*Pretty Persuasion (2005) - B- (though if what I'm curious about is the actual source of any large aspect of the film than C- is a bit generous. After all, beggars borrow . . . and this was borrowing.)

I don't know what I expected going into this, but it's exceptionally blunt and even more so caustic in terms of its obvious anger at amongst other things, the sacrifice of dignity for fame, the sacrifice of fame for infamy, and the meaning of the words "collateral damage" as imagined by somebody young in terms of being an American today.

The reason this is a bonus review is that I figured out where I had seen Evan Rachel Wood's performance before: the matter of fact silly-coquetish know-it-all who leads to friends' destructions, which is Ms. Beckinsale's character in Last Days of Disco, which, again, I can't help but recommend thoroughly (the latter film).

Particularly in the scenes at the end in which each actress lets their self-loathing shine through, which is a much longer and thus somewhat more painful scene in Ms. Wood's case, and please don't get me wrong, I'm not thinking Ms. Wood ever saw the movie - she would've been, what, 10, when it came out. Producers, however. . .

As for the twist, it's very much not a twist in that if you are paying attention, it's detectable about 5 minutes into the movie without any particularly silly conjectures necessary. Instead it's pretty much the equivalent of Heathers' Slater characters motive in terms of, well, duh (other) girl - it has always been fairly obvious what was going on.

Fuck you.

I know I've taken forever to update anything here. I've seen a shit-load of films in the mean-time and I've liked a few of them.

I admire profoundly the people that can put this sort of drivelly bullshit out on an every-day basis, and I thank them for it because that's, like, 40% of my day gauging readings of stuff that's probably stupid and unfun, but sometimes yields gems.


I'm in a miserable mode, and I need to bail.

Review:

Underworld: Evolution: B

Greatly amusing in most ways. Dude, it's got Kate Beckinsale in some sort of PVC and tight thing throughout, and her, fairly naked (emotionally, metaphorically, and also literally, which, um, we were not expecting _at all_.)), in a way that we haven't seen her before.

She is, here, more naked (again, emotionally speaking) than she's been since Last Days of Disco*, in which she is so real that you can't actually believe.

As for plot, um, it's stupid and flimsy and entails Derek Jacobi fighting Tony Curran, which, any fight involving Derek Jacobi is awesome as far as I'm concerned, but, um, still. . . . Now, that the third act is entirely the Kate, fighting several people with "Ben" from Felicity occasionally doing damage, is by far the film's greatest strength (second is "Ben"'s tendency to, no shit, rip jaws off of people and things that disagree with him at any given moment), though it's weaknesses such as "why not ditch the exposition and make a great movie?" are very evident, and there is a "stop watching "the Matrix" whilst stoned and start making greatly fun movies yourself" vibe, which God knows I've encountered hundreds of those in the past several years.

Kate Beckinsale manages to be real and vulnerable and fun all at the same time here. I'd give her an Oscar because she is obviously trying, but doesn't let the strain show, and but still manages to transcend every bit of the material that she is given. She is awesome.

Relevent, I think, is Angelina Jolie in Tomb Raider. Lots of pressure, very small personal rewards. In both cases the actors came out wonderfully, but I think Ms. Beckinsale came out considerably ahead in terms of any qualifiable standard. She acts well. Extremely well.

*which bonus review now coming up.

I'm not entirely certain why I like so much the song "Cry Me A River" by Justin Timberlake, which, um I really like, which, what, 2004?

For 2005, though, I thoroughly recommend Dean Gray's remix of "American Idiot" by Green Day, which you can easilly find by way of bittorrent or newsgroups, but so is also the best thing to happen to mash-ups maybe, ever, but certainly in a long time, otherwise.