Animation

. Brett,, here is an animation I did today. It doesn't have sound yet though.

Sound is coming soon however. We have the softwear on our old steam powered laptop.

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Forbidden Lies Review

Brett>> Forbidden Lies is a movie by Anna Broinowski about Norma Khouri, and the two women are the commanding presences in it. Norma Khouri was revealed as a faker in 2004 for the writing of her book Forbidden Love (The book is no longer in print, pulled by the publishers when she was uncovered, but it is still possible to get it second hand, see link below).




The book put the issue of honour killings in Jordan on the map. This practice is where a man, or some men, from a family kill a female member of the family for having a relationship with a man that the family doesn't approve of. Norma Khouri’s book was about a young female friend of hers who had been stabbed to death by her father for a relationship with a Christian man. The movie is suspenseful and fascinating, the question of, `is there a real victim?´, `is it all lies?´ keeps you guessing till the end. Broinowski has left the film a little ambiguous about this point, even though in the DVD special features it becomes clear that she had made her mind up herself before even completing the filming. I think this was done for editorial purposes and to make the film more enjoyable, but it gave me the feeling that the film itself was faction and undeserving of the title `documentary´ (although I wouldn’t know what else to call it).
Babsi>> It was a very interesting film, because it also showed you a bit about the world of greedy publishers who keenly jumped on the book, because they could smell the big bucks, which the book then delivered. It was fascinating to also observe what kind of idea the west still has about Arabic countries. At the beginning the film showed the story of the woman in really glossy, almost cheesy colours with pretty people as a sort of dramatic soap opera. It already looks pretty strange and fake. Maybe this is how a lot of readers would imagine the book.
One funny example is e.g. that when Brett and I went to Tunisia we firmly believed that an oasis would consist of two palm trees and a pond. But then we saw one and it couldn't have been further away from the truth: it was huge with a lot of trees and water. It's just these weird ideas from maybe fairy tales or books that we have about these countries. It's also tricky, because books can intentionally or not incite hatred. I saw it happen when the book “Not without my daughter” came out in Germany. Hatred grows slowly and books can be totally used as propaganda to support it and explain political actions against countries.
One interesting fact of the film was also that these killings do happen in Jordan and that the Jordanian government tries to cover them up. They are trying to present a civilized Western front so they can get support from the United Nations. But on the other hand who is the West really to point fingers? This is what gets me: the Western countries are always quick to point fingers, in South Italy and Sicily women are pretty oppressed by their families as well, I have never actually heard of honour killings, but they do have a hard time. And Australia isn't exactly harmless when it comes to their own indigenous people. The situation of the indigenous people is dreadful and it is rarely talked about.
Brett>> The movie is thought provoking and not least because of the background of Khouri, she seems to have come from the wrong side of the tracks. I would give the movie three spirals. It isn't a classic of the genre like Fahrenheit 9/11 but it is interesting.

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Smart People Review

Brett>> I really loved SMART PEOPLE. It was a smart movie and I laughed my ass off at the same time. The family in the movie were a disfunctional bunch, sent off the rails by the death of the mother, and we join them in this movie just as they begin to get their act together after what is hinted at as a very long time.

Babsi>> It was very good, the casting was fantastic and very clever. The characters were all very different, smart but cranky professor, smart but kinda unhappy daughter, weird adopted brother funny and dry and the awsome Sarah Jessica Parker as certainly smart and very interesting doctor turned girlfriend. She really has this remarkable ability to create different characters in different films, I mean some people are always the boring same, but she is different. The script was great. What I thought was cool was that it didn’t try desperatly to be a cool or arty film. It just existed, kinda like life. Not like oh this is an arty film I better put weird effects and strange camera angles and maybe half of it black and white. No, it didn’t need that at all, the story just kinda spoke for itself. A bunch of interesting and weird people working out stuff…

Brett>> I loved Sarah Jessica Parker in this as well. She and Dennis Quaid had the grown up deep relationship in this movie and they really sold it. I also liked the other relationship between Quaid’s adopted brother (a middle aged loser) and his daughter (a high-school overachiever). The meeting of his slacker devil may care attitude and her prim control freakery was delicious. At one point she comes into the room and tells him that he should have made the bed because it sets the tone for the day, and he replies that she doesn’t know what tone he is trying to set. Right there we have the character that I most identify with, the slacker brother. I also liked how we see people reading and talking with passion about books at one moment and then drinking and making bad choices the next. We are all that mixture of wise and stupid, just like the people in the movie.

