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  1. #1
    Kam
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    Some recent rentals, proceed with caution.

    So had an interesting mix last couple of days. It was the Good, the bad, the better than i thought, and the phenomenal. (beware some major kam-ranting below).

    Coach Carter - (the better than i thought) sam jackson plays the tough love coach who teaches the punk kid high schoolers going nowhere how to play basketball, and how to survive in this world. way better than i thought it was going to be, but i came in with low expectations, so that might have had something to do with it. has some typical cliches, but, what can ya do? good fun movie.

    Assassination Tango - (the bad) couldn't even finish it. don't rent at all. i tried twice to watch it and both times was highly unwatchable. duvall plays an assassin who gets sent on this hit down to south america and tangos ensue. he wrote, directed, produced, and starred in it. while i really loved The Apostle (which he did all the same in) he is hitting 50% here, cuz this one is a stinker.

    Samurai Assassin - (the good) definitely reccomend this one. about a group of ronin who decide to assassinate the shogun. dont want to give away too much in case anyone sees it, because i personally like to go in to movies not knowing anything, and then seeing how good/bad it is (a test most movies nowadays would fail since they, and you, know practically everything going in to it from the trailers, side note: try walking into or watching a movie you know absolutely NOTHING about and see how it unfolds versus a movie you basically already know the plot too. when you do know the plot, the film can be far weaker than it should be, because you are already connecting the dots since you know what's going on. when you don't, and the film has to stand entirely on its own without any prompting of additional outside input from yourself, then THAT'S a successful film). this is a classic japanese movie with the great mifune (kurasawa's favorite actor). you see the different motivations of each ronin and why they want to join in this nefarious plot and what honor means to each and what they are willing to sacrifice in order to see the plot to its end.

    Now....

    Primer - (the phenomenal) ok, HIGHLY reccomended, but with a caveat. if you're sick of the schlop that's been coming out for the past few years really, and want a refreshing change... look no further. the jury award winner at sundance in 2004 was shot for $7,000. On film. that alone is incredible, let alone the complexity and yet simplicity of the storyline. Again, definitely don't want to give anything away on this one, but all you need to know is the basic premise and tagline. It's about time travel and the tagline is: If you always want what you can't have, what do you want when you can have anything?
    This movie is not dumbed down at all, quite the opposites. There are no special effects in this movie at all. its not about the technology, its not about the effects, its about the story and ALL about the story. Probably the best time travel movie i've seen. and definitely the most well thought out time travel story. this is a sci-fi movie without a single visual "special effect" because the entire movie is the special effect of thought. something lacking in nearly every sci-movie since the terminator. (although i did love serenity, that's not a thinking sci-fi movie, that's a character sci-fi movie with great characters).

    When a group of engineer friends are sitting around discussing their projects, they dont stop to explain what they're saying to the audience, because people don't do that. always a pet peeve of mine when the writer/directors/ etc all dumb down the scripts so that the 'common man' can understand what's going on. that concept itself is idiotic to me. Yes, i have absolutely NO idea what the semiconductor and argon and copper wiring and freon discussions they were having meant one single bit. But that's not the point, everything they said sure sounded authentic to me, and that's the only thing that is crucial to the story. i am immediately taken out of any storyline when the idiot factor is put in and is used almost everywhere, and COULD have been used here but brilliantly wasn't. (generally what i mean is when two people know something or have 'higher order' knowledge, a third person is the idiot who asks what is going on and the smarter characters explain it to him and therefore to the audience). the two engineers when they discover this time travel explain it to each other and do so at a level that THEY would comprehend easily, not US. We aren't here to comprehend time travel, we're here for the emotional truth of that story, and that WE (or at least I) comprehended in spades. here one of the engineers has a wife. they very easily could have explained their higher order discussions to her, but they don't. its inconsequential and very rarely have i ever seen it happen in the real world. when i talk shop with my buddies around sig others, we dont stop, pull ourselves out of the conversation, pause, explain in detail the intricacies of up-rezing hd to 35mm in layman's jargon. does it happen? sure, at times, everything happens, but its not interesting when it does. this movie does a great job of telling a very interesting story, and then also showing how this reality truly would exist. this is not a mass market movie, which can be seen by its extremely limited release in only ny and la. but now it's on dvd. and its available to all. if you're up for an interesting challenge, definitely rent this. if you don't like "indie" movies, you're not a fan of thinking, and prefer your movies with a healthy portion of crud, stay away. (btw, not ripping on all movies like that, because i enjoy the good dumb action flick and so-bad-its-good type movies like tremors as much as the next guy, but i prefer, and am happily refreshed, when finding gems like Primer).

    peace
    k2

    go 'canes!
    /create

  2. #2
    Can a crooner get a gig? dean_martin's Avatar
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    Kam,

    Thanks for being the point man for the obscure. I'll definitely check out Primer.

