Let's start off with Hot Fuzz. This movie, from the creators of Shaun of the Dead, is an action-comedy about an overachieving London cop who, in order not to make his contemporaries in the police force look bad, is sent to a backwater little English village. While the worst crime in the village appears to be serving alcohol to minors, a series of "accidents" lead Sgt. Angel to dig deeper into the unlikely inhabitants of the village until he finds out what really goes on. Combining hilarious action and outrageous comedy (not to mention goofy references to classic action films), this is going to be one of my favorites for a long time yet.

After an amusing but unspectacular sequel, Shrek returns in what I expected would be a "the quest for more money" kind of movie. Despite (or maybe because of) my ridiculously low expectations I actually enjoyed Shrek the Third quite a bit. It's not a brilliant movie by any means, but it has a much better signal-to-noise ratio than the second one in my opinion, and my companions and I laughed our asses off throughout the production. Bottom line? If you're looking for a fun way to spend a couple of hours, it works very well.

It's hard to explain just how low my expectations of Transformers were. To me, it's a classic "well how can it not suck?" kind of movie, along with Resident Evil and Bloodrayne (both of which sucked, in case you were wondering). And I'm not even a fan of the TV series, so I had every reason to expect a terrible movie.
Well, it actually wasn't. The first half is surprisingly funny (not "ha-ha" kind-of funny, I mean "laugh out loud" funny), and the second half is non-stop, kick-ass action. This movie is definitely going to become high-definition reference material when it comes out on Blu-Ray or whatever, and the intentionally simpleminded plot works very well indeed. Biggest surprise of the year - recommended!

Starts out a little confusing, but really a lot of fun. Thumbs up!

Also in other news, Jamie Zawinski is hella funny.

To cut to the chase, Spiderman 3 was... part great, part awful. On the one hand, amazing cinematography and special effects, on the other hand a soulless script, misguided patriotism on the part of the director (this scene in particular reminded me of Raymond Chen's classic saying, "I bet somebody got a really nice bonus for that feature").

There is so much going for this movie that I couldn't help but attribute most of its shortcomings to a surprisingly shallow screenplay; my theory is that Sam Raimi's background as a B-Movie director ("in the trenches" is the term I'd use), while affording him impressive technical innovation and brilliant tongue-in-cheek humour, does not lend as well to his screenwriting abilities. The first two Spiderman movies were written by professional writers, and with Raimi's superb(not to mention distinctive) style of visual gloss the combination is very effective. For some reason the Raimi brothers took it upon themselves to write the script for the third movie, and it suffers accordingly.

Overt patriotism (which was much more subtle and agreeable in the first two movies) is very awkward for a superhero that is, in many ways, the antithesis of his contemporary who swears to uphold "truce, justice and the American way;" this reflects in the acting, and outlines how artificial those scenes were. The same goes for most love- or romance-related scenes which also felt forced and superficial. Tobey Maguire, who seemed in the first movie so appropriately docile and nerdy, on the second suitably vulnerable, now seems a little out of his element; in his defense, the over-the-top dialogue and violent mood-swings called for in the script would probably make any actor falter. A lot of the script just doesn't work.

Sandman is, and please remember that I have not actually read the comics, an utterly uninteresting character. It seems like a subplot, and one that doesn't make sense at that (it was never obvious to me why he fights against Spiderman); Thomas Haden Church plays, in this case, a very lethargic character that has - whether due to bad scripting or bad acting - very little depth. This would be a good opportunity to oppose a conundrum (minor spoiler ahead): at least once during the movie a fake news broadcast is shown, in which the anchorman provides commentary on the proceedings in real time. The anchorman provides the audience at home with the particular details of the combatants, and names them accordingly (Spiderman, Sandman, Venom). As my friend Yoav puts it, "who gets to decide these names anyhow?" (link in Hebrew)

On the plus side, James Franco actually seemed to learn to act, or maybe lack of any significant screen time in the first two movies never let his talent show. His dialogue is, ironically, quite sensible, and he carries it off very well indeed. A cameo appearance by the legendary chin is utterly hilarious, the music is great and the cinematography - as I previously alluded to - is simply fantastic. I'm not in the business, but I wouldn't at all be surprised to find out that Raimi has invented any number of new camera techniques in the course of filming Spiderman 3 alone. The special effects are brilliant and there is non-stop action - most of which is really good.