Babsi>> Yeah that was cool. The non smart brother was really interesting, it seemed that he was most happy and comfortable with his choices even though they might seem not soo cool and suitable in the real world. It was the smart people who had issues. Ellen Page as the daughter was a very interesting character, very set in her opinions kinda scary but fascinating. I guess we can assume once she gets herself to California to uni she will be happy and content. Her dad was very self absorbed though and she was really kinda lost in the world. Smart but lost, not an ideal combination. I have recently thought about the smart and bad weather combination. Maybe when its nice and sunny you don’t really need your brain that much?

Brett>> Yeah, this was set in Pitsburgh in the cold. The people had to stay home and read and talk. Maybe the movie wouldn’t have been so smart if it was set on Bondi Beach. So I’d give it five spirals. It was one of the best movies I’ve seen this year so far.

Babsi>> Definitely four spirals from me.

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Spirited Away

We are sitting in a hotel room in Sydney and it's really raining outside. Usually we have a great view of the Sydney Tower but it's impossible to see today through the rain clouds. Last night as we were up till all hours we watched spirited away on Australian TV (unfortunately the dubbed rather than the subtitled version). This is an animated movie from Japan about the adventures of a young girl who gets trapped in a strange Japanese traditional spirit world full of bath houses and priests and witches and other odd stuff. Babsi just said it always makes her cry, and it is a very emotional story. The quality of the animation is just fantastic. Every painted background is a work of art. The motivations of the characters are really strange and otherworldly, you just let yourself go and be taken along by the very strange dreamlike hypnotic story and when the ending eventually comes you'll be just a little sad to leave the spirit world, just like the character.

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Why do we watch the Oscars every year?

Babsi: Why do we always watch the Oscars? It's a rather seedy annoying event actually, although it depends on the presenter. I was surprised to see John Stewart presenting it for a second time. He was just as rubbish as last time really, although he seems to be a friendly soul.
Brett: What makes you say he was a kind friendly soul?
Babsi: Well he was really sweet, for example when he made sure that Marketa Irglova got to make her acceptance speech. That was extremely sweet and I think he organised that. So why do we bother? That was the question.
Brett: Who knows? What does it even mean? A bunch of people in LA like There Will Be Blood and No Country for Old Men. What's that got to do with me?
Babsi: Most of it is really, really cheesy but there are always touching moments. A touching moment was when Marion Cottilard won her Oscar, and she deserved it, well deserved it. It was a great film and a fantastic performance. And the second one was of course when the people from Once won. I was very, very happy for them. It is such a beautiful film. There's no violence in it, it doesn't need any action. They just do their thing and it's just beautiful. It really is cute.
Brett: The Oscar was for the song, and it really fits with the mood of the movie.

