Tag: reviews

Yesterday, after badminton, a belated lunch, and some shopping, Edong, James, and I headed for the usual movie. We usually watch no-brainer action flicks. Exactly what we need to just sit back and relax after a strenuous morning at the courts. We all thought Sleuth would be the usual fare but I was extremely delighted when it turned out not to be. The movie is about a husband (Michael Caine) getting back at his wife’s lover (Jude Law). And the latter getting back at the former for that. And so on. The whole movie is just the two men doing mental and verbal sparring. Lots of clever dialog and impressive acting. Interestingly, I learned that the movie is a remake and Caine played the role that Law played in this new version.

Rating: 4/5

No Country For Old Men is not an easy movie to watch. It is full of subtleties and nuances in addition to the in your face violence. Throw in the Texas drawl to the mix and you’re guaranteed to have a hard time understanding everything. A small-towner running away with a bag of cash he finds from a drug deal gone bad (imagine lots of dead people and even a dog too, that bad). A psychotic professional (and really scary) killer running after him. People dying left and right (and up and own). It sound like your average predictable thriller, but it’s actually unpredictable and quite riveting all the way down to the very end. I have to confess that it doesn’t totally make sense to me but I liked it and I’ll most probably watch it again just to make more sense of it.

Rating: 4/5

In Gone Baby Gone, a young and idealistic rookie private detective takes on more than what he bargained for when he took the job of finding a toddler who had disappeared. Along with his associate/girlfriend, he starts the investigation. As they slowly unravels the mystery, they suffer from the mental and physical toll of the work. And along the way, but especially towards the end, they must make or rationalize decisions and actions that are morally and ethically ambiguous. The movie doesn’t take sides on these issues and generally just presents things as they unfold. The ending scene is, however, a bit different as it seems to imply a possible result of his final decision. But still, is it the right decision? It is still up to the viewer. A good movie with a compelling story and interesting characters. Especially more so, coming from first-time actor-turned-director Ben Affleck.

Rating: 5/5

When I first saw the trailer of A Very Long Engagement so long ago, I thought I have a pretty good idea what the story is about. I finally got to watch it last night and I found out that it wasn’t exactly as I expected. Set in France just after World War I, the story is about a girl, Mathilde, looking for her fiance, Manech, who went missing and presumed dead after the horrific Battle of the Somme. Yet she did not believe he is gone. When you love someone, when do you give up hope and admit that he is lost to you? In this case, you don’t. She went on a determined search for him and gradually put together pieces of the mystery. Despite all the difficulties she encountered and all the discouraging answers she got, she persevered. In the end, she finds out that… Well, I guess that’s for you to also find out.

Rating: 4/5

Cloverfield is Godzilla meets The Blair Witch Project. Essentially Godzilla’s attack on New York from the perspective of a group of friends or more accurately from the perspective of their old-model home video camera that severely lacks a shake-reduction/motion-stabilizer feature. Could have been an interesting story but the first-person perspective approach was dizzying and I don’t mean in a good way. Half of the time my eyes were closed trying to recover my sense. I should have listened to Eeya’s recommendation not to watch it. So maybe listen to mine: Don’t watch it if you are motion sickness prone!

Rating: 1/5