Babbling about movies

The girl who played with fire (Flickan som lekte med elden) (2009)

2009-09-12T16:18:00.006+03:00

Stieg Larsson's bestselling Millenium -trilogy is being transformed into movies. The girl who played with fire is the second part in the series, and continues the story that started in The girl with the dragon tattoo, the story of the hacker Lisbeth Salander and the Millenium -magazine's editor in chief Mikael Blomkvist.

Lisbeth (Noomi Rapace) returns to Sweden after about a year's "exile" and immediately gets the "men who hate women" on her tail. Mikael (Michael Nyqvist) has not heard a single word from Lisbeth since she disappeared after the events in The girl with the dragon tattoo. Mikael starts working with a freelance-journalist Dag, who has with his girlfriend (who is doing her doctoral thesis of the subject) done research of the buying and selling of women. In their research they have found interesting things about some high ranking state officials participating in the trade, and want to get their names in public.

When Dag and his girlfriend are murdered and in the gun the fingerprints of Lisbeth are found, everyone in the police as well as among the criminals in question start chasing the gothic, tattooed young woman. More horrifying details are revealed of Lisbeth's past and finally she gets to meet her past, face to face. And this is the most I can tell you without spoiling the story :)

The girl who played with fire does not quite reach the quality of its predecessor. The girl with the dragon tattoo was a masterpiece among thrillers in every detail with such an intensity that can only be admired. Thematically it was unique because of the feministic and anti-racist plot. Part two continues the same style, but as a whole is more fragmented and difficult to follow.

Following the complex story leaning only to subtitles is a bit difficult. My knowledge of Swedish is not very good and I found myself having some difficulties in understanding everything that was happening, as the story moves forward in such a fast speed and it does not waste too much time in explaining things. Also you may get more out of the story if you have read the original novels... I had not.

However, The girl who played with fire is filled with the same feminist energy as its predecessor and Rapace pulls her amazing and complex role again with such a skill that must be applauded. This movie focuses even more to Lisbeth's character and makes it definitely Rapace's film. Lisbeth is a female character with an attitude that is seldom seen in movies these days, and this along with her strange and horrifying past makes her one of the most interesting movie female characters in a long time!

Final verdict: Does not quite match its predecessor, but is still a very good thriller with interesting characters and focus on important issues of human trade and women's rights as well as the state of the psychiatric health care. Lisbeth Salander is one of the most interesting female characters in a long time, and Noomi Rapace does a marvellous job in personating her. Recommended to people who enjoy quality thrillers and who are not afraid of watching a Swedish film.

Directed by Daniel Alfredson
Written by Jonas Frykberg, based on Stieg Larsson's novel
Cast Noomi Rapace, Michael Nyqvist, Georgi Staykov, Sofia Ledarp
IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1216487/
***** by Paivi

Happy Birthday to us!

2009-08-29T08:00:00.001+03:00

Movie Babblings is one year old today =) Happy birthday to us!
My movie friends had suggested me to start an own movie blog and finally I did last August. It took me a while to get into the world of blogging, but once I did, it seems there's no turning back. After a while having a blog in English, I felt the urge to write also in Finnish - as you can see from my other blog The Hangman's Joke.

Although I started Movie Babblings in August, it was not until in spring 2009 that the blog started getting more content when I joined forces with a long time friend and movie geek Sari. It has been quiet here during the summer because of holidays and everything, but things should change :)

Thank you to all our readers!
Paivi

Brüno (2009)

2009-07-09T21:08:00.012+03:00

In 2006 Sacha Baron Cohen introduced the world to Borat, a reporter from Kazakhstan who shocked the USA when traveling around and looking for Pamela to make her his wife. The "semi-documentary" style movie gained Cohen an Oscar-nomination for Adapted Screenplay and many considered Borat the best comedy of the year.

This year Cohen brings his third character, a gay Austrian fashionista named Brüno, to the big screen. This time however it is not as easy to make the movie as documentary in style because Cohen's face is so well known all over that it's hard to fool people.

In Austria Brüno runs his own tv-show called Funkyzeit, but when he creates a disaster in the Milan fashion week, he gets fired and even his boyfriend dumps him. Deeply hurt Brüno decides to move to L.A. and become a celebrity there. His assistant Lutz (Gustaf Hammarsten) is the only one who has faith in him, and comes along.

In L.A. Brüno finds out it is not easy to become a celebrity, especially with his style - stereotypic gay guy who is not afraid to show a talking penis in his tv-show. Lessons are learned though, and as people become famous for their charity work, Brüno decides to bring peace to Middle-East. When even that does not work, he adopts a baby from Africa. And when even *that* does not work, he decides that to become a celebrity, one must turn heterosexual, like "Tom Cruise did".

Brüno is one of the funniest comedies this year. It is one of those that really make you laugh out loud. But it is not a movie to everyone as it's goal is clearly to shock conservative people. The story flows in a similar manner as does the story of Borat - Brüno travels around, meets real people and makes his moves to shock, irritate and question people, their openness and morals. This includes meeting a preacher who turns homosexuals to heterosexuals, a couple of PR-blondes, a bunch of hunters and a talk show audience.

Some parts are clearly staged but most of the movie is still hilarious, and especially the final scene in the wrestling ring made me cry out of laughter. And it is not just Cohen who makes the audience laugh, it is also the counter shame that one feels for the people who meet Brüno, who has totally no limits.

But despite its controversial theme, is Brüno himself homophobic? The stereotypic gay and the extreme sex scenes may be translated as homophobic as well.

Final verdict: Extremely funny and controversial comedy of a gay Austrian fashionista by Sacha Baron Cohen. Brings up the prejudices many people have against gay people and shocks with the open sexuality.

Directed by Larry Charles

Written by Sacha Baron Cohen, Anthony Hines
Cast Sacha Baron Cohen, Gustaf Hammarsten

IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0889583/

by Paivi

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (2009)

2009-07-08T20:36:00.011+03:00

Directed by David Yates
Written by Steve Kloves, based on J.K. Rowling's novel
Cast Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Rupert Grint, Tom Felton, Michael Gambon, Alan Rickman, Jim Broadbent, Bonnie Wright, Helena Bonham Carter
IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0417741/

Reviewed by Paivi
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Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, the sixth installation of the Potter -series is a story of Harry's (Daniel Radcliffe) sixth Hogwarts wizard school year. The evil lord Voldemort has gained more and more strength and his impact has reached even the muggle world - bridges are collapsing and people are dying because of the work done by his Death Eaters. This affects also the wizarding school and the school is covered by extra protective spells to prevent the evil from coming inside the school grounds. However, even the best is not always enough, the evil has its ways, and this leads to events that make Harry once again lose someone important to him.

Voldemort and his Death Eaters are not the only pain the students in Hogwarts face. They are growing up and it is no less than sex that causes them trouble and heartache.

Hogwarts school gets a new Potions teacher, professor Slughorn (Jim Broadbent) and former Potions master, professor Snape (Alan Rickman) gets to teach the Defence against the Dark Arts (it's a pity all of the actual classes have been cut of the movie). Slughorn is not asked to Hogwarts by professor Dumbledore (Michael Gambon) without a reason, but he holds a secret Harry must find out, as this secret may help in destroying lord Voldemort.

Finally - professor Dumbledore takes Harry along with him in the action. The headmaster gives Harry a lot of new information on Voldemort and together they continue discovering the Evil Lords secrets in their attempt of destroying him once and for all.

Half-Blood Prince continues the Potter-saga in a very similar fashion as the couple of previous movies have done - it leaves most of the book's complex plotlines out. This is good in a way that it is impossible to squeeze everything from those enormous novels into a bit over 2-hour-movie. But even though something has been gained, something is also lost in this process, and Half-Blood Prince feels a bit hollow, as if it was made without a heart totally involved. The biggest flaw is probably the fact that even though the name of the movie is Half-Blood Prince, the mystery around the Prince is totally left out and the discovery of the Prince in the final scene seems almost corny.

The pains and sorrows of growing up are very prominent in the movie, so much it made me ask were they really that important? That so many scenes were included in the movie in the expense of the actual Harry-Voldemort -story? I would have preferred a deeper digging into the storyline that really matters, and leave the love life of the young ones less visible - after all it is not that much visible in the original story either.

The main trio of the saga have really grown up, but they still fit into their roles as before. Emma Watson (Hermione Granger) has grown up to be a total stunner and Rupert Grint's (Ron Weasley) talent as a comedian has strengthened on. Radcliffe has always had a bit stiff style of acting, and he continues the same way. Tom Felton (Harry's arch enemy Draco Malfoy) however looks perfectly like his father's son in his suit. Rickman as Snape and Gambon as Dumbledore are brilliant as always. It is wonderful to see these classic actors work so well in a movie targeted to young audiences.

Half-Blood Prince offers the fans of the saga a nice and working piece of magic and action, but don't expect to see a masterpiece.

Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky (2009)

2009-06-24T20:45:00.000+03:00

Directed by Jan Kounen
Written by Carlo de Boutiny and Jan Kounen
Cast Mads Mikkelsen, Anna Mouglalis, Yelena Morozova, Anatole Taubman
IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1023441/

Reviewed by Paivi
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There are two Coco Chanel biographies released this year. Coco avant Chanel stars Audrey Tautou (Amelie) as the leading lady and the movie is released later this year. Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky (starring Anna Mouglasis as Coco and Mads Mikkelsen as Igor) shows only a small part of Coco's life and focuses on her relationship with the Russian composer.

Coco Chanel was a very independent woman for her time. After her lover called Boy (Anatole Taubman) was killed in a car accident, she decided to live alone in her huge mansion, interiors designed by herself. The actual Chanel mansion is used in filming the scenes. Coco is a fan of music and an admirer of everything brave. When she witnesses the almost riot that follows the "scandalous" premiere of Igor Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring, she wants to get to know the composer.

Stravinsky lives with his wife (Yelena Morozova) who is sufferfing of tuberculosis and children in a small flat and Coco invites them all to live in her mansion - allowing Igor a possibility to more space for his musical creativity. Coco and Igor are drawn to each other and finally end up having an affair.

Brilliantly filmed movie uses beautiful visuals. Every single frame is like a work of art. However, the story itself is missing the passion that should be present between the two artists. Coco even though very well presented as an independent woman feels calculating and cold without any emotions.

The Danish actor Mikkelsen makes Igor a vulnerable man, a man drawn to two directions - the wealth and love of Coco and on the other hand his loyalty to his wife and children. Also for a man and an artist it is difficult to accept the fact that the woman is also an artist and with her own will and self esteem.

Chéri (2009)

2009-06-17T18:45:00.005+03:00

Directed by Stephen Frears

Written by Christopher Hampton, based on Colette's novels
Cast Michelle Pfeiffer, Rupert Friend, Kathy Bates

IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1179258/

Reviewed by Paivi

Michelle Pfeiffer and Stephen Frears worked together in 1988, doing the romantic 3-Oscar-winning drama Dangerous Liaisons, which gained the first nomination also to Pfeiffer. Three years ago Frears made The Queen that gathered success around and brought its leading lady Helen Mirren an Oscar.

With Chéri Frears and Pfeiffer travel back to France and to the time before the World Wars, the time known as Belle Epoque, when courtisans were a visible part of the society. The most successful courtisans lived luxurious lives in beautiful houses, surrounded by beautiful dresses, jewelry and their own staff. The story is based on novels by Colette.

Pfeiffer is Lea, a luxury courtisan who is aging and planning on retiring. She has experienced all kinds of love, except the true love. One day when visiting her old colleague Madame Peloux, played by brilliant Kathy Bates, she is tempted to kiss Madame's 19-year-old son Fred, nick named Chéri (Rupert Friend). Unexpectedly the kiss turns their lives upside down and they find themselves living together for many years.

When Madame Peloux informs that she has arranged a good marriage with a wealthy young girl Edmee (Felicity Jones) for her son, both Lea's and Chéri's dreams come tumbling down and they realise their affection is something deeper than just lust and friendship.

Wonderful Pfeiffer is the heart of this movie. As an aging beauty, insecure and troubled at the inevitable fate of her body slowly losing its youth and glamour, Pfeiffer does a convincing job. Also as a woman so involved in all sort of love affairs in her life, finally finding true love and losing it to a younger woman she is a fragile work of art.

Rupert Friend as the young courtisan's son is at ease in a role many others might have been afraid of performing. He is a good looking angel face with a gorgerous body when naked, and considering he's working with such a big name as Pfeiffer, he pulls his role as her lover professionally.

Visually stunning surroundings, beautifully framed pictures give the drama an extra essense. Frears is at best in directing movies of interesting personas - Chéri shows this the similar way as The Queen did.

Final verdict: Beautifully shot Belle Epoque drama of the love affair of an older woman and a younger man. Strong and convincing characters played by brilliant actors, especially the lovely Michelle Pfeiffer. Watch for next year's Oscar nominations and especially costume design category.

UP 3D (2009)

2009-06-01T06:21:00.018+03:00

Directed by Pete Docter, Bob Peterson (co-director)
Written by Bob Peterson (screenplay)
Cast Edward Asner, Christopher Plummer, Jordan Nagai, Bob Peterson, Delroy Lindo, Jerome Ranft, Elie Docter, Jeremy Leary
IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1049413/

Reviewed by Sari
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UP 3D is yet another 3D-animated film on the theaters and it's also the latest Disney-Pixar production from the makers of Toy Story, Finding Nemo and Cars. This colorful story starts from the early childhood of an old man, Carl Fredricksen (voices, young Carl by Jeremy Leary, old Carl by Edward Asner), who is the leading character in this animated film.

He once was a quiet little boy, who meets a rascal girl called Ellie (voice by Elie Docter), falls in love with her and finally marries her. So it's the classic love story, so to speak. Carl and Ellie are one extremely happy couple, and they share the same dream of going on an adventure to South America one day. They even dream about having their house at the edge of The Paradise Falls. But their life passes by and the adventure seems always to be postponed further. Until the day Ellie gets seriously ill and passes away.

Carl is now alone, being an 78-year old man and is facing the fact that the adventure they so wanted to experience never took a place in their life. But things start to change for him and one day he decides to literally "take off" and is soon flying high on the sky in his house, thousands of balloons carrying him to his destination, South America.

For his suprise a young wilderness explorer Russell (voice by Jordan Nagai) is going to share this experience with him and these two soon find they way to South America and face the most interesting situations and characters while trying to move Carl's house to the right spot, next to The Paradise Falls, that Ellie so dearly loved.

On their way to the falls they run into a rare bird species, a pack of talking dogs and end up inside a large cave, where Carl's childhood hero, the ultimate explorer Charles Muntz (voice by Christopher Plummer) lives and has trained all these obedient dogs. Carl is excited to meet him, but it's soon quite obvious that Charles is not a good man, but he is actually after something they possess and this leads into an exciting and intense chaise.

The story starts quite smoothly and takes you to the early years of Carl's life, giving you a nostalgic feel of his past. It's also quite funny to see him and Russell battling their way to South America flying on a house carried by colorful balloons, trying to find the perfect spot to that beautiful, old house. At some point the story gets a bit chaotic though, especially from the point where they run into a talking dog called Dug, and then into a whole pack of talking dogs, leading their way to an old explorer behind them, Charles Muntz. I wasn't sure if I understood the funniness behind the talking dog theme, but then again, I really loved that old man Carl and his little companion Russell and felt that those two were meant to be together on this adventure.

UP being and animated film is of course a film made for the whole family and especially children, so perhaps the storyline and all the peculiar characters will open up better for the younger age groups than us grown-ups. Visually the 3D-film is just stunning and I especially enjoyed all the vivid colors, the high-quality animation and all the 3D-effects, which we could all expect to be excellent after seeing all those previous Disney-Pixar films.

UP is an entertaining animation which you want to take your kids to see and let them enjoy all the craziness and chaos of this everyway colorful, animated film. And don't be suprised if you enjoy it yourself, too.

Terminator Salvation (2009)

2009-05-27T18:25:00.007+03:00

Directed by McG
Written by John D. Brancato, Michael Ferris
Cast Christian Bale, Sam Worthington, Anton Yelchin, Moon Bloodgood, Helena Bonham Carter, Bryce Dallas Howard

IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0438488/

Reviewed by Paivi

The legendary leader John Connor, the son of even more legendary Sarah Connor, has been previously played (in movies) by Edward Furlong (young and rebellous one who played Guns N' Roses loud in his cassette player in T2) and Nick Stahl (a young adult in T3). This time it is Christian Bale's turn and the year is 2018 (and he's still playing Guns N' Roses when driving on a "motorbike") and John Connor has become the warrior legend we have heard so much about, the leader of the resistance against the machines of Skynet.

Not many years have passed but the Skynet has conquered the whole world with its machines and Terminators, cities and all working infrastructures are gone and no food is visible anywhere. Humans are living in small groups, some are battling against the machines along with the resistance, some are just trying to survive.

Skynet is developing better and better Terminators all the time and time is running out of the humans. They need to figure out a way to hit strong into the Skynet's system or they will go extinct.

The Resistance gets help from a very strange source when Marcus Wright (Sam Worthington), a convicted murderer from 2003 whose last memory is his execution, is found from the desert. Marcus had earlier befriended with teenager Kyle Reese (Anton Yelchin, last seen in Star Trek as Chekov) (the future dad of John Connor) and when Kyle is kidnapped by the machines, Marcus helps John in getting to his rescue.

Terminator Salvation is all action war movie and only a little bit of drama. Which is a pity because almost two hours of shooting of Terminators and other machines does not exactly carry the whole movie. It amazed me how on earth had the Skynet with its machines managed in destroying the entire planet in just a few years and in developing such a fancy and sophisticated system for itself. Also the production of a certain well-developed infiltrator-Terminator is not believable because all the other Terminators are so different, so simple machines. And I don't even start talking about making successful heart transplants in field conditions and without any knowledge of the matching blood types...

