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MichailB
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Detectorists (2014)
Unpretentious
Found this mellow little British jewel on FilmRise, and was hooked almost immediately. In a relaxing contrast to many those "drama" series of today the Detectorists needs no kings or zombies, no artificially and unsurmountably constructed problems and no arrogant moral highgrounds to stand out from the masses, just lovely stories of more or less normal people, some only slightly oblique, some nerdy but everyone still relatable or even likeable. Quite laid back escapism if I had to choose a stereotype.
Loved the theme song by Johnny Flynn, sung from the treasures point of view. Oh, a question to all native speakers (German here): what on earth does the line "... song birds, they sang all the wrong words" mean in your opinion? Nice verse yet I have no idea what that is supposed to mean.
The Mandalorian (2019)
More Star Wars than VII-IX ever was
Refreshingly different to those childish last three movies. In what I consider to be "real" Star Wars settings an unamed bounty hunter makes his way. Neither eloquent, spectacular nor heroic he misjudges, falls and gets up again; in short no boring super Jedi saving the republic, just your normal next-door Mandalorian.
Stories are well told in my opinion, not too loud, too fast or too patronizing. The main character develops slowly but consistently in most episodes, except perhaps the fifth one which seemed a bit odd to me. As a German of course I liked to hear Werner Herzog speaking in his peculiar manner and pronunciation.
Overall nice scene settings and special effects, everything absolutely 100% Star Wars. I especially liked the music by Ludwig Göransson. Waiting for the second season...
Oh yeah, and don't fall for the kid, you won't be able to detach.
Emil und die Detektive (1931)
The man with the stiff hat
After the children's book "Emil und die Detektive" was published in 1928 this first screen version was made in 1931 under the supervision of the author Erich Kästner himself.
The story seems simple: young Emil gets to visit his granny in Berlin and is given 140 marks by his mother for his grandma. On the train to Berlin the 140 marks are stolen by a man with a stiff hat while Emil sleeps. Arriving in Berlin he tries to follow the thief and receives help from a well organized and nice "gang" of Berlin street "detectives" in his age. A happy end seems possible.
While the movie contains a very entertaining story itself, an even more interesting detail of this movie is in its backdrop: an authentic Berlin of 1931 with open cabs, cars driving next to coaches, wide streets with lots of space for cyclists and so on. I always wondered when viewing older city maps what street life was like in the twenties of the last century when the streets were not as crowded as today, when the speed difference between pedestrians, cyclists, cars and coaches was still comparable in human measures.
The camera work, special effects (Emils dream on the train) and movie music are distinctly thirty-ish which made this movie even more interesting to me. All in all a very enjoyable movie for kids and adults alike.
Ying xiong (2002)
A beautiful painting first and foremost
I watched Hero about five times but I never took it as a mere movie. Its story contents, historically and politically, may very well be questionable; I can agree on that without hesitating. The one thing however that seems to be without discussion is its tremendous visual beauty and amazing music score. I sometimes put in the Hero DVD just to listen to the music only.
To get a broader view of the historical topic, the Chinese unification of the seven kingdoms under the emperor of Qin, the movie "The Emperor and The Assassin" by Kaige Chen may be taken into consideration as well. Yet when it comes to Chinese movie arts, Hero surpasses every Chinese movie I have seen up to now (not very many I have to admit).
In contrast to other opinions I will not comment on the martial arts aspects, nor on symbolisms found all over the place. To me this movie simply represents a beautiful painting containing people moving and fighting, loving and deceiving. The painting is accompanied by one of the most wonderful Chinese music scores I have listened to so far.
Hero clearly needs to be enjoyed, not discussed.