I watched 22 new movies in March, plus rewatched 1 film,
plus rewatched a TV show season.
I spent the month mostly concentrating on 2014 films so that
I could put together my Top 10 list for the year. I only saw three films from
the TSPDT list. I happened to see one movie from
the
Empire Top 500 list because it was expiring from Netflix Instant. I also spent a sizable chunk of time
rewatching the fourth season of Game of Thrones, which came out on Blu-ray this
month. Once again there are a ton of
extras on the disks. As always, I will
be writing a review for it before the fifth season starts in mid-April.
I said last month that I was figuring on completing the
current version of the TSPDT list either that month or this month, depending on
how much I concentrated on it. Since I
saw so few from the list in March I will have to set the same goal of
completing it either this month or next month.
I have 27 entries left to go. And
I still have three films new to my
Consolidated IMDB Top 250 at the 2014
year end that I have left to watch.
Here are the 22 new movies I saw in March. Highlighted films are ones to which I would
give at least three stars out of five.
TSPDT (3): Street
Angel (1937), Dust in the Wind (1987), Land of Silence and Darkness (1971)
Empire (1): Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure (1985)
Other Movies (18): Ida (2014), The Tale of the Princess Kaguya
(2014), The Hunger
Games: Mockingjay Part 1 (2014), The Kingdom of Dreams and Madness (2014), The History of Future Folk
(2012), The Zero
Theorem (2014), I
Origins (2014), Big
Hero 6 (2014), The Boxtrolls (2014), The One I Love (2014), 30 for 30: I Hate Christian Laettner (2015),
Nightcrawler (2014),
Dinosaur 13 (2014),
Inherent Vice (2014), Song
of the Sea (2014), Upside
Down (2012), In
Your Eyes (2014), Damaged (2014)
Rewatches (1): The
Core (2003)
Ida (2014) –
Good, but not great, despite winning the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar. You can
read my full review here. 3
stars
The Tale of the
Princess Kaguya (2014) – Well done film from Studio Ghibli and the director
of Grave of the Fireflies. The animation
style is a little different and for the most part it works. 3.5 stars
The Hunger Games:
Mockingjay Part 1 (2014) – People who hadn’t read the book were
disappointed by the fact that they felt this was slow, but if you know what to
expect going in you should find this to be quite good. 4
stars
The Kingdom of Dreams
and Madness (2014) – Documentary on Studio Ghibli shot during the
production of their films The Wind Rises from Miyazaki and The Tale of the Princess Kaguya
from Takahata. There is far more Miyazaki in this since he
apparently cooperated with the documentary crew more. It's a good look at the inner workings of the
studio, and Miyazaki
shares his thoughts on many things, not all of them positive. For instance, he figures Studio Ghibli will
be no more in the future with the way things are going. I would recommend having at least seen The
Wind Rises before watching this since the ending of that film is discussed. And the more Studio Ghibli films you have
seen, the more you will enjoy picking up on a lot of little things such as
artwork hanging around the studio or references various people make
while talking. 3 stars
Street Angel (1937)
– This is a strange mix of slapstick comedy and melodrama, all in an early Chinese
film. The combination didn’t quite work
for me. 2.5 stars
Dust in the Wind
(1987) – Yet another slow moving Taiwanese slice of life film from Hou
Hsiao-Hsien. I’m beginning to think it’s
the only kind of movie he knows how to make.
2.5 stars
Land of Silence and Darkness (1971) – Occasionally
moving, early documentary from Werner Herzog.
It’s about people who are both deaf and blind. One such woman tries to help others like
herself. 3.5 stars
The Zero Theorem
(2014) – Gilliam’s semi-remake of his own Brazil that sometimes works and
sometimes doesn't. Melanie Thierry is
the best thing about it. The sound mix
on the DVD wasn't great, and when combined with the multitude of accents from
the cast, it made about every other line unintelligible. I had to turn on the subtitles about 10
minutes in. 3 stars
I Origins (2014)
– Mike Cahill and Brit Marling, who gave us one of the best films of 2011 -
Another Earth - pair up again on this film. While not quite as good as Another Earth it is
still well worth seeing if you like topics outside of the norm handled
intelligently. 3.5 stars
The Boxtrolls (2014)
– A little disappointing since it was nominated for an Oscar as Best Animated
Film. It relies too much on the
grotesqueness of the characters for humor, when they should have been trying to
make a better overall story. 2.5 stars
The One I Love (2014)
– Great movie with a completely unexpected story in it. It’s another winner from the Duplass
brothers. It made my Top 10 for 2014 and
I will be reviewing it in full in the coming days. 4
stars
30 for 30: I Hate
Christian Laettner (2015) – Amusing documentary on just how wrapped up some
people got (and still get) in hating a man who was a very successful college
basketball player 25 years ago. 3 stars
Nightcrawler (2014)
– Great movie with a great lead performance from Jake Gyllenhaal. It deserved an Oscar nomination, but the
subject matter probably made some of the Academy squeamish. It made my Top 10 for 2014 and I will be
reviewing it in full in the coming days.
