The Oscars 2013 - My predictions, hopes and choices

This sunday it's time for Oscars once more and as always I'll make my guesses and voice out my opinion who should have won. Though instead of multiple lists, I'll just put them all here.

My prediction: As most of you already know the winner is decided mostly by politics, whoever lobbied their picture the best for the Academy and the alignment of the stars. So actual artistic merits have very little to do with the choosing of the winner. So judging from all that these are my guesses on who will walk away with the prize.

My hope: This is the one from the nominations which I'm rooting for and hoping to win.

My choice: If I had the power, this would be the one to receive the Oscar. So this one is out of all the movies, not just the ones nominated.

Anyway here's my predictions, hopes and choices for 2013.

Best Motion Picture of the Year:
My prediction: Argo (2012)
My hope: Django Unchained (2012)
My choice: Cloud Atlas (2012)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role:
My prediction: Daniel Day-Lewis for Lincoln (2012)
My hope: Joaquin Phoenix for The Master (2012)
My choice: Joaquin Phoenix for The Master (2012)

Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role:
My prediction: Jennifer Lawrence for Silver Linings Playbook (2012)
My hope: Naomi Watts for The Impossible
My choice: Naomi Watts for The Impossible

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role:
My prediction: Tommy Lee Jones for Lincoln (2012)
My hope: Tommy Lee Jones for Lincoln (2012)
My choice: Javier Bardem for Skyfall (2012)

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role:
My prediction: Sally Field for Lincoln (2012)
My hope: Anne Hathaway for Les Misérables (2012)
My choice: Anne Hathaway for Les Misérables (2012)
This is by far the hardest category this year. I'd be happy to give it to basically anyone nominated.

Best Achievement in Directing:
My prediction: David O. Russell for Silver Linings Playbook (2012)
My hope: Benh Zeitlin for Beasts of the Southern Wild (2012)
My choice: Quentin Tarantino for Django Unchained (2012)

Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen:
My prediction: Quentin Tarantino for Django Unchained (2012)
My hope: Wes Anderson and Roman Coppola for Moonrise Kingdom (2012)
My choice: Wes Anderson and Roman Coppola for Moonrise Kingdom (2012)

Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published:
My prediction: Tony Kushner for Lincoln (2012)
My hope: Chris Terrio for Argo (2012)
My choice: David Mitchell, Tom Twyker, Andy and Lana Wachowski for Cloud Atlas (2012)

Best Animated Feature Film of the Year:
My prediction: Rich Moore for Wreck-It Ralph (2012)
My hope: Sam Fell, Chris Butler for ParaNorman (2012)
My choice: Sam Fell, Chris Butler for ParaNorman (2012)

Best Foreign Language Film of the Year:
My prediction: Amour (2012)
My hope: War Witch (2012)
My choice: Intouchables (2011)
Unfortunately I have only seen two of the movies nominated here so can't say for sure. I would be surprised if Amour didn't take this one, though I do think War Witch was a better movie. But what I'm wondering is why Intouchables wasn't nominated, it was released in 2012 and has Oscars written all over it, hence my choice, even though again I'd say War Witch was better.

Best Achievement in Cinematography:
My prediction: Claudio Miranda for Life of Pi (2012)
My hope: Roger Deakins for Skyfall (2012)
My choice: Roger Deakins for Skyfall (2012)

Best Achievement in Editing:
My prediction: Tim Squyres for Life of Pi (2012)
My hope: Tim Squyres for Life of Pi (2012)
My choice: Alexander Berner for Cloud Atlas (2012)

Best Achievement in Production Design:
My prediction: Eve Stewart, Anna Lynch-Robinson for Les Misérables (2012)
My hope: David Gropman, Anna Pinnock for Life of Pi (2012)
My choice: David Gropman, Anna Pinnock for Life of Pi (2012)

Best Achievement in Costume Design:
My prediction: Paco Delgado for Les Misérables (2012)
My hope: Joanna Johnston for Lincoln (2012)
My choice: Joanna Johnston for Lincoln (2012)

Best Achievement in Makeup and Hairstyling:
My prediction: Peter King, Rick Findlater, Tami Lane for The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012)
My hope: Howard Berger, Peter Montagna, Martin Samuel for Hitchcock (2012)
My choice: Howard Berger, Peter Montagna, Martin Samuel for Hitchcock (2012)
Even though Anthony Hopkins doesn't look exactly like Hitchcock, that makeup is still just amazing.

Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Score:
My prediction: Mychael Danna for Life of Pi (2012)
My hope: Mychael Danna for Life of Pi (2012)
My choice: Reinhold Heil, Johnny Klimek and Tom Twyker for Cloud Atlas (2012)

Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Song:
My prediction: Adele, Paul Epworth for Skyfall (2012)
My hope: Adele, Paul Epworth for Skyfall (2012)
My choice: Adele, Paul Epworth for Skyfall (2012)
I think this will be the only category where I'm going to agree with the Academy.

Best Achievement in Visual Effects:
My prediction: Bill Westenhofer, Guillaume Rocheron, Erik De Boer, Donald Elliott for Life of Pi (2012)
My hope: Janek Sirrs, Jeff White, Guy Williams, Daniel Sudick for The Avengers (2012)
My choice: Janek Sirrs, Jeff White, Guy Williams, Daniel Sudick for The Avengers (2012)


As for the rest of the categories, I can't really say anything about them. I don't know what's the difference between sound editing and sound mixing, so can't judge that in any way. I haven't seen any of the short films competing this year so can't say anything about that one either. And as I've only seen one of the documentaries that wouldn't be enough to judge them in any way. We'll see on sunday how horribly wrong my predictions were and if maybe we'll see some positive surprises, I'm kind of rooting for Beasts of the Southern Wild, would be quite a shock if that one cleaned up the table.

I'm back again!

Well, it's been over a year again with no new posts. Was too busy with other stuff and at start I kept a list of movies I needed to post a review in here, but as that list grew longer and I still couldn't find time for it, I gave up. Then when I actually would have had some time I totally forgot about the whole blog. Well now I'll try to continue it again, starting with my top 10 movies of 2012. Hopefully I can keep the blog a bit more active this year and hopefully there's still someone reading it.

