Platoon

Platoon is a classic war film that deals with the attitudes and actions of US soldiers in Vietnam. An intense experience, and essential viewing for war film fans.

First a quick note: having seen two war films in one day, I have to say that I'm not a huge fan of them. I do respect their craftsmanship and some of the messages they convey, but for a war film to be serious it almost inevitably loses a lot of joy. There are fun moments, in both Waltz With Bashir and Platoon, but they are dwarfed by the serious nature of their subject matter. I haven't seen a whole lot of them, for this reason, but there's no doubt in my mind that while Platoon is a great film, I'd sooner revisit the more sensationalist Where Eagles Dare because it's so much more fun.


Oliver Stone's Platoon follows a group of soldiers on the front-lines of the Vietnam War. The film, deservedly I think, won a slew of awards in 1986. It is a brutal vision of war (a response, Stone says, to the more jingoistic representations of Vietnam that came before), in which good and evil are far from cut and dry.

Waltz With Bashir

The film artfully presents one of the more recent atrocities of war with a compelling facade of a mystery being unearthed. An effective evocation of the madness that is war.

Waltz With Bashir is a documentary presented in an animated medium. This animation is not for kids.It deals with the events surrounding the Sabra and Shatila massacre during the 1982 Lebanon War. The dialogue is partially lifted from real interviews conducted by director Ari Folman, as well as voiceovers of himself, explaining his experience to the audience. The dialogue is assembled in such a way that the events of the massacre unfold like the clues to a mystery. The mystery is contained in the filmmakers mind; all he remembers of that fateful day is a vision of three soldiers rising out of the water, watching as eerie orange flares illuminate the sky.

Laputa: Castle In The Sky

My favourite of the Miyazaki's that I've seen, and certainly up there with the best of Disney - a great, fun animated adventure!

Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli have made some fantastic films across their career. I only say that to pass on what I know through the grapevine of cyberspace - I've only seen a handful of them; Totoro, Howls Moving Castle, Ponyo, and some of  Spirited Away and Kiki's Delivery Service. This is undoubtably the best piece I have seen from this studio.

Laputa: Castle In The Sky is a fairytale, at it's core. It's about a young boy named Patsu who sees a girl - Sheeta - floating from the sky; he catches her. She's being chased by the military, a secret agent and a gang of pirates, who all want the crystal necklace she's carrying. The crystal holds the potential to unlock the location and secrets of the legendary floating city known as Laputa. By some extraordinary coincidence, Patsu's father once saw Laputa, only to be laughed off for purporting its existence. Patsu dreams of proving his father right, so is absolutely keen beans to fight off pirates and big baddies to protect the girl and find the city.

Mr Smith Goes To Washington

Even back then, Hollywood knew exactly what people wanted to watch...

In 1939 the Hollywood studio system was in full swing, and Frank Capra was cranking out drama films for Columbia pictures - a big name in the industry, from which we get a number of classics including It Happened One Night, It's A Wonderful Life, and this film: Mr Smith Goes To Washington.

This is a fun movie. It's about a guy who gets elected a US senator, by the machinations of a group of conspirators who need a stooge to vote their way for their profit. The man they pick is Mr. Jefferson Smith - leader of the boy scouts, and completely oblivious to politics. Over the course of the film we follow Mr. Smith as he struggles with his public image, his duties as a senator, and his purpose for being there. He's also totally overwhelmed with patriotic pride at being in Washington DC, amongst all the monuments and memorials to The American Way.

The Dark Knight Rises - The Ending

If you haven't already, read my first post about this film (spoils a few plot details). This post will simply continue that train of thought, but with explicit discussion of the final act of the film.

MAJOR SPOILERS FOLLOW - WATCH THE MOVIE FIRST!

Ok, let's start with some small things.

Alfred leaves Batman. Apparently this is some kind of heresy in Batman lore; Alfred should be loyal to the very end. For this trilogy though... I don't know, I kinda liked it. It was the most emotional scene for me - I felt literally heartbroken as it unfolded; as the consequences of Alfreds well-intentioned lie began to dawn on him. "Let the truth have its day" he says. It resonates well, on a larger scale, with Gordons deception about Harvey Dent exposed to the city. The peace they had tried to establish was founded on untruth, and ultimately usurps them.

