Yup, I saw a bunch of movies. Quick reviews.
Ratatouille - Just stunningly animated and conceived. Maybe the best Pixar movie I've seen.
Sicko - Will someone please give Michael Moore the key to the city already? Those who nitpick Sicko just sort of make me scratch my head. It's as if to say "Oh, sure there's a massive Healthcare Crisis and it's enslaving the American People and denying them their basic rights...but the way he uses EDITING really burns me."
I've heard it said that Sicko doesn't give the Health Insurance Industry a chance to respond. Well, we're living in their version of America. That's their say. One two hour movie of a completely different vision, I think, is fair game.
Transformers - (Just saw this with friends at a late night screening) Giant. Robots. Blow. Things. Up. So, yeah, if you like that sort of thing, you will love this movie. I, for one, loved Transformers as a kid, and I felt like they made it just to make me happy. You actually say "How many more things can blow up?! Oh! MORE!?" Crass, but perfect.
About Me
- Freeman
- Matthew Freeman is a Brooklyn based playwright with a BFA from Emerson College. His plays include THE DEATH OF KING ARTHUR, REASONS FOR MOVING, THE GREAT ESCAPE, THE AMERICANS, THE WHITE SWALLOW, AN INTERVIEW WITH THE AUTHOR, THE MOST WONDERFUL LOVE, WHEN IS A CLOCK, GLEE CLUB, THAT OLD SOFT SHOE and BRANDYWINE DISTILLERY FIRE. He served as Assistant Producer and Senior Writer for the live webcast from Times Square on New Year's Eve 2010-2012. As a freelance writer, he has contributed to Gamespy, Premiere, Complex Magazine, Maxim Online, and MTV Magazine. His plays have been published by Playscripts, Inc., New York Theatre Experience, and Samuel French.
6 comments:
Hey Bud,
Couldn't agree with you more about Ratatouille (and philosophically about Michael Moore, althoughI haven't seen Sicko yet).
Ratatouille was amazing. Formally inventive (the ongoing conceit for the sense of taste was amazing), exciting, funny and moving, and jam-crammed with content. It's interesting that it has three major themes (the whole class striving follow-your-dream theme, one on collaboration and one of food) and manages to juggle them all. Just fucking brilliant.
"Oh, sure there's a massive Healthcare Crisis and it's enslaving the American People and denying them their basic rights...but the way he uses EDITING really burns me."
So true. I got into a lengthy and heated debate with a friend on the weekend and he was like, "it's not a proper documentary." And I'm like, "what's a proper documentary? And why can't we look at it as op-ed film?"
And then he goes, "What? I'm not allowed to criticize the way he made the film?"
And I'm like, "but your criticisms suggest that Moore's techniques fundamentally compromise the integrity of his work."
And then it went on and on like that.
Anyway, it was a frustrating discussion because my friend fundamentally likes Michael Moore and his films, but gets hung up on trying to make them fit into some stupid little genre box.
Ian
You know who your friend wouldn't be able to argue with?
GIANT F*CKING ROBOTS.
They are now in charge of all Michael Moore complaints.
There are very few things I like to see more in life than giant robots blowing sh*t up, so I'm definitely in for Transformers tomorrow, perhaps as a double feature with Ratatouille (yes, I'm a little behind
Just saw Transformers. I mean...I can't say it's a good movie, but you're absolutely right: Giant. Robots. Blow. Things. Up. I got just what I was looking for. Now, with regard to Optimus Prime:
SUPER-COOL: Getting the same voice actor from the cartoon.
SUPER-LAME: Having Prime say, "My bad."
I also thought that a lot of the actors were amusing in that "Hey I'm in a Summer Popcorn Flick" way.
I think a lot of Prime's lines were great. He basically said a lot of stuff from the cartoon, which pleased me to no end.
One thing I basically loved about Transformers (my friend David D. and I were talking about it beforehand) was that there was none of the misery that seems to infect the latest big fantasy/sci-fi/comic book movies.
Think about Spider Man 3. There was so much crying. So many times it seemed clear that being Spider Man was a burden. Obviously, if you're Batman, you're this brooding dark psychotic freak. But Ang Lee's The Hulk? Suffering from repressed memories? Superman Returns? He returns to getting killed, feeling abandoned and dealing with adoption. X-Men? Intolerance and death.
Honestly, the way these movies are working lately, it's like being a superhero is the worst job in the whole friggin' world.
The one thing that we loved about Transformers is that the Giant. F'ning. Robots. That. Are. Here. To. Protect. The. Earth. seemed terribly straightforward about being good and being HUGE and having swords that pop out of their arms. They seemed, frankly, to be relatively good at fighting the bad guys and certainly more than happy to go and kick some butt.
It was really sort of great to go to a movie about things that are designed to be fantastically cool, and not here Optimus Prime go: "Boy, it's hard to be an Alien Robot that transforms in to a Truck. When I'm a truck, no one will marry me."
Instead he said: "If I cannot defeat Megatron, BLOW ME UP!"
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