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recently seen:
"Upstream Color"- Dallas boy done good... one of the best of the year- challenging and impeccably edited.
"Something In the Air"- another best of the year so far.... I just love the films of Olivier Assayas and this one feels so lived in
"Dancing In the Dust"- debut film of Asghar Farhadi ("A Separation"), very hard to find but worth the adventure. Boy divorces young wife due to social presure and stows away in the back of a van that ends up in the middle of the desert with a slient old snake catcher. The tonal shifts are jarring.
"Now You See Me"- just terrible.... explains every plot point and every one is a smirking douchebag
"The Bling Ring"- Sofia Coppola has become the queen of disaffected youth, and this may be her most underrated film yet. It's a study in vapidity, executed with such style and cinematic prowess that one almost forgets its really just an updated version of Bret Easton Ellis and his young, chain smoking, status-obsessed L.A. denizens.
"Man of Steel"- Loved the first half (and Kevin Costner deserves a supporting actor nom this year), checked out in the second half when CGI and big bad battles become the focus.
"The Burglars"- terrific, lost 70's Jean Paul Belmondo/Omar Shariff heist film. The opening robbery is amazing and it just gets better from there.
"Stories We Tell"- A documentary by wonderful filmmaker/actress Sarah Polley, turning the lens on herself and her own family as she scalpels away at the truth of the infectious personality of mom Diane and exactly what happened in the late 70's. Using direct interviews, grainy home video footage and even actor-portrayed recreations, "Stories We Tell" charts the timeline of her family with judicious investigation. Why doesn't she look like the rest of her family? What causes a marriage to fade into boredom and familiarity? And what's the responsibility of future generations to trace the truth of past ones? All of these questions are answered in Polley's capable hands, at great personal cost to all. Best film of the year so far.
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