were gorging on make believe delicacy. Big Jim was so hungry that he hallucinates Chaplin into a huge chicken and chases him around with a rifle.
The love plot between Chaplin and Georgia (Georgia Hale) is a heartwarming story of sincerity overcoming all odds. In one of the most touching and funny scene, the tramp hallucinates doing a bread roll dance for Georgie and the girls who came over for New Year’s eve dinner.
There is nothing difficult about Chaplin and his movies are fun to watch with satisfying endings.
Time Regained
Directed by Raul Ruiz
It’s probably unadvisable to review Time Regained after having only seen it once as the story flutters from scene to scene and across time; making it hard for teh reviewer to make a sum judgment. Though we do know it is based on Marcel Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past, the story of a dying man who remembers his younger days.
Time Regained contains amazing cinematography. In the starting scene where the old men is reciting to his maid what to write for his novel, the camera scenes moves and changes positions fluidly. As the audience of a concert was listening to a recital, the camera moves gracefully as if they were sliding.
These extra-diegetic effects, like the narration, creates a loosely structured film, in which events are implicitly related sometimes just by a character having similar thoughts. For example, when Marcel (Marcello Mazzarella) was drinking from a cup and waiting an audience, he is transposed to the past.
Marcel’s recollections of his friends are hardly kind. Marie-France Pisier is loud and bitchy as Madame Verdurin. In one instance, Ruiz distorts and skews Marcel’s perception of his dinner mates as he remarks indifferently about them. John Malkovich as Charlus, a gay baron who employs young boys for sexual favours in return is disdainful of common people.
Charlus happens to have some of the more witty lines in the movie as he eschews on politics and war. Morel (Vincent Perez) journalist cum pianist is much sought after by the ladies despite his marriage while Marcel desires to write great literature.
Overlap of memory, crossing of time zones and giving multi-character point of view perspectives, Time Regained is hardly a story conventionally. It is confusing
to watch and make sense, which explains difficulty in writing an essay after first viewing. The novel which it is based on is an expansive effort that makes it hard to be made into a movie in the first place.
Directed by Charles Chaplin
Like the Modern Times DVD I reviewed earlier, The Gold Rush is a worthy collector’s item. The first DVD features the movie with running commentary by Charlie Chaplin, which was a re released update as compared to the first silent version released in 1925.
The movie is inspired by a real life story of a group of travellers who are cut off from the real world after being caught in a snowstorm. In the Gold Rush, Chaplin is the lone prospector who went searching for gold. He was soon trapped by a blizzard in a little hut with the owner, Black Larsen (Tom Murray) and a miner, Big Jim McKay (Mack Swain) who has dug gold and deposited it in a secret hideout. Unable to get out of the house and hungry, they sent Larsens out to search for food. Meanwhile, the little fellow as he was called, cooks one of his shoes to devour.
Like many of his other movies, Chaplin funny scenes are riddled. Chaplin films the eating of his shoe as if they were gorging on make believe delicacy. Big Jim was so hungry that he hallucinates Chaplin into a huge chicken and chases him around with a rifle.
The love plot between Chaplin and Georgia (Georgia Hale) is a heartwarming story of sincerity overcoming all odds. In one of the most touching and funny scene, the tramp hallucinates doing a bread roll dance for Georgie and the girls who came over for New Year’s eve dinner.
There is nothing difficult about Chaplin and his movies are fun to watch with satisfying endings.
Time Regained
Directed by Raul Ruiz
It’s probably unadvisable to review Time Regained after having only seen it once as the story flutters from scene to scene and across time; making it hard for teh reviewer to make a sum judgment. Though we do know it is based on Marcel Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past, the story of a dying man who remembers his younger days.
Time Regained contains amazing cinematography. In the starting scene where the old men is reciting to his maid what to write for his novel, the camera scenes moves and changes positions fluidly. As the audience of a concert was listening to a recital, the camera moves gracefully as if they were sliding.
These extra-diegetic effects, like the narration, creates a loosely structured film, in which events are implicitly related sometimes just by a character having similar thoughts. For example, when Marcel (Marcello Mazzarella) was drinking from a cup and waiting an audience, he is transposed to the past.
Marcel’s recollections of his friends are hardly kind. Marie-France Pisier is loud and bitchy as Madame Verdurin. In one instance, Ruiz distorts and skews Marcel’s perception of his dinner mates as he remarks indifferently about them. John Malkovich as Charlus, a gay baron who employs young boys for sexual favours in return is disdainful of common people.
Charlus happens to have some of the more witty lines in the movie as he eschews on politics and war. Morel (Vincent Perez) journalist cum pianist is much sought after by the ladies despite his marriage while Marcel desires to write great literature.
Overlap of memory, crossing of time zones and giving multi-character point of view perspectives, Time Regained is hardly a story conventionally. It is confusing
to watch and make sense, which explains difficulty in writing an essay after first viewing. The novel which it is based on is an expansive effort that makes it hard to be made into a movie in the first place.
