A MOVIE LOVER

The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time. - Mark Twain. This is not quote from this new documentary "Obit". A film that, to some degree, glamorizes the work of the obituary writers at the New York Times . By "glamorize", I don't mean "making it fashionable," but, rather, this film shows the alluring side of a job some would usually associate with a rather depressing, dark, sad character. It is not. At least that's what the characters - the real life reporters of the New York Times' obituary department are trying to convey to the audience throughout the film. According to them, their obituaries are more about "life" than "death," more about celebrating the lives of the deceased rather than talking about the end of it. Of course, while at a journalism school, not many writers to be would plan wishfully to be ending up writing about "deaths", but ...

Are you a fan of Banksy? If so, see amazing documentary Banksy Does New York, directed by Chris Moukarbel, which talks about Banksy's experimental one month residency in New York City, where he sets to surprise public every day with new work around the city unannounced. This fragment talks about one day of the month when he sets up a stall near the Central Park and sells his original work for $60 a piece. In just this one fragment Banksy makes a good point of how art is nothing without attaching a famous name to it. Genius point. Watch what happens...you'll be blown away.

Should I recommend to see it? Let's see... A few days ago I went to see a new Spanish drama "Ma ma" by Julio Medem starring Penélope Cruz, Luis Tosar, Asier Etxeandia and Àlex Brendemühl. I was warned that this film is heavy, so I was prepared for a hard subject matter, but I wasn't prepared for that much drama and tragedy. The film is very good. It's very solid acting from all of the actors, especially Penelope Cruz who does know how to make you cry every second of the movie. The film is very well done in the way it shows a human nature drama and how people deal with death, loss, terminal illness, raising kids, marriage, divorce, etc. Yes, it's not a light movie at all, but it does give hope and it does put things in perspective as you start to appreciate every minute of your life...

Stay tuned to HBO! Judd Apatow is in town and he’s shooting new comedy series “Crashing” for HBO in NYC (which he’s not only producing, but directing (unlike the Girls that he only produced) starring comedian Pete Holmes! The other day I not only witnessed them shoot in Soho, but also saw Judd Apatow in person, whose films I love, love, love...

I bet you didn't know that TriBeCa Film Festival is not only about the traditional filmmaking. Yep, neither did I until I went to the TFI interactive event - an all day one day event during the first week of the festival that showcase the latest technologies in the filmmaking like virtual reality, holograms, 3D and etc. This year they brought robots and more virtual reality! Even Katie Holmes stopped by to check it out.

(Photo by Ellen DeGeneres ) And the Oscar goes to…Samsung. "Forget the commercials, Social Branded Entertainment is everywhere at the Academy Awards. From the Samsung device product placements throughout the Oscars to the famous Ellen selfie taken last year with the Samsung Galaxy Note, it’s clear that Advertisers and their paid campaigns for social content is where the real GOLD is." - Says the digital design agency, Vertic. The bloggers at Vertic argue that the Oscar's is becoming more about the advertisers and social media marketing than about the art of the film and celebrating the talents. Here's what they say: click here to read the full blog.

Courtesy of Paramyth Films by Nika Agiashvili. The last time I’ve seen a movie that somewhat reminded me of “Once upon a time in America” , a 1984 Italian epic crime drama film co-written and directed by Sergio Leone and starring Robert De Niro and James Woods was last week, when I watched A Green Story , minus the mafia and crime. But what a delight and how refreshing it is to see a film that not only engages, but that also inspires!

It's been a while since I've been absolutely breath-taken away by a movie as I was just recently by the Ang Lee's latest story about the boy and the tiger - Life of Pi . Surprising enough, I actually knew about this movie way before it has opened in USA. The film critics from around the world were raving about this film-story for months, including the fact that the film got Academy Award 11 nominations: Best Picture, Best Direction, Adapted Screenplay, Production Design, Cinematography, Sound Mixing, Sound Editing, Original Score, Original Song, Film Editing and Visual Effects! Should I say any more? The anticipation of the film has been, definitely, built by the time it arrived to the theaters in America and the world-wide recognition of the film speaks for itself. Here's what I'm going to tell you, aside from the fact that I'm a very tough movie critic - Life of Pi is nothing you've might have ever seen before, and not because the story takes ...

It's a common belief that a consequence to a movie would not be any good with an exception of just a few films that have proven to be not as bad as the first movie. Say, Meet The Parents - Meet The Fockers did live up to our expectations, and maybe even more. Say, Agent 007 . But that's from another category of the sequence movies - it's like a new movie every time they make a 'sequence', beautiful women change, villains change and even James Bond, once in a decade - changes. However, for the most part, as a general rule, one expects very little from the sequence, especially when the first movie was about the human trafficking and sex slavery, who would want to see the sequence to it? What's else new could have been done for the second part - a new villain? A new victim? A new  hero? Taken-2 - a sequence to the blockbuster success Taken - is a movie that has it all: love, action, family and - the locale!Although, this is definitely not the movie to pr...

What's the idea behind the movie? I kept asking myself this question throughout the movie "Shame"  , directed by Steve McQueen , as I watched a scene after scene of the main character's full frontal and endless sexual activities, including very graphic masturbation scenes. I wanted to 'read into the lines' to see if there's a point to all of it for the director to actually make a movie that is both disturbing, dark, sad and solves nothing. However, some of you might have no doubt, what the director wanted to show. A man's despair? Perhaps. A sexual deviance? Definitely. A today's modern family? I'd say so. A lonely New York City? This could be possible too.

