Aihearkisto: Cinema

Water For Elephants

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Water for Elephants is a romantic drama movie based on Sara Gruen’s historic novel. The film is directed by Francis Lawrence and it was released on April 21, 2011. It stars well known actors like Reese Witherspoon and Twilight saga star Robert Pattinson.

PLOT

The movie starts with old retired Jacob Jankowski who wants to see circus performance. Staff tells him that the show is over and offers to call retirement home to pick him up. Suddenly Jacob shares his own story about Benzini Brothers Circus.

The flashback takes us all the way to Jakob’s college time. First his parents die in a car accident and Jacob leaves home and all behind – he jumps on Benzini Brothers Circus train. Right then and there the real adventure begins.

The beginning in circus is not easy, Jacob tells he have studied veterinary science and he become circus’ vet. First thing he kills circus’ star attraction Silver(horse), because the horse is in huge pain. The owner August is not too happy about it and makes it clear to Jacob that his words are the law. For Silver’s replacement August buys an elephant, Rosie and names Jacob to train the elephant.

Marlena, August’s wife, performed with Silver, so now she had to also learn to perform with Rosie. This only brings Jacob and Marlena closer to each other. August gets frustrated with Rosie and beats her. After that Jacob notices that Rosie can understand only Polish. With that remark he becomes a hero.

Circus succeeds and August is happy. Suddenly he notices that his wife and young polish boy have fell in love. He gets angry and hits Marlena and then Jacob. Jacob and Marlena try to run away but they fail and August’s men find them. Jacob doesn’t give up – he returns to circus. That day, Benzini Brothers Circus’ last day, is full of action.

Rosie, the clever elephant kills awful August and the hole circus dies. Jacob and Marlena live happily ever after with Rosie.

The story ends and old Jacob asks for job in a circus.

 

CHARACTERS

Robert Pattinson as Jacob Jankowski – Sweet Polish boy who falls in love with Marlena – owner’s wife.

Reese Witherspoon as Marlene Rosenbluth – Beautiful performer, owner’s wife who falls in love with Jacob.

Christoph Waltz as August Rosenbluth – Circus’ owner, ruthless man who kills people and animals to keep the circus going.

There was plenty other people – circus’ staff, who became important to Jacob but they didn’t affect significantly on the plot.

 

CAMERAWORK

The filming is by Rogrigo Prieto. I liked the way the movie was shooted and I think it’s excellent.  It brought the needed feeling to otherside of the screen. Editing is by Alan Edward Bell. I think that also Bell done it well, none of the deleted scenes wouldn’t made the movie any better.

 

SOUNDTRACK

Film’s music is by James Newton Howard. As I said before the feeling came across the movie in filming but also in music. All of the film’s music was composed strictly for the film.

Atonement

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Atonement is a Drama Mystery film made in 2007 based on a bestseller novel of the same name written by Ian McEwan. The director of the film Joe Wright has done some very successful films during the last eight years. One of his most critically acclaimed films is Pride & Prejudice in which Keira Knightley plays the main character Elizabeth Bennet.

Keira Knightley reunites with director Joe Wright in Atonement in which she plays Cecilia Tallis, the elder one of the Tallis sisters. Cecilia is very protective of her little sister Briony, although she finds her very condescending. Younger Briony Tallis is played by Saoirse Ronan and later on by Romola Garai. James McAvoy was cast as Robbie Turner after Joe Wright had tried to work with him in the past. Robbie is the son of the Tallis charlady and he used to be very good friends with the Tallis children before noticing the class difference between them. Basically Atonement is a story about how an innocent young girl tells a lie which changes the lives of her beloved ones and how she desires for atonement. The young girl, Briony, lies about her sister being raped by Robbie whom she thinks has also raped her family friend Lola. Although she is unsure about what actually happened she still carries on with her lie. After this the two lovers Robbie and Cecilia are divided by this lie and also by the II World War, which is an important theme throughout the film.

The beautiful film score is composed by Italian composer Dario Marianelli, who has worked with Joe Wright in four of his films. Dario has composed different themes for the movie, but the most important one has to be little Briony’s theme which consists mostly of sounds from an old typewriter. It fits beautifully with the tension between all of the main characters.

