where you going? Nowhere who are you going with? No one when will you be back? Later
PREFACE
This is the sporadically updated blog of reviews by Harriet, author of In the Aquarium: a londoner's life.
I have kept the reviews separate to enable them to be indexed and therefore more easily accessible (see listing below).
FAVE FILMS DEAD MAN What an idea, the man is dying for almost the entire length of the film, the music is fantastic, its black and white, ideology, mythology, funny, sad, Johnny Depp sex god...
THE DRAFTMAN'S CONTRACT The first Peter Greenaway film I saw and possibly the most accessible. Beautiful set, costumes, direction. Fantastic soundtrack.
MULHOLLAND DRIVE I knew exactly what was going on right up until the last 15 minutes and damn it but then I lost it.
NIGHT ON EARTH Jim Jarmusch made the only film with Winona Ryder worth watching and it had Beatrice Dalle (say no more)
O BROTHER WHERE ART THOU? Roar out loud with laughter and tunes that make you love country music. My sister had to sneak out of the cinema ahead of our dad and me cos she was so embarrassed at our laughing.
ORLANDO Quiet, passionate, time travel.
PITCH BLACK Bails and I watched this with its bleached scenery and its whoar factor star. We LOVED him, Mr Diesel take a bow.
RESERVOIR DOGS Tight Tarantino gang heist gone wrong. Great soundtrack. And there's something about Michael Madson, dancing just before cutting off the cop's ear...
ROMUALD ET JULIETTE Truely lovely romance comedy.
THREE COLOURS TRILOGY Blue, White and Red. I liked them all. Quiet stories, beautifully shot.
THE USUAL SUSPECTS Its a story told. And the first time I saw it I didn't get the twist until just before it happened.
There's a party, its being videoed by one of the guests. Everybody is really annoying in that cloying we're-painfully-trendy kind of way. Part way through a huge explosion happens and everyone runs out into the street. It looks like when the twin towers were about to come down - smoke and dust everywhere. Everyone is running and screaming. It isn't clear what from or which direction. People start looting. The video keeps going. It is jerky and not always in focus. Buildings collapse, dust falls, people run around. The army comes in and starts evacuation. Everybody is on the bridge trying to get to Brooklyn. Something breaks the cables to the bridge. People fall in the water and scream. Eventually we get a glimpse of what it is that's causing so much devastation. Some kind of creature. Fleeting between the buildings. Shooting. The people we are following are running, they hide, they try to find a way out - choose to go into the underground. Walk along the subway. In the dark they are attacked by viscous little creatures. ONe of them gets bitten. They come up into another station - through some kind of mall. The army has a base there - lots of people are being treated. On seeing the group - they drag one of them off shouting bite bite - when they get her into a special area she explodes.
Anyway, whatever. I thought there was tension, couldn't figure out what exactly was going on for ages - no clear view. Technique of using the panicked view through the video made it like I imagine that kind of situation would be like - chaotic bascially. In the end nobody survived from the group. Bit like Blair Witch Project. Boyfriend didn't like it.
I had no idea what this film was going to be about. It had a great sound track, kooky star. Story is about a girl who is 16 that gets pregnant. Her parents are ultra understanding. She isn't able to get a termination. So she decides to find a couple to adopt her baby. Its quiet. About relationships between people. A slight film but funny, sad and heart warming. I liked it. Laughed.
