Open Water

                                                                                           
In some ways, I am having a hard time explaining this movie. Open Water is a film that you could look at in a lot of different ways and come to many conclusions but regardless it is an excellent film that is a great addition to the horror genre and it is also a really good shark film.

Based on a true story, this movie is about a couple who are on a vacation to get rid of some stress and they go scuba-diving during the trip. As the diving expedition goes on, they get accidentally left out in the middle of the ocean when the boat full of other tourists leaves without them and they face a life or death scenario with things looking not good at all.

There are quite a few things here that make Open Water an effective movie but the first is the two leads, Blanchard Ryan and Daniel Travis. They really are the main parts that makes this film work. They are very effective and believable and they both bring a good package to the film.

Also the cinematography really is better here than I thought it would be. The film is shot differently by moving the camera in interesting way. There are really good water scenes and some great close-ups and the cinematography makes the film more realistic and believable.

I have never felt more claustrophobic watching a film as I did with this one. The movie is really only shot in water with the camera going up and down a lot, and you really feel like you are in the water and in danger of drowning. The film also has some good eerie music and a nice ending.

Like many Hollywood films, the film has some nudity and frankly there seems to be no point to it here. Blanchard Ryan is a no doubt a pretty lady but there seems to be absolutely no purpose to her nude scene. Her character also has a bad vomit scene that's not believable and not fully shown. These are really the only serious flaws in an otherwise great film.

Open Water really impressed me more than I thought it would and is one of the more beautiful films out there. This movie provides a lot for everything and is a must-see even for non-horror fans.

4.5/5

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ParaNorman

In so many ways, ParaNorman is a film that I can relate to. It has a lead character named Norman who really feels like a lot like me and has many of my interests. It also has a supporting cast that feels like some of my own friends and a plot that has elements of one of favorite films of all time, The Blair Witch Project. Overall, ParaNorman is just great film that really deserves more attention then it is getting.

Set in the small town of Blithe Hollow, Massachusetts, ParaNorman is story of a nerd and a big horror fan named Norman (Kodi Smit - McPhee) who can speak to the dead and along with his friend Neil (Tucker Albrizzi), Neil's brother Mitch (Casey Affleck), the town bully Alvin (Christiopher Mintz - Plasse) and Norman's sister, Courtney (Anna Kendrick), they all try to stop an old witch curse that is seriously affecting their town.

The plot really works well here. It can be confusing and hard to follow at many times but it is original for an animation film, quite entertaining and provides plenty of interesting scenes including a pretty cool ending.

What is also interesting about the film is how the entire film has an adult feel to it even though it seems to be geared towards kids and teenagers. The movie has quite a few adult references and uses the Halloween movie theme song which most kids won't get. It also has a great grindhouse opening which really worked and added to the film.

ParaNorman also has stop motion animation which obviously has been done many times before but here it is done in a really different way that is both strange and original. I think this was a brilliant choice for the film.

Along with an adult feel, it also has a lot of strange moments that I can't quite figure out where it is coming from. There is also one scene that involves the character Mitch that can't make you look at the character the same way but it definitely adds to the film, I can tell you that.

ParaNorman also has really good characters and voice actors. The characters have a lot of personality to them that makes them likable and fun to watch. The voice work is great and this stands out even more because the film has some smart writing to it.

The humor in the film is sometimes good and sometimes hilarious and again the scene with Mitch is great because it is so strange and it is one my favorite parts of the film.

Out of all the films I have seen in 2012, ParaNorman is no doubt one of strangest and in many ways one of the dumbest films of the year, but it is still a great motion capture film that along with the The Avengers ranks as one of the top films of the year for me.

4/5.5

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Mother

The director of this film Bong Joon-ho is one of those directors that struck me as a pretty good director the first time I saw one of his films, The Host. It is a great monster film and memorable for a lot of reasons. This film, Mother, is not as good or memorable but it is still an impressive thriller that I quite enjoyed.


Mother is set in South Korea in a small town and is the story of mentally unstable kid in his late teens or early twenties who is charged with a local town murder. His mother is one those mothers that will do anything to support her son and the film is about her trying to assist him and do whatever is necessary to have him found "not guilty" in the criminal proceedings.

The best part of this film is doubt the storytelling. Bong Joon-ho really takes a rather simple story and turns it into a story with many sub-plots that goes in many directions. The material is very good and the plot is compelling. This is very original and quite interesting and in some ways, it can be shocking.