Babsi: Yeah, the song's genius actually. So there were these two really special moments, even though you think you're just going to see the same old cheesy rubbish and predictable stuff.
Brett: I liked Tilda Swinton as well, when she won. It obviously shocked her very much and she gave a great speech. It was cool.
Babsi: Yes she gave a great speech, it was funny.
Brett: It surprised me actually. She looks a little austere and librarian like but when she got up on stage she was like a mall rat.
Babsi: And then she was talking about the statuette's butt.
Brett: And George Clooney's rubber nipples on his Bat Man outfit.
Babsi: And you know I haven't seen Daniel Day Lewis's performance but I'm sort of pleased for him because I just like him.
Brett: I thought he was weird. Like a peculiar uncle with his long preying mantis arms and legs flailing about.
Babsi: He is a bit weird, but he's interesting. He was really, really good in In The Name of the Father. Awesome, an ancient movie but we know it because we're kind of ancient. So there always some little surprises. It's the same as Lost, just as you've given up there is a little surprise to keep your interest. I would say that Marion Cottilard's performance was great and the film was excellent. It was really sad. A bad performance could have made it a little pathetic or unbelievable, but she didn't. The way she played Edith Piaf when she was old.
Brett: That was very good, it was.
Babsi: For the same actress to play some one fairly young and quite old is amazing. It was the calibre of Bette Davis.
Brett: She looks a bit like Bette Davis to me.
Babsi: You mean in the film?
Brett: Yes, with the old-fashioned plucked eyebrows.
Babsi: How many times can a person be nominated. I mean Johnny Depp has been nominated how many times?
Brett: Well nobody expected him to win.
Babsi: He could have won for Pirates, but then pirates was categorised as a kids film.
Brett: He should have won for pirates, and they will give him an Oscar one day.
Babsi: Yeah, when he's ancient. When he's 80 or something and not hot anymore, for goodness sake.
Brett: He'll be given an Oscar for something quite reserved with a big scene where he cries, but it's really Pirates he'll be getting it for. I think they'll make him turn up five more times before they give it to him, maybe ten.
Babsi: He should have won for Ed Wood, that was a really good performance.
Brett: Films like La Vie En Rose win Oscars, having your lover die, going bonkers in a hotel room, fading and dying, that's what wins Oscars. Not being a slightly cheesy movie director with a permanent grin.
Babsi: (Laughs) You're so cruel.
Brett: That was the acting, it was a permanent grin.
Babsi: There was a lot more to the acting, I don't agree. He was very good.
Brett: I think he should have got it for Hunter S Thompson in...
Babsi: Fear and Loathing.
Brett: Now that was a really good performance.
Babsi: It was an awesome performance. But you know you can't reward somebody with an Oscar for doing lots of drugs and running around saying, “I'm seeing the bats.” You can't do that. The Documentary on the Iraq war winning was interesting. In the past they booed Michael Moor in his acceptance speech and his speech was awesome. I always wanted to write him an email saying, “Dude, respect.” I thought that was good and it takes guts. It's easier not to be confrontational when you accept something. This always reminds me of the funny acceptance speech in living in oblivion. When Steve Buschemi in his dreams gets what's supposed to be an Oscar and at the end he tells everyone to get lost, and then he wakes up. It's funny, really funny. He dreams he has the guts to tell all the people who have been mean to him where to go. But it's a good institution, because in a way it's a huge recognition for what you've done. Though it won't promise you any more parts. Lots of people have just sort of disappeared even though they won an Oscar.
Brett: I think it's just a brand.
Babsi: No there are good people being recognised for good work.
Brett: I'm always a little disappointed every year when I watch it.
Babsi: There was one year when it wasn't disappointing. When Julia Roberts won, and Denzel Washington won, and Halle Berry won.
Brett: I suppose the Oscars represent the power in Hollywood and when you see something like that happening...
Babsi: It seems that the power is still with white men. Directors are men and they're white, and that's a big thing. The director is a very, very important person.
Brett: When an Oscar is given to a black woman, it shows that something is changing.
Babsi: You see you're not even saying black man anymore, it's 2008.
Brett: Just because you said Halle Berry and it reminded me...
Babsi: Sure, her acceptance speech was pretty good, I liked it. There was a bit of crying but it was still...
Brett: It was real, it was a real emotion.
Babsi: And it's easy, by discrimination, to deny people a chance. Talent is a very tricky thing to define. Most of the musical performances nominated for an Oscar were shriekingly terrible. That woman singing the song from Enchanted was terrible, really awful. Mindbogglingly rubbish.
Brett: It was just dull I thought.
Babsi: Apart from Marketa Irglova and Glen Hansard, that was great.
Brett: It was the only good song in the whole show.
Babsi: That's not really good enough is it.
Brett: I'll give it one spiral.
Babsi: That's cruel.
Brett: No. I mean it.
Babsi: I like the way Johnny Depp just sat in the audience and chewed gum. That was a way of saying, “I don't care about this whole thing.” I quite liked that, it was funny.
Brett: Why did he even go?
Babsi: If your nominated, you have to.
Brett: You can send someone to pick it up for you.
Babsi: You can do that at the Grammys or the BAFTAs whatever it's called, but you can't do it at the Oscars. Did John Stewart present it because of the writers strike, couldn't they get anyone else in such a short time.
Brett: Why did he do it again? He's good on his own show but this is a whole different kettle of fish.
Babsi: I enjoyed the hosting by Whoopi Goldberg, many, many gazillion years ago. And I liked Chris Rock because he was funny. Still one spiral is too harsh, I'm going to give it two and a half. There were three people who won that made me believe it wasn't just commercial rubbish.

