Movies You Watched This Month – August 2016

CinemaParadiso Synopsis
Cinema Paradiso is the beautiful, enchanting story of a young boy’s lifelong love affair with the movies. Set in an Italian village, Salvatore finds himself enchanted by the flickering images at the Cinema Paradiso, yearning for the secret of the cinema’s magic. When the projectionist, Alfredo, agrees to reveal the mysteries of movie making, a deep friendship is born. The day comes for Salvatore to leave the village and pursue his dream of making movies of his own. Thirty years later he receives a message that beckons him back home to a secret and beautiful discovery that awaits him.

The movie won an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film in 1989. The movie is very leisurely paced and some of the scenes felt a bit repetitive but its a excellent movie on a young boy’s lifelong love affair with the movies. Its very beautifully made and seeped in nostalgia. Not sure how autobiographical it is but one can feel the love of the director for movies and for that era.

Watched the Theatrical cut but found out there is a Director’s Cut which is 50 minutes longer. Read about the differences and want to watch the Director’s cut now. In the Theatrical cut the love story doesn’t get resolved but it felt real the way it ended abruptly. The Director’s cut supposedly has more of the love story and provides reason for the way the love story ended.

The scene where the priest censors the kissing scenes is funny. The scenes between the kid and Alfredo are excellent. The climax scene where Salvatore watches all the kissing scenes is excellent and one of the best scenes ever. The scene where the little kid rescues Alfredo did not make sense.

The kid Salvatore Cascio looked very cute and was excellent. Marco Leonardi was good as the younger Salvatore. Philippe Noiret was excellent as Alfredo. Agnese Nano looked pretty as Elena. Antonella Attili was good as the mother. Jacques Perrin was good as the older Salvatore.

Highly Recommended

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TheBridgeOnTheRiverKwaiSynopsis
The Bridge on the River Kwai opens in a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp in Burma in 1943, where a battle of wills rages between camp commander Colonel Saito (Sessue Hayakawa) and newly arrived British colonel Nicholson (Alec Guinness). Saito insists that Nicholson order his men to build a bridge over the river Kwai, which will be used to transport Japanese munitions. Nicholson refuses, despite all the various “persuasive” devices at Saito’s disposal. Finally, Nicholson agrees, not so much to cooperate with his captor as to provide a morale-boosting project for the military engineers under his command. The colonel will prove that, by building a better bridge than Saito’s men could build, the British soldier is a superior being even when under the thumb of the enemy. As the bridge goes up, Nicholson becomes obsessed with completing it to perfection, eventually losing sight of the fact that it will benefit the Japanese. Meanwhile, American POW Shears (William Holden), having escaped from the camp, agrees to save himself from a court martial by leading a group of British soldiers back to the camp to destroy Nicholson’s bridge. Upon his return, Shears realizes that Nicholson’s mania to complete his project has driven him mad. Filmed in Ceylon, Bridge on the River Kwai won seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director for the legendary British filmmaker David Lean, and Best Actor for Guinness. It also won Best Screenplay for Pierre Boulle, the author of the novel on which the film was based, even though the actual writers were blacklisted writers Carl Foreman and Michael Wilson, who were given their Oscars under the table. (From Allmovie)

The movie is excellent but did not like the ending. After reading up on the ending I can understand it better but I still think the execution was bad. I think many people have hated and will hate the ending. The movie is beautifully shot and the movie won an Oscar for Best Cinematography. The background score is excellent especially the famous whistling tune “Colonel Bogey March”. The movie won an Oscar for Best Music, Scoring.

Alec Guinness is excellent as the idealistic British colonel Nicholson and won an Oscar for Best Actor but there are a couple of scenes where his acting looked bad like the last scene. Sessue Hayakawa was excellent as the Japanese Colonel Saito and was nominated for an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor.

Recommended

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18 Comments
  1. Author
    sputnik 8 years ago

    Started watching Stranger Things and finished first three episodes.

    Its good but don’t understand all the high praise. It is heavily inspired/copied from E.T which I watched just recently. It has the same story of kids who hide an alien (not ugly as in E.T) in their home. Some scenes are straight rip offs. It also has a kid who disappears story which might be some other movie.

    The kids are irritating the way talk and act. The parents seem very irresponsible but then it is supposed to be 80s.

    • Author
      sputnik 8 years ago

      Finished watching Season 1 of Stranger Things. Liked the show overall. At times it was like a B grade movie in the way some characters did stupid things – like Nancy going into the tree by herself or Jonathan not showing the pic to the cop or Jonathan not telling his mom that he believes her.

      The last couple of episodes weren’t as good as the earlier ones. It was like they were fast forwarding through the story as they decided to wrap it up in nine episodes. The way the season 1 has ended I don’t think there is material for season 2.

      • cr7 8 years ago

        Same here . The ending was really underwhelming . Agree about the B grade movie feel here and there .

  2. cr7 8 years ago

    1 episode left of “Stranger things” . Liked it a lot . Its cliched but the suspense & thrill is consistent . The setting is perfect for the genre .Good bgm,cinematography,location . Solid bunch of actors .

