Fifteen Minutes of Fame

When I read today’s topic from The Daily Post, countless ideas flooded my mind. If I could be any celebrity for one day, who would it be?

My first thought was whatever supermodel was fortunate enough to be currently dating Leonardo DiCaprio. No, that would be a waste of the day. (I’ll come back for you, Leo.)

After that notion faded, my mind came to a few of my favorite directors. Frank Darabont (The Mist, The Green Mile), Christopher Nolan (Inception, The Dark Knight), or Tobe Hooper (The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Poltergeist). I can’t imagine what fifteen minutes inside the mind of any one of these men would be like. Maybe it would inspire a new way of thinking that would skyrocket me to fame, my name mentioned with the likes of Alfred Hitchcock and Quentin Tarantino. I kind of envision me just walking around in their minds as if they were museums. I would see all the fantastic ideas they had already claimed as their own, without thinking of any for myself.

Okay, maybe I’ll be an actress. Working under the direction of one of the greatest directors to ever life has to be inspiring, right? My favorite actress is definitely Kathy Bates. If you haven’t seen the movie Misery, watch it and tell me she isn’t the most incredible actress to ever walk the earth. Or maybe I could play a Victorian era goddess compliments of Keira Knightley. Can I go back in time to be Christian Bale in American Psycho? I have the Huey Lewis & The News scene memorized, I would blow everyone away. Then again, I feel like there is never a day that being Bruce Willis is a bad idea. That could work. I can do Die Hard. Maggie Gyllenhaal, Will Smith, Sandra Bullock and Emma Watson are also among my favorites. Or I could be Bethenny Frankel from The Real Housewives of New York. (The last one is a joke.)

Then the answer came to me.

The most brilliant writer to ever put pen to paper (or fingers to keys). Horror maven, Mr. Stephen King. The man responsible for The Shining, It, Carrie, The Mist, Misery, The Green Mile.. Shall I continue? Clearly this man’s imagination is a gold mine. If I could think like Stephen King, there was nothing I couldn’t do. Although, I wouldn’t just want to inhabit his body and live as him for a day. Can I just sit in a dark corner of his flourishing mind and see how his imagination works?

Come to think of it, Stephen King’s mind is a celebrity in itself. That is who I would be. A fly on the wall in the mind of the Master of the Macabre, himself.

The Greatest Movie Ever Made

What is the greatest movie ever made?

It’s a loaded question. There’s no possible way to ever get a definitive answer, unfortunately. How would you even go about deciding? You could look to box office success and decide that way (accounting for only theatrical revenue, that would be James Cameron‘s Avatar). You could poll movie critics, movie-goers, filmmakers… But it’s unlikely that you would get more than 3 people to provide the same answer.

As for the top ten highest grossing films, the list is as follows:

1. Avatar (2009)
2. Titanic (1997)
3. Marvel’s The Avengers (2012)
4. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2 (2011)
5. Frozen (2013)
6. Iron Man 3 (2013)
7. Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011)
8. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (2003)
9. Skyfall (2012)
10. The Dark Knight Rises (2012)

My personal favorite of the films listed above is Christopher Nolan‘s The Dark Knight Rises, and it is likely that there are plenty of people who don’t think Avatar is worthy of the title of “Greatest Movie Ever Made.” Great? Sure. The greatest ever? That’s debatable.

Most of these films have not won any Oscars (Avatar, Titanic, Lord of the Rings: Return of the King, and Skyfall were the only ones to snag an Oscar, [or 2, or 11 in the case of Titanic] but a few of the others were nominated.)

There are plenty of factors a movie can be judged on. I prefer the story in The Avengers to that in Avatar, but there’s no question that Avatar was deserving of its Oscar wins in the categories of Best Cinematography, Best Art Direction, and Best Visual Effects. You could also base your decision off the performance of the actors. I prefer Leonardo DiCaprio in Titanic to Sam Worthington in Avatar, even though Avatar is higher on the list. You could also merit the films based on the quality of the plot, the overall look of the film, and many more factors.

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After scouring the Internet for “The Greatest Movie Ever Made,” I found about a dozen different lists from different contributors. You can check out IMdB’s list of the 250 greatest films here – this list seems to encompass most of the films listed by other contributors. There were many lists that covered just the greats of one genre, but I omitted those, and only counted the ones that looked at movies overall. A lot films were on nearly every list. Francis Ford Coppola‘s 1972 film, The Godfather, was the most common film listed, taking the top spot on quite a few of the countdowns. Other films that appeared on numerous lists include Citizen Kane (1941), Vertigo (1958), The Shawshank Redemption (1994), Casablanca (1942), and Psycho (1960). There is no doubt that all of these films are considered great by many people, and I think it’s safe to say a lot of them could be considered classics. (Notice that though Avatar was the highest grossing film ever, it didn’t top any of the lists I encountered.)

 

I found myself pondering this question, “what is the greatest movie ever made?” and I have come to the conclusion that there isn’t, nor can there ever be, one definitive answer.

