Reviews

This movie is quite solid, with simplicity that's nicely elevated by outstanding performances. While there aren't many elements that particularly stand out, the real gem here is the acting. James Caan delivers a commendable performance, but it's Kathy Bates who steals the show with an absolute tour de force. I must say, it would have been amazing if he had killed her with the typewriter!

At times, the plot does follow a predictable path, and the overall narrative is quite straightforward. However, the strength of this film lies in its exceptional performances and a solid storyline. It's a good, effective movie that keeps you engaged. Kathy Bates' eyes alone manage to convey a terrifying intensity that truly sells her performance. Kudos to the cast for making this movie a memorable experience.

Nope is not the best Jordan Peele movie, but it's still very good. I think it's a lot slower than what I was imagining, but I really enjoyed that slow-burn atmospheric kind of neo.-western horror/sci-fi aspect of it. How the creature is slowly revealed is something I really enjoyed, which really reminded me of Jaws and if I had to compare this movie to others, I'd say it's pretty similar to Jaws and Signs, maybe a little bit of Close Encounters of the Third Kind as well. It's as if those three movies combined their DNA with Jordan Peele and Nope is the result. Now, it's not as good as any of those films, but I do think its's still very much worth a watch. I liked how the creature legitimately looks alien, it's a very weird take on it, but it's very original and I loved it. There are also many underlying themes about how we exploit tragedy for a profit, which was also very interesting.

Interestingly enough, I thought the characters were the weakest part of the movie, Daniel Kaluya seems like he doesn't want to be there, the sister character is too enthusiastic (and verges on annoying) for my taste, the cinematographer guy and the tech guy are just meh for me as well. I actually think the dad would have probably been the most interesting character, I think it would have been great if they kept him in the movie for longer and then killed him off afterwards maybe?

Even with its flaws I think Nope is very good, the direction is great, as well as the cinematography and sound design. Worth a watch.

So, I saw The House That Jack Built a couple of weeks ago as my official introduction to Lars Von Trier. I wouldn't say I necessarily enjoyed watching that movie, however I did find it to be very artistically compelling, extremely disturbing (to this day the most disturbing film I've ever seen, yes, more than Antichrist) and just caused me to feel a lot of things while I was watching it and I was actually thoroughly entertained throughout it, although, like i said, I didn't particularly enjoy it.

As far as Antichrist goes, I have mixed feelings about it, which is somewhat similar to the thoughts I have on The House That Jack Built. There's no denying that this is a very disturbing movie, definitely not for everyone, but I just didn't connect with it that much. It's a lot more abstract than The House That Jack Built, I thought that was a more straightforward movie in every way possible. But there's this thing about Lars von Trier, where he rides the line between artistic and pretentious and (at least for my taste) The House That Jack Built masterfully rides that line and even though he veers sometimes a little more into the pretentious side, I actually do think it is some sort of weird macabre masterpiece. I can't say the same for Antichrist.

There's the opening scene, which I think is beautiful, but ruined by the shot of Willem Dafoe's penis. And there's just a lot of excess in the movie, that i just think is uncalled for. I have to say I was bored throughout most of it. The dialogue seems forced, the editing is choppy. And there's just a lot of it that seems excessive and just like von Trier smelling his own farts kind of thing.

There are some scenes that I thought were great, like the "Chaos reigns" part was pretty chilling, to be honest. But the truth is I was just bored throughout most of it and wanted it to end.

But, it did made me think a lot about the meaning behind the movie. Like i said, it's not as straightforward as The House that Jack Built and it does require a little bit more of an analysis to kind of understand the meaning behind it. But from what I've heard not even von Trier fully understands what he was trying to say with this movie. I've seen some interpretations online about this movie being some kind of either commentary on religion or the misogyny of religion or something. Besides the clear plot of it being, overcoming grief, for me it was more of an exploration of guilt and that the Wife was exploring these themes about all the women that have been killed by like the Inquisition and throughout history serves not as the main point of the movie (it's only explored later on), but as a way to explore the feelings of grief and guilt that she has.

So here's what I mean: It's revealed near the shocking end of the film that she was aware that her son was about to fall off the window, but she did nothing because she was having sex, but I think it's a little more than that. I think here's what happens, because she was studying all of these women that were killed, she kind of blamed men for it, just straight up, it's men's fault. Not necessarily religion or ideology, it's just men killed women and that's the way she saw it. Now, having established for herself that her main enemies were men, even though she loved her son, as a mother, right, he was also a boy, who would eventually become a man and become her enemy, as she saw it. So, even though she loved him, she also hated him and tortured him for it, in subtle ways, like putting his shoes the other way around and neglected taking care of him.

