Morning Glory

No this is not a documentary about the band "Oasis".

This film is good. There is some great acting from Diane Keaton, Harrison Ford and Rachel Mc Adams who keeps it all together. She carries the film in a believable way and I would say it's her best film to date. The story is a bit bland, serious news versus entertainment news and a nervous producer (Mc Adams) who tries to keep people working with each other and make sure that everyone can do a good show. It's a bit cliche, but the script is witty enough and doesn't shy away from taking the piss out of itself.

The scene where Jeff Goldblum asks Rachel Mc Adams at her interview if she's gonna sing had me in stitches. Rachel's character is soo enthusiastic and super positive that really this is the only question you could ask. Goldblum does it in such a dry way it's hilarious. Keaton is good but a bit underused, her part could have been bigger. Harrison Ford is interesting, kinda a Jeremy Paxman (cranky BBC newsreader) character who now has to face the fact that all he can do is lame entertainment news. It's an interesting part for him and he can show off his different kinds of frustrated faces.

The colour palette is "happy Hollywood" and the camera is partly interesting. J.J. Abrams has proven that (after such shows as Lost and Fringe) he can also produce pretty good movies. Roger Mitchell is a renowned director who has directed such hits as Notting Hill and Changing Lanes and judging by the acting he's done a good job.

The ending is a bit frustrating, it's a happy one, but it's message is also "Man we're stupid, but we totally rock" and anybody who likes serious news will be disappointed. Poor devils.

A single Man

Well this film is not new, it's already out on DVD and Blue-Ray, but it excels in absolute brilliance. It's the unbelievably tragic story of a middle aged gay college professor whose partner dies early on in the movie. So it's a very sad story, but it's filmed oh so beautifully. The cinematographer Eduard Grau bathes the audience in the grief and the pain which the fantastic Colin Firth has to endure and Grau uses different effects for different parts of the movie, sometimes the camera seems to be faintly influenced or reminiscent of Wong Kar Wai's "Happy together". The entire film was shot with one camera, a 5279 35mm Kodak and in one scene the colour was completely removed. Ford and Grau made this decision together, deciding which colours would fit each individual mood the best. The result is incredibly arty. The colour palette ranges from cold blues and greys to warm reds and oranges.

There is an incredible stillness. Again this is a movie which can exist without FBI Agents or Space monkeys, it's just a small haunting story, but it will haunt you. It's amazing what colours can do to your mood, like music they can change from happy to melancholy in a second and drown you in your own emotions and deepest fears. The equally fantastic Julianne Moore offers a little comic relief. But it's a tragic one, because she longs to be with her best friend and strange homesickness for rainy London and better times are always reflected in her mood swings. It's one of the most beautiful films I've ever seen, don't miss it but have plenty of tissues on you. You will need them!

Black Swan

So this is another movie you could technically be excited about, Portman has already won the Golden Globe for it, but I couldn't help leaving the cinema with a "Meh" on my lips. It leaves you sort of lukewarm. Portman is a very good dancer, all the ballet training has finally paid of, but she failed to move me and really make me feel sorry or anything else for this woman. Vincent Cassel as the dodgy manipulative French choreographer doesn't have enough of a part to come across as a villain and there are a lot of events which happen throughout the movie that are not explained. At some point I thought that the filmmaker had intended to go the Fight Club way and give the film an interesting twist, but it just didn't deliver. I felt like I was in a restaurant and people kept serving different dishes, but none of them had any kind of flavour.

But the camera is remarkable. Matthew Libatique the cinematographer who already worked with Arnofsky on the much more profound "Requiem for a Dream" is using a very reflective and invasive camera technique. You have the feeling you can see what Nina, the main character, sees and really experience her increasingly freakier psychosis which sometimes is also very gory and horrible. I had the feeling they couldn't make their mind up about the genre. Was it a horror film? It felt like it sometimes. But the characters had no chemistry and weren't given enough dialogue to be able to build up any. Sure Portman just lives for the art of dance so she kinda shuts herself off from everyone else, Kunis is ok, but a rather sketchy and unconvincing character and the mother? She totally has different issues of her own which are never disclosed to the audience. There are films where people obsess about one thing, usually art, and it's still very good. Shine, Pollock, All about Eve, Frida, Basquiat, Amadeus are all films about obsession and they are soo amazing. So no it's not the subject that's the problem. When Cassel tells Nina not to be so tense and loosen up you can't help wonder if that wouldn't be good advice for the whole movie. Just live a little, and get plenty of popcorn to hide behind to avoid all the bloody and creepy scenes. Or maybe that's just me.

