Great Films – Bonnie and Clyde

The switch from Old Hollywood to New Hollywood is very distinct. Most people seem to strongly have a preference although personally two of the best movies I’ve seen(my all time favorites are far too recent) are each from the different eras. One of these films is Bonnie and Clyde which truly started this film revolution in Hollywood.
What is so different about Bonnie and Clyde from the previous films that were produced in Hollywood? Well, it’s violent. The majority of tales told in Old Hollywood are much more romanticized and epic however, in New Hollywood, the importance was placed on realism. Films became gritty and violent because they were trying to show a version of reality that didn’t cover up any of the parts.
Bonnie and Clyde is the story of the infamous bank robbing duo and their adventures from the time they first meet to their death. There are not a large series of events found within the film as it focuses primarily on the relationship between the duo and the way that being criminals changes them. specifically Bonnie.
Warren Beatty gives a fantastic performance as Clyde which is really a compliment coming from me because male actors rarely impress me. He got into the role and made you love him and see nothing wrong with the crimes he was committing.
Faye Dunaway was a delight in her Oscar nominated role as Bonnie. She was able to portray a woman who committed crimes without remorse but still felt the pain of losing her family and being ignored because of whiny other women. She showed the pain of feeling ignored by your partner very well yet was the type of badass that men typically portray.
The chemistry between the two was amazing and not something you typically find. The strength of this chemistry helped to enhance their performances and bring the film to a truly fantastic level where its above most other films.
The effect of New Hollywood can also be seen in the plot of the movie as most films at this time didn’t focus on such violent and ruthless subjects and the directors at the time felt these stories also needed to be told.
Bonnie and Clyde is a very important film in the history of cinema for ushering in a new period in the history of the medium. It’s also a really good film that I would recommend to everybody because I cannot find it possible for somebody to find Faye Dunaway’s turn as Bonnie to be anything less than a delight.

Great Films - Carrie

Few horror movies actually provide any sort of real feeling of danger. Many use quick gags to get a reaction, similar to many comedies, but few really get to an idea that is truly terrifying and inspire fear within us. Carrie is one of those great movies.
The subject matter seems almost normal at first. A teen girl who is unpopular and bullied is taken in by the popular crowd only to end up betrayed and humiliated at the prom. This scenario removes an important part of the equation where Carrie discovers that she has telepathic abilities and gets revenge on the entire school, which ends up in a lot of fire and death. That isn’t even the scary part.
The true high point of the film is the scene with Carrie and her mother after this big devastation as they fight between Carrie’s acceptance of her difference and her mother’s intense religious beliefs. I won’t give away any specific details though because I don’t want to ruin the true horror that one feels towards religion at this point and earlier in the film.
Of course, the key to this film, other than the fact that it is a true horror film, is the performance by Sissy Spacek. She plays the titular character and gives a truly bizzare performance in the best possible way. Her character is just weird but she plays that so well. Her mother’s over-protectiveness makes her naïve and an easy target for bullying. However, her ascent to the top due to forgiveness is such a pleasant tale although we can constantly feel the trouble brewing.
There’s a lot of great things an actress can do to make a performance above average. But one of the things that an actress can do to make a performance truly fantastic is just to go completely crazy. In the final revenge portion of the film, Spacek does just this and does it so well that we become terrified of her yet we empathize with her at the same time. That the film has the ability to do that proves the strength of Stephen King’s story and depiction of this girl.
Carrie is a rare horror film but truly a necessary one to anybody interested in the genre. I don’t recommend it if you scare easily but otherwise, it’s a great revenge flick as well as a typical teen movie that turns to religion based horror in an instant.

Recently Viewed: January Edition

Tangled (2 viewings): The perfect Renaissance for Disney that combined the old feel of their films with the modern cinematic world. 10/10 (More on this later)
Blue Valentine: So depressing even in the happiest moments. A depressing look on love that is carried by Ryan Gosling although Michelle Williams is also impressive 10/10
Les Amours Imaginaires: Xavier Dolan makes such beautiful films and this one left me feeling good at the end. His performance enhanced the film tremendously. 10/10
Waking Sleeping Beauty: The subject matter is a favorite of mine but there’s nothing too remarkable about the film. It’s just a well told story with interesting footage. 8/10
Broken Embraces: My first experience with Pedro Almodovar was a beautiful one with a rich story, fabulous performances and all the visual splendor I expected. 10/10
Harry Potter 7: Part 1 (Second Viewing): Didn’t improve, in fact I just got bored quicker. It would be fabulous if they had included a plot in this movie. 7.5/10
The King’s Speech: Good but nothing special. The performances were good, especially Helena Bonhem Carter but other than that, I was not impressed. 8/10
Somewhere: A huge disappointment with the only shining light being the talented Elle Fanning. Stephen Dorf’s career should not have been resurrected. 6/10
Vicky Cristina Barcelona: Passionate study of love with a million fantastic performances and the most beautiful setting. This bodes well for my opinion of Woody Allen. 10/10
No Strings Attached: A hilarious and very cute romantic comedy that fared better than most of the crap released around this time. Natalie Portman is a true star. 8.5/10

Goddess Kidman

Actresses love to remind us of just how fabulous they are. Nicole Kidman is currently displaying this fact in Marie Claire.

