30 Days of Night | The ALASKAthon

When the success of the Twilight franchise precipitated a swarm of mediocre, over-eroticized vampire novels and cinematic adaptations of these, the vampire trend was officially a thing. Before that, vampire films had been mainly limited to the horror genre for a long period - as far as my limited knowledge of film history goes. 30 Days of Night was released one year before the first Twilight movie and hence its vampires are ugly brutes that want nothing but to kill and feed. Which is a nice exception from the mass these days...

Set in Barrow, the northernmost town in the US, the film takes place during the 30 days of darkness that the inhabitants of the town experience every year. While the sun never sets, the vampires are free to roam Barrow day and night and leave behind them a trail of destruction. The gorgeous Police officer Eben Oleson (Josh Hartnett) is the first to find out what's going on and along with a few other people he manages to survive the attacks for a long time.

Insomnia | The ALASKAthon

I've decided to finish the left-up work and continue the ALASKAthon as a final installment on this blog. Maybe it's because I cut my toe and am thus excluded from most fun summer activities or maybe it's because I just don't want to leave my blog as a half-baked mess. Better to end things neatly if you really have to end them. 

Wendy and Lucy | The ALASKAthon

- Chris from Movies and Songs 365 also reviewed Wendy and Lucy -

In the ideal case, an independent movie is more than just a movie produced by a small studio or on a small budget. It's a movie that aspires to walk off the beaten path, to swim away from the mainstream as we like to say. To achieve this, independent films can tell stories that big studios find too risqué to produce, explore themes that won't please a large percentage of the shrinking amount of moviegoers. Or it can use uncommon ways to bring its message across, play with the technical side of filmmaking or choose the long way instead of the easy one. 

In the last weeks, I have been lucky to experience many of the aforementioned techniques or paths an indie film can choose. I had the chance to see Linklater's brilliant interpretation of a coming of age film, Boyhood, to luxuriate in Ayoade's twisted stylistic rhythm in The Double and to experience the orgasmic fusion of low-budget South Korean filmmaking and Captain America gone dirty in Snowpiercer - among others. This week's film choice for the ALASKAthon is another indie movie that takes a different perspective on a certain story than a big studio would have abandoned - a very unusual perspective, indeed. 

Leaving Hogwarts and the Half-Blood Prince

HARRY POTTER AND the half-blood prince

book 2004   movie 2009   first read 2004   first watch 2009

A sixth-in-a-row return to the school of witchcraft and wizardry, where love is in the air and each laugh is followed by a sob.

Au Revoir to Cannes 2014 | Blue Is the Warmest Color

Yesterday was the last day of the 2014 Cannes Film Festival. It was also the day that I saw last year's Palme d'Or winner La Vie d'Adèle, Chapitres 1 et 2 or Blue Is the Warmest Color for the first time.

Do you remember the time when a beautiful, fresh French face made a short but effective appearance in Woody Allen's Midnight in Paris? Back then, it was still questionable whether there was more behind that intriguing smile. Not anymore - last year, Léa Seydoux (the actress behind selfsame smile) was awarded the Palme d'Or along with her director Abdellatif Kechiche and co-star Adèle Exarchopoulos. The two ladies are the only women to have won the award beside Jane Campion. Blue Is the Warmest Color is indeed a very feminine film that explores women in various ways. Firstly, there is the most apparent theme - homosexuality. The films main character, Adèle, finds out that being with men doesn't give her the same sort of satisfaction as being with a woman does. More so, there is one particular woman that Adèle falls head over heels in love with: the artistic and charming, blue-headed Emma. The two spend several years together as Adèle finishes high school and starts studying to be a teacher. Meanwhile, Emma is becoming an acclaimed artist and doesn't have as much time for her girlfriend anymore. After Adèle cheats on Emma with a male colleague, the two break up, leaving Adèle cold and lonely. 

