J.D. Hansel

2000s Movie Reviews

Moolaadé Review

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Warning – this movie is about topics of a highly sensitive nature, and potential triggers may appear in this review.  Proceed with caution.

I feel as though it wouldn’t be right for me to review a film like this one – foreign to me both in terms of geography and experience – without prefacing my commentary with the concession that I am uncultured swine with virtually no knowledge of that which lies outside of my happy little bubble of interests.  This means that I lack a proper understanding of the context of the final film of famed director Ousmane Sembène, Moolaadé, which concerns the matter of Africa’s traditions of female genital mutilation.  While I do know a little bit about Islam, most of the context I have to help me better understand the film is knowledge of one of this director’s earlier works, Black Girl, which gives me a different perspective than other viewers might have.  While there is obviously much in Moolaadé I feel I cannot comment on objectively, the subjective experience of how the movie made me feel is something that I, like all other viewers, am perfectly qualified to express.  This will have to be my focus.

I must say that I was not much of a fan of his film Black Girl, and I was so unmoved by it that I never bothered to write a review, fearing I wouldn’t have enough to say.  Moolaadé, by contrast, is a very gripping, moving film.  Due to the bad subtitles that accompanied the copy of the film I was watching, I struggled to keep track of what was going on, which made it an experience that was not very enjoyable, but I still really appreciated the movie.  I was still invested in some of the characters, amused by some of the humor, intrigued by some of the commentary, and very curious about how the story would end, which is enough to make it a good movie.  When one then considers the reality and importance of the subject matter, and the way that it’s handled with drama, creativity, and empowering themes of liberation, it’s clear that this film is a special one.  It may not be exactly my cup of tea, but I’d still recommend it, because any master of film like Sembène is considered to be would have to be proud to have this fine work of cinema as the finale to his filmography.

110 Moolaade

The Motorcycle Diaries Review

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I debated about whether or not I would review this film.  Keep in mind, I do not (at this time) review documentaries, mostly because I think approaching something that tries to accurately capture real history – or accurately capture a real person’s perspective on his/her history – is perhaps too great a task for me.  Assessing historical accuracy has never been my forte, and I I’m not sure how to review a story if that story is an unchangeable matter of fact.  Still, this movie is clearly not a documentary – it’s a fascinating “what if” movie that shows what a young, idealistic, quickly-evolving Che Guevara might have been like on his road trip through South America.  When viewed as such, it’s really quite fascinating.

This film breaks one of the rules of storytelling in a way, which polarizes the audience in terms of strength, effect, and maybe even aesthetic distance depending on what knowledge of Che the viewer has at the onset.  Generally, movies are very focused on set-ups and pay-offs, always making sure that every moment the audience sees will make the following scenes (and/or the previous scenes) more meaningful.  This film, however, is designed as a sort of prologue or prequel to the infamy of Che Guevara, so the set-ups for the irony, and arguably for the importance of each scene, are in all in the knowledge that the viewer supposedly has of what Che would become.  Fortunately, because I saw this movie in a film class, I was informed of Che’s legacy, controversy, and infamy, so I really enjoyed the movie.  However, had I not known who Che is, I would not have been able to enjoy the movie nearly as much – perhaps I would have hated it.  While I do think that this is a fun story that succeeds at opening up one’s mind to new ways of looking at history and the world, I must withhold my praise to some extent because the movie works best as a supplement to a separate story that the audience is left to figure out for themselves.

Still, after a tiny bit of research, this is a really different kind of road trip comedy that can be really enjoyable.

94 The Motorcycle Diaries

Mean Girls Review

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First order of business: low pass filter.  Maybe it was just the version of the film I happened to be watching – I watched it on Netflix – but there was a very high-pitch ringing sound that would appear in a few shots, seemingly from background noise that was not edited out by the sound editors.  It became an annoyance because it was one of the very few things keeping me from really enjoying the film, and I suspect it probably could have been solved with a basic low pass filter.  (The fact that my number one issue with the film is so minuscule and irrelevant is a good indicator that this is a good movie.)  I think the sound is actually the worst part of the film, if sound includes the soundtrack, which does have some ugly tracks and some pathetic soundtrack clichés.