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Review of "Definitely, Maybe"

Babsi: We saw Definitely, Maybe yesterday. I think it was interesting. Shall we review it? What did you think of it?
Brett: I really enjoyed it, I thought it was great.
Babsi: Why?
Brett: Well it was really well written, funny all the usual stuff. It was like When Harry Met Sally funny.
Babsi: It's not as good as When Harry Met Sally because, it was good, but the acting wasn't all that great. The main actor is no Billy Crystal and none of those three women are a Meg Ryan.
Brett: I get a bad vibe off him actually. I had to ignore that to enjoy the movie.
Babsi: Really?
Brett: Yeah.
Babsi: No he was ok, he was alright.
Brett: Well we'll see. I've got nothing to base it on. I'll have to do a bit of research in Hello and OK, see what his private life is like.
Babsi: Well no, you can't judge an actor by what his private life is like, that's ridiculous. I don't agree with that.
Brett: Tom Cruise
Babsi: Ah Tom Cruise is just an idiot, we know that. He's a complete freak. Yeah but that's wrong, to judge somebody by their private life.
Brett: He seems to have bad vibes, like he's not nice.
Babsi: I thought he was too nice to be true actually, in the part.
Brett: But it seemed to me that was an act. Like he was gritting his teeth through it.
Babsi: Maybe, so you didn't quite buy his acting. What I thought was brilliant about the film was that it was set in during the first Clinton campaign and he was trying to get Clinton elected. He was phoning people up and trying to sell them tickets to fund-raising dinners, that was funny. The whole background was interesting. I liked the people who worked there, especially the copy girl person. She was cool, she got a bit soppy with the whole proposing thing and that was cheesy but it's an American movie and you've got to expect a bit of cheese.
Brett: There was a lot of cheese, like the kid being very grown up and wise about relationships, that was so cheesy.
Babsi: It was a bit cheesy but I like Abigail Braislin. She was very good in Little Miss Sunshine.
Brett: She acted it well, yeah.
Babsi: She acted it really well.
Brett: But it's a cheesy contrived thing to make a story move along. And that was the first thing on screen, so my initial reaction was, “Oh dear. What have I let myself in for?” But it worked in the end.
Babsi: It did work. I think it did work. She was a bit too good to be true. All the characters were a bit too good to be true. The copy girl wasn't though she was a bit more interesting.
Brett: In the end she was. He told her to get her act together and she became the head of some charity fund-raising company or something and all of a sudden was a millionaire living in a brown stone in New York.
Babsi: You always get that, the big whopping enormous apartments. But then the main character went through a time when he was just drinking and not really getting anything together and lived in a small apartment and I reckon that was fairly realistic. But it was good, it leaves you with a good feeling, which I usually don't get from American movies.
Brett: It was good and it was about a modern relationship.
Babsi: Little Miss Sunshine was a lot better. You really can't compare it at all.
Brett: I loved Little Miss Sunshine
Babsi: It was good. That really was a good movie. But it was an independent one and Definitely, Maybe is a blockbuster. There's your big difference. Although not all art movies are good, Last Days for example is destined for our bottom drawer ( bottom drawer list will follow soon). It's a sort of arty movie about Kurt Kobain and it's terrible.
Brett: It's rubbish, nobody says anything the whole movie. There's a couple of grunts and one yelp but no dialog.
Babsi: You see his butt in the first scene and you think, “This could be a good movie.”
Brett: (Shrieks)
Babsi: Well yeah, but you know...
Brett: That's when the dread really started to set in for me.
Babsi: Well we are different. He looked ok, nice butt.
Brett: It was a bit pale.
Babsi: But leaving that aside, Rachel Weisz's character was quite interesting.
Brett: Yeah, but she put her job first, she was a journalist and she was doing a story on a politician the main character was working for and she went easy on the politician for him...
Babsi: No but she didn't, she published the dirt.
Brett: No she didn't and she got criticised for that so she did a follow up article. She really did her research, and that was when she found out he was dodgy and then published the dirt. And then she got criticised and everyone called her a “bitch”, but I thought if that was a mail character he'd be applauded for it.
Babsi: Ah, I see, I see. That's an interesting point.
Brett: When I saw it I thought, “Now that's weird.”
Babsi: Yeah but, it is very complicated. That sort of ended their relationship didn't it.
Brett: Yeah, that was a deal breaker. He walked out and they didn't see each other for a long time, and they were never close again. Just like that, over.
Babsi: But that's pretty realistic in a way. It can happen. Do you mean a woman would be more forgiving if she was working on a campaign and her boyfriend journalist wrote a negative piece on her candidate? Probably not. It's quite bad if you work for somebody and you write an article about their boss being dodgy.
Brett: I just thought if it was a male character, would people be saying, “It was wrong of him to do his job well?”
Babsi: Her character was really interesting. I thought all the female characters were quite interesting.
Brett: Yeah, apart from the high school sweetheart.
