Screening Log - 2012

MARCH
13 - Las tr3s Marías (González, 2012) ***
12 - The Help (Taylor, 2011) *** x 3
11 - Game Change (Roach, 2012) ***
11 - The Hunter (,2011) TBA
11 - Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971, Stuart) ***½ x 4
11 - The Piano (Campion, 1993) **** x 4
10 - Friends With Kids (Westfeldt, 2012) * read my review.
10 - Some Like it Hot (Wilder, 1959) **** x 3
07 - My Week With Marilyn (Curtis, 2011) **½ x 2
06 - This Means War (McG, 2012) ½ read my review.
03 - Weekend (Haigh, 2011) TBA
03 - A Dangerous Method (Cronenberg, 2011) *** read my review.
03 - Young Adult (Reitman, 2011) *** read my review.
03 - To Catch a Thief (Hitchcock, 1955) *** x 2


FEBRUARY
29 - The Devil Inside (Bell, 2012) ½
27 - The Artist (Hazanavicius, 2011) ***½  x 3
26 - Bridesmaids (Feig, 2011) ***½ x 5
25 - Midnight in Paris (Allen, 2011) **** x 6
24 - Hugo (Scorsese, 2011) **** x 2 read my review.
23 - The Moment of Truth (Rossi,1965) ***
22 - The Woman in Black (Watkins, 2012) *** read my review.
21 - My Week With Marilyn (Curtis, 2011) **½
20 - Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (Daldry, 2011) *** read my review.
20 - A Star is Born (Wellman, 1937) ***
19 - Pina (Wenders, 2011) *** read my review.
19 - Chico & Rita (Trueba, 2010) ***
19 - A Cat in Paris (Felicioli, Gagnol, 2010) **
19 - Hugo (Scorsese, 2011) ****
18 - Kung Fu Panda 2 (Yuh, 2011) **
18 - Puss in Boots (Miller, 2011) *½
16 - The Artist (Hazanavicius, 2011) ***½  x 2
13 - Nostalgia for the Light (Guzmán, 2010) ***½ read my review.
12 - Bullhead (Roskam, 2011)  ***½ read my review.
06 - Martha Marcy May Marlene (Durkin, 2011)  ***½ read my review.
04 - Texas Killing Fields (Mann, 2011) * read my review.
04 - Margin Call (Chandor, 2011) ** read my review.
04 - The Iron Lady (Lloyd, 2011) ** read my review.
03 - Take Shelter (Nichols, 2011) *** read my review.


JANUARY
29 - The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (Fincher, 2011) **** x 3
28 - The Help (Taylor, 2011) *** x 2
27 - The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (Fincher, 2011) **** x 2
26 - A Better Life (Weitz, 2011) **
24 - Drive (Refn, 2011) **** x 2 read my review.
23 - The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (Fincher, 2011) ****
22 - The Artist (Hazanavicius, 2011) ***½  read my review.
21 - Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (Alfredson, 2011) **  read my review.
21 - War Horse (Spielberg, 2011) *  read my review.
21 - The Descendants (Payne, 2011) *½  read my review.
20 - J. Edgar (Eastwood, 2011) *½ read my review.
19 - The Darkest Hour ( Gorak, 2011) read my review.
15 - Bridesmaids (Feig, 2011) ***½ x 4
14 - Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (Ritchie, 2011) **
11 - The Muppets (Bobin, 2011) ***½
08 - Certified Copy (Kiarostami, 2010) **** read my review.
03 - August (Rapaport, 2011) ***
03 - Carnage (Polanski, 2011) ** read my review.
02 - Drive (Refn, 2011) TBA
02 - Higher Ground (Farmiga, 2011) **½ read my review.
02 - We Need to Talk About Kevin (Ramsay, 2011) **½ read my review.
02 - The Prince and the Showgirl (Olivier, 1957) ***
01 - North by Northwest (Hitchcock, 1959) **** x 4
01 - Horrible Bosses (Gordon, 2011) *** x 2


Previous screening logs
2011

Sheet-y Saturday: Best Posters of 2011

 Where we take a look at the year's best posters.

10. The Ides of March
How do you get two of the handsomest men in the world in the same poster without recurring to silly face offs and awkward floating heads? You throw in a clever nod to duality via one of the most notorious magazines of our times. If only the movie had played with this duality in the same way, it would've been a real stunner.

