Film 3 - Youth In Revolt

Quite simply one of the funniest films I've ever seen. I went to see it about a week ago with a group of friends and we all laughed all the way through it. The plot seemed fine at the time although the more you think about it there is an element of absurdity about it, but then again how can a film in which the main character creates a split personality alter ego not be slightly absurd.

Funniest moments included:

1) Nick's alter ego trying to destroy the car and trailer whilst Nick inadvertently causes even more damage then walks away trying to look innocent.

2) Nick knocking over the cereal bowl, brilliantly deadpan acting, as Nick tried to think of something vaguely subversive and found nothing much.

3) Dodging the teachers as they try to stop him escaping the French boarding school

4) The book coming to life when he's high on 'shrooms' and the little finger moment, genuinely got the most laughs of any moment in the film

5) Nick being escorted away by the police in a dress

There were many other moments, and in many respects the film was just a vehicle for a series of vaguely connected skits. It was a pretty hilarious vehicle though.

Film 2 - Shallow Grave

A couple of days ago nothing else good being on TV and my internet down meant that I decided to watch Danny Boyle's directorial debut, Shallow Grave. I expected a lot, with Christopher Ecclestone, Ewan McGregor and Kerry Fox starring. The original premise, of three people having to decide what to do with a dead body and a suitcase full of money expands over the course of the film into something much more.

This was the most gripping film I've ever seen, David's descent into psychosis was just brilliant, drilling holes in the floor, holding a drill to his flatmates head, and all this caused by sawing the hands and feet off the corpse. The film continues to spiral out of control, making me ever unsure of what David would do next. The killing and body disposing parts of the film have a very horror theme, and the garish piano music is reminisicent of the beginning of  Halloween

It may have been easy for many people to dislike the main characters, but I found myself identifying with their very human greed. They didn't want to kill, they weren't insane to begin with, they just wanted the money. Who knows what they would do in the sort of situation they were put in?

Film 1 - Madagascar

Animated family films with talking animals rarely fail... and this was no exception. For my first film of this year I chose (because it was on BBC3) Madagascar, and it didn't disappoint me.

The group dynamic between the four main characters (Alex, Marty, Melman and Gloria) was brilliant, the slapstick comedy was laugh out loud hilarious and they all delivered some very funny lines, especially Melman and King Julian.

The Penguins have a small subplot which could have been expanded. They were brilliantly funny and seemed to have some very socialist/marxist tendencies. Maybe that was just me.

As I was watching the movie, good as it was, my mind drifted to who the voice actors were for the main characters. I immediately worked out that Melman was David Schwimmer and not long after my suspicions were raised that Alex was voiced by Zach Braff. My wild guess for Marty was Chris Rock, it just sounded like him, but I couldn't be sure, and for Gloria I had no idea.

A quick look at Wikipedia shows me that I got two out of three, but not the ones I thought. Alex wasn't Zach Braff but rather Ben Stiller. It sounded so much like Braff though!. I also found out that the voice of King Julian was Sacha Baron Cohen, which makes sense now, but I couldn't tell at the time.

Brilliant fun, not hugely sophisticated, but then, neither am I.

100 Films

Yes, that's right, I plan to watch 100 films this year and blog about every single one of them on here.

That will give me 101 posts on this blog (including this one)

I may start today by watching Once Upon a Time in the West, a film which I saw the start of in a Media Studies lesson last year.

Hopefully in a year and 100 posts time some people will be reading!

Day 4 - The Terminator

It's not the fourth day since I started, but it's Day 4 regardless, and a sci-fi action classic, The Terminator was on BBC3. It started slowly, and I several times considered turning it off, but in the end I really loved it.

I'm not usually a fan of action movies but the Terminator's killing was brilliantly ruthless, and Sarah Connor and Kyle Reese escaping by inches time after time was riveting.

The best moments were the ones that I recognised from being parodied elsewhere: "I'll be back"; the moment when the Terminator's red eye went out for the final time (coincidently, I couldn't watch when he took out his eye).

I worked out that Reese was John Connor's father before it was revealed at the end, it was pretty obvious, and the romantic moments between Kyle and Sarah were brilliant.

Overall, as I seem to be saying about every film, I really liked it. There may not have been the intellectual depth of Blade Runner but it was good at what it was.

Day 3 - Imagine Me And You

Movie night ended up being movie afternoon, as people went home before night began, and after seeing this film we noticed that it had been snowing, so out we went for snowball fights and snowman making.

So in the end we only saw one film, this chick flick about a woman who falls in love with another woman at her wedding (to a man).

The two women were a really cute couple, but it was hard not to feel sorry for the man when his wife left him for a woman at the end.

Overall, not one of my favourites so far, but I liked it.

Day 2 - About A Boy

Immediately after Miracle On 34th Street I started flicking channels, finding on ITV2 About A Boy showing, I'd missed the first 15 minutes but it didn't matter too much as I easily settled into the plot... trendy London bachelor suddenly finds he's been burdened with a kid that isn't even his. Enter Nicholas Hoult, about 5 years before he played Tony in Skins making his silver screen debut playing Marcus brilliantly opposite Hugh Grant's rich London lothario..

The film is literally un-stop-watchingable, the relationship between Marcus and Will develops brilliantly through the film and the ending is happy but not unrealistically happy. The soundtrack - written and composed completely by Badly Drawn Boy - is excellent and I now really want to read the novel (written by Nick Hornby).

Tonight is film afternoon/night/morning with a group of friends, I'm taking Fight Club (which I've already seen) and No Country For Old Men (which I haven't). Should be good, and expect about 12 blog posts tomorrow.