I haven’t watched too many films recently. Here are the eight I watched since the last time I posted in this category.

Beginners, 2010, dir. Mike Mills
I really enjoyed this, when I saw it at the Coral Gables Cinemateque¹. Christopher Plummer plays Ewan McGregor’s father, who comes out as gay as an older man after his wife passes away, dates a much younger man, and then passes away; we watch McGregor’s character deal with the death of his father and interact with the really stupendous Mélanie Laurent², with whom he begins a relationship. It wasn’t a perfect movie, but it was very amusing, and sweet, and dealt with many difficult subjects well. Recommended.

Gasland, 2010, dir. Josh Fox
A documentary about hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) and the US natural gas industry. Really depressing because on the one hand, natural gas is a great resource, while on the other hand, the means we’re using to get it out are damaging the earth and people’s lives. This is where those videos of people lighting their tap water on fire are from. It is one of the only reasons I am glad that I have an electric range at home. Worth watching if you don’t know much about fracking.

Los Amantes del Círculo Polar (Lovers of the Arctice Circle), 1998, dir. Julio Médem
One of my favorite movies ever. Watched it this time without subtitles, which was fun. (Although I watched this and the movie below while I was sick, which was not fun.) Médem also directed Lucía y el Sexo (Sex and Lucia), which is also a good film. This movie is sweet and sad and technically very clever; it’s also sexy and has a good plot. Otto and Ana become interested in each other as children; their parents, divorced from other spouses, end up marrying each other. And I think I’ll leave the description there. The film is mostly just a drama, but it’s intriguing, I think. I first watched this movie in a class, where we watched a number of really good international films. This one wins out, though. Oh yeah.

Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory, 1971, dir. Mel Stuart
A classic! Although I like the newer version as well, this one’s the best. Another movie I own; another fun watch while I was sick.

Freakonomics, 2010, dir. Ewing, Gibney, Gordon, Grady, Jarecki, & Spurlock
A documentary based in part on the book. I never really wanted to read the book, but I find the ideas interesting. My mother and I were looking for something streaming to watch and happened upon this one. I had fun watching it, but don’t really remember much of it.

L’Illusionniste (The Illusionist), 2010, dir. Sylvain Chomet
I talked about wanting to see this on Halloween, almost a year ago; I didn’t like it quite as much as I hoped I would. It was, as I text-messaged a friend in Philadelphia while watching it, quite dispiriting: “Damn the French make sad animated films,” I sent him. It’s made by the same people who made The Triplets of Belleville, which I quite liked; it’s quiet and sad and not very uplifting at all. I don’t know if I recommend it, but I also didn’t dislike it. I just think there are other things I’d rather see.

Persona, 1966, dir. Ingmar Bergman
I saw this with my sister, on a rainy Sunday while visiting her in New York. She convinced me to see this over several other options. I think I’d only seen one other Bergman film³, and I was glad to see another. I like him, when I’m willing to invest some time and patience in a film. This is considered a classic, and one of his best films. It was haunting and kind of bizarre, and manages to be weird without being particularly silly. It didn’t hold my attention perfectly, but at the same time it’s the sort of film I’d like to watch again, and think about some more. One that requires a bit of work, but might be worth it. I don’t watch that kind of film often, but it’s nice on occasion.

Balada triste de trompeta (The Last Circus), 2010, dir. Álex de la Iglesia
This movie was pretty ridiculous. I saw it last Sunday, and spent the entire drive home from the theatre (the awesome O Cinema) trying to decide if I liked it. My friend Justin, with whom I saw it, concluded that he did; I guess I have to as well. It’s about, errr, a clown in a circus who goes insane? I guess. It’s really bizarre, and you have to spend a lot of time suspending your disbelief—but they do a good job of stretching the conceit (clowns gone mad; violent men dressed as clowns) a lot further than you’d imagine. I don’t know that I’d recommend it, exactly. It’s a bunch of g’s: gruesome and graphic and grotesque. But if you watch the trailer and think, “oh man!, this looks ridiculous and fun!,” which is what I thought, then maybe you’ll like it as well.

