Too casual philosophy and too-formal blogging
Dir. Sofia Coppola, Cin. Edward Lachman; in English; 97 minutes. A meditation on the male gaze and nostalgia and the psychological distance of boys and girls in late 20th-century suburban white America, beautifully shot and scored. Well done for a debut, though I was not sure how much, if not all, of the movie was … Continue reading The Virgin Suicides (1998)
Dir. Wes Anderson, Cin. Robert Yeoman; in English; 109 minutes. Kitschy, cutesy, full of corners and muted pastels, daddy-issues, and whip-pans, this Wes Anderson picaresque contemplates forgiveness in a quirky and not altogether unsatisfying way. The distinctive style made empathizing with the characters hard at times: much of the drama felt so stilted as to … Continue reading The Royal Tenenbaums (2001)
Dir. Russo brothers, Cin. Trent Opaloch; in English; 149 minutes. The memory of too little of this generic genre-film lingers; rarely did I (though I still occasionally did!) find myself immersed enough to feel the stakes in any given event. It also attempts to make an empathetic villain out of a terroristic crusader out to … Continue reading Avengers: Infinity War (2018)
Dir. David Fincher, Cin. Darius Khondju; 127 minutes; in English. What if a thirteen-year-old's take on Nine Inch Nails were, like, a movie with a title and conceit only a thirteen-year-old could possibly think were edgy? It would probably center around a gross, lonesome dude projecting his troubled inner life onto everyone around him; feature constantly grimy, … Continue reading Se7en (1995)
Dir. Ridley Scott, Cin. Derek Vanlint; in English; 116 minutes. Closed, tight, grimy, and disgusting, Alien makes for a tense and uncomfortable two hours. While I found the childbirth imagery added depth to an otherwise simple locked-room dark-dank-and-trapped atmosphereic horror flick, the major plot twist—that a certain crew member intended to let the crew die … Continue reading Alien (1979)
Dir. Oliver Stone, Cin. Anthony Dod Mantle; in English; 134 minutes. Stone's movie on an impressive and courageous whistle-blower unsuccessfully straddles the thick barrier between documentary and narrative. By showing us what—and often how—Snowden finds over and over again, and how at each stage this compounds his stress and attenuates his romance, the film stretches … Continue reading Snowden (2016)
Dir. Wes Anderson, Cin. Robert Yeoman; in English; 93 minutes. Rushmore captures with Wes Anderson's over-the-top, self-conscious style at once the electricity of starting a project—writing a novel, starting a new diet or exercise regimen, building a shed from scratch—and the shame of leaving it unfinished, of masking that shame in yet another project. Perhaps … Continue reading Rushmore (1998)
Dir. Rob Reiner, Cin. Barry Sonnenfield; in English; 96 minutes. A charmingly-presented, smarmily funny movie steered by very troubled leads: Harry and Sally each spend a lot of the movie repressing what they want, causing problems for each other because they refuse to say how they feel. (Hence the frequent shift between two-shots and shot-reverse-shot.) … Continue reading When Harry Met Sally… (1989)
Dir. Guillermo del Toro, Cin. Dan Laustsen; in English; 119 minutes. A stereotypically gothic novel film rife with (spoilers!) incest, familial violence, poisoning, and ghosts, oh my. I found that it drew almost exclusively from his very limited lego-set of del-Toro-isms, even finding the time to force a close-up of a mottled bug on the viewer … Continue reading Crimson Peak (2015)
Dir. Paul Thomas Anderson; in English; 130 minutes. Very pretty, at times, but mostly harmful where not boring. I left wondering if I'd just watched an apology for abusive relationships. At its core, this movie retreads the formula of There Will Be Blood, but with couture and romance and a more invasive score: lots of … Continue reading Phantom Thread (2017)
Not Opinionated Enough 