Happy Monday, everyone! I’m actually still enjoying another day off today 😀 Well, staying in for the holiday break has quite a bit of perks. Besides not having to deal with holiday traffic, I also got to enjoy more movies than I usually around to in a typical weekend. I like mixing up genres when I watch movies, so after watching The Last of the Mohicans
on Wednesday night, my hubby and I were planning on seeing Tangled with another friend after a hearty Thanksgiving lunch. We had bought tickets for the Disney flick but at the last minute we decided to see Social Network instead which was playing five minutes after.
Not sure what took me so long, but I’m certainly glad I finally got to see The Last of the Mohicans. As I had just seen Master & Commander just a couple of weeks ago, I kind of saw some similarities not only because both are period films taking place roughly around the same time (only about 50 years apart), but they both have strong leading men who carry the movie on their buff shoulders.
Daniel Day-Lewis is nothing short of electrifying as Hawkeye, an adopted son of a dying tribe called the Mohicans. Set during the French and Indian war in 18th century colonial America, it’s got a wonderful mix of action/adventure and unabashed romance at the heart of the story. It’s probably going to be on my top five Michael Mann films (though not having seen Collateral and Ali yet I probably should wait until I do).
Well, I’m probably the last person to see Social Network. I wasn’t too interested in it as I’m not a regular Facebook user but was intrigued by all the hype and stellar reviews (97% on RottenTomatoes, wow!). It’s hard to keep expectation in check with that kind of buzz but luckily, the film delivered. It truly captured the spirit of our generation and a fascinating look at the rise of the social media phenomenon.
You don’t need to do a ton of research to know the movie took much liberty with the story of FB founder Mark Zuckerberg, which makes Social Network more fascinating than a standard biopic because the subject of the story wasn’t even involved in the making of the film. But I was mostly curious to see the movie as an art form as I really don’t even care much about the subject matter to begin with, and in that regard, David Fincher did an amazing job. The film kept my attention the whole time, it was taut and gripping, more so than a lot of stuff out there billed as a ‘thriller.’ Performances were great all around, particularly Jesse Eisenberg as Zuckerberg and Andrew Garfield as his BFF Eduardo Saverin. I’ve noticed Garfield in Red Riding trilogy and Never Let Me Go and was really impressed by his screen presence. I think the 27-year-old Brit’s got a nice blend of leading man quality with character actor sensibility, not a bad thing to have for any actor. Justin Timberlake also turned in a compelling and humorous performance as the Napster founder Sean Parker.
This weekend I also re-watched How To Train Your Dragon that we bought on Black Friday and loved it even more the second time around. So yeah, it was definitely worth every penny! And last night I finally got to see Part I of the Pillars of the Earth 8-part miniseries. I like it so far, but then again I’m always fond of movies with lots of Brits in ’em… and it doesn’t hurt that Rufus Sewell is involved 🙂 I’ll post my review once I’m done with the whole thing.
Oh, I also want to share that I’ve got a french crime thriller Le Samouraï scheduled to arrive tomorrow that I’m quite excited about. I’ve always wanted to see an Alain Delon movie (who was one of my late mother’s favorite actors) but haven’t got around to it for some reason. Thanks for This Guy Over Here‘s list, I finally added it to my queue.
So, what movie(s) did you manage to see this past weekend?
FLIXCHATTER FILM BLOG 
Good gravy is that ever one amazing weekend’s worth of movie watching!!
MOHICANS is one of my all-time favorite films, and shows DDL and Mann at their best. I’d recommend people watch the movie just for that amazing kiss between DDL and Stowe under the waterfall!
Ha..ha.. yes it was indeed, Hatter, and I didn’t eat even a spoonful of gravy 🙂 I feel so left out not having seen Mohicans since that seems to be a lot of people’s faves. I can see why! DDL is always good but I love Mann’s direction here, too. That love scene at the barn (or whatever it was) was hot, too… but yeah, that kiss under the waterfall is heart wrenching considering what’s gonna happen next.
