Ice Age 4: Continental Drift (2012)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2012
	Director: Steve Martino, Mike Thurmeier
	Actors (voice): Ray Romano, Denis Leary, John Leguizamo (Land of the Dead, Collateral Damage), Nick Frost (Hot Fuzz), Queen Latifah
	Country: USA
	Genre: Adventure, Animation, Comedy
	Conditions of visioning: 30.12.2012, SD VOD, Home cinema
Synopsis: The odd family composed of a mammoth, a sabretooth tiger and a possum, plus some new friends, will need to get moving to avoid being crushed by the continental drift.
Review: It is nice to see again the characters we liked from the previous episodes in this new adventure, but it looks like it is more and more targeted towards the young audiences, loosing the second degree of viewing (for adults) that was present in the first film. Moreover, it looks like the problem encountered in the movie franchise follow the ones of the average viewers as they grow up (a baby in the first film, kids in the second and now teenagers). There are some funny slapsticks moments, including the usual apparitions from Scrat, but that is all. Better to watch if you are tired and don't want to think too much.
Rating: 4 /10

Enemy of the State (1998)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 1998
	Director: Tony Scott (Top Gun, Crimson Tide, The taking of Pelham 123)
	Actors: Will Smith (Independance Day, Hancock), Gene Hackman (Crimson Tide, French Connection), Jon Voight (Mission Impossible, Anaconda)
	Country: USA
	Genre: Action, Thriller
	Conditions of visioning: 25.12.2012, French version, 42" TV
Synopsis: A group of hyper-equipped agents will use all possible technological means to get back a piece of evidence against their leader (Voight) from the unlucky lawyer (Smith) that became unknowingly involved in the story.
Review: Last time I saw this movie was on VHS. I remember thinking at the time that the satellite aerial views were inspired from the Grand Theft Auto video game. I find the movie still as good ten years later, meaning that it aged well. In particular it sells as very advanced some technologies (miniaturized cameras, GPS trackers...) that came to become part of our daily live. The topic of invasion of our private life by governments (or other groups) through information technology is still actual at the age of Facebook (that didn't exst when the film was made). A good fast-paced thriller. I regret not seeing it in better conditions.
Rating: 8 /10

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2011
	Director: David Fincher (Se7en, Fight Club, The Social Network)
	Actors: Daniel Craig (Skyfall, Cowboys vs. Aliens), Rooney Mara (The Social Network), Christopher Plummer (Starcrash, The Sound of Music, Up), Stellan Skarsgård (Pirates of the Carribean 2-3, Thor), Robin Wright (Forrest Gump)
	Country: N, S, USA
	Genre: Polar
	Conditions of visioning: 30.12.2012, Blu-ray, Home cinema
Synopsis: After loosing a trial against a powerful magnate, the editor of a political newspaper (Craig) is hired by the head of a powerful family to investigate the dissapearance of his niece 40 years before. An outcast young female hacker (Mara) will team up with him.
Review: This remake by the nonetheless gifted David Fincher is as useless as the one of the excellent Infernal Affairs by Scorcese. The story is the same as in the original, some scenes even copied shot by shot, and only some sections are adapted to an American audience. All of this only to have known faces on the screen. Maybe it is because I saw the original a few weeks ago, but I was not convinced by neither the filmmaking nor the acting in the remake. It might be true that the lead actor Michael Nyquist was not very charismatic, but Daniel Craig is not much better. I had the feeling that the connection between some scenes is not very fluent, and follows more a receipe. In particular during the first half of the movie the parallel between the two stories (Craig and Mara) is not well done. The Girl from the title is well played by Rooney Mara, but not as well as Noomi Rapace in the original. On the good side, Fincher managed to efficiently reduce the length of the movie from three to two and a half hours, and remove the TV-film look the original sometimes had. But some ellipses make that we are less convinced by the motivation of the characters, while at the same time some things are over-explained while they were better left suggested as in the original.
Rating: 5 /10

The Ward (2010)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2010
	Director: John Carpenter (Halloween, The Thing)
	Actors: Amber Heard (Zombieland), Mamie Gummer, Danielle Panabaker, Jared Harris (Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows)
	Country: USA
	Genre: Horror, Thriller
	Conditions of visioning: 21.12.2012, Blu-ray, Home cinema
Synopsis: Kristen (Heard) is sent to the psychiatric ward of an hospital after having burned down an old farm. She will start to make friends with the other innmates, and discover that some kind of entity haunts the place.
Review: The latest movie by one of my favorite directors John Carpenter (I own all his movies), who has been absent since Ghosts of Mars in 2001, except for two episodes of the TV-series Masters of Horror. The topic fits him well, but it has been done before. I cannot really tell which other movies this one reminds me of without spoiling the ending. I enjoyed as usual Carpenter's art of moviemaking: slow pace, beautiful use of the cinemascope format, nice presentation of some good-looking actresses. I also liked the opening credits sequence (that you fully understand only at the end) and I found the soundtrack very good in the first half hour, reminding me of the one of Drive. But the last hour contains less and less ideas, and in the end I realized it is pretty much a copy of another movie, only transposed in a ward and with an all-female cast. One detail at the end makes me think that the copy is intentional, making it an hommage then. SPOILER: Highlight the following to know which movie it is a copy of, and the main twist: Identity (2003), multiple personalities.
Rating: 6 /10