Look what the cat dragged in this time

I ordered quite a few of Shameless Screen Entertainment releases as they were on sale on Amazon, so lots of weird stuff coming up. I've already gone through some of them and surely it's not the whole collection, only the first 17 of them, but the rest will follow as well.

Been a bit quiet again

Well I've been quite busy with other stuff so haven't had the chance to watch any movies at all. Finished the last two Hitchcock movies today so the filmography series is now complete (apart from those two films which I haven't found anywhere). Any ideas which director I should look into next? Was thinking maybe Kubrick or Leone or maybe Kurosawa. Any suggestions? Next weekend it's time for Night Visions again which I'm of course attending so tons of new movie reviews to come from just that. And the pile of unwatched DVD's and Blu-Rays is getting quite large so I'll be going through them as well. Anyways I'm back from the "break".

Breaking news - week 11

Last week was quite a silent week in movie news. Everyone was watching movies in the SXSW Festival and surely I too did enjoy reading which movies might be worth checking out when, or if, they get to Finland. Other than that nothing special caught my eye. Though I have to again cover a bit of sad news from the mainstream cinema; Darren Aronofsky won't be directing the new Wolverine movie. The spinoff from X-Men two years ago, X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009) was quite a bad movie to be honest, but the character has potential and Aronofsky would have surely been an interesting choice for the director. Guess it's going to end up to some stock director who will make it even worse than the first one.


Upcoming movies:

Invasion of Alien Bikini
Only in Asia...

Norwegian Ninja
Coming soon to DVD near you. I ordered mine already.


Other fun stuff:

Simon Pegg and Nick Frost act out Star Wars
Well not the whole thing, but it's funny none the less

Baby Star Wars posters
Speaking of Star Wars, this was quite disturbing...

Top 10 Badass Bronson Moments in Movie History
Charles Bronson kicks ass!

This is Not Porn
Different kind of celebrity photos.

Nicolas Cage Terror Alert System
Well the title says it all.

Internet Movie Firearms Database
Gun nuts... They're everywhere...

Canimals by Aardman Animation

That's all folks.

Breaking news - week 10

So I decided to post some bits of news from the world of movies right here in my blog. Just some things that caught my eye during the week from other blogs, sites and magazines. I won't go that much into the mainstream movies as that stuff you can read everywhere, so I'll focus on the weirder stuff you might not have noticed. Though of course if there's some interesting news in the mainstream films worth noting, then I'll of course post them here as well. So here's what happened this week.

Sitges festival got charged with exhibition of child pornography
I think this was the biggest news of this week. You can click on the topic for more info, but the charge is because the festival screened A Serbian Film. I mean come on, the movie is surely nasty and yes it involves themes of child pornography, but there is quite a big difference between the real thing and a fictional movie. You can think what you want about the movie and surely it's not for everyone, even I thought it was too much, but it's their right as film makers to make a film on the subject they want and no one can deny that. And if a festival shows the movie it's surely their right, no matter how hard the subject is. Some people should really learn the difference between movies and real life...

Geeks boycott Universal
Click on the topic to read that quite a long blog post, it has tons of great stuff in it. In short the fuzz is about Guillermo Del Toro's next project that was supposed to be a huge fantasy horror movie based on a Lovecraft story with a budget of 150 million dollars that Universal decided to dump as they were afraid it wouldn't bring any profits. The geeks went mad of course blaming Universal. Well I would have loved to see the movie as well, but I don't blame Universal, I blame the people who go out and actually watch movies in the theatres. Drew McWeeny sums up my thoughts quite nicely in his blog, I'll just suggest you read it.


Upcoming movies:

Conan the Barbarian
I know this is a mainstream movie and most likely will be a bad adaptation of the original, but for some reason I have my hopes up for this. If they just steer away from the new superhero for the kids mentality it could work. There are not many barbarian movies out there so I wish this would fix the shortage, but at the same time I really don't think it will.

Ronal the Barbarian
And of course there needs to be a spoof of the movie as well. I have a feeling this will be more entertaining than the remake...

Hobo with a Shotgun
I've been waiting for this ever since I heard they are making the movie from that fake trailer on Grindhouse. And it has Rutger Hauer starring so it can't go wrong!

Panzer Chocolate
Ok this is so freaking insane idea that it can't be a bad movie. Nazis turning Jewish women into chocolate to boost the fighting spirit of their troops. Talking about crazy ideas, this is somewhere at the top.

AARGH
This looked quite great, though I don't know if they can bring enough out of the character to carry the whole movie, but the trailer works for me.

The Return Of The Moonwalker
This went straight to my must see list.

Bunohan
A Malaysian martial arts movie with attitude. Looks like a fun homage to the classics of it's genre.

Karate-Robo Zaborgar
I really wonder if it's something in the food they eat or the water they drink that makes those Japanese people so insane...

A Chinese Fairy Tale
Just so we don't go with only violence and horror here. This surely looks great.


Other fun stuff:

Strangers in the Night
This is for all of you classic monster movie fans out there. Pure brilliance every second of it.

Cinema Cool Tribute to John Carpenter
Cinema Cool made a nice little tribute to Carpenter, well worth checking out.

Zombie Research Society
Ok, what the fuck? Seriously?

Reelizer
Wow, just wow. Sometimes fan art is way better than the original.

That's it, more next week.

Girl walks into a bar...

There's a new movie premiering tomorrow, March 11th, starring Danny DeVito, Josh Hartnett, Carla Gugino, Rosario Dawson, Robert Forster and Zachary Quinto. It's called Girl Walks Into a Bar (2011) It's directed by Sebastian Gutierrez and it's supposed to be some kind of supernatural comedy. Now that's all fine and dandy, but what's so special about that you might ask? Well the movie gets it's world premiere on YouTube and you can watch it there tomorrow, of course for free.

Link here.

