Star Wars

Star Wars was one of the major films of our time that changes cinema and created a whole new world for film: space. Never before had there been such a huge, intense movie made that took place entirely in different worlds. I remember my dad took my little brother and me as soon as the Digitally Remastered Version hit the theatres. I have always been a fan of these films because they make us look to the sky and wonder if there really is anything crazy going on out there. The fact that humans have very little of the technology portrayed in the movie but it is all based on our technology makes us wonder if these fantastic ships and planets and aliens are a real part of the universe we don’t know much about. The movies are really the story of Anakin Skywalker and how he was thought to be the hope for all good in the galaxy but he turns to the Dark Side of evil. The movies play hard on the good Jedi race defending liberty and justice pitted against the evil Sith who want to kill and corrupt. We can read this as George Lucas’s ideas on spiritual warfare as we see the real battle is for minds hearts and loyalty instead of men and land. The battlefield of space makes the factors of men and land irrelevant, we are forced to look into the personal battle each of many memorable characters fights as they decide which side they will fight for. These movies make us look into ourselves and make that same decision within ourselves.

Se7en

Se7en is a movie that reminds you of that deep primitive fear that we should have about the world we live in. In the animal kingdom it is a simple survivor scenario where death is a natural part of the environment. As humans we don’t openly kill each other for food but there still is a competition where each human is against all the others in the world. We kill in instances of anger or fear for our lives and we see murder as a dirty thing no matter how you cut it. There is no good way or good reason to kill another human being. As a society we kill as punishment and to deter crime but it is not an open sport. Se7en is about showing us the evil in our world that is closer than we want to believe, and how often times it parades around as religion. Spacy plays a crazy religious zealot who sets out to punish those who commit the seven deadly sins. Brad Pitt plays the perfect up and coming detective with a family still believing in all the good in the world. Only he finds that it is a dark and dirty place full of evil and malice. So the moral of the story is; read your bible, keep your head on a swivel and don’t break those seven deadly sins.

American Psycho

This movie creeped me out, but I enjoyed it nonetheless as it reminded me of something Stephen King would write. It tells a normal story that we can all relate to, only there is this cold, awful streak that runs through it that stirs a little thought deep inside you that whispers “this could really happen, this could seriously be someone I know.” It is only scary because you know a guy like that. The casting of Christian Bale as the “American Psycho” was perfect. He embodies the American man. He is intimidating, built, successful, wealthy, and does whatever he wants. He functions in society and maintains a vice president job during the day and enjoys beating, killing, and disembodying hookers in an empty apartment building that he bought specifically for that use. We hear Christian Bale’s non-diagetic voice as we see him getting ready and we hear the calm insanity that is Patrick Bateman’s thought process. He explains that for all the effort he puts into his outward appearance that he “simply isn’t there”. He is narcistic and obsessive compulsive about his appearance and physical fitness. He interacts with colleagues and is planning to marry his girlfriend. He occasionally lets out random bursts of hateful murderous language that people simply ignore. Sitting with his buddies at a meal he brings up how a serial killer once said he liked to imagine a woman’s head on a stick. He often excuses himself by saying “I have to return some videotapes”. The movie does a great job of showing how someone so normal can be that crazy through good casting and Christian Bale’s performance.

The Shawshank Redemption

The Shawshank Redemption is one of my favorite movies and it was based of the writing of my favorite author Stephen King. This story represents the type of story that made Stephen King one of the most popular writers of our time. It is full and rich with a twisted darkness to it with one constant element; it could happen to anyone anytime anywhere. This movie makes you examine yourself. I consider that one of the most important points I consider when I decide what I think about a movie. I love film that makes me question basic questions about myself to identify with the protaganist that brings me to a better understanding of myself. In Shawshank, we see Andy Dufresne sentenced for the murder of his wife and another man while his wife was cheating on him with the aforementioned man. When we see Andy sentenced for the murder and brought to prison, we ask ourselves the first question, “Would I have killed them both?”. I answer the question yes and the movie continues. A new inmate hears about Andy’s trial and we find out that another man killed Andy’s wife and lover and got away. Andy didn’t deny it at the trial because the motive was there and Andy had a gun. You then ask yourself the second question, “What would I have done if I found my wife cheating on me, plan to kill her, decide I still love her and don’t want her dead, she is randomly killed by a wanted felon, and her murder got pinned on me and I went to jail for life?”. It would be a terrible terrible thing to happen but it could and that is why the story works and that is why it crawls inside your head. The Shawshank Redemption uses an incredible story and well developed characters to make you pull for Andy and share his joy when he crawls out on the other side of the wall.