4 stars
Dinosaur 13 (2014)
– If this documentary doesn't piss you off about abuse of power then I don't
know what will. After fighting to keep
their T-Rex fossil that they had found, excavated, bought, paid for, and were
putting on display in their little town near where it was found – only to have
the government come in with the National Guard to take it away from them – a
few folks then find that the government is doubling down by now coming back to
indict them on more than 100 charges. As
one of them points out, if you added up all the time he would get if convicted
on all charges it would be 363 years in prison - more time than Jeffrey Dahmer
got for killing and eating 13 people...and all for collecting dinosaur bones
and not filling out two forms properly.
4 stars
Inherent Vice (2014)
– For the life of me I have no idea how this received a Best Adapted Screenplay
Oscar nomination. A large part of this 2
1/2 hour film consists of scenes where people just show up to spout exposition
at the protagonist to explain to him what is going on. Combine this with the voice over narration
and it's as if the director was trying to reproduce the book instead of make
a movie. I can't believe this is
the same person who adapted an Upton Sinclair novel to make There Will Be Blood. 2 stars
Song of the Sea
(2014) – This Oscar nominee for Best Animated Film is from the same people
who brought us The Secret of Kells (2009).
If you liked that film then you should like this one, too. 3.5
stars
Upside Down (2012)
– Packaged as science fiction, but really fantasy, a boy and girl who live on
different planets only hundreds of feet from each other, but with opposing
gravity fields, fall in love with each other and create an interplanetary
incident. It has a great concept,
although it doesn’t always play by its own rules of how the planets and people
interact. 3 stars
In Your Eyes (2014)
– Based on a more than 20 year old script Joss Whedon wrote when first trying
to break into Hollywood,
a man and woman on opposite sides of the country can literally see through each
other’s eyes and hear each other. This
creates a very intimate relationship, which is a problem since she is married
and he is an ex-con on parole who can’t leave his state. 3
stars
Pee-Wee’s Big
Adventure (1985) – Large Marge sent me to tell you that if I had seen this
as a child I probably would have loved it. Seeing it as an adult meant being really
annoyed by the main character (and yes, I realize the whole point of the
character is to be an annoying child). On
the other hand, the movie got better once he hit the road and the jokes were
not focused on Pee-Wee's personality. For
example,
the "deep in the heart of Texas" scene was silly, but it made me laugh. All in all, they balance things off. 3 stars
Damaged (2014) –
Lead actress Merritt Patterson is very beautiful, but that’s about the only
reason to watch this movie that I stumbled across on Lifetime and thought,
“Wow, she’s beautiful. Who is that?” 2 stars
If you go to IMDB.com you will find Christopher Nolan’s
films to be rated far beyond all reason.
There is actually a group of people who tirelessly work through
thousands of accounts they have set up to rank all his movies as high as
possible (and to rank competing films such as The Avengers as low as
possible). The result is that seven of
the eight films he has directed since hitting the public consciousness with
Memento (2000) are not only in the IMDB Top 250 list, six of them are in the
Top 100, and three of them are in the Top 25, including Interstellar at
#23. While Interstellar is far from
being the 23rd best movie ever made, it is good enough to take the
last spot on my Top 10 of 2014 list.
I saw the film The One I Love just before finalizing my Top
10 Films of 2014 list. I’m glad I did
because this movie ended up making it onto it.
It’s another small independent film starring Mark Duplass. In recent years I’ve come to keep an eye out
for his movies that fall into this demographic because he seems to be able to
pick films that are better than average (i.e. 2012’s Safety Not Guaranteed, 2011’s
Your Sister’s Sister.) In this case the
Netflix Instant description didn’t exactly sound that interesting, but I gave
it a try anyway just on faith. I was
glad I did. This is a film that went in
completely unexpected directions.
Jesus Camp is a documentary about how fundamentalist
Christians in the U.S. ensure they get their message to as wide a range of
children as possible. As Aristotle
wrote, “Give me a child until he is seven and I will show you the man.” The primary adult focused on in this movie is
a firm believer in this. She draws
parallels with how some Muslims will train children from the time they are
young to groom them to be suicide bombers and how guerillas in Africa will turn
children into soldiers. From her
perspective, she is trying to turn these children into the future generation
that will ensure the country “returns” to the Christian values she believes it
has gone away from. The result is a
sometimes disturbing look at the methods used.
Steve called it one of the scariest documentaries he had ever seen.
The fourth season of Game of Thrones is based on the last third
of the novel A Storm of Swords, as well as parts of A Feast for Crows and A
Dance with Dragons – the third, fourth, and fifth books in the ongoing series
titled A Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin. Please note that this review of the fourth TV
season and fourth book contains spoilers for the first three TV seasons and
books. If you have never seen this show
and would like a spoiler-free overview of what it is about and why you might
want to watch it, please read my review of the first season and book here. My reviews of the second season and book can
be found here and the third season and book here.
When the Oscar nominations were announced in January the
film Nightcrawler was one that I would sometimes hear mentioned as having been
“robbed” (although it did get one nomination for Best Original
Screenplay). Of course, every year there
are some films that have passionate supporters that feel exactly the same way
when their personal favorite does not get nominated so I didn’t pay too much
attention to that. I do try to see as
many Oscar nominated films as I can. And
I did make a mental note to see this movie before doing my Top 10 Films of 2014
list, just in case its supporters were onto something. I am glad I did because this did make my Top
10. Nightcrawler turned out to be a great
movie not just for its story, but also for the lead performance of Jake
Gyllenhaal.