I'm not a big fan of watching movies from my computer, I like the couch and big telly better. But I'm going to watch it as I think this might be a glimpse of the future of movie distribution. Like Life in a Day and Home were, but this time it's a fictional commercial movie, not a documentary. As a side note, if you haven't seen either of those, I well recommend them, even though Home is at parts a bit too tedious with it's tree hugger mentality, but it surely looks stunning so better watch it in HD. Funny thing is that Life in a Day however can't be watched from there anymore even though Google (who owns YouTube) itself was producing it. I'm smelling greed...

And the Oscar went to…

Well it's over and again there were many expected results, but also some quite surprising ones and one complete travesty of justice. I wrote my guesses two weeks ago here so I'll just comment on those which I didn't guess right.

Best Achievement in Costume Design
I guessed The King's Speech (2010) would get this one, but it went to Alice in Wonderland (2010). To be honest I really didn't mind which way, both have nice costumes.

Best Achievement in Editing
I guessed and hoped for 127 Hours (2010), but The Social Network (2010) grabbed this one. Well I don't agree with it, I think a movie like 127 Hours (2010) takes a lot more editing skills than The Social Network (2010) did, but then again, both are well edited so it doesn't matter that much.

Best Achievement in Cinematography
This is the travesty. Roger Deakins not only was clearly the best cinematographer this year with True Grit (2010), but he also should have got it as a recognition for his amazing career. When you think of beautifully shot movies I bet at least one of them had Deakins behind the camera and for some reason the Academy has never rewarded him for any of his masterpieces. True Grit (2010) was absolutely stunning, there was supposed to be no contest, but then again he was the clear winner in 2008 also and didn't win it. The Oscar went to Wally Pfister for Inception (2010), which was technically well shot, but it really didn't have any style to it.

Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen
Like I said this is a hard one, I guessed The Fighter (2010) but The King's Speech (2010) grabbed this. Either way I'm fine with it, both of them are fairly well written.

Best Achievement in Directing
I guessed Fincher would take this with The Social Network (2010) but it went to Tom Hooper for The King's Speech (2010). Oh boy, out of those 5 candidates that was the weakest effort from a director.

Best Motion Picture of the Year
I knew my favorite had no chance in this one, but I guessed The Social Network (2010) would grab it, well turned out The King's Speech (2010) was the winner. Meh, far from the best of the year but then again my guess wasn't the best either. That's how the Oscars go, whoever does the best lobbying wins.

Degeneration of an art form

You know I've been complaining about the lack of creativity in big studio movies and the huge number of remakes and sequels/prequels lately. And I'm going to complain a bit more. I just read a great article by Mark Harris called The day the Movies Died and he puts most of my thoughts into words better than I could, so it's definitely worth reading through those four pages.

I know it's a bit exaggerated to say that the whole art form is dying, but there is a ever strengthening trend looming around that doesn't really look good. There will of course be brilliant movies in the future as well, but the thing is that the big studios won't touch them. Now why should I care about the big studios? Everyone knows they are into it just for the money, not the art. Well the thing is that I enjoy watching movies from the big screen. Sure some movies work just as well from my widescreen telly at home, but some movies are so absolutely beautiful that you need to see them on the big screen. And I'm not talking about the CGI filled action adventures that pound your head with an audio-visual assault. I mean movies like for example Winter's Bone (2010), the cinematography is so brilliant and the scenery just doesn't work as well from my telly as it does on the big screen. But now if this current trend continues I can't see a beautifully shot drama at the theaters, unless it's part of an already branded series of comic books, toys, video games or what not. And since the big studios basically control the theaters, that's a big problem looming around.

The thing is that drama just doesn't sell. Like Mark said in his article, the target audience, the adults who actually can and like to use their brain don't really enjoy the cinema multiplexes. I don't either. But there is a huge difference between watching The Road (2009) in a theatre to watching Iron Man 2 (2010) in the theatre, the audience is completely different. The other is half empty with only adults who really want to see the movie and enjoy it as it's supposed, while the other is packed full with kids just killing time in there. Of course the one with the adults is a lot more enjoyable experience as you can focus on the movie and not to the kid who's talking on his phone or the kid who needs to comment everything that happens in the movie to her friend while it's happening or to the kids who are there to discuss their day. The thing is that once you've been to one of those movies you really don't want to go there anymore and would rather stay at home waiting until it's out on DVD. That gives a bad reputation to the theaters for all movies, not only to the ones that are actually like that. The thing is that there used to be theaters aimed for more mature audience, playing arthouse movies and world cinema, kids stayed away from them as they were boring and that was a great thing. But those theaters got removed from the way of these huge cinema multiplexes with dozens of screens and tons of other activities to kill your time while waiting for the movie to start. I really want those one screen theaters back so there would be a place I could go and see movies and really enjoy the experience.

I'm going to speak a bit about Finland here, but I'll bet you can pretty much say the same thing from other countries as well. The big multiplexes are all owned by one company that just made a huge deal with the big Hollywood studios for digital projection of the movies. That basically means that the big studios control even more what we can see in those theaters and that's certainly not a good thing. While Finnish movies are growing more and more popular (last year was a record breaking year for Finnish movies), this deal means that it's coming harder to distribute the domestic films in Finnish theaters. I mean, what the fuck? Are they idiots or what? That's unfortunately how it goes, big grow bigger and anything smaller is being eaten away. Now there is of course the national film archive that hosts screenings from the archive films and those are quite brilliant. But the thing is that I don't want to wait 20 years before I can see a movie on the big screen. That leaves me with one theatre in whole city of Helsinki where I can probably see a new movie that's something else than just the mainstream movies with an audience I really don't want to see it with. Well I don't want to whine about it, it's better than nothing, that's for sure and just think of the horror if that would die too.

