By Alfred Eastwood There is a great temptation for film lovers: do lists or personal counts. If this service added the great cliché to say that the list is personal, subjective and that there are many items out, we are at the absolute edge of cliché. So it is best not to speak and present just a list with all these features and also supports many discrepancies on which in my opinion are the best films of the first decade of the century.
10. No Man's Land. Danis Tanovic / Bosnia Herzegovina, 2000. Using the framework of a conflict which met from within, Tanovic, who was a war correspondent in Bosnia-Herzegovina, criticism with humor and without mercy the role of the UN and the absurd in all military confrontations. Human acidic film.
9. Hero Zhang Yimou / China, 2002 hitherto virtually unknown in the West, Yimou has shown us the splendor of their culture, displaying a beautiful picture to tell an epic story of the Chinese Empire. Impressive and captivating.
8. Behind the Sun Walter Salles, Brazil, in 2002 unfortunately seen by few in our country (He was not in theaters and we believe that only those who went to festicine of Cartagena), this film by Salles (The Motorcycle Diaries itself), marked a high point in exotic Brazilian film telling the story of a duel of honor between families, through exquisite photography. A look at the stranger rural Latin America.
7. Gran Torino Clint Eastwood / USA, 2009 One of the best films of Eastwood, the last great movie classic, is the framework to tell the story from one character to the ancient learned the hard way to live and to respect individual differences. In his farewell as an actor, Eastwood confirms that it is an icon of cinema.
6. Memento Christopher Nolan / USA, 2000 Thanks to the break with classical narrative beginning, middle and end, Nolan amnesia makes us and makes us live life looking backwards more important: Who we really are and why we do what we do?
5. The Lives of Others Florian Henckel / Germany, 2006 Leaving aside the political pamphlet which tend to become this kind of movie, "The Lives of Others" is a journey from intolerance to understanding other points of view through exercise to "take the place of others." A story that confronts us with our personal prejudices.
4. Mystic River Clint Eastwood / USA, 2003 One of the best casts in recent years, led by the best contemporary director gives rise to a brilliant police tape on crime, punishment and redemption, framed by friendship and complicity.
3. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly Julian Schnabel / France, 2007 Based on a best-selling literature and the true story of journalist Dominique Baubin, cinema film is written in first person painfully. A humane and moving drama that reaches the limit of making us feel hopeless in the flesh the feeling of not controlling our body.
2. Oliver Hirschbiegel's The Experiment / Germany, 2001 This film is almost a sociological treatise on how people behave in extreme situations and assuming a role. Based on a real experiment, this film confronts us with the dilemma of those who think we are and what we really are.
1. City of God Fernando Mereilles / Brazil, 2002 An honest look at the favelas of Rio, which are not very different from our neighborhoods, a neighborhood that grows as a witness to a history of blood and a colorful journey through the darkest situations characterized Mereilles that the film boasts an impressive photo, mounted copy and a message even more powerful.
cinema imitates life and so the charm of the movies is that most of us tell us that what really counts.
At the request of The Capo, we will try to make our posts a little shorter, seeking to have a better chance of interaction with each of you.
With this idea, the truth, I was doing a favor at this time, because although I plead defender of some examples of the genre, romantic comedies are becoming a problem for the world of film or if wants un ejemplo de películas hechas a la carrera y con actores estereotipados, ya sea por su 'calidad' o por sus éxitos pasados.
Arranquemos con la reivindicación del género con películas maravillosas como Sabrina, con Hepburn y Bogart, Pretty Woman, con Julia Roberts, o Notting Hill y Love Actually, protagonizadas ambas por Hugh Grant (responsable de algunos de los mejores y peores ejemplos de este género) en las que la mezcla entre el amor y la comedia se ven maravillosamente representados. Historias bien estructurados, personajes definidos y, aunque responden claramente a las fórmulas establecidas (cuentas de tale), Beautifully situations expressed in images. In short, wonderful films.
The problem is that lately we have found such terrible examples Where is the Morgan?, Valentine's Day and The Bounty Hunter. Stories told badly, badly armed and badly estalarizadas especially by "stars" like Jennifer Aniston (which should accept a Friends movie as soon as possible because it goes toward the abyss), Sarah Jessica Parker, Ashton Kutchner or George Lopez.
are perfect examples of how to build a disaster in the history of cinema. And the worst is that lockers are goes well, ensuring even even worse consequences.
forward Summer leaves us hope in such films as Mourning Glory, starring Harrison Ford, or the next jewel to bring geniuses like Richard Curtis. Let's wait and see.
First I want to apologize for having left these two months, but we are back to open a window into Hollywood in our Blog, but it seems that we are making progress with Keto. Let's wait and see.
now have to get in, because for those of us who love movies is a special time of year when every week we have the premiere of a movie we've been waiting for months, some even a couple of years. It is time for the premieres of summer, a time when we did not leave the cinema and Jerome does not leave the video store or specialty rooms because our territory will not be anything you like. Well ... what can we do.
