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Rick's Flicks Picks on AWN

Blogs

Blu-ray Buzz – Classic Thriller Smiles on Blu-ray

This week seems like one dedicated to British films. Some classic thrillers and a cult classic for the U.K. A new version of a classic tale from Britain. We also have a new thriller from Down Under. Additionally, there's another zombie flick from the master of the zombie flick and a trio of classics from Josef Von Sternberg.

Pick of the Week
Mona Lisa
I had seen Bob Hoskins in films like WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT and MERMAIDS before I saw this film. After seeing his performance here I have never been able to think of any other performance of his since when I first hear his name. He plays a lower-level thug who has just been released from jail. His gangster boss, played villainously by Michael Caine, sets him up as the driver for a high-class prostitute (Cathy Tyson). The relationship between the con and call girl is unique. Hoskins’ George comes to care for the vulnerable young woman, who desperately needs his help with her abused friend. It twists and turns all along the way as we try to get to know the secretive leads. One of the best thrillers with a shocking conclusion that left me reeling.

Blogs

THE TILLMAN STORY (2010) (****)

When the news first broke that Pat Tillman left behind millions of dollars to join the Army, I made assumptions about what kind of person he was. After seeing Amir Bar-Lev's wonderful documentary, I learned what it makes you and me when you assume. However, I do take consolation in the fact that it seems most people thought about the same thing. But the real problem is that the people who knew otherwise and had the responsibility to tell everyone the real story made another one up.

So who was Pat Tillman? He was a low-key sort of guy who hated talking about himself. He married his high school sweetheart, but only after he and his brother Kevin decided to enlist for three years. As a defensive football player, he loved to hit the opponent as hard as he could. On the other hand, Tillman graduated from Arizona State early and summa cum laude. Following his college football success, he signed with the Arizona Cardinals where he broke team records. While his teammates drove luxury cars to practice, he rode his bike. After 9/11 he did enlist, but never publicly told anyone his reasons.

Blogs

Blu-ray Buzz – The Classics Come to Blu-ray

After some busy weeks of releases, this week is a little more before a monster release week next week. Classic tales on film come to Blu-ray this week, as well as an Emmy nominated TV movie and a 1960s French classic.

Pick of the Week
Hamlet
William Shakespeare’s HAMLET has been adapted for the screen dozens of times. The tragedy won Sir Laurence Olivier an Oscar for Best Actor and Picture. However in many ways Kenneth Branagh’s version of the domed prince’s tale is superior. At just over four hours, this 1996 rendition feels better paced. The natural approach to the material certainly makes it more accessable to a modern audience. The all-star cast includes Branagh, Richard Attenborough, Julie Christie, Billy Crystal, Judi Dench, Gerard Depardieu, John Gielgud, Rosemary Harris, Charlton Heston, Derek Jacobi, Jack Lemmon, John Mills, Rufus Sewell, Timothy Spall, Robin Williams and Kate Winslet. It puts the whole play on film with an Oscar nominated screenplay, Art-Set Direction, Costume Design and Musical Score. Branagh’s performance is especially interesting – is his Hamlet mad or just pretending? It’s hard to say.

Blogs

8: THE MORMON PROPOSITION (2010) (***)

This documentary about California's Prop 8, which defined marriage in the state as between a man and a woman, has a specific point of view. Director Reed Cowan sets out to paint the Mormon Church as bigots who campaigned to take the rights of gays to marry away after it had been granted by the State Supreme Court. A point of view is fine, but are Mormons or other anti-gay marriage proponents going to read or watch past this point? So in the end, the film is preaching to the choir. But for those in the pews, the song can be moving.

Narrated by Oscar-winning MILK screenwriter Dustin Lance Black, the film begins with a retelling of the events that led up to Prop 8 being passed. It uses the hook of a gay couple who were married on the first legal day in California to set the emotional stage. Then it goes to tell how the Mormon Church organized its followers and other religious organizations to help get the Prop passed. The tone is like a shocked whisper when nothing revealed is all that shocking. It's based on secretly obtained internal documents from the church and treats them like they are the Pentagon Papers. There is no doubt from the way the details are told that it still hits a raw nerve for the filmmakers.

Blogs

BLACK ORPHEUS (1959) (***1/2)

Director Marcel Camus takes the Greek tragedy of Orpheus and Eurydice and transplants it to 1960s Rio de Janeiro. Driven by an ever present bossa nova beat this tragic love story takes place during Carnival where the poor and the rich mingle in the streets in celebration. But Death is lurking in every corner.

