Movies in December

I'm pathologically behind on these things. If only I could bear to stop watching movies long enough to catch up on blogging...

First up: Forgetting Sarah Marshall. I got this one for my birthday. Pretty much confirmed my belief that I love Paul Rudd in absolutely everything. Fuck the lemons.

Heroes Season 2 started out promising and then fell apart. It would be interesting to see how this season would have turned out if there hadn't been a writers strike halfway through it. They had some cool plots going, but they suffered greatly from trying to wrap them all up far too quickly.

The Santa Clause 1, 2, 3. I thought these got better as they went. Mostly because movies that advocate that believing in Santa Claus without evidence is somehow noble just bug me. They are usually accompanied by the flipside: that despite anything you've personally witnessed Santa doesn't actually exist. Again the disregard for looking at the evidence and making your own conclusion despite what anyone else might be telling you. Well, the first movie was pretty much about that (how creepy to tell the kid you've already brought with you to the North Pole that there's no such thing as Santa Claus) but the second two weren't and so they fared better with me. Plus I just like Martin Short. (Most aggravating for me: The Polar Express. A kid who can board a magic train to the North Pole and take roller coaster rides through immense toy shops and then while surrounded by legions of dancing elves still have to reach deep within himself for Belief before he can see Santa Claus because the other evidence just isn't enough... that's just deeply pathological. Plus, the animation is creepy).

Fred Claus was one of those frustrating movies that just didn't quite work for me. It was well cast and had some clever ideas (I particularly liked the support group for guys with more famous brothers), but it didn't quite come off. I suppose in such cases one blames the director...

Two old Christmas films I saw for the first time this year: White Christmas and Holiday Inn, both starring Bing Crosby although he only does blackface in one of them (ugh). Of course I love a musical, and Bing's voice. Quin and I did our own little compare and contrast between these old school musicals and Bollywood. If these were Bollywood movies, Bing would sing but someone younger and with more discrete ears would have picturized it. The dance numbers in the Bollywood version would have involved a lot more people, but there is something to be said for just two terrific dancers apparently nailing it all in one take (I didn't see any cuts in Fred's number in Holiday Inn).

Which is why I love a world where everything doesn't have to be done just one way, frankly. I couldn't really say which I like better, it depends on my mood, and I certainly couldn't trot out critical assessments to declare one or the other "better".

One Spanish film, something I saw posted on Tor.com and had to check out myself: The Spirit of the Beehive. This reminded me a lot of My Neighbor Totoro, with two sisters who share an imaginary friend, although they each have a different relationship with it. The Spirit of the Beehive had more of an air of menace to it, as if all of childhood was spent just one misstep away from a tragic accident. A beautiful film with some wonderful performances from the two little girls; if you like slow moving European films, this is an excellent one.

Bollywood in brief: Majhdhaar and Veergati were both early Salman Khan films. Majhdhaar started out well, a love triangle between three childhood friends, but I thought the ending was both depressing and a cheat. As much as I hate the falsely happy ending, the falsely depressing ending is no improvement even if it seems arty. Veergati I scarcely remember now. It involved Salman Khan and a sword at some point; that was probably the highlight. He was supposed to be some sort of poker ace, but the game they were playing was not really poker. It involved five cards face down on the table and two players shoving all their money into the ante without looking at their cards or bluffing/calling bluffs or even taking turns. Then you turn your cards over and see who won. It's hard to imagine how anyone gets good at that sort of game.

Kahin Pyaar Na Ho Jaaye was another Salman Khan film. I was 20 minutes into it when I realized I was watching The Wedding Singer. It didn't translate at all. Living with your family is perfectly normal in India, so the main character living with his sister and her family doesn't have the same air of the pathetic as it did when Adam Sandler did it. And this version backed off from making anybody the bad guy, so the girl that jilted him at the altar had a really good reason, and the guy who's supposed to marry Rani/Drew Barrymore seems like a heel but then shapes up in the end. Thoroughly unsatisfying. But the songs were good.

Bollywood Hollywood is a Canadian film about Indian expats. It was charming and had a lot of fun references to Bollywood films, but I wished it had been longer.

Lastly was Soldier, with Preity Zinta and Bobby Deol. There were two good movies in here, one about a hitman avenging his father and the other about a guy goofy in love with a girl. I liked both of those movies, and Deol managed to be both menacing as an assasin and adorable as the wooer of Preity. Sadly the two movies didn't really mesh together and the switching in tone was jarring. The ending was long and bloody and wrapped up the revenge story well enough but completely dropped the happy story. But, you know, the songs were good.