Films

30 Day Movie Challenge – Day 7: Favourite Animated Feature

by Dennis••5•Posted inFilms

Ghost in the ShellThis is one of the few categories I didn’t have to think too long or too hard about. Ghost in the Shell is an amazing anime that features a great, sophisticated storyline, an atmospheric and immersive visual style and good voice acting. It deals with existential and mature subjects and isn’t afflicted too much by the obsession that a lot of Japanese anime artists seem to have for juxtaposing the cute with the hyper-violent. Both Kusanagi and Batou, arguably the story’s main characters are rich, three dimensional and well thought out, and the antagonist is not your run of the mill opponent either, both the Laughing Man and The Puppet Master. GitS was the second anime I really loved, after Akira, which was the only other anime that could come close to getting the title Favourite Animated Feature. It also spawned several spin-offs, all of which had a high level of quality, though none had the impact on me that GitS had, probably because it changed something inside of me forever.

Since GitS and Akira there have been a few others of note, but none as good as either of these, nor as fundamental and impactful to animated films.

I remember when I first watched Akira with my cousin. It must have been 1990 or so and we had rented it from the local video store back when renting was still the thing to do. I ended up not being able to watch it for whatever reason, but my cousin did and informed me that I really had to make some time for it. I picked it up and watched it three times that very weekend before returning it to my cousin so he could return it to the video store. It was so amazing, so special and so not like the Disney crap I had expected to watch simply because it was an animated film. Sure, I’d watched Robotech and whatnot, but all feature animations were always that honey-sweet Disney shit. So I was pretty much hooked and I started watching all kinds of anime, mostly Manga. Most of it was pretty bad, but I liked the edge and grit it seemed to have over western cartoons. And then when I just thought I was done with anime, just when I thought that Akira was lightning in a bottle, Ghost in the Shell hit and sent me into the stratosphere. I’m still waiting for another to come along and do that again. :)

30 Day Movie Challenge – Day 6: Favourite Horror

by Dennis••0•Posted inFilms

There are many different films that could be qualified as horror films that have scared the crap out of me. When I was younger, before I was a teenager, Fright Night and Salem’s Lot really did it. The Exorcist and Pet Cemetery scared me when I just hit my teens, and later I remember being very disturbed by Event Horizon, The Exorcism of Emily Rose and the likes of Japanese horror films like Audition. From the time of Fright Night to now the fright I felt has changed. When I was young I was frightened at what they showed me, now I’m scared of what they don’t. They say imagination starts hyperactive and gets duller and duller as you grow older, but with me it seems to have worked the other way around. I don’t need much nowadays to let my imagination run rampant with it and take me into the deep waters of dread.

One of the best examples of showing little and therefor scaring me more was The Blair Witch Project, in which three people get lost in the woods of Maryland while they’re researching the legend of the Witch of Burkittsville. The films doesn’t show anything overly frightening, but it leaves a lot to the imagination. A lot. This is the reason why I really like this horror film, much more than the overly gory films that have come to dominate the horror genre.

30 Day Movie Challenge – Day 5: Favourite Action

by Dennis••0•Posted inFilms

This is the fifth day of the 30 Day Movie Challenge and I’m starting to notice a trend; I don’t know how to categorise films very well. I don’t know what constitutes a drama or a horror or a thriller and I certainly don’t know what falls within the boundaries of an action film. The easiest ones that come to mind are Predator, Aliens and Terminator, thought the last could also be classified as a sci-fi. But then, does Heat fall in that category? Sure, there’s a lot of action in that film, but to classify it as such does the film a disservice, I feel. I deeply appreciate the Bourne films, but again I think their depth goes beyond the classification of an action film. And then there are films like Platoon and Apocalypse Now, which certainly transcend the simplicity of an action film.

So I’ll go for Predator, a film I already gave quite a long-winded review for.

Predator

30 Day Movie Challenge – Day 4: Favourite Drama

by Dennis••0•Posted inFilms

Having peeked at all the questions in advance, I probably find this question one of the hardest to answer, mostly because I don’t really know what falls in the category “drama.” Anything that’s not predominantly action or comedy, I suppose. Also, I think a dramatic film should deal with weighty, meaty topics. I think The Royal Tanenbaums is too comedic to be a drama, but it does deal with substances that have gravitas. See what I mean? Is Fight Club a drama because it deals with multiple personality disorders and many other considerable subjects? Hard to answer that one.

There so many drama’s that I’ve enjoyed and I’m hard pressed to name a favourite; Festen, Hana-bi, Leaving Las Vegas, Bad Lieutenant, Dog Day Afternoon, Donnie Darko, Leon, The Pianist… I think I will have to go with The Fountain. Not because it’s the best, or because it’s got endless rewatchability, but because the last time I saw it I needed two days to recover from it.

30 Day Movie Challenge – Day 3: Favourite Comedy

by Dennis••0•Posted inFilms

This is another really difficult category, since I’m not entirely sure what counts as a “movie.” I’ve decided to include stand-up comedy specials, mostly because it makes it really for me to make a choice. When I was about 12 years old I was sifting through several of my parents’ VHS tapes, probably looking for a tape that I could use to record something else. I came across a video tape that I never watched and it had Eddie Murphy’s Delirious on it as well as Steve Martin’s The Lonely Guy. I had never seen either of them. I first watched The Lonely Guy and then continued watching Delirious. I couldn’t get through the first ten minutes of it without laughing so hard I fell of my chair and started wheezing. I immediately called my best friend to tell him to come over. I rewinded the tape to the start of the show and we watched it again. I have never laughed so much in my entirely life.