Deep in the jungles of darkest Peru, a family of spectacled bears have learned to interact domestically from an adventurous British geographer, spending their time conversing in English while feasting on marmalade, science having been environmentally harmonized with their surroundings, the curious and the coddling, perching merriment's full bloom.
But tragedy strikes as an earthquake shatters their domain, and a loved one is lost, to unforgiving geologic caprice.
The youngest family member, having learned that if he arrives in London he's bound to be looked after by that very same geographer, sets out for the United Kingdom, luck and ingenuity aiding him on his way.
Upon arrival, he meets a kind family who agrees to help him, the husband, begrudgingly, the wife, hospitably, the son, ecstatically, the daughter, morosely.
Comic trials and errors then flourish, as a mystery invites sleuthing, and an evil taxidermist comes 'a callin.'
Set on vengeance and destruction.
What follows is a funny, charming, pleasantly peculiar tale of growth and discovery as a family comes together as one.
Through the power of bears.
Highlights: Paddington (Ben Wishaw) accidentally catches a pickpocket, young Judy (Madeleine Harris) learns to speak bear, whenever Paddington eats something, Mrs. Brown's (Sally Hawkins) outfits, Mrs. Bird (Julie Walters) tying one on, pigeons, baguette sandwiches, the emphasis on codes, manners, heart warmth.
The benefits of learning a Chinese dialect are also mentioned, the relations between youth and age are playfully cross-examined, creative multistep mischievous refinements abound, and there's a focus on understanding, nurtured through well being.
Paddington doesn't really look like a spectacled bear but there could be some variation within the species I'm unaware of.
And he's still young.
Costume design by Lindy Hemming.
You can still interact domestically while speaking bear.
Solid bear sounds.
Loved the alliteration.
Friday, February 27, 2015
Tuesday, February 24, 2015
Jupiter Ascending
Jupiter Ascending could have been better.
It's like they're trying to condense three to four hours worth of material into a 127 minute film, and the resulting action suffers from athletic overexposure.
Everything happens too quickly.
Because they cover so much ground, they're constantly placing characters in new hyper-reactive scenarios, and rather than taking the time to calmly build-up tension while diversifying character, bam, another battle begins, whether it's physical, bureaucratic, or conjugal, and it's like the fighting never stops, yet there's no sense that something could go wrong.
Spoilers.
Okay, the film points out how millions of people, in this case entire planets, can be exploited to increase the riches of a few, in this case a plan is in place to harvest humans to create an expensive highly coveted youth serum that prolongs life indefinitely, but the film also naturalizes royalty, which indirectly suggests that royals should have access to benefits denied to their subjects, like a youth serum for instance, even if the royal in question doesn't want to have anything to do with them/it.
The bee scene is one of Jupiter Ascending's coolest moments, but it doesn't fit well with the film's ethics.
And in the end Jupiter Jones (Mila Kunis) doesn't try to use her new position to break up the intergalactic obsession with the serum, she just goes back to her old life, chillin' with the fam and new partner Caine Wise (Channing Tatum).
Who are also both cool.
It's fun watching Caine fly around on his jet boots, like he's figure skating through time and space, but he does it so often there's a cloying affect, which significantly decreases the cool factor.
The fights he's in are usually full of people hired to do things which involve firing weapons, who obviously never learned how to shoot them.
Also, when Jupiter confronts arch-rival Balem Abrasax (Eddie Redmayne) in the end, his dominion disintegrates far too quickly.
Here's one of the wealthiest people in the universe, and his defence grid seems like it's made out of lego.
A lot of corny dialogue.
Love the Wachowskis, but not Jupiter Ascending.
It's like they're trying to condense three to four hours worth of material into a 127 minute film, and the resulting action suffers from athletic overexposure.
Everything happens too quickly.
Because they cover so much ground, they're constantly placing characters in new hyper-reactive scenarios, and rather than taking the time to calmly build-up tension while diversifying character, bam, another battle begins, whether it's physical, bureaucratic, or conjugal, and it's like the fighting never stops, yet there's no sense that something could go wrong.
Spoilers.
Okay, the film points out how millions of people, in this case entire planets, can be exploited to increase the riches of a few, in this case a plan is in place to harvest humans to create an expensive highly coveted youth serum that prolongs life indefinitely, but the film also naturalizes royalty, which indirectly suggests that royals should have access to benefits denied to their subjects, like a youth serum for instance, even if the royal in question doesn't want to have anything to do with them/it.
The bee scene is one of Jupiter Ascending's coolest moments, but it doesn't fit well with the film's ethics.