Musical Chairs (2011) | The Thin Line Between TV-Trash and Guilty Pleasure

With tv-shows gathering more viewers than many films and producing higher quality than ever, the bad reputation of the tv-film is nowhere near upgrading itself. For centuries, tv-films have been regarded as the black sheep in the world of film - and there is a reason for this. One half of the tv-films I watch are German, the other half are Disney Channel movies - and few of them are rememberable for cinematic quality. Tv-films have low budgets and lower pressure than the next blockbuster, they are filled with clichés, stereotypes and most of the time don't have to be seen from beginning to finish. They are escapism in snack form - a little bit of adventure to finish up your ordinary work day.

Musical Chairs fits in to much of the criteria I just summed up, yet it has something else to offer as well. Telling the story of a group of people in wheelchairs who decide to start ballroom dancing, it's a typical feel-good, joy-of-life story that is supposed to be inspirational and uplifting. There's a couple of love stories involved, many typical rom-com elements and characters bounding to stereotypes. But Musical Chairs manages to make its character just realistic enough, the dialogue just cheeky enough and the story just fresh enough to be different from the rest of its tv-film siblings. The performances range between okay and really good, especially leading lady Leah Pipes makes the struggle and the fear of her character seem relatable instead of whiny. Some of the side stories are very cute while others are a bit unnecessary, so the runtime could've been cut with 15 minutes or so. But it's not like the film ever gets boring. You know where it's going but still, you are invested in the journey of these characters and the execution of the plot. Furthermore, the visuals look less cheap than expected and some shots have a cinematic quality to them, while the sound design is delicious. It's okay that most of the soundtrack is composed of the same ballroom track then and that there is your usual dose of melodramatic slow-motion.

This isn't the renaissance of the tv-film or the rise of feel-good films but an enjoyable flick that won't hurt anyone and really does add some adventure to your ordinary day.

MUSICAL CHAIRS

2011 • USA • English

director Susan Seidelman

author Marty Madden

★ Leah Pipes, E.J. Bonilla, Laverne Cox

FINAL FRAME | STRAWBERRY

Beyoncé, eat your heart out!

Why The Grand Budapest Hotel Is Definitely Worth a Visit

- http://thegrandbudapestrp.tumblr.com/

Aren't we all more or less attracted by shiny objects? As toddlers we were. In kindergarten we were. In high school we really were. And even though we're getting better at hiding and transferring this primal instinct, we still are: attracted by shiny objects.

Wes Anderson is one the most talented, living craftsmen who make shiny objects. He taps the sunshine, freezes the quicksilver and literally blows the dust from the treasures of ancient (European) families. I have talked about Wes Anderson and his films before, at length. With the surprising arrival of The Grand Budapest Hotel to a cinema "near" me, I finally have more to talk about. A wise man once said that it is "the most Anderson that Anderson ever Andersoned" or something among those lines, and it's about the truest thing you could say about this film. It has the carefully and lovingly designed sets that create an atmosphere of a doll's house, the craziest... oh well, there's no evading the word, quirkiest characters, played by the most hyped actors. It has the props, the songs and the poetry. And - this is probably the most important thing - it has Europe. If we're being very black-and-white about it, Hollywood produces glamorous, entertaining movies while European films are thought-provoking and low-budget. Europe would not have made a film like The Grand Budapest Hotel. Nor would the United States. It's an inbetweener, a curious outsider, a cinematic weirdo. And that's part of why I love it so much.

The Grand Budapest Hotel is not just a film though, it is a place as well - and this is important to remember. It's a similarity that the film shares with Rushmore, The Darjeeling Limited and Moonrise Kingdom, which just so happen to be some of my favorite Wes Anderson movies. To be true, most of his movies are some of my favorite Wes Anderson movies. Still, his latest work stands out from the little crowd. It's a pink bubble of nostalgia, romance and Ralph Fiennes being funny. Shining bright till the credits. 

THE GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL

2013 • USA/ Germany • English/ French

director Wes Anderson

authors Wes Anderson, Hugo Guinness, (Stefan Zweig)

★ Ralph Fiennes, F. Murray Abraham, Tony Revolori, Saoirse Ronan

FINAL FRAME

„You're looking so well darling, you really are.“

Leaving Hogwarts and the Order of the Phoenix

HARRY POTTER AND the order of the phoenix

book 2003    movie 2007   first read 2003    first watch 2007

A fifth-in-a-row return to the school of wizardry and witchcraft, where I realize the upside of growing up and that Professor Umbridge is really Goebbels.

