Day: December 17, 2005

capote

last night i saw capote, because neither simon nor our friend jennie wanted to see brokeback mountain (don’t ask). i enjoyed the movie while it was going, though i was a bit weary during the last third. but simon and jennie talked me out of liking it in about 15 minutes of conversation after the movie’s end. here is our collective thought on capote:

philip seymour hoffman is a great actor who handles his first major (or first, period) lead role with great aplomb and artistry. he is actually magnificent. i guess the director knew hoffman was his best asset, because every other shot is a close-up of his smooth, babyish, pink face. i actually find him quite fetching, so i didn’t Continue reading capote

Kong

Am I the first to see this, or the only one who cares to post?

First, I would pay to see Kong and Glick in a jelly-donut-eating contest. I did like Clifford, despite it being terrible, so I ought to give Jiminy a shot, too.

Second, I did enjoy Jackson’s film. The first hour is all glorious romanticized Hollywood-pictures-of-the-’30s crap–Black is manic, Watts is luminescent, the filmmakers glory in deep-focus recreations of NYC, there’s vaudeville depicted, there’s a vaudevillian tone. It’s fun. Then there are some amazing, exciting, even surprising action sequences on the island. And the ending does recapture some of the elegaic melancholy of the original. The graphics are what they’re cracked up to be; the film is certainly too long, maybe by a good hour; I wish it was loopier (more like early Jackson than LOTR-ambitious-Jackson). But it’s certainly fun in many ways at many times, and never dragged.

But. Continue reading Kong