7 Word Reviews: True Grit, The Illusionist. Somewhere

Because this week is about trying to keep up with screenings, interviews and endless precursor announcements, here are some very very short reviews.

The Illusionist
A magician in the twilight of his career, finds companionship in a young woman.
7WR: Slow but just sublimely rendered. Devastating finale. B+/A-?


All Good Things
Unsolved mystery from the 80s about a wealthy heir and his missing wife.
7WR: Nightmarishly uneven, convoluted. But Kirsten hurts authentically C-

True Grit
The Coens adapt a western about a young girl seeking to avenge her father's murder
7WR: Even the horses act with meticulous predetermination. B-

And in conclusion a highly narcissistic double feature. Both films are rendered with visual aplomb and quite in tune with their own unique frequencies but you should steer wide and clear if you're allergic to wealthy people hosting their own pity parties and expecting you to bring gifts.

Tiny Furniture
A college graduate returns to her artist mothers home; regresses, refuses to leave it.
7WR: Navel-gazing finds funny highly specific lint. B+

Somewhere
A famous actor, lost to himself, kills time with his daughter.
7WR: Director/Protagonist treads water but what form! B

7 Word Reviews: Black Swan, Rabbit Hole, The King's Speech

What I've been up to: Wrote up a piece for Tribeca Film on the avalanche of screeners and the insanity of the holiday season inbetween rush of screenings. Also was buried in avalanche of screeners and rushed 'tween screenings whilst fretting about the holiday. Symmetry! Posting will be light for the rest of the week (it can't be helped: holidays, off-blog duties, etcetera) but December will be robust with excitement.

Until time frees up itty-bitty teeny-weeny reviews.

Black Swan
In which a ballerina loses her shit when she wins the lead role in Swan Lake.
7WR: Thrillingly fuses camp (?) horror and highbrow metaphor. A-

The King's Speech
A new king sees a speech therapist as WW II approaches.
7WR: Fussy but somewhat endearing. Unfortunately few surprises. B


Kawasaki's Rose
Czech Republic Oscar submission about a decorated psychiatrist who may or may not have been an informant during the Communist region.
7WR: Heavy novelistic depth buffered by nimble storytelling. A-/B+

Rabbit Hole
A married couple struggles as they approach the anniversary of their child's tragic death.
7WR: Refreshingly unhistrionic grief; Kidman superbly three-dimensional. A-/B+
*

7 Word Reviews: From Rapunzel to Woody

Until I find more time... 7 words must suffice.

Tangled 
Disney's animated Rapunzel musical (Skip the 3D, save money.)
7WR: Gorgeously rendered central image / conflict. Tonal slips.  B+
[More to come on this one soon. Sorry for wait.]

You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger
Woody Allen's annual comedy. This one focuses on a failed writer (Josh Brolin) whose new work just doesn't measure up to the old (hmmmm) and the women in his life.
7WR: Woody, lazily confessing, quotes Shakespeare "...signifying nothing."  D*

Inside Job
Oscar finalist documentary on the global economic crisis.

7WR: Dry, linear 'Recitation O' Horrors'. Beautifully shot. B

The Way Back

Peter Weir's true WWII era story of escapees from a Siberian work camp.

7WR: The walking dead; only haunts in stasis. B/B-

*That grade might be generous. It might be my second least favorite Woody Allen film. Nothing "tops" The Curse of the Jade Scorpion.

7 Word Reviews: Made in Dagenham, Stone, 127 Hours, Etc...

Can you feel Oscar precursor season gearing up?

Left: Aron Ralson as himself.
Right: James Franco as Aron Ralston

The mountaintops are a-rumbling. To delude myself into thinking I've "caught up" before the avalanche, herewith seven word reviews on a bunch of movies I haven't got around to talking about just yet. More to come on three of them.

127 Hours
In which James Franco plays Aron Ralston who is pinned under boulder in southern Utah.
7WR: Nervously tricked up storytelling, but gripping nonetheless. B/B+


Made in Dagenham
Sally Hawkins leads fellow factory women on a strike for equal pay in late-60s England.
7WR: Engaging nuanced star turn elevates predictable story.  B

Stone
A parole officer who is about to retire (of course!) gets mixed up with an inmate and his wife.
7WR: Weirdly acted, overcooked presentation of undefined 'whatthefuck?'ness. D

Norton: What the fuck are you looking at?
Nathaniel: Honestly, I have no idea. You should tell me since you made it. 

Salt
In which Angelina Jolie is an American spy accused of being a Russian sleeper agent.
7WR (Angelina): An unactable enigma, so Jolie charismas instead. B+
7WR (Movie): Endearingly absurd but sadly disposable. Lame ending. B-

Soul KitchenFatih Akin's comedy about second chances, a flailing restaurant, and two German-Greek brothers.
7WR: Slow burn silliness and lusty adult appetites. B+

Leaving
Kristin Scott Thomas gets the f*** of her life from Sergi Lopez, then loses her cool.
7WR: Feverishly horny portentousness. Somehow Kristin sells it. C+

I Am Love
Tilda is the matriarch of a rich Italian clan whose family business is changing hands.
7WR: Mouthwatering visuals, melodramatic verve, subtextual theme;  Masterpiece?  A/A-

(big article forthcoming now that it's on DVD. Probably in a week's time.)

