You know, I haven't actually watched a movie in weeks, very unlike me. I have seen a bunch of the older James Bond movies as of late (11 are presently on American Netflix), the stunts are much better than I previously recalled, and the colonist attitude and casual racism of its time is prevalent as well.
I did see two flicks today, I'd like to write about those.
Peter Jackson uses his gifts as a storyteller and wielder of technology to impressive ends with They Shall Not Grow Old, a WWI documentary of unusual immediacy. There's no narration, just a bunch of vets telling their stories, there's no talking heads, just century old footage gussied up in such a way to remove the distancing effect of the limited reach of its now primitiveness. The impression that this film made most strongly of me was of how everyday life in the trenches was lived, the vividness of the footage combined with the matter-of-factness to the narration really put me in the shoes (actually always damp and cold shitty boots) of these ordinary servicemen. Its a personal film that's not attributed to any one person in particular, but succeeds greatly in pulling an extraordinary story out of the distant past, one that would have been common to know about only many decades ago. Best thing PJ has been associated with in quite some time, way to go there Pete.
65 year old, 5 foot 2 Isabelle Huppert is an unusual choice to play a bogeyman but as it turns out she's more than up to the task in Greta. Its a stalker-psycho-thriller in a slightly unfashionable mold (its a more maternally focused Fatal Attraction if that helps), but its made with just the right amount of tongue in cheek, with performances pitched just a shade south of the parody that it possibly could have been and sometimes veers towards. Honestly, its a hoot, and a well executed one at that, with a number of carefully constructed suspense setpieces. I looked at this film and easily saw the De Palma version of it, and it wasn't that different from the Neil Jordan one we got (that's a big compliment for me). I had a lot of fun with it, more fun than Oscar winning Green Book (no, I'm not salty or nothing).
