Birds of Prey: And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn

I love Wonder Woman and Captain Marvel and I think they are both wonderful movies about terrific heroines. However, I cannot fully connect with them because, while they kick ass, they are so very noble and kind. Diana grew up on a paradise island, surrounded only by loving and supportive women, and Carol doesn’t fully remember her past, which explains why they aren't pissed off. Because if they knew what we know and experience what we do, they'd be very, very angry.

The Beach Bum

There are some actors who suit the part they are playing so well you cannot possibly imagine anyone else doing that. It's the case with Jeff Bridges as the Dude. Samuel. L Jackson as Jules Winnfield. Keanu Reeves as Neo. And now Matthew McConaughey's Moondog.

McConaughey, who had his career comeback a while back, had less luck in the last few years appearing in a bunch of movies that were either unsuccessful, underseen or complete box office and critical flops. Just few months ago we watched him in utterly insane Serenity, but even there you gotta admit while the film was an incomprehensible disaster McConauyghey's entertaining performance still made it a lot of fun to watch.

The Beguiled is a dull, pointless remake and a sad sign of the times

2017

The Beguiled has been one of my most anticipated movies of the year. The story of young girls and their teachers finding a wounded soldier and taking care of him in isolated school seemed like such a great idea with wonderful potential. My expectations for the movie were even greater since Sofia Coppola won best director award for this film in Cannes. Unfortunately, the film has turned out to be one of the biggest disappointments of the year, Coppola's worst movie and one of the worst remakes I've ever seen.

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice

Where to begin?

The last, glorious flight - deciphering Birdman.

Usually when I see a truly great movie that I fell in love with instantly I can review it on the same day, effortlessly. But not with Birdman. It has, quite literally, blown my mind. I was unable to collect my thoughts on it and shape them together into some coherent strain. They just kept bouncing off, running away ....I'm still not exactly clear on how to write this, so perhaps the best way to it is take a clue from the film and let it out in one steady flow.

Begin Again

Meet Dan (Mark Ruffalo). Dan's life is not going well at the moment - his marriage collapsed, he can't connect with his teenage daughter, he drinks way too much and he hadn't had a professional success - in his job as a music producer - in 5 years. One evening, after a particularly shitty day, Dan goes to a bar to get drunk. As he is drinking he hears a song. A song sang by a girl named Gretta (Keira Knightley) on the stage. Immediately Dan wants to sing Gretta up. But as things don't go as they planned, the two decide to record a live album in different locations in NYC. As they do that, they start getting closer to each other and finding something that they didn't have in their lives in a long time - joy.

Blue Jasmine

There is a fairly new pattern in the world. Every two years Woody Allen makes a good movie. Between that his movies are either really, really bad or truly acquired taste. After an unholy abomination that was From Rome with Love, truly one of Allen's worst, comes delightful, mature, insightful and surprisingly dark Blue Jasmine.

Blue is the Warmest Color

(spoilers)

The search for your identity. First love. The yearning to belong. Those are the themes explored in beautiful, melancholic and highly controversial Blue is the Warmest Color. The film is a remarkable work of art - it's 3 hours long and it follows its heroine so closely we are face to face with her for most of the film. You really feel like you are right there with Adele, locked in with all of her confusion and loneliness.

Byzantium

We are in the middle of vampire craze in cinema. Ever since Twilight, there was a bit of a renaissance when it comes to vampire films - there seem to be at least three new big productions every year. From television shows like True Blood and The Vampire Diaries through European flicks like Livide and Let the Right One in to the big productions like Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter and Underworld series, vampires are everywhere these days.

Behind the Candelabra

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Beasts of the Southern Wild

I was certain I will love Beasts of the Southern Wild - it's set in Louisiana, the place I love, it shows so much nature, which I love as well, and its protagonist is a child - as a sensitive person such movies usually move me to the very core. Unfortunately, even though I shed a tear few times during this movie, it didn't make a lasting impression on me. It's unique and interesting, but it doesn't have enough going for it to make me want to see it again or to leave a lasting memory in my mind, lasting mark on my heart.

