Netflix Challenge: Under 10

We need to catch up on the Netflix Challenge. In the last two weeks, it's been all about the French frogging up our queue. But now, les films sont retirés de la file d'attente.
Thank you, Google Translate!

The Horse Boy
A documentary about a family of an autistic boy as they travel to Outer Mongolia in an attempt to heal their son. Still not quite sure how I feel about this one. Is the effect real or wishful thinking?




Swimming Pool
Whoah! A good Hitchcockian thriller about a cranky, middle-aged British mystery writer who travels to France for peace, quiet and new literary inspiration. She finds it, along with a heaping helping of bare French breasts, sex and big tubs of yogurt.




Delicatessen
Before there was Amélie, there was Delicatessen. This is a visually striking and funny French movie about a retired circus clown who finds work at a strange apartment building full of hungry tenants.




Dark Matter
Didn't really know what to expect from this one and it ended up shocking me right out of my pantaloons. This first film by opera director Chen Shi-Zheng provides a look into the world of academia and the hidden lives of all those genius foreign students who come to the U.S. to study. It won a Sundance award for best feature film about science or technology.




The Stranger
I got on a real Orson Welles kick and knocked out two of his noir films I'd never seen before. This one has the great Edward G. Robinson, the realy nugly Loretta Young and Welles with a great mustache and haircut. Robinson is a UN war crimes commission investigator and Welles is a Nazi war criminal hiding out as a professor in a small Connecticut town. I highly recommend this one. Apparently, you can watch the whole thing for free right here on the YouTube.




The Third Man
Another classic noir with Welles playing the bad guy. This time he's Harry Lime, a suspected black market profiteer in post-war Vienna, who also happens to make one of the best, most dramatic screen entrances ever.




To Be and To Have
This is a sweet little documentary about a tiny, one-teacher school in the French countryside with a bunch of sweet, tiny French kids. There's just something about little kids speaking that poo-poo, oui-oui French that gets me every time. Although, the whole thing is spoiled a little when you learn that the nice teacher sued the filmmakers after the fact.



Just eight titles to go. We can do this.

Great things accomplished today

What a Saturday!

1) After about eight months of dumbly looking at the all dried up tube of Crazy Glue, I finally bought a replacement. I went with Super Glue. I'd had enough of the crazy.

2) Super-Glued the knob on the kid's underwear drawer. Wood on wood action! And it stuck. Now, for the first time in four years we can open the drawer the way it was meant to be opened.

3) Super-Glued the Elvis '68 Comeback Special Christmas ornament. It's like Elvis' patella is brand new again.

4) Struck Record Store Day gold when I picked up a near-mint copy of Terence Trent D'arby's "Introducing the Hardline" on vinyl for $4. God bless the poor soul who parted with that one. Their soul is that much poorer now.

What could Sunday possibly have in store?

Netflix Challenge: We're under 20

SNL: The Best of Dan Aykroyd
An excellent reminder of the genius of Dan Aykroyd, whose sketches hold up better than many of his SNL contemporaries of 35 years ago: Irwin Mainway and his dangerous Halloween costumes (Invisible Pedestrian); Fred Garvin, the nerdy male prostitute serving the entire Quad Cities area; pitch man for the Bass-O-Matic 76; and the list goes on.






Goodbye Solo
Director Ramin Bahrani's critically acclaimed film about Solo, a Senegalese cab driver in Winston-Salem, N.C., who takes it upon himself to prevent an old man from committing suicide. A great, great movie that lets you take a peek into modern immigrant culture in America, far away from the big cities. Plus, Red West, a key figure in Elvis' "Memphis Mafia," plays the old man.




The Messenger
A tough-to-watch drama about two soldiers assigned to the casualty notification unit. Amazing movie with great performances by Woody Harrelson and Ben Foster, but I'm glad it's no longer on the queue.





Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson
I'm ashamed to say I didn't know very much about Hunter Thompson, this documentary rectifies that. Features interviews with Jimmy Carter and Jimmy Buffett, not to mention readings by Johnny Depp.




Shanghai Kiss
Based on the poster that features a big picture of Hayden Panettiere, I thought this was going to be horrible. It wasn't. In fact, she's barely in it, and the movie is pretty interesting.

Despite what the poster implies, the film is actually about a Chinese-American actor in Los Angeles, suffering in his career due to Asian stereotypes in the industry. He does have a weird, unhealthy relationship with a teen girl (Panettiere) who obsesses over him. When his grandmother dies and leaves him her home in Shanghai, he visits China for a view days just to sell off the place and make some cash. Instead, he meets a nice Chinese girl and finds himself longing to reconnect with his ancestry.

According to Wikipedia, this went straight to DVD. It's better than that.



16 titles still remain...

Netflix Challenge: European, I'm-a-peeing

In an attempt to cleanse myself of this Oscar mess, I crawled back into the loving arms of heady European cinema.

First, it was the 1929 Luis Buñuel/ Salvador Dalí collaboration, Un Chien Andalou. Sixteen minutes of surrealist goodness -- razors to eyeballs, ants crawling on hands. Fun!

Then, it was on to one of my all-time favorites, Jean Luc Godard's masterpiece, À bout de souffle (Breathless). It's an important film in the history of cinema for many reasons, but if it were nothing more than just 90 minutes of staring at Jean Seberg, I'd still love it. She's a 1960s intercontinental American Dream.

