My Namesake?

So Disney is coming out with another life-affirming movie for the kids. Have you seen the commercials yet? It has something to do with people almost dying in the North Pole or somewhere else really cold, and their eight sled dogs who also almost die. In the trailer, they read through the eight dogs’ names slowly and dramatically while flashing the pictures of the dogs on the screen (even though they all look the same, they’re freaking sled dogs)… and that’s right, the first dog’s name is… MAYA. I think this name is reaching a total saturation point since it’s being used for dogs in Disney flicks. Ho-hum. Time to switch to Consuelo?

In praise of Mathieu Amalric

I just found out today that Mathieu Amalric is in Munich. I got so excited I was ready to cut out of work and head directly to the theater. I restrained myself, but will certainly be seeing it this week.

Mathieu Amalric is pretty much ubiquitous in the French arthouse films that manage to be released in the US. Still, nobody except for me seems to know who he is. At one point I had seen him in so many films, I wondered whether he was the French equivalent of Tom Hanks. But then I asked some French friends about him, and they hadn’t heard of him either.

Why do I love Mathieu Amalric so much? First of all, he’s a brilliant, entirely natural actor who always works with the best French directors. He has huge, expressive eyes. Regardless of what role he’s playing, he looks like he spent the previous night drinking numerous bottles of wine, passed out for five hours, rolled out of bed and skipped showering, and showed up on set ready to film. He is the most consistently scruffy actor working today. That’s not usually what I look for in a dude, but it works for him. I want to marry him.

It’s hard to recommend films that he’s in. Either you love French films and you’ll love them, or you hate them, etc. Probably the safest one to recommend is Late August, Early September.

Ones to check out if you’re feeling able to deal with a movie not only being French, but also being over three hours long:
My Sex Life… Or, How I Got Into an Argument
Kings and Queen



And of course, Munich. I also read that he’s in Sofia Coppola’s newest movie Marie-Antoinette… unfortunately he’s billed as “Man at the Masked Ball” which isn’t terribly promising. Don’t even get me started about him playing second banana (or more like fourteenth banana) to Diaper-Face Kirsten Dunst. How in the world could they even be in the same movie? Something is definitely amiss. Well, I’ll take Mathieu whenever I can see him.

Time for the Best of 2005 Movie List! Yeah!

All right, I have a huge problem picking the year-end “Best of Whatever” lists, but for some reason I feel compelled to do it anyway. So here is my list of the top ten (plus one) movies of 2005, with accompanying excuses.



Usurpation of Cronenberg?
The New World
All right, not the best movie of the year, and I don't see why it should be on the 2005 list at all since it was only open in New York for like 2 minutes during 2005... But it's my favorite movie of the year, and don't be surprised if it heads my best of 2006 list as well.



A History of Violence – Easily the #1 movie of the year. Even if David Cronenberg directed a movie that was a steaming pile of shit, I would name it the best movie of the year. I’m just that devoted! But incidentally, A History of Violence is not a steaming pile of shit. It’s pretty much the opposite of that.


Munich
My favorite Spielberg movie of recent memory. It's really quite good. I intended to see it in the theater again, but I keep watching The New World instead.


Brokeback Mountain – I never was a fan of gay cowboys before. I guess I’m still not. But I am a fan of this movie, even though Anne Hathaway and Jake Gyllenhaal cannot be convincingly aged to look older than 26. And who would have guessed that Heath Ledger was actually awesome? Not me.

Brick – OK, this movie wasn’t released in 2005. It may never be released. That’s what you get for making obtuse independent movies. But I found this movie intriguing and experimental enough to include it on my list. And it’s got a great, tense climactic scene that is just spectacular.


Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance – Truffaut said something along the lines of “Every war movie is a pro-war movie,” because war movies inherently glamorize war. Jonathan Rosenbaum made the obvious deduction from this statement and said something along the lines of “Every war movie can be either a pro-war movie or an anti-war movie depending on who’s watching it.” I think the same applies to revenge movies. Watch this movie and discuss it with me later. And I’m sorry I’m too lazy to look up the exact quotes.


Me and You and Everyone We Know – A tad precious, but not in the way that makes me want to barf. It was really well-filmed, and that little kid should win a Kiddie Oscar!


Save the Green Planet! – OK, along with the other two Korean movies on this list, it technically wasn’t released in 2005. But it opened in Chicago for the first time in 2005, so here it is on my list. And why are the only three foreign films on my list Korean films? I have no idea.


Batman Begins – Best action movie of the year, and most miraculous recovery of hotness by a hot leading man (Christian Bale, after The Machinist).


Mysterious Skin – This movie has its goofball moments, but also has some of the most powerful scenes filmed in recent memory.


The Interpreter – Favorite straight-up Hollywood movie of the year. I don’t care what anyone else says, I thought this movie was great. It was filmed more in the style of 70s thrillers (slow-building tension with very little action – but when the action happens, it’s worth the wait). I’m sick of seeing an explosion every 1.5 seconds.



The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy – Best comedy of the year, and cutest movie to boot.



Oldboy – See comments for Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance above. Probably the most visually stunning movie I’ve seen in recent memory.

Of course I’m leaving out the movies I haven’t seen (a miserable 65 in the theater this year). So, the movie I haven’t seen yet, but seem to be popping up on Best-Of lists everywhere:

The Squid and the Whale
Syriana
The New World
Caché

I have especially high hopes for The New World. Terrence Malick rocks, and I get to see Christian Bale on the big screen again. So I may revise this list later.