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wafflehouse91
Reviews
Io sono l'amore (2009)
More like "I Am Bored"
This summer has a pretty distinct lack of compelling popular movies (besides the spectacular Toy Story 3) so I figured it was time to check out some of the lesser known movies at the local art house theater. I heard good things about I am Love, but I didn't have any expectations.
The movie theater in which I saw "I am Love" has a policy where one can get a refund for movie tickets as long as 30 minutes have not passed once the movie has started. I strongly urge viewers to inquire about similar policies at their local movie theater if they have any interest in seeing this movie. The first 20 minutes of the film give you a pretty good idea of what the film is about, and if you're not sold at that point, you probably won't be. I don't mean the plot when I talk about what this movie is about. I mean the feeling of the movie. Some may call it deliberate. I call it excruciatingly boring.
The story starts off incredibly slow; it takes about an hour for anything interesting to happen plot-wise and even then it continues to sluggishly plod along. An upper-class middle-aged heiress to a family textile factory falls in love with her son's friend, a chef named Antonio. All of the characters are completely uninteresting and undeveloped. There is a little bit of a tragedy towards the end of the movie which I won't spoil, however the movie did such a poor job of pulling me in and making me care about the characters that it was almost completely unaffecting.
So the movie doesn't do plot very well, nor characters, so what's the point? I've heard people praise the cinematography, but it was more headache-inducing than it was interesting. Its as if a five-year old was handling the camera, with consistently bizarre focus changes and close-ups.
I have also heard that the movie does its sex scenes well, which I guess depends on whether you find Tilde Swinton attractive (I don't), and whether you can stomach the aforementioned camera lunacy. Maybe sex scenes aren't really my thing, but an older gentleman in the audience apparently found it poor enough to laugh at.
So the funky sex scenes and cinematography were awful. Granted, the Italian setting was nice, however I am not too surprised. It would be harder to find an ugly place in Italy since that place is apparently so damn attractive.
If any of this rubbish sounds appealing to you but you don't want to spend the money, you could probably replicate the experience pretty accurately by watching the screen-saver on your computer for an hour and switching to a second-rate pornography video for the rest of the time, all the while playing pretentious and inappropriately intrusive classical music.
But take my word for it. This is one movie safely missed.
Spinning Boris (2003)
Surprising little gem
It was a dull day at my house when we had to trudge over to the neighbors' to see if they had any good movies to watch. I don't know where they found this flick; I had never heard of it and I couldn't find much about it online. I was initially put off by the title. But don't judge a book by its cover. If you ever get the opportunity to see this little gem, do yourself a favor and get right on it.
A quick synopsis: In the 1996 election in Russia, American campaign managers are secretly hired by Russians to help President Yeltzin's re-election. So its based on a true story.
The movie is very witty and smart, even dealing with serious subject matter. The whole film has an appropriately uneasy tone to it. The movie takes a little while to establish itself but after it does, it is expertly paced. For a historical movie spread out over several months, pacing is key, and Spinning Boris nails it.
The three leads, Jeff Goldblum, Anthony LaPaglia, and Liev Schreiber are amazing, they play off each other very well. The viewer really gets that sense that the characters have been buddies long before the events of the movie. I especially enjoyed Goldblum's performance, for the style and wit he brings to the otherwise tense Russian setting.
The fact that the plot is so secretive to begin with and hesitant to unravel makes the film intriguing to watch. The plot would be impossible to believe if it weren't true. But it comes off as very authentic, lending this movie an undeniable charm. I whole-heartedly recommend you see this movie.
Never Been Kissed (1999)
A perfect example of what is wrong with our society
After having the misfortune of watching this movie i was surprised at how many people liked it. This movie gives a horrible message to any young person watching. the main character (Drew Barrymore, who is not sexy enough or talented enough to have a movie) is a reporter who sacrifices her career for popularity.
The message is as horrible as the acting. She prefers to be a victim of the judgment of teenagers and keep a fantasy view of romance (never happens in real life) rather than maintain her professionalism or advance her life. any mature adult watching the movie should see the immaturity of the main character, her failure to move past her primitive teenage instincts. It seems to praise women who are too emotional for professional positions in lucrative careers and are too immature to move past high school. While there is no problem with a movie about a girl who goes back to high school, elevating her for doing so is appalling and shows that the character has de-matured and fallen into a world of fantasy.
It was painful for me to watch this as it was not comedic or effective in sparking emotion for me to recommend to anyone. This is perhaps the worst movie i have ever seen.