Hey I stumbled across this thing I made about 2 years ago and just thought I'd share it with you all. My collection has grown considerably since then (like maybe 100 more or so) and I could've made this better now if I had made it today but I still think it might be worthy of checking out?


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Yeah it's just a bunch of clips strung together with some music in the back, I dunno what the hell this topic is about discussing

Some of the best movies I have seen are foreign-language films. They are some of the most original, pure and mostly unspoilt by Hollywood gimmicks and hypocrisy.

There are a lot more foreign language films that I want to watch and that I haven't had the opportunity to because of lack of accessibility, so this list might be missing quite a few films that should have been here but I made a list of 10  foreign language films that I have seen and really like. This is by no means a list of BEST TEN FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILMS EVER but my 10 personal favourites, even though I really need to see more.


10. Water (2005)



Language: Hindi

"Water" examines the plight of a group of widows forced into poverty at a temple in the holy city of Varanasi. It focuses on a relationship between one of the widows, who wants to escape the social restrictions imposed on widows, that the only choices she have are; one, marry her husband's younger brother, if his family permits; two, to kill herself on his funeral pyre; three, to live a life of celibacy, discipline, and solitude amongst her own kind.

This film is poignant. Its subject matter is relevant and upsetting, the sorry plight of Hindu widows in traditional Indian society is made evident. The director has clearly set out to make a film with a message but she lets the story carry the message and she does not demonize the supporters of ancient oppressive practices, some of whom are motivated by faith rather than self-interest. Strangely the film's beauty undercuts to some extent the political message. People might feel that the film attacks Hinduism but what it really does is attack a certain set of beliefs that Hinduism bring with it, like how one might attack Christianity for claiming that the world is only 4000 years old. It asks questions that many of the higher-ups do not want to answer and is a great film in itself but carries a strong message of gender equality in the Hindu world.

"Water" has been banned from India and Pakistan.


9. Spirited Away (2001)



Language: Japanese

While moving to a new home in Japan, Chihiro and her parents take a wrong turn down a mysterious wooded path. They come across an ominous-looking tunnel of which only Chihiro is scared. Going through the tunnel, they are lead them to a mysterious town filled with restaurants that have all kinds of delicious food on display. Chihiro's parents quickly sit down and start gorging themselves, assuming they will pay the restaurant upon their return. Chihiro's doubt of this strange town leads her to wander off, and she comes across a building of titanic size, where a young boy warns her to leave before nightfall. However, as the sun sets, the town begins to fill up with the gods of Japan's mythology, and Chihiro returns to find her parents mysteriously turned into pigs. The young boy, Haku, works in the building, which is a bathhouse for 8 Million gods. He helps Chihiro find work in this new world, find a way to save her parents from a dinner platter, and find her way home.

"Spirited Away" is an odd film to put here because it's anime and I'm sure a lot of hardcore anime lovers have seen it already, especially since it's been dubbed in English now (dubs suck, subs all the way... subs not dubs) But I'm just putting it here as a representative of every Hayao Miyazaki film (others are Princess Mononoke and Howl's Moving Castles). I am not an anime fan but the man makes beautiful movies, not only in the visual but in the thematic. Spirited Away is nothing short of a lavish fairytale filled with spectacular ideas, characters and images. If you like shitty anime like Yu-Gi-Oh and Digimon, you should definitely give this a try and see how a good anime is actually done.


8. Amores Perros (2000)



Language: Spanish

Amores Perros is about three interconnected stories about the different strata of life in Mexico City all resolve with a fatal car accident. Octavio is trying to raise enough money to run away with his sister-in-law, and decides to enter his dog Cofi into the world of dogfighting. After a dogfight goes bad, Octavio flees in his car, running a red light and causing the accident. Daniel and Valeria's new-found bliss is prematurely ended when she loses her leg in the accident. El Chivo is a homeless man who cares for stray dogs and is there to witness the collision.

Amores Perros (the English title is "Love's a Bitch") is the first of Alejandro Gonzalez Inaritu's "interconnection" trilogy (the other two are 21 Grams and Babel). The film represents three different viewpoints of the struggle of love and the depths the human soul can descend into to attain it or while chasing it. Breaking it up into three different narratives, each revolving around different characters, presents the audience with the ability to view each story as independent the others, a more pervasive perspective. Amores Perros explores everything it wants to explore from so many angles and splits them up into so many layers that it is hard to watch it and not appreciate it. It's a fascinatingly intertwining tale involving dog fights, petty gangsters, a tragically injured model, a cheating husband, an abused teenage wife, and a homeless hit man. Not only is it a great story, the director paces the movie so well that it keeps the audience in constant suspense. It's a dark slice of Mexican life and not everyone will be able to stomach it because Inaritu's films usually have this depressing level of reality that cut right through you.

7. The Motorcycle Diaries (2004)



Language: Spanish

"The Motorcycle Diaries" is an adaptation of a journal written by Che Guevara when he was 23 years old. He and his friend, Alberto Granado are typical college students who, seeking fun and adventure before graduation, decide to travel across Argentina, Chile, Peru, Colombia, and Venezuela in order to do their medical residency at a leper colony. Beginning as a buddy/road movie in which Ernesto and Alberto are looking for chicks, fun and adventure before they must grow up and have a more serious life.