Now that the kids are dominating the multiplexes the studios of course play by their rules. Action, adventure, comedy and the occasional thriller based on a well known brand, with tons of audio-visual stimulant to distract the viewer from the bad story is their recipe. Spice it up with the completely unnecessary gimmick like 3D and the sugar rushed kids are going crazy. This means that the big studios eventually won't even bother making movies for the adult audience. Why would you make a movie for the adults with 40 million which will bring back 50 wile you can make a kids movie with 100 million which will bring back 200. It's business and that's a shame. Eventually this leads to all the movies for adult audiences to be made directly for video with a lot smaller budget than it would have got had it been made for the theatrical run. Now throwing money at a movie doesn't of course make it any better, but some movies just need a big budget to make them and this trend is going to be the death of them.

But like I said there will be brilliant movies in the future too as there's lots of great film makers out there, it just might be impossible to see them on the big screen. Not much anyone can do about it except to vote with their wallets. But as the kids seem to have outnumbered us adults in the theaters, that's not going to be easy. I personally promise I won't go see any comic book/sequel/prequel/remake/toy/video game adaptation in a theatre this year and will go see some big studio dramas (if there will be any) in a theatre that's not part of the big monopoly. Independent and other smaller studio movies I will of course go and see as usual (if there will be any).

New rating system

Well I've been planning on doing this for a while now, but I guess I can't change them all at once so I'll switch the rating numbers to a new system from now on and will correct the older ones eventually. The thing with 0 to 5 rating is that quite a few movies will end up with full 5 and making difference between them is quite impossible with such a limited range. So from now on I'll use percentage to rate the movies, so from 0% to 100%. That should be a lot more accurate, for what ever that's worth. Here's how it will go.

0% to 9%
These movies are horrible crap you should never ever see. Run away from them if you come across them. Consider this a warning.

10% to 19%
Very bad movies you should try to avoid. These have some very small parts that work but the overall experience is quite painful.

20% to 29%
Bad movies that have bits and pieces of good in them, but still the overall leaves a bad taste in your mouth.

30% to 39%
Somewhat bad movies that may have something to look for, but fail to deliver an enjoyable experience.

40% to 49%
Below average movies that may have many things right but might not really be worth it in the end.

50% to 59%
Average movies that someone might like, mostly have many things right and at parts work quite well, but are still quite meaningless.

60% to 69%
Above average movies that have many things right and are worth checking out if the subject matter is interesting for you.

70% to 79%
Good movies well worth checking out if the subject matter is interesting for you.

80% to 89%
Very good movies, well worth watching.

90% to 99%
Brilliant movies, don't miss these.

100%
Absolute masterpieces. Best of their kind and should be considered as part of general knowledge.

I'll be updating the previous reviews from time to time, but from now on I'll go with that percentage system. Sorry for the confusion the transition period may cause.

I also added a quick rate buttons under the posts so you readers can rate the movies as well if you like to. I know it won't work in posts with multiple movies and that it sticks it to posts without movies at all, but at least it's something.

And the Oscar goes to…

In about two weeks it's that time again when American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences hands out the most wanted trophies of the film industry, the Oscars. The whole concept of Oscars has kind of lost it's credibility with me. It's not about the art that much anymore, but more about profit and whoever promotes their film the best. I personally rank Cannes or Berlin much higher than the Oscars when it comes to the art of cinema, but the Oscars are still the biggest and most wanted prizes. And since I've actually seen all the movies that are nominated as best picture I thought it would be fun to put my preferences and predictions up here. So this is how I wish the results would be and how I believe they will be.

Best Achievement in Visual Effects
Haven't seen Hereafter (2010) or Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 (2010) so can't say for sure, but I would be quite surprised if Inception (2010) wouldn't win it. Surely would deserve it.

Best Achievement in Sound Editing
Inception (2010) will be the winner here also.

Best Achievement in Sound Mixing
Never understood what's the difference between these two awards, but I'd say it's Inception (2010) again.

Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Song
I would give the Oscar to If I Rise from 127 Hours (2010), but I bet Toy Story 3 (2010) will grab this one.

Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Score
I would give this one to 127 Hours (2010) also, just loved the soundtrack, but I'm quite sure The Social Network (2010) will grab this.

Best Achievement in Makeup
Well I've only seen The Wolfman (2010) so can't say much about the others. But Rick Baker can surely have his seventh Oscar.

Best Achievement in Costume Design
The King's Speech (2010) will get this one.

Best Achievement in Art Direction
I would give this to Alice in Wonderland (2010) and would be quite surprised if it didn't go to it.

Best Achievement in Editing
127 Hours (2010) deserves this one. Making an interesting movie from a guy trapped in a canyon takes some serious editing skills.

Best Achievement in Cinematography
True Grit (2010), no contest here.

Best Foreign Language Film of the Year
Unfortunately I haven't seen any of them yet, so can't comment on this one.

Best Animated Feature Film of the Year
Toy Story 3 (2010) all the way.

Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published
I would hope Winter's Bone (2010) would take this one, but I'm guessing The Social Network (2010) will grab it.

Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen
This is a hard one, none of the movies nominated had a stellar script. But I'm guessing The Fighter (2010) might grab this one.

Best Achievement in Directing
It's going to be a fight between Fincher and Aronofsky. I would give it to Aronofsky, but I'm guessing Fincher will take it.

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role
Hailee Steinfeld would get my vote, but I'm guessing Melissa Leo will take it.

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role
Christian Bale, no contest here.

Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role
Would give this to Jennifer Lawrence, but Natalie Portman will most likely get it.

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role
Jeff Bridges would be my choice, but I guess Colin Firth will get this one.

Best Motion Picture of the Year
Out of these 10 I enjoyed Toy Story 3 (2010) the most and also ranked it highest among these. But I wouldn't give the award to it, I would give it to Winter's Bone (2010). Though I'm guessing The Social Network (2010) will grab this one.

In two weeks we'll see how close my guesses went...

