Take Shelter - A Movie Review by Andrew Lawrence

"You think I'm crazy? Well, listen up, there's a storm coming like nothing you've ever seen, and not a one of you is prepared for it."

Take Shelter is a small budget movie that is written and directed by Jeff Nichols, starring Michael Shannon and Jessica Chastain. Curtis (Shannon) is a hard working husband and father, who one night has a very unsettling dream about a terrible storm that tears his house and family apart, and when this dream continues to reappear, Curtis decides to build a storm shelter in his back garden. As his dreams continue to get more disturbing, Curtis becomes more and more convinced that an actual storm of terrible proportions is actually coming, which leads him down a path that his family, friends and colleagues find hard to write off as being completely normal. People start to think Curtis is going crazy, and as a viewer, you begin to wonder the same thing. The question of whether Curtis is mentally ill or whether his concerns are legitimate is the main plot of this movie, and if you enjoy these kinds of mysterious character driven dramas, Take Shelter is sure to keep you greatly entertained. 

Now, every film enthusiast has a favourite genre of movies, be it horror, action, drama or comedy etc. Personally, I find the most enjoyment in dark dramas with deep and engaging characters, and from what I had heard about it, Take Shelter was supposed to be exactly like that. And by God. It is. Explaining how far up my alley this movie is would take hours, so I'll just settle with saying that it's pretty God damn far. It's a very atmospheric movie, meaning that you have to sit yourself down and really 'lock in' in order to get the most out of it. Watching it on a laptop with a pair of bad headphones on a train, in school or anywhere else where you might get distracted by something isn't going to work at all, you just won't get as emotionally engaged as you need to be in order to enjoy this movie as much as you should. A lot of people aren't going to like Take Shelter very much, simply because it requires so much ability to just sit down for two hours and focus on watching a movie. For true fans of cinema and great film making though, this movie is deep, enthralling, thematic and spellbindingly atmospheric; a must see. 

As explained in the beginning for this review, the question of whether Curtis is sane or not is the main plot of the movie, and the way Nichols handles this element is extremely impressive. On one hand you can easily see how the things Curtis are doing to prepare for the (supposedly) impending storm are kinda ludicrous, but on the other hand, his dreams seem really realistic and horrifying, and the way Michael Shannon displays his characters inner fears and struggles are strangely convincing. At no point during the movie was I wholly convinced that either of the two solutions was right, and I flipped between leaning more to one side than the other several times throughout the entire two hours that the movie lasted. The fact that the mystery is so well preserved and carefully constructed is impressive to say the least. It's worth noting that the dreams/nightmares that Curtis is subject to are truly terrifying and well created, and the fact that the film crew managed to make Jessica Chastain more shit-in-pants inducing than hot in one of them is a true feat of greatness. 

Some people who generally liked this movie sadly were turned off by how long it seemed to be at times. Admittedly, there are parts in the early second half that seemed to drag on a bit too long, but it never got to the point where I was bored or lost interest in the story. I agree that the movie could have been a good 15 minutes shorter and still be as effective is it is, but it's not a huge problem in my opinion. I'm very forgiving when it comes to this commonly criticised part of a lot of movies though, and I understand why a lot of less enthusiastic moviegoers than myself are going to loose interest in the plot because of these dragging parts. Forgivable as they are, these bits do limit the movie's re-watch ability somewhat. If you manage to stick with the story to the last act of the movie though, I promise you that you'll witness the most amazing ending to a movie you'll see in a long, long time. The last three scenes or about 20 minutes are intense in such a degree that I'm struggling to put it into words, but rest assured, the climax of Take Shelter is nothing short of jaw-dropping.

Whether you like the movie or not, one thing that every sane person has to agree upon, is the fact that Michael Shannon deserves inhumane amounts of praise for his performance in this movie. Take Shelter is the first movie of his that I've seen, and I'm already convinced that this man is an incredibly talented individual. His facial expressions are authentic and believable, ans the way he delivers his lines, filled with agony and emotion, it's simply surreal. The amount of times I was convinced that his character was completely and utterly insane, yet still lovable and caring is beyond counting, and the list goes on and on. The entire cast was good, but every single one of them, several time oscar nominated Jessica Chastain included, paled in comparison to the powerhouse performance of Michael Shannon. 

When everything is said and done, Take Shelter is a deeply emotional and captivating movie, for those who are capable of appreciating quality film making for what it is. I enjoyed it immensely myself, and I definitely recommend everyone who enjoys a dark drama to give it a go. Jeff Nichols' second feature film is a masterpiece in terms of character driven storytelling and character development in itself, something I enjoy immensely. It's also an extremely underrated movie that didn't see a wide release anywhere in the world, but I truly believe that it's one of those movies that'll gain a large following over time, and will be looked back upon as one of the cult classics of our time. For that reason alone, Take Shelter is easily worth buying on BluRay. (5/6)

Take Shelter IMDb page here

Take Shelter trailer here

Iron Man 3 - A Movie Review by Andrew Lawrence

*wink* "You'll never see me coming..." *wink*

Take a look at that picture above. I made it larger than usual so you can really get a good look at it. Take a good hard look. See how Tony Stark is falling from the sky, smoking, on fire, destroyed, beaten, defeated? That's your dreams. That's your expectations. That's this movie. Think about how hard this film has been hyped for God knows how long, and try to imagine how sad you would feel if it turned out to be a sloppy mess with no context what so ever. Wouldn't you feel let down and disappointed? Sadly, that's exactly what the latest Iron Man movie is; a let down and a disappointment.

I was so exited for this movie, I literally could not wait to see it. I loved the first Iron Man movie, I didn't think the sequel was as bad as people made it out to be, and the fact that Shane Black, the director of the Lethal Weapon series and Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, one of the most underrated movies of all time, had been hired, not only to direct it but also to write the script, only served to get me even more exited for Iron Man 3. But man. Oh man. This movie has so many flaws that I hardly know where to begin. Explaining what's so bad about it without spoiling too much of the plot might become a challenge, but I should be able to give you a general idea of what you should expect from this movie without spoiling anything. 

