Tag Archives: Melancholia

by

At The Theater 2012 #1: Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy is a slow movie. It’s almost Melanchoia-slow. It’s hard to keep a movie suspenseful when the pacing is so slow. The filmmakers didn’t have to give it the breakneck pace of an action movie, but I will gladly point them to The Usual Suspects and the films of Albert Hitchcock as examples of suspenses that don’t have me fighting the urge to take a nap.

I never read the book. Were the characters dealing with a lot of inner thoughts? Because there were a lot of shots of people staring at each other or at the walls.

But what Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy did well, it did extremely well. Spies are portrayed as real people in this movie, not the jazzed up supermen of James Bond movies. Their actions and their world, where no one is sure who can be trusted, leaves marks on their psyches and their relationships. Maybe that’s why the characters spend so much time staring at things: they are always trying to figure things out.

Benedict Cumberatch performance was my favorite in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy.
Closey followed by Mark Strong.

The other best aspect of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy was the costumes, which were amazing, and set the film clearly in the 1970s.

The score was also amazing. I would bet on this score winning Best Original Score at the Oscars, and that’s without having heard the others.

I wouldn’t recommend seeing Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. The slow pace keeps the movie form being engaging. Then again, maybe it’s a movie in which my opinion of it will drastically change upon a second viewing. We’ll have to see.

by

At The Theater 2011 #15: Melancholia

Wow, that was a boring movie. Hard-core boring. Like Human Centipede boring. I’ve never rooted for a planet to smash into the earth the way I did in this movie. Dear Lars von Trier, how do you make a movie about a planet hitting the earth so boring?
This should be exciting!
I wanted to fall asleep in Melancholia, but I fought against it. And it was a hard fight. But I was convinced that if I fell asleep I would miss the one exciting scene in the movie. So I stayed awake for the whole movie. That exciting scene never came. I’m convinced half the theater was asleep when the credits were rolling.

I’m not going to completely hate on Melancholia. It’s a beautifully shot movie. It’s as beautiful as it is boring. The cinematographer deserves an award.

 SPOILERS FOLLOW AFTER THESE TWO BEAUTIFUL, BORING STILLS…
So beautiful…So boring…



Melancholia is told in two parts, each named after one of the two sisters in the movie. The first part, Justine, is about Kirsten Dunst’s character Justine’s wedding, held at the massive estate of her sister, Claire (Charlotte Gainsbourg) and her brother-in-law, John (Kiefer Sutherland). The wedding doesn’t go well. The bride and groom arrive hours late. Justine is never where she’s supposed to be. Oh, and she fucks some other guy on John’s lawn. So it’s not surprising when her new husband bolts at the end of the night. If only I had his foresight.

Don’t be fooled by the smiles. This is the wedding from hell.

The second part of the movie, Claire, is where the movie really becomes doused in Nyquil. Justine, super-depressed, moves in with Claire and John. Justine can’t take of herself, so Claire does. John seems to hate Justine, and as the movie progresses, so do I. Oh, and remember that entire first half of the movie you just watched? It has almost nothing to do with the second half.

When John realizes that the rogue planet Melancholia is not going to do a fly-by and will actually hit Earth, he offs himself. How could you betray me like that, John? Didn’t you think about the viewer, fighting as hard as he could to stay awake, clinging to your snark to get through the movie? Thanks for nothing, dick.

If you suffer from insomnia, Melancholia is a relatively cheap cure.