My Cinema Unlimited September & October 05

More of my film year in review, courtesy of the Cinema Unlimited card:

Great Films
A History Of Violence - David Cronenberg directs Viggo Mortensen as a man whose life is destroyed when he kills in self-defence. Excellent.

You and Me and Everyone We Know - Just manages to stay on the correct side of the 'irritatingly quirky' line, and every coming-of-age scene featuring the wonderful child actors has got incredible heart.

Good/Decent Films
Pride And Prejudice - Keira Knightley steps into period costume to play Austen's spikiest heroine Elizabeth Bennett in a solid film version. Spooks actorMatthew MacFayden, plus Judi Dench and Donald Sutherland co-star. While acknowledging Keira's beauty I've never been particularly interested in her, but something about this performance captivated me in a similar way to Olivia Hussey's in Zeffirelli's Romeo and Juliet.

Howl's Moving Castle - The latest gorgeous animation from Spirited Away creator Hayao Miyazaki. Not quite as narratively captivating.

Serenity - The Wild West in space as Buffy creator Joss Whedon brings his Firefly TV series to the big screen. Admirably fulfills the requirements of genre.

The Wallace & Gromit Movie: The Curse Of The Were-Rabbit - Everyone's favourite bits of Plasticine make their big-screen debut in Aardman's long-awaited follow-up to Chicken Run. Lovely jubbly!

The 40-Year-Old Virgin - Steve Carell bags his first lead role as a middle-aged innocent. Genuinely hilarious on first viewing, a second watch shows how badly edited and over-long it is. The DVD release makes it even longer!

The Aristocrats - Documentary on the cream of comics from across the Anglophone world who compete to tell the filthiest in-joke ever. If you can get over the onslaught of deliberate bad taste, this film is clearly about the craft of comedy.

Lord Of War - Nic Cage prepares the glib comebacks to play a charismatic gunrunner pursued by Ethan Hawke's Interpol agent. Some dodgy moments but always fascinating.

Corpse Bride - A stop-motion Gothic fairy tale from the mind of Tim Burton, featuring the voices of Emily Watson, Johnny Depp, and (what a surprise!) Helena Bonham Carter. Another in the vein of Edward Scissorhands.

Broken Flowers - Jim Jarmusch directs Bill Murray at his world weary best as an ageing lothario who must visit his previous other halves when he's contacted by a son he never knew he had. Many people I respect would call this a great film: I felt Bill was just too muted. Even though he's the master of reactive acting, there wasn't enough of it for me. But it's certainly a fine film.

Thumbsucker - When a 17-year-old finally stops sucking his thumb, all kinds of hell break loose in this indie look at the perils of growing up. Keanu Reeves, Vince Vaughn and Tilda Swinton lead an interesting cast. Keanu sends up his zen hippie persona, and Vince restrains himself admirably.

Average/Poor Films
Goal! - This is average rather than poor. The first part of a planned footie trilogy about a young American kid's dream to become the best 'soccer' player in the world. David Beckham, Alan Shearer, Zidane and Kieron Dyer in innovative cameos. I was so looking forward to this film, and it could have been much better if it had been about something other than a typical American-dream plot, like the exploitation of poor immigrants, or the spoiling of football by big business.

Oliver Twist - Roman Polanski adapts Dickens' most famous novel with Ben Kingsley leading the cast as Fagin. I found him never less than interesting, but the Bill Sykes actor was more cuddly than a possessor of the requisite amount of menace.

Cinderella Man - Russell Crowe stars as Depression-era fighter Jim Braddock, who defeated heavyweight champ Max Baer in a 15-round slugfest in 1935. Co-starring Renée Zellweger, which is usually a film's first mistake.

Waste-of Time Films
The Legend Of Zorro - Antonio Banderas and Catherine Zeta-Jones returned for this sequel to the 2000 swashbuckler.

Films I meant to see in Sept/Oct, but didn't.
Four Brothers - Mark Wahlberg is one of four siblings out for avenge their mother's death in the latest pic from Boyz N The Hood director John Singleton.
Revolver - Guy Ritchie, back with Lock Stock mate Jason Statham playing a gambler who's up to his neck in a particularly dangerous game. Ray Liotta co-stars in a Kabbalah-influenced film so savaged by the critics it must be checked out, surely.
Rock School - Documentary following the students at a real School Of Rock, which comes complete with a fallen rock angel of a teacher.
Green Street - Elijah Wood puts Frodo behind him to play a Yank Harvard drop-out absorbed into the violent underworld of West Ham United football hooliganism (Upton Park is on Green Street). Apparently the Cockerney accents are appalling.
Red Eye - Horror maestro Wes Craven tries his hand at a thriller about a woman kidnapped onboard a plane and blackmailed into committing murder. Baddie Cillian Murphy is always worth watching.
On A Clear Day - The Full Monty all at sea as Peter Mullan plays an out-of-work metal worker who decides to swim the Channel. Brenda Blethyn and Billy Boyd add to this apparently twee British film.
Syriana - George Clooney and Matt Damon headline a biopic of CIA agent Robert Baer, who spent his 21-year-long career battling terrorism around the world. Who doesn't love George Clooney and this phase of his work?
Kinky Boots - Shaun Of The Dead's Nick Frost and Chiwetel Ejiofar line up for a British comedy about a lad who recruits a Soho cabaret star called Lola to rescue his Dad's ailing shoe factory.
Sky High - Kids' superhero pic starring Bruce Campbell, Kurt Russell, and Kelly Preston. It looked fun.
Land Of The Dead - George A Romero returns to his roots for this, his fourth zombie movie. I want to see this partly because because it's supposed to have a slight anti-Bush polemic, and also because I want to pick up tips for some horror stuff I'm putting in my current screenplay.