Frankly, the movie is a mess from the very beginning. Iron Man 3 takes place after the events of The Avengers, and Tony Stark is suffering from post dramatic stress syndrome. Saving the world from an alien invasion proved to be a little more than he could handle, and the first third of the movie shows how his life has taken a change for the worse. He can't sleep at night, Pepper and him have begun to drift apart, and his competitors in the technology business have begun to catch up to him. We're also introduced to the the main bad guy/bad guys in this first part, and the foundation for the main conflict is constructed. Sadly, all these things happen in a very convoluted and weird way, and I never really got on board. The movie goes in a million different directions right form the beginning, and they never manage to sort of reconnect and make sense compared to each other. This tendency continues in the second part where the plot kinda starts to escalate, but still, a lot of things just happen without much reason or explanation, and this sadly carries on throughout the movie. Things just happen, and they don't make sense. 

By far my biggest problem with Iron Man 3 is the plot. If I had to compare it to a dairy product, I'd probably say that its closest comparison would be a Swizz cheese; stinky a full of holes. There are so many "but if that's possible, why can't they do that?"-moments, even more "why do these people care about each other?"-situations, and almost just as many "OK, what does that thing that just happened have to do with anything?"-scenarios. This movie is so poorly put together, so many things are never explained, so many things just happen for no reason, and I found myself not caring about what was gonna happen next way too many times, because I knew it would have nothing to to with anything that had already taken place. I sadly can't explain what my biggest problem with the plot is without spoiling some of it, but what I can say is that one of the big important story lines, the most important one actually, the one that the whole movie relies upon to make it interesting, gets completely and utterly ruined half way through. Tony Stark's character progression gets completely swiped under the rug by something way too simple and minor that makes no sense what so ever, and from that point on, I didn't give two shits about his character progression any longer. Everything the trailer and the fist half of the movie had build up about his battle within himself, was just completely shrugged off as a joke. Tony Starks character progression basically got Boba Fetted. 

Another thing I absolutely have to touch upon is the villains. Ben Kingsley and Guy Pierce are fantastic actors, that goes without saying, but they were completely miss used in this movie. Especially one of their characters take a completely unexpected turn for the bizarre in the latter half of the movie, people who have watched it will know what I mean. There are many different opinions on this twist, and I personally found it kinda hilarious and well though up. That being said, it completely smashed the villain concept of the entire movie, and gave the other guy about 20 minutes to become an astablished character worth fearing, before the final showdown. I love when a movie has an awesome and respectable bad guy, but in that department, Iron Man 3 went down a road that just did not work at all. None of them had any credibility, and the small amount of motivation they had for doing what they did seemed weak and confusing. 

The final showdown of this movie is bad, it just is. Sure, the pyrotechnics and the explosions are impressive, but it fell through completely. The setup was poor and the execution was worse, but what irritated me the most about it was the emotional bait and switch half way through. The creators had an opportunity to do something extremely cool and surprising, but in the end, they chickened out and made the safe decision anyway. At no time was I emotionally invested in this movie, even in the final moments of the big confrontation between good and evil. On top of that, when the thing that really was supposed to make the audience shudder in grief happened, I just didn't care. I own a big werehouse where i store all sorts of things, and no matter how hard I searcheh it, I literally couldn't find a single fuck to give. It just didn't phase me in the slightest, because of how badly it was handeled.

I personally think that special effect and cool looking CGI should be used as a tool to improve something that is already great, add a little bit of seasoning to an already finished product, and not as a foundation or something that everything else is based upon, as it sometimes is the case in Iron Man 3. Sometimes things happen just to look cool and awesome and impressive, which they admittedly do, but they just don't fit into the context of the movie. It's as if they were put in just so the editors had something cool to put in the trailer. The fact that the two coolest things in the entire movie were in these trailers as well, isn't exactly a plus either. Speaking of editors; another major complaint I have about Iron Man 3 is the way it's edited. Often times it's way too easy to see when a scene is filmed in two or more takes and clipped together afterwards, and it feels too rushed and incomplete at times. Sometimes when I actually got close to getting invested in the story, I'd suddenly snap out of the experience because of some jumpy or clumsy piece of editing. 

Most people will go easy on this movie and say things like "it's a superhero movie, what did you expect?" or "for what it tried to be, the movies was awesome!", but I strongly disagree. Yes, I realize that all movies can't be like Schindler's List or a Taxi Driver in terms of storytelling, emotional appeal and character development, and I know that Iron Man 3 is based on a comic book for children and young adults, but that doesn't mean it isn't meant to be taken seriously. A movie can have as many sparkly explosions and as much good looking action as it wants to, but if it has no structure or integrity, it becomes a sloppy mess that true fans of the superhero genre aren't going to enjoy at all. I liked The Avengers because it knows what it is and doesn't try to be something it's not, I love the first Iron Man movie because it was simple, had a great plot and some amazing character development, and both of those movies have great special effects and tons of action, just like Iron Man 3 has. The latest addition to the marvel movie universe just doen't have that solid base and structure that good movies have to fall back upon, and it suffers tremendously because of it. 

In the end, no matter haw many hilarious oneliners Tony Stark has or how likeable Robert Downey Jr. is as an actor, In a world where we have comic book movies like 300, V For Vendetta, Iron Man 1, Batman Begins, The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises, Iron Man 3 sadly just isn't worth anything more than a silent facepalm. (2/6)

Iron Man 3 IMDb page here

Iron Man 3 trailer here

Children of Men - A Movie Review by Andrew Lawrence

"As the sound of the playgrounds faded, the despair set in. Very odd, what happens in a world without children's voices."

Children of Men is a science fiction movie set in a near future where all women in the world have become infertile, and as a result, no babies are being born any longer. In the beginning of the movie, the youngest person in the world is killed at 18-years-old, so it's been almost twenty years since the last child was born when our story begins. Panic and despair has spread across the globe, and almost all major cities and governments have been brought to ruin, leaving the world in a state of chaos. England is the only country that hasn't completely fallen apart, mainly because the government has an extremely aggressive and radical way of dealing with the mass immigration that the country is experiencing. At every train station, airport and ferry dock, armed-to-the-teeth soldiers pick up anyone without a British passport, and send them to a camp that practically works the same way as a modern day concentration camp. 

Theo Faron, played by Clive Owen, lives a lonely and depressing life, until a certain someone from his past one day comes along, and asks him to help her do something that essentially could rescue the world from it's steep decline into pandemonium. Theo is a lonely office worker who lost his sense of purpose when his his son died at eight years old, and he used to be a political activist who fought against the violent and radical British immigration system. However, since his wife left him after the the death of their child, he's lost his sense of meaning in life, as well as his motivation to try and change the ways of the government. A turn of inevitable events eventually force him to return to business, and thus we have our movie. 

