Sort by
Listing Movies
Display Movies
Knowing (2009)
What happens when the numbers run out?
Filmmaker(s): Alex Proyas

A teacher opens a time capsule that has been dug up at his son's elementary school; in it are some chilling predictions -- some that have already occurred and others that are about to -- that lead him to believe his family plays a role in the events that are about to unfold.

The Cleansing is everything. I saw this in a stressed state, looking for escape. I saw it in a grand old theatre with large, excellently tuned equipment. I saw it not knowing anything at all about it. And I loved it. Yes, I know people do not like...


Published March 2, 2023
| Categorised as IMDB Comments, Threes |
Tagged: , ,
Adaptation (2002)
From the creator of Being John Malkovich, comes the story about the creator of Being John Malkovich.
Filmmaker(s): Spike Jonze

Nicolas Cage is Charlie Kaufman, a confused L.A. screenwriter overwhelmed by feelings of inadequacy, sexual frustration, self-loathing, and by the screenwriting ambitions of his freeloading twin brother Donald. While struggling to adapt "The Orchid Thief," by Susan Orlean, Kaufman's life spins from pathetic to bizarre. The lives of Kaufman, Orlean's book, become strangely intertwined as each one's search for passion collides with the others'.

Abject Folding am writing a book about “folding” in film. That’s a term I have coined to describe all the parallel levels that have become part of the film vocabulary, among them self-reference, reflection self-aware irony and timeshifting. I love these films. They are always...


Published February 27, 2023
| Categorised as IMDB Comments, Twos |
Tagged: , ,
Adam (2009)
A story about two strangers. One a little stranger than the other...
Filmmaker(s): Max Mayer

Adam, a lonely man with Asperger's Syndrome, develops a relationship with his upstairs neighbor, Beth.

Stuttered Beginnings found this to be offensive in that mild way that occurs so often. Storytellers sometimes have to make decisions that cost the viewer something — the worst kind of cheat because it pushes the pain onto the unwitting. Is it a net good...


Published February 27, 2023
| Categorised as IMDB Comments, Twos |
Tagged: , ,
Action Boys (2008)
Filmmaker(s): Jung Byung-gil

Only eight out of 36 boys pass the rigorous training at Seoul Action School. They all have different dreams but all wish to become stuntmen. Despite frequent accidents and injuries, they never give up their dream, and the movie follows their hopeful desperation.

Dorm Room Trifles saw this at the Melbourne International Film Festival. It was fantastic in large part because it was new. I saw it paired with “Theater of War,”, whose idea was that little people enable unhealthy societies. That film presumed that structure in film...


Published February 27, 2023
| Categorised as IMDB Comments, Threes |
Tagged: , ,
Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery (1997)
Debonair. Defiant. Defrosted.
Filmmaker(s): Jay Roach

As a swinging fashion photographer by day and a groovy British superagent by night, Austin Powers is the '60s' most shagadelic spy. But can he stop megalomaniac Dr. Evil after the bald villain freezes himself and unthaws in the '90s? With the help of sexy sidekick Vanessa Kensington, he just might.

The Pamela Urge saw this with ‘Borat’. It didn't work for me. Neither comedy did; the reasons seem related. If you put distance between something and it's source, then you have opportunity for low humour. The closer you get to the original or the reference, the...


Published February 12, 2023
| Categorised as IMDB Comments, Ones |
Tagged: , ,
Gone Baby Gone (2007)
Everyone wants the truth... until they find it.
Filmmaker(s): Ben Affleck

When 4 year old Amanda McCready disappears from her home and the police make little headway in solving the case, the girl's aunt, Beatrice McCready hires two private detectives, Patrick Kenzie and Angie Gennaro. The detectives freely admit that they have little experience with this type of case, but the family wants them for two reasons—they're not cops and they know the tough neighborhood in which they all live.

Baby Arrives love it when I am wrong, and someone that I think doesn’t matter surprises me. Ben Affleck put together some snappy lines in “Good Will,” but that project was so ordinary in form it self-destructed. His acting is generally silly. There isn’t a role...


Published February 7, 2023
| Categorised as IMDB Comments, Threes |
Tagged: , ,
Visual Acoustics (2008)
The modernism of Julius Shulman.
Filmmaker(s): Eric Bricker

Visual Acoustics celebrates the life and career of Julius Shulman, the world's greatest architectural photographer, whose images brought modern architecture to the American mainstream. Shulman, who passed away this year, captured the work of nearly every modern and progressive architect since the 1930s including Frank Lloyd Wright, Richard Neutra, John Lautner and Frank Gehry. His images epitomized the singular beauty of Southern California's modernist movement and brought its iconic structures to the attention of the general public. This unique film is both a testament to the evolution of modern architecture and a joyful portrait of the magnetic, whip-smart gentleman who chronicled it with his unforgettable images.

Speaking Space more about the challenge of architecture and cinema. It is not trivial, the problem of what spaces mean in films? What narrative role does it play? What vocabulary is relevant? This film is rather mundane in most ways. It is a biography of a...


Published December 26, 2022
| Categorised as IMDB Comments, Threes |
Tagged: , ,
A Separate Peace (2004)
Filmmaker(s): Peter Yates

Four friends with one dark secret they could never outrun.

Parallel Branches books seem natural for high school study. They need to be simple to read, but contain enough ambiguity and analogy to show students that real literature is more than a plot. If the book is set in high school, so much the better....


Published December 25, 2022
| Categorised as IMDB Comments, Ones |
Tagged: , ,
A Girl’s Own Story (1984)
Filmmaker(s): Jane Campion

This early short from director Jane Campion concerns a group of teenage girls in the 1960s.

Her Very Own recently watched “In the Cut,” and found its connectives strange and exciting. So I went to this to see them when young and raw. Supposedly, this is Campion’s first long form film. It didn’t quite work as a film the first time because...


Published December 24, 2022
| Categorised as IMDB Comments, Threes |
Tagged: , ,
A Fish Called Wanda (1988)
A tale of murder, lust, greed, revenge, and seafood.
Filmmaker(s): Charles Crichton

While a diamond advocate attempts to steal a collection of diamonds, troubles arise when he realises he’s not the only one after the collection.

Remote Brits watched this recently, and also saw it when it was new. At the time, I suppose it was funny. Now I do not, and I think perhaps it is because the center of gravity for humour has changed. Each of the Pythonista’s had a...


Published December 24, 2022
| Categorised as IMDB Comments, Ones |
Tagged: , ,
preloader image