A British French German American romantic comedy directed by Chris and Paul Weitz, starring Hugh Grant, Toni Collette and Rachel Weisz.
An independently wealthy man decides that single mothers are good to date and gets himself in trouble by lying about having a son. Through a friend of a friend, he meets the 12 year old son of a suicidal single mother and they become friends.
I think I like Chris Weitz as a director. I recently watched A Better Life (2011) and saw the similarities between these 2 films. His films don't jump out and grab the viewer like those of Alejandro Jodorowsky or Quentin Tarantino, but these realistic dramas about families are made well and hold my attention. They seem to have a tendency to get a little sappy at the end, but I can see past a little maple syrup when the rest is this good. Something about this one that I really liked was the heavy double narration. The man and the boy both had voice-overs spaced through the duration. I'm rating this good. If you like this or A Better Life, you should watch the other and possibly other films by Chris Weitz.
A British Netherlands Luxembourg German drama directed by Peter Greenaway, starring Toni Collette and Amanda Plummer.
An old woman dies, leaving her husband and son together after the funeral. Being astronomically wealthy, hey decide to build a harem for themselves and collect women who sign contracts to be their concubines.
Excellent! I would put this in a folder with La Grande Bouffe (1973) and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998), labeling it "too much of a good thing". The plot took a little while to develop clearly, but it definitely got interesting. I liked the middle section most, which is weird because I usually like film beginnings most. The characters weren't that great, but this was more about plot anyway. Amanda Plummer played Lydia in The Fisher King (1991), Yolanda/Honey Bunny in Pulp Fiction (1994) and Claude's mother in Ken Park (2002) (one of my more popular posts). Toni Collette played Princess Yum Yum's Nanny Witch in The Thief and the Cobbler (1995), Mandy Slade in Velvet Goldmine (1998) and Lynn Sear in The Sixth Sense (1999). Video all looked good. I liked how each section started with script text. There were also manufactured earthquakes which looked convincing. An odd note, this movie about sex has no graphic sex scenes. Audio was terrible. Everything except the helicopter landing was really quiet. The father spoke mostly in whispers. I'm rating this awesome because it's a keeper. If you like the weird, but coherent stuff like I do, this would be a great choice. Watch it.
An Australian animated drama directed by Adam Elliot, starring Toni Collette and Philip Seymour Hoffman.
An Australian girl becomes pen pals with a mentally ill man in New York City. They tell each other about the problems in their lives.
This was animated very well and looked really cool. The plot was very sad and tragic, but that seemed to be the goal. The characters were developed marvelously well because of them narrating the letters in which they describe their lives in detail. The stop motion claymation style was awesome because of the limited, almost black and white color palette. The audio was mostly dialogue and the music was mixed low to bring out the voices of the characters. Overall, it seemed to be planned and executed in a very exact manner. I rate this awesome. Watch it!!!
