Movie Reviews part 13: How many movies will Jessica Chastain star in?

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I really liked the ending, how it circled around to the start with Kyle Orton/Robin Pecknold telling a story and the staff having to chase down the kid. And the story was a definite feel good moment, after a lot of sadness. Thought it bookended the thing nicely. Fuck Scott Tobias.
 
The events and interactions between the bookends feel so natural that to have crazy writerly conventions nudge their way into the mix feels disingenuous.

Marcus's rap and that ending feel like they're in two different movies.
 
Doing a Resnais marathon. He seemed to be right up my alley and it proved to be just that and more. Hiroshima mon amour, Last Year at Marienbad and Je t'aime je t'aime were all excellent, with Marienbad leading the way. Truly a unique cinematic experience. You can see these films have influenced generations of filmmakers, from Kubrick and Lynch to Wong Kar-wai and Michel Gondry.
 
Red Rock West is fucking great. Nic Cage, Dennis Hopper, and the Immortal J.T. Walsh all in top form... alongside a Twin Peaks-era Lara Flynn Boyle, no less. It's a knotty pine of a neo noir, expressive and tense as all hell.

Cage vs. Hopper is akin to what I imagine the Greek gods against the Titans must've been like. You know, in olden times.
 
The Wolf Of Wall Street

Such a blast. Leo brings it so hard, and the memorable sequences are too many to list, though right now I'm thinking about that fucking hilarious lunch with McConaughey and the boat encounter with Kyle Chandler's FBI agent. Scorsese has made Margot Robbie a star. And this makes American Hustle look like amateur hour in comparison.

12 Years A Slave

Fucking hell this is a sad story, but it's told so well. Mesmerizing, visually stunning, and I do think Ejiofor's performance is as strong as anything from the year. Thought it was a great choice to include all of those lingering close-ups on his face. His face really told the story. Phenomenal actor. Thought Pitt was great in his two big scenes, too. Pitt for President 2016???

In A World...

I enjoyed this a lot. Super funny. I'll be honest, I didn't know anything about Lake Bell before this, and I never really cared much for Demetri Martin or Rob Corddry either, and now I'm a fan of all three. All three were very likable, especially Martin. Dude cracks me up in this movie. I'm in love with the scene where he's trying to ask Lake Bell on a date and fucks it up and ends up whipping his phone at the wall.

Blue Jasmine

Liked it, didn't love it. Great cast, but I felt something was missing overall. I guess it was just a story that I didn't completely care about or buy into. I definitely prefer Midnight In Paris when it comes to the recent acclaimed Woody.
 
Finished reading The Great Gatsby this morning...just finished the 2013 film. Thought Joel Edgerton was amazing. Kinda wish he'd been nominated for best supporting. The rest of the movie bounced between unmitigated disaster to best movie ever. I think that ends up leaving it somewhere between a 6.5 and a 7 in my book. But I think I'd trade most scenes in any film I've ever seen for the sequence of Daisy and Gatsby's first meeting.
 
The first hour of Gatsby was edited like a shitty music video. It reminded me of Hamish Hamilton at his worst. Awful crap.

The rest was fine because the story is fantastic and Baz let it breathe some.
 
No human in the history of the planet has ever cared about your opinion on movies, and they're certainly not gonna start caring now. Stick to spending an absurd amount of time on your music reviews. You're spreading yourself too thin.
 
I thought it was a refreshing take on the material. Perhaps too literal at times, and the one significant addition of the framing story didn't quite work. Mainly because Tobey Maguire is a wet noodle.

But I think Baz really nailed the excitement of the era, but also handled the more intimate moments well from a character perspective. Fantastic turn from D-Cap (what a fucking year this guy had), a welcome "debut" for Elizabeth Debicki, and solid, intense work from Edgerton. Carey Mulligan is just too slight a presence to register here, though I guess Daisy just sucks in general as a person anyway.

What the hell do I know, though. I loved Australia.
 
Tobey/DiCap's real life BFF status adds a subtext that piques my interest a bit. I just can't get onboard the Baz train in the same way Jeunet, Gondry, Besson, and other hyper-expressive, production design-oriented Euro ex-pats leave me cold. There are exceptions in their work -- Eternal Sunshine, Delicatessen -- but collectively they feel like strained shouts.

I'd pay a dollar for Fincher's Gatsby, though between Benjamin Button & Fight Club we pretty much have one already.
 
lazarus said:
I thought it was a refreshing take on the material. Perhaps too literal at times, and the one significant addition of the framing story didn't quite work. Mainly because Tobey Maguire is a wet noodle.

But I think Baz really nailed the excitement of the era, but also handled the more intimate moments well from a character perspective. Fantastic turn from D-Cap (what a fucking year this guy had), a welcome "debut" for Elizabeth Debicki, and solid, intense work from Edgerton. Carey Mulligan is just too slight a presence to register here, though I guess Daisy just sucks in general as a person anyway.

What the hell do I know, though. I loved Australia.
Click to expand...

I'm torn between how much I wanted to love the movie (based both on how much I guiltily love Baz and the fact that I've been trying for a year to get around to reading the source material) and the little things that were huge problems.

It hurts me, for whatever reason (probably Spiderman fan-girl holdout feelings) to say that Maguire was a huge detriment to the film. I also thought the first "party" (the one in the hotel with Tom's mistress) was one of the worst edited scenes I've ever witnessed.

But everything from there on put mostly pleased me greatly.

I still haven't seen Australia, fwiw.
 
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The Great Gatsby is dope.

Australia is great.

Moulin Rouge greatest film ever.

I'm not super on board with Romeo + Juliet still, and Strictly Ballroom is solid. I like Baz a lot.

/deepthoughts
 
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