More Films I Found on Netflix
"Dirty Pretty Things"
starring: Chiwetel Ejiofor, Audrey Tautou, Sergei Lopez, Sophie Okonedo, Benedict Wong
directed by: Stephen Frears
written by: Steven Knight
With this film from 2000, which I just got around to seeing, even though it's been in my Netflix queue for a very long time, we see "rising" stars Chiwetel Ejiofor and Audrey Tautou playing immigrants working hard to survive in London; but what we don't get to see is the surface beauty of London, instead, the writer and director collaborate to present us the underground and shadowy and sketchy reality of the illegal immigrant world as they scramble to survive and do the best they can to avoid deportation.
British stage actor Chiwetel Ejiofor plays Okwe, a Nigerian doctor, lonely and soft-spoken, who works far below his skill as a cabbie and hotel clerk. One night while inspecting a hotel room, he finds a human heart in a toilet, which opens the door to a sinister black market in organ transplants. It's a hideous fact that Frears ("The Grifters") and screenwriter Steven Knight use as the springboard for an exploration of isolation and ethical responsibility: An estimated 15,000 illegal transplants have been performed worldwide in recent years, usually involving wealthy Westerners and desperate Third Worlders who sell their organs, most often kidneys, to stay alive.
Kidneys are traded for passports in a seemingly easy fashion, in this story, and it's all in Chiwetel and Audrey's sad eyes that project their feelings of desperation and isolation. Chiwetel's character Okwe suffers a hero's dilemma to end all dilemmas: Should be err on the side of expediency and profit from the transplant trade or heed the ethical reserves of conflict and mystery? Given his history, which is revealed very late in the film, he is a hero with a sorted past in his homeland, but ultimately he's been trying to right his wrongs and he wants to do it for Audrey Tautou's character. There really is no easy solution, especially given the shadowy London underground setting.
"There is nothing so dangerous as a virtuous man." No truer words have been spoken.
......................................................................
"About a Boy"
starring: Hugh Grant, Nicholas Hoult, Sharon Small, Toni Collette, Rachel Weisz
directed by: Chris and Paul Wietz
written by: Nick Hornby
It's sort of hard to believe that it has taken me this long to finally see "About a Boy" given that I'm such a fan of nick Hornby's writing (he wrote the novel and the screenplay). It's even harder to believe that Hugh Grant has seemingly become quite irrelevant nowadays and has fallen off the face of the earth given he was a go-to leading man especially for rom-coms back in the 1990s and early 2000s. What has happened to him? Even harder to believe that the boy in the film is Nicholas Hoult, now very well known for his role in the British television series "Skins" as well as now "X-Men" films and for having dated Jennifer Lawrence. But, perhaps most hard to believe is that the brothers responsible for "American Pie" and also at the helm for this film with such a good heart and excellent story.
"About a Boy" exploits Grant's edge and much of his considerable charm in its story of a 38-year-old London bachelor who accidentally becomes entangled in the life of a 12-year-old boy. In addition to being a smart comedy and an excellent showcase for Grant, it's an honest movie about childhood that avoids sappiness and sentiment and goes in unexpected directions.
Of course, there are two boys in "About a Boy," and one of them is Will, the overgrown one played by Grant. He doesn't need to work, so he doesn't. He lives off the royalties from a Christmas song his father wrote in 1958 and spends his days buying CDs and watching television. He has no interest in marriage or children but spends much of his time thinking of the best ways to meet women.
The film's story has a lot of plots and characters, but the superb writing of Nick Hornby just allows it all to unfold much like life does without becoming too much for us as the viewer to get lost within. It becomes less about Grant's character and more about the troubled 12 year old boy, Marcus (Hoult) who has a suicidal and extremely depressed mother (Collette). Marcus seems to need the guidance of a male figure as well as a friendship and he somehow thinks Will (Grant) is the perfect role model for him, despite Will's inattention to the need to grow up himself. They actually end up needing each other, which Will sort of comes to on his own, nearly too late; but that's the message I think Hornby is trying to tell us- it's never too late.