Babsi: But she slept with the flatmate, that was cool.
Brett: That was cool and modern, I liked that.
Babsi: It was interesting and modern so they didn't quite dare to paint her as quite fantastic and perfect, because the main character did at the beginning and you thought, “Oh dear, this is dull.” It was written well, it was a good script.
Brett: It was very witty.
Babsi: It was very funny. I loved his friends, the other guy on the campaign was funny, he was cool.
Brett: You just thought he was pretty. He didn't get the best lines and he wasn't the best actor.
Babsi: I thought he was pretty good.
Brett: He was all right.
Babsi: No I liked him.
Brett: I know you liked him that doesn't mean we can tell everyone he was a good actor.
Babsi: Beans to you, I thought he was a good actor and you'd better agree or you'll get some sand in your face.
Brett: Because we are lying on Bondi Beach recording this on a mobile phone, that's what the sand in the face thing is about.
Babsi: Yay, life is a breeze.
Brett: Life's a dream.
Babsi: On a Monday, I hate Mondays.
Brett: But this movie is good is what we are saying right.
Babsi: I thought it was good. I really liked the fact that it was set during the Clinton campaign. That was cool and they'd researched their stuff well. It was set in the early 90s and that was clever, and there was one bit where George W was on TV. He was just on TV and that was interesting.
Brett: Everyone was saying “Who's this idiot.”
Babsi: Yes! That was cool. I guess for an American movie, that makes it pretty out there. For an American romantic comedy it was pretty out there.
Brett: For an American movie I got a left wing vibe from it, because it showed divorce in a positive light. It wasn't conservative, I don't think, although he did get disillusioned with Clinton after working for him.
Babsi: I liked that, because it's in the beginning that you're all enthusiastic. Like the copy girl character, because she was all... she didn't give a monkey's. She worked on the campaign but she didn't care at all, which was interesting because if people work for the president you expect them to want him to win and that they're all behind it. But of course that's not the case. It never is. I thought she was cool and she had some cool views and I really liked her the most. She was funny and sort of quirky.
Brett: There was a cool scene where he criticised her cigarette choice because they were a bit more expensive than his Marlboroughs. He told her that she was just paying for the logo and she told him that hers actually costed less. They had a bet, and they went outside for a smoking race. And it turned out that his had a chemical in that made them burn faster and his was finished first.
Babsi: It was kind of funny and kind of clever.
Brett: There was lot's of well written stuff where they were flirting without really flirting. Yeah it was really cool. As a love story it worked really well.
Babsi: It did work really well, and they had good chemistry, and it was quite believable, They were just friends for a long time and she dated some hot dude called Kevin.
Brett: That was funny because it seemed like she'd made him up. It was almost like after they had that conversation she went out and found someone called Kevin. Because he didn't believe there was a Kevin.
Babsi: No I believed her, she was cute.
Brett: I didn't believe it either. When he went to the flat a month later and there was a Kevin there I was surprised. It was a funny scene anyway.
Babsi: There were a couple of things that could have been rubbish, like the book thing. You could have thought, “How tedious.” but it wasn't.
Brett: By the time the book turned up I liked the movie so much that I thought, “Oh well, I'm going to go with it.” And the kid thing, in another movie, nope, click, turn off.
Babsi: You had tears in your eyes though.
Brett: I was crying a bit, I liked it.
Babsi: Ah, what made you cry. You cried at Titanic as well.
Brett: That was only once though, in this one I cried two or three times. When she finally realised that she liked him too and she came back from Europe. But he already fancied someone else and he hadn't told her. She was crushed and I started crying a little bit.
Babsi: Ah, you're tragic.
Brett: She was being brave, she just pretended she didn't love him after all and gave him a hug, and was happy for him and stuff. And she did, like this wet eyes thing very well, like bambi. She did it three or four times in the movie and I got wise to it after a while and I even thought she might be just putting some chemical in there to make her eyes glisten. But the first time on the street when her eyes went watery it got to me.
Babsi: In Titanic they had to close the cinema because it was flooding with tears.
Brett: I'm going to declare this review over unless you behave yourself.
Babsi: No you behave yourself, and admit that you cried at Titanic.
Brett: I did, but so did you!
Babsi: No I didn't.
Brett: Yes you did.
Babsi: I did not.
Brett: You wept, it went beyond crying into weeping.
Babsi: You wept, you wept buckets. The cinema was drenched, they had to close the place afterwards. They had to put up a sign saying: "Closed because of too much crying." How lame is that?
Brett: You didn't wail, but you had to stifle the wails, there were some grunts and some snuffles.
Babsi: Titanic is beyond anything, it will be featured in our bottom drawer for being rubbish. So how many spirals for Definitely, Maybe then?
Brett: Not five that's for sure, but not one. Three?
Babsi: Three seems about right.

