Entertainment Value: Movies I Saw This Week - June 24, 2013

(descriptions and information gathered from IMDB.  The opinions rendered below these, however, are mine. Using a 5 star rating system.)

Cache**** - 2005
France
A married couple is terrorized by a series of surveillance videotapes left on their front porch.
Director and Writer: Michael Haneke, Stars: Daniel Auteuil, Juliette Binoche
Very cool and intriguing, with an enigmatic ending.  Haneke crosses the line a bit in this film, involving his viewers as more than just audience members.  He apparently has a reputation for breaking the rules.  I haven't seen his other films, but in this one, I'd say it works.  Watch the last scene carefully as the credits roll…


They Live* - 1988
USA
A drifter discovers a pair of sunglasses that allow him to wake up to the fact that aliens have taken over the Earth.
Director and Writer: John Carpenter, (from the story, "Eight O'Clock in the Morning", by Ray Nelson) Stars: Roddy Piper, Keith David, Meg Foster.
A truly terrible movie.  Poor, hammy acting with schlocky dialog and scene structure.  I have to blame John Carpenter.  I think he was looking to make a somewhat goofy movie, but he really just made a very bad one.  I've seen many of the actors in other movies, and they were strong and capable.  I've seen many John Carpenter films, on the same kind of budgets and they were fantastic.  What gives?  I watched this movie because it was referenced in Zizek's "A Perverts Guide to Ideology", which I loved.  The scenes shown in that movie, made it look great. It certainly has a great premise.  Ah well.


Leon: The Professional** - 1995
USA
A professional assassin rescues a teenage girl whose parents were killed in a police raid.
Director and Writer: Luc Besson  Stars: Jean Reno, Gary Oldman, Natalie Portman
There are things to like about this film, despite its hyper-violence and downer ending.  Natalie Portman's performance is exquisite, especially when you note that she was 11 when it was filmed.  Jean Reno chooses an interesting characterization of a brilliant killer and a dim-witted man.  The story keeps you apprehensive and involved.  I felt Gary Oldman's performance was quirky and unpredictable.  This is often true of his performances, I find, but in this case, it drew way too much attention and threw the balance of the movie way off.  Child death and a very creepy sexual undertone between Jean Reno's and Natalie Portman's characters makes this a difficult film to watch.

Black Swan***** - 2010
USA
A ballet dancer wins the lead in "Swan Lake" and is perfect for the role of the delicate White Swan - Princess Odette - but slowly loses her mind as she becomes more and more like Odile, the Black Swan.
Director: Darren Aronofsky, Writers: Mark Heyman, Andres Heinz, Stars: Natalie Portman, Mila Kunis, Vincent Cassel, Barbara Hershey, Winona Ryder
I found this to be an absolutely gorgeous film.  Where oblique camera angles and stylized set pieces have often gotten in the way for me in other Aronofsky films, they worked perfectly here.  Symbols abound.  Blackness and whiteness, loss of innocence.  Queens and Kings, Princesses and Princes rising up and dying.  Truly amazing.  I'm quite shocked the film didn't win an Oscar for art direction, but there you have it.  My favorite scene is Nina dancing the Black Swan part and slowly sprouting huge black wings. It gave me a sense, for a moment, of how a ballet dancer may perceive herself while fully giving herself to a role. Just stunning.  Natalie Portman won an Oscar (and a Golden Globe), for her performance and it was well deserved. All the performances are wrenching and awesome.  Barbara Hershey as Nina's broken mother, is particularly strong.  This is certainly a difficult film, as far as content, as it depicts insanity.  It's hard to say whether it's an accurate depiction, how could we know, but it is a depiction, and as deeply wrought and powerful as it can be.