Several movies (plus a musical and a concert)

Here are some belated comments about several movies that I've seen over the last couple of months:


Lars and the Real Girl: This was quite a charming film, and deals with certain types of social awkwardness quite well. (The lead actor did a good job in this one.)

The Spiderwick Chronicles: This film is decent, but there's been much better stuff in this genre the past several years.

The Other Boleyn Girl: This film was a nice piece of historical fiction. It was good but not great. The character that Natalie Portman played was quite a bitch.

Horton Hears a Who!: I really liked this cartoon! (Highly recommended!) It captures the spirit of Dr. Seuss quite well, and Steve Carrell and Jim Carrey were both extremely well cast. I also got to see a teaser for the third Ice Age film during the trailers. I approve!

Son of Rambow: This film has been advertised as a "British comedy," which is a bit misleading. It does have some comedic moments, but it is better described as a dramedy. It is a great film. I recommend it highly.

Persepolis: This film was excellent and incredibly well done! The animation style was awesome. The thing I like best is that even in the most serious scenes, one can see something ridiculous in a small part in the background. (For example, in one such scene--which I believe focused on the tattered remnants of a city after lots of violence--one can briefly see a dog peeing in the background.) I was consistently laughing at that stuff (sometimes the only person in the theatre doing so). After seeing this film, I'll never be able to think of "Eye of the Tiger" in quite the same way again. The main quibble I have with this flick is that characters from culturally similar (or, really, the same) backgrounds are voiced by people with completely different accents, and that hurt my suspension of disbelief a bit. On a similar note, the casting of Iggy Pop as a voice actor was odd (to put it mildly). What the Hell? That notwithstanding, this is one of my favorite films of the year so far.

Iron Man: I saw this film on Tuesday, and it is also one of my favorite films so far this year. This flick is outstanding. In fact, in my mind this is one of the best comic book films ever! (Note: I am not classifying these films according to how faithful they are to the original sources, but merely according to how much I enjoyed the movie versions.) After seeing the film, I was thinking it might be my favorite comic book film ever, but this morning I remembered V for Vendetta (which is from a comic book, right?) and I'm probably forgetting others. Robert Downey Jr. is awesome, as usual, and I love the witty repartee he has with his character's inventions. (Downey Jr. is one of my favorite actors.)


I also saw a musical and a concert during the past couple of months (with two more musicals coming up in the next couple of weeks):

Buena Vista Social Club: This show was basically a linear combination of Jazz and various types of Latin music. The highlight for me was their souped-up rendition of "Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps." Of the Caltech crowd, I think Lemming in particular would have enjoyed this.

Fiddler on the Roof: I've wanted to see this for several years, so I'm glad I finally had the chance to do so. The performance was very good (especially that of the lead actor), but everybody except for the lead had a considerable amount of trouble maintaining their accent (and even the lead slipped once or twice). Somehow, hearing a bunch of different British Isles accents hurts the suspension of disbelief quite a bit for this particular musical, which is usually done by a bunch of people who are supposed to speak English like Woody Allen, Jackie Mason, Fyvush Finkel, etc. (Finkel has actually played several different roles in this musical in the past.)