The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury (2004)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2004
	Director: Peter Chung (The Animatrix, segment Matriculated)
	Actors (voices): Vin Diesel (XxX, Pitch Black, Fast and Furious), Rhiana Griffith, Keith David
	Country: USA
	Genre: Animation, SF
	Conditions of visioning: 21.12.2012, DVD, Home cinema
Synopsis: Barely escaped from a monster-infested planet (see Pitch Black) Riddick (Diesel), the little girl Jack (Griffith) and the Imam (David) are captured by a bounty hunter.
Review: An interesting animated follow-up to the excllent B-movie Pitch Black, using the same characters and introducing some ones of the following Chronicles of Riddick. Lasting only 33 minutes, it tells us a bit more about the legend Riddick and his extraordinary ability to fight, especially in darkness. The story with bounty hunters reminds strongly of Cowboy Bebop, and the organic animation of the Animatrix episode from the same director. But there is not much more to it, just an interesting expansion of the universe, with an OK quality for animation and story.
Rating: 5 /10

Collateral Damage (2002)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2002
	Director: Andrew Davis (Above the Law, Under Siege, The Fugitive)
	Actors: Arnold Schwarzenegger (The Terminator), John Leguizamo (Summer of Sam, Land of the Dead), Francesca Neri (Hannibal), John Turturro (O'Brother, Transformers 1-3), Cliff Curtis (Blow, Fracture, The Last Airbender)
	Country: USA
	Genre: Action
	Conditions of visioning: 20.12.2012, Blu-ray, Home cinema
Synopsis: After a terrorist attack, events will compell a firefighter (Schwarzenegger) to look for the responsibles by himself.
Review: After making this movie, Schwarzy did Terminator 3 to which he was attached contractually, and then almost dissapeared from the Movie scene for the eight years of his Governorship of California. Thus it was the last opportunity to see him play a human before about a decade! Unfortunately this movie about terrorist attacks was about to be released end of 2001, but after the 9/11 events it was pulled out, editied differently and release in 2002. Even though, Schwarzenegger writes in his autobiography Total Recall: My Unbelievably True Life Story (soon to be reviewed on this blog): "when Collateral Damage debuted the following February, it felt both irrelevant and painful to watch in the light of the recent events". Indeed the movie starts pretty well with good screenplay (although classical) and good ideas. I found Schwarzenegger's acting very good for this role which is not one of a trained killer for once. A bunch of known actors make you feel at ease, like John Turturro around the middle of the movie that introduces some comedy to release the tension. On the down side, some special effects look terribly cheap and more importantly in the third act of the movie you feel the absence of the scenes that have been edited out, and the conclusion feels strange and unfinished. It is still OK to watch, but not as good and ambitious as it could have been.
Rating: 5 /10

Pumping Iron (1977)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 1977
	Director: George Butler, Robert Fiore
	Actors: Arnold Schwarzenegger (Conan the Barbarian, The Terminator), Lou Ferrigno (The Incredible Hulk TV-series), Matty Ferrigno
	Country: USA
	Genre: Documentary
	Conditions of visioning: 19.12.2012, DVD, Home cinema
Synopsis: What is bodybuilding and how do you train to become Mr Universe?
Review: Reading the excellent autobiography from Arnold Schwarzenegger Total Recall: My Unbelievably True Life Story (soon to be reviewed on this blog) made me want to see some of his first and/or less known movies. I have already seen Hercules in New York (1969), his first movie as bodybuilder, and I will soon watch Stay Hungry (1976) in which he learned acting from Jeff Bridges. Pumping Iron is the 1977 documentary that made the world discover bodybuilding. I didn't learn more by watching it than by reading the biography, but I could see the bodybuilders in action! We follow a few of them as they teach us what is bodybuilding and as they train and compete for the amateur title of Mr Universe or the professional one of Mr Olympia. In particular Arnold Schwarzenegger is planning on winning this title for the sixth time in a row. He tells us that bodybuilding is all about symmetry and definition of the muscles, but that to achieve perfection you also need a strong mind. We discover the arrogant side of him, ready to use any psychological mean available in order to destabilize his opponents. In particular how he proudly convinced Lou Ferrigno that he will loose even before the contest starts ("I already called my Mom to tell her that I won", "Too bad the contest is too early, one month later you would have had a chance at least" ...). We feel sorry for the young unexperienced Lou and his hard-working father. Apart from the interesting topic, it is worth noticing that the documentary is quite well done: structure, editing, music...
Rating: 6 /10

