Friday, March 25, 2011

The Last 10 Films I've Seen- It's a Strange List




We are using the image above as something that could go with "Rango" that the other 112, 316 bloggers who've mentioned the animated western with the voice of Johnny Depp haven't used. We had to insert the words "Big Green Lizard Costa Rica" in Google to come up with this!

I wasn't too keen on seeing "Rango" until a tweet from film director Sofia Coppola said that it was not only a good film, but it was like 'a kiddie version of Chinatown.'

The very last movie I've seen is the 2000 Iranian film "The Circle" by Jafar Panahi, whose later film "Offside" was championed by my good friend Bilge Ebiri. The late Susan Sontag was among those who praised "The Circle," an amazing, highly-political film about the plight of women in Iran.

The Iranian film brought to mind some of the controversial films made by the late Turkish actor/director Yilmaz Guney in the late '70s and early '80s. Although, I have the subjective opinion, which I think even people who aren't of Turkish heritage like myself would agree with, that Turkey is a far better place politically than Iran. Well, we certainly hope that is the case!

The most disappointing of the ten films listed was unquestionably "Bronson," a 2008 English film which is essentially a Stanley Kubrick rip-off orchestrated for the shock porn generation.....hmm....I am starting to sound too much like Jonathan Rosenbaum, forgive the film geek humor!

We must profess that we got this idea from the great magazine "Film Comment," which has an amazing article on the gradual death of film projection in the current issue.

Here is the the list, my rating (out of four stars) comes after each film:

1. "The Circle" (Iran, 2000) ****

2. "Rango" (2011) ***1/2

3. "The Lucky Ones" (2008) ***

4. "The Tall T" (1957) ***1/2

5. "The Devil-Doll" (1936) **1/2

6. "24 City" (China, 2008) ****

7. "Treeless Mountain" (So. Korea, 2008) ***1/2

8. "Bronson" (2008) **

9. "The Adjustment Bureau" (2011) **

10. "Youth in Revolt" (2009) **

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