That twist.

I was in a Toni Collette mood some weeks ago and added a few of her films to my yet-to-watch list, from which I sometimes buy DVDs at random. So that’s why I found myself with a copy of The Sixth Sense on my desk. And to be honest, I was wondering what on earth I had done. Why would I want to own, let alone watch, a Bruce Willis film. When I think of him, I think of action movies, alpha men, or slightly over the top comic stuff. None of which interests me much, I must say. But hey, since I had the DVD in front of me I thought I might as well give it a go.

Now, there are a lot of films I see that I like, or like very much, but there are only a few that really move me, touch me, stay with me for days. The kind of films you want to creep into, be a part of, so that you’ll never have to leave that world.

And I must say that for me The Sixth Sense is definitely one of those films. I was completely blown away by the sensitivity of the subject matter, the actors, the whole feel of it. Gripped from the very first moment. Bruce Willis was absolutely amazing, as was Toni Collette. And the young boy, Haley Joel Osment, was spellbinding.

And, yes, of course, there’s that twist in the narrative, which is why this film got/gets so much publicity, but even without it, it would have been a wonderful film.

So go and watch it, but don’t read up on it, so as not to spoil anything, and let the whole thing wash over you and take you away. I promise you it’ll be worth it!

Adrian

Shaken, shocked and scared.

I finally got round to seeing The Silence of the Lambs the other day. Having heard so much about it, mostly in terms of “couldn’t sleep for weeks after seeing it”, “scariest film ever”, and similar reviews, I was prepared to be shaken, shocked and scared. So was I?

Well, in short: no. The film did not work for me, I’m afraid. I’m not saying I think it’s a bad film. On the contrary. Jodie Foster was amazing, Anthony Hopkins was amazing. But there were too many parts of the film I didn’t care much for. The whole ‘other serial killer’ story was maybe necessary but rather graphic (was that really necessary other than to simply shock?), the whole FBI doing their work bit was nothing out of the ordinary. Even Anthony Hopkins going all cannibalistic seemed so out of character and – though clever – not awe-inspiring.

What I did enjoy tremendously was the psychological thriller part of it. The meetings between Foster and Hopkins were magical. If that had been the main thrust of the film and if they had downsized the ordinary ‘how-catch-em’ part of it, it would have been a 10 out of 10 for me. There was an amazing tension in those meetings, they both played it so well, I could easily have watched that for hours on end. As it was, it lost some of its tension because of all the other noise going on.

Last line in the film was hilarious though. I’ll give ‘em that. No, I won’t spoil it by saying what it was. Just watch the film (again?) and see what I mean.

🙂

Adrian

Guilty Pleasure

It’s surprising how much negative press this film gets. Everybody seems to dislike it heartily, criticise it for almost everything, or ridicule it to death. To a point where you’re almost ashamed to admit you actually quite like it. But let me be bold: I do like it. In fact, I love it!

Come on, what’s not to love! It’s a splendour of a film what with all the costumes and period features, it’s got a lot of Shakespeare, so it can’t be all that bad, it’s funny, romantic, a little sad even, it’s got loads of tongue-in-cheek references, such as Hamlet’s skull and a “Greetings from Stratford upon Avon” mug in Shakespeare’s room.

Sure, it’s not a deep film. We’re not talking Bergmanesque struggles with the meaningful questions of life, death and religion, we’re not dealing with Tarkovskian atmospheric contemplativeness. But it’s just such a joy to watch, very entertaining, and the Romeo and Juliet story may be as old as the hills, it is still a masterful story and this original telling of it deserves more praise!

Adrian

It did not happen one Roman holiday

Funny how we all recently watched It happened one night and were told this was the original rom-com on which all subsequent rom-coms through the ages have been based. So when I saw Roman Holiday again the other day, I was struck by how right the above statement is. Just replace one heart throb, Clark Gable, with another, Gregory Peck, add a new girl being introduced, and hey presto.

Journalist guy meets runaway girl, recognises her and is hoping for a big news feature. Then he falls in love and subsequently won’t bother with getting his scoop. The similarities are blatantly obvious. Only question was: would he get her in the end? Well, maybe a right royal romance was a bit too much for the screenwriters to stomach….

Having now seen both I can see why It happened one night got so many Oscars. The originality and wit of that film was obviously hard to emulate!

Adrian