True Story

The truth pounds and pontificates, asserting its virtue like harvested sunlit ascension, but politics and the law prevaricate in turn, truth remaining their raison d'être, placated as a matter of posture, taste, illusion.

Fascination.

The truth becomes more variable as time passes, and you continue to read, and it slowly becomes apparent that there's at least a critical correspondence between the truth and what actually happened, depending on the subjects involved, left wing truth, right wing truth, and their relationships to profit and manipulation.

If the right's too powerful there's no worker truth, if the left's too powerful there's no management truth, the bourgeois bullseye.

Rupert Goold's True Story truthfully examines truth from truthful perspectives, a journalist confusing factual writing with fictive, a murderer seeking to innocently sway.

A librarian involved in the action.

It perspires as it illustrates the truthful, manipulative, and profitable dynamics of legalistic sanities by having the journalist (Jonah Hill as Michael Finkel) meet with the suspect (James Franco as Christian Longo) to battle cloaked blistered scripts.

Jill Barker (Felicity Jones) has the best speech.

Something's missing from the middle of the film, at first Hill and Franco's interactions provocatively move things along, but without anything to disrupt their discussions for a time, an image, an armadillo, bark, the film sags, until the disruptions return.

Also intermingling credibility, reputation, and popularity, True Story still sombrely reflects on the forbidden, stark carnal peculiarities, vivacious choral runes.

Great companion film for While We're Young, insofar as both films adopt different attitudes regarding the expression of truth, one celebrating charisma, the other delegating consequences.

Concerns.

While We're Young

Predictable contained pleasant enough maturity is injected with spontaneous jubilance as two couples at different stages in their lives start chillin' in Noah Baumbach's While We're Young, the art of documentary filmmaking bringing them together, one filmmaker trying to launch his career, another having been interminably editing and collecting new footage for a decade, cradling Borg perfection, creating an abstruse tome.

In search of truth.

The truth isn't necessarily fun, however, and the presence of youth rejuvenates struggling Josh (Ben Stiller), although a well groomed stubborn and proud persona still obfuscates, his outlook rigid and exacting, unable to incorporate the new.

When it becomes clear that Jamie (Adam Driver) isn't a student looking for a mentor, but a competitive force trying to gain access to Josh's more successful father-in-law (Charles Grodin[!] as Leslie Breitbart), the reclassification intensifies.

Hysterically.

Ideas.

Different Approaches.

What's going to work?

In terms of diligently orchestrating a text that's both fun and informative for a variety of different audiences anyways.

Which is what Noah Baumbach has done, again, with While We're Young, love his films, he diversifies this text with multiple characters playfully representing different sociodemographic domains, uses the differentiations to mischievously yet instructively comment on relationships, ethics, and art, the good sides, problems, making manipulation seem fun, just in time for a classic Ben Stiller freak out.

It's not just the couples who are contrasted with one another, but each couple pluralizes a dynamic of their own, within which each partner complements while contradicting the other.

As the streams cross.

Naomi Watts impresses again, don't see her in anything for years, then she shows up in 3 exceptionally cool films back-to-back-to-back.

Outstanding.

Furious Seven

Fast-paced volatile extremely airtight precisions dominate the best moments of Furious Seven, the latest, possibly the last instalment in The Fast and the Furious franchise.

Which could have been better.

Riddick won my heart years ago so I have a soft spot for Vin Diesel, but you have to give him a better script to work with if you want his raw animalesque agility to instinctually throttle.

The franchise moments, the moments where they b/romantically tie all the films together, are so flimsy and sentimental that I thought I might shed tears of corn husked slushie.

I'm not that devoted to the films, so I thought perhaps I would have been more forgiving if it had been a Star Trek or a Die Hard film, but this isn't true, when those franchises screw up, I'm still there to remind them.

For instance, I did prefer Furious Seven to Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Star Trek V, and A Good Day to Die Hard.

You still have to suspend your disbelief a wee bit too much while viewing it however.

The final battle is just too ridiculous.

Dwayne Johnson awesomely decides to leave his hospital bed (where I believe he was watching the Stampeders) and join in on the action, but come on, how did he find everyone so quickly, it's as if he's simply programmed to kick-ass, and can intuitively place himself within those situations which immediately require ass-kicking.

There's more, but I'd rather not get into it.

It's fun, don't get me wrong, and hey, I love a strong Belgian ale, and Kurt Russell (Nobody), and Corona sometimes, at the beach, although if I could get strong Belgian ale at the beach, but they didn't spend enough time on the script, and may have gotten away with some bland insincerities.

The script doesn't show enough respect for fans of the franchise in my opinion.

Although I'm not a devoted fan.

So I might not know what I'm talking about.

Think I'll hit up a terrace though.

Yes, I, will.

Detective Byomkesh Bakshy!

Incisively inclined to meticulously mitigate, Byomkesh Bakshy (Sushant Singh Rajput) lucidly exfoliates the devils in the details, from facade to haste to postage, instantaneously accessing each and every complicit pact.

Indubitably.

This curation doesn't wistfully pry, rather, he gracefully inspects subterfuge and dissimulation like a distraught determined sloosh, ingenuity modestly asserted, the collection of facts, the gathering of precipitates.

Not really a film noir, there isn't a sense of perpetual oppression or an ambiguous translucent hue, Bakshy's too green to be jaded, to successful to be shorn.

More like Guy Ritchie's Sherlock Holmes films, its subject matter gradually becoming more grandiose as Detective Byomkesh Bakshy! progresses, it still does frequent the underground while avoiding the police, Bakshy's insight surveying both realms to serialize ingenious constellations.

Characters curiously come and go, the convivial confessing like crisp contraband, the wicked revelling in their byzantine confessions.

It's well designed, the seemingly insignificant worked into a greater vision, characters reappearing just when I was wondering what had happened to them, logical license and casual constructs, solid crescendo, youthful passion making danger seem fun.

Whenever it appears like it's going to far, Bakshy's detections cleverly level things out.

Intense yet chill.

October Gale

Overcome with shattering grief, a widow heads North, to convalesce in the calming wilderness, embowered yet stricken, facing her demons alone.

When catastrophe strikes in the form of a hunted man, desperately seeking escape, who suddenly shows up unannounced on her island, frightened, abandoned, and wounded.

His story's far-fetched, yet when his assailants come calling, their truth projects panic and understanding.

As the power goes out.

And the storm sets in.

Two struggling lonely resiliencies meet, come together, and lock and load, Ruba Nadda's October Gale supplying their depressions with a maniacal impediment to surmount, its vindictive ammunition, oppressing their hopes for forgiveness.

Compassion and trust come to their aid, as they constructively bond, to prognosticate their survival.

Character driven, the film relies on the strong performances delivered by Patricia Clarkson (Helen Matthews), Scott Speedman (William), and Tim Roth (Tom), the intensity of their restrained emotions, embracing the storm's bitter graft.

The film focuses on scarcity, on lack, on the barren repercussions of losing a loved one, which explains why the scenery isn't warmly pronounced, even though they're in an exceptionally beautiful region of Canada.

Poignancy.

Shi Gu (Lost and Love)

A dedicated father travels throughout China searching for his lost son, his limitless efforts composed yet impassioned, his task seemingly hopeless yet his hope never fades nor yields, year after year alone on the trek, putting up flyers, waving his flags, strangers offering assistance through random acts of kindness, communal decency and wholesomeness addressing his wounds, when one day a teen, who was stolen from his parents at a young age and sold to an unscrupulous family, freely lends a hand, the two then continuing to search together, practically blind but united by purpose, the wonders of social networking, aiding them as they cruise.

Through the labyrinthine zealiotropic haze.

A plan touching in its simplicity yet complex in its random achievement of unexpected results.

It's a feel good film, depressing theme but still feel good, wherein citizens from different walks of life do what they can to limit despair, politely fighting against bland cynicism, expressing a nation's profound disgust.

Madness envelopes ineffable horrors in striking forthright balm, heartache and hardship, pinstriped periwinkle.

It's too cheesy at times but Shi Gu's (Lost and Love's) spirit overcomes these sprawling tear-jerks to illustrate how a strong determined will can positively influence hundreds of lives over the years by remaining committed to a principled goal, and/or how said commitment can move beyond its initial individualistic purpose to find itself driven by nurtured communal bonds.

