There Will Be Blood

Once again the Alamo Drafthouse DHCP server suffered under the strain of 200+ movie fans trying desperately to blog and read about the movies they've seen during a fantastic week of Fantastic Fest. With the festival behind me, I can try to get back to the usual routines of work and home. Don't expect many film reviews in the next few weeks. ;-)

Last night's closing night feature was There Will Be Blood from director Paul Thomas Anderson, in its first public screening. As historical fiction based on an Upton Sinclair novel about the early 1900s American oil industry, this isn't exactly on-genre for the festival. Tim League in his introduction simply called it a "fantastic film". Still, it seemed to play well with the audience. After the movie during the brief Q&A, the director referred to it as part horror, with a vision of Dracula in the lead character. Maybe.

This is an art film in many senses. It's releasing at the end of December to be in prime share for Oscar nominations. It doesn't have a single word of dialog for the first 10 minutes of the film, and then 90% of the dialog is from the main character. Anyone who goes to it based on the title will be disappointed, and half the people who perhaps would go based on the story will be confused by the title.

All of this said, I thought parts of the movie were very slow. There were too many scenes with little to no sound at all, and with the on-screen action moving at a snail's pace. I think judicious cutting of 10-15 minutes would improve the flow, especially during the first half of the film. Leave all the scenes intact - just shorten them.

I watch this kind of film on PBS when I'm balancing the checkbook. I don't go see it in the theater. If you like this genre, go and enjoy the film.

There Will Be Blood
2007, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson

Death Note 2: The Last Name

The epic struggle continues for another installment.

Going in, I was under the impression that they planned to stretch this into a three-to-five movie franchise. Thus, I was surprised to see just so many of the expected super-conflict clichés packed into this one film. If you like the series, go into this knowing that it concludes the story and you'll be satisfied.

Death Note 2: The Last Note
2006, 141 minutes, directed by Shūsuke Kaneko

Death Note

I think most who will see this are already familiar with the story. This is a fantastic tale of corruption and death, and (in the typical Japanese fashion) a story of the struggle between two young, brilliant, emotionless, cruel, good, evil, men.

Having no background on the series, I felt that they did a good job of building up sympathies with Light before bringing them down. Even with the very predictable themes, it was a good ride from start to finish.

Death Note
2006, 126 minutes, directed by Shūsuke Kaneko

El Orfanto (The Orphanage)

The Spanish have stolen the show. Juan Antonio Bayona's masterpiece El Orfanto is a beautifully-told ghost story. There are few shocks or other horror elements that would scare off potential audience - sadly just the Spanish with subtitles will doom this to a poor American release.

The writer and director were on hand to answer questions after the movie. Director Juan Bayona described his movie as a "connection to childhood". Writer Sergio Sánchez added that he "redid Close Encounters but replaced aliens with ghosts and added some angry Carlos." While in screenplay form they received strong feedback that this movie was a mix of genres and therefore unable to succeed. I'm very pleased that they proved that wrong.

El Orfanto (The Orphanage)
2007, 100 minutes, directed by Juan Antonio Bayona

Sex and Death 101

The Alamo's public wireless network is stressed under the strain of hundreds blogging after each movie. I was unable to get an IP address at all yesterday, so my four movie reviews had to wait.

I had high hopes for this as something very different for this festival. It's more of a guy comedy, but the star is just a bit too smug, and the ending is way too predictable.

The "romantic comedy" tag is a stretch, no doubt, but it falls closer to that than anything else I can imagine. Sorry.

Sex and Death 101
2007, 100 minutes, directed by Daniel Waters

La Hora Fría (The Cold Hour)

I had high expectations for this movie. It's one of the few truly "sci fi" films to screen at this year's Fantastic Fest, and sci fi is my favorite genre. I loved the concept, and the movie was filmed and choreographed beautifully. When it was introduced, we were told that "all questions would be answered" if we just stayed until the very end. Alas, I disagree, and after a night of restless sleep filled with dark passages and impending doom, I have to say that I'm not satisfied. Just what, exactly, does come out at the Cold Hour?

La Hora Fría (The Cold Hour)
2006, 93 minutes, directed by Elio Quiroga

Spiral

I'm often disappointed in the "madness" film genre. I don't want to see some of the things they put on screen. (See Offscreen for example. Or don't, actually, ever.) I liked this one. I was disappointed in the obvious nature of one of the plot twists, but the ending more than made up for it.

Spiral
2007, 90 minutes, directed by Adam Green and Joel David Moore