A Franco-Belgian-Canadian animated movie, The Triplets of Belleville tells the story of a French cyclist Champion, his Portuguese grandma, and their unwanted adventures in America, where they meet three American sisters. There is a lot to praise in this movie, but the main praise to any film is that time flies when watching it, so entertaining and enchanting is.
The animation looks like old style hand-made Miyazaki's, both in detail of de drawing, style, fluidity of the images, quirkiness of the characters, and action. Still has a very special feeling, which is both very European and very American.
It is remarkable that an animation movie without princes and princesses, fairytale love stories, or young
characters can be so appealing to people of all
ages. In fact, the characters are a group of old women, an overweight dog, and some nasty Mafiosi. If this was not enough, the characters rarely speak, just mumble a few words, make guttural noses, and sing some songs. The story is entertaining, quirky and original enough to keep the viewer interested and entertained, and the characters are very expressive, like the old silent movies, despite their lack of language. That is a lot to say.
The movie has an awesome soundtrack by Benoît Charest inspired by golden-era Jazz and Motown classics, plus some classic music pieces that perfectly convey the atmosphere of New York in the 1920s-1950s. In fact, the recreation of New York as Belleville has a lot of art-deco with a twist of European Disney (the skyline of Belleville resembles a European castle), plus a contemporary projection of the image of Americans in European mentality (the inhabitants of Belleville are morbidly obese) creating something that is oddly beautiful and original.
Especially brilliant are the scenes of the crossing of the Atlantic, the watching of human programs in TV by the cartoons, the diet of the triplets, and, above all, the surreal black and white dreams of Bruno the dog.
The only thing I did not like was the car persecution at the end, which I found childish and hurriedly resolved, and the end of the movie.
This is a brilliant movie with a delightful script for people of all ages with lots of winks to adult viewers.
Match Point is a UK-USA-Ireland-Russia Co-production, mostly shot in London, and directed by Woody Allen.
The story revolves about a love triangle between young retired tennis player turned businessman Chris Wilton (played by Jonathan Rhys Meyers), his wife the sweet good-hearted rich girl Chloe Hewett (Emily Mortimer), and the bombshell struggling actress and Tom Hewetts' girlfriend Nola Rice (Scarlett Johansson). This is one of those
stories we have seen brought to the big screen many times, a Hitchcock's
theme in a way, the love triangle, the crime, the coward. The first scene of the movie is very philosophical and it is a good premise of the drama that will unfold:
"The man who said "I'd rather be lucky than good" saw deeply into life. People are afraid to face how great a part of life is dependent on luck. It's scary to think so much is out of one's control. There are moments in a match when the ball hits the top of the net, and for a split second, it can either go forward or fall back. With a little luck, it goes forward, and you win. Or maybe it doesn't, and you lose."
Luck is more important in life than you can ever expect, and it is always unpredictable and fanciful. In fact, the story is all a story of a very good luck for Chris's character, especially at the end. However, this is a romantic psycho-drama with a predictable plot, so the interesting premise gets diluted very soon. In other words, the movie is too mundane to be philosophical, and pretending the contrary is... pretentious.
The film is shot in a very fresh way, has a nice bright artsy atmosphere and hints of Allen's sense of humour (especially in the policemen's conversations at the end). The actors do a good job in their respective roles, although this is a mini-coral movie. Meyers has a good chemistry with both Mortimer and Johansson, and he's able to portray with believability the double face of a cheater, and also the difference between love and passion. Emily Mortimer shines as a very believable sweet bland woman who is blind to anything she does not want to see. Johansson also shines in her femme fatal role, which she always nails.
The soundtrack is a mix of modern and old opera arias. Carusso's old records are intercalated in the middle of the movie to highlight the actions of the characters. Modern performances are played while the characters attend performances in the theatre or hear some records.
The movie has a nice feel about it, is well filmed, decently acted, and has a good direction. However, the movie does not add anything new to the genre, is too predictable, has a poor script and important flaws in the murder story. A bit dull but enjoyable the same.
An Argentinean film directed that tells the story of retired public lawyer Benjamín Esposito, who starts writing a novel about one of the most intriguing cases of his past: the rape and murder of young wife Liliana Coloto, and the investigation that led to the capture of her murderer. The movie has a
wonderful warm retro mood and tones, a beautiful interior photography, a
simple unfulfilled romance story, an intriguing plot, a very
interesting ending, and good performances by Darin and Francella. I do not mind flaws in a script if they are well integrated in the story, and if the movie compensates them with other positive elements. However, there are so many and evident flaws here that one cannot ignore them: 1/ The first one is the fact that the way a man looks a woman in a photo can lead to anyone to suspect he is a murderer; to be honest, if this is the case, Esposito could be a potential murderer, too, if we take into account the way he looked at his adored Irene in the photos taken in her pre-wedding party.
