Monday, February 18, 2008

No Country for Old Men

With the risk of giving you the impression that I go to the cinema every week, I want to tell you about the movie I saw this Saturday. Still not the Kite Runner, as I went with my wife and she already saw that one. Instead I saw No Country for Old Men.

It is dangerous to compare it with anything else, but if I have to I would compare it to a gloomy version of Pulp Fiction. However, that resemblance is limited to the level of violence being used combined with a peculiar sense of humor. There the resembles stops as quick as it started.

Perhaps it is my lack of imagination but there was only one scene that I found to be predictable. For the rest of it I had no clue where it was going, and that pleasant feeling lasted until the end. I can't mention any character that was not convincing, including the side-kicks. Come to think of it, except for the hunter and the hunted every other character made a pretty "normal" impression. That is, as far as people from Kansas can be considered to be normal (no offense meant).

On a scale of "worthless" to "genius", I gladly give it an "excellent".

Monday, February 11, 2008

Cloverfield

Yesterday I went to the movies as a kind of birthday present with a nephew of mine who recently came of age (being 18 in his case). Offered the options to either go to The Kite Runner or Cloverfield, for some reason he choose the latter. Now why would that be?

Pehaps the best way to describe Cloverfield is as a crossover between The Blair Witch Project and Godzilla, inheriting the better aspects of both of them. The whole movie is shot with a hand-held camera. Somewhat disturbing in the beginning but I got used to it pretty soon. Bending your head to the left or right on a regular base is a good exercise anyway.

It already has been described as an exponent of the YouTube generation, and some critics state that it redefines the concept of monster movies. Only time can tell if they are right. What I can tell you now, though, is that you don't need to be afraid of too much character building (there is none in any significant way), and in a pleasent way the monster is more a sidekick than the main dish of the story.

If you already saw the Kite Runner, you might consider Cloverfield as your next target. It's worth that big screen.