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Reviews
Inside Out (2015)
No surprise here
This movie is over-rated: its too family-love-ish for people like me from messed-up families, and gets all yukky-soppy at too many points. Probably a great movie for middle-class kids on the verge of adolescence who have just moved somewhere new, otherwise I can't see how this would appeal to many other types of people (unless they are parents watching with their kids). But what spoilt it most of all for me is that there was no surprise - literally. The six basic emotions in psychology include surprise as well as the five represented here (happiness/joy, sadness, anger, fear and disgust). Without surprise, the poor girl in the movie can never be amazed, and will probably find it hard to 'get' most jokes if she can't feel surprised. Major plot-hole.
Heavenly Creatures (1994)
Is mentioning the unicorns a spoiler?
Just looked at the ratings for this movie, and all demographic groups gave it between 7.1 and 7.7, and there are few if any unsatisified reviews. But I thought it was truly average, and honestly over-rated. Yes, the production values were high etc., but quality form needs salient content. Though it's apparently a true story, and was interesting (though never gripping) in places, the plot seemed derivative and the metaphorical scenes were clichéd (unicorns and adolescent girls? seriously?). Kate Winslet played herself well, as usual, though with a different accent. I feigned interest for my partner's sake, who did rate it highly, though she seemed puzzled and possibly annoyed when the movie ended and I said 'let's watch Night of the Living Dead again, and continue the dead actors theme'. Yawn. Peter Jackson had to start somewhere, I guess
Only Lovers Left Alive (2013)
Movie of mood and metaphor
This is a beautiful and artistic movie on many counts: mesmerising soundtrack, atmospheric sets and settings, dreamy camera-work and scene-play, methodically under-stated acting, and slow but sure character development. We get to know the four vampires, especially Adam (played brilliantly by Tom Hiddleston) and Eve (played by the versatile Tilda Swinton), from a series of contrasts and paradoxes as their motives, moods and lives change. They seem both ancient and modern,languorous yet focused, familiar but alien.
As the slim story-line and minimal back-story unfold, the movie focuses on triggering our empathy for creatures who have survived for several centuries, facing many challenges, the most constant of which is the threat of boredom and existential alienation. Apart from blood - as food and drug - their main motives for survival are human knowledge and culture: art, science, literature, music. Living on 'back-door' blood samples from hospitals, these 21st century vampires now avoid feeding on humans because of the growing chances of detection by modern police agencies.
Things had been going fairly smoothly for Adam, a retired rock star hiding away in an old house in Detroit, until his old 'lover' Eve returns from Tangiers, soon followed by her troublesome 'sister' Ava from LA. Ava brings heat to the door, and Adam's quiet life changes. But, as noted, the story is not the main thrust of this movie, nor is vampire mythology (it's not a standard horror flick). My feeling was that the director (Jim Jarmusch) wanted to take a fresh approach to the old narrative theme of empathizing with the experience of being immortal, as well as exploring the metaphor of living with a serious drug habit. He does well on both counts. A classy, moody movie, which you should definitely watch before making any decisions about becoming a vampire.