Camp Lazlo (2005 - 2008)

An American animated comedy series created by Joe Murray, directed by Sue Mondi and Brian Sheesley.
Anthropomorphic animals are at summer camp. Lazlo the monkey stars with his friends Raj the elephant and Clam the rhinoceros. The scoutmaster is Lumpus the moose. They are always involved in some type of absurd situation.
American animated series of this time period were noticably poor in terms of plot and writing, but this is the exception to that trend. It didn't seem like "stupid kids' stuff", but more universal humor dealing with exaggeration and hyperbole. Some of the elements which entertained me most were the dung beetles (my favorite characters voiced by Steve Little), Lougie Llama and Lazlo's arms making impossible shapes. The animation style is very traditional and cartoony. Creator Jo Murray also made Rocko's Modern Life, an earlier cartoon which I like as well. Carlos Alazraqui voiced Rocko and Lazlo, Tom Kenny voiced Heffer on Rocko's Modern Life, Spongebob on Spongebob Squarepants, Eduardo on Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends, Scoutmaster Lumpus and Slinkman on Camp Lazlo. Mr. Lawrence voiced Filburt on Rocko's Modern Life, Plankton on Spongebob Squarepants, Edward, Dave, Ping-pong and Nurse Leslie on Camp Lazlo. Jodi Benson voiced Ariel in The Little Mermaid (1989), Tula in Pirates of Dark Water, Patsy, Jane Doe and Almondine in Camp Lazlo. The series was produced in 16:9 aspect ratio and originally aired in 4:3. I watched a 4:3 version and it makes me wonder what got cut out or modified to change the frame shape. I rate this good.

About Cherry (2012)

An American drama directed by Stephen Elliott, starring Lili Taylor, James Franco and Heather Graham.
A girl leaves her home, messed up family and boyfriend to move to San Francisco with a male friend. She has paid for the trip with money from a nude photo shoot and enters the porn industry. She meets a rich lawyer and they begin a relationship. Her mother and sister visit, but things don't work out very well with that.
Kind of a weak start, strong middle and terrible ending. It took a little while for things to get happening, but then held my attention. Production was good and the characters worked. There was lots of selective focus in camerawork. A good example is filming filming and having the camera focus shift from camera screen to action. Correct casting and good writing made it seem like the characters were not acting, but actually in these scenes. Isn't that the goal with casting, acting and dialogue? The ending was really just a vaguely implied series of incomplete information. It's difficult to spoil what is so difficult to describe. Small changes took place and we have to assume that time has elapsed before these quick scenes of altered situations. I rate it adequate because the middle was made so well.
No image again because blogger is still broken.

Lekce Faust (1994)

A Czech, French, British, German, American fantasy directed by Jan Švankmajer
A man receives a map from men passing them out on a street corner. He follows it and becomes an actor in the role of Faust at a theater production. As the story progresses, stop motion fantasy elements are added and he turns into a marionette, but goes back to being an actor between scenes, while still in a deal with the devil.
Jan Švankmajer also made Alice (1988) and Little Otik (2000). This belongs in the same category as those: weird and wonderful. I liked Little Otik the most, but this was pretty cool too. The stop motion all looked good and there were some great scenes. The heads rolling through areas looked good and the small marionettes in the signature scene were great. My favorite was when the jester was trying to catch a bird. He repeatedly summoned and banished a devil with some humor involved. The audio was in Czech, but the version I watched had on time English subtitles. I rate this good just for being so strange. You should probably watch it.
Sorry, no image. Blogger is broken again.

Mutafukaz A.K.A. ムタフカズ －MUTAFUKAZ－, Mutafukazu, MFKZ (2017)

A French Japanese animated adventure directed by Shōjirō Nishimi and Guillaume "Run" Renard.
A character with large eyes lives in a city ghetto with his friend whose head is a flaming skull. He finds that there are "tentacle mafia" guys all around and he is involved with them. The daughter of the tentacle mafia leadeer takes a liking to big eyes and some luchador wrestlers help them.
Amazing! There are very few movies which will prevent me from playing guitar while I watch them. This is among that elite group. My friend, Thomas recommended this, so I have to thank him here. Although this is very unique, I would recommend it if you liked Dante's Inferno: An Animated Epic (2010), The Haunted World of El Superbeasto (2009), Bigg Snoop Dogg: Adventures of Tha Blue Carpet Treatment (2008) and The Boondocks (TV series). I rate it best. Watch it!

About Adam (2000)

An Irish British American romance directed by Gerard Stembridge.
3 women from the same family are all interested in the same man.
I could tell within 5 or 10 minutes that this movie was not for me. I waited until 35 minutes in to turn it off. As I have said before, love and war are my least favorite subject matter for films. The video was really bright, which is not bad, but this usually (and in this case) goes along with very feminine films. I'm just too male to appreciate any value which my be there. I rate it shit in accordance with my turn off policy.

Karas series A.K.A. 鴉－KARAS－, Karasu (2005 - 2007)

A Japanese science fiction fantasy anime directed by Keiichi Sato.
Deomons, spirits, kappas and city guardians duke it out in Shinjuku. A police detective is trying to figure out what is going on and there is a young woman wandering around.
Most of this was not so great. The plot was vague and muddy, so I didn't really know what was going on. There were a few fights and good scenes here and there. Then the ending happened. It made it all worthwhile. I'll just say that there is a long fight. The animation style mixed traditional anime with digital editing and really looked cool. I was watching the last 2 episodes, wondering what to write about this and that's all I got. I rate this adequate. You might want to just watch the last 3 episodes.

Xanadu (1980)

A Musical romance directed by Robert Greenwald, starring Gene Kelly.
A painter reproduces album covers on a larger scale and meets a woman who was on one of the covers. He also meets an old jazz musician and they open a dance club.
Not good at all. What I want to talk about here is not lack of originality or crappy music. I'm not discussing how this won more bad awards than good ones or how terrible a film it is. I want to point out Don Bluth's animation sequence. That's why I watched it. The male and female lead actors turn into fish and birds. That may seem inconsequential until you see them and their similarity to those in The Sword and the Stone (1963). So similar, in fact, that I expected the characters to become squirrels at any moment. The posture of this bird reminds me of when Wart turned into a sparrow (image). I rate this bad because it was damn near torture to watch. Don't inflict this upon yourself or anyone you know.