Take a look:







21 to go!

Crud

It's taken a week for me to get to a place where I can write about it, but Carolina won Oscar Smackdown XII.

She had a great night, correctly picking 21 out of 24 categories. That's impressive and I graciously congratulate her.

On the flip side, I had what can only be described as an average night for a genius like me. I hit 16 out of 24 categories -- not great, but good enough to beat Roger Ebert and win a free, three-month subscription to this arthouse movie site, MUBI.com. I'll take it.

For her efforts, Carolina won The King's Speech-themed first place prize package featuring a King George Harrison iTunes card, a bottle of London Pride beer, a tube of UK-made McVittie's Hob Nob biscuits and tea.

I took home the Social Network loser prize featuring a box of Sour Patch Kids, a bottle of He'Brew Messiah Bold beer and a Napster card.

I'll get over it.

Oscar Smackdown XII

Tonight, Carolina and I will do battle in our 12th Annual Oscar Smackdown competition. After another loss by a sizable margin in the Grammy challenge, I once again find myself with my back against the wall.

Let's do this:

Short Film (Animated): Day & Night, Teddy Newton
Actually saw this one.

Documentary (Feature): Inside Job, Charles Ferguson and Audrey Marrs
Actually want to see this one.

Short Film (Live Action): Na Wewe, Ivan Goldschmidt
Heard this is good.

Documentary (Short Subject): Killing in the Name
Looks Oscar-worthy.

Film Editing: The Social Network, Angus Wall and Kirk Baxter
You notice the editing in The Social Network, in a good way.

Actor in a Leading Role: Colin Firth, The King's Speech
British+handicap+ royalty = Oscar Trifecta

Sound Editing: Inception, Richard King
Inceptions sweeps the technical awards

Actor in a Supporting Role: Christian Bale, The Fighter
Body change (weight loss) + Crack addict = Oscar

Foreign Language Film: In a Better World, Denmark
The Danes are so hot right now.

Actress in a Leading Role: Natalie Portman, Black Swan
Momentum+Body Change+Oscars Need Natalie Portman = Win

Sound Mixing: Inception, Lora Hirschberg, Gary A. Rizzo and Ed Novick

Makeup: The Wolfman, Rick Baker and Dave Elsey
Thriller x 2010 = Oscar for Rick Baker

Actress in a Supporting Role: Hailee Steinfeld, True Grit
I probably should have gone with Melissa Leo, who was great in Frozen River last year and didn't win. This could be the make-up year.

Visual Effects: Inception, Paul Franklin, Chris Corbould, Andrew Lockley and Peter Bebb

Music (Original Score): The Social Network, Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross
It's recognizable and set just the right tone for that film.

Animated Feature Film: Toy Story 3, Lee Unkrich
It's an unwritten Academy law that some geek from Pixar must take a break from Segway-ing around the office to deliver an Oscar acceptance speech.

Art Direction: The King's Speech, Production Design: Eve Stewart, Set Decoration: Judy Farr
Period + British + 11 other nominations = Oscar

Writing (Adapted Screenplay): The Social Network, Screenplay by Aaron Sorkin
The Social Network needs to be acknowledged with at least one major award. This will be it.

Cinematography: Inception, Wally Pfister
I like his name.

Music (Original Song): If I Rise (from "127 Hours"), Music by A.R. Rahman Lyric by Dido and Rollo Armstrong
Shot in the dark. Rahman won for Slumdog and I don't see Randy Newman getting up there for another Toy Story song.

Costume Design: The King's Speech, Jenny Beavan
Period + British + 11 other noms = Oscar

Writing (Original Screenplay): Inception, Written by Christopher Nolan
Personally, I prefer "The Kids Are All Right," but this is my official pick.

Directing: The King's Speech, Tom Hooper
Uncle Mo'

Best Picture: The King's Speech
British + World War II + Handicap = Oscar

Netflix Challenge Update

Oscar season has taken up all of our movie-watching time, so it's been slow going on the Netflix Challenge.

Here's a quick recap of what's been taken off the list since December.

I'll Believe You
This one made the queue because I saw Chris Elliott on the cover. It was horrible. I couldn't finish it.




Taps
A good cast featuring Sean Penn and Tom Cruise early in their careers, but its only value today is as a document of the crazy return of "tough guy" military war mongering of the Reagan '80s. Sucked.




Kicking and Screaming
Finally, one I sort of liked. Not to be confused with Will Ferrell's very funny film of the same name, this is writer Noah Baumbach's (The Squid and the Whale, Margot at the Wedding) first movie. It's about a group of guys in the mid 1990s who can't quite move away from their college campus after graduating. It's one of those, "I wish I'd written that" movies. There's definitely room for improvement, as a lot of the dialogue sounds very written in the way that Kevin Smith's movies always sound very written.




Capitalism: A Love Story
A good Michael Moore movie. If you like him, you'll like this.




Cheech and Chong's Nice Dreams
I remember seeing this a long time ago and thinking it was funny. Stone sober, the comedy has not aged well.


Downtown 81
The real Jean-Michel Basquiat hangs out with artists and musicians in New York in 1981. Super cool with good music.



Others removed from the list before viewing:
Paloma de Papel
Dirty Harry

Just 25 titles remain.