Let's All Go To The Movies

It has been some time since I wrote about movies. In the meantime, I have seen many, many movies: some good, some bad, some that I immediately forgot as soon as the DVD credits rolled. Nothing that I loved, though. Nothing that spoke to me in that way that makes me want to see the movie again.

Movie Recommendation: The Treasure of the Sierra Madre. I must admit that I really like Humphrey Bogart, the sensitive guy beneath the tough-guy persona (Casablanca is one of those movies that I love). I didn’t love Treasure, but liked it quite a bit, and Bogart isn’t even the best part of the movie. That honor would go to Walter Huston (father of director John Huston) who was great in the part of an ancient gold prospector. Though the movies stylistically have little in common, I was reminded of Shallow Grave because of the themes of greed and mistrust that occurs after a financial windfall. Though it has been some time since I have seen Shallow Grave, I would recommend it also. It is the movie that Danny Boyle made before Trainspotting (another movie that I love). Ewan McGregor is great (and all Scottish and hot) and Christopher Eccleston (now appearing on Hereos as that invisible dude, Claude) plays McGregor’s roommate and he is really good as well. I don’t play favorites when it comes to genres and don’t automatically think that classic equals good so I would wholeheartedly endorse both Treasure and Shallow as movies to see.

Other movies that are pretty good: The Fountain. My opinion of The Fountain, though, has been tainted by all of the press that the movie received. It was conceived by Darren Aronofsky as this mammoth science fiction film with an enormous budget and Brad Pitt in the lead. The budget was slashed, the script was rewritten and rewritten and rewritten and Brad Pitt became Hugh Jackman. I kept picturing the movie as it could have been, rather than as it was. Still, it contains some really breathtaking images and is a pretty good love story. I thought Requiem for a Dream (also by Aronofsky) was really good, though I thoroughly disliked Pi and just couldn’t get into it.

The Prestige was also good. I admit that I will watch anything that Christian Bale does. He is just one of those actors who consistently chooses interesting projects and I enjoyed him as a magician engaged in a dangerous game of escalating illusions in The Prestige, just as much as his turn as Patrick Bateman in American Psycho, Batman in Batman Begins and that anorexic insomniac machinist in The Machinist. (All movies I would recommend, though if you want the full impact of the shallowness of the yuppie 80s culture and the grisliness of a soulless killer, watch the movie American Psycho, then read the book. Some of the images are bound to linger with you.)

Half Nelson was pretty good, elevated by the performance of Ryan Gosling. He will watch anything with Ryan Gosling in it, really, which explains how I came to watch The Notebook (actually good, if predictable, though not a great movie). I would recommend seeing Gosling in The Believer. The movie is good and Gosling is very good as a Jewish neo Nazi. Edward Norton was in the similar-but-very-different American History X and gave an outstanding performance, which led me to have high hopes about his future work. The Illusionist (another magician movie that came out at the same time as The Prestige) really under whelmed me, though.

Another movie disappointment: Dreamgirls. Usually, I enjoy movie musicals (not always, but usually). This was an exception. I didn’t find anything to get excited about.

So, I am on a quest to find another movie that I will fall in love with. It has been some time since I have experienced that, though in the meantime, I have had a good time viewing.