Movie of the Month - May - Drive

I don't drive. If I did, there would be thousands of causalities. Oh My God. What If I drove over an animal? But I enjoy sitting in the car, while someone who knows what they are doing is driving. It's so relaxing. You have music on and you see all those places and people through the window. It's especially amazing at night.

Watching Drive is a bit like that, except you are sitting in front of the screen watching the movie. But it completely captures the vibe - the film has an amazing style, but the style never hides the substance. Drive is one of those movies that are destined to become a classic - it's the kind of story that is both intriguing and entertaining. And all of that because of the protagonist.

Movie of the Month - March - The Ides of March

For March, the movie of the month is...The Ides of March. I feel that this film is very underrated, it was actually one of my favorite movies in 2011 and it even ended up in my top 5 of 2011. I think Good Night and Good Luck is a fine film, but I found The Ides of March to be easily the most entertaining movie that was directed by George Clooney, though I won't deny that it seems to be mostly Clooney's vanity project that allowed him to preach his ideals without actually running for any public position.

Movie of the Month - February - Amelie

It's better to help people than garden gnomes

What better film to chose for the movie of the month of love? There are few films out there that fill your heart with happiness and Amelie is one of such rare gems. The story of a sweet, lonely girl who decides to bring joy to others and in the process of that finds love is extremely inspiring and heartwarming. If every single one of us was a little bit like Amelie, I'm convinced the world would be a better place.

Movie of the Month - January - Frost/Nixon

I'm saying that when the President does it, it's *not* illegal!

Following the resignation of US President Richard Nixon (Frank Langella), television talk show host David Frost (Michael Sheen) wants to arrange a series of interviews with him to air on television. Part of the reason Frost thinks the interviews would be compelling to both the public and the television networks is that Nixon never admitted any guilt of or offered any apology for the Watergate scandal which led to his resignation.. Nixon believes he can railroad Frost, who is better known as a pop cultural entertainment styled interviewer than an investigative political interviewer. However, Frost has every intention on these interviews being hard hitting and pointed; in addition to his producer John Birt (Matthew MacFayden), Frost hires two investigative reporters known for their previous exposés on Nixon: Bob Zelnick (Olivier Platt) and Jim Reston (Sam Rockwell). Nixon's chief adviser for the interviews is his current chief of staff, Jack Brennan (Kevin Bacon).

Movie of the Month - December - Solaris

You are all I see

For the beautiful and somber month of DecemberII decided to chose Solaris, hugely under appreciated and misunderstood movie directed by Steven Soderbergh. The film, based on brilliant and difficult novel by Stanisław Lem, focuses on just one part of the story - the love the protagonist Chris and his now deceased wife Rheya share.

Some time after Rheya commits suicide, Chris is called by his friend and asked to fly to mysterious ocean-like planet Solaris. The ship that was investigating the planet had some trouble on board and when Chris gets there he finds out the truth - some of the crew members were driven insane because the planet has the mysterious ability to duplicate their loved ones who died. During his first night on the ship, Chris wakes up next to Rheya. Though he gets rid of her first duplicate, when she comes back again he finds himself unable to let go of his love.

Movie of the Month - November - The King's Speech

Most of the time I feel ashamed for being a part of human race. The shit we do each other on daily basis, people to other people, simultaneously shocks me, freighters me and disturbs me. We kill our animals, we kill others, we kill ourselves. Not so long ago there was a blogathon - which movies would you show to aliens who visited our planet to best demonstrate the qualities of human race. While I'm sure if the aliens hang out long enough they would make a correct decision of killing us all and leaving the place to animals, I must say sometimes people surprise me. Sometimes as I watch others and their acts of kindness I have a fleeting sensation of hope. Sometimes even I surprise myself in positive way. Sometimes I read about ordinary people or historical figures and their big sacrifices or quite battles. Or I simply happen to watch a movie about them. And that gives me more hope, seeing that we can be good too..

Movie of the Month - October - Angel Heart

Harry Angel has been hired to search for the truth... Pray he doesn't find it.

It's only 29 days till Halloween so the only right choice for October's Movie of the Month is one of my favorite movies and one of my favorite horror films - Angel Heart.

Movie of the Month - September - Grey Gardens

For this month's I'm choosing one of my favorite movies - very underrated Grey Gardens, HBO film from 2009 starring Drew Barrymore and Jessica Lange.

Grey Gardens is an HBO film about the lives of Edith Bouvier Beale/"Little Edie", played by Drew Barrymore, and her mother Edith Ewing Bouvier/"Big Edie", played by Jessica Lange. Co-stars include Jeanne Tripplehorn as Jacqueline Kennedy (Little Edie's cousin) and Ken Howard as Phelan Beale. The film, directed by Michael Sucsy and co-written by Sucsy and Patricia Rozema, flashes back and forth between various events and dates ranging from Little Edie as a young débutante in 1936 moving with her mother to their Grey Gardens estate through the filming and premiere of the actual 1975 documentary Grey Gardens.

Movie of the Month - August - Earrings

Alex Withrow who runs one of my favorite - if not my favorite blog - And so it Begins - recently released his debut short film entitled Earrings. Because it's really good and I want as many people as possible to see it it's the movie of the month for August on my blog. Here is my review for the film:

75/100 (2012, 31 min)
Plot: A young woman dives into increasingly destructive behavior after witnessing a traumatic event.
Director: Alex Withrow
Writer: Alex Withrow
Stars: Catherine Warner, Martin McSweeney and Andrew Kirkley

Earrings is directorial debut from Alex Withrow, very good writer and passionate movie fan. You can see many influences here, in his haunting short film, but one that particularly stands out is the influence by Steve McQueen's Shame - we observe a character having a breakdown, the reasons for which are for most part unknown to us. We see their daily routine, we see the camera follow them and ultimately we see them being consumed by despair.And we want to know - why? What could have possibly happened to make them live - or either stay alive without the desire to live - like this?

Movie of the Month - July - Swimming Pool

On the surface, all is calm.

Initially another movie was supposed to be my pick this month, but as I recently saw Love Crime with impressive performance  by Ludivine Sagnier it made me think of her another great work in Swimmig Pool. The film, directed by Francois Ozon, tells the story of a writer Sarah Morton played by Charlotte Rampling who visits her publisher's summer house in the south of France. While staying there she meets his daughter - young and fun loving Julie.

Sarah is fascinated with Julie because the young girl is everything she is not – free, promiscuous and uninhibited. The more Sarah finds out about Julie the more she becomes curious about her and her bond with the girl becomes stronger. At the same time Sarah is trying to write her novel but her curiosity of Julie gets in the way of that especially when the two women are forced to share a secret together.

Movie of the Month - June - Repulsion

 I must get this crack mended

Repulsion, the movie by Roman Polanski, is a chilling tale of the young, strange and very beautiful woman named Carol. She is very timid and fearful of everything around her and she looks as if she was made out of porcelain - so delicate that if you touched her, she would break into million pieces. Carol is especially afraid of men, whether they are just passing by her or trying to have a date with her.

Movie of the Month - May - The Runaways

"Girls nowadays, they don't have any role models. This band is self-empowerment, man - Aphrodite, Cleopatra, Eurydice! No more second-class status, sitting at concerts with asshole boyfriends who worship bands from a Popular Mechanics evaluation of amplifiers. The Runaways have the most chance of any group I've seen... To do with the Beatles did. To tear this world apart."

You probably noticed that for two months now there is a movie of the month image on the sidebar of the blog. Each month I chose a movie I think is underrated and provide the link to my review of it. The movie of the month of May is The Runaways, a very good film featuring wonderful work from Kristen Stewart and Dakota Fanning.