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I Am Legend

Babsi: Lets discuss “I Am Legend”. We watched it in Nelson two weeks ago now and I sort of expected the typical creepy zombie movie with freaks around and that sort of stuff. Which it kind of was in the end as well. I thought Will Smith’s performance was excellent. It was really good the way he talked to the dog at the start and then when the dog is dead he is alone, that was excellent. The flash backs were very clever but in the end it turned a little bit religious and strange.

Brett: That scene where the serum, the blood reaches the settlement, reaches safety, the town that is going to save everything, and it is such an American stereotype of a place.

Babsi: Yep. The Americans always have to do that. They always have to chuck in this type of thing somewhere.

Brett: There is this white-painted wooden church with the stars and stripes flying. But I still loved the movie, I really, really enjoyed it. It scared the daylights out of me.

Babsi: It didn’t scare me.

Brett: You weren’t scared?

Babsi: Mmm, it was a bit predictable. There were some good bits, very arty Ideas with the manikin. The zombies used the manikin to trap him. That was very cleverly done.

Brett: Yeah the manikin he said hello to every day. The zombie took it and used it as bait in a trap after he’d used blood as bait in a trap for them.

Babsi: That was really clever and sort of unpredictable in a way.

Brett: Yeah. I even had seen a photograph from the movie of him hanging from the lamppost, and it still caught me by surprise.

Babsi: The photography was absolutely outstanding. In the beginning New York overgrown by jungle, I mean that is just a cool image, stunning. In cities like Singapore and Sydney you don’t have to do that because they are overgrown by jungle anyway, so it doesn’t really matter, but in a place like New York it’s more like a concrete jungle. And all the animals at the beginning, that was well done.

Brett: Although I think the animals were a little bit computer graphicsey sometimes.

Babsi: No, I didn’t think so.

Brett: They would move too fast for a real animal, turn corners that were too tight.

Babsi: It wasn’t too bad I thought.

Brett: No they were good. It wasn’t too bad, I’ve seen a lot worse.

Babsi: It was a clever story but the problem is that these films are good at the beginning and in the middle sort of just go a bit off.

Brett: What was that point in the middle that…?

Babsi: When that woman appeared, it just didn’t really work.

Brett: Yeah, I agree, up until that moment it was all absolutely hanging together and then when she effortlessly rescues him, off screen, just by setting off a few fireworks.

Babsi: That was absolutely ridiculous. I didn’t trust her either. I thought she was spy for the zombies.

Brett: She was so unbelievable, you didn’t trust her. As if she was so unbelievable on purpose. She was so well groomed. I thought he was fantasizing her for a moment.

Babsi: She kept talking about the colony, and how the colony actually existed. I thought “What’s that all about?” But there were lots of interesting details in the movie that I liked. For example, he liked listening to Bob Marley. It was a good scene and his apartment is really interesting. He kept watching the old news which was interesting and confusing at the same time.