How many people do you see sporting Che Guevara T-shirts? Nine out of ten of them might not be able to tell you anything about Che Guevara or what he did except he was 'some sort of revolutionary'. But laying my own personal views on Che Guevara guerrilla tactics and politics aside, this film is simply a portrait of a boy believing in something and the conflict brewing in him while he decides to leave his past life behind and go out to achieve what he wants. It casts Che in a remarkably bright light, which is necessary, I believe, to show how passionate he was about going out to meet what he wanted and struggle for the ideals he believed in. What makes this film poignant and the message strong is the fact that we actually know who the character eventually will become after the story of the film finishes and the end titles start to run, that makes it rather more poignant. We only witness the beginning of his personal journey and know how much he will travel.

6. Downfall (2004)



Language: German

It's the last days of Adolf Hitler, April 1945, and Hitler's personal secretary Traudl Junge finds herself in the Der Fuhrer's bunker. Facing inevitable defeat, Hilter's moods range from defiance to fight or flee, remain loyal or opt for self-preservation. Eva Braun parties while Magda Goebbels kills her children. The movie goes on to show how Hitler and Eva lived their last hours in the Bunker.

We're going from one 'revolutionary' to another. The last film was about the start of Che Guevara's mission. This film is about the last days of Adolf Hitler's mission. Now, that's something nobody has seen before. It tells the story from the eyes of his impressionable secretary. The film portrays Hitler in a sympathetic light as his reign is ending and the walls are closing in on him and every plan he had conceived and dreamt of. The film is uncanny to make us feel sorry for him while all of this is happening when we know inside it was probably the greatest thing to ever happen. It is a psychological attempt at creating a slightly different image of Hitler and his closest "companions" than has been preferred by many so far. The "monsters" appear to have human feelings. They, however, have mostly dark rather than black souls.


5. Paradise Now (2005)



Language: Arabic

The story places two close friends, Palestinians Said and Khaled, recruited by an extremist group to perpetrate a terrorist attack in Tel-Aviv, blowing up themselves. However, things go wrong and both friends must separate in the border. One of them, maintaining in his purpose of carry the attack to the end, and the other will have his doubts about it.

Paradise Now is a very relevant film to today and it is a shame that the people it most applies to might not even watch it. It's bold and authentic and opens our eyes to the internal strife in the Middle East. It is about the conflict between religion and humanity, the moral consequences felt because of a so-called calling from God. The film asks the question of whether they are really martyrs or not and shows the entire process of the preparation of the suicide bombing, including the farewell videotapes, the cutting of their hair and having the bombs strapped on them so they could go bomb a building. Will they really find eternal peace and rest if they do this? By having two protagonists, one willing to do it and one dubious, the film does a great job of trying not to be one-sided with its arguments and getting into the minds of these young men.


4. Pan's Labyrinth (2006)



Language: Spanish

In 1944 fascist Spain, a girl, fascinated with fairy-tales, is sent along with her pregnant mother to live with her new stepfather, a ruthless captain of the Spanish army. During the night, she meets a fairy who takes her to an old faun in the center of the labyrinth. He tells her she's a princess, but must prove her royalty by surviving three gruesome tasks. If she fails, she will never prove herself to be the the true princess and will never see her real father, the king, again.

Director Guillermo del Toro almost did not make Pan's Labyrinth. He had lost his notebook with his story and sketches in a taxi cab. It was only a while later when the cab driver asked for him to reclaim it, he decided he had to do the movie. And I'm glad he did. The film has already developed a rather large fanbase because of its touching story, its remarkable concepts and its beautiful cinematography. This is one of the prettiest-looking films I have ever seen and it just wows the mind to watch the scenes flow into each other. It switches between a brightly coloured fantasy world and a dark dismal real one. Del Toro does a great job making these worlds spill together in the end and the effect it has on its protagonist. The villain is also one of the most disgusting people ever portrayed on film.


3. Life is Beautiful (1998)



Language: Italian

In 1930s Italy, a carefree Jewish book keeper named Guido starts a fairy tale life by courting and marrying a lovely woman from a nearby city. Guido and his wife have a son and live happily together until the occupation of Italy by German forces. In an attempt to hold his family together and help his son survive the horrors of a Jewish Concentration Camp, Guido imagines that the Holocaust is a game and that the grand prize for winning is a tank.

As the film's tagline reads, it is an unforgettable fable that proves love, family and imagination conquer all. It is a very sad love song heralding the beauty of keeping childhood sacred and the father who would go at any end to make it so for his son. The film begins as a dream and descends into a nightmare but the script and the acting is so well-done that it makes us seem like the characters would snap out of it from any time during the movie and go back to their normal lives. Life is Beautiful resonates on a number of levels that relate to childhood and asks the question, "Is a white lie so bad? Is shielding my child from the ugly things in reality bad?"

It's a shame movies like this aren't made anymore.


2. Amélie (2001)



Language: French

Amélie is a story about a girl named Amélie whose childhood was suppressed by her Father's mistaken concerns of a heart defect. With these concerns Amélie gets hardly any real life contact with other people. This leads Amélie to resort to her own fantastical world and dreams of love and beauty. She later on becomes a young woman and moves to the central part of Paris as a waitress. After finding a lost treasure belonging to the former occupant of her apartment, she decides to return it to him.