The new Renaissance of Disney

When the world you live in consists of a new Disney masterpiece every few years, it can be easy to think of Disney as a consistent creator of animated classics. They have been the most consistent source of animated films worthy of praise yet this material has not been constant. Disney, like all companies and artists, has suffered its own slumps.

During the most recent slump, which started as early as Pocahontas or as late as Tarzan, depending on your taste, has gotten worse until the seemingly final traditionally animated feature, Home on the Range, was released. The film is surely one of the worst that Disney has made and was the final nail in the coffin of traditional Disney. For the next few years, Disney attempted to make CGI films similar to those of their property, Pixar. Some were successful (Bolt), some were decent (Meet The Robinsons) and some are best forgotten (Chicken Little). After a lot of changes in the power at Disney, they tried to bring back traditional animation with The Princess and the Frog. This was still not their best effort and many had begun to lose hope in Disney once again after the new hope had been found.

However, this was not the moment to lose hope. For in 2010, Disney finally found what it had lost in Tangled, a movie that had suffered through a lot of development pains, which made me wary of whether it would be worth even seeing. I am so pleased that I did though, because it is truly the beginning of a new Renaissance for Disney. But what makes Tangled such a perfect film for Disney?

It’s common knowledge that Disney’s favorite characters tend to be princesses. Rapunzel, the star of Tangled, is no different. It’s a fairy tale that most people have heard of and are familiar with to a degree. It’s the tale of a girl who is trapped in a tower and is waiting to be freed. At its core, Tangled is a romance between Rapunzel and the action hero created for the film, Flynn Rider. They create a romance that is the core of many other Disney classics, most easily linked to Beauty and the Beast, for they both see each other in a different light than the rest of the world and find a deep understanding for each other, which nobody else can see.

However, Tangled also has the comedy elements of past Disney fare, including sidekicks, Pascale the chameleon and Maximus the horse. The film manages to not feel trapped in another era by combining the comedy sensibilities of past Disney features with the modern self-awareness of films, like Shrek. Yet it doesn’t veer too far off the track of what Disney is known for and keeps with the feel of a proper Disney film.

The true backbone of the movie that defines it all is the music, which is true for any Disney musical. From the opening number of When Will My Life Begin that clearly defines the wants and needs of the heroin and shows us where the plot will lead to Mother Knows Best, a villain song that recalls Poor Unfortunate Souls. The songs also take a comedic turn in I’ve Got A Dream that mixes the comedy with a wistful feel of the hope found at the soul of Disney.

The clear musical highlight of the film is I See The Light. The song is the classic romantic theme found in Disney features throughout the years from A Whole New World to Something There and many other songs that show the blossoming romance between the two leads. The song is classically beautiful and the sequence that accompanies it in the film is so beautiful and heartbreaking that I dare you to not be touched.

Although you expect this to be the emotional peak of the movie, it keeps you hanging for another 20 minutes or so and continues the action and emotion to bring you to the happy ending that everybody expects in a Disney movie. They manage to keep it interesting by employing story points that I believe originate in the fairy tale but are not as familiar to us that we get bored with them.

Tangled is exactly the film that Disney needed at this point in time to bring them back to their prime. It’s a comedy, a musical, an action adventure and a movie that is full of heart. Each character fits perfectly into the plot and feels familiar without feeling overused. The soundtrack is one of the best that Disney has used since their Golden Ages of the past. If Disney continues on this path, animated features will be filled with the happiness and heart that they were in the early 90’s and back in the days where Walt was alive.