Lei Zekuan (Andy Lau) isn't just acting on his own, Shi Gu takes a serious look at synergistic interdependence, mutually inspired and inspiring, chillin' on motorized bikes.

It's not all light and fluffy, the edge is a kind of raw innocent unrelenting sharpness that foolishly glides and genuflects, like the loss of a son engendered eternal youth, sustained by an ongoing search, the conclusion of which would bring about age.

Wisdom.  

Unfinished Business

Undervalued.

Underappreciated.

Dan Trunkman (Vince Vaughn) reacts harshly after his boss announces budget cuts that decrease his well-deserved salary, his hard work not seeming to count for much, which leads him to decide to start his own company, prorated with specialized exactitude.

He immediately hires a 67 year old ex-employee of the same company who was forced to retire, plus a youthful space cadet eagerly seeking his first job.

A strong team they forge.

One feature from the film that could have been developed differently was the dynamic (almost) established between Timothy McWinters (Tom Wilkinson) and Mike Pancake (Dave Franco).

You see it early on, Pancake knows next to nothing, and McWinters is an experienced bitter vet, Trunkman lying somewhere in between, and when Pancake asks McWinters for clarification, he steps in with seasoned awkward advice.

I was hoping Pancake's questions would become increasingly ridiculous and McWinters's answers increasingly inappropriate as Unfinished Business progressed, Trunkman offering chill intermediary comments, but this didn't really happen.

They're hoping to close a big deal and find themselves competing against Trunkman and McWinters's former company, in Germany, and their former boss is ahead of the game, and revelling in self-satisfied obnoxiousness.

Trunkman must child rear while negotiating the deal and this is where the film steps up, Vaughn adding a new dimension to his persona, or at least one which I've never seen him develop so well before, believably portraying a caring, loving, dad, loved the motionless fake screen freeze technique.

It doesn't detract from his parenting.

It also steps up with American Businessman 42, a work of living art, seriously comedic, informatively pranked.

There are also some exploits, the aforementioned team.

Not the strongest film I've seen starring Vaughn, but the traditional sublime underdog functioning playfully yet competently is present, providing cultural insights that make sense in terms of community development, sidewinding and succeeding, workin' it, pushin' it, livin' it.

Wilkinson and Franco round things out.

Could have been diggin' a bit deeper.

The Riot Club

Into the bleakness.

Excessive wealth descends upon an unsuspecting family restaurant in Lone Scherfig's The Riot Club, debauched plutocrats at play, members of an exclusive enclave celebrating to excess in order to excrete authoritative postulates, rancid ribald raunch, the pecking order coaxing adroitly, a vaporous shroud, puffing up the smoke.

The club, the Riot Club, has been devoted to unfettered hedonism for centuries, but in this instance their antics are viciously nuanced, thereby vilifying their freedoms and demonizing their lust.

For chaos.

A lone voice criticizes the calumny, a new member of the club, but his opponent picks up on his indignation, and instigates the reckless in turn, consequently augmenting his rank.

The bourgeoisie holds fast to its integrity, refusing to perform like enslaved sycophantic drones.

The Riot Club plays a dangerous game; it seemed to me that abuse was encouraging latent sentiments of class consciousness within in order to deride the truly wicked, but it could be seen as a festive carnal salute to elitist angst, flagitiously large and in charge, seeking to practically express itself.

The film diversifies several characters, examines responsibility from multiple perspectives, uses its characters to make side comments on issues such as ethnocentricity and belonging, before igniting an inflammatory controversy which makes a sensational yet memorable impact.

Co-existence never seemed like much of a problem to me, you learn from different perspectives, take into account alternative points of view, make related choices.

If group dynamics aggressively seek to enlarge themselves through physical and/or psychological violence, and this behaviour is culturally normalized, a different standard of social etiquette reemerges, whose focus on threats and preemptive strikes significantly pollutes social spheres.

Replacing respect with animosity burgeons tyrannical dividends.

Controversial film.

Gurov & Anna

Another bleak film, Rafaël Ouellet's Gurov & Anna, not as bleak as Chorus, which seems to have set out to create the most depressing film ever, nevertheless, quite bleak, desolate.

Post-Oscar season.

No sign of a Grand Budapest Hotel this March.

Gurov & Anna examines the line where literature intersects with reality, where imaginary creations try to fit within a quotidian schematic, this particular schematic slowly becoming increasingly more desperate as the realistic variables which haven't been taken into account significantly diverge from their literary counterpoints.

I couldn't generate sympathy for Ben (Andreas Apergis) as he sacrifices his near perfect life for an impromptu affair, an impromptu affair which maniacally consumes him, causing him to lose all sense of decorum.

You see that he's a jerk to begin with, critical when he should be supportive, neglectful of the luxuries life has granted him, more concerned with control than cooperation, a success, but still quite empty inside.

He thinks an affair will somehow revitalize his lost youth, or romantically overcome his overwhelming sense of aged futility, as it does occasionally in books, without taking into consideration the price such sensualists often pay.

He doesn't even try to get to know young Mercedes (Sophie Desmarais), just purely objectifies her, slowly becoming more and more brutal as an individual accustomed to the dictates of reason succumbs to hedonistic madness.

He's made all the right moves throughout his life and doesn't have the historicopsychological makeup to formalize being a complete and utter screw-up.

If that's possible.

When it becomes obvious that he can't control the affair in the same way he controls everything else in his life, not realizing that his ecstasy is the product of the affair's lack of limitations, which can't be controlled without being effaced, entropy sets in, with its accompanying focus on destruction.

Contentment.

There's something to be said for contentment.

Not in the sense that you let it prevent you from changing or let it cause you to stop innovating within the boundaries established by your marriage, in the sense that, from time to time, like Dale Cooper's daily present, without letting it neuter you, you appreciate the wonderful situation you find yourself within, and thereby seek to find new ways to enhance its diversity, through the art of conversation and the love of difference, through youthfully embracing the maturity of the role.

I know it doesn't work out that way a lot of the time.

It does in Kierkegaard's Aesthetic Validity of Marriage however; so easy to write, so difficult to realize.

Mercedes is as full of life and beauty as Ben is full of reserve and banality.

Her presence saves the film.

A complicated look at relationships and their shortcomings, the wonders of the imagination, and realism's abyss.

Garm Wars: The Last Druid

Barren and aimless, two mutually destructive cultures battle for supremacy on planet Annwn, consciousness prolonged indefinitely, omnipresent tactical analysis, the survivors, the residue, a permanent present reliant upon regeneration as opposed to growth to secure its objectives, goals whose rigid confines have imprisoned their masterminds in an endless cycle of repetitive monotonous decay, their citizens in a derelict jagged futureless rot whose entrails pathologically require constant immured virulence.

Bleak film, Garm Wars: The Last Druid, indirectly examining the ethnocentric politics of perpetual conquest and ruin, collegially counterbalanced, by an adventurous dreamlike team.

They head out into the forgotten wilderness, in search of truth, guided by the vestiges of spiritual purpose, embracing the enchantments of the unknown.

Their endeavours lead to some captivating scenes, where two soldiers, bred for war, struggle to define their new perspectives, blossoming in their burdens, embracing difference for the first time, articulating miraculous parlays.

Coming into being.

The film's kitschy sci-fi with a prophetic edge whose juxtaposition of technology and the environment whirlwinds cataclysmic conclusions.

An examination of nothingness, of war, like the end game of 1984. 

With a badass druid.

Driven to succeed without any concept of success, a map is drawn.

Formulating plans on a need-to-know basis, they flatter a scourge, and prepare for the sequel.

Solid Lance Henriksen (Wydd).

The Babadook

An intelligent mischievous creative child (Noah Wiseman as Samuel) has trouble fitting in with his Grade 1 class, notably because a demon terrorizes him throughout the night, known only to him and his mother, as the malevolent Babadook.

His mother (Essie Davis as Amelia) finds it odd that he continues to create elaborate contraptions to defend them against what she considers to be a disconcerting obsession, and can't open her mind to the truth of his dementia, until the Babadook menacingly appears.

It's a disorienting look at the ravages of exclusion.

