Two Great Movies!

Rob at the Movies!

Two Great Favourite Movie Recommendations

Hey everyone, it’s time for this week’s blog. I’m not going to go on and on in detail about a number of film’s or a specific subject this week. I’m simply going to talk about two films that mean a great deal to me and I couldn’t recommend more. There’s so many great films I love and you’ll probably here about some of them in future blogs on a similar topic... for example, the lovely chap below...

So, what’s been going on in my world this week? Well not loads of really exciting things but a pretty decent spread nonetheless, the ups and downs as you have it. Still waiting to sort out what’s happening with my benefit, I got some through but it still doesn’t seem they’ve got the facts I sent them to calculate it on right just yet. But I’ve got enough to manage for a bit, it just seems cuckoo!

Ah well. In other news, there was a rather interesting evening last night at St Marks where I helped with the visuals whilst sound expert Ben H did a cracking job as always... it was an evening hosted by Open Doors, a really fascinating charity that helps persecuted Christians in foreign countries, I won’t go on in great detail but it was rather a stunning evening as you can imagine. There was around 4 or 5 DVD’s showing what is happening in these countries, as well as prayer stations with facts and details to pray for and some testimonies from the Open Doors representatives. 

It’s a real eye opener to see what is happening and it just makes you realise how fortunate you are to be able to worship and pray without the persecution over here... and it’s definitely that requires as much prayer and help as possible for those people, and if you can afford to donate some money to it... I’d really recommend helping in every way you can. That was in place of our cell group, though we were mostly all there and chatted and met up still.

Other than that, just been chilling at home, looking for work and watching a fair few movies on the TV from Sky plus, such as the rather good From Hell with Johnny Depp as a unorthodox detective trailing Jack the Ripper... it’s rather daft but also rather gripping and Depp is no less than superb. 

Also watched the daft but rather rubbish Ninja Assassin, which made no sense and was just gory without half the fun, as well as Did You Hear about the Morgans? Which was passable rom com fare with a bit of action thrown in, rather average bar the always loveable Hugh Grant and the ever cool moustache of Sam Elliot... I’m talking about the dude! 

 

Also started watching the very fantastic Boardwalk Empire, a prohibition (banning of Alcohol) era TV drama from Martin Scorsese that is absolutely terrific as well as the welcome return of Dr House, and a cracking return it was too, both very funny and very moving as always.

I also saw a preview of Never Let Me Go at the excellent Liverpool One Odeon on Monday... such a downbeat but superb movie with three fantastic performances from Carey Mulligan, Andrew Garfield and (surprisingly) Keira Knightley, who my mother so correctly observed, doesn’t usually act very good. Don’t want to say too much, because it’s a film to discover as the plot moves on, but it’s devastatingly sad towards the end and very bittersweet but is a film not to be missed. 

That’s out now, and I’m very looking forward to seeing two films in the next week.... Jeff Bridges playing Rooster Cogburn in The Coen Brother’s True Grit remake and Pegg and Frost in Paul... two very different films, but both look absolutely terrific.

Time for the movie recommendations, two really great films that I couldn’t recommend any higher. Firstly, don’t forget your booties because it’s cold out there today....

Groundhog Day

Easily my favourite comedy movie of all time, and as close to perfection as I feel a comedy can get... far too clever and far too brilliantly written. The plot has become a well-worn trope by now, reliving something over and over and over, but this is the movie that started that trend as weatherman Phil Connors, played by a (I think) career best Bill Murray and that’s saying something from one of my all time favourite actors, goes off to Punxsutawney to cover the annual Groundhog Day festival... where they bring out the Groundhog to tell how long Winter will last from thereon in.

Phil is the usual curmudgeonly Murray character and hates having to cover this festival, so he’s thrilled when he can leave... until that is, a blizzard that he had reported would not be hitting actually does and he has to stay the night. Needless to say, when he wakes up... it’s Groundhog Day all over again, and if he ever wants to escape this mad time loop, he may just have to change his lives and etc and etc... But not without having a bit of fun with it first.

