100 & 99 Of My Favorite Movies of All Time

  Marty Piletti is a simple man. And he leads a simple life.
He works a job as a butcher, he helps take care of his mother, he hangs out at the local cafe with his simple buddies on the weekend.
  The only problem is, Marty lives during a time when being an unmarried man in his thirties is considered not normal. And even though he tries to live contently with the resignation of his bachelorhood, he does begin to feel from others the pressure that he should go out and find himself a beautiful bride.
  However, when he finally meets someone who sparks his romantic interests, she doesn't exactly fall within the boundaries of what everyone else thinks of as physical beauty.
  So now this simple man Marty must make the complicated decision between the amatory palpitations of his heart and the parochial expectations of others.



  A small movie that, even though it may tend to hit you with its easy point over the head like a hammer at times,
features engagingly warm and down to earth performances by Earnest Borgnine and crew.

  Man,
forget all those stupid Chuck Norris internet memes that you see running ridiculously rampant all over the world wide web. The truth is, he's nuthin' but a milquetoast martial arts mockery whose so-called brass balls could never hope to stand up against Bruce Lee's raging fists of fury.
You really want to see what badd-ass 100% kickassery looks like in its purest form?
Exit one Texas Ranger.
Enter The Dragon.

  Streetwise is a documentary that takes one of the most in-depth looks into life on the streets when "life on the streets" literally means life on the streets. It follows the day-to-day goings on of several young individuals who are homeless inside an area that was created for its citizens to prosper. It's a journey that exposes the kind of physical, mental and emotional struggles that people in these situations go through in an existence that can only be survived through it day by day, hour by hour, even minute by minute. It all culminates into an emotionally wrenching ending that can cut anyone viewing it to the bone, because we watch it unravel as real life and not a script.  Raw reality, back-alley drama and heartbreaking yet engaging emotion, all at a level that the world of escapist entertainment can never really compare to.
 

  For me, I've always found that there's something about creating philosophical discussions on film that can easily come off as arrogant if not tread through carefully. Part of it is because I feel that any kind of communication on a philosophical level has evolved nowadays to the point where it is so individually subjective, that any talks about the purpose or why's of existence should leave some kind of room for everyone listening to it to be able to contribute in some fashion. And even if not everyone can, the space should at least be there. But when it's captured on film, that is not possible for a viewer.
  But obviously, with Waking Life on this list, it is one of those rare movies that proves to be the exception.
  It is a film that is made up not so much of a linear story as it is with a line-up of philosophical musings, told with expressionistic graphics of computer-generated "paint", overlaid on top of life-action. And the end result is a visual style of discussion that emphasizes that this is a piece of cinematic work that is engaging, intellectually stimulating, and of course, not at all a kid's film. Or for those who watch films exclusively so that they can turn their brains off.



  Watching Waking Life is a unique movie-enjoying experience when approached with "open" eyes and the right frame of mind.
  Or, in other words, it's a flick that I found my introspective pimp-ass sufficiently engaged in with all of its discussions, ruminations and pontifications on all of these sorts of various ideas, musings an' sh#t.

 Look, not that I'm judging or anything, but having the most important meal of the day at a place like Tiffany's just might be a tad too hoity-toity for me. Call me simple, but when it comes to starting my day off right, I would prefer breakfast at MikkyDee's more than anywhere else. Those Sausage McMuffins wit' Egg sandwiches, surely, they be nought but the very food of the gods themselves.
Heck, just thinkin' about 'em now has reminded me that McDonald's has started serving their breakfast menu all day long. Which is sorta pushin' me in the direction of cutting the description of this entry short, jump in my car, and take a quick trip over to their drive-thru window....

   When I was a kid in the 70's, like most other fandom-based nerds, I thought that things like dragons, mythological creatures and wizards were cool as all get out. Or more specifically, I thought their concepts were cool. 

   At the time, what we usually got on the silver screen or TV screen concerning these, usually, was not. Because, obviously, back then, the world of cinema didn't have the technological means to make such things "come to life" on film. Oh, there were some worthy efforts...  the classic Ray Harryhausen flix of the 60's and 70's, Willow, Legend, Clash of the Titans, even the animated albeit severely truncated adaptation of LotR from 1978.

  But even the best applications still reminded viewers that what they were looking at was simply a movie.