  3. Author
    sputnik 8 years ago

    Action Hero Biju
    Action Hero Biju is a 2016 Indian Malayalam-language drama film directed and co-written by Abrid Shine in his second directorial venture.

    Did not like it. It had no real story. Biju is a cop and the whole movie is about how he handles all the cases that come to him. It felt like some propaganda movie or one of those public service announcement ads for the police.

    Nivin Pauly was good and earnest.

  4. FS 8 years ago

    torrentz dead 🙁 rip all the future films

    • Author
      sputnik 8 years ago

      Never really used torrentz. There are other websites from where you can download movies but you will need some account like rapidgator/keepshare or so on.

      • aryan 8 years ago

        I used Torrentz to see 3D movies specially it was a good site now don’t know which site i can download and watch 3D movies.

  5. FS 8 years ago

    Game of Thrones Season 6 :- Incredible series. it doesn’t stop surprising. loved every bit of this season and i loved more since it was a continuous watch from start to finish.

    Suits season 6 – The story is being dragged but at the same time each episode is engaging as well. I think by the end of the season he’ll be back as lawyer again.

  6. cr7 8 years ago

    What we do in the shadows- Not sure about everyone but I found it hilarious.if you like spoofs and have seen enough vampire movies Its a thoroughly enjoyable movie .

    Sairat – Lovely movie . The main plot is very basic but its very well made . They have taken care of the tiniest details with utmost sincerity . The acting is very authentic , the leads look like 2 everyday teenage deeply in love . The song and their picturizations are gems .What big budgeted movies fail to do with thousands of crew,foreign location they did it perfectly with the first two songs .

  7. Author
    sputnik 8 years ago

    Delhi in a Day
    The staff of a Delhi household have just one day to return a British traveler’s stolen money.

    Ok movie. Its a low budget indie movie. Not much of a plot or a story but highlights the difference between the rich and their poor servants.

    Victor Banerjee was good in a small role. Lillete Dubey plays a role that she usually plays – of a high society woman. Kulbhushan Kharbanda was overacting and acting like he usually does – speaking dialogues in his constipated voice. Anjali Patil was very good as the servant girl. Lee Williams was good as the foreigner on a trip to India.

  8. Author
    sputnik 8 years ago

    The Man Who Knew Infinity
    Growing up poor in Madras, India, Srinivasa Ramanujan Iyengar earns admittance to Cambridge University during WWI, where he becomes a pioneer in mathematical theories with the guidance of his professor, G.H. Hardy.

    Good movie. Liked it. The movie highlights the hard work and the genius of Ramanujan, his struggle being a vegetarian in 1910’s England and his friendship with Hardy.

    Dev Patel was very good as Ramanujan. Jeremy Irons was very good as Hardy. Devika Bhise was good as his wife Janaki. Toby Jones was good as Littlewood and Jeremy Northam was good as Bertrand Russell. Arundhati Nag was good as Ramanujan’s mother in a somewhat negative role.

    Recommended

  9. cr7 8 years ago

    The man who knew infinity – Liked it . A very sincere effort . But I feel a movie on Ramanujan could have been much better.

    • Author
      sputnik 8 years ago

      Agree that it could have been much better.

  10. Author
    sputnik 8 years ago

    Septembers of Shiraz
    After creating a prosperous life in Iran, a Jewish family may be forced to abandon everything as a revolution looms on the horizon.

    The movie was too long and it felt very dragged even though the subject was good – about how a Jewish family is treated after the Iranian revolution.

    Adrien Brody was very good as Issac. Salma Hayek was good as Farnez but her character was sometimes mean to her servant. Shohreh Aghdashloo was good as the servant Habibeh.

  11. Author
    sputnik 8 years ago

    Pay It Forward
    The story of a social studies teacher who gives an assignment to his junior high school class to think of an idea to change the world for the better, then put it into action. When one young student creates a plan for “paying forward” favors, he not only affects the life of his struggling single mother, but he sets in motion an unprecedented wave of human kindness which, unbeknownst to him, has blossomed into a profound national phenomenon.

    Boring, cheesy and overly sentimental movie. Ending was pathetic. While the premise of each person having to help three others was good the screenplay was a mess. Don’t know why but Thomas Newman just reused his own music from American Beauty.

    Kevin Spacey was good but his role was all messed up. Helen Hunt was good but her role felt very similar to her role from As Good as It Gets. Haley Joel Osment was good in some scenes but he was overacting a lot. He was very bad in the scenes where he was urging Kevin Spacey to help and do some thing. Those scenes did not require the acting from The Sixth Sense.

  12. cr7 8 years ago

    Watched Narcos season 1 . Solid show .Well acted and good detailing . The old footage and voiceover makes it feel like a documentary . Season 2 is out already and I’ll be watching it soon .

    • Author
      sputnik 8 years ago

      Have been a bit busy lately but am going to try to watch it soon. Have heard a lot of people praise it.

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