watching movies one cup at a time

I feel like this movie got kind of brushed off. It was delayed for quite awhile before it came out and so by the time it hit theaters at the end of 2008 it was kind of an afterthought. And it didn’t help that Tom Cruise has been riding a negative publicity wave surrounding his controversial Scientology religion and tabloid fare. But despite how people may feel about Tom Cruise and Scientology, he consistently delivers a great performance in all of his movies and it would be a mistake to dismiss a quality movie like this just because of the actor’s personal life.

Directed by the extremely talented Bryan Singer, Valkyrie delivers a compelling story about a part of history we never hear about in the United States. We never hear about the German citizens who chose to rebel against Hitler in the face of tremendous pressure and risk during WWII. A friend of mine who had lived in Germany said that some felt that Germans didn’t need a “Hollywood” movie about their past. But the truth is millions more will hear about this from this movie than a small independent or a documentary. And despite being a so-called “Hollywood” movie, this film has a stellar ensemble cast doing top-notch work. And no one does a better job than Tom Cruise.

The story follows Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg who becomes involved in a plan to take down Hitler and launch a political coup to topple the Third Reich before they lead Germany and the rest of Europe into further destruction and chaos. Many join the cause in the face of oppressive and mandatory loyalty that is enforced through constant threats and coercion. It’s dangerous and risky but we all know the outcome. No spoiler alert necessary. But I never knew about this before and I think it’s important to know that not all German’s citizens, even members of Hitler’s “inner circle,” went along with Hitler.

It’s a quality movie definitely worth watching.

As thrillers go, this was really good. It never got boring and the structure of the film was fast-paced and effective. In the film, an assassination attempt is made on the President of the U.S. while he’s in Spain for a summit meeting. The assassination attempt is followed by a bombing in the plaza where everything is happening. What makes this film interesting though is we get to see the incident from the perspective of 5 different people who were a part of it, and then one big climatic view that ties everything and everyone together. As each person’s view is told, we find out more and more about what happened and who’s responsible. It was very impressive how they kept the different views fresh and only revealed things little by little. And the action level was kept on high throughout the whole movie, kind of like a Bourne flick.

Bottom Line: Lots of car chases, guns, bombs, what’s not to like?

Creepy. What’s up with David Cronenberg? He’s like obsessed with creepy flesh movies where people are puling themselves apart. Videodrome is a tv show that sends out a signal that makes you hallucinate and then lets people control you. James Woods plays a small-time TV network buyer always on the look out for “cutting edge” programs. He comes across videodrome and gets sucked into a world of S&M, sex, violence, and twisted hallucinations. Debbie Harry plays a sort of muse to the videodrome and you never really know if she is real or a hallucination in Wood’s mind. They get freaky, video tapes turn into breathing flesh, tvs come alive and get sexually turned on, and the line between video and reality disappears. It’s got lots of violence, weird sexual images and Debbie Harry looking hot. Not bad.

It would be interesting to see an update in contemporary culture since television is being replaced by the portable media device and the wireless world. Video tapes are now a dead medium so it really dates the movie. But it’s an interesting idea that reality and the perceptual visual image can be manipulated and blurred to the point where it no longer matters what is “real” or not since it’s all just perception anyway. How much of the news and info do we get now through the filters of the internet and cable? It’s a perception that has expanded to a tremendous range but has also reduced our experiences to something best viewed on a screen in isolation, separated from the world.

Videodrome is dated but it is creepy like all of Cronenberg’s movies. Not for the faint of heart but not overly gross either. An interesting look into early ’80s culture and fears of the future.