Leaving Hogwarts and the Goblet of Fire

HARRY POTTER AND the goblet of fire

book 2002     movie 2005     first read 2003?     first watch 2005

A fourth-in-a-row return to the school of wizardry and witchcraft, where I marvel at the fast pace, cleverly constructed plot and the connections to North By Northwest.

ZOOM IN.

Leaving Hogwarts and the Prisoner of Azkaban

HARRY POTTER AND the prisoner of Azkaban

book 1999      movie 2004      first read 2002?     first watch 2004

A third-in-a-row return to the school of wizardry and witchcraft, where I swoon over Alfonso Cuarón's directing style, Daniel Radcliffe's improved acting skills and how Hermione's hair looks from behind.

ZOOM IN.

Also known as "The One Everybody Loves", Prisoner of Azkaban marks the point at which the Harry Potter film adaptions became a force to be reckoned with. Changing out director Chris Columbus, who had approached the previous two films from a traditional "children's movie" perspective, with the darker and more stylized mind of Alfonso Cuarón, stepped up the game quite a bit. It also helps that the three leads have grown into better actors and that their characters are able to develop in a more interesting, nuanced way. Finally, Prisoner of Azkaban connects another two Brilliant Brits to the series with Gary Oldman as Sirius Black and David Thewlis as Professor Lupin.

Blind Spot Fixed: Memento

Memento was easily one of my blind spot films that I was most excited to watch. It's Stevee Taylor's favorite movie of all time, which in itself is worth a thousand reasons I should watch it, and in the top 10 of countless lists floating around the internet - including many an IMDB Top list. In contrary to many other of my blind spots, I actually knew about Memento a long time before I moved to the island of film lovers (as Ryan McNeil - sort of - puts it: the more movies you watch, the more blind spots you never even knew you had, you discover). I owe this knowledge to one of the sides of Indian cinema that I've always been critical of: it's affection for remaking films from other corners of the world (primarily Hollywood blockbusters). So Ghajini, a 2008 Bollywood hit remake of Memento, marked my first encounter with the Memento Mori story. Ironically enough, this movie was also a Hindi-language remake of the 2005 Kollywood (Tamil-language) film of the same name by the same director. At any rate, Ghajini was fairly enjoyable, mainly because of its cinematography and the man who turns iron into gold, Indian superstar Aamir Khan. However, it didn't ignite a burning desire to watch the original Memento in me.

WRITING ELSEWHERE #2

IS SHERLOCK STILL READABLE?

In the age of Johnlock, slow-mo boxing scenes and a female Watson, why should we actually read Sherlock Holmes?

@ THE ARTIFICE

Leaving Hogwarts and the Chamber of Secrets

HARRY POTTER AND the chamber of secrets

book 1998     movie 2002      first read 2005?      first watch 2003?

A return to the school of wizardry and witchcraft, where I pay my accolades to Hermione's last truly geeky year, sleek-hair Malfoy, Ron's first wand and the old Dumbledore.

ZOOM IN.

Once hooked by the magical world of Harry Potter, I never considered actually reading The Chamber of Secrets as preferred to just watching the movie. It was out there, so why not just slip it in the DVD player (easier said than done, but my birthday wasn't far away). I was young, I was stupid. So when I finally did go back and read the book, about two years after watching the film, I was surprised to find so many new aspects of the story in the book. Whether my surprise was caused by the bigger similarity between the first book and its film or whether I was just too inexperienced to know that things do get lost in translation, I'll never know. The scene that left its biggest impression on me then was definitely Sir Nick's ghost party, which I didn't see coming at all. Speaking of that, the ghosts were rather neglected in the Harry Potter films, am I right (Peeves, anyone)? Still, I do love them.

HAPPY NEW YEAR + Anticipating 2014

With the new year being only 13 days of age by now, I don't think I'm stretching it by posting my end-of-year post only now. Am I? Don't worry, I'll keep the celebrations short.