And in the end Jupiter Jones (Mila Kunis) doesn't try to use her new position to break up the intergalactic obsession with the serum, she just goes back to her old life, chillin' with the fam and new partner Caine Wise (Channing Tatum).
Who are also both cool.
It's fun watching Caine fly around on his jet boots, like he's figure skating through time and space, but he does it so often there's a cloying affect, which significantly decreases the cool factor.
The fights he's in are usually full of people hired to do things which involve firing weapons, who obviously never learned how to shoot them.
Also, when Jupiter confronts arch-rival Balem Abrasax (Eddie Redmayne) in the end, his dominion disintegrates far too quickly.
Here's one of the wealthiest people in the universe, and his defence grid seems like it's made out of lego.
A lot of corny dialogue.
Love the Wachowskis, but not Jupiter Ascending.
Friday, February 20, 2015
Leviafan (Leviathan)
Isolated in a small town in Northern Russia, a man fights to save his home from a corrupt mayor, relying on an oligarchically inclined legal system, and a lawyer skilled in the art of public sensation.
He's lived his whole life in the town.
Grew up there, became a family man, it's all he knows.
He has personality, responsibilities, a network.
Remote plutocratic politics.
A voice, legal rights, Andrey Zvyagintsev's take on contemporary Russia, Leviafan (Leviathan), like the skeleton of a massive destructive unstoppable procession, religion sans spirituality, futile to fight back, take the offer, drink, drink more, from one historical epoch to the next, take reprehensible thugs and give them wealth, prestige and power, hold them in place with the threat of imprisonment, they'll do as they're told, don't find a middle ground between what things were like before and after the 1917 revolution, recreate the system that lead to that revolution, bask in its imperialistic splendour, lock things down for a generation, flaunt your might, and see what Hobbes gets you.
Trust was placed where trust was deserved, its betrayal ripe with spontaneous idiocy, 10 blissful minutes for the bored, a maximum security sentence for the innocent.
Innocence requires innocence.
Angelic quid pro quo.
The act provides the mayor with leverage, a solid footing, authority.
Opulent construction.
In the gently falling snow.
He's lived his whole life in the town.
Grew up there, became a family man, it's all he knows.
He has personality, responsibilities, a network.
Remote plutocratic politics.
A voice, legal rights, Andrey Zvyagintsev's take on contemporary Russia, Leviafan (Leviathan), like the skeleton of a massive destructive unstoppable procession, religion sans spirituality, futile to fight back, take the offer, drink, drink more, from one historical epoch to the next, take reprehensible thugs and give them wealth, prestige and power, hold them in place with the threat of imprisonment, they'll do as they're told, don't find a middle ground between what things were like before and after the 1917 revolution, recreate the system that lead to that revolution, bask in its imperialistic splendour, lock things down for a generation, flaunt your might, and see what Hobbes gets you.
Trust was placed where trust was deserved, its betrayal ripe with spontaneous idiocy, 10 blissful minutes for the bored, a maximum security sentence for the innocent.
Innocence requires innocence.
Angelic quid pro quo.
The act provides the mayor with leverage, a solid footing, authority.
Opulent construction.
In the gently falling snow.
Tuesday, February 17, 2015
Timbuktu
Law and order is ridiculously applied to the daily lives of Timbuktu's inhabitants, a city in Mali, and a film by Abderrahmane Sissako, a brutal unforgiving violent accentuation of a fruitless interpretation of Islamic texts, interpreted to profit those in power, regardless of what the texts actually say.
Alternative voices emphasizing Islam's focus on understanding and forgiveness express themselves but are immediately ignored due to their lack of influence.
It's men with guns, large and in charge, unconcerned with their lack of knowledge, severely punishing anyone who breaks their arbitrary laws.
Much more direct than Leviafan.
Musicians performing privately at night face the whip even though they're singing about God.
Women who don't wear gloves and socks are penalized.
A man who sees a girl and wants to marry her is fully supported when the girl's family objects to his inappropriate conduct.
Soccer is frowned upon.
Tough times if you aren't part of the ruling minority.
No opportunities.
No growth.
No music.
Make things as boring and lifeless as possible to maximize and inculcate your barren conception of reality.
This is how the rulers proceed.
Heavily armed.
With constant surveillance.
Alternative voices emphasizing Islam's focus on understanding and forgiveness express themselves but are immediately ignored due to their lack of influence.
It's men with guns, large and in charge, unconcerned with their lack of knowledge, severely punishing anyone who breaks their arbitrary laws.
Much more direct than Leviafan.
