District B13

District B13 is a French movie directed by Pierre Morel and produced by Luc Besson. The film takes place in an alternative post apocalyptic France, where gangs have taken over one of the districts. The are is overrun with crime and drugs and is spiraling out of control. One day a timed nuclear bomb has been sent to the district. A good cop and a thug combine forces to stop the bomb from going off and figure out who was behind it.

The story is pretty simple. Stop the bad guys. This movie is more on the entertainment level and is all about kicking ass. The film is best know for is stunt sequences, which were done without wires or the use of CGI. The movie has action from the beginning to the end. Now I first heard about this movie by using you tube. I was looking up free running/ parkour and a clip from this movie poped up. I was hooked. It wasn’t until two years later I was able to watch it and I dragged my girlfriend with me to see it .

What was special about this movie is parkour, made famous by the films actor David Belle. Parkour is using the only the body to get from point A to point B in the fastest way possible. So if you would take the stairs to get to the top of a building, he would climb the building.

Overall this was a great movie that I can watch time and time again. This is a film all action junkies should see, and it shows that France can also make action movie just as entreating as America. This movie is a must see and should not be missed.

Tsotsi

Tsotsi is a film by South African director Gavin Hood. The film is based on a novel by Athol Fugard. The movie is about a boy, Tsotsi, who is very troubled and lives his life as a thug. He steals and kills just to survive and sometimes for not reason at all. When you see his actions, it is very hard to see how this character can have any good in him.

One day he shoots a woman trying to get inside her house and steals her car. In the process of stealing her car, he finds out that she has a baby. Instead of leaving the car and the baby all together, he decides to take the baby for himself. It is very hard to imagine someone so violent take care of a baby. Since the beginning of the movie he has done nothing but beat and kill people. But from the looks of it, this may be his once chance for salvation.

We find out that he had father issues in a dream sequence. His real name is David, and his mother was very ill. He cares much for her but his father did not want him near her. His father felt that he would get sick too. A dog can be heard barking in the background, and the father breaks it’s back so he runs away from home. He tries to take care of the baby but needs a mother to give him milk. So he hold a new mother hostage until she breast feeds him. He become friends with the lady and wants to take care of him at first but will not let her.

The lady he shot is not dead and the cops are looking for David. Flyers are put around the town and people realize it is David. David and other friends go to the rich part of town and back to the house were the baby belongs. The husband is at the house as the rob it but things go wrong and David has to shoot his friend. David realizes he cannot keep the baby so he decides to return him. He gives the baby back to the mother and is arrested.
There is a lot going on in the movie and it was hard at first to even care for the protagonist because he was so evil. But as the film progressed we see another side of him, a side that shows the good in him. He loved his mother but his father kept him away from her. The movie really show how important a mother is to a child. Overall this was a great film that I will watch again.

Dreams

Dreams is a film by Japanese director Akira Kurosawa. There are eight dreams in this movie but I will only talks about the seven that I have seen. The first dream is called Sunshine Through The Rain and it is about a boy who goes into the forest against his mother’s wishes to see the foxes wedding. He is seen by the foxes and runs away. When he arrives home, his mother tells him he must commit suicide or he can ask for the fox’s forgiveness.

The second dream is called The Peach Orchard and it is about a little boy who chases a ghost into the destroyed peach orchard. The ghost tells him that it is his fault and that he should pay for what has been done. He tells the ghost the he loved the orchard and one of the ghost believes him. They dance around for like five minuets and flower pedals float around on the screen. The Orchard is now repaired but when the boy runs to it they are all destroyed again except for one.

The third dream I saw was called The tunnel and it is about a solder who sees his dead army again. They till think he is in charge and he tries to tell them that they are dead and need to return back to where they belong. The fourth dream is called Crows and it is about a art student who finds himself lost in Vincent Van Gogh’s art paintings.

Mount Fuji in Red is about a nuclear power plant that has a meltdown next to Mount Fuji. Mount Fuji erupts and sends the people of Japan fleeing to the ocean. Three people are still alive but realize that death is inevitable. The Weeping demon is about mutated human that is growing horns on his head and explaining what has happened because of the nuclear holocaust and plants are growing enormous and the mutants must feed on the weak.

The last dream is called Village of the Watermills and it is about a man who stumbles on to a small simplistic village. He talks to and old man and the old mans explains how we should not depend on technology to live a healthier happier life. At the end we see a funereal and no one is morning. Everyone is celebrating for the life this person has lived.

The theme in dreams seems to be antiwar and environmentalism. We should look at life in a different way and repay Mother Nature for all that she has given us. We should never take what we have for granted because tomorrow, it may not be there. It also reflects the impact the nuclear bombing had on Japan.

