DO THE RIGHT THING!

Well, to start of this movie had a really stong focus on racial issues. I'm sure that at the time of this movies release the problem of rasicm was just as big of a problem if not bigger than currently. Racism has been present throughout history and people have always been of opposing sides of issues. This movie is another great depiction of how these problems are present in our society . There were many examples of how racial tension is dealt with such as when Buggin' Out's shoes are scuffed by the white man and he flips shit and starts yelling at the guy. Also when Radio Rahem what killed the community lashed out at the thing they think caused it even though they didn't think it through and really consider what the problem was. In our society people do stupid things without thinking about what they are doing. Many problems with racism are still present today such as gangs. There is a lot of tension present in gangs and these tensions often lead to people getting hurt. Just like then we need to work together to try and stop these problems from happening.

The Battle of Algier

Well to start of the review of this movie that I read was the one by The Washington Post. This was a very unbiased review in my opinon and accuratly hit all the point about the movie. This review spoke about how the different sides of the movie were both depicted evenly without much extra puch for one side over the other being depicted. I already knew this but one fact that I still find really amazing about this movie that most of the actors were just pulled off the street and had even really been a part of the real event. I hadn't really thought of why the film was being re-released but now after reading this it makes perfect sense to me that it is parallel to what is going on over in Iraq right now. Another thing that we were already told but I continue to find to be funny was that the pentagon had a special showing of this movie just to try and understand terrorism better. Overall looking at this movie as a documentary I give it major props but as a movie I would want to watch on a normal day...no thanks.

Memento

First of all I am happy that we finally got back to a color movie. This movie was made more recently which is also kind of nice because it had better special effects and is more out time period. I though that this movie was probably one of the most confusing that I have ever seen but I think that that was what the director was going for. The plot of the movie I found to be excellent because it is interesting to think about what you would do in a situation like this. Would you try and find your wifes killer? Would you just kill yourself? Who knows what you would do. I thought that is was really weird how the movies sequence played out and am still not sure I understand why the director would film the movie the way he did because it was very confusing. Also by putting in the black and white scenes it just made it all the more difficult to follow. I think that this type of movie takes a lot of patience to watch because throughout the entire movie you want to know what really started it all because you got to see the ending before the beginning and that has never been the case before. I think that I would reccomend this movie to someone on the basis that it was really unique not that it was really a good movie.

Double Indemnity

This movie was the first film noir that we have watched in class. I think this is only one of the two or so film noirs that I have ever seen so I don't have much to compaire it to. The other one that I have seen is Sin City. I thought that that movie was awesome first of all and was probably the best movie of the year. I think that it was much different from Double Indemnity because of the fact that it was made in our time where we have much lower censorship codes. The movie we watched in class was a very clean cut movie. I can't say that I liked it for a few reasons. One reason that I didn't like it was because like nothing happened in it. As I thought back upon the movie after watching it I thought my myself...what did I just watch? I could barely think what I just wtached because there was so little action and actually happenings. Another reason that I didn't like watching this movie was that it seemed much to scripted. I thought that the characters just seemed like they were reading their lines instead of acting the part. Overall I didn't like it that much and hope to see a better on this time around.

Groundhog Day

Well first of all I would like to say that I enjoyed this movie very much. I have never seen it before but I have definatly heard of it in the past. I find Bill Murray to be hillarious and have seen many of his movies. I thought that the plot of this movie is something very interesting to think about. How does everyone know that the life they are living is really what they think it is? How would we really know if we were just living the same days over and over again. I think that the characters in this movie played out their parts really well and must have all had to be really tollerable of having to shoot very similar scenes over and over and over again. Personally I would be really bored after having shot the same scene like twenty times. One of this things that I like most about this movie is the progression of Phil's character day by day as he had to live out the same day over and over again. I found it very interesting the way his personality morphed from being a sort of snobish grumpy person to one of the nicest person in town. I thought it was really cool how he slowly started to try new things and maybe do things that everyone would like to do but couldn't. I was amazed when he started to kill him self in different ways and also thought it was hillarious. Overall I really did enjoy this movie and would reccoment viewing it.

Bringin Up Baby

Now this movie was one that I don't know I liked or disliked. I found some parts of this movie to be appealing but also just hated some of it. One of the things that I found to be somewhat funny were the characters. I thought that the stupidity played out by all the characters brought something to the movie. I find that sort of stupid humor to be amusing and thought that the actors were very good at all being stupid together and really played their parts. Now even though I thought that the actors played their parts well none the less I found a few certain characters to be annoying as hell. Susan probably was the most annoying character I have ever seen in a movie. First of all, her voice reminded my a a bird being defeathered and her childish attitude reminded me a a 5 year old girl trying to get whatever she wants. I found David's stupidity to be a little bit over the top and him giving in the everything Susan wanted was pretty annoying. Over all I think that this movie was not one of my favorites but there were a few parts of it that I liked.

