True Blood (Season 1)

Okay, so I know that this is a movie review blog and we don't typically write reviews for television shows. However, this weekend I had the pleasure of watching the entire first season of the hit show True Blood. True Blood is about a young girl named Sookie who lives in a small Louisiana town. At this time, vampires are "coming out of the coffin" and trying to live among people and drink a type of synthetic blood called TruBlood to survive. One night, Sookie meets vampire Bill outside of the bar she works at and the two begin a magical relationship.

True Blood is the grown up Twilight. Only True Blood has one thing that Twilight doesn't: vampires. Some of you may be saying, "Isn't Twilight all about vampires?" And my answer to that is NO. Not by any means. The vampires in True Blood don't sparkle in sunlight, they burn to a crisp. The vampires in True Blood don't hide away from humans, they live among them no matter how dangerous that might be fore them. The vampires in True Blood don't play baseball in an open field when a bunch of evil vampires are after them, they play Wii Golf. Well, that last one isn't very intimidating but you get my point. True Blood has True vampires. However, the dialogue in True Blood does resemble that of Twilight, but it's just so much cooler when it comes out of the mouth of a REAL vampire.

Another reason True Blood is MILES better than Twilight is the acting. Anna Paquin, Sookie, and Stephen Moyer, who plays vampire Bill Compton, are absolutely incredible. Paquin is a delight to watch on screen. She seems to really enjoy her role and her fear and anger and joy just flies off the screen. Moyer is also an extreme delight. He seems to sincere and he plays the vampire perfectly. Robert Pattinson has nothing on this man. Moyer is incredibly suave and sexy and alluring, just like a vampire should be. Nelsan Ellis, who plays Layfayette, is also an absolute joy who brings the comic relief in every episode so far.

The plot of True Blood is also very exiting. It has everything an exciting drama should have sex, violence, drugs, and murder. And it's not only vampire fans who'll enjoy True Blood. The story arch of the first season is actually more about a murderer (a human, I might add) than vampires or anything supernatural. However, there are many supernatural aspects to the show that I won't address in the review so I won't give anything away. But if you like murder mysteries or supernatural thrillers True Blood is the show for you. However, don't go into this expecting it to be like the light-hearted Twilight. True Blood is an emotional and dark show that was not meant to be seen by children due to it's extremely violent and sexual content.

The only thing I didn't really like about True Blood is how likable the characters are. Because as soon as you start to really like a character, they're probably about to be killed off. Oh, and one more thing, if you're squeamish about blood, do not watch this show.

-H

The Piano

A few days ago I had the pleasure of watching Jane Campion's The Piano in class. It's not the kind of movie that I normally watch, being more of the action frame-of-mind, but I very much enjoyed watching this gem of a film. Ada McGrath(Holly Hunter) is a mute woman in 1850s Britain who is sent off to savage New Zealand along with her daughter Flora(Anna Paquin), as a mail-order bride to a land-owner there, Stewart played by Sam Neill. Once there, her new husband, in a bid to increase his land holdings, trades Ada's most prized possession, her piano, to his neighbor, Baines(Harvey Keitel). Ada is naturally upset, but when visiting Baines in order to give him lessons on how to play his new piano, he makes her an offer: sexual favors for the return of her piano.
The Piano is a success on many different levels. Jane Campion, the writer and director of the film, crafted one of the rare films that works as both an accessible story, as well as a layered, meaningful work of art and literature. Watching the film once will be entertaining merely for the well written story, but watch it again and you will see the layers that it has. Jane Campion began her college life with art school. Once there, she realized that she was trying to tell stories with her artwork and that film school would be a better fit for her. With that background in the arts, Campion has a special way of placing the scene in front of the camera(what film students call mise-en-scene) that creates an artistic image to be interpreted by the viewer. The film is a joy to watch because the placement of the scene and of the camera has meaning and beauty all of its own. The story that Campion wrote also is many-layered, portraying gender issues of the nineteenth century, family relationships, and exchanges of power. Many of Campion's films include a tactile quality to them, emphasizing the sense of touch and what it means. Some of the most powerful emotions in The Piano are conveyed by the feel of a piano key.
The writing and direction were not the only good qualities of this film. The acting done by Holly Hunter as the mute Ada is some of the best I have ever seen. Jane Campion, when she made this film, wanted her heroine to have a piercing gaze that seemed to reach down into one's soul. I don't know how Holly Hunter managed to pull that one off, but she did. Though her character is mute, she portrays more emotion in the performance without a single word than ninety percent of actors more well known. Holly Hunter really carries this film with her perfect emotionality. Harvey Keitel also does an above-average job as the at-first lecherous, later not so much Baines.
Overall, The Piano is a film that I would give both of my thumbs-up to, as well as a recommendation to anyone I know.

-J

Lost in Translation

Sophia Coppola's film, Lost in Translation is one of the rare films that come along and truly depict human interaction. Most of us are used to fairy-tale endings or tragedies. Either the main character fall in love, grow up, get married, and live happily ever after or they meet, fall madly in love, and then one or both of them die before they're even close to getting married. We are also all used to the wild and crazy adventures that people in movies find themselves them: they are either involved in some outrageous scheme or involved in some wild, hot affair or something else completely ridiculous.

Lost in Translation is completely different. It tells the story of Bob Harris played by Bill Murray and Charlotte played by Scarlett Johanson. These two characters are both in a very lonely and desperate place. Bob is a famous actor who has had to leave his family to make commercials in Tokyo. Charlotte is a young woman living with her husband of two years in Tokyo. Her husband is a famous photographer who has to leave her alone while he goes on business trips. Both Charlotte and Bob are alone, in a strange place, with no one to talk to and no one to connect with. So the two of them form a strong bond after the meet in the bar of the hotel where they are both staying. The movie shows how their bond grows over time and how the two become closer and closer to each other and closer and closer to falling in love.

*SPOILER* But nothing happens. They don't have any kind of affair, at least not physically and they don't have some kind of fantastic adventure. They just meet, talk, and then they leave. It's just so realistic it's incredible. Sometimes, I think, movies get to bogged down with all the adventure and glitz and glam. But Lost in Translation is something that could happen and it's something that probably has happened many, many times in real life. And that's what made it incredible.

Lost in Translation was also amazing because of an underlying metaphor. The phrase lost in translation refers to so many different aspects of the film. The obvious aspect of the film that the title refers to is the language barrier between the main character and the Japanese speaking people. Another aspect of the film that the title refers to is the barriers built between the main characters and their spouses. Both seem to have trouble communicating their desires to their spouses which causes trouble in their relationships. The third aspect of the film the title refers to is a barrier between the audience and the characters. In the final scene of the film, Bill Murray's character whispers something to Charlotte and the audience cannot understand what he says. Many of speculated about what the actual line may be but I don't think that it is really important. The ambiguity of the final scenes is open to interpretation which leaves the viewers intrigued and keeps with the realism of the film. In real life, things are not black and white and sometimes we just don't know what's going to happen. And that's what happen in the film. Because we cannot understand that line, we just don't know what's going to happen to the two characters in the future and we can only guess at what may come for the two of them.

Bill Murray and Scarlett Johanson both do a remarkable job at portraying their characters. Johanson portrays Charlotte as calm and collected. Her depiction of Charlotte's sadness and loneliness is beautiful and truly works as does Murray's depiction of Bob's sadness and loneliness. It appears that both actors truly dig deep within themselves and must use some of their own emotions to portray their character so realistically. Anna Faris also appears in a small role and is hilarious as usual.

Lost in Translation is an incredibly enjoyable film. It is a deep and emotional film that will stick with you long after seeing it.

-H