Mic-Macs
(From the man behind Amélie.) A man with a bullet in his brain seeks revenge on arms dealers.
7WR: Inspired (But Exhausting) Hijinx Setpieces 'R Us B-

 *
If you've seen any of these, do share your feelings. I lift the restrictions on word counts for the comments. You may use more than 7! (If you're ever in doubt about whether or not to comment try to think of comments as little crumbs and The Film Experience as a zoo. Here you may should feed the animals because they don't eat otherwise.) 
*

NYFF Finale: 7 Word Reviews (Meek's Cutoff, Another Year, Hereafter, More...)

Oh readers. What to do with me? I'm always falling behind. In an effort to acknowledge that NYFF ended this weekend, and fall prestige/early campaign season is already upon us (Toy Story 3 event tonight!), here's everything I saw at the NYFF. I got sick right in the middle so I missed a handful I wanted to see. The films are presented in the order I saw with a brief description and a 7 Word Review. For now.  Surely I'll find time to say something more about two or three of these later. If you've wondered why I've been posting 2 grades for each movie I see lately, it's because it's my current grade (bold) plus the grade I could be talked into / might end up with when all is said and done.

Poetry & Oki's Movie (South Korea) |  Tuesday After Christmas (Romania)

Poetry full review A-/A 

Oki's Movie
A filmmaker recounts a romantic affair and professional entanglements.
7WR: Funny. Repetitive. Aggressively unwilling to engage visually. C/C-



Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives full review B+/B

Tuesday After Christmas
A Romanian man loves two women. Must choose.
7WR: Love Wrecked! Incisive, naturalistic gem. Pitch-perfect ending. B/B+

 The Robber (Germany/Austria) | My Joy (Ukraine) | Certified Copy (Various)

The Robber & My Joy
The Robber: an ex-con trains for long distance runs but continues his life of crime.
My Joy: a truck driver gets lost on dangerous allegorical roads.
7WR (x2): Virtuosic filmmaking but autistic experience. Couldn't connect.
Grade? Depends on what we're grading. This is when Nick's VOR would come in handy as both films strike me as worthy sees for commited cinephiles. But they're almost impossible to enjoy because they're so emotionally deficient or at least tonally limited to entirely nihilistic worldviews.

 Certified Copy
The English author of a book on the worth of artistic forgeries, tours Italy with a beautiful married French stranger (Binoche!).
7WR: Transcends its fun intellectual gimmick. Beautifully acted. B+/A-

Of Gods and Men
French monks living peacefully in a Muslim village are warned to leave when terrorists arrive.
7WR: Despite vibrant emotional pulses, touch too sedate. B/B+

The Social Network previous articles A-/A

 We Are What We Are (Mexico) | Another Year (UK) | Meek's Cutoff (USA)

We Are What We Are
A poor Mexican family struggles to keep their "rituals" alive after the father dies in this gruesome horror film.
7WR: Thematically obvious/clumsy but compulsively, masochistically watchable B-/C+

Tempest
Julie Taymor adapts Shakespeare's shipwrecks & sorcery play.
7WR: Muddy everything: ideas, sound, performance. Visual tourettes. D-/F

Another Year
Mike Leigh! A long married couple in England are surrounded by needy friends in four seasonal vignettes.
7WR: Blissful troupe rapport, comic beats. Weirdly judgmental. B+/B

Meek's Cutoff
Three families in covered wagons get lost in Indian country. They're running out of water.
7WR: Western From Another Planet but mysteriously confident. B/B+

Hereafter
A French woman experiences near death. A British boy copes with grief. An American psychic resists his gift.
7WR: Mawkishly moving but stiff, disjointed, weak storytelling. C-/D+


The Social Network used the fest as its world premiere and then promptly opened to great acclaim and presumptively leggy box office. Otherwise you're going to have to wait until 2011 for these films, apart from two: Hereafter (Oct 22nd) and The Tempest (Dec 10th)... unless you want to count Another Year but New Year's Eve releases are soooo next year if you ask us.

7 Word Review: The Social Network

Screwball sharp dialogue meets riveting bad behavior.
(A-?)

I'll get to a fuller review soon. Screened it at 9 AM this morning and I'm already desperate to see it again. The film has its big premiere tonight at the NYFF. Expect another torrent of crazed "buzz" to follow. That word is often used interchangeably with "hype" in Oscar punditry and online discourse -- I use it incorrectly myself I freely admit. But "buzz" is the real thing whereas "hype" is like buzz in vitro, carefully created. Buzz is uncontrollable and what results when something (pre-hyped or not) actually delivers. And The Social Network most definitely does.

 About the sordid topic of Oscar... Before seeing it, I had predicted The Social Network for five nominations: Picture, Director, Supporting Actor (Justin Timberlake), Adapted Screenplay and Editing. I have probably underestimated it slightly since Cinematography and Sound could well be in the cards, too. The performances are quite strong across the board but I fear it's the type of work that the acting branch will be the most resistant too, since most of the characters are "unlikeable" without being showy, and showy is the key modifier in clearing the unlikeable hurdle for awards voters... generally speaking of course.