Although chronologically the summer does not start up within a month, studies have taken over the 16 weeks to introduce the films they trust to take over the market and is an occasional story in the imagination of all that we feel vacation, so I do not.
Well, let's look at that in my opinion are the jewels of this season of 2010 and those films that we hope will be burned off the shelves of history. This is what there is to see:
We started with Iron Man 2, directed by Jon Favreau and starring Robert Downey Jr., who by the way, thanks to the first film series we recover the ostracism of drug scandals and one of its best actors of recent years. We shall not dwell much better because it Keto said, I can not tell you what good movie should be. Opens this week here in Colombia.
The next week we are working with the fifth set of Ridley Scott and Russell Crowe, who after Gladiator, American Gangster, the wonderful A Good Year and easily forgettable Body of Lies, give us a new version of Robin Wood, in seeking to tell how a British nobleman became the legendary bandit who robbed the rich to give to the poor. Hopefully this story is closer to the classic Erroll Flynn movie and not Kevin Costner disaster. They also act Cate Blanchet (The Aviator), William Hurt (Hulk) and Mark Strong (Sherlock Holmes).
parallel, and for those who like a little romance, film premieres Letters to Juliet, starring Amanda Seyfried (Mamma Mia), and tells the story of an American girl who discovers a love that lasted over time and in the colors of the wonderful Italian province.
After we find the fourth and final installment in the saga of the green ogre and his friends, Shrek Forever After, that brings all the players back but unknown each other because of an evil spell of Rumpelstiltskin that gives the power in the kingdom of Far Far Away. The return of the traditional characters of the series that since 2001 has produced over one billion dollars in box office. An animated film that seeks to reclaim the lead of Shrek 2, forgetting the disaster of the third installment in the magic of 3D.
The arrival of Shrek and his gang gives us a chance to ignore MacGruber, a parody of the popular 80's MacGyber result of a segment of the U.S. program Saturday Night Live that following the example of The Blues Brothers and The Coneheads seeks to establish itself as a film option crude and simple humor.
May ended with the inevitable contribution of Jerry Bruckheimer, who incidentally is working on the next installment of Pirates of the Caribbean, Prince of Persia The Sands of Time , starring Jake Gyllenhaal (Brothers) and enable them to manage by Mike Newell, hopefully you were able to remove the taste of failure of the mouth after Love in the Time of Cholera. This is a film based on a popular video game that follows the adventures of a prince that time domain tries to prevent an evil governor bring death and despair on Earth. It is a typical film producer assures us a good time at the movies. Inevitable popcorn and soda.
That same weekend again Sarah Jessica Parker, Kim Cattrall, Kristin Davis and Cynthia Nixon on the characters that immortalized on Sex and the City 2. A film that seeks to reclaim the success of the first delivery and the six seasons of the HBO series, which two years later sought to have the new adventures of these friends in New York and the Middle East. Very light comedy with explicit sexual comments that leave us calm to want to wait to get to DVD and not spend money on film.
We have to talk about films like The A Team, Toy Story 3, Salt, Predators, The expandable and not invite more movies to theaters over the next four wonderful months.
In this space I have the fortune to share with my two colleagues, Eastwood, and Jairo Alfred Potter, the view that a film is not ontologically good or bad. Avoiding judgments on technical quality, consider a movie as good if it delivers what is expected, rather than seeking more than they can deliver. With this vision, an intimate film, made formally and with exquisite visual detail can be as good as a comedy of errors, a parody or a police chase movie. So it's very difficult to define what is the best film in a given year, for the production variables are also related to the type of expectation that the film has generated. There are films that simply seek to distract the view, other thought-provoking, some of which are responsible explore narrative and formal possibilities of the medium, other than just waiting to tell a story that touches us. Some think that the most representative works must meet only one of these qualities, but there are those who believe that the best films tend to be those that achieve a satisfactory mix of all these qualities.
On this occasion I will refer to Iron Man 2 as a film that does the trick at all levels being raised. Meets the requirements of film genre, and succeeds as a good cult movie, meet fans and newbies. Although it may seem convenient, it is useful to assert that there is a new film genre defined by the comic book adaptation. I do not think that this classification serves as the film has been adapted all kinds of works (painting, literature, journalism, television, radio and even film), and it's absurd to divide products film according to the source material for adaptation - except in the case of 'remake'o fried because it is a reconstruction of the same medium.
funny thing is that it seems very comfortable referring to the comic book adaptation as a particular form, however the storyboard, an essential step in the development of the majority of films, is almost a comic in itself. As the script is a transformation by way of written project, the storyboard sequencing is an image that effectively turns the narrative action in a series of vignettes that can be static be understood by the production team and serve as a guide to its filmic representation.
