Friday, April 14, 2006

Lucky Number Slevin

This one sort of begs that question - is all art, or are all movies, derivative? And if so, is that necessarily a bad thing? I've heard all sorts of dismissive reviews of this movie - it's lightweight; it's not as good as its predecessors; it thinks it's smarter than it is, etc. It is lightweight, and based on the art direction, I think that's intentional; it may not be as good as some of its predecessors (The Usual Suspects jumps to mind), but it is surely better than most (so forgettable, I've forgotten them); and part of its charm lies in its sure-footed arrogance.

If you are willing to be entertained, to relax into a universe where everyone lives with hallucinogenic wall-paper and lamps shaped like bongs designed by Jonathan Adler show up everywhere, to experience Morgan Freeman and Sir Benjamin Kingsley playing kingpin shut-ins, then this movie fits the bill.

I enjoyed my two hours in this world, inhabited by characters and caricatures, nicely played by Bruce Willis, Freeman and Kingsley, Lucy Liu, Stanley Tucci, and a particularly well-suited Josh Hartnett, heretofore not high on my list of favorites. The pacing is brisk, the dialog snappy, and the story hangs together; watch carefully from the beginning and, being well trained after "The Usual Suspects" and The Sixth Sense, you will catch the clues that build the ending brick by brick.

So, to answer my question - sort of - most movies are dependent on the legacy of film that came before. How, really, could it be otherwise? I was re-watching Mission Impossible II (dir by John Woo) the other night - a movie I love to watch - check the (not-so) small nod to Hitchcock's To Catch a Thief in the car chase scene between Tom and Thandie at the beginning. Besides the obvious sports-car-on-a-twisty-mountain-road-with-no-guardrails wink, there is also a great full-screen close-up of Thandie's high-heel sandaled feet shifting gears - a nearly picture-perfect quotation of Hitchcock's close-up of Grace Kelly's feet during that famous drive. What is derivative, what is respctful, and what is just plain bad? That's like asking whether vanilla or chocolate tastes better.

So do I think Lucky Number Slevin a great movie in the pantheon? No. But a good watch? Absolutely. And these days, that's no small shakes.

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Wednesday, March 01, 2006

oscar oscar oscar

So - as usual, the men's race is chockful of amazing performances in great movies, and the women - who was nominated again? I'm not saying anything new... but that doesn't make it not worth saying, or at least, repeating. What's interesting to me is that the female performances may have been great - but their movies, were, well, blah. I've seen all but one of the Best Actor movies (sorry, Terence Howard - but I loved you in "Crash") - and only one of the Best Actress movies - seriously, did anyone see "Pride and Prejudice"? Is that a marketing issue? A societal issue? A culture issue? Or is it just me?
Working our way through the "F" movies -- saw "Firewall" - predictable but worth it until the last 1o minutes - who directed those??? Yikes. "Freedomland" - a movie I think I'm supposed to be affected by, I'm supposed to 'discuss' - but I just left confused, confused as to the point, the message, the motivation. Samuel Jackson played his role - just as you'd expect. Julianne Moore, seemingly out of character, but yet not. It's not easy to jam multiple moral imperatives into one story line, and somehow "Freedomland" just ended up with rambling deep thoughts, sort of Jack Handy meets Spike Lee.
Next week, yet another "F" movie, "Failure to Launch" - don't tell me, don't tell me, I am still hoping.

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Thursday, February 09, 2006

Great Books for Kids (of all ages)

Some notes on this list, if you will:

  • there is no age limit (in either direction)
  • not all books by each author are listed - which only means that I either
    • a) don't remember them all
    • b) didn't read them all
    • or c) got tired of typing and wanted to move on.
    • please note - I am a firm believer in reading ALL books by a great author
  • author links are usually to sites about the author or their books
  • book links are usually to the book on amazon.com

A great site for more book recommendations, from James Patterson: Read Kiddo Read

Also, although this is by no means a complete list (not universally nor even personally)... it's a good list nonetheless...




From my Serious Series Obsession Phase:

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