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Notes: I haven't seen this one yet...
chosen by Wilma
Notes: Even though I didn't really like 'Ida', I was quite eager to give this director a 2nd chance, especially since this movie had been widely heralded and was even considered as one of the best movies released in 2018. Well, unfortunately, pretty much like with 'Ida', I really struggled to connect with this movie. I mean, once again, Pawel Pawlikowski delivered some fine directing with a gorgeous black-and-white cinematography and the music was really neat as well but this story just didn't really work for me. First of all, even though I completely understood why Wiktor would fall in love with Zula, after all, she was a beautiful and fascinating woman, I didn't really get why Zula was so infatuated with him. I mean, seriously, what was so amazing about this guy? Then, another problem I had was that I was never able to figure out the motivations of these two characters. I mean, except from the fact they were clearly mad in love, from the beginning until the very end, I still didn't much have a clue about what was going in their head so I had a rather hard time to really care about what they were going through. Maybe I'm not just smart enough but it was all too subtile and subjective for me, I guess. On the other hand, I did like the way Pawlikowski tried to argue that not all the people living in Poland during the Cold War felt miserable and that the West was not always a so-called 'beacon' of hope and freedom for all of them.
(Dec. 2018)
Notes: I had to admit it, I'm not really familiar with John Wayne's work and, in my opinion, he basically always portrayed typical tough guys so I was rather surprised to see him being cast in a such a romantic feature. And the best thing is that it actually worked. Basically, it is a rather simple and very old-fashioned romantic feature. Still, the fact that it was so old-fashioned made it, at the same time, very cute and charming but also sometimes rather annoying to watch. Still, I thought it was quite enjoyable to watch and the whole thing had an extra personal dimension (indeed, my own father moved from the Netherlands to live in France and I myself moved from France to live in the Netherlands). Eventually, it remains a harmless romantic flick and I thought it was pretty good, even if it was nothing really mind-blowing.
“Even though this movie was rather poorly received like most of Netflix original films, I still wanted to check it out. Of course, the first issue with this movie was that Jon Favreau had released another version of this tale just a couple of years ago and the fact that this movie turned out to be a ” read more
Notes: Eventually, it actually turned out to be definitely one of the saddest movies I have ever seen. First, they gave us this opening with this famous melancholic guitar tune which kept coming back throughout the whole thing. Then, in the very first scene, there was this 5 year old girl holding her dead dog while both her parents were being shot by a plane. I mean, it was just 5 minutes into the movie and I was already a total wreck... Then, they kept bringing again and again some heartbreaking scenes and, as expected, the end was also completely devastating. Around the same time period, I saw 'The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas' as well and everybody seemed to think that it was a major tearjerker but even though it was indeed pretty heavy, compared to this feature, it was actually a piece of cake. A part from that, the acting by the kids was just really impressive and I also enjoyed the writing. Indeed, all the characters were three dimensional and felt really genuine in the sense that they were sometimes nice and sometimes pretty nasty, even this two children.
Notes: I haven't seen this one yet...
“Even though this movie didn't make much waves when it was released, since it was directed by Sofia Coppola, I still wanted to check it out. On top of that, even though I didn't recall much about Don Siegel's version which I saw years ago, I still could remember that it was a rather spellbinding tale” read more
“To be honest, I wasn't really sure what to expect from this movie but since it was directed by John Frankenheimer, I thought I might as well check it out. Well, not so long ago, I actually saw 'The Warriors' which was also dealing with some New York gangs but while 'The Warriors' might be a cult-cla” read more
“Since I kept hearing some interesting things about Ben Wheatley, I was quite eager to check one of his movies. Well, even though I did like it, it actually turned out to be one of these movies which are equally fascinating and frustrating to watch. Basically, as usual, I knew pretty much nothing abo” read more
Notes: First of all, even though I never really cared for Fred Astaire, I always thought that Gene Kelly was very charismatic and he was, of course, a great dancer but, even though this movie was supposed to be his magnum opus, I have to admit that I had a rather hard time to really care about the damned thing. I mean, sure , I did like it but I can't say it really blew me away. Even though the story is usually the weakest point in most of the musicals I have seen, I actually enjoyed this plot but, to be honest, I expected more from the songs and dances. I know, it might sound surprising but most of these dance sequences didn’t really impress me and, eventually, I thought that the dance scenes in ‘An American in Paris’ were actually cooler than in this movie. Anyway, it probably had to do with the fact that I am not a fan of musicals and, at the end of the day, it remains a classic and it is definitely worth a look. 
“Since I really enjoyed ‘The Last Picture Show’, I thought I might as well check this rather obscure sequel. Well, this movie was the perfect example that releasing a sequel 20 years after a stellar movie is not always a guarantee for success. First of all, I have to admit that it has been year” read more
Notes: I haven't seen this one yet...
“Since I kept hearing some really good things about this flick, I was quite eager to check it out. Well, to be honest, I didn’t think it was really so original and, on top of that, I’m not really a huge fan of these movies mixing a serious drama with some fantasy elements. Still, even if it did” read more