Day 148: The Great Gatsby

Nick Carraway (Tobey Maguire) recounts the short time he spent with Jay Gatsby (Leonardo DiCaprio) and how it affected his life.

I won’t go into specifics since the film itself is only recently out, so I’ll just make some general comments. The first half was both weird and boring at the same time, although I’m not sure how it managed that. I don’t know who keeps giving work to Tobey Maguire but they need to have their heads looked at. He is just so awful, it’s like he’s fresh out of acting school and thinks every line has to be said in this ridiculously dramatic way while his eyes look all serious and thoughtful. To be fair though, all the rest of the actors were good. All of Leonardo DiCaprio’s scenes were great, he never fails to impress me. Some of the shots were beautiful but I feel like the film relied too heavily on the beauty involved and didn’t spend enough time developing the story in a believable way.

6/10

Day 147: Dumbo

Dumbo has rather large ears for an elephant and he’s ostracised by the others in the circus. After his mother is taken away from him, a friendly mouse tries to help him.

He’s such a wee cutie, I don’t know how the others could be so rude to him. I’m sure I remember enjoying this film more as a child but it wasn’t all that this time around. And I’d forgotten how nightmarish the pink elephants are. How do children cope, I don’t know.

6/10

Day 146: Malèna

Malèna is so beautiful, all the men want to fuck her and the women want to skin her alive. Outside of their prying eyes, she gains an understanding observer in Renato. While he is still taken with her beauty, he also cares for her and doesn’t want her harmed by the people of the village.

The film is set in Italy during the war and as such, everyone is suspicious and perhaps more unforgiving than they would normally be. They gossip about Malèna and doubt her faithfulness to her husband while he fights in the army. The men all ogle her and try anything to get close to her. Although the men are ridiculous, it’s the women that surprised me. They’re so vicious and cruel to Malèna. The film was good but it all seemed a bit overly dramatic, although I think that was intended.

7/10

Day 145: How To Train Your Dragon

Hiccup (Jay Baruchel) just wants to be part of his Viking community but finds that he can’t kill dragons. That’s a big part of what makes up the community so it’s a bit of a problem. He catches a dragon known as ‘night fury’ and he names him Toothless and the two become friends. Hiccup helps him fly again and changes the way his community think about dragons.

I’m going to admit to something here, try not to laugh. I believe in dragons. I believe they existed and perhaps they do still and just haven’t been found yet. But it’s a good thing we don’t know where they are because you can just bet that humans would kill them or try and use them for some military purposes. In the film humans do try and kill them for years because they don’t understand them and are frightened. It takes almost complete annihilation of the Viking community before they change their minds about the dragons and stop attacking them.

I do really like this film. Toothless is such a wee cutie, how could you not love him?

8/10

Day 144: You Can't Take It With You

The snobs have to interact with the plebs and it’s all very difficult for them. But Papa Snob soon realises that maybe money and power isn’t everything and that he’s lost what makes him happy along the way.

I’m not entirely sure I believe the dramatic turnaround of A.P. Kirby (Edward Arnold) but perhaps Grandpa (Lionel Barrymore) is really just that persuasive. I enjoyed the film and all the characters. Probably wouldn’t watch it again but I still liked it.

7/10

Day 143: Meet Joe Black

Death wants a break from the loneliness of his work and so goes to Bill Parrish (Anthony Hopkins) to be guided in the ways of the living. He experiences more than he intended when he fell in love with Bill’s daughter Susan (Claire Forlani) and he is reluctant to leave.

The mark of a good life must surely be having no regrets and when Bill is confronted with Death, he doesn’t try to change things in his life, he mostly continues on as before but is more open with his love for the people closest to him. And he doesn’t make a risky business decision because he wants the company to stay as he built it, so the people can remember him through it. I can’t imagine many of us will die with no regrets, I’m sure the majority of us will have something we wish we could’ve done differently. But knowing that, as most people must, doesn’t usually make people change their ways. We will watch a film such as this and think how wonderful it must be to live exactly as you wished to and maybe even entertain a notion or two about changing something in our lives that hasn’t been right. But that won’t last, it might only last so long as a blog post, let’s say. Then we’ll go back to doing things we don’t want to do even though we know we could live so much better.

If we accept that Death (as a sentient entity) does exist, it never really occurred to me how lonely it must be. Its sole purpose is to take people out of their lives and off into some form of afterlife and rarely is it welcomed. It makes sense that Joe (Brad Pitt) would be reluctant to leave because he’s in love and is loved in return, and he’s had many other interesting human experiences along the way. People can sometimes wish for the sense of isolation that Death has but to have never experienced any form of closeness to any other person seems quite heartbreaking. I’m not really sure what I’m getting at here, to be honest. Enjoy your time with people while you have it, and try not to wish it away.

The film itself is very well done, which is what you’d expect since it does last for over 3 hours. Anthony Hopkins was delightful, as usual. His portrayal of a man who has been so strong for all his life but is now faced with such pain and uncertainty is great. Brad Pitt is able to exhibit two very different personalities; one is intense and commanding, while the other is laidback and sweet. The story is very interesting and I’d recommend this film to anyone.

8/10

Day 142: Hedgehog in the Fog

While on his way to meet his bear cub friend, a hedgehog finds himself in a deep fog and is confronted with various things that frighten him.

The animation suits the story well. So often bad animation can detract from the actual story being told but this makes it better. The story itself is simple enough; a hedgehog is taking raspberry jam to his friend and they’re going to count the stars, but the mist he finds himself in makes the journey more terrifying and interesting than usual. He is being followed by a crazy owl and he gets attacked by a bat too. But it’s not all scary, he also sees a beautiful white horse through the fog. He seems rather bewitched by the horse, first wondering if she’ll be alright when she lies down in the fog and later, after finally joining his friend, he wonders how she is. For a trip that must be so routine, the fog brought out a side to the world he hadn’t come across before and as he sits with his friend, he appears to be reflecting on all that he’s seen.

8/10