Movie-count: 239

Book-count: 34

Not bad, definitely not bad, there's always room for improvement. One thing I'd like to do - or rather need to do - is to watch more movies from 1900 - 1979. This year, I saw 10 or less movies for each of these seven decades and less than five for five of them! I haven't checked my movies for countries but I'm pretty sure about 80 or more percent of them are from the US or the UK - another thing I want to change. It's been a bad year for Indian movies for me too - most of them I watched at the film festival. This is something I want to try to change. Otherwise, the new year is all open. I definitely want to finish watching Supernatural and then dip my toes into either Mad Men or Breaking Bad (help?). Book-wise, I want to read more non-fiction, poetry and short stories. I have the feeling that YA Dystopian fiction is very overexposed, at least in the internet book-loving society, and I don't like following that trend blindly anymore. 

Apart from those plans, I'm looking forward to watching these movies in particular in 2014:

Writing Elsewhere - Divergent: 5 Options For This Future Franchise

In the future, I will assemble posts that I've written for other websites under the tag 'Writing Elsewhere'. As you may know, I was selected as a writer for The Artifice about a year ago, but after I had written my Love Actually Review, I never got around to writing more for the site. I'd like to change that and at least write one post per month there. The content will be a little bit different from my usual blogging content, since there are stricter guidelines for tone and quality on The Artifice, so that's exciting for me. 

The first post I wrote is a post about the upcoming Divergent Franchise - I compare it to 6 other big YA franchises of the last few years and try to decide how the turnout for this one will be. I hope you'll enjoy reading it!

CLICK TO READ

My 9 UNOFFICIALLY Favorite Films of 2013

You already know my 9 UNOFFICIALY Least Favorite Films of 2013, now it's time to take a look at the most magnificent, most wonderful, most splendid film viewing experiences that I've had with some movies from the last year.

Let me remind you once more; I have only seen 35 films of 2013 (one more than in the previous list since yesterday's 12 Years a Slave) due to various reasons, I do not claim this list to represent the 'best' of the year nor am I going so far as to make it an official list. That list is going to be published some time at the end of the year. Or perhaps even later, who knows? I'd love to wait until I've seen 100 films from the year but that's a very high aim. Perhaps 50 or 70 will suffice.

But back to the UNOFFICIAL list - let's start with the bottom of the top then, shall we?

My 9 UNOFFICIALLY Least Favorite Films of 2013

A new year has come upon us in all its shining glory... and I haven't even seen more than 34 films of the last one. There are many reasons for this - lack of money, lack of interest in paying too much money to watch movies, lack of possibility to watch new releases in English (I can't handle German dubs more than 4 times a year), outdated German and Danish release dates, lack of time and the fact that we moved to the country side. So maybe I should be happy that I've even seen 34 movies!

To honor this little bunch of flicks while not dishonoring the film year itself, I have decided to put together an unofficial list of my favorites and least favorites. Be gentle with this one though; I don't deliberately go out and watch the movies that are supposed to be bad, so it's nowhere near representing the worst last year had to offer. Let's start with the top of the bottom then, shall we?

How I Learned to Stop Worrying

a HOW I LIVE NOW review

Growing up 21st century's Europe has its perks - technology redefines the limits of communication, consumerism and culture, we can travel without having to do little more than showing our passports and politicians seem busy sustaining peace in our own little world as well as the Middle East. It becomes difficult to differentiate between documentations of the World Wars and movies like Independence Day, both depicting horrible, life-threatening situations and ending on a happy note (more or less). I for one find it incredibly hard to believe that my own grandmother fled (mainly by horse waggon) from what was once Pommern (the eastern part of Germany) to the north, and had to work under more or less slavery-like conditions for the Russians. Hell, I can't even fathom there was once a great wall separating Eastern and Western Germany - that fell only 6 years before I was born! However, once in a while, I am reminded of the actual danger that still surrounds every living creature in this world; the animal-esque war of survival that is hidden beneath health care, unemployment benefits and supermarkets. Watching How I Live Now was one of those experiences that made me realize there is a threat of war in my life and the lives of the people surrounding me, and that our little bubble of peace, equality and freedom of the mind could burst any day. 