MAD MEN

OMG one of the best TV Series ever. I looove Mad Men. Season 4 is just as good as the other 3. And while many of their counterparts ( Lost, Flash Forward, Desperate Housewives) kinda loose it after season 3 Mad Men is still going strong. Fab acting from Jon Hamm, Elizabeth Moss, Christina Hendricks, January Jones etc. and pure perfection from the supercool credits to the end . If Miles Davis Kind of Blue is the perfect album, Mad Men is the perfect TV experience. Such a comparison might sound a bit weird especially since Mad Men still hasn't introduced a main black character, but in my opinion Davis's cool jazz is echoed in the way the camera moves and the colour palette. You don't just watch it, you breathe it and if "Sometimes so little appears to be happening, you have to fight the urge to get up and slap your TV to make the characters start moving again" ( quote Charlie Brooker The Guardian) than I reckon you don't always need crazy space monkeys jumping up and down in your living room threatening to take over the world for a few bananas. Yes you follow the characters from home to the office and back again, but it's fascinating to watch ordinary people doing their thing. Mad Men allows you to travel back in time. Every little detail and every sound has been carefully researched to make it a complete time traveling experience. So fasten your seat belt for season 4.

Heartbreaker

Romain Duris and Vanessa Paradis are an interesting mixture. She currently seems to pick better films than her partner Johnny Depp. And the film is sometimes funny and sweetly quirky in that charming French way. It's no Amelie, but it's not bad. Romain Duris is a very good actor. His character is convincing and charming enough, but Vanessa Paradis is a bit irritating. She's incredibly disturbingly thin and her performance is a bit strange and distracted, but in the end she manages to turn it around and add a bit more depth to the whole thing. It helps that her character likes Dirty Dancing, blue cheese and George Michael. The plot is kinda thin, of course she is rich and he's in debt and the camera is slightly dull and average. Sometimes it looks like a long ad for the obviously beautiful and very tidy Monaco. But it's good enough for a fun night out with lots of popcorn.

Fair Game

Now this film is as intelligent and interesting as they come along once in a blue moon. The title refers to the book written by Valerie Palme Wilson and the film is set shortly after September 11th. America is battling it's emerging paranoia and the crazy weapons of mass distruction ideas. The plot and the dialogue are informative, quick and full of little details, blink and the information is gone. The editing is superb and the message is clear. Where do we get our information from? And what kind of news is propaganda and what isn't? Clearly Fox News is, we know that, but CNN, BBC, Sky News? In the times where Wikileaks was a mere idea in the brain of an Australian dude, I vaguely remember when they all reported roughly the same stuff all along while the sky of Iraq lit up on the small screen in many eerie colours. The story about the discredited CIA agent kinda came out of the blue and at that time I didn't make the connection.

Naomi Watts and Sean Penn are fantastic. She gives a very strong and subtle performance, playing the part of a highly professional, tough CIA Agent and then gradually falls apart bit by bit. Sean Penn is the retired ambassador who also falls apart, but doesn't stop fighting until both their names are cleared. There are the usual dinner parties with clueless friends who attempt a political discussion, but he appears to be the only character who fights them nail and tooth on their political views. Obviously Watts being an agent and all can't really get properly involved in the discussions. The camera is very obtrusive, it makes you feel almost a bit claustrophobic, many scenes are shot in a way that makes you aware of the other person and a possible elephant in the room. The colours are cold with a sharpness of a winters day except the places other than America. It felt very realistic, especially the scenes in Iraq. There was no cheesy, irritating soundtrack and when music was employed it always fitted perfectly with the story. If you want to see a critical film which makes you think and appeals to your intelligence, then don't hesitate to see it. I can only recommend it strongly.

The Tourist

So first we have that Tourist movie. Somehow I feel incredibly sorry whenever I see people cueing for that movie, I want to beg them not to see it, cause I have and it ain't pretty. So let's see no plot, no chemistry between the actors, bizarre dialogue that doesn't make any sense whatsoever and ah yes Venice. Presumably the actors were tempted to be involved in a film that takes place in such a beautiful and charming city. It can't have been the script, even though it was claimed that it has been written by three different guys, I can't believe it took three grown men and rather renowned scriptwriters to come up with this rubbish. But surely Venice alone can't carry a film, that is just too much to ask from a lovely place. So one cliche follows another, the scene where Johnny Depp starts smoking and thereby turns his character into a real man is just pointless. So is the exciting chase scene in the canale, they get chased by some gangsters and the police. The only problem is that Jolie can only drive very slow, why they chose to film the scene in one of the small canals is beyond me, the speed limit is 5 km and trust me no chase scene looks good in that speed, it's almost slow motion. Jolie ducks carefully to avoid the bullets and Depp just looks like a wet dog chained to the back of the boat. But it is unintentionally funny and somewhat helpless. So go see it if you must.

If you feel arty you can compare the two films. The Tourist is based on this movie. Careful it's in French language only.