1. They insist on misspelling the word “cinematheque,” although I don’t know why. Otherwise, they’re great; Miami has been lucky in the past year to suddenly gain two new art cinemas—this and O Cinema, in Wynwood—and have the Miami Beach Cinematheque re-open. [↩]
2. She played the awesomely mad French woman in Inglourious Basterds. [↩]
3. The Seventh Seal [↩]

I left it a bit too long, so I have a bunch of movies to add to my list-of-movies-I’ve-seen-recently. I’ll go through them briefly, rather than as I often do. Oldest first.

Never Let Me Go, 2010, dir. Mark Romanek
I really liked this movie, although it’s a bit slow. Really good, creepy sci-fi-ish plot (cloned Brits are raised in boarding schools and then sacrificed for their organs), with a strong main character, good emotional development, excellent acting. Beautifully shot. I saw this over two months ago, so I can’t say much more than that, but I’d definitely watch it again.

Hanna, 2011, dir. Joe Wright
Hanna was not a thought-provoking movie, but it was a well-done action movie. The character is cool and smart. The violence is well-organized and not the point. I really liked it.

Heartbeats (Les Amours Imaginaires), 2010, dir. Xavier Dolan
Okay, so I might think that Xavier Dolan is ridiculously cool, and I might have liked this movie in part because of that. And maybe it could’ve been better as a short film rather than a full-length film that felt like a shorter film interspersed with little story-telling vignettes. But I liked the vignettes, and the shorter film. I thought it was a simple story told well. The acting is pretty good and pretty believable. Some people raved about this movie. I see why.

Beaches, 1988, dir. Garry Marshall
I was told that I had to see this. I did. It was fine. I wasn’t bored. But it was ultimately pretty forgettable.

Brief Interviews With Hideous Men, 2009, dir. John Krasinski
I really liked this. I haven’t read the David Foster Wallace short story (stories?) on which it’s based, which is totally fine. I liked the story, I liked how weird it was. I liked the confusion about which story was real. Apparently lots of people didn’t like it, but so what.

The Cove, 2009, dir. Louie Psihoyos
This documentary (about the killing of dolphins in Japan) was fucking intense. Really good. Very scary. A thriller despite being documentary-style. Upsetting. I was really impressed.

Little Shop of Horrors, 1986, dir. Frank Oz
I’m glad I finally saw this. I saw some friends / fellow students put on the musical a few years ago, and liked it well enough. I think I also saw the original non-musical movie, long ago. But the musical was fun. I like musicals, sometimes, sort-of.

TiMER, 2009, dir. Jac Schaeffer
This was cute. I’m not the biggest romantic comedy man, but this was fun and distracting, and it was relatively clever. I definitely enjoyed it while I watched it, but I’m not sure I have anything to say now.

Exit Through the Gift Shop, 2010, dir. Banksy
Not sure that I liked this movie, but I think that was partially the intention. I like Banksy. I didn’t like the person who became the primary character of the film, Thierry Guetta / Mr. Brainwash. Don’t like his art, either. But I certainly wasn’t bored. I just.

The Cave of Forgotten Dreams, 2011, dir. Werner Herzog
I’m really glad I got to see this in 3-D, even though I’m not sure how I feel about 3-D movies. (It hurt my head.) Getting to see the cave paintings he filmed in “three dimensions” was pretty amazing. Herzog’s narration is actually relatively fun. Not the fastest-paced documentary I’ve ever seen, but I liked it a lot.

Down by Law, 1986, dir. jim Jarmusch
My sister bought this for my father for his birthday. I like Jarmusch (Coffee and Cigarettes, Dead Man, Broken Flowers). I like Tom Waits! Not the fastest-moving film I’ve seen. But seeing shots of an older New Orleans was really cool. A young Roberto Benigni was interesting. I enjoyed this.

Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, 2010, dir. Apichatpong Weerasethakul
I liked this about as much as I expected to. I tried to see it last weekend, but the screening was canceled, and so O Cinema organized a free screening mid-week. It was a slow film, but honestly I enjoyed something about it. Thailand is beautiful. The title gave more description than the movie itself did, maybe. I might’ve felt differently had I seen it alone. But with friends, it was an interesting experience.

Paprika, 2007, dir. Satoshi Kon
People really admire this director, but I didn’t much like Tokyo Godfathers, the other movie of his I saw. I liked this. I saw in in 2007, I think, with my friends Jacob and Sophie and Rachel. After I watched Inception, I’d been wanting to watch this again, to confirm my suspicion (confirmed indeed) that Paprika was so much better. It’s not a perfect movie by any means, but the animation is great, it does a wonderful job of treating dreams and confusing reality/dream, and the music is awesome. (It’s anime, in case that’s not clear.)

I should probably add in David Lynch’s Twin Peaks television program, but I haven’t finished the series yet, so I’ll write about it when I do.

Every so often I try to write down, with brief reviews perhaps, the films I’ve seen in the preceding weeks/months. Seeing as how I don’t watch movies all that often these days, this is not a regular occurrence, although I likewise have been lax at posting on the blog, and therefore I last did this not so long ago.

In any event:

The City of Lost Children (La Cité des enfants perdus), dir. Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Marc Caro, 1995
This was a weird film—but then again, it’s Jeunet, who’s the director who also did Amelie and, before this, Delicatessen. There were some things I really liked about it. I loved some of the Rube Goldberg machine style events. I liked the set design. The plot itself is very weird, and intentionally so… but I enjoyed it, as a whole.

127 Hours, dir. Danny Boyle, 2010
James Franco plays Aron Ralston, who was trapped under a boulder in Utah when he went solo exploring, and ended up cutting off his own arm to escape. I remember reading about Ralston when this happened; I really enjoyed watching this movie, although I think it could have had about thirty minutes cut (it was already only an hour-and-a-half; I understand why they didn’t cut). Franco is great; the cinematography is wonderful. It made me want to go to Utah.

Enter the Void, dir. Gaspar Noé, 2009/2010
(See my review/thoughts)
I think in the end I would say I am really glad I saw this movie, but it definitely inspired mixed feelings.

El Secreto de Sus Ojos (The Secret of Their Eyes), dir. Juan José Campanella, 2009
This movie won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film last year; I’d been meaning to see it but hadn’t gotten around to it. I really liked it, but I guess there were some things I disliked about it. Still, a pretty cool movie; I definitely recommend it.

Black Swan, dir. Darren Aronofsky, 2010
Really amazing. I know some people hated this movie (starring Natalie Portman as a dancer in the Tchaikovsky ballet), but I really liked it. It may have had something to do with the excellent company, but I think most of me liking this film had to do with it being an excellent film. There was one scene (the hospital scene near the end) that I think was wholly unnecessary, but the movie struck just the right cord of creepy with me (especially the feathers stuff—gah, but that was effective). I think of all the movies on this list, this one’s up there as the best. Although many of them were great, actually.

Wit, dir. Mike Nichols, 2001
This was an HBO movie (co-written by Nichols and Emma Thompson, who starred in it) that I watched the day after I saw Black Swan, with the same company. It’s about a woman (Thompson) dying of ovarian cancer, and struggling with her own death. It was really intense, and certainly sad. Like 127 Hours, it’s essentially a one-character film, and that’s great—Thompson is wonderful and funny and sad. Definitely recommend.

True Grit, dir. Joel & Ethan Coen, 2010
I liked this film, but I didn’t quite see why people raved about it. I liked the acting; I loved the oddly stilted English (although it reminded me a bit of Diablo Cody’s writing in Juno in a weird way). I never quite felt like I cared, though, and I’m not sure why not.

The Fighter, dir. David O. Russell, 2010
I really liked Russell’s I &heart; Huckabees, but this was better. I guess I might’ve liked it more than Black Swan, actually; it’s the first fight movie I’ve seen in years that was this good. All of the acting is amazing—woah, but Christian Bale is wonderful here—and the story is damn-good as well. The movie’s about Mark Wahlberg as a boxer; his older brother (Bale) was once reasonably successful, but now has a drug problem. Wahlberg is struggling to figure out what he wants as a man and as a boxer. There were plenty of things to love in the movie—the fact that boxing was more the vehicle than the story helped a lot, if that distinction makes sense.