OBSTRUCTION 3/5: A Copy-Paste-Review

Sensing a pattern in my posts for the 5 Obstructions Blogathon? At least I'm still in time.

Obstruction #3: Write a review of a movie only by copying and pasting words (at least 5 consecutive words from one sentence) out of other reviews of the same movie.

There are huge, lavishly told stories that hardly touch you. And then there are little stories that go straight to your heart. Just like the rather unglamorously named Stanley Ka Dabba. Can a little child’s life revolve around whether or not he gets tiffin to school? More importantly, can a full-length feature film revolve around that? Stanley ka Dabba does and Amole Gupte, the writer, director and producer shows us how touching and enjoyable a ride it can be at the same time.

Percy Jackson and the Sea of Perdition

Do you remember back at the beginning of summer, when I wrote one of those rambles you're hopefully not missing so much (or should I hope you do?) on the Percy Jackson series? If you've read it - and you should, if you're going to stick around to read about Sea of Monsters - you've probably figured out the following: Percy Jackson is not my favorite fandom, the books are not one of my favorite series of all time and neither is the first movie. But I enjoyed the material for what it was. Simple yet very intriguing entertainment. Yes, there's a lot of Harry Potter in this, yes the first movie is very different from the first book - and yes, it's trashy. But it knows what it is and hence works perfectly well.

This month, new material was finally released in the shape of a sequel movie to The Lightning Thief. I'm writing movie because - like every fan should know and/ or finally realize - the movies and books are two very damn separate things. Sea of Monsters starts where the first movie ended, and like the book it centers around a new quest for Percy and his friends; the tree that guards Half-Blood Camp is slowly dying and can only be saved by the Golden Fleece, which is currently owned by a blood-thirsty Cyclops living in the middle of the dangerous Sea of Monsters. There are a lot of details that are similar to the story in the novel, actually more than in The Lightning Thief and the tone is typical Percy Jackson. Everything's very light-hearted, propped with one-liners and the cast seems to be having fun. Now that's all I expect from the Percy Jackson series by now. Fun, just plain fun. I don't need accurateness or plausibility or award-winning performances. This is not the place for stuff like that. As long as I get Logan Lerman being absolutely lovable (and talented), Alexandra Daddario sporting her incredible eyes and everyone else being either funny or hot, I'm fine. And the acting isn't even terrible. Douglas Smith owned the role as Percy's Cyclops brother Tyson and Anthony Head was a far better Chiron than Pierce Brosnan. Even the CGI was fine this time (keyword: adorable rainbow ponies aka Hippocampi).

I understand why some people didn't like Sea of Monsters. 6.5 on IMDB is an understandable average, because clearly this isn't a critic's movie - nor a universally appealing entertainer. 38/64 on Rottentomatoes? Fine with me. What I don't get though is the shit that this movie gets from the people that were supposed to back it up. The ones that knew what they were getting into, knew the source material and enjoyed it. The worst thing is, they don't even tear Olympus apart by pointing out all the things that went "wrong" technically - directing, soundtrack, editing, whatever critics could probably argue wasn't all that great from an objective point-of-view. No, the Percy Jackson fandom, or a big part of it, is pissed off by the fact that Riptide isn't the cursed blade from the prophecy (it's still a cursed blade and you don't know how they're going to continue that plot). Because Kronos was defeated (as if). Because of stupid details. Just chill, people, and accept the fact that a book and its cinematic adaptation can be very different from each other, okay? Just saying. Because if nobody goes to watch Sea of Monsters, or at least buy it, we're not getting The Titan's Curse. We wouldn't want that, would we? 

PERCY JACKSON: SEA OF MONSTERS

2013 • USA • English

dir. Thor Freudenthal

authors Marc Guggenheim, Rick Riordan

★ Logan Lerman, Alexandra Daddario, Brandon T. Jackson

Final Frame: STRAWBERRY