Tag Archives: Helena Bonham Carter

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What I’ve Watched in my First Week on 2013

Happy Monday all! This the first FULL work week I have for a while now, I’m definitely gonna miss the partial work week from the Holiday season, ahah.

In lieu of a weekend roundup, I thought I’d share how my movie watching has been in its first week of the new year. Actually it’s been rather slow and I haven’t been to the movie theater since The Hobbit over a week ago. Not that I miss going to the cinema, though some things are definitely meant to see on the big screen, which is why we’d go see Life of Pi next weekend.

AMCtheater

I miss the movie-going experience, though not the waiting-in-line part

I’ll be going to a couple of advanced screenings this week, but due to the embargo, I can’t talk about ‘em yet. Let’s just say one of them is likely going to be in the running for Academy Awards nominations and the other one is a period action film starring a few very popular actors. So anyways, I’ve only seen about three movies so far and three of them were new to me.

  • The Shop Around the Corner (1940)
    ShopAroundtheCornerPoster    The inspiration for You’ve Got Mail starring Margaret Sullavan and James Stewart is lovely. I didn’t know it was set in Hungary. Though the mail correspondent part wasn’t as prominent a plot as the remake, but the scene at the cafe were pretty much identical.
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    I need to watch more James Stewart movies, I think The Philadelphia Story is next! Oh, I also like Frank Morgan as the store owner Mr. Matuschek!
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  • Safety Not Guaranteed (2012)
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    SafetyNotGuaranteedPosterI’m so glad I finally saw this. I’ve been seeing a ton of great reviews on this one, glad it was available on iTunes. All of the actors were unknown to me, but I was impressed by Aubrey Plaza and Mark Duplass. The story is wonderfully bizarre and it was full of quirky characters as well. Duplass (who reminds me a bit of Sean Bean) plays Kenneth, a supermarket employee who put a classified ad seeking a companion for time travel, and Plaza plays Darius, one of the three magazine employees who head out on assignment to write a story on it.
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    The premise makes for off-the-wall and hilarious scenarios, but yet the story ends up being quite heartfelt, especially when it’s between Kenneth and Darius. It keeps you guessing throughout up until that whoa! ending. It’s the kind of ending that makes you stand up and cheer despite how preposterous it is, definitely one of the most original time-travel stories I’ve ever watched. If you’re looking for great, memorable characters and emotional gratification, this movie is not to be missed. I quite like the music too, my favorite part was when Kenneth sang The Big Machine with a Zither!
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  • The Wings of the Dove (1997)
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    WingsoftheDovePosterI’ve been wanting to see this movie for quite a while, especially when someone mentioned about the memorable scene at the London Tube. Well, there’s that and a boat load of memorable rainy scenes in Venice too!
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    It’s based on a 1902 novel by Henry James. The tagline says it all: A couple with everything but money. An heiress with everything but love. A temptation no one could resist. Helena Bonham Carter in one of her plethora of period dramas was quite bewitching as a young woman, Kate, who’s torn between love and her privileged life. She’s basically an impoverished girl who’s taken up by her wealthy aunt (Charlotte Rampling), but she’s in love with a penniless journalist Merton (Linus Roache). When she befriends a dying American heiress Millie (Alison Elliot), she concocts a plot to enable her to have her cake and eat it too, but things don’t exactly go according to plan.
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    Oh, the things people in the name of love… the chemistry between Helena and Linus was scorching, but man, it’s awful and sad how far Kate is willing to do to get what she wants. It’s really a dark, twisted and poignant love story. It certainly makes for a passionate and ravishing period drama. Both HBC and Linus were captivating, Linus was quite mesmerizing, he’s got such an uncanny resemblance to Christian Bale, no wonder he was cast as Bruce Wayne Sr! Bonham-Carter was nominated for an Oscar for this role. I pretty much love all the performances, down to the supporting roles with thespians like Michael Gambon and Charlotte Rampling.
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    It’s the kind of story that lingers long after the end credits. In fact, I kept thinking about it all night all the way until this morning. I feel like this film deserves a full write-up, which I still may do in the future. The cinematography alone is breathtaking… all in all a bewitching adaptation.
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  • Indiana Jones & The Last Crusade (re-watch)
     It never fails to entertain. Sean Connery + Harrison Ford pairing is just brilliant, plus there River Phoenix in the beginning as the young Indy. I wish he were still alive today, I’d rather see him than Shia in the fourth installment! Anyway, we also watched the making-of documentary which was pretty cool as Spielberg went almost scene-by-scene on various locations.