Right from the beginning, Children of Men is an extremely dark and chillingly atmospheric movie that does a really great job of creating a depressive mood of despair and catastrophe. The streets of London are grey and littered with trash, and living there is a constant struggle against crime, fear of terrorist attacks, hunger and sickness, and the griddyness is completely believable because of the realistic set design. The beautiful camera work is also worth noting, and especially some of the longer scenes are incredibly well filmed in my opinion. There's just something about long, unedited and uncut takes that is just incredibly fascinating to me, and Children of Men have several of those. The editing and phasing of the movie is top notch as well, and as a result, this movie manages to tell what could have easily been a three hour story, in almost fifteen minutes less that two hours. There were a few times when the CG could have been a fair deal better, but it's not very noticeable, especially if your not one of those people who pays a lot of notice to detail. To sum it up: almost all of the technical aspects of this movie are extremely well done, but they are not what you'll be thinking about the most after you've finished watching it. 

In my opinion, the level of emotional engagement i felt towards the main characters and the task they set out on, is Children of Men's strongest selling point. There were so many times throughout this movie where i found myself left breathless by the raw, emotional and tragic things that occur, and the speed at witch I became attached to most of the main cast is something I've rarely experienced before. Juliane Moore is terrific in this movie, and Clive Owen's character has a lot of emotional connection to Moore's, something that's very well depicted in a very short amount of time, and it's a very vital element in Theo's character progression. Owen's portrayal of Theo is probably the best performance of this movie also, so having his progression as a character be as important as it is makes perfect sense. He plays the "Average Joe gone heroic and sacrificial hero"-type flawlessly, and his powerful screen presence is hard to ignore. 

Charlie Hunnam and Chiwetel Ejiofer are both great at portraying political activists/terrorists, and Michael Caine is just being Michael Caine; utterly fantastic. I liked Pam Ferris and Clare-Hope Ashitey much less though. Ashitey's acting was just kinda horrible at times, and it was a little too visible that her character weren't originally in the book that the movie is based upon. In the book, her character and Julian Moore's is the same person, and I'd have liked it better if this was the case in the movie as well. I do however see why they decided to split them up, and as a whole, the writers probably did the right thing by splitting the role in two. Ferris' character was just plain annoying, dispensable, stupid and unlikeable. All in all though, I'd say that the cast does an all round good job, Clive Owen, Juliane Moore and Michael Caine especially. 

The world in which Children of Men takes place is another thing I liked tremendously about it. Post apocalyptic movies have always fascinated me, and out of the many movies in this franchise that I'we seen, I feel like this one creates one of the more realistic and well though out illusions of how things would be in such a situation. In one of the opening scenes, the one where Theo is buying coffee just before the beginning credits, I was really impressed with how well the director and the camera crew captured the essence of what a society on the brink of downfall would be like to live in, and the fact that the climax of a scene so early in the movie is as memorable as this one is, is extremely impressive.

Children of Men is a great movie in my opinion, and it's a film that the wast majority of people will be able to watch and enjoy. The characters are great, the technical work that went into the movie is top notch, and there's not a single scene in which I found myself bored or in lack of entertainment. It's an emotionally engaging picture with lots of heartbreaking, realistic tragedy and nail bitingly intense moments that will make your heart pound, and as a whole I've got very few bad things to say about it. It's relatively short and to the point, which makes it easier to watch than a lot of other sci-fi dramas, although I would have liked to see a bit more of the political stuff that would be going on behind the scenes in a world like this, but then again, it might have dragged on a bit too long if this had been the case. I feel like this is one of those movies that you can just watch over and over again and never get tired of seeing, and as such, Children of Men is very much worth buying in BluRay. (5/6)

Children of Men IMDb page here

Children of Men trailer here

Chronicle - A Movie Review by Andrew Lawrence

"A lion does not feel guilty when it kills a gazelle, right? You do not feel guilty when you squash a fly... And I think that means something. I just think that really means something."

The found footage genre has been done to death in the past five years, so when I heard that yet another one was coming out, I didn't think too much of it. I've always though that the the concept of found footage is very interesting and compelling, but I had also kinda lost hope of ever seeing another film pull it off in a way that seemed realistic, because it's been done so bad so many times as of recent. Thankfully though, when the genre had reached it's lowest low and all hope seemed lost, something came around and changed all that completely. 

Chronicle is a movie about three college seniors, who find a meteorite in a cave that gives them super powers. They have a lot of fun with their new found abilities in the beginning, but as they begin to discover just how powerful the skills they've gotten really are, things start to spiral out of control. The main character Andrew (played by Dane Dehaan), is a troubled young man who gets abused by his father. His mother is very sick as well, and on top of that he's being bullied in school. Taking this into consideration, it's not hard to imagine that things start to get out of hand when he suddenly learns telekinesis. Andrew's character development is the main story arc in Chronicle, although the movie also deals with things such as responsibility, friendship, high school popularity and being an outcast as well. 

The thing that usually bothers me the most about found footage movies, is that feeling you often get of "Okay, by now a normal person would have turned off the camera!". Thankfully Chronicle deals with this problem very early on in the movie, by having Andrew state that he likes to use the camera as a way to create a barrier between himself and the people around him. He's being portrayed as a very anti social person from the very beginning, so this totally makes sense. Also, when the three boys eventually make their discovery and gain their mystic powers, Andrew begins to levitate the camera and have it follow the boys around, a storytelling decision that probably was made to give the filming crew more freedom than the found footage genre usually allows for. This works out just fine, and Chronicle has some pretty good looking sequences in the latter part of the movie, which is largely because of this freedom that the "levitating camera"-plot provides. 

Another thing about Chronicle that struck me early on is how realistic it actually is. Have you ever wondered why Spiderman suddenly feels an incredible sense of responsibility as soon as he gets his super powers? So have I, and it has always seemed a little fishy to me. In Chronicle however, it takes the main character a lot longer to start realizing what it is they're dealing with, and as a result, I got to enjoy about 45 minutes of the coolest shit I've seen in a found footage movie, ever. The guys did all the awesome stuff that everyone has always wanted to do, and I was incredibly entertained by how closely Chronicle depicted how I'd probably use my super powers, if I had any. 