The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938)

The movie that I decided to watch was from Robert Ebert's list. It was The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938). This movie to my suprise when I went to Blockbuster to rent it was in color! I guess I don't really know when movies started being filmed in color but I was stunned when I found that this movie had color and good color at that. The Behind the scenes element that I decided to look at as I wantched this movie was set design. I couldn't find anything online about the set creation but under problems of making the movie there was nothing mentioned about the set so it must have been all good. The setting was very typical to all the other Robin Hood movies that I have scene in the past. The set designers did a good job on the two locations that this movie was filmed on and gave it a realistic look that brought me back to the middle ages.
First of all, one this that made my decision in lookoing at set design was that the movie was in color. I think that it adds a lot to the set when color is in the picture because it makes many things stand out while in black and white that is not quite the case. There were basically only two different sets in this movie. There was Sherwood Forest and the King's castle. The forest was not a fake set, it was just a normal forest full of oak green leafed trees. There were a few many different scenes in the forest and the director, Micheal Curtiz, did a good job of having the right scenes in the right locations of the forest. An example of this is when Robin hood and his men were setting up to ambush a nobleman and his soldiers the scene was set on a slender path with tall trees in which they could hide. When they would feast in the forest it wouldn't be in a cramed area but in a large opeing in the woods. I liked also that the forest was more or less undisturbed from industralization execept for a couple dirt paths because this made me feel like we were back in the medival age. The second part of the set that was used was King Richard the Lion Heart's castle. This castle was a built set that was used in many scenes as well. The castle depicted an old time castle pretty well except for a lack of windows. Exept for that it looked like it was made of strong stones and there were many torches used to light up all the banquet halls and corridors. Also the little things of the set were large dinning tables with big chairs for the nobles and even more luxourious for the king and prince, etc... There were large wood doors and wooden barracads to keep out the enemies which I think was very realisitc. The castle had one big fight scene in it where Robin Hood, Sir Robin of Loxley, was all over that place. He was running up and down all of the tall sprialing stair cases and it gave that castle an appearance of being massive as they indeed were. One thing that I think showed the movie being a little older was that there was never a long shot of the castle where you saw the roof or any part of the ceiling. Since I know that the budget for movies back in the day were not even close to what is spent today to make movies I assume that they had limitied funds for making the set super good but I though this movie's set was awesome for having been made so long ago.
Overall this movie had an excellent dipiction of the old days of nights and castles. I think that with the limited budget that they had they did a wonderful job pulling it all together to make this movie. For being made so long ago I was amazed at the color and I think that it added on a lot to the movie as a whole. I would have never guessed that this movie was made so long ago because I was very impressed. Overall I highly reccommed watching this movie.

The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938)

Western Theme

One of the themes that I found to be most present in the western that we watched, My Darling Clemintine, was the Good vs. Bad. In this movie there was of course the protagonist who is introduced in the frist scene, Wyatt Erp, as well as the protagonist, the Clantons. I found that throughout the entire film there were many scenes in which these two parties were in conflict. This conflict was the real meat of the movie because this dispute kept the movie rolling on. In many westerns that I have scene the theme of this movie highly envolves the good vs. bad because that is basically what makes up a western.
In my opinion this is a good theme to have in a movie. Many movies have a theme similar to this because it is a commonality that usually are part of the plot in most movies. I think that when this is the theme for a movie I can expect a little more from the film because it causes more conflicts and action. In some movies like say mystery movies and maybe comedy's, which are great genres, are sometimes a little bit slow moving because of the lack of that protagonist vs. antagonist. There is no saying what the best theme is in my opinion because there are so many but this is one that I do enjoy very much and make westerns the great films that they are.

Citizen Kane

Well first of all I have not sceen too many black and white movies in my day so I don't have much to compare this one too. Even though my B&W experience is minimal from the ones that I have sceen I found this one to be pretty enjoyable compared to the others. First of all, I found the acting to be pretty good even though it said at the end most of the actors were new to acting and it was there first film. Also I did like that there were some special effects used even though they were nothing like we have today they still add onto the movie. Since this was based on somewhat a true events/people I found it to add to the mystery of the movie therefore getting me more excited to find out what would happen. Overall I did enjoy the plot of this movie and found it to seem very well done for a movie made so long ago.