Look what the cat dragged in

I'm kind of for and against all sorts of box sets of DVD's and Blu-rays. The thing is that if it's a good box set you get many great films for quite cheap in a nice package. But most of the time there are one or two or just a few good movies in a box set and the rest are total garbage. So you end up paying for some shit you'd never pay for otherwise. This particular box set, and the reason why I wanted to make a blog post for it, is quite great. First of all the price is right, with less than 2 euros per movie it's cheaper than rental, so no worries if there are a few bad ones in there as well. Second, the content of the box is quite something. 21 movies from the legendary production company, Hammer Films. Hammer might not ring a bell for most of you, but you'd be surprised to find out how many Hammer films you've seen. These are classics and don't think that anyone growing up in the 80's, watching television and renting videos wouldn't have seen at least some of them. For me Hammer introduced some of my childhood idols like Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing among other great characters and gave some nice chills with it's gothic touch to the mood in horror films. It's not a complete catalog of their films, it's just some of them. It's not even only the best of them, but still there are so many good movies that the box is a bargain for anyone even a bit into classic Brittish horror or a bit of nostalgic movie history.

She (1965)

The Nanny (1965)

Dracula: Prince of Darkness (1966)

The Plague of the Zombies (1966)

Rasputin: The Mad Monk (1966)

The Reptile (1966)

The Witches (1966)

One Million Years B.C. (1966)

The Viking Queen (1967)

Frankenstein Created Woman (1967)

Quatermass and the Pit (1967)

The Vengeance of She (1968)

The Devil Rides Out (1968)

Prehistoric Women (1967)

Scars of Dracula (1970)

The Horror of Frankenstein (1970)

Blood from the Mummy's Tomb (1971)

Straight on Till Morning (1972)

Fear in the Night (1972)

Demons of the Mind (1972)

To the Devil a Daughter (1976)

That's a nice list of movies, but the box pretty much forgets all of the 50's Hammer classics. The Dracula, Frankenstein, Mummy and Quatermass series were started (actually redone as the first three already had a franchise at Universal) by Hammer in the 50's and this box only contains some of the sequels to the series. That's not at all bad as those sequels are actually the more famous parts of the series than the original ones. But would have liked to see some 50's stuff in here as well. Anyway, this is a nice set of movies and I'm looking forward for going through them.

Oh and don't worry, this blog won't turn into a Hammer blog, I won't go through them all at once. But will check them out every once and a while as we go along.

Where to get the movies?

I get asked a lot where do I get all my movies that I review here. Some of them I go to see in the theaters on their regular screenings, but some of them I get to see in a previews before their premiere in Finland. I also just rent some of them, mostly those which I'm quite sure I won't like too much. But the majority I just buy on DVD or Blu-Ray. If it's a good movie it stays in my collection, if it's a bad one I'll sell it forward.

So where do I buy them? About 40-50% I actually buy from Finland in stores. I just like to browse them by hand and make nice discoveries from time to time. Dunno how helpful this is to my readers but these are the best movie stores in Finland:

Filmihullu leffakauppa
This is by far my favorite store. Even in European standards it's quite special. The collection is quite small, don't know the exact figures but I'd estimate under 10000 movies in the store, so not large by any means. But the quality is just unbelievable. The focus is in world cinema, early Hollywood classics, art house, some indie productions, some exploitation classics, Finnish cinema and only the selected best from the mainstream releases. I'm not kidding about the quality, you can go to the store, close your eyes, walk around the shelves, pick a random movie and it'll be good. There simply are no bad movies in the store. The service is very professional, ask about any movie and you'll get an answer or they will find it out for you. The prices are not the cheapest, but nothing insane either. Amazing store.

Pieni Leffakauppa
This one is for a movie freak like a candy store for a kid. Huge collection of pretty much anything you can think of. Tons of sleaze, exploitation, asian, sexploitation, all sorts of horror, used mainstream movies and quite a bit of everything else. The service is quite professional, you need something and they'll most of the time find it for you. Prices range from very cheap to quite expensive.

Anttila
Not really a movie store, but a super market with a fairly large movie section. Only mainstream movies, but the discount bins are sometimes a treasure chest. Cheap prices and sometimes very good quality. Wait a few months after the movie is released on DVD and you can get it very cheap here. The service is quite bad as the staff usually knows absolutely nothing about movies, but then again can't blame them.

In addition to those I visit a number of random super markets, record stores and second hand shops which sell movies with varying quantities and qualities. There's so many with none better than the other so I won't list them here.

For on-line movie stores I prefer these:

Play.com
Simple. All prices in euro's and postage to Finland included in the price. They ship all movies as separate pieces no matter how many you order at once. Fairly good packaging and if the product is damaged, send them an email and they'll send you a new one, mostly not even asking for returning of the damaged product. Simple and effective. The collection is huge. Mostly mainstream, but there are a lot of surprises in there as well. The customer service is good and the delivery times are ok. I love how easy it is to order from here, though my credit card doesn't. It's quite cheap, especially the on sale items.

Amazon
My main source for Region 1/A movies. The collection is pretty much as big as it can get, not much you can't find in here. The customer support should be ok, though as I've actually never had to contact them, can't really say. But as I've ordered way over 100 movies from here that's a very positive thing that never has anything gone wrong so that I'd have to contact them. Good packaging and decent postage fees. Prices range from absolutely ridiculous to very cheap and especially those special offers are really worth looking at.

Something Weird Video
Like the name says here you can find something completely different, weird and crazy. Most movies are R1 but there are quite a bit of R0 in there also. Mostly in DVD-R format, but also proper pressed DVD's. Picture quality ranges from horrible to surprisingly good, but then again in most cases the best possible master is already so poor that you can't blame them. The collection is quite wide and ranges to absolute junk to those camp classics that are so bad they are absolutely brilliant. Prices are fairly ok, though of course if you do random shopping you might end up paying a lot for something totally worthless waste of celluloid. Postage is not the cheapest, but nothing excessive either.

CDON and Boostep
I put these together as they are fairly similar in collection, postage fees and packing. Only use them for some special offers they have where you can find something good for very cheap.

EzyDVD
My number one source for Aussie releases. Collection is large and the prices range from expensive to very cheap, especially on the offers. Postage is quite expensive.