  Ten minutes into watching the first LotR film, that's when I realized that we were finally there. By the end of this installment, The Return of the King, I had seen fire breathing dragons, giant spiders, mythical elephantine beasts, huge trees that walk like men, Orcs, balrogs, wargs and other creatures with names that make the average person go "Huh?", all done with the kind of digital detail and movements that belies the imagination and one's sense of what's "real". 
  For any nick-pickers out, I realize that this trilogy isn't perfect. But, for me, I was just simply happy and satisfied to finally see a series of the fantasy genre being adapted onto film with all the respect and effort of the highest quality available in the medium.

  While the drug problem in the United States is something that has been an issue for most of the country's history, the trafficking side of it didn't really start to come into play until about the late 1970's, just as the product was making its way more prominently into the middle- and higher-class areas of its cities. That's when the government finally began putting effort into the how's and why's of this increasing situation. And while Hollywood has always been using drugs and its addictions as a central theme for stories and plots for quite some time, it wasn't until it was reaching zenith proportions that it also began putting its focus on the issue of trafficking. Which is obviously evident by just the name of this film.                             
  After the accolades started coming in for Traffic, there were a couple that I read and read that praised its story for not centering out any one specific reason for the drug epidemic, because the reality was that there was a wide variety of reasons that so many of the populace were becoming addicted. But I have to say that I semi-disagree with that.



   For me, I think that there is a scene featuring Michael Douglas that is pivotal as to one of the major reasons why all of this is happening. The character, a high-ranking judge named Robert Wakefield who has been appointed by the President himself to a committee to counter the drug trade, comes to finally accept that his daughter has a drug problem, and decides to start paying more attention towards her than his vocation. In one of the final scenes of the movie, he explains that in order to help her beat her addiction, rather than continually lecturing to their daughter not to do drugs, his wife and he were instead going to start listening to her.
I think that his dialogue hit the issue pretty good on point, not just on an individual level, but also on a national level too.

  With the realism of the coming-of-age teen life themes that the film "Kids" started a year before, Welcome to the Dollhouse continues that 90's era trend of down to Earth toughness in the matters of pubescent transition, but with its own twist to the theme. Moving away from the documentary style of fiction that made "Kids' feel so "real", in this one, the plot is fitted into a "more linear" storyline, with the intent of structuring the movie in an order that makes it more focused on the particulars of how "ugly and mean" this period of life can be. Especially when it is hidden from any kind of "adult supervision" or mentoring that would be required to keep it all from getting out of hand.



 This is the film that introduced Todd Solendz unique brand of dark, misanthropic brand of filmmaking, whether it be drama or comedy.  Dollhouse is a hard-nosed depiction of those who are quietly and easily overlooked and who tend to make up a larger percentage of the student population of the public school system than many of us don't wish or even care to notice.

  One of my favorite things about new millennium cinema is that when it comes to romantic comedies, there seems to be a current trend towards the more unconventional and quirky types.
  The year of 2012 is an excellent example of this, as, with the release of movies like Silver Linings Playbook, Moonrise Kingdom and, my fave of the bunch, Safety Not Guaranteed, it proved to be the year of the edgy and uber-quirky rom-com.



   I wish I could go more into detail about why I liked SNG so much, but the truth is, if I did, I would then have to get into explaining the path that the storyline took in this movie, which eventually would lead into revealing the ending, therefore resulting in me having to subject you fools to a spoiler. And while guaranteeing anyone's safety on this site is far beyond my ability to control, avoiding a spoil on any of my "Fave Movies" list is definitely something I can manage.

Shall.
We.
Play.
A.
Game?



  WarGames is about the kind of troubles a slacking loner can get into when hacking into the government's military online systems. Especially when a part of it is because he's just trying to impress a girl. A teenage Cold War thriller back when computers were all dial-up, all screens were black with green fonts, and backdoors were the best kept secrets that computer hacking nerds had in their on-line arsenal.

  A meticulous yet suspenseful thriller by Francis Ford Coppola that succeeds above the requirements of its premise, and yet, is one that hardly gets any mention when discussing great films. Most likely because The Conversation came out the same year that FFC's other, more well-known cinema classic, The Godfather Part II, was released. Otherwise, with its quality cast and edgy direction back when Coppola had both an edge and a direction, maybe this film wouldn't be one those that continually is filed under the category of "underrated and overshadowed". It is definitely a movie that you just can't go wrong with as it's a work by a director at the height of his prime and stars the always dependable Mr. Gene Hackman in the central role along with the late great John Cazale, an actor who in his short film career, never starred in any movie rated less than an A+.

