Monday, November 06, 2006

Prestigious movies

We saw The Prestige over the weekend, and it was every bit as good as I had hoped. When you see a movie about two rival magicians that was directed by Christopher Nolan (Memento), you have to expect some twists and surprises. This movie delivered. After being terribly disappointed by the latest Shyamalan film, I was relieved to find out it is still possible for a filmmaker to pull the wool over an audience's eyes. It's not all about the twist either. The movie was well acted, well shot, and engrossing throughout. And tell me, how cool was it that this period piece had a Thom Yorke song playing over the closing credits? I'll answer--very cool.

While we are on the topic of movies, let me tell you that R, C, and I are two-thirds of the way through Kieslowski's Trois Couleurs trilogy. These art films, from the early nineties, are surprisingly fresh, slightly inaccessible, and very rewarding. Hollywood doesn't make films like these, at least not anymore. Films like these need to be absorbed rather than simply viewed. Blue was painful, yet poignant. White was less serious but more entertaining. Red is up next. We will watch it as soon as our guest, C, returns from New York. My preceding thought is that it will be the best of the three.

Has anybody else out there seen any good movies lately? I hear The Departed is worth checking out. Any others?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

we've got the trois couleurs films in our netflix queue. good to here you enjoyed them.

we recently watched 'infernal affairs' which was great...not sure why they thought they needed to remake it so quickly into 'the departed'. not that i've seen the departed or anything.

Anonymous said...

Hello..The Departed is REALLY good! DEFINATELY worth checking out.