We do hear the famous quote "I'll be back" and we see a digitally produced Arnold Schwarzenegger, but those feel fake. All humour that can be seen in previous Terminator -movies is gone, Terminator Salvation is very serious, laughless piece of action. Most of the action scenes are however well done and the scene when the special-Terminator is revealed is the best scene in the whole movie.

Just wait for new Terminator -movies in the future: John Connor's wife Kate (Claire Danes from T3 replaced by Bryce Dallas Howard) is pregnant (this is no spoiler because she is already pregnant in her first scene) so probably Connors' child will continue the father's work in making the world free again?

The Soloist (2009)

2009-05-27T00:55:00.010+03:00

Directed by Joe Wright
Written by Susannah Grant (screenplay), Steve Lopez (book)
Cast Jamie Foxx, Robert Downey Jr., Justin Martin, Nelsan Ellis, Lisa Gay Hamilton

IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0821642/

Reviewed by: Sari
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The Soloist is a true story inspired by a book written by journalist Steve Lopez.

The movie starts with a violin, a homeless guy and a journalist, who is in need to find a new subject for his column and ends up meeting a homeless guy called Nathaniel Ayers (Jamie Foxx). The journalist happens to be Steve Lopez (Robert Downey Jr.), Los Angeles Times columnist who immediately sees something special in Nathaniel and starts to investigate his past. He discovers that Nathaniel was once a very talented cellist, who also studied in Juilliard School for gifted, but who dropped out after the second year due to mental health problems.

Steve is intriqued by Nathaniel and these two get closer. Steve finds himself wondering among homeless people in the streets of Los Angeles and gets a whole new picture of their situation. Steve now has a mission. He wants to get Nathaniel's life back on it's track and uses his contacts to try and help him out. Eventually he realizes that big concert halls and public events are not meant for Nathaniel but he is still there to help him and even gets him an apartment of his own. Eventually Nathaniel shows his darker side and Steve gets frightened and stays out of his life for a while, but at the end these two people from two different worlds are still able to remain friends.

This was yet again an unbeliavably strong performance by Jamie Foxx, which was not a big suprise after seeing him in the legendary role of Ray Charles in the movie Ray. Here the role is still so much more challenging. Playing a mentally unstable, musically gifted genius is not a role for everyone, but Jamie Foxx nailed it. Robert Downey Jr. as Steve Lopez was no less performance, and he once again proved to be one talented and strong actor, even though the main focus of this film is on Nathaniel.

This movie is an eye-opening experience and really gets you to think about the less fortunate homeless people who live among us. There are so many untold stories behind those faces and tired-looking eyes. So many chances, so many lost talents, like Nathaniel.

Considering this The Soloist was not just a story of Nathaniel. It also represented the situation of homeless people here in U.S. In a way it was a little reflection of our society and the sad fact that so much more should be done to help these people. In our society we have learned to turn our heads away from all the misery and sadness, concentrating on our own success and material needs. Hopefully this movie gets people to talk and even creates some kind of action to help all these people in need.

I was deeply touched by this story and the message it delivered. Beautiful, soulful story, that will for sure linger inside my mind for quite some time.

2009 movies summarised

2009-05-21T18:40:00.003+03:00

The movies released this year and which we have either reviewed or seen will from now on be summarised in a chart that you can find in the right hand side image link :) Check in there if you don't immediately find the movie you are looking for!

Observe and Report (2009)

2009-05-20T13:18:00.007+03:00

Directed by Jody Hill
Written by Jody Hill
Cast Seth Rogen, Ray Liotta, Anna Faris, Michael Peña, Collette Wolfe

IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1197628/

Reviewed by Paivi

Observe and report is a strange comedy of a mall security guard Ronnie, played by Seth Rogen, who would like to be something more than just someone observing and reporting to the real police - he would himself love be allowed to carry a gun like a proper police officer. His prayers are answered in the form of a flasher who starts harassing the female customers and employees of the mall. Ronnie takes the "flasher case" as his own, and plans to solve it before the real police led by agent Harrison (Ray Liotta).

Apart from being the head of the mall security, Ronnie is in love with the beautiful Brandi (Anna Faris) from the cosmetics section, lives with his alcoholic mother (Celia Weston), has a bi-polar disorder for which he is taking medication and becomes friends with cute and friendly Nell (Collette Wolfe) from a coffee shop.

When Ronnie's dream of a career in the police force is wrecked because of his mental disorder and delusions, hell breaks loose in the mall.

Observe and report is a strange comedy, because it is not really a comedy at all and this is what makes it very difficult to review. The characters are not funny, but mostly sad and pathetic, and it is extremely difficult to actually like them in any level. None of them, except maybe Nell.

Security guard taking anti-depressants during lunch and with delusions of killing all the bad guys is just plain sad and not funny. Cosmetics sales girl allowing pretty much anyone to screw her and lying in her own puke is just plain sad and not funny. Alcoholic mother who blames her son for the fact that the father left the family is sad and not funny.

We are used to seeing the funnyman Rogen in roles that make you like his teddybear appearance, laughter and witty dialogue - like for example in Knocked up and Pineapple Express. This role brings us a different Rogen, dark Rogen who is ready to fire a gun and is not sympathetic at all. I personally prefer the other type of Rogen.

Taken (2009)

2009-05-16T23:05:00.025+03:00

Directed by Pierre Morel

Written by Luc Besson, Robert Mark Kamen
Cast Liam Neeson, Maggie Grace, Famke Janssen, Leland Orser, Xander Berkeley, Katie Cassidy

IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0936501/

Reviewed by Sari

What if you are a retired CIA spy, a loving father and ready to help your child whenever possible? What if your child happens to be an adventurous 17-year old girl, ready to explore the world, all by herself? Well, it means that perhaps your help is needed sooner or later, especially Liam Neeson being in the leading role in this fast paced movie.

In Taken Bryan (Liam Neeson) is this ex-spy, living modest life close to his 17-year old daughter Kim (Maggie Grace), who herself lives with her mom Lenore (Famke Janssen) and stepdad Stuart (Xander Berkeley), getting everything she wants and having a very luxurious lifestyle. Bryan doesn't necesserily agree on her daughter's lavish lifestyle and all the freedom her daughter has, but tries to adjust as well as he can. As for him the most important thing is just to be close to his daughter, after all those years serving the country and not being able to spend a lot of time with his family.

Suddenly Kim decides to travel to Paris with her friend Amanda (Katie Cassidy) and Bryan gets very frustrated and even a little paranoid about this idea. He is afraid that she ends up getting in trouble travelling with no adult supervision, but reluctantly sings the papers that free her to go abroad, being under aged. He gives Kim a cell phone and asks her to keep in contact with him all the times, fearing for her safety. Girls have just arrived to Paris and Bryan is on the cell phone with Kim when the inevitable happens. Both girls are being kidnapped by Albanian human smugglers and Bryan is witnessing all this by the phone.

He contacts his friend Sam (Leland Orser) and finds out about the Albanian connection and is immediately on a a plane, on his way to Paris. This leads to a hunt where desperate father is after the criminals trying to figure out their next steps to find her daughter and he doesn't hesitate to use all his power and all the possible ways to rescue Kim.

This movie has all the parameters needed to work like a good action movie should. There is a lot of exciting moments, some pretty intense chasing scenes and the person who makes this film even more interesting is of course Liam Neeson and his character Bryan. Neeson is just wonderful to watch on screen. There is a man who is always so humble, yet extremely talented and can play any role, any time, making it his own thing.

The storyline is not perhaps the strongest possible and at some point it gets pretty obvious what is going to happen next and how the story is going to end. But Neeson keeps the audience in excitement and it is quite obvious to see, that the main responsibility for this movie to succeed lays on Neeson's hands.

Reminds me of those good, old 90s action films with a lot of chasing, excitement and a strong, charismatic person in a leading role. Sometimes that is all it takes to have a good movie experience. So enjoy! I sure did!

Angels and Demons (2009)

2009-05-13T15:00:00.008+03:00

Directed by Ron Howard

Written by David Koepp, Akiva Goldsman, based on Dan Brown's novel

Cast Tom Hanks, Ewan McGregor, Ayelet Zurer, Stellan Skarsgård, Armin Mueller-Stahl

IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0808151/

Reviewed by Päivi

Like so many others, I started my friendship with the author Dan Brown with his novel Da Vinci Code. Few years ago when I was traveling in New Zealand and had already almost two months behind me, I needed something to read and rest my head. I found Angels and Demons from a bookstore and after that the next few days I spent sightseeing the amazing New Zealand by day and adventuring in Vatican by night. After that experience I thought, wow, this would be great to see as a movie!

Now my wish has come true - Angels and Demons is released as a movie version. Tom Hanks continues as the professor Robert Langdon specialised in symbolism as he did in the movie version of Da Vinci Code. (I have always had problems with Hanks as Langdon because he is not at all that convincing, handsome professor I pictured him in my mind...) Langdon is invited to Vatican City after the Pope has died and four cardinals - preferiti, the most popular choices to become a new Pope - have been kidnapped by an ancient secret society called Illuminati. A cryptic message is left behind and the Vatican wants the world famous symbolist to help them in saving the lives of the cardinals.

At the same time a container of antimatter is stolen from the LHC lab (Large Hadron Collider) in CERN Switzerland. A physicist studying the antimatter, Vittoria Vetra (Ayelet Zurer), has traveled to Vatican as well because not only have the cardinals been kidnapped, also the whole Vatican is in danger of exploding because the antimatter may work as a bomb.

While the Pope's camerlengo (Ewan McGregor) heads the papal office and leads the cardinals into a conclave to try to elect a new pope. Langdon and Vetra run around the Vatican and Rome in search of the ancient Path of Illumination, the kidnapped cardinals and the antimatter container.

Angels and Demons the movie is filled with action. Everything happens within five hour timeframe and as the pretty complicated story is squeezed into two and a half hours, the action is at times breathtaking. The screenplay is written well, it sticks together and does not fall apart despite the various possibilities. The focus of the story is mainly in the riddle of the Path of Illumination, the four elements of science and how they are combined with the four missing cardinals and pretty much everything else from the book is left out.

For someone not familiar with the novel, this is one hell of an action ride with interesting twists and turns and a very different angle for a mystery thriller. It is fascinating to see how the Vatican works and see a glimpse of the secrets vaults of Vatican (which are of course not real because director Ron Howard was not allowed to film in Vatican but he had to recreate Vatican elsewhere). But for those who know the story. the thrill gets lost at times, and it is often difficult to really stay interested in what happens to who.

Overall, Angels and Demons is pretty loyal to the original story, is well acted, has good action sequences, interesting twists, introduces us to the art and history of Vatican and Rome, but is a bit soulless. It runs it's course in a decent way, but instead of being either black or white, it leaves a somewhat grey feeling.

Star Trek (2009)

2009-05-10T20:49:00.007+03:00

Directed by J.J. Abrams

Written by Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman based on Gene Roddenberry's tv-series

Cast Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Karl Urban, Eric Bana, Leonard Nimoy, Zoe Saldana, Bruce Greenwood, Simon Pegg, John Cho, Anton Yelchin

IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0796366/

Reviewed by Päivi

First, let me clarify one thing: I am a Star Wars fan and I have never really seen any Star Treks. So I saw the Star Trek directed by Lost creator J.J. Abrams open minded, without any expectations and no original story to compare it to. Trust me, all I knew was that there were characters named Kirk and Spock, and a spacecraft named Enterprise. And I have to say I was very pleased indeed in what I saw on the big screen: a fascinating space adventure, interesting characters, story well written and visually worth sitting in the theatre for a bit over two hours.

This version of Star Trek is like Batman Begins - it tells the origins of how James T. Kirk became the famous Captain of the U.S.S. Enterprise and how Kirk and Spock became friends. Chris Pine is the young and restless - and fatherless - James Kirk, who tries to pick up girls in a bar when he meets a certain Captain Pike (Bruce Greenwood) who questions his future and tells him to join the space fleet if he wants to honor his father.

Kirk is sceptic but eventually turns out in the recruitment center next morning. Arrogant young man does not please everyone, especially one guy from the planet Vulcan with pointed ears (Zachary Quinto) but he becomes friends with the doctor McCoy (Karl Urban). With the help of McCoy Kirk gets through things he would not otherwise get, fights against a group led by (almost unrecognisable in his mask) Eric Bana's Captain Nero, and eventually turns from an arrogant, selfish youngster to a reliable guy worth of Captain's status.

J.J. Abrams' Star Trek is something you would wish for a good space adventure: cool gadgets and technologies, interesting, brave characters and action that is still not happening on the expense of the story. The growth story of Kirk was very basic, but it worked in a reliable way. Some overacting from Pine especially in the beginning bugged me a bit, as did some extremely cheesy moments, but they did not spoil the overall experience, which was purely entertaining.

A nice addition is the original (from the tv-series in the 60's) Mr. Spock Leonard Nimoy's appearance, and based on the comments of friends' who have seen also the original shows, all characters are very loyal to the originals and all names, personalities and nationalities have been stored unchanged. The diversity of the Enterprise crew was something that I took notice, and I found them all fascinating, well done and well played characters.

Star Warsy stuff, Episode I

2009-05-07T19:55:00.009+03:00

Star Wars is an institute in movies. Not only has the Maker George Lucas made a fortune with the movie saga and the spin-off tv-series, but also with all the merchandise around the movies, Extended Universe of novels and comic books, action figures, toys, collectibles... you name it, uncle George has it.

Since the release of the first ever Star Wars in 1977 have many movie makers used the theme in their creations and included references to the space fantasy in their work. I, as a Star Wars fan, find it extremely entertaining when I notice the beloved adventure featured in other movies.

Last weekend I saw X-Men Origins: Wolverine and the ending scene (can't explain in detail so that I won't spoil the story) reminded me very much of a certain scene in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace, the one when the evil Darth Maul is defeated by young jedi Obi-Wan Kenobi. The scene in Episode I is haunting and the same atmosphere has been captured in Wolverine as well.

A much lighter reference was seen in the recent hit-comedy 17 Again starring Zac Efron. Efron's character's best friend is an adult "fanboy" who has decorated his home with all kinds of fancy merchandise from Star Wars, Lord of the Rings and the type. Even his bed is the shape of Luke Skywalker's landspeeder from A New Hope.

When Efron's character and his friend have a fight, they settle it with one blue and one red Force FX lightsaber (even though the box of the lightsaber says it is a collectible item and not a toy - I know I have two of those myself) - Darth Vader vs Luke Skywalker -style. The scene is so very cute.

References to Star Wars can be seen literally everywhere. These movies that came out this spring are just two most recent examples. The story continues...

Duplicity (2009)

2009-05-06T15:42:00.011+03:00

Directed by Tony Gilroy

Written by Tony Gilroy

Cast Julia Roberts, Clive Owen, Paul Giamatti, Tom Wilkinson

IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1135487/

Reviewed by Päivi

Tony Gilroy, the man behind many engaging cinematic stories such as Michael Clayton, Jason Bourne -series, The Devil's Advocate, an Oscar-nominated director of Michael Clayton and also a man behind another new thriller State of Play (reviewed in here) has written and directed Duplicity, a story of two spies who end up falling in love.

Clive Owen is Ray Koval, a MI-6 agent on a mission in Dubai when he meets Claire Stenwick (Julia Roberts), a CIA agent. There's something about Claire, thinks Ray, and ends up in bed with the lady... only to find himself next morning, drugged, and all his secret papers stolen by the other agent.

Time passes, the agents' paths meet again and it seems they can't stay away from each other. Because they know so many of the agent tricks, they start planning together a gig that would lead them to big money. But they have a problem: how to be able to trust each other? They are a perfect match in a way that they understand each other, but they are both so deep in their jobs that betrayal and mistrust is always in their minds.

Their plan involves two soap industry bosses, played brilliantly by Tom Wilkinson and Paul Giamatti (check especially the opening of the movie, when the two middle aged bosses have a fight in slow motion - just hilarious). A lot of spying, counter spying and a very very complicated plot follows, and I'm not going to explain that to you because it would spoil the surprises, and eventually everything pretty much turns upside down and everyone is confused on who betrayed who.

The complex story is very well written and the actors play their parts nicely. Especially Giamatti and Wilkinson are awesome as those soap moguls who try everything to find the magic product and especially launch it first (no matter who originally invented it). It is interesting to see all the complexities in industry secrets, how those big companies are well organised like countries who hold national secrets and they even have their own agents in house. In case of a big invention that might bring the company billions of dollars, this is understandable.

Roberts and Owen are cute as professional spies who are very efficient and self confident in what they do, but who are so vulnerable and insecure when it comes to questions about love. Owen is showing his usual charm and he fits into the role beautifully. Roberts is a bit missing her charisma as an ice-cold spy, and it is easy to understand why Ray questions her love.

There are a lot of twists and turns in the story, and still the ending brought a little surprise with it, which is pretty rare nowadays. And I totally loved the end scene with the champagne and all. Duplicity is recommended to all who enjoy crime/thriller stories with some comedy inside.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009)

2009-05-02T19:20:00.016+03:00

Directed by Gavin Hood

Written by David Benjoff, Skip Woods

Cast Hugh Jackman, Liev Schreiber, Danny Huston, Ryan Reynolds, Lynn Collins. Taylor Kitsch, Daniel Henney, Dominic Monaghan, Kevin Durand, Will i Am

IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0458525/

Reviewed by Päivi

When I was a teenage girl, I loved reading X-Men comics (and other Marvel-comics as well). My two favourite characters were Wolverine and Storm - Storm for being so beautiful (especially when her hair was cut and she was wearing it as a mohican) and so powerful with her talent on controlling the weather, and then Wolverine - for being the tough guy with those magnificent claws and a skeleton made of some fancy sounding adamantium. Also, what combines these two characters was that their past is interesting: it holds secrets only few people know.

