you always hurt the ones you love...

Last night I rewatched Blue Valentine and I remember why I think Ryan Gosling is so hawt. Typically I don't do blondes, but there's something so authentic about him that I can't help but to be ensnared by his charms. The film that tells the story of a couple throughout the years through the use of interchanging cuts from the present to the past. It's heartbreaking, hilarious, and awkward all at the same time; which is a lot like real life isn't it. I won't rehash the plot for you or tell you the 100 reasons why this film is worthy of your viewing. Just know its one of the few movies to ever make me cry. The scene that I cried at is this one:



It's mainly cause I love this song.

Just watch the movie. You want regret it.

with my last heartbeat...

       Last night my partner-in-crime, Collin, made me venture to the shady streets of Williamsburg to watch a film I've been dying to see. Heartbeats (les amours imaginaires) is the second film from my enemy Xavier Dolan. No I don't know him personally, but any 21 year old who has made two films that have been showcased at the Cannes Film Festival is no friend of mine. What I will say is that he knows how to make a film. Sure there were certain elements that I could do without, such as the weird lighting during the sex scenes, but the dialogue made up for any epileptic shock I was experiencing. Plus the soundtrack is friggin amazing. BANG BANG. Dolan has managed to make characters that speak the way that young'uns speak today. It was very strange because Collin and I both realized we were watching ourselves on screen. We're exactly like the bitch couple, Francis and Marie, and I was hard to watch our images reflected back at us. The story centers around two best friends who happen to fall in love with the same boy, Nicolas. Whether Nico is gay or straight is questionable because he's so friendly, his nature is hard to interpret. Watching Marie and Francis try to figure Nicolas out and fall in love with him in the process, is exactly how people fall in love today. There are no more dates or real courtship. Love nowadays slowly creeps up on you before you have a chance to acknowledge it. This movie has reignited my desire to get a fucking movie out by the end of 2012. 

he's a prophet and a pusher, partly truth, partly fiction. a walking contradiction....

      So my taste in men may be questionable. Sure I like the smart, charming, handsome type, but give me a potential psychopath and I'm game. Or maybe it's only when that psychopath is Robert DeNiro. I've always loved Bobby DeNiro, but I don't ever think he's looked hotter than in Taxi Driver. Yes I know he plays a mentally unstable cabbie, but look at that face! Look at that boyish smile and full head of hair (at least for most of the film). He's just adorable until he goes maniacal and kills pimps.
        Marty Scorsese directs DeNiro in a film about finding a purpose. DeNiro's Travis Bickle is an insomniac that has nothing to live for and so begins obsessing about things. First he obsesses over the gorgeous Cybill Shepherd and when that goes south, he turns his attentions to Jodie Foster, playing a twelve year old prostitute. This movie has it all--including a long-haired Harvey Keitel wearing groovy pants. It's a good story that shows that an idle mind really is the devil's playground.

For what? for what? I gotta have something to wear besides this...

I spent my holiday vacation in bed either sleeping or watching movies. Basically I was in heaven. The best day of my vacation was after my family opened their Christmas presents, I snuggled up with my stuffed animals, and a bowl of hot porridge, and watched two of my favorite Dustin Hoffman movies: Kramer vs Kramer and Tootsie. Sometimes I think my taste in leading men are unusual. I'll take a Gene Hackman, Geoffrey Rush, and Kevin Spacey over a Robert Pattinson, Zac Efron, and Taylor Lautner any day (Now if I can have all six, I would be the happiest camper in the world). I like the unconventional leading man because he brings something different to the table and Dustin Hoffman might be the dreamiest of them all (definitely with the best head of hair).
     In Kramer vs. Kramer, he plays a dad in the midst of a divorce, who's ex-wife (played by the drop dead gorgeous Meryl Streep) has deserted him and their young son. After being a office work-horse at the advertising company he works for, Hoffman's character, Ted, has to learn to be both mom and dad, while still maintaining his position at work. It's not always easy and sometimes he sucks at it, but he never stops trying and never stops loving his son. Unfortunately, once Hoffman and his son have hit their stride, his ex-wife reenters the picture wanting custody of their son, after sixteen months of abandonment. Now Ted must fight with a justice system that believes a child should always be with their mother and claim his right as a parent. It's a heart-wrenching film that doesn't pick sides but just shows the different models of family that were sprouting in the 1970s. Hoffman's performance is stunning and when Streep enters the courtroom and is cross-examined, her portrayal is breathtaking. Both actors truly deserve the Academy Award wins they received.
        Hoffman is also a very versatile actor and his comedic work is something to watch, and I'm not just talking about Meet the Fockers. In the 1982 film Tootise, Hoffman plays Michael Dorsey, an out of work actor who makes ends meet by waiting table at a local restaurant in New York. When his agent tells him no one in the industry wants to work with him because of his harsh attitude and unwillingness to compromise, Michael auditions for the role of hospital activist on a local soap by pretending to be a woman, and not a very attractive one at that. He lands the role and becomes a sensation. He also shakes things up and stands up women's rights on set. Of course things get complicated as Michael falls in love with his costar and he starts receiving male advances from unexpected male companions. It's a hilarious tale and the last fifteen minutes of the film always has me in stitches, the kind where you're suffering from panic attacks because of the embarrassment these characters have to endure. If you've never fallen in love with Dustin Hoffman before, you certainly will after these films.



Dustin Hoffman is still sexy as a female. Love Him!!!

i'll stick to my own definitions...

