Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (2011)

This is a fun movie - the chemistry between Holmes and Watson is fun and the adversarial chemistry between Holmes and Moriarty is interesting. It has been fun to watch these new Robert Downey Jr. movies with the new BBC series as they are both reinterpreting the books. The BBC series is far better, but these are fun and stylish.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011)

David Fincher couldn't resist making his own film adaptation of the wildly successful mystery novels (I've heard they read exactly like the movies...) even though the original (released just 2 years previous) was very well made and popular.

This version is no tamer than the Swedish version. It is brutally graphic in its telling of the investigation into serial/ritual murders, Lisbeth's abuse, and the original mystery of the missing girl. The acting and style are stellar with an unrelenting pace.

I still can't figure out why they had to make another almost identical version, but it was well done none the less.

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Tinker Tailer Soldier Spy (2011)

No movies adapted from John Le Carré novels come to mind when I recall bad film experiences. The complexity of the characters, the extreme circumstances, and the very personal look at the decisions and consequences they face make a film like Tinker Tailer Soldier Spy well worth a look.

Oh, and the grand performances must be mentioned.

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Dr. No (1962)

Very funny, what with all the getups that Ursula Andress wears, the villain's lair, and Sean Connery's one liners. Despite it's efforts, I was not moved to flinch or quiver.

Agent 007 heads to Jamaica to investigate the death of another MI6 agent only to uncover a plot to destroy a space program. Lots of beach scenes.

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The Bicycle Thief (1948)

What a heartbreaking film! A desperate labourer is robbed of his bicycle and spends the next day trying to find his bike and thus save his employment in postwar Italy. The film was a powerful display of what life is currently like in many parts of the world and I was surprised at how similar late 1940s Rome looked to current Guatemala City.

As painful as the story is, it is a beautiful image of a family working hard to make ends meet.

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The Adventures of Tintin (2011)

What sheer pleasure this film was. Adventure in one of its purest forms. Tintin proves that he is as much a super hero as the American variations by his unwavering tenacity.

Peter Jackson (prod.) teamed up with Steven Spielberg (dir.) to make this animated feature and they complement each other very well. The camera placement/movement, animation and motion capture are so stunning that any childish aspects of the story are dwarfed (not that the screenplay is lacking, it's just a really simple story).

In one scene we see Captain Haddock and you can see the yarn that makes up the sweater and it looks so real. The advantage to digital animation is that the camera can be placed wherever you wish and so Spielberg kept it moving throughout the film. I don't think it was still for a moment.

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Hereafter (2010)

While I think this is terrific film making, I'm pretty dismayed with the message it promotes: we can hear from the dead. If we believe this, then we open ourselves up to extortion, theological heresy, and a life that can be interfered with by the dead.

The film itself tells of the struggle of three individuals all connected to this otherworldly dimension. One is a medium who wishes he could turn off his dead person sense. Another is a boy who tragically loses his twin in an accident and longs to hear from him. The last is a woman who dies momentarily and comes back to life and seeks answers to the things she remembers seeing.

Kudos to the tsunami creators - stunning sequence.

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Winter's Bone (2010)

Authentically tense with some raw strength in both the characters and the gripping narrative.

Ree has to track down her dad who is out of prison on bond. If he doesn't show up for his court date, she loses the family land and house. The back hills of Arkansas aren't the most welcoming place to be poking around, in fact it's quite terrifying. Blood is thicker than water.

Jennifer Lawrence is fantastic, but who is this director? Debra Granik? She's awesome!

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The Day of the Jackal (1973)

We get a fascinating historical look at the early 1970s in this cat and mouse thriller. A detective uses all means possible to thwart an elaborate plot to assassinate French President Charles de Gaulle. There is a bit of melodrama, but essentially the film is saved by the sleepless detective who has an army of people in several countries combing through paper files as they try to identify the hit man hired by a terrorist organization (it wouldn't have been nearly as engaging if they had the internet and electronic databases at their disposal).

Kind of a cool film with some intriguing characters.

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Fanny och Alexander (1982)

Fanny and Alexander is one of Ingmar Bergman's most celebrated films. It is the intimate account of a brother and sister born into the aristocracy of 19th century Sweden. The story begins at Christmas time where opulence is exposed as a deep root for the sadness in the family. It carries through a death into the bleak and cheerless world of a bishop's manse. The third chapter of this grand film is punctuated by the surreal inside a Jewish home.

Bergman helps us interpret these worlds through the discerning eyes of children. One does not necessarily leave the film filled with hope making it tough to watch at times. The engaged viewer should finish with more wisdom though, making it quite worthwhile.

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The Seventh Continent (1989)

Yet another bleak contemplation on violence, hopelessness, and the inexplicable nature of what causes people to give up and how it must be linked to our increasingly secluded society from Michael Haneke.