Even though it's a movie about super powers, there are three elements in Chronicle that makes it feel oddly realistic. The realistic curve at which the guys learn about their powers and how to deal with them, the great execution of the found footage element and some surprisingly decent performances from all the main actors, when combined, create an authentic and believable reality that makes the movie more exiting than super hero movies normally are. Calling Chronicle a movie about super heroes probably isn't the right way to put it though, seeing as the main character kinda looses his shit from time to time. "Super villain origin movie" is a more fitting title in my opinion. 

Having been created on a very low budget, Chronicle sadly lacks a bit in the special effects department. The things that Andrew and his friends do, awesome as they are, often don't look very authentic. Their flying looks down right bad at times, and there are scenes where it's 120 % completely obvious that the actors are acting in front of a greenscreen. Had the budget for the movie been a bit higher, these things would not have looked as fake as they did, and my over all enjoyment of the movie would have been greater. The last 20 minutes of the movie didn't quite get to me either, in that I was not as exited about what was gonna happen next as probably should have been. I'm not saying that this part of the film was bad or anything, I just enjoyed the earlier parts a great deal more. 

All in all, Chronicle was a really cool movie that kept me entertained from start to finish. The early parts where the guys are beginning to get a grasp of what they're capable of doing is fantastic, I really enjoyed the chemistry between the actors, and Andrew's character progression was impressive, interesting and quite disturbing at the same time. There are rumours about a possible sequel floating around on the internet, and if they're true, I'll definitely be looking forward to watching said sequel, especially if the special effects budget gets raised a bit. Chronicle is a great movie that covers a lot of great themes when you consider how short it actually is, it's dark and gritty yet still entertaining and exiting, and sometimes even suspenseful. This movie has definitely earned by seal of approval, and I'd be willing to spend some money to buy it on BluRay if the price was low enough as well. (4/6)

Chronicle IMDb page here

Chronicle Trailer here

The Place Beyond the Pines - A Movie Review

"You know something Luke, if you ride like thunder, you're gonna crash like Thunder."

In The Place Beyond the Pines, Ryan Gosling Plays a stuntdriver called Luke, who works as a motor cycle stunt driver for a travelling circus. One day he reunites with a woman he once hooked up with, and when she deals him some shocking news, Luke decides to turn his life around. Unfortunately this doesn't work out the way he planned, and a turn of events eventually lead him down a dark path. This is the beginning to a long, twisted turn of events, and as a viewer you suddenly find yourself watching a saga of tragedy, loss, ambition, consequences, destiny and family, unfold before your eyes. 

I was really looking forward to this movie, mainly because of the actors involved, and as predicted, they all did a very good job. No surprises in that department. What really took me by surprise however, was the pure craftsmanship that went into creating this picture. The Place Beyond the Pines is one of those visually stunning movies that comes around every so often and leaves you nailed you to your seat, completely stunned by the visuals. I was not a big fan of the directing in Derek Cainfrance's last movie, Blue Valentine, but I gotta say that he surpassed any and all expectations PBTP's early reviews had given me, in terms of directing. This movie has many beautiful shots of people simply traveling through pine forests, one of the best looking car chases I'we seen in my life, a beautiful use of sound and music that the movie several new layers, things that are all vital to creating a good movie. 

But. As important and well executed as these things are, none of them are the things that make The Place Beyond the Pines as remarkable as it actually is. In my opinion, nothing stands out from this movie as much as the story in itself. This might sound like a minor thing, but honestly, The Place Beyond the Pines has one of, if not the best storytelling element I've seen, ever. It reaches the status of classic Greek tragedy very early on, and the way human behaviour, ambition and consequence is displayed through nerve wracking intensity, but also beautiful, discrete and subtle hints and winks is truly breathtaking. As great as the actors are, none of them would have been able to do what they did without the writer/director's script and story. This is Derek Cainfrance's masterpiece, his baby, and it's a piece of hard work that I will look back upon in awe, seen from a story telling point of view. 

Being as cinematic and story based as it is, this is very much a movie that you have to let yourself completely submerge into, in order to enjoy it to it's maximum potential. Sure, it has some dramatic and breathtaking suspense scenes that everyone can enjoy, but the vast majority of this movie consists of brutally honest depictions of human behaviour, motivations and consequences, and you have to be able to enjoy these things in order to really appreciate the movie. It's a moody, atmospheric and grand picture, nothing like most movies that come out these days, and as a result of this, a lot of people who maybe don't care that much about movies that are based on dialogue and emotion storytelling won't enjoy this movie nearly as much as other people who do. You kinda have to be a fan of movies and movie creation, have an interest in human psychology and emotional elements like ambition, hopelessness and frustration, in order to enjoy the full 140 minutes of this completely original movie. 

When I say that The Place Beyond the Pines is an original movie, I truly mean it. It's 100 % completely unpredictable, and it's put together in a way that makes it seem like a saga or a legend that spans over a huge period of time. Every so often you hear a movie being described as "taking movies to a new level", but in my humble opinion, none has ever been more fitting for that title than The Place Beyond the Pines, simply because of how original it is. It's completely possible that many other directors have done "things" that are similar to what Derek Cainfrance has done with this movie, but I've personally never experiences anything like it. 

Now, this is the part of the review where I normally begin to list the things i didn't like about the movie I'm reviewing, and looking at all the praise I've given it so far, I bet it's hard to imagine that i would have a single gripe about The Place Beyond the Pines, right? Well, I do. This will be the first time in my history of blogging that I'll be complaining about the length of a movie, because honestly, this movie is too long. I know this might sound a bit contradictory to what I'we said about the amazing storytelling elements in the movie and the whole thing about enjoying films based on dialogue and emotional depictions and that jazz. What I mean when i say it's too long, is that I was very aware of just how much time i spent sitting still. After we had exited the theatre, my mother and sister told me in detail how they never felt like The Pines was a long movie. I wish I'd felt the same way, but the fact of the matter is that it felt like a four hour movie to me. It was an exhausting movie to watch, and it's taken me more than three days to digest it completely. No matter how great a movie is acted and and created, if it makes me, the guy who would gladly watch the 3.5 hour extended edition of Gladiator every single day of the week, actually think that a movie is too long, that kinda says a lot about how slow paced a movie actually is. 

