Salut! Et au revoir!

Salut!

I’m currently making myself comfortable for studies in France so there will be two things to expect here:

*) Less intense coverage (I’ll still try to get some moviequations online etc.)
*) A shift in focus, since France is a completely different movie country be sure that I will be writing about movies nobody gives a damn

First movie looking forward will be “Requiem pour une tueuse” with Mélanie Laurent, the fantastic lead from Inglourious Basterds.

Quick news:

1) The Oscar Race is over
The King’s Speech took home the DGA (Directors Guild) and SAG (Screenactors Guild) Awards – since it was shut out from WGA (Writers Guild) this means that The King’s Speech has won all important guild awards it got nominated – which means the ending of this year’s Oscar is clear. So long Social Network, it’s really a pity that Fincher won’t get the trophy.
I guess he will win once he makes one of those “important” movies, so somehow I’m hoping that Fincher will continue with his non oscar movies and give us more Social Networks and Fight Clubs.

2) Bardem being offered to play Roland and a character in James Bond
Apparantly this was the revelation the studio proclaimed a week ago and at first I didn’t realize it and saw it as another rumour, since I thought they would definately reveal who Roland is.

Well at least they now confirmed their interest in this terrific actor..

Now I love Bardem and could people stop their whining how he doesn’t match Roland because he is hispanic? Give the guy a chance. Seriously, worry about Akiva Goldsman (Batman and Robin) writing the script, but the fact that they want an Oscar winning actor (who has been nominated again this year) should be a sign that they are looking for quality. It might not be the Roland we have hoped for, but come on, this Dark Tower project up until now stands out as a project of very unexpected and sometimes interesting choices (the television concept to bring the entire story on screen, Bardem as Roland) that make up for some “meh” decisions (no J.J. Abrams, Ron Howard, Akiva Goldsman).

There will be water if god wills it!!

And not enough good news? Bardem is also offered a role in the new James Bond who has made its way back from development hell (mark November 9th 2012!).

3) Hereafter (by Clint Eastwood) is unworthy of being a Speed Racer nominee!
Even the french subtitles couldn’t make Hereafter funny. I watched this movie yesterday, hoping to see another fun travesty (The Last Airbender, Speed Racer), but this movie is just forgettable trash. Not funny and what makes matters worse is the feeling of “gravitas” and “importance” it pretends to have when at the end we don’t even know what the point was.

Seriously I don’t know. At least Twilight had a point (albeit a stupid one but a point nonetheless). Hereafter is just waiting until it ends with no reason why we should care.

I have seldom seen so many tired and bored faces after a movie ended and the lights went back on – seriously stay away from this movie, it’s a piece of shit.

The thing that saddens me is that it was directed by Clint Eastwood who seems to have gone from Christian allegories (Gran Torino – fantastic movie) to spiritual propaganda which of course I’m a bit sensitive towards since I’m an atheist.
Still I can’t imagine any spiritual person watching and enjoying this either…

Category: 3
Score: Total Failure

4) If you want to watch a spiritual film: Des hommes et des dieux

While I didn’t enjoy it that much, at least this movie gives you something to think about the nature of faith and the reasons people need it. It is based on the true story of a group of monks who got killed in Algeria 1996.

Interestingly while it is a long and sometimes boring movie it features great performances (albeit subtle) and the moral/ethical problems are never reduced to “Christianity good / Islam evil” – quite the contrary.

As I said I didn’t really enjoy it but it’s worth a shot, maybe you see more in this movie than me:

Category: 3
Score: Lukewarm