Musicians performing privately at night face the whip even though they're singing about God.
Women who don't wear gloves and socks are penalized.
A man who sees a girl and wants to marry her is fully supported when the girl's family objects to his inappropriate conduct.
Soccer is frowned upon.
Tough times if you aren't part of the ruling minority.
No opportunities.
No growth.
No music.
Make things as boring and lifeless as possible to maximize and inculcate your barren conception of reality.
This is how the rulers proceed.
Heavily armed.
With constant surveillance.
Friday, February 13, 2015
Kiş Uykusu (Winter Sleep)
Prolonged drowsy interminable winter, dilemmas and debts and rigid bitter realism, frozen immovable remote reverberations soundlessly echoing through time like omnipresent gallows for some, casual laissez-faire cocktails for others, a small town in Anatolia, a consciousness of place, order, balance, predictability, the insertion of divergence, glacially counterbalanced, from whichever side, whatever predicament, interred for the ages, contradiction's fertile sum, punishment to reward, thoughts eloquently marooned, the snow is falling, confiscated tempests, every point will be made, an old man wandering blindly, his dominion staggeringly glazed, fissured, crumply.
When challenged he preaches.
He has done no wrong.
According to his will, which vainly asserts his blights.
Proven through the narrative's conception.
Of unyielding irrational control.
The darkness of men's souls.
To say, "Be a man at all costs. In a domain ruled by men."
There's a powerful scene, epic in its isolated rustic nocturnal candour, which expresses the rationalities of these mad oppressive entitlements.
Wait for it.
Viewing, it's like you're in the village, present at these conversations, living these lives, freezing, because of their patient plodding conversions.
Thinking.
Finding things to do.
When challenged he preaches.
He has done no wrong.
According to his will, which vainly asserts his blights.
Proven through the narrative's conception.
Of unyielding irrational control.
The darkness of men's souls.
To say, "Be a man at all costs. In a domain ruled by men."
There's a powerful scene, epic in its isolated rustic nocturnal candour, which expresses the rationalities of these mad oppressive entitlements.
Wait for it.
Viewing, it's like you're in the village, present at these conversations, living these lives, freezing, because of their patient plodding conversions.
Thinking.
Finding things to do.
Tuesday, February 10, 2015
A Most Violent Year
Patience, hard work, and skill, transferrable knowledge calmly and efficiently presented, threats, competitive thefts assaulting bottom lines, disrupting morale and distribution, fermenting internal disputes, fear and uncertainty corrupting the working day, factions, a lawsuit, thugs, insert stoicism, by the books, leadership, an impenetrable reliance on a sense of fair play cultivated through years of shrewd progressive expansion relied upon during its darkest yet most definitive hour, revenue streams collapsing, worst case options relied upon, an unwavering commitment to the law, like Michael Corleone, if he had started from scractch.
Law and order.
Concealment.
As Abel Morales's (Oscar Isaac) business expands, his competitors employ desperate tactics, their livelihoods threatened, pathological pyrosthetics.
A Most Violent Year resists the urge to fight back.
It keeps a level head.
Distinguishing itself from other films in the genre.
It was odd watching it, I kept waiting for the eruption, the countermeasures, the explosion of pent up rage, disastrous regimens of revenge.
But its aesthetic honours goodwill as opposed to vindication, composure rather than frenzy, its blueprints shackling threats of reprisal, steady assured confidence, in the methods that have ensured success.
It's like the feeling you get when you work hard for something, enjoy the rewards, stay true to a vision, accept professional challenges, and continue to modestly achieve.
Like graduating from high school or being promoted.
Staying in business for decades.
Thoughtful innovations.
Law and order.
Concealment.
As Abel Morales's (Oscar Isaac) business expands, his competitors employ desperate tactics, their livelihoods threatened, pathological pyrosthetics.
A Most Violent Year resists the urge to fight back.
It keeps a level head.
Distinguishing itself from other films in the genre.
It was odd watching it, I kept waiting for the eruption, the countermeasures, the explosion of pent up rage, disastrous regimens of revenge.
But its aesthetic honours goodwill as opposed to vindication, composure rather than frenzy, its blueprints shackling threats of reprisal, steady assured confidence, in the methods that have ensured success.
It's like the feeling you get when you work hard for something, enjoy the rewards, stay true to a vision, accept professional challenges, and continue to modestly achieve.
Like graduating from high school or being promoted.
Staying in business for decades.
Thoughtful innovations.
Friday, February 6, 2015
Wild
One foot forward, a crushing weight backpacked, stricken through the desert, identity intact.
To the summit.
