Letters to the Editor
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Paprika
I saw Paprika at the New York Film Festival last year. O'Hehir got it pretty much right in this piece: Kon gives us gorgeous animation with a fascinating central premise, and couple of the set pieces, especially the one that opens the picture, will blow your mind. But "hallucinatory" does not begin to describe it; I gave up trying to follow the plot about twenty minutes in and just enjoyed the visuals. I'd say it's very much worth seeing, especially for anime buffs, but a kewpie doll to anyone who can come back here and tell me what the hell this picture was about.
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Thanks for the guide
Time will tell if you are right about these films, but it's encouraging that you were able to get the correct take on Starship Troopers. It's always discouraging trying to explain that film to Americans who seem, just as with the current situation in Iraq, completely unable to get it.
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Black Book
I saw Black Book at the Toronto Film Festival. I arrived late and had to sit in the front row, turning my neck from side to side to read the subtitles on the curved screen. I vowed that I would dart out of the theatre if the film wasn't immediately captivating. And well, I stayed for the duration. This is a must-see.
Werner Herzog's Rescue Dawn and Ken Loach's The Wind the Shakes the Barley are also being released in North America next year and they are well worth checking out.
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Missed one!
What about Transformers? It's a movie about robots. And those robots turn into cars and things. They're more than meets the eye.
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Great article!
After last year's drek, let's hope this is a happy new year, indeed.
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another for your radar... SUNSHINE from Danny Boyle on March 16th
This film should be an interesting combination of surreal environment/circumstances, character tension, hard-science premise and Boyle and team's unique filmmaking style ;)
For more info check out http://www.sunshinedna.com
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I loved STARSHIP TROOPERS!
I try to explain that it's a very funny satire on fascist militarism, and hardly anyone believes me.
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Troopers
ST sucks because it barely follows the book. In the book the soldiers battle in powered armor. They jump all over chucking out small tactical nukes. I was so disappointed when they didn't have armor in the movie.
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Holy FUCKING SHIT!!!
New Times has taken over The Village Voice?!?! Good GOD, will the blasphemies and obscenities of our times never END?!
And I was living in San Francisco, and an avid reader of SF Weekly, when that fat cocksucker came storming in, telling everybody on your staff that their truly excellent free weekly was "full of p.c. bullshit." He was an asshole then, and he's an asshole now, and New Times is to free alternative weeklies what the National Transportation Association was to light rail public transportation in the 30s and 40s: Designed to take over and destroy.
And now the bastards have got The Village Voice. Shit, shit, shit...
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Keep an eye out for Persepolis
I'm disappointed this one didn't make the list.
Marjane Satrapi's cult graphic novel Persepolis is being adapted to an animated feature film, as announced at last year's Cannes festival, and the film is due out in '07. Production images released so far are beautiful, following the comic's style.
Persepolis is a darkly comical autobiography of Satrapi's childhood in Iran during and after the revolution. Translated from the original French into multiple languages including English, the graphic novel has had universal appeal, and is increasingly relevant in the current political atmosphere.
It's the one movie I'm most excited about in the coming year.