Sunday 17 January 2016

Those two horrible departures

Most of my notes on this blog were not too serious, as I did not really intend to ponder on any matters of great gravity. But the way this year has begun - with two devastating losses - makes me feel obligated to do so this time. We have bid farewell to two astonishing, extremely talented artist.

David Bowie was, first and foremost, a musician - but he was not a typical rockstar. His bizarre act and personality - both on and out of stage - has tought us that being different does not necessarily have to mean being worse, that there is certain courage and beauty in standing out in the ordinary crowd. I'm afraid that his generation - which is unfortunately slowly passing away, one great (wo)men at a time - will turn out to be irreplacable. Can you name one modern artist who would have such a vision as he did?



Before we even had the time to reconcile after Bowie's death, we heard another tragic news - that Alan Rickman has passed away as well. According to those who had te great honot of working with him, he was a warm and caring person, and a truly inspiring artist. If David Bowie has tought us that there's nothing wrong with being different, I think what Rickman tough me - through his characters - is that it's ok to be torn apart, and to commit mistakes, that nobody is beyond redemption. More than anything, I will remember him as Severus Snape - a character insanely profound and complex, whose evolution through the Harry Potter series is incredibly moving. But he also brought us Harry form Love actually - a man as lost in his live and choices as could be - and voiced Marvin, the paranoid android from A hitchiker's guide to the galaxy.

Saturday 16 January 2016

3 movies I'm looking forward to watch

While Poland has entered European Union and NATO years ago, there are still some differences between us and the West: one of them are certainly the movie release dates. Here are three movies I'm still waiting to see although my colleagues in France or England probably already did:

The Revenant
From the very first time I saw the trailer, this movie stroke me as different: while "a man tries to survive in the wilds" kind of movie usually seem boringly repelling to me, this one promises dramatism and excitement. Starring Leonardo Dicaprio - a great actor who should have got the Academy Award a long time ago - it's gritty and brutal, and will surely turn out to be a fascinating experience. Fun fact: a "revenant" is a word used to describe a person who has supposedly return from the grave!

The Hateful Eight
You either love Quentin Tarantino or hate him, and in the recent months he has been more controversial of a figure than ever before. Personally, I find his movies really captivating, and it seems like in the last years - with "Inglorious Basterds" and "Django" - he has found a new formula, after several not so good movies such as "Jackie Brown" or "Kill Bill". While some accuse him of shwing unnecessary and excesive violence on screen, to me, he is a great director, and his sense of humour and original characters more than make up for all his weaknesses.
The Lobster
A new movie of Giorgios Lanthimos, director of one of the most disturbing films I've watched, "The fang", is a dystopain Sci-Fi in which single people are closed in a hotel and forced to find a person to pair with within a certain period of time - or else, they are transformed into animals. This seems to be a great idea, and probably will give us some great characters with interesting relations with one another. I just hope it won't turn into a "lets break out of this prison" kind of movie - that would be just too simple and the director can do better than that.

Tuesday 12 January 2016

The franchise has awakened

This note is as spoiler-free as it could be, and in general shouldn't really give you any new information if you have seen the trailers of Star Wars VII: The Force Awakens

It took me suprisingly long to write a note about a movie I care about so much. I have seen the new Star Wars movie twice and I am glad I did - one viewing is just not enough to appreciate how rich and beautiful it is. There are many people in the Internet pointing out, or even raging about it's shortcomings - but I think it is just what I hoped it would be.

As you can guess by the trailers, there are several new characters in the movie: Rey, a tough-as-nails junk scavenger hailing from a desert planet Jakku (it's interesting story is all but omitted in the movie, unfortunately), Finn, a soon-to-be-ex stormtrooper, and dashing rebel pilot Poe Dameron (my personal favourite). Of course, as every movie in the franchise, this one comes down to the archetypical battle between good and evil, the latter represented by Kylo Ren, who seems like your typical mask-wearing villain ... but is it really all that simple? Of course, we also see a return of some of the old friends.

Without spoiling anything, Imay only say that all those new characters are psychologically consistent and well motivated, and satisfyingly complex. Rey, for example, is a perfect of how a feminine characters should be presented in a movie: she's strong and smart (or at least street/desert-smart), and we can clearly see that she's so much more than a potential romantic interest for a male protagonist. 

I was also astonished by The Force Awakens humour: that's the area where, at least in my opinion, the new trilogy failed the hardest. Episode VII, in contrast, has numerous scenes and lines that are genuinely funny (the scene where Finn and BB-8 reach an agreement is absolutely brilliant. If you've seen the movie, you'll surely remember it).

It goes without question that the audiovisual effects are top shelf - it would really be disappointing if they weren't, right?

So, just go see the movie - even if you do not like it as I did, it's surely worth seeing, at least you'' be able to (dis)agree with all the people on the internet.