9. One Day

This truly unbelievable picture does justice to Henri Cartier-Bresson and the iconic "The Kiss" by Alfred Eisenstaedt, in how both of them seem to really have captured something unique in time. The synergy between Annie and Jim Sturgess in this picture is sexy, romantic and aches with something that resembles nostalgia. Their feet seem to be in movement, as if this kiss can only happen in this instant, because their feet are moving them somewhere else immediately. Extra points for the exact measure of tongue to make this tasteful and not tacky.

 8. Meek's Cutoff
The poster captures the single most breathtaking moment in the entire movie, which is a lot, coming from a movie where every scene demands to be paused and examined for their sheer beauty. Gotta love the fact that the illustrator alludes to both the era during which the movie takes place (the faded palette) and is also a wink to postmodernism.

7. Albert Nobbs

Simple. Straightforward. Concise. 

Works as a more effective art piece than the actual movie.

6. Drive

The font! The hot pink! The greasy look in Ryan Gosling's face! The vertical text!

Don't you just want to drop everything and go listen to synthpop the minute you see this poster?

5. Martha Marcy May Marlene

Like the cover of a 60s LP, the images are haunting and warm. We see the juxtaposition between the women (it's the same woman actually) and are reminded of summer haziness. The semi open mouth an invitation for a kiss, maybe? A song about to come out?

Then there's that male figure in the background. A lover? A threat? No other poster summed up its movie's mood and psychological dilemma better than this.

4. Shame

The covers are both repulsive and inviting.

The simple title feels more like an ironic proposal than an accusatory statement.

Are you in?

3. Melancholia
Like Millais' Ophelia, Lars von Trier's Justine looks at us from what looks like it will be her watery grave.
Kirsten Dunst's eyes seem fixed on her beholder but then we notice there is something reflecting on the upper right. It's the title planet set to crash against our own. Justine's intention then seems to change, she is no longer looking at us announcing her fate, she's lovingly looking towards the skies, accepting her new beginning. She's marrying the night, indeed.

2. Jane Eyre 
Haunting and creepy like a 19th century cameo, this poster best captured the phantasmagoric qualities of its source material and the elegance with which the film version updated it.

1. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
The teaser is movie star power at its best and rawest. Daniel Craig and Rooney Mara look at us directly, his arm over her as if trying to conquer Lisbeth Salander's intensity. Without even smirking her hand is on top of his arm, it is she who's in control. The final one-sheet took this concept to the next level, like Jane Eyre's, this poster also has something that resembles romantic melancholy. The story after all isn't merely about a tarnished journalist and the bisexual goth hacker, it's a deep love story about people coming together when they least expect it to. The darkness that surrounds them is nothing but a misstep. Like the haunting tagline reminds us, secrets only are revealed when their time arrives.

How about you? What were your favorite posters this year?

Best Art of Nature & God on Earth : wonderful natural drawings

When it is about the biggest artist of the world, nothing can be as great as God whose art and design is reflected in the form of naturally formed wonders on Earth. Though some of them are very common but in this post we have covered some of the most wonderful natural art formations considering their natural shape which resembles with some or the other thing to a great extent. The best thing is that these are crafted the nature only and are among the best art and designs of nature on Earth. So, have a look at the photos of these wonderful shape formations on Earth by default and notice their degree of resemblance with known shapes/objects and you will come to know about the perfection of nature.

Cristiano Ronaldo hot girlfriends & affairs : luckiest men with more then 28 on the list

Niki Ghazian

Jordana Jordel

Nuria Bermudez

Paris Hilton

Raffaella Fico

Soraria Chave

Gemma Atkinson

Diana Chaves

Irina Shayk

Isabel Figueira

Letizia Filippi

Luciana Abreu

Alyona-Haynes

Gemma Atkinson

Carolina-Patrocinio

Merhe Romero

Maria Sharapova

Playing foot-ball, he learned how to kick some balls and he had the balls to get some more balls for him. you might not get this at first, even we didn't when we first drafted it!!Anyway, we are talking about Cristiano Ronaldo, the 'colorful' player, who has had many girls in his life. We compiled some pictures for you (we counted and it seems like we have covered most of the relationships).

