4.5 Razors

Hot Fuzz

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Hot Fuzz
  • IMDb: link

“Well, I wouldn’t argue that is was a no-holes barred, adrenalin-fueled thrill ride. But, there is no way you can perpetrate that amount of carnage and mayhem and not incur a considerable amount of paperwork.”

Hot Fuzz movie review

Supercop Nicholas Angel (Simon Pegg) is promoted and shipped out of London to the sleepy burg of Sandburg.  The rest of the London force is sick and tired of being shown-up by a one-man force with a 400% higher arrest record who makes the rest of them look bad.

So Angel shows up in Sandford, a town with almost no crime but a large amount of “accidental” deaths.  Partnered with the chief’s son (Nick Frost), who has a love of American action flicks, a tendency to ask really annoying questions (“Have you ever fired two guns whilst jumping through the air?”), and little actual police knowledge, Angel investigates a few accidental deaths and becomes convinced a serial killer is murdering his way through the small town.

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Life is Often Stranger than Fiction

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Stranger than Fiction
  • IMDB: link

Harold Crick (Will Ferrell) is an IRS agent whose life is structured, scheduled, and numbered.  Nothing ever exciting happens to Harold until he starts to hear the voice.  Out of the blue Harold begins to hear a woman’s voice narrating his everyday actions, with extreme accuracy, an eye for detail, a knowledge of the future, and, as Harold puts it, a better vocabulary.

Kay Eiffel (Emma Thompson) is a famous author of tragedies where good men and women meet grisly fates.  She is struggling with her new book.  The publishers have sent her an assistant (Queen Latifah) in hopes of ending her writer’s block and getting her book in before the deadline.

Kay’s major obstacle is she doesn’t know how to kill her main character – Harold Crick.

The bizarreness of the story is terrific as it isn’t attempted to be dissected or given a simple explanation (dream, etc.).  Harold Crick is real, yet his actions and his destiny lie in the hands of a Englishwoman with a typewriter.

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Sing Out Loud, Sing Out Strong, Sing Out Proud

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Shut Up and Sing
  • IMDB: link

“Wherever they burn books, they will also, in the end, burn people.”

I don’t think they like you Mr. President

There is a scene from the documentary where organized protesters burn and destroy copies of the Dixie Chicks CD’s, not because they dislike the music, but because of a single sentence expressing a personal opinion about George Bush.

The quote above is from German poet Heinrich Heine who knew something of censorship, for his views against class structure.  For his own views, which were argued against, but never proven wrong, his works were banned.

“Just so you know, we’re ashamed the President of the United States is from Texas.”

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The Departed

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: The Departed
  • IMDB: link

Martin Scorsese has given American cinema some great films.  Who could forget Taxi Driver, Raging Bull, Goodfellas, and Casino?  His recent films however have recieved a mixed reaction.  The Aviator was exqusite and sleek, but lacked the heart and soul of the film it must always be compared to, given its subject matter, Citizen Kane.  Gangs of New York was brutal and honest, but some unfortunate miscasting and near week-long running time was a little too much to bear.  And most critics agree 1999’s Bringing Out the Dead was, at least in a small way, a blunderous misstep.

Here Scorsese returns to a cops and maifa story, re-uniting with DiCaprio, and giving us a tale of intrigue and thrills that relies more on story than gun play, and more on character than body count (at least until the last 20 minutes).  The result?  It’s his best film in years.

The film follows two new members of the Boston State Police Department fresh from the academy and put to work in Boston.

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End of Innocence

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Bobby
  • IMDb: link

In the style of Grand Hotel, Emilio Estevez (who wrote and directed) brings us a look at the Ambassador Hotel and the people who work and stay there.  It’s not just any day however, it’s June 6, 1968 and Bobby Kennedy is coming to give his last speech before tragedy would strike, and one of the last remaining beacons of hope in his time was extinguished by hatred and violence.

The film follows the guests and staff of the Ambassador Hotel over the period of a day as they work, play, and ready for an appearance, by who many believe will become the next President of the United States.

The characters include the manager of the hotel (William H. Macy), his wife (Sharon Stone) who works as the beauty parlor, and his mistress (Heather Graham) who works the phone bank with her friend (Joy Bryant)  There’s also a Mexican kitchen worker (Freddy Rodriguez) dealing with a racist boss (Christian Slater), and a bride (Lindsay Lohan) who is marrying a friend from high school (Elijah Wood) to stop him being sent to Vietnam.

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