The innocent Eurydice (Marpessa Dawn, SWEET MOVIE) flees to Rio to escape from a mysterious man (Ademar Da Silva) she believes wants to kill her. She turns heads as she roams the streets trying to find her cousin Serafina (Lea Garcia, ORFEU). She particularly catches the eye of Orfeo (Breno Mello), a poor trolley car conductor who is known throughout the slums for three things   his guitar, samba group and playboy status. The problem with him finding true love with Eurydice is that he’s engaged to the loud Mira (Lourdes de Oliveira).

Comedy Blogs

SCOTT PILGRIM VS. THE WORLD (2010) (***1/2)

Best videogame adaptation ever! Wait, but it's adapted from Bryan Lee O'Malley's graphic novel. This send-up of videogame culture is frantic and funny. It uses videogames as a style with wit and ingenuity. Director Edgar Wright, the maker of SHAUN OF THE DEAD and HOT FUZZ, has taken a simple, quirky love story and blown it out into a grand cinematic spectacle that had me smiling form the moment the 8-bit version of the Universal logo came up on the screen.

Blogs

SCOTT PILGRIM VS. THE WORLD (2010) (***1/2)

Best videogame adaptation ever! Wait, but it's adapted from Bryan Lee O'Malley's graphic novel. This send-up of videogame culture is frantic and funny. It uses videogames as a style with wit and ingenuity. Director Edgar Wright, the maker of SHAUN OF THE DEAD and HOT FUZZ, has taken a simple, quirky love story and blown it out into a grand cinematic spectacle that had me smiling form the moment the 8-bit version of the Universal logo came up on the screen.

It is announced right from the start that Scott Pilgrim (Michael Cera, JUNO) is dating a high school girl. Now you might be thinking that a 22 year old dating a 17 year old is one year short of being right, but Scott seems too innocent to expect anything more than a kiss. Scott just likes the adulation of Knives Chau (Ellen Wong) even though his sister Stacey (Anna Kendrick, UP IN THE AIR) thinks there's twisted fantasy fulfillment going on in him dating a Chinese Catholic school girl with the uniform and all. But he seems satisfied with her simply being amazed at his knowledge of the origin of Pac-Man's name. She of course thinks he's awesome because he plays bass in a band called Sex Bob Omb.

Blogs

KICK-ASS (2010) (***1/2)

This comic book adaptation is not for everyone, especially little kids. Those that hated it really hated it. The film is violent as can be and puts an 11-year-old girl right in the middle of that violence as a gleeful participant. Defenders can tell detractors that they need to lighten up — it's only satire. But the detractors will come back and say how can you get any joy out of seeing a little girl beaten savagely by an adult? Well I'll make my attempt to tell you how.

Dave Lizewski (Aaron Johnson, NOWHERE BOY) is just your average high school student who hangs with his friends after school at a comic book shop. He wonders why out of all the people who love comics why no one ever decided to try to be one. He freely admits that it’s a crazy idea because as he says his only superpower is to be invisible to girls. But he keeps fantasizing about the idea and like a serial killer one day fantasizing isn't enough. He confronts a pair of thieves and ends up in the hospital for months. But after he recovers, the urge is still there. He's like an alcoholic only addicted to putting on a green and yellow scuba suit and walking the streets looking for trouble. Well trouble finds him again and this time there are teens around with cell phones, making Kick-Ass an Internet sensation.

Blogs

EAT PRAY LOVE (2010) (***)

Based on Elizabeth Gilbert's wildly popular memoir, the film rendition has the tough task of taking a largely philosophical and observational tome and transforming it into drama. At one point the Liz character asks another character why he only talks in bumper stickers and the same can be said about the film. The story never delves too deep into what makes its characters tick. So what does this film have to offer then? It's part wish fulfillment and part pop philosophy pick-me-up and part gorgeous travelogue.

Liz Gilbert is played by movie star Julia Roberts. Some might find the episode regarding her buying big jeans a cruel joke when the rail skinny Roberts tries to squeeze into a size 0. But I digress. Gilbert has been married to Stephen (Billy Crudup, ALMOST FAMOUS) for seven years, but hasn't found wedded bliss. She decides she's had enough and files for divorce, but Stephen won't let her go easily. She meets a young actor named David Piccolo (James Franco, MILK) and falls into his arms like a cartoon character jumping off a high dive into a paper cup. But she's still not satisfied. She wants to make a bold change and take a year off, living in Italy then India and finally returning to Bali where the medicine man Ketut (Hadi Subiyanto) told her she would have a short marriage and a long one, but didn't know at the time which one she was in.

