The Runaways

I did say that I was into rock bands lately and so by chance, I stumbled into this film which was showing on HBO entitled, The Runaways.

The movie chronicles the early beginnings of the band The Runaways. It was an all girl rock band around the 70's. Learn more about the band here.

The cast was quite impressive. Well, the moment I saw Dakota Fanning's name in the roster, I immediately expected a really good film. Amazingly Kristen Stewart was with her in the film, and what's even more amazing is she seemed to have some talent up her sleeves. Maybe she's just really not cut out for girly roles.

Anyway, IMDB gave it 6.6 rating. Honestly speaking, I thought the film was good. Nothing too very impressive as all biographical film, but the cinematography and flow of the whole story for me was good and captured the feel of the decade. I really am not yet aware of the jargons and elements in film so that's generally all I can say. It held my attention for the whole length of the film and not for the wrong reasons... so there... if you want a more professional comment go to IMDB.

Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps

I was definitely looking forward to watching this movie since the actors involved were of such high caliber and the trailer left something to be expected and craved for in the film. Not that I am "wall street/stock literate" nor am I a fan of stock market and how the money in the world goes round. I was particularly interested in the plot of George Gekko (Michael Douglas) stepping back into the life of his daughter and making a whole mess of things. Sounds a bit morbid but hey, it catches your interest.

In any case, the movie was moderately enjoyable for me. I have a thing for movies with a lot of dialogues. I like to see how actors add life to these dialogues, meshing up the actions they think would define their character and the way they'd deliver the lines. Things that when put together somehow gives life and interest to a an otherwise tasteless thread of words. Not that I am commenting that the dialogues were not interesting, they were, it's just that they were too jargon-ish for me. But then again that is the setting of the movie. I guess they tried hard to make the terms, the situations, the conversations as simple as they can without making the characters seem like some other person just walking by. After all would you even believe that they are people form Wall Street if they did not talk a certain way?

The plot was somewhat underplayed and had little coherent direction, could not flesh out a continuity in them, and probably, some of the parts were very predictable. I did feel like at the end of the day, I had little understanding of what happened. I felt very minimal of a build up towards a climax, not much of a clincher. I thought the film left too much to be craved for and in between, dropped quite a lot hints at something else that were not really used. I don't know. It was a fairly decent try, but not up to expectation with the story it had promised. 

For the most part, I guess it's because the cast was absolutely amazing that I kept watching until the end. Never expected Shia LaBeouf to be that good. I mean, I grew up watching "Even Stevens" and I commend him for doing such a great job of getting out of the "child star" pit that holds most child actors back from becoming recognized as adults. Although I did feel like something was wrong with how their characters were built up. I don't know, maybe motivation, maybe a sense of coherence of what they want to achieve especially with the main character.

Check out comments on IMDb - Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps.

Foxfire (film)

Yesterday was not a good day for me. It started with my Neuroanatomy exam. You see next to my want to revive my "lost" passion for the arts, my interest and love for Neuroanatomy is about the nearest to that level of passion I used to have for literature. Long story short, my test did not go well despite all my best efforts and I got let down... anyway, this is how this film comes into the picture, it was on HBO. Simply put, I watched it because it was on and it had Angelina Jolie in it. As you would already guess, I am a big fan of hers probably more because of her looks than her talent though her talent is something to be admired as well.

Anyway, on to more pressing matters and one that would actually mean something to my blog. Briefly, I would like to say that this blog is supposed to encompass different arts and well, film and script writing are on top of my "need to learn" list in order to make a good one of my own. So, finally, the film.

I have to admit that I was pretty distracted with how young Jolie looked and how it was nice to see an old movie of hers. The movie was great, I wasn't quite sure if it was a teen movie but ok... it was. The dealt a lot about teenage rebellion, finding strength for yourself, leaving your comfort zone and maturing. For me the whole flow and experience of the movie was in itself much like teenage life. I felt like nothing was falling into place and everything seemed to have just been thrown in. The film felt like it was just giving you bits and pieces of plots, not sure whether they will be elaborated on and they make you feel like they're about to give you something big about it, and it just falls. I felt like the characters were a bit poorly used and maybe the plot itself was poorly used. It just felt like it could go that extra something to make it absolutely brilliant.

The film was near to what teen rebellion would have been like during the year it went out. Reminded me a lot of how the movies and "teleseryes" of the 90's influenced me to think that maybe I was caged up and cooped up and I wasn't thinking for myself. I did not particularly liked the movie that much. At the end of the day I was left with the impression that the movie seemed to aim at nothing. It did little to provoke me to think.It did do more for my ever growing fan mania over Angelina... but anyway... that's all I have to say about this film.

I did not like the lines that much nor the way the screen adaptation went. I am not so sure however if that would have been the fault of the screen writers or the director. Maybe I should start understanding the processes and nitty grittys of film making to make a solid comment on them. After all, I am here to learn about the techniques behind these arts. :) Here's a comment on the film which describes it in a more detailed and analytical manner, I guess... http://www.proyouthpages.com/foxfire.html. The blogger said it was based on a book... might as well find it during the summer... and start reading.