Date Night

Greetings from Sri Lanka for a very happy new year, everyone! I've been watching some movies, only didn't feel like reviewing them here. Well, not until I saw Dae Night. You Know, there are some books and movies that you just push aside for no reason and only read or watch them only  you have nothing else available and when you do, some of them are pretty good that you just wonder,"why the hell didn't I read/watch this before?  Well, date night was just like that.

The plot unfolds around a  married couple,  the Fosters, quite bored, stuck in the routines of domestic life, jobs, bringing up kids, you name it. One day, they go to a city restaurant for dinner, leaving the kids with a sitter. They reach the place pretty late, and can't get a table. Then Mr Foster decides to pretend themselves to be a couple who just didn't turn up for their reservation, and they make it to a table, only to get tangled up in trouble with some goons, as the couple they were pretending to be had some involvement with them. So the Fosters must use their wits to the best to get out of the mess. ................

The movie was pretty funny with fairly good acting from Steve Carell  and Tina Fey as the Fosters. Actually it was their acting specially Steve's that defines the movie altogether.      
 

One Wonderful Movie Is The Princes And The Frog

Hi folks, I couldn't wait to write this review after seeing The Princes And The Frog, for it was fabulous! My blogger buddy Nebular told me of another great movie!

The plot of this movie has obviously been inspired by the good old The Frog Prince fairy tale, but is very original. The graphics are crispy and so vividly colorful, making this one of the most visually striking films ever. The voices are perfect, the dialogs very lively throughout and often hilarious. You get to listen to a few pretty cool songs with such a unique blend of music.

For me, The Princes And The Frog was like one long, wonderful, lucid, dream. Many thanks to Nebular for this very persuasive review!

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Coraline, With An Unusual Theme For An Animation Movie, But Just Brilliant!

I often rely on my blogger friend Nebular's movie review blog, CineMarvellous, to decide on what movies to watch. That's how I got to know of Coraline.

Coraline was greatly different from all other animation films I've seen. The plot and the sequencing were mostly different. Coraline Jones, a little girl, moves in to a new house with her parents. She is very inquisitive, and finds her parents rather strict, boring, restricting. One day, a kid in the neighborhood brings her a rag doll, which, much to her surprise, looks remarkably like her. Coraline later on discovers a tiny, locked door in side the house. When her mother opens the door for her, Coraline is disappointed to see only brick wall behind it. But some time after, she learns that a the door indeed leads some where, under special circumstances, some where she gets to do or have anything that might be impossible with her parents. Little does she know that this newly discovered, too-good-to-be-true place is nothing she ever bargained for...........

The movie is brilliant in the way it slowly builds up tension, with the anticipation that something sinister is about to happen. The sequencing and some absolutely brilliant music enhances that effect. I have never seen any other movie using music for that purpose as effectively as Caroline. The dialogs,voices,graphics are all of great quality. I highly recommend this film to you all movie lovers.
See the review on  CineMarvellous

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I'm Not Scared, A great Movie Experiance!

I'm grateful to Nebular for posting a very good review of this film here on Cninemarvelous because that's how I came to know this movie. I went straight for a trailer in you tube  after reading his review. All looked very promising. When I finally watched the movie I was so glad that I did. Io Non Ho Paura, a.k.a. I'm not scared was a masterpiece. 



In this gripping Italian movie is a plot that takes your fullest attention through out. It cats a group of kids living quite happily in a breath taking countryside of Italy, playing about carefree like birds. One day they ride on to an abandoned building. One of  the kids, a boy, Fillipo, accidentally discovers a big hole dug on the ground and covered from above.   He takes a peek in to it gets a nasty shock when he sees  a child imprisoned inside.  


Fillipo slowly builds a rapport with this locked-up stranger, and tries to figure out who he is, why he is kept there, and by whom, not quite realizing how what reveals it self to him would affect him and what it would demand of him.

This plot is so strong and full of suspense, keeps you wondering what would happen next, and the end is as appealing as the beginning. And you get see one of the best acting performance of a child ever. The selection of the locations couldn't have been better. And the director has used some symbolic,   subtle things to express ideas that  a hundred words wouldn't. Io Non Ho Paura is a very good example as to how have thriller effects suspense in a  movie  with out using blood curdling action sequences. 

Inkheart

I just saw the movie Inkheart yesterday, and enjoyed it. It is about a father and a daughter who possess the mystical ability to bring the characters out of a story book if they read it aloud, an ability they didn't know they had until it was too late. I wouldn't go any deeper in to the plot here as I will only spoil it for you if I do.
I perceived this movie as one with a good mysterious plot that builds up lots of anticipation, and fairly good cinematography. I'm afraid acting performance of the cast in general is very mediocre.      This movie has been shot at some of the most beautiful locations I've ever seen.
Inkheart the movie wasn't as well received as the book on which it was inspired.
 I hope to get whole Inkheart trilogy and read it. If I do, I might post a review on Smart Readers, my book review blog.
 

Signs

I refer my favorite weekly science mag Vidusara in search of good sci-fi , movies to watch, and that's how I got to know of Signs. The review on the mag was impressive enough to persuade me to see the movie. The movie was really good in many aspects.

Lets start with the plot. Graham Hess (Mel Gibson)  lives in a large corn farm with his son and daughter. He had been a priest, but after the death of his wife in a terrible accident, he no more has faith in god. His son suffers from asthma, and his daughter is hydrophobic. his younger brother Merrill (Joaquin Phoenix) has come to live with them after the tragedy, leaving his baseball career behind. One morning, they are all shock to see a massive crop circles in the corn field. They first think it to be a hoax by a neighbor, but what follows the incident along the next few days  make them think otherwise. Strange figures appearing and disappearing at the farm in the dark, their dogs acting weird, other crop circles and UFO s appearing all over the world, and some other happenings that I wouldn't rather tell you so as not to spoil things for you, convince them of a possible alien invasion.   The plot flows on with how they face what comes for them in the end.

What I liked ,most about Signs is the suspense and thriller effect it generates. Sound effects, lighting,camera angles, pace, and the feeling of anticipation have been used to cause an optimum effect on the audience, and above them all is the brilliant acting performance of all key characters.     

Signs is more of a thriller/suspense movie, discusses deeply about man's faith, under the cover of a plot involving an alien invasion.   So why don't you have a go at it too?        

A bug's Life

A bugs life is  an animation movie about a colony of ants who were made slaves by a bunch of grass hoppers. I found the truly wonderful. 

There is a colony of ants who work hard for all some gathering food, only to offer a very large portion of it to a bunch of bullying grasshoppers. Flik is an ant who is considered an oddball by the rest of the colony. He always invent things, and tries to make a difference. The real starting point of the plot is when Flick's newly invented harvesting machine knocks the pile of offerings for the hoppers in to a water puddle in the haste of getting in to the anthill as the hoppers approach the colony looking for the usual offering. The grasshoppers are furious to find no offering, and threaten and order that the ants somehow gather food for the offering, "before the last leave fall".
              




The movie has a good plot, the voices are brilliant, dialogs are fantastic, and the graphics and animations are superb.