Daniel85

Anyone seen any good movies lately?

My parents just bought a massive LCD TV that is totally beyond their means, but the good thing is that we got a book full of Video Ezy coupons with it. Free weeklies and new releasies galore.

Between that and the fact that when you rent from Video Ezy, there are more free offers on the back of the receipt, we won’t be paying for a DVD rental for the next ten years. Coincidentally, that’s probably how long they’ll be paying off the TV. Badoom. 

I’m usually way behind the times on watching movies, but thanks to our glut of freebies I’ve been catching up on a few recent (and not so recent) movies. I’m going to write paragraph reviews of them, just because I feel like it.

Secret Window. This was fucking awesome. It’s as if Alfred Hitchcock and David Lynch had a little movie baby. It’s based on a Stephen King novella, so the story is pretty predictable, but that doesn’t detract from the pleasure of it. Johnny Depp’s and John Turturro’s performances are both brilliant. I don’t usually take much notice of film scores, but the music in this movie really impressed me. That’s not surprising; I checked the back of the DVD cover and the composer was Phillip Glass, the guy who scored Koyaanisqatsi. And heck, I love writers writing stories about writers writing stories.

Charlie & The Chocolate Factory. More Johnny Depp. Not gay or nothin’. I really don’t know what to think of this movie. It’s hard to objectively approach a ‘remake’ (perhaps re-adaptation would be a better term in this case) of a film with an imposing legacy. There’s either the Gus Van Sant route (shot-for-shot remake), or the ’something a bit different’ route,  like Tim Burton tried with this. I’m usually a fan of Tim Burton’s Weirdness™, but it seems like he just phoned this one in. There were some good bits, though. I liked the backstory about Wonka’s childhood, and the whole Jon Benet Ramsay thing with Violet Beauregard. One thing that really stuck in my craw was how Mike Teevee was updated into a video game addict, but his come-uppance in the factory was still the same. It would have been better if there was some kinda video-game thing Wonka was working on, maybe a Pac-Man clone with candies and chocolate bars instead of dots.

Cars. This was okay. Standard Pixar fare. I think I liked it better when it was called Doc Hollywood, though.

Over The Hedge. Brilliant. I usually hate CGI funny animal movies, just because there are so many of them and they’re all the same. This was refreshingly different. The visual comedy was some of the best I’ve ever seen in a CGI movie, and the writing was fantastic. “Mmmmthat’s good satire.” (I forget what episode that’s from, but it’s a Simpsons quote.)

In Good Company. I quite liked this. Dennis Quaid was hilarious, Scarlett Johansson was hot, and Topher Grace was Eric Forman. It’s gonna be interesting to see how he goes with something meaty in Spider-Man 3, although I don’t really care as much as some Spider-Fans. I always thought Venom was stupid anyway.

Ultraviolet. I wish it was really ultraviolet, so I didn’t have to see it. Little spectrum humour for you there, folks. This movie sucked. I have nothing critical to say about it, so I’m just going to make up snarky puns to show how derivative it is. More like… ’X for Mendetta’! More like… ’The X-Matrix’! Hah!

Speaking of the mutants… I don’t really want to admit this, but I still haven’t seen X-Men 3. By all accounts, I should be thankful for that. I’m a glutton for punishment, though, so I’ve got it ready to go on the ol’ LCD tonight. Wish me luck.

And I repeat: anyone seen any good movies lately?