When they made movies of X-Men, I was happy to find my other favourite character performed by an actor that suits the character perfectly. Yeah well, Hugh Jackman is a lot taller than Wolverine in the comics, but that did not matter. He did a brilliant job.

A movie of this character's origins that so many I've heard thinks as their favourite character, was more than justified. X-Men Origins: Wolverine is exactly what the name tells: how Logan became the adamantium-skeletoned Wolverine.

The story begins with events that lead to young James (Troye Sivan) first witnessing the claws coming out of his hands and killing a man. Terrified of what happened, James and his older brother Victor escape from home. Both of the boys have the skill of healing fast and eventually they end up fighting back to back in many wars. It is not until in Vietnam war when the then grown up brothers (Hugh Jackman and Liev Schreiber) are spotted by a certain William Stryker (Danny Huston) who recruits the brothers to his secret group of overly skilled soldiers.

The many wars have made their mark on the brothers: when James (now known as Logan) has grown to hate all the killing, Victor has learned to love his power. When Stryker takes them on a mission that is morally questionable in nature, James leaves the group and for many years lives a harmonic and peaceful life in the Canadian Rockies with beautiful Kayla (Lynn Collins). But Logan is not meant to live in peace, and after six peaceful years his brother finds him which leads to events that give birth to the Wolverine we all know.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine is a dark story with a lot of emotions. It is a very well made action flick with all the compounds an action fan would enjoy. But it has also flaws that made me drop off one star from the review.

South-African born and awarded director Gavin Hood has all the tools to make a great film of one of the most-loved comic characters ever, but sometimes he relies too much on the old action cliches where the hero walks out of a scene of an exploding helicopter just a few meters behind without looking back for example.

Also the visual effects are often not at the level they should be. For example the scene when Wolverine admires his new adamantium claws for the first time, they look fake, and with all the technology available today, this kind of essential thing from the story's point of view should be pretty basic to make look real. In some scenes I was really wondering how the effects could be so poorly made in a movie of this big budget.

But overall, Wolverine is a decent piece of entertainment. The story rests on Jackman's charisma pretty strongly, which is understandable because of the awesome charisma of last year's sexiest man on Earth. Jackman makes Wolverine the character we know from Marvel's comics, and even though he still brings some new life to the character, he does it in such a subtle way that the audience is totally bought.

Of the other mutants seen on the flick, we can see among others Ryan Reynolds' swordman Wade, Kevin Durand as Blob, Dominic Monaghan as Bolt, Will i Am as John Wraith, Daniel Henney as Agent Zero and Tim Pocock as young Scott Summers (future leader of the X-Men, Cyclops). Also Taylor Kitch's Gambit does some cool stuff with his cards.

Bolt 3D (2008)

2009-04-29T20:19:00.002+03:00

Animations made in 3D seem to be getting more and more common, and no wonder because the technology allows the makers do so many wonderful things these days. However, the fancy technology is not the only thing that makes a good movie. It is also the old-fashioned story that needs to be good to engage audiences with full force. No matter how shiny the picture is, if the viewers don't feel satisfied with the characters and the story, the makers have lost the magic touch of movie making.

Bolt is one proof that the magic still exists. It is a story of a super dog Bolt (English voice by John Travolta) who battles against the bad green eyed villain Dr. Calisco (voice by Malcolm McDowell) with his human girl Penny (voice by Miley Cyrus) - in TV. Bolt does not know he is just an actor and that his super powers are not real.

When an evil cat comes laughing at the ignorant dog, he suddenly makes a mistake escape from the movie studio, and ends up accidentally in the other side of the continent in New York. In New York he meets Mittens the cat (voice by Susie Essman) and gets tied up with her in his plans on returning to Hollywood to save Penny from Dr. Calisco. However, why his super powers don't work, he can not understand.

Bolt and Mittens start their long journey accross the country and in one trailer park bump into Rhino the hamster (voice by Mark Walton) who is Bolt's number one fan and likes living inside a transparent ball. Rhino wants to join Bolt and Mittens, and the journey continues all the way to Hollywood.

As a dog loving person I knew that I would like this at least in some level, but was pleasantly surprised with the quality of both the story and the technology. The animation just looks plain awesome in 3D - all those animals hairs look so real and the 3D really works beautifully by making the movie an enjoyment to watch.

The animal characters are incredibly cute, but they still have their own personalities and some edge. The dialogue is witty and charming. The version I saw was dubbed in Finnish so I can not comment on the original voice actors. However the Finnish version worked incredibly well with all those nice dialects some of the supporting cast was using.

Bolt is highly recommended entertainment for the whole family - a story and characters that engage both children and adults served on such a beautiful plate.

Directed by Byron Howard, Chris Williams

Written by Dan Fogelman, Chris Williams

Cast (English voices) John Travolta (Bolt), Miley Cyrus (Penny), Susie Essman (Mittens), Mark Walton (Rhino), Malcolm McDowell (Dr. Calico)

IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0397892/

State of Play (2009)

2009-04-27T22:41:00.000+03:00

State of Play is a movie based on a British television drama serial, broadcasted on BBC One in 2003. It captures a balanced combination of crime, drama and thriller ingredients. The story begins with an intense chase, where a young criminal runs for his life late in the evening, eventually finding a hiding place from a dark alley, but unfortunately meets his final destiny and gets shot by a mysterious briefcase man, along with a witness, who just happened to be at a wrong place at a wrong time.

The next day an investigative newspaper reporter Cal McAffrey (Russell Crowe) from Washington Globe comes to the crime scene and is curious to know what has happened. He is a well-known reporter among all the cops and detectives and is always there where something's going on.

Later that morning there is a news flash on television about yet another death, this time the victim is a young woman called Sonia Baker (Maria Thayer), who also happens to be Congressman Stephen Collins' (Ben Affleck) assistant and even more, as speculated, his secret lover. Cal happens to see the news and seems to be in awe with all this. And there is also a good reason for his reaction. Stephen Collins happens to be his former college roommate and a close friend of his, but Cal didn't have any idea of his secret affair with this young woman. He now finds himself in a challenging position trying to solve the case and on the other hand trying to help his friend.

He starts to investigate these two crimes with a young reporter, Della Frye (Rachel McAdams), even though at first he is not that interested to work with a young college grad who is still a bit green and concentrates mainly on her political blog in the newspaper. They end up doing the story together after all and as they get deeper to the story, they find out that there is much more going on than just these random deaths. All the incidents are linked together and they soon discover that Congressman Collins is also much deeper into all this than they first thought.

State of Play is well implemented movie, the storyline is strong and keeps you alert till the very end. The cast is phenomenal, Russell Crowe once again showing the audience what an incredibly talented actor he is. Watching his acting as Cal, this old-style reporter was such a strong performance and he was so comfortable with this character it felt like he truly has been a reporter in his former life. His brown corduroy jacket, the long, curly hair and rough, unshaved beard were like the finishing touches to his spectacular role.

Ben Affleck as the congressman Collins was also solid and believable, as well as Rachel McAdams in the role of Della Frye. McAdams added some fresh female energy to this film, along with Helen Mirren in a role of Editor-in-Chief Cameron Lynne. Together these two ladies made a nice balance with the strong smell of testosterone in this reporter-detective story.

Probably one of the strongest movies of its kind this year making you want to see more films like this. Enjoyable movie, with not so much action or violence, but with more investigative and crime-solving perspective.

Directed by Kevin Macdonald

Written by Matthew Michael Carnahan, Tony Gilroy & Billy Ray (screenplay), Paul Abbott (television series)

Cast Russell Crowe, Ben Affleck, Rachel McAdams, Helen Mirren, Robin Wright Penn, Jason Bateman, Viola Davis, Maria Thayer

IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0473705/

17 Again (2009)

2009-04-23T21:02:00.000+03:00

In 1985 Michael J. Fox went back in time to find himself coping with his then-teenage parents; in 1988 Tom Hanks grew Big overnight, from 12-year-old to adult; in 2004 13-year-old Christa B. Allen made a wish to be an adult and woke up as 30-year-old Jennifer Garner. This spring 37-year-old Matthew Perry wishes he was young again - and to his surprise (with the help of an elf disguised as an old janitor of his school) turns into 17-year-old Zac Efron.

Mike O'Donnell (Perry/Efron) was a brilliant basket ball player in high school, who had a wonderful career in front of him as a professional player. But as destiny has a habit of messing with things, his girlfriend Scarlett (young Allison Miller / adult Leslie Mann) informs him they have fooled around with unsafe sex and that she's pregnant. Mike gives up his own dreams and marries the girl and raises a family.

At the age of 37 Mike is frustrated, depressed man whose family life is getting ruined because of his constant self pity. Scarlett wants a divorce and Mike is forced to move to live with his best friend Ned (Thomas Lennon) - a software developer, rich guy and a grown up fanboy living in a house full of memorabilia from Star Wars and Lord of the Rings.

When Mike does not get the promotion at work that he was so waiting for, he thinks everything is over. He goes to his old school (where his own kids now go to school) and sees his glory in the 20 years old photograph. Suddenly an old janitor (Brian Doyle-Murray) asks him if he would want to be young again. Mike says yes, of course, and suddenly he's turned into his 17-year-old self - but current time, not by going back in time.

A lightsaber duel is needed for his friend Ned to believe who he really is, and agrees to pretend to be his father when he goes attending the school again. In school Mike becomes friends with his own son and discovers the lives of his children are not as good as one might think, and starts helping them out.

Adult Scarlett is amazed by how his son's new friend looks so much like her old husband, and feels strangely attracted to the young boy. As does the boy towards Scarlett.

Does Mike manage to fix his children's lives? Does he stay 17 forever? Does he become a big basket ball hero? Does Scarlett get her divorce? - See for yourself!

Much of the movie's appeal rests on Efron's young shoulders: without his charisma and very unique "presence" the movie would be much duller. But he makes the movie an enjoyment. 17 again is very harmless Hollywood comedy that does not really bring anything new to the genre, but it is very well done, the story works and the actors are really good. Well, imagining cute Efron becoming a boring looking Perry is not that fun, and I don't understand why on earth Perry was cast as adult Mike.

The supporting cast, especially Lennon as Mike's weird friend Ned and his love interest, the school's principal Jane Masterson (Melora Hardin) make some extremely fun scenes, for example during their first dinner together. Recommended to fanboys and -girls ;-)

If you want to see a well made, but totally harmless feel good movie, 17 again is a good option. It gives a few laughs, but performs it's humour in a thoughtful manner. Some overacting is of course visible, but not so much it would ruin the entertainment. And the story has a warm heart.

Directed by Burr Steers
Written by Jason Filardi

Cast Zac Efron, Leslie Mann, Thomas Lennon, Matthew Perry, Michelle Trachtenberg, Sterling Knight, Melora Hardin

IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0974661/

Yes Man (2008)

2009-04-23T17:57:00.001+03:00

Yes Man is a story about a guy called Carl (Jim Carrey), who lives a pretty boring life as a junior loan officer at a local bank, has some friends, but prefers staying home watching movies rather than hanging out with them and is still saddened about the fact that he and his wife Stephanie (Molly Sims) divorced three years earlier. His friends are furious at him and especially his best buddy Peter (Bradley Cooper) is quite frustrated with his way to neglet his friends and always making excuses not to meet with him.

Then one day a guy from his past (John Michael Higgins) shows up and gives his a leaflet about a special personal development program and invites him to join them to their next meeting. Carl hesitates and is about to say no, but somehow finds himself at the meeting and suddenly for his own suprise becomes a new covenant for the program that emphasizes the power of saying yes to every opportunity that comes to your way. He soon finds himself being the typical Yes man, saying yes to flying lessons, saying yes to learn korean and even saying yes to the most unexpected loan applications he would never had approved before all this.

But no matter how ridiculous this all may sound, he actually realizes that his life is on its way to a new direction. His career starts to blossom, he has a new, fresh lovelife with a young woman called Allison (Zooey Deshanel) and things seem to be just great. But of course there is a downside to all this craziness and he eventually understands that his life is not only about saying yes, but there is a limit to everything and maybe saying yes to all the opportunities is not the answer to his problems.

This movie really is one crazy comedy and at some point you may face the fact that you either love it or hate it. Jim Carrey sure hasn't changed a bit as an actor and literally flies through the movie with his passionately entertaining and colorful wings giving some pretty darn good scenes to watch. But he surely can be a bit annoying at times and may divide the audience with his overactive character. He has a very strong presence and his charisma is just something else, but is it sometimes too much to handle? He is usually all over the place making faces, overacting and may get the audience to hyperventilate at times.

At first I really didn't know if I liked or hated this movie. But as the movie progressed I had to admit that Carrey is such a goof-ball that I cannot resist but like him, at least a little bit. At times I just laughed tears in my eyes, since some of the scenes were just so over the line. Entertaining comedy to cheer you up on a rainy, grey day.

Directed by Peyton Reed

Written by Danny Wallace (book), Nicholas Stoller, Jarrad Paul and

Andrew Mogel (screenplay)

Cast Jim Carrey, Zooey Deschanel, Bradley Cooper, John Michael Higgins, Molly Sims

IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1068680/

Sunshine Cleaning (2008)

2009-04-23T08:01:00.000+03:00

Sunshine Cleaning is a movie about a young mom Rose Lorkowski (Amy Adams), who raises her son Oscar (Jason Spevack) by herself and is living in a small town, close to her father Joe (Alan Arkin) and her younger sister Norah (Emily Blunt), who still lives with their dad.

Rose was once the head cheerleader and got all the attention of the boys back then. But now she is facing the fact that she is a single mom, still having affair with former football player Mac (Steve Zahn), now a husband to another woman. If this already makes her feel bad about herself, what about the fact that all the other girls from high school have families and careers and she is simply a maid in a small cleaning company, going from house to house and cleaning other people's (also her former school friends) homes.

Then suddenly she hears from Mac that there is a need for crime-scene cleaners and decides to try this thing out with her sister Norah. Norah is a bit rebellious young lady and first laughs out loud at the whole idea, but soon they both find themselves at the crime scenes, cleaning up after all those deadly crimes. Things start to get better for Rose and the business is growing, until Norah messes things up and Rose is facing a new challenge and tries to figure out how to sort things out again and how to forgive her sister.

Sunshine Cleaning is a comedy all right, but I would say that this film is a mixture of both comedy and drama. Okay, it sort of plays around the peculiar lifestyle Rose and her family has and gives you a grin every now and then, but there is also some deeper aspects into this film. It's also a story about sisterhood and motherhood, the family ties and the freedom and acceptance to be yourself amongst your family members. It's also a story about new opportunities and the fact that it really doesn't matter what you do for a living, as long as you enjoy it.

Cast is well-selected and believable. I myself especially enjoyed Emily Blunt as Rose's sister Norah. She really caught my attention and I'm very curious to see more roles from this young lady.

The storyline is bubbly and colorful, but does also have its melancholy moments. It keeps your interest alive till the very end. This is a good choice for a movie to see if you want to experience a mixture of comedy and drama combined with everyday humour and some very interesting career choices.

Directed by Christine Jeffs
Written by Megan Holley

Cast Amy Adams, Emily Blunt, Alan Arkin, Steve Zahn, Mary Lynn Rajskub

IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0862846/

Vin Diesel - the mysterious muscle guy

2009-04-17T21:18:00.000+03:00

The recent box office hit Fast & Furious stars Vin Diesel, the muscular tough guy whose work as an actor is dividing opinions among critics and audiences. He is often considered as a man with just one face and role - the role of the ultimate tough guy who smashes everyone in his way, who does not smile or show any emotions. Some consider his acting skills limited because of this.

Not all think like this - when the director Steven Spielberg saw Diesel's self directed and acted short film Multi-Facial (1994), he wanted the man to work in his war epic Saving Private Ryan (1998) where Spielberg is told to have a role written especially for Diesel.

The New York born Diesel was born Mark Vincent in July 18, 1967 to an artistic family of a astrologer mother and a step father working in the theatre. His acting career started by accident when he as a schoolboy broke into a theatre, got caught and instead of a punishment was offered a script and a chance to come to practise every day after school.

At 17 athletic Diesel ended up working as a bouncer to get extra money. After a few years he dropped out of school and flew to Hollywood to make his acting dream come true. Despite his experience in theatre he did not get through, and returned to New York to produce, direct and act in his own film, Multi-Facial, a short film about a struggling actor. The film made its way to Cannes film festival and launched Diesel's acting career going slowly upward. Encouraged by Multi-Facial, Diesel collected money to fund his second film, a full lenght feature called Strays that was accepted to the Sundance Film Festival in 1997.

Diesel's deep voice gained him a title voice over role in the 1999 animation the Iron Giant. This along with the previous year's success in Saving Private Ryan landed him a role of the anti-hero Riddick in a sci-fi story Pitch Black in 2000. Riddick is a mercenary and a convicted criminal who has eyes that can see in the dark. The role was so interesting that a sequel was made four years later, with Riddick's name on the title, Chronicles of Riddick. The sequel was not as critically appreciated as Pitch Black, but it spawned a video game as well as an animation The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury. In all of these Riddick's voice is provided by Diesel.

In 2001 Diesel starred beside Paul Walker in the first The Fast and The Furious. Fast cars, illegal car racing, tough guys and sexy girls - and the franchise was ready. However, Diesel valued the role of Riddick over the F&F franchise and declined to work on the sequels. Also he took the bad ass role of Xander Cage in xXx in 2002 which almost gained him a Razzie nomination.

