Saturday, April 29, 2006

Films I have seen

I saw King Kong last night at film group, and was... underwhelmed? Uninspired? No, I think completely ambivalent would be right. It looked nice, the special effects were impressive, and there were some truly scary and creepy parts (especially the mega-bugs at the bottom of the chasm). But I never felt particularly engaged with the story, and Jack Black's character essentially annoyed me three hours. So yeah, King Kong? Meh.

A film that I saw a few weeks ago that did engage me was V for Vendetta. Oh my god, truly amazing. It's been a long time since I've seen a movie that I... connected with? so quickly. It's dark, and menacing, and the parallels with what's going on in the world right now hit just a little too close to home. But when I walked out of the cinema I felt, well, inspired. It's a truly powerful film, made so by truly powerful performances by Hugo Weaving and Natalie Portman. Hugo Weaving in particular was absolutely incredible, delivering an immensely emotive performance without ever showing his face. Top stuff.

I also watched Kiss Kiss Bang Bang last week - hilarious! Robert Downey Jr. has always rocked my world (he was the only redeeming feature of Ally McBeal towards the end), but who knew Val Kilmer was funny? More top stuff!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

King Kong - Everytime Jack Black came on screen a piece of me died inside.

V for Vendetta - Best film a have seen in some time - John Hurt rocks my worlds

The Other One - Haven't seen it

Bye the bye - have you see Capote yet? It hasn't come to the cinemas up this way - If you saw it, did you think it was any good?

Mads said...

I usually love Jack Black - School of Rock is one hell of a good movie! - but I'm not all that convinced by his move to 'serious' movies. I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt though, because I suspect that he did the best he could with pretty dodgy material: that character was going to be excruciatingly annoying, no matter who played him.

Yes! for John Hurt. Yes! for the entire movie, really, but I'd forgotten about the wonder of John Hurt. Hugo Weaving's magnificence just overwhelms everything else for me.

You should watch Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, Matt, I think you'd love it.

And that's a no to the Capote - it's not on a film group this semester, so I guess it'll pop up next time.