Gone Girl (2014)

Director: David Fincher

Writer: Gillian Flynn

Starring: Ben Affleck, Rosamund Pike, Neil Patrick Harris

Okay so this wasn’t my original “G” movie but to be honest since my neighborhood video store closed I wasn’t able to find 2013’s Gravity anywhere for under ten dollars. Sorry, but it could’ve been horrible and not worth my money. So I randomly picked again and came across David Fincher’s Gone Girl. Now I know it’s based on a book but I haven’t read it…Yeah, yeah, I’m sorry. Having not read it I can’t say if it did the book any justice, but what I can do is say that as a film it blew me away.

The movie is basically about this guy named Nick Dunne (Ben Affleck) who on the day of his fifth wedding anniversary comes home to find that his wife Amy (Rosamund Pike) has gone missing. So the police get involved, the news spreads like wildfire to basically the entire town and eventually across the U.S. and due to Nick’s apparent lack of concern, people start getting suspicious, as his behavior resembles that of a sociopath. (Pretty much everyone starts to think he murdered his wife). So then as we move on we are given, through flashbacks, a clear image of what Nick and Amy’s marriage was like: at first almost too good to be true; however, we then discover that it was in fact slowly deteriorating which has us very confused about what we think actually happened. It’s awesome.

So I really can’t say much more about the plot because honestly it would be doing you a disservice. I would usually recommend not watching a trailer but seeing as I had seen it plenty of times before watching the movie and had no idea what was coming, I think you’ll be good.

First of all I have to comment on the visuals, which were great. At times it felt a little darkly lit but what I loved was the simplicity of how the movie was shot mixed with the slightly faded and even kind of greenish filter. There were moments where we would be with Nick inside his house, which would be darkly lit but with bright, constant white flashes coming from the reporters outside. It was done in such a way as to almost make me feel like I was being harassed as well, as they were on the brink of being extremely disruptive. But they weren’t and it added to the overall feel of the movie. There’s also a shot of Nick’s wife that appears twice in the film (I won’t say when) of her leaning on him and looking straight into the camera (or Nick’s eyes) and after having figured things out, the second time I saw it I literally got chills.

Aside from the visuals, the performances were top notch. Ben Affleck has proven, within the past few years, that he has talent. I mean I don’t think I’ve ever come across an actor who makes what he does seem so damn effortless. He has this very modest way about him while still managing to become a completely different person, in this case Nick Dunne. Also, Rosamund Pike? Damn! She was absolutely perfect for this role and gave such a haunting and, in a way, confusing performance. She had me so invested in her character and gave just the perfect amount of energy to pull off such a complex character. This, however, leads me to the one issue I had with the movie...Neil Patrick Harris. Yup, he’s in it…

I adore Neil Patrick Harris. He’s charming, attractive, and…not the right casting choice to play Desi Collings, Amy’s obsessive, and frankly very creepy, boyfriend. Even Tyler Perry  (who, yes, was also in this movie) seemed like a good choice. But seriously Neil Patrick Harris? Now don’t think I’m objecting because of his sexuality because, trust me, that’s NOT my problem. My problem is that I simply think he plays the delightfully funny guy very well, and while I respect him for branching out, I just don’t think this role fit him well and, therefore, it kind of took a little bit away from his scenes for me. Just saying…you can totally have your opinion but that’s mine.

Okay so I would definitely recommend this movie. I could go on and on about things I loved and not about those I didn’t. Ben Affleck fans out there will love it, as will fans of movies in the “who done it” genre. It’s slow paced but in a way that will somehow have you entertained throughout the entire two and a half hours. And that’s saying something…

The Frozen Ground (2013)

Director: Scott Walker

Writer: Scott Walker

Starring: Nicolas Cage, Vanessa Hudgens, John Cusack

Rated: R (violent content, sexuality/nudity, language, drug use)

So apparently I had seen this movie before – something I wasn’t aware of until the random scene involving a moose happened. I wasn’t sure that was a good thing…

The Frozen Ground stars Nicolas Cage, John Cusack and believe it or not, Vanessa Hudgens (yes, the girl from High School Musical). Obviously when I randomly picked this movie and saw that Nicolas Cage was in it my first response was “well it has to be good I mean its Nicolas Cage!” (Jokes, people. I joke sometimes.) As most avid movie watchers know, Oscar winner Nicolas Cage has been in numerous films that are…well…just plain awful. I mean Drive Angry? The Wicker Man?? Left Behind??? Don’t even get me started. Nicolas Cage, man, what the hell happened?