And i guess another thing she takes away from her studies is that women got killed either because they were women or because there was something wrong about their sexuality, something evil about it. And so, when her son dies, she lets him die, because he's a man (or a boy) and she does so while exploring her sexual desires, thus (in her mind) releasing herself from the chains of history.

But what she doesn't know is that she basically just unleashed hell upon herself. And so her guilt is all tied up with her sexuality and she blames the husband too, right, which is why she puts the grindstone on his leg.

But then I guess von Trier wants to convey this deep message that history repeats itself or something because the man ends up killing her, but he also kills her after she brutally attacks him and tries to kill him. And when he burns her I guess it's some kind of visual re-enactment of the women who were burned at the stake. When all the women appear it's like they were all released or something, that part I didn't care much for.

But yeah, overall I guess I enjoyed more thinking about the movie, than watching it. There's a lot more to dig through, the whole thing about the forest called Eden and how Nature is the Devil's sanctuary or whatever. All of that kind of just fell flat to me, to be honest.

So overall, I'd say I wouldn't recommend it necessarily but it's an interesting movie to talk about.

Jacob's Ladder is a lot of things. It's a Vietnam movie, a trippy movie with certain themes about drug experimentation, a movie about the choices you make in this life, about purgatory, heaven and hell and accepting death. Tim Robbins is great in the movie and all of the performances in general are pretty good.

I don't think I have anything bad to say about this movie. The screenplay is extremely original, the performances are phenomenal (particular praise to Mr. Nicholas Cage is due for playing two very different characters wonderfully) and it somehow manages to express thought-provoking messages, themes about writing, relationships, overcoming fear and it is also very funny. I loved this movie. And I loved the meta-aspect about it as well. It's a movie about writing a book that will then be written as a screenplay to be made its own movie. And the continous jumping back and forth betwen the present and the past is really good, it is a very well editied movie.

It's one of the best examples that I can think of a movie portraying loneliness, awkwardness, extreme introversion, shyness, but also in the end kind of providing an antidote to all of these things that I just mentioned. There's a scene where Nicholas' Cage's character has finally had enough and decides to go to Bob Mckee's seminar and he asks a question about life being so boring, nothing really happens in real life, so how can you make a realistic script that accurately reflects the reality of how boring life really is. And the guy who plays Bob Mckee, I forget the actor's name, but he's really good in the couple of scenes he's in, just destroys Nick Cage's perception and then Nick Cage buys him a drink after the seminar and they have a conversation. And Mckee basically tells him you can mess up the first two acts of the film, but the ending has got to be amazing and there you will win your audience over. In a very meta movie, this is maybe one of the most meta moments, because not a lot happens in the film, except obviously learning about the story of how Meryl Streep's book was written and Nick Cage's horrible state of mind the whole time, but in the end, some crazy stuff happens and it's unexpected but it didn't feel like they just pulled out of nowhere to get an interesting ending, it makes sense.

So, the movie constantly surprised me, it is most definitely not a predictable movie and it's just a great film, watch it.

Rashomon is a movie that explores the phenomenon of truth and perspective. It asks important questions, such as is there such a thing as objective truth? Does it depend on the situation? What happens when there is no universal standard of truth and all you have are individual witness accounts? Is there a way to overcome individual biases?

I think it presents these questions in an interesting manner and at the end, there is no final answer to the question of what the objective truth is, if there even is one. So, philosophically, I think it's an interesting movie. Some parts I found very entertaining, but I would be lying if I said that I wasn't kind of bored throughout the movie. Maybe it's the part about me that prefers a more conventional story in the sense of you actually kind of know what happened.

I understand Kurosawa's choice to not reveal the truth, or perhaps it's that he doesn't believe there is one, I'm not sure, but I think I would have been more satisfied on a personal level if it what actually happened were revealed. But then again, this might defeat the purpose of what Kurosawa was trying to say.

RE7 is possibly the best horror game I have ever played. It is very effective. At time, I feel like it can get a little too repetitive and some of the horror tropes can be a little too on the nose and a little too familiar. But there are parts in this game that really scared the hell out of me and in general it is very well made. I would say most of it is a solid 9/10, but I gave up on it during the wrecked ship part, because it got a little too repetitive and confusing for me. Still, very much worth playing.