Wednesday, October 17, 2007

Movie picks of the last two weeks


Sunshine:

While the hollywood bean counters want to tell us that the smart science fiction movie is dead, they are claerly not speaking about Quality. Dark, bleak and intelligent with a great cast Sunshine is a great film and more proof of Danny Boyle's skill as a filmmaker. What he did best perhaps was gather an excellent cast who worked well together. the captain of the space vessel was Hiroyuki Sanada the star of the underrated Twilight Samurai and Michelle Yeoh who is fantastic in a non-stereotypical role.

Rescue Dawn: Warner Herzog is back in the jungle and it was worth the wait. This tale of a U.S. fighter pilot shot down and captured in Vietnam is pretty amazing film. Christian bale proves again that he is the bravest actor out there. Great stuff.

No retreat no surrender: Amazing crappy action movie directed by Corey Yuen who made respectable films in china staring Jet Li. This film kicks ass but i would not use the word respectable. It is a low budget rip-off of the karate kid complete with breakdancing scenes,training sequences featuring the ghost of Bruce Lee and best of all early Jean Claude Van Damme as the villian. Watched it with Bru-dawg, he approved.

The Thing: Watched this on the big screen at the HP Lovecraft fest, the place was packed and wow what difference watching with an audience and all huge on the big ass screen makes. A funnier, creepier(as if it wasn’t enough on TV)experience. Reminds you the value of the movie experience.

Tears of a black tiger: Crazy off the hook set design and color add a great dimension to this Thai western. The battles are bloody squib-tastic fests and include bazookas. Is this the birth of the Pad Thai western?

Demons:

Bru-dawg pick. Argento produced Italian gorefest with Motley Crue, the scorpions and Rick Springfield(!?!) on the soundtrack. The paper thin plot about a demons siege of a movie theater is awesome and most importantly short.

Yor Hunter of the future: Bru-dawg brought this gem over. What an awesome – yet god awful piece of crap. Amazing prog-metal theme song into a strange post nuclear war cave man fight aliens movie. With a finger poised on the fast forward button you will enjoy this. if you watch this and Zardoz in the same night your brainwill just stop working.

Book and the sword:

A made for Chinese mini-series based on my favorite Kungfu wuxia pan novel was nerve wracking choice at movie madness. On one hand I wanted to see it. On the other I assumed the production value would be crap. I was surprised to find excellent fights, well done wirework and the budget only shined through a few times. If you are a kungfu dork who wants to see a somewhat faith adaptation of a Wuxia pan classic it’s worth a rental.




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