After solidifying his career in Hollywood Diesel started experimenting. He tested his comedy skills in a family comedy The Pacifier (2005) and in Find me guilty (2006) - a movie based on a true story of a crime trial of Jackie DiNorscio, who ended up defending himself and prolonging the trial for unbelievable time. Diesel's performance in both showed he has potential on diverse roles, even though because of his physicality, he is best as an athletic tough guy.

2009 brought Diesel back to Fast & Furious with Walker. Read the review of the movie in here.

In Diesel's future looms his long time dream of making a movie of Hannibal the Conqueror, which he would both direct and star in. Hannibal has been announced for years but the production has never started. Hopefully we will see this some day because Diesel based on for example Multi-Facial clearly has potential as a director and the theme itself sounds like something suitable for Diesel.

In his personal life Diesel is a mysterious man who does not much reveal anything of his life. He is a father of a daughter (Hania Riley) born in April 2008 with Paloma Jimenez. He has a twin brother Paul who works as a film editor. Racially he is half African American and half Italian American. He likes dogs and owns an Italian Mastiff named Roman. This is the most we know about the personal life of the former bouncer, now a moviestar Vin Diesel.

Fast & Furious (2009)

2009-04-17T11:00:00.000+03:00

Fast & Furious is the fourth installment of the Fast & the Furious franchise that introduced us to the action couple Vin Diesel and Paul Walker in 2001. After the first movie, Diesel decided to move on and the second movie 2 Fast 2 Furious was made without his involvement. The third, movie named Tokyo Drift was missing both of its original leads.

The fourth movie feels like a direct continuation to the first as it reunites Diesel and Walker, the odd pair of a strangely warm-hearted even though tough crimimal Dom Toretto (Diesel) and a cop with a soft spot to fast cars Brian O'Conner (Walker). Also the girls from the first movie are there: Dom's sister Mia (Jordana Brewster) and his love Letty (Michelle Rodriguez).

After five years Toretto and O'Conner meet again. This time they end up fighting against a common enemy and have to bury their hatred (if there ever really was any) against each other. Along the way to the punishment a lot of cars are smashed, and a lot of fast driving is seen, both on the streets of a big city and the empty, sandy Mexican desert.

Fast & Furious is not even trying to be a masterpiece but a decent piece of action. Filled with cool guys, sexy girls and fast cars, it must be young boys' wet daydream. Recommended to people who don't want anything too serious but purely entertaining action. Check out especially the gasoline robbery in the very beginning of the movie - and that looks very cool indeed.

Directed by Justin Lin
Written by Chris Morgan, based on Gary Scott Thompson's characters
Cast Vin Diesel, Paul Walker, Michelle Rodriguez, Jordana Brewster, John Ortiz
IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1013752/

12 Rounds (2009)

2009-04-16T21:50:00.000+03:00

Renny Harlin is one of the most well known Finnish movie directors outside Finland. There is of course the more critically acclaimed Aki Kaurismäki who has got credit with many of his films in especially European film festivals, but Harlin is the one who is making bigger budget movies for larger audiences. And as a fellow Finn I respect Harlin's hard work, and I have liked a lot his action packed Long kiss goodnight starring Geena Davis and Samuel L. Jackson as well as Die Hard 2.

12 Rounds feels as if it was Harlin's Die Hard 3. The story is almost the same as in John McTiernan's action sequel: detective Danny Fisher (WWE Champion John Cena) makes a crime lord Miles Jackson (Aidan Gillen) angry and he creates Danny a 12-step-game he must solve in a given time frame. If he does not manage, Miles will kill his kidnapped girlfriend Molly (Ashley Scott).

Danny is not given much time to think and he must act constantly. If 21 Rounds does not give much time for the lead actor to breathe, it does not do that even to the viewer. The action is very fast, and it keeps the adrenaline levels high up. Sometimes this works, but in this case not.

I personally was burdened with the Die Hard 3-load - addidentally seen it on blu-ray the night before seeing 12 Rounds in theatre. I did not know the synopsis of 12 Rounds beforehand, and it stroke me by surprise how similar these two stories were. And how different in the way they were composed: Die Hard 3 has a lot of breathtaking action but the action is compensated with the witty, dark humour Bruce Willis is so capable of, and that makes it such a great entertainment for action lovers. In 12 Rounds the humour is all gone and the action and the story overall are trying to be so very serious that it gets boring in the end.

Harlin is using a lot what seems like a hand held camera and really fast cuts. Normally the shaking camera does not bother me (I had no problems in watching Cloverfield for example), but in this case I was having serious trouble in being able to actually watch the movie because of the fast movement.

No matter how much I wanted to like this movie, no matter that Harlin was again using his trademark of showing something Finnish in his movies, no matter how much I love action movies... I did not like 12 Rounds and unfortunately it made it's way to the worst movie experience of this year in my list so far. I'm sorry fellow Finn Harlin.

Directed by Renny Harlin
Written by Daniel Kunka
Cast John Cena, Aidan Gillen, Ashley Scott, Steve Harris
IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1160368/

Hannah Montana: the Movie (2009)

2009-04-16T21:00:00.001+03:00

Hannah Montana is a Disney -phenomenon that has a great deal of appeal on especially young girls. Understandable: Hannah is a superstar every girl would love to be because at the same time she is a superstar, she is just a normal girl with normal teenage problems.

Hannah Montana: The Movie is the story of a girl who is living a secret double-life. During the days she (Miley Cyrus) is a normal school girl Miley Stewart, who has a best friend Lilly (Emily Osment) and who lives with her father Robby Ray (Miley's real life dad Billy Ray Cyrus) and brother Jackson (Jason Earles). But every once in a while she transforms into a brilliant, young pop star called Hannah Montana and draws arenas of young fans. Hannah is a bit like Britney Spears in her early days.

Miley has made a promise to her single father (her mother has died when she was young): she will keep Hannah a secret and won't let the popstar affect her normal life. As soon as the stardom starts interfering with Miley's real life, she will quit.

Easier said than done. Being a superstar is like a drug: once you taste it, you'll keep wanting more and you don't want to give up. So when Hannah starts taking too much of Miley's time, daddy decides that it is time for a break, and takes her (against her will of course) to the countryside, to see her grandmother Ruby (Margo Martindale).

Miley rebels at first, but then realises how much she had missed the peace and quiet of the countryside and riding on her horse. When Travis (Lucas Till) from the neighbour turns in, she notices there are some things in the normal life she can't live without.

The story of Hannah Montana: The Movie with all the glitter and fuss is a bit shallow for a grown up, but I'm sure it will have a very different appeal on younger girls. After all, with all the superstar stuff, Miley is a normal girl and with all her rebellion she is still unconditionally loved and supported by her father. In real life that might not be the case.

The movie involves all the features a young, shy girl just about to grow up would love (I was once like that and when I think of myself at 12 years old, I'm sure I would have loved a story like this): popstardom, horses on the countryside, a cute boy from the neighbour and the loving and caring adult who is always there and understands the young.

Besides from the shallow story, what bothered me was the overly stupid scenes which try to make Miley/Hannah more adult, more Cosmo-girl, more funny - when she's fighting with Tyra Banks over a pair of shoes for example. The best parts are the ones with some deeper thought in them - when Miley is having a discussion with her father in the end is beautiful.

Directed by Peter Chelsom
Written by Daniel Berendsen, based on Michael Poryes, Richard Correll and Barry O'Brien's characters
Cast Miley Cyrus, Billy Ray Cyrus, Lucas Till, Jason Earles, Emily Osment
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1114677/

Happy-Go-Lucky (2008)

2009-04-01T06:17:00.000+03:00

Happy-Go-Lucky is a fresh and humorous movie written and directed by Mike Leigh. It's a movie about a 30-year old school teacher Poppy (Sally Hawkins), who is single, who lives in London and has a lot of friends and very positive and easy-going personality. She's all about happiness and can't really understand miserably behaving, unhappy people.

The story starts when Poppy visits a new bookstore and runs into this quiet bookseller (Elliot Cowan), who doesn't really care to share a word with her. But with her humorous attitude she turns that uncomfortable situation into a laughable matter and is soon out of the door and out of that weird situation. For her disappointment though, she finds out someone has stolen her bike, but hey, being the easy-spirited young lady she is, she doesn't really get too nervous, is just a bit disappointed she didn't have a chance to say goodbye to her bicycle.

The story continues when she gets home, to this nice townhome she shares with her friend for years Zoe (Alexis Zegerman) and starts to talk about the fact that after losing her bike she needs a driver's license. Zoe is okay with that idea as long as Poppy isn't planning to use her car from now on.

It doesn't take too long when Poppy is already taking her first driving lesson from a local driving instructor Scott (Eddie Marsan) who is a bit weird guy, has a pretty bad temper, some serious issues and takes his work as a driving instructor way too seriously. He's favorite saying is: Enraha! Enraha! And that becomes an inside joke between Poppy and her friend Zoe. Enraha! So it's a challenge for both Poppy and Scott, being miles apart with their attitude and personality, sitting in this tiny car for an hour every Saturday, trying to make it work. But for Poppy this doesn't seem to be a big problem and she keeps on coming back every Saturday, even though things are not going too well with Scott or the driving lessons.

The viewer can follow these hilarious driving lessons and the colorful conversations through the entire movie and eventually things go bad between these two, Scott totally loses it and gets violent towards Poppy. This is the final straw for Poppy and she tells him that she doesn't want him to teach her anymore.

Poppy also has some peculiar hobbies. She goes jumping on trampoline's after school and starts taking flamengo lessons with her co-worker. She also likes spending time with her friends and goes to pubs and clubs with them quite often, being a single woman she is. But she's not worried about her situation and doesn't stress about not having a family or a child at her age. She is simply happy like she is, enjoying every moment.

And it's no suprise that also love is about to find her. When she notices that one of her students Nick (Jack MacGeachin) is behaving violently at school, social worker Tim (Samuel Roukin) comes to her help to figure out what is going on with this young man. Poppy realizes that Tim is actually a nice guy and they set up a date. And that thing leads to another... So, you may guess the rest already.

This movie gave me some much needed positive energy. Poppy herself reminded me of a bright yellow balloon that has found it's way to get free from the balloon seller and is flying high in the blue summer sky, so free, so happy and so full of energetic yellow color. Saying this I have to give credit to Sally Hawkins who delivered Poppy's spirit with such an enthusiasm and talent I couldn't but admire her performance. No wonder she won a Golden Globe for her role.

The plot itself wasn't too deep or complicated. It was simple, straight forward and almost diary like. Just going through a period of time in Poppy's life. There were no hidden agendas, no twists and some things were predictable, but that didn't matter too much, since the whole movie was so easy-going and relaxed. And the dialogue in this movie, so bubbly and fascinating!

I think we all need a little bit of Poppy inside us! Darn good movie to watch when you want to lift up your spirits and have a good laugh!

Written by Mike Leigh
Directed by Mike Leigh
Cast Sally Hawkins, Eddie Marsan, Alexis Zegerman, Samuel Roukin
IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1045670/

Rachel Getting Married - Movie Review (2008)

2009-03-22T21:04:00.000+02:00

Rachel Getting Married is a story of Rachel (Rosemarie DeWitt) who is obviously getting married, but rather than just consentrating on this special day and all the beauty of weddings and the consept of marriage, this is also a story of a bittersweet relationships between family members, struggling sisterhood and the importance of one basic fundamental in everyone's life, our families.

The setting is beautiful and peaceful. Rachel is back at her childhood home in Connecticut and is ready for her big day. She and her fiancée Sidney (Tunde Adebimpe) are expecting to have lot of friends and family members coming to the reception and there will be a lot of ethnic flavor, beautiful music and a lot of love in this house during this special weekend. So who could ask for anything more? It seems like this is going to be the perfect wedding.

Except for one little detail, which happens to be nothing less than Rachel's own sister Kym (Anne Hathaway), who is coming to the house the day before the wedding and is always a bit unpredictable, a sister who may either behave nicely or possibly ruin the whole thing. So Kym is obviously the Black sheep of the family and has had her share of struggles in life, living in rehabilitation facilities and now finally, and strongly trying to stay sober and stabile.

So here they are, those two sisters, the other one starting a new chapter in her life and the other one, still trying to find herself, still trying to fit into the picture (and into the family). When Kym arrives as this dark, self-ironic, self-centered herself, the mood in the house changes quickly. Rachel gets very upset and frustrated about her sisters theatrical acts especially after the rehearsal dinner and cannot stand how their father Paul (Bill Irwin) is always trying to protect Kym. Kym on the other hand, once again finds herself being accused of lot of things, defending all her acts. So the beautiful setting gets soon a different tone of color and things get more darker and more dramatic.

It was so bittersweet and so familiar to witness all the confrontations, jealously and arguments between these two sisters and especially Rachel's frustration and negative feelings towards Kym felt so real. On the other hand it was quite sad to see all the sorrow and the despair that Kym was facing and those thoughts that were running in her head all the time. Her thinking of being this not so wanted, unpredictable, sosiopathic, strange sister of Rachel's.

There is also some deep sadness still lingering in this family. Kym and Rachel lost their brother Ethan years ago accidentally and this loss seems to still hunt them all. Kym is torn apart because of the loss, blaming herself, and for a pretty good reason. She being the one driving the car (under the influence of drugs and alcohol) when she lost control and her brother ended up drowning. Even in the middle of all the wedding preparations they go back to this old memory which is so tough thing to swallow, especially for the dad, Paul.

But the most saddening thing was to see their mother Abby (Debra Winger) coming to the picture and realize she was a mother who didn't really seem to care about her daughters too deeply and who looked like she was trying to run away from all the situations quietly, without a scene. Which gave me the idea that maybe Kym's problems in the past were due to her mother's emotional unavailability for her children.

Still, in the end the importance of family breaks through all the drama and all the difficulties and the end was delivered quite beautifully and gave a nice finishing touch to this story.

This movie made a huge impression on me and really got me to think about my own motherhood and the fact that the role we give to our children is something to think about, seriously. This movie also got me to think about the importance of family and the relationships between family members. How many times I myself have witnessed family gatherings gone wrong, and for no important reason.

I also enjoyed the cinematography and the style of directing in this film. I think that the movie was visually so familiar and traditionally implemented that it almost felt like someone from the bride's or groom's family was filming some of the scenes. I think it brought the characters closer to the viewer and made the whole story more believable.

Even though some criticize this fact, I really liked the visual style and would enjoy to see more films like this. I feel strongly that stories don't have to have the Hollywood-Style visual shine to make a deep impression on viewers. The stories with a beautiful soul and strong, believable characters are the ones that touch us the most. And Rachel Getting Married is definitely one of those films.

I was very close to giving this movie five stars, but towards the end the movie got a little slower and I felt like some of the scenes at the end could've been left out, so that is why (only) four stars.

Directed by Jonathan Demme
Written by Jenny Lumet
Cast Anne Hathaway, Rosemarie DeWitt, Mather Zickel, Bill Irwin, Anna Deavere Smith, Anisa George, Tunde Adebimpe, Debra Winger
IMDb:http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1084950/

Inkheart (2008)

2009-03-11T20:29:00.000+02:00

Inkheart is a fantasy movie based on Cornelia Funke's novel of the same name. It is a story of a father, Mo (Brendan Fraser) and his 12-year-old daughter Meggie (Eliza Bennett) - and they both love books. However, it has been nine years since Mo last time has read anything out loud to her daughter, and reason for that is that he has the power to bring the creatures from the book to our world. His skill has given him an extra name, Silvertongue.

This skill has its downside. Every time someone is transferred from a book to the real world, someone from our world is transferred to the book - always keeping the balance between the worlds. Nine years ago Meggie's mother (Sienna Guillory) was lost in a book called Inkheart, and ever since has Mo been trying to find a copy of that book for saving his wife and the mother of their daughter.

The evil Capricorn (Andy Serkis) had accidentally entered our world from Inkheart and he had become so fond of our world that he did not want to go back. And that's why he had been destroying every single piece of Inkheart he's able to get his hands on. He is also keen on getting Mo's power in his hands.

Mo has an ally, Dustfinger (Paul Bettany). also from the pages of Inkheart, and his will is to get back - to his family. Capricorn's quest for Mo's power, Mo and Dustfinger's quest for finding a copy of Inkheart and that way getting back to their loved ones - well, that's the story in a nutshell. There is also the girl , Meggie, who eventually plays a pretty important role in the story, Mo's aunt Elinor (Helen Mirren) who lives in a castle in Italy and adores her library, and also a young, amazingly beautiful boy Farid (Rafi Gavron - look out Orlando Bloom, you have a young challenger!).

Inkheart is an entertaining fantasy movie. It has an impressive cast - Mirren, Jim Broadbent (as the author of Inkheart the novel), Bettany, Fraser, Serkis... although it is not clear why are they all actually in the story, Mirren for example. And the story - well, it is a very basic fantasy story, but as Mo in the beginning says he has no control over the events that happen between the two worlds when he reads, suddenly towards the end there seems to be a lot of control and everything happens as the reader tells.

Even though the movie is targeted to young audiences, I would not recommend it to very young kids. Would it make kids afraid to read when they'd start fearing the events might come true? Maybe for some who'd be afraid to lose their mothers like Meggie did in the story. Some might be couraged to start reading books just because of that.

The movie is shot in beautiful surroundings - the mountains of Switzerland, the lakes of Italy, all extremely beautifully shown. Otherwise the visuals and effects are pretty average, although pyrotechnics by Dustfinger look pretty cool.

Recommended to fantasy lovers seeking for pure entertainment.

