Sore Eyes

ok... so, i have been averaging about 2 and a half movies a day lately .. which means i am watching about 5-ish hours of tv/film/media a day (including my daily dose of television)

dont worry, i have some days off work - so i am using them wisely and catching up on the old picture shows! so, below are some pretty quick reviews of everything i have watched in the past few days...

sketches of frank gehry

this doco is shot by film-maker sydney pollack who is usually making clear and present danger, the interpreter and other such political thrillers... its about the famous architect who is an old pal of syd's. basically explores his work and how he is inspired and looks at all his fucking amazing buildings around the world.. not really a polished doco ... because as pollack says, he isn't at all familiar with the way to approach the subject. it's an intimate look at his friends work and its a pretty fascinating experience to see just how these buildings are created... it's probably not for everyone, but it is worth a look if you appreciate massive buildings and the art in how they are made!!!

noise

the new aussie film written & directed by matthew saville of "we can be heroes" fame. basically some woman is the only one to survive a mass murdering of a melbourne train (GO CONNEX for not seeing it on the 'security') and the killer knows her name. at the same time, a cop (played by brendan cowell from love my way) is under-going some serious head trauma because he has a constant ringing in his ears. sooo... he gets put in a caravan to conduct interviews around the area of sunshine... this film is great. after watching SOLO i needed something to get me all happy about the aussie industry. its a great film, tense and funny... fantastic cinematography ... and the sound design, well.. with a title like noise it certainly lives up to its name. GO SEE THIS MOVIE NOW!!!

curse of the golden flower

after hero and then house of flying daggers it was time to return to more familiar territory for Yimou Zhang. this movie is a totally different affair than the last two. like a shakespeare play set in the china dynasty ... mix in a bit of moulin rouge-ish lavish PD and you have this film. i must admit, i was falling asleep here and there, but that was due to the fact i was full of food, warm... and in the dark. the storyline is pretty much about a messed up family with so many secrets every member will do whatever they have to to keep everyone else quiet. all the actors are great, chow yun fat & more importantly - gong li -making a great return (after being thrown around like a wet blanket in miami vice) to her roots of being a hella hot empress bitch... although there are not as many action scenes in this movie as the previous two, it makes it up for the sheer scale of the scenes... like, hundreds and hundreds or extras and all those fucking costumes... you certainly gotta hand it to them...

mad max

yeh, it seriously took me 20 years to watch this essential mother of aussie cinema. after watching happy feet a million times, i thought, oh, he has done other stuff... so anyways... the verdict... it was mixed. i guess at the time this film would have been one bad mother ... but now... i have freakin' michael bay car chases to compare to. but, for its time its pretty kick ass.. good ol' gibson does his best as MAX who in a nutshell leaves the force because the badies are killing off the cops and then he runs away with the wife, baby and a dog and then you can guess what happens to make him go back to the force... which will happen I'm guessing in no. 2!!! some of the shots in this film are pretty incredible... and the speeds at which they are going is also pretty sweet. certainly ahead of its time ... it will be interesting to see if dr. george miller gets to make part 4 after his next animated feature...

the wind will carry us

another attempt on my half to educate myself by watching movies from around the world. this little one hails from iran... with farsi spoken dialogue. (look how cultured i am!!!) a dude and his crew rock up to this tiny village in the middle of nowhere to await the death of this woman so they can document and take photos of it. they are plagued by no mobile reception and the fact that the woman is so selfish she wont die. its a pretty good... (but long-ish) film... shot very minimalistic and with non actors mostly improvising, it has some really cute and funny moments. ... i have to watch some more of Abbas Kiarostami's work ... i get the feeling there is better stuff out there... oh, and it loses points for the main character turning a turtle over on its shell.