The Hangover, 2009

Will no doubt end up my surprise of the year. I was not expecting to hate this film, but I wasn't at all expecting to like it as much as I did. It's not the funniest movie of all time (as I've been told by many, many people), but it is good, and I laughed a lot.

Why is it good? Well, for several reasons. Mostly, I enjoyed the fact that it wasn't crude. I was waiting for much crudeness, in line with Superbad and Step Brothers -- another couple of films I was told were the funniest movies ever (they weren't). Resisting an avalanche of farty, pooh-y, sex gags (which pass, it seems, for comedy these days), this movie has a real innocence to it, which adds to its premise of four fish very much out of water. These are not your Trent-like Swingers Vegas-babies, they're four men (well, perhaps with the exception of Alan) who live fairly standard lives thrown into a world they think they understand -- they've obviously seen Swingers a few times -- but they really don't. Even the alpha, Phil, is less cocky and more assured when he stands up to take charge of each bizarre situation.

In effect, these men are easier to relate to and it's more fun watching them get into scrapes when we see they're just as normal as we are, and we would also be as confounded in tangles with Mike Tyson, Vegas mafioso, strippers, and a tiger.

That said, the guys still know how to party. But this movie is not about the good times, but the after effects. The scrapes -- like a post-modern After Hours -- are not what bring the comedy here, but the guys' interaction. The nerdy, safe one, the crazy one, the soon-to-be-married one, and the uber-male -- they all react differently, and their reactions to each other are what make this movie funny. There are some great one-liners, some hilarious conversations, and even though it all leads to an ultra-standard cutesy ending, you get there with a sense that modern comedy may have shifted yet another gear -- one miles from the pooh and the farts and more towards actual, relatale, character-driven scenarios. Let's hope so.

I Love You, Man, 2009

My Sister's Keeper, 2009

Carl Barron: Walking Down the Street, 2009

Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist, 2008

Entre le murs (aka The Class), 2008

Saw this at the Deckchair Cinema in Darwin with Asha. Under the stars, a crisp, gorgeous night, in the most uncomfortable deckchairs ever. Good thing we brough extra pillows. Still, it's not about the chairs -- this place is all atmosphere. Where else can you watch a movie and see weird bugs flying around, and hear noises behind your seat that could quite possibly be a possum? And where else can you watch a movie and eat chili and scalloped potatoes?

A really fun night.

The movie? I enjoyed it. I found out later that the actors in the film are not actors at all but the real people in the life of the featured teacher. They all trained for a year to get up to scratch to act in what is sort of a documentary, sort of not. It's a fictionalisation of the real life of Francis Begaudeau, a teacher in France dealing with a range of students from a variety of backgrounds. He's the kind of Morgan Freeman-y teacher who wants to reach these kids in ways the school system doesn't often allow -- by being direct, by administering punishment based on case by case analysis of situations, by treating his kids as individuals rather than as a collective.

Good thing is, though, this is not like Lean on Me -- this is reality, or as close as a film like this can get without being a documentary, and so there are successes and there are failures. The happy endings you might expect don't necessarily come, and so the film reaches the truth about education and the education system -- only rarely will the teacher get through to everyone who needs getting through to. And it resists massive drama, too -- it's a slowly-told film that lets you in rather than dragging you through with any sort of melodrama. The story and the characters are fascinating enough.

A good film, an interesting experiment in style, and a thought-provoking story.

Sketches (aka Breaking the Rules), 1992

Revisited this with Trish. We used to watch this A LOT when we were 16. I've seen it over and over throughout the years, so it's all firmly planted in my head. Trish, however, hadn't seen it for years, and it was great hearing her say lines along with the film, and laugh BEFORE funny things happened because she remembered it so well. It's the kind of movie that sticks with you.

A great reminisce. And I still cry. We both cried. It's just a gorgeous film. Holds up, too, after all these years, The leads are so good here. Makes my heart break to see C. Thomas Howell acting his way through the worst shit these days when this movie so clearly lets us know how good (and deserving) an actor he is.

On the upside, the world has finally given Jason Bateman his dues. And, I remember reading an interview with his a few years ago wherein he mentioned this movie, and how much it means to him. It means a fuckload to us, too. In one of those unexplainable ways. It's just perfect.