Directed by Iain Softley
Written by David Lindsay-Abaire, based on Cornelia Funke's novel
Cast Brendan Fraser, Paul Bettany, Helen Mirren, Eliza Bennett, Sienna Guillory, Andy Serkis, Rafi Gavron, Jim Broadbent
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0494238/

Mammoth (2009)

2009-03-11T17:44:00.000+02:00

Swedish movie maker Lucas Moodysson (Fucking Åmål, Lilja 4-ever) has created a touching story of the world today, how families are separated and connected only with mobile phones and how important our families really are - this is Mammoth.

Leo (Gael Garcia Bernal) is a "game guy" who a few years ago started a community in the web, which then grew into one of the biggest gaming communities. He is no business man but more of a nerd and he has other guys to take care of the business. However, his signature is needed and he is forced to fly to Bangkok for singing a big deal.

His wife (Michelle Williams) is a surgeon who often works at nights. They have a 7-year-old daughter Jackie (Sophie Nyweide) who is taken care of by a Philipino nanny Gloria (Marife Necesito) most of the time. When mother is always working, she and her daughter start to drift apart, and Jackie gets more connected to her nanny. Gloria however has her own heart breaks: her two small sons are back home in the Philippines taken care by their grandmother when she is trying to earn the family money to build a new house by working in the US.

When the husband is facing the many worlds of Thailand, the wife must deal with dying kids in the hospital and the lack of time to spend with her own daughter, the nanny must cope with longing to be with her own kids especially in the time when they really need her...

Mammoth is strong with emotions: love of mothers and fathers to their children, love of husbands and wives, love for the world. It reminded me a lot of Alejando Gonzales Iñarritu's Babel (review of Babel in here) with the story happening at the same time in very different environments of New York, Thailand and in the Philippines.

The first half of the movie I was convinced on awarding the film five stars, but in its latter half things started repeating themselves a bit, and the story started losing its emotional grip. Somehow I believe that due to the strong emotions on children, Mammoth will affect more those people who have children on their own. After all the biggest idea behind the story is that children and parents need time together.

Mammoth is visually stunning, and just like Babel, it focuses on very different views in different parts of the world. It shows the children collecting garbage and selling themselves for tourists in the Philippines, it shows both the beauty and the ugliness of the tourism in Thailand, and it shows also how a seemingly normal life in New York can be so filled with emotions that are not getting fulfilled. And also it shows that in a world full of technology that should keep people more easily connected to other people, people still need each other in person and not just as a voice, sms or email.

Directed and written by Lucas Moodysson
Cast Gael Garcia Bernal, Michelle Williams, Marife Necesito, Sophie Nyweide
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1038043/

Confessions of a Shopaholic (2009) - Movie Review

2009-03-05T06:03:00.000+02:00

Confessions of a Shopaholic is based on two different Sophie Kinsella books (Confessions of a Shopaholic and The Shopaholic takes Manhattan), and the name just tells you all. This is an ironic story about a young college graduate Rebecca Bloomwood (Isla Fisher) who happens to live in New York City and happens to have a bit of a problem. The fastly growing pile of credit card bills and the urge to shop beautiful things whenever possible, is giving her a headache of a lifetime. She just doesn't seem to be able to resist the beautiful mannequins on the display windows and is drawn into the luxurious, definitely over her budget stores, time after time, despite the unpaid bills she has.

After a funny girls night out and a little mix-up with mailing two letters, she soon finds herself working for a financial magazine (how funny is that!) writing a column by the name: The Girl in The Green Scarf, even though she dreams of doing something else, writing for a Fashion Magazine Alette. But here she is, giving advice on how to save money and use it wisely at the same time as she herself is in a pretty bad shape financially. And as you may guess, all this will end up being revealed and her boss Luke (Hugh Dancy) is not that crazy about all this, especially when her financial crisis comes to public in a TV show where they both are guests, talking about their magazine and Rebecca's amazingly popular column.

At the end she finds out that her true dream is actually not to work for Alette and she even decides to auction most of her clothes away to get the money to pay off all the credit card bills. She also realizes that she and her boss Luke might have a future together. So yes, happy ending after all this nonsense.

Rebecca Bloomwood is such a naive young woman, obsessed with high quality shoes, purses, scarfs, basically anything that you can name. She seems to face all the possible obstacles that you can face in the "cruel" world of materialism in the Big Apple. For some reason she reminds me of Reese Witherspoon in Legally Blonde, but just like a cheap copycat compared to her. For me she was a bit goofy and her big, innocent Bambie looking-eyes made me want to laugh. I understand that there are thousands and thousands of women who can relate to her and feel for her, but still something was seriously wrong and lacking here.

The story gave nothing new, except one new trick to prevent me from using my credit card too often. Freezing it! But what a meaningless movie this is. It just goes on and on and on about her shopping, and the end, it was just ridiculously predictable and all those talking mannequins at the very end were like the icing on the cupcake expired days ago.

This is just one of those movies where you go empty headed and where you come from as empty headed as you went in. Or worst case scenario, you may find yourself at the closest Macy's and shop till you drop, or until your credit cards get overheated... Or who knows if the mannequins start talking to you? Spoo-ky!

Directed by P. J. Hogan
Written by Tracey Jackson, Tim Firth and Kayla Albert (screenplay), Sophie Kinsella (books)
Cast Isla Fisher, Hugh Dancy, Krysten Ritter, Joan Cusack, John Goodman, John Lithgow, Kristin Scott Thomas
IMDb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1093908/

Tale of Desperaux (2008)

2009-03-04T18:16:00.001+02:00

Tale of Desperaux is a story of a tiny mouse who has a heart the size of a knight's. It follows the lead of so many animations these days by using a very detailed CGI, making every single hair and texture in its animal characters look and act in a realistic way.

The story involves a seaman rat called Roscuro (Dustin Hoffman) who accidentally ends up spoiling the Soup Day (the most important celebration of the year) of the kingdom of Dor. His actions cause the King of Dor to order all rats hunted down and killed. At the same time in the Mouseworld of Dor a tiny mouse called Desperaux (Matthew Broderick) is born. Desperaux is different from the other mice in many ways: he has huge ears and he is not afraid of anything.

As Desperaux grows older, his curiosity leads him to the library of the castle where he finds the fantastic world of books and stories. His little heart longs to be a knight in shining armor, and when he meets the Princess Pea (Emma Watson), he tells her he's a gentleman and becomes her friend - and being friends with a human is something to be punished for in the Mouseworld.

Desperaux meets Roscuro the Rat and they become friends as well. Roscuro is feeling guilty and after finding out about the friendship between Desperaux and the Princess, tries to make an apology. But things don't always turn out the way you would want them to turn...

The animation style of the movie is amazingly sharp and realistic, but it does not compensate the lack of the story. The story is very thin, like the viewer is waiting for the whole duration of the movie for the story to finally pick up, and it never really does.

Even though Desperaux has his name in the movie title, it feels as if he is just a supporting character, like there was no lead character in the story at all. The characters are all lacking something. Only the "pig girl" Miggery Sow (Tracey Ullman) who pretends to be a princess is somewhat interesting. The animals are cute, that must be admitted, but the humans look plastic.

Because of the cute characters Tale of Desperaux is best for young children. At least the school group of about 8-year-olds in the screening I went was cheering at the end of the film.

Directed by Sam Fell, Robert Stevenhagen
Written by Gary Ross, based on Kate DiCamillos's novel
Cast (English voices) Matthew Broderick, Dustin Hoffman, Emma Watson, Tracey Ullman, Kevin Kline
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0420238/

Slumdog Millionaire - A movie review

2009-03-01T21:40:00.000+02:00

I was finally able to go see the talked about movie, eight Oscar winner: Slumdog Millionaire.

I was so curious to find out what the story of this film was all about. What made it so extraordinary that it ended up winning all these Oscars? Best picture, best directing, best original score, best original song, best editing, best soundmixing, best cinematography and best adapted screenplay. The trailer itself didn't reveal too much and I wasn't sure what to expect other than a pretty boring thought of a young man participating in a Who Wants to be a Millionaire-competition in India. But I was so wrong, since the competition itself was just a tiny part of the story, like the top of an iceberg.

In truth this was a compelling story of a young man, a slumdog Jamal (Dev Patel), who ends up playing in a Who Wants To Be a Millionaire-game and suddenly and for everyone's suprise is just one question away from the Grand Prize! But it's not that easy to be in a position like this in India and just before the final broadcasting and the final answer, he finds himself in a local jail. In an intense questioning he tries to give the answers to all the questions made by the local Police Inspector (Irrfan Khan): How could you know all the answers? You are just a poor boy with no education and now knowledge of such things as poetry or our culture! You just cannot know the answers! Can you?

But you just watch and see...

As Jamal answers the questions in the competition (and to the Inspector in the questioning) the story rewinds back to his early childhood, to his brother Salim and the girl he so dearly loved, but then lost, called Latika (Freida Pinto). It shows the complex relationship between the brothers, but it also reveals the poverty and the despair of their childhood in the slums of Mumbai. This movie isn't just about the story of Jamal, but also a story of his culture and the slums of Mumbai. It was beautiful to watch how the story evolved with all the children turning into young adulthood and how those two, Jamal and Latika finally found each other again despite all the obstacles they had to go through. And last but not least, all the questions (both in the competition and in the jail) being answered one by one, just like it is written.

One of the Oscars of this film went to director Danny Boyle (The Beach). And no wonder. The directing in this film has its own, fresh point of view. And it sure was nice to see something a bit different from everyday Hollywood style movies, and I really enjoyed how Boyle brought all the cultural aspects to the screen, showing us not only the story of Jamal, but also the cultural side of the story, the despair of those little children of Mumbai and the overall differences between our world and the world of Jamal's.

But still, for me it's a bit hard to put this movie on its place. Was this an extraordinary experience, being the best movie of the year? Exceeding all the others I have seen this past year or all the other Oscar nominees? I really don't know. But I sure will remember this one and appreciate the fact that the Oscar Committee went for a fresh movie this year, and gave hope to all of those low-budget film makers.

This film sure wasn't just a movie along others, since the story was so different and up to date. All the cultural aspects made it more believable and more colorful than most of the films that I have seen in the past year. The cast itself was amazing, all the actors and actresses being locals and the youngest children being the real children of the city of Mumbai, some of them from the slums themselves. This had a very important role as making the story come alive and to be more realistic. The cast actually made it so real that at times I thought I was watching a real documentary film rather than a movie. For saying this I also want to mention the cinematography, which was unbelievably colorful, strong and well implemented and I personally still have a lot of those vivid images in my mind.

So, if you are looking for a movie with a colorful cultural aspects and a new, fresh point of view, go see this one! I am sure you will enjoy!

Directed by Danny Boyle and Loveleen Tandan (co-director in India)
Written by Simon Beaufoy (screenplay) and Vikas Swarub (novel)
Cast Dev Patel, Freida Pinto, Anil Kapoor, Irrfan Khan
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1010048/.

Breaking Dawn (Twilight -saga) - book review

2009-02-27T20:46:00.000+02:00

Breaking Dawn is the fourth and last novel of the immensly popular Twilight-saga by Stephenie Meyer. It continues the story of Bella the human girl, Edward the vampire and Jacob the werewolf. With its over 700 pages it is the most massive of the series, but I have to admit that the story is so addictive, I read the book in two days (when also working during the days and taking care of my two-year-old in the evenings).

It is impossible to describe the book without spoiling the story. The book dives deeper into the complex relationships between the supernatural creatures and humans which makes it interesting, a story you don't want to let go from your hands. Some aspects of the story are a bit disturbing. Some even more disturbing.

It is fun to notice how Meyer has developed as a writer during these books. When reading Breaking Dawn, it feels like Twilight was just a piece of practise. The books definitely get better in time, the story gets more complex, the characters more deep. Breaking Dawn does not use most of its time describing how beautiful Edward is - the part repeated until its annoying in Twilight. Instead it binds the story into a thrilling web of relationships, and when in some previous books you might have thought of characters a certain way, you most likely will start feeling something for each and every character in this last book.

Meyer's style of writing is similar to the previous books: reader still knows all the time what's going to happen next (or in the next few hundred pages), but all events are again written in such an addictive way, that it absorbs the reader totally.

My suggestion: if you have read Twilight and are planning on giving up the saga after the first book, just give it a try - the story gets so much better in the books three and four!

Written by Stephenie Meyer
Year 2008
Pages 768
Amazon.co.uk - order here
Amazon.com - order here
Play.com - order here

Watchmen (2009)

2009-02-26T21:01:00.000+02:00

In 1986-87 Alan Moore and David Gibbons published a series of comics that eventually formed a graphic novel called Watchmen. The novel became one of the most highly acclaimed graphic novels of all time, and received an honor of being the only graphic novel to win a Hugo-award. So, the pressure on who'd take the story and make it onto the big screen was huge.

Director Zack Snyder (300) was not afraid of the challenge and created a movie that is very loyal to the original work, both in its story and visual style. Watchmen is a challenging work of art as a novel - it requires its reader to really work through the story, every single frame has so much information and there are parallel stories that need the reader's full attention. The film does not differ that much from the novel: it is also challenging to watch. During its three hour duration one will see rape, murder, very graphic and bloody violence not that common in comic book movies.

Watchmen is a story of a former group of masked superheroes. Masked heroes have been made outlaws in the US, and only very few still continue their work on the streets. Many of the ex-Watchmen are already aging, retired from the superhero business, and then suddenly one of them (The Comedian played by Jeffrey Dean Morgan) gets brutally killed. Rorschach (Jackie Earle Haley) suspects someone is killing off masked heroes and starts investigating. At the same time the world is falling towards the World War III between the Soviet Union and the US.

The story is very complex and to even try to describe it here would not make any sense. Due to the complexity it is strongly recommended to read the novel first and only then see the movie. That way the viewer will get the most out of the movie as well, because there are many things that are not thoroughly explained.

The Watchmen cast is brilliant. Billy Crudup as the blue Dr Manhattan has just the perfect amount of the god-like behaviour in him, but does not fully forget he was once a human. Haley as a socially incompetent Rorschach is as perfect as in his creepy role in Little Children. Haley's Little Children colleague Patrick Wilson brings vulnerability to his shy-ish Dan Dreiberg, and Malin Akerman is just too sexy in her latex costume as Laurie. Matthew Goode as Adrian Veidt first feels a bit too "weak" for the character, but eventually he grows into the proportion required for the "world's smartest man".

Watchmen is a comic book movie but it is no Fantastic Four. It is complex and does not necessarily open up to a person not familiar with the original story. It is challenging in both its story and visuals. It is dark and grim, but visually mesmerizing, and it gives something to think about, and also a reason watch it again.

Directed by Zack Snyder
Written by David Hayter and Alex Tsu, based on the graphic novel by Alan Moore and David Gibbons
Cast Malin Akerman, Billy Crudup, Jackie Earle Haley, Patrick Wilson, Matthew Goode, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Carla Gugino
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0409459/

81st Annual Oscar Gala

2009-02-23T18:16:00.000+02:00

Yesterday evening the Oscars were given for the 81st time, in Kodak Theather, Hollywood.

It was a great evening with shining stars and perhaps a couple of suprises.

It was also a nice and welcomed change to see Hugh Jackman as the presenter at the Gala and he sure opened a new chapter in: How to do the Oscars. As he said in Barbara Walter's interview earlier: It doesn't always need to be all about business, but more of a show and having fun!

And it sure worked! He went through the nominated films with Broadway style and pulled Anne Hathaway from the audience, proving that this young lady is not only talented actor, but could also have a bright future as a singer. And soon after Hugh Jackman and this amazingly talented crew did a spectacular number with names like Beyonce and many other young, talented actors. But even though Hugh Jackman was amazing the most interesting part was yet to come.

The Oscars!

What a night! So many touching speeches, so many unforgettable moments and so many talented people gathered inside the Kodak Theathe.

The most talked about films of the evening were The Curious Case of Benjamin Button nominated in 13 different categories, winning three. But the real winner of the evening was Slumdog Millionaire being nominated in ten different categories and winning eight. After seeing the Golden Globe winnings this victory was not a big suprise, though.

And here they are, all the winning Oscars in different categories.

* Best Picture: Slumdog Millionaire
* Best Actor in a Leading Role: Sean Penn, Milk
* Best Actress in a Leading Role: Kate Winslet, The Reader
* Best Directing: Slumdog Millionaire
* Best Foreign Language Film: Departures (Japan)
* Best Original Score: Slumdog Millionaire, A.R. Rahman
* Best Original Song: ''Jai Ho,'' Slumdog Millionaire
* Best Editing: Slumdog Millionaire
* Best Sound Mixing: Slumdog Millionaire
* Best Sound Editing: The Dark Knight
* Best Visual Effects: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
* Best Documentary Short: Smile Pinki
* Best Documentary Feature: Man on Wire
* Best Actor in a Supporting Role: Heath Ledger, The Dark Knight
* Best Actress in a Supporting Role: Penélope Cruz, Vicky Cristina Barcelona
* Best Live Action Short: Spielzeugland (Toyland)
* Best Cinematography: Slumdog Millionaire
* Best Makeup: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
* Best Costume Design: The Duchess
* Best Art Direction: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
* Best Animated Short: La Maison en Petits Cubes * Best Animated Feature: WALL-E
* Best Adapted Screenplay: Slumdog Millionaire, Simon Beaufoy
* Best Original Screenplay: Milk, Dustin Lance Black

And for the brightest stars of the evening...

They were of course Kate Winslet in The Reader (my absolute favorite in this category) winning the Oscar for Best Actress in a Leading Role and Pénelope Cruz in Vicky Cristina Barcelona (the best choice in this one too, I would say) winning the Oscar for Best Actress in a Supporting Role.

As well as Sean Penn in Milk (a little suprise in this category I would say, since many of us were hoping for Mickey Rourke to receive this one) winning the Best Actor in a Leading Role and Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight (supposedly everyone's guess in this category) winning the Best Actor in a Supporting Role. Heath Ledger's family, his father, mother and sister all gave a little speech and it was very emotional moment for them as for all the viewers.