Animation Blogs

TALES FROM EARTHSEA (2010) (*1/2)

It has been reported that Ursula K. LeGuin granted Studio Ghibli the rights to her EARTHSEA series largely based on her love for Hayao Miyzaki's work. When Miyazaki was not available to direct the film, the studio hired his son Goro instead. Hayao publicly said his son was not ready to write and direct his first feature film. They should have listened to the master.

Blogs

TALES FROM EARTHSEA (2010) (*1/2)

It has been reported that Ursula K. LeGuin granted Studio Ghibli the rights to her EARTHSEA series largely based on her love for Hayao Miyzaki's work. When Miyazaki was not available to direct the film, the studio hired his son Goro instead. Hayao publicly said his son was not ready to write and direct his first feature film. They should have listened to the master.

The land of Earthsea is out of balance. Dragons have been spotted over the sea. The King walks to his study and is stabbed by a young man who turns out to be his son Prince Arren (Matt Levin, BLADES OF GLORY). Arren flees and winds up in the desert where he meets the Archmage Sparrowhawk (Timothy Dalton, HOT FUZZ), who takes the young man under this wing. When they arrive at the city of Hortown, Arren has a run in with slaver traders led by Hare (Cheech Marin, FROM DUSK TILL DAWN), who try to enslave the scared young woman Therru (Blaire Restaneo), who is the ward of Sparrowhawk's old friend Tenar (Mariska Hargitay, TV's LAW & ORDER: SVU), a former witch. Sparrowhawk soon learns that the evil wizard Cob (Willem Dafoe, ANTI-CHRIST) is behind the turmoil in Earthsea. The male wizard who looks like Cher needs Arren to obtain immortality.

Blogs

NATIONAL LAMPOON'S EUROPEAN VACATION (1985) (**)

The first VACATION film was a comedy with a satirical purpose. The sequel had only one purpose – being a sequel. In a perfect sort of way, the film represents everything cliché about bad follow-ups. The ante is upped, while the general premise is slavishly copied. Original actors didn’t return and needed to be replaced with lesser versions. The actors that remain start chewing the scenery to make the tired material seem funny.

Clark Griswold (Chevy Chase, FLETCH) puts his family on a FAMILY FEUD-rip-off called “Pig in a Poke” and wins a trip to Europe. Clark is again eager as ever to have the best family vacation ever. His wife Ellen (Beverly D’Angelo, HAIR) supports him the best she can, encouraging the kids to embrace their father's enthusiasm. Their daughter Audrey (Dana Hill, SHOOT THE MOON) doesn’t want to go because she can't imagine leaving her boyfriend. Their son Rusty (Jason Lively, NIGHT OF THE CREEPS) is a more willing traveler, eager to meet the loose European women. The all-expense paid trip turns out not to include good hotels or swanky transportation.

Comedy Blogs

THE OTHER GUYS (2010) (***)

I have mixed feelings about this buddy cop comedy. I went in hoping for a satire of outlandish cop flicks. For the most part that's what I got. Then the film hints at something more, dealing with desk cops doing "boring" police work to catch the biggest thieves like Bernie Madoff. I really wish this area had been developed deeper instead of focusing on unconnected and very broad character moments. Then again some of those moments are really funny. But then again some of them aren't.

Blogs

Blu-ray Buzz – Blu-ray Crumbles

Another busy week for Blu-ray this week. Criterion has Terry Zwigoff’s docs. Great library titles come to Blu-ray for the first time. A duo of 2010 releases makes the Buzzed About list.

Pick of the Week
Crumb
In my original review of this 1995 doc, I called it a collection of bests. One of the best docs, portraits of an artist, tale of an eccentric family, and examination of sexual hang-ups. Robert Crumb might be viewed as an odd bird when simply looking at his sometimes sexually perverse art, but wait until you meet his brothers. I love the film’s honesty and humor and heart. This is one of the very best films of the 1990s.

Blogs

IN THE SHADOW OF THE MOON (2007) (***1/2)

This documentary tells the story of the Apollo missions from the mouths of the men who went to the moon. But what makes the film special is that it doesn’t chronicle every detail of every mission, but instead talks with the astronauts about what it felt like to go to the moon. This intimacy is often moving, as well as thought provoking.