After seeing his reaction and his new found perspective - she decides to devote her life to the people around her. Such as, her father who is obsessed with his garden-gnome, a failed writer, a hypochondriac, a man who stalks his ex girlfriends, the "ghost", a suppressed young soul, the love of her life and a man whose bones are as brittle as glass. But after consuming herself with these escapades - she finds out that she is disregarding her own life and damaging her quest for love. Amélie then discovers she must become more aggressive and take a hold of her life and capture the beauty of love she has always dreamed of. This film's world is bright, playful, cheery and colourful and I don't see how anyone can not enjoy, or at least appreciate, what was crafted here.


1. City of God (2002)



Language: Portugese

Based on true events and characters who live in the overlooked and poverty stricken slums in the shadows of Rio de Janiero, where life expectancy doesn't reach the 30's and drug dealers are kings. Brazil, 1960's, City of God. Three young men robs motels and gas trucks. Younger kids watch and learn well...too well. 1970's: one of the kids has prospered very well and owns the city. He causes violence and fear as he wipes out rival gangs without mercy. His best friend Bené is the only one to keep him on the good side of sanity. Rocket, another boy, has watched these two gain power for years, and he wants no part of it. Yet he keeps getting swept up in the madness. All he wants to do is take pictures. 1980's: Things are out of control between the last two remaining gangs...will it ever end? Welcome to the City of God.

There is a shot in City of God of the protagonist watching through some holes in the wall, witnessing a very gruesome violent murder. This is exactly what the film is to the viewer - you're seeing what you're not sure what you want to be seeing. City of God startles and shocks. You think your city is a violent place? You think shit is bad? Wait until you see the favelas of Brazil, where being good just does not pay, even if you are nine years old. The story is sprawling and is told through a number of vignettes and the film highlights its characters so much that they become like familiar friends to you. The violence is in-your-face distressing, but not in a manner of showing excessive bloodshed, but the reasons why it is committed and WHO commits it. It is not normal to see a 10 year old toting a gun and shooting a grown man to death, stealing his money and then laughing to his friends about it as they count the money. But this is how things were in the Brazil slums back then.

This was what was normal even though it appears very shocking to us. City of God is a modern day masterpiece of social commentary and storytelling blended into one, along with a very lively ensemble of performances. The story covers all the facets of the life, charting the growth of several key members of the gangs from childhood through to young adulthood, with their transformation from young hoodlums to local drugs barons. City of God is essential viewing, and is cinema at its most brilliant. The violence is never presented abhorrently, distastefully or gratituously but is used artfully to present a point that will hit you right in the chest.

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Honourable Mentions:

Letters from Iwo Jima (Japanese)
Monsoon Wedding (Hindi)
The Barbarian Invasions (French)
Lagaan (Hindi)
No Man's Land (German/Bosnian)
Tsotsi (Zulu/Afrikaans)
The Sea Inside (Spanish)
The Lives of Others (German)

Yeah, I need to see more foreign flicks but I don't have much access. So talk about your favourite foreign flicks!

We've seen good performances, but what about those performances where the actor actually seems to step out of his own skin to portray somebody else, real or fictional? This kind of work is meticulous and can be pain-staking and does not just rely on the alteration of physical appearance but perhaps mastering an accent or voice, copying the body language, mimicking the very essence that made the person they are portraying stand out. They have to actually EMBODY the person they are acting.

It's a big risk but there's usually a big pay-off and I will list ten performances like that now:

10.



Robert Downey Jr. as "Charlie Chaplin" in Chaplin (1993)

Most of you know Robert Downey, Jr. in his starring role in "Iron Man". Downey Jr. is a fine actor and after some drug rehab, he reinvented himself and starred in films like Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, A Scanner Darkly and Zodiac. However, before the whole drug thing, he did Chaplin, where he portrayed the lovable silent film-era actor Charlie Chaplin (come on, you've gotta know Charlie Chaplin...) Downey brings with him all the slapstick and adoration that Chaplin was known for, as well as portraying a darker, more disturbed side of the actor. He portrays him with astounding accuracy, mimicking all the characteristics of the real actor.

Some may argue that acting may not be so difficult if one can just watch some clips and mimic them but when you're actually portraying a loved actor ON FILM, it demands a tremendous amount of responsibility and talent to do so. Downey was nominated for an Oscar for this role.


#9.



Viggo Mortensen as "Nikolai Luzhin" in Eastern Promises (2007)

Viggo Mortensen is most famous for his portrayal of Aragorn in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Since then, I think most people thought he would be stuck in that type of role, the rogue adventurer of sorts. Then he met David Cronenberg and did "A History of Violence", where he played a complex lead role. He teams with Cronenberg again to do "Eastern Promises" and does an even more complex role. He basically steps into the skin as Nikolai and the Viggo Mortensen we all knew had disappeared for the 90 minutes that was Eastern Promises. He pulls off the mannerisms and the Russian accent almost too convincingly and he was nominated for an Oscar for the role, so it's good it wasn't overlooked.

#8.



