I've been lazy and haven't written much lately, and I have a big backlog of movies to catch up on, so I plan to buzz through most of them very quickly in the next few posts so I can spend more time and space later to write about three movies I have fallen in love with recently. Here are some I didn't love:
Inglourious Basterds: This Oscar nominee, set during WWII, was disappointing. I run hot and cold with Tarentino, and I was definitely cold on this one. The problem was that it felt like 2 different scripts, neither of which got the attention it needed. In the first and most publicized plot, Brad Pitt and a scrappy band of Allied (and mostly Jewish) soldiers go nutty killing Nazis and scalping them; the ones they let live get off with just a swastika carved in their foreheads. In the second, more interesting plot, a young Jewish woman whose entire family had been massacred by the Nazis plots revenge when high Nazi brass, including Hitler, decide to attend the premiere of a new propaganda film (starring a dashing Nazi hero played by Daniel Bruhl, pictured) at the theater she operates. For all the press that the first plot got, Pitt basically has a supporting role here--really, no one actor gets enough time to be a star. The theater story has the makings of a good Hitchcockian thriller, but with the exception of a strong sequence set in a basement cafe, the two storylines come together in a lackluster fashion.
An Education: This Oscar nominee, set in England during the early 60's, was equally disappointing. An Oxford-bound high school student (well played by Carey Mulligan) gets a different kind of education when she falls for an older man (well played by Peter Sarsgaard) who, though charming and successful on the surface, is a bit of a basterd (oops, I mean "bastard"). It's a rather boring coming-of-age story; I like that Sarsgaard isn't a total creep--more like a kid who never quite grew up--and that Mulligan doesn't seem horribly scarred by her experience, but there just isn't much heft to the story. The acting by the two principals (and by Alfred Molina as Mulligan's working-class father) is the main reason to see this bland melodrama.
Inglourious Basterds: This Oscar nominee, set during WWII, was disappointing. I run hot and cold with Tarentino, and I was definitely cold on this one. The problem was that it felt like 2 different scripts, neither of which got the attention it needed. In the first and most publicized plot, Brad Pitt and a scrappy band of Allied (and mostly Jewish) soldiers go nutty killing Nazis and scalping them; the ones they let live get off with just a swastika carved in their foreheads. In the second, more interesting plot, a young Jewish woman whose entire family had been massacred by the Nazis plots revenge when high Nazi brass, including Hitler, decide to attend the premiere of a new propaganda film (starring a dashing Nazi hero played by Daniel Bruhl, pictured) at the theater she operates. For all the press that the first plot got, Pitt basically has a supporting role here--really, no one actor gets enough time to be a star. The theater story has the makings of a good Hitchcockian thriller, but with the exception of a strong sequence set in a basement cafe, the two storylines come together in a lackluster fashion.
An Education: This Oscar nominee, set in England during the early 60's, was equally disappointing. An Oxford-bound high school student (well played by Carey Mulligan) gets a different kind of education when she falls for an older man (well played by Peter Sarsgaard) who, though charming and successful on the surface, is a bit of a basterd (oops, I mean "bastard"). It's a rather boring coming-of-age story; I like that Sarsgaard isn't a total creep--more like a kid who never quite grew up--and that Mulligan doesn't seem horribly scarred by her experience, but there just isn't much heft to the story. The acting by the two principals (and by Alfred Molina as Mulligan's working-class father) is the main reason to see this bland melodrama.
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