I would not watch this movie again. I actually found it quiet boring and too experimental for my taste. I understand that they are suppose be dreams and sometimes dreams don make much sense, but I felt this movie took it to another level. The peach orchard dream was very strange to me. I felt the whole dancing ghost scene could have been cut down a bit because I lost interest one what they were doing. Granted this film reflects Japanese culture so maybe I wouldn’t understand. This movie is very much only for a selective group. Nonetheless, it was very well made and put together, but overall its just not my type of movie.

Eat Drink Man Women

Eat drink Man Woman is a film by academy award winning writer/director Ang Lee. The film takes place in Taipei, Taiwan and is about a Taiwanese chef and is three daughters. Chu is a widowed chef, losing his taste for food and his daughters and growing up fast. His eldest daughter is Jia Jen and she is a school teacher who is Christian and suffers being lonely. The middle child is Jia Chien and she is a business women who want to be independent. The youngest child is Jia Ning, and she is a college student looking for love.

As the movie progresses we find out that the Jia Jen has a crush for the new gym teacher. She keeps getting notes in her mailbox from a secret admirer and feels it could be him. Jia Chien plans on moving to a new apartment, but she thinks she may be falling for her sister’s ex-boyfriend. Jia Ning is falling in love with her friends boyfriend. Chu has been talking to and old friend and it looks as if they may hook up. Chu is also planning on selling the house.

In the end we find out that the notes Jia Jen were receving were not from the teacher but from the students playing a joke on her. She confesses her love to the teacher by giving him a loving kiss and they marry immediately. Jia Chien find out that her sister lied about her whole first relationship and decides that she should stay in Taiwan and takes over her fathers house. Jia Ning tells her friend of her relationship and continues to date him. Chu is not dating his old friend and is infact dating her very young daughter. They marry and have another child together.
I feel the major theme in this movie is aging. Everyone in the film is aging in a way and becoming more mature as they progress through the movie. They realize there are more important thing to life then what they were currently doing. Life is precious and should not be taken for granted.

This movie was very entertaining to me. It had a very western film and that makes sense considering Ang lee went to film school in America. The film was very well made and its themes were interesting. I have also scene the movies 2001 remake Tortilla Soup and the two films are very similar. Tortilla soup does have a warmer feeling to it though. Overall this was just the beginning for Ang Lee and it showed the potential he holds as a great film director.

The film Not one Less is a neo-realisim film directed by Yimou Zhang. The film is set in rural China. This part of the country is very poor and the schools are losing more and more students because the families need their children to work. There is only one teacher in the Shuiquan village, Gao, but he needs to leave because his wife is very sick. The village cannot afford a real substitute so 13 year old Wei Minzhi is substituting for the teacher.

Wei is told that the school is losing many students, but if she can manage to not lose one student, she will get a bonus. Trouble already begins when she cannot control her class. The students will not listen to her and she shows how young and naïve she really is. She ends up losing one student because a sports school recruits her. Wei tries to keep them from taking her but is told that it will be ok because she is not leaving for work.

The schools trouble maker, Zhang, ends up having to leave to the city because his mother is very ill so he has to work. Wei gathers up the others students to all pitch in money so she can go to the city and get Zhang back. She goes to the station but still does not have enough money. The students sneaks Wei onto the bus, but she still gets caught and kick out. She makes it to the city by hitchhiking and goes to the place were Zhang should be working. We find out that the girl who was suppose to bring him to work, lost him at the bus station. The go back to the station to find him but no luck.

Wei buys ink and paper to make posters about Zhang. She creates a hang full of flyers, but the falls asleep on the curb and the posters are thrown away. She is told of one last place that may help, the television station. She travels down to the station, but the receptionist will not let her in. She waits all day and night to find the station manager. He finals come out for her and is ashamed that the receptionist would make her wait like this. She tells the manager of her story and he decides to broadcast it live on TV. Zhang sees the broadcast and is taken home. The tv station not only brings Zhang and Wei back to the village, but the town is given a donation of school supplies. Wei is given her bonus and we see facts about how poverty in China is.
The theme in this movie is poverty. This movie really shows how fortunate we are just to have chalk in a school. More people in the country value work and money then a well-defined education. Education can get you more money in the long run, but the children in this movie don’t have a choice. They are forced to work to help out their families and it creates a viscous cycle of uneducated people.

