Some film I just got back from a particularly nasty day with high winds and heavy snow up on the trail to Emerald Lake, in Rocky Mountain National Park. Spring is here now, but enjoy the reminder of how fierce it can get up there in winter!
Nymph Lake
Ice Skating on Nymph Lake
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A year-end letter, five weeks late.
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When I travel internationally, I like to send postcards. I have quite a long list of contacts now, many in the USA, some abroad. Every person on my list means something to me; the postcards serve as a way to let them know that no matter where I was, what I was doing, they were on my mind.
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Amy Schumer’s “Trainwreck” is the funniest movie I have seen in a long time. And I’m not alone; from mom & pop blogs to the big critics, the film is earning accolades left and right. I’m sure it will be a contender for the big end-of-the-year awards.
In the social justice era, people take notice of a comedian like Schumer, and her brand of brave, no-hold barred, body-conscious humor. The edge she honed on her TV show, “Inside Amy Schumer” is cutting sharper than ever in “Trainwreck. Schumer has no problem being totally frank about the problems faced by the ambitious young woman in today’s world.
Schumer’s character sleeps around, drinks, smokes and absolutely hates the idea of family, as represented by her sister’s dopey husband and child (the pair of which show up from time to time, constantly smiling and basically as cartoons).
This is how Schumer, and by extension, the film as a whole, earns the trust of the female millennial audience. Schumer’s character also hates sports, which is ironic, since the movie uses sports as a clever way to appeal to male audiences.
Christopher Nolan is one of the best mainstream filmmakers working today. There are better, I won’t argue that with you, but there are only a select few artists in the mainstream who can consistently make blockbusters that are as visually pleasing, thought-provoking, and tense as those that bear the stamp of Syncopy, Christopher Nolan’s production company.
Nolan is one of the only filmmakers whose movies I will see without knowing anything about them. I went into “Interstellar” having seen a trailer or two, and not much else. I knew it was sci-fi, a genre I love, and from a man whose previous original projects included “Inception,” “Memento,” and “The Prestige.” Those are all fantastic mind-bending films which have a lot of flair. It’s hard to argue with a pedigree like that (although many online Steven Spielberg fans will argue with you about it until neither of you enjoys the discussion anymore).
Interstellar tries really hard to fit the same mold, but it just didn’t work for me in the same way Nolan’s earlier films did. Simply put: Interstellar is a decent film, but I left it in the theatre (along with eighty dollars, but that’s another story). My mind was already on tomorrow by the time the lights came up. I didn’t find myself immediately wanting to rewatch it, which is the way I felt after “Memento,” “The Prestige,” and “Inception.”
Although the plot of the movie (I’ll keep it vague, promise) revolves around some fairly advanced astrophysics, information or understanding is never withheld from the audience. The critical scenes in the movie all have clearly defined stakes and rules. The movie progresses from plot point to plot point in a linear fashion. And even when the film ventures into strange territory and advanced theoretical concepts, there’s never much of a sense of mystery or wonder.
The cinematography is jaw-dropping and breaks its back to instill meaning and scale into the void left by a compelling plot. The score by Hans Zimmer is well-constructed, but unobtrusive (not usually a word I would use to describe the work of Hans Zimmer).
Matthew McConaughey as Cooper is the emotional center of the movie, and it is largely the strength of his performance that anchors the movie. Nolan clearly understood this, as he hangs the success this film on emotional appeal.
I’m a cerebral person. Although I can appreciate a good tearjerker or a quiet movie which silently swims on emotional subtext, I’ll take the guessing game of “Memento” over that stuff any day. At least in a Christopher Nolan film.
I can’t say that “Interstellar” was a bad film; it clearly connected with her, and others I have spoken to about the film echo her sentiment. The film strikes a resounding emotional note. And for some people, that’s enough. Strike that note in the cold vacuum of space though, and it produces no sound.
thisisyouth 