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Dale, Colleen and I look ahead to the films opening in the month of December. Not quite as crowded as I first thought but still a fairly busy holiday season.
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Show Notes:
Click on movie title for trailer.
:01 – Bumper
:31 – Introduction
Opening December 7th
3:01 – The Golden Compass
4:55 – Atonement
6:38 – Grace Is Gone
8:45 – The Amateurs
10:30 – Revolver
12:16 – The Walker
Opening December 14th
13:30 – I Am Legend
– Movie Club Podcast – December films: Escape from New York and The Last Man on Earth with Vincent Price
– I Am Omega Trailer
16:42 – Juno
17:30 – The Kite Runner
18:26 – The Perfect Holiday
18:37 – Alvin and the Chipmunks
19:42 – Youth Without Youth
18:37 – Alvin and the Chipmunks
19:42 – Youth Without Youth
Opening December 21st
20:50 – National Treasure: Book of Secrets
22:19 – Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story
24:10 – P. S. I Love You
25:28 – Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
26:14 – Flakes
Opening December 28th
26:59 – The Water Horse: Legend of the Deep
27:45 – The Bucket List
29:22 – Alien vs. Predator: Requiem
30:22 – The Orphanage
– Spanish Trailer
31:18 – Charlie Wilson’s War
32:12 – Persepolis
33:07 – The Great Debaters
34:19 – Cassandra’s Dream
37:27 – There Will Be Blood
42:22 – Closing
It's really quite amazing how few films I'm left looking forward to considering the size of that list:
There Will be Blood
Sweeny Todd
and
Persepolis are the 'must sees' for me.
I'll probably accidentally find my way into Charlie Wilson's War (mainly for Mike Nichols and Phillip Seymour Hoffman) and I Am Legend probably just for Cinecast purproses.
The Kite Runner, Atonement and The Golden Compass do little for me. And Coppola's film is supposed to be pretty lightweight. As for AVP2, Alvin, WalkHard, The BucketList and National Treasure – Even at gunpoint I'd have to think hard about those. Oi! How did so much trash creep into my holiday prestige season? I guess they call that counterprogramming…
I've already seen Juno and The Ophanage and they are both solidly entertaining films.
Kurt, I'll just assume that you accidently overlooked Alvin and the Chipmunks.
My MUST sees:
Atonement – Dale, what's the FIRST hottest kiss of the year?
Revolver – You don't like Snatch or LSTSB!? Blasphemy!
I Am Legend – Post apocalypticism. In.
Juno – Juno, JUNO! Not like the city in Alaska. Can't wait!
National Treasure – I'm looking forward to it. Not a MUST see, but liked the first one quite a bit
The Orphange
Peresepolis
There Will Be Blood – oh, wait… I've SEEN THIS! I think it's good, but it takes some thinking about. PTA is terrific (LOVE LOVE Boogie Nights, Magnolia). Kubrick-esque with a disjointed storyline. Lots of great things about it though. Just don't get your hopes way up. It's deatable whether it can be considered a western or not.
—–
Youth Without Youth – talked to my friend from the theater yesterday who said it's an absolute mess.
Sweeny Todd – Does nothing for me. Don't know why. Depp has rubbed me the wrong way as of recent + one word: musical.
Rumor has it – It was Jennifer Aniston and Shirley McClane. And it was mediocre.
Annie Hall – piece of shit should've never beaten out Star Wars for best picture. But Match Point was awesome.
Freakin' Alvin. Good god every time I see the trailer I want to go plug my ears.
Andrew – green with envy at TWBB. Soon. Soon!
"Juno" is so bloody good. "This is a doodle that can't be undone home skillet"! What impresses me most is that unlike nearly every other comedy that gives you big jokes in the trailer that are no longer funny by the time you see the movie 'cause you've seen the trailer so damned much – here those are the jokes that still get the biggest laughs. Diablo Cody proves that it's all about context man.
I can't be dis-waded from YWY. It may be a train wreck waiting to happen for me but I want to be there to suffer through it.
"Rumour Has It" – agreed it wasn't great but I had fun.
Oh, and are you serious about the hottest kiss? I may have to do a post about that.
There is a Revolver post coming, although I've seen over 2 years ago at this point. Ritchie is always amusing in a full-on-trashy sort of way.
I'm trying to ignore than Annie Hall comment. I don't know what would be worse, Star Wars having a Best Picture Oscar or Titanic.