So now I am posing this question to you: In your opinion, what is the greatest movie ever made and why?

 

Leave a comment below and let me know! Thanks for reading!

Featured Director: Christopher Nolan

 

This man is an absolute genius. I could write an entire book about why Christopher Nolan is amazing. He is my absolute inspiration. As you can see above, some of his films include Following, Memento, Insomnia, The Dark Knight trilogy, The Prestige, and Inception. If you’re reading my blog, I assume you’re somewhat interested in film. If that assumption holds true, I bet you’re familiar with at least one of Christopher Nolan’s phenomenal stories. If you have any experience with Christopher Nolan, you’ll recognize that he has a very distinct style. Mind bender plots, that don’t always progress chronologically. If you’ve seen one of these films, you’ll understand exactly what I’m talking about. I’ve made it a personal goal for myself to watch anything that Christopher Nolan has been involved in, simply because he is awesome. He’s done some production work on Transcendence and Man of Steel, and has a new movie, Interstellar, coming out later this year. I’m going to review a few of my favorites from Nolan’s filmography, but I encourage you to check all of these films out.

This is one of Christopher Nolan’s most well-known films. Inception. This film took Nolan ten years to write, if that gives you any indication of how mind blowing this movie is. This film features an all star cast: Leonardo DiCaprio, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ellen Page, Michael Cain, Marion Cotillard, Cillian Murphy, and Tom Hardy. You’ll see plenty of these characters in Nolan’s other films. This film was my first IMAX experience, which made it even more amazing. This story is extremely complex, and you’ll need to be paying close attention to grasp the story. Watching it more than once will probably help. I’ve seen this movie at least 100 times, and I still can’t completely determine my take on the ending.The story completely blows me away every single time I watch it. The actors are all incredible, but Leo (of course), along with Ellen Page and Joseph Gordon-Levitt give exceptional performances. The basic premise of the story is that Saito, played by Ken Wantanabe, makes a deal with Dom, played by DiCaprio, and his team. The team specializes in extracting information from people’s minds through their dreams. Saito wants them to implant an idea into the mind of his business rival: Inception. If I tried to explain the plot in detail, I would just confuse you and take away from the story, so you can check out the trailer for yourself. This is one of the best movies ever made in my opinion. The story completely blows me away every single time I watch it. The actors are all incredible, but Leo (of course), along with Ellen Page and Joseph Gordon-Levitt give exceptional performances.

I know that people have very strong opinions concerning superhero films. This is my particular opinion, but feel free to share your own with me! To say that I love this film would be insulting. I saw this movie seven times in theaters, three times in the first 24 hours of its release (judge me). The cast is fantastic. Christian Bale will forever be the image I see when I think of Batman. Tom Hardy as Bane was absolutely incredible. With the majority of his face covered by a mask, and his voice altered, he still manages to convey emotion perfectly. Gary Oldman is one of the most versatile actors in Hollywood, who doesn’t receive enough credit. His portrayal of Commissioner Gordon in this film is no exception! Joseph Gordon-Levitt was great in Inception, and his performance in this film did not disappoint. I do have one complaint about this movie, and that is Catwoman. Sure Anne Hathaway did okay, but of all the people they could’ve cast, I don’t understand why they picked the star of The Princess Diaries. But never the less, this movie was still phenomenal. On a side note, Hans Zimmer composed an incredible film score for this movie (and the other two in the series). The composers don’t seem to get a lot of recognition, and this score is definitely worth mentioning. Here’s the trailer for the movie. All three of Nolan’s Batman movies are great, and definitely worth watching (Heath Ledger as the Joker is one of the greatest performances ever), but this is my favorite in the series.

Every great magic trick consists of three parts or acts. The first part is called “The Pledge”. The magician shows you something ordinary: a deck of cards, a bird or a man. He shows you this object. Perhaps he asks you to inspect it to see if it is indeed real, unaltered, normal. But of course… it probably isn’t. The second act is called “The Turn”. The magician takes the ordinary something and makes it do something extraordinary. Now you’re looking for the secret… but you won’t find it, because of course you’re not really looking. You don’t really want to know. You want to be fooled. But you wouldn’t clap yet. Because making something disappear isn’t enough; you have to bring it back. That’s why every magic trick has a third act, the hardest part, the part we call “The Prestige”.

As with most Christopher Nolan films, trying to explain the plot of this movie would serve no purpose. Here’s the trailer so you can get an idea of the story. This review will give you a bit more about the plot. This film stars Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale as two rival magicians. This story is pretty unique, but I love the theme of magicians. The overall look of the film is very appealing, and everything just works. It took me a while to get my hands on this film. Waiting for a movie to hit the shelves of Edward McKay Used Books & Movies (because if you’re a broke college student, that is what you do) doesn’t always work. I finally broke down and ordered it on Amazon. Like the review I posted above says, in the beginning of this film, nothing makes sense. But by the end of the film, you’ll fall in love with it.

