Shutter Island review

Directed by Martin Scorsese
Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Ruffalo, and Ben Kingsley
Running time: 138 minutes

Warning, there may be some spoilers... but I tried not to give anything crucial away

After finally seeing Shutter Island on Tuesday, I must say that I'm quite shocked to see it have only a 67% rating on rottentomatoes.com. Since it's only February and the movie was supposed to be released last year, I have to say that it would've easily made it to my top ten movies of 2009. This is a beautifully made, meticulously crafted, and superbly acted film. The great ensemble cast includes great performances from Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Ruffalo, Ben Kingsley, Michelle Williams, Max Von Sydow and Jackie Earle Haley. Haley, the former child actor, has formed quite a career since his highly memorably performance in "Little Children" and his brief on-screen time in Shutter Island leaves quite a lasting impression.

Yes, there are some twists and turns in this movie. The ultimate twist at the end has turned some people off to the whole product, but I really think it enhances the film for me. Sure, it would've been satisfying to see Leo's character, Teddy, solve the case and leave the island peacefully. But that wouldn't fit right with the context of the movie. From the beginning, we are clued in on the fact that something is not quite right with Teddy. His motion sickness, his hallucinations, his flashbacks--- all are clues to the fact that this is a man that is deeply haunted by his past. Of course the hallucinations and flashbacks only started occurring shortly after he was given those pills, the cigarettes, or anything else the people from Shutter Island gave him.

Teddy is there to investigate the disappearance of a woman who was sent to Shutter Island after she drowned all three of her children. As soon as the investigation begins, it is clear that there is something iffy and unsettling about this whole investigation. But is that why he's really there? Is that really what he was brought there to investigate the island? Is he really there to investigate anything? All of these questions can be asked fairly early on in the movie.

So, I'm sorry to say this to all you naysayers out there but Shutter Island is legitimate from start to finish. All the clues and pieces are there, they are given to you as soon as the movie opens. Scrosese does a great job of successfully selling how cruel, creepy, and mysterious the place is. Doing this allows for some things in the beginning of the movie to not make sense. But really, I feel like I've gone through every scene over and over in my head... and if something in the beginning "doesn't make sense," I think you can attribute that to the fact that there are a lot of things about the island that doesn't make sense or add up. I think that's what makes the ending work for me. I still feel like the ending still leaves things ambiguous enough for two versions of the story to work--- once you see the film, you'll understand what I mean by that.

Overall, Scorsese has developed a reputation for himself that making a film like this---that's simply meant to entertain and thrill---may underwhelm some people. This isn't necessarily a film for a "Scorsese fan," it's moreso for someone who is a fan of movies. I mean, really a fan. Someone who is very in tune with all the references and influences that this movie derives from. This is a great example of a movie successfully using its references... it makes it an even more fun movie to watch for a self-described cinephile such as myself. You can see bits and pieces of The Shining and Vertigo, to name a few, when you watch this movie. It may not be Scorsese's best work because, well, nobody can top his best work. But, I have a feeling that this will wind up becoming one of my favorite films of the year. A movie that I will want to watch over and over, hopefully discovering new things about the movie that I hadn't previously picked up on. Is this Scorsese just screwing around in a different genre? Well, if it is, then wow... I'd like to see what he does when he's actually "trying."

8.5/10

Homage or Ripoff?

I can't tell if the From Paris with Love poster is a ripoff or an homage to this Mean Streets poster. You decide.

Or I could just be way off... that's always possible.

Movies to look forward to this year (sans explanation)

I will just list movies that I'm looking forward to without going into detail. Instead, these are just movies I'm most likely to see in theaters when they come out, therefore, a review of these movies are likely.

