Mr. M’s Movie Mondays: Let the Right One In, Chocolate & Knowing

from Mr. M:

So I’ve been a bit remiss lately in providing any sort of movie reviews, but that doesn’t mean I stopped watching them. In fact, I’ve been on a bit of a foreign film kick lately… not quite sure why… but Kim’s not too hot on them, I know that for sure. Something about watching a movie with subtitles seems to make it a little more artsy and gives it an edge in my book for being a better movie…but some of them fail even then. For example… Le Pacte Des Loups, also known as Brotherhood of the Wolf, is not a great movie. But watching it with subtitles makes it more intriguing, and I actually enjoyed it. I then tried to watch the dubbed version, and made it through all of 15 minutes. But that’s not the movie I wanted to talk about… well, actually there are two.

“Let the Right One In” – A Swedish Film about misfit kids, one of whom just happens to be a vampire. The story follows a poor blond-haired boy who lives in an apartment with his mom and just doesn’t quite fit in. He gets bullied at school and spends a lot of time on his own in the courtyard of his apartment building. Enter a young girl and her guardian in the neighboring apartment. But there’s something a little odd about the girl, who only comes out at night and says “you know we can’t be friends”… madness ensues. Honestly, this movie makes me want to see more Swedish films. It’s got all sorts of interesting bits… some cute, some awkward, some tense, and some where you just want to cheer. If you enjoyed movies like “Interview with a Vampire” or are one of the closet fans of “The Vampire Diaries” this would be a good one for you. I’d give it four of five stars.

“Chocolate” – I honestly have no idea why this movie is called chocolate because it’s about an autistic girl who is able learn martial arts by merely watching the school next to her house and who uses those skills to try and save her mother from dying of cancer. Interesting premise, especially for those of you who watch heroes. It’s done in the style of “Ong-bak,” if anyone remembers that one… but the gripper in this one is the martial arts. There are some scenes that involve jumping from balcony to balcony and through floors and very few of the scenes involve CG. The story is a bit convoluted though, so I’d only pull this one off the shelf if you remember Friday night kung fu movie marathons with fondness. Two of five stars on this one… just cause the story dies out into a few huge fight scenes.

And for those who just don’t want to go down the subtitle route, I recently watched “Knowing”. Some part of me thinks that Scientologists everywhere jumped for joy at this one. I’ll start with the rating on this one 2 out of 5, but let me explain. Any movie with Nicholas Cage, in my book, loses two stars for just bad casting. For example, Ghostrider, Next, Gone in Sixty Seconds… I could go on. Let’s not even discuss his contribution to the guinea pig movie, G-Force. And just a warning, Ghostrider 2 is coming out… Kim and I went to a movie-industry dinner function (one of the perks of having an uncle who is well-connected in the movie industry) that was celebrating the accomplishments of one of the heads of Sony Studios. This was the week after Ghostrider came out. They fully acknowledged that it was a crap movie, but it was a “hit”!!! So enter Ghostrider 2, which promises to be an even bigger steaming pile of poo. But back to “Knowing”… for those who don’t remember the preview, N. Cage’s son in the movie pulls a sheet of paper from a time capsule at his elementary school that identifies the time and number of casualties of every major disaster for the last 50 years. And there are still some numbers to go. If Mr. Cage wasn’t walking through his lead role, I may have found the story more interesting. The initial parts of the movie are spooky and you really cheer for anyone to figure out what the hell the numbers mean. Spoiler Warning – But the story boils down to an alien race trying to warn the human race that the world is going to end ( I won’t mention how ), but they’re only willing to save the children, and only a select few at that. So ultimately, the beginning had me on the edge of my seat but the end of the movie nearly made me take aim at a nearby squirrel with the DVD.

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