In fact, clichés are the film’s second-biggest problem, and even they are generally rather tame.  It is clear that Mean Girls is trying to be smarter than the average high school girl movie, and with Tina Fey’s writing, it succeeds at doing so, but some of the same old scenes we’ve seen before in every other movie in the genre still find their way in throughout.  Since I know I just wrote this in my Divergent review, I hate to repeat it so soon, but it is very relevant: a great film is not one that is without imperfections, but one that overcomes them with strong characters and stories that give the audience a good time.  For me, between the cleverness of the story, the perfection of the cast, and the third point that I can’t think of but has to be included anyway because of the rule of threes, I had a good time.

76 Mean Girls

The National Treasure series: Upon Further Consideration…

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(MINOR SPOILERS)

I’d always thought of the National Treasure series as a franchise that was decent for what it was, but wasn’t anything all that special. For this reason, I was surprised to find out that the screenwriters behind it were Ted Elliot and Terry Rossio, whose website I’ve relied on greatly to learn about screenwriting. So, when my mother wanted to watch the series during a long car ride, I was interested in giving them another chance to see if they were any better than I remembered. I was not disappointed.

The first film is very cleverly written, and much like The Road to El Dorado (from the same screenwriters) it is very much a “correct” screenplay. It handles everything exactly the way it’s supposed to be handled, constantly upping the stakes and setting up solutions that the audience won’t see coming. I was very impressed not just by the knowledge of history and conspiracy theories National Treasure displays, but in how they were interwoven with a smart, original, interesting story. The movie actually makes good use of Nicolas Cage, so his performance almost seems believably human. All in all, the movie just works well, and while it may be a tiny bit cliché here and there, it’s still a good one for any screenwriter to study.

The second film was sadly weaker, which is to be expected since Rossio and Elliot were not quite as involved. It felt a little forced and redundant, in spite of the fact that it had much of the cleverness and humor of the first. Part of the problem is that the villain isn’t as strong or believable, which is a necessity in a movie like this, if it needed a villain at all (although I’m not sure it did). Still, it’s certainly not a bad film, and it contains some of the most interesting and memorable moments in the franchise – particularly when they all have to balance each other’s weight to avoid falling off the trap inside Mount Rushmore. In the end, I’m glad this sequel was made, and I’m happy to say that I’m a bigger fan of the franchise than I thought.

Zoolander Review

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It’s a happy coincidence that I happened to come across Zoolander right around the time that the news of the sequel started spreading, and I’m hopeful that the coincidence could hand me an extra slice of attention for this review.  What’s important for that to work, however, is that I have something new and interesting to say about this film.  The problem is that I oddly have very little to say about it.  It’s simple, passable, and done correctly.

If I may be honest, I generally don’t go for the brand(s) of humor developed by Ben Stiller, Will Ferrell, and Owen Wilson, which generally involve(s) idiots shouting, or just over-the-top awkwardness.  This film, however, seems to play its cards right, and it knows how to make a “correct” film.  Its jokes are based on the interactions of its strong characters, with very appropriate cameos, and its moron protagonists are innocent enough to be likable.  The biggest laugh for me is the nod to 2001, which is strangely perfect.  The overall plot is clever, the visuals are appealing, and the soundtrack is a delight.  While I may have my little gripes about a couple of things I’d have done differently, I can’t dis a film that makes the smart choices and strives to be “technically correct,” even if it has a deliberately incorrect comedy style.

I must wonder, however, if it could have been better had it worked out a clever way to be successfully incorrect.  Perhaps this is what’s required for a good movie to be more than just a good movie.

69 Zoolander