Change Your Image
majorlester2004
Reviews
Lawless Heart (2001)
Bill Nighy strikes again
Bill Nighy said that "I know how not to make my eyes wiggle about"... and he demonstrates his, straight faced, lost older man, skills in this film. Brilliant, the way he conducts a conversation with Tom Hollander in the pub, but really to himself, about "courage" in love. All done with minimum face expression.
Douglas Henshall, who plays a totally convincing, with great hair, wild at heart, prodigal son returning to the Essex village after 8 years travelling, is asked "Where's your hippie necklace" (sub text... so all that hippie stuff was just a passing phase, and now you've grown up). Henshall pulls out his hidden necklace from behind a loosened tie, and replies "Round my hippie neck".
Henshall is never so convincing in this part as when he returns drunk at 3am to Tom Holander's house, where he has been lent a bed. While his companion gets down to rolling one, he puts on some music, much too loud. This wakes up Tom Hollander, who says it just isn't working out and asks him to leave. "But its 3am" he complains, and puts on one of the most exquisite expressions ever seen in the cinema, drunk but not so drunk that he can't attempt to placate, and be rational with Hollander.
There are Rashomon quotes in the trivia (the home movie filmed into the sun), as well as the obvious parallels in the story line structure. The scarf keeps popping up, rather like the Rashomon book in Gost Dog.
I love this film. There are scenes that will stay with you for life, but I will spare you my list, and simply say, watch it, again.
Domino (2005)
Kiera Nightly jumps from Lizie to Domino in one bound
Kiera Nightly moved straight from the P&P set to this action movie... she could hardly have chosen to remake her image more dramatically. A great success in Love Actually and as Lizie in Jane Austen's classic, she is, once again, "having a go". Just as her bikini clad warrier woman in King Arthur was more skin than muscle, it is difficult to imagine this delicate frame standing up to a bounty hunters life... but then this is exactly what Domino Harvey (the real one) did, and I (being one of Nightly's biggest fans) believe she carries if off.
Stuff....
* 90210 (for the non American world) is the post code of Beverly hills in LA, where all the film stars live. * Domino Harvey father's mostfamous film was Manchurian Candidate (which appears in the film). * Domino Harvey died of a drug overdose in her bath before the film came out in June 2005, after having been arrested for drug dealing. She had just completed the negotiation for some of her music to be inlcuded in the film. * Kiera Knightly alludes to Domino Harvey's sexuality in her interview with Lucy Liu.
If you find this film a bit far fetched, then check out Domino Harvey, as the facts are more amazing than the fiction.
Donnie Darko (2001)
Time travel meets teenage angst
This great film nicely tackles the old chestnut of time travel by slowly revealing details throughout the film, but it is not until you get to the end that you realise what's going on, and then you need to watch it all over again to check it out. No wonder it bombed at the box office, but took off finally in DVD format... and now is number 95 in the IDMB all time hit list. The new double DVD directors cut is the business, including an amazing art show based on the movie, and loads of extras.
Richard Kelly (director/screen writer/artist) covers all the bases of teenage angst; teachers, parents, gurus, relationships, fat kids, bullies, religion (it's no surprise that the highest ratings for this film come from teenage girls). But in the end its a love story, and love conquers all.
This is one of those films that demands several viewings, and much discussion. Surely it will be studied at film school ("Discuss the significance of rabbits"). Perhaps it was Richard Kelly's intention, having just left University of Southern California studying film only 3 years before shooting DD. In the director's over-dub, Richard Kelly states that once he decided on the end and beginning of the main plot, he then just filled the rest of the film with clues... and yes, they are there, waiting to be deconstructed by film buffs the world over.
In HARVEY, the 1950's classic where James Stewart talks to an imaginary 6'7" rabbit, the advantages of his company are elaborated by Stewart... "Oh, yes! Yes. Yes - these things always work out just the way Harvey says they will. He is very, very versatile. Did I tell you he could stop clocks? Well, you've heard the expression 'His face would stop a clock'? Well, Harvey - can look at your clock and stop it. And you can go anywhere you like - with anyone you like - and stay as long as you like -- and when you get back -- not one minute will have ticked by".... coincidence? I think not. If I understand Richard Kelly, then he will love the connection even if he didn't plan it (but a film graduate probably had to study how Stewart made acting to an imaginary character seem natural).
And of course the music is fantastic. The film made Gary Jules famous for his cover of the Tears for Fears classic "It's a mad world" .