In conclusion, to reiterate the first sentence in this article: Spiderman 3 is not a bad movie, nor is it great (that title is reserved to the first movie in that particular series). I just wish Sam Raimi would stick to what he's (very) good at and leave the screenplay in the hands of people better suited to the task.

Lastly, it's worth noting that I saw this movie in Pathé Tuschinski in Amsterdam, which is undoubtedly the single most impressive cinema I've ever been to; it is a very large building, reportedly built in 1921 in the Art Deco style, and much more impressive on the inside than on the outside. Theater 1 is huge, spacious and comfortable, with an astounding number of chairs and two (!) levels of balconies. Audio and video quality was excellent - possibly the best I've ever experienced, and the lobby alone is worth the price of admission which, excluding discounts or sales, is €9-10 - quite pricey.

Long time no update. Reason? A vacation in Europe - mostly centered around the Netherlands (which I like very much). In the meantime I'll just post some random musings:

• 
  Radiohead rock. I have this thing where, when I hear music that I immediately dislike or "don't get," I feel obliged to give it another go every year or so. It took my years to learn to like Pink Floyd, and even more time to learn to like Radiohead, but after a serious listening session I have to concede that my friend (who we shall term "the rhesus") was right to call OK Computer "one of the 20th century's sublime records."
  
• At Outline 2007 (on which I will expand in a seperate post) I got acquainted with a Dutch tracker who styles himself Cosmiq. Take a listen to his second album, which I actually really liked (particularly track 3, "A Shine Too Much").
  
• You'll notice that I added a button for the FSF's latest campaign, Play OGG, under "advocacy" on the right. I'll take OGG over MP3 any day (on account of better sound quality for size, and no licensing fees for anyone); I don't expect the campaign to be wildly successful, but you never know. Maybe I'll actually be able to enjoy my next iPod or car audio set on my own terms.
  
• Had a bit of time to spare, so I watched The Karate Kid again. The movie certainly looks different after 10 or so years -- it actually looks better (if you discount the obligatory '80s movie influences). Pat Morita is extremely funny, and I've seen much worse actors than Ralph Macchio (who looks much younger than his 23 years at the time). It also happens to be a really quotable movie, mock Eastern wisdom notwithstanding: "to make honey, young bee need young flower, not old prune."

Next on the agenda: Spiderman 3.

Robbie Williams plays an amazing comedian turned president in Man of the Year. The movie is a non-too-small jab at American democracy, the American democratic process and the American voting public in general. As such it's inevitably cynical, however it still manages to temper cynicism with a genuine attempt to make people see that the democratic process is not completely rotten, that things people take for granted are the result of a lot of hard-work by a lot of usually well-meaning people, and finally reiterates the old adage to "never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."

Otherwise, it's a well-directed, well-acted (featuring, among others, Christopher Walken, Laura Linney and Jeff Goldbloom) and well-written movie. Recommended.

I've blogged about Neil Gaiman's MirrorMask before, and have neglected to follow up with comments on the movie. To make it short and to the point: it's brilliant. Original story (Alice-esque, but is otherwise new and fascinating), amazing artwork, impressive photography, great music and terrific acting. This is a top-notch movie which in many ways is better than Labyrinth, and easily parallels Dark City in imagination and visual production. Although this is not a movie for everyone, I would greatly recommend it to anyone who's enjoyed the above movies, or for that matter Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events.