The Seventh Continent - literally Australia, but symbolically it is death - follows the unceremonious daily routine of a family of three, then it shows their deliberate march into oblivion.

Not a picker upper. About as haunting as they come.

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The Tree of Life (2011)

One of my favourite film makers delivers this masterpiece of cinema - a poetic account of one boy's struggle with meaning juxtaposed with images of the cosmos and eternity. Absolutely stunning camera work, realism blended with childlike wonder and real emotional pain and joy.

The pace is slow, but the characters are engaging and the 139 minutes pass as though a dream. Categorically perfect contemplation.

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Luftslottet som sprängdes (2009)

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest is the final installation of the Millenium series and it culminates with the recovering and mysterious Lisbeth standing trial for murders. The trilogy moves from a mystery disconnected to our heroine in book/movie I to a focus on the identity of our heroine in book/move III.

As I mentioned in the last review of Played with Fire, the implausibility of the whole story detracts from what could be a far more engaging story. That conceded, it is an exciting albeit disturbing conclusion to a fascinating character sketch.

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Flickan som lekte med elden (2009)

The intense follow up to The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Lisbeth is now the tracked as she is accused of murders related to a sex trafficking ring. She keeps her ally from the first movie at an arms length as they both search for the real culprits.

The Girl Who Played with Fire continues the theme of independence, strength, and justice only to demonstrate again that none of these is completely possible, despite their ability to drive a superhero story like this one.

The movie is pretty cool because it's set in Sweden instead of New York or L.A. or London. It's also blatantly far-fetched which both adds to the intensity and kicks it down a couple notches in my mind because it's more difficult to buy in.

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Super 8 (2011)

Film makers J.J. Abrams and Steven Spielberg created here is an homage to sci-fi pop films of the 1970s and 80s where children are the stars and magic is in the air (think E.T. meets The Goonies). The movie is appropriately straddles the two decades as it is set in 1979. The young actors are set on making their own movie on super 8 film and inadvertently draw attention to themselves when they are caught shooting at the site of an alien escape. The feds are on their trail as the kids try to solve the mystery.

The film is masterfully shaped and expertly executed making for a really fun movie to watch.

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Congorama (2006)

I was really pleased with this funny collaboration between Belgium and Canada. A Belgian man discovers that he was adopted from Québec and as he faces joblessness and irrelevance, he seeks out his origin in the farmlands of eastern Canada. Belgian Congo works its way into the story too.

While taking a break from pitching an invention, Michel has a providential encounter with people in a town where he was apparently given up to some nuns and then given away at Expo '67 in Montreal. He is given the key to success, but not without compromise.

One scene in the film impressed me in particular because I had lower expectations for a Canadian film.

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Unmistaken Child (2008)

When a lama dies in central Asia, one of his disciples seeks out his reincarnated image in this fascinating documentary.

The film outlines the process of selecting a successor to a Buddhist spiritual leader and demonstrates the care and faith required to do so. The disciple becomes convinced that a toddler in a mountain village clearly demonstrates his master's qualities and presents him as the heir to this spiritual power. The child is presented with several objects, some belonging to the deceased lama, and if he can pick the right ones, he is clearly the new lama.

There are some rather heart breaking scenes - and perhaps they would be euphoric to a Buddhist.

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Before Sunrise (1995)

This Richard Linklater film is a cross between an essay, a play, and a romantic drama. It distills the essence of what a connection between two people is: trust, mutual interest, and sexual attraction.

A rather bold American tourist comes on strong to a French woman traveler on a train in Vienna. The two strangers decide to spend 24 hours together in the historic city on a whim and fall in love only to leave each other at dawn.

The two converse and self-correct and wander through the night as they explore each other and metaphysical reality.

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A Murder of Crows (1998)

Everything is nicely resolved in this mystery/crime drama. It's too bad since it could have been far more dramatic and interesting if things didn't get tied up so nicely - the story is quite clever.

A New Orleans lawyer gets a conscience and subsequently is disbarred. He moves to Florida to write a novel when out of the blue, an old man shares with him a novel manuscript about a man who murders lawyers. When the old man unexpectedly dies, the lawyer peddles the book as his own yielding consequences from the true facts in the novel.

The film was made for the masses, offering little cerebral tension, but Cuba Gooding Jr. shares some life lessons that lend a modicum of meaning to the film. As a mystery, it works on the same level as a good Agatha Christie film.

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Il y a longtemps que je t'aime (2008)

I've Loved You So Long is a gorgeous film from France. It tackles some difficult issues, but very graciously and from a character's perspective.

A younger sister, Léa, invites her older sister, Juliette, to live with her and her family when she is released from prison after a long sentence. Juliette is not easy to love and behaves selfishly, but Léa persists.

Special credit goes to Kristin Scott Thomas who holds her own in this French speaking role and who evokes complex sympathy.

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