This movie pulls out all the tropes. You've got the fall from grace, the struggle for redemption, and the comeback. Roll credits.
Gyllenhaal is solid as the prizefighter, and widowed father.
2/5
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The Campbell Review |
Southpaw is a wholly predictable boxing picture in three acts that can be described in essence as a movie with a training montage set to an EMINEM song. This movie pulls out all the tropes. You've got the fall from grace, the struggle for redemption, and the comeback. Roll credits. Gyllenhaal is solid as the prizefighter, and widowed father. 2/5
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Foxcatcher is an American Drama/Thriller based on real events. Foxcatcher is the truly bizarre story of John Du Pont, heir to the Du Pont fortune, and his obsession with the Olympic wrestler Mark Schultz. Steve Carell is unrecognizable here under heavy prosthetics and make up, and he's oh sooooo good. Likewise, Tatum and Ruffalo bring their A-game. Tatum is completely riveting as Mark, he's barely recognizable as the heavy brute with an underbite. He's a very physical actor and uses his body here expertly. So many actors take their bodies and faces for granted. Not Tatum, he uses his whole being masterfully. This is a quiet, slow-burn, but rather intense film. 4/5 La Strada (Frederico Fellini, Italy, 1954) All my favorite Fellini's are the ones starring his wife Julietta Masina (check out Nights of Cabiria and Variety Lights). Subsequently these are his films that lean more heavily on the tradition of Italian Neo-Realism than his more Surreal films such as Satyricon and 8 1/2. Here, Masina is brilliant as Gelsomina--a young woman sold by her mother to a travelling sideshow strong-man, Zampano, played by Anthony Quinn. Gelsomina is forced to leave her life and follow Zampano on the road. He treats her absolutely horribly, but finally breaks away, goes out on her own, and finds her own path. This film is utterly beautiful and tragic. 5/5 3-Iron (South Korea, 2004) is a South Korean romantic drama directed by Kim Ki-Duk. Ki-Duk makes a variety of films, some beautiful, quiet, and somber such as 3-Iron and Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter...and Spring, others gruesome, violent, and shocking such a The Isle and Bad Guy. 3-Iron is about a silent drifter who breaks into people's homes in order to fix broken appliances and to clean. When he breaks into a house he thinks is empty, it turns out he's being watched by a similarly quiet, young abused wife. The two begin a silent romance. This is an astonishingly beautiful film. I like quiet films and this is certainly quiet. This film is worth every precious minute. 5/5 Ape (2012) is a super lo-fi guerilla 1990s indie slacker throwback directed by newcomer Joel Potrykus. It's a slightly absurd, meandering, and sometimes unrestraint, black comedy about a sociopath, pyromaniac, stand-up comic. It takes a little while to get going, but I liked the seemingly pointless narrative because it perfectly captures a type of an analog boredom, seldom seen today. Joshua Burge is incredible as Trevor. 5/5 Buzzard is the follow-up to Joel Potrykus' Ape, also starring Joshua Burge. Buzzard follows aimless loser Marty as he skims, scams, and runs small-time cons. Paranoia causes him to run away to Detroit with a bunch of stolen petty checks, where he hides out with nothing but a Nintendo power glove, and plans to build his own Freddy Kruger glove. Joel Potrykus is gonna be HUGE. Mark my words. 5/5 Joe. Wow. So good. I'm not typically a Cage fan, but he's great when he's great. In Joe, he is great. Tye Sheridan. Wow, keep your eyes peeled. This kid is the real deal. Joe is his third film of, no doubt, many to come. You may have seen him in Mud (also stellar), and Tree of Life (again, stellar). I'm so pleased for David Gordon Green to come back to his Southern American Small Town thing after a strange journey through Franco/Rogen stoner comedies. If you caught Prince Avalanche, Joe capitalizes on the best part of that film here. That being, the one scene with the non-actor woman looking through the charred remains of her home. Joe is full of wonderful casting choices made up of non-actors. I'm so pleased that it seems Green is back where he left off with Undertow, which I though was a phenomenal film. Joe is about the friendship between a 15 yr old boy from an alcoholic/abusive home who works on a tree killing crew for an ex-con with a violent past. Joe's intense and quiet and brooding, and has a punch you in the guts kinda vibe overall. I loved it. 4.5/5 |
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