Here we are, the pictures of the various 'Cristiano and babes' together (equal focus on Ronaldo as well will be appreciated). He is one of the most eligible bachelors of the world (who can always be seen flirting in company of some of the hottest & most desirable women on Earth) and also one of the richest and good looking sports personality of the world. Women are just crazy about him and so does he (:p). He has had many affairs and has dated many women in the past, so we decided to bring this special achievement of Cristiano (off-field) in the lime light. So, here we present the photo gallery listing Cristiano Ronaldo's past girlfriends and lady loves. At the age of 24 years only, around 28 Cristiano's 28 girlfriends were known to the world and believe us the list is still growing. So, have a look at the photos presenting the 17 top girlfriends and women in his life till now.

Short Take:"Moneyball" and "Tuesday After Christmas".

Moneyball is a good movie but its sensibility is unquestionably, perhaps exclusively, American given that it centers around the world of baseball. Screenwriters Aaron Sorkin and Steven Zaillian do a superb job of trying to sketch out the universal in the real-life story of Oakland Athletics' general manager Billy Beane (Brad Pitt) who single-handedly tried to revolutionize the sport by recurring to mathematics and statistics.

Jonah Hill plays Peter Brand, the Yale graduate who was hired by Beane to scout players using a strange method that has them choose players who have been rejected by other teams based on their "on base percentage". The Athletics become the laughing stock of the baseball world until they suddenly begin to go on a winning streak the likes of which had never seen before in baseball history.

If you see past the baseball lingo and all the mathematics and numbers, you will discover a movie that's essentially an example of how we try our best to excel in the face of adversity. Pitt is exceptionally magnetic as Beane, finally showing some signs of rugged wisdom beyond his pretty boy looks. The rest of the cast does a wonderful job circling around him, Kerris Dorsey is particularly good as his daughter Casey, but the film can't tap into the universality to make it really work outside the American context. Sorkin and Zaillian try to make its outer layer become more accessible, but the end result is quite marred by one's own tolerance for sports, particularly because director Bennet Miller keeps everything under such precise control that you can't help but feel unwelcome. "How can you not get romantic about baseball?" asks Beane, if you agree with him, then this is the movie for you.

The Romanian New Wave might just be the singular, most exciting film current to have occurred in decades! Every film coming from the formerly troubled country, feels like a breath of fresh air in the midst of all these pre-produced, highly disposable works done all over the world. What results so strange about these movies is that they're essentially telling us stories we've heard a million times before; even the fact that they often seek to portray the social angle makes us wonder what makes them superior to similar schools of thought. Can it be maybe, that having been repressed for so long gave these young filmmakers the ability to see the world with fresh eyes? To find uniqueness in what's become so ordinary and unnoticeable to others?
Take Tuesday After Christmas for example, an exercise in Bergmanian restraint that's as dark and strangely humorous as the master's best works. The film opens with a naked couple engaging in post-coital conversation. Raluca (Maria Popistașu) teases her lover Paul (Mimi Brănescu) about his stamina, the size of his penis and then wonders when she will see him again. Paul it turns out, has a wife (Mirela Oprişor) waiting for him back home.
The film, which takes place in the days leading to Christmas Eve, has none of the usual twists we'd expect from plots in which infidelity is a major theme, perhaps precisely because the film isn't about cheating. It's a carefully constructed slice of life that gives us access to lives that could very well resemble ours. Watching Paul and his wife arguing about what to get their daughter for Christmas makes for a slightly disturbing nod to what we might see every day at the mall. These people, we are constantly told, are not special or unique, they are pieces of a larger universe.
Perhaps director Radu Muntean is emphasizing the blasé fascination with others' lives as a way to encourage us to empathize with others. The film isn't even "interesting" in strictly superficial terms; there are no insane plot twists, sudden shocks or scenes that alter the main landscape, yet somehow watching these parents take  their daughter to the dentist becomes more thrilling than watching alien-robots fight each other, watching the wife cut her husband's hair as he stands naked, rings with more urgent humanity than a dozen activist documentaries and the camera's stillness throughout the film is a perfect reminder that cinema might be the ultimate window to the soul.