Oh wait a minute, Braveheart, Forrest fucking Gump, and A Beautiful Mind all have statues. Oi! ugh. er. yea.
Grrr. No Southland Tales in my neighborhood yet. Looks like it will be December on that one for me (hopefully).
KuRt.
Just Juno and There Will Be Blood for me. I am reserving a spot on my top ten of 2007 for TWBB… Daniel Day Lewis as a scene-chewing misanthrope alone qualifies it, the question remains will it rank higher then No Country for Old Men, which would be something.
Titanic, Braveheart, Forrest Gump – all good to great films. Lighten up.
What is so great about Annie Hall? The fact that it is the same as all other Woody Allen movies? Or the fact that it's not funny and stars Woody Allen playing… Woody Allen?
I don't really (sadly) know how to articulate the point of why I'd rather sit down with 'early' Woody Allen than these overblown somewhat pandering Oscar Winners, but I would. I just get angry watching just how darn condescending Forrest and Braveheart were. Can't lighten up on this one. Nope.
Annie Hall is a masterpiece. If you don't find Woody Allen funny, obviously it's a tougher sell, but it's one of the few movies revolving around romance that is directed towards adults. And after you've seen the film, you somehow feel like you have experienced this relationship.
Add to that the slapstick gags, the satirical aspects, some genuinely good cinematic qualites (the long shot of the two guys talking on the sidewalk comes to mind) and some of the more intellectualizing aspects that it brings to itself, like playing with the diegenetic qualities of the main character etc. and you've got one hell of a worthy Best Picture winner. Fucking way more so than Star Wars will ever be, no matter how many times you watched it when you were 7 years old.
Forrest Gump and Braveheart are fantastic movies as well. What's with this animosity towards grown men, Kurt? I agree A Beautiful Mind is pretty bad, but with so many weak years, you're bound to have mediocre winners. I mean any of the BP nominees that year (possibly apart from In The Bedroom, which I have not seen) were mediocre-to-terrible movies.
I'm with Henrik on Annie Hall over Star Wars by leaps and bounds. But it's about as apples to oranges of a direct comparison as possible. Almost a pointless comparison as both films are aiming for entirely different goals (I guess the common goal of 'highly entertaining' was achieved by both though. Although certainly your mileage will vary.)
In lieu of Forrest Gump, I present Pulp Fiction or Three Colours: Red (admittedly this film only had the nom for screenplay, but I'm not going to split hairs on this one).
As for the Braveheart year, possibly the weakest year for nominations, yes, But I'd throw out Zhang Yimou's Shanghai Triad, 12 Monkeys and Leaving Las Vegas, all got noms for other things…
And on In The Bedroom, the perfs are great, but the screenplay is rather grating (in a Paul Haggis sort of way) more often than not. Todd Field's Little Children is a major step up from In The Bedroom.
Man 12 Monkeys is shit. Take a 30 minute masterpiece and turn it into a 2½h shitburger with Bruce Willis (probably one of the least interesting looking actors out there) being uncharming, and Brad Pitt overacting. At least Braveheart has real authenticity from Angus McFadyen. He was strong in that movie. Also some killer war scenes.
I would not have been upset if Pulp Fiction had won. I love both Pulp Fiction and Forrest Gump, and I think that year was probably the strongest for american film in my lifetime. I am not a huge Kieslowski fan myself. I did notice Veronique on your top 20 list, which I did not find particularly interesting. I have not seen his colors yet.
I think you're misunderstanding the oscars though. It's the american film awards, not some sort of world cinema appreciation society. There is a category for foreign film, because the Best Picture award is reserved for their own films. I guess they have strayed from it from time to time, but those would be the exceptions which prove the rule.
I love La Jetee as much as the next man (probably more), but the 'over-acting' in this version is kinda the point. This is Gilliams version of what is essentially a great story. Gilliam's version does not negate the original, just sort of a wacky (ain't the world crazy) slapstick version. I like both. I don't even see the flaws, this is probably Willis' best performance, one of the few he doesn't smirk his way thru. There are just too many good elements in this film which outweigh the bad ones.
We'll have to agree to disagree on this point.
Also, I love Kieslowski, particularly the two films he made with Irene Jacob (Veronique and Red).
The Oscars, well, yea, everyone seems to have a different idea as to what these awards mean. I like the world cinema appreciation thing, even if I know it's a pipe dream.