Friday, December 3, 2010

Movies That Actually Look Good

So around this time of year I'm usually going bonkers because there would be about 5000 amazing looking movies coming out. The holiday crowd-pleasers plus the real meaty Oscar-bait. No such luck this year, lucky for my wallet I suppose, bad for movies. This year saw a pretty pithy array of mediocre movies-- not a host of dreadful ones, but not alot of greats (from what I've seen and also read/gathered). All that there really was were alot of promising kid movies (Toy Story 3, Despicable Me, this month's Tangled), INCEPTION, crushing everything over the summer, and The Social Network, making all of the film reviewers seizure (rightfully so, I still think the movie's pretty damn brilliant). Personally, I also really like the smaller dramas Ghost Writer and Greenberg, but I am in the minority. The Town was pretty good, though I thought Affleck's first movie, Gone Baby Gone, was more emotionally connective. Anyway, all of those movies were far between and to me only The Social Network was completely satisfying (Inception, though totally amazing, fails to meet even the tip of its potential, sorry). So. It's December, and what have we? So far as I can tell, only the following hold much promise:

Black Swan

The end of that trailer gives me the creeps.

True Grit

Definitely the film I've been looking forward to the most. Freaking Coens. I should have known it'd be you, making the Western awesome again. I should have known!

How Do You Know?

This could be really good and satisfyingly As Good As It Gets-ish, or really lame, half-baked, meandery ending ala Spanglish. I don't like the clip of Reese Witherspoon talking about how she doesn't know if she has what it takes, trying to look like she's just a girl hanging out in her oversized sweater (looking perfectly stylized casual), and the SIGNIFICANT LOOKS are overused, but still, it seems really timely and relatable and solid. Or it could be. Anyway, I really like seeing Owen Wilson in a role of substance again. He hasn't done one since he tried to kill himself.

The King's Speech

A little predictably concieved, but nevertheless totally appealing. Looks like compelling stuff, and I love Bonham-Carter and Geoffrey Rush. And Colin Firth can be very good. When filmmakers take the grand scale of history and put it in terms of the individual, even if that individual is royalty, it becomes 10X more compelling.

Somewhere

Sofia Coppola is one of my favorite people. This looks beautiful-- nothing terribly new and different, but another nice, soft cloud of introspection with lots of silent character development (I'm not mocking-- she is actually a genius at developing characters with no dialogue at all). Somehow I feel she's not been at her best lately, but even if this sucks I know I'll enjoy looking at it. Her films give me such a meloncholy feeling.

And then... the maybe?'s

The Fighter

I think Mark Wahlberg in leading roles generally blows, but I'm really intrigued by Christian Bale doing what he does best here. Looks like he may be acting again (not that physical transformation implies that, but it looks like an interesting role for him, finally, after all this Batman Terminator business and sucking hard in Public Enemies). Anyway, I hope the concentration is primarily on the brother/brother relationship. I'm 50/50 on this one. Also, the part where Mark says "not you, not you, and not you!" cracks me up. What? No!

Tron

Mmmeh. It looks cool, but it could get old very fast. I do remember liking the old one, though, and I think it's awesome that technology now allows the Tron-cars to look fantastic (whereas in the old one... sad. so, so sad)

Company Men

I really want this to be good, and not a wad of propaganda to cheer up unemployed, underpaid America. The end of this does look dangerously cheesy, but there's a nice warmth and realism to it that I like. Also, I like Tommy Lee Jones. Also, I really like Kevin Costner in these kinds of roles. Also, the part where his wife says "you have ME" does make me almost tear up. Anyway, I'm not sure about it, but I did just read a glowing review of it from EW, so maybe it's not too schmaltzy. Time shall tell.

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