Mark's Movie Madness
April 5, 2012
I decided to keep track of the movies I watched (and in what format) this year, because I often get to the end of the year and can't remember what movies I watched or what year I actually watched them. So here's the last 10.
1. Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol. (theater)
Fun. I've been sort of tepid about the first three. They all had great action set-pieces, but the characters aren't necessarily likable, they seemed to exist in a humor-free zone and in the case of the first film, it was practically incomprehensible. I liked this one a lot. Simon Pegg was wonderful, Tom Cruise lightened up, and none of the technology worked.
2. Source Code (Video)
Technically, this was a second time around. I saw it in the theater, but Ian got it as a DVD for Christmas. I really like this movie and this type of movie. It's sort of hard to describe if you haven't seen it, but it involves a kind of time travel/alternate universes/stop the terrorist thing. Really works for me.
3. The Adjustment Bureau (Video)
Again, one I liked a lot with a nice philosophical underpinning about alternate realities. About a politician (Matt Damon) who discovers a mysterious Adjustment Bureau that makes adjustments to people and timelines to keep things on track. And the Powers That Be want him to eventually become President of the U.S., but he falls in love with a woman during a chance meeting and they want to eliminate that because he won't become President if they fall in love and marry.
4. Ghosts of Girlfriends Past (TV)
This movie sucked. I'm sorry. I'm forgiving of Matthew McConaughey and of his shitty taste in scripts and am generally forgiving of romantic comedies, but almost everything about this film sucked dead bears.
5. The Next Three Days (Video)
A Russell Crow thriller about a college professor whose wife goes to prison for murder and he decides to break her out and go into hiding. The skepticism thing here is huge - it never quite made me believe it was possible - but Russell Crow is usually interesting to watch and that was the case here.
6. Moneyball (Video)
Oh yeah. Fantastic film about baseball. Loved it.
7. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (Video)
A rather slow, artsy and too long film with Brad Pitt as Jesse James and Casey Affleck as Robert Ford. If you take it as an artsy movie you'll probably like it. If you think it's going to be a western shoot 'em up about Jesse James and train robberies, no, you're going to be disappoitned. And apparently it's reasonably accurate in terms of historical events. Casey Affleck is pretty amazing in it. But it's really slow.
8. Real Steel (Video)
Giant fighting robots. Hey, what's not to like? It's incredibly predictable, a good family film. We had some fun because some of it was shot in Michigan, including a couple scenes in Oxford only a mile or two from my house, so we got to spend some time saying, "That looks familiar! Hey, what about..."
9. The Hunger Games (Theater)
A powerful and disturbing movie that's quite faithful to the book. I might like to see it again, but it's not something I necessarily want to see again and again.
10. The Ides of March (Video)
George Clooney and Ryan Gosling and Paul Giamatti and Marisa Tomei and.... hell, the cast goes on and on. A thoughtful political film, not really a thriller, but I think you could argue that it's really about how politics turns idealists into cynics. And it sure as hell is cynical.
I decided to keep track of the movies I watched (and in what format) this year, because I often get to the end of the year and can't remember what movies I watched or what year I actually watched them. So here's the last 10.
1. Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol. (theater)
Fun. I've been sort of tepid about the first three. They all had great action set-pieces, but the characters aren't necessarily likable, they seemed to exist in a humor-free zone and in the case of the first film, it was practically incomprehensible. I liked this one a lot. Simon Pegg was wonderful, Tom Cruise lightened up, and none of the technology worked.
2. Source Code (Video)
Technically, this was a second time around. I saw it in the theater, but Ian got it as a DVD for Christmas. I really like this movie and this type of movie. It's sort of hard to describe if you haven't seen it, but it involves a kind of time travel/alternate universes/stop the terrorist thing. Really works for me.
3. The Adjustment Bureau (Video)
Again, one I liked a lot with a nice philosophical underpinning about alternate realities. About a politician (Matt Damon) who discovers a mysterious Adjustment Bureau that makes adjustments to people and timelines to keep things on track. And the Powers That Be want him to eventually become President of the U.S., but he falls in love with a woman during a chance meeting and they want to eliminate that because he won't become President if they fall in love and marry.
4. Ghosts of Girlfriends Past (TV)
This movie sucked. I'm sorry. I'm forgiving of Matthew McConaughey and of his shitty taste in scripts and am generally forgiving of romantic comedies, but almost everything about this film sucked dead bears.
5. The Next Three Days (Video)
A Russell Crow thriller about a college professor whose wife goes to prison for murder and he decides to break her out and go into hiding. The skepticism thing here is huge - it never quite made me believe it was possible - but Russell Crow is usually interesting to watch and that was the case here.
6. Moneyball (Video)
Oh yeah. Fantastic film about baseball. Loved it.
7. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (Video)
A rather slow, artsy and too long film with Brad Pitt as Jesse James and Casey Affleck as Robert Ford. If you take it as an artsy movie you'll probably like it. If you think it's going to be a western shoot 'em up about Jesse James and train robberies, no, you're going to be disappoitned. And apparently it's reasonably accurate in terms of historical events. Casey Affleck is pretty amazing in it. But it's really slow.
8. Real Steel (Video)
Giant fighting robots. Hey, what's not to like? It's incredibly predictable, a good family film. We had some fun because some of it was shot in Michigan, including a couple scenes in Oxford only a mile or two from my house, so we got to spend some time saying, "That looks familiar! Hey, what about..."
9. The Hunger Games (Theater)
A powerful and disturbing movie that's quite faithful to the book. I might like to see it again, but it's not something I necessarily want to see again and again.
10. The Ides of March (Video)
George Clooney and Ryan Gosling and Paul Giamatti and Marisa Tomei and.... hell, the cast goes on and on. A thoughtful political film, not really a thriller, but I think you could argue that it's really about how politics turns idealists into cynics. And it sure as hell is cynical.
posted by Mark Terry at 5:43 AM
1 Comments:
Good idea. I've seen 8&9 but I seen few movies other than with my boys.
Post a Comment
<< Home