Director David Sington blends the missions together starting with the selection of the men moving to the preparation for the launch. We find out from the men what riding a rocket is like. We learn the awe-inspiring experience of making it into space, seeing the Earth shrink behind them and the moon grow in front of them. We feel the rush of a successful landings and the anxiousness that one feels about the return home. On Apollo 11, President Nixon pre-recorded a message in case the moon lander wouldn’t take off, stranding Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldren on the surface of the moon. There was pressure in being an astronaut before launch, but that status as a hero never left any of them for the rest of their lives. Armstrong declined to participate in the documentary, having always been uneasy with his historical status.

Blogs

THE ART OF THE STEAL (2010) (***1/2)

What if you paid the best lawyers to write your will and let say you gave your estate to a charity to help needy students. Then after your death the trustees of your will decide to give the money to your sworn enemies so they can fund some reality show on the rich and famous throwing parties. But be assured its all to make more money for your estate and some students might watch the show. That’s about what happened to Dr. Albert C. Barnes – only he had $30 billion worth of artwork that the rich wanted.

Dr. Barnes’ first accomplishment was to discover a cure for VDs. He took his fortune and bought art, amassing a collection of more than 9,000 pieces, which includes 181 Renoirs, 69 Cezannes, 59 Matisses, 46 Picassos, 16 Modiglianis and seven van Goghs. Some of the paintings are so unique that putting a price tag on them is impossible. But at the time he bought his collection, the Philadelphia Museum of Art believed his selections to be trash. Now any museum in the world would die to have a few of the paintings in the Barnes Foundation collection.

Blogs

THE OTHER GUYS (2010) (***)

I have mixed feelings about this buddy cop comedy. I went in hoping for a satire of outlandish cop flicks. For the most part that's what I got. Then the film hints at something more, dealing with desk cops doing "boring" police work to catch the biggest thieves like Bernie Madoff. I really wish this area had been developed deeper instead of focusing on unconnected and very broad character moments. Then again some of those moments are really funny. But then again some of them aren't.

P.K. Highsmith (Samuel L. Jackson, PULP FICTION) and Christopher Danson (Dwayne Johnson, GET SMART) are NYC's celebrity cops. They engage in all sorts of reckless chases and stunts, destroying more than they save and yet they are still touted as heroes. Detectives Allen Gamble (Will Ferrell, ANCHORMAN) and Terry Hoitz (Mark Wahlberg, THE DEPARTED are the other guys. Gamble gleefully does the paperwork for cocky Highsmith and Danson. Hoitz is riding a desk not because he wants to, but because of an accidental shooting, which has made him the pariah of the city. Hoitz taunts Gamble into taking more dangerous cases, but Gamble is more interested in a scaffolding violation involving businessman David Ershon (Steve Coogan, TRISTRAM SHANDY: A COCK AND BULL STORY).

Blogs

CHLOE (2010) (***1/2)

Atom Egoyan has made a career out telling tales with strange sexual undercurrents. This story deals with how sex changes in relationships as those in the relationship change. Unspoken issues develop calluses, but become sensitive to touch. The resulting pain makes one act in uncharacteristic ways.

Catherine Stewart (Julianne Moore, THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT) is a successful gynecologist who is married to the busy professor David (Liam Neeson, KINSEY). She has planned a big surprise party for his birthday, but he doesn’t show up after he misses his plan back from a speaking engagement. When he sees a picture message from one of the students, she is convinced that he had an affair. Catherine finds the call girl Chloe (Amanda Seyfried, TV's BIG LOVE) and makes plans for her to secretly seduce her husband in order to catch him in an affair. This action will reveal things about their relationship that Catherine never expected. Moreover, she never expected what it reveals about herself.

Blogs

JAMES AND THE GIANT PEACH (1996) (***)

Based on the Roald Dahl’s book, director Henry Selick made this project his follow-up to the successful NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS. Bookended by a live-action opening and closing, this stop-motion feature is generally an episodic adventure following a classic tale of a young boy dreaming beyond his circumstances.

After the death of his parents, James Trotter (Paul Terry) becomes a virtual slave to his ghoulish aunts Spiker (Joanna Lumley, TV’s ABSOLUTELY FABULOUS) and Sponge (Miriam Margolyes, BABE). One day he meets a wandering old man (Pete Postlewaite, IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER), who gives him magic worms that he claims will help him attain his dream of getting from England to New York City. Spilling the worms on the ground, James sets off a series of events that grows a giant peach on a barren tree where human-sized bugs come to live.