The Burning Plain

65/100 (107 min, 2008)
Plot: A drama with a two-tiered storyline concerning a mother and daughter who try to form a bond after the young woman's difficult childhood.
Director: Guillermo Arriaga
Writer: Guillermo Arriaga
Stars: Charlize Theron, Kim Basigner and Jennifer Lawrence

Love heals. Love absolves. Love burns.

If you are a movie fan you are probably familiar with the name Guillermo Arriaga. He is the guy who wrote scripts for many great Alejandro González Iñárritu's movies including Amores Perros, Babel and 21 Grams. The Burning Plain is his feature film directorial debut and it really shows his lack in experience when it comes to directing. While the story has many strong points and well written characters, the script is too chaotic. However what ultimately drags the movie down is the execution of that script .

To summarize the plot would be an impossible task - we watch three different women - Sylvia, (fantastic Theron) successful but self-destructive woman who hides her regrets and anger by engaging in casual sex, often with men she barely knows, Gina (Kim Basigner) who has recently beaten breast cancer and now finds herself engaged in an affair with a man, while at the same time pulling away from her husband and her daughter Mariana (Jennifer Lawrence) who sees her mother actions and doesn't understand them.

A Beautiful Mind

72/100 (135 min, 2001)
Plot: After a brilliant but asocial mathematician accepts secret work in cryptography, his life takes a turn to the nightmarish.
Director: Ron Howard
Writers: Akiva Goldsman, Sylvia Nasar (book)
Stars: Russell Crowe, Ed Harris and Jennifer Connelly

The mysterious equations of life

"I need to believe, that something extraordinary is possible."

"A Beautiful Mind", Academy Award winner for Best Picture was also named one of "The 20 Most Overrated Movies Of All Time" by Premiere magazine - that situation actually represents the true nature of the film - it has amazing moments only to have completely mediocre, bland and unnecessary scenes following them. I always considered the movie to be very overpraised,  but there are parts of the film that are truly able to move the audience - mostly because of wonderful performances and gripping story the movie is based on. Still, I will always find the fact that "A Beautiful Mind" won over "Lord of the Rings - The Fellowship of the Ring" and "Moulin Rouge!" to be one of the Academy's worst mistakes.

Inspired by life of John Nash, the movie tells a story of brilliant mathematician who suffers from paranoid schizophrenia. Nash is a typical shy outsider - very focused and fascinated by his work, mocked by others who are jealous of his brilliance and suspect he will achieve great things. During one of the lectures he gives on University he meets Alicia, beautiful girl who reaches out to him. Two of them fall in love and seemingly everything is looking good for Nash, who by then made progress in developing his revolutionary game theory. But soon Alicia and John will come to face life altering difficulties.

Bag of Bones

25/100 (234 min, 2011)
Plot: Novelist Mike Noonan, a recent widower, holes himself up in Maine to unblock his writer's block. Unexplainable things begin to happen to him at the cabin and he's convinced that his dead wife is trying to communicate with him.
Director: Mick Garris
Writers: Stephen King (novel), Matt Venne (screenplay)
Stars: Pierce Brosnan, Melissa George and Annabeth Gish

Bag of Yawns

Good Lord, what a bad movie. What makes matters worse is that it's actually a two parter - TV production, so it contains a lot of prolonged and unnecessary scenes, which would not happen if it was a feature film. I can say that this is, without a doubt, the worst movie based on the novel written by Stephen King from the ones I've seen. I do not know how it holds up as adaptation, since I'm not familiar with the book, but from what I gathered - it does poorly in comparison.

The story is far from being original - of course, the protagonist is a writer. I'm beginning to think that writers, right after dumb college chicks, are the most unfortunate group in horror movies. As every writer who lost his wife - along with inspiration - Mike Noonan looks for consolation at the bottom of whiskey bottle. But he finds nightmares and ghosts instead. It gets even more cliche as we move towards the sweet promise of the ending.