2/ When Esposito and Sandoval are at the house of Isidoro's mother, the old lady returns, her dog starts barking at them, but she does not suspects anythin; what is more, OMG! the back-door is completely open for them to escape free!
3/ We are told who is the murderer and that he loves a specific football team, so Esposito and Sandoval go to the next match, the stadium is fully packed, but they manage to find the murderer 10 feet away from them; not only that, the lawyers have convinced the Police -one assume Argentinean Police had much free time at hand at the time and would consider the proposal sane- to be there to capture the murderer.
4/ Most of the movie is set in the 1970s, when a military dictatorship was ruling Argentina, a system that allowed the Justice System to act in a certain way; but if you are not familiar with Argentinean History many of the events and attitudes in the movie will not make any sense to the foreign viewer.
5/ We know who the murderer is quite early, before he is even captured, a fact that kills the suspense very soon.
6/ One would expect that whoever sent the group of Mafiosi to Esposito's apartment would have provided them with a photo or at least an accurate description, so the question the Mafiosi make in the movie is completely redundant.
7/ The end of the murder case is good, but still, too delayed and lost amidst a mix of themes explored at the same time On the other hand, the end of the romance story is a bit unbelievable, "I solve the mystery and I overcome all of my securities with this woman" sort of thing.
This, and much more, makes impossible to call this movie a masterpiece, as many reviews have been doing, unless you are blind.
The acting is uneven,
poor sometimes, with the exception of Guillermo Francella who is
terrific as the drunkard but insightful lawyer Pablo Sandoval. Soledad
Villamil and Ricardo Darín have a great chemistry on camera, but not
much dramatic emotion can come from them as the script has the love
story as a background to the murder investigation, so their feelings are
mostly showed indirectly. She plays correctly Irene, a high-class
judge, a beautiful rich inaccessible girl. Darín shines in his portrait
of the lonely old retiree looking for clues in his life through
remembrance, more than in his portray of the young Esposito; however, he
portrays with constriction and sensitivity the soft looser that
Esposito is. The script tells us widower Ricardo Morales is an emotional
wreck after the death of his wife, a man still in deep love with her,
but Pablo Rago's performance rather shows emotional frigidity regarding
the death of his wife, his grieving, and the search and capture of the
murderer. I found Javier Godino's performance over the top as Isidoro
Gomez, although I think it is what the script requires from him; in that
regard, it is not his fault. The film it truly overrated, still enjoyable.
There is nothing worse that a simple fun oriented film and story that pretends to be an intellectual artistic exercise. I find this sort of pretence not only annoying and deceiving to the spectator, but also artistically contrapuntal as you cannot seat and just watch the movie for what it is. If you want to show off your feathers, better be real! Guy Ritchie, the actors and producers have insisted that this movie not only captures the essence of the original, but also reinvent the, but both statements are delusional. In fact, I thought that the TV series "Sherlock" offers more artistry, inventiveness, interestingness and mystery that Richie's, it is true to the original but still adds elements of modernity that can be enjoyed by modern audiences.
I have read the books, which I immensely enjoyed, and I did not find Sherlock in this movie, or at least the SH I had imagined when reading the books. Robert Downey Jr. destroys the credibility and essence of the original character and turns it into an eccentric clown; he is funny, actually, but is not SH to me. Without a good Sherlock Holmes, the rest is not worth a penny. The rest of the acting is OK: Jude Law, Rachel McAdams, Mark Strong. and Kelly Reilly are Dr. John Watson, Irene Adler, Lord Blackwood, and Mary respectively. Robert Maillet was fun as giant Dreader. Eddie Marsan was unconvincing as Inspector Lestrade, though.
The story is entertaining, as all SH's stories are, has some moments of fun and is visually stunning, full of action and special effects. I liked the visual style of connecting slow/fast motion elements (typical of Ritchie) with SH's deductive way of thinking, which makes clear for the viewer why SH immediately gets what is happening and what is going to happen. The digital recreation of London and the mood of the era are certainly impressive; I especially liked the slum-dog sort of areas and shops, not as much the general views of the city that looked a bit oneiric and cartoon-ish (video-game-ish actually) at times. This is an action-packed movie that relegates to a second place the logical deduction, pace and essence of the original books.