Grades:
Moneyball **
Tuesday After Christmas ***½

Like Crazy ***½

Director: Drake Doremus
Cast: Anton Yelchin, Felicity Jones, Jennifer Lawrence
Charlie Bewley, Alex Kingston, Oliver Muirhead, Chris Messina

Why is it that the most romantic films always have to tear through your soul, grab your heart from your chest and then smash it to pieces? Like Crazy does this and more, yet even with the eventual feeling of devastation that remains, one can't help but fall in love with it.
Call it masochism, call it hope, or call it plain insanity, but the movie proves just how humans seem drawn to misery and pain in the search for a larger truth, proof, perhaps, that we are not alone.
Anton Yelchin and Felicity Jones play Jacob and Anna, star-crossed lovers who must battle the evil forces of immigration to be together. Anna is a British student who overstays her US visa to be with Jacob over a languorous summer in Los Angeles. When she tries to return to the US, after attending a family thing in the UK, she is denied entrance and sent back to England, creating an obstacle for their blossoming relationship.
The rest of the film then divides itself between the two countries, as we see the young lovers trying to remain together even if they're apart.
Despite the Victorian sounding nature of the plot twist, the film is far from being an exercise in forced romance, instead it goes to the heart of love and wonders out loud, what makes one commit such inhuman acts in order to fulfill a romantic longing. Is love really that important in the face of emotional destruction and practical living?
Watching Jacob and Anna try to survive without one another is often more painful than inspiring, which makes the movie ring true in a universal manner. Yelchin once more brings his down-to-earth ease to Jacob, providing him with a stoicism that works as a perfect reflection of his heartbreak and Jones is just astonishing as Anna. She breathes violent life into the movie, making her character's actions ring true in a way that's both extremely cinematical and hurtfully realistic. She can be compared to Kate Winslet's delicious Clementine in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, in how you can see how flawed they are, but still can't help but fall for them. The supporting cast is also great, including Lawrence as a girl in love with Jacob and Muirhead and Kingston as Anna's supportive parents.
It doesn't require much film knowledge to realize that Like Crazy draws deep from its writer's personal experience. In fact Doremus, who co-wrote the screenplay with Ben York Jones, has revealed that the film was inspired by one of his relationships; however do not look into his biography further if you want to have your own idea of what happens after the uncathartic finale in the movie.
With all of its pain and bitterness, Like Crazy somehow escapes pure tragedy by drawing from the power of humanity to remind us that our most important love affair is the one we have with ourselves.

Mahendra Singh Dhoni wedding photos : rare, unseen and private pics of marriage

A Groom who used to vroom : He was earlier known for hitting balls, no not those balls, but cricket balls, out of the parks. He was also famous for vrooming on bikes. Now, like all the unlucky men, he's been made a groom. He was FORCED to marry his childhood friend Sakshi (we are seriously kidding) and are now a happy couple.Here we are, with some official rare unseen and personal pictures of the marriage which broke many hearts (both sexes, seriously), the bride and the groom. This was seriously one of the most gossiped and famous wedding of all time in India. So, have a look at the real exclusive photos of Mahendra Singh Dhoni and his wife Sakshi's wedding.

Special note for Indian media - He was busy marrying when he could be practicing. News for you fellas, right?? "

The Tree of Life ****

Director: Terrence Malick
Cast: Brad Pitt, Sean Penn, Jessica Chastain
Hunter McCracken, Laramie Eppler, Tye Sheridan, Fiona Shaw