HKFlix
And this I use for Asian releases. Fairly large collection, prices are quite high and postage is not cheap either. But still you can find a lot in here which you can't find elsewhere.

I do of course use a plethora of other sites, but most of them I only use once or twice for some specific title or offer.

There are also some sites that I've had some quite bad experiences with, so I'll list them here as well to maybe stand as a warning or "heads up" for those planning on ordering something from these:

Discshop
By far the worst experience that I've had with any store. First time I ordered something from them about two years ago, paid the order beforehand and waited a month for nothing. All of the products were shown in stock on their site. Contacted them about it and they apologized that there's a bug in the system that some of the titles were not in stock. Well waited another 3 weeks and contacted them again, told them to send whatever they have from the order and refund me the rest. A week from that point I got 5 out of 7 titles I ordered and rest of my money back. Second time I ordered only one title, again it was in stock, paid in advance, waited for 2 months, called them and said "fuck off and give me my money back". Got my money back. Third time I ordered 3 Shaw Bros. movies from them about a month ago. I selected the bill me later thingy this time as I thought they would send the bill with the movies. Well a week ago I received a bill with a delay fee for not paying the initial bill in time. This was the first bill I received from them. As it was not much I just paid it and didn't want to waste my time in sorting it up. Still haven't received any movies, so will contact them again to tell them to fuck off and give my money back. I will never order anything from them anymore and really urge everyone else to be cautious also.

DVD Pacific
I used to like this store, one of the first ones where I ordered movies and ordered hundreds of movies from them during the years. Cheap prices and good collection. But then the site got hacked, they stole all the credit card details, mine also. So I had to go through a whole lot of hassle to close my card and get a new one. Well time goes on, no harm done and they assure they have new security system so I start to order from them again. After a couple of months my card all of a sudden stopped working when I was trying to pay with it in a grocery store. It was weekend so the banks were closed so I called to the service number on the card and they told me my card was closed as the limit was exceeded. Needless to say I was quite puzzled. Turned out that DVD Pacific was hacked again and again my card details were stolen and this time also used. Tons of hassle but luckily didn't lose any money or anything like that. But I did lose my faith in the store. Too bad it was good as long as it lasted.

DVDFr
This is a funny story. Couple of years ago I ordered a few Russ Meyer movies from here. I paid with credit card and everything went smooth. They billed my card straight away and the next day I received a mail that my package was on it's way and that I should allow 1-10 weeks for delivery. 10 weeks from France to Finland? Are they bringing it by foot or what?! Sounded quite silly but I was happy things went so smooth. So I waited a week, a month, two months, forgot all about it already, three months, then I remembered where the hell were my Meyers? Contacted them and they said it's on it's way. Waited another month, contacted them again and wanted my money back. They said it's probably got lost in the mail and they'll send another one with express courier without any extra charge, it should arrive in 3 days. Well I was ok with that. Waited again. After two weeks contacted them again and said fuck this, give me my money back. They did and I was pissed, but happy that I got it back without any further problems. Well the funny part is that after almost exactly a year from the initial purchase I receive a phone call from UPS that they have a package for me. I was a bit puzzled what it could be as I didn't have any outstanding orders at that time. Well signed it and surprise surprise it was the Russ Meyer movies I had ordered from DVDFr.

Best of 2010

Might have been wondering why I lately reviewed some movies from earlier this year. Well it's for this closure of the year as it's time to name the best new movies I saw this year. Before we go to the list I have to make it clear that I haven't seen all the movies released in 2010, so it's in no way a definitive list, but it's from those which I did see. Also it's the release year, some of the movies were made in 2009 but released in 2010 in Finland.

Overall best movies of the year:
The Road (2009)
This was quite easy as this movie is in a league of it's own. Others worth mentioning:
Winter's Bone (2010)
Kick-Ass (2010)
Shutter Island (2010)
Machete (2010)
City of Life and Death (2009)
Dogtooth (2009)

Biggest positive surprises:
Dogtooth (2009)
By far the biggest surprise, but there were other movies that took me by surprise also:
Monsters (2010)
Piranha (2010)
Defendor (2009)

Best drama:
The Road (2009)
No contest here. As this is a very wide genre I'll focus on the ones that are focused somewhat heavily on dramatic content:
Winter's Bone (2010)
City of Life and Death (2009)
The Killer Inside Me (2010)
How I Ended This Summer (2010)
Social Network (2010)

Best action movies:
Machete (2010)
So over the top, it's hard to beat this. These came close:
Kick-Ass (2010)
The Expendables (2010)
And I have to put one more realistic dramatic action movie in here too so we won't go with just those brainless flicks:
Cell 211 (2009)

Best comedies:
Four Lions (2010)
This year was great for fun movies, lots of good movies with tons of comedy like:
Dogtooth (2009)
Kick-Ass (2010)
Machete (2010)
Piranha (2010)
Zombieland (2009)
Defendor (2009)
The Other Guys (2010)

Best thrillers:
Shutter Island (2010)
Can't beat Scorsese, but these came quite close:
Winter's Bone (2010)
Buried (2010)
The Killer Inside Me (2010)

Best horror movies:
The Last Exorcism (2010)
Conventional horror is still alive and well. This is also well worth mentioning:
Crazies (2010)
And if the horror doesn't need to be scary then this is the way to go:
Piranha (2010)

Best sci-fi movie:
Monsters (2010)
Another good one:
Inception (2010)
All the other sci-fi movies I saw from this year are really not worth mentioning so I'll leave it to just these two.

Best documentary/mockumentary:
Exit Through the Gift Shop (2010)
Didn't watch that many documentaries this year so it's quite a thin list. This is also worth mentioning:
Reindeerspotting (2010)

Best animation:
Can't choose the best animation as there's still so many possibly good animations I haven't seen from this year like:
Toy Story 3 (2010)
Despicable Me (2010)
Megamind (2010)
How to Train Your Dragon (2010)
Shrek Forever After (2010)

Best of something completely different:
Bored of those conventional movies? Then these should be the thing for you:
Dogtooth (2009)
Enter the Void (2009)

So that's it. There's still many movies I haven't seen from this year like Black Swan (2010), Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009) and A Prophet (2009) which could most likely be in those lists from what I've heard, but those are from what I've seen. More new movies next year.