The Setting of the film is magnificent. A certain scene in the film caught my eye: the beautiful but at the same time destructive shot of the Dunkirk evacuation during the II World War. Also the cast of the film was full of great British actors. I fell in love especially with James McAvoy’s performance because of his pure, relatable and touching interpretation as Robbie Turner. I got interested in the film because of Keira Knightley who is an old favorite of mine, but I also found new talent like Saoirse Ronan. She is very young in the film but her age didn’t prevent her from giving an amazing performance.

All and all this film made a great impression on me. The story, the beautiful score, the acting and the beautiful cinematography make it an enjoyable but also a devastating film to watch. The story will stay with you for a long time after watching it.

atonement

Wuthering Heights (2009)

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Wuthering Heights is a romantic movie and based on the novel by Emily Brontë (released 1847). This old love story has inspired many directors particularly since 1939, when the first film of the story was released. I watched version of the motion which was released in 2009 and directed by Coky Giedroyc.

Wuthering Heights is a traditional and unique romantic movie at the same time. It tells Cathy Earnshaws and Heathcliffs story. Next I’ll tell a little bit about the plot, so if you don’t want to know, stop reading! So, Cathy and Heathcliff are childhood friends, whose friendship turn into love. They can’t get married because Cathy has a highter social status than Heathcliff. Heathcliff goes away, and Cathy marries Edgar Linton. Later Heathcliff comes back, but Cathy is pregnant to Linton. Cathy gives birth to a little girl and dies herself in the birth. Cathy and Heathcliff both knew that they love each other, despite they both got married with someone else. In a sense they get each other in the end, in a sense not. Anyway, their love story is so touching, love between them is passionate and strong and it’ll never finish.

There are two actors who starring Wuthering Heights; Charlotte Riley (Cathy Earnshaw) and Tom Hardy (Heathcliff). Their roles have been criticized, but my own opinion is, that they suit quit well in their roles. I’ve red later that Riley and Hardy got engaged after the film, and you can notice their chemistry in the motion. Some scenes are a little bit too dramatic and make me smile though I must be touched. And other scenes make me cry, too.

Camerawork is usual and classic, I don’t have nothing to say about it. There aren’t any special effects in the film, too, and only a little bit music. At the beginning music creates exciting feeling and with the picture it’s nearly scary.

I can’t decide if I like the movie or not. I like it at the first sight, but when I watched it second time, I was more critical. I don’t believe I would watch the film third time. Nevertheless, the story is very beautiful, and I can recommend Wuthering Heights to everyone, who likes romantic movies. This is the motion, which worth to watch; but maybe one time is enough!

The hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

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The hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (year of release is 2012), the long-awaited fantasy adventure film directed by Peter Jackson. Movie is the first of a three-part film adaptation of the novel The Hobbit (1937, by J.R.R. Tolkien). The script is written by Jackson and his collaborators Guillermo del Toro, Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens. Story’s principal character is Martin Freeman who act the part of Hobbit Bilbo Baggins. Other important actors of film are Richard Armitage (Thorin Oakenshield), Ian McKellen (wizard Gandalf).
An Unexpected Journey –story set sixty years before The lord of the Rings in Middle-earth. Movie’s principal character in young Bilbo Baggins whose life change completely by the wizard Gandalf: Bilbo is convinced by the wizard Gandalf the Grey to accompany thirteen dwarves (Thorin, Balin, Dwalin, Nori, Dori, Ori, Oin, Gloin, Fili, Kili, Bifur, Bofur and Bombur) led by the legendary warrior Thorin Oakenshield. Bilbo reluctantly joins the company on their journey to the Lonely Mountain. Then starts exciting adventure, the quest to reclaim dwarves stolen home the Lonely Mountain from Smaug the dragon. To achieve their goal they have to go across middle-earth and encounter many scary threats such as orcs, trolls, enormous colossuses made by stone and, of course, Gollum.
The film looks beautiful, characters are fun and memorable, and the special effects look amazing. Bilbo is pleasant and brave little man and Dwarves are loyal to each other, really pedantic and materialistic and Gandalf old and wise wizard.
Before I see the movie I had high impressions that it would be amazing fantasy story because the legendary Lord of the Rings have also been great, famous and award-winning movies. As I watched the movie I noticed more and more of how good it really is! After seeing the movie I wished the other parts of hobbit could come out as soon as possible !
All in all, the hobbit: An Unexpected Journey has good plot setup and great action but some scenes were too long I recommend this movie to fan of fantasy or Tolkien’s novels.. If you enjoyed entering Middle Earth over a decade ago, then I highly suggest watching the Hobbit.

