on the noir trip that i am on, otto premingers ‘laura’. a mysterious murder of a top advertising executive leads to suspicions flying all round, including her fiance and her much older mentor. most of the action takes place in the apartment of the dead woman and the central character is a snarling detective complete with crush on said victim. really not that mysterious but fun to watch.
it is apparent that a fashion designer was behind the very stylish visuals of the gorgeously shot ‘a single man’. carefully recreating the chirstopher isherwood novel the film follows a day in the life of an english professor in los angeles as he reminisces about the lover he lost a few years back. as he contemplates suicide the world reaches out to him to love and cherish in precise detail, colour and texture.
a romance with an older man offers a bored exceptionally bright girl in britain a chance to really experience life- as defined by restaurants, concerts and a trip to paris. too bad that it turns out that he is married. a straightforward coming of age period drama. straightforwardly and smartly made.
but ‘paranoid park’ is something else. below a bridge young men ride skateboards rolling, swaying, swinging- freedom on the edge. they all seem to be escaping from something. our hero- young wide eyed innocent – from a family that is breaking up and a girlfriend he does not care for, and his own shyness. an accident where he kills a security guard forms the basic plotline of the film- but really that does not matter too much. the long slow motion skateboarding scenes, the muddled complex soundscape, and the gentle boys who are playing at being men, all reminded me so much of gus van sants earlier american suburbs and violence epic- ‘elephant’. loved that too.
i am supposed ot like ‘the day the earth stood still’ a sci fi special effects extravaganza where aliens invade the earth yet again- and destroy it- yet again- all because the human race is incapable to keeping the greenhouse gases under control. so keanu reeves arrives with a single expression on his face accompanied by a gigantic cyclops like figure in the middle of central park (where else?) the films tries to get all profound and philosophical and fails spectacularly. if only they had embraced more wholeheartedly the silly hollywood fluff it could have been.
a run of the mill prom king / queen high school comedy in ’10 things i hate about you’. the only real highlight is heath ledger and julia stiles as the guy and girl that everyone is afraid of in the school. the rest is bubblegum.
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