I haven't seen anybody blogging about what movies they've seen or liked last year; Zakcq made a nice list for 2004, but he's all books this year apparently.
Anyway, we've had a lot of time this week to catch up on movies we might have missed (in addition to the four hours we spend watching 24 on Monday). The kid sleeps a lot, and even though she sleeps almost the whole night, we're still in a sort of daze all day long, so we try to sneak in movies while she sleeps the entire day (except for early afternoon and about midnight to 1:30am, she's a regular Rip Van Winkle). So with occasional interruptions for feedings and diaper changings, we watched Syriana, which was good, but a tad slow, we watched The Constant Gardener, which was incredible, if a bit too long, and we watched the Chronicles of Narnia, which was somewhere between awful and lame (and which, by the way, is no more an approximation of Christianity than is the Matrix and Bambi). So if i were to make a best movies of the year list, it'd have to go something like...
Comments (7)
Ryan, my guess is your days of movies @ the cineplex are done except for the rare 2 or 3 times now that you have your little one.
Zakcq, did you not see Der Untergang ("Downfall" to us) yet? I have heard so many good things about it.
The movie is on my list, but not my wife's so that is the issue.
Posted by Jerry | January 22, 2005 1:21 AM
Posted on January 22, 2005 01:21
I'm surprised you loathed "Narnia" so. I thought it was operatic, charming and 100x more faithful in tone and story to it's source material than "Lord of the Rings" films. Of course, you hated those movies too if I recall...
I haven't seen "Wallace & Gromit" yet but I want to. I love those guys (and "Chicken Run").
Posted by Chris Dugan | January 19, 2006 11:46 PM
Posted on January 19, 2006 23:46
truthfully, i thought it was just sort of lame, until the fight scene at the end which was utter crap.
Posted by ryan | January 20, 2006 12:09 AM
Posted on January 20, 2006 00:09
Crazy. I thought the end battle was very well paced and edited and suprisingly violent for a PG kids movie nor did it overwhelm the rest of the movie (since the battle lasts about a page and a half in the book). You have to give them credit for convincingly showing a big CGI battle scene in broad daylight and not obscured by darkness, muck and rain like certain other big-budget fantasy epics.
I found the juxtaposition of score and imagery at the end to be surprisingly moving as well.
But if you are certainly entitled to think it sucked.
Posted by Chris Dugan | January 20, 2006 11:48 AM
Posted on January 20, 2006 11:48
J and I always make a big push to see a lot of movies once the oscar nominations come out, so I'm going to reserve my judgement until then. so far, constant gardener (africa, spies, berlin... what's not to like) and goodnight and good luck have to be my favorites, closely followed by interpreter (africa, spies, new york... what's not to like).
Foreign films I've heard good things about: Paradise Now (palestine), Beautiful Country (vietnam) and the Edukators (Germany, Austria) are all on my list to see soon.
Munich and King Kong were fun cinimatic experiences, but they didn't really make me think about them once i was out of the theater.
I think tomorrow we're going to go to Match Point.
Posted by zakcq | January 20, 2006 8:05 PM
Posted on January 20, 2006 20:05
good night and good luck is next. we just watched pride and prejudice, which was good. the austen society found it too sexy.
Posted by ryan | January 20, 2006 8:33 PM
Posted on January 20, 2006 20:33
yeah, downfall was good, but that was last years oscars, as was motorcycle diaries and a very long engagement
--------
Posted by zakcq | January 22, 2006 1:37 PM
Posted on January 22, 2006 13:37