The Place Beyond the Pines is like three movies mixed into one. I won't explain how this works out in detail because I'll end up spoiling too much, but I will say that the first two parts are 100 % worthy of the Movie Magic rating. Some people claim that the movie quote on quote "falls apart" in the last part, but that's not how i see it. Granted, it becomes overambitious and some of the things that happens are a little cliché and way too coincidental, but at no point in time was I ready to straight up leave the theatre in anger, like other reviewers have stated they were. I enjoyed the last part less than the first two, but it was still worth watching, even though it made the over all movie feel much longer than it was.

All in all The Place Beyond the Pines is a fantastic story that deserves major praise for the craftsmanship and dedication that went into creating it. I didn't get to talk much about the acting in this review, but if I had to summarice it shortly, I'd say that Bradley Cooper and Ben Mendelsohn both have very bright futures, that Dane DeHaan has an even brighter one, and that Ryan Gosling is one of the best actors working today, even though he plays the same character in almost all the movies he has been in recently. No one plays the "silent but violent" role better than Gosling, let's settle at that. 

No matter how long it is and how slow paced it is at times, The Place Beyond the Pines is a movie I'd be glad to own on BluRay, even though I might end up only watching the first two parts. It's got a lot of movie magic potential, but the fact that watching it almost becomes a physical challenge drags it down a whole lot. The Pines gets my seal of approval, and a huge one at that. (4/6)

The Place Beyond the pine IMDb page here

The Place Beyond the Pines trailer here

Black Swan - A Movie Review by Andrew Lawrence

"Perfection is not about control. It's about letting go!"

Darren Aronofsky is known for creating artistic, surreal and sometimes even supernatural movies. I'm a big fan The Fountain and The Wrestler, but for some reason I hadn't gotten around to see his latest movie, Black Swan, until very recently. As it usually is the case in these situations, Black Swan of cause ended up completely blowing me away when I finally did see it.

Black Swan is about a ballerina called Nina, played by my future wife Natalie Portman. Nina is a sweet, fragile, innocent and antisocial young woman who still lives with her mother, and she has pretty much dedicated her life to becoming the world's greatest ballet dancer. She is eventually given the role of a lifetime, The Swan Queen in the ballet Swan Lake, and everything seems to go the way young Nina has planned. This abruptly ends when Lily, an uncontrollable and wild chick played by Mila Kunis, who basically represents the polar opposite of Nina, joins the ballet team. Things start to get really weird and creepy, and as pressure and anxiety begins to pile up on Nina's shoulders, one of the most intoxicating and enthralling stories of the decent into madness starts to unfold. 

One of the first things that should be said about Black Swan is that it's a ballet movie and a horror movie at the same time. Maybe not as much horror as  ballet, but it definitely has some incredibly creepy and disturbing moments in it. Some of these did seem a little bit forced, but it never got to the point where I didn't enjoy watching them. Some parts of the movie feel like nightmare'ish fever dreams, and I did not expect it to be as black and eery as it is, not at all. This chillingly creepy atmosphere that surrounds the two main characters throughout the movie, combined with the sense of things being completely out of control no matter how hard Nina tries to be perfect, adds something new to this movie that I've never seen before, and it works out incredibly well. I'm not a horror movie fan at all, so for me to say that I enjoyed the scary parts of Black Swan may be the biggest compliment I can give it. 

Black Swan is one of those movies that is just completely filled to the rim with symbolism and metaphors, something that often gets really complicated and hard to keep up with. However, in the case of Black Swan, I actually found these symbols and hints to be fairly easy to keep track of, and as a result Black Swan left me feeling strangely satisfied, because I was able to pick out the clues and symbols and put them together and come up with something that made sense. Darren Aronofsky reveals just so much of the plot that most people will be able to understand what's going on, but still leaves room for interpretation and stuff to think about, and I really enjoyed that about Black Swan. It's the first film I've watched that has done this, and It's definitely something I'd like to see more of in the future. 

Black Swan has a great story arc and a truly hypnotising musical score, but none of these things truly matter if the actors aren't great. Luckily for this movie, the entire cast does a very good job. I enjoyed Mila Kunis' performance very much, the evil villain from Ocean's Twelve is really great as well, and Barbara Hershey was incredible as Nina's overprotective mother. All these three characters are absolutely crucial to the story, and they all have an incredible amount of influence on the main character. The way these three behave towards Nina are the main catalysts for most of the things that happens in the movie; the twist, the turns and the development of Nina as a character almost all lead back to the supporting cast, and the movie would not be the same without any of them. Black Swan is a great example of how supporting character development can really make a movie shine.

As vital to the main character as they are, the supporting cast never manages to steal the spotlight from this movie's true star: Natalie Portman. Her portrayal of Nina won her an oscar for best actress in a leading role, as well as any other award there is to win, which it's 100% justified. She is spellbinding in this movie, from start to finish. Her facial expressions, her body language, the fact that she does 80% of the dancing in this movie herself, and her ability to display emotions such as anger, despair, happiness and loneliness, it's all magnificent. Perhaps the greatest part of her performance is when she has to flip it 180 and become a totally different person. The reason why she has to do this is that Lily, who embodies the black swan, eventually starts to influence Nina, who in the beginning is the whitest of the white swans, in a very disturbing way. The relationship between the white and black swan and the way they are connected and keep getting into more and more dangerous situations together is the main plot of Black Swan, and i gotta tell you, it's pretty god damn astonishing how great the chemistry between these characters is. 

Whilst watching this movie, I noticed that Black Swan has something in common with the movie Fight Club, another great movie I've reviewed in the past. I won't explain what this connection is in detail because it would spoil the plot of both movies, but the fact that it's there is pretty cool to me. Whether Fight Club or Black Swan handles this element I'm talking about the best is hard to say, but one thing that's for certain is that it's the best part of both movies respectively. Both movies, Black Swan in particular, also manage to keep the momentum going from start to finish, never getting boring or predictable. There's always something happening, something to look out for, an element I appreciated immensely. 

If i had to describe Black Swan with one sentence, it would have to be something like "A fever dream of mystery, insanity and ambition". Any movie with that tag line is worth watching in my book, and if you enjoy physiological thrillers with incredible acting, twists and turns, scares and beauty, Black Swan is something for you. When the movie was done I sat down in a chair for 20 minutes, trying to wrap my head around what I had just seen, and days later I've not stopped thinking yet. Black Swan is an existential mind bender about ambition, pressure, madness and greed that I'll be watching many many times in the future. It's an artistic masterpiece, it's that simple... And it has a Natalie Portman/Mila Kunis lesbo scene, which essentially is enough to earn it the rating of Movie Magic in itself. (6/6)

Black Swan IMDb page here

Black Swan trailer here

Update #3 - Upcoming Ryan Gosling Movies!