If you guys have any films or directors you would like to see up here, please comment and let me know! Or if you simply want to share your opinion about one of the films I’ve reviewed, I’d love to hear it. I also really want some film recommendations from all of you, so please share a small portion of all the cinematic wisdom that I know your mind contains. 🙂

Best Picture Nominee Reviews

So, the 2014 Academy Awards have come and gone, but I think there were some pretty worthwhile films that were up for best picture.

The full list of Best Picture nominees:

American Hustle
Her
Nebraska
Dallas Buyers Club
12 Years a Slave
The Wolf of Wall Street
Philomena
Gravity
Captain Phillips

Admittedly, I did not get around to watching all of the movies in this category. However, I am going to review a few of the ones I did get the chance to see.

I’ll start with my personal favorite:

I completely fell in love with Nebraska. It’s quirky and witty, with just the right amount of emotion. The cast, first of all, makes this movie what it is. Bruce Dern plays the patriarch, Woody Grant. His son, David, is played by Will Forte. June Squibb as the matriarch, Kate, and Bob Odenkirk (AKA Saul Goodman to all my Breaking Bad fans) as Woody and Kate’s other son, Ross, round out the perfectly dysfunctional Grant family. Basically the premise is that Woody thinks he has won a million dollars, and wants to travel to Nebraska to claim it. Woody begins his journey from Billings, Montana on foot, only to be stopped numerous times, before his son, David, agrees to take him. The whole family tries to tell him that he’s being scammed, but there is no stopping him. I know you’re thinking this story sounds extremely predictable. And to a certain degree, you would be right. But in so many ways, it’s very unique. I am fairly critical of the comedy genre, because I very often find myself being disgusted with the humor; it’s too forced, and just comes off as painful. I wouldn’t consider Nebraska a comedy, it’s more of a drama with a twinge of dark humor. However, there were multiple points in this film that had me laughing out loud. A scene near the latter portion of the movie involving David and Ross’s plan to take back an air compressor that their father believes to be his played out to be hilarious. This movie may be somewhat polarizing; a love it or hate it kind of thing. In my opinion, it’s certainly worth the watch, and of all the nominees, this story won my heart. Here’s the trailer!

I was so beyond excited to see this movie when it came out. The director, David O. Russell, was also behind Silver Linings Playbook, which I loved. American Hustle also had two of Silver Linings Playbook‘s stars: Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper. Both of whom I love on a professional and personal level. I’m not a big Amy Adams fan, but I love Christian Bale and Jeremy Renner. This film didn’t disappoint me. The acting was great (I’m looking at you, JLaw!) and the story kept me interested. However, I didn’t love it the way I loved Nebraska. The story wasn’t as relatable. The overall look of this film blew Nebraska (filmed in black and white) out of the park. It was bright and glamorous, all the characters were so exaggerated (this time I’m looking at you, Christian Bale). I definitely enjoyed this movie, I think it was well made and deserved to be nominated. I really thought it had this award in the bag, and honestly, I breathed a sigh of relief when it didn’t win. You can watch the trailer here. It’s worth the watch, if only to enjoy Jennifer Lawrence’s incredible talent.

 

And finally, Dallas Buyers Club:

 

I didn’t watch Dallas Buyers club until after the Oscars. Matthew McConaughey snagged best leading actor and Jared Leto won best supporting actor for their roles in this movie. I’m a huge Leonardo DiCaprio fan, so I was a little upset to see that he was beaten out for best actor by Matthew McConaughey. I’m used to seeing Mr. McConaughey in silly, mindless romantic comedies, like How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days and Failure to Launch. Enjoyable movies? Sure. Oscar-worthy acting? Hardly. I had heard all the buzz about Dallas Buyers Club, which is based on a true story, so I knew I should see for myself. Everything about this movie completely blew me away. This is no Kate Hudson RomCom, that’s for sure. Matthew McConaughey’s performance as Ron Woodroof was outstanding. Ron is a sleazy cowboy who contracts AIDS. He teams up with Rayon, a transgendered female, played by Jared Leto. Together, they form the Dallas Buyers Club. Here’s a little more about the plot, if you’re interested, and here’s the trailer so you can get a taste of McConaughey and Leto’s incredible performances. I just want to take a moment to talk about Jared Leto. I suppose it’s a stereotype that you can’t be a great actor and a great musician. While not everyone will agree with me, I believe Jared Leto defies this stigma. His performance as Rayon was absolutely fantastic. He plays such a lovable character, and if you couldn’t tell by his Oscar acceptance speech, it’s clear that this project means a lot to him. This story is really emotional, but don’t expect a sugar-coated love story. This movie brings out raw emotion and doesn’t hold back. I did not know a lot about AIDS prior to watching this film, and it completely opened my eyes. The emotion that Leto and McConaughey bring to this film is unreal. While neither of them live with this debilitating disease, their performances reflect perfectly the heartache and struggle it brings. I know I sound cliche, but watch it, and you’ll agree with me!