Letterboxd — Your life in film

This movie had no business being as fun as it was. Credit to Soderbergh, McConaughey, and most importantly Channing Tatum. Tatum was fantastic in this. Charming, funny, sweet, and endearing in a way I did not think possible. I guess the role was made for him, since it was based partly on his real life, but still, he brought a lot to a role that could have been extremely bland. Oh and dude can dance; very impressive.

There are several…

I was one of 'those' kids. While my friends were reading choose your own adventure books and Encyclopedia Brown, my Mother mandated I read things like 1984, Moby Dick, and, oddly enough, Papillon. Not sure what I got out of them at that age, but I read them and liked some more than others (I've re-read 1984 dozens of times since then, but I can't bear to look at Moby Dick and some of the others that were thrust upon…

One of the greatest achievements of this film, aside from making me laugh like an idiot for 90 minutes (that final 17 goes some places I did not enjoy), is making me aware of a new Ozzy-fronted Black Sabbath album. I've been listening to End of the Beginning on a loop since the credits rolled; great tune.

Anyway, I wasn't exactly sure what to expect going into this one; I'm a pretty huge fan of almost everyone in the movie,…

It took me about three weeks to watch this movie as I would get through about 10-15 minutes of it, then would stop due to what I thought was being tired. I kept blaming myself for not being into it, but after all is said and done I think I need to put some of the blame on the film itself.

The beginning is great, setting up what feels like it will be a revenge film, but then it becomes…

I'm actually surprised it took this long for someone to make this story, since it is a fascinating one. I guess the issues Soderbergh had with getting the film financed and distributed explain why, but if you knew any of the Liberace story from back in the day, it seemed ripe for a film.

Douglas is amazing as the man himself, really conveying the offbeat, complicated individual without resorting to caricature. He does bring a humanity to the guy, which…

I liked it, in spite of the fact it is kind of a big mess of a film. The editing destroyed the pacing, the dialogue was beyond cheese at times, the final action sequence was far too long and repetitive, and the whole Lois Lane relationship did not work. Despite all of those things I had fun overall.

The decision to do pretty much all of Superman's origin story as a flashback was, in the end, a good one as…

I grew up on video games, often times to the detriment of my studies, so I thought I would enjoy this one a lot more than I did, for nostalgic reasons if nothing else. Unfortunately there was nowhere near enough nostalgia to make up for the generic story, characters, and the complete lack of laughter (these cartoons are supposed to be funny, right?).

I almost turned it off about 15 minutes in, but for some reason I stuck with it…

I know nothing of the Bronte novel; as a kid I assumed any book titled after and written by a female was a chick book, so I stayed away and buried myself in novels by Melville, Orwell, and of course books about manly things like sweaty, shirtless dudes slaying dragons.

Fortunately as I grew up that bit of misogyny faded away and I accepted heroes and heroines of all shapes and sizes. Unfortunately I never really went back to make…

First things first, this is not a good movie. However, I still really enjoy it. There are themes of psychology and humanity in here which I find very engaging. The sci in the sci-fi is laughable at times, as is the ending...yikes, but I don't really care as I like pretty much all of the characters (Hoffman and Jackson specifically are awesome and their interactions are so much fun to watch).

I do wish there was a bit deeper examination…

I'm not entirely sure the origins of this film, whether it was highly anticipated or anything, but it's hard for me to imagine a big action blockbuster coming out these days with such a darkly suicidal protagonist. Having Gibson crying in his trailer sucking on the barrel of a 9MM is not something I could picture Vin Diesel doing in the latest Fast or Faster film. I was surprised by that aspect of the film, but I liked that it…

I was a little all over the place with this one. At times I thought it was fascinating and hilarious, at other times boring and nonsensical. The whole opening thirty minutes or so was brilliant; the unassuming and lost Depp as a bumbling accountant (I can relate my friend) getting caught up in a world he knows nothing about and becoming a man he never knew he could be.

Unfortunately it lost me for long pieces after that wonderful start.…

I'm not sure why I avoided this one for so long. It's somewhat relevant to me as I am half Polish and when I was a kid, my Jaja on my Dad's side would tell me stories of his life during the war. He generally did not like to talk about such things (as an annoying 12 year old on Summer break I would essentially follow him around the farm all day trying to help and pestering him with questions),…