Month: January 2008

We awoke on Sunday morning and thought we should go see Cloverfield considering last night didn’t really work for us.

At noon we strolled into the theatre and caught one of the more innovative films I’ve seen in awhile.

Am I biased? Heck yeah. I dig J.J. Abrams stuff. His television shows, films and viral marketing plans are interesting. He knows how to use the tools of the new age.

I suppose I can say that I may spoil Cloverfield for you when you read ahead but at the same time, there’s nothing really to spoil. There’s no grand revelations. It’s a monster movie. But if you really don’t want to hear any word of the film at all before seeing it, stop reading now!

Cloverfield takes place in Manhattan where everyone is going to a party for their buddy Rob who is moving to Japan to work. In the first twenty minutes you get introduced to the main characters of the film at a party through the medium of a handheld videocamera which is taking footage of Rob’s friends so he can have the film when he goes to Japan. It’s standard fare throughout with the connections of the characters laid out before us and with some good humour spread out.

Then the insanity starts to happen when there is an earthquake and they go up to the roof to investigate and a building in the distance (or maybe it’s the Statue of Liberty?) explodes and there is masses of shrapnel (think meteors) hitting their surroundings. Chaos ensues, everyone is running into the streets and up above something tears through a building and down on the street it comes to a stop – the head of the Statue of Liberty. Essentially, this is in the trailer so you aren’t getting spoiled with any details here.

The film then follows our ragtag team trying to escape the city in the midst of wondering what the heck is going on and running amongst the chaos of the army attacking a monster and the looters and general mayhem.

The film is all based from the point of view of one person’s videocamera which made me feel sick at one point and I had to leave the theatre to get some fresh air.

I enjoyed the concept of the film in that it was a monster movie but from our viewpoint. It was very realistic in the emotions and the actions that would be occurring at the moment. I felt like I was part of the film running around with them.

I also loved the little societal comments they made; for example when the head of the Statue of Liberty lands in the street everyone around it yanks out there cellular phone and snaps photos of it. We are living in a world where everything is documented and probably ending up on the Internet. It’s…strange. Instead of running the heck out of Dodge because everything around them is being destroyed, they pause for a moment to snap a photograph. This is essentially the main drive of the video camera operator as well as he says “Someone is going to want to see this after it’s done.”

Vero and I thoroughly enjoyed this film with the different take on the monster movies you’ve seen in the past. While I couldn’t handle the erratic filming of the scenes, it didn’t take away from the sheer amazing feeling of following this group of people trying to escape a city under attack by a monster.

Two sidenotes: For those who have seen the film, did you catch at the end what happens in behind the scene at Coney Island? I missed it but read about it on Wikipedia. That’s interesting.

Also, I enjoyed the fact that the film was shrouded in secrecy. JJ Abrams has stated that he finds the connected world we live in to take some of the magic away from films nowadays; in that everyone knows every little detail before even walking in to watch the film. I must agree on this point as I recollect The Blair Witch Project and I had no idea what the film was about until I saw it in the theatre. I think the magic would have been stolen from me if I knew stuff about it.

Sorry to the crew of friends who we went to the film with last night. In hindsight, I’m glad we didn’t stay in the third row. If I was sick in the furthest row from the screen, I’m sure I would have been feeling the same (if not worse) last night.

Lastly, my friend James commented on how he didn’t like how everything was wrapped up in one neat package at the end; as in, you don’t really find out much in terms of what the heck is attacking Manhattan.  I personally love that.  Too often do we see films that answer every little detail for us.  I like how the film’s concept was more to capture the feeling of how you would be in a monster-torn city, rather than the story about the monster.

iplaying: Come Again – Thornley (Come Again)

On Saturday, I relaxed and sifted through some more recordings. I also hit up the Mongolian Village for some dinner with Vero, Matt, Karilee, Joe, Danielle and Danielle’s brother and company.

I enjoy the Mongolian Village. You go up to their buffet table, put your food in a bowl and they cook it for you and bring it to your table. I was quite stupid in the fact that I got two separate helpings and Vero pointed out that the minimum they would have charged me would have been $5 per bowl anyhow so it would have been smarter to load up the first bowl. I then pointed out to her that she is clearly the smartest of the two of us and should speak up when these things enter her brain so I don’t end up with a bill for $30 at the end of the night instead of $20.