Written by Emmaa

Rogue Assassin (War)

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Rogue Assassin (also known as War) is a typical action film, though it has a fairly boring name. The summary of the plot sounds just as boring as the name of the movie: an FBI-agent dies as a bystander in the competition between two criminal organizations(Yakuza versus Chinese Triads), and his partner starts chasing the killer for revenge.

Altough the plot of Rogue Assasin isn’t the most imaginative, the movie has a certain tension, which leads to that the movie can be watched again and again. The plot contains lots of clichés such as ninjas with samuraiswords, rule breaking agents and mob bosses defending their honour. There is also some problems in the plot, but a normal viewer doesn’t pay attentintion to those, since the main focus is on the action.

Jet Li makes brilliant work as an assassin named Rogue. Stone-faced Li is an ideal choise for this role, and he is very believable as an ruthless killer. The character of Rogue is told to have worked for CIA, but for some reason he started to work for Yakuza and help them with their competition with the triads. Suddenly Rogue begins to kill people also from the Yakuza, secretly collecting fees from both sides. The film tries to give the impression that Rogue is just greedy and wants to push the two factions in full war in order to get more money, but the viewer can easily see that there is something more complex behind Rogue. The real motive of Rogue is kept as a secret till the end, and the reveal ads a quite intresting twist to the movie.

The second main character is John Crawford (played by Jason Statham), an angry and frustrated FBI’s special agent who has tried to catch the murderer of his partner over three years. The revenge soon becomes an obsession, and Crawford stops following the rules – so the suspects are usually beaten and even slightly tortured. Jason Statham is definitely one of the best action actors of  today, however in my opinion Statham is unimportant for this movie – he could be easily replaced with a fresh and unknow actor, to emphasize Li’s great performance – besides, Statham is a bit too rough to be an agent.

So there are some problems with the casting and the plot, but Rogue Assassin is an action movie, so the action scenes are what matters the most. And this movie contains a lot of action. Fist fights, gun fights, sword fights, car chase, motorcycle chase, explosions. And everything is very well done. Overall I’m very pleased with the action scenes and the special effects, tough the final fight could have been a bit longer.

So this isn’t a masterpiece worth of Oscars, but Rogue Assassin is still a very good flick which fits perfectly for friday night if you want some action.

Saw

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Saw is an indepentend horror film directed by James Wann. It’s premiere was in 2004.It was the first installment in the franchise, there are seven Saw-films overall. Saw’s plot starts when two men wake up chained in a dilapitated bathroom, with no clue how they ended up in there. In the middle of the room lies a dead man who has shot himself in the head. These two men, doctor Lawrence Gordon(Cary Elwes) and Adam(Leigh Whannell) ,who is a photographer, are given instructions how to escape this trap via microcassette recorder. Lawrence must kill Adam before the time runs out or else his family will be murdered. Adam is told simply to escape the room. Elsewhere the police are trying to catch the man who sets up these ”games”, the jigsaw killer.

The start of the film creates a very interesting layout to it and keeps the viewer interested. The plot is very well written overall, it stays exciting for the entire movie, despite the fact that Saw has a slower tempo than it’s sequels. It tells bit by bit a little more from this ”jigsaw killer’s” other victims and deepens Lawrence’s and Adam’s characters by revealing things from their past and by telling more from their backround. But very big part of the film is located in that single room where these two man are chained in, and still it manages to stay entertainig. This partially explains the fact that Saw was shot only in 18 days, which is very fast for a feature film.

Altough Saw had only about 1 million dollar budget, it looks and sounds very good. All the gory effects that are seen in it look very beliavable and will definitenely cause shudder in the viewer. Speaking of gore, there is not that much of it in Saw compared to it’s sequels, it has been used only (at least mostly) when the progression of story requires it and it has been carried out with good taste. Also the movie has a psycolochigal aspect to it, for it’s theme is ”How much blood would you shed to stay alive?”. Saw also gets a big plus from an epic soundtrack which is very memorable, especially the song at the end.