Okay let’s not talk about how Nicolas Cage is basically bipolar when it comes to the movies he’s in. Now lets talk about the film. So I’m sure a majority of film lovers or critics probably didn’t expect much from this movie – probably because of the casting choices – and to be completely honest, I didn’t either. I thought Vanessa Hudgens was a particularly peculiar choice and basically expected her to simply suck. Well…I was wrong and she surprised me very much.

Alright briefly I’ll explain what the movie is about. It takes place in Anchorage, Alaska in 1983 and it’s based on the true story of Alaskan State Trooper, Jack Halcombe (Nicolas Cage) and his search for serial killer, Robert Hansen (John Cusack) who after thirteen years of going unnoticed has been discovered again after a series of murders occur (all of young women – mostly “street girls.”) None of the girls had escaped except for one, Cindy Paulson (Vanessa Hudgens) who approaches and then aides Halcombe in locating and arresting Hansen all before the next murder takes place.

While I did have a few issues with The Frozen Ground, I was actually pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it. I thought, despite Nicolas Cage’s history, my disliking of John Cusack, and my overall doubts about Vanessa Hudgens that they all gave some pretty awesome performances. I was especially pleased with Vanessa Hudgens, as this is such a different character from those I’m used to seeing her portray. You are welcome to disagree if you’ve seen it already but you can’t deny she tried. I mean she’s literally gone from being a Disney kid to starring in pretty sophisticated movies. But that doesn’t include Sucker Punch; let’s just not talk about that one…

As I said, John Cusack is pretty much the opposite of my favorite actor for personal, and frankly pretty stupid reasons, but I actually thought he gave the best performance of all three of the main leads. I mean if an actor or actress can make you hate them as much as I hated him in this movie, that’s saying something. He ain’t no Officer Daniels, but hey, he was good.

I thought the movie was also overall well balanced. By that I mean that there was a fare share of drama, thrills and suspense but also scenes during which we could get to know some of the characters. I respected this aspect of the movie because I think that there are so many movies that try to be so many genres at once that the film just feels like an unorganized mess. (Dirty Girl – two reviews back – would be an excellent example of this.)

For the parts of the movie I didn’t like I’ll begin with talking super briefly about the soundtrack. Now this was technically something my mom mentioned so I’m just going to sum up what she said, which is similar to how I felt by the end of the movie. While the music wasn’t bad, it just didn’t really fit at certain moments. Seriously Nicolas Cage would be opening his file cabinet or something on top of which was just this mega-intense music. Honestly if someone who couldn’t see were watching the movie and no one was telling them what was going on they would probably think that instead of opening his file cabinet, Cage was dying a painful and dramatic death. Of course this movie is dramatic so the music did seem appropriate for the most part but during some scenes me – and my mom – were both just thinking, Mr. Composer Sir, you my friend need to calm down.

The next issue I had was the chemistry between Nicolas Cage and Vanessa Hudgens. While I thought they were both quite good, I literally felt that the chemistry between them was practically non-existent. This could have been because the script during scenes where they interacted with each other wasn’t strong or simply because I watched Bruce Willis and Haley Joel Osment in The Sixth Sense three days after but I just didn’t buy their characters’ connection. There is a particular scene that takes place in a skate rink with the two of them eating pizza and talking about Cindy’s childhood and abusive father and then the story of Halcombe’s sister’s death and while it was obviously a touching moment, I wasn’t moved at all just because of the lack of on-screen chemistry.

The last problem I had wasn’t the cinematography but the never-ending shaky camera. One big decision the director and cinematographer of a film must make together is if the camera will be held steady on a tripod or if it will be handheld. Handheld camera work is often used to evoke some sort of emotion from the audience, for example in Jaws, cinematographer Bill Butler managed to convince Spielberg to use shaky camera work throughout the entire film in order to make the action feel more intense and real. Having the technique used for the whole film was obviously a good choice as Jaws is considered to be an extremely visually intense movie today but for The Frozen Ground I just didn’t think it added anything to many of the scenes. I don’t know, watch the movie and see what you think. Maybe I’m just being picky.

Well, to end my “F” review, I’ll recommend this movie to anyone who’s a fan of Nicolas Cage, Vanessa Hudgens or John Cusack as they all deliver solid performances. It’s an entertaining crime thriller that will have you at least a little on edge for the most part.

Oh and I also have the mention that originally the random movie I picked for the letter F was Fifty Shades of Grey and I literally almost cried. That movie looks like nothing I ever want to experience on screen (or in real life!) so I had a fiesta when I realized it hadn’t even been released in theaters yet. I thank whoever decided not to release it in 2014, you deserve a special place in heaven.