As soon as the kid emerges as a major character, there is a tendency to think this is one of those movies where our hero is supposed to realize something noble, probably about the joys of commitment and the triviality of his existence. But the picture doesn't fall into a predictable groove.
This is a great film to watch.
.......................................................................
"Heaven"
starring: Cate Blanchett, Giovanni Ribisi, Stefani Rocca
directed by: Tom Tykwer
written by: Krzysztof Kieslowski
This is a film from the director of "Run, Lola, Run" and the writer intended it to be the first film in a trilogy, but he sadly passed away before this film was even made, leaving the rest in film limbo/purgatory, never to be made.
"Heaven" is about to souls that meet under terrible circumstances, joined by love and divided by society, seeking redemption and understanding. Cate Blanchett plays a schoolteacher in Italy who accidentally kills four people while attempting to avenge her husband's death. Giovanni Ribisi plays an Italian police officer/translator who falls in love with her while translating her testimony, springs her loose in a cat-and-mouse type of situation, and eventually runs away with her.
There are many moments of long silences and deep celestial awe at play as the story unfolds, but ultimately the film lets Blanchett's character off the hook for the senseless and unnecessary murder of four innocent people, while under the guise of her seeking to avenge her husband's death by one man, a drug pusher whom we never really met, really leaving us to wonder- was it worth it? doesn't she deserve punishment and those four innocent people, don't they deserve justice? what did they die for? Her character ultimately abandons her responsibility, which does not really make her someone we can feel any sympathy for. I guess, it would have been interesting to see what happens to her character if the story would have been continued in the planned two other films. I guess we'll never know.
.....................................................................
"About Adam"
starring: Stuart Townsend, Kate Hudson, Tommy Tiernan, Frances O'Connor, Cathleen Bradley, Charlotte Bradley
directed and written by: Gerard Stembridge
Kate Hudson plays an Irish waitress-singer in a Dublin bar who falls under the charm of a stranger named Adam (Townsend), whose spell casts Hudson into infatuation, but unfortunately for her, he casts his spell on her sisters and her somehow her brother as well. She's planning their wedding when all of this happens, unbeknownst to her.
There are a few laughs here and there, but this is definitely a forgettable film and perhaps one Hudson doesn't prefer to talk about much, with good reason, as it come out around the same time as "Almost Famous" which projecting her into leading-lady status, most notably in rom-coms.
..........................................................................
"Heavenly Creatures"
starring: Kate Winslet, Melanie Lynskey, Sarah Peirse, Diana Kent, Clive Merrison, Simon O'Connor, Jed Brophy, Peter Elliott
directed by: Peter Jackson
written by: Fran Walsh
Long before Peter Jackson became well known for directing "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy and "The Hobbit" trilogies, he made this film about two girl friends who become so infatuated with each other that many people believed them to be lesbians, they share an intense fantasy life with each other, share secrets and passions. The girls are separated by their concerned parents, and they thus seek and plot out their revenge, specifically on one of the mothers.
It's like "The Good Son" except with two teenage girls in the role of deeply disturbed. Pauline Parker and Juliet Hume plot a cold-blooded murder of Pauline's mother, which we see the foreshadowing of and the aftermath of right at the beginning of the film, with both girls running out of the woods all covered in blood and hysterical, acting, of course. The film unfolds what brought them to this point, and at the end we see the murder unfold with the girls taking a walk through the woods with Pauline's mom and they bash a brick in a nylon stocking into her head over and over.
Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh refuses to see the girls as demon seeds (a difference from "The Good Son") and instead attempt to showcase them with humanity and vulnerability, suggesting instead, that we as human beings all have the potential to commit the same acts as these two girls and it is about what drives people over the edge. Essentially, as Jackson explains it, the film is a "murder story about love, a murder story with no villains" whether or not you believe him, perhaps says more about you than about the girls.