So thematically it was consistent, and Micheal Caines acting can seemingly never be faulted... But I guess I just wanted more of Alfred. He says he's leaving, and in the next scene he's gone - just a shot of him getting into a car would be nice. But worse, he never appears again until after the day is saved. I feel like maybe he should have been waiting outside the prison when Batman rises, or contributed to the final fight in some way or other. Again, I want more, though it might have hindered the pace of the film even further.

The Dark Knight Rises

Fantastically executed, emotionally affecting, thematically weighty and rich in spectacle - Rises isn't as tight as The Dark Knight, but it caps off this amazing trilogy in grand style. This series will be talked about for years.

Christopher Nolan has done a bold thing. First by creating this iteration of Batman - in all his brooding darkness and gritty realism - then by following it up with the best superhero film ever made, and now by concluding the story as a trilogy... Anything he served up would appease the studios desire for a big opening weekend, but this series has become more than just a popcorn flick; The Dark Knight proved that super heroes can have legitimately good, artful, well-acted, powerful films, tackling real issues despite their fantastic premise.

I read a poem describing the job of poets: to create "Imaginary gardens with real toads in them"(Marianne Moore), and I think this can be applied equally well to film, and especially well to such films as Batman Begins and The Dark Knight; a fantasy world the draws us in and delights us with its spectacle and inventiveness, while still grappling with the 'toads' of reality - those things that plague us still in real life.

The hype surrounding this film has been incredible - with phrases like 'masterpiece' and 'perfect film' being thrown around to describe its predecessor, can Nolan follow up his success with an equal - or even greater - film?

Birth Of A Nation

Ambitiously made, with volatile subject matter. D.W. Griffiths phenomenal epic about the formation of the United States still strikes a nerve even today. Sitting through this film is an ordeal - but as affecting as great cinema should be.

Just look at that poster. Our hero everybody!

Wind the clocks back almost a whole century, to 1915. Film was the new thing, a cheap sideshow type attraction, with studios pumping out hundreds of movies a year, selling tickets for 5c at nickelodeons. The films were only about 20 minutes long, and no one would really call them high art yet, but there was one director that had a vision.

D.W. Griffith is considered the great pioneer of filmmaking. His techniques were not new or ground-breaking - but their implementation at his hands was marvellous. Audiences were blown away by his ability to juxtapose two scenes in editing - creating the sense of two things happening simultaneously in different places. They had never experienced a camera that moved at the same speed as the horse it was following; the thrill was spectacular. All these and more Griffith utilized in creating what is arguably his greatest film - certainly his best known: the 3-hour epic that is Birth Of A Nation.

Brave

Fun, family friendly, original, funny and beautiful; this films' only flaw is that it doesn't stack against the best of what Pixar can do.

Pixar have pretty well established themselves by this point as the 21st century's Disney. Everything they've produced appeals to adults as well as kids, and none of it could be considered 'crap', and the best of what they've given could undoubtably be called 'great'. Their last film was Cars 2, but the film before that (Toy Story 3) is arguably their greatest.

So with their latest offering Brave (directed by Mark Andrews and Brenda Chapman), I had high hopes; a Pixar film with an original story, set in Scotland, featuring bears and a strong red-headed princess... The problem with having high hopes, is that even small dints in them seem all the more disappointing.

Not that Brave is a bad film by any means. It's got a lot going for it. Pixar has mastered the art of side-stepping the uncanny valley, so even as their films get more and more photo-realistic, the human characters never look too real. There's always exaggerations and cartoonish quirks that make them amiable and never creepy. The setting for this film is fantastic; there was clearly a lot of effort put into recreating the natural beauty of the hills of Scotland, and they've done a stunning job, crafting a world of wonder and mystery that is enticing and exciting to inhabit.

The Player

The more you know about Hollywood, the more you'll appreciate the many, many references. The less you know, the more fascinated you'll be by this nasty machine from whence our entertainment comes.

Sex, violence and a happy ending - what more could you want from a movie?

How about a healthy dose of wit, satire and irony. This is a very smart Hollywood movie.

The film stars Tim Robbins as a studio executive living and working in Hollywood. Director Robert Altman uses the setting to his advantage - roping in about 60 cameo roles by well known actors, directors and other personalities. They appear briefly in the many shots of lush restaurants, cafes, offices and car parks that these insanely rich people occupy.