Seeing as I've already reviewed two of his movies and have mentioned him as being my personal favourite actor, some people might have guessed that I'm pretty stoked about two new Ryan Gosling movies premiering within two month. I decided to write a little bit about each of these movies before i watch and review them, mainly because i usually don't get to write about movies i haven't already seen. I love to talk about my expectations and reasons for being exited about a movie with my friends and family, so why not start doing the same on my blog? I plan to do this maybe once every other month or so, probably just whenever a promising movie is looming in the horizon, as a part of my update blogs. 

Derek Cainfrance's The Place Beyond the Pines

The Place Beyond The Pines has already come out, and although I haven't watched it yet, I'm going to do so this coming Saturday. I'm super stoked for this movie, especially because of the cast and the great reviews It's already gotten, although many critics have been concerned about the length of the movie (about 150 minutes). This actually only serves to make me even more exited for Gosling and Cainfrance's latest collaboration, seeing as I'm a huge fan of movies that take their time to tell a story as in depth and concentrated as possible, no matter how long it ends up becoming. I'm exited about Bradley Cooper being in this movie as well, seeing as i enjoyed his performance in Silver Lining Playbook immensely, but one person i absolutely can't wait to see is Killing Them Softly and The Dark Knight Rises star Ben Mendelsohn. He completely stole the show in Killing Them Softly, and I can barely wait to see him on stage with the likes of Ryan Gosling and Ray Liotta. My Review of The Place Beyond the Pines will be up either this coming Saturday evening or Sunday afternoon.

Nicolas Winding Refn's Only God Forgives

Now, this movie is the reason why I decided to make an "upcoming movies"-segment in this update blog. Refn's latest Gosling movie, Drive, is the sort of movie that you either love immensely or hate with a passion. I fall into the first category myself. Drive is without a shadow of a doubt one of, if not the best movie I've ever seen, in fact I've seen it seven times in two years and still can't get enough of it, so there's really no simple way for me to describe how much I'm looking forward to the 23. of may, where Only God Forgives premieres in Denmark. I'm writing this in early April, and right now Denmark is the only country that has been given an official release date, which is probably because the director is danish himself. Maybe we'll evens see a world premier here as well, so in theory there's a chance that the world's first movie review of Only God Forgives will be going up right here on my blog! Even though that's probably not going to happen, I'm still exited as fuck for this movie. The cinematography and directing in Drive is unbelievable, and if Refn's new movie lives up to its predecessors standards, I would be surprised if Only God Forgives doesn't prove to be my favorite movie of 2013. It certainly is the one I'm most exited to see.

/Andrew

The Place Beyond The Pines IMDb page here

The Place Beyond The Pines trailer here

Only God Forgives IMDb page here

Only God Forgives trailer here

Rescue Dawn - A Movie Review by Andrew Lawrence

"Empty what is full. Fill what is empty. Scratch what itches."Rescue Dawn is an adventure/war/drama movie, and it's based on the experiences of a real life pilot whose plane was shot down near Laos during the early days of the Vietnam war. Christian Bale plays the lead role in this movie, and he does a great job of portraying how being lost in the jungle would wear a man down, both physically and mentally. The survival part is cool, although it's when he eventually gets caught by the vietnamese militia and ends up in a hostage camp where he meets other captives, both american and vietnamese, that the movie really starts to unfold and becomes something more than a "Tarzan has to survive in the jungle" kinda movie.

The first thing you notice about Rescue Dawn, is the fact that it's not filmed like a lot of other movies. You can tell that the director and the cinematographer made en effort of making the scenes where Dieter (Bale) is lost in the jungle and those where he is being held captive look like they were being shot with a handheld camera, and this really works to the films advantage. It gives these scenes a raw and intense touch, as if nothing is under control, and it gives the whole thing a strong, authentic feel. The fact that I felt as though someone was filming these events taking place in real life greatly increased my experience of watching this movie, and i got really invested in the story very early on. You did a good job cinematography guy, very good job.

One of the things that never ceases to amaze me, is how much effort and heart Christian Bale puts into his roles. He did 99 % of his stunts in this movie by himself, and I'm not gonna spoil any of them, but some of the shit that he does in this movie, I'm telling you, it's awe-inspiring. It's incredible how much this guy is willing to put his body through in order to make his characters seem more legitimate. For an example, he lost 55 pounds, about 25 KG, in order to sell the whole "being lost in the jungle for a long time"-element better, and that's not even the biggest weight change he has undergone in preparation for a movie role. Christian Bale is one of our time's most dedicated and talented method actors, and his performance in Rescue Dawn is just one the many that you can't help but admire. 

When creating a movie that is based on a real historical event, it's important that you make your movie feel as realistic as possible, in order to convince the audience that what you're presenting them is fact-fiction, and not just regular fiction. The director did of cause take some autistic license in a few cases, but over all it did feel like I was watching a real event unfold int eh screen. Apart from the great way the movie was filmed, something i talked about earlier, the way the different characters react to certain events and become more and more affected by being held hostage works fine as well, but there were also times where i raised my eyebrows a tad. Some of the these were when the supposedly top trained military guys do something stupid and irrational while trying to survive in the jungle. At times it felt like they hadn't watched as much Extreme Survival with Bear Grylls as you'd expect marines to have seen. 

All in all i can honestly say that Rescue Dawn was one of those movies that impressed me to the point where i would recommend other people to watch it, mainly because of Bale's acting and the realism that the movie displays. It does a great job of depicting how men in that situation would behave, but do keep in mind that it's based on a real story, and that there as a result of this won't be too many extravagant Hollywood special effects and fireworks present. The only real action scene is the one where Dieter's plane is shot down in the beginning of the movie, a scene that's featured in the trailer, a trailer that by the way spoils the best segment of the entire movie, so stay away from it of you don't like spoilers (!). This scene, and the other scenes that got my heart beating the fastest, actually had very little explosions and other "normally associated with action"-elements to them, something i appreciated immensely. 