Amelia can't get over the death of her husband who died on the night she gave birth to her son.

As she has understandable trouble reintegrating, her son's social difficulties exasperate their isolation.

She's older and has built up a thicker layer of psychological feints to conceal her overwhelming grief.

But as the manifestation of their loneliness closes in, threatening their sanity, a new defensive system must be hybridized.

If they can't find recourse to sociological restructuring, the Babadook is free to conquer.

Directer Jennifer Kent creates a haunting atmosphere of ostracized tension within, which works well considering her budgetary constraints.

Patient piecemeal manic hysteria quietly descends, facing bravery and insolence as it seeks leverage.

With additional resources, there's no telling what the sequel may unleash.

Relatos salvajes (Wild Tales)

6 volatile tales, worst case after worst case after worst case, scenarios often drenched in vengeance and justice, unexpected reactions to systemic rigidities, spitfires and incendiaries, riddled with hostility, both participants in the carnage, explosively splintered and drawn.

Who's in the wrong?, detonates each of these backlashed drills, as they comedically yet devastatingly assert themselves, like sociocultural aneurysms, caution and hesitancy be damned, to escorted retributive strife.

Beyond grieving.

Alarming dysfunctions.

The bitter outcast, the conscientious victim, road rage, billeted bombast, chaotic extortion, a bridal blush.

Consequences abound.

Social media condemns then rectifies.

Punishment, misfortune, degradation, resilience, Relatos salvajes (Wild Tales) passionately revels in ambiguous cohesion, disobedient in its logic, playful, carnal, means.

The oppressed and the oppressive, skewered kindred collisions, chance, structure, happenstance, mischievously envisioned in/sane tec/tonics.

The rules.

Play by which set of rules?

Immediacy begets fleeting permanence, instantaneous conception, sudden breaking news.

Chappie

Violent aggravating hierarchical threats competitively embark in Neill Blomkamp's volatile Chappie, as a success story attempts to enhance his marketability through the creation of something beautiful, through the rearing, of robotic young.

It's not happenin'.

His child is quickly hijacked and then alternatively reared by desperate criminals intent on paying off 20 million in debt.

Instead of delicately nurturing his nascent creativity, Ninja (Ninja) prefers to ignite a trial-by-fire, consequently introducing him to a band of troubled youths, who then proceed to throw rocks at him and actually light him on fire.

The youth think he's a police robot, because his creator, Deon Wilson (Dev Patel), uploaded a humanesque consciousness into a broken down police robot, a part of a robotic police force he also created, young Chappie (Sharlto Copley), who remains unaware of these facts, and defencelessly terrified.

He does learn from his experiences though.

Which leads to a memorable science-fiction comedy.

The script's multifaceted (written by Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell), consisting of criminal and professional diversifications which populate the film with myriad characters at different socioeconomic levels, each of them given plenty of screen time to develop, as they pursue various goals before meeting for a ludicrous showdown in the end.

Solid science-fiction/action series are intertextually woven in, Robocop being the most obvious, but Chappie also acknowledges Die Hard, The Terminator, Predator, Alien, and Transcendence to name a few.

Ninja says, "Yippee ki-yay, motherfucker!," at one point.

Chappie fires at the Moose in the same way Sarah Connor fires at the T-1000 in the final moments of Terminator 2.

When the hunt is on, movements are robotically tracked as if a Predator is stalking prey.

It's co-starring Sigourney Weaver (Michelle Bradley).

And human consciousnesses are uploaded to computers like in Transcendence. 

Transcendence wasn't so solid.

As Chappie comes of age in less than a week, a naive innocent caregiving sense of blossoming chaotic youth awkwardly contrasts the social horror show, the dynamics of which are simultaneously shocking and instructive.

The script has all of these elements but it still fails to impress on some fronts.

There are several characters given the chance to develop but they never really move past their first impressions, apart from Ninja, Chappie, and Yolandi (Yolandi Visser), who do change a bit.

And Deon buys a gun.

Ninja easily goes about acquiring the 20 million he needs to pay off Hippo (Brandon Auret), there's no sense that something could go wrong.

The thugs escape the police near the beginning even though it seems obvious they'll be captured.

Catch 'em. Let 'em break out. Make their escape seem plausible.

Cars are easily stolen and it seems like there's no possibility the thieves could be caught.

All this with a robotic police force patrolling the streets.

It's like hardwired explosive emancipated desperate largesse, highly structured to joyously refute the logical, with a thin layer of predictable rationality sensationally stitching things together.

It's campy.

So campy.

Sort of awful.

But still a must see.

You get the sense that there aren't a lot of public funds available to level things out a bit in Johannesburg, from Chappie.

The people on the bottom have no institutional means of moving up and earning a respectable living.

And the people on top have no means of preventing them from excelling at crime.

And are just as ruthless at pursuing their own respectable livings.

Nice to see fallible robot cops. I for one would prefer not to see robots in uniform.

It's possible that the lack of character development in the film directly relates to Blomkamp's brutal depiction of life in Johannesburg, meaning that there's only one dominating personality available, and if you don't embrace it, you won't survive.

Dog eat dog.

Unless you're brilliant like Deon.

Who ends up becoming a robot.

Because he disobeyed his weapons manufacturing boss.

Social safety net people. Public funds.

It's also possible that they partied way too hard while making this film.

Who knows!

Red Army

A different approach to the cultivation of sporting legends was adopted by the former Soviet Union.

Notably in regards to hockey, according to Gabe Polsky's new documentary Red Army.

Constant training, living together in isolation for 11 months of the year, severe punishments for failure, patronizing management of all aspects of a player's life, a rigid system demanding strict and unyielding obedience.

Under coach Tikhonov anyways.

Coach Anatoli Tarasov had a different style, much more gentlepersonly, focusing on the artistic nature of the sport, the application of progressive thought to cohesive teamwork, balance, to equanimous belonging.

Both coaches succeeded, one was despised, one loved.

I never realized how crazy about hockey the Soviet Union was until watching this film, it was like watching Canadians discuss hockey, I didn't know Russians loved the game so much.

Tikhnonov's torturous regime did produce results, the Soviets going undefeated for 2 years in the '80s, Red Army even including footage of Gretzky in awe of their prowess, during his prime, the Russian Five of this period referred to by many as the greatest line ever.

They still hated their whiplashy coach.

I always understood that it's a source of National pride that we defeated the Soviets in '72, but I wasn't alive at the time and only ever really highly respected it because everyone who was alive at that point regarded it as a nation building moment, something much more elevated than just another international hockey tournament.

After watching Red Army, I fully understand why.

Even if Polsky exaggerates the Soviet Union's obsession with hockey, it still rivals our own, and to think that we beat them, winning 3 in a row on Soviet home ice to win the series, against a team that trained religiously, no pun intended, is astounding.

I always thought the Soviets were more well rounded when it came to sport, because their population was so much larger than Canada's, Russia's still is, thinking that with such a large population their athletic interests would be more like those of the United States, although I do recall them winning quite a few medals whenever the Olympics were held and they attended, in my youth, but don't ever recall them playing football, basketball, or baseball.

In Fareed Zakaria's Post-American World, whose title is misleading, he points out that the American economy was/is so dynamically multifaceted that it could/can pursue multiple goals simultaneously, and effectively, while countries with smaller economies have had/had to focus on a smaller number of things, many of which they elegantly pursue/d, but in terms of sheer diversity of excellence, no one could/can compete with the United States.

Perhaps that's why the Soviets focused so much attention on hockey.

They did finish 4th in the World Cup of Soccer in 1966 as well.

I've read a depressing number of articles recently about the lack of high-paying permanent jobs in the United States however, and it would be nice to read about that possible trend disappearing.

Red Army uses the example of Viacheslav Fetisov to offer insights into an individual's growth within a collective system, examining the pros and cons of that system from his own testimony, and that of others, thereby investigating how things have changed in Russia since communism fell.

He's perhaps not the best example to use since he spent most of his life on top, although it was a much less glamorous life than that experienced by exceptional professional athletes in North America or non-Soviet Europe, he still wasn't starving or sent to the gulag, and could hold his head high being one of the best in the world.

He still had very little freedom.

