DVD: Once Upon a Time in the West Italian director Sergio Leone is the man from whom the term “spaghetti western” originated – a film set in the hey-day of the USA’s “wild west” made by an Italian director, and often filmed (at least in part) in Italy. IMDB’s plot summary is pretty straightforward, but …
Category Archives: media
DVD: Green Zone
DVD: Green Zone Matt Damon and Paul Greengrass (who worked on the second and third Bourne movies) team up again to tell a story about the WMDs that were missing in Iraq. It’s a political thriller, meets and action movie. Not bad, but not amazing either. If you like Matt Damon and explosions, then you …
DVD: Fantastic Mr Fox
DVD: Fantastic Mr. Fox Having loved The Life Aquatic and the Royal Tenenbaums in years gone by, I was interested to see what Wes Anderson was going to do with a kids story. In part this is another vehicle for George Clooney to deliver clever lines with his legendary voice. At its best, there are …
DVD: Shutter Island
DVD: Shutter Island Director Martin Scorsese has created a lot of interesting films over the year, but i’ve mainly seen only his gangster stories thus far. Reading Matt’s review made me feel like this divergence into the horror genre would be worth a look. It didn’t hurt that it owed a certain amount to the …
DVD: Up in the Air
DVD: Up in the Air I’d been looking forward to seeing this one after its impressive trailer – witty, some good lines from Clooney and others, and a theme – the travel-obsessed loner – that appeals to a nagging inner voice that I have on occasion. Unfortunately, it’s not as funny as the trailer would …
DVD: Moon
DVD: Moon (2009) Directed and written by Duncan Jones, son of David Bowie, this is a science fiction movie made on a small ($5M) budget. The best part about this film is the plot: the less you know about it, the more you’ll enjoy it. If you’re a fan at all of the epic science-fiction …
DVD: Public Enemies
Public Enemies There’s a sense in which it’s worth watching Johnny Depp just read the phone book: I’ve enjoyed watching him on-screen since the days of 21 Jump Street, and – though there are several Depp films I’ve never seen, I’ve been trying to get through them all. Public Enemies is from the director of …
DVD: Where the Wild Things Are
DVD: Where the Wild Things Are Throughout my childhood, we were told good things about this book, but Campsie library’s copy always seemed to be out, or damaged, or both, and so we only read it once in my formative years. As such, while I love the story, I don’t connect with it in quite …
DVD: Children of Men
DVD: Children of Men Famous for its long takes (there are single shots that go for around 10 minutes), this story from a dystopian future – one where there hasn’t been a new pregnancy on earth for 18 years – and the world has responded in chaos. England somehow remains exempt from these problems, but …
DVD: X-Men Origins: Wolverine
DVD: X-Men Origins: Wolverine This comic book inspired movie, created as a prequel to the X-Men trilogy, has all the explosions and special effects you might hope for in this genre, but for me seemed just too shallow. Sure, there were a couple of plot twists and some funny lines, but it might have been …