Dehlia_
Joined Nov 2001
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Dehlia_'s rating
Perry Smith (Robert Black) and Dick Hickock (Scott Wilson) murder the Clutter family in Kansas in 1959.
In Cold Blood is just about flawless. It dances the same delicate dance of the book, creating sympathy for Perry and then pulling back and showing his monstrosity, and then drawing in and creating sympathy again. It is this that is more disturbing than the murders themselves. Dick is less fleshed-out, in part, I suspect, because the movie avoided mention of the pedophilia, although mostly it's amazingly frank for its era. It also omits the fact that Dick's personality changed after a head injury, which was something I found fascinating in the book. Nonetheless, the movie works both as an adaptation of a "true novel" and as a film in its own right. It applies just the right amount of artistry to show Perry's distorted thoughts, and just the right amount of bareness to show a true story as it unfolds.
It is, perhaps, the bareness that is most shocking. Consider: The movie is rated R for violence, despite the fact that none of the violence appears on-screen. It feels that real.
What the movie cannot do, quite reasonably, is portray Truman Capoteyou'll have to see Capote, or perhaps Infamous, for that. The eyewitness journalist here is a fictional character named Jensen, of a neutral hard-boiled type that allows narration to happen without getting in the way.
In Cold Blood is just about flawless. It dances the same delicate dance of the book, creating sympathy for Perry and then pulling back and showing his monstrosity, and then drawing in and creating sympathy again. It is this that is more disturbing than the murders themselves. Dick is less fleshed-out, in part, I suspect, because the movie avoided mention of the pedophilia, although mostly it's amazingly frank for its era. It also omits the fact that Dick's personality changed after a head injury, which was something I found fascinating in the book. Nonetheless, the movie works both as an adaptation of a "true novel" and as a film in its own right. It applies just the right amount of artistry to show Perry's distorted thoughts, and just the right amount of bareness to show a true story as it unfolds.
It is, perhaps, the bareness that is most shocking. Consider: The movie is rated R for violence, despite the fact that none of the violence appears on-screen. It feels that real.
What the movie cannot do, quite reasonably, is portray Truman Capoteyou'll have to see Capote, or perhaps Infamous, for that. The eyewitness journalist here is a fictional character named Jensen, of a neutral hard-boiled type that allows narration to happen without getting in the way.
Peter (Paul Bettany) is a mid-level tennis play about to retire. He meets Lizzie (Kirsten Dunst), a major tennis star, when both are at Wimbledon.
I only watched this because I somehow got the impression it was written by Richard Curtis. It was apparently written by someone who is a fan of Richard Curtis, and perhaps I read a review that mentioned a similarity.
Wimbledon is an odd duck of a movie, in that it seems not to understand romantic comedies. Which is really very odd because there are so many of them, and they're not actually that hard to understand. In a romantic comedy, boy meets girl (except in gay romantic comedies, in which either girl meets girl or boy meets boy but I digress), something keeps boy and girl apart, and after overcoming some comedic adversity, boy and girl get together.
This isn't rocket science, so screwing it up is sort of unforgivable.
In Wimbledon, boy meets girl, and nothing much keeps them apart. Thus they go through the motions of romantic comedy without anything all that interesting going on. Some of the romance is quite charming, and Paul Bettany is just tons of disarming, and there's some sexy, but that's about that.
It may be that the movie is going for more of a sports underdog story, which obviously it has going for it, but again, not that interesting. A little bit of fun there, a little bit of Go Peter! but nothing to write home about.
I only watched this because I somehow got the impression it was written by Richard Curtis. It was apparently written by someone who is a fan of Richard Curtis, and perhaps I read a review that mentioned a similarity.
Wimbledon is an odd duck of a movie, in that it seems not to understand romantic comedies. Which is really very odd because there are so many of them, and they're not actually that hard to understand. In a romantic comedy, boy meets girl (except in gay romantic comedies, in which either girl meets girl or boy meets boy but I digress), something keeps boy and girl apart, and after overcoming some comedic adversity, boy and girl get together.
This isn't rocket science, so screwing it up is sort of unforgivable.
In Wimbledon, boy meets girl, and nothing much keeps them apart. Thus they go through the motions of romantic comedy without anything all that interesting going on. Some of the romance is quite charming, and Paul Bettany is just tons of disarming, and there's some sexy, but that's about that.
It may be that the movie is going for more of a sports underdog story, which obviously it has going for it, but again, not that interesting. A little bit of fun there, a little bit of Go Peter! but nothing to write home about.
David and Dana Hurst (Campbell Scott and Hope Davis) are married dentists, working together and raising three daughters. When David begins to believe that Dana is having an affair, an angry patient (Denis Leary) seems to embody his own secret rage.
The Secret Lives of Dentists is an observant film. It notices the small gestures, the ordinariness, the holding back, the expressing, that make up a life.
I was struck in particular by a scene in which Dana wakes up with a cramp in her foot, and David massages it. In the midst of his profound distrust of her, in the midst of her pulling away from him and longing for more, this moment was more physically intimate than making love. Movies mostly miss this sort of thing, and indeed, some people found the movie dull, in large part because of its domesticity.
But domesticity is relentless. David seethes with fury, but holds back from saying anything to his wife. Their marriage is played out in glances over the heads of the children, in snatches of conversation while caring for a vomiting toddler, in drives to the country house. In the end, it is a uniquely nuanced and satisfying view of real life.
The Secret Lives of Dentists is an observant film. It notices the small gestures, the ordinariness, the holding back, the expressing, that make up a life.
I was struck in particular by a scene in which Dana wakes up with a cramp in her foot, and David massages it. In the midst of his profound distrust of her, in the midst of her pulling away from him and longing for more, this moment was more physically intimate than making love. Movies mostly miss this sort of thing, and indeed, some people found the movie dull, in large part because of its domesticity.
But domesticity is relentless. David seethes with fury, but holds back from saying anything to his wife. Their marriage is played out in glances over the heads of the children, in snatches of conversation while caring for a vomiting toddler, in drives to the country house. In the end, it is a uniquely nuanced and satisfying view of real life.