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I Need a Hero

I should have gone to work today. I have a major deadline on Friday and I am going to be stressed about it all week, so I should have just thrown away my holiday and gone into the office. But I felt like a slug this morning and Oscar the CatDog is acting like he's about to have another diabetic crisis, so I decided that I should just stay home.

But of course, we didn't actually stay home. Oscar was less wobbly by midday and eventually we got hungry, so we went out to brunch, and then decided to go see a matinee that afternoon. I am generally a slave to critical review, so since "Hero" got the best ratings, I pushed for that one.

"Hero" really surprised me. First off, it was in Chinese with English subtitles. Maybe I am underestimating the American public, but I would not have expected a non-English language movie to have pretty unanimously good reviews as well as hold the #1 position in the box office for two weeks in a row.

It was just not your average dumb box office hit. The story line was very, very simple. They did a little but of time displacement through storytelling, but it didn't really have any plot twists and, at times, the storyline moved pretty slowly.

The cinematography was absolutely beautiful, though. Elements like rain and leaves falling made the fight scenes a delight to watch. Plus, I always like swordplay, especially when it is on wires to give it that magical effect. If I had a big DVD collection and was filing this one away, I'd be more likely to put it in the same category as "Winged Migration" (visually stunning) than "Enter the Dragon" (standard kung fu movie).

I came away from the movie just amazed by the grandeur of the scenes, a little disappointed in the story, but definitely glad I got to see it on a big screen. I also came away from it desperately wanting a sword to whip around and pretend I can fight with. It put me in a kung fu kind of mood.

The Door in the Floor - Movie Review

The first book I read by John Irving was "A Widow For One Year," the book upon which this movie is based. I have a theory that whichever the first Irving book you read is always your favorite. Although "Cider House Rules" (which I read second) was an excellent novel, "A Widow for One Year" will always be on my list of favorite books. The topics that are explored in this book (death, in particular) are not cheerful, yet there were many portions of the book where I found myself laughing out loud. The images in the book are crisp and so realistic, it seemed like it would easily translate into a movie.

When I found out that "The Door in the Floor" was based on "A Widow for One Year," I was very excited. When I saw that it was being released through Focus Features ("Lost in Translation" and "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind"), I was confident that it would be worth seeing and would not ruin my memory of the book. And, thankfully, I was right. :)

The movie does not deviate very much from the novel. The characters are very similar to what I imagined when I was reading, and the scenery is an exact replica of what I had envisioned. The script was taken word for word from the novel. The main difference between the two is that the tone of the movie is a lot more somber than that of the book.

And no wonder. The premise of the book is pretty grim. A husband and wife lose their two teenage sons in a car accident. They deal with the loss in very different ways (some may argue that they are not dealing with it at all), and their loss spills over into others in their lives. There is something about the way John Irving writes that makes the dark theme seem light and mostly humorous, but this did not fully translate into the film.

So, another theory I have is that you should always watch the movie before you read the book. If you read the book first, 9 times out of 10 you will be sorely disappointed in the movie and the other time you will simply regret it. So go watch this movie and then come home to read the book and fully experience the richness in which John Irving tells the story. And finish the story. The movie only covers the first third of the book. (3 1/2 stars)

Collateral Damage

Dangerguy and I went out for a lovely dinner at Bonefish Grill tonight and then went to the movies to see Collateral. I am staying up late to write up this review because I tend to have short term memory when it comes to movies.

I went into this movie seeing good reviews from most of the major news sources, but I hadn't seen a preview or really read the reviews closely, so I didn't really know what to expect. Jamie Foxx plays a nerdy cab driver who picks up Tom Cruise as his fare for the night. Tom Cruise is the villain in this movie, a hired gun who is supposed to kill five witnesses in a key narcotics trial that is supposed to begin the following day. Jamie Foxx is forced at gunpoint to drive Tom Cruise around and help him with the job.

There's a few extra plot elements here, but I don't want to give away everything. There is precious little in the way of plot twists here. The movie starts out very slowly, showing Jamie Foxx in his element as a cab driver. There's a lot of rich dialogue with his first fare of the night (Jada Pinkett-Smith) which continues through the first half of the movie while he is driving Tom Cruise. So much so, I thought, wow...this is going to be a character study. I didn't know what to expect, but I really would not have guessed that a Tom Cruise movie was going to be a character study.

As the action picked up in the last 30 minutes (or less), I realized that it was just a normal action movie after all. And really, that was when the movie started to be fun. For the most part, character studies make me sleepy. *Yawn.*

So, to wrap things up: Collateral is worth seeing on the big screen, but get something caffeinated at the concession stand to make it through the first part and make sure your bring your suspension of disbelief. You'll need it. (2 1/2 stars)