I was also one of those hoping that the Oscar for the best Actor in a Leading Role would've gone to Mickey Rourke in film The Wrestler, but well, I haven't even seen Milk yet, so who am I to judge here? But still, I have to say, Randy The Ram was such an unforgettable and touching role I can't but wonder why the Oscar didn't go to Rourke.

One shining star was also the Best Director Oscar Winner Danny Boyle with his work in the movie Slumdog Millionaire. I have not yet seen this film, but I sure am going to after all these eight wins this film achieved yesterday evening. And all the other wins in Golden Globes, SAG Awards etc.

And of course the movie itself, Slumdog Millionaire. Winning the Oscar for Best Picture. A low-budget film that almost didn't make it to the movie theaters is now a multi-Oscar Winner! Wow!

And last but not least. Best Animated Feature Oscar winner, WALL-E.

Our family's number one movie at the moment and as I already revealed in my other blog my daughter's guess for the winner in this category.

-------------------------------------

What a great night!

And let's not forget all the other Oscars from last evening either. Given for Best Documentary, Cinematography, Visual Effects, Sound Mixing and so many more important parts in the art of making movies.

I know that some of you have been awake the whole night watching this show and I really hope you all enjoyed it as much as I did!

And it doesn't take too long, when we can start guessing which are the nomimees for next years Oscar Gala...

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008) - movie review

2009-02-22T19:14:00.000+02:00

David Fincher came to my knowledge a few years ago with his terrific horror movie Se7en. With that he owed me a few nights of sleep. Then came Fight Club that solidified Fincher's skills in my books. Couple of years back came Zodiac which was also a nice piece of work.

This time Fincher has taken a totally different kind of story in his hands - a romantic drama of a man who is born old and gets young all his life. The story is loosely based on a short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald in the 1920's.

Benjamin Button (Brad Pitt) is born in 1918 and his mother dies in childbirth. His father is devastated by her death - and even more when he sees his baby boy who looks more like a dying old man than a cute little newborn baby. He abandons him at the door of nursing home for old people, where he's taken care of by Queenie (Taraji P. Henson). Queenie believes all God's creatures deserve to live, and especially because she could not have children on her own, she takes Benjamin as her son.

Soon she realises that Benjamin is very special. He refuses to die as doctors predicted, and starts growing up, and at the same time getting young. When he meets a cute little blue eyed granddaughter of a lady living in the house, his life gets a new turn. Somehow the old young man and the girl get connected. The blue eyed girl grows up to be a stunning young lady called Daisy (Cate Blanchett) and eventually her and Benjamin's paths cross again.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is a delicate romantic drama. The story holds up surprisingly well for its whole duration of 2 and a half hours. Surprisingly, because when I first heard about the movie, I thought the story sounds stupid. But it is far from stupid. It is a very sweet story, and even though you know exactly where events lead to, even just seeing other people get old and Benjamin get young is fascinating. The idea of being able to use all your old age wisdom and experience when young is interesting. But the idea has major downsides: the people around you just die of old age when you still continue to flourish. This will eventually lead to serious loneliness.

This is the third time Fincher and Pitt work together, and every time they do brilliant job together. It is beautiful to notice how Pitt has grown into a great actor after his "cute boy" years, and him working with one of without doubt the greatest actresses of our time, Blanchett, is fantastic to watch. Blanchett's variability is just amazing, how she can do pretty much any role she's given, and always in such a passion that captures the viewer deep into the story she's telling with her presence.

Benjamin Button was nominated for 13 Oscars which made it the most nominated film this year.

Directed by David Fincher
Written by Eric Roth
Cast Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett, Julia Ormond, Taraji P. Henson, Tilda Swinton
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0421715/

The Reader (2008) - Movie Review

2009-02-16T05:20:00.000+02:00

This is a story of Post-WWII Germany. This is a story of two people that meet and have true passion despite the age difference. This is also a story of pride, pride that can in the end lead to some sacrifices. And a story of new connection, new beginning and new hope, even there is not always so much to look for.

The movie begins on one rainy day. A young Michael Berg (David Kross) is walking in the rain and is weakened by a worsening scarlet fever. He gets a helping hand from a lady called Hanna (Kate Winslett), who offers to guide him back to his home. When Michael gets better and is able to leave his house again, he wants to go to her and thank for her kindness. Hanna lets him in her tiny apartment and in her lonely life. It doesn't take long for them to find themselves being passionate lovers. There is quite an age difference and the affair keeps secret, but there is still something unforgettable about all the moments these two share together.

Hanna also seems to have some peculiar habits. She loves to be read and Michael sure enjoys reading to her, every single time that they meet. He doesn't ask any questions, but just keeps on reading. No matter how passionate they seem to be, there is always room for a new chapter, a new book and a new story.

Until one day, when Hanna mysteriously disappears, leaving Michael heartbroken.

-------------------------------------------

Years go by and Michael is a law student observing trials in court halls. One day when going to the court there is a Nazi war trial, where several S.S. guards are defendants and believed to have sent children and women to their deaths in Nazi camps. When at the courtroom he suddenly realizes that Hanna is one of the accused S. S. guards. He is stunned to see her again in these kind of circumstances. There is also a tiny secret, just a little detail Hanna won't reveal in the court, but which Michael knows about and is torn between helping her or just letting it go.

Time goes by and Hanna is now in prison. She is serving a life time sentence for her actions during the war. Michael (Ralph Fiennes) on the other hand has a family, but eventually gets divorced and when going through his old things, he finds all the books he used to read to Hanna and decides to record those books into tapes and send them to her. He sends them year after year, until finally Hanna starts to use these tapes to teach herself how to read.

In the end Michael is the only contact Hanna has in her life outside the prison and when it's time for her release, he is the one to take care of her and her new life, being a free woman. But things don't always go the way they're supposed to as is the case in this one too.

The end of the film was quite slow paced and even a bit boring I would say, but overall this was an interesting story of two strangers that meet, fall in love, have true passion, drift apart and then meet again in the strangest circumstances.

Kate Winslett's role as Hanna was very strong, believable and real. Like Kate herself is. There is just something about this woman that makes her so alive and real on the screen. She is perhaps one of the most down to earth actresses that I know of and maybe that's one of the reasons she outshines the others. And remember, Kate is nominated for an Oscar for her role as Hanna.

But this film is not only about love and the little affair, nor about Kate or her skills, even though she is nominated for Oscar for her role in this film. But we need to remember that this is also a story about war and about all the horrible memories of the Holocaust, the dark side in German history. It was very moving and confusing to see young Michael walking in the old prison camp, all those empty halls and those empty gas chambers. You could almost sense the presence of all those poor people that were walking their last steps to their deaths, closing one chapter in German History.

Directed by Stephen Daldry
Written by David Hare (screenplay) and Bernhard Schlink (book)
Cast Kate Winslett, Ralph Fiennes, David Kross
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0976051/

He's Just Not That Into You (2009) - Movie review

2009-02-12T23:16:00.000+02:00

Don't you just sometimes want to relax by watching a movie that is not so deep, but entertaining an funny? Even though you may run into some clichées and "I've seen it before" scenes? Well, I do and won't hesitate to see these so called Chick Flicks every now and then.

He's Just Not That Into You falls into this category. The storyline is bubbly and quite entertaining, and the cast is full of well-known actors and actresses. Names like Ben Affleck, Drew Barrymore, Jennifer Aniston, Jennifer Connelly and Scarlet Johansson. Not to mention some new names (at least for me) like Justin Long, Ginnifer Goodwin, Kevin Connolly and Bradley Cooper.

In this movie there are several parallel stories of singles or couples who are desperately trying to understand each other and read other peoples behavior. This may sound a bit chaotic, and maybe it is, but the cast keeps the story alive and compelling until the very end.

The story begins with the early childhood of Gigi (Ginnifer Goodwin), when she gets the first clue that men are not that easy to read. Years later she is still struggling to find a perfect match and finds herself always waiting by the phone for THE phone call, from a man who is obviously not that interested. But through a failed date with Connor (Kevin Connolly), she meets Alex (Justin Long), who is able to help her to read the signs men give and she is hoping her love life will get a bit better with his help. And everything goes well until she starts to misread Alex and thinks he's falling for her... Or maybe he is?

Gigi's friend Mary (Drew Barrymore) has her own obstacles when it comes to men and feels that she has been dumbed with every possible gadget that our modern technology offers. But she doesn't want to give up and believes she will find her man, eventually. She just has this problem wanting to share all her love-life details with her "perhaps not so straight" co-workers, which is not always the smartest way to do things.

When a man and a woman decide to be just friends, what do you expect happens...? Ben (Bradley Cooper) and Anna (Scarlett Johansson) run into each other at a local grocery store and sparks fly immediately. Ben tries to hold back and explains that he's happily married with his wife Janine (Jennifer Connolly), but Anna won't give up and persuades him into a relationship, which starts first as a friendship, but you know, who can resist Scarlett? I mean... Anna... ;-)

And what if you have been together for years, let's say seven years, and there is no sign of him to be interested in marrying you? Would you start thinking it's against the nature? Well, at least Beth (Jennifer Aniston) feels this way about his long relationship with his beau Neil (Ben Affleck) who seems to be totally against marriage and Beth can't help but think that maybe this is a bad sign. A sign of something much more serious. A sign that says that he will never marry her and even worse; is not that into you...

And of course ladies love to share their thoughts about all the disturbing details of their relationships and point of views from friends are always highly appreciated. Who else can give you help in these matters than another woman, since they know the best. Don't they?

You can expect to see a lot of new turns and little twists, but don't expect this to be too deep or a life changing experience. Entertaining and funny, but an average movie experience, I would say. And one star goes to the cast, absolutely!

Directed by Ken Kwapis

Written by Abby Kohn, Mark Silverstein
Cast Ben Affleck, Drew Barrymore, Jennifer Aniston, Jennifer Connelly, Scarlet Johansson, Justin Long, Ginnifer Goodwin, Kevin Connolly, Bradley Cooper

IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1001508/

Eclipse (Twilight -saga) - book review

2009-02-12T09:08:00.001+02:00

Eclipse is the third novel in Stephenie Meyer's Twilight -saga of altogether four books. First novel was filmed in 2008, the second novel New Moon will be released as a movie version in November 2009, and based on the popularity of the series, I would be very surprised if the whole saga was not made into film. Wait for Eclipse in cinemas in 2010?

It is very difficult to review this book without spoiling the story. That's why I won't tell much about it. Eclipse continues directly from New Moon, and focuses more and more on the complicated relationships in the series. It introduces new creatures and monsters, it deepens the original story and the characters familiar to us from the first two books and that way it gives the characters history.

After getting Edward back in New Moon, Bella faces a new problem: her relationship with Jacob has formed into such a deep friendship it is difficult to balance. Especially when some new magic steps in. Bella is also (again) in mortal danger - Victoria is still hunting. And this forces people to form unexpected alliances with each other.

In a way Eclipse is better than the previous novel - the deepening of the character's motives and backgrounds gives things perspective and interesting history to the whole story universe. Also there is more action, cool fights that would be interesting to see on screen.

The weakest point of the saga is in my opinion the central character Bella. Even though the author has mentioned in some review that everything is done the way Bella wants, and that way the story is a feminist story, I just don't see this. I see Bella as a self centered, whining and even stupid girl, who does everything according to other people's will. She seems to be almost totally lacking the ability to logical reasoning and she is being irrational in so many ways. Other characters - especially Jacob in this book - are so much more complicated and interesting. They have souls that are able to think outside the box.

Meyer's way of writing is still holding the reader. Despite the annoyance one may feel towards some events, characters or motives, the events and actions are still described in such a detail that it is easy to picture the steaming hotness of certain things in one's mind. However, she does not give the reader much surprises. All events are hinted so clearly along the way, that once the characters themselves finally figure out the case, the reader has known that already 100 pages before. But somehow it is not what happens, but how it is described to the reader that counts in these books - very often the "how" overrides the "what".

I felt incredibly bad for one of the main characters in the end of the book. And even though I have already spoiled myself with the final novel, I'm still looking forward on reading the story wrap up.

Written by Stephenie Meyer
Year 2007
Pages 640
Amazon.co.uk - order here
Amazon.com - order here
Play.com - order here

New Moon (Twilight -saga) - book review

2009-02-07T19:01:00.002+02:00

New Moon is the second book in Stephenie Meyer's vampire romance saga and direct continuation to the story of Twilight.

In New Moon Bella is facing a different problem from being killed by a vampire: aging. Her 18th birthday makes her freak out because then she's officially older than her beloved, always beautiful and 17-year-old Edward (even though in real years he's about 100 years old). Her birthday party becomes a chaos after she gets a bleeding cut in her hand at Cullens' house - a house full of vampires.

This leads to events that cause the whole Cullen family to move away from Forks, and Edward leaves Bella behind. Her world comes tumbling down and she spends months in a deep depression. Finally she starts to recover with the help of Jacob Black who eventually becomes her best friend, but who also has a dark secret to bear.

The writing in New Moon has the same kind of gripping hold of the romance-thirsty reader, but the story does not handle much deeper investigation. I suppose it is the author's own views on life that jump up in the story too much - the glorification of the good vampires and the inclusion of religious views in such a story make me sigh in disbelief. Also I find it difficult to understand that a 18-year-old girl who is officially and legally adult, would be fine with being grounded at home by her father. It does not make any sense to me.

Sex is prominent between the lines but is still not really mentioned in the story. Marriage is mentioned though, and that clearly shows the author's disapproval for pre-marital sex. This does not make any sense in the real world, at least not to a person living in a sexually liberal Nordic country. It just makes me wonder, if this kind of beliefs, which were common in this part of the world many many decades ago, really still are that strong in the US.

Is there then any good in New Moon? Yes, of course there is. It has much more action than Twilight, it has new creatures and monsters, interesting revelations, but the author also digs pretty deeply into the area of depression. It describes thoroughly how the changes in life can cause total chaos in one's mind, making everything meaningless, even survival. Because depression and other forms of mental illness are so common in the world today, I find it good that such things are also discussed in literature targeted to young audiences as it may help also them to deal with the difficult time as a teenager and also with the emotions that may lead to serious depression.

The movie of the novel is set to be released in November this year, and it will directed by Chris Weitz, the director of The Golden Compass. Robert Pattison and Kristen Stewart will be returning to their roles as the lead couple Edward and Bella. It will be interesting to see how the new movie turns out as New Moon will require much more efficient visual effects than Twilight, in which the effects were a bit crappy. Also interpreting Bella's depression will be a difficult task for Stewart.

Written by Stephenie Meyer
Year 2007
Pages 608
Amazon.co.uk - order here
Amazon.com - order here
Play.com - order here

Eye candy for ladies

2009-02-07T18:59:00.001+02:00

Often men are criticised for being shallow and getting visual satisfaction of the pretty girls on film. However, based on my experience I suppose men and women are the same in this: both love to watch beautiful people, and get good vibrations of the opposite sex specimens on film they personally consider sexy and attractive.

I do like to watch beautiful women like Angelina Jolie and Keira Knightley, but as a heterosexual female, it's the men that make my heart beat a few times more with their muscular upper body, piercing dark eyes, hairy face and deep voice... Think about Australia - without bearded Hugh Jackman and his shirtless appearance the movie would have been much boring (eye candy-wise)!

I have noticed that a good looking man can make otherwise miserably bad movie watchable, and sometimes I even choose to see a movie just because some of my favourite sex symbols is in it.

Only very few remain as the favourites for many years, but there are a few. I do have a soft spot for tall, dark and handsome men. Johnny Depp and Keanu Reeves have been my guilty pleasures for about 20 years now, and I still melt in front of those beautiful eyes.

Few years ago Colin Farrell made his way to my top of sexiest men. And I just utterly adore his freshly rebel and still somehow shy performances on screen. Being a good looking man, and a great actor is a fantastic combination, and Farrell, Depp, George Clooney with his now already aging charisma and the Mexican heart-melter Gael Garcia Bernal are examples of this.

No matter how much Reeves's acting skills are being criticised, he still draws my attention to his movies. They may not be masterpieces (except for the first Matrix), but they are pleasing to watch because of the chocolate eyed heartthrob.

Sometimes it is not just the looks that count. My heart can beat a few more times also when I hear a sexy voice. This is what happened with Vin Diesel. In my books he was not that great looking, but when I heard him speak for the first time (it was actually in xXx), I changed my mind - his voice made also his looks so damn sexy it took me some time to recover.

It's not always even the voice, but the way of talking. Farrell is a perfect example of this: when he opens his mouth and starts talking, I'm done for. And a brilliant young Scottish actor James McAvoy - I just love to listen to his native accent!

I am aging along with my beautiful stars, and my taste in men has also grown up. I don't think the gray hairs in Clooney's head are at all less sexy. He still has that boyish look in his eyes. 20 years ago I couldn't have thought a gray haired man was sexy!

Even though the men of (around) my own age have appealed to me, I have found it is very cute to see some new rising star, a new young face that has enormous potential on becoming the new "George Clooney".

I did not like the movie Narnia 2 (nor did I like the first one, though), but there was something that caught my eye. A young, fresh and extremely beautiful face of Ben Barnes, whose career I'm definitely going to follow more closely from now on.

Although the dark haired, dark eyed men are the ones that on screen make this blonde drool, I'm not excluding the blondes totally. Brad Pitt was definitely eye candy when I was young (and he was young), but nowadays, oh how masculine that once baby-faced actor now is, when over 40!

And last but not least, the late Heath Ledger... RIP. The brilliant actor just died too young.