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Well, glad to report that the three new ones were all very enjoyable. So what movies did you watch in the first week of the New Year?

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Weekend Roundup: Musings on A Room with a View

It’s Monday again! Did you all have a nice weekend? Well, it’s a nice one weather-wise here in the Twin Cities, in fact, it could very well be one of the best Halloween weather ever. We usually get snow or unusually chilly temps, but yesterday there wasn’t a cloud in the gorgeous blue sky and it was warm enough to forgo your jacket!

Friday was Girls Movie Night for October, where my girlfriends and I take turn hosting dinner and a movie. A Room with a View had been on our to-watch list for some time, but due to a couple of snafus on my part, we haven’t been able to get the movie until now. It’s a Merchant-Ivory period drama starring a then 19-year-old Helena Bonham Carter set in Edwardian England at the turn of the 20th century. I suggested this movie after reading all the accolades this movie got (winning 3 Oscars, and a slew of other awards), and the story of illicit romance appeals to me.

The movie opens with a gorgeous view of Florence where Lucy Honeychurch (Bonham Carter) and her chaperon Charlotte Bartlett (Maggie Smith) are vacationing. Unfortunately, they didn’t get the view from the room they were promised to get, and they complain about it over dinner (I suppose I’d be too given the view is of the Ponte Vecchio bridge over Arno river!). Upon learning about the situation, fellow guests Mr. Emerson and his son George gladly give up their room-with-a-view to Lucy and Charlotte. Before long, sparks fly between George and Lucy, and George makes sure Lucy knows it. But Charlotte reminds Lucy that George isn’t the perfect suitor, as the Emersons aren’t as socially acceptable (basically for being too ‘open’ for such a stifled society), and so she must let her go and marry someone her family would approve. To complicate matters, the Emersons end up becoming their neighbors and not only disrupts her nuptial plans but also challenge her way of thinking, as well as those closest to her.

Perhaps I should give this movie another go, but upon initial viewing, it didn’t wow me as much as I thought it would. I like the premise of the movie, but I thought the movie is kind of all over the place and boring at times. I actually dozed off the last 15 minutes of the movie, I did wake up just before the closing credits when George & Lucy sit by the window exactly like in the movie poster. It’s quite obvious the plot is predictable, but I don’t mind that so much if I can just get into characters. Aside from their first unexpected but passionate kiss in the fields, I never quite get into the main love story. The baby-faced Bonham Carter captured the sweet innocence of her character, yet she just wasn’t captivating enough for me to root for her. But the worst part is Julian Sands’ stilted performance, which pretty much drew jeers from my girlfriends for his unconvincing delivery. He just wasn’t compelling enough in the ‘romeo’ role, in fact, there’s a lack of emotion from the romance the entire plot is built on, which is a pity as it would’ve been a far more engaging movie. There are strong performances from Maggie Smith and Judi Dench, but the scene stealer here is the unrecognizable Daniel Day-Lewis as Cecil, Lucy’s bookish and pretentious fiance. His character is a stark contrast to the free-spirited, fun-loving George, and we’re supposed to dislike him, but his amusing portrayal truly is one of the highlights of the movie. No wonder Daniel’s career is light years ahead of the actor in the lead role.

Photo courtesy of Pixelcrave.net

Oh, one thing I didn’t quite expect from this period drama is the scene of male frontal nudity in the skinny dipping scene. I’m not talking about a brief glimpse but an extensive scene of the three male characters being shown clowning around freely in and out of water, there’s even a chase scene that lead to the women discovering George and Lucy’s brother Freddy in their birthday suit. I suppose it’s meant to show the stark contrast between the openness of the modern sensibilities and the repressed culture of the day, which seems to suggest that modesty equals ‘uptight.’ Well, call us old fashioned but we we were as taken aback as the female characters in the movie and we certainly won’t be comfortable running into guys skinny dipping in real life. The scene itself is pretty hilarious, it wasn’t scandalous or obscene, but it did take us away from the movie for a little bit.

Overall, it’s a decent movie and I’m glad I watched it, but I can’t say I love it. It’s a gorgeous movie for sure, what with the Florentine art and architecture, the melodious Beethoven music and the picturesque scenes of Italy and English countryside, if only the romance is equally bewitching. If anything though, it made me want to go back to Firenze pronto!

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Anybody has seen this film? Well, what did you think?