Goodfellas

I like a good mob movie and Goodfellas is the best. The thing I love about Goodfellas and one of the main reasons so many people like Martin Scorsese’s work is because it is a viewing experience that you can get no where else. He gets the best, funniest Italians in the business and he tells them to act like badass Italian mobsters who take care of the family and have a great time doing business beating people up. They love that kind of work and you can tell that the actors emulate their “hero” or ideal self and really get into their parts. They get to swagger and strut around and generally harass everyone else. Goodfellas is a fun movie that depicts a life that I cannot imagine, but I have a feeling I would have a really good time being an Italian gangster. It holds the viewer because it shows all of the power, money, violence and extravagance that we all secretly wish we could indulge in. The movie shows us how the little guy can climb his way to the top and make all his dreams happen. It also shows us the reality of organized crime and how while that life would provide a plethora of worldly pleasures, it is fundamentally wrong and destroys a person over time. We watch because we want to be those guys on the screen, on some level we all want to be Goodfellas. Scorsese nails down another classic and changes the way we see the mob but beyond that the moral is universal and changes the way we see the world. It is a powerful movie that makes you wonder if that is what you’d get off to doing. Like Henry Hill said, "As far back as I can remember, I've always wanted to be a gangster."

Monty Python and the Holy Grail

As a Monty Python fan I have come to understand that there are people who simply will not stand for the silliness that is Monty Python. It is a unique style of humor but the Python troop is my favorite thing that ever came out of England. It would be democracy but as a proud Louisianan I have France to thank for the gift of the Napoleonic Code, usually a step above common law. This film is a shining example that you can make a decent quality/A for effort movie on a very small budget. The film started with a budget of 229,000 pounds (462,000 dollars), part of which was contributed by rock legends Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd. The directors Terry Gilliam and Terry Jones squandered much of the money on expensive dinners and alcohol leaving only 150,000 pounds (303,000 dollars) to produce the entire movie. It reminds me of when I was in church camp and we had to make videos with a hand held camcorder and maybe a tripod. The group later talked about how Holy Grail was the hardest movie they had shot and that everything that could’ve gone wrong did. Faced with adversity, the Python spirit prevailed and they tackled the film as if it was an episode of Flying Circus and they made the film work. They could not afford horses so they had their squires gallop behind them banging two coconut halves together. The extras on the DVD even include a guide to making your own coconuts and how to gallop about banging them together. That would not work in a serious movie, nor would it be acceptable in most genres of cinema. Monty Python proved conclusively that cinema doesn’t have to be serious. They made a major motion picture that was wildly successful and still is extremely popular while taking many liberties with the story and shortcuts in the production.

Forrest Gump

Forest Gump is the second greatest movie of all time. Second only to Braveheart and beating out Monty Python’s Holy Grail by a small margin. Forest Gump is cinema’s anthem for America. The movie actually taught me more pertinent information than I learned from my American History in high school. That is what makes the movie, aside from Tom Hank’s best performance ever. Forest Gump tells the story of America. It takes us through the decades as we see Vietnam from a soldier’s point of view through Forest. We see the hippie free love movement as it was lived by Jenny, Forest’s childhood love. The casting for this movie was spot on. Tom Hanks plays a great determined lower IQ man who achieves so much in life and tells his amazing story to random people on a bench waiting for a bus. Sally Field plays the mother. Mykelti Williamson plays the perfect Pvt. Benjamin Buford 'Bubba' Blue(gum). Gary Sinise didn’t have to stretch too far to play the overzealous Army Lieutenant Dan Taylor who I believe plays Forest’s diametrical opposite. Lieutenant Dan is a willing force of the war whereas Forest simply follows directions like his mama taught him and runs from danger like Jenny told him. Lieutenant Dan is manic with strong wild emotions; from raging on the battlefield screaming that he wants to die with his men, to suicidal depression in the hospital, to becoming an alcoholic on welfare, to cleaning up and settling down with a nice woman. We never really see emotion from Forest. He doesn’t laugh or cry or really express any strong emotion making me think he might be autistic. We see him get mad at the guys that mess with Jenny, he drops everything to come be with his mama while she’s sick, and he jumps off his boat while its still driving when he sees Lieutenant Dan has come to work with him. Forest is happy simply living on God’s green earth and takes us through a video essay on American History. Like the movie’s tag line says, “The world will never be the same once you've seen it through the eyes of Forrest Gump.”

Fight Club

Many guys when asked would reply that Fight Club is hands down the best movie ever made. I find that the film makes me feel excited. Every time I watch it the film gets a little more intense and more personal for me. I believe that is what Fight Club is about. Fight Club is so good and so popular because it touches something inside all of us. This movie was made solely to make the viewer feel empowered and enlightened in an anti-social, Brad Pitt makes a lot of sense, kind of way. Freud theorizes that most of our brain and being is made up of our subconscious mind and the id. The id or inner desire is the suppressed part of us as humans that this movie is directed at. The id is the deep instinctual part of our mind concerned only with food, sex, and aggression. Edward Norton and Brad Pitt were the only two people that could have pulled this movie off; Edward Norton plays a great sadistic schizoid and Brad Pitt is the man’s man embodiment of cool. Norton at the beginning of the film is pitiful and his depression and lack of drive is a common thing we all secretly worry about sliding into. His id reaches forward and asserts itself in the form of Brad Pitt who fears nothing, starts fighting clubs, then assembles and directs a militant nation/global wide group of terrorists. The plan is amazingly simple and could theoretically happen; destroy all financial records in America/The World and set all accounts back to $0.00. The rich would lose all and the poor would free and there would be anarchy. One specific note I made is to clarify when I earlier said the movie feels excited. The movie makes me feel that tingle and those butterflies in my stomach that I get before I fight. It is the feeling of the mind and body cycling up to do combat and it always feels good. As Tyler Durden reveals the plan that feeling always rises up in me and I believe that Freud was on to something. I believe the reason we all love the movie Fight Club is because we all want to fuck the system and deep down we want that combat and we want that release of inhibition. Fight Club delivers because it was cast perfectly and it identifies with every single human that watches it on a very deep, personal level. The message is to live your life for yourself and reexamine what is important in your life.