Brett: The only clue that it was old news was a tape counter box at the bottom of the screen and other than that it wasn’t explained at all. I liked that touch.

Babsi: And there was this cartoon bit, what was it? Shreck. Where he knows the words of the Donkey character.

Brett: Why was that interesting?

Babsi: Because I guess it was a film he had watched with his daughter. Maybe that was the reason, it was a light little touch.

Brett: Alright I get that now. I didn’t get that at the time.

Babsi: And that cinema in Nelson is kind of cool.

Brett: Yeah, it’s a nice little Art Deco cinema. So, you said you liked Will Smith’s performance.

Babsi: I really liked his great speech scene. When people have a speech like, “Friends, Romans, countrymen,…” that’s a speech, to the audience. If they have a few people there, which would be the case in “Julius Caesar”, and so they can address these people but he is on his own. I guess that's why he used a video camera, it helped his performance a lot.

Brett: His acting, on his own, in the lab with just the recording equipment …

Babsi: …was very, very believable. He’s the lead character so he has to make it believable. The movie stands and falls with him. They still managed to spoil it a bit with her performance which did not work and was not believable and he again became unbelievable because it’s like a game play really. As an actor you use the partner and you throw a ball at them and they throw a ball back at you, more friendly, more violent, whatever you want but you need that. If you don’t have that partner it’s harder, a lot more difficult. You use the audience, ok so the theatre has the audience which is something that can be used, but if you don’t have an audience, well I guess you could use the camera people of course, anyway he’s come a long, long wayfrom those "Fresh prince of Bell-air" days.

Brett: You know what I think was going on in that? Because it was supposed to be where he was taken to safety, and he’s supposed to spend this beautiful relaxed day with her and then the danger is supposed to start again at nightfall. And I think the director was trying to make it very, very safe. To make her relaxed. To make her kid relaxed. So he made her well groomed and beautiful. So you begin to relax and think this is a new part of the movie, a new safe place, and then when danger comes again you’re supposed to be even more shocked maybe. Maybe that’s what they were trying to do.

Babsi: Maybe, but it didn’t work. The energy became saggy in the movie.

Brett: Yeah it totally drained out.

Babsi: A typical Hollywood blockbuster, half of it worked, half of it didn’t.

Brett: I don’t think this was the typical Hollywood blockbuster though. I mean there were elements of it that were but they were trying for something more. Something more like classic science fiction from the 60s, something like Omega Man or…

Babsi: It wouldn’t be in my top ten but the photography was good and I did enjoy it but American Gangster was better.

Brett: I liked about this movie that the skyscrapers were full of threat. The zombies were hiding in the dark in the skyscrapers so he had to stick to the streets and zoom through quite quickly in cars.

Babsi: I bet he enjoyed that, I bet it was fun to be the only person who can zoom round. The beginning was sort of funny because he played golf and did all these strange things.

Brett: I think it was a very beautiful movie like a painting. Almost like they had limited their pallet of colours, I remember it very brown, very Naples yellow, very yellow ochre.

Babsi: I remember it very green. There were a few scenes that were very impressive when he went out in the car to shoot food. I still think that Twelve Monkeys was a lot better – even though it was crazy.

Brett: This film was scarier.

Babsi: No, no I don’t agree.

Brett: What do you mean by scared, this one was “Oh I’m shocked!” scary and Twelve Monkeys was “Oh dear the world is a strange place!” scary.

Babsi: No Twelve Monkeys was scarier and more touching somehow, because even though in "I am Legend"he loses his wife and his kid.

Brett: This one wasn’t touching – the emotions.

Babsi: The energy of the actors really worked in the play we saw recently (As You Like It, see previous post) worked really well and Will Smith was such a strong link on his own but he couldn’t just hold it somebody bad came in – her, and she really wasn’t any good – and it fell apart.

Brett: Was she bad or was she given bad direction?

Babsi: She had a really strange part but she could have made it stronger. A Cate Blanchett would have probably made it quite strong and quite believable, but she didn’t.

Brett: No she seemed too relaxed, she was supposed to have saved him from zombies and driven him across New York.

