20 east

As Zosia is away we have had a chance to catch up on some films. The summer season is not the best time to get out there so we had to supplement with a few DVDs as well. I tend to keep my reviews simple! IMDb scores in brackets after the titles.

Terminator Salvation (7.0) – kind of okay if you like action films. This whole thing about not letting the machines kill John Connor is really boring now. As is pouring molten metal on the bad robot guy and a few other things that keep cropping up. Hopefully the last we’ll see of this franchise.

Public Enemies (7.6) – Why do all 30’s gangster films have to steal images from the Grand Central Station scene in “The Untouchables”? This was good but it could have been a lot better. Bad casting of Christian Bale, or bad acting. I’d have to question the direction too. Also it seemed to be shot in very high definition and if the instructions for the correct viewing distance for a HD TV are correct, we should have been sitting in Poznan to have optimum viewing pleasure given the size of the screen! Hard to keep track of HD shots that are moving fast. To be honest, if you want a film like this I’d recommend The Untouchables (8.0) (1987 – Costner, Connery, De Niro, Garcia) or Bonnie & Clyde (8.1) (1967 – Beatty, Dunaway, Hackman). Both far better films.

Ice Age 3 (7.3) – Another Ice Age film. Good in parts. Zosia enjoyed it. Watched Polish language version. (She was home one weekend)

Milk (8.0) – Was expecting something far better given the reviews. That’s why you have to be careful with American reviews if it’s a subject close to their hearts. Not being gay nor American and not having heard of this Milk guy the movie was not really relating to me on any deeper level. As a film it was okay, worth seeing, interesting but that’s about it. I know others disagree.

Dorothy Mills (6.1) - Or as the Polish title maniacs call it “The Exorcism of Dorothy Mills”. Don’t ask me why, there’s no devil and no exorcism. What could possibly be wrong in calling it Dorothy Mills like the makers wanted? Doesn’t deserve the poor IMDb score. Slightly spooky film but not outright scary and hardly any blood. Certainly no spinning heads, pea-soup projectile vomiting or deep voices…..actually there is a deep voice. Sort of low budget feel to it. Based in a small Irish island village where one gets the impression there’s been a fair bit of inbreeding.

Brüno (7.0) – Rates a 3.0 with me. There are a very few truly funny moments but these take up about 5 minutes maximum of the films length and are mostly when nobody is forcing it to be funny. For example, when the idiot is sitting there with the red-necks and nobody’s saying a word. The rest of the red-neck scene is supposed to be funny but it isn’t, unless you’re 10 years old and a bit slow. This might appeal to non English speaking people in the same way Mr Bean or Benny Hill does but I hate both of those so………. This is actually a pretty dishonest film as was well explained by Toby Young in the Spectator & I agree with him.

Coco Chanel (6.8) – Deserves a better score but it’s not about the USA saving the world so…. Audrey Tautou does a good job, as do the supporting cast. For lovers of Chanel fashion it might be a let-down as the film finishes just as the fashion gets started. Focus is on childhood up until death of the guy she loved, essentially on how she got started. This was in French with Polish subtitles.

Changeling (8.1) – Clint’s a good director, Jolie puts in a good performance and it’s an interesting, if a little unbelievable, story based on real events. We enjoyed it but think the reviews are a little OTT.

There were others but I forget which they were now! All we’ve got left at the kino is the latest Harry Potter and possibly Transformers but I expect we’ve seen all the good bits of that last one in the trailers!