Snooki: The Modern Heroine

Ever since the debut of MTV back in the 80’s, it has had a strong hold on the youth and captured the essence of their culture countless times. From making and breaking the musical heroes of modern teenagers to creating the now inescapable reality television phenomena, they’ve done it all. Every couple years, they truly strike gold as they did last year with Jersey Shore, which is arguably the trashiest show to grace their airwaves. A show that revolves around eight twentysomethings who live in a beach house together by the Jersey Shore for the summer.
The overall values presented on the show are something to be found in the nightmares of most parents. Their lives revolve around tanning, having sex and partying with lots of alcohol. They fight, they fuck, they do everything that shows like The Secret Life of the American Teenager fight against. Yet this is a better reflection on the lives of today’s young people. While MTV is a network that aims mainly at a teenage audience, the cast of the show is mostly in their twenties. These young people have been judged harshly by many critics. Some love their crazy antics for the trashy factor while others find them to be a bad example for today’s youth. But are their antics really an issue to concern ourselves over or are they just another example of harmless fun in the media?
The show has created many stars of its cast. The most famous by a large margin has been Nicole Polizzi, known as Snooki. She’s influenced fashion with her hairstyle that vaguely recalls the obsession with Amy Winehouse’s train wreck hairstyle a few years ago. She’s had many sound bites that have gotten play throughout the media and are now staples in the daily lives of today’s youth. Her influence on Western culture is enormous and not limited to the teen market unlike that of past MTV celebrities like Lauren Conrad.
Her fame comes mostly from the ridiculous antics displayed on her show yet through all the crazyness, she comes out seeming to be a hero of sorts. The show has its douchebag guys, strong women (aka psycho bitches) and dramatic couple, all of which are essential elements for a popular reality show. However, Snooki comes out of all this as the odd woman out. She’s hopeless in love and is cast as the outsider in the first episode, where she has too much to drink and indulges in the behaviour we expect of these people yet is judged harshly for trying to be herself and make a good expression. This is relatable to the youth. She’s the one we’re supposed to sympathize with. She’s just an average, fun girl who got caught in a sticky situation. Everybody loves the underdog.
As the season progresses, we root for her as she gains friends within the house, such as her confidant and partner in crime, JWow, whose selling points seem to be her no-nonsense approach to drama for girls and her large breasts for guys. After she has established herself as a normal human being within the house and has been accepted by the rest of the cast, she begins her second story-arch that draws in the viewer.
Snooki has a specific type of man which she loves to adorn with names like gorilla and juicehead, which are codenames for men who are addicted to working out and steroids because of the horrific standard that the media places upon men. Snooki’s obsession with this type of men does not help the role of men within society and does not allow them to move past this gender stereotype. However, her inability to find a man that will stick with her past a night of casual sex forces the viewer to gravitate toward her longing with sympathy. The hopeless romantic within her comes out and keeps her in the heart of the audience as the poor girl who just can’t catch a break. As the first season finishes her quest for love seems like it will never end.
This all changes in the second season which starts with Snooki and her boyfriend, who will have to continue working on their relationship as Snooki goes off to Miami to party but must resist the temptation of hooking up with anybody who is more than 90% muscle. This temptation does not turn out to be the danger but this storyline is used to further the idea of men being driven only by their genitals as her boyfriend ruins their relationship because he can’t keep it in his pants. While this storyline had been previously explored in both seasons with JWow and her boyfriend, Tom, Snooki brings a sort of first love experience and heartbreak to it that leads the audience to have a newfound sympathy for this played out storyline.
Things seem to be rocky in the third season for Snooki’s love life as she tries to find romance with cast mate Vinny but his penis leads him to hook up with all of Snooki’s friends which leads to further heartbreak. This storyline will surely be played out throughout the season as Snooki’s quest for love is always a big seller with the viewers. This season she will also come into trouble with the law, which seems to be related to her alcohol addiction from the gossip stories of her arrest within the summer. It will be interesting to see how our heroin deals with the bad guys sent by the man to stop her fun.
This isn’t the first time that Snooki’s drinking has lead her to trouble with violence. In the first season, Snooki was punched in the face by a man at a bar over shots that he stole from Snooki and friends. This plotline was surely a surprise for the people behind the show but clearly a delight as it added to Snooki’s role as the poor girl we have sympathy for as it presents the clear value that it is wrong for a man to hit a woman. This standard of violence in society is so deeply assumed yet to make sure we understand how wrong this crime is, each cast member, with emphasis on the males, weighs in on how crazy this situation is. 
Men are not the only gender to be demonized so that we sympathize with poor Snooki. Sammi, who claims to be a sweetheart but whose behaviour suggests anything but that, is blind to the behaviour of her boyfriend, Ronnie, who cheats on her constantly then crawls back to her without revealing any of his escapades. Snooki and her sidekick, JWow, decide to do something about this by writing Sammi a note to tell her all the bad things that her boyfriend is doing to get her to gain strength and become a heroine in her own sense. However, she’s not the hero of the show and Snooki is much better at playing the victim to an evil bitch than she is being the friend who helped get a girl out of a bad relationship. Therefore, the story takes a turn for the worst as Sammi lashes out against the two other girls and they become the victims of the show once again.
While Snooki may not be the best role model for young girls, it is easy to see why they love her so much. She’s victimized in each episode for many different reasons yet through all the adversity she faces, she still manages to have fun and be obnoxious enough for us to love her. Season 3 will clearly bring more pity for Snooki from the audience and cement her place as the modern heroine of the internet age.

The new superhero

I don’t hate it.