Revolutionary Road (2008) - movie review

2009-02-01T15:04:00.000+02:00

Life and relationships are full of ups and downs, everyone knows that. Some people are better at enjoying life's little treasures than others, some are never satisfied with what they have and always want more, and for those life is sometimes very hard. They think they should deserve something better, but are paralysed from acting and making the change themselves, they end up miserably on the comfort zone.

April (Kate Winslet) and Frank (Leonardo DiCaprio) are a young adorable couple with two beautiful kids. They live in a cute white house with some space for everyone to play and enjoy life. Frank works in the city and is forced to take a train to cover the long distance, when April has lived years at home taking care of the kids, house, food and garden.

She's a bright young lady who suffers of her situation, and the difference between the couple's lifes starts to tear them apart. April gets depressed, Frank gets an affair. Suddenly April remembers their long lost dream of moving to Paris, and their relationship starts sparkling again. But when things have gone already bad, not even Paris helps...

Revolutionary Road is extremely intense drama. It is intense especially because of the realism - this can happen to anyone, and I'm sure this kind of couples are out there - many of them. All the terrible pain of relationship gone bad, being together but alone, and that performed with the skill and intensity of Winslet and DiCaprio, ones of the most brilliant actors of their generation, just makes your heart ache for two hours.

This movie is one of the best I've seen in describing how a relationship can go bad without a clear reason. For outsiders everything looks perfect, but under the cover everything is burning and ready to explode and destroy.

The movie wakes you up. It makes you think about your own life. And if your own life is going downwards, it hopefully wakes you up to act before its too late.

Directed by Sam Mendes
Written by Justin Haythe, based on the novel by Richard Yates
Cast Kate Winslet, Leonardo DiCaprio, Kathy Bates, Kathryn Hahn, David Harbour, Michael Shannon
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0959337/

Australia (2008) - movie review

2009-01-28T15:24:00.001+02:00

Australia is an old-fashioned love story of a Lady and the Tramp, set in the beautiful surroundings of Australia, with a drop of politics in the form of Aboriginal rights.

Nicole Kidman is Lady Sarah Ashley, an English aristocrat whose husband is doing business in Australia. Once Lady Ashley feels that her husband is getting nothing done, she decides to travel to the other side of the world by herself to make things happen.

Once she gets Down Under, all she finds is her husband gotten killed and no-one taking care of the farm. She is forced to spend time with a rough local man, Drover (Hugh Jackman), who works on freelance basis to the Ashleys, driving their cattle.

Devastated of the situation Lady Ashley plans on selling the farm to the local cattle king, King Carney (Bryan Brown), but suddenly his actions among the Aboriginal people change her mind and she's determined on winning the battle against Carney. She befriends with a mixed breed boy Nullah (Brandon Walters), whom the government wants to take away to be educated away from the Aboriginal traditions.

As if the battle with the local farmers and the unpredictable Australian environment was not enough, the WW2 begins with the Japanese bombing Australia...

All this is just background to the love story, the love between the Lady and Drover. First they seemingly hate each other, but soon the relationship changes to something else, and finally deep friendship and love, which has to get over all the obstacles mentioned above.

The movie is visually stunning, the environment looks wonderful and the story of the mixed breed little boy is very touching. Director Baz Luhrman has clearly wanted to show his homeland as a beautiful mixture of magic and natural wonders. The cinematography is very interesting: colours ranging from the faded colours of the war and city to the extremely powerful colours of the Australian nature. The land Down Under is definitely one of the key players in this game.

Kidman and Jackman are a bit of lacking mutual chemistry - the only time you could actually feel their passion was during their first kiss in the outback, but after that it's mostly gone.

Directed by Baz Luhrman
Written by Stuart Beattie and Baz Luhrman
Cast Nicole Kidman, Hugh Jackman, Bryan Brown, David Wenham, Brandon Walters
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0455824/

Låt den rätte komma in (Let the right one in) (2008) - movie review

2009-01-28T13:58:00.000+02:00

The funny thing how two movies of the same subject - love story between a human and a vampire - are released at about the same time. And even funnier thing is, how different these two movies are from each other!

Let the right one in is nothing like Twilight. It is a Swedish film based on a Swedish novel by John Ajvide Lindqvist, who also wrote the screenplay and it has been directed by Tomas Alfredson. It tells a story of a lonely, bullied 12-year-old school boy Oskar (Kåre Hedebrant) who lives with her mother in a suburb of a small Swedish town and visits his father occasionally at his cabin outside the town.

Suddenly a strange, dark haired girl (Lina Leandersson) moves to the neighbour with her father. She introduces herself as Eli, and becomes an odd friend of Oskar - always meeting him outside after dark.

Strange deaths start to happen in the previously peaceful neighbourhood, but Eli's and Oskar's friendship gets deeper even though she tells him they should not be friends. For a little boy without friends a powerful vampire as an ally is a nice asset against the other boys.

Let the right one in is such a different vampire movie. It focuses on a perfectly traditional Swedish neighbourhood with perfectly traditional people - drunks, loners, working moms, lonely kids and gangs. And then there comes the vampire that changes the balance, dramatically.

The movie is dark and very grim, but it is not horror in the very sense. And it sees the world via the eyes of a pre-teenager. It is not a movie for children even though it's central characters are young in age. It is a story of loneliness and what loneliness can make you do. Desperate things.

Directed by Tomas Alfredson
Written by John Ajvide Lindqvist, based on his own novel
Cast Kåre Hedebrant, Lina Leandersson
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1139797/

Changeling (2008) - movie review

2009-01-28T13:25:00.000+02:00

The true story of a woman who lost her child is something that I'm sure wakes up every mothers' feelings. Director Clint Eastwood seems to like these powerful stories that are emotionally challenging to the viewers.

Changeling, true story that happened in 1920's is a story of Cristine Collins (Angelina Jolie) who lives alone with her son Walter (Gatlin Griffith). One day she is forced to stay at work for a bit longer than usual, and when returning home she finds to her horror her son nowhere in sight. Night falls and no news come from him. Mother calls the police and the police just tell her to wait till morning.

Days, weeks, months pass and the police is unable to find the boy. Mother is devastated and making everything she can. Suddenly she gets news: they have found Walter! She hurries to the train station, only to find out that the boy in question is not her true son. This starts the battle of a desperate mother in her search for her real son - battle against the corrupted police, and leads to terrible findings.

Jolie's portrayal of a desperate mother is impressive, and she clearly has been able to pull emotions from her real life as a mother. However, from the viewer's point of view all the crying and screaming of wishing to have her son back are not only positive. The movie could have been more efficient if the lenght was not as long as it is now. The film would have hold itself together more as now the excess focus on the suffering face of Jolie starts to lose its emotional power.

I liked the way Eastwood takes into account the role of women during this time. For a feminist as myself it is always a pleasure to see strong women who fight against the corrupt power of men. The scenes in the asylum strenghten this point of view nicely.

Directed by Clint Eastwood
Written by J. Michael Straczynski
Cast Angelina Jolie, Gatlin Griffith, John Malkovich, Jeffrey Donovan
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0824747/

Twilight (2008) - movie review

2009-01-28T09:27:00.000+02:00

The inner teenager woke up inside of me when I read the novel Twilight by Stephenie Meyer, and despite the pretty negative reviews, I wanted to check the movie with my own eyes. I thought that even though the cinematic values might not be that great, the fandom, excitement and entertainment values might be ok.

The story in the movie follows pretty closely the one in the novel: Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) moves from Phoenix to her father Chief Swan (Billy Burke) in the cloudiest part of the state of Washington, a small town called Forks. There she goes to a new school, gets new friends and gets curious of the strange family of Cullens, especially their son Edward (Robert Pattinson) who sits by her side in biology.

Edward acts like she hates Bella and that makes her even more curious, and finally she finds the answer: Edward and all his family are vampires, who have adapted themselves to the normal life. Instead of being afraid, Bella falls in love with Edward - whose visible hate turns out to be pure lust - for Bella's blood.

The Cullens are "good" vampires, but there are also "bad" vampires, and Bella's and Edward's relationship gets Bella in great danger because the bad vampires want her blood as well. But Edward and the Cullens promise to protect her, as this is the first time in almost 100 years that Edward finally falls in love...

My expectations of the entertainment values were a bit too high, because I felt very disappointed in the movie. I did not like the idea that instead of being insecure about herself as in the book, Bella was selfish and not interested in people. Also her overwhelming love towards Edward was somehow missing, the chemistry between Bella and Edward was nowhere near the passion that is oozing from the pages of the novel. Overall acting was not natural at all.

I am planning on reading the sequels and will probably check also the movie sequel, which will be directed by Chris Weitz the director of for example the Golden Compass, with which movie version I think he succeeded ok. Hopefully it will capture the story's atmosphere a bit better than Twilight.

Directed by Catherine Hardwicke
Written by Melissa Rosenberg, based on Stephenie Meyer's novel Twilight
Cast Kristen Stewart (Bella), Robert Pattinson (Edward), Billy Burke (Chief Swan), Cam Gigandet (James), Peter Facinelli (Carlisle), Ashley Greene (Alice), Nikki Reed (Rosalie), Taylor Lautner (Jacob), Kellan Lutz (Emmett), Jackson Rathbone (Jasper), Anna Kendrick (Jessica), Michael Welch (Mike)
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1099212/

Twilight - book review

2009-01-28T08:40:00.001+02:00

After finishing all the Harry Potter-books I needed something to fill in the void and started looking for something new that would hold my interest the same way as J.K.Rowling's story of the wizard boy had done. And because the young girl inside my woman's body required something targeted to younger audiences, I became interested when I heard about a series of books about a love story between a teenage girl and a vampire.

After few sceptical glances on the first pages I dived into a story that awakened the teenager in me, the one that is looking for the perfect love, perfect lover, all the electricity of first love, and I was hooked, and read the whole book with butterflies in my lower stomach.

Twilight is the first novel in Stephenie Meyer's vampire saga which at this moment is four novels long. The story is about a 17-year-old Bella who moves from Phoenix to live with her father in cloudy state of Washington, in a small town called Forks. She is insecure, a bit of a lone wolf, and is surprised by the warm welcome she receives in the local high school. There's only one boy who does not seem delighted of Bella's arrival, and his behaviour starts bugging the girl.

Bella clearly has the same stubborness and police instinct in her like his father the police Chief, and she starts digging information of this strange boy whose eye colour changes along with his mood changes, and his weird family who never eat at school. She finds out a truth that could terrify others: the boy, Edward, is a vampire. However she is not afraid but instead finds herself falling in love with the boy...

The storyline of the book is very simple and all actions predictable. However it is not intended to be a literary masterpiece, but a story that grabs people in its iron hold to follow how the relationship between a girl and a vampire could be possible. The relationship is so full of dangers, so full of the wonderful feeling of the electricity of the first love, so impossible, that it does not let you go.

The story is targeted to young women especially, but older ones can enjoy it just the same. One can always go back to those times when everything about love and sex was new and fascinating.

After finishing the book I just *had* to go to cinema to see the movie version...

Written by Stephenie Meyer
Year 2006
Amazon.co.uk - order here
Amazon.com - order here
Play.com - order here

Babel (2006)

2009-01-25T20:31:00.000+02:00

A director's cut of Alejandro Gonzales Iñarritu's Babel was shown in the opening of Helsinki International Film Festival in autumn 2006. This cut was said to be slightly different from the award-winning version in Cannes spring 2006.

Babel is a story of three stories about communication difficulties, and how a person can be alone also in a huge city as well as inside a family, because people have not found means to communicate properly with each other. In the first chapter an American couple is visiting in Morocco when the wife (Cate Blanchett) gets shot in the middle of the desert and her husband (Brad Pitt) is desperately trying to get help in time. Second chapter is about a Mexican lady (Adriana Barrazza) who is taking care of two kids in California, and ends up taking the kids along with her to Mexico in order to be able to attend her son's wedding. Third chapter is about a Japanese deaf-mute girl (Rinko Kikuchi) who feels extremely alone after her mother's death and because of her problem. And as in Iñarritu's previous films, also Babel ties all these stories together in the end.

Babel is full of powerful emotions and drama. Pitt as the desperate husband in the Moroccoan desert does incredibly touching job when trying to help his wife. This must be one of Pitt's best roles ever. In Morocco Iñarritu is using mainly local amateur actors as the villagers and other people, and they bring beautiful authenticity to the film among the beautifully simple desert scenery.

Huge, crowded and noisy Tokyo is a total opposite to the Moroccoan desert. Being alone in a city like that feels unrealistic, but Kikuchi as deaf-mute Chieko makes that possible. Her role is extremely powerful as a girl who has just lost her mother, is not very close to her father and is unable to make physical connection to other people.

Babel is a beautifully made movie, even though it does not exactly equal the two previous films of Iñarritu -trilogy. Sometimes it feels as is the original idea of communication difficulties is somehow hidden under other kind of drama, and I kind of missed some of the details of the original idea. After Amores Perros and 21 Grams my expectations were probably a bit too high for Babel. However, despite its flaws, Babel is still a masterpiece.

Babel is one of those dramas that make you feel strong emotions and make you think. I recommend Babel to all people who enjoy films that speak to you and make you feel. But this is not a mainstream movie to everyone's liking.

Directed by Alejandro Gonzales Iñarritu
Written by Guillermo Arriaga
Cast Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett, Adriana Barrazza, Rinko Kikuchi, Gael Garcia Bernal
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0449467/

Brokeback Mountain (2005)

2009-01-25T16:33:00.000+02:00

It is not the words that are said, it's the words that are left unsaid

Brokeback Mountain is said to be a "gay-cowboy"-movie. That is not completely true. It is true that the main characters in the movie are cowboys, and that they fall in love with each other, but that is not everything. This story could be of anyone. But it is of two men in love.

Ennis del Mar (Heath Ledger) is a shy young guy who gets a job herding sheep for a summer in Brokeback Mountain, with Jack Twist (Jake Gyllenhaal) as a partner. One cold night they end up drunk and in a same tent, and make love. This is where the love story begins. After the summer both men go separate directions, get married and get children, but they never forget each other. Then one day after four years they meet again and there is no turning back.

Brokeback Mountain is emotionally packed, powerful movie. It left me feeling blown up for a day at least. Only few movies do that to me, that they really get into my head and don't let go. Brokeback Mountain did that. It is not so much of the things that are said in the movie, that get you. It is the things that are left unsaid. And it is not only the things that are shown in the movie that get you. It is the things that are left unshown.

It was interesting to notice how big erotic impact a movie like this can have. I have no desire to see real gay sex, but seeing these two strong men hugging each other, kissing each other after many years of separation, I was totally stunned.

Ledger and Gyllenhaal are amazing in this movie. They are brave men who take this kind of role that has the possibility of making them immortal and take them to the top actors' league, but also possibility of marking them with the "gay" stamp forever. Both were just fantastic. Of the minor roles, Michelle Williams as Ennis' wife Alma actually shines in her role. When Alma witnesses his husband kissing a guy, she is heart broken, but keeps everything for herself.
Ang Lee really knows how to make "pretty pictures" (for example Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon). Every single frame of the movie was a work of art in itself. The stunning scenery, colours and the people, everything was just perfect.

Directed by Ang Lee
Written by Larry McMurtry & Diana Ossana, based on a short story by Annie Proulx
Cast Heath Ledger, Jake Gyllenhaal, Anne Hathaway, Michelle Williams
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0388795/

American History X (1998)

2009-01-25T14:16:00.000+02:00

American History X is a story of two brothers - Derek and Danny Vinyard (Edwards Norton and Furlong) - who believe in White Power, and they belong to a Neo-Nazi movement where people think if you are not "white protestant", you're not worth anything. When three black guys try to steal Derek's car, Derek freaks out and kills two of the thieves and goes to jail where he is forced to see the other side of things. "In here, you the nigga. Not me" tells Derek's working partner in the prison.

American History X is one of the most powerful movies I've ever seen. The way two stories - current day in colour and past events in black&white - are told in a parallel way is very beautiful, implicating how things in the past were so simple, so black and white, whereas in reality they are much more complex.

The story is very strong and wakes up strong feelings in the viewer, but towards the end gives also hope and vision of a brighter future. As the little brother Danny puts it: "Hate is a baggage. Life's too short to be p****d off all the time. It's not worth it".

Norton got Oscar -nominated for his role as the skinhead Derek Vinyard. And I don't question that nomination a bit! He is just awesome as first the hateful, self confident skinhead, then confused and sad man, questioning things and in the latter part a strong father figure for his little brother. The growth story of Derek is brilliantly made, a very powerful role for Norton who delivers his performance flawlessly. It is also amazing to see the transformation of otherwise a bit skinny baby-faced Norton to this muscular, tough guy skinhead.

Furlong as little brother Danny plays a beautiful role as well. Grown up in the shadow of his brother he is the sweet big-eyed little brother everyone wants to protect. Furlong fits into his role 100%.

American History X jumped directly to the top 10 of my all time favourite movies. After watching this two times during the weekend, I can still feel the movie in me after so many days. Not many films make that kind of lasting impact. American History X did.

