Cinema - July

DVD

Margot at the wedding

Movies about American dysfunctional families are hit and miss for me. I liked ‘Squid and the whale’ but did not quite get ‘Margot at the wedding’ – both directed by Noah Baumbach. There is no culture shock in watching these movies anymore but sometimes there is a sense of relief that I am not part of that culture.

Waitress

  I might have ordered this movie after watching its trailer close to two years ago. I was watching a movie with wifey at that time and the trailer suggested that this would be a good movie to watch with her. What do you know – I was right. Southerners seem to be rich with stories in America. I was saddened to read about the director’s untimely death. A ‘sweet’ movie though.

The Darjeeling Limited

I might have mentioned this before – Movies about American dysfunctional families are hit and miss for me. This was another miss. Wes Anderson and his quirky characters have been even more of a miss than hit. I didn’t quite get the ‘prequel’ – Hotel Chavalier – either. Maybe it will make sense during a second viewing but I don’t see that happening. The usage of music from Satyajit Ray’s movies was satisfying.

ONLINE

The Iron Giant

E.T – the XXL version. Brad Bird, of Incredibles and Ratatouille fame, directs this animated movie that has a lot of heart. The rendering of the movie was refreshing – definitely felt old school. Good storytelling seems to be Bird’s forte.

 

Ong Bak

This could so easily have been a Thamizh movie. Tenacious village bumpkin goes to the city in pursuit of bad elements responsible for stealing a village treasure. Thai Masala entertainer with straight forward linear story telling and oh yeah – lots of martial arts. Particularly impressed with the auto-rickshaw fight sequence.

Step brothers

I always find myself rooting for Will Ferrell but his brand of comedy does not work all the time. I am afraid this comedy was not funny – at all! This leaves us with a daring possibility of remaking Agni Natchatram as a comedy. Ha!

 

At the movies

UP

Pixar scores again. Watched it with the right crowd – school going cousins. For an animated movie, this had more drama than comedy, but you hardly realize it until much later. I guess that’s the hallmark of good story telling. And the music stayed with me for a while… (Thanks Suresh for the video link). I think in the years to come I will watch this movie many times.

 

Hangover

A movie worthy of guys alone time – guffaws and laugh out loud funny. The script that can introduce lines like “There's a tiger in the bathroom!” and put Mike Tyson in a cameo appearance might even be considered for the Oscars.

 

Movie of the month: UP