They say that before you die, you see your entire life flash by before your eyes. Those who have "come back" tell how in a second, their whole earthly experiences appear in a sequence, as if to remind them of how they did during their time here. Most speak of receiving a taste of heavenly bliss: a certainty that there is much more to life than we think, always has, always will.
Regardless of one's own personal spiritual beliefs, near-death experiences all have one thing in common: they are the closest to creating cinematic moments, that non-filmmakers ever come to.
In The Tree of Life, Terrence Malick has done something even more impressive, he has captured that all-encompassing feeling within a single piece of art. It's not common to have physical reactions to movies but The Tree of Life has the ability to move you, to take you to places you never knew existed within you.
It is the closest cinema has come, in a very long time, to recreating the feeling once conveyed by religious artists, who with a single stroke of the brush, could encompass entire universes.
The film feels more like a visual poem than a movie, with every single cut, every single frame perfectly placed, evoking the cadence and rhythm of verse. Shot with delicate authority by the amazing Emmanuel Lubezki, every scene becomes a play of light and camera movements. The camera, like life on the planet (as we are told in a stunning sequence), never stops moving. It approaches its subjects, it explores its surroundings, it gets so close to them that we think it'll cut right through them, then it ascends towards the skies trying to get nearer to whoever inhabits it.
"That is where god lives", says a mother (Chastain) to her baby, as she points towards the skies. His father (Pitt) meanwhile holds on to him lying on the grass, as if trying to keep him closer to the ground, to earthly existence. It makes sense that when the baby grows up, he has troubled recollections about his upbringing. "Father, mother, always you wrestle inside me, always you will" says the grownup Jack (Penn) as he revisits his memories (or is the whole movie the flash before he dies?). Growing up in Texas, the young Jack and his brothers deal with the different thought currents in their house. Their mother is a sweet woman who urges them to always do good, their father is an authoritative figure who constantly reminds them that in order to succeed you can't be too good.
She takes on the shape of grace, he takes on the shape of nature; both aspects of life then become the center battle in the movie. What will the children choose?
It might be easy to say that Malick has made his choice, after all one of the first lines in the movie tells us that "no one who loves the way of grace ever comes to a bad end", but instead of delivering an obtuse sermon, Malick explores how those who choose grace must live in a world that's so heavily ruled by nature.
The film then works as a harrowing coming-of-age story and as a spiritual exploration of how we got to where we are. As with any piece of art, the film can be approached from endless levels succeeding in addressing each and all.
Besides the obvious Christian undertones that permeate the film, the family dynamics also make for a fascinating take on Freudian theories of castration. What results breathtaking is watching Malick create a synergy between both currents, as we see Jack seemingly overcome his father's brutality but never finding peace with the god he turns into a father figure.
All through the film he wonders how god could go on creating, while he was suffering and we understand that in his narrow world view as a child, he transferred his father's duties to a being he wasn't even sure existed in the first place. The whole movie then plays with the idea of free will as both a burden and a gift.
The only movie that resembles The Tree of Life, in terms of scope and ambition is Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey, both of them explore creation, evolution and "what's next", but while Kubrick's work remained on the purely cerebral, Malick's tries to capture what a soul - if they exist - might be like. Does god exist? Does god exist if he makes us suffer? Malick addresses these questions looking for answers. Kubrick explored them with more accusatory tones. Both movies end on a similar note, but only one is able to convey a deep sense of humanity by giving us the power of choice. Malick might just be our greatest living optimist. 

Style Sunday.

The girl with the mod coat? Rooney Mara makes for a true winter wonder in this beautiful Carven overcoat. With the Christmas chills, don't you just want to go hug Rooney?

Roadtrip to Kullu-Manali-Solang Valley : the best paradise tourist destination of India

Nature is man's perfect teacher. She unfolds her mysteries slowly to his search, opens his eye, illumes his mind and purifies his heart with her immortal blessings and subtle magnetism. The simple gifts of nature can teach us more than what we can learn from books. Such oppotunity to interact with nature and to feel its closeness and peace is available at its best in the Kullu-Manali-Solang Valley. The sheer mention of this destination transports the soul to high mountains and chilly winds, winding roads and green valeeys and panaromic view of great majestic snow capped Himalayas. Solang Valley, surrounded by green hills on three side and snow peaks on the fourth, is the finest place for pitching tents. Dotted with pine and Deodar trees, Solang Valley is an excellent destination for adventure sports. Rock climbing, Rappelling and river crossing add to the value of place.
The serene greenery of Manali fascinates the mind as the visits to the hot water spring - Vashishtha Kund, the four storyed pagoda- Hidimba Devi Temple, the legacy of Buddha - Tibetan Monastery and Van Vihar is amazing. Shopping at mall road is truly an experience to cherish and the girls and women there are truly adorable as they are gifted with immense natural beauty. Adventure of skiing in the feather snow of Manali was an awesome experience and furthermore the experience of paragliding in the valley was an experience of a lifetime. Truly, Kullu-Manali-Solang Valley is one of best tourist paradise destination in India and it can even be tagged as the best place for tourists to visit and with falling snow, chill weather and natural beauty, this Christmas-Winter season is one of the most optimum time to visit the place. The availability of thick snow in plenty gives the feel of a European country to the tourist. Have a look at the photos of the place and enjoy its beauty.