So I renewed my Netflix subscription this week and went kind of crazy with the “watch instantly” feature. There’s 11 movies this week and 7 of them were from this magical Netflix feature. A good mix of docs, drama, animation and horror this week.
Mad Hot Ballroom
Rating: Worthy
After this documentary was over I wanted to go learn how to dance. I didn’t end up doing that but I wanted to. A large amount of this doc’s charm and heart comes from letting the children talk for themselves without much adult intervention apart from their dance teachers and a few parents. It’s a rare documentary that makes you want to cheer at the end but this is exactly that kind of doc.
The Birth of a Nation
Rating: Worthy
Yeah, it’s obviously racist but it’s also a pretty epic story that anyone interested in film history or in epics should give a watch. Just make sure you watch it during the daytime or you may fall asleep before it’s halfway done.
Fall from Grace
Rating: Unworthy
A documentary about Westboro Baptist Church. It doesn’t really say anything new about them or dig that deeply into the family. I at least appreciated that the doc was clear in pointing out that this particular church did not represent the Christian mindset.
A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy’s Revenge
Rating: Unworthy
This sequel, like most sequels, kinda sucks. The elements of imagination and terror are severely lacking from Freddy’s second outing. This coupled with a few laughable scenes that are supposed to be scary really kill this movie’s chances. There’s almost nothing more stupid than a family being terrorized by a parakeet for a few minutes before it spontaneously explodes. Hitchcock has already got the market cornered on bird terror.
Spaceballs
Rating: Worthy
I can’t believe I waited so long to see Mel Brooks’ spoof of Star Wars. This is the kind of movie that those “movie movie” guys only wish they could make. There are a few misses but the amount of comedic hits and laugh out loud moments more than make up for them.
Revolver
Rating: Worthy
If you go into this movie expecting Lock, Stock or Snatch, you’ll be severely disappointed. If you go in expecting a philosophically minded gangster film, then you’re on the right track. It’s one of those movies that you might not understand on first viewing and if a film gets me to think about it and question it for longer than 5 minutes, then it’s worth watching in my book. You might not agree with the Ritchie’s philosophy but at least he’s doing something different and challenging. Props to him.
Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story
Rating: Unworthy
This movie was a lot sillier than I was expecting. Unfortunately for the makers of this film, silly does not always make funny. There were certainly some funny moments but unlike Spaceballs, the misses outweigh the hits. I usually like Reilly but those have mostly been his more dramatic roles.
Snuff: A Documentary About Killing on Camera
Rating: Unworthy
As the title divulges, this is a doc about the existence or non-existence of snuff films. It appears that the director took the lazy route and didn’t really research his topic at all. The talking heads consist of two video store owners, a guy who had something to do with The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, a retired policewoman and an anonymous “cinephile”. Not exactly the people I would go to for insight into this sordid topic. Apart from this, the documentary is utterly boring and devoid of life. It kind of just limps around the topic but never goes anywhere or offers any real compelling information or insights.
Coraline
Rating: Worthy
From criminally under appreciated director of The Nightmare Before Christmas and James and the Giant Peach comes his magnum opus of claymation, Coraline. There were times on occasion during the movie when I would suddenly remember that I was watching a claymation movie. After being assulted by computer animated movies these last several years, it is a breath of fresh air to see something so fantastical coming from something physical. There were obviously some moments where they used computer tech but it blended in so well that I never noticed. Speaking of blending in, the 3D effect in this film were perfect. It was never gimicky or drew attention to itself but only helped to enhance the experience and to put you further into the movie. Like visual effects, I think that the best 3D effects are the ones you don’t notice.
Lars and the Real Girl
Rating: Worthy
There’s so many ways that this film could have turned out bad. There are obvious jokes to be made from a situation like this and in different hands, I’m sure that this is what would have happened. Fortunately, it happened to be these folks. Rather than looking down on or making fun of the protagonist, we feel sympathy for him. The movie never stoops to the expected raunchy material and instead infuses the film with a caring and compassionate heart. It uses the situation not for laughs but as a way to examine human relationships and how we ought to care for each other. I loved it both for what it was and for what it refused to be: a cheap joke.
Meet the Robinsons
Rating: Unworthy
Disney’s answer to Pixar. In this case, they should have just stayed silent. The film was way too random and silly for my tastes and that’s saying quite a bit. The humor and style just never really gelled with me. Their use of time travel also struck me as being silly but then I was raised on the Back to the Future theory of time travel. I do have some problems with the way BTTF uses it but for the most part I think it’s a good theory. There were also some elements of the story that I thought were outright cheats. All that said, there were elements I liked and they all involved The Bowler Hat Guy. I loved his character a lot and his animation. That was about it though. I’d almost recommend the movie for him alone but he just wasn’t in it enough.
What did you think of this week’s movies?
