Last Holiday (2006)

At the beginning of her career, it looked like Queen Latifah was only capable of playing sassy wisecracking women. But she has expanded her repertoire to show she is quite a versatile actress. Here she convincingly plays a reserved, tentative woman who is pushed to act the way she's always wished she could, without boundaries, when she discovers she's dying. Although the movie itself is not that great, she brings life to a character that could have been bland in anyone else's hands. A thumbs up to her, a "meh, whatever" to the film itself. 3 stars.

Life Is Beautiful (1997)

As the screen faded to credits and I sat alone in my living room, I kept replaying the final few minutes in my mind. The film continued to haunt me throughout my sleep and into the next morning. I don't know what rating to give it. This movie was both somehow *wrong*, that such a horrifying event was given such a rosy color, but at the same time so stunningly beautiful, that a young boy could come out of that event with that image of it in his mind. The story of a father determined at any cost to keep his son alive and happy was charming at the beginning and then almost terrifying at the end. I can understand why people respond both negatively and positively to this. And I am torn between those two poles... which is probably the way it was meant to be. If you go too far one way or the other, you lose the meaning of the movie. The fight between terror and joy, which is fought throughout the entire story. This isn't a movie you should be able to just choose an opinion on. I have a feeling I'll be revamping and reconsidering and reordering my thoughts on this movie for days and weeks and perhaps months and years to come.

I am going to give it an extremely high rating because for a movie to conflict me that much emotionally, it means it was almost certainly made superbly - if I can't just throw it off to the side, it has something worth considering. 4.5 stars.

Defending Your Life (1991)

I've decided I'm not a fan of Meryl Streep. At least not in comedies. She is bizarrely awkward in this movie, as she was in Mamma Mia!, communicating not normal cheerfulness or simply a vivacious personality, but an immature teenage mentality. However, that aside, this is a perfectly capable little romantic comedy. There's nothing to shout about here -- the story's been done before and goes on a little long at 112 minutes. I was ready for it to be done around 90. However, it's not all that bad. Very pleasant, not spectacular. 3 stars.

ShakespeaRe-Told (2005)

I had mixed reactions to this series of retellings of some of Shakespeare's classics. Macbeth was the strongest - the tale of two people who thought they were ready to kill but find out too late they weren't. There's something very appropriate about making it about a chef. It gave rise to all sorts of interesting imagery.

A Midsummer Night's Dream was charmingly done. The tone of the story was somehow kept, even with the fairies speaking in modern day slang and an odd added plot about Hermia's parents (anything similar in the play? I can't recall). Very enjoyable.

The other two fell victim to the fact that Shakespeare's characters are ridiculously mood swingy. Much Ado About Nothing's Beatrice was a bit unbalanced emotionally and I found myself waiting for the moment when she would explode all over her loved one, but oddly enough, it never happened. She's mood swingy but not even consistently. Great acting, though. She managed to make it almost manageable.

The Taming of the Shrew was just ALL over the place emotionally. The 15-20 minutes between the marriage and the "taming" were the best, with some great angry banter back and forth, but everything before it made Katherine so unlikeable that we can't possibly want her to be happy, and afterwards she was so suddenly and creepily docile that the only logical explanation is that he's been slipping tranquilizers into her coffee. Very awkward. Rufus Sewell was superb, however.

Overall, two were quite good, one was quite good given what it had to work with, and one was ... odd but had potential. Probably worth watching - it was interesting to see all the various creative rewrites. 3.5 stars.

Alice (1990)

This film comes and goes in how good it is. The premise is marvelous, the ending is thoroughly satisfying, and the scene where she meets a former lover is very touching. As a whole, however, there are a lot of scenes that don't ontribute much to either the film's plot or the film's tone, and really don't seem to have any purpose at all. Woody Allen's films often meander into discussions of the philosophical, but this seemed not even to have that in mind most of the time. Not one of his better ones, although still worth seeing for a fan. 3 stars.

Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008)

This is the most substantial movie Woody Allen's made in a couple of years. Cassandra's Dream (2007) wandered a bit too much and Scoop (2006) was pleasant, but completely fluffy. Match Point back in 2005 was much darker, but was received similarly well.

As with all of Woody Allen's movies, I just enjoyed watching the characters interact. Whatever their circumstances were, as the characters sought to find what they wanted, they were interesting. (By the way - Penelope Cruz for Best Supporting Actress? I highly disagree. Rebecca Hall, who played the more subdued but far more interesting Vicky, would have been the better choice.) Two-thirds of the way through the movie, I was unsure where it was going or how it would end. Most of all, I was worried it wouldn't end in a way that made sense for Woody Allen, a writer/director whose work has come to feel very reassuringly consistent for me. But as the last scene faded to black, it was a satisfying one. It ended in such a way that I had to go back and rethink the characters and everything they'd been through, and how it all connected.

Although there were moments that dragged on a little bit long, it was overall an excellent film, and Allen's best in three years. I'm excited to see where his next one goes. 4 stars.

Purple Noon (1960)

I liked this adaptation of Patricia Highsmith's novel just a bit better than 1999's "The Talented Mr. Ripley," although that was good as well. This is smoother and classier, and Alain Delon is chilling as Tom Ripley. The two movies vary significantly in how they end. I haven't read Highsmith's novel, so I'm not sure which one is closer to the original. I liked both endings almost equally well, although my sense of justice was more satisfied with this film. This film is also significantly shorter than the 1999 one, telling the entire story in under two hours, which gives it a tighter, more imperative feel. 4 stars.