In conclusion, Rescue Dawn is a muddy and believable tale of a man who wouldn't give up hope of making it home alive, with a few scenes so intense that you'll find yourself sitting on the edge of your seat, heart a'beating, forehead a'sweating, and fists a'clenching. The movie has definitely earned my seal of approval, and who knows, if I were to stumble upon a bargain, I'll maybe even pick it up on BluRay as well. (4/6)

Rescue Dawn IMDb page here

Rescue Dawn trailer here

Fargo - A Movie Review by Andrew Lawrence

"There's more to life than a little money, you know. Don'tcha know that? And here ya are, and it's a beautiful day. Well. I just don't understand it." 

I recently watched and review No Country For Old Men, a movie directed by The Coen Brothers. It was the first movie of theirs I had ever watched, and even though I was disappointed by that particular movie, I did notice the amazing directing and cinematography behind it. Based on this, I decided to watch some more of their movies, the first one being Fargo, and oh man. Oh man. Fargo takes place in the winter of 1987, in a couple of small towns in northern Minneapolis. It centers around a spineless, greedy and slow witted man called Jerry Lundegaard, played by William H. Macy, a benign, goodhearted and willfull police detective called Marge Gunderson, played by Frances McDormand, and a couple of ruthless and murderous criminals, played by Steve Buscemi and Peter Stormare. I wont go into too much depth concerning the actual plot of the movie in fear of spoiling too much for those who have not seen Fargo yet, which is something I very strongly suggest you go ahead and do right away, but it also isn't what i want to talk about concerning this movie.

Just like No Country For Old Men, this Coen movie has a message. In the case of No Country, the message was that you cannot outrun death and evil, but that you instead should come to terms with your faith and admit that you're not in control of everything that happens around you. Many people, myself included, will probably consider this a very cynical and nihilistic way of approaching life, but after watching Fargo, I've realised that the Coens do not applaud a such sad and indifferent view of life. The way this comes to show in Fargo is through the main character Marge Gunderson. This police detective is probably the most goodhearted and forgivefull character I've seen in cinema, and even though she seems a little distracted, she is just such a good person. So much so that the most cynical and psychotic of the two criminals actually end up being "saved" by her. 

As such, I'm 100 % convinced that she was intended to symbolise some sort of salvation, maybe even a savior. I say this because even though the movie is very violent and bloody, it leaves the audience with a feeling like there's still hope, as long as people like Marge still exists, as if good is still better than evil. This is very much the polar opposite of what No Country For Old Men taught us, which is fascinating, because is shows just how much perspectives and outlooks on life can vary. The fact that the Coens have managed to create two such similar yet different movies is also a testimony to their amazing ability to tell stories and make the audience go though different kinds of emotional states. It's also worth noting that Javier Bardem won an oscar for his portrayal of "the devil" in No Country For Old Men, and that Frances McDormand won one for best actress in Fargo as "the savior". 

One my favourite things about Fargo, is the fact that it's incredibly funny, and at the same time filled with drama and intensity. As mentioned before, this movie is very violent and graphic, and when you combine that with a really dry, yet brilliant humoristic touch and do it well, the result is absolutely amazing. Many of Jerry Lundegaard's lines made me laugh out loud, he's just such an awkward and goofy character that i simply couldn't help it. Another indescribably funny thing about Fargo is the accent and vocabulary that the characters make use of throughout the movie. You can't imagine how incredibly entertaining it is to listen to someone use the phrase "a'tootelin" in a serious manner. 

When it comes down to it, Fargo is well acted, well written, has a great script and is very well directed. It's funny, it's violent, intense and dramatic, a movie that every movie enthusiast should watch. You can just feel how much effort the directors and the crew behind the movie put into creating this picture, and it's no wonder that Fargo is considered a classic already. I realise that this review hasn't been as in depth and furrow as some of my earlier ones, but i really just wanted to write about the art of creating symbolic and meaningful cinema in itself, hence the many references to No Country For Old men. In the end I have to say Fargo is one of the most well written and solidly created movies I've ever seen, and not giving it my highest rating would be a dishonour. In my opinion, Fargo is story telling at it's finest and character development at it's best. Put simply; it's movie magic. (6/6)

Fargo IMDb page here

Fargo trailer here

Moon - A Movie Review by Andrew Lawrence

"You've been up here too long, man. You've lost your marbles."

Moon is movie director/writer Duncan Jones' first stand alone movie. It takes place in what I assume to be the near future where Sam Bell, an astronaut played by Sam Rockwell, works alone on a space station on the moon. He has signed a three year contract with a company that extracts a powerful energy source from the dark side of the moon called Helium3, and his job is basically to go out to some harvesting machines and collect a canister of Helium3 every day, and then ship it back to earth. Sam's only company is a robot voiced by Kevin Spacey called GERTY, so needless to day, he's very, very lonely. The movie takes place near the end of his three year trip to the moon, and Sam is beginning to wear out from being completely isolated for so long. He misses his wife and daughter and he's sick of eating prepared meals from small plastic bag, so when something strange happens on the space station, the lonely astronaut begins to question his mental stability. 

This indie sci-fi/drama surprised me. I bought it on Blu-Ray because it was cheap, and no way had i expected to like it as much as I did. First of all I have a hard time believing how a movie that is made with a budget of 5 million dollars can look as a beautiful as Moon does. The atmospheric shots of whats going on outside the space station looks gorgeous in particular, but everything else, from the actual station to the astronaut suits and the technology in and around the base looks totally authentic and realistic. Watching Sam drive across the lunar surface in a moon jeep wearing sunglasses while a beautiful score blurs in the background was strangely fascinating, and looking at the earth and the stars in the distance while absorbing the loneliness and isolation that the character is subject to got me emotionally invested in the plot. Moon is very well directed, and I can't wait to see what Duncan Jones comes up with next. 

Being one of those movies that completely centers around a single person, the actor that plays that person obviously has to be good. Luckily for Moon, Sam Rockwell knocks it out of the park. His performance is solid and trustable, and he does a great job of displaying what being completely isolated for more than a thousands days does to a human being. When his character experiences difficult situations and has to make even more difficult decisions, Rockwell manages to display the emotions someone would experience in such a situation nicely. Moon feels really realistic, and you truly believe that something similar to what Sam Bell is put through could happen in real life. 

Being the only real supporting character, I honestly would have liked GERTY to be voiced by someone else than Kevin Spacey. Because he's a well known actor and therefore is easily recognizable, i kept thinking of Kevin Spacey talking into a microphone every time GERTY was speaking. This resulted in me never really believing that that GERTY was a real robot with intentions of his own. An unknown or less known person would have worked better for me. Over all I did like the robot as a character though, the best part being a small screen displaying a smiley face that changes according to GERTY's mood, even though I found it creepy at times as well. Something about the way the face would look completely indifferent when GERTY is seen alone kinda freaked me out. Whether or not this was intentional I can't say, maybe I'm just easily freakoutable. 