He eventually did play in North America, winning a Stanley Cup in his late 30s playing on a Russian line for the Detroit Red Wings, with one teammate from his former Red Army line (Igor Larionov).

Note that many players don't play that well in their late 30s in the NHL.

An informative tripartite examination of ideology, politics and sport, Red Army delivers a chilling look at objective efficiencies, the value of teamwork, and personal strength.

Unbelievable how many awards Fetisov won.

Good companion film for Foxcatcher.

Terre des ours (Land of the Bears)

As bears wake up from their cavernous winter lairs, nature slowly unravels a bountiful nutrient enriched spread, the frozen months having left them restless and hungry, ready to once again, embrace their awe inspiring surroundings.

Millions of calories must be stored before winter descends once more, and bears must keep active to consume enough to prepare them for their next extended slumber.

Guillaume Vincent's Terre des ours (Land of the Bears) follows them as they adventure.

I've read about bears maintaining loose familial bonds while foraging, and Vincent's film factualizes this tendency.

A young male heads out into the world for the first time without the accompaniment of his mother or sister, and upon encountering his sister early on in the Spring, takes the time to warmly greet her, before they sit back, stray, and frolic.

Younger bears must learn to be bears as well, and 2 leave their den in the care of their mother, passing the time curiously learning her lessons, while also engaging in bold acts of mischief.

Bears abound in this land and come close to forming a sleuth, although they do often still maintain a respectful distance.

Heartbreak strikes as two young cubs who have lost their mother emerge from the woods to take food from cubs younger than themselves.

I've also read about bears adopting motherless cubs, but this doesn't happen in Terre des ours.

While Disneynature's Bears attaches an endearing narrative to its subject/s, Terre des ours takes a more random approach, interspersing events from various bear lives throughout, while adding relevant and informative commentaries.

Not as cute and cuddly as Bears, Terre des ours's form chooses to accentuate the wilder aspects of their lives, the edited accumulation of footage functioning like an instructive a/symmetrical mosaic, the bears within seeming more like wild animals than huggable teddies, which is an intelligent modus operandi, inasmuch as it reflects both strength and struggle.

It's important for humans to view bears from a distance as a general rule.

Treadwell proved that you can oddly live amongst them for long periods, but it's only a matter of time before you're transformed from observer to snack.

I think over the centuries many bears have learned to identify humans with death, and acculturating them to the presence of humans makes the poacher's crime easier to undertake.

Many of them are like giant raccoons, not related to raccoons, they may still be debating this, but they can still turn and suddenly start hunting you. Raccoons usually split quickly. I was sitting in the forest one day and I looked to the left and saw a raccoon approaching who hadn't noticed me. I waved, it looked up, and took off into the bush full-speed ahead.

If you see a bear, move away slowly, but note that it's likely not going to attack.

The bears in Terre des ours spend most of their time fishing and playing, it's a great film for bear enthusiasts and nature lovers generally.

They've chosen great moments to insert songs with vocal tracks, and sustained a visceral sense of majesty and wonder.

Like the bears themselves are living breathing volcanic lava.

Raconté par Marion Cotillard.

What We Do in the Shadows

Heightened rationalized improbability permeates What We Do in the Shadows, productively enlivening the confines of the undead, with shattered/rebuilt staggering susceptibility.

Incinerator.

4 vampires have been living together for some time in Wellington, New Zealand, tediously, nonchalantly, constructively, and impetuously approaching eternity, sort of learning and growing together as one, individuality integratively asserted, within their infernal domestic.

A camera crew is granted access and follows them around as they socially interact.

Debating, observing, feasting.

The film successfully works its way into the mockumentary cleavage, adding a bizarre sense of feisty unrealistic yet applicably pertinent ironic existential banality to its hemorrhage, asinine arteries and viscous veins wickedly yet lovingly distributing its worn permanence, like the genre itself is transformatively expired.

A skulking pantheon.

As they explore the external world and attend festive gatherings, favourite representatives of various divergencies emerge, their conversations occasionally fraught with bitterness and decay, a clash with the lycans, everything held together by Stu (Stuart Rutherford).

Stu is the human friend of recently converted vampire Nick (Cori Gonzalez-Macuer), and he aloofly yet essentially stylizes the film.

Nick builds Deacon's (Jonathan Brugh) character by contrasting his youthful rebelliousness with rash exuberance, the two growing ensemble, clueless direct un/concerned advice intact.

Some of the jokes don't work, like swearwolves/swerewolves.

More could have been done with the vampire hunter and the Unholy Masquerade.

Still, as far as people awkwardly placed within a time period they neither understand nor care to get to know goes, taking the time to formulate opinions and conclusions which both validate and empower them regardless, even if they subconsciously recognize their inherent weaknesses, What We Do in the Shadows serves to obscure while lucidly contemplating, as discoveries are made, and friendships develop.

It would be nice to see what Clement and Waititi could pull off with a larger budget and more time.

What We Do in the Shadows could make a funny show, there's plenty of material to work with.

Elephant Song

Dr. Toby Green (Bruce Greenwood) is ill-prepared for the devious manipulations of psychiatric patient Michael Aleen (Xavier Dolan), as he visits him for the first time on Christmas Eve, at his long term care facility.

Aleen, the unwanted son of a legendary opera singer, skilfully exploits Green's palliative expectations, expediently employing cunning and subterfuge, prevaricative expertise, with goals in mind.

Artfully engaged in indirect communication, they painstakingly proceed through a kaleidoscopic array of circumlocution, Dr. Green unconvincingly naive, unprofessionally struck by Aleen's dazzling intellect.

His disingenuous merit.

To which he cannot rhetorically respond.

It's the film's weakest point.

It's hard to believe someone that accomplished would fall for Aleen's tricks so quickly, so easily, even on Christmas Eve, and sincerely keep up the same level of trust for so long, having been so effortlessly duped from the outset.

Masterfully.

Why does he maintain the level of trust?

Frustratingly quilled yet mesmerizingly insouciant, Charles Binamé's Elephant Song still ambivalently deconstructs relational therapeutics, 2 steps forward, 2 steps back, patient bilateral supplications.

The application of learning.

To heartaching horizons.

*Dolan's that good in English too. Impresario.

**I'm not against employing clichés in writing, but they need to be worked in with carefully placed well-timed elasticity, to thrivingly live again.

***As the crow flies . . . ;)

Paddington

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Escobar: Paradise Lost

The tranquilities of a peaceful life living on a beach teaching surfing unexpectedly mutate in Andrea Di Stefano's Escobar: Paradise Lost, as love magnetically draws a couple together, and a Canadian romantic is suddenly thrust into the world of cocaine exportation.

Tectonic shifts.

Alternative outputs.

The couple is quite young and Nick (Josh Hutcherson) somewhat ill-prepared for his newfound corruptly honourable daily transactions, their relationship fervid and flourishing, his responsibilities, a discombobulating mind fuck.

Kingpin Pablo Escobar (Benicio del Toro) takes religion quite seriously.

He distributes wealth to the people.

He takes care of friends and family.

Requiring strict obedience.

And no nonsense.

The film embraces its haunting naive blossoming recourse to sound polarized youthful degeneration with multidimensional popularized efficiency, almost tumbling off a cliff, the established and the entrepreneur coming together as family, age inspecting its curious new fledgling, love securely blanketing the stage.

The crimes.

A chilling if not formulaic examination of familial stress and stipulated largesse, competing ethical constabularies cauterized in political inflammations.

Nick is forced to adapt as the authorities move in and Escobar downsizes.

To fight back.

To survive.

Solid career move for Hutcherson.

American Sniper

Clint Eastwood's American Sniper is about soldiers.

It's not about politics or asking questions, it's about the people who risked their lives fighting for a cause they believed in, incendiary polemics aside, they were on the ground, fighting an enemy intent on killing them, living through events that would haunt the survivors for the rest of their lives, experiential extracurricular extents, forging bonds through action, teams, through combat.

It's focused on one sniper in particular, Navy SEAL Chris Kyle (Bradley Cooper), with a gift for precision, an eye for detail.

He becomes a legend.

A part of a team, embracing his role as protector, he saves the lives of his fellow recruits time and time again, through vigilance and dedication, making decisions no one should have to make, accepting the consequences, psychologically covering up the outcomes.

