School has been a real asshole. I know, I know. My first post since July, and I open with a grumble? I can explain. Time is so darn precious, and much of it is required by the job I have to attend to and this blog that I have to raise. That I’ve only been able to write one review (The Dark Knight Rises) since school started should give you an idea of how endlessly busy I’ve become. Such is my distress, but I find inspiration in the immortal words of Mark Twain: “I have never let my schooling interfere with my education”. Ah, yes.
But of course the quote is only applicable if you are an extremely intelligent person… or if your school is incompetent by world record standards. I’m not a very smart person, and that should be enough of a hint. Which brings me back to my opening sentence. But never mind. I’m scheduled to graduate in April of next year. That’s five more months. I persevere.
Though April 2013 isn’t as far away as it seems, I can’t wait that long to start posting actively here again. That is why I’ve decided to start this Movie Journal. Despite my soul-sucking schedule, I’m still able to watch around two to four movies a week. It’s the reviewing part that I don’t have time for anymore. So much opportunity has already gone to waste, and I hope that this Journal will be the beginning of a steady revival. Films that I saw and wanted to write about but did not end up reviewing include “Argo”, “Looper”, “Skyfall”, “The Avengers”, “The Muppets”, “We Need to Talk About Kevin”, “The Bourne Legacy”, and many, many more.
I plan to post a Journal entry about once a week or every other week, depending on my requirements form school and work. (This will be my routine until I graduate college, reclaiming sweet freedom.) Each post will feature (1) a brief intro regarding my current status and future plans and (2) a short discussion of about two to three movies that I watched within that week; think of it as a collection of Quick Reviews gathered to make one long post. For this first post, I’ll talk about two movies that I’ve recently seen, movies that I’m very enthusiastic about. And they are as follows.
Wreck-It Ralph – Rating: 
I’ve long complained about how many movies of today are constructed to flow like a banal, routine video game. Who would have thought that flipping this notion could produce a place that is so dazzlingly original? “Wreck-It Ralph” is a video game that functions like a Real Movie. Sure, it retains the usual Disney elements of the Misunderstood Good Guy and his Spirited Sidekick, but their journey unfolds within such a beautifully imagined universe that everything it surrounds is given a fresh feel. The story takes place inside arcade games where its characters are able to move independently when no human is in sight. I’m sure our pals at “Toy Story” can relate.
Much of the fun from “Wreck-It Ralph” comes from the ingenious logic used by Disney to connect the games of the arcade. We learn that the adaptor of the extension cord is the central station where famous video game characters like Donkey Kong, Sonic, and Mario could bump into each other and exchange High Fives. Characters can visit other games by travelling through the cord’s wires (Duh!), which are conveniently labeled by game. This allows the story to instantly shift from one dimension to another that’s completely different in genre, design, and graphics. We follow the lives of Ralph, the villain of a 30-year-old game called Fix-It Felix, Jr., and Vanellope von Schweetz, the glitch from a racing game called Sugar Rush.
I cared for Ralph (John C. Reilly) and Venellope (Sarah Silverman). In fact, this is the most I’ve shown affection for a pair of animated characters since I was first introduced to Carl and Ellie Fredricksen in “Up”. I did not want the movie to end. There were too many games left to explore, and there was a lot more video game characters that I wanted to meet. But oh well. “Wreck-It Ralph” represents the most creative use of animation in years, and the Academy would commit a shameful injustice if it doesn’t award this gem the Oscar for Best Animated Feature.
Take Shelter – Rating:
“Take Shelter”, the most overlooked Great Movie of 2011, is an apocalyptic thriller that transpires entirely inside the afflicted mind of a man trapped in an agonizing fear. This man is Curtis (Michael Shannon), a simple construction worker who lives in a small town in Ohio with his wife Samantha (Jessica Chastain) and their deaf, six-year-old daughter, Hannah. Curtis greatly loves his family, is happy with his job, and is working hard to earn for an expensive operation that could restore Hannah her hearing. Everything is going alright for Curtis until he is plagued by nightmares and hallucinations about a monstrous storm that, according to his visions, will arrive without warning and rain destruction upon the helpless town.
Without deliberation and approval from his wife, Curtis decides to build a storm shelter that he can’t afford with time that he doesn’t have. The townspeople, and later even Samantha, think that the storm shelter is a stupid idea, and that Curtis’s efforts are futile. We, on the other hand, as the film’s audience, are able to empathize with Curtis because we experience every nightmare and hallucination that Curtis goes through. The obvious observation here is that Curtis building the shelter is an act of sheer paranoia, which is not the case. More perceptive moviegoers will identify Curtis’s actions as a fulfillment of his unconditional love towards his family. He risks his employment, his reputation and at some points even his marriage just to make sure that his family is safe from a threat that may not actually end up happening.
With this fact, we feel a subtle suspense, and the final twenty minutes of “Take Shelter” is something to hold in high regard; I was completely in a state of awe during the film’s final scenes. Michael Shannon’s performance here is the most powerful and convincing acting I have witnessed since Daniel Day-Lewis drank our milkshake in 2007’s “There Will Be Blood”. And that’s saying a lot.
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