Without further ado:

rest of February:
Shutter Island
Cop Out

March:
Alice in Wonderland
Green Zone
Greenberg
I Love You, Phillip Morris
Hot Tub Time Machine*

April:
Kick-Ass

May:
Iron Man 2
Robin Hood

June:
Get Him to the Greek
Toy Story 3
Jonah Hex

July:
Inception
Salt

August:
The Other Guys
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
The Expendables

September:
The Town

October:
Your Highness

November:
Due Date

December:
Untitled James L. Brooks Comedy
Green Hornet
True Grit

Unknown release date:
Black Swan
The Fighter
Machete
The Rum Diary
Somewhere
Tree of Life
You Will Meet A Dark Stranger
The Way Back



Keep coming back here to see my opinions on these films, when they come out. And also on films that are still to be released that I'm unaware of right now.

Expect reviews on Shutter Island and Hot Tub Time Machine by next weekend.

A Director Profile: Kevin Smith

In co-ordinance with his new movie Cop Out coming out in a few weeks, I decided to say a few words on Kevin Smith. Now, if you have been watching tv lately, you might have seen some commercials for Cop Out and you might not think too much of it. The red band trailer however is pretty funny and makes the movie more desirable to check out. It's right here

Now I love Kevin Smith. I love his personality, I love his frank-ness, I like how accessible he is to his fans and the relationship he has with his fans is great. In the '90s, he made a couple of great films. Clerks and Dogma are very enjoyable, very different with great, smart comic writing. Mallrats is a bit underrated but I guess it can be seen as a lesser work compared to those two. Chasing Amy, however, is his best work by far. In fact, Chasing Amy is so good it has since lead me to sort of resent Kevin Smith for not attempting to go down that road again.

Like I said before, he has a great relationship with his fans. That type of accessibility is definitely part of what makes him so cool, but I also am afraid it might force him to make career decisions that aren't necessary. Clerks II isn't a bad film, but it felt odd that he went back down that road after seemingly closing that chapter of his career after Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back. But, ok, so he wanted to end it right. Fine, I can respect that. But, here's the truth, folks... as much as Kevin Smith is great to listen to and even though he started out his career promising enough, he has not grown or matured as a director. Zack and Miri Make a Porno is enjoyable, but definitely does not have the re-watchability that his earlier work has. In fact, none of the films he made in the last decade were anything above average.

With the box office disappointment of Zack and Miri, it seems that Kevin Smith is taking a step back and trying to recover. Instead of getting out of the game for awhile, he decided to go right back and make another film. This time, from someone else's material. Obviously when you watch the red band trailer, you can see that the material is still very much in line with what Kevin Smith is used to; you can see what attracted him to the script in the first place. And I hope Cop Out does well. I hope it's a good movie. But I also hope one day that he's able to make material as high quality as Chasing Amy. Chasing Amy's combination of potty-mouth humor and raw, emotional drama is simply unmatched. Kevin Smith can do drama... very well. Jersey Girl was in the right direction, but it didn't have the same flavor as Amy did. Something has been missing in his work since that movie and I don't quite know what it is. I think Jersey Girl failed because it was a PG-13 Kevin Smith movie and we all know that he's a Rated-R filmmaker. As talented as Tarantino and PT Anderson are, I don't see them ever making a PG-13 movie. Not that it's bad to make one, but they're not PG-13 directors. Neither is Kevin Smith, which is part of what makes him so special.

Kevin Smith is about to turn 40 years old. Some directors don't even start making movies until they're 40. So, he has a long way to go just yet. He's a nice guy, he's funny, he's an interesting character. But I wonder if he'll ever get back to making really great films instead of movies where the entertainment is skin deep only. He doesn't think he has the talent and that's a shame. He does have the talent, he just hasn't gone through the depths of it for the past 10 years. I'm not expecting any cinematic masterpieces from him, but I think he could be a vulgar, less neurotic version of Woody Allen for the rest of his career. Would you say Woody Allen has ever made a masterpiece? Maybe not, depending on your definition. But Annie Hall, Manhattan, Broadway Danny Rose, Hannah and Her Sisters, and Crimes and Misdemeanors are some of the greatest films of the '70s and '80s. They are the epitome of what makes Woody Allen great. They are Woody Allen films through and through and they are great. Kevin Smith can be someone like that. Someone whose greatest films are still very much Kevin Smith films and they are great because they are the zenith of Kevin Smith's talents.

