So, what movies have you been watching lately...?

[Lookin4Precious]

Bought "Crash" the other week having heard nothing but rave reviews and finally watched it last night. A good movie, with great moments, but certainly not a great movie. The performances were all great, and the script was riddled with jewels... but overall, it did have some glaring errors (for me anyway)

To name a few of them

- the all to obvious "Magnolia' similarities. "Magnolia" is one of my all time favorite films, and "Crash" certainly took a lot from it. Using LA as the backdrop for an ensemble piece where otherwise unconnected individuals come to be connected. Right down to the snow (er, i mean frogs) and the Aimee Mann like song.

- The coincidental ways in which the characters all came to be related. I mean c'mon. A guy ends up stealing the car of the DA who then, unknowingly, uses that very guy as leverage to get his brother to keep on the D.L. That is just one such example.

- Then the one piece of the script that really bothered me was the fact that Don Cheadle's character brought his strung out Mother to the morgue to identify the body of his brother which he had already done. It was set up so obviously simply to have an emotional moment with the mother seeing the body and collapsing that it lost all its punch due to the fact that it just wouldn't have happened.

The things i DID like about it

- The dialouge for the most part was excellent. Bringing out true racial tensions that so often find themselves swept under the rug in mainstream entertainment.

- The performances were all wonderful. There wasn't a single bad performance and there were many exceptional ones.

- The jewels of the script. Mainly the one dealing with the inpenetratable invisible robe.

- For a debut director, Paul Haggis really did impress. However, it is hard not to compare him to P.T. Anderson who handled the same basic structure much, much better.

Just my two cents.

And i just watched "Eraserhead." I really won't say much about it except that it is phenomenal (coming from a HUGE David Lynch fan). If you like Lynch i'm sure you love this, if you don't, i'm sure you absolutely hate it. I coudl go on about what I interpretted the film to mean, but A. i don't think that's the point of Lynch's films and B. it is different for every person

 

[Darklord Dave]

I just saw Flightplan, Lord of War and A History of Violence.

Lord of War was interesting intellectual exercise, but not much more. I was most impressed with Violence; it's been a long time since we've seen a movie that really should be rated R - it was even slightly shocking given the 'safe' product that has been rolling out recently. Cronenberg likes to push the edge and will never be mainstream, which is a good thing. This film has some awesome performances, not only Harris and Mortenson but most impressively from maria Bello, who has never impressed me before; and the kid who plays the son.

I highly recommend "Violence" but don't take your kids or your grandparents...

 

[screamingmetal]

L4P I had the same problems with Crash that you had. I'd also add that I had a problem with the car exploding, even in a Dramatic movie cars have this tendency to explode that doesn't occur as often in real life. But it was good. It was also great to see Marina Sirtis get some good work, but as a Persian?