More on labels

I've received a couple of questions about the labels so I'll try to explain it a bit here. I'll label the posts by the director of the movie and the genres it fits to. As some of the posts have so many movies, for example the festival posts, I can't fit them all in. So director will be there always and if there's space then the genre also. I'm not that much into categorizing movies so forgive me if some are in a genre they shouldn't be or some isn't in a genre they should be.

Also a bit of explanation on some of the genres. Action, comedy, drama, horror and so on are simple, everyone knows them, but those other genres may need a bit of explaining so here's a bit of info about them.

Blacksploitation: Sub genre to exploitation. In the early 70's USA many exploitation films were made for the black people in hopes to get them into the theaters. These movies have primarily black actors, mostly a funk or soul soundtrack and a story of an exploitative nature. Examples: Super Fly (1972), Coffy (1973).

Camp: Movies that drive from bad taste and ironic content, mostly unintentionally. But also as a deliberate pre-planned style. Examples: Valley of the Dolls (1967), Beat the Devil (1953).

Chase flick: A movie which general idea evolves around a car chase. A form of exploitation to itself as the chase is what the audience want to see and the story is mostly there just to fill in the blanks. Examples: Vanishing Point (1971), Gone in 60 Seconds (1974).

Cult: Movies which have acquired a very exclusive and devoted fan base, even though the movie itself might not appeal to the general public. Mostly movies that are so bad that they are good. The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975), Plan 9 from Outer Space (1958).

Eurocrime: General name for European crime movies (movies that focus on the lives of criminals). Most notably including Poliziotteschi an Italian sub genre which was very popular from the late 60's to the late 70's and the French neo-noirs. Examples: Caliber 9 (1972), Le Doulos (1962).

Exploitation: Movies that rely heavily on a subject matter which is believed to be the crowd drawing factor of a film. Be it sex, nudity, violence, special effects or a big star. Sometimes it's none of those but just a sensational title with content that doesn't reflect it in any way. Basicly these movies are done cheap, taking the selling ideas of other successful movies, filling it up with a somekind of a script, cast with which ever actors are available and put fast to the market. Can't really pick any examples for this or I'd need to go for all the sub genres also, there are thousands.

Giallo: Italian sub genre for horror and thriller exploitation. Characteristics are stylish camerawork with unusual music and extremely long murder sequences with sometimes slow motion footage. Examples: Suspiria (1977), Blood and Black Lace (1964).

Mockumentary: A fictional tale dressed up to look like a documentary. Examples: Borat (2006), Man Bites Dog (1992).

Sexploitation: Sub genre of exploitation. Sex and nudity being the selling points and the story made around them. Examples: Up! (1976), Caligula (1979).

Slasher: Sub genre of horror, usually involving a serial killer of some sort and a variety of home appliances (knife, chainsaw, machete and so on) used to do the killing in a very graphic manner. Examples: Friday the 13th (1980), Scream (1996).

Spaghetti western: Italian sub genre for western. Also a form of exploitation as they were riding on the success of the American westerns. Done by Italian directors, writers and crew, starring fading (or young no name) Hollywood stars alongside Italian movie stars and shot mostly in Spain or Italy. Examples: Once Upon a Time in the West (1968), Django (1966).

Splatter: A horror or violence sub genre where the focus is in excessive usage of gore, guts and blood. Examples: Braindead (1992), Blood Feast (1963).

Trash: A low quality movie, also known as a Z-movie. As B-movies were sometimes surprisingly good on some parts, a new rating system was needed and Z was the lowest and thus most appropriate for it. These movies are intentional and mostly unintentional garbage, sometimes so bad they are good, but mostly just bad. Examples: Manos: The Hands of Fate (1966), Plan 9 from Outer Space (1958).

I'll add more genres as they come across. Hope this helps, feel free to ask if you have questions.

Labels

Well as I'm a complete nub with these things, I just found out about the labels. So I added them now, I guess it's a bit easier to browse different genres and so on with them.

I'm back again

After a break of almost two years I'm finally back. Was busy with movies as we had a few bigger projects. But I intend to continue writing a bit about the movies I see. Not going to write all the movies I've seen this past two years, but maybe I'll pick a few of them here from time to time. Lets just hope there won't be another break as long as that.

A little update

I have quite a lot of stuff coming in the next weeks/months/years. The Helsinki International Film Festival is starting next week and I'm of course attending with a long list of movies I want to see. So plenty of them to come. Also the British Film Institute is celebrating it's 75 years of excistense by offering some of their superbly restored classics on DVD with a bargain price. I of course ordered 13 of them right away, would have wanted more, but my wallet said no way. More of them later when the post office delivers them to me. Hope there's something for everyone there, see you after the weekend.

The List

Don't know what is it with lists and movies. Every movieholic loves lists, they love to make them and they love to compare other lists with their lists. So let's start this off with a list of my 200 favorite movies of all time. Maybe this will give some idea of what I like and they're all worth watching even if your taste differs from mine. I put them in alphabetical order because it's near impossible to rank them from 1 to 200.

