Nacho Libre

I read a review that made me interested and I had enjoyed School of Rock.

Good-humored, though without the urgency that seemed to fuel School of Rock, and perhaps guilty of being an attempt to repeat a formula.

Little Miss Sunshine

People I knew spoke positively of it, or at least it was coming up in conversation.

Cinematography-wise, I felt as if I were watching a home movie. The performances I found over-stated and somewhat annoying. Maybe the fault was in me. I have trouble with movies that have no character for me to fall in love with, a limitation on my part.

Blade Runner

This image is actually from a BMW ad based on images from the movie.

I read the story that was this movie’s inspiration, and loved its narrative pulse, its futuristic jargon, and its immediacy.

While not as densely charged as the story, it’s still densely charged, and powerfully suspenseful throughout, with crowded, visually dramatic imagery that serves as an analogue to the punchy language of the source. It does seem larger, more epic than the original. Harrison Ford’s performance grounds things in a satisfying way. A favorite discovery since I started subscribing to Netflix.

Wait Until Dark

To show my daughter, an Audrey Hepburn fan.

Even scarier than when I watched it as a teenager; I understood much more of it. Hepburn’s character’s vulnerability makes this almost unbearably suspenseful (in a great way) for almost the entire movie. The dramatic stand-off between Hepburn and Arkin is very striking.

The Magic Flute

While the overture plays, Bergman goes from a close-up on one audience member's face after another.

To show my daughter.

The first time I saw this was in a movie theater where the music wrapped the audience inside it, and it was one of the most magical movie experiences of my life. Slow at times. Pamina singing the aria in which she is about to kill herself is some kind of highlight of the universe.

Meet Me in St. Louis

I heard Judy Garland’s version of “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas and was moved, and learned it was part of this movie.
I found Judy Garland as a teenager (as opposed to the younger Judy Garland as a girl in The Wizard of Oz) horrifying. The musical numbers seemed painfully stagey. I had to stop watching. NOTE: the fault was probably in me; I was too fixated on what seemed to me the strangeness of Judy Garland’s performance and look.

High School Musical

Too much of a cultural phenomenon among my younger students, especially those at the summer program, not to see.
Smarmy, clichéd, cynical. The stagings of the musical numbers, e.g. the basketball court number, have some energy.

Breakfast at Tiffany's

It was a classic and an Audrey Hepburn movie I hadn’t seen.

Too bad about the racist faux-Japanese-upstairs-neighbor scenes; Hepburn at a mysterious remove—why is she so neurotic?—playing with an irresistible understatedness; her eroticism is real, not forced (as it is in some of her movies); funny and moving; cinematography (crowded NYC apartment, streets) un-stagey, energetic.

West Side Story

Ordered so my daughter could see it; can’t remember re-watching but she tells me I did, with my brother and his kids, even though they had already been at our house “for three hours.” The score is unforgettable.

The Bicycle Thief

(ordered to show my arts/social issues class; they liked)
Not very punchy except at moments; one of the moments is the ending; maybe tugs at the heart-strings too much; almost emotionally unbearable at times, including the ending; filled with a dignity (containing no bombastic-ness) unlike that of any I have encountered.

Mad Hot Ballroom

Mad Hot Ballroom I ran a community service project that had a parallel with the subject, though my project wasn’t as successful as I take this one to be (still it went on for seven years, and I was the one who called a halt, he said, comforting himself).
Couldn’t watch; slow and predictable NOTE: the fault may have been in me, in my lack of patience.

Beat Street

Recommended by students for a class focusing on art work with a political aspect, particularly concerning African-Americans
Artistic-triumph-as-climax movie; the hip hop dance and the DJ-ing are mesmerizing; this movie loves its subject.

Introduction

A few years ago I started subscribing to Netflix. Then at some point I decided to try to write something every day or as close to it as I could manage, even if it was one sentence. I started a blog called Consciousness Walk, to some extent an attempt to try to notice things about my own sense of consciousness, in part to try to understand it and keep it from breaking down on account of aging. This blog helps give me something to write but as its all on one topic and doesn't have to do with consciousness. (Not that the other one always does either.)
First I'll briefly describe my motivation in choosing the movie and then I'll opine.


Any attempt to adapt Shakespeare to a modern setting is interesting to me, and Twelfth Night is my favorite Shakespeare play; plus I like movies about teen-aged life. Plus more than one student told me I had to see it.
Contrived, prurient, clever in its adaptation of Shakespeare, with a narrative pulse.