Waves of energizing and/or haunting memories intermittently bombarding and/or enlivening, accomplishments, missteps, experimental independence mixed with overwhelming grief dealt with through taking on a herculean quest for conscious convalescence, reestablished resilience, contemporary being flushing out the destructive life choices made after the death of a loved one, and their corresponding affects on friends and family, a path with a goal and a purpose, the Pacific Crest Trail, blistering heat and instructive elevations, gear, wildlife, companionship, the impossible slowly dispersing picturesque probabilities, a new sense of self, persevering in the hearth throes.
Emerging.
Jean-Marc Vallée's Wild sets out into the wilderness to build a future by confronting the past, through presence, chillingly capturing subconscious correlations, raw elemental exacting births.
She's tough.
Cheryl Strayed (Reese Witherspoon) improvises her way with sheer grit and determination, poetically driving her will, its valleys and peaks, a subtly directed incarnation.
Editing by Martin Pensa and Jean-Marc Vallée as John Mac McMurphy.
Live in the world while focusing on the beautiful.
Posture outfox and sidewind.
Overcome.
To the summit.
Waves of energizing and/or haunting memories intermittently bombarding and/or enlivening, accomplishments, missteps, experimental independence mixed with overwhelming grief dealt with through taking on a herculean quest for conscious convalescence, reestablished resilience, contemporary being flushing out the destructive life choices made after the death of a loved one, and their corresponding affects on friends and family, a path with a goal and a purpose, the Pacific Crest Trail, blistering heat and instructive elevations, gear, wildlife, companionship, the impossible slowly dispersing picturesque probabilities, a new sense of self, persevering in the hearth throes.
Emerging.
Jean-Marc Vallée's Wild sets out into the wilderness to build a future by confronting the past, through presence, chillingly capturing subconscious correlations, raw elemental exacting births.
She's tough.
Cheryl Strayed (Reese Witherspoon) improvises her way with sheer grit and determination, poetically driving her will, its valleys and peaks, a subtly directed incarnation.
Editing by Martin Pensa and Jean-Marc Vallée as John Mac McMurphy.
Live in the world while focusing on the beautiful.
Posture outfox and sidewind.
Overcome.
Tuesday, February 3, 2015
Still Alice
A high-functioning established warm caring multifaceted professional is confronted at the height of her career with the onset of Alzheimer's disease, and its effects quickly take hold.
She's a fighter, accomplished and strategic, boldly doctoring her plight, taking things in stride, coping, achieving, her family coming to her aid to help out wherever they can, together functioning as a cohesive unit, through strength, distress and helplessness increasing as time passes, slowly transforming into stoic acceptance, the acknowledgement of pain.
Still Alice maturely approaches illness from fruitful familial viewpoints, Alice Howland's (Julianne Moore) husband and children supporting while suffering to do what they can.
Julianne Moore delivers a career defining performance as she pluralizes her conception of identity, stunningly adding varicose variabilities.
There's a great scene where her new self communicates with a predecessor via a preprepared homemade video, a buoyant succinct butterfly.
Her alpha husband (Alec Baldwin as John Howland) convincing juggles his urge to dominate with his expressions of sympathy, respected by Alice through understanding, his attempts to hide his frustrated emotions callously manifested at times.
He has trouble halting his progression.
The children react as befits their personalities, aptly introduced through the art of conversation, the daughters featuring more prominently than the son.
The family's love holds back its depression although it could have been more sorrowful.
Hope in the darkness.
In tune.
She's a fighter, accomplished and strategic, boldly doctoring her plight, taking things in stride, coping, achieving, her family coming to her aid to help out wherever they can, together functioning as a cohesive unit, through strength, distress and helplessness increasing as time passes, slowly transforming into stoic acceptance, the acknowledgement of pain.
Still Alice maturely approaches illness from fruitful familial viewpoints, Alice Howland's (Julianne Moore) husband and children supporting while suffering to do what they can.
Julianne Moore delivers a career defining performance as she pluralizes her conception of identity, stunningly adding varicose variabilities.
There's a great scene where her new self communicates with a predecessor via a preprepared homemade video, a buoyant succinct butterfly.
Her alpha husband (Alec Baldwin as John Howland) convincing juggles his urge to dominate with his expressions of sympathy, respected by Alice through understanding, his attempts to hide his frustrated emotions callously manifested at times.
He has trouble halting his progression.
The children react as befits their personalities, aptly introduced through the art of conversation, the daughters featuring more prominently than the son.
The family's love holds back its depression although it could have been more sorrowful.
Hope in the darkness.
In tune.
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