You’re not the last person to see The Facebook Movie. I haven’t seen it, and really don’t care much. 🙂
We saw Brazil (really weird), Pat & Mike (reviewed), HP7.1 (yay!), and re-watched Kiss Me Kate. Good weekend.
Three cheers for Last of the Mohicans … looooooved that movie when it came out. Mostly because, well … it’s pretty. 😀
I think Social Network is worth seeing, the topic itself is fascinating regardless of what one think about FB and fine acting all around.
I’ll check out your Pat & Mike review later today. What is Brazil about?? Oh glad you got to see HP7 Part 1, hope you enjoyed it.
Did you see Mohicans at the theater? Jealous! Would’ve looked awesome on the big screen.
LOL My girlfriends and I saw LotM in the theater probably at least 5 times. *sigh* Daniel Day-Lewis running …
Brazil is a very bizarre 80s “sci fi” film, set in a dystopian future, etc. It was written/directed by Terry Gilliam, so that should tell you something. I probably should have reviewed it, but it was just so strange and trippy that I didn’t feel like trying to wrap my head around it. I think I described it to someone as “Orwell’s 1984 tripping on LSD.”
WOW, 5 times huh? Now that’s hard core, I think the most I’ve seen any movie in the theater is 3 times! But yes, he is one of those people who looks great running. Oh and he’s soooo romantic in this movie, he’s probably an inspiration to all those Harlequin romance novels with his long hair and muscular um, chest 🙂 Btw, don’t you love that scene when he stared at her longingly… and she can’t help staring back… [swoon] DDL is da bomb!
Ah, Terry Gilliam, his films are definitely not for everyone. I think that’d be too weird for me from the sound of it. I think I’ll watch Dr. Parnassus instead.
Saw the 1970 Wuthering Heights with Timothy Dalton as Heathcliff. Mr. Dalton played Heathcliff as a textbook version of Lawrence Olivier in the 1939 film, they both played the character almost identically, which is a plus, IMO, and makes you wonder if TD wasn’t an avid student of Olivier. But Cathy and the rest of the cast were all more exaggerated than the ’39 cast, overall I liked the 1939 version better.
And Last of the Mohicans is now in my queue!
Ohhhh Wuthering Heights!! You should just ask me, I think I have the Dalton version. Well he’s been compared to Olivier a lot, I mean the kinda look a like (tall, dark & handsome!) and both are from theater background. He probably did look up to Olivier.
I LOVE his Heathcliff, sooo deliciously brooding and the movie is pretty dark. I don’t care for the girl playing Cathy though, it’d have been a better production with a better actress IMO.
I think you’ll enjoy Mohicans. Plenty of eye candy both in the people and scenery 😀
Glad you’re enjoying time away from here!! The Last of the Mohicans is quite a film. I remember watching the Masterpiece Theater version of that story as a kid. When it came to the big screen I didn’t know what to expect. Very well done!
I tried to watch that Dragon Tattoo movie, but dang was it sloooooow and the subtitles got old. So, being a typical “short attention span” American I cut my losses after an hour.
Saw “Eat Pray Love”. What a crock! Naturally the GF would disagree.
Yes, a stay-cation is pretty nice. I didn’t want to travel since we’ll be away around Christmas… I generally avoid holiday travel as much as possible.
Vince was telling me about Dragon Tattoo, so you saw the Swedish version then? Not my kind of flick so I think I’ll skip that.
Ha..ha.. didn’t you get my warning in this post? https://flixchatter.wordpress.com/2010/08/13/who-will-win-the-weekend-the-expendables-vs-eat-pray-love/ Though Expendables wasn’t exactly a good alternative, either. I don’t even want to see it even though it was partly shot in Bali. My friend’s relative happened to work as a production assistant during filming and so she met all the cast on the set. She said Roberts was really friendly, but Javier Bardem was a total snob (didn’t even look her in the eye every time she greeted him), but his wife Penelope Cruz who visited him was quite nice.