Civilian life becomes difficult.

He leaves unfinished business in Iraq, a nemesis at large, who continues to hunt his compatriots, this unnerves him as he tries to live with his family, überconscious conscience, the fall out of his exceptional track record.

Which leads to an exciting Young Guns sequence.

A compelling cinematic interpretation of levelheaded battlegrounded hysteria.

Direct, straightforward, and to the point, while mixing in enough trauma to unsettlingly exfoliate, American Sniper brings together eclectic teams, unified through bitter shattering circumstances.

What actually took place is fictionalized to the point where it makes a strong war film, however, this aspect of its creation makes what actually took place seem fictional, which takes away from its realistic impacts.

But it still salutes the life of a great Navy SEAL who went beyond the call of duty and risked everything to do what he believed was right, individuality within the collective, cohesively functioning as one.

Made the most of the worst possible situation.

Persevered.

Whiplash

Worst case scenario.

From my point of view anyways.

The drill sergeant teacher, militaristic jazz, believing that greatness can be cultivated using cruel ruthless humiliating tactics which psychologically destroy while potentially diversifying.

If you can take it.

If you don't break down as he viciously insults you and contentedly rips you to shreds.

This guy's brutal, a true Full Metal Jacket.

Thoroughly versed in the dark side, he finds an historical example where callous pedagogical shocks produce skills beyond exception, and then tries to recreate the soul crushing circumstances which harshly brought about the virtuosities, not taking into account the uniqueness of the situation, the educational, demographic, individual, historical, and social characteristics at play, difference exploited as a means to oppress rather than a factor to be conceptualized, music isn't war, you're trying to elevate not conquer, you have to push to succeed but you can push without pulverizing, excel without collapsing, although there are people who need the drill sergeant, I simply never understood why.

Was lucky in school. Never ran into teachers like this. I can't function in such environments, just shut down and suffer, can barely think.

Long time since I've been in one.

Whiplash is about a young drummer attending Shaffer Conservatory who is given the opportunity to play in their premier ensemble, and chooses to find a way to become part of its core.

The teacher uses despicable methods which lead to improvements but his heavy hand is too much for the 19 year-old to take.

Bad decisions.

Pushed too hard.

He does excel though and is given the chance to say fuck rather than thank you eventually.

A well-casted examination of emotionally disturbing teaching methods and their outcomes, Whiplash's unquestionable villain sacrifices balance for beatification.

Hoping to nurture sheer brilliance.

Clucking malevolently in the abyss.

Selma

Slow moving change.

Sometimes change does move too slowly.

Sometimes mind-bogglingly frustrating bureaucratic 'efficiencies' prevent the advancement of basic civil rights, in Selma's case, the right for African American citizens to vote in the States, in the Southern States, in the 1960s, Alabama particularly.

They have the legal right to vote, but the caucasian population who controls the voter registry comes up with ridiculous loophole after ridiculous loophole to prevent them from actually voting, to make seeking the right to vote seem debased and futile, insert various humiliations.

Obviously this is unacceptable, and leaders emerge to change things, not twenty years from now, but in the near future, Martin Luther King Jr. (David Oyelowo) actively advocating for peaceful non-violent change, for peaceful non-violent dignity.

Selma's best moments feature King in action, delivering powerful speeches which motivate his listeners, debating strategy with his fellow activists, discussing tactics with his devoted wife Coretta (Carmen Ejogo), or holding firm to his principles when upholding them with President Lyndon B. Johnson (Tom Wilkinson).

His goals are immediate and necessary, making compromise an untenable option.

The film presents a basic opposition between progress and stagnation, those standing by the status quo appearing backwards and simplistic, those hungering for change, thoughtful and brave.

Johnson's character does change after the violence reaches outrageous heights and the protests continue.

It's still going on.

In light of the Ferguson tragedy, and several other recent disillusioning American tragedies which have deeply affected African American communities, Selma historicizes the present, to encourage an impregnable sense of unity.

There should be accountability when unarmed people are shot dead.

It doesn't have to be about white versus black, it can be about different groups working communally to forge strong integrated multidimensional secularly spiritual pluralities, strength in diversity, acculturating as one.

It's about simple acts of kindness and the acceptance of alternative points of view.

If the U.S. is the most advanced country in the world, why does it still have these problems?

Why are they persisting?

Generation after generation.

Inherent Vice

Blistering pronounced enigmatic athleticism, neat and tidy obscurity, a question asked, a question, answered, competing forms of non-traditional rationalities searching for clues within a down and dirty faceless salute to comic cerebral lechery, with role playing, familiarity, pop-ups, explanations, free form investigative hallucinogenic heartache, golden plunders, an error, bows and arrows, cameolot, freewheeling receptive improvised incognitos, purpose, demand, facts and fictions fused to fornicate, to love, the ether, groundless fluctuating intuitive forward motion, possessed, indecisive, a partnership, sympathy, acquiring a foothold, intransigent brawn, a narrator's clarifications, grinding and gone.

Far gone.

It seems that America's great directors must now hear the call of the The Big Lebowski's pastiche of The Big Sleep to make misguided judgment hedonistically live again.

Insert pot smoke into the underground world of high-stakes narcotic reality.

Remain calm.

React.

It's more about potential and theory, ideas, than plot, although the plot is astounding.

Difficult to say if the events depicted are actually taking place or simply expiring in an exposed hemorrhaged zig-zagged amphetamine.

I didn't see any evidence for this however.

The cast reminded me of that which you often find in feel good comedies, Eric Roberts (Michael Z. Wolfmann) filling in for Sam J. Jones or Billy Idol.

Martin Short's (Dr. Rudy Blatnoyd, D.D.S.) still got it.

I'm buying some absinthe.

The Imitation Game

A mind unlike any other, with an idea, a vision, confidently clad in driven unyielding pertinence, searing arrogant genius, applied to teamwork, to working as a team, to theorize, to crack codes, to imagine an immaculately mechanized gaseous maelstrom, sucking in cyphers then spitting out circumstances, World War II's oppressing destruction caught in its construct like visceral vacuumed variability, results producing tactics which serve to plan, to strategize daily essential outputs affecting lives and the people who live them, the soul crushing realities of life and death logic, covertly consensualized, as spiralling boisterous bedlam.

To suffer in ecstasy.

And win the war.

The Imitation Game celebrates unprecedented advances in theoretical practicalities, adding humanistic plights to the achievement of goals, balance and structure within the hierarchy, competing authoritative conceptions, managing the exceptional's zeal.

Creation's credibility.

Love's unacknowledged blush.

It's about a brilliant mathematician who creates an apparatus that cracks Nazi Germany's enigma machine.

Beyond tragedy, what eventually takes place, difficult to think that so many incredible leaps forward have been squashed in their infancy by culturally accepted prejudices, suffocatingly husking hopes and dreams.

Futures.

From Black Bear Pictures.

Into the Woods

Intersecting adventurous clips, securely stashed in a spell; wandering blindly baffling blips, serving to cast off a shell.

The forest provides what the hapless surrenders, riddle me opaque bouquets.

Paths intertwining, confidence rendered, lushly air brushing the haze.

The narrator holds things together.

It's not to be taken seriously, Into the Woods, according to his unconcerned tone, as if, even though the events that take place have paramount repercussions, love, happiness, giants, they're still simply banal and insignificant.

This aspect is captured in the film's focus on preparation as opposed to orchestration, apart from the accumulation of necessities, the land of the giants remaining overtly off limits, the balls Cinderella (Anna Kendrick) attends, never actively showcased.

Brilliant way to save money.

It also explains how easily the Baker (James Corden) and his wife (Emily Blunt) acquire the bizarre knick-knacks they must find, the humdrum coronation of the fantastical, realistically equipped with sensation.

The songs are kind of fun.

Evil is punished, good natures, rewarded.

It wasn't enough to keep me captivated, although I did revel in its mischief.

The middle-class finds salvation.

Paths lined with embowering gold.

Big Eyes

Isolated freedom, revelling in its independence yet struggling with domestic determinants, a husband left behind, another guaranteeing affluence, the domain of patriarchy, one gender controlling, uplifting as it suffocates, a deal is begrudgingly struck, the wife possessing talent, the husband seductive salespersonship, his greed stretching beyond the limits of the financial, his oppression, firm and resolute.