Across the Universe

I was blown away by this movie. The music! The music was incredible and made the movie that much more powerful. I already have the soundtrack on my computer. Its 31 Beatles songs performed by the actors in the movie each with their personal style wove onto the Beatles lyrics. Some bigger names cover songs and represent historic figures like Bono from U2 portraying Dr. Roberts and portrays the original LSD experiments. He does a great cover of I Am the Walrus. Joe Cocker comes out to play a pimp singing Come Together and comedian Eddie Izzard does his take on For the Benefit of Mr. Kite. The songs are great by themselves, but when you bring 10 musicians/performers together to pick and play a few songs and put it to a story on a big screen, it was unlike any movie I’ve ever seen. Jim Sturgess does an incredible job as a poor English boy named Jude roaming through America, meeting all kinds of great people and having some good times with drugs and music. The movie flows through events in Jude’s life, set to the music, while the 70’s unfold in the background. We see the transition from free love and peace to the civil rights movement and the violence that period of American history represents. Its interesting to see those songs performed not as a show or musical, but in a movie. It’s a musical yes, but this is much more than a musical. This is the embodiment of what the Beatles wanted to touch people with. This movie shows the reality about drug culture and how it is not limited to the degenerates of society. Across the Universe is all about the beginning of recreational drug use and its ties with music. I consider Across the Universe a must see, unless you don’t like the Beatles, and cannot wait to add it to my library.

American History X

American History X is a powerful film that examines the causes and consequences of racism and hate. Edward Norton does a great job creating a character that demands attention and drives the film with passion springing from his love for his Dad that sours to hate and rage when he is killed putting out a fire at a drug dealers house in a black neighborhood. Norton, Derek Vinyard, becomes a neo-Nazi and becomes a leader in the white power movement. The cinematography in this movie is amazing as we are pulled through the story from the point of view of Daniel Vinyard, Derek’s little brother. Danny worships Derek and gets caught up in the white gang when Derek goes to jail for homicide. American History X is so gripping because we see the ultimate white supremacist broken and humbled in prison. We share Derek’s pain as we see his rhetoric and beliefs fail him and he is attacked by his own Nazi brothers and we find hope watching this figure of hate embrace and accept the gift of safety and protection provided by a black man. The viewer is shown Derek’s direct punishment in his incarceration and treatment in prison. We also see Danny’s pain that Derek causes him and the family. Finally we are shown Derek’s pain as he must live with Danny’s murder and we are left in shock and disbelief at the tragic ending twist. The movie’s message is spoken by Danny in a voice over reading of his American History X paper; life is to short to hate, we’re never guaranteed another minute so we have to live and love to the fullest.

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb

Dr. Strangelove is a weird and twisted movie. It is disquieting to think about our government and military leaders in this light but the film is driven by logic and procedure that is eerily familiar as we learn more of our nation’s dark secrets. I believe that this movie serves the specific and important purpose to make people weary of the government. This movie uses lighting and setting to highlight how the love of power is what will kill us all in the end. The crux of the story is that too much power is given to individuals and bad things happen and that is the case. Can you imagine if the United States sent troops to storm say, Barksdale Air Force Base because a renegade general decided he wants there to be nuclear war. Dr. Strangelove plays on one of the greatest fears America has endured collectively as a nation. During the cold war every nation had nukes pointed at everyone else, Americans were well aware of this fact and were deathly afraid of the bomb. We see how it all could end, on a breakneck mission to bomb people we don’t really know. We have to be careful about who we let have the power. Our hope comes from people like Jimi Hendrix who said, “When the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace.”

Maria Full of Grace

Maria Full of Grace is a story of determination and survival. After being unfairly treated, Maria quits her job at the flower plantation. Maria has to work to provide for her family and now it seems she has failed. Along with the fact that she is now pregnant with her boyfriend’s, whom she doesn’t love, child. A friend slips her the idea of becoming a mule or someone who smuggles heroin pellets in their stomach into another country. Desperate for money, Maria gives in and swallows 62 heroin-filled pellets before being flown to New York City.
In the film, I found the motif of pregnancy to be extremely important. For example, when Maria arrives to the New York airport, she is immediately taken away by U.S. customs for suspicion of drug trafficking. After they have questioned her, they tell her that they need an x-ray just to be sure she is telling the truth. However, when they find out she is pregnant, they can no longer do an x-ray as it might cause harm to the child and she is released. Her pregnancy is what saved her from the disaster of being caught. Maria’s pregnancy is also the reason why she decides to stay in America. After having spoken to Lucy’s sister about the reason why she came to America, Maria realizes that her baby will have more opportunities if she stays in America. So then she stays and begins her new and better life.