 While I've always had an interest in movies from all eras, including those from the silent era, recently, for some inexplicable reason, I seem to have really developed a fascination for those works that were produced during the Age of Jazz. I think that if I were to take the time to delve into the reasons of why this attraction has been taking a more prominent role in my personal taste for cinema, it would take up more room than is typically required for a description box provided by this site. 
 I can admit, at least, that one of the most ardent rationalizations that I can surmise as to why this has come to be, is the camera grabbing allure of one the most iconic "figures' of the pre-Crash era, Louise Brooks. 
  Her most well-known is this one and I watched it mostly because I was curious about what was it that made the flapper girl the embodiment of the female liberation movement during the Roaring Twenties. Alongside "It" girl, Clara Bow, this was the look and style that made its star, the divine Mz. Brooks, not only one of the most enduring female movie actresses of the silent era, but also, the definition of what it meant to be a free-spiriting flapper.
  And after watching Pandora's Box, it became pretty clear that this was a movement which, once its box was opened, it could never again be contained. 

  After becoming cool again with his role in Pulp Fiction, John Travolta follows up as a gangster turned movie producer in Get Shorty.
A movie about movies in where there really isn't anybody called Shorty that needs to be "get", but the main character is a shylock called Chili Palmer, and who is also a guy that proves that you can be both a huge movie nerd and a totally hip bad-ass at the same time.
Hmmmm....
 maybe I should change my screenname here on this site to "Chili Palmer".........

  An alien being comes down to Earth, morphs into a human form in order to understand our species and then begins a race against time to meet with his star-faring rendezvous party before the government military can get its hands on him/it. But not before he/it can get a girl pregnant.
Simply put,
this movie is E.T. for adults.
Or at least, it's for those of us whose minds are mature enough to understand that when it comes to traffic lights, red means "stop", green means "go" and yellow means "go very fast".

  Outside of When Harry Met Sally, this movie ranks as one that could easily represent the epitome of the modern romantic comedy.
  A good script, with each of the central actors approaching their roles with quality efforts, despite the lightness of the subject matter. This movie has the heart, laughs, chemistry and even a touch of satiric social commentary that matches the rest of the film's themes in the same way that a nice pair of high heels would match an elegant dress-gown.
 Tootsie's end-result is that it satisfies in the manner which was always meant to be of the rom-com when the genre was first conceived.

  As someone who had no real interest in this series or it's subject matter, it wasn't until this installment that I finally watched a Harry Potter movie. And being that I never read any of the books, I was quite taken aback at the over-all consistency of balance between the fantasy element of the wizarding world and that of the personal struggles of what goes thru a young person's mind trying to deal with things like death, authority and finding one's place in the life. Compelling drama, a storyline that both successfully continues the series and yet also manages to stand on its own, well-placed chemistry between the characters, medieval sets that visually stun, Dementors that horrify, old tree willows that whomp and even a werewolf that looks pretty damn bad-ass.
I walked into this film an indifferentiated non-fan and ended up coming out of it a hardcore Pot-head.

  Every once in a while, a part comes around that helps to define the career of a certain actor. Popeye Doyle's was Gene Hackman's. From here on end, I always viewed Mr. Hackman's roles as a guy with a friendly smile, though with a slight slant of sinister intent.
  Officer Doyle, as portrayed in this film was a guy out to do good, but is so determined to catch the bad guy, that he is willing to beat a suspect for info or haphazardly speed dangerously down a New York city street. In the end, he'll make sure the law wins, even if he has to break a few rules (and a few skulls) along the way.
  Or rampage a stolen car thru rush hour traffic in a chase scene that all car chases from here on end will be measured by.

  Even though all the follow-ups, videos and merchandising would take the next cyber-evolutionary step in visually outdoing the one that started it all,
the story in this first chapter of Neo & Co. was still fresh and not yet so over-wrought with complicated ideas and all walks of philosophical influences that tended to bog down what originally started as a really cool concept in a world of monumental pixelized possibilities.
 You are now entering the Matrix.