An easy way to explain just what I love so much about this film, and why I consider it so perfect, funny, charming and clever is to break it down into likes and even, dum dum dum, dislikes if there are any...

What I Love about it:

- Bill Murray. Normally that would enough, and in most ways it is. But as you’ll see there’s much more than the leading man to enjoy here, but what a leading man... doing his usual sarcastic shtick with aplomb, whilst also unveiling a sympathetic and touching side too as he becomes affected by his ‘special condition’ and learns to help more.... it’s a great performance, at times very very funny, with some great dialogue and also very touching and strangely romantic towards the end. I’ll always say Jim Carrey missed out big time when the academy snubbed him for Truman Show, here’s another unjustly ignored performance that surely warranted a nomination.

- The timeframe.... never does the movie ever explain just how long he goes through the ‘day after day’ symptom, but it could be anything from years to decades or maybe months... and I’ve always found that intriguing. Just how many of the things he learns to do day after day, from helping people to knowing everyone to romancing Rita (Andie MacDowell) to a fault. Its mind bogglingly clever just how day after day you could do so much, and how long does he do it for?

- Using the timeframe to his advantage. Yet another example of how clever and witty it is, there is a whole range of ways he manipulates the timeframe he finds himself in. Whether it be going on a drink drive rampage, being arrested and then waking up in his hotel Scott free; killing himself a whole number of times in elaborate ways; timing a bank truck delivery of money perfectly to simply waltz past and grab the cash in cinema’s easiest and best bank heist; or perfecting the art of a romantic dinner conversation with Rita about toasts and the best drink order. Every single time you watch it, you never fail to be impressed by the precise comic timing of these scenes and the subtle cleverness with which they’re concocted.

- Ned! Cinema’s most annoying person you can’t help but love, Ned Ryerson (Stephen Toblowsky) is the old bud from high school Phil doesn’t recall but who bumps into him every morning on the way to the festival, this is abused lovingly in a collection of different variations on the meet; from lovingly embracing him to an uncomfortable level, to guessing everything he’s going to say, through to simply (and hilariously) knocking his lights out in cinema’s funniest punch. A classic character for the ages, and cinema’s most ridiculous laugh... I got that one, raaaawlll!

- Just sublime, I could go on for hours and hours about how much I love this film... but I’m not going to. It’s brilliantly witty and funny, has a huge charm towards the end that I don’t want to spoil for those unfortunates who have yet to relive this film over and over and over and over... just watch out for that first step, it’s a doozy!

Any weak spots?

- To be fair, Andie MacDowell isn’t the greatest actress in the world. She does her part perfectly fair here, and having seen the film so many times it’s hard to imagine someone else doing it. But a truly great supporting actress to Bill would have been superb... perhaps Emma Thompson or even Lea Thompson, so underrated in Back to the Future and not seen in much else, except very sadly Howard the Duck, a career nadir for anyone.

- The same could be said of Chris Elliot, hardly a bad comic foil to Murray in some scenes but no great actor, but to be honest though he’s perfectly fine, and his auction scene is priceless.

Though are very brief niggles to a fantastic film that sits very high with my very favourite films ever, a clever and touching and funny movie that deserves to be seen over and over and over.... again x

High Fidelity

Music and love, they go together like cakes and cream. And those two ingredients is essentially what this film can boil down to, as John Cusack takes up through his past failed and success in relationships and love, all the while a soundtrack of absolutely fantastic music plays out for Cusack’s character Rob (great name!) is a music geek, working at a cool record shop and is busy sorting his collection out into alphabetical order whilst he narrates the movie. Alongside this, he has just broken up with long time partner Laura (Iben Hijele, so great here yet unseen much since) and is wondering where she will fit into the pantheon of what he deems his Top 5 Relationships.

This is a film that really means a great deal to me, as it not only started a small fascination with lists and countdowns, which many of you may know I do a fair few of... but it really genuinely kick started a deep love of Music, not least Mr Bossman Bruce Springsteen who an absolutely genius cameo here. 