The characters in Saw are well written and believable with their faults and personal problems. But the absolute star of the film is the jigsaw killer, who is not a generic superpowered horror movie killer, instead he is a 54-year-old cancer patient, with at least questionable ideology. He wants to ”cure” people and make them learn appreciate life through these lethal traps he refers to as ”games”. There is always a way to escape, but not without infilcting terrible damage and pain to yourself. Also Jigsaw is very intelligent and plans everything he does very carefully. The casting for the movie is well made, Cary Elwes and Leigh Whannell do their job very well. And there is no bad performance seen in the film from anyone. But again, Tobin Bell does an astonishing job as the Jigsaw, and I couldn’t come up with a better man for the role. You can see the passion he put into his character from his acting.

Saw made a big impression on me, and I’d recommend it to anyone who likes well made horror films. The movie’s ending is very suprising and will definitely give you goose bumps. I also liked Saw’s brilliant and very interesting plot, which made me want to watch the second movie instantly. It is hard to find anything negative to say about the film, Saw is one the most succesful horror movie franchises in this century and in my opinion not without a reason!

Moscow doesn’t believe in tears

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Moscow doesn’t believe in tears (Moskva slezam ne verit) is a Soviet movie that was directed by Vladimir Menshov and released in 1979. It is a melodrama about the life of three women who move from the countryside to Moscow in search for a better life. It was once a real blockbuster in the Soviet Union.

The story begins when Katja (Vera Alentova), Ljuda (Irina Muravyova) and Antonina (Raysa Ryazanova) move to a university dormitory in Moscow. They all came there for a good education, job and a husband. It turns out that life doesn’t always go the way you wanted it to go. Katja doesn’t pass the exam to a university and has to keep working in a factory. Katja and Ljuda fall in love at a party and after dating for awhile Katja becomes pregnant. When Rudolf (Juri Vasiljev) finds out that Katja has been lying to him  about her life including her job,  education and financial situation, he dumps her. At this point Antonina and Ljuda are married and Katja is raising her baby girl alone.

The movie is divided into two parts. The second part starts after about 15 years. Katja is a director in a factory, her daughter is a teenager and she lives in her own apartment. Only one thing’s missing from Katja´s life; a husband. Later on a local train she meets her future husband, Georgi (Aleksei Batalov). When everything is finally going the right way, Katja’s ex-boyfriend turns up demanding to meet his daughter. Because of this Georgi gets hurt and  disappears for a week.  Later Ljuda’s husband found Georgi, had a proper conversation with vodka and anchovy, and Georgi decides to come back to Katja. The movie ends with Katja saying twice “How long have I been looking for you” .

The actors of the film are the best I’ve ever seen. The way they act is something you rarely get to see nowdays. Especially Irina Muravyova’s performance stood out in a good way. Also the casting was well considered. The roles were like made to the actors.

There are no special effects in this movie and I personally think that it doesn’t even need any. It’s plot, great actors, beautiful music and sarcastic Russian humour do the trick all by themselves. I would recommend this movie to everyone who wants to see something different than usually.

Police Academy

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Police academy is a comedy film made in 1984 which was directed by Hugh Wilson and produced by Paul Maslansky. The film was released on the 23rd of March ’84 and the running time was around 96 minutes.  It is the first of the seven movies in the Police academy ‘’series’’, and in my opinion, it’s the best one of them by far.

The plot is basically this: The local police force has a severe shortage of police officers so the chief police decides to lower the requirements that are used to rule out the not so great candidates. This means, that the general level of physical, and sometimes mental wellbeing within the new police officers is drastically worse. A lot of conversations are held so that it could be decided, whether the new candidates will stay or not. Commander Eric Lassard has a different opinion. He thinks that the future police officers should stay and finish the academy. And in fact he’s right, because they save the town from a horrifying riot that suddenly occurred.

The characters are very memorable. Everybody, who has seen a Police academy-movie, is able to name at least one character. This is mostly due to the fact that every character has his/her own special ‘’ feature’’, for example, cadet Larwell Jones, played by Michael Winslow  is truly outstanding with his famous sound-effects. There are also many other memorable actors, such as Steve Guttenberg ( as cadet Carey Mahoney) and Bubba Smith ( as cadet Moses Hightower). Hightower’s name is actually ‘’true’’, because of his great length and strength. One funny pair of characters is Thaddeus Harris and Carl Proctor. They interact with each other like no other I’ve ever seen. So in other words, the actors are wisely chosen and they give their characters a personal ‘’touch’’.