  A martial arts film that decides that it's not going to be one.
 Many forms of physical combat like to brag of itself as being a form of violent ballet, but Crouching Tiger Hidden dragon is one that just wants to portray it martial arts as an art tool that blends into the majesty of the story's theme of honor, love and wisdom, that this film ends up laying claim to that dance-metaphor that the other fighting films wish they could be truly worthy of.
No character in this film, no matter how small, is colored in the simple black and white colors of good and evil, and all are duty bound by a personal sense of honor.   And both men and women are equally capable in either masterfully full contact engagement or scaling the walls and even the very air in gravity defying leaps that serve more to enhance the fable-like atmosphere of the story.
Intelligent, straightforward and "martially artistic", Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon is a pure fun action flick merged into a story whose simplicity is hidden behind the human depth of a group of characters who believe their respective situations to be truly epic.

  Almost a decade and a half earlier before Blade Runner, 2001: A Space Odyssey was one the first films to successfully marry the big budget sci-fi with a genre of a different theme (that of psychological thriller) so that all the high-tech flashiness of science fiction acted as a contrasting backdrop to a darker side that resided underneath all the complicated buttons and wires of futuristic technology.
Then came Ridley Scott's Alien, which did the same for the darkside of sci-film, but now more in the method of the straight-up horror genre.
He followed that up with another marriage to sci-fi, but this time in the cinematic category of film noir. Now, with this story of replicant-hunter Rick Deckard, Scott depicts what lays beneath all the flashy neon lights that decoratively symbolize the endless possibilities of the future, to tell a tale of the grit and grime layers of lost and forgotten cyber-souls that could only act as a foundation of those towering spires of technological brilliance that would allow the mortal men living in 'em to perceive themselves as gods.
Blade Runner is just as equally a visual stunner as the other famous sci-fi classic that Harrison Ford is known for, but now, instead of a distant galaxy far far away, it's in a distant future that more down to Earth.

  Before Epic Movie, Scary Movie, Date Movie or Superhero Movie, there was this movie. The original gangsta of the "modern" take off movie.
  Or to put it another way,
this is a movie about another movie but done as a spoof movie. And since I've used it nine times, here's the word "movie" just one more time, to make it an even ten.

Al Pacino in the mob, but this time, on the opposite side of the heirarchy. A low-level aging hitman who can't get no respect. One of the few times Al gets to expand his acting muscles as opposed to just flexing 'em with a loud performance, which, over the years, has sorta become his standard.
For me, a great gangster movie isn't just about "wacking" people. It's when it shows the inner-most details of how the mob works. This one goes towards the very lowest part of the totem and shows us how the "cogs" grind thru a living in hopes of someday climbing that mafia ladder.

Tim Burton's has a great style to his movies, but for my money, not enough substance. Sleepy Hollow is the exception. The idea of this movie wasn't one that had any real appeal for me, but it turned out to have more in terms of story and character than I would've expected. I think Mr. Burton, though still considered avante garde, would be held in much higher regard if he could flesh out his stories as well as he did for this one.

Cary Grant gets chased across America by villainous spies, government agents, and the most dastardly of 'em all, a crop-duster!
In the same manner that Psycho made me start taking baths in order to avoid the "someone-sneaking-up" factor that is the natural result of shower curtains,
this movie made me always choose dwellings within the city in order to avoid ever having to cross paths with any of these air-borne single engine bi-planal horrors.

  While Texas Chainsaw Massacre introduce us the idea of an unstoppable masked maniacal force intent on making all mere mortals that it comes upon into its chopped sushi bitch, Halloween introduced us the formula of this theme before it became formulaic. And also, before the formula became stupid.
  Pay attention to the handling of the characters, the situations of each victim and even the simplicity of the musical score, and you'll find that even though this film requires the usual suspension of belief that is needed to swallow the outrageousness of this genre, this film does not ask that you hide your intelligence too much behind any kind of William Shatner mask.

Some of the most breathtaking and gorgeously intricate background set designs ever in a film. So rich are the colors and exquisite details in this movie, that it requires multiple viewings just to be able to soak it all in. Once one can get passed that aspect of the film, it will become obvious that the sets are not a distraction, but an enhancement to the story. An enrichment that adds to the dialogue with an intensity that allows the ideas of what appears to be human pettiness behavior in a royal setting to be revealed as much grander in scope and concept.
And for a movie that can make someone as simple minded as myself come to a conclusion like that, that's definitely a statement to the power of it's artistry.