Most of the characters are complex and take some time to be put together that takes work but the mother character played by Kim Hye-je is in my opinion the most complex character. The character is done in a way that is not very common, and it has to be acted just right for it to be believable and Kim Hye-ja succeeds with this. The supporting cast is good and that helps the character. This lead character is really done up well in a kind of  lovely way and Kim Hye-ja really wins you over.

Won Bin plays a kid who is charged with murder. This is another difficult character to play and Bong Joon-ho executes it very well and this helps the film even more than the Mother character.

Even with a good plot and characters, the film does kind of have a rather pointless opening. I don't think it really adds to the film. The ending is not really what I would have wanted either and the scenes, especially the opening scene just seem to lengthen the film by at least twenty minutes.

Aside from some very small flaws, Mother is a quite interesting thriller that has a great twist and is pretty likable in a lot of ways. I think it is one of my favorite foreign films ever for a lot of reasons.

4/5

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Swingers

I didn't know too much about this movie, Swingers before seeing it. In a lot of ways, I liked it and found it to be a hip comedy but at the same time, I think not knowing much about the film beforehand helped me like it even more and it is probably one my favorite comedies of all-time.

The plot is something we have seen before but the film puts it in a new and original way by adding fresh characters into place and putting in some good writing. The film is about a guy named Mike Peters (John Favreau) who lives in Los Angeles and is struggling with life. He just broke up with his girlfriend after six years so he and his best friend Trent Walker (Vince Vaughn) start hanging out and helping each other out with dating and trying to be happy.

The plot here would probably not work without good leads and Favreau and Vaughn both do well. The acting is excellent, and these actors work well together. The Favreau and Vaughn characters are great, original, funny and lovable in every single act. The supporting cast is excellent as well with some good ideas to them and we root for them every step of the way. Every character we learn about in a unique way and they all have good style to them. This is a film that you could watch again just for the characters and it's one of the best character study films your ever going to find.

The ending also really works and the film is so good even in it's final moments. It shows how the characters have developed and what we as viewers have learned.

The film does have minor flaws. Some scenes are just overdone and too long with just filler stuff, but it does show that the film is trying.

I found Swingers to be a fun ride of a film and even though personally I could not relate to the plot, I still loved every minute. Unfortunately, it is a film that has become somewhat forgotten fifteen years later.

4.5/5

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The Burbs

The Burbs is one those films that I watched one or twice as a little kid. Now ten years later later, I couldn't remember most of it and watching it after all those years, I see I didn't miss much. It does have some highlights and I found some stuff enjoyable but all in all, it is kind of a mess that needs a lot of work.

Set in a suburban neighborhood, The Burbs is the story of a family who get new neighbours who move in next door and seem very different and out of place. Over a holiday weekend, the family starts to investigate what's up with these people. Overall, it is an original plot that works to some degree.

The film does have some pretty good characters. As usual, Tom Hanks does well with the lead role and the film does provide him with a good character. He moves the film throughout.

The strange and mysterious people here are the next door neighbors. From what I saw of them, I liked them. They are original characters with a creepy side and when they are on-screen, they make the scene much more interesting.

What is neat about this movie is that there is a nice message too and I think this is kind of different for a film like this to do that. The message is only mentioned only one time but it is inspiring in many ways and it had an effect on me.

Unfortunately, this film is just too goofy and over-the top. There are many ways scenes I was laughing but at all the wrong things. Also, many of the characters are very childish. Even though I like him in a way, Corey Feldman's character is very dumb and he has some very cheap lines. Some of his actions at the end are very unrealistic including letting some friends over to watch action in the neighbor's house. Like I said before, Tom Hank's character is good but he can be dumb and unrealistic as well.

The film is also shot in a real weird way. It is shot on Colonial Street at the Universal Studies. With this location, it just makes the film seem more unrealistic and makes me wonder why they didn't choose another location.

The Burbs is a rather dumb film that has the 1980's written all over it. Feel free to pass on it but I would give it at least one visit for a lot of reasons.

3/5

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Goodfellas

It doesn't beat out the first two Godfather films but Goodfellas is no doubt a really a top-notch mob film. Along with most Martin Scorsese films, it has everything you would want and very few dry spots, and it is a film you can watch again and again.

This film from 1990, is the story of Henry Hill who has been involved with the mob since he was a young teenager and as he gets older, he becomes one of the members of the business working with Jimmy Conway (Robert De Niro) and Tommy Dev Vito (Joe Pesci). Like the Godfather films and most mob films, things start to change for the characters as time goes on and things go bad in the business.

In many ways, the characters are golden  with good personalities and have a  uniqueness to them. Across the board,  the acting is flawless in every act.

