Posts filed under '2010'
Director Anton Corbjin has enough visual talent to make a film set in drab, waterlogged Macclesfield, England (post-punk biopic Control) one of the great cinematographic achievements of the past decade. You can imagine, then, what he does with Southern Italy. In strictly pictorial terms, Corbjin’s new thriller “The American” is jaw-dropping from first frame to last, capturing a gorgeous hilltop village that sits above the clouds in the lower valley. What’s even more impressive is that the film’s imagery never feels like shallow postcard fodder. Corbjin coaxs all sorts of unexpected emotion out of categorically beautiful territory - paranoia from an overhead shot of strangely twisting roads, methodical determination from geometric architecture, loneliness out of a lush riverbed.
Continue Reading September 6th, 2010
Raj Ranade
Universal Law of Cinema #436 states that the most satisfying part of any film including in its cast the actor Bill Murray will be the actor Bill Murray. In this regard, the debut film from director Aaron Schneider, Get Low (trailer), does not disappoint (Universal Law of Cinema #437 states, on the other hand, that serious films shall endeavor to avoid any titular resemblance to noted singles by Lil Jon & the East Side Boyz, but I digress).
Continue Reading August 30th, 2010
Raj Ranade
Are you ready to rumble (in a manufactured marketing-ploy kind of way)? Studio wonks have been spinning this weekend’s release of chick flick “Eat Pray Love” and 80s-action-hero-reunion “The Expendables” into an epic battle of the sexes faster than you can say “limp attempt to conjure publicity out of nothingness”.
Continue Reading August 15th, 2010
Raj Ranade
Let’s be honest: Martin Scorsese has been playing it safe for the past decade. “Gangs of New York,” “The Aviator” and “The Departed” are good-to-great films that exemplify Scorsese’s mastery of visual storytelling, but you can feel the man pandering to mainstream audience tastes in a way that wasn’t true of masterpieces like “Raging Bull” or “Taxi Driver,” which remain shocking viewing experiences even today. Perhaps his Oscar for “The Departed” has set him free - “Shutter Island” is the weirdest film Scorsese’s made since “Bringing Out the Dead” in 1999, and if it isn’t entirely successful, it’s exhilarating more often than not.
Continue Reading February 25th, 2010
Raj Ranade