Bad Teacher

71/100 (92 min, 1011)
Plot: A comedy centered around a foul-mouthed, junior high teacher who, after being dumped by her sugar daddy, begins to woo a colleague -- a move that pits her against a well-loved teacher.
Director: Jake Kasdan
Writers: Gene Stupnitsky, Lee Eisenberg
Stars: Cameron Diaz, Jason Segel and Justin Timberlake

Teacher from Hell

"Bad Teacher" is Cameron Diaz's comeback to good form. She has been appearing in truly awful movies for the last few years and now she finally found a good material to work with. Although from what I'm seeing the movie is quite underrated, I consider it to be one of the funniest films of the year - granted, it was not a very good year for comedy, but still, I laughed during "Bad teacher". The movie is a comedy about Elizabeth, quite awful human being, who cares only about finding rich boyfriend and thinks she will achieve that by getting a boob job. How to get the money for it? Using her position as a teacher.

Beginners

60/100 (2011, 100 min)  
Plot: A young man is rocked by two announcements from his elderly father: that he has terminal cancer, and that he has a young male lover.
Director: Mike Mills
Writer: Mike Mills
Stars: Ewan McGregor, Christopher Plummer and Mélanie Laurent

It's never too late

I find it amusing that this year we seem to be flooded with movies that insist into making life itself their protagonists, at the same time being mind numbingly dull. First we have the ponderous experience entitled "The Tree of Life". Now we have "Beginners" - a movie with the script so wasted, it borders on committing a crime. The story follows Olivier, sullen man approaching 40, who has just lost his father. Olivier spends his day talking to his father's dog Arthur and making his pretentious art entitled, wait for it, "the history of sadness". I felt bad for that dog - If I were him I'd run away from the owner like that - Olivier takes the phrase "being emo" and brings it to whole new level of nonsensical sadness, oh I'm lonely and I'm scared of commitment. Boohoo.

The script offers so much - very nice way of showing events, through small details in our lives - how pets look like in given year, what is considered to be pretty etc. The characters are all there - Oliver's father who comes out of closet at 75 and finds Young lover (Goran Visnjic acting as if his character was retarded, which I don't think was intention of the creators of the film), Anna, an actress who is moving from town to town and Olivier himself. Except for Plummer nobody has a clue how to play their roles - McGregor is trying as best as he can, but he is simply not good enough of an actor to pull this off.

Black Swan - Possession theory, step by step.

“Black Swan” is in popular opinion a movie about ballerina suffering from mental illness. But I favor the other theory – the theory about demonic possession. Because the movie is so subjective – we see what Nina sees, we experience what she feels, we follow her everywhere, there can be many theories and none of them can really be disproved. There are many clues that point to the fact that as with “Suspiria” the ballet company was subjected to the games of evil force. Force that for no apparent reason other than because it can, toyed with fragile individuals and by pushing them over the edge wrecked their lives.

Black Swan

(108 min, 2010)
Director: Darren Aronofsky
Writers: Mark Heyman (screenplay), Andres Heinz (screenplay)
Stars: Natalie Portman, Mila Kunis and Vincent Cassel
 

Demons laugh within.

“As I lie here and stare
The fabric starts to tear
It's far beyond repair
And I don't really care
As far as I have gone
I knew what side I'm on
But now I'm not so sure
The line begins to blur”
- Nine Inch Nails, “The Line Begins to Blur”

In my many years of being a movie fan I have never waited that eagerly for a movie. Having read both versions of the script I was sure that this idea can't fail, especially in the hands of Darren Aronofsky, who has never made a bad film. The movie mixes many fantastic films within itself, but the core of it and the reason why it's Aronofsky's best film is that apart form fascinating characters the story takes us deep into the protagonist's state of mind. We travel down the rabbit hole of insanity along with Nina, we are scared, happy and exhilarated when she is and we can't never guess what will happen next.