Lies.

Nothing but lies.

Desperate for the prestige yet unable to qualify its conviction.

In terms of actually creating his own texts.

Margaret Keane (Amy Adams) produces them regularly, changing and growing over time, a specific insight blossoming in the bower, dedicated, talented, active.

Walter Keane (Christoph Waltz) sells them as his own.

The critical art versus kitsch continuum actualizes the scene as recognition leads to expansion, as opportunity pluralizes the popular.

Do what you do well I say.

If Margaret had wanted to stay in the background, the situation would have been perfect, a fortune made, the strengths of both partners flourishing, a pool, a house, mutual agreement, not bad, if it's agreed upon beforehand, and artfully managed with subtle praiseworthy comments here and there, in various conversations, socially constructing a contradictory narrative, intriguing in its gentile playfulness, if time changes the nature of the agreement, and credit need be applied where credit's due.

No such agreements.

No such amendments.

Don't freak when the critics don't like you.

There are myriad critics, myriad points of view, myriad methodologies, myriad revelations, extract relevant insights that can help you grow from those who aren't malicious, pretend like it's all nonsense, onwards.

This is where liking sports comes in handy.

In the NFL, you can be one of the greatest players of all time, but you'll still be torn up if you have a bad game, you can't let it get to you, the opposition's fierce, prepare for the next game, let it go, let it go.

Walter turns out to be incorrigible, trying to take all the credit for his wife's work, but she embodies true integrity, leaves the luxury behind, and starts from scratch again.

I liked the film and was impressed that Tim Burton wasn't directing another remake.

I think he still has another Beetlejuice within, I watched it again recently, I love that film.

Like Margaret's work, Big Eyes is accessible and witty, charmingly plucking its heartstrings, multidimensionally navigating cultural tributaries.

Nice to see Jon Polito (Enrico Banducci).

And Mr. Terence Stamp (John Canaday).

The Man in the White Suit

There's a timeless quality to Alexander Mackendrick's The Man in the White Suit(1951).

Its examination of capital and labour faced with the advance of progress has transferrable applications for any historical epoch.

It's fun to watch too.

A scientist within, Sidney Stratton (Alec Guinness), takes constant risks to develop an indestructible cloth that can't be stained, thereby revolutionizing the textile industry.

The owner of the company he works for is initially impressed, until his competitors note that Stratton's breakthrough will put them out of business, costing the British economy thousands of jobs.

It's a control issue.

Labour hears the news as well and recognizes their precarious position within the new marketable leap forward.

Heads contentiously clash until labour and capital realize they seek the same ends, proceeding thereafter to suppress Mr. Stratton as he tries to move forward with his discovery.

He doesn't realize the impacts of what he's doing until he accidentally bumps into an elderly person in the street, as he's on the run, laundry, the subject of conversation.

It's a compelling study of beginnings, of panic, in this instance, mixed with diverse voices from multiple stakeholders, and several unexpected serendipitous scintillations, the naive and the nepotists, the powerful, and the hungry.

Made me think of the Who Killed the Electric Car? film.

And baby steps.

I always thought that if you were making trillions of dollars from a non-renewable resource, you would spend some of that money on creating independent infrastructures to sustain local economies, if the resource happened to run out.

Future minded thinking.

You see this in the ways infrastructures are developing at the métro stations in Laval anyways, which are equipped with spots where you can park and rejuice your electric car.

Perhaps, as sales of electric cars (which are making a comeback), or hydrogen-fuelled vehicles, increase, petrol service stations will begin to proportionally offer a variety of services for them in order to manage profit fluctuations and keep their workforces employed.

Factories which manufacture cars fuelled by gasoline can switch to harnessing the power of electricity.

Slow moving change, linked directly to increased demand.

Rather than exclusively searching for new oil deposits, the focus could partially switch to finding new sources of electric power, in remote regions, while respecting local traditions, to supply the necessary increases in hydro-electric energy.

If the independent infrastructures are in place, the panic is slowly mitigated over time, and if you have 100 years and ample capital and labour to create them, civil unrest could be minimized.

A lot of people will still be mighty pissed-off however.

They may be upset if they find out they have cancer too.

This option could lead to a much cleaner environment.

A much healthier planet, more sustainable, in the fortunes of time.

Unbroken

Opposites react in Angelina Jolie's Unbroken, as true strength resiliently responds to the abject whims of contemptuous jealousy, the byproduct of feelings of inadequacy and self-loathing, a modest olympic runner's withdrawn yet irrepressible spirit unwillingly begetting torture, as a lowly pathetic subordinate seeks to cowardly assert himself.

The film's straightforward, a solid accessible account of wartime atrocities unpretentiously layered with both camaraderie amidst suffering and religious sentiment to feature forgiving frequencies while vilifying the wicked.

I find thinking about forgiveness as opposed to revenge leads to peace of mind, you just have to watch out for people who exploit the forgiving for their own ends, and approach each situation on a case by case basis.

I thought the film progressed well, smoothly using the flashback to build character in the beginning, finding ways to keep the narrative flowing while plane wreck survivors are lost at sea, accentuating the terrors of war, lauding independence in the face of brutality.

It's perhaps 15 minutes too long, perhaps because they were truthfully following the actual events of the story, the best scene still coming near the end, stronger minor character development in the last 45 minutes would have worked to its advantage.

That seems to be the way many films are set up, the hero, the villain, no devil in the details, centralized contained conflict.

Information networks have already been established within the POW camp when Louis Zamperini (Jack O'Connell), the Torrance Tornado, arrives, and the film doesn't focus on escape.

They are located near Tokyo which would have made escape somewhat futile.

If not commanding in its absurdity.

Foxcatcher

The regalia of dedication and commitment, the steps to take, one by one, routines, platforms, workouts, sparring, success breeding opportunity introducing patronage, competing forms of professional logistics, an olympic gold medal winner is given the chance to train with one of the wealthiest men in America, as opposed to his fellow olympic gold winning average joe heart-of-gold brother, difference embraced, independence, appreciated, yet the accompanying affluence and opulent caprice problematize traditional approaches, leading to profound psychological disturbances, as he is disciplined and punished, for adopting the regimen foolishly implemented by his surrogate father.

Who loves wrestling, but, unlike Mark Schultz's (Channing Tatum) brother, knows little about the art of coaching.

Balance, order, masters, servants.

His brother Dave (Mark Ruffalo) is confident and rational, aware of his exceptional strengths, and not willing to be toyed with.

The frustrated worker who moves up too quickly, the successful middle-class force, and the spoiled oligarch then proceed to battle wits in a repressive atmosphere which Dave doesn't fully comprehend as he follows the strategy that has lead to his extraordinary accomplishments.

Form and content unite in Bennett Miller's Foxcatcher to restrainedly grapple with differing varieties of freedom.

Psychologies of the gods.

Lamenting luxurious liabilities.

Casting by Jeanne McCarthy.

The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies

They squeezed many a film out of J. R. R. Tolkien's The Hobbit, and I loved going to see them all, none of them blowing me away like Star Wars or that cartoon I happened to see on television during a blizzard when I was like 6, but I am much older now, and tend to be blown away by different types of narratives.

Greed is the sin dominating The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies, as Thorin Oakenshield (Richard Armitage) succumbs to dragon sickness and refuses to share his gold with others.

Others who sheltered him.

Others who protected him.

A delirious dream sequence brings him back to his senses and team Thorin joins the battle, the battle that dominates most of the film, it's a cool battle I guess, the fifth army still indisputably my favourite, as it was watching the cartoon as a child, this time with werebear accompaniment, brilliant move, even if Beorn (Mikael Persbrandt) didn't figure prominently in the action.

The film also productively deals with the unfortunate hardships facing the people of Esgaroth, as they struggle with their new situation, food, organization, lodging, required and sought after, possessing few if any possessions, a leader emerges amongst them.

Other strong features include Tauriel's (Evangeline Lilly) multiple appearances, Bilbo (Martin Freeman), feisty as ever, the focus on teamwork, albeit begrudging teamwork, and concepts like loyalty and honour, mischievously played with as egos clash and contend, which seems to always happen in these films.