Even though I find myself surprised at how much I've been consistently entertained by the majority of those movies that have been made with the handheld-cam method of film-making, I thought for sure that by this point in time, we've pretty much reached the point of exhausting the genre.
Then comes along this movie and shows that in a style of cinema that should have been drained of life by now, when entering the realm of the paranormal, there can still be some signs of activity.

For me, watching this Brazilian-based film feels almost exactly like watching a documentary. In one frighteningly all-too real scene involves a young (incredibly young) kid gang member who is cornered by a much older gang leader from another troupe and then is asked to choose between getting shot in the hand or in the foot. In my opinion, it is a scene that holds more power, depth and context than most movies contain in their entirety. An incredibly eye-opening and moving picture that reveals the true grit of violence, hopelessness and poverty of the South American slums that lie behind tourist paradises such as Rio de Janeiro and the like.

  Jack Nicholson's only role as a detective in a "modern" noir film that doesn't try to be anything else other than a modern take of a noir film. It is because of this, that the 1970's sensibilities that are just a natural result of being a film of this era, along with it's "twisted" twist ending, that Chinatown comes off as being a work more layered and "edgy" than a standard mystery film. Which ends up giving this movie a much more distinctive feel that surpasses the genre in which it respectfully tries to remain faithful to.
And when you think about it, aren't those the type of qualities that usually make a classic film a classic?

In 2005, Judd Apatow scored big with 40 Year Old Virgin, a comedy that explores the ups and downs of trying to get laid. He followed that up with what is in my opinion, his second best film so far, Knocked Up, a film that explored the ups and downs that can come after getting laid.

  Clint Eastwood begins his tour de force as the San Francisco cop with a 70's machismo-sized chip on his shoulder and a Smith & Wesson Model 29 in his shoulder holster. Inspector Harold Francis "Dirty Harry" Callahan is an on-the-street inspector who consistently talks thru incessantly gritted teeth, enjoys pissing off his starch-collared superiors and welds big, hefty handguns like they were just a natural extension of what makes him so dirty to begin with.



  In other words,
he's mad as hell and he's not gonna take it anymore, punk!

With the "Big One" raging over a major part of the world, and most of "our boys" overseas doing their bit, its up to the gals to hold down the fort and help keep the home front moving forward, despite it,'s lack of manpower. Even when it comes to the game of baseball, the diamond field is no exception. It's time for the ladies to jock up and step behind the plate and make sure that America's favorite pastime keeps on swinging.



In a game mostly associated with male players, it's ironic that a film which focuses on the women's first professional entry into the sport, would be the one that, for me, truly captures the feeling which best reflects of why this sport is truly an American past-time: that the purpose of a game is, no matter how the global scale of political events may be turbulently transpiring, we can all just escape for a little while by catching a ballgame. And hopefully, in the end, then return into the real world with our spirits a little higher and our perspectives a little bit clearer. Because, as we all know by now,
there is no crying in baseball.

Now, even though I'm a comicbook nerd and I own the graphic novel, I haven't read it in years and it was only about twice that I picked up the book,
so I don't remember it clearly.
Which I think was an advantage, because since I can't really recall what would be the parts that didn't make it into the film, for me, the story felt incredibly full and tight. Since the concept of the Watchmen was a lot more intelligent than the time-constraints of the film allowed it to be, for me personally, the movie felt more like the kind that Marvel were putting out when they first started to "grow up" with runs like the Claremont/Byrne era of X-Men or Frank Miller's Daredevil (before the company sold out and reverted drastically to the immature stories of the 90's).
I really enjoyed the way this movie panned out, and from what I remember in the graphic novel, I definitely think that the film's version of the ending fit in perfectly within the context of the media in which it was told.
Really good stuff that I really found myself enjoying way more than I expected when I first walked in.

Juliette Binoche and chocolate.
Two great tastes that taste great together.
And yeah, I know I should probably get into more detail about why I think this is such a quality romance film,
but to be honest, whenever I think about of this "charmingly light-hearted food fable",
I can't get the idea of a chocolat Binoche out of my mind.
:homerdrool:

In 1979, Francis Ford Coppola came out with Apocalypse Now, the definitive Vietnam War movie on an artistic level.
In 1986, Oliver Stone came out with Platoon, the definitive Vietnam War movie on a more realistic level.



