Final for March

FIRST VIEWINGS:

Sherlock Holmes: A Game Of Shadows (2011) Robert Downey Jr, Jude Law. Fun with Downey and Law. Story is confused. Watchable. More fun than the original. 8/10
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1515091/combined

Safe House (2012) Denzel Washington, Ryan Reynolds, Vera Farmiga, Sam Shepard. Confused action film. All about getting a rogue former CIA agent, to a safe house in Cape Town, manned by a rookie agent. Mercenaries attack the house and it is up to the rookie to get the experienced crooked agent to another safe house. I think. Denzel as the rogue and Reynolds as the rookie, have some good moments, but it is hard to root for either of them. Farmiga in the command center is wasted. 6/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1599348/combined

ENCORES:

Here Comes Mr. Jordan (1941) Robert Montgomery, Evelyn Keyes, Claude Raines, Edward Everett Horton, James Gleason. Very satisfying fantasy. 10/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0033712/combined

You Were Never Lovelier (1942) Rita Hayworth, Fred Astaire, Adolph Menjou. Great dancing. 8/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0035583/combined

The Third Man (1949) Joseph Cotton, Orson Welles, Alida Valli, Trevor Howard. One of the best about post WWII Europe. 10/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0041959/combined

Witness For The Prosecution (1957) Tyrone Power, Marlene Dietrich, Charles Laughton, Elsa Lancaster. Career bests for these stars. 9/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0051201/combined

Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison (1957) Deborah Kerr, Robert Mitchum. Very satisfying adventure about a marine and a nun on small island in the Pacific alternately occupied and abandoned by the Japanese. The Yanks finally get there and win the island with our Marines help. 9/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050490/combined

The Way We Were (1973) Barbara Streisand, Robert Redford. Cast and music first rate. 8/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070903/combined

The Big Chill (1983) Glenn Close, Kevin Kline, William Hurt, Mary Kay Place, JoBeth Williams, Meg Tilly, Jeff Goldblum. A favorite from the '80's and fun to see where this cast went from this break out film for most. 8/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085244/combined

The Bourne Identity(2002), The Bourne Supremacy(2004), The Bourne Ultimatum(2007) Matt Damon. Favorites! Watched them back to back for a full and fun afternoon before the fire on a cold day. 8/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0440963/combined

The Descendants (2011) George Clooney. Love the Hawaiian scenery and music. Melancholic story of a family coping with an accident which renders the Mother comatose. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1033575/combined

Olympus Has Fallen (2013) Gerard Butler, Aaron Eckard, Angela Bassett, Morgan Freeman, Ashley Judd, Melissa Leo, Dylan McDermott, Rick Yune.

Non-stop action and graphic violence means heart pounding thrills. The beginning sets up the First Family as loving parents to their young son, who is buddies with head Secret Service agent Mike Banning. So instead of Mike being in the car with the President, Mike goes in the car with Conner, the boy, who asks if he can. A horrible accident on the way from Camp David to the White House causes a death and Mike is blamed so is reassigned to desk work at the Treasury Dept.

So when the attack on D.C. and the White House comes, Mike runs amid the chaos to the W.H. and by the time he gets there he is able to enter and find out the who, what, where of the people who have taken over the building. Since he has worked there and knows all the secret communications and passages, he is able to talk to the command center and those left in charge. He works his way toward the 'safe bunker' where the villians have set up shop and listed their demands. The scenes where he has to fight and kill his way toward his objective are graphic and bloody, but make you gasp and at times exclaim. Like other thrillers - Taken, for example - one extremely well trained guy is able to do the impossible.

I am an older woman and I enjoyed the film and seeing Butler in action. The whole cast is very good, especially the three women in roles of importance to the story. 8/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2302755/combined

Some middling viewing recently---

FIRST VIEWINGS:


League Of Gentlemen (1960) Jack Hawkins, Nigel Patrick, Richard Attenborough, Roger Livesey. Great cast in a caper film that is surprisingly boring. And a let down at "the end." I really didn't care how it came out. Just wanted it to end. 6/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0052997/combined

How To Lose Friends & Alienate People (2008) Sidney Young, Kirsten Dunst, Jeff Bridges, Megan Fox. Strange lead character, a writer at a magazine in London, who ends up at a large publication in New York. How he becomes a success is the story. It takes a while to get to like this guy so I can't say I cared much about the story. 6/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0455538/combined