    BTW, I searched out and found Y Tu Mama Tambien based on your mentioning it here and I believe we may have discussed it before. However, the more I thought about the conduct of the characters, particularly the female, the more I began to think the narrator could not be trusted. This is a clever device often used in literature in which the person telling the story is either intentionally distorting the truth or is telling only one side. I think the female character played/manipulated those young guys to the hilt, but I didn't come to that conclusion until a couple of days after watching the film because while watching it the narrator tries to convince you (with an objective-sounding tone, no less) that everything she does is with the guys' best interest in mind. Then again, I don't speak Spanish so something could have been lost between the spoken word and the subtitles.

  3. #3
    Kam
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    Quote Originally Posted by dean_martin
    Kam,

    Thanks for being the point man for the obscure. I'll definitely check out Primer.

    BTW, I searched out and found Y Tu Mama Tambien based on your mentioning it here and I believe we may have discussed it before. However, the more I thought about the conduct of the characters, particularly the female, the more I began to think the narrator could not be trusted. This is a clever device often used in literature in which the person telling the story is either intentionally distorting the truth or is telling only one side. I think the female character played/manipulated those young guys to the hilt, but I didn't come to that conclusion until a couple of days after watching the film because while watching it the narrator tries to convince you (with an objective-sounding tone, no less) that everything she does is with the guys' best interest in mind. Then again, I don't speak Spanish so something could have been lost between the spoken word and the subtitles.
    gonna pull this down off the shelf and check it out again along with Amores Perros and have a double feature with them.

    but the untrustworthy/lieing narrator, i think, is one of the best story telling devices around, and when it's executed makes for the best movies. the first time i ever came across it, and loved it, was the original The Jungle Book with sabu and it's own lil trick ending. I was blown away by that simple little twist. other, more recent classics would be Memento, The Usual Suspects, anything by lynch because you never can get a grasp from who's pov the story is being told, and Fight Club. of course when its done wrong, you never remember the movie again.
    /create

  4. #4
    Big science. Hallelujah. noddin0ff's Avatar
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    Just rented Primer last night. What a great movie. Thanks for the recommendation! I can’t believe the shoestring this was made on. I can’t think of a single way a bigger budget could have improved this movie (exept for taking it from 2.0 to 5.1, heh, heh).

    I thought one of the more ironic parts about renting Primer was that I wanted to keep going back in time to figure it out. The movie was only 85 minutes but I think I watched it for just over 2 hours with all the rewinding. I'm not really sure I figured it out, but I don’t care. I’m still thinking. I’m still thinking of watching it again. I think that's how you're supposed to feel with a paradox. Suffice it to say, you can’t watch this movie without paying attention.

    I read some reviews that made comparisons to Momento and Donnie Darko. Toward the end of my viewing, my thought was that the closest philosophical comparison might be to Groundhog Day. Bill Murray got to leave when he got it right. But, what if there was no 'right' and do-overs were your choice?

  5. #5
    Big science. Hallelujah. noddin0ff's Avatar
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    Did anyone notice the names of the characters, Aaron and Abe, could be for for A>A and A>B?

  6. #6
    Kam
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    that's a good catch! the a/a, a/b thing, didnt even notice that. if you want, i can post this review/recap i read where they outlined exactly what happenned and broke down what/how he did what he did. it might not be the definitive answer, but it made sense as to what was going on and which 'aaron' (i get them confused, maybe abe, the darkhaired one) is the one that got on the plane and we see working in the hangar making a giant version of the machine in the end. that's the part i thought was fascinating, because it wasn't the aaron i thought it was. if you remember the one scene where he's removing all the other aarons, one of them fights back, and that's where i got confused as to which aaron continued from that point on.

    very fascinating movie. and that budget, it is unbelievable, but what's more ridiculous, is they shot a nearly 1:1 ratio. that is, what you see, is EVERYTHING they shot.
    /create

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