The perception of war is a funny thing. Whether one is a "hawk" or a "dove", the use of military combat is still a subject that seems to be very subjective to many people, whether they're a brigadier general or an average citizen watching reports of it on the TV.
Oliver Stone was said that the main reason he decide to make Platoon was to counter John Wayne's pro-militarism portrayal in The Green Berets.
Which, at first, I thought was kinda strange, since Berets was made back in 1968. Between that movie and this one, there have been other films which glimpsed into the reality of the Vietnam War. Movies such as The Deer Hunter, Coming Home and the aforementioned Apocalypse Now. And yet, despite those movies, he still felt the need to release one that would be so forthright in it's approach, that while the overall pragmatism of war may still in be question, the atrocities, from both sides, would leave little room for debate. Although the story in Platoon is based on fiction, it is a personal effort that held back no punches and took a much more comprehensive look into what really happened deep within the bushes and jungles of the "little war" that left such big scars.

I was a big fan of the TV series, and often watched it in syndication during my tweener years, when my tastes in entertainment were just beginning to experience their own particular brand of puberty. I had heard that there was a movie from which this series was based off of, but never watched it until just a few years ago. After getting so used to the TV version, it took me a bit before I started becoming comfortable with the feel of the movie, which is more raw, not as tightly focused on "preaching" the anti-war message as it's small screen counterpart. However, once I began adjusting my viewing senses to more readily absorb the movie's integrity, it's brilliance of creativity, "wartime operating-room realism" and humor, all became more apparent. It's ability to interweave these aspects with such a spontaneitic balance was not only a reminder of a director's (Robert Altman) prime, but also, why this movie is considered such a classic of the genre, particularly in the realm of its genre of dark comedy and satire.

Not only did I walk into this film not really knowing anything about it but also several minutes late into, at the scene where they kept switching between the dialogues of the two boys walking down the street and of the group of girls commiserating about sex. Because of this, my initial impression was that I was watching a documentary. That is, until I caught on to the camera work and noticed that it was obviously a movie. As someone who grew in an incredibly poor neighborhood, for me, this movie one of the "realest" depictions of "wake-up call kids" that I had seen up to this point in time.

Kick Ass is a twerpy teen who decides to fight crime with no superpowers or experience,
Red Mist is a mobster's son who follows suit using dad's money and the Mistmobile,
Big Daddy is a Batman clone who shows everybody how it's done,
and Hit Girl....well, she practically steals the whole show.
A foul-mouthed fun-filled over the top action flick that's not for the faint-hearted comic books fans whose preferences off the spinner rack were mags like "Archie".

When it comes to Fried Green Tomatoes, I like mine with a touch of salt and a dash of tabasco sauce. No fava beans or chianti. That's a combo that goes with something else.



But, yep.
That's how I luvs me some fried green tomatoes.

..... and I luvs me some Snatch, too



Particularly when it comes as a flim-flam flick speckled with heavily British accented wit with just a touch of over-the-pond mob humour.

What Close Encounters Of The 3rd. Kind did back in the 70's, this film takes to the next evolutionary step, in terms of the actual physics and concepts of an actual meeting 'tween us mere mortals and any life-forms.



For my money, Contact contains some of the best discussions of religion and atheism in any film ever made. It's depictions of the manner that things like general fear and politics can get in the way of a true quest for knowledge is both basely intelligent and comprehendibly poignant. This film's plot does a great job treading on the subject of how our society is constantly struggling between the comfort of what we already know and the confrontational truths about our species that can be revealed as result of the discovery of what is new, especially if seen thru the "eyes" of a life-form that's a lot smarter than us.
Contact is a reminder to me that when it comes to sci-fi films, I luvs me some intelligent life-forms.

Living a life with just enough to get by, "Sully" Sullivan seems okay with just that despite the years piling on. When his estranged son comes to town with his own son in tow, "Sully" starts to feel the twinges of patriarchal charge towards the grandson he never knew had. Moving through the typical "atypical" happenings of his small town, Sully finds the pieces of his life starting stitch together in a way in which he must decide to either just keep crustily cruisin' by, or, to do that one thing that has always felt alien to him.... take some responsibility.



This is simply one of those movies that I really enjoy that never really gets much mention anywhere. Paul Newman, Jessica Tandy, Bruce Willis, Melanie Griffin and Phillip Seymour Hoffman are a great cast of actors playing a great cast of characters in this, a pretty great film (at least, in my opinion it is). And each one is a piece of a puzzle that, despite their sharp edges, all still fit in perfectly.