Geez, I need to see Le Samourai again. Been a long time and Melville is one of my all-time favorite directors. Ever seen anything else by him?
So I take it you like Le Samourai? No, I’m not familiar with Melville, but if I really like this one I might check out his other work.
Glad you enjoyed The Last of the Mohicans, which is my favorite Michael Mann movie and one of my favorite film ever. You definitely need to see Collateral too, one of the most underrated film of last decade 🙂
I’ve added Collateral to my queue now. Then I should be able to make a proper Top 5 Michael Mann list 🙂
I’m not planning on watching SOCIAL NETWORK, since I don’t like the director’s opus, but I am extremely tempted since Justin Timberlake is one of my absolute favourite celebs 🙂
And I shall forever remember THE LAST OF THE MOHICANS for the angelic beauty and performance of Madeleine Stowe 🙂
Not a Fincher fan are you, Dez? Well I’m not hugely familiar with his work, but I did like Fight Club. Well, I’m actually not the biggest Timberlake fan, never has been and probably never will. But to be fair, the role was perfect for him and I can’t imagine anyone else playing Sean Parker.
Oh yeah, Madeleine was absolutely striking. I totally see how Hawkeye falls for her right away. She’s even more beautiful in the behind the scenes interview… such a classic beauty.
I haven’t seen the Social Network yet but i liked his performance in Alpha Dog. But then again, he probably took some acting lessons considering he has money to burn
I think Justin’s got a natural charm about him that makes him so watchable on screen. In general I don’t care for him though, I always think of him as the guy from N’Sync.
I was hoping that someday Mann would release the 3 hour version that he turned in to the studio, they forced him to cut it down to about 2 hours because they were afraid it won’t make any money. The film was actually scheduled to come out summer 1992 but because Mann had to do some more editing, they pushed the release date back to the fall of that year.
[SPOILER ALERT] The 3 hour version would’ve included the love story between Uncas and Alice, which was the main focus story in the book. You probably noticed in the movie that there were some hints that those two characters has some sort of connections. That’s the reason why she jumped off the cliff after Uncas was killed.
The film was a hit and I assume Mann decided to just keep this version, I do believe though that had the film tanked at the box office, we would’ve gotten the director’s cut by now.
I know I can always rely on you for movie trivia, Ted 😉 I totally wouldn’t mind seeing a 3-hour version of this. I actually think the movie seemed kinda short and though I did see the connection between Uncas and Alice, it was so underdeveloped that I didn’t fully understand why she did what she did.
I wish he’d still include his version in the dvd/bd release even though the film was a success.
Yeah I would love to see the 3 hour version too, but I can understand why the studio did what they did. At the time Mann hasn’t prove himself to be a bankable director yet and also Daniel Day-Lewis was an unknown to the American audience. Then there’s the interracial love story so yeah I think the studio executives were quite nervous.
I’m assuming that the reason why he’s still won’t release the 3 hour version is because maybe he doesn’t have the rights to do it. Same thing happened to Blade Runner, they planned to release The Final Cut version way back in 2000 but one of the producers of the film refused to agree to re-release it. He owns about 50% of the movie and apparently he hated the film so much that he was doing it out of spite. I think they settled on some kind of a deal and we finally got the The Final Cut version of Blade Runner.
Just saw Last of the Mohicans on DVD, and realized I had seen the very first part before on TV. As I keep watching, though, I hadn’t seen much beyond the first fort battle scene, and quickly figured out why. As I fast forwarded through one more fight, skirmish, assault, and scalping after another, and finally got to the end of the film, I thought “is that all there is?” Honestly, after moving quickly through those parts, there wasn’t much left to enjoy. DDL was just OK for me, I actually liked the real Native American, Russell Means, the best.
Pingback: Valentine Special: Spotlight on 14 Favorite Movie Couples – FlixChatter Film Blog