Philip Seymour Hoffman as "Truman Capote" in Capote (2005)

Philip Seymour Hoffman never bothered much to dive into mainstream cinema. I think the most mainstream thing he has done is play the villain in Mission Impossible 3. He has stuck mainly to independent flicks or not-big-budget artistic films like Magnolia, Boogie Nights, The Talented Mr. Ripley and Charlie Wilson's War. He had already established himself as a good actor by the time he signed on to do Capote, however, to play the real-life writer, Truman Capote, writer of the book "In Cold Blood".

For those of you unfamiliar with Truman Capote, he is fricking difficult to pull off. He has a high-pitched voice that almost sounds unnatural, he laughs a funny way, his effete mannerisms (he was gay, by the way), he had a style of his own. Hoffman lost a bunch of weight to play Capote, trained his voice to sound like Capote's and mimicked all the mannerisms so well that you couldn't tell it was Hoffman anymore. He won an Oscar for this role.

#7.



Edward Norton as "Derek Vinyard" in American History X (1998)

Edward Norton is an actor who never turns in a bad performance. You may know him at least from the new Incredible Hulk movie or from Fight Club. He usually plays intelligent, introverted meek characters. Then he did American History X. American History X is the story about a very violent Neo-Nazi named Derek Vinyard who reforms and discovers his brother is going down the same path and must stop him.

Norton packed on a ton of muscle for the role and shaved his head. The thing about American History X is that it portrays Vinyard in three different stages of life, so Norton has to look and act three different ways throughout the movie; a gawky teenager, a violent skinhead and the reformed skinhead. He turns in a tour-de-force performance that he has not equalled yet and he was nominated for an Oscar for the role.

#6.



Charlize Theron as "Aileen Wuormos" in Monster (2003)

Charlize Theron you may know as the woman from The Italian Job and a bunch of other stuff. She always plays these feminine type roles - lady to the leading man, if you know what I mean, so she didn't really have any space to do any physical transformation performances. However, in 2003, she signed on to do Monster, portraying the real-life serial killer Aileen Wuormos, who lured men in as a prostitute and then murdered them for their lust.

There have been many crazy woman roles but I don't think any can match up to this one. Theron really brings the Wuormos' manic behaviour as well as vulnerability to the role and I guess it helps that they look like fuckin' duplicates, gaining weight for the role and shedding the pretty woman look aside. Theron won an Oscar for this role.

#5.



Peter Sellers as "Captain Mandrake / President Muffley / Dr. Strangelove" in Dr. Strangelove (1962)

I had to throw in an oldie in here. Some of you might know Peter Sellers as Inspector Closeau from the old Pink Panther movies (no, not the Steve Martin ones) but we're not talking about Pink Panther, we're talking about Dr. Strangelove and the multiple roles Sellers played in it. He played Captain Mandrake, a timid man caught in a bizarre one-on-one with the comically paranoid General Jack D. Ripper. He played President Muffley, a president, presented with very serious low-brow fashion, who has no idea what to do when Jack Ripper goes crazy and orders his men to bomb Russia. And he played Dr. Strangelove, a very very very eccentric German scientist whose own hand wants to attack him. Yeah, all in the same movie, and you could never tell that they were all the same person.

Yeah, and also Eddie Murphy played a white guy in Coming to America hehe Sellers was nominated for an Oscar for this (these) role(s).

#4.



Gary Oldman in EVERY MOVIE HE HAS EVER BEEN IN.

Gary Oldman is probably the most underrated actors today. He is a fucking chameleon. He has the ability to transform into any role that is given to him. The diversity of roles he plays is so broad it's not even funny. Oldman came to prominence in the mid-1980s after a series of well-reviewed performances and has since retained a career as both a lead and character actor, appearing in over 50 films, including: Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead, State of Grace, Bram Stoker's Dracula, True Romance, Léon: The Professional, The Fifth Element, The Contender, the Harry Potter film series and Christopher Nolan's Batman film series. He has also portrayed a significant number of real-life historical figures on screen, such as Joe Orton in Prick Up Your Ears, Lee Harvey Oswald in JFK, Ludwig van Beethoven in Immortal Beloved, Pontius Pilate in Jesus and perhaps most notably, Sid Vicious, his portrayal of whom in 1986 biopic Sid & Nancy.

Oldman has received much critical acclaim over the years for his diversity of roles and mastery of world accents. Revered film critic Roger Ebert has long been a fan of Oldman's work, hailing him as "one of the great actors, able to play high, low, crass, noble", while Janet Maslin called him a "phenomenal" actor who "since Sid and Nancy has taken on a string of new accents and dramatic identities with stunning ease." Oldman's acting style has, however, occasionally been referred to as being excessive and over-the-top by some critics. This may perhaps be in part due to a long run of being cast as eccentric and outlandish villains, something of which he eventually grew tired. Oldman, however, is also noted for playing reserved, non-villainous roles such as in The Contender, Batman Begins, and Harry Potter film series.

#3.



Christian Bale as "Trevor Reznik" in The Machinist (2005)

We're getting to the really serious ones now. Christian Bale is most known for playing Bruce Wayne in the new Batman movies and as the psychotic Wall Street worker in American Psycho. In between those two, he signed on to do The Machinist to play Trevor Reznik, a horridly emaciated insomniac with a mysterious paranoia that drives him over the edge.