Babsi: And you know, people out there feel free to comment on this, and maybe tell us you’re opinion because we want to make this open and let people get involved. In my opinion he was really good by himself, you see this a lot in the theatre as well, people are really good and strong and then a bad character comes in and really messes it up. I mean Johnny Depp was almost too strong in Pirates of the Caribbean, even those two whelps Keira and Orlando couldn’t mess it up.

Brett: So we were talking about I Am Legend and Twelve Monkeys.

Babsi: Twelve Monkeys is an old film, but Terry Gilliam really thought about what he was doing and Twelve Monkeys is altogether more scary. There is more threat, and they both are about viruses and stuff but in Twelve Monkeys the rhythm is better, and the photography. Although the photography isn’t all “Oh I’m an arty movie and I have to be all arty in my photography”, which I Am Legend was, it was purposely arty. Twelve Monkeys was arty by accident almost, bleaker, greyer.

Brett: I think Twelve Monkeys must be arty on purpose. You have to give Terry Gilliam that, he puts together stunning visuals, often on limited budgets. Watching that Man from Lamancha documentary he got some amazing visuals with just some little people and a handycam.

Babsi: But it was so clever because of the music from the group Gotan Project, who were very successful when Twelve Monkeys was out. It is such great, fantastic, haunting music.

Brett: When we are talking about Twelve Monkeys, we are talking about what Terry Gilliam did and when we are talking about I Am Legend we are talking about what Will Smith did.

Babsi: That’s really interesting actually.

Brett: When we are talking about Twelve Monkeys we aren’t talking about what Bruce Willis did.

Babsi: No, he was good, he was fine but there were lots of them – Madeline Stowe was really good, Brad Pitt was really good. Actually Brad Pitt was surprisingly good though I’m not the worlds biggest Brad Pitt fan, but he was good in that. Whether that has got to do with the directing or him, I don’t know.

Brett: I don’t know he can be good sometimes. I thought he was good in Ocean’s Eleven. So why was Twelve Monkeys scarier?

Babsi: It was interesting, because the funny thing was it was all set up about this group of people, and it just turned out that the rather nice funny people we were just trying to save the animals and the threat was from somewhere else and that’s frightening. And the way it’s between the future and the past, it was very timeless. I think Twelve Monkeys will always have a bigger status than I Am Legend even if the title of I Am Legend which is a bit pompous and Twelve Monkeys is a more modest title.

Brett: I think the two films have a different view of American society. When you are watching Twelve Monkeys, American society is some kind of strange monolith, like a Kafkaesque or Orwellian society which doesn’t know what it is doing even to itself.
And in I Am Legend it seems to be a benevolent society that is trying to cure cancer, but makes a mistake, and if it believes in the stars and stripes and white wooden churches it can get back from those mistakes. It’s gone too far with science and .. I Am Legend is much more conservative, probably. It would be the sort of movie Charlton Heston would have made back in the 60s – like Omega Man or Soylent Green.

Babsi: I can’t tell you how much one of Terry Gilliam’s other movies, Brazil scared me. It scared me so much I didn’t even want to go to Brazil. ( I saw it when I was 15 and had no clue that it was not about Brazil) I don’t even know why on earth it’s called Brazil, it’s not set in Brazil, whatsoever. It was really frightening. It’s about a mistake in administration leading to the dude being taken away, and these people come through the ceiling. It’s really, really scary.

Brett: Twelve Monkeys was like Brazil 2, it was almost the same society.

Babsi: The difference was that I Am Legend was a different type of scary. It was scary but not scary enough.

Brett: It was trying to say "don’t worry, our society is basically good and it will survive, no matter how bad it gets". The films have almost the same subject but they are done completely differently. Will smiths character is very disciplined and methodical, he was watching every video in the video store from A to Z.

Babsi: That was actually funny, even if you are alone in the world you still have to be disciplined because of the threat. How would the story work if he was just alone in the world with nobody else? What would could you do with the story then? They had to create a threat other wise… Take out the zombies altogether and you get a castaway kind of situation which could work.

Brett: I think that would be a really interesting movie. It might even be scarier.

Babsi: The way he recorded his diary on video and talked about himself. “I am doctor …etc.” That was good, and arty in a "Lost" kind of way. Even film directors must be fans of Lost, scary. To sum it all up, it was good when he was alone, the photography was good, I can still see pictures in my mind’s eye.

Brett: Me too, the destruction, emptiness and desolation stay with you.

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