12 Angry Men
2001: A Space Odyssey
A Clockwork Orange
A Fish Called Wanda
A Fistful of Dollars
A History of Violence
Across 110th Street
Alien
Aliens
American Beauty
American History X
Amores Perros
Anatomy of a Murder
Apocalypse Now
As Good As It Gets
Bad Santa
Bad Taste
Barton Fink
Battle Royale (Batoru Rowaiaru)
Before Sunrise
Bicycle Thieves
Blade Runner
Bob le Flambeur
Boogie Nights
Brazil
Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia
Cabin Fever
Casablanca
Castle in the Sky (Tenku no shiro Rapyuta)
Children of Men
Chinatown
Citizen Kane
City Lights
City of God
Commando
Dancer in the Dark
Danger: Diabolik
Das Boot
Dawn of the Dead
Delicatessen
Deliverance
Dial M for Murder
Die Hard
Dirty Harry
Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
Dog Day Afternoon
Donnie Darko
Dr. Strangelove
Drunken Master (Jui kuen)
Ed Wood
Evil Dead
Evil Dead 2
Fantasia
Fargo
Fido
Fight Club
Foxy Brown
Full Metal Jacket
Goldfinger
GoodFellas
Grumpy Old Men
Happiness
Harakiri
Hard Boiled
Harvey
Heat
History of the World - Part I
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
Irreversible
Jackie Brown
Jaws
Jungfrukallan - The Virgin Spring
Kill Bill, Volume 1 & 2King Kong
L.A. Confidential
La Appartement
La Haine (Hate)
La Strada
Lawrence of Arabia
Leon (The Professional)
Lethal Weapon
Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels
Los Olvidados
M
M*A*S*H
Magnolia
Metropolis
Miller's Crossing
Modern Times
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
Monty Python's Life of Brian
Night of the Hunter
Night of the Living Dead
No Country for Old Men
North by Northwest
Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens
Nuovo cinema Paradiso
O Brother, Where Art Thou?
Oldboy
On the Waterfront
Once Upon a Time in America
Once Upon a Time in the West
One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest
Open Your Eyes (Abre los ojos)
Plan 9 from Outer Space
Predator
Princess Mononoke (Mononoke-hime)
Pulp Fiction
Raging Bull
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Ran
Rashomon
Rear Window
Requiem for a Dream
Reservoir Dogs
RoboCop
Saving Private Ryan
Scarface
Schindler's List
Seven
Shoot 'Em Up
Shrek
Simple Plan
Sin City
Sleepy Hollow
Snatch
Some Like It Hot
Spirited Away (Sen to Chihiro no kamikakushi)
Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and Spring
Stalker
Stand by Me
Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope
Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back
Stranger Than Fiction
Strangers on a Train
Straw Dogs
Sunset Boulevard
Suspiria
Sympathy for Lady Vengeance (Chinjeolhan geumjassi)
Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance (Boksuneun naui geot)
Taxi Driver
The Big Blue (Le Grand bleu)
The Big Lebowski
The Birds
The Blues Brothers
The Boondock Saints
The Breakfast Club
The City of Lost Children
The Day the Earth Stood Still
The Deer Hunter
The Devil's Backbone (Espinazo del diablo, El)
The Elephant Man
The Exorcist
The Fearless Vampire Killers
The French Connection
The Godfather I, II & III
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
The Graduate
The Great Dictator
The Great Escape
The Guns of Navarone
The Hudsucker Proxy
The Iron Giant
The Isle
The Killer (Dip huet seung hung)
The Maltese Falcon
The Nightmare Before Christmas
The Others
The Party
The Return of the Pink Panther
The Seven Samurai (Shichinin no Samurai)
The Seventh Seal
The Shawshank Redemption
The Shining
The Silence of the Lambs
The Terminator
The Texas Chain Saw Massacre
The Thin Red Line
The Third Man
The Trouble With Harry
The Untouchables
The Wicker Man
The Wild Bunch
This Is Spinal Tap
Thriller - en grym film
To Catch a Thief
To Kill A Mockingbird
Tonari no Totoro (My Neighbor Totoro)
Touch of Evil
Toy Story
Unbreakable
Unforgiven
United 93
Vertigo
Visitor Q
Wages of Fear
Where Eagles Dare
Yojimbo

The past, the present and the future

Lets start this blog with a bit of info about me.

The past

I've been a moviefreak for about 20 years now. I don't remember what was the first movie I saw, but I do remember what movie lit the spark for my hobby. In the mid 80's my mom bought us a VHS player, I didn't care about it much at that time, yeh I watched some movies, but was more interested in my C64 and the games on it. Then one day a friend of mine had rented a movie called Commando (was in 87 if I remember right) and invited me to watch it. I was totally blow away by it, it was by far the best thing I had ever seen and I loved every second of it. We watched it 4 or 5 times in a row before my friend had to return the tape. But we wanted more, so we rented it again and made copies of it for ourselves so we could watch it more. The movie itself was severely cut due to the censorship in Finland at that time but we didn't mind as we had no idea of anything better. That movie led me to such classics as First Blood, Missing In Action, The Terminator and ultimately after a year or so to RoboCop which became my new all time favorite movie. At that time I also became aware of the censorship and the damage it had done to some of the movies. RoboCop being one of the most notorious examples of it. That led me to search for movies abroad where they had the brains to keep the movies intact. There I found great movies that were totally forbidden in Finland at that time like Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Evil Dead, Friday the 13th and so on. And during the next years my preference in movies went from action to horror. During the 90's I widened my perspective and started to really watch every movie that sounded good and not limit it just to the Hollywood flicks or some specific genre. My favorite movie changed sometimes daily and went from musical to comedy to drama to kung fu and so on. At that time I realized that there's no such thing as the best movie, there are lots of great movies and some movies work better on different mindsets. Late 90's I also started to update my quite big VHS movie collection to DVD's.

The present

So at the moment my movie preference is quite complex and trying to explain it would be quite impossible. So I'll post a list of my 200 favorite movies to give some idea about it. Also I'm more of a director fan than an actor/actress fan. I mean most of the times when a director makes a great film his/her other films tend to be quite good too. Of course there's exceptions to this especially with the old directors who tend to loose their edge over time but still an actor can be in a great movie and then in lots of crappy ones. And I'm not meaning that a good actor can't be good in a crappy movie, but a crappy movie is usually crappy no matter how good the actor is. I watch movies as a whole, not just one part of it.

The future

Well I decided to make this blog so I can write something about the movies I watch. I'm not going to update all the movies I've seen here as it would take me ages to do that, but the list will grow as we go along. I'm not going to write huge novels about every movie, just what I felt about it, sometimes it can be summed up in few words and sometimes you need more of them. Anyways I hope someone finds this helpful and all feedback is appreciated.