Mixing his advice on relationships with the best of music and displaying an absolute love of music, it just made me appreciate and love music that much more, this being when I first saw it at the cinema, probably being around 14. It’s just a sublime movie, at points very funny and witty and at others really sad, poignant and heart warming... a really great movie and probably one of the best ever made about relationships, a love story (like 500 Days of summer) that doesn’t gloss over the faults that lie in the road to love.

Oh and it’s also the start of the rise of Jack Black, so you’ll either love it or hate it for that... but considering just how good he is here, I don’t mind at all, and from School of Rock through to Kung Fu Panda he’s done enough right, not to mention The D to win me over again and again. But this isn’t about him, its Rob’s story, and in that weird sentence lies an unsubtle irony, it’s a really human story and could apply to anyone hence its wide appeal x

What I Love about it:

- The music. From some Springsteen through to Katrina and the Waves via The Beta Band, you can tell this is a movie with immense respect and passion for music from the sublime soundtrack that permeates throughout. It’s a film about music, with music about people who sell music and live music and it seriously shows, from the main tracks through to the incidental stuff heard in the backdrop in many scenes. And is that Peter Frampton? Seriously, go buy this soundtrack!

- John Cusack. Ever the everyman, he anchors the film throughout with a great mix of charm, weakness, arrogance, humanity, humour, anger, and lots more besides... and he’s work it in all into a sympathetic everyman who makes mistakes but that’s life. As with Groundhog Day, this is I think Cusack’s finest hour, well very closely tied with Grosse Pointe Blank (which I’ll talk about in another blog at some point) and he’s fantastic throughout and really holds the film together from start to finish, a greatly engaging presence.

- Jack Black. You either love him or hate him, and this was his first big role that really showed him off to the world. Playing Rob’s loud and obnoxious employee but not without his usual charm, he’s a tour de force of energy from his morning tapes to crooning Marvin Gaye at the end and showing his surprising softer side. A true example of great scene stealing.

- The supporting cast. From sidekicks Black (already mentioned) and the lovingly geeky Todd Louiso through to on and off screen sister Joan Cusack (in greatly shouty yet loveable form)... as well as the camederie of great turns from all of Cusack’s exes, special mentions to Catherine Zeta Jones in one of her earlier Hollywood turns who is charming and feisty as well as a nice turn by the utterly lovely Lili Taylor (making up for The Haunting a year earlier). 

There’s also a sweet turn by Lisa Bonet as an up and coming singer who befriends Rob, and she is at turns utterly gorgeous and really sweet. It’s a great backdrop cast that really compliments the events and story. Look out also for Drake Bell (sans Josh) as a young Rob.

- Tim Robbins as Ian! Always a great presence in movies, Robbins is on delightfully snide and slimy form as Ian, the grey ponytailed creep whom Rob’s ex Laura is currently dating... best of all though are the fantasy scenes in which Rob and his music buddies wreak revenge on him in many crazy and hilarious ways!

Any weak spots?

- It’s pretty hard to be fair to pick out much really, and to be honest I’m not going to because at this moment I can’t think of what I don’t like about this film.

Simply put, it’s a truly great film that holds a special slot in my heart. From its great cast and great music through to its heartfelt and true story and heart... it’s a brilliant film through and through, and one that deserves to be thrown on the player every now and then for a spin. Did you really just ask for I Just Called to Say I Love You? x

And that’s it for this week’s blog, I’m off tonight for a lovely meal for my brother Matt’s birthday... we’re going to Old Orleans at The Printworks and it looks absolutely tops! Also there’s going to a epic service at church on Sunday no doubt so always looking forward to that, plus the usual ups and downs a week can provide. 

Best of all I’m going to see Paul on Thursday at AMC with my great cinema pal Dale Brooks, so that’ll be ace and the rest, and that segues nicely into... the Next Blog where I’ll be looking at Paul, which is the new film from Nick Frost and Simon Pegg as well as looking at their other films Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz as well as a quick review of True Grit, with Jeff Bridges taking on the John Wayne role of Rooster Cogburn. Until then, I hope you all have a really great week and most of all....

You stay classy.... Planet Earth! X