Monthly Archives: September 2013

Blutgletscher [The Station] (2013)

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Blutgletscher
Director: Marvin Kren
Writer: Benjamin Hessler
Cast: Gerhard Liebmann, Edita Malovcic, Brigitte Kren, Hille Beseler, Peter Knaack, Felix Römer, Wolfgang Pampel, Murathan Muslu, Michael Fuith, Adina Vetter, Coco Huemer
Part of: /slash Filmfestival

Plot:
Glazius is a climate monitoring station in the alps. They’re keeping an eye on the glaciers, basically documenting their recline. When Janek (Gerhard Liebmann), the station’s constantly drunk technician, and Falk (Peter Knaack), one of the scientists, discover a red glacier made up of a peculiar, organic substance and Janek soon after sees a very weird looking animal, the climate change quickly becomes the smallest of their worries. Especially since Ecology Minister Bodicek (Brigitte Kren) is approaching with a small delegation.

Blutgletscher is Austria’s first creature feature and as such it is of course a historical movie. But it’s also a really cool movie that works perfectly – right up until the ending.

blutgletscher

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White House Down (2013)

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White House Down
Director: Roland Emmerich
Writer: James Vanderbilt
Cast: Channing Tatum, Jamie Foxx, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Jason Clarke, Richard Jenkins, Joey King, James Woods, Nicolas Wright, Jimmi Simpson, Rachelle Lefevre, Lance Reddick

Plot:
John Cale (Channing Tatum) is a bodyguard and wants nothing more than to work for the Secret Service and on the protection detail of the president Sawyer (Jamie Foxx). Especially because his daughter Emily (Joey King) is a huge fan of the president. So when John actually gets an interview in the White House, he takes Emily with him. Unfortunately this just happens to be the day where the White House and the president are attacked. Suddenly everything depends on John.

It is hard to not compare this film to Olympus Has Fallen. And White House Down is the clear winner in that comparison. I didn’t even have alcohol and I enjoyed pretty much every second of it, even if not everything was supposed to be as funny as it was.

whitehousedown

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The World’s End (2013)

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The World’s End
Director: Edgar Wright
Writer: Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg
Cast: Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Paddy Considine, Martin Freeman, Rafe Spall, Eddie Marsan, Rosamund Pike, Pierce Brosnan, Bill Nighy, Michael Smiley, Steve Oram, Alice Lowe, David Bradley, Julia Deakin, Reece Shearsmith, Peter Serafinowicz, Mark Heap, Ben Whishaw (at least I’m pretty damn certain it was him)
Part of: The Cornetto Trilogy
[Here are my reviews of the other two movies in the trilogy.]

Plot:
When they were still young and living in Newton Haven, Gary King (Simon Pegg) and his friends Andy (Nick Frost), Peter (Eddie Marsan), Ollie (Martin Freeman) and Steven (Paddy Considine) tried themselves at a pub crawl and came short. 20 years later, Gary is still obsessed with the idea of finishing and convinces the old gang to come. But things are a little weird in Newton Haven – weirder than in other small towns.

Since I love both Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, I was very worried that it this film wouldn’t be able to fulfill my expectations. But fortunately it did. It was awesome.

The-Worlds-End

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Red 2 (2013)

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Red 2
Director: Dean Parisot
Writer: Jon Hoeber, Erich Hoeber
Based on: Warren Ellis‘ and Cully Hamner‘s comic
Sequel to: Red
Cast: Bruce Willis, Mary-Louise Parker, John Malkovich, Helen Mirren, Anthony Hopkins, Byung-hun Lee, Brian Cox, Catherine Zeta-Jones, David Thewlis, Neal McDonough, Titus Welliver

Plot:
Frank (Bruce Willis) and Sarah (Mary-Louise Parker) are starting to settle down. But Frank’s past, Sarah’s sense for adventure and Marvin (John Malkovich) make it pretty impossible for them to really live in peace. And so they soon find themselves hunting down what remains of Project Nightshade, a super-secret Cold War weapons project.

Red 2 was fun. Maybe not as much as the first one, but it gets pretty damn close. Great characters, nice dialogues and awesome performances.

Red2

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Re-Watch: Shaun of the Dead (2004)

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Shaun of the Dead
Director: Edgar Wright
Writer: Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg
Cast: Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Kate Ashfield, Lucy Davis, Dylan Moran, Penelope Wilton, Peter Serafinowicz, Rafe Spall, Bill Nighy, Jessica Hynes, Martin Freeman, Tamsin Greig, Matt Lucas, Chris Martin, Rob Brydon, Joe Cornish, Mark Gatiss, Michael Smiley, David Walliams, Julia Deakin, Reece Shearsmith
Part of: The Cornetto Trilogy

Plot:
Shaun (Simon Pegg) spends his life between his dead-end job, his best friend Ed (Nick Frost) and his girlfriend Liz (Kate Ashfield). Liz is frustrated with his complacency. But things get severely shaken up when there’s a zombie outbreak. As soon as Shaun realizes, he tries everything to save the ones he loves.

