drama | Fifth about The Seventh

Captain Phillips

October 17, 2013 by Felipe Rosa

Captain Phillips: very strong, tense thriller; very efficiently told by Paul Greengrass, who as usual makes great use of handheld camera (Barry Ackroyd is one of the best in the business) and taut editing to keep the suspense up. Most importantly, the acting by Tom Hanks is superb, reaching high emotional notes in a few scenes; Barkhad Abdi also is able to create a very good, believable character (but the rest of his crew doesn’t have so much luck). Here is […]

Categories: Film reviews • Tags: biopic / historic, drama, thriller

Gravity (2013) – Revisit

October 14, 2013 by Felipe Rosa

Gravity: a revisit to this film showed how enthralling an experience this film is. In general, particularly when the second view is so close to the first one, the mind takes precedence over the heart and the attention is on the technical aspects instead of the story. However, while still absolutely in awe of the visual choices, the story was even more gripping and the anxiety level, higher. The banter, which at first seemed the weak spot of the film, […]

Categories: Film reviews, Revisit • Tags: drama, sci fi, top

Rush – Second Opinion

October 11, 2013 by Guest

Rush (written by Francisco Rosa): motivated by what my filmmaker, film-critic son wrote in this blog, I decided to watch Rush.

Categories: Film reviews • Tags: biopic / historic, drama

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Cabaret (1972)

October 8, 2013 by Felipe Rosa

Cabaret: while the narrative structure of this film is somewhat uneven (mostly because the musical interludes are used to comment, not advance the story), the story itself and the setting are so interesting that they make up for it. Liza Minnelli gives life to a great character, while Michael York was somewhat bland (even thought the character somewhat required it). The songs are all beautifully executed, but also somewhat uneven: a few are memorable, a few are readily forgettable. The […]

Categories: Film reviews • Tags: drama, musical

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Gravity (2013)

October 5, 2013 by Felipe Rosa

Gravity: this film tells has, at its core, a simple but very powerful tale of survival. It is, however, the gorgeous execution that raises this to the rank of extraordinaire. Alfonso Cuarón’s style (long, uninterrupted takes; which, I might add, is a personal, well-known bias of mine) lends itself perfectly for the setting. Emmanuel Lubezki’s camerawork (I’ll call it so for simplicity, but the images are a mix of cinematography, editing and special effects) is mind-blowing: the camera dances around the […]

Categories: Film reviews • Tags: drama, sci fi, top

Prisoners (2013)

September 27, 2013 by Felipe Rosa

Prisoners: thriller that goes beyond (but not much) the usual when telling the story, and while the plot falls in some of the same pits, the characters raise this film above the genre’s average. It’s, however, almost an unpleasant experience, full of dread. The cast is very good, both on paper and on the screen. (Not that Maria Bello and Viola Davis have all that much to do, or Terrence Howard, for that matter.) Visually, it’s beautifully functional; unsurprising since […]

Categories: Film reviews • Tags: drama, thriller

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Barry Lyndon

September 25, 2013 by Felipe Rosa

Barry Lyndon: above everything else, a film of enormous beauty; from the choice of music to the rigorous, painting-like quality of the images. The story, an interesting portrait of the time, is told with cold detachment: the unemotional and precise narration, the shot selection (more often than not, from a distance, observing the action from a neutral point of view), the low-key acting (still effective). The ponderous pace imposed by Stanley Kubrick does not bother, as there is always something […]

Categories: Film reviews • Tags: drama

Rush (2013)

September 22, 2013 by Felipe Rosa

Rush: entertaining and solid, if not very innovative, sports drama; it all starts with the good script that lays down appealingly the rivalry between the two main characters. It’s a sign of strength that both are flawed but reasonably well-rounded, and attractive in their own different ways. Chris Hemsworth and Daniel Brühl are both strong in their portraits. Furthermore, they are physically a great match to their real counterparts, the most notable (but not only) sign of attention to detail […]

Categories: Film reviews • Tags: biopic / historic, drama

Hannah and Her Sisters

September 12, 2013 by Felipe Rosa

Hannah and Her Sisters: the episodic structure of this film breaks down the flow of the story and makes it less pleasurable to watch; it ends up weighting on the dialogues, that end up being overly expository at times. In the same vein, the humorous moments feel tacked on, inorganic. By the other hand, the stories told are, for the most part, interesting ones, and the gallery of characters, rich and definitely well-defended by the cast: Mia Farrow has the less […]

Categories: Film reviews • Tags: comedy, drama

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