Change Your Image
Thorbejorn
Reviews
The Pursuit of Happyness (2006)
The cinematic art of overcoming obstacles to rise to fame and fortune
I liked this film and it was both an inspiration to overcome my own obstacles and to be frustrated and frightened by them.
I found an interesting similarity between this film and last years movie "Cinderella Man". Both films showed a man who had a great love for his offspring and an unrealized or overlooked talent (in one case boxing, in the other case math). And both main characters had a wife who did not share her husband's dream. In the case of Cinderella Man the wife wanted him to quit his dream and get a job at the docks, bust she stuck with him when he stuck to his dream. In the case of "The Pursuit of Happiness" the man's wife not only didn't share his dream but she eventually lost all faith and hope in him and left. But in both cases the role of the woman was as an obstacle or a force pushing in a direction away from a great man's goal.
I will site two other films with similar female roles: "Houdini" with Tony Curtis, and "Mountains of the Moon" about the life of the explorer Richard Burton. In both films the women stood in the way and failed to see the genius in their husband's calling.
So, my point is in the observation that the role of women in certain films is contrived to be an obstacle in way of a great man's purpose. And I believe that this is a concoction on the part of the movie makers to create drama at the expense of feminism. And, because I have a daughter I am sensitive to this false assumption. I want her to be great and I want her to support great people. But the media is so strong an influence and a role model in our lives that these powerfully negative views of women as shallow homebodies and vision less turncoats is terrible. In real life women see potential as well as men.
So, for men this film was inspiring. But for woman it was belittling.
Night of the Dead: Leben Tod (2006)
most horror movie fun since Sean of the dead
I got to see a friends screener of this film and I have to admit, as violent as it was we had a really good time. It's not for everyone because it is incredibly violent, I mean seriously violent and there is some nudity and some Strong language but over all this was absolutely a laugh riot and a good time. We had a crowd so we were feeding off of each other but we haven't had as much fun, all of us sitting around and watching a movie on DVD since Sean of the dead.
But again, let me stress, this is way more bloody than maybe any other movie that I have ever seen. And just when I thought that the filmmaker had no where else to go there was another totally unexpected violent and bloody scene. And then more fun. Even the blood was a good time.
Sure it's campy and over the top and colorful. But we had a very good night watching this film.
Snakes on a Train (2006)
Big shoes to fill
Snakes on a Plane was such a well hyped film that it was both inevitable and a little crazy to try to release another movie with almost the same title in the same year let alone the same week. Reading the other comments here I see the results. A lot of people are mad. Mad because it doesn't have the best special effects. Mad because it doesn't have a star cast. Mad because they wanted to see Samuel Jackson say "I'm sick of these M^*&*&%-Er F*^(^%-Ing Snakes on this M^*&*&%-Er F*^(^%-Ing Train"!
Well, this sure ain't the Samuel Jackson version. And maybe that's good.
Snakes on a Plane was lost between cop film and horror, a family action film and a bloody gory movie of death. Saturday Night Live performers got laughs while Jackson swore enough to make a grandmother cover her ears, and as far as kids go, they would be traumatized by the violence.
Snakes on a Train however knew exactly what it was. This was a cheaply made horror movie on a train. Sure it had snakes and sure many of them were scientifically harmless garden snakes with fake rattler sound effects. But never once did it miss a step in its plot or intention where as the "on a Plane" version was tripping all over itself from the first scene on.
I did enjoy the over the top fun that Snakes on a Plane had to offer and I admit that the "...on a Train" version was a little dry. But hey, in trade, it was a cool and unexpected story. This little horror film could have gone way more wrong than it did.
For this it gets a 7 out of 10.
The Black Dahlia (2006)
good looking but hard to watch
I was so looking forward to this film. The historic murder case is compelling and the fact that it was done on high def video makes it a film of the future. But I was completely turned around from the first moment. I thought that this was going to be a film about the Black Daliah. I thought that we would be interested in her. It took me over a half an hour to realize that the movie was about a boxer turned cop and his boxer pal and his girlfriend. By that time I was disengaged. When the Black Daliah finally appeared in the middle of the film I was reconnected. But the story about the cops just missed me. And I was totally disinterested in Scarlet Johanson's character, and I usually like her.
Over all, as a movie it was not a big success. But it does hold some place in on the list of historic murder cases retold. But compared to Citizen X, a great historic murder tale told through the cop's eyes, this does not compare.There are some great psycho killer biopics out there. I wish that this was one of them.