What makes this movie so good is how it opens. I really like the idea of the Henry Hill character being told from childhood. There are some small flaws to this but it is pretty well done with good acting by Christopher Serrone. I found this all to be realistically styled and it works well as a whole.

The film mostly moves along through storytelling but there are small action scenes with some good blood to it that moves the story and are a good change of pace for the film.The story itself is really good with excellent criminals and drug scenes that are put together very well. The ending is also great and shows how a best friend can turn into an enemy.

There are some flaws with this film but they are very much overshadowed by how good this film is. The characters do not age and there is one  ridiculous bar scene and this would really affect a lesser quality film but it does not affect this movie at all for me because of how amazing the rest of the film is. You can easily overlook the flaws.

The Godfathers films are of course great but Goodfellas does much more for me personally and got me more into the Mob Film genre. This is a great film that will probably grow on me even more as times goes on.

4/5

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Premium Rush

When I heard about this film and saw a trailer a while back, I kind of wrote it off. After the mess of The Dark Knight Rises, maybe unfairly it was hard for me to look at the actors in that movie the same way. This includes Joseph-Gordon Levitt who actually was not bad in the Batman movie but that movie just left a bad taste in my mouth. Also after watching the trailer for Premium Rush, I was not really much interested in the plot which involves bike messengers in New York City. Once Premium Rush hit the theaters, I saw that the critics loved it so I decided to see it myself. I didn't love this movie but did enjoy it somewhat and I also feel it is a movie that might grow on me as time goes on.

The plot involves a bike messenger named Wilee (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) who is trying to help a girl named Nima get her son to America from China by delivering a package for her which contains an important receipt for her son's freedom. The plot is quite original and not one I will probably ever see again. This movie also has a nice cast all the way around and some of the sets are not bad. It can be hard to follow at times though. It also does not have a very good lead-in for the story and it is missing some things at the end but all in all, it is a very cool plot and movie, and maybe the most original plot from a film in 2012.

What I also liked is how good the villain Bobby (Micheal Shannon) is here. At times, he is not really believable as a cop and his actions seem unrealistic but he can pretty funny and he plays his part pretty well.

Out of all the good actors in this film, I think Joseph Gordon-Levitt gives the best performance. He has kind has a bad-ass side to him that I liked a lot. He is a really likable character and he is also pretty funny too.

I liked the messenger and biking scenes more than I thought I would. They are done pretty well with some good slow motion parts to them. There are also some really good chase scenes though New York City that have some computerized tracking aspects that I liked.

The film also has a lot good little things that make it work better. There is a nice love story involving Joseph Gordon-Levitt and the Dania Ramirez character who is also a bike messenger with the Wole Park character trying to butt in. There are also some good chase scenes with a police officer on a bicycle that provides some good laughs (even though it is not very realistic) and there is some good music in this film. Without all these little things, maybe this film wouldn't  have made the cut for me.


Premium Rush is a film with some flaws that I probably won't watch often but it is something fresh and fun and it also shows how film trailers can be wrong sometimes.

3/5

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To Kill a Mockingbird

Here is an oldie but goodie. To Kill a Mockingbird is one of those films that really took me forever to get around to watch. It is a film that I knew I would like and it eventually helped me a lot during my high school English class because we had to read it. That said, I didn't expect to like it this much. It is a very powerful film that shines in almost every department, especially the acting.

The movie is set over a three year period in the 1930's and is the story of a single dad named Atticus who along with two children learn many things about life including segregation, people, the courts and probably most of all themselves.

It is a film that works on very many levels and has a good plot, fine leads with Gregory Peck as Atticus and a young Mary Badham as Scout and some very fine writing. Out of all of it, I found that trial scene involving Brock Peters as Tom Robinson to be best part about the film. It is a scene that really sums up a film, brings out a lot of good opinions and thought to the forefront and is something you can't really take your eyes off. In addition to that scene, the film has many other very touching scenes. Gregory Peck and Mary Badham are in most of them and have good chemistry which makes these scenes quite believable.

The ending also really brings out the best of everything and is quite powerful on every level. It even made me shed a tear. Finally, it was very cool to see a young Robert Duvall.

What I am not a fan of in the film is some of the actions of the characters and also some of the wardrobes. The younger characters seem to run rampant through the town without any supervision and this feels very unrealistic. Along with that, some of the characters don't seem to change their shirts even though the movie is set over a three year period.

Even though I'm pretty tired of this story due to all the work I did with it in school, I still recognize that this film is pretty special and one of the best films of the 1960's.

4.5/5

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