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mdayne-1
Reviews
The Royal Hotel (2023)
Character Driven Parable
Without such strong characters and great acting this movie would have been lost. The imagery and the story layers are a great canvas for the talents of a great cast from leads to peripherals. Kudos to Hugo Weaving for allowing the two female leads to lead. A true professional. Despite what you may read I didn't find this movie to be particularly disturbing or scary. To me this was a story of how lost we can get trying to find a meaning to life and looking for adventure by going to the ends of the earth when all of it resides in each of us.
Too bad it wasn't more successful commercially, but you get the feeling that all involved were involved for the love of acting and storytelling.
Beau Is Afraid (2023)
What a Mind Muddling Mess
This movie reminds me of modern art that people are afraid to call crap feeling they are missing the true meaning of the creation. This creation is cluttered with fine actors firing off vapid soliloquies with determination and verve and no real end. The film jumps from one bizarre premise to the next reminiscent of After Midnight with a character lost in some dimension that is fluid and beyond reason. If the writer/director wanted to show us what it would be like to live in the mind of a paranoid schizophrenic, he succeeded. What he didn't succeed in was producing a viable, entertaining or enlightened film.
Saltburn (2023)
Remake of The Talented Mr. Ripley
Patricia Highsmith wrote a tighter story with more interesting characters, IMHO. And the TMR with Damon and Jude Law was much better. Still enjoyed this one except for the creepy sexuality interspersed. No problem with remakes, but this one went for a little shock value which didn't help the story. Still entertaining and the acting was good especially the principal characters. Not sure why they even bothered casting Cary Mulligan. She was in it for a blink. All that being said this movie was well produced, well directed and well worth the time spent watching it. Better than the plethora of action flicks and foreign imports.
No Sudden Move (2021)
State of Creativity in a Streaming World
Here's an idea. Let's sign up a bunch of names pretend we have a film noir script with a bunch of twists and turns and, wait for it, the big reveal, it's about catalytic converters. At least Matt Damon had the sense to not be identified in the credits.
To put it mildly, this is what film making is now. Quantity over quality. Whatever the streaming service thinks it can pass off on streamers as worth the $12.95 a month. We get what we pay for guys. And there's plenty more crap where this came from.
Uncut Gems (2019)
Anxious and Overproduced
Take a relatively simple story about a loser who desperately needs money, then inexplicably lends his ticket out to a basketball player. And make it like the viewer is on acid watching it. Director, cinematographer must have been doing a lot of day drinking on this one.
Focus (2015)
Plausibility Please
This was an entertaining movie with decent acting and a good supporting cast. Wong and McRaney seem to shine no matter what roles they play. Although Robie tends to be marginalized as just a hot body, I found her to be convincing and sincere, especially playing off Smith, playing Smith yet again.
Now for the flaws. Why can't screenwriters stick with plausible story lines instead of interjecting nonsense? Robles character ostensibly shows up in second act to steal a watch and then uses cliché excuses to avoid becoming intimate with her mark. This just seemed silly and inane. Then an evil minion visits a drug store, buys collision supplies in order to kidnap Smith and Robie for the tied to the chairs garage scene, lame. Lastly, Smiths surrogate father shoots him, shoots him in order to seal the scam. Better writing, please.
Transparent (2014)
Who's Not To Dislike
The writers seemed really determined to craft a cast of very dislike able characters. None of this group seems to have any ounce of moral integrity and the infidelity piles up like yard waste. For all the accolades thrust at the subject matter, I found the central premise tiring after a couple of episodes. Dare I say, a lot of this material seems dated at this point. Maybe it is because I have had a lot of exposure to trans gender persons, but as one reviewer commented, I felt like I was watching a bad SNL skit. There is certainly a lot of better information out there these days, I would recommend the excellent documentary, Prodigal Sons by Kim Reed as a much more informative and honest reveal of the trans experience. All in all I suppose this series will help educate and reveal more to the ill- informed. I get the sense, as in Gay marriage, that the day is fast approaching where we will all be saying, "so what's the big deal."
Her (2013)
Existentialism For Sale
For the obscene price of what they charge at the cineplex these days, one gets to delve philosophically into what makes for good and bad relationships. This movie would have us believe that the physical presence of a partner/lover is nonessential, but that communication and trust are key; that both physical and emotional connectedness is important. So tell me something I don't already know. This in essence is why this movie panders and pretends to be some deep thought-provoking production, when, in fact, it is a meandering portrait of losers who seem to want more out of life than just plain, old fashioned happiness. Kind of what I think every time I see someone held captive by their smartphone, completely enrapt and ignoring the human around them. Phoenix certainly plays losers very well. Take the makeup off Adams and we see a shallow, pathetic piece of work whose creative juices run to producing a somnambulant documentary. This movie was not bad for one reason; Scarlett Johansson's voice.
Labor Day (2013)
Perfectly Nuanced Film
This film is a great example of a simple story which was presented through a keenly written screenplay, an experienced, talented director who knows how to bring a screenplay to screen and the casting of actors who are at the top of their game. Is there anyone more talented than Kate Winslet? One gets the sense that Reitman must have had a very easy time directing Winslet and Brolin. These two together make acting seem effortless and easily work through the complexities of their characters without a lot of dialog. The supporting players fit perfectly, making even minor screen time seem essential to the story. James VanderBeek? Yes,, that James VanderBeek, playing a suspicious cop like he's playing Hamlet.
In this era of big budget, blow it up, comic book crap, it's nice to see that some people still know how to present interesting characters and tell a story.