I ran over to the movie theatre as everyone else had picked up their tickets earlier in the day. Unfortunately, it was too late to do anything good with the tickets. As soon as we entered the theatre, it was every man for themselves as it was packed. I must get out of the Kapuskasing mentality of going to the theatre. In the end, Vero and I ended up in the third row from the screen. After debating whether or not we should just get a refund or not, a woman came to the front and announced that the Cloverfield film is filmed with shaky handheld cameras and would be reminiscent of The Blair Witch Project.

That sealed the deal for the two of us as we figured we would not be able to see much in the third row with a shaky camera. This man gets a little motion sickness from those kind of things.

We left the theatre, got a refund and went to Rogers Video where I picked up Death Proof – Quentin Tarantino’s latest movie which is a homage to the old 70s drive-in films as well as a homage to the American muscle car films of the 70s.

It had been awhile since I’ve seen a Tarantino flick and I fell in love with it within 5 minutes…with the random conversations and the intriguing characters. The film revolves around a sociopath in the form of Kurt Russell playing Stuntman Mike who drives around in his stunt car which is deemed Death Proof; as in, no one inside it can die. The movie is split into different halves, one where Stuntman Mike meets some women in a bar, and then the second half when he appears again meeting another group of women who are looking for the car that appears in Vanishing Point. Interesting sidenote in that I have never seen Vanishing Poing but had heard about it from Rob’s old roommate Grant in which he claimed it was the best movie ever but it has never been released on film.

A good portion of the film is dedicated to Vanishing Point where they obtain the car and they enjoy a test drive in it.

The car chase scenes were amazing and Tarantino has outdone himself in creating something original in the form of the great classics of car chases.

Vero and I thoroughly enjoyed this film and recommend it to all if you’re into that sort of thing.

iplaying: Louie Louie – The Kingsmen

After work yesterday, I headed out to the OC Transpo Lost and Found depot to look for my stray glove and after scouring through a garbage pail (one of the large ones) full of stray mittens, I could not find it.  I suppose I shall go again next week in hopes of finding it.  I also dropped some money in the donation box as I didn’t have any change the last time I went there to get my lost bus pass.

I then headed towards Milestone’s with Mike while picking up some Tragically Hip albums at CD Exchange which is YET ANOTHER record store shutting its doors in Ottawa.  Gak!  When will it stop!?

Milestone’s was fun times with Maren and Krista.  Although I must admit that our service was pretty horrible (having an empty drink on my table for five minutes irks me).  In the end, I enjoyed the Shanghai Noodle Stir Fry once again but we may opt to try out a new place in the future.

I then headed over to La Nouvelle Scene to see a play with Vero – a play in which our friend Steve was acting in.  The play was called Duel and it was written by Michel Ouelette.  What was interesting about tonight’s spectacle is that it was performed in a laboratory environment, where two different groups chose the same scene to act out and you get to see what the Director has as a vision for the scene.

Thing is, in theatre, there’s always reinterpretation going on.  You don’t always see the exact same play.  The director puts some thought into how they envision the play ~ the visuals, the mannerisms, the characters, but the dialogue remains the same.

So the first scene had Steve and someone else do a very stylized interpretation and I thought Steve’s performance was probably one of the best I’ve seen in a long time.  He played a transvestite who had a mean streak…I thought of the Joker when seeing him perform and I thoroughly enjoyed his actions throughout the scene as well as his speech pattern.  Very cool.

The next group that came up were actually doing the scene in the Romanian language.  Now, after a few beers at Milestone’s, the french was hard enough to comprehend, but there’s no chance in Hell that I would understand the Romanian one!  The funny part was that I didn’t catch that they were doing the same exact scene because it was definitely different in style and I only caught the characters names in the Romanian language which tipped me off that it was supposed to be the same exact scene.

They had an interesting Q&A session at the end where the two groups came together and talked about how different it was to see the scene they did reinterpreted in such a vast way (for example, the transvestite makes no appearance in the Romanian version).

All in all, I enjoyed it purely for Steve’s performance and the manner that the laboratory works (as in, seeing two different takes on a scene).  It would be like giving Troy and I a lyric sheet and asking us to write a song.