Monday, October 30, 2006

Saw Two Movies This Weekend

Marie Antoinette.
Beautiful to look at, but shallow story. Hardly any history or politics. Imagine the slick trailer stretched out over two hours. I don't recommend.

Babel.
Not bad. Similar to his other films in that there are three stories that are sorta intertwined. I thought the acting was good. You can put this on your Netflix queue.

5 comments:

MK said...

Re: Marie Antoinette: "Beautiful to look at, but shallow story. Hardly any history or politics." I haven't seen it yet, but my understanding is that it specifically meant to portray the descent into shallowness of someone raised in material excess but without any genuine personal warmth. It is also meant as a parallel, comparing Versailles to the shallowness of Hollywood.

chanchow said...

Perhaps all the clothes, food, wigs, jewelry and other excesses that figure prominently in the movie are supposed to parallel the superficiality in Hollywood. I wouldn't know.

But I'm not giving Coppola the benefit of the doubt this time. Her other two features similarly relied too much on the visuals and soundtrack. I think the superficiality of this movie (and her other films) is due to the fact that Coppola cannot give us a more layered story with well-developed characters.

Ron said...

Babel! That comes out to an art house theatre nearby (Wash. DC) on Friday and I can't wait to see it...Amores Perros was very well done and the American "version" 21 Grams was especially well acted...

Anywho, hi chanchow, I've been gone awhile and now I'm back.

Happy Halloween.

Creative-Type Dad said...

I think both are going on the Netflix. I can't think of any movie being "Movie Theater" worthy right now.

MK said...

Saw Marie Antoinette on Friday. I disagree that there is no character development. I thought she showed empathy with her main character as to how one can develop into becoming such a vapid materialist person. That being said, the movie simply didn't flow very well. Once it established a certain mood, it no longer progressed from there and remained somewhat static. Also, while the rather naturally spoken texts made for a certain level of approachability, I found the general approach to the characters a bit too lax. In the end it felt more like a bunch of current American teens romping around Versailles than a real historical movie. My suspension of disbelief was being challenged.