A completely different beast is Borat (I'll spare you the full title). Anyone who's ever watched Ali G should already be familiar with how hysterically sad this character is; it's not that Borat as a character is funny, it's just how stupid the people he interviews are. To put it mildly, it was difficult getting up when the movie ended because my stomach muscles were so sore from laughing. And Borat speaks Hebrew almost the whole movie, to boot!
_{(Disclaimer: it's worth noting that this movie is completely idiotic, full of profanity and racist jokes. If you're touchy enough to be bothered by this, you shouldn't be reading this blog.)}

I won't deny being an Alfonso Cuarón fan; although I've only seen two of his movies, they both impressed me by being completely original and visually striking. His newest movie, Children of Men, definitely struck a chord with me. I'm not sure if this is obvious to anyone but me, but the narrative is like a modernized version of War of the Worlds with a human emphasis (i.e. no aliens): a regular joe getting caught in turbulent times, just one amazing thread of story that appears meaningless when viewed in the grand scheme of things. I'm not a professional writer so it's difficult for me to explain this properly - I hope I've managed to at least pique your curiosity.

Finally, I just feel the need to share a bunch of anecdotes:

• The Princess Bride is still (after so many years) a masterpiece of duality: sentimentality and criticism, virtue and wickedness, beauty and hardship. It's simply a brilliant tale, and if you haven't seen the movie you literally owe it to yourself.
• Holy shite, they're making a new Beowulf movie! One directed by Robert Zemeckis and written by Neil Gaiman no less. Who knows, maybe it won't utterly suck?
• They're actually making new Rocky and Rambo movies. Rocky 5000 all over again?... I mean, I like Sly as much as the next guy, but he's over 60!
• Pan's Labyrinth looks really gorgeous. The visual style is starting to get old, but the movie itself looks incredibly promising, and I'm definitely looking forward to it.

So I'm sitting at work, listening as I usually do to all sorts of music in the background. I found myself listening to the excellent soundtrack written for A Clockwork Orange (which also happens to be one of the best movies I've ever seen). Some of the classical pieces there have a distinct ring to them, as if they've been performed in a very peculiar and distinct (somewhat synth-y, for lack of a better word) style. It kept bugging me that I've heard this someplace before, and after some 40 minutes it finally struck me: it sounds highly similar to the soundtrack written for the movie Tron (also highly recommended).

I took a better look at the tracks to see who wrote them - a Walter Carlos. This was even more surprising for me, because I recall the Tron soundtrack credited to a Wendy Carlos. What's up?

Some digging in wikipedia proved once again extremely fruitful:

Her first six recordings were released under the name Walter Carlos, although, being a transsexual woman, she had already changed her name from Walter to Wendy. In 1972, Carlos underwent gender reassignment therapy. The last release to be credited to Walter Carlos was By Request (1975). The first release as Wendy was Switched-On Brandenburgs (1979). Carlos's first public appearance after her gender transition was in an interview in the May 1979 issue of Playboy magazine, a decision she would come to regret as it brought unwelcome publicity to her personal life. On her official site, her transition is discussed in an essay stating that she values her privacy on the subject.

The universe never ceases to surprise me.

I've also watched King Arthur while on vacation. I don't have a single word quite powerful enough to describe how utterly bad this movie is, so I'll settle with "horrific"; I mean, seriously, it was shit. Moreover, I'm not sure if Guinevere was a terrible character because of poor casting (Keira Knightley, who's also starring in the aforementioned Domino) or, more likely, due to a crappy screenplay. The camerawork was awful (most battle scenes were completely incomprehensible) and music uninspired. Bottom line: stay the hell away.

On the contrary, I also had the chance to watch Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events, to me an obscure movie I haven't even heard of until a couple of weeks ago. How can a movie of this caliber remain so unknown? I believe it wasn't even shown in Israeli theaters. Anyway it was an interesting movie, very funny at times and certainly very beautiful and imaginitive, but I can't shake the feeling that we have here a Tim Burton wannabe... I still haven't decided about it properly, I intend to watch it again and then I'll have a final opinion on it.

It's sort of 1984 (at least in the beginning) meets The Matrix (towards the middle). There are plenty of very high-profile actors who do a pretty good job with the mediocre script (including Ewan McGreggor, Scarlet Johansson, Sean Bean, Steve Buscemi and Michael Clarke Duncan) - there's even a guest role for our own Noa Tishby.

Bottom line: harmless generic action movie; ten years ago it might've been considered innovative but nowadays it's just a cash cow. The acting is, as I said, pretty good (considering the amount of star actors), the eye candy is great - but the movie itself is really uninspired.

