I hadn’t heard about this movie, but upon stumbling on the dvd cover, i was intrigued. For some reason, it was placed under comedy, when it would more appropriately be called a romantic fiction. Nonetheless, Cash Back was indeed a treat. it is a british movie and the humor may be a bit off but it does have its moments. it is a partial narrative of a guy who discovers he has the power to slow down time. he discovered his power through insomnia, caused by his girlfriend dumping him. He then undresses girls at a supermarket , just to draw them. the plot sounds stupid, and it is misleading. this is actually an artistic movie of epic poetic proportions. It is pretty close to the style of Perfume. the trailer below will give you a better feel of the movie.

Now i found it specifically interesting, because of how the movie makes you appreciate time. There are times we wish for time to go faster or slower. And fortunately, our minds are complex enough to create the illusion of the varying speed of time. But the only illusion we can’t create, is that of a second past. This isn’t a new thing, but its like a reflection. While watching the movie i began to remember how much difference ONE second can make. why is this important? why shouldn’t it be?! Appreciation of the little things taken for granted, is a gift. This movie just reminds me why i like to live in the moment. worrying about the future or regreting the past only distracts you from the present. Unfortunately, this comes with nullifying feelings from the past such as regret and remorse, and that may provide a battle for your conscience. however, a second spent worrying is a day of possibilities wasted. that’s how i look at it and despite the consequences of spontaneity, it is a great way of feeling alive.

Entertaining: A
Plot: C
Stimulating: B-
Overall: A

as time goes by i see myself getting more and more interested in the intellectual and artistic aspects of movies. i no longer enter the movie theater solely for a thrill, i go there to fully deconstruct a movie and understand the director. after taking a film arts class i got a deeper appreciation of movies and accepting it as indeed an art form with a (possible) intellectual side. It creates a means where directors and story tellers come together to share their philosophies. and it is another form of broadening our perspectives of life, when a movie isn’t misread.

But like every art form, beauty is in the eye of the beholder; some art resonate with the all of us, some art have fewer fans. we have our Da Vinci paintings and our children book pictures and everything between. And when it comes to seeing a movie, (if you’re like me), you are curious to know what critics or other people have to say about a given movie. One thing to understand is regular movie goers and critics have completely different views of movies.

Regular movie goers go for entertainment or are looking for something to identify with, whatever it may be. these set of people tend to be more forgiving about how the movie is made and concentrate on the story. and their rating of the movie depends on how well they liked the story, how scary it was, how much action, how funny and so forth. but that doesn’t mean they completely ignore how the movie is made, everyone will look at the same painting differently if it was done on a canvas or on a piece of toilet paper.

Critics on the other hand (or at least most of them) look for originality and movie making finesse. Most often than not, a story a critic has seen before is more likely to get a poor rating simply because of the predictability of the story line. despite how good a movie may be, if it isn’t a new concept or plot critics deem it as just the same thing in new clothing and pass it as a poor movie. they look for the inability to guess what happens next in some cases.

These are very brief summaries but enough information to give an idea. when i watch a movie, i try viewing as both a regular movie goer and a critic with a third dimension; Intellectuality, how much brain stimulation am i getting and how much does it get me thinking. one of the things i look for is character development, and how much u can understand the characters with the given information. one movie i love for character development is Kill Bill. if u can look pass the action and pay attention to the main character and listen to the dialog, you’ll be amazed about how well the director (Quintin) brought the emotions of Kiddo (accompanied by a great performance from Uma T) to life. kinda hard to explain but watch the movie again, paying attention to each character’s story and listen to the dialog. Each story gives motive and makes you understand even the enemy and it adds a strange “i kinda understand” emotion to the movie. this makes it fresh in a way and it stands out from other action movies.

Other things i look for are hidden philosophies of the director/story teller. this has nothing to do with the quality of the movie, but it is a bonus to know anyone’s way of thinking.

i could go one forever talkin about the different aspects of movies, but i’ll stop. maybe the next time u want to see a movie u won’t let a rating from other people affect a movie you wish to see. it may hold something useful to you on different levels. maybe from now on u may understand how i criticize some movies as a ” layman “.

Alright i went into this movie expecting the same results as Chronicles of Narnia, but this was substantially different. for one this had a darker, more adult feel too it. The underlying plot, surprising to me, was fantastically disguised to hide the political aspect of the movie: the government trying to control the masses through questionable means. i won’t go too deep into this and will leave you to go watch. it definitely has a message pointed towards real life situations. anyway that’s the adult theme. The Golden Compass is no doubt a fantasy movie with captivating visuals but nonetheless aimed at the younger demographic. my best analogy for this movie would be a toy which adults won’t mind playing with but might question having their kids play with it. dunno whatelse to say about the movie…no concept was new, just different clothing, but entertaining nontheless. it is a trilogy and it won’t reach the level of LOR or even pirates (maybe in popularity and hype, but not quality)

one last thing to add, this movie is from a book and i can tell even without reading the book that alot of things were left out. i feel the story is great as a book but just falls short as a movie.

Entertaining: B-
Plot: C
Stimulating: C+
Overall: B-

this is yet another great movie that silently went through the theaters. Talk to Me is based of the life of Petey Green a revolutionary radio talk show host around the time of the great Martin Luther King. a man who always spoke his mind regarding a lot of political and social issues.

I was initially put off by the movie from my first impression. i thought to myself, this is just another movie to remind people about racism and spark up some short-lived emotions of hate, regret and sympathy. this movie however was not about racism and was really just centered around Petey Green. the movie starts off as a refreshing comedy and slowly sobers up into a movie with a message “the simple power of truth”. the director Kasi Lemmons did a great job in developing the characters and this wasn’t quite simple considering the complexity of the character types (Petey Green and his manager). the movie is simply a story well told and makes you come to love the characters created to portray the life of the Ralph ‘Petey’ Green.

you may ask: why should i watch a movie based of the life of a radio talk show host? well here are some clips of the REAL Petey Green while he was alive (well obviously not like he took a break from his grave to shoot this):
in this clip he is talking about the “system” hustling us out:

as u can see, he said the things we all want to say. but despite being truthful, he was also hilarious. here is another clip of Green talking about black people eating watermelons

the clips talk for themselves, BE URSELF…damn i love watermelons lol.

here’s the trailer for the movie

Entertaining: A
Plot: A
Stimulating: B-
Overall: A-