Liz and I finally got out to see a movie! We also got to hang out with Matt and Liz so I’d call that a double bonus. I wasn’t really sure if I really wanted to go see this in the theater or not just from watching the preview. I’m really glad I finally saw it though. This is a quality film. It reminded me a lot of Tears of the Sun and Saving Private Ryan, only this movie was a lot more meaningful and worthwhile.
If you’ve never heard of blood diamonds, you’ve might have heard of conflict diamonds…no? Ok, I’ll start at the beginning. A lot of violence has, is and will continue to happen in Africa over the control of valuable natural resources. Diamonds are just one of those resources that governments and warlords are trying to control. Many innocent people lose their lives over these resources and some of the larger nations in the world have been trying to do something about it. This movie is a story about some people who are affected by this situation.
For starters this was directed by Edward Zwick. He has directed films such as The Last Samurai and Legends of the Fall. He’s also produced I Am Sam and Traffic. For actors we have Leonardo DiCaprio, Djimon Hounsou and Jennifer Connelly. One person that immediately stuck out to me was Arnold Vosloo. You might recognize him as the mummy from The Mummy. Caprio is probably best known for his role in Titanic, a movie I still haven’t watched, but I like to remember him for other roles such as “Growing Pains”, What’s Eating Gilbert Grape, Romeo + Juliet, Gangs of New York, Catch Me If You Can and The Aviator. I still haven’t seen The Departed. Hounsou is an amazing actor and has done an amazing job in films such as Stargate, Amistad, Gladiator, The Four Feathers and In America to name a few. Connelly has definitely been around the block. She started her career out early in classics like Once Upon a Time in America and Labyrinth. She’s also been in other films such as A Beautiful Mind, House of Sand and Fog, and Requiem for a Dream. If you’ve seen some/all of these films you’ll know that the cast is pretty good. I used to not really like DiCaprio all that much and I wasn’t sure why. This guy is a great actor though. He’s done a wide variety of films with a wide variety of characters. I’m always impressed.
I really liked how they shot some of the different scenes with different colors. I’m not talking about colors like Hero but more along the lines of shading things from browns to blues to vibrant colors depending on the location. It’s little things like that, combined with music and the score that can really set a mood for a film.
Even though I loved this movie I’m sure there will be some that won’t for various reasons. There is a bit of violence in here. A lot of running through jungles and people being shot and killed. There’s even a scene where you see captured villagers getting hands chopped off. This might be a bit much for some, but at least it’s meaningful and not a Gibson film, right? Ok, I’ll just stop right there. I highly recommend this one. Check it out.
If you know me or read this blog very often, you’ll know I always enjoy a good documentary. Well I found what looked to be something cool on Netflix a while back - a documentary about Sherman’s March. This was when General Sherman marched across the South, to the sea and devastated the civilian population everywhere he turned. This sounds like it would be good, right? This is another case of expectations not being met for me. Apparently I didn’t read the description of the movie before I eagerly added it to my queue. While in the next couple paragraphs I’m going to rock this movie for how I thought of it, this is probably 70% due to the fact I was expecting something totally different. The other 30% is just because the movie was lame.
Well, Ross McElwee starts out with his illusions of grandeur only to find out his girlfriend has just dumped him. That’s in the first 5 min and this is where the movie starts to turn south (no pun intended). The rest of the movie is then Ross chasing after every girl he meets. He’s like a kid in a toy store who sees a toy and must have it. Nothing else in the world matters to him, but this one toy. Then he turns around and sees toy #2. Now he feels stupid for even ever considering toy #1 to be cool and shiny and desirable. All that matters is how much he needs toy #2. Then he turns again and sees a third toy….
I’m sure you get the point. It was psuedo interesting, but many times I left the room for a few minutes here and there and I didn’t really care that I was missing parts of the movie. It wasn’t that great. Left me feeling a sense of loss. I was really hoping to watch a documentary about Sherman’s March.
This is a documentary starring Arnold Schwarzenegger as he attempts to win Mr. Olympia in 1975 for the sixth time in a row. This year he is defending his title against Serge Nubret and the one and only Lou Ferrigno. My sophomore football coach recommended this to us during a summer lifting session and I have to say I was pleasantly surprised. It was pretty amazing to see how Schwarzenegger taunted and buttered up Ferrigno and ultimately psyching him out for the win. Then you realize how old these guys are and you’re even more amazed. Arnold was only 28 and Lou was only 24 at the time.
Even more amazing was seeing Bud Cort in the deleted scenes. He’s the star from Harold and Maude and more recently can also be seen in The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou.
This is another one of those “boring documentaries” as my friend likes to describe them. However, I kind of like them. If you’re into body building, or just like seeing big men taunt each other, you definitely need to check out this cult-classic sometime.
Robby, Liz and I saw this over the weekend and we now know what everybody is raving about. This movie is hilarious! There are definitely some crazy parts, some offensive parts and maybe even some gross parts. I’m sure there are many who would not find this funny at all…but I did. Maybe this should be tossed into the same category as South Park: Bigger, Longer, Uncut. The one thing I’m actually surprised with is how people are trying to sue Sasha Baron Cohen after finding out they’re in the movie. These people signed release forms and were interacting with a man and a camera crew. This guy also has a TV show where he plays the exact same character. I guess some people are just slow to catch on.
If you don’t know much about this movie, a man pretends to be a news reporter from Kazakhstan and travels all over the US gaining experiences along the way. He’s very anti-semitic and has many offensive ideas and ideologies that he shares with just the right people along the way. He also does a lot of things to put people in awkward situations and seems to get away with it because he’s “foreign”.
I can’t recommend this to most, but I found this one to be quite funny.
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