Road to the Oscars: Day Two (American Hustle)

Some of this actually happened.

American Hustle confuses me. Before trying to write this I went and read some other critics reviews because I wasn't one hundred per cent sure how I felt about it. What I found was everything from blatant hatred for the film to those who couldn't praise it high enough. Obviously the Academy agrees more with the latter, or it wouldn't be nominated for ten Oscars at the upcoming ceremony, one of which is 'Best Picture'. 

I have to admit, the film surprised me when I first watched it. The trailer hadn't done it any favours and there were honestly only five reasons I went to see it: Christian Bale, Jennifer Lawrence, Bradley Cooper, Amy Adams and Jeremy Renner. I definitely hadn't expected a comedy. Did anyone? A comedy about government corruption in the 70s? But I did laugh a lot throughout the film. Admittedly it was mostly laughter about the state of Christian Bale's body and Bradley Cooper's hair but there were definitely other funny parts too. Jennifer Lawrence dancing to 'Live and Let Die' certainly springs to mind. 

I agree a lot with what critic David Thompson had to say about the film in his review. Firstly, the film goes for 129 minutes, which Thompson believes is "29 minutes too long". There were many parts that they could have cut out, all of which while slightly amusing or interesting, did not add to the story at all. Secondly, he says that "one could be forgiven for thinking that the entire movie is an opportunity for these actors to read an outline of script and take it from there" and that it could easily be seen as an "after-hours jam session" for the actors. I can't help but agree. The performances were great, but it seemed too easy in some parts and a lot of the script could be called 'monotonous' without hearing any arguments from me. 

I could see it winning the Oscar for Best Costume Design, because it was pretty amazing, but if it was up to me, that would be the only one. With all that said, it definitely deserves to be on the list of the top nine films for the last year, it just won't win Best Picture. 

Man of Steel

You will give the people of Earth an ideal to strive to.

You know those movie’s you just know you’re going to love? Well this was definitely one of them for me.

source: isaaclacry

What is there not to love? I’m a sucker for all superhero movies, Henry Cavill, and anything Christopher Nolan has his name on.

Sadly, I couldn’t see this movie when it first came out (the downsides of Europe, eh?) so I feel like this review is a little pointless but if you haven’t seen it yet: try and find a cinema where it’s still showing and go or definitely start looking forward to it coming out on DVD.

When I was talking to Jess after we saw the film, I said that it reminded me of Nolan’s Batman Trilogy. She agreed, and then added “but a lot cheesier”. That is something I definitely noticed too, and there were times during the film I felt it was a bit lame and other times I kind of liked it, and I swooned like a little school girl falling easily for the cheesiness of Henry Cavill’s lines and wishing desperately that I was Amy Adams.

source: isaaclacry

At Comic-Con a few weeks ago, they announced the Man of Steel sequel, which is to feature an established, older Batman too. Rumours have already started circling about who is to play Batman including Ryan Gosling, Josh Brolin and my favourite of the rumoured: Tyler Hoechlin from Teen Wolf. Personally I am very interested to see who ends up with the role. As a huge fan of Christian Bale, whoever ends up in the role has massive shoes to fill in my opinion. It is set for a 2015 release.

What did you guys think? Did you love Henry Cavill as the latest Superman? Are you looking forward to the next instalment? 

Trailer Tuesday #3

Who's the master: the painter or the forger? 

David O. Russell's latest project, The American Hustle trailer came out last week and I watched it with eager anticipation. Like his previous work, Silver Linings Playbook, the cast for this movie looks absolutely amazing. Christian Bale is the main drawcard for me, and then there's also Jennifer Lawrence, Bradley Cooper, Amy Adams,  Jeremy Renner and Robert De Niro to add to that too.

The trailer includes very little speaking and gives so few details of the actual story away. It's kind of refreshing seeing a trailer do that these days, seeing as most of them today just give the whole plot away in the one and a half minutes they have to entice you to see it. I love the music they used for the trailer, Led Zeppelin's 'Good Times Bad Times' which is the perfect song for the era of the film and is such a perfect focus the trailer seeing as there is so little dialogue. On the other hand, the trailer left me with absolutely no idea what the movie was about. I googled it, and it turns out it's based on a real life FBI case known as 'Abscam' which was an investigation of corruption in the U.S. government.

What do you guys think of the trailer? Like or dislike?