The Virgin Suicides, dir. Sofia Coppola, 1999
This was Coppola’s first film, and I had never seen it. I loved the novel (by Jeffrey Eugenides, who also wrote the amazing Middlesex) when I read Emily Alves’ copy in high school. So I figured it was finally time to watch it. The movie’s really beautiful, and very Sofia Coppola. Seeing a young Josh Hartnett is pretty awesome. On the whole, I didn’t feel like my attention was entirely held. I guess it’s sort of the same reaction I had to Marie Antoinette.

I’ve been watching the David Lynch-directed TV show Twin Peaks, slowly, with my folks; it’s good fun. I also went through the entire first season of Veronica Mars, which is considerably lower brow, but also fun.

This past week was the Miami International Film Festival (MIFF), and I only went to two films this year, primarily because I was busy.

Black Field (Mavro livadi), dir. Vardis Marinakis, 2009/2011
I saw this movie last weekend with two high school friends. It was kind of ridiculous. Definitely my least favorite of the movies in this post. It’s about a convent in Greece in the 1600s, where a wounded Janissary who has desserted is nursed back to health by the sisters, and about the young nun who becomes fascinated by him. The general story was, sure, interesting. But the plot was somewhat convoluted and didn’t really follow; the ending left me thinking, “Wait, what?”

Incendies, dir. Denis Villeneuve, 2010
This French-Canadian film was pretty wonderful, if occasionally a wee bit over-the-top; I just watched it last night. It was nominated for an Academy Award, although it was beat out by another film that was at MIFF (last weekend), which I didn’t make it to. It did, however, win a bunch of Genie Awards, Canada’s highest film prize. Understandably so. It’s about twins whose mother dies and, in her will, leaves them a mystery which they unravel during the film. It’s based on a play (whose title is translated to English as Scorched, although the word incendies means fires/blazes; the movie is presented without a translation for the title). I have several criticisms beyond that “occasionally a wee bit over-the-top,” but I was definitely perfectly engaged throughout the film, and I really liked the acting, the setting, and the Radiohead soundtrack (although I’m sure some people will dislike this). I have mixed feelings about the fact that they chose to set the film in an unnamed, imaginary Arabic country; more than anything, the mixed feelings have to do with my being confused most of the film about where they were. (Some of the movie took place in Canada, but much of it did not.) I thought it could be Lebanon, but they intentionally used names that could be real but were not. (Obviously, this was intentional; I think it was probably a good move, but it is mildly confusing.) In any case, a really excellent movie, and a moving one (hah!).

Okay, that’s the present.

I haven’t been an avid movie-watcher in the past while, so I’ve been holding off on posting about the films I’ve watched until they built up a bit. Well, here are some few reviews. For a change, let’s go in reverse order. In fact, I’ll start with movies I want to see — the NYT just did a section on upcoming releases.

releasing Dec. 25: L’Illusionniste (The Illusionist), dir. Sylvain Chomet. I read about this movie a few months ago; Chomet is the guy who made The Triplets of Belleville, and this movie looks wonderful. It’s animated, which is obvious if you’ve seen Triplets. The story behind the film is that Jacques Tati, this famous French comedian/director, wrote an unfinished screenplay; his daughter conceived of animating it and passed it on to Chomet, who finally made the film. The plot is about a magician and his relationship with a young girl who thinks he does real magic. I don’t really know more, but I’m excited nonetheless.

releasing Dec. 10: The Tempest, dir. Julie Taymor. She’s the one who did Across the Universe and, more importantly, 1999′s amazing Titus (Andronicus). She makes Prospero into a woman (played by Helen Mirren), but I’m excited. Like: Shakespeare. Like: Taymor.

releasing Dec. 3: Black Swan, dir. Darren Aronofsky (of Requiem for a Dream and Pi fame). Natalie Portman is a ballerina who goes crazy while training for dancing the lead in Swan Lake. Everything I’ve heard sounds good.

releasing Nov. 5: 127 Hours, dir. Danny Boyle. (See: Trainspotting, 28 Days Later.) Strangely, I often think of Boyle and Aronofsky as similar, because Trainspotting and Requiem are such strangely parallel films. Anyway, this movie is about Aron Ralston, the real-life hiker who cut off his arm to free himself from being trapped under a boulder. James Franco plays him. It will be awesome.

