Category Archives: Love Story

2013, Abduction, Dark, Detective, Drama, FBI, Flirting, Gay theme, Grim, Lawyers, Love Story, Made For TV, Mental Illness, Occasional gore, Psychological Thriller, Revenge, Sadism, Serial Killer, Sex Scenes, Suspense, Torture, Violent, Wonderful acting

The Following (2013)

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From NetFlix:

When escaped serial killer Joe Carroll goes on a new killing spree, reclusive former FBI agent Ryan Hardy is called in, having captured Carroll nine years ago. Hardy soon discovers that Carroll has a loyal following of killers ready to terrorize.

Fifteen TV episodes of psychosis, ugly violence, and really good acting offer you a guilty pleasure. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Kevin Bacon always delivers a great performance, including this gory series. James Purefoy makes a great psychotic and insidiously clever villain. Take note, in addition, of the trio of very young adults (Valorie Curry, Nico Tortorella, and Adan Canto) who provide a sadistic bisexual mini-drama on their own. Nothing is nice in this series except possibly Kyle Catlett who plays the little boy Joey.

Stream along with NetFlix and expect to be absorbed.

2013, Action Film, Good digital effects, Love Story, Medical Theme, Sci-Fi, Suspense, Violent

Elysium (2013)

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From Netflix:

In this dystopian thriller set in 2159, the wealthiest humans move to a fabulous private space station, while life on Earth grows ever more grim. With no other options, an ex-con agrees to join a risky mission to bring balance to the two worlds.

Is science fiction pessimistic or realistic? First read a newspaper and then tell me the gap between rich and poor is not widening. As a limit to this widening gap we have “Blade Runner” and “Elysium”. In both cases planet Earth is a real mess. Enter Matt Damon who tries to lead an honest life inside this earthly mess. Eventually industry mismanagement accidentally dooms him to death by radiation exposure. To save his own life he undergoes a painful physical operation to become a bit robot-like. What carries the film along is not Damon’s merely acceptable acting, but rather the plot.

As far as acting goes, Jodie Foster can be one real hard-hearted woman. Sit back and watch her make nasty “management” decisions.

Every successful sci-fi film needs some “gimmick”. In this case households in Elysium each have a machine that can cure any human illness. Sign me up!

2012, Comedy, Coming-of-age, Drama, Feel Good Not For Children, Flirting, Love Story, Mental Illness, Optimistic, Quiet, Sex Scenes, Small gem of a film, Talking Heads, Witty dialog

Liberal Arts (2012)

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From Netflix:

A speaking engagement brings 35-year-old Jesse back to his college alma mater, where he’s blindsided by nostalgia and a plucky sophomore named Zibby. Newly single and unfulfilled by his job, Jesse finds Zibby pulling him out of his disillusionment.

Call it talking-heads, call it an hour and one half of feel-good bubbles, but this little gem made me smile. Just enjoy all the philosophical pronouncements, some of them even make sense.

How can you not like 35 year old Jesse (played by Josh Radnor), an ordinary-looking guy with a friendly, sincere smile who is moral enough to think twice about sleeping with a 19 year old college student and warm enough to help a student suffering from manic-depression?

Feel sorry for the other characters who in a negative way help Jesse start to come alive: Professor Holberg (played by Richard Jenkins) who regretfully must retire even though he still feels like he is 19; Professor Fairfield (played by Allison Janney) who has grown cynical and bitter after loveless years of teaching literature.

Enjoy listening to the clever banter between Jesse and Zibby (played by Elizabeth Olsen). Were you like Zibby at her young age ?

Try and see it with someone you love.

2011, Based on a Book, Basically Sad, Dancing, Drama, FilmReview, Love Story, Plot Twist, Quiet, Revenge, Sex Scenes, Slow, Unusual

Trishna (2011)

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From Netflix:

Raised in rapidly changing rural India, well-educated Trishna is torn between cultural tradition and her own desires when she falls in love with a British businessman who has returned to India to work in his family’s hotel business.

According to Wikipedia, this film is an adaptation of Thomas Hardy’s novel “Tess of the d’Urbervilles.” Hopefully that will not spoil the plot for you (although the adaptation is only very approximate).

Not for everyone, this film features:

  • Many different views of life in India, rural and urban.
  • Dancing.
  • Some Bollywood film-making.
  • Details in Indian life that you may or may not find interesting.
  • Slow development of the story.
  • Quite a few (discreet) sex scenes.