Edward Scissorhands (1990)

Director: Tim Burton

Writers: Tim Burton, Caroline Thompson

Starring: Johnny Depp, Winona Ryder, Dianne Wiest

Rated: PG-13

It’s Christmas time! Or if not Christmas time for some – the holidays FINALLY. Of course I wanted to find a holiday movie to review this December so I thought I would ignore the alphabet rule just this once but…turns out I didn’t need to as the random holiday movie I picked was Edward Scissorhands – one of my all-time favorites.

For those of you who haven’t seen it it’s directed by Tim Burton and stars Johnny Depp, Winona Ryder, Dianne Wiest and a whole lot of other awesome people, one of them being the “nerd” from The Breakfast Club!

The movie is actually a flashback; in the present, an old woman is telling the story of where snow came from to her curious granddaughter. The story goes like this…So this really old and eccentric Inventor (Vincent Price) creates a young man named Edward (Johnny Depp). He’s very handsome (it’s Johnny Depp I mean duh) but not quite complete. Before the Inventor could finish Edward, he passed away, leaving Edward with scissors instead of hands. We assume Edward stays up in the Inventor’s huge house for many years as it has become dilapidated and is also now surrounded by a small, simple suburb.

Anyway, the movie begins with Peg Boggs (Dianne Wiest), an Avon saleswoman making the rounds not having very much luck at selling anything. She’s kind of desperate so decides to venture to the giant creepy mansion at the edge of the perfect little neighborhood (think Count Olaf if you know who that is) to see if anyone lives there and if they do would they like to buy beauty products. So she obviously comes across Edward and eventually decides to take him home with her – a spur of the moment kind of decision…

Turns out as odd and kind of dangerous as Edward appears to be he is a kind soul whose only wish simply seems to be loved and accepted by someone. He stays with Peg, her husband (Alan Arkin), and two kids Kevin (Robert Oliveri) and Kim (Winona Ryder) for a few months and has an…interesting time. He and Kim develop a non-physical but very strong relationship and he finally gets the loving family he always wanted. The thing is he just doesn’t really fit in…

Okay I keep mentioning the neighborhood without really describing it. I mean it’s Tim Burton and if you don’t already know he’s known for having the gloomy clash awkwardly, yet brilliantly, with the bright and cheerful. Edward Scissorhands goes a little farther and is like Tim Burton meets Dr. Seuss. Does it sound weird? Well it is but it’s amazing. The whole movie kind of makes fun of American culture in the 1950’s with the whole perfect neighborhood, perfect families, etc. and it isn’t until Edward – or “change” – comes for a visit that things get chaotic. The housewives are all ridiculous as they are obsessed with gossip and other people’s business (such as Edward himself). So are the husbands because they are all oblivious to the change and are only focused on…I don’t know being husbands? But what my dad pointed out the other night when we watched it together was that underneath the obvious plot of Edward coming to stay with the Boggs’ was this other issue of kind of fitting into a group of people. Peg and her family are very different from the others in the neighborhood, yet they also find themselves trying to be socially accepted by their judgmental neighbors. Of all characters, Kim succumbs to this pressure the most in a scene I won’t spoil and for a moment we kind of find ourselves hating her. But, then again, we also have to think of it as simply crumbling under peer pressure – a popular issue in the world of teens.

This movie is kind of hard to review as I’m so familiar with it and am tempted to just tell you the whole story because it’s so great. But don’t worry I won’t!

I think all of the actors played their characters so well and had us believing that this unbelievably ridiculous town was real. While their physical appearances were perhaps a little on the unrealistic side, their characters were so familiar that we saw the world they live in as very true to our own.

For Burton fans out there who maybe haven’t seen this movie, I don’t think you will be disappointed. It’s a bit more of an emotional rollercoaster than some of his other films but it still holds that dark humor we all know and love – you just may happen find yourself crying at the end and it’s my favorite Tim Burton movie for this very reason.

Dirty Girl (2010)

Director: Abe Sylvia

Writer: Abe Sylvia

Starring: Juno Temple, Jeremy Dozier, Mila Jovovich, Mary Steenburgen

Rated: R (sexual content including graphic nudity, language)

Firstly, sorry it’s taken so long to get back on track. (Finals…) But anyway, now that I’m on Christmas break hopefully I’ll get back in the groove!