Here's a story of Christmas that has become such a staple on the television during the Yuletide season, that I wonder if I really should waste any time to describe it. Everybody by now (and when I say everybody, that includes you.... yeah, you.... the person reading this) knows the story of Ralphie and his journey towards becoming the surest sure-shot and deadliest deadshot that ever sent Black Bart and any other forms of insensate evil towards pushin' up daisies.



Lemme tell you guys something, if Santa were to leave an official Red Ryder carbine-action 200-shot range model air rifle/BB gun under my tree this year, even at my current age, I'd still end up beating my chest and proclaiming to the whole world that it's a wonderful life.
And before anyone says anything,
lemme just say
"F#ck* my eye. I don't care."



*( ...and when I said that, it didn't come out as "fudge".)

 There are a lot of stories that have been told in cinema that deals with real life events that have occurred during World War 2. As The Shadow in My Eye demonstrates, there are still plenty more to be shown/told. Telling the true story of a Royal Air Force mission that goes awry when their initial target is misidentified from a Gestapo headquarters to a boarding school for young children, this excellently crafted Danish export does an exceptional job of covering  a wide range of the emotional spectrum, easily making it not only one of the best foreign films of the past several years, but even moreso, one of the best films period.

 Speaking honestly, for the past ten years, while I've seen some pretty good movies, there have almost none that I've been able to add to my top fifty favorites lists. This one of the few rare ones that did. Shadow is one of those rare works that comes along that is visually pleasing, expertly crafted and is about as emotionally moving, brutal and gripping as it gets.
For me, this is simply the stuff that great cinema is made of.

While this movie couldn't match the spontaneous quality of it's predecessor, back when this came out, it was still rare for a sequel to reach the level of both box-office and financial success that this one did. The romance between the Rock and Adrian flows wonderfully into it's next level as two people trying to form a unity based on each other's distinct personalities. Carl Withers is not forgotten as Apollo Creed as this installment enters deeper into the life of the champ who's titleship comes into question. And even Mickey manages to surprise us by revealing some of the heart that seemed hopelessly buried beneath his years-long thick crust of curmudgeon hide.
As a follow up to the the first film, the plot in Rocky's 2nd. crack at the worldbelt felt like an natural extension of the story that had begun in the first film and not just as a sequel out to cash in on the success of that initial effort.

?Fashion backwards a in arranged were movie this of comments the for words the if obvious too way be it would



The future director of the Dark Knight utilizes a backwards structure for this film in a manner that was exceptionally well-thought thru, making it possible for the viewer to able to be kept on his/her toes and yet still able to follow the plot thru one's own puzzle-solving skillz.

  Check the "on button" to your brain at the door when entering the Animal House, pick up a handful of mashed potato, mixed greens or whatever your favorite choice of sloppy luncheon side order may be,
and then, prepare for battle.



 Oh, and feel free to top this entry off by entering your own toga reference here.

After watching this film, I was so inspired, that I decided, on a whim, to go running all the way across the country. However, by the time I reached the end of my block, I was so devastatingly winded, and I was weezing so desperately for air, that I thought for sure, my left lung must've collapsed in on itself.
So, instead, I just reminded myself that "stupid is as stupid does", then I went back into my house and ate an entire "box of chawk-letts".
Which, of course, is what life is kinda like.

Okay, so, as of this writing, this is my favorite Taika Waititi film so far. Taking the subject of the "Hitler youth", and using it as a premise for a "coming of age real quick"  comedy requires a  combination of incredibly sharp wit, boisterous bravado, finely tuned empathy, razor wire balance,  a slap on the back style humor, plus probably a whole bunch of other stuff, that is all tightly wrapped into a well construction whole.

 And that something that Kiwi kouifered director/writer manages to pull off here.  Not an easy task, fer sure, but it is presented with a more easily digestible ease than one would expect from such a plot device, but still with a bite on the edges that cannot be avoided considering the subject matter. 

 Creating Nazi centered comedies is nothing new, but it's not something we see often, particularly successfully, in the world of cinema. 

But on a short list of of these types movies that have been gaining momentum lately (Inglorious Bastards, Death of Stalin, etc.), Jojo Rabbit is that can now be firmly added to the ranks of The Great Dictator, To Be or Not To Be, Top Secret, etc..

 That is, of course, in my own humble opinion.