Mini Reviews: 1/9/13

The Tall Man:  2012 thriller directed by Pascal Laugier and starring Jessica Biel, Jodelle Ferland, and Stephen McHattie.  Julia is a widowed nurse in a small, dilapidated former coal town.  When children begin to disappear, several of the townsfolk believe it’s the work of local legend/scary story The Tall Man.  Then Julia’s son is kidnapped from her home and the wild chase begins. 

It was decent.  Not scary but suspenseful.  Sufficiently creepy.  And it definitely kept me guessing, so many twists and turns that it was JUST on the verge of annoying me.  Not totally sold on the ending.

Snowtown:  2011 Australian film about serial killer John Bunting and the Snowtown Murders, directed by Justin Kurzel and starring Daniel Henshall, Lucas Pittaway, and Louise Harris.  Jamie is confusedly fumbling through his teen years, trying but failing to deal with the sexual abuse that he and his brothers suffered at the hands of a neighbor.  And then his Mom meets John, who takes Jamie under his wing and harasses the neighbor into leaving town.  By doing things like throwing kangaroo innards on his doorstep.  At first Jamie is revived by this friendship, he’s feeling more confident, getting himself together.  But you know, when your new friend tells you to kill a dog for no reason, that might be an indication it’s time to get the hell outta there.  JESUS was this tough to watch.  Like, damn.  I couldn’t get all the way through it, it was just too brutal.

Pressure Cooker:  2008 documentary directed by Mark Becker and Jennifer Grausman.  It follows three students at Philadelphia’s Frankford High who are enrolled in a Culinary Arts class run by Wilma Stephenson, and hope to win scholarships to culinary institutes.  Every school has that one teacher who inspires fear in most but devotion in a small few; that would be Ms. Stephenson.  She’s a total badass.  She’s like a tiny little drill sergeant of cooking, and her methods work.  I think she elevated what might have otherwise been a rather sappy, clichéd film.  I am a fan of the struggle-to-overcome-adversity documentaries, but after a certain point they tend to run together.  This stands out, mostly because the saccharine is cut with abrupt, staccato yelling about knife skills.  I really liked it.

The King’s Speech:  2010 British historical drama directed by Tom Hooper and starring Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush and Helena Bonham Carter.  I am still planning to do a lengthier review of this side-by-side with W./E.  I swear.  But until then here’s the quick:  it’s a big, warm, fluffy blanket of a movie.  It won’t make you think, it won’t surprise you, but it’s nice and lovely and the acting is great.  If you like period dramas then sure, why not.

The Gate:  1987 horror movie directed by Tibor Takacs and starring Stephen Dorff, Christa Denton and Louis Tripp.  Glen and Al are young siblings home alone for the weekend and through their adolescent shenanigans accidentally open a portal to a demon realm.  Whoops.  Yeah, that’s as far as I got.  It was just too cheesy for me.  I mean, Dorff was insanely cute as a little kid, and it had potential, but it was kind of gross and not scary.

Cleopatra:  1963 epic directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz and starring Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, Rex Harrison, Roddy McDowell and Martin Landau. 

Watching this movie is like accepting a dare.  It’s four mostly intolerable hours of yelling and crying and costume changes.  It’s pretty to look at but assaults the ears.  If you want to see a good film about Taylor and Burton destroying each other, watch Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf instead.

Eden Lake:  2008 horror film directed by James Watkins and starring Kelly Reilly, Michael Fassbender and Jack O’Connell.  Jenny and Steve are off on a romantic weekend getaway to a remote lake in the English countryside.  Which would be lovely if only those surly youths would turn down their music.  And keep control of their angry dog.  You see where this is going.  Now they’ll confront the teens, now the teens will play a “prank” which will get totally out of hand.  All this will culminate in that all-too-familiar point in the horror movie when the victim is now totally unrecognizable, covered in goo and blood and viscera and becomes feral and goes apeshit on their attacker(s).

It was utterly predictable, right up until the SUPER BRUTAL ENDING WTF.  Was not expecting that.  Holy crap, guys.  It gave me chest pains.