This is an excellent film, even given that it came out in 1994 and seems quite dated at this point, it still holds up against time, though.
starring: Chiwetel Ejiofor, Audrey Tautou, Sergei Lopez, Sophie Okonedo, Benedict Wong
directed by: Stephen Frears
written by: Steven Knight
With this film from 2000, which I just got around to seeing, even though it's been in my Netflix queue for a very long time, we see "rising" stars Chiwetel Ejiofor and Audrey Tautou playing immigrants working hard to survive in London; but what we don't get to see is the surface beauty of London, instead, the writer and director collaborate to present us the underground and shadowy and sketchy reality of the illegal immigrant world as they scramble to survive and do the best they can to avoid deportation.
British stage actor Chiwetel Ejiofor plays Okwe, a Nigerian doctor, lonely and soft-spoken, who works far below his skill as a cabbie and hotel clerk. One night while inspecting a hotel room, he finds a human heart in a toilet, which opens the door to a sinister black market in organ transplants. It's a hideous fact that Frears ("The Grifters") and screenwriter Steven Knight use as the springboard for an exploration of isolation and ethical responsibility: An estimated 15,000 illegal transplants have been performed worldwide in recent years, usually involving wealthy Westerners and desperate Third Worlders who sell their organs, most often kidneys, to stay alive.
Kidneys are traded for passports in a seemingly easy fashion, in this story, and it's all in Chiwetel and Audrey's sad eyes that project their feelings of desperation and isolation. Chiwetel's character Okwe suffers a hero's dilemma to end all dilemmas: Should be err on the side of expediency and profit from the transplant trade or heed the ethical reserves of conflict and mystery? Given his history, which is revealed very late in the film, he is a hero with a sorted past in his homeland, but ultimately he's been trying to right his wrongs and he wants to do it for Audrey Tautou's character. There really is no easy solution, especially given the shadowy London underground setting.
"There is nothing so dangerous as a virtuous man." No truer words have been spoken.
......................................................................
"About a Boy"
starring: Hugh Grant, Nicholas Hoult, Sharon Small, Toni Collette, Rachel Weisz
directed by: Chris and Paul Wietz
written by: Nick Hornby
It's sort of hard to believe that it has taken me this long to finally see "About a Boy" given that I'm such a fan of nick Hornby's writing (he wrote the novel and the screenplay). It's even harder to believe that Hugh Grant has seemingly become quite irrelevant nowadays and has fallen off the face of the earth given he was a go-to leading man especially for rom-coms back in the 1990s and early 2000s. What has happened to him? Even harder to believe that the boy in the film is Nicholas Hoult, now very well known for his role in the British television series "Skins" as well as now "X-Men" films and for having dated Jennifer Lawrence. But, perhaps most hard to believe is that the brothers responsible for "American Pie" and also at the helm for this film with such a good heart and excellent story.
"About a Boy" exploits Grant's edge and much of his considerable charm in its story of a 38-year-old London bachelor who accidentally becomes entangled in the life of a 12-year-old boy. In addition to being a smart comedy and an excellent showcase for Grant, it's an honest movie about childhood that avoids sappiness and sentiment and goes in unexpected directions.
Of course, there are two boys in "About a Boy," and one of them is Will, the overgrown one played by Grant. He doesn't need to work, so he doesn't. He lives off the royalties from a Christmas song his father wrote in 1958 and spends his days buying CDs and watching television. He has no interest in marriage or children but spends much of his time thinking of the best ways to meet women.
The film's story has a lot of plots and characters, but the superb writing of Nick Hornby just allows it all to unfold much like life does without becoming too much for us as the viewer to get lost within. It becomes less about Grant's character and more about the troubled 12 year old boy, Marcus (Hoult) who has a suicidal and extremely depressed mother (Collette). Marcus seems to need the guidance of a male figure as well as a friendship and he somehow thinks Will (Grant) is the perfect role model for him, despite Will's inattention to the need to grow up himself. They actually end up needing each other, which Will sort of comes to on his own, nearly too late; but that's the message I think Hornby is trying to tell us- it's never too late.
