by Felipe Rosa
OSS 117: Cairo, Nest of Spies: a spoof of James Bond movies that doesn’t have to (mostly) resort to penis and fart jokes to be (very) funny. The trick is to have someone who would be beliavable as 007, and Jean Dujardin fits to a T: one wonders how he is able to even cross the street.
Categories: Film reviews • Tags: comedy
by Felipe Rosa
An Officer and a Gentleman: at best, this is a movie that has not aged gracefully. Between the hammyness if the acting, the overblown story where machiavellianism rules and the bad 80’s music, this almost feels like a movie from another planet.
Categories: Film reviews • Tags: bottom, drama
by Felipe Rosa
The Ides of March: while this film doesn’t really bring much that is new, either broadly (some of the ideas presented) nor more specifically (story and characters), it still does what it’s supposed to do quite competently. It is quite hard to not do so with such an all-star cast, all of them delivering; the story also plays like a chess game: cold, but well structured.
Categories: Film reviews • Tags: drama
by Felipe Rosa
50/50: somewhat standard story, at least in movies. The relationships are what really matters anyway, but sadly they are not all that interesting either, probably because the characters themselves are just not fleshed out enough. That leaves Anna Kendrick as being the highlight of the movie, with her well-tuned sweet vulnerability.
Categories: Film reviews • Tags: comedy, drama
by Felipe Rosa
The Guard: the buddy comedy has been around for so long that unless the cast or the environment brings a new element to the fray, the film is going to feel tired. While the quite interesting cast tries their best, the story still is too run-of-the-mill and the interaction between the main characters too limited.
Categories: Film reviews • Tags: comedy
by Felipe Rosa
Metropolis: the sheer ambition (thematically and aesthetically, not to mention the scale of it) of this film should help its place in the movie pantheon. The fact that it succeeds makes it a guarantee. Of course, the changes in film language since it was made makes it a less than simple watch, but this is a major work of art in all possible filmmaking facets.
Categories: Film reviews • Tags: sci fi, top
by Felipe Rosa
Moneyball: solid movie. A good story, thematically interesting, anchored by the performances of the good cast and the quality writing. Visually not all that attractive, however. Curiously, it will probably be branded a baseball movie without having much baseball at all; I hope people won’t shy away because of that.
Categories: Film reviews • Tags: drama
by Felipe Rosa
Killer Elite: a credible fact doesn’t make it true, or basis for a good story for that matter. The choice of how to deal with that fact, in this case, begot in a rather generic actioner, if slightly above average. While the action was somewhat restrained, it worked better. Of course, the characters are one-dimensional, one of them in particular.
Categories: Film reviews • Tags: action
by Felipe Rosa
Warrior: the sub-genre of “underdog movies” has been around forever, but this innovates a bit by having a pair of sympathetic underdogs instead of a single one. While this raises the bar in terms of excitement a bit (which one of them is going to raise to the top?), it also thins a little bit the story, as we have to spread our attention to two different lines. Tom Hardy is in top shape here, both physically and actorly.
Categories: Film reviews • Tags: drama
Fifth about The Seventh