Day 116: Broken Flowers

After being dumped again, Don (Bill Murray) finds out that he might have a teenage son. His wannabe-detective neighbour, Winston (Jeffrey Wright), sends him off on a journey that will see him revisit 5 of his old girlfriends to try and find out which of them is the mother of his child.

Don seems to just be coasting along, he doesn’t get passionate about anything. Even when Sherry (Julie Delpy) is leaving him, he doesn’t fight for the relationship or even really seem to care all that much that she’s going. When he goes to visit his old girlfriends it is obviously awkward and he doesn’t seem to know what to say or how to act around them. They haven’t seen each other in 20 years, it must be difficult when faced with someone from your past like that. I wonder how it feels.

Anyway, I was thoroughly bored throughout the entire film. I understand that it’s not supposed to be some high drama thing and it’s just about loneliness and whatnot but god, it was just so dull.

4/10

Day 97: Moonrise Kingdom

Sam (Jared Gilman) and Suzy (Kara Hayward) are young kids in love who just want to be together. They decide the only way that can happen is if they run away together. But naturally the adults involved are worried and they make up a search party to find them, which is populated by khaki scouts, a lonely police officer, an unhappy married couple, and Social Services. Runaway children would be bad enough but there’s a storm coming that makes it all a tad more dangerous.

The acting in Wes Anderson films always takes me a little while to get used to but once I do, I end up enjoying it. The film isn’t too flashy, it’s just a simple story of love and friendship. With a twist of scouts and a secluded town to make it a bit more interesting.

“I love you but you don’t know what you’re talking about.”

7/10

Day 50: Charlie's Angels

Lucy Liu and two other women are secret crime-fighting badasses working for Charlie, a man none of them have met but who they trust and care for. After helping to find a kidnapped computer genius and help him get his software back, it turns out the genius had created the whole drama in order to find Charlie and kill him. But Lucy Liu and the other two work hard to make sure that doesn’t happen.

I needed an easy film today and this definitely fit the bill. I don’t have much to say on it. It’s enjoyable, the fighting is all very exciting, the women work well together. To be honest, after Lucy Liu did her whole hair flipping thing at the start of the film I was pretty much distracted for the rest of it. Lucy Liu is marvellous, what else is there to say.

6/10

Day 26: Lost In Translation

You know when you’re having a bad day and you just want to watch a film with Scarlett Johansson in it because you know it’s going to make you feel better regardless of how shallow and potentially creepy that might be? But you’ve lost your copy of Lost In Translation and for some reason it’s not on Netflix anymore? But then you check SkyGo and it’s available but you have to pay for it? And you decide you’ll pay for it anyway because your day is just so bad? Yeah.

Bob (Bill Murray) is an ageing film star who is in Tokyo starring in an advert when he meets Charlotte, who is accompanying her husband on a photo shoot. Both are dissatisfied with how their lives are and both are questioning how the future will turn out.

Charlotte is clearly unhappy; her husband is busy and seems to be rushing off from her in any chance he can get (mad man!) while she is left to amuse herself. Which she seems alright with some of the time as she does stumble across interesting things while exploring. But mostly she just seems sad. She phones her friend in an attempt to connect but her friend doesn’t have the time for her and she’s left again. She’s not sure what she wants to be in life and says she feels stuck.

Bob’s marriage and his fading from film are the main problems for him. Clearly he is only starring in this advert because he has no other opportunities; you can see he is massively uncomfortable at every point when trying to shoot it. His wife doesn’t seem to care about him anymore (judging from their phone calls) and it sounds like they don’t know how to talk to each other. He says that in the beginning they used to have fun together, which he is now re-experiencing with Charlotte.

They both have trouble sleeping and so spend time together. A pattern I’ve been noticing is that I seem to like when people just enjoying being with each other. They don’t have to be doing anything particularly fantastic, they just feel comfortable and content in the moment that they are together. Oh, I also appear to love how people look at each other. Charlotte’s face instantly warms when she spots Bob and he always looks so much more relaxed when he sees her. They spend a lot of time just looking at the other and so obviously I was pleased. Towards the end they are lying in the same bed and through talking they seem to be able to get the sleep that they couldn’t get alone.

It’s time for him to leave and they both don’t want it to happen. They say bye but it’s not really how either of them wanted it and you can see he’s disappointed. On the way to the airport he spots her walking in a crowd and he jumps out of the car to catch up with her. He whispers something to her and they kiss. Then they go their separate ways and they’ll probably never see each other again but they’ve got the memory of the time they spent together and they’re both a little different as a result.

8/10