Newer Movie Review

Once again we have another film about terrorism. Starring action super star Bruce Willis as John McClane, a NY police officer who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. he is visiting his wife when the office party gets broken up by a group of terrorist who are trying to steal a large sum of money from the buildings vault. John McClane is the typical super police man who can take out the bad guys with ease. Being the man on the inside it is up to him to save the day. Director John McTeirnan has taken the aveage view of terrorism and played it out as usual in this film. One thing that was similar to most films involving terrorism is that the terrorist were all foreign. I don't like this stereotype because it gives people a misconception that all terrorists are foreign. Alexander Gunadov plays the role of Karl, the main terrorist in charge of the takeover. In the film he is a ex-German freedon fighter. For not being a very mainstream actor I think that he played out his role very well. I like his character as being very ruthless and to the point as I assume someone would be in this situation.

The director used many special effects which I think were fairly realistic for the time even though back then they didn't have the digital technologies that we do today. There were many gunfights and explosions which did end up briging a fialry realistic view to the film. Also the makeup that must have been fairly difficult to do seemed very realistic. The characters were constantly changing from bloody to bloodier and alive and dead. I think that the makeup job in this film was top notch.

One main thing that I noticed in this film was that the lighting was almost always fairly dark. I think that this was done because it was more of a dark film and therefor it fit the mood. Also the camera movements were clearly more advanced than older films. They was more than just pan and tilt used. Cameras moved up and down and all around. Also they used a heli-cam to film when actors were up in a helecopter which I think added to the intensity of some scenes. It was a pretty basic action film but now a days what isn't.

I would give it 2.5/4 stars because it was a good film but just didn't stand out as being all that speacial.

Random Thing About A Movie

A movie that I rented last weekend that I have been wanting to see for a while was Hot Fuzz. I got this movie first of all because the two actors from Shaun of the Dead were in it and I found that movie to be absolutely hillarious! Conicidentally Shaun of the Dead was on TV the day after I watched Hot Fuzz which was sweet but back to the point...I got Hot Fuzz because I heard that it was comparably funny to other british comidies. When this movie started I could tell it would be a little different than what I was expecting but none the less looked like it was going to be a good choice. As the movie progressed I could tell that it was definatly going to be really funny. There was a little bit less action than I was expecting but I still am glad that I rented this movie because it was definatly worth it. I highly reccomend taking a look at this because the acting and story line is excellent!!!!

Superbad Critique

The critique I chose to write about was by Colin Covert from the Minneapolis Star Tribune, about the recently released movie Superbad. I chose to write about this review because the author seemed to have a smiliar view to mine on this film.

I had heard people talking about this film for months before I finally decided to go and see it. I haven't been to the theaters in a while but I am glad I finally got around to going there. I had fairly high expectations for the movie based on everything that I had already heard. When I was going to see the movie I was expecting it to compare to movies such as The 40 Year Old Virgin or Knocked Up. When I got to the movies I was very excited to see what was to come. After the first five minutes of the movie I knew that it was going to thouroughly enjoy this epic movie. As the movie went on I got more and more into it and couldn't take my eyes off the screen. I found every line of this movie to be hillarious and thought the scenes were genius! The critique that I read also had some of the same views as mine such as...

I hurt my face laughing at "Superbad,"

I totally agree with what Colin is saying. The laughs kept on flowing from everyone throughout the entire movie. This movie was a hillarious depiction of how I think the high school life actually is, with a little exaguration of course. Many of the ideas from this movie were what I would imagine actually happening in the high school life, such as a nerdy guy trying to impress a "hott" girl by promising to bring alcohol to her party. This movie was also of course full of things that could never happen such as the ride along with the two police officers. I found that to be one of the funniest parts of the movie because of all the police moives there are where all the officers are super serious and tights asses. It was good to get a break and have some laughs about the police.

The cast is perfection. Hill and Cera riff together so effortlessly that you
can believe they've spent years together developing their syncopated banter.

I also agree with this quote that speaks about that actors. These two actors totally hit the money on this film. All of the scenes with them together were perfect and so well executed. I totally forgot about that acting and thought of them as two real people on a ridiculous adventure. When a director can make the film seem so real I think they have suceeded in making a good film. The friendship that was shown in this movie was a wonderful depiction of how friendships play out on the last few months/weeks before the seperate for college. Obviously there isn't nessesarily so much drama but the basic idea of spliting up is true. I found this truth to build in to the true life experiences being shown on film. Overall this was a wonderful film and I reccomend it to anyone.

Just Made

Hey I finally figured out how to make this thing work!