But really, why did we have to see so much Alfrid Lickspittle (Ryan Gage)? He's like the worst character.

In battle, why doesn't Gandalf (Ian McKellen) cast more spells? Wouldn't that ease up the pressure a bit?

Who let Lee Pace (Thranduil) get away with that performance?

So much drama, so much pettiness, so much angst, so much fighting.

Quinctilius Varus, where are my eagles!?

Loved the Bard (Luke Evans).

Star Wars starts up again next Holiday Season.

Congcong Nanian (Back in Time)

Hard luck high school communist romance takes centre stage in Yibai Zhang's Congcong Nanian (Back in Time), five friends, hormonal hearts throbbing, social revelations pressurizing, a tender look back at innocent desires, the magnification of seemingly insignificant events not so insignificant in terms of personal depth and growth, their affects shockingly uplifting and bewilderingly entertained, courage forging a psychological frame of reference within the young psyches, its creation confusing in its definition and covetous of supplementary material, subsequent dreamlike narratives searching for these definitive moments, their emotional mechanics insulating the eternal in a resounding depiction of bliss, youthfully sustained, through the passing of the years.

I think the trick is not to think, "oh, it was so much better back then," but to think, "that was amazing, what I'm doing now is alright too, and the future looks good as well."

The friends have to learn to cope with unfortunate disruptions in their unpredictable routines as they leave high school to pursue different goals, and the world opens up with unforeseen temptations.

The film's a fun exploration of relationships and love, maddeningly elevating foundational convivialities, naivety descending into revenge and horror, with a celebration of the good old days, and redemption in the end.

I kept wondering about restrictions on filmmaking in China while watching as government propaganda repeatedly and hilariously popped-up throughout.

There are a bunch of great communal shots, visually emphasizing the benefits of teamwork.

But I was wondering if government film making restrictions were too harsh to nurture the development of a young Chinese Jean-Luc Godard, which would be a shame, considering how much Godard has done for France.

Basketball has the green light.

I have faith that these restrictions may loosen up a bit, as the middle class continues to prosper, because after I had these thoughts, characters from the film wound up in Paris, a good sign for me anyways, and perhaps, for the future of Chinese filmmaking.

I did like Congcong Nanian, I'm just thinking, there are 1.? billion people in China, and the economy is rapidly expanding, the potential for previously unconsidered revolutionary developments in filmmaking are limitless, especially if the censors become hip to alternative forms of expression.

Not simply who can make the most explosive violent films.

But who can make the most thought provoking intellectually accessible poetic reflections on issues of universal humanistic resiliencies, poignant in their multilayered insights, developing an exceptional Chinese filmic frame of reference, to grow and develop over time.

Perhaps it's already there, I don't see many films from China.

If it's not, trying studying what they've done in Québec.

They are making it working here.

Exodus: Gods and Kings

There are so many problems with this movie.

Huge, huge big budget screw up.

It's crafted like you're supposed to like it, like its implausible encounters, flat conversations, mediocre foreshadowings, and tawdry special effects are so infallible that you'll love them because they're attached to a well known biblical story, and not to love them, is to critique that story itself.

The bible deserves better than this.

Scientists are directly critiqued as are advocates of global warming as scientific explanations are delivered for a series of God's plagues, which continue to harass the Egyptians because they obviously can't stop them because in the context of the film they're caused by God.

Homosexuals are treated disgustingly and violently, undoubtably to fuel anti-Gay marriage initiatives, but also to congratulate homophobic bullies, as if segregating and victimizing a group of people is okay, in a film about freeing the oppressed, thoroughly and disgracefully revolting.

Of course the gay character occupies a position of power which he exploits for personal gain, making it difficult to critique what happens to him.

But it's odd that apart from Nun (Ben Kingsley) he's the only minor character to have multiple one-dimensional lines stretching across the film, drawing attention to him throughout, so that we can be sure it's him when death comes calling.

There's no character development in Exodus: Gods and Kings apart from Moses (Christian Bale) and Ramses (Joel Edgerton) who bromantically duel par excellence as fate divides them from their fraternal longings.

It's far too focused on the central characters, I don't care if one of them is Moses, you need secondary levels of strong character development to support primary exchanges, not just the odd subservient line thrown in here and there.

This also creates deep complementary layers of productively dialectic action.

Too top heavy.

Oddly, an Egyptian tells a prophecy and it comes true, thereby validating pagan practices which if I'm not mistaken are unjustifiable if there is only one true God.

Moses is a reasonable man and I would have liked his character if every scene he was in wasn't short and to the point, Ridley Scott even just tacks on the ten commandments like they're a box to check on a spiritual grocer's list, the short perfunctory scene disrespectful of their monumental importance, to be sure.

Doing too much in too short a period of time, and the film's 150 minutes long, an agonizing 2.5 hours, constantly moving forward while cumbersomely dragging its ostentatious feet.

In a film about freeing slaves the only characters they develop, and it's not like they're developed that well, are individual rulers with dictatorial powers.

This is okay in the context of the film for Moses, for he is just, but bad for Ramses, because he is not.

Ramses even survives when the Red Sea drowns his army, standing alone on the opposite shore to Moses, like they're trying to set up a sequel.

Give me The Ten Commandments over this film any day.

The Exodus action film; I'm surprised Ramses and Moses didn't start fighting with the Red Sea closing in.

It's like they're indirectly critiquing Gods and Kings by spending so much money on such a piece of crap.

For shame.

The Homesman

The callous and the cavalier, upstanding non-traditional direct and driven, courage, at home, with faith in the Lord, Mary Bee Cuddy (Hilary Swank) accepts a challenge, a calling, to save the souls of three hopeless wives, whom stark privation has psychologically deranged, longing for bygone days, the future, The Homesman's depiction of frontier life generally lacks the overdone resilience of pioneering spirits, brutal realities aggregating impoverished still born dreams like despondent cynical destitute waves of bustling bitter contempt, Cuddy stands out, having endured and overcome social and natural hardships, strength, vision, fortitude, the product of her religious necessity, assignments, iron clad dues.

She seeks a man.

And discovers one.

He tragically arrives, windswept and woebegone, worldly and weathered thick and thin wits having left him in need of assistance, yet capable of repaying a debt, still too in/transigent to lay back and cuddle, too independent, too mad.

A team.

They forge a team and set out across the prairie to do the Lord's work, his knowledge pertinent and bound, still too mired in misfortune, to recognize eternal signs of beauty.

It's a lesson in harsh patriarchal limits ignoring sound opportunities based on preconditioned ideas the absurdities of which are sorrowfully conceptualized.

No matter what the age, no matter what the station.

Sadness.

Loneliness.

There is redemption in excess which only exacerbates the age.

Time is built into the script like cold hearted bone.

Bleak but well done accept for the editing at points and the occasional scene which could have used a few more takes.

Nice to see Barry Corbin (Buster Shaver).

Bird People

This one's sneaky.

About halfway through, as Gary (Josh Charles) decides to abandon his responsibilities, I was thinking, "okay, this would make a much better novel, I need to know what this character is thinking, why is he acting this way, apart from the panic attack, more detail, more psychology, without said value-added information, this film's becoming desolate, I have no reason to sympathize with him, no reason, to care."

I thought the film was awful but there were signs that director Pascale Ferran wanted me to think this, a number of shots, including one of Audrey (Anaïs Demoustier) standing by a window, which seemed like extraordinarily well captured moments of unconcerned bubble-gum bliss, like ads for soap or candy bars but exceptionally well done, bearing artistic imprints, working with the content, their exceptional qualities tenderly embracing the beautiful, finding art in lives where banalities pervade, revelations, serendipities, flowing with the material while subtly standing out, making a statement without suggesting anything, banality dematerialized, the life hidden within surfacing, rejoicing.

Then there's this, what?, are writers Ferran and Guillaume Bréaud on acid?, switch, which seems ridiculous and totally out of place at first, but then, as the subsequent action progresses, it's like this is incredibly beautiful, so much fun to watch, to take part in, logic and preparation be damned this is one of the coolest surprises I've seen in a film in years, joyous while remaining vigilant (there's a cat), so glad I didn't walk out, you can see why it's playing at Cinéma EXCƎNTRIS.

