The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)

4/5

Wes Anderson's The Grand Budapest Hotel is like many of Wes Anderson's other movies: delightful and magical if you like his style, banal and irritating if you don't. The plot follows a hotel concierge (Fiennes) who teams up with a lobby boy (Revolori) to prove his innocence after being framed for murder. The plotting is surprisingly intricate for a Wes Anderson movie, but is also somehow easy to follow at the same time.

What I like about Anderson's earlier movies is his ability to seamlessly switch between comedy and tragedy at the drop of a hat. Luckily, that opposition is still here, albeit in a less profound and less immediate form. Anderson superimposes an overall levity onto the relentless march of impending war, switching between the two moods from time to time, but The Grand Budapest Hotel focuses predominantly on the darker side of life.

Anderson has an undeniable visual style and he doesn't disappoint here. There's a reason this movie won the Oscar for best makeup and costume. He dresses his locales and his characters precisely and pristinely. The characters themselves (and the performances that underlie them) are not particularly deep or textured, but they are distinct and charming and unforgettable. They are brought to life by appealing, fast-paced storytelling and an irresistible, uncontainable magnetism. For Wes Anderson fans, The Grand Budapest Hotel is near-perfect filmmaking.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2278388/

The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997)

4/5

I have trouble reviewing movies I grew up watching, especially ones that have the cachet of Spielberg and the nostalgia of youth behind it. The Lost World is one such example. It is a remarkable but imperfect piece of filmmaking, yet all its flaws are ignored when remembering it 15 years later. Not quite the breathtaking, innovative escapism that Jurassic Park was, this sequel somehow manages to be both more mundane and more extravagant. Industrial Light & Magic's CGI here is astounding, even by today's standards. But all the special effects are front and center, with a spotlight shining down, instead of simply existing as a tool in the storyteller's arsenal. Though the plotting is as richly intricate and textured as the first one was, it puts too much emphasis on the spectacle of the dinosaurs. It makes the Tyrannosaurus Rex the protagonist, without humanizing it enough to make it feel like King Kong for a new generation. Like the 2005 King Kong remake, it centers on special effects instead of story, action instead of characters, and that is where it misses out on its full potential. The Lost World loses the awe that Jurassic Park had. The thrills excite, the jokes lighten the mood, and the movie reaches its inevitably satisfying conclusion, but not nearly as well as the first one did.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0119567/

Jurassic Park (1993)

4/5

Steven Spielberg's Jurassic Park is a classic 1990's creature film, and perhaps the most memorable one in history. Based on Crichton's book, it melds science with fiction to create a terrifying but believable alternate world. Entrepreneur John Hammond (Attenborough) extracts dinosaur DNA from ancient mosquitoes to create an amusement park filled with dinosaurs. Before announcing it to the public, he invites experts in the field of paleontology (Neill, Dern) and chaos theory (Goldblum) for a preview showing, along with his grandkids. Unfortunately, things go very wrong when the dinosaurs escape.

What makes this movie so unforgettable is not the special effects, awesome (in the traditional sense of the word) though they may be. The cererbral concept, the thought of creating dinosaurs, is exhilarating and thrilling. Its story is a classic tale of man's hubris leading to destruction, of greed leading to demise, of fear and courage. An epic battle plays out between the kings of old and the kings of new, brawn vs. brains.

Throw in Goldblum's spot-on neuroses and Spielberg's unerring eye for cinema and you get a movie that stands the test of time. It's invigorating and endearing because it puts its story and its characters front and center, allowing the CGI to be eye candy and window dressing. Special effects won't always seem so incredible, but good stories never grow old. And Jurassic Park tells a phenomenal story.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107290/

Morning Glory (2010)

4/5

Morning Glory is a surprisingly affecting tale of a young, fiercely independent woman who believes in herself and her abilities. The plot follows Becky Fuller (McAdams), a TV producer who gets hired to rejuvenate the failing morning show Daybreak. Because of her age, nobody takes her seriously. But when she fires one of the co-anchors and hires news legend Mike Pomeroy (Ford) to take his place, people start cheering her on. Her handsome coworker Adam Bennett (Wilson) even asks her out on a date. But her challenges are far from over, as the ratings plummet further down and her boss (Goldblum) informs her that the parent broadcasting company may cancel the show altogether.

