Movies!

Yesterday, I went to the grown up movie theatre (no kids allowed! They serve alcohol!) with Seujan to see Nine. I knew that it wasn’t supposed to be very good, but it’s a musical and I have a thing about musicals…I’m a big of a musical theatre fag, to be completely honest with you.

It was okay, but I felt like it was a poor update to All that Jazz, Bob Fosse’s semi-autobiographical pic about a director and the influence of the women in his life. Granted Fosse only primarily focused on three women (his ex-wife, his lover and his daughter...along with some strippers and Death, played by an incandescent Jessica Lange. Seriously, this flick is definitely worth a rental.

Nine on the other hand was okay. The pretty girls looked pretty, but I thought they could have been filmed much better. I was surprised by that. I was kinda surprised by Kate Hudson singing. The role didn’t feel like much of a stretch, but she did a good job singing & dancing. My favorite was definitely Marion Cotillard, who once again shows what a beautiful and talented actress she is (another rental recommendation is her amazing La Vie en Rose biography of Edith Piaf.)

I’d definitely say you should skip Nine and go for one of those rentals instead. It just didn’t hold my attention very well, I found the lyrics banal and (unfortunately because the cinematographer lived across the street from me in Laurel Canyon & won an Oscar for Chicago), it didn’t look that great.

Then last night, I finally sat down and watched Inglorious Basterds. I can’t exactly explain why I love Quentin Tarantino’s flicks so much, especially since they all tend to have violence in them and I generally avoid violent flicks. I just love his scripts and something about his movies makes me oh so aware of how much he loves movies. It feels like he’s always paying homage to someone. I know that personally he’s a bit of a nutcase, but I don’t care – I really think that he’s a genius.

Story was interesting, I turned away and avoided the scalping (there was actual scalping of Nazis) but was ok with shooting Nazis (that wasn’t very graphic). The performances were great, especially Christoph Waltz, who won a SAG (Screen Actors Guild) award this weekend for this performance. He is a totally different kind of evil Nazi than we’re used to seeing.

Regardless of the violence, this was a kick ass, fun ride. I highly recommend it.