Das Boot (1981)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 1981
	Director: Wolfgang Petersen (The Neverending Story, Air Force One, Troy)
	Actors:  Jürgen Prochnow (Wing Commander, Air Force One, The English Patient), Herbert Grönemeyer, Klaus Wennemann
	Country: D
	Genre: War
	Conditions of visioning: 16.12.2012, Blu-ray, Home cinema
Synopsis: During WWII we follow the day-to-day life of the crew in a German submarine patrolling the North Atlantic.
Review: Last time I have seen this movie was on a DVD in which the added scenes were of poorer quality with respect to the rest of the movie. This has been fixed with this nice Blu-ray edition: three and a half hours of continous tension beautifully rendered. Petersen managed to keep us attentive in spite of the extra lenght of the movie, even without showing much action! You have to be in the right mood to stand the length, but it can be quite... immersive. The main music theme also helps during the action scenes. The best element of the movie is with no doubt the recreated interior of a WWII German U-Boot, that I had the opportunity to visit at the Bavaria Film Studios in Munich. It is basically no more than a long a narrow corridor spanning from the engine room at the tail, through the kitchen, command post, sleeping area and torpedo room in front. This narrowness plays a big role in making the movie believable and realistic. Then you have this bunch of very young men locked under water and subject to fear and boredom, lead by a captain played by the brillant Jürgen Prochnow and a no-less brillant team of officers. A movie that must belong to a collection of sub-marine movies side-by-side with Hunt for the Red October and Crimson Tide, especially as it belongs to another generation.
Rating: 8 /10

A History of Violence (2005)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2005
	Director: David Cronenberg (Scanners, Naked Lunch, The Fly, Videodrome, Eastern Promises)
	Actors: Viggo Mortensen (The Lord of the Rings 1-3, Eastern Promises), Maria Bello (Payback, E.R TV series), William Hurt (Dark City, The Incredible Hulk), Ed Harris (Apollo 13, Ed TV)
	Country: USA, D
	Genre: Thriller
	Conditions of visioning: 15.12.2012, DVD, Home cinema
Synopsis: A regular man (Mortensen) in a small town will become an American hero and attract unwanted attention to him and his family.
Review: It was a positive shock when I saw this movie for the first time. I thought Cronenberg dead and buried, his success was winding down with Crash, eXistenZ, Spider, but he managed to get out of his traditionnal genre of hard/gore/strange organic movies to produce somehing completely different and surprise everybody. One must watch the international and not american version of History of Violence, in which a few typical Cronenberg organic scenes have not been edited out, and reinforce the message of the film. I find this movie very well filmed, the actors (in particular Mortensen) very convincing, and the music by Howard Shore (The Fly, The Lord of the Rings) just what is needed: guiding your feelings but never stealing the attention over the images. I love the wordless ending, all played in the characters eyes and subtle reactions, and you understand that things are going to be allright. I have read the Grapic Novel that inspired the movie and I find the adaptation very well done also. The third act of the novel (in which Joeys brother is alive and has been tortured for twenty years) would not have worked on film. I also liked Cronenberg's next film Eastern Promises, although not so much, and am looking forward to Cosmopolis. The only reason I didn't give it the highest ranking is because I find that the introduction of the perfect family at the beginning of the movie is a bit too cheesy.
Rating: 9 /10

The Girl who played with Fire (2009)

	Also Known As: Verdammnis (Germany), Flickan som lekte med elden (original)
	Year of first release: 2009
	Director: Daniel Alfredson (The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest)
	Actors: Michael Nyqvist (Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol), Noomi Rapace (Prometheus)
	Country: D, DK, S
	Genre: Polar, Thriller
	Conditions of visioning: 14.12.2012, Blu-ray, Home cinema
Synopsis: The two main characters of the first film (Rapace and Nyquist) are reunited though a prostitution story involving girls from Eastern countries.
Review: This sequel feels a bit forced in bringing back together the characters of the first film and the winning receipe, a bit like in The Bourne Supremacy. While the first movie was set in the countryside and the police was little involved, this time we are in the big city and the police investigation runs in parallel to the journalistic one. The reactions from the protagonists are sometimes nicely unpredictable. I liked in particular when the young boxer witnesses the kidnapping of the friend he came to warn, follows the car and ends up fist fighting to free this friend, against all odds. Nicely written. If the first movie reminded me of many Nordic movie I knew, this one recalls Kill Bill to my mind! No specific reason, just a feeling, an atmosphere and some references. Still a good sequel but I hope for some change in the third opus.
Rating: 6 /10