Christian Bale starved himself for over 4 months prior to filming, as his character needed to look drastically thin. Allegedly his eating consisted of one can of tuna and an apple each day (approximately 275 calories), although there are conflicting reports on this. According to the DVD commentary, he lost 62 pounds (28 kg), reducing his body weight to 120 pounds (54.4 kg). Bale wanted to go down to 100 pounds (45.3 kg) but the filmmakers would not let him due to health concerns. He later regained the weight, plus an additional 40 pounds (18 kg) due to weightlifting, in preparation for his role in Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins.

Serious stuff!

#2.



Leonardo DiCaprio as "Arnie Grape" in What's Eating Gilbert Grape? (1992)

We all know DiCaprio from Titanic and his stints in Martin Scorsese's films, Gangs of New York, The Aviator and The Departed. But how many of you know about What's Eating Gilbert Grape, where he played the most convincing mentally retarded child ever? DiCaprio trained for his part at children hospitals for mentally challenged children to prepare for this role and he pulls it off fantastically, so convincingly that audiences were wondering how they got that mentally retarded boy to act so good since DiCaprio was an unknown back then. If you don't believe me, see the damn movie. The transformation is so incredible, it is unreal. You ever want to argue that Leo has never turned in a terrific performance? See it.

Leonardo DiCaprio earned his first Oscar nomination for this movie.

#1.



Billy Bob Thornton as "Karl Childers" in Sling Blade (1995)

Nowadays, Billy Bob Thornton is most famous for playing that drunk asshole in Bad Santa, followed by a whole line of drunken asshole roles. Maybe it's collateral for being married and divorced to Angelina Jolie, I don't know. But before all that bullshit, in 1995, he wrote, directed and starred in a little indie movie called Sling Blade. It tells the fictional story of a simple man named Karl Childers who is released from a psychiatric hospital where he has lived since murdering his mother and her lover at age 12. He befriends a young boy, begins a friendship with the boy's mother and must confront the mother's abusive boyfriend, as well as his own dark past.

The first time I saw this film, I could not believe that this character was played by Billy Bob Thornton. Anyone who has any doubt that Billy Bob Thornton has the potential to be a terrific actor, see this film now. He is virtually unnoticeable as his character Karl Childers, in mannerism, appearance and voice. In a scene, Karl describes to a young girl how he came to being in a mental hospital and, accompanied by the lighting on the set, this has to be one of the creepiest moments in cinema history--the way Thornton rubs his hands together as he speaks, shaking his head, never making true eye contact. You cannot tell what is going through his head - does he want to stab this girl or is he just shy? It is an amazingly complex role and Thornton totally immerses himself in the role to make my #1 for this list.

Thornton was nominated for an Oscar for this role, but won an Oscar for writing the screenplay.

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Add to this list! Share your opinions.

When an actor is constantly casted as a certain type of character, he is said to be typecasted. Examples of this include Bruce Willis being cast as the brash hero sent out to save the day, Seann "Stifler" William Scott being cast as the usual perverted jerk, Tom Hanks as characters with that "tame nice guy" image, Kelsey Grammar being cast as cultured and intellectual characters after "Frasier" (even The Beast and Sideshow Bob can be considered cultured and intellectual). When an actor is cast in a role completely different from his other films or other styles of acting, he is said to be playing against type.

I found myself very interested in this and I'm going to do a list of ten instances where I thought the actor playing against type really stood out. Of course, this is all subjective and the real point of this thread is to discuss actors that are typecasted or playing against type  but I always like to kick these discussions off with a list.













Notable Instances Where I Think Playing Against Type Worked:

Tom Cruise in "Collateral", villanous performance straying from his usual good guy roles.

Mary Tyler Moore in "Ordinary People", cold distant performance from an actress known to be the motherly type.

Sean Penn in "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" (even though it's like his first role so it probably doesn't count lol)

Viggo Mortensen in "A History of Violence" and "Eastern Promises", different types of performance to move away from being typecast as Aragorn.

Eddie Murphy in "Dreamgirls", musical/dramatic performance from actor commonly known for his comedy.

Paul Giamatti in "Shoot 'Em Up", villainous performance from actor who usually does comedy.

Al Pacino in "Angels in America" and "Merchant of Venice"

Macaulay Culkin in "Party Monster", weird performance from ex-child actor (I liked it but a lot of people think it sucks!)

Michael Douglas in "Falling Down", violent and villainous performance from actor commonly known as the good guy (except Wall Street)


Where Playing Against Type Went Wrong:

Edward Norton in "Death to Smoochy".

Jim Carrey in "The Number 23".

Russell Crowe in "A Good Year".


So, discuss typecasted actors and instances where you think they tried to break out of being typecasted.

I just saw this and I don't think there was a topic about this film here and I feel totally compelled to make one so here it is.

"Into the Wild", currently #126 on the Top 250 on imdb, has its summary written on its site as,

"After graduating from Emory University, top student and athlete Christopher McCandless abandons his possessions, gives his entire $24,000 savings account to charity and hitchhikes to Alaska to live in the wilderness. Along the way, Christopher encounters a series of characters that shape his life."

It is directed by Sean Penn and the cast includes Emile Hirsch (The Girl Next Door) as Christopher McCandless, William Hurt (A History of Violence) as his father, Marcia Gay Harden (Pollock) as his mother, Jena Malone (Donnie Darko) as his sister who provides the narration for the film, Catherine Keener (Being John Malkovich) as an aging hippie he encounters, Hal Holbrook (All the President's Men) as an old man he befriends and Vince Vaughn (Wedding Crashers) as wheat farmer he befriends, as well as other actors. It is based on a true story.