The most compelling element of this sci-fi movie is sadly the thing that many people will dislike the most about it as well. What I'm talking about is the haunting atmosphere, which is what i loved the most about Moon. You have to let yourself plunge into the isolated and hopeless reality of Sam Bell to truly enjoy this movie, but if you do, I promise that Moon will take you on a beautiful, haunting, indulging and immersing journey into space and the human psyche. It's a subtle movie without action and explosions, yet it's still rich on suspense and drama if you have the ability to put yourself into the the situation of Sam Bell. After the movie had ended I couldn't stop thinking about what I would do if i was in main characters shoes, and I have a feeling that this is exactly what the director aimed to do. Moon is beautiful, well acted, thought provoking and definitely worth buying on BluRay. (5/6)

Moon IMDb page here

Moon trailer here

No Country For Old Men - A Movie Review by Andrew Lawrence

"Here last week they found this couple out in California. They rent out rooms for old people, kill'em, bury'em in the yard, cash their social security checks. Well, they'd tortur'em first, I don't know why. Maybe the television set was broke."

Now I was really looking forward to watching this movie. I mean, the Coen Brothers directing a movie about drugs and violence starring Javier Bardem, Josh Brolin and Tommy Lee Jones sounds almost too good to be true, right? Well, to me, No Country has elements that are absolutely breathtaking, but it sadly has elements that fall flat as well. 

The movie takes place in 1980's southern USA, where Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin), a hillbilly'ish welter/hunter stumbles upon a drug deal gone sour. He finds a suitcase containing 2 million dollars which he decides to keep, and thus becomes the the target of a psychotic assassin portrayed masterfully by Javier Bardem. A double manhunt ensues, and Llewelyn Moss finds himself in the center of a bloody tornado of violence and ruthlessness. I call it a double manhunt because not only is Anton Chigurn (Bardem) trying to catch and kill Llewelyn, but and old sherif called Ed Tom Bell (Jones) is trying to find and arrest Bardem's character as well. The movie can be described as a chain, with the three main characters each symbolizing a link, one being a little ahead of the one behind it. 

The mass murdering Anton Chigurn is the strongest link in this movie by far. I had head that Javier Bardem was amazing in this role before i watched No Country, but what i saw completely blew me away. There is no way you can prepare for what Bardem brings to the table, just no way in hell. The character is evil, menacing, cold hearted, psychotic, everything a mother in law would be afraid of. He's such an important part of this movie though, and i would actually go as far as to calling him the main character, because he simply is so vital to the over all message of the film. He has very little dialogue, a horrendous haircut and two infinitely cool weapons that he uses very frequently, and i totally ended up rooting for the guy. The fact that the big baddie of the movie in some kind of weird way ends up being the hero, or anti-hero if you will, is very telling, and it ties in perfectly to the message this film tries to get across. 

Another great thing this movie has going for it is the way it's directed. Theres something about the way No Country For Old Men is put together that instantly got me fascinated, and though it's hard to explain to someone who's not seen it, i believe those who have will agree when i say that is has a haunting coldness to it, and I believe this is mainly due to the lack of music or background noise in almost all of the scenes. I only remember hearing anything in the background of like two or three scenes, which is not a lot in a two hour movie, and this serves to create a very toned down and lonely, yet suspenseful and enthralling tone. In this case less definitely is more. The movie looks gorgeous, everything from the wast desert areas of Texas to the bleeding corpses left behind by Anton Chigurn kinda pops out in a non 3D-kinda way, and at first i was happy to find out that the Coen Brothers were awarded the best director academy award for their work on this movie (more on this later). This is largely due to the lasting impression that this movie leaves the audience with. Theres no pat on the head, no reassuring that everything is gonna be fine. It's hard to explain this in too much detail without spoiling the ending and the message of the movie, but it's actually quite haunting. 

Sadly, there were times during this movie that i would have wished the Coens would have sticked to their less is more approach, and by this i mean the Tomme Lee Jones parts. Granted, Jones did a great job of displaying a struggling elderly sherif full of regrets, and i do acknowledge that his character is vital to the main theme of the movie, but honestly, theres just too much of him. I'we read that when writing the script for this movie, the amount of dialogue in the book that it's based on, was drastically reduced by Coens in an effort to create a more eery and ruthless atmosphere. This worked great with Bardem's and Brolin's characters, bur for some reason, it seems as though they forgot to reduce the amount of dialogue from Tom Bell. Some may think that this would diminish the message the movie was trying to get across, but honestly, it worked with the other characters, why not this one?

Many occurrences in this movie aren't explained in detail, something i don't mind at all. I love having to think things through and sort of come up with my own explanation to certain parts of movies, something no country for old men does as well, kinda. Most parts of the film follows this principle nicely, but its almost as if the directors tried too hard force-feed the meaning of Tommy Lee Jones' character. As a result, the movie feels like it's way longer than it actually is, and i found myself getting annoyed every time Tommy Lee Jones got on screen. The last ten minutes are nothing but him talking, talking and talking, and by then i just wanted the movie to end. The plot was finished, the message had been delivered, but it just kept on going, which is a damn shame. All in all, the elements of this movie that were awesome were really awesome, and the elements that annoyed me really annoyed me. 

The Coen Brothers won three oscars for this movie, one for best director(s), one for best adapted screenplay, and one for best picture. I don't agree with theses decisions. When i got to think about it, There Will Be Blood was superior both in terms of directing and dialogue, and i over all thought it was a great deal better than No Country For Old Men, and therefore don't believe it was worthy of best picture. Maybe this is just because I'm a huge Paul Thomas Anderson fanboy, who knows, but this is my blog God damn it, I'll write whatever I want! (this last sentence should be read aloud with the accent of a middle aged black woman). When it comes down to it, No Country For Old Men is worth the watch because of Javier Bardem, the acting in general and the amazing atmosphere that is present in 80 % of the scenes, but the irritating part was just way too irritating for me to give it my seal of approval. Look up Javier's scenes on youtube and you will have watched the best parts of this movie. Sorry Tommy. (3/6)

No Country For Old Men IMDb page here

No Country For Old Men trailer here