Nonetheless, I could not stop watching. Perhaps I see too many violent films, but I kept expecting something awful to happen. Instead, for awhile the plot seems too easy, almost as if the writers were sparing us any stress. But eventually there is an unexpected change in direction and (for me, at least) a surprise ending. In fact, I cheated and did not list all the possible categories because I did not want to introduce any spoilers.

If nothing else, you can spend two hours appreciating the very beautiful female star.

2011, Complicated, Crude Talk, Drama, Feel Good Not For Children, Flirting, Lesbian Theme, Love Story, Quiet, Sex Scenes, Talking Heads, Young Adults

Your Sister’s Sister (2011)

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From Netflix:

Jack, who is mourning the death of his brother, has a complicated relationship with his best friend, Iris, who used to date his brother. Their chaotic situation becomes even more tangled when Jack has a drunken tryst with Iris’s flighty sister.

Why was I smiling while listening to young adult superficial banter? Granted it was clever banter, but somehow …

And then it gets complicated and serious. Are 21st century relationships really more contorted than in previous generations? Or is this plot contrived enough that we should just ignore or reject the situation? Or are 21st century young adults just a bit confused?

But I did have to stick around to see how the three characters got themselves out of their self-created emotional tangle. And just to spoil this film for you, they come up with a solution, believable or not — you decide, that made this film a “feel good”.

And the very ending was PERFECT!

2013, Gangs, Love Story, Revenge, Some exaggerated violence, Suspense, Violent

Dead Man Down (2013)

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From Netflix:

This taut crime thriller stars Colin Farrell as a brutal gang enforcer who falls for a woman bent on exacting revenge on his boss. Via seduction and blackmail, the woman persuades the gangster to help her achieve a bloody payback.

Do not be put off by the opening violence that makes the film look like every other shoot-em-up Hollywood knockoff. Only at the end is there another explosion of exaggerated destruction. In between, the largest segment of the film by far, the interplay between Colin Farrell and Noomi Rapace (Oh my gosh! It’s the Swedish Lisbeth Salander of the Millenium trilogy!) is downright poignant. What makes the give and take so appealing is the silence and hesitancy. As part of that, Colin Farrell says very little. My cynical comment here is that a clever acting trick is to keep your mouth shut and let the audience think for the character. So let’s just say that Farrell’s tortured facial expressions effectively substitute for a lot that goes unsaid.

Colin Farrell grabbed a very suitable script for himself. Not bad!

1999, Anti-Semitism, Based on true facts, Could Be Hard To Watch, Disturbing Image, DO NOT MISS, Ethical struggles, Explicit sex, FilmReview, Human spirit, Hungarian history, Istvan Szabo, Jewish Culture, Love Story, Marital Infidelity, Nudity, Political statement, Rape, Revenge, Torture, Violent, Wonderful photography

Sunshine (1999)

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From Netflix:

A single actor portrays father, son and grandson in this epic historical tale that follows a Jewish family as they struggle to survive anti-Semitism, war and corruption in Hungary. Each man deals with the prevailing regime in his own way.

Istvan Szabo, the director, presents us with a wonderful three hour epic that leads us through many periods in Hungarian history: Austria-Hungary, World War I, Communism after WW I, Nazi occupation of Hungary in World War II, Pro-Stalin Communism after WW II, and finally the fall of Communism.

For a detailed account of the film see the Wikipedia article.

For those of us in Massachusetts please note that “Sunshine” was written by the director Istvan Szabo and Israel Horovitz. Horovitz is Founding Artistic Director of the Gloucester Stage Company in Gloucester, Massachusetts. Kathy and I have seen several of his plays.

Although there are too many wonderful actors to mention, clearly the film was a tour de force for Ralph Fiennes who plays parts in three generations of the family. Jennifer Ehle as Valerie Sonnenschein was strikingly beautiful.

Warning: there is one ugly scene when Fiennes as the character Adam in a concentration camp is tortured to death. Szabo makes it quite clear that the villains in this piece are not Nazis, not Germans, but HUNGARIANS who are very anti-Semitic.

Three hours may seem like a long time, but this film is worth every second.
DO NOT MISS!

2012, Animation, Black humor, Car Chase, Comedy, Crude Talk, Fantasy, Love Story, Medical Theme, Mental Illness, Motorcycles, Musical, Nudity, Satire, Senior citizens, Short Films, Suicide, Unusual, Vulgar

Oscar Shorts (2012)

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From Netflix:

This collection of Oscar-winning shorts from 2003-2012 covers works from around the globe, including “God of Love,” “The New Tenants,” “Toyland,” “West Bank Story,” “The Lost Thing,” “Logorama,” “The Danish Poet,” “Ryan” and “Harvie Krumpet.”

