Orange Ink

So after seeing The Artist I have been saying that it is the best thing I have seen in the last ten years.  Just to keep myself honest I made a list of other good movies from the last ten years but it does in fact beat them.  See below for my list of the top 45 over the past ten years.  With a gun held to my head my top five would have to be The Artist, The Lives of Others, Micmacs, Wall-E, and House of Flying Daggers.

American Splendor

Big Fish

Capote

Children of Men

Downfall

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

Finding Neverland

Frost/Nixon

Good Bye, … Continue Reading

On the original Star Trek  series there were pipes and tubes all over the starship Enterprise  that were labeled “GNDN.”  The abbreviation was placed there by some otherwise bored set designers.  It stood for “Goes Nowhere, Does Nothing.”

I often feel like Alexander Payne’s are GNDN movies.  There certainly tend to be story arcs  but the main characters end up in the same physical place in which they started, progressing little in the abstract.  I don’t feel that a film has  to go … Continue Reading

Some observations on a very short trip to Singapore:

It only took 45 minutes to get from the gate to my hotel including going through customs.  Unlike London or New York there is an actual functional highway between the airport and downtown.   And the airport was put much closer to a place you would like to get to.  An interesting fact is that since the airport is so close to downtown, buildings are not permitted to be above 919 feet tall.  There are three that are this tall, soon to be more.

I had to wait a whole two minutes for … Continue Reading

I am not a fan of CGI.  There, I said it.  But I watched Rise of the Planet of the Apes on an LED television where everything looks fake anyway so it was tough to judge.  Why anyone would want to watch a movie on a television that makes everything look like it was from a soap opera on the BBC in the 1970’s is beyond me.  I have heard people say that it looks “too real” on these TVs.  Too real?  What could that even possibly mean?  Bright? Yes.  Weirdly lit? Yes.  It’s anything but real to me.

So watching … Continue Reading

Why I have so much trouble writing scripts is because I cannot make my characters make bad decisions.  I find my self being so disappointed when I watch characters on the big screen do stupid things.  I know.  This makes films what they are. Hide the body.  Don’t call the cops right away.  Sure, have sex with that random person you met in a bar.  But when I try to write these things I keep asking myself “why would anyone act so stupid?”  It’s not like I make perfect decisions all of the time, or even most of the time … Continue Reading

Someone told me this wasn’t a “chick flick” but a romantic comedy, which made me stop and think.  There’s a difference?  I guess the chick-flick label is reserved for overly sappy and predictable romances where you spend most of the movie saying “uggh WHEN are they going to get together (and then back together).”  I can’t think of any movie that  I have seen recently that fits this model since I avoid them like the plague. Okay, 27 Dresses.  I would certainly not include movies like Love Actually or Amelie in this category but I suppose this is in the … Continue Reading

It’s that in-between movie season in the U.S. where I seem to burn through my Netflix queue more quickly than usual and head to the theater quite a bit less.  Since this film (To Live 生活) is always listed in his top two or three, I am surprised that I have not seen this masterpiece from Zhang Yimou much sooner.  Just when I feel like I have seen all of the good movies in existence a gem like this sneaks into a red envelope and ends up in my DVD player.  Possibly with the … Continue Reading

One of the most absolute laws of nature is that if a book is good at least one movie will be made from it.  A second absolute is that someone will invariably say (whine) “the book is better.”  I have never been able to puzzle out what people actually mean by this  statement.  Was the acting better in the book?  Did it have better cinematography?  Did you like the way they scored the book better?

I’m not saying that films are inherently better than books or vice versa.  It’s just that … Continue Reading

So should you find yourself with more than five hours to waste in Heathrow, get the heck out of the airport.  It will take you two hours to get to someplace good in central London via train (Paddington station does not count as “good”), tube and taxi.  Then you will need an hour to get back and the usual “get there two hours early for an international flight” rule will have to apply.  But British Airways for some reason likes to assign layovers that often exceed this amount, often by quite a lot.

This is a perfect opportunity to go spend … Continue Reading

Europe, where soccer comes on at the right time and baseball is on way too late to watch.  Marseille just destroyed their opponent in the champions league and Nice is still one of the worst teams in the league.  Not that anyone on the French Riviera cares about that when the MIPCOM TV entertainment deal-making conference is in Cannes all week.  Except me.  I work in TV news but couldn’t wait to get to Eze or anywhere that wasn’t watching women in big sunglasses and men in tight t-shirts.

If you go to see Eze I recommend taking the Nietzsche path … Continue Reading