Shaun of the Dead is not only one of the best zombie movies I’ve ever seen, it’s just one of the best movies ever, period. And this re-watch proved it to me again.

shaunofthedead

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Re-Watch: Hot Fuzz (2007)

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Hot Fuzz
Director: Edgar Wright
Writer: Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg
Cast: Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Timothy Dalton, Jim Broadbent, Paddy Considine, Rafe Spall, Olivia Colman, Martin Freeman, Bill Nighy, Joe Cornish, Alice Lowe, David Bradley, Bill Bailey, Stephen Merchant, Julia Deakin, Cate Blanchett, Steve Coogan, Peter Jackson
Part of: The Cornetto Trilogy

Plot:
Nicholas Angel (Simon Pegg) is London’s star police man. But his success makes the rest of the service look bad, so he is reassigned to the small town of Sandford, where he’s partnered up with Danny Butterman (Nick Frost). Sandford might officially be the safest town in the UK, but Nick’s investigations soon turn up some weird things, when a series of freak accidents start.

Man, I really love this movie. It’s funny, fast-paced and riddled with cameos (some of which I only just learned about, like Peter Jackson and Cate Blanchett). It’s just an absolute joy to watch.

hot_fuzz

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Pitch Black (2000)

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Pitch Black
Director: David Twohy
Writer: Jim Wheat, Ken Wheat, David Twohy
Cast: Vin Diesel, Radha Mitchell, Cole Hauser, Keith David, Rhiana Griffith

Plot:
A spaceship crashlands on an unknown planet, steered by Carolyn (RadhaMitchell) who takes over from the captain. The ship carried a few passangers, most of them civilians. But among them are also Riddick (Vin Diesel), prisoner of William Johns (Cole Hauser) who is transporting him to a penal colony. While everyone is anxious at first about Riddick, the fact of the matter is that the only thing more dangerous than Riddick himself on this planet are the creatures that inhabit it.

Pitch Black is one of those rather claustrophobic space thrillers and it works rather well. Though the sometimes rather cheap look hurts the film a bit, I did enjoy it.

pitchblack

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Re-Watch: Red (2010)

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Red
Director: Robert Schwentke
Writer: Jon Hoeber, Erich Hoeber
Based on: Warren Ellis‘ and Cully Hamner‘s comic
Cast: Bruce Willis, Mary-Louise Parker, John Malkovich, Morgan Freeman, Helen Mirren, Brian Cox, Karl Urban, Julian McMahon, Richard Dreyfuss, James Remar
[Here’s my first review.]

Plot:
Frank Moses (Bruce Willis) enjoys his retirement. Most notably, he enjoys his monthly calls to his represntative at his insurance company, Sarah (Mary-Louise Parker). Shortly before he gets the courage to actually see her, though, his CIA-operative past catches up with him: a kill squad comes to his house and levels it pretty much completely. Frank survives, the assassins don’t but now Frank has to get Sarah to safety and then call on the help of his old squad – Joe (Morgan Freeman), Marvin (John Malkovich), Victoria (Helen Mirren) and Ivan (Brian Cox). All the while he’s being hunted by CIA-agent William Cooper (Karl Urban).

Red still is one hell of an entertaining movie. I think I enjoyed it just as much as the first time round.

red

[SPOILERS]

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Hatchet II (2010)

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Hatchet II
Director: Adam Green
Writer: Adam Green
Sequel to: Hatchet
Cast: Danielle Harris, Tony Todd, Kane Hodder, Parry Shen, Tom Holland, AJ Bowen, Mercedes McNab, Joleigh Fioravanti, Shawn Ashmore (for about 3 seconds before getting his face sliced off)

Plot [with Spoilers for Hatchet]:
Marybeth (Danielle Harris) just barely escaped Victor Crowley (Kane Hodder) and she’s the only one from her group. She returns into town to ask Reverend Zombie (Tony Todd) for help. Zombie agrees and gets together a band of mercenaries for support. But there is more to his agreement to help than pure altruism and Victor Crowley is far from dealt with.

Hatchet II is a decent continuation of the series. It concentrates more on the gore and less on the sexism, which I appreciated. But it also rehashes a bit and makes the ending of the first movie worse in hindsight.

Hatchet-II

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A Princess of Passyunk (Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff)

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[I got a copy of this book in an Early Reviewer give-away at librarything. I don’t think it’s tainted my judgment, though.]

A Princess of Passyunk is a novel by Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff.

Plot:
It’s the 1950s. Ganady is sixteen and spends most of his time thinking about baseball and the games he watches through time eddies with his best friend Yevgeniy and Mr. O.  The rest of the time, he thinks about the big questions in life, which he tries to answer with the help of his Jewish grandmother, his priest and her rabbi. And then his baba tells him the beginning of a fairy tale about an enchanted princess and Ganny suddenly finds himself in the middle of his own story revolving around baseball, cockroaches and the mysterious Svetlana.

A Princessof Passyunk starts off really sweet. So sweet, in fact, that I didn’t really mind the religious themes, which usually really aren’t my cup of tea. But then the entire story goes on too long and becomes really weird.

Woman Facing Away from Man

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