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Durang0
City: espoo
age 24
Movies/directors that I like ^^ ?
Giallo (don't torture a duckling!), Sergio Leone's work, Kubrick, Kurosawa, Tarkovsky, Tim Burton, Shyamalan, Aronofsky, takashi miike (not all of his stuff though!), bergman. Some exploitation movies are fun as long as they are entertaining and have a likable, unique style. Even a bad movie can have a few great moments...
Currently being drawn to anime, not yet to any series but some movies have been excellent.. really interested about Hayao Miyazaki for example.
Anyway, I guess if there's anything common about the directors/genres above, it's that I think they all put style & atmosphere above alot other aspects. So if a movie has an interesting and intriguing atmosphere and overall style, I'll propably like it. Also the music counts for a lot in making that atmosphere for me.
EDIT. but for example "The Fall" just sucks, even though I guess it fits to the description :D
I still consider myself a bit uneducated when it comes to actually having seen alot of stuff "that you should see", but so far Im just enjoying films at a moderate pace.
Reviews
System Shock 2 (1999)
Superior to bioshock, one of the best games ever made
For me this has to be one of the greatest games ever made. It combines claustrophobic survival action, great storytelling and cyberpunk thematics, puzzle solving, solid character development system, and above all, just unparalleled atmosphere.
You really were blown away back then (and I'd say still today) the first time you rigged an alarm and a pack of mutant zombies made a rush for you in the narrow hallways, and a kick ass cyberpunk techno song began blasting through your speakers! Man this game was intense. You never knew when you were safe, when your gun would jam or when you would run out of bullets (ok - eventually you'd get better, but this game was at it's best with a high difficulty / high intensity playing mentality. And high music volume!).
The details of the story might not be that revolutionary, yes we have seen this before. The flesh versus machine, the theme of dehumanization. It's not in the story or the themes, it's in the delivery. We see gruesome images, we listen to audio logs that really spark emotions in us, that really seem to tell stories of their own, not just some quickly made up sidequest stuff like in so many other games. These contain real feeling. The player lives with the story, and ascends deeper and deeper to the final confrontation.
Bioshock, although hugely popular, was just a shallow copy of this game. Same story structure, weaker story themes, weaker characters (shodan vs .. who? I forgot the name of the villain in bioshock), much lamer music and surprisingly, a weaker, simplified character development coupled with simpler level design and tuned down puzzle difficulty.
Ao no hono-o (2003)
A little gem that really spoke to me
This movie surprised me completely. It deals with topics that we've seen many times such as child abuse, alcoholism, teenage relationships and juveniles breaking the law. But this is only the surface of the plot and the means of which it contemplates it's main theme. The main theme as I now see it, is the negative side of adulthood hitting a child. This might not sound in anyway peculiar but it's in the delivery that makes it so special.
At first I thought the movie's main function was probably to deliver cheap thrills, raise sympathy in the easiest way, speak against domestic violence, tell a moral story or to portray some typical teenage drama. Before the last minutes I still wasn't sure what to make of it, as it seemed to end without any final conclusion. But then when the ending came it blew me away, even if the viewer guessed what was going to happen long before. The point wasn't about what happened, but how it happened and what we got to know about the main character. Who is this guy? Is he a manipulative scoundrel? A hero that saves his little sister? A criminal that learns a crucial lesson? We don't know this for sure before the last scenes.
He secretly drinks whiskey, he keeps a bat in his room but doesn't dare to use it, his relationship with Noriko is almost nonsexual. This is (at least how I think it) because sexuality belongs to the adult world that he sees threatening. When he hears the not so dreadful moans of his mother he doesn't know how to react. He is embarrassed for the sake of his sister and mother when he hears his real father Sone masturbating, never mind that his sister later hints that he himself is doing it too. In away, I'd say, that Sone represents Shuuichis darker adult side and it is also that what he fights against. Ironically he uses the same means as Sone, force and hatred to solve the problem. He fights fire with fire. He is trying to protect his childhood but by doing it, ends it himself.
One theme of Blue Light is the lack of a father character for a growing boy. He was the only male in the house for 10 years. His teachers seemed to be portrayed either as formally distant or blatantly uninterested in the students. The only one who shows interest in him is the detective, but by then it's too late, as the damage has already been done.
For me, Noriko isn't important as a real girl but as an idealization of childhood innocence with her naive answers and the talking dog. At the end of the movie she is crying. Again I take this as a metaphor. Innonce is gone, a broken childhood. While she is holding back tears the main character's list of favorite things is narrated. Here he finally reveals himself. He was not a hero nor a bad guy, just a typical teenager with his little enjoyments in life (with a hint of soon beginning adulthood). After all the schemes Shuuichi pulled and all the lies he told, the knowledge that he was at he same time insecure and vulnerable made me feel an emotive connection that I haven't felt watching movies in a long time.
There's also an interesting detail about the use of blue light. Every time Shuuichi is portrayed in blue light, whether it's the night time in his room, the seaside dock or the public aquarium, he is at his most vulnerable and honest state. Other times he always masks himself with lies or dismisses the uncomfortable topics with jokes and daily phrases. Noriko even paints him with blue background, a hint maybe, that she likes him that way.
Lucky Number Slevin (2006)
Well made outfit with a rotting interior
So what's the first impression of this film. You see well made short scenes, with the oh so cool guys shooting with silenced guns. You might like the groovy music and the camera job and think "this has some style, let's admit that". You hear dialog spoken by famous actors. Although the talk is just these average "clever" one liners, you go with it. After all, at this point the movie might feel almost like a comedy as it rolls on and the spectator is happily oblivious to the true suckyness of it.
But then something happens. As usual, the plot is revealed fully only at the last moments. By then you have already guessed it so you are more interested in how they are going to bring it out so it doesn't seem totally implausible. They don't. Good guys kill the bad guys, the boy gets the girl, end of story. Now if you portray Bruce Willis and Josh Hartnett (who is really out of place here) as your world's best hit men who shoot everybody in the head, why do they even need to do all that plotting that could go wrong in any of the movie's wonderfully clever plot twists. In the end they just walk in to those towers and blow the sh*t out of everyone. Where do you need the one liners, just do it and end the movie. 5 min job.
Right right, now all you think "these movies are not meant to be taken seriously". Then why does the makers want us to swallow the serious feelings about the dead family, the gruesome violence or the mob bosses' tormented pasts. Every emotion feels faked (well lets face it: the dialog, characters and the action kinda feels that way too). The romance is as shallow as ever, even though that too is portrayed in the frustrating touchy feely way.
Come to think of it, the movie's basic plot line does have a striking resemblance to both "Fistfull of dollars" and "Once upon a time in the west". There're a few problems though: Josh Hartnett is no Clint Eastwood, Jason Smilovic & Paul McGuigan are no match for Sergio Leone and you're missing Ennio Morricone's music.
Betrayal at Krondor (1993)
A great RPG
This game was one of my favorites back in the days. It's a good example of a game that doesn't need fancy graphics to be a classic. It feels like you are partly reading a book, the amount of text is huge (this may disappoint some people but it shouldn't). The game is based upon "Krondor" (cant remember the correct name but at least some of them were under the name of the Riftwar Saga) books by Raymond E. Feist. He also participated in the making of the game, and it shows. The atmosphere, dialog, characters, script and the sub quests are all great and it's more fun playing it than playing many of the newest RPG games. The game is very non-linear and you have an illusion of freedom that I haven't experienced in many other games: you can go where ever you want in the vast land of Midkemia, and do things in the order you prefer.
This is an adventure game that you shouldn't miss, and it's been freeware for sometime, so you can download it for free.