Movie time. Or something.
So I've given Bicho de sete cabeças a watch and Solaris a rewatch.
Bicho de Sete Cabeças:
* Might the tragedy have hit harder had I not been quite so transfixed by the sheer awe-inspiring prettiness of long-haired, 25-year-old Rodrigo Santoro? Perhaps. It still hit, though. Oh, it hit.
* Speaking of Sr. Santoro, I agree that those who say the boy can't act ought to be referred to this movie, but he does give the impression of a normally good-if-unspectacular actor who was hand-held somewhat and might not be able to reproduce it on his own. There wasn't that sense of "wow, I just watched an incredible acting job", either.
* The inmates who looked after Neto-Ceará and the other one at the second hospital whose name I never caught, was that Ednei?-were so sweet. The scene where Ceará drives Neto bats with his loud, off-key harping on the same verse of the same stupid song...I just wanted to reach into the screen and give the guy a hug.
* The use of still shots...I'm not 100% sure I approve. Still thinking about that one.
* The title song on the soundtrack was one I fell in love with before even hearing of the movie. It's only slightly ruined for me now.
Solaris:
* This time out it was Jeremy Davies. And his...what were those, emo bangs?
* I approve of changes from the book like making Rheya a troubled adult treated as exactly that rather than a clingy teenager patronized at every turn and turning Sartorius/Gordon into a woman. The gender politics of the book is one of the things that really dates it.
* I got no sense of a living creature at work. The planet just looked like an ornate gas giant and was spoken of in terms that did nothing to contradict that.
* I realize it was probably in large part aimed at giving Gordon something to do besides rant as well as handing that action to the most obvious (thanks to her anti-Them ranting) character to do it, but what are the other implications of her rather than Snow using the Visitor-B-Gone on Rheya? And I noticed that there was no equivalent of the line "He's a good man." from book!Rheya's note in movie!Rheya's recording. Simply superfluous or is there more here?
* Gibarian's line that "we don't want other worlds, we want mirrors" was also Snow's originally. How much else that I'm not remembering was taken away from that character, leaving squirrely Jeremy Davies to just be squirrely Jeremy Davies?
* Was Snow so far around the bend as to be getting a visitation from himself? I suppose he was. And how long was that visitor masquerading as him, anyway? (My guess is "not long", but there are those with other theories. [ETA 20 April 2008: Nope, I was wrong. After another two viewings and a jaunt through the draft of the screenplay provided on the DVD, I am satisfactorily convinced that the real Snow was intended to have been dead the entire time. Hence the significant shot of the bloodstain in the cold room that Kelvin doesn't notice.]) The thought strikes me that he would have been far less incomplete than the other visitors, though still not quite whole, being made out of a man's own memories of himself.
* The ending. I tend to be a bit dense about these things, but I had to read the book to confirm that he was on the planet's surface there. [ETA 20 April 2008: Well, the real Kelvin is on the planet if he's alive at all-but it's possible that that scene takes place on Earth and the Kelvin we see is as much a visitor as the Rheya who appears to him. I suppose in that case, Gordon's worst fear came true and she brought the phenomenon with her when she went home.]
Finally, I'm hearing Things about Across the Universe. Rather more positive Things than I heard when it was released, but from people I might just consider less trustworthy. Those of you who've seen it, given that a. I'm not by any stretch a Beatles fanatic but would recognize a good few of their songs and live with an avowed Beatle-appreciator and b. Julie Taymor makes me profoundly happy in my film place, would any of you recommend it?
Bicho de Sete Cabeças:
* Might the tragedy have hit harder had I not been quite so transfixed by the sheer awe-inspiring prettiness of long-haired, 25-year-old Rodrigo Santoro? Perhaps. It still hit, though. Oh, it hit.
* Speaking of Sr. Santoro, I agree that those who say the boy can't act ought to be referred to this movie, but he does give the impression of a normally good-if-unspectacular actor who was hand-held somewhat and might not be able to reproduce it on his own. There wasn't that sense of "wow, I just watched an incredible acting job", either.
* The inmates who looked after Neto-Ceará and the other one at the second hospital whose name I never caught, was that Ednei?-were so sweet. The scene where Ceará drives Neto bats with his loud, off-key harping on the same verse of the same stupid song...I just wanted to reach into the screen and give the guy a hug.
* The use of still shots...I'm not 100% sure I approve. Still thinking about that one.
* The title song on the soundtrack was one I fell in love with before even hearing of the movie. It's only slightly ruined for me now.
Solaris:
* This time out it was Jeremy Davies. And his...what were those, emo bangs?
* I approve of changes from the book like making Rheya a troubled adult treated as exactly that rather than a clingy teenager patronized at every turn and turning Sartorius/Gordon into a woman. The gender politics of the book is one of the things that really dates it.
* I got no sense of a living creature at work. The planet just looked like an ornate gas giant and was spoken of in terms that did nothing to contradict that.
* I realize it was probably in large part aimed at giving Gordon something to do besides rant as well as handing that action to the most obvious (thanks to her anti-Them ranting) character to do it, but what are the other implications of her rather than Snow using the Visitor-B-Gone on Rheya? And I noticed that there was no equivalent of the line "He's a good man." from book!Rheya's note in movie!Rheya's recording. Simply superfluous or is there more here?
* Gibarian's line that "we don't want other worlds, we want mirrors" was also Snow's originally. How much else that I'm not remembering was taken away from that character, leaving squirrely Jeremy Davies to just be squirrely Jeremy Davies?
* Was Snow so far around the bend as to be getting a visitation from himself? I suppose he was. And how long was that visitor masquerading as him, anyway? (My guess is "not long", but there are those with other theories. [ETA 20 April 2008: Nope, I was wrong. After another two viewings and a jaunt through the draft of the screenplay provided on the DVD, I am satisfactorily convinced that the real Snow was intended to have been dead the entire time. Hence the significant shot of the bloodstain in the cold room that Kelvin doesn't notice.]) The thought strikes me that he would have been far less incomplete than the other visitors, though still not quite whole, being made out of a man's own memories of himself.
* The ending. I tend to be a bit dense about these things, but I had to read the book to confirm that he was on the planet's surface there. [ETA 20 April 2008: Well, the real Kelvin is on the planet if he's alive at all-but it's possible that that scene takes place on Earth and the Kelvin we see is as much a visitor as the Rheya who appears to him. I suppose in that case, Gordon's worst fear came true and she brought the phenomenon with her when she went home.]
Finally, I'm hearing Things about Across the Universe. Rather more positive Things than I heard when it was released, but from people I might just consider less trustworthy. Those of you who've seen it, given that a. I'm not by any stretch a Beatles fanatic but would recognize a good few of their songs and live with an avowed Beatle-appreciator and b. Julie Taymor makes me profoundly happy in my film place, would any of you recommend it?