Directed by Tony Kaye
Written by David McKenna
Cast Edward Norton, Edward Furlong, Beverly D'Angelo, Avery Brooks
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120586/

Paivi's movies seen in 2009

2009-01-01T10:43:00.005+02:00

Paivi's Movies (first time views) seen in 2009, latest on top:

MAY:
72. Flash of Genius (2008) (dvd 4/5) - ***
71. X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009) (cinema 2/5) - *** - read Babblings review in here

APRIL:
70. Transsiberian (2008) (dvd 30/4) - ***
69. Bolt 3D (2008) (cinema 29/4) - **** - read Babblings review in here
68. Filth & wisdom (2008) (dvd) - **
67. Ned Kelly (2003) (dvd) - ***
66. 17 again (2009) (cinema) - *** - read Babblings review in here
65. Katyn (2007) (blu-ray) - ****
64. Taken (2008) (dvd) - ****
63. Rachel getting married (2008) (dvd) - **** - read Babblings review in here
62. Mimmi Lehmä ja Varis (Mamma Mu och Kråkan) (2008) (blu-ray) - ***
61. The Wrestler (2008) (dvd) - ****
60. Ten Inch Hero (2007) (dvd) - **
59. The day the Earth stood still (2008) (dvd) - **
58. Body of lies (2008) (blu-ray) - ***
57. The Duchess (2008) (dvd) - **
56. Yes man (2008) (dvd) - ** - read Babblings review in here
55. Monsters vs. Aliens (2009) (iMax cinema) - ***
54. Fast & Furious (2009) (cinema) - *** - read Babblings review in here
53. Hannah Montana the movie (2009) (cinema) - ** - read Babblings review in here

MARCH:
52. Whisper of the heart (Mimi wo sumaseba) (1995) (dvd) - ***
51. Nim's Island (2008) (blu-ray) - ***
50. Standard Operating Procedure (2008) (blu-ray) - ****
49. The Escapist (2008) (blu-ray) - **
48. Traitor (2008) (dvd) - ***
47. He's just not that into you (2009) (cinema) - *** - read Babblings review in here
46. Easy Virtue (2008) (cinema) - **
45. 12 Rounds (2009) (cinema) - * - read Babblings review in here
44. Die Hard: with a Vengeance (1995) (blu-ray) - ****
43. Pineapple Express (2008) (blu-ray) - ****
42. Mammoth (2009) (cinema) - **** - read Babblings review in here
41. Last Chance Harvey (2008) (cinema) - **
40. Inkheart (2008) (cinema) - ** - read Babblings review in here
39. Tale of Desperaux (2008) (cinema) - ** - read Babblings review in here
38. Neverwas (2005) (dvd) - ***
37. Journey to the center of the Earth (2008) (dvd) - *
36. Lars and the Real Girl (2007) (dvd) - ****
35. Son of Rambow (2007) (dvd) - ****
34. Raging Bull (1980) (blu-ray) - ****
33. Blindness (2008) (dvd) - ***
32. Slumdog Millionaire (2008) (cinema) - **** - read Babblings review in here

FEBRUARY:
31. Watchmen (2009) (cinema) - **** - read Babblings review in here
30. Curious case of Benjamin Button (2008) (cinema) - **** - read Babblings review in here
29. The Vanishing Point (Ce que mes yeux ont vu) (2007) (dvd) - **
28. Max Payne (2008) (dvd) - **
27. The Rocker (2008) (dvd) - ***
26. Mad Money (2008) (blu-ray) - **
25. The sisterhood of traveling pants 2 (2008) (blu-ray) - ****
24. Open season 2 (2008) (blu-ray) - *
23. Idiots and Angels (2008) (dvd) - ***
22. First Blood (1982) (dvd) - ***
21. Revolutionary Road (2008) (cinema) - **** - read Babblings review in here
20. Coffee and cigarettes (2003) (dvd) - ****
19. MirrorMask (2005) (blu-ray) - ***

JANUARY:
18. Expired (2007) (dvd) - **
17. The Memory Keeper's Daughter (2008) (dvd) - ***
16. Life before her eyes (2007) (blu-ray) - ***
15. Just Buried (2007) (dvd) - *
14. Broken Flowers (2005) (dvd) - **
13. Batman returns (1992) (blu-ray) - ****
12. Driving Miss Daisy (1989) (dvd) - ****
11. Twilight (2008) (cinema) - ** - read Babblings review in here
10. Changeling (2008) (cinema) - *** - read Babblings review in here
9. Let the right one in (Låt den rätta komma in) (2008) (cinema) - **** - read Babblings review in here
8. Knocked Up (2007) (dvd) - ***
7. Henry Poole is here (2008) (dvd) - **
6. Freaks (1932) (dvd) - ****
5. RocknRolla (2008) (cinema) - ***
4. Niko and the way to the stars (Niko lentäjän poika) (2008) (cinema) - ****
3. Australia (2008) (cinema) - **** - read Babblings review in here
2. American Gangster (2007) (dvd) - ****
1. Zodiac (2007) (dvd) - ****

Note: the rating in Movie Babblings reviews may differ from this list because the actual review may be written by someone else than Paivi

Tropic Thunder (2008) - review

2008-09-12T21:23:00.000+03:00

No matter what is said of Ben Stiller, but this time he really blows a bank with a fun and witty comedic satire of movie making, called Tropic Thunder. Directed and co-written by Stiller, Tropic Thunder is definitely one of the most entertaining comedies of 2008.

Stiller himself is an action star Tugg Speedman, the star of six sequels of a Scorcher-franchise. Jack Black is Jeff Portnoy, comedian who in his Fatties -movies play an entire family of farting fatties. Robert Downey Jr. is an Australian 5-time-Academy-Award winning actor Kirk Lazarus, whose latest film Satan's Alley is about two monks affair.

These three are recruited to act in the most expensive war movie ever - Lazarus playing a black guy. When budget is blown away, the director (Steve Coogan) is forced to figure out some other way of completing the film. Vietnam vet Four Leaf Tayback (Nick Nolte) whose book the film is based on, suggests an extreme method - place cameras all over the jungle and drop the boys to do their job on their own. This leads to unexpected situations where team spirit is really needed.

The story is full of brilliant satire towards the movie industry - actors, directors, producers, Academy - they all get their share. And in a wonderfully hilarious way. So often comedies don't make you laugh because they don't have anything original in them. Tropic Thunder is its own kind, and really made me laugh. It has the courage to go far enough in the satire and the courage to use language not often heard in Hollywood movies.

And you can hardly recognise Tom Cruise (who does a great job) in his disguise...

Directed by Ben Stiller
Written by Ben Stiller, Justin Theroux, Etan Coen
Cast Ben Stiller, Robert Downey Jr., Jack Black, Brandon T. Jackson, Jay Baruchel, Nick Nolte, Steve Coogan, Danny McBride
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0942385/

In Bruges (2008) - review

2008-09-11T20:48:00.000+03:00

In Bruges is probably the best comedy this year: filled with pitch black humour, dazzling dialogue, interesting characters, hilarious plot, damn good acting and beautiful photography.

Ray (Colin Farrell) and Ken (Brendan Gleeson) are killers from London, who are sent to a beautiful medieval town called Bruges in Belgium, to relax and calm down after their last gig, and hopefully wait for their next assignment. Ken decides to take everything from the mini-vacation - he's excited about the beauty of the town and its marvellous sights in the lovely late autumn sunshine. Ray on the other hand is not that satisfied and complains about being sent to the stupid Belgium.

After few days the truth of their Ray's and Ken's last assignment is revealed. Their boss (Ralph Fiennes) takes action and comes to Bruges himself to sort things out. This leads to some shooting and serious action, but filled with black humour.

Farrell and Gleeson are a perfect pair - the other is older and wiser, calmer, and the other is young, restless, and still looking for himself. Fiennes is brilliant as the revenge seeking boss. Dialogue is just great and the story is full of surprises, not the least by a dwarf who is shooting a n art film in Bruges. In Bruges is the debut film by Martin McDonagh, and an extremely positive start for his film career!

Directed and written by Martin McDonagh
Cast Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson, Ralph Fiennes, Clémence Poésy
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0780536/

Babylon A.D. (2008) - review

2008-09-05T22:18:00.000+03:00

Previously the French Mathieu Kassovitz has been seen more in front than behind the camera. After his mediocre directions Gothika and Grimson Rivers he took Maurice G. Dantec's dystopia novel Babylon A.D. under work. The result is a movie filled with violent action, but story wise it aims too high and then falls hard and heavy.

Vin Diesel is Toorop, a bounty hunter, that a Russian Gorsky (Gérard Depardieu) hires to deliver a young Aurora-girl (Mélanie Thierry) from a cloister in deep down in Asia to New York. There is something special and secret about the girl which makes the delivery very valuable, but Toorop takes the job without questions. With the girl comes her foster mother, sister Rebeka (Michelle Yeoh).

Toorop starts the journey in the hopes of getting a reward, without feelings or interest towards the girl's secret. Immediately he notices the journey is not going to be a pleasure trip, because after the girl are also dangerous men who are not afraid to use any means available. But Toorop is just like them. He ends up protecting the girl with his life and does not hesitate when it comes to slaughtering few people who get into their way.

Babylon A.D. reminded me closely of Luc Besson's Fifth element (1997), but is much more rough and serious compared to its colourful "cousin". After an interesting start the story loses its power and twists its complex story into a good looking mess. The over dose of cliches and the anti-climax in the end take the last of the edge out of the movie.

The environments are built with style and imagination which make the movie look visually good. Even though a lot has been borrowed from elsewhere, the movie has some ideas of its own, such as the submarine transporting refugees. Rock-like Diesel fits in this kind of roles as a glove in a hand and Thierry's fresh and innocent appearance is his total opposite.

Director Kassovitz has himself mentioned in the interviews that he is disappointed on the movies because the studio had cut it from original, resulting in "violent and stupid" version. It is to be seen if the director's cut on dvd is any better.

Directed by Mathieu Kassovitz
Written by Eric Besnard, Mathieu Kassovitz and Joseph Simas, based on a novel by Maurice G. Dantec
Cast Vin Diesel, Mélanie Thierry, Michelle Yeoh, Gérard Depardieu, Charlotte Rampling
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0364970/

Definitely, maybe (2008) - dvd review

2008-09-05T12:53:00.000+03:00

Definitely, maybe is a sympathetic drama comedy in which 11 years old Maya (amazing Abligail Breslin) requests her divorced father to tell about the times before she was born - after getting so interested in love during the school's sexual education class. Dad (Ryan Reynolds) dresses the story in a mystery, and tells a story of one man and three different women, and how one of them became Maya's mom.

Daddy's past gets more flesh around it's bones along the way and his political past is fun to follow. The mother-mystery remains unique until the end and only in the last half of the movie gets a little bit cliched. Breslin and Reynolds work together amazingly well and they form the story a firm backbone.

Directed and Written by Adam Brooks
Cast Ryan Reynolds, Abigail Breslin, Elizabeth Banks, Isla Fisher, Rachel Weitz
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0832266/

Reservation Road (2007) - dvd review

2008-09-05T12:36:00.000+03:00

Losing your own child is the biggest of all losses. Reservation road is story of both the family which loses a child in an hit and run and the guilt of the driver. Neither side has it easy.

Ethan (Joaquin Phoenix) and Grace (Jennifer Connelly) are mother and father to a small daughter and son. Dwight (Mark Ruffalo) is a divorced lawyer who tries any ways possible to hold on to his son who is now living with his mother. When Dwight is driving from a baseball game with his son, he accidentally hits a little boy on the road, and decides to risk everything and hurries away without stopping.

When the boy dies and the police can not find the driver, boy's father decides to take the case into his own hands. What is left is just a revenge.

Even though the subject is heartbreaking and the roles are brilliant, Reservation road still does not really convince. There are too many coincidences to make the story feel real. What's missing in the story is replaced by the extremely realistic fathers whose pain you can almost touch.

Directed by Terry George
Written by John Burnham Schwartz and Terry George, based on the novel by John Burnham Schwartz
Cast Joaquin Phoenix, Mark Ruffalo, Jennifer Connelly, Mira Sorvino
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0831884/

The Bucket List (2007) - review

2008-09-05T12:09:00.000+03:00

Life is short and very few of us does what they dream about, what they would really want to do with their lives. When the end draws near, it is the things undone that you regret. This dead serious subject is what the comedy called The Bucket List tells about.

After working his whole life as a car mechanic Carter (Morgan Freeman) hears he is suffering from incureable cancer and his life is ending sooner than later. In the hospital bed he has time to think about things and starts writing a "Bucket List", list of things he would like to experience before kicking the bucket. He gets a room mate with the same medical destiny, a self centered millionaire Edward (Jack Nicholson) and after a while these two very different men find many things in common. And finally they escaoe from the hospital to fulfill their dreams.

The director Rob Reiner (When Harry met Sally..., Princess Bride) draws a sympathetic story of a dead serious subject. What makes the story unrealistic is that as a millionaire it is financially so easy to make your dreams come true. There are some touching scenes, like the "kiss of the most beautiful girl in the world", but as a whole it is just warm hearted entertainment.

Directed by Rob Reiner
Written by Justin Zackham
Cast Jack Nicholson, Morgan Freeman, Sean Hayes, Beverly Todd
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0825232/

The Spiderwick Chronicles (2008) - dvd review

2008-09-04T20:46:00.000+03:00

The Spiderwick Chronicles is yet another movie version of a children's book. However, this time it works and the result is an entertaining movie for both children and adults, with all fantastic and original fairy tale creatures and a well made story.

A reluctant Jared (Freddie Highmore) moves to his great-great-uncle's old mansion with his twin brother (Highmore's double role), sister (Sarah Bolger) and mother (Mary-Louise Parker) after his mother's and father's divorce. The reluctant mind changes when he finds a curious field guide from the attic. It is not a common field guide, but a guide to a magical world with amazing creatures. With the help of the book Jared gets to know all the creatures living in and around the house, both good and evil.

Mark Waters who has previously made mainly comedies (Freaky Friday, Mean Girls) holds the reins very well and the result is an adventure in a fairy tale world inside our own. Arthur Spiderwick's field guide is wonderful and the characters both funny and scary. Even though entertaining, because of the scary monsters I would not recommend this to the smallest of the family.

Directed by Mark Waters
Written by Karey Kirkpatrick, David Berenbaum and John Sayles, based on the novel by Tony DiTerlizzi and Holly Black
Cast Freddie Highmore, Sarah Bolger, Mary-Louise Parker, David Strathairn
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0416236/

Superhero movie (2007) - dvd review

2008-09-04T20:25:00.000+03:00

Riding on the success of last years' superhero movies Superhero movie is an embarrassing act of comedy. Making parody mainly of Spider-man and X-men, Superhero movie failed to tickle my humour nerves and just made me yawn.

While dreaming of the cute blonde (Sara Baxton) in his neighbour, Rick (Drake Bell) gets bitten by a gene-manipulated dragonfly on a school trip. This gives him superpowers and he turns to be a superhero called Dragonfly. When a supervillain Hourglass (Christopher McDonald) threatens to slaughter the whole city, Dragonfly comes to help.

Craig Mazin (the writer of a couple of Scary Movies) uses the same proven-to-be-successful concept again, but jokes seen more than once don't convince anymore. The story is directly from Spider-man, with some additional fart jokes and bumping into things. Comedy veteran Leslie Nielsen is cast as Rick's uncle and Pamela Anderson as an Invisible Girl, mainly invisible.

Director Craig Mazin
Written by Craig Mazin
Cast Drake Bell, Sara Paxton, Christopher McDonald, Leslie Nielsen, Marion Ross
IMDb http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0426592/

Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008) - review

2008-08-29T21:16:00.000+03:00

I managed to get tickets to the final screening at Espoo Cine film festival and was expecting a lot from this new Woody Allen film. It had all the aspects of being a masterpiece: Woody Allen's witty writing and directing skills, brilliant cast, interesting storyline and beautiful sceneries of Spain.

The story evolves around two art-loving American women (Rebecca Hall and Scarlett Johansson) who travel to Spain for a month. Hall's character Vicky is engaged, about to get married, very down to earth person, and her opposite, Johansson's Cristina is single and adventurous, and does not really know yet what to do with her life. They bump into a sexy Spanish artist Juan Antonio (Javier Bardem), who asks the girls to come with him, enjoy some good food, drinks - and sex.

This leads the girls to an adventure which involves among others the mentally unstable ex-wife (Penelope Cruz) and flips both worlds upside down. In the end they are forced to search their own feelings thoroughly.

Although I liked the overall story and the characters were fresh and real and the acting was good, in the end something was missing. With seeing the complexity of human relationships during the film, I was a bit let down with the anti-climax of the story in the end. But it is always wonderful to watch beautiful, talented people together - Penelope Cruz is always so charming, Scarlett Johansson knows how to be sexy and cute and it was fun to see Javier Bardem in a "normal" role after seeing him as a cold-blooded killer in No country for old men.

Director: Woody Allen
Written by: Woody Allen
Cast: Penelope Cruz, Scarlett Johansson, Javier Bardem, Rebecca Hall
Official site: http://vickycristina-movie.com/
Imdb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0497465/

Here we go...

2008-08-29T21:08:00.000+03:00

I love movies. I love talking about movies. I love gathering information about movies. I love writing about movies and sharing my thoughts about movies. Some of my friends asked me, why am I not keeping an own blog because I write so many reviews in different web sites, and I could not find an answer to that. Why am I not sharing my babbles in my own name? It took couple of days to think this over and here I go :)

2009 movie reviews

2008-01-01T15:03:00.038+02:00

Movie name	Paivi	Sari
12 Rounds	*	*
17 Again	***	-
Angels and Demons	***	***
Bride Wars	**	-
Brüno	****	-
Chéri	****	-
Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky	***	-
Confessions of a shopaholic	-	*
Coraline	****	-
Duplicity	****	-
Fast & Furious	***	-
The Hangover	****	****
Hannah Montana the movie	**	-
He's just not that into you	***	***
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince	***	-
Ice Age: The dawn of the dinosaurs	***	-
Mammoth	****	-
Monsters vs. Aliens	***	*
Observe and Report	**	-
The Soloist	-	*****
Spread	**	-
Star Trek	****	****
State of Play	-	****
Terminator Salvation	**	-
Watchmen	****	-
UP 3D	-	***
X-Men Origins: Wolverine	***	***