The rest of these I’ve seen:

Howl (2010), dir. Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman. Starring: James Franco as Allen Ginsberg. Another movie carried primarily by Franco, this is more or less an art film, about Ginsberg’s marvelous poem and also about Allen Ginsberg. The movie has six layers, interspersed (I should note from the first that Franco plays Ginsberg in all of these; there is no documentary footage): (1) an interview with Ginsberg, quoting directly from a real interview, and delving into (2) scenes from Ginsberg’s recent past, re-enacted; (3) Ginsberg’s writing of “Howl,” at a type-writer, illustrated by (4) animated sequences showing interpretations of the poem as it is read; (5) Ginsberg’s first live reading of the poem in 1955, in front of an audience in San Francisco; (6) segments (drawn from court records) of the obscenity trial of Lawrence Ferlinghetti, for publishing the book.

Obviously, only the last and first segments are really narrative (spoiler: they win the trial); 3, 4, & 5 are all just the poem. Which is awesome, and beautiful — but really only interesting if you like the poem. Which I do — so I say, go see the film. But maybe read the poem first.

They finish with him reading “Footnote to Howl,” which is one of my favorite poems. I kind of like the part where it shows up in The Best of Youth (see: youtube: scene from The Best of Youth, skip to 3:00), too. But it’s a great poem.

Paranormal Activity (2007), dir. Oren Peli. I watched this Friday night with my friend Briana and her boyfriend. I liked it all right, I guess — I like the way they play with the narrative by having it be in the documentary style — but it’s not particularly novel, and the movie didn’t really scare me at all. Maybe it would have more if I had any sort of belief in these things.

The Secret of Kells (2009/2010), dir. Tomm Moore and Nora Twomey. This is an animated movie; it was nominated for an Oscar this year, and with good reason (although it lost to Up; stiff competition this year). It’s absolutely gorgeous; they took a lot of time in the art, and it shows. It’s much more art-based than a Pixar film, which is nice but a bit un-modern in a way that feels almost strange after so much art that’s not actually hand-drawn. It’s about a young boy living in a monastery during the 9th century; he helps to illuminate a biblical text. I really don’t think you need to know more, but suffice to say that there are threats to the art, to the place they live, and to the boy’s world-view. Also a really cool girl living in the forest. I watched this with my mother a few weeks ago, on Netflix Instant; we both really enjoyed it.

Outrage (2009), dir. Kirby Dick. This was a documentary about anti-gay rhetoric, as practiced and promoted by politicians, especially closeted gay politicians. It had some really good interviews, and focused on hypocrisy. I thought it was reasonably well-made, and I thought they at the very least did a good job of trying to find evidence for what they were claiming. I’d also say I learned some stuff I didn’t know, although perhaps not all that much.

Banlieue 13 (2004; District 13 / District B13), dir. Pierre Morel. This is a ridiculous action movie, which I primarily liked because I think parkour (freerunning) is awesome. It’s French, the action is good and done without wires, the acting is fine, the plot is interesting. Ain’t that enough?

Nowhere Boy (2009, released 2010), dir. Sam Taylor-Wood. This film is about John Lennon when he was a teenager. It’s pretty good; I read the review in Slate and thought it sounded good which it was. She makes some good points in the review, including the weirdness of seeing Aaron Johnson (from Kick-Ass) play John Lennon, but you get used to that. All in all, I really enjoyed this movie. As with other Beatles movies (Across the Universe comes to mind), if you love the Beatles (I like them, but love isn’t the word I’d use) you might hate it, but you also might like it. Otherwise, it’s a movie with a great soundtrack, a good story, and some quite good acting.