The movie follows the story of extremely ambitious and dedicated ballet dancer Nina Seyers (Natalie Portman in a performance sure to win Oscar). Nina is very hard working, unfortunately she lacks true talent and passion. She lives in apartment with her overprotective mother, former ballerina (Barbara Hershey). After persuading the director of the new version of “Swan Lake” Thomas Leroy (Vincent Cassel) Nina surprisingly gets the lead role of Swan Queen. The role consists of playing both shy and fearful White Swan (which is essentially the personality of Nina) and sexual and malicious Black Swan (which Nina has no idea how to dance). As Nina struggles with her role, new dancer, free spirited Lily (Mila Kunis) appears in the group and seems to be perfect for the role of Black Swan. To make matters worse, the ballerina of great fame, Beth, retires and blames Nina for her downfall...

There is so much drama going on in this story, it would be sufficient for few separate movies. The core of this film lies in the rivalry and physical similarity between Nina and Lily. Nina, most likely a virgin is a good girl – she lives with her mother, I suspect because there is no reason for her to move out. Her entire life is her dancing. There is a strong possibility she became a ballet dancer because her mother wanted her to, but regardless of the reason, this is her life now and her dancing and success are the only things that matter to her. Nina is very much like an innocent child, although being in her late twenties – her room is pink, it's filled with stuffed animals, her mother tucks her in every evening and turns on music box with a ballerina's figurine turning around to the theme of “Swan Lake”, sounding like a creepy lullaby. Nina is working way too hard – her body is ruined, she has eating disorder, she is freakishly skinny, her nails break and she has a nervous tick – she unconsciously scratches her back till it bleeds.

Blue Valentine

(112 min, 2010)
Director: Derek Cianfrance
Writers: Derek Cianfrance, Cami Delavigne
Stars: Ryan Gosling, Michelle Williams and John Doman

Is this love?

“I feel like men are more romantic than women. When we get married we marry, like, one girl, 'cause we're resistant the whole way until we meet one girl and we think I'd be an idiot if I didn't marry this girl she's so great. But it seems like girls get to a place where they just kinda pick the best option... 'Oh he's got a good job.' I mean they spend their whole life looking for Prince Charming and then they marry the guy who's got a good job and is gonna stick around.”

“Blue Valentine” is a hard movie to watch because it treats love as it probably is in reality – as something very unsure, difficult and elusive. Unfortunately, despite the great subject matter and fantastic performances the film itself is boring and for most of it we ask ourselves “why should we care?”. We watch these two people, we see their interactions, but the film lacks heart and the story of love lacks...love.

Dean is a simple guy, without decent job, without plans and education. But he is a good person and helpless romantic. One day he sees Cindy and he falls in love with her, without even knowing her. He thinks she is the one for him and he wants to spend his life with her. Cindy wants to be a doctor, she changes boys as gloves, although she takes care her of grandmother, showing which is obviously useless attempt for the audience to get to care about her, she doesn't really get attached to guys, having seen the bitterness and hatred between her parents. Could there be two more different people?

Thirst (Bakjwi)

(133 min, 2009)
Director: Chan-wook Park
Writers: Chan-wook Park (screenplay), Émile Zola (inspired by the book "Thérèse Raquin"),
Stars: Kang-ho Song, Ok-bin Kim and Hae-sook Kim

Between God and desire.

“She took my heart, I think she took my soul
With the moon I run
Far from the carnage of the fiery sun
Driven by the strangled vein
Showing no mercy I do it again
Open up your eye
You keep on crying, baby
I’ll bleed you dry”
- Kings of Leon, “Closer”

In Korea, the dedicated Priest Hyo-Sung volunteers to work in a special research of the Emmanuel Virus, a.k.a. Curse of Bazira that does not affect African, only Caucasian and Asian; However he contracts the disease and dies, but after a blood transfusion, he surprisingly survives among the fifty volunteers and is considered saint by the worshipers. Sooner Hyo-Sung finds that the transfusion was made using vampires blood and he is thirsty for blood and lust for woman, Tae-ju.

If I had to make a list of five best vampires movies ever made “Thirst” by the director of Vengeance Trilogy Chan-wook Park would be on it. The movie brilliantly shows vampire's lust, in all forms of it, has one of the best characters I've seen in vampire movie (Tae-ju) and is beautifully shot. It's a delicate and sometimes even poetic movie about brutal and irreversible aspects of vampires' lives.