| REVIEWS, REVIEWS, REVIEWS! Updated 4/6/06 |
| MOVIES/VIDEOS Rated on a grading scale--A+ to F-. These are totally my biased opinion, but hopefully my reasoning might be helpful: |
| I've started renting movies via Blockbuster on-line, so I'm getting to see movies I couldn't even find before:) Thumbsucker <DVD> A This movie is about a teenager who still sucks his thumb (as far as I can tell, just at home and mainly when he's asleep). Many of the men in his life--his father and orthodontist mainly--who know about the behavior want it to stop. This movie is really about how we try to get rid of people's idiosyncracies, finding all sorts of "problems" with them, regardless of no "real" harm being done. (The movie especially seems against Ritalin and the like.) I must admit that through most of the movie I thought it mediocre, but the last two scenes changed my mind greatly...so I'd recommend it! King Kong <DVD> A- I liked this version better than the other two (older) versions. I felt that Kong is given more of a personality and the interaction between Kong and the "beauty" is more realistic/understandable. There are problems--the dinosaur stampede scene doesn't look very believable and some of it doesn't make sense (there's a pile of dying dinos laying there, yet the carnivores still chase the people?)--but overall I wasn't ever bored. The only problem was that I kept wanting Kong to somehow be saved (even though I knew it wouldn't happen), so I cried quite a few times in the knowledge of and experience of his death. Interstellar 5555 <DVD> A This is really a movie-length Daft Punk video, but I love it none-the-less. There is no dialogue (except for the very first where the director speaks), the action just flows with the music. It's about a man who kidnaps alien musicians and turns them human-looking, then pushes them to the limit (under mind control) to obtain gold records. I won't give away the reason and it's no great mind-blowing movie, but I enjoy watching it and it makes me tear up too. |
| MUSIC Same scale, same subjective opinions! |
| Thumbsucker soundtrack A+ I LOVE this soundtrack. I'd never even heard of the two artists behind it, but it has an upbeat yet "true" feel to it. I especially love the song, Move Away and Shine (both the "regular" and in a dream version). I can't fully describe the music, though on another site the person said it's "sappy pop." I guess I'd agree, though I normally don't love "sappy pop" as much as I love this CD. Even though the sound is "sappy pop," there is a deeper meaning to it all:) Daft Punk--Discovery A+ Again, I LOVE this CD, which is the sountrack for the above Interstellar 5555. It's a mix of techno dance, funk, pop, and I don't know what else. The real reason I love it though is it takes me back into the movie...the movie is what led me to want the CD. So if you rent the movie, you'll know if you'd like this album:) |