When I first heard about Into the Wild, I wasn't crazy about it so I didn't see it in the cinema (and I try to see a lot of movies in the cinema) and I really feel I missed out after getting the DVD and watching it on my small screen. Emile Hirsch as the principle character shines in this film. Though his character appeared silly and arrogant at times, Hirsch portrayed McCandless in his bliss. It made me want to be there with him - this fleeting character who drops into people's lives unannounced and leaves this remarkable impression. The shots in this movie are beautiful. I've been into forests and they don't look as stunning as they do in this film and that made it feel unreal for me. But this isn't how I see the forest, it's how Christopher sees the forest and the shots in this movie depict it in all its glory to him.

There are many other remarkable shots of the Alaskan wilderness, a flurry of birds flapping across a beach landscape, shots of turbulent rapids. I'm not gonna lie - I'm a nature lover. I'm a sucker for it and for it to be photographed so beautifully, it just... warmed the cockles of my heart. But we're not watching a nature documentary here, we're watching a movie! So how's bout that story! Well, I've always been fond of road trip movies, mobile stories, where everyone is moving from place to place. I loved Jack Kerouac's "On the Road". I loved the film version of The Motorcycle Diaries (haven't read the book). This film felt much like The Motorcycle Diaries to me with McCandless being his own Che Guevara with a mission and a goal and the determination to get to that goal. But let's leave Che out of this from now on.

I connected with McCandless' personal conflict, not that I've experienced it but because I thought the story was related so well and I related with many of the characters. If I had to pick a favourite performance in this movie, it would be Hal Holbrook's as Ron Franz. His scenes were my favourite scenes in the movie. His character just seemed to click with the McCandless character and they both had a wonderful friendship going - McCandless' boisterousness and adventurousness and Franz's humility and stability.

I thought this was a beautiful movie. It has definitely had an effect on me. Has anyone else seen it? And what do you think of it?

Oh, did I mention it has a killer Eddie Vedder soundtrack.. (love Eddie Vedder...)

Additional Information
imdb page
movie trailer

They're either overshadowed by grandstanders or fit into their role so comfortably that we forget that they are just playing a character. These are the performances that zip right past everyone's heads and probably do not get the attention or proper acclaim they deserve. This week's list is dedicated to the underrated and/or overlooked performances in cinema.

I have a rather short attention span for this one so you'll notice a lot of performances are very recent, so you'll have to forgive me for that. Here are my top 20 underrated performances (let's just say for the past 15 years):





















So that's my list!

What are yours? Discuss any performance you think is underrated or overlooked in a movie.

There are those films where no actor grandstands the others or pushes the rest of them in the background. These are the collective talent and efforts of a group of actors and actresses that push the film forward - these are the films where these performances are the sturdy foundation of the film and every actor relies on the other. The strength of these types of movies has to rely on the chemistry of these actors - else they will just unravel. These are ensemble performances and here are my top personal 20 ensemble performances in movies:





















*phew* That's a lot! I'm not gonna do a list for television as I'm really tired right now.

But what are yours? Discuss your favourite ensemble performances in either television of film.

Based on the Dr. Seuss book of the same name, Horton Hears a Who! is a CG-animated film that features the voices of comedic actors Jim Carrey, Steve Carrell, Seth Rogen, Jonah Hill, Isla Fisher and Carol Burnett. The film is currently notable as being the first Seuss film adaptation in years to have gotten outstanding reviews, compared to the poor reviews of two previously adapted films, The Cat in the Hat and How the Grinch Stole Christmas.

On imdb, its plot summary is written as, "One day, Horton the elephant hears a cry from help coming from a speck of dust. Even though he can't see anyone on the speck, he decides to help it. As it turns out, the speck of dust is home to the Whos, who live in their city of Whoville. Horton agrees to help protect the Whos and their home, but this gives him nothing but torment from his neighbors, who refuse to believe that anything could survive on the speck. Still, Horton stands by the motto that, After all, a person is a person, no matter how small."

My Own Review

I have seen the film twice in theatres and I enjoyed it thoroughly both times. Though I have not read the source material it was based on (and I suspect that a deal of it was read to us during the film itself since a deal of the movie was comprised of rhyming narration), I think I can say they really managed to capture the Seuss-esque ethos and feeling in this movie. The characters are interesting and the voice acting was done generally well, especially by Carol Burnett as The Kangaroo, the main antagonist.

Okay, and I have to add, though I am not a sucker for graphics and CG, the animation for this movie was simply beautiful and flawless and as I said before, really managed to capture the visuals of the Seuss ethos.

Due to my tendency to look at these things in a much deeper way, I can see that Seuss was probably trying for a way to tell people that they should open up their eyes/ears before disbelieving something and there were numerous subtle references to God and perhaps clairvoyance and the insanity that seems to trail it. But I don't think that the movie's intent was trying to say that "non-believers will be shunned" but rather "take ample time to examine before you discard something". That being said, I think this movie can be enjoyed on different levels - whether you want to take this to a philosophical stratum (yeah, I know this sounds pretty dumb) or as just purely entertaining storytelling.

