This movie rocks the chaos theory.

The special effects wouldn’t have been anywhere near as good had the special effects team not had an intuitive grasp of chaos theory. Their magic insight? Crashing water looks the same in miniature as on a large scale. Rock on miniature builders!

Wow. This is amazing. I kept hearing about the Battle of Algiers now and again over the course of my movie watching career (and it is a career), but I had never seen it.

It’s amazing. The movie plays itself out almost like a documentary. Though filmed a few years after the events depicted, it seems far more vivid. I suspect part of it is the black and white, which I love more and more. The filming and action make the movie feel like it was made more recently than it actually was.

If you even sort of like spy-genre movies, this is an amazing trip that takes off for two hours and doesn’t let go. Best part: based on actual events.

Despite being quite old in a genre that ages about as well as a computer, this novel reads like it was written yesterday. It’s fast and sucks you in.

It made me want to be able to jaunte.

I thought the filming done in all hand-held, faux-home-video style was awful. If you want to see how hand-held camera can make a movie more exciting, see the Bourne Ultimatum. If you want to see how hand-held camera can make you motion sick, watch this.

The rest of the movie was ok. Not good, not bad, but ok. I can’t wait for the remake in twenty years (haha). The director was betting that the fake-documentary style would make it more exciting. It didn’t. I can’t believe that the Academy of SF and Horror picked this as their SF movie of the year. Surely I am Legend was better, the popcorn-movie Transformers certainly was.

I enjoyed this movie. It was a mix of documentary and costume drama. I was really enjoying some of the fake story about the witches, but then the director shifted to his time (1922). It seemed weird.

But then, this is a very early documentary. Interesting in its own right.

There’s a sex scene in this movie.

It’s awful. There are obviously body doubles being used. It’s so awful that it’s screaming for an MST3K style treatment.

The rest of the movie wasn’t much better.

This is a really good movie. I’d say it’s Gilliam’s most mature work to date. Possibly (dare I say it?) better than Brazil, a movie I love. I even half paid attention to the commentary, which I usually don’t do. Gilliam and his co-writer make snide remarks about the critical reception of the film. It’s pretty funny.

Anyway, do take everyone’s warning about this. If you’ve got a thin skin or think you aren’t easily offended, this isn’t for you. You need to be unoffendable (is that a word?). By anything. Or you really need to be in tune with what Gilliam is trying to do. Or be a fan of the book that this is based on.

Yes, there is drug use shown on screen. Death is dealt with in a non-conventional way. Some of the sexuality dealt with made me squirm a bit.

So count yourself warned.

I read this for a paper in high school. I was dumb and didn’t realize how hard (and boring) primary sources were to use without any training. Oh well. Live and learn.

What amazed me was that this book very clearly spelled out everything that was obsessing Hitler years before he came to power (though in the most boring way possible). Hitler was clearly crazy with his obsession about the Jews at this time. I cannot believe that this warning bell was ignored by the folks-in-charge outside of Germany—the Germans knew, he was in jail when he wrote this book. Of course they did let him out of jail before too long. It was published in German in the mid-1920s and an abridged translation in English was available by 1933. Our history would have been much different had this book been read as a warning of potential horrors.

If this book doesn’t convince you of Hitler’s monstrosity, you may want to check out The Essential Hitler. More boring style, but this time about the implementation of Mein Kampf through Hitler’s own bloviation.

Disclaimer: I work for the company that publishes The Essential Hitler, but I don’t earn any royalties or commissions off of it.

While I was watching this, I had the nagging feeling that some of it was staged. After all, 1920’s movie gear wasn’t portable like the hand-held Digital Video stuff available now. I couldn’t help but think that the interior shots of the igloo weren’t quite legit. I was right. Reading over at Wikipedia, my suspicions were confirmed.

I don’t feel bad about this, because there were technical limitations: 1920’s movie-making equipment, hostile environment and limited daylight hours. In perspective, this film is an amazing accomplishment and an fascinating picture of life in the Arctic ninety years ago.

Or did you also notice the Moby Dick overtones?

I thought it was so strong that Jaws is just another adaptation. Quint as Ahab, no?