Patient, delicate, exploratory, curious, a continuation of the voyeuristic theme that doesn't seem intrusive or flighty.

It's a very cheeky film yet illuminatingly subtle, Ferran playing with her audience, setting it free from predictable preconditioned patterns of observation, tempting it to embrace something new, a soothing transformative catalystic swoon, the art of mesmerizing, discourses of the beautiful.

Citizenfour

I always found it odd that suddenly there was this relatively free electronic network that I could use to communicate with others, read the news, shop, bank, play games, book tickets, do practically anything I wanted to do, sitting at home, using my computer.

I understand next to nothing about how it was constructed yet eventually started using it so much that I found it was an integrated inextricable part of my life, an unprecedented development, I started to think we were living in the luckiest moment in human history, and still sometimes can't believe our good fortune, although reservations began to settle in a while back.

With most of my life up online, it began to occur to me that this information could be manipulated in the wrong hands, and used for some bizarre counterproductive purpose, the likes of which never really occurs to me, I don't see why that would happen, I do watch a lot of movies though, the possibility of which still subconsciously disturbs me, however, in the background, at times.

But I figured, whatevs, I live in North America.

I'm Canadian, we have rights, a Charter of Rights and Freedoms, guarantees that you can speak freely, discuss things rationally, irrationally, criticize things as you see fit, without having to worry about being watched or going to prison.

Freedom of movement, equal opportunity, public libraries, freedoms to gather, all of these things that we didn't have hundreds of years ago but have now because previous generations fought for and created them so that our lives could be somewhat more free.

Citizenfour chronicles how the American government has access to all kinds of private information shared between electronic devices and how it can illegally use that information to potentially imprison you for speaking freely about some kind of oppressive instance which at one time would have been the subject of a riveting public debate.

There's no escaping it.

I don't see how you can stop this.

Law enforcement officials are supposed to need warrants to search your private information.

It shouldn't be available to them 24/7 because some lunatics launched the 9/11 attacks.

But it seems like that was the reason why the internet was suddenly available for free for everyone, or at least part of the explanation, giving law enforcement agencies the power to bypass constitutional rights to privacy, on Obama's watch, so that they can access a fluid, hip, integrated police state, your entire life available to the authorities, shimmering in the ether, billowing in the cloud.

Snowden's account of what can be known about someone based upon their online footprint is astounding.

Movements predicted, potential conversations held at specific points, expected patterns of behaviour, etc., I got used to the potential for this a long time ago, figuring it was a possible hazard for anyone who writes about politics, but still wish it weren't so, not an easy thing to get used to.

Snowden risked everything to expose abuses of power by the American authorities which bypass constitutional rights to privacy so that everything Americans do can be monitored and scrutinized.

He didn't just suddenly make the information available online, but worked with reporters like Glenn Greenwald to slowly reveal the truth about the illegal activities that have been sanctioned for years.

He should be welcomed back to the United States as a champion of individual and collective rights and freedoms, and we shouldn't have to wait 30 years to see this happen.

A truly exceptional individual.

What an American.

The Theory of Everything

I think Stephen Hawking deserves better than this film.

Providing someone who made a unique globally recognized contribution to the study of physics with something as obvious as this, is unfortunate, in my opinion.

Hawking (Eddie Redmayne) meets his future wife Jane (Felicity Jones) in the opening scene, there's no build up or potentially disrupting frenzy induced courtship kerfuffles, it's just, oh, they meet in the opening scene, and it's obvious they're going to get married, and other obvious things keep happening, like 2+2=4, more obvious than that even.

There is the illness.

Hawking struggles with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis throughout, but in terms of dissertation production or locking-down his true love, or having an illustrious career, there's no struggle, the best possible things keep happening, and it's like he never had to make any effort; there must have been effort; there must have been sacrifice.

A struggle, something to break up this crystal clear laundry list of exceptional and deserved preeminence, the film's like hugging your favourite teddy bear, Hawking isn't a teddy bear, he's bad ass, as he's demonstrated over the years with appearances on shows such as The Simpsons, Star Trek: The Next Generation, and The Big Bang Theory, indubitably.

Okay, there's a bit of a bad ass dimension in The Theory of Everything, and this is a feel good tribute to a remarkable person, whose comic spirit and extraordinary tact created ground breaking works, which, I'm assuming revolutionized the study of black holes.

It's not a cheeky mouthy neat unconcerned flip take on the life of a brilliant physicist.

But you can still express both bad assness and wholesome amicability without being cheek or flip, a shot of Hawking watching Black Belt Jones for instance, mixed in with a discussion with a student about Žižek, substituting actual moments from his life for these examples, and keeping them coming throughout the entire duration of the film.

Perhaps he loves bears, who knows, you don't get the details in this script, it's too general, too focused on achievements, and marital milestones, the big picture, lacking the subtle intricate fragments that hold that big picture together.

I don't really think there's some kind of unifying equation out there that can define and delineate everything, but I do think the potential for limitless expansion exists as time progresses.

I used to wonder about the Metrons on Star Trek: The Original Series (honestly, Star Trek isn't in this movie?) and how they managed to reach a higher plane of existence than the crew of the Starship Enterprise.

I theorized that reaching that plane required a universal understanding of a single idea, I've probably mentioned this before, consciously, whereby everyone on the planet thinks the same thing at the same time, at random, something beautiful, like bear cubs playing or homemade blueberry pie, thereby unlocking the door to an expanded collective Metronesque consciousness, everyone transforming into a spiritualized immaterial consciousness at once, like particles of light, or reticent radiation.

Not really the kind of idea you want to put into practice due to associated expenses built in to its potential quackery.

How can humanity become more like the Metrons though?, that is a compelling question.

Where's the Star Trek?

Some sort of whacky black hole discussion in relation to underground science-fiction agendas.

Marriage, marriage, marriage.

Boring.

The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 1

The Hunger Games return, and President Snow's (Donald Sutherland) grip on his domain loosens as he attempts to augment his stranglehold.

Revolt is in full swing and the people who have nothing are risking their lives to dismantle his order of things.

But they're disorganized, in need of both a communications network to coordinate their freedom fighting and a voice to articulate their common goals.

So they can combat Snow's minions as one.

Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) must decide if she can provide the people with that voice, with that superhuman strength which will give them the courage to persevere.

To sacrifice.

Her situation is extreme.

A tyrannical program of terror has been suffocating free speech and universal human rights for 75 years within her realm, forcing people to work excruciatingly long hours for nothing, at gun point, leaving them with no time to spend with their families, using media to convince them such practices are divine.

Showing off the wealth.

Murdering those who protest.

Mockingjay - Part 1 is bleak but how could it be otherwise?

It's about an unwilling leader coming to terms with their accidental heroism while living underground and fighting an overwhelmingly powerful enemy.

There's no cream or sugar.

No solace.

It still illustrates the end game of tyrannical political programs and the hopeless situation within which its proponents hope to enslave their opposition, who then have no hope but to spend practically every hour of the day working, so they can come home at night and crack open a can of beans, and then watch luxurious images of excess on their television screens.

Mockingjay even shows how the opposition creates propaganda to fight back, calling it propaganda, something I never thought I'd see in a mass produced American film.

Its politics remind me of those from the South Africa Nelson Mandela describes in Long Walk to Freedom, without the focus on race.

How people can treat other people with such disgust makes no sense.

I often think there's a different bible, one where Jesus chills with the rich and viciously punishes the poor for being lazy.

This would explain why tyrannical leaders sometimes seriously promote religion while prominently catering to the interests of the highest bidder.

Balance is the key.

Again, countries like Norway and Sweden seem to have found a working balance, a secular form of Christianity, where the wealthy can still have lots of shiny things and the poor don't have to ingratiatingly prostrate themselves.

Canada's quite a wealthy country as well.

We used to be a leader on the world stage.

Embracing patriarchal buffoonery isn't novel, it's been around a long long time.

The potentiality is built in to postmodern frameworks.

But such frameworks also support countless more cohesive cultural alternatives.

Back to the film, I would have ended it as soon as Peeta (Josh Hutcherson) was overcome.

It is Part 1, and didn't require its own specific ending.

They must have debated that.