Live Action shorts are:

  • God of Love – Singer uses unusual methods (timed darts) to cultivate love affairs.
  • The New Tenants – Surprise! Vince D’Onofrio (looking really overweight and unhealthy) The new tenants have a series of crazy visitors.
  • Toyland – German with subtitles – Persecution of Jews in Nazi Germany. “Toyland” is a euphemism for a concentration camp. Little Aryan child wants to accompany his Jewish friend to “Toyland”. Grim, sad, beautifully done.
  • West Bank Story – Much effort went into making this satirical take-off on “West Side Story”. Kosher King versus Hummus Hut.

Animated shorts are:

  • The Lost Thing – Australian – On beach man finds incredibly imaginative “thing” that seems to be a giant almost-teapot with reptilian extremities. Priceless!
  • Logorama – Vulgar mockery of American products and their logos, complete with car chases shoot-outs, earthquakes, an oil flood, and the west coast under water.
  • The Danish Poet – A Danish poet visits Sigrid Unset
  • Ryan – Imaginative but grotesque people missing parts (e.g. missing half a skull) provide opportunities for digital distortions. Downright weird.
  • Harvie Krumpet – Claymation story of Polish Harvie born to insane mother and lumber jack father. Harvie escapes the Germans and flees to Australia where he lives a life full of funny misfortunes each of which lands him once again in the hospital. Meanwhile he continues to collect increasingly funny facts (misspelled as “fakts”). Explicitly vulgar and very tongue-in-cheek.

“West Bank Story” is probably famous. In fact, I think I have seen it in other collections. Well worth watching.

“Harvie Krumpet”, while funny, could also be a bit depressing.

“The Lost Thing” may well be one of the most original animations I have seen. To enjoy all its details you might have to watch it more than once.

2013, Abduction, Bullying, Cancer theme, Child Molestation, Clever Plot, Crime, Crude Talk, Dark, DNA, DO NOT MISS, Drama, Drugs, Dysfunctional Lives, Explicit sex, FilmReview, Gritty, Love Story, Made For TV, Murder Investigation, Nudity, Rape, Revenge, Sad small town, Suspense, Trailer Life, TV Series, Violent, Vulgar, Wonderful acting

Top of the Lake (2013)

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From Netflix:

When pregnant, 12-year-old Tui tries to kill herself in a freezing New Zealand lake, Detective Robin Griffin has plenty of questions for the girl. But when Tui suddenly disappears, Griffin finds herself knee-deep in small-town secrets.

Just about everything happens in this gritty, tough TV series taking place in a remote location in New Zealand. To name just of the few features:

  • An amoral, cruel hillbilly family that kills, rapes, manufactures illegal drugs, etc.
  • A cult-like compound for women who have had bad experiences and are sometimes completely naked.
  • Child molestation
  • Gang rape
  • A mother dying of cancer
  • Self-flagellation
  • Dishonest police officers
  • A very capable woman detective (played by Elizabeth Moss) trying to get on with her life while dealing with her troubled past
  • Quite a few nude sex scenes
  • A not quite civilized society
  • Several murders

Yes, this is one crazy TV series. Elizabeth Moss, who played Peggy in “Mad Men”, does a terrific job. But all the actors do wonderful jobs.

You might not want to eat a full meal before watching. Nonetheless, for me at least, in the category of gritty this series is a DO NOT MISS!

2012, Crime, Drama, Dysfunctional Lives, Explicit sex, Gritty, Love Story, Murder Investigation, Nothing special, Nudity, Police Story, Suspense, Violent

Deadfall (2012)

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Netflix:

On the run after a casino heist, siblings Addison and Liza split up. When Liza gets a ride from a prison parolee heading to his parents’ home for Thanksgiving, unexpected events lead the two families toward a collision in this suspenseful thriller.

You might expect good things from a film in which Kris Kristofferson, Sissy Spacek, Olivia Wilde, and Treat Williams appear. In fact the film offered a good plot, good acting and well-done suspense. Note that the film is violent and gritty.

Essentially the story brings together a brother and sister who recently robbed a casino, a young man Jay recently released from jail but estranged from his father who together with his wife expects his son for Thanksgiving, and a young woman police officer whose police captain father does not respect her choice of career even though she is very competent. Eventually they all converge at the Thanksgiving dinner table with lots of guns in sight.

Liza and Jay’s falling in love is unrealistic. Jay could possibly be a better actor. Nevertheless …

Really not bad at all.