Tokyo Godfathers (2003), dir. Satoshi Kon. I watched this primarily because the director just passed away. I’d seen his film Paprika, which I thought was really cool and insane (it’s the film that I most connect to Inception because of the way it treats dreams); this was not as good. It’s anime, which I am willing to like when it’s done well, and the art is actually quite good, but the characters weren’t particularly likable and the plot was odd. It’s about three homeless people — a runaway girl, an older bum, and a drag queen — and the baby they discover on Christmas eve, and try to return to its mother. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t terribly exciting either.

Planet Terror (2007, dir. Robert Rodriguez) and Death Proof (2007, dir. Quentin Tarantino) — together, these were released as Grindhouse. I didn’t end up seeing these back-to-back as I was supposed to. Then again, they weren’t released with the ridiculous previews, so I couldn’t've re-created the theatrical experience anyway. I wasn’t a big fan. I know what they were getting at, but Planet Terror was a bit too dumb, and Death Proof a bit too overtly misogynistic. I liked parts of both of them, but was overall kind of bored.

Yossi and Jagger (2002), dir. Eytan Fox. I liked this Israeli film about two gay soldiers on the border with Lebanon, and their relationship. It’s cheaply made, and it shows. But I found the story interesting enough. I wouldn’t recommend it highly, but I also wouldn’t knock it down.

Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009), dir. Wes Anderson. This animated film, based on the Roald Dahl book, was a lot of fun. I’m assuming most people have seen it, which is probably inaccurate but whatever. It’s quite good. Definitely worth seeing, if not just for the fact that it’s stop-motion animation, and that’s impressively done.

Scott Pilgrim vs. The World (2010), dir. Edgar Wright. I like Michael Cera; I like comic books. Having said that: I also liked this film. I thought the directing very cleverly evoked comics (in general), and played well with the comic book it’s based on (I’m on the fourth volume now). The plot is that Scott Pilgrim, a 22-year-old Canadian dating a 17-year-old, suddenly meets the (literal) girl of his dreams, Ramona Flowers, and falls for her — but in order to date her, he has to defeat her seven evil ex-es (in battle). In the movie, Jason Schwartzman plays the head of the evil ex-es. There’s been some criticism of the way the film dropped female characters, but as a romance and as a comedy and even as an action-film (sort of) it does quite well. I enjoyed it, and some parts were really excellent.

Marie Antoinette (2006), dir. Sofia Coppola. I’d never seen this, and I’m glad I finally did, although the point that it was kind of boring was not lost on me. I liked the filming, the art direction, the a-historical stance, and so forth. I enjoyed the not-quite-vapidness of Kirsten Dunst’s character. Jason Schwartzman is in this one, too, as her husband; he does quite well. But all in all, I kind of wished it were shorter.

The Prestige (2006), dir. Christopher Nolan. I’ve liked Nolan since I saw Memento (I own it on VHS!). I actually have seen all of his movies but his first, now that I take a look. I’ll have to see that one, too. Anyway — I had never gotten around to seeing this one, for whatever reason. I’ve associated it with the similarly-themed film released around the same time, Neil Burger’s The Illusionist (not to be confused with The Illusionist at the top of this entry), starring Edward Norton, but never saw this one, which was often compared favorably to that film. The Prestige stars Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale; they’re both excellent as rival stage magicians. Essentially, the story is that they both keep on one-upping the other. Bale’s character has a trick that Jackman’s cannot replicate, so he tries to figure it out, and does him one better. I liked a lot about the film, although had some reservations at the ending.

At some point, I watched Little Ashes (dir. Paul Morrison, 2008) and An Education (dir. Lone Scherfig, 2009); I don’t think I ever wrote about them. The former was kind of crap, about Lorca and Dalí but with Robert Pattinson and a kind of weird imagined story. The latter was actually really good, and a lot better than the title might suggest. I probably saw it in April, though.

Anyway, a bunch of good movies, right?