So last night I watched Dirty Girl. Never heard of it? Neither had I. To be honest I was really dreading watching it because the trailer looked terrible. But I judged too quickly. At least I think I did…

The movie takes place in Oklahoma in 1987 and it’s centered around high school “dirty girl,” Danielle (Juno Temple) who, because of her oh-so-slutty ways, has been placed “with the retards.” (Does it sound offensive yet? Don’t worry it isn’t as bad as it seems.) Basically her principle hasn’t been impressed by her promiscuity and as a sort of punishment places her in a school program for troubled students called “Challengers,” in which she is teamed up with Clarke (Jeremy Dozier), a shy, gay outcast, to work on a project.

Meanwhile at home – because mentioning family life would probably be important as well – Danielle lives with her sweet and very young mother, Sue-Ann (Mila Jovovich) who is soon to be married to this kind of annoying Mormon guy (William H. Macy) who’s already got two really annoying kids. Danielle isn’t too fond of any of them – including her mother – and pretty much spends most of her time not helping out by constantly acting out.

Clarke lives with his loving, yet easily intimidated, mother (Mary Steenburgen) and homophobic father (Dwight Yoakam) who’s not the nicest of men out there as he tends to act violently at any sign of “gay behavior” from his son.  

So…Danielle and Clarke start to spend time with each other as they work on their project (taking care of a flour sack). Then, after discovering the identity of Danielle’s father, the two set off for California in hopes of finding him.

Okay so there’s kind of a lot to this movie as you may be able to tell. It’s kind of all over the place and not the easiest to explain. (I left a lot out to spare you a fair share of literary confusion). I can’t really tell if I liked it or not to be honest. The first half an hour or so was surprisingly funny (a whole bunch of crude humor) but beyond the humor the content was actually pretty serious and really quite sad. I mean there’s a ton of verbal abuse from father to gay son, which I’m sure hits very close to home for a lot of people and then this whole sub plot of hating your single parent and wanting to find the other one in hopes they’ll be better, which, again, I’m sure many can relate to.

What was weird though, was that at some parts the movie wasn’t trying to be touching but then at others I could tell it was and to be completely honest, it was during the effortless parts that I felt the most invested and even kind of emotional. I think with as little as twenty-five percent less cheesiness (such as lines and music) the film could have been way better because it was when they weren’t trying to make me really feel for the characters that I did the most. For example just observing Danielle’s typical relationship with her mother made me just feel terrible for both of them, yet lucky that my relationship with my own mother is healthy . If or when you watch the movie, you’ll probably see what I mean when I say that some of the script was too cheesy for words and that the soundtrack was a little much at times, but when neither of these applied, the movie was actually kind of decent.

*SPOILER ALERT* Don’t read the next two paragraphs if you don’t want spoilers. Just to add on to what I was just saying and to end this really awkward review, I wanted to quickly discuss a scene I thought was really well done and one I thought was too much.

So Danielle does eventually make it to her father’s house. Her mother, who had gone after her along with Clarke’s mother, had made it there before her, and attempts to discourage Danielle from meeting her father. Danielle then runs away in order to avoid her mothers grasp and ends up in her fathers backyard where she finds him grilling burgers – a very stereotypical “dad activity.” The scene then patiently progresses as the two briefly talk and introduce themselves to each other. At one point her father’s young daughter comes out and Danielle is introduced as one of her father’s students. In tears Danielle meets her father’s little girl and honestly it’s really damn emotional. I mean despite a whole lot of stupid things that happened leading up to this moment, I was actually feeling like if I were a tad more invested in the movie I might have teared up a little bit. But don’t let that make you think its Oscar-worthy because, trust me, it isn’t.

The other scene that I thought was just ridiculous was the last scene where Danielle is performing in the talent show singing Melissa Manchester’s “Don’t Cry Out Loud” – a song Clarke had thought of performing earlier on in the film. (By the way she’s doing it solo because Clarke’s father had sent him off to Military School - I told you there was a lot going on in this movie). The scene wouldn’t have been so bad if Clarke hadn’t shown up out of freaking nowhere to finish the song with Danielle having randomly returned home (like what?) I don’t know it was just painful to watch.

*NO MORE SPOILERS* So this review I’m sure was all over the place and not very well organized, but to be fair neither was the movie! Hopefully you’re able to make sense out of what I’m trying to say about this film but if not I’ll sum it up real quick.

Basically I didn’t think this movie was great; it made me cringe at times and just feel really confused at others. However…the acting was actually very good despite the kind of terrible script and about seventy-five percent of the jokes are pretty funny if you’re into crude humor. It wasn’t worthy of an award or anything but really, Rotten Tomatoes, I think it deserves a little better than a 27%. But that’s just my opinion…