Maybe I lost you with that comparison, but my point is that he doesn't have to stray too far to make great films. He just has to stop trying to please his fans and start making movies where you can tell come deep from his heart. Maybe that's what is missing from his movies in the last decade. They're not bad movies, they just don't have much heart. Whereas, all of his movies in the '90s had heart and Clerks and Chasing Amy had heart and were brilliant.

So, here's to Kevin Smith for all his future successes. I'm still a fan of yours, but I expect a lot more out of you and I hope you can prove me right.

Cop Out comes out on February 26th.

Notable movies that missed my top 100 of the '90s

Some were close, but didn't make the cut into the top 100; there are some that are well-liked but I may not be too high on; and others are simply ones that I haven't seen yet. I'd tell you which ones were which but I don't feel like it!

1990
darkman
days of being wild
edward scissorhands
ghost
the grifters
hunt for red october
misery
pump up the volume
reversal of fortune
state of grace
vincent & theo

1991
Cape Fear
Fisher King
Jungle Fever
LA Story
Life is Sweet
Naked Lunch
Point Break
Slacker
Thelma & Louise



1992
Crying Game
Howards End
Last of the Mohicans
A League of their Own
My Cousin Vinny

1993

Age of Innocence
Army of Darkness
Falling Down
The Firm
In the Line of Fire
Manhattan Murder Mystery
Menace II Society
A Perfect World
The Piano
The Remains of the Day
This Boy's Life
Three Colors: Blue


1994

The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert
The Client
The Crow
Ed Wood
Forrest Gump
Four Weddings and a Funeral
Hudsucker Proxy
Interview with a Vampire
Reality Bites
The Ref
Speed
Three Colors: White
True Lies



1995

Apollo 13
Babe
Clockers
Dead Man
Dead Man Walking
Desperado
Kids
Nixon
Richard III
Strange Days


1996

The Birdcage
From Dusk Til Dawn
Hard Eight
The Long Kiss Goodnight
Marvin's Room
Primal Fear
Sling Blade
That Thing You Do!
A Time to Kill
Welcome to the Dollhouse


1997
Face/Off
The Fifth Element
The Full Monty
The Game
Gattaca
Grosse Pointe Blank
The Ice Storm
Life is Beautiful
Lost Highway
Mr. Jealousy
Private Parts
The Spanish Prisoner
Starship Troopers
Titanic


1998

A Simple Plan
American History X
Buffalo '66
Bulworth
Dark City
He Got Game
Last Days of Disco
Pi
Pleasantville
Ronin
Your Friends & Neighbors


1999

Dogma
Fight Club
Sixth Sense
Sleepy Hollow
Sweet and Lowdown
Talented Mr. Ripley
Toy Story 2

Top 15 movies of 2009... second to last revision

15. Bright Star
14. The Hangover
13. Avatar

12. Where the Wild Things Are

11. The Informant!

10. Star Trek

9. 500 Days of Summer

8. Up

7. District 9

6. Fantastic Mr. Fox

5. Up in the Air

4. In the Loop

3. Moon

2. The Hurt Locker

1. Inglourious Basterds

Vintage me

Uncovering my past blog entries from my old livejournal, I thought I'd give a little insight on me from five years ago. You know how I just made a top 100 of the '90s... this was my top 10 films from the '50s to the '00s... check it out. I posted this in February of 2005.

I know it's surprising that I have a lot of classic foreign films on there, I don't even remember seeing some of those films back then, but I obviously did. I wouldn't put them on my list if I hadn't seen them! I've seen them all by now anyway... although I don't know if my lists would be the same... you already know my '90s list is different.