Pieces Of April (2003) Katie Holmes, Patricia Clarkson, Oliver Platt. The rebel daughter lives with her black boyfriend in a seedy apartment in a really bad NYC area. Her Mom back in a Pennsylvania suburb is fighting terminal breast cancer. So she invites the whole family to have Thanksgiving dinner with her. She starts the day getting the turkey stuffed in a disgusting kitchen. Then! discovers her oven is broke! So lamely goes from apartment to apartment trying to find a working oven. Meanwhile her family starts a road trip and we learn how dysfunctional they all are. I stuck to the end but it was a really unlikeable group of people. 5/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0311648/combined

The Lucky One (2012) Zac Efron, Taylor Schilling, Blythe Danner. Veteran treks across country to find woman in picture he felt was his lucky charm that gets him home safe. He finds her in a town in Louisiana living with her grandmother and her son. He doesn't tell them how he came to their place but takes a job offer when they think he is answering an ad for help. Ups and downs of his relationship with them and others in the town and how he gradually wins their trust and love. Lovely old homes, trees dripping moss along the bayous. 6/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1327194/combined

More recent ones I watched.

FIRST VIEWINGS:
Old Acquaintance (1943) Bette Davis, Miriam Hopkins 8/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0036230/combined

Relative Values (2000)Julie Andrews, Colin Firth. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0210943/combined

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (2009/Man som hatar kvinnor/Sweden) Noomi Rapace, Michael Nyqvist. Original version with subtitles. Very good. 8/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1132620/combined

Joshua (2007) Jacob Kogan, Sam Rockwell, Vera Farmiga. Strange boy makes family crazy. 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0808331/combined

ENCORES:

Victor/Victoria (1982) Julie Andrews, James Garner, Lesley Anne Warren, Robert Preston. Delightful. 9/10  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0084865/combined

The Ugly Truth (2009) Gerard Butler, Kathryn Heigl. 8/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1142988/combined

Loretta Young, and others

I'm so far behind in reviews I'll just list the films and let it go for now.

FIRST VIEWINGS:


They Call It Sin (1932) Loretta Young, George Brent, Una Merkel. 7/10
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0023581/combined

She Had To Say Yes (1933) Loretta Young, Winnie Lightner, Lyle Talbot, Regis Toomey. 7/10  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0024549/combined

The Hatchet Man (1933) Edward G. Robinson, Loretta Young. 7/10 
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0022979/combined

Little Women (1933) Katherine Hepburn, Joan Bennett, Spring Byington, Frances Dee. 6/10  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0024264/combined

The Silver Queen (1942) Pricilla Lane, George Brent, Bruce Cabot, Eugene Paulette. 7/10  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0035335/combined

The Taming Of The Shrew (1967) Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton. 7/10
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0061407/combined

200 Cigarettes (1999) Ben Affleck, Casey Affleck, Janeane Garofalo, Kate Hudson, Paul Rudd. New Years Eve 1981. 6/10  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0137338/combined

Purple Violets (2007) Selma Blair, Ed Burns, Debra Messing, Patrick Wilson, Dennis Farina. 5/10  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0491109/combined

Northanger Abbey (2008) Felicity Jones, J J Feild, Carey Mulligan. 6/10
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0844794/combined

What's Your Number (2011) Anna Faris, Chris Evans, Blythe Danner. 6/10
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0770703/combined

Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence In The House Of God. (2012) Documentary. pedophilia in the Catholic Church, following a trail from the first known protest against clerical sexual abuse in the United States 8/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2111478/combined

Killing Lincoln (2013) DocuDrama. narrator, Tom Hanks.  8/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2299248/combined

ENCORES:

Gone With The Wind (1939) Vivein Leigh, Clark Gable, Olivia deHavilland, Leslie Howard. Still a great watch and one of the best of all time.

Rebecca (1940) Joan Fontaine, Lawrence Olivier.

Blood & Sand (1941) Tyrone Power, Linda Darnell, Rita Hayworth.

Casablanca (1942) Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Claude Rains, Paul Henried.

Wilson (1944) Alexander Knox.

The Stanger (1946) Loretta Young, Orson Welles, Edward G. Robinson.

Anna & The King Of Siam (1946) Irene Dunne, Rex Harrison, Linda Darnell.

The Ugly Truth (2009) Gerard Butler, Katherine Heigl

The Big Year (2012) Jack Black, Steve Martin, Owen Wilson. Birders in competition to list the most birds spotted in one season in USA.  A favorite of 2012!