As soon as the kid emerges as a major character, there is a tendency to think this is one of those movies where our hero is supposed to realize something noble, probably about the joys of commitment and the triviality of his existence. But the picture doesn't fall into a predictable groove.
This is a great film to watch.
.......................................................................
"Heaven"
starring: Cate Blanchett, Giovanni Ribisi, Stefani Rocca
directed by: Tom Tykwer
written by: Krzysztof Kieslowski
This is a film from the director of "Run, Lola, Run" and the writer intended it to be the first film in a trilogy, but he sadly passed away before this film was even made, leaving the rest in film limbo/purgatory, never to be made.
"Heaven" is about to souls that meet under terrible circumstances, joined by love and divided by society, seeking redemption and understanding. Cate Blanchett plays a schoolteacher in Italy who accidentally kills four people while attempting to avenge her husband's death. Giovanni Ribisi plays an Italian police officer/translator who falls in love with her while translating her testimony, springs her loose in a cat-and-mouse type of situation, and eventually runs away with her.
There are many moments of long silences and deep celestial awe at play as the story unfolds, but ultimately the film lets Blanchett's character off the hook for the senseless and unnecessary murder of four innocent people, while under the guise of her seeking to avenge her husband's death by one man, a drug pusher whom we never really met, really leaving us to wonder- was it worth it? doesn't she deserve punishment and those four innocent people, don't they deserve justice? what did they die for? Her character ultimately abandons her responsibility, which does not really make her someone we can feel any sympathy for. I guess, it would have been interesting to see what happens to her character if the story would have been continued in the planned two other films. I guess we'll never know.
.....................................................................
"About Adam"
starring: Stuart Townsend, Kate Hudson, Tommy Tiernan, Frances O'Connor, Cathleen Bradley, Charlotte Bradley
directed and written by: Gerard Stembridge
Kate Hudson plays an Irish waitress-singer in a Dublin bar who falls under the charm of a stranger named Adam (Townsend), whose spell casts Hudson into infatuation, but unfortunately for her, he casts his spell on her sisters and her somehow her brother as well. She's planning their wedding when all of this happens, unbeknownst to her.
There are a few laughs here and there, but this is definitely a forgettable film and perhaps one Hudson doesn't prefer to talk about much, with good reason, as it come out around the same time as "Almost Famous" which projecting her into leading-lady status, most notably in rom-coms.
..........................................................................
"Heavenly Creatures"
starring: Kate Winslet, Melanie Lynskey, Sarah Peirse, Diana Kent, Clive Merrison, Simon O'Connor, Jed Brophy, Peter Elliott
directed by: Peter Jackson
written by: Fran Walsh
Long before Peter Jackson became well known for directing "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy and "The Hobbit" trilogies, he made this film about two girl friends who become so infatuated with each other that many people believed them to be lesbians, they share an intense fantasy life with each other, share secrets and passions. The girls are separated by their concerned parents, and they thus seek and plot out their revenge, specifically on one of the mothers.
It's like "The Good Son" except with two teenage girls in the role of deeply disturbed. Pauline Parker and Juliet Hume plot a cold-blooded murder of Pauline's mother, which we see the foreshadowing of and the aftermath of right at the beginning of the film, with both girls running out of the woods all covered in blood and hysterical, acting, of course. The film unfolds what brought them to this point, and at the end we see the murder unfold with the girls taking a walk through the woods with Pauline's mom and they bash a brick in a nylon stocking into her head over and over.
Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh refuses to see the girls as demon seeds (a difference from "The Good Son") and instead attempt to showcase them with humanity and vulnerability, suggesting instead, that we as human beings all have the potential to commit the same acts as these two girls and it is about what drives people over the edge. Essentially, as Jackson explains it, the film is a "murder story about love, a murder story with no villains" whether or not you believe him, perhaps says more about you than about the girls.
This is an excellent film, even given that it came out in 1994 and seems quite dated at this point, it still holds up against time, though.
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