Top 10 movies of the '50s:
1. On the Waterfront (1954) directed by Elia Kazan
2. The 400 Blows (1959) directed by Francois Truffaut
3. La Strada (1954) directed by Federico Fellini
4. Vertigo (1958) directed by Alfred Hitchcock
5. North by Northwest (1959) also directed by Alfred Hitchcock
6. Seven Samurai (1954) directed by Akira Kurosawa
7. Ben-Hur (1959) directed by William Wyler
8. Paths of Glory (1957) directed by Stanley Kubrick
9. Nights of Cabiria (1957) directed by Federico Fellini
10. Some Like It Hot (1959) directed by Billy Wilder

Top 10 movies of the '60s
1. Psycho (1960) directed by Alfred Hitchcock
2. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) directed by Stanley Kubrick
3. The Good, The Bad, The Ugly (1966) directed by Sergio Leone
4. Dr. Strangelove: or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964) directed by Stanley Kubrick
5. Rosemary's Baby (1968) directed by Roman Polanski
6. 8 1/2 (1963) directed by Federico Fellini
7. The Graduate (1967) directed by Mike Nichols
8. The Apartment (1960) directed by Billy Wilder
9. Lawrence of Arabia (1962) directed by David Lean
10. Spartacus (1960) directed by fuckin' Stanley Kubrick

Top 10 movies of the '70s
1. A Clockwork Orange (1971) directed by...Stanley Kubrick
2. Manhattan (1979) directed by Woody Allen
3. Apocalypse Now (1979) directed by Francis Coppola
4. Jaws (1975) directed by Steven Spielberg
5. The Godfather (1972) directed by Coppola
6. Young Frankenstein (1974) directed by Mel Brooks
7. Chinatown (1974) directed by Polanski
8. Nashville (1975) directed by Robert Altman
9. Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975) directed by Terry Jones & Terry Gilliam
10. Taxi Driver (1976) directed by Martin Scorsese

Top 10 movies of the '80s
1. Raging Bull (1980) directed by Martin Scorsese
2. Brazil (1985) directed by Terry Gilliam
3. Amadeus (1984) directed by Milos Forman
4. Ran (1985) directed by Akira Kurosawa
5. Full Metal Jacket (1987) directed by uh...Stanley Kubrick
6. Paris, Texas (1984) directed by Wim Wenders
7. Hannah and Her Sisters (1985) directed by Woody Allen
8. This is Spinal Tap (1984) directed by Rob Reiner
9. Blue Velvet (1986) directed by David Lynch
10. Down By Law (1986) directed by Jim Jarmusch

Top 10 movies of the '90s
1. The Silence of the Lambs (1991) directed by Johnathan Demme
2. Being John Malkovich (1999) directed by Spike Jonze
3. GoodFellas (1990) directed by Scorsese
4. Pulp Fiction (1994) directed by Tarantino
5. Fargo (1996) directed by the coen brothers
6. Groundhog Day (1993) directed by Harold Ramis
7. Se7en (1995) directed by David Fincher
8. Boogie Nights (1997) directed by Paul T. Anderson
9. Short Cuts (1993) directed by Robert Altman
10. Eyes Wide Shut (1999) directed by who? oh yeah STANLEY KUBRICK

and the reason why I made this...
i was thinking about the top 10 movies of the past 5 years of the 00 decade (00-04)
here is my top 10 of 00-04
1. Traffic (2000) directed by Steven Soderbergh
2. Memento (2000) directed by Christopher Nolan
3. The Pianist (2002) directed by Polanski
4. City of God (2002) directed by...Fernando Meirelles
5. Amelie (2001) directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet
6. The Aviator (2004) directed by Scorsese
7. Mulholland Dr. (2001) directed by David Lynch
8. The Royal Tenenbaums (2001) directed by Wes Anderson
9. Lost in Translation (2003) directed by Sofia Coppola
10. Adaptation. (2002) directed by Spike Jonze

One can conclude that I love Stanley Kubrick and Martin Scorsese.

the last top 10 was hard, but it has to be 'Traffic.' such an important, emotional film. brilliant direction. excellent acting. it has everything. I also love Polanski's work. Can't wait for Oliver Twist, which is coming out sometime this year. I do love foreign films, and will continue to watch more in the future.

that's it.