Overall the movie was ok. The fact that all of the actors in the movie have never acted before was interesting. For people that have no background in acting, they did a very good job. Yimou Zhang must be very talented to direct and bring out emotion to someone that is not classically trained. The film was a bit boring in the beginning, it did not get interesting until Wei had to go to the city to find Zhang. I probably would not watch this movie again, but I think other people should check this film out to see how life in other countries can be harsh.

Le Femme Nakita

Le Femme Nikita is a film by one of France’s greatest film directors Luc Besson.The film is about a low life girl, Nikita, who heartlessly kills a police officer when robbing a store with her friends. She is caught and taken to jail with a death sentence. The audience thinks the is being killed by lethal injection, but we find out she was put to sleep and given a choice. Nikita can either take a job as an assassin for the government or she can fill the grave were her body is suppose to be.

Nikita takes the assassin job, but not happily. She goes through the training process and causes more trouble then actually learning anything. Bob, the person in charge of her process, is told that if she does not improve by the end of the month, she will be killed. Nikita successfully goes through the process and exceeds expectations. As a reward for her birthday, she is taken out for diner with Bob. Everything is nice until she receives her present. They are not celebrating her birthday, this will be her first hit and the present was a gun. She is kill a man in the room to complete her training. She unwillingly completes the job and is now free to live a “normal” life.

She tries to live a normal life meeting and dating a grocery boy. As she starts to enjoy the simplistic life, she gets a call for another assassin job. The job takes her first to a hotel; she simply has to take a bugged tea set to a room. The next job takes her to Italy, and her boyfriend is getting very suspicious of what she does. While arguing with him she has to take out a person with a sniper rifle with out anyone noticing. She starts to feel the pressure of living a double life and the consequences that come with it.

Back in France she has a long termed hit. She must work nights and figure out how to get certain files from her target. The plan the attack but the job goes bad. A Cleaner is called in to fix the mission. With the cleaners help she gets the files, but it does not go down easily. The cleaner is killed and the cops are after her. She goes home to Marco, but he figured out that she is an assassin. They have one final conversation together and she disappears never wanting to kill again. Bob visits Marco and they talk about her. Marco gives Bob the files he needed and a not from Nikita. Bob smiles and the movie ends.

The major theme in this movie is that a cold-blooded killer can learn to love humanity again. Nikita started out as a trouble child but as she grew older she learned to appreciate life. With love in her life she found a reason to live and to never kill again. By the end of the movie she could not heartlessly kill a person.

This film was just the beginning for Luc. His movie The Professional is one of my favorite movies and after watching Nikita, I see the make of a great director. The characters in the movie feel alive. He has a way with bringing a human charm to the most ruthless characters. Le Femme Nikita is a great movie and I would definitely watch this film again.

Bad Education

Bad Education is a film by acclaimed Spaniard director Pedro Almodóvar. The movie is about a two men, Enrique and Ignacio who have a history of love and tragedy together in and all boys religious school. The only problem was Father Manolo, the principle was also in love with Ignacio. Father Manolo is obsessed with Ignacio and will not let anyone near him. Enrique is kicked out of the school so he can no longer be with Ignacio.

16 years later, Enrique is a up an coming film director looking for his next big project, when and old friend comes to visit him. Ignacio is all grown up and has the next feature length hit for Enrique to make. Enrique is excited to see Ignacio again, but something does not seem. Enrique reads the script and see that the script is very much like his past. He agrees to do it but still feels weird around Ignacio who can not seem to remember their past relationship.

Enrique finds out that Ignacio is really dead and Angel is pretending to be him. They continue to make the movie regardless of the truth that has been told, but Enrique decides to change the ending and have Zahra die. While filming the ending we see the real Father Manolo arrive and the true story of Ignacio is revealed. We find out that Father Manolo is no longer a priest and that Ignacio has become a transvestite. Ignacio is writing a screenplay about the story of his life and tries to blackmail Manolo. Manolo and Angel fall in love and kill Ignacio by having him over dose on drugs. The movie is complete and it is a hit. Angel becomes a famous actor, Angel kills Manolo for trying to blackmail him, and Enrique becomes a famous director.

To me the major theme in this movie is blackmail. Everyone in the movie is on there own agenda and only cares for themselves. Throughout the movie the characters will do whatever it takes to get what they need. From killing your own brother, to kicking a kid out of school so he can no longer be with his loved one.

Overall the film was ok. It was very different from the movies I normally see and there was a lot of shocking imagery, but I felt it was needed in the movie to portray how much in love the characters were with one another. The director is openly gay so I am not surprised on who risky this movie is. The film is very well made and Gael García Bernal is very good actor, but would I watch this movie again? Probably not, one time is more than enough for me, but I would recommend it to people who are interested edgy, risk, taking, movies.