In the end, I thought this movie had a lot of heart and the only faults I could find with it are the intentions of a certain antagonist (not Kangaroo) and Jim Carrey going a little overboard (AS HE ALWAYS DOES) with his role with the goofiness. But children found it funny so I can excuse it.

Additional Information
imdb page
movie trailer
Rotten Tomatoes Reviews

We've seen them - we think they're either badass or creepy as hell. There's some of them we love to hate and some of them we feel so guilty about loving, whether they're just a pure psychopath or a corrupted DEA agent. They're vile, they're disgusting, they're evil, they're scum and they've got it out for everyone else in the film. They're villains!

So, some of these dudes aren't villains, but just overall creepy performances, but I just had to include them.






















So, tell me about some of your favourite villainous performances!

So I always follow these awards races, guessing here and guessing there who would be nominated and who would be snubbed. There mightn't even be a ceremony this year because of the writer's strike. So, anyway, if anyone's interested, here are the nominations for this year's Oscars:

(winners in bold)

Best Motion Picture of the Year

Atonement
Juno
Michael Clayton
No Country for Old Men
There Will Be Blood

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role

George Clooney for Michael Clayton
Daniel Day-Lewis for There Will Be Blood
Johnny Depp for Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
Tommy Lee Jones for In the Valley of Elah
Viggo Mortensen for Eastern Promises

Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role

Cate Blanchett for Elizabeth: The Golden Age
Julie Christie for Away from Her
Marion Cotillard for La Vie En Rose
Laura Linney for The Savages
Ellen Page for Juno

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role

Casey Affleck for The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Javier Bardem for No Country for Old Men
Philip Seymour Hoffman for Charlie Wilson's War
Hal Holbrook for Into the Wild
Tom Wilkinson for Michael Clayton

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role

Cate Blanchett for I'm Not There.
Ruby Dee for American Gangster
Saoirse Ronan for Atonement
Amy Ryan for Gone Baby Gone
Tilda Swinton for Michael Clayton

Best Achievement in Directing

Paul Thomas Anderson for There Will Be Blood
Ethan Coen, Joel Coen for No Country for Old Men
Tony Gilroy for Michael Clayton
Jason Reitman for Juno
Julian Schnabel for The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen

Juno : Diablo Cody
Lars and the Real Girl : Nancy Oliver
Michael Clayton : Tony Gilroy
Ratatouille : Brad Bird
The Savages : Tamara Jenkins

Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published

Atonement : Christopher Hampton
Away from Her : Sarah Polley
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly : Ronald Harwood
No Country for Old Men : Joel Coen, Ethan Coen
There Will Be Blood : Paul Thomas Anderson


Best Achievement in Cinematography

The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford : Roger Deakins
Atonement : Seamus McGarvey
No Country for Old Men : Roger Deakins
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly : Janusz Kaminski
There Will Be Blood : Robert Elswit

Best Achievement in Editing

The Bourne Ultimatum : Christopher Rouse
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly : Juliette Welfling
Into the Wild : Jay Cassidy
No Country for Old Men : Ethan Coen, Joel Coen
There Will Be Blood : Dylan Tichenor, Tatiana S. Riegel

Best Achievement in Art Direction

American Gangster : Arthur Max
Atonement : Sarah Greenwood
The Golden Compass : Dennis Gassner
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street : Dante Ferretti
There Will Be Blood : Jack Fisk

Best Achievement in Costume Design

Across the Universe : Albert Wolsky
Atonement : Jacqueline Durran
Elizabeth: The Golden Age : Alexandra Byrne
La Vie En Rose : Marit Allen
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street : Colleen Atwood

Best Achievement in Makeup

La Vie en Rose : Didier Lavergne, Loulia Sheppard
Norbit : Rick Baker
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End : Ve Neill, Martin Samuel

Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Score

Atonement : Dario Marianelli
Into the Wild : Michael Brook, Kaki King, Eddie Vedder
Michael Clayton : James Newton Howard
Ratatouille : Michael Giacchino
3:10 to Yuma : Marco Beltrami

Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Song

August Rush ("Raise It Up")
Enchanted ("Happy Working Song")
Enchanted ("So Close")
Enchanted ("That's How You Know")
Once (“Falling Slowly” )

Best Achievement in Sound

The Bourne Ultimatum : Scott Millan, David Parker, Kirk Francis
No Country for Old Men : Skip Lievsay, Craig Berkey, Greg Orloff, Peter F. Kurland
Ratatouille : Randy Thom, Michael Semanick, Vince Caro, Doc Kane
3:10 to Yuma
Transformers : Kevin O'Connell, Greg P. Russell, Peter J. Devlin

Best Achievement in Sound Editing

The Bourne Ultimatum : Karen M. Baker, Per Hallberg
No Country for Old Men : Skip Lievsay
Ratatouille
There Will Be Blood : Matthew Wood, Christopher Scarabosio
Transformers : Mike Hopkins, Ethan Van der Ryn

Best Achievement in Visual Effects

The Golden Compass : Michael L. Fink, Susan MacLeod, Bill Westenhofer, Ben Morris
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End : John Knoll, Hal T. Hickel, Charlie Gibson, John Frazier
Transformers : Scott Farrar, Shari Hanson, Russell Earl, Scott Benza