Thus, it seems absurd to think that the comic was this rather than textual support, but sometimes include visual elements that play on the big screen. But talking about the comic book adaptation as a genre is as absurd as talk of literary adaptation as a genre. The comic, like literature, has many facets and many different types of products.
The case of Iron Man 2 serves as an example, because it gives us a certain kind of comic book - the comic book superhero - whose interest is primarily the entertainment. This type of comics has been characterized by excessive devotion to create images of perfection in human bodies, the creation of characters and stories that extend over time thanks to the constant reproduction of printed comics, and visual exploration of graphic space and communicative possibilities within the printed page, among other qualities that do not want to explore now to avoid spreading too. The relationship with other forms of media can thus be seen clearly: the obsessive interest in the ideal bodies on the comic vision of the Hollywood film, which wallows in actors and actresses who defined the concept of beauty. Narrative continuity separate full stories related to comic book serialized television, rather than film or literature. His exploration of the visual boundaries of the page, away from the film and brings it closer to painting in its expressive desire.
Similarly, the cartoon has been actively nurtured the film and photography. The ideal body reference promulgated by Hollywood have become benchmarks for the creation of characters and actors have been the model for some comic book heroes. The angles and photographic compositions, as well as blur, have served to enrich a medium that originally focused on more general levels. Painting techniques have made the comic not limited to a visual reduction of features, but to explore the possibilities of various techniques such as watercolor and oil paintings.
Iron Man 2 shows many of these issues. Robert Downey Jr. not only plays a major role as Tony Stark, also builds a new facet. This gives him a face more specific in this character, just like Christopher Reeves affected the way that drew a Clark Kent. The obsession with male and female bodies is evident, from the dancers who accompany Stark in his first appearance in this movie, even the clothes stuck Rushman Natalie (Scalet Johansson), focusing especially on the male body of the 'suits' Stark metal. Is excessive interest by the exaggerated male and female body as we have seen in almost all movies based on comic book superheroes (Superman, Batman, Sin City, 300, The Spirit, to name a few).
The construction of the characters developed for many years in the comic book series serves to allow the proceedings in the movie stand out. Robert Downey Jr. manages to embody the narcissistic, arrogant and self-flattering Tony Stark, including weakness for alcohol and extreme self-sufficiency. This dedication to the characters allows them to have bright lines that help you remember the characters and remain in the memory of fans. Beyond that, this constant current international representation through cameos strengthen those characters and created a universe of links that satisfy the most dedicated forever cult following - for example, Tony Stark appears in Hulk, The Incredibles (2008 ) and the next installment of Nick Fury (2011) and The Avengers (2012), or Stan Lee, creator of many Marvel Comics characters, making cameos in the style of Hitchcock.
Interestingly visual possibilities within the page have not been brought to produce similar effects in film. In Iron Man 2 there is no use of visual space to tell stories in parallel, or contrast moments, even to represent the face of Stark or Vanko within the 'costume' mechanic. This aspect of the comic has not permeated both films, though his most important contribution is visual. At best, in The Spirit (2009), Sin City (2005), or 300 (2006) has served to acquire a background image stylistically similar to that produced in the comic, but not for the narrative construction through vignettes.
However, the movies based on superhero comics have had similar good fortune to the literary adaptation. While some have been great successes that continue to produce sequels or franchises (Batman and X-Men as the best examples), others have been significant failures. Furthermore there are also movie versions of comic book superheroes are not, as such, corresponding to a different style of play not based on a monthly or weekly occurrence, but annual best. Asterix has had several film appearances in France, with mixed results, the film Mortadelo and Philemon (2003) was irregular and Mission: Save the Earth (2008) a total failure the next year we will see Steven Spielberg directing the first version of Tintin in the film. We'll see what kind of adaptation shows this famous director.
In short, Iron Man 2 is a film palatable, understandable, with a well-developed main character, showing a visual delight in the male and female bodies, and with a large dose of explosions and high speed chases to violent demonstrations aggressive but not bloody (thereby receiving a classification to avoid the younger go to see it).
The film also has a strong ideological, as Jerome says in his book Rivera Film: Recipes and Symbols , represents both the historical moment as the backdrop against which the work is constructed. It is inevitable to see the reference to the U.S. center of the universe, and technology and free enterprise as a bastion of culture and, presumably, as a promulgation of world peace. No need, either, disqualify the work for this reason. Simply, and as recommended by the book, one must understand that the audiovisual work has many simultaneous messages and we must realize that some of those absorbed without realizing it. Therefore these issues discussed here, to show that there is much to say about the film. Yes, and quoting Rivera, talk about movies, "No let's enjoy it. "
9. Hero Zhang Yimou / China, 2002 
Interestingly 