The movie was filmed entirely in Toronto Canada and the various studio sequences were filmed at Lakeshore Studios. The camerawork is in general very good indeed and the soundtrack seems to fit into the movie rather well. The soundtrack consists of songs, that are mostly very ‘’bluesy’’. Most of the songs are performed by a musical group called Jack Mack and the heart attack. But undoubtedly the most famous songs of the soundtrack are the march at the beginning of the movie, and the melody, which starts to play at the ‘’Blue Oyster’’ bar. But one of the most remembered things about all of the seven Police Academy-movies has to be the awesome sound-effects performed by Michael Winslow.

All in all it could be said, that the movie is really excellent in pretty much every way. The soundtrack fits to the movies age perfectly with its bluesy sound from the 1980’s. In my opinion this movie should belong to the top 10 comedy movies ever made. But there is an intriguing question; what in the name of all that’s holy were they thinking, when they decided to make 6 sequels to this masterpiece?

Written by Tomi

The Young Victoria

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The Young Victoria

The film is describing 1800´s history, when 18 years old Victoria became the queen of United Kingdom. The plot of film based on true story, which increased film´s interesting and gave information about real history. Film´s plot was a little bit drag and in the beginning it was difficult to get into the plot. In the beginning film described too much about that times history and scheming to Victoria, because everyone wanted to take advantage of her. I think that the film should been more interesting from the beginning if you had previous knowledge of that topic. The film´s plot could have been clearer. The film bettered toward of the end, because you get into plot. I would have wanted a little bit less policy and history and more describing about personal life of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. Their life described only in general level. The film included also funny scenes. The film´s rate of progressing was slowly but sometimes it still moved on long steps. The Young Victoria is all in all impressive film.

 The films characters were true and they have lived in during the 1800s. The Queen Victoria is historically significant person and many people have previous information about her, which helped to watching in question film. Characters of film were believable and their appearance and costumes was invested in very much. In the film was also involved animals and they brought more authenticity.

The films characters not really develop in the story line at all because they are only described in Queen´s youth years.

 The film has good and delightful actresses. Emily Blunt (Queen Victoria) acts the leading role excellently and she empathizes to her character amazing well such as Rupert Friend, who plays Price Albert. Also others actresses plays their roles well, but they maybe stayed in the shadow such as Paul Bettany who plays Lord Melbourne.

 Genre of the film was romantic drama, but I think that movie emphasized too much history and policy. The film would be able to go beneath the surface and describe more in-depth their personal life.

Written by Elisa

The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift

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The third movie of The Fast and the Furious is Tokyo Drift. This movie is Japanese-American illegal street racing action film. Tokyo Drift was released in 2006 and it was directed by Justin Lin. The movie was shot in Tokyo and parts of Los Angeles. This third movie part of The Fast and the Furious is very different from earlier movies of The Fast and the Furious,because this movie has changed for example all actors and film crew ..

The plot tells a young boy, Sean Boswell, who likes drive to really fast. Sean’s passion is driving fast and that is the reason why Sean get into trouble with the police. Sean’s many strifes with the polices lead  to that he had to move to his father to the other side of the world. When Sean moves to his father to Japan, he avoid prison. Sean should stop to drive fast by car but he get to know drift in Japan. He meet also a girl and her boyfriend. Boyfriend doens’t like Sean and that’s why he challenge Sean in many different and dangerous drift-race. So, how does it happen, it have to see..!

In my opinion the actors of the movie is good even many people says that the actors of the movie sucks. I don’t no why…I can’t  maybe look the actors critically but i think the actors suit their own roles. Camerawork and special effects of the movie have really successful. The movie has really cool tuning cars, while slide down radical curves. That movie is also filmed really well, excellent perspectives. Soundtrack is good and suit to scenses. Stunts and amazing race acts  of the movie get viewers to enjoy and get to feel a few extra heartbeat. In my and many other people’s opinion the movie is known for cool tuning cars, amazing races and half-naked women.