Best Animated Feature Film of the Year

Persepolis : Vincent Paronnaud, Marjane Satrapi
Ratatouille : Brad Bird
Surf's Up : Ash Brannon, Chris Buck

Best Foreign Language Film of the Year

Fälscher, Die (Austria)
Beaufort (Israel)
Mongol (Kazakhstan)
Katyn (Poland)
12 (Russia)

Best Documentary, Features

No End in Sight
Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience
Sicko
Taxi to the Dark Side
War Dance

Best Documentary, Short Subjects

Freeheld
Corona, La
Salim Baba
Sari's Mother

Best Short Film, Animated

Même les pigeons vont au paradis
I Met the Walrus
Madame Tutli-Putli
Moya lyubov
Peter & the Wolf

Best Short Film, Live Action

At Night
Supplente, Il
Mozart des pickpockets, Le
Tanghi argentini
The Tonto Woman

--

So, basically:

Yay:
No Country for Old Men
Coen brothers
Atonement for Best Pic (for some reason I thought it was going to be snubbed)
Javier Bardem
Paul Thomas Anderson's first directing nomination!
Viggo Mortensen!
Daniel-Day Lewis (always good)
Cate Blanchett double nomination


Bleh:
NO ZODIAC ANYWHERE
Ruby Dee for American Gangster (she had like what, 5 minutes screen-time?)
Tim Burton snub
Russell Crowe/Christian Bale snubs
Three songs from Enchanted?
Surf's Up
Academy Award nominee Norbit
3:10 to Yuma not in any major categories
Ellen Page (I dunno why, I just hate this bitch)
I actually liked The Kite Runner and was hoping that it'd turn up for something other than just Score
Diving Bell and Persepolis off Foreign Language film? Or were they ineligible for some reason?

Most Deserving, Imo:
Daniel-Day Lewis
Viggo Mortensen
Javier Bardem
Amy Ryan
Ratatouille for Best Animation/Screenplay
Bourne for Editing
Coens for No Country for Old Men
Roger Deakins double cinematography nom for No Country and Jesse James

Based on the Upton Sinclair novel "Oil!", There Will Be Blood is a film produced, written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson. P.T. Anderson is perhaps most well known for his sprawling multi-character epics Boogie Nights (1997) and Magnolia (1999), as well as the quirky romance-comedy Punch Drunk Love (2002) with Adam Sandler.

Shooting began in mid-May 2006 in New Mexico and Marfa, Texas, with principal photography wrapping August 24, 2006. The film was released on December 26, 2007 in New York and Los Angeles. A sneak preview screening was held in 14 select cities on December 29, 2007. The national release is planned for January 11, 2008.


On imdb, it is described as "A story about family, greed, religion, and oil, centered around a turn-of-the-century Texas prospector (Daniel Day-Lewis) in the early days of the business."

There Will Be Blood stars Academy Award winner and three-time nominee, Daniel-Day Lewis (probably best known as Bill the Butcher in Gangs of New York) and Paul Dano (Little Miss Sunshine). Day-Lewis has won a slew of awards so far for his performance and is even expected to take him the Best Actor Oscar. The movie itself has been nominated for Best Picture at the Golden Globes and Critics' Choice Awards. Paul Thomas Anderson has been nominated for Best Director at the DGA, one of the most prestigious awards.

I am very interested in seeing this movie as I am a fan of Paul Thomas Anderson and Daniel-Day Lewis (this has to be like the most consistently good actor nowadays).


Additional Information
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movie trailer

We all have those, right? You see it on DVD or on cable and you absolutely love it and regret that you did not see it on that big silver screen. This could go also for those older movies that would've been cool as heck if you were alive back then to see it in the cinema. Maybe for the cinematography, maybe for the lush score, maybe for the special effects or visuals, or maybe it was just TOO DAMN COOL for the small screen. So what's your top 5 movies (or any five or you can't think of a top 5) that you wished you saw on the big screen?

Me?

1. Pulp Fiction
2. Saving Private Ryan
3. The Crying Game
4. The Shining
5. A Clockwork Orange

So I go to the cinema quite a bit - I'd say about once per week because every Thursday afternoon there's no classes at my university, even if it's to see something shitty (but not something embarrassing like Bratz or something). I really like going to the cinema because I like watching the movie with an audience and hearing the reactions and such. The downside is that sometimes there's a rowdy group that just annoy the crap out of you.

But that doesn't usually stop me from going to the cinema to see movies (recent examples) like The Departed, The Illusionist, 300, Zodiac and Hot Fuzz. I even went to see the 'smaller' films like Babel and Little Miss Sunshine in the theatre. I own alot of DVD's and I find that when I watch them home, I don't get the same effect. And there's lots of movies I wish I could have seen in the cinema - including old ones.

But I know people who prefer the comfort of their own homes to watch movies. Surround sound systems, lounging on their couch with a bowl of popcorn, etc. I'm all for that too but I often feel like it'll be much better in the theatre.

So where do you prefer watch your movies?

And what movies do you wish you saw at the cinema?

Some of mine are:

- Saving Private Ryan
- Pulp Fiction
- American Beauty
- The Green Mile
- Being John Malkovich
- Magnolia
- Traffic
- Silence of the Lambs
- A Clockwork Orange
- The Shining
- Fargo

Ugh I have so much more but I'll stop there.