We all know this story. We all know the stresses of daily life and the balancing act between our professional and personal goals. We all know the trite romance that will develop between the handsome man and awkward woman. This movie deals with the former with aplomb and thankfully downplays the latter. But Morning Glory is also surprising in a lot of ways. It delves into a different kind of relationship rarely portrayed in cinema: the family dynamic that emerges after working with people day in and day out. It treats the coworker interaction as a special, cherished kind of relationship that is equally as important as the relationships we develop in our free time. It examines the workplace as a joyous environment, challenging but rewarding, filled with obstacles and solutions, instead of a miserable existence we so commonly hear about.

This movie succeeds not because of cinematography or editing, but because of convincing portrayals by the actors. You can see every bit of excitement and nervousness and determination in McAdams's eyes. Underneath Ford's gruff, monotone voice is a depth and texture that is not immediately apparent. It is so much more fascinating than him playing a jaded old curmudgeon. Morning Glory is a movie about love in a very nontraditional way. It's about loving ourselves, establishing priorities and dreams and never letting them go. This is an inspiring and uplifting movie. And here I was thinking it was just going to be another romantic comedy. I'm glad I was wrong.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1126618/

Nashville (1975)

4.9/5

Robert Altman's Nashville is a truly astounding picture. The film follows a series of singers at various stages in their career, whose lives intertwine during a few days in Nashville. In all these people resides a common love for music, which makes the film feel like a living, breathing entity whose experiences are those of everyone involved. Thus, we see the aged singer (Gibson), who must give up his fans to the younger generation. We see the Lothario rock star looking for true love (Carradine), the son in his father's shadows who never got to sing (Peel), the backup singer waiting for her chance at fame (Black), and the radiant celebrity with her adoring fans (Blakley). Throughout these few days, a reporter from the BBC tries to interview the celebrities (Chaplin), a politico tries to promote his presidential candidate (Murphy), and a bizarre man with goofy glasses performs magic tricks and gives rides to random women on his motor-tricycle (Goldblum). And there are many more characters I don't have space to describe. While these 20 or so personages are introduced in the first 20 minutes, they make such an impression on you that you remember them for the entire movie.

The editing in this movie is pure magic. There are five or more storylines taking place at any one time, each one with overlapping dialogue and music. And yet there is never a confusing moment in the picture. You always know exactly where you are and exactly which people are involved. And it is hilarious and moving all at once, thanks to stellar writing and acting. However, the weakest aspects of this movie are its lighting and cinematography. Bland, washed-out colors and cheesy extreme zooms heavily date the film. Combined with a 2.5 hour running time (which probably could have been trimmed to 2 hours), the film fails to invite modern audiences in. But give it a chance, because this is a truly magnificent portrait of American culture.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0073440/

The Fly (1986)

4/5

The Fly is a horror drama with special effects reminiscent of John Carpenter's The Thing. Jeff Goldblum believably plays a scientist who has recently perfected a teleportation device. When a fly gets trapped in the machine with him as he teleports himself, the two combine on a "molecular-genetic" level. Over the course of the movie, he undergoes a metamorphosis. This change is so fluid and gradual that it effortlessly draws you in. Unfortunately, the characters don't develop as well as the story does. They seem like symbols and metaphors that the plot can alter at will in order to get an important thematic message across.

This movie succeeds in most technical areas. The editing (on a shot-by-shot level) was much, much tighter than in his later Eastern Promises, which helped this movie seem real instead of staged. The special effects were well-envisioned and well-executed, starting subtly and mushrooming at the climactic finale. There were some nice camera movements, although none of the compositions really stood out as being anything more than adequate. I really did not like the lighting, and thought most of the movie was much darker than it should have been. All things considered, this movie is a solid four, but is only recommended for true film fans and not casual viewers.

IMDb link: http://imdb.com/title/tt0091064/