Blogs

Blu-ray: JAMES AND THE GIANT PEACH (1996)

Read my review of JAMES AND THE GIANT PEACH

Henry Selick's children's film is dark in both its tone and look. That is translated over into the new 1080p release from Disney. The color palette is muted, so one doesn't get the pop that animation often brings to Blu-ray. The images don't have the same depth as other animated films on Blu-ray do as well. I believe this is certainly more to do with the source than the transfer. Just looking at the standard definition trailer you can see a huge improvement. The picture is much clearer than the murky DVD transfer. There is noise throughout, especially in the live-action sequences, but no artifacting or banding. I'm not convinced this is the best the film could look, but it's the best available for home viewing to date by far.

Blogs

Blu-ray Buzz – Prophetic Week for Blu-ray

This is one awesome week for Blu-ray. The best film released in 2010 thus far arrives. Four other titles appear in the Queue Qualified section for films I highly recommend. And the Buzzed About section has three films I've been eagerly awaiting their arrival.

Pick of the Week
A Prophet
While this was nominated for an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film last year, this French film didn’t get a release until February of this year. I haven’t seen a better film released in 2010. When I thought there can’t be a new twist on the gangster flick, this film came along and proved me wrong. Malik (Tahar Rahim) is a smart, but naïve teen that is thrown in jail seemingly because he is an Arab. The scrappy kid draws the attention of Corsican gang boss Cesar Luciani (Niels Arestrup), who enlists him quickly and he has to develop a killer’s spirit under fire. The film underlines how people don’t get rehabilitated in prison; they only become better criminals. Watching Malik learn is an impressive and frightening thing.

Blogs

Blu-ray: JAMES AND THE GIANT PEACH (1996)

Henry Selick's children's film is dark in both its tone and look. That is translated over into the new 1080p release from Disney. The color palette is muted, so one doesn't get the pop that animation often brings to Blu-ray. The images don't have the same depth as other animated films on Blu-ray do as well. I believe this is certainly more to do with the source than the transfer. Just looking at the standard definition trailer you can see a huge improvement. The picture is much clearer than the murky DVD transfer. There is noise throughout, especially in the live-action sequences, but no artifacting or banding. I'm not convinced this is the best the film could look, but it's the best available for home viewing to date by far.

Animation Blogs

JAMES AND THE GIANT PEACH (1996) (***)

Based on the Roald Dahl’s book, director Henry Selick made this project his follow-up to the successful NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS. Bookended by a live-action opening and closing, this stop-motion feature is generally an episodic adventure following a classic tale of a young boy dreaming beyond his circumstances.

Blogs

DINNER FOR SCHMUCKS (2010) (***)

Steve Carell really kicked off his big screen career with the awkward innocent in THE 40 YEAR OLD VIRGIN. Now he plays another awkward innocent, however Barry makes VIRGIN’s Andy look world weary. This mouse taxidermist might be the most clueless character to arrive in theaters since DUMB AND DUMBER.

Barry becomes the perfect idiot for Tim (Paul Rudd, ROLE MODELS), an eager analyst at an equity firm. He’s hoping for a big promotion and his boss Lance (Bruce Greenwood, STAR TREK) has invited him to a big wigs’ dinner where each person must bring the biggest misfit they can find so that they can make fun of them. Tim desperately wants to get the promotion so he can impress his successful art curator girlfriend Julie (Stephanie Szostak, THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA). But Julie thinks the whole idea of this “dinner for winners” is cruel.

Blogs

ORPHAN (2009) (***1/2)

This orphan from hell flick is one of the best killer kids movies I’ve ever seen. It takes its premise and genuinely develops its characters in compelling ways. It begins down clichés of this type of film, but does so with creepiness and real dread thanks to the time spent making us care for the characters. Then it delivers a whopper of a twist that is simply fabulous trash.

Kate (Vera Farmiga, UP IN THE AIR) and John Coleman (Peter Sarsgaard, AN EDUCATION) have a stillborn child. The tragedy hits Kate particularly hard. We jump forward in time and Kate and John have decided to adopt. They go to an orphanage where they meet the smart, talented Russian girl named Esther (Isabelle Fuhrman, HOUNDDOG). She's a bit of an outsider, dressed in clothes out of the American Girl catalog. The Colemans’ son Daniel (Jimmy Bennett, STAR TREK) gets jealous of the attention his parents give the strange new girl in their house, but their deaf-mute daughter Max (Aryana Engineer) finds a new friend.

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