Layers Any children’s movie runs the risk of easily being reducible to a ‘message’, often mistakenly called a moral. I’ve already read a few reviews of this that mention the film’s message, and how wonderfully it is presented. I suppose if that is how you watch movies, this will deliver. It is heartwarming, and it… Continue reading The Magician’s Elephant (2023)
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Moana (2016)
Disney within Disney I was expecting a standard, manufactured Disney Princess item. What I encountered was a powerful embodiment of myth in a young woman, with the notable exceptions of the coconut pirate and glittery crab sequences. These were conceived and directed by others. I suppose many commenters will speak to the different appealing techniques… Continue reading Moana (2016)
A Haunting in Venice (2023)
The Influence of Inscrutability Agatha Christie based films are a sort of bellwether for me. I think the most important trend in our culture just now is how we play with awareness. The most obvious and experimental centre for that is long form film. The most significant influence historically is the detective story, and the… Continue reading A Haunting in Venice (2023)
Private Gold 93: The Sexual Adventures of Little Red (2007 Video)
Ladies Fair Orient, Rosy Blooms Appear A couple years ago, I criticised this team. Today I applaud them. I am studying “folding,” various techniques for putting the viewer into the narrative. We have good science that indicates mirror neurons work intensely with porn and food movies. That means when you watch, you enter in a… Continue reading Private Gold 93: The Sexual Adventures of Little Red (2007 Video)
The Flash (2023)
Illuminated There’s been a decision made to not tune the CGI very much, I guess in the assumption that it won’t matter. The emphasis instead is on a lot of story in many episodic clusters, plus what passes for human interest in this demographic. There is some clever use of recalled Batman actors. A completely… Continue reading The Flash (2023)
Sherlock! (2010)
Logical Circularity This comment applies to the three, presumably the only three episodes of the BBC Sherlock! (The trend seems to be to modernise famed detectives and so denote with an exclamation point.) (After this comment was written, there would be more) I come to this as I come to any version of Sherlock because… Continue reading Sherlock! (2010)
The Super Mario Bros. Movie (2023)
Winning I shudder with the knowledge that in a few days, this grossed higher than any Pixar movie. Imagineer that. This about as charmless as it gets without the floor falling off, so I can only attribute the success to love of the character. As a non-gamer, I have no window into what this entails,… Continue reading The Super Mario Bros. Movie (2023)
Tenet (2020)
Reflective Narrative You can draw a chart of what goes on in Nolan’s mind and how that instances in the worlds of cinema and the one I share. That chart would then be superimposed on a chart of timelines and events in this film. Nolan’s chart would trace an obsession with narrative reinterpretation plus cinematic… Continue reading Tenet (2020)
The Birth of a Nation (1915)
Bad Influence This film marked a disastrous turn in American society. No, I’m not talking about the overtly racist content. Any nitwit can see that and adjust, though I suspect that my grandchildren will decry with equal vehemence the content of the films I now casually accept. The disaster that “Birth” brought was far more… Continue reading The Birth of a Nation (1915)
Birth (2004)
Operatic There’s a scene in this that will be a feature of film school classes for a long time to come. Nicole is an uneven actress, only sometimes rising to the world class of Kate and Cate and the young Julianne. The smallest part of this is the process of inhabiting a character, rare enough… Continue reading Birth (2004)