Of course this post is long overdue. I've been dying to see this movie since the trailer was released online. Do you remember seeing it in the previews for Inception? The chills that I got were so intense. (I'm also getting chills for the Harry Potter finales, but let's wait till November for that). There were no actual plot devices shown but rather images of facebook icons and profile pictures that we regard as so mundane because it's so engrained into our every day lives. But when it's presented to you on a huge screen, you start to realize the sheer magnitude of influence that Mark Zuckerberg's creation has on our existences.
         When I finally saw The Social Network, I went in with the notion that this movie would not only change my life, but define my generation. Isn't that the refrain we've been hearing from the critics? The Social Network will be our The Breakfast Club. As I cozied into my huge seat (of course dominating all the surrounding seats as well) I prepared myself to see my life flash before my eyes. Unfortunately, it didn't.  It's not that The Social Network isn't a good film, it's just not about "us" as a whole. Where The Breakfast Club had a character for each social class to identify with, The Social Network is partitioned with the "have" and "have-nots". If you're not rich then you're not cool? That seems a little prehistoric and maybe it is, especially when the setting of the film is at one of the oldest universities in America. The basic plot of the film is that after being dumped by his girlfriend for being an asshole, Mark Zuckerberg gets the idea for the facebook while drunk and seeking fame on his college campus. Along the way he gets help from his best friend Eduardo Saverin (played by the uuber adorable Andrew Garfield. sigh) and begins to build an empire. In true rags to riches fashion, the acquire groupies (Brenda Song being amazing) and enemies, the Winklevoss twins (played by the singular but sexy Armie Hammer) and turns from a regular asshole to a powerful jerk.
       The story culminates with the several lawsuits that Zuckerberg faced and the basic understanding that regardless of what ludicrous amount of money he pays to his enemies, he has created not only an empire, but a lifestyle change. As Sean Parker says in the movie, Zuckerberg has created "a once in a generation idea". Regardless of how universal facebook is (they don't have roads in Bosnia but they have facebook) the characters don't define this particular generation. Of course everyone wants to be known for something and not an outcast, but is this a generational notion or rather one shared by everyone regardless of race, creed and age. When I think of our generation, I think of hipsters and posers. I think of us as the generation that thinks outside the box. We aren't bogged down by the notion that there's only one right way. We want to make it on our own by our own standards. Whether this is a good thing or not, I don't know.
    Now I don't want to seem that I'm coming down on the movie. I had a good time. Whether it's Oscar-worthy I don't know. I think both Jesse Eisenberg and Armie Hammer's performances definitely deserve a campaign. The screenplay is phenomenal, with lines that had to be written. But I'm going to save my vote for a film that actual define more than a generation...it defines me.

...who's car we taking?

I could have sworn I wrote a post about this movie a while ago, but of course I was wrong. So I saw The Town two weeks and it was much better than I anticipated. I genuinely liked this movie. I didn't have low expectations but it was beautifully filmed and it had a good balance of action and heart. It's the story of Dougie Macray who live is Charlestown, Boston , the bank robbing capitol of America apparently. He and his three buddies, including a surprisingly terrifying Jeremy Renner, plan efficient bank and armored truck heists and basically run their neighborhood. The opening scene of the film involves a robbery that seems to go wrong and they are forced to take the bank manager as a hostage. They leave the manager, Rebecca Hall, alive but they find out that she lives in the same neighborhood as one of the robbers. Dougie attempts to find out how much she knows about them and in the process, of course, he falls in love with her. In Dougie's effort to leave behind his old life, he is faced with a conflict of interests between his past and where he wants his future to go. The film has cameos from a cracked out Blake Lively and a sexy John Hamm. The sad thing about the movie is that it has the potential to be phenomenal. Yes this a story that's been told before and will continue to be told (A young man trying to reform his life but is constantly being tugged back into his old ways) but there are different aspects of that story that could be told. I think the relationship between the bank manager and Dougie could have been more complex as opposed to making Rebecca Hall's character this angel that represents Dougie's only chance for a new life. I also think that Jeremy Renner was doing such interesting things with his badass, no respect for anyone character, that I would have been interested in seeing how he deals with people outside of his family. All in all, I think this was a fun movie and the car chase is really exciting and had my heart racing a little bit.

never let me go...

I've been so MIA because of the shift from my party sleep party mentality of the summer that has no transitioned into party work internship gym party. I haven't quite figured out how to fit in blogging, sleeping and eating, but I'm sure I'll get there. However I have managed to see some films. I love this time of year when quality films are racing to get to the theater in order to be eligible for the Oscar race. One such film is Never Let Me Go based on the book of the same title. It's about three young people, in a world similar to ours, who were raised to donate their internal organs. In their short lives they deal with the same struggles that each of us face and our trying to make sense of their situation. I must admit that my initial draw to the film were both Carey Mulligan and Andrew Garfield, whom I believe are really talented actors and their performance in this film proved that I was correct. The film doesn't center around the ethical implications of whether one life is of greater value than the next, but rather how much time is enough to live? Is there any point at which we realize that we've gone as far as we'd like to go. It seems to me that regardless if you live one hundred years or only twenty, you still have that moment of recognition of how you want to leave this earth.
I also want to add the song from which the film gets its name was a perfect choice and the scenes in which the song came  into play were definitely my favorite. Sometime music can carry a film.
In all honesty I think this film and the performance are going to be overlooked come award season. After viewing the film, I had a sense of incompleteness. Maybe death isn't always the end.