Quit whatever you're doing, it's not important. Maybe you're performing a surgery. Put the scalpel down. Maybe you're holding a runaway car back from rolling over a carriage which contains an infant. There's no baby shortage, and even if there were, they're apparently a lot of fun to make. Run over the roof of the car, go home, and open up a browser.

It's rare that I encounter something which I can't find the proper amount of superlatives to describe. That something is Charly and the Chocolate Factory, the latest Tim Burton/Johnny Depp movie based on the famous novel by Roald Dahl (which I admit not to have read). I will not bother you with the list of superlatives I did manage to come up with, but trust me: you owe it to yourself to watch this movie. Just stop whatever it is you're doing and go.

Another recommendation that's bound to steal a few days of your life (and repay you by making the remaining days worth living) is the fantastic Psychonauts. It hardly matters what you're playing now, it can't compare. Remember Monkey Island? Day of the Tentacle? Grim Fandango? Same guy, and Psychonauts just might be his best work ever. You owe it to yourself to play this game. Just stop whatever it is you're doing and go.

Anyway, bottom line - I did go and did see it in the theaters. And it did not suck. Not even remotely as much as I feared it would. Now admittedly I've read the various "it doesn't suck" quotes on the 'net, but being my usual sceptic self I had to see for myself. I wouldn't call it terrific, though; it has two major problems without which it would probably have been the best in the series: crappy dialogues that seem to have been written by a 6-year old (particularly the various Padme vs Anakin scenes), and Hayden Christensen. Not even Ewan McGregor, whom I hold in very high regard since Big Fish, was able to keep me from noticing how poorly the dialogue is written, and not even the really terrific action scenes and utterly astounding visuals could keep the grimace off my face whenever Anakin came on-screen. Add to that an anti-climaxic Darth Vader experience and what you have is a pretty decent movie that could've been the biggest thing since, well, Lord of the Rings. A crying shame.

I had a completely opposite experience with The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: I was never a big fan of the series (yes, I read all of them) and had very low expectations. When the trailer came out I was plesently surprised to find that I thoroughly enjoyed it and laughed quite a bit, so it was with mixed feelings that I went to see it in the theater. Suffice to say that when the lights came on for the half-time break I was quite surprised: 45 minutes had gone by, and I didn't even notice. This movie is funny as hell! It's well-written, well-acted and even well-designed (visually); there are a lot of subtle jokes (as opposed to the incoherent in-jokes I originally expected) and this just made everything even better. I'm also very happy that the authors of this movie didn't give in to the fanboys, which means the authors did have some artistic license - I actually prefer the movie to the book this way. So in summary: this movie rocks. Watch it.

I had reasonably high expectations for Sin City: I like dark films and the trailer seemed very nifty. I had no idea what the movie was about though (never read the comic, nor could be bothered with previews) so I had no idea what I was getting into when I went to watch it. All in all I dub this film "high quality garbage." The production values are as high as it gets, but it doesn't stop the movie from being generic comic-based film-noir. The plot lines are overly simplistic and what the movie lacks in story-line it makes up for in insane amounts of gratuituous violence. When I made this argument a friend of mine challenged it, saying that I enjoyed Kill Bill immensely despite the level of violence which was at least as high; now don't get me wrong - I'm not squeamish and enjoy a good violence scene at least as much as the next guy, but the difference is that where violence in Kill Bill is intentionally portrayed as ludicrous and works to advance a simplistic plot (not to mention homage to '70s Hong Kong action flics), the violence in Sin City is not portrayed as ludicrous at all and works mostly to take the place of a nonexistant plot. It may work in the context of a comic, but I've never been a comic fan, so for me it merely detracts from a quality production. That said, the acting is top notch and the graphic design is absolutely beautiful, but as a whole Sin City is one movie I'm probably not going to watch again.

Finally I have a recommendation to make: grab Oldboy from the nearest Blockbuster and watch it. It's a Korean movie and I'm not sure how to best define it, but it's combination violent, disturbing and thought-provoking, with incredible acting, visual design and music to boot. Heartily recommended. Also, if you get the time, check out Kung Fu Hustle - I think it's in the theaters (in Israel) right now, or will be soon.