In Bruges
15 August 2011

Incongruity is the key word in this film, displacing the gritty London gangster underworld into the pretty, quiet Belgian town of Bruges. Ordered by their boss to lay low after a job goes wrong, Ray (Colin Farrell) and Ken (Brendan Gleeson) handle their two-week exile differently. While Ken is content to take in the sights, Ray broods and refuses to enjoy his surroundings. The beautiful Clémence Poésy plays a member of a film crew who catched Ray’s eye. This film took a tone and direction that was unexpected and which gave the film more depth as a result. Dark, funny at times, poignant and brutal. Definitely worth a watch, but probably just the once.

The Social Network
24 August 2011

I really didn’t want to like this. Maybe it’s peevish of me but I really didn’t want to watch about the rise of this upstart entrepreneur who just so happened to create one of the most influential websites. Facebook annoys me as it is – I use it but only because everyone else does which is the worst reason (come on, people, start using Google+ already). However, once I saw that the way that Zuckerberg is painted in the film – as an egotistical, arrogant, clever nerd – I could start to get on board. The usually loveable Jesse Eisenberg managed to portray the character (which I am sure if not necessarily a totally accurate depiction) in a way in which you loved to hate him. Andrew Garfield was a sympathetic character as the guy who helped Facebook get started but was nudged out when he outlived his usefulness.  It is not a film I would want to watch again and I was still irritated by the success of Facebook but it was still a decent watch.

The Green Hornet
24 August 2011

I didn’t know how much I didn’t know about The Green Hornet until we watched this film adaptation 1930s American radio show and subsequent comics, movies and TV shows. It would probably would have helped to appreciate it but even without the back story or previous knowledge, it was a fun film to watch. Seth Rogen plays the millionaire brat-turned-vigillante/super-hero but the highlight for me was the charismatic and talented Jay Chou who plays the trusty sidekick, Kato. Ultimately, a little forgettable, this is a harmless, fun film to pass a couple of hours. It won’t change the world, though.

The Town
6 September 2011

Ben Affleck wrote, directed and starred in this bank heist movie set in Boston, particularly Charlestown. The settings, the accents and the use of Charlestown residents for smaller parts helped to bring this world to the masses. Affleck plays a member of a bank heist team who take a woman hostage during a raid in order to get away. A chance meeting brings them together again, although the woman, Claire (Rebecca Hall), has no idea that the guy who she has befriended and falling in love with is part of the gang that turned her world upside down. It is tense and fast-paced with a sensational showdown at Fenway Park, which Affleck managed to film at on location (not many filmmakers would have been given this permission). For me the weakest link was Blake Lively who mangled the already fairly incomprehnsible Charlestown accent and generally got on my nerves.

Blue Valentine
6 September 2011

I was excited to watch this. Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams? What’s not to like? Admittedly, I didn’t really know what this was about but even so, I thought I knew what I was going to get – a love story with a sad ending. To be fair, this is what I got but something just didn’t click for me and I didn’t find my heart-strings being plucked (despite that fact that this is usually very easy to do – I cry at nearly anything). The film is about a love story at the beginning and the end. I found both characters so unlikable in their unhappy end-of-relationship selves that I found myself not caring about their happy start.  I think the way the film was made was interesting – Williams and Gosling lived together in the hiatus of filming between the two timelines – they shot all the falling-in-love scenes first and then came back after a month to film the rest.  However, I think the whole concept of the film was flawed for me.  For me to enjoy the happy scenes, I need to be able to believe that the relationship would last – this is true of any romantic entanglement in a film. We want the happy-ever-after. So because I was already not invested, their eventually demise was not nearly as poignant as it should have been.  Disappointing.