If you choose to not believe in the magic, at least do not choose to do so during Christmas and New Year's Eve. These should be magical for any age and any gender - always and forever. Do believe in Santa as long as it's possible, it'd be than easier for you to tell and pass a holiday magic onto your kids later in life. Personally, I believe that if believing in magic - [and in love and romance] - is not present in one's life, this person is pretty much dead. He or she is not longer living fully and hope-fully. That's why I'm a strong advocate for the holiday movies, especially when the plot is all about love, dreams and hopes - even if it's a bit on a cheesy side - it's all good, it's all healthy. The whole premise of such movies is to become more hopeful and optimistic about the future, to forget problems at home and work and to start believing in good and bright again - even if it's just for two hours...

I never had any doubts and/or disillusion about the loneliness of Hollywood. In the glamour, popularity and fans' obsession, one can overlook the fact that those Hollywood stars - [most of them]- are very lonely, very sad people in real life. Most of them don't even have the same 'character' as they portray in the movies, where one sees them making jokes and being fun and witty, etc. As a matter of fact, most often, the Hollywood stars are very sensitive and vulnerable individuals who are surrounded by people, most of whom don't really care about them. Just think of Judy Garland, Michael Jackson, Marilyn Monroe - when in the spotlight, they are beaming and the fans around them are screaming for their attention. Once they are back at home - they are alone, pain-relieving with drugs, dissolving in alcohol and being forgotten by the loved ones.

First of all, If I were Constantin Stanislavski  - [the work on whose Acting Method/System won me an acceptance to apply with the Harvard University in 1999] - I would have left the movie theatre on the first scene... One cannot portray a psychologically ill person by simply freezing in spasms and moving a jaw in all the possible directions. It's not enough to roll one's eyes and start mimicking an ill person. This is exactly what Keira Knightley's character - Sabina Spielrein - did and what almost drove me out of the theatre. I can accept a bad acting, but only in certain movies I usually watch once in a while for the sake of being mindlessly entertained. But Knightley should have known better - not sure why the director didn't notice such a bad acting? She should have studied an ill person - just as Dustin Hoffman did for his part in Rain Man , for which he spent almost a year at a special clinic. She should have spent at least a day or two at a psychiatric...

There's something about an art-house movie - it's honest, it's real, it's applicable to real life, it's natural, it just touches heart, soul and mind. This is the kind of a movie I'd prefer over any blockbuster with special effects, colorful scenery, beautiful actors... But I've already said that many times before, that's why more often I do reviews of independent, foreign and/or art-house films. Yes, I'm being a bit subjective to it. And, of course, there are exceptions to the rules - sometimes those films end up to be too 'artsy', too far from the action plan on how to apply an art form of a film to the reality. Sometimes they are just too 'weird' to be taken both as a life lesson and as a pure entertainment. In this case, although, the film Like Crazy did serve the purpose of bringing real life scenario - or what might happen to everyone in this life - to a film.

Do not let the name of the movie fool you - it's not a sci-fiction. But at moments I wish it was. The characters do engage in certain super-natural tricks to stop the time - like controlling ocean tides and moon. The cat in movie does talk. And a t-shirt - a safety blanket for a 'her' character - is capable to crawl. Described as a 'cute comedy', some of the film critics are too far from the reality to realize that there is nothing cute about this movie. It's a rather sad slow film that features a couple, who are far from normal. They are, actually, schizophrenic and I wish the audience did see the fact that what the characters say and do - can not be explained, but rather studied by the likes of Sigmund Freud and Nancy Andreasen - they are the perfect 'cases' for the psychiatrists to study.  Please watch the trailer before reading further, the review would make more sense to you then.

The film "Friends with Benefits" , or FWB as we've been casually abbreviating the "relationship" that became a prominent part of the 21st Century ,ended up to be too predictable. It's the kind of movie that everyone knows in the first 5 min how it's gonna end - because, as most of us - adults, know - friends with benefits either do NOT work or they DO work. Friends with benefits either become strangers or they become - a couple. There is no perfect "middle", as much as many of you out there hope it to be. This "relationship" has become to exist in our vocabulary not long ago - most likely at the same time as the slogan "Make love, not war" was created.

"Vincent Will Meer" stands for "Vincent Wants to Sea" , which in my opinion, first of all, could use an action verb in the title of the movie - perhaps "go" or "see"? Germans have been very, very good filmmakers in the past few years. Aside from the Deutschen black and white films, like The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920), they've been known for solid films - although, during Nazi times, the filmmakers were too occupied shooting documentaries about Hitler...

I must admit, there are certain actors on this planet, whose films I would see regardless of a plot and/or level of my tolerance for a disguise. It does not matter if these actors would be eating vomit or have sex with a goat - I just know that not matter what they'd do in a movie, they'd do it it superbly. Among such actors - the actors, whose work I greatly admire - are Meryl Streep, Robert De Niro, Dustin Hoffman, Cate Blanchet, and Tom Hanks. Tom Hanks was one of the reasons I went to see Larry Crowne , and not on an opening night, not even on the next day - due to the fact that I have a pretty good natural intuition for a good vs. bad movie. I felt  from the very first day of its promotion that this movie would not live up to the hype. And it didn't, even despite the fact that it had Julia Roberts and Tom Hanks in it - ones of the most respected, great actors working in Hollywood today. Their acting couldn't even save the poorly-written, cheesy plot.

There is not a better way to feel good about the national traditional press than seeing what's happening at one of the most prominent respected newspaper in the country. There is not a better way for a journalist to feel good about his/her job than seeing what goes into a real hard-core journalistic work at a newspaper that's "produced" some of the best journalists in the country. If you agree, than you, as myself, looked forward to the release of "Page One: Inside The New York Times" - a documentary about the newspaper and the people who put it together.