Elysium
Pretty much the defining standard of a badly written movie, this clunker is a mess of bad, unsubtle writing that drove me to distraction. You can see the script-writers behind every scene and every line of dialogue: "Here we need a scene that needs a female and a vulnerable child. Act vulnerable!" "Here we need a scene with tough guys in a poor neighborhood. Act tough!" And so they do, unimpressively and unmemorably.
A guy on Earth (all of whom are poor and live on a planet with no vegetation (where do they get oxygen?) is critically injured and so, like many others, makes a daring attempt to get to Elysium, a floating ring-world where all the rich people live in style and comfort with universal healing machines. Lots of punching, snarling, meanness, and crashes follow.
Like Skyfall and dozens of other bad movies that inexcusably didn't spend a teeny fraction of their production budget on someone who knows anything about technology, I was once again laughing out loud at the future of computer technology. I love when mankind's highest and most secure technology can be brought low by a couple of twisted wires (why are they still using wires, and why is every wire a universal access port to "the entire system", and why do all access ports universally use the same communication standard as every ad-hoc laptop brought to hack it?).
The basic plot points, while obviously supposed to have political metaphor, don't really make any sense; one example: healing technology is free, limitless, and consumes no resources; why keep it away from the poor people?
Skip.
Before Midnight
This is a sparkling achievement that demonstrates that there is endless possibility for great movies, and they don't need a single special effect or action sequence.
This is the third movie in a trilogy from director Robert Linklater and actors/writers Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy. I don't recognize Ethan from anything else, but I remember Julie from her equally fine performances in Kieslowski's great Trois Couleurs trilogy. All three of the movies in this trilogy (both trilogies, actually) are can't-miss movies, and they should ideally be seen in order.
The movies are sequences of long conversations, some of which take place in real time without a camera cut over the course of 15 or 20 or more minutes. They are daring conversations that present real conversations about universal issues while avoiding anything cliche. They succeed by bringing the individual and his or her perspective into the mix, so that the conversations don't use the exact words that we might use but they sure seem to cover the same ground.
They are insightful and thought-provoking, fascinating, captivating, and at times highly charged and emotional. One of these movies is worth the rest of the summer's multi-million dollar special effect comic book adaptations and Pixar sequels combined.
Must-see. Be warned that this movie contains an extended topless scene, but it's not very sexual.
The Lone Ranger
Speaking of overproduced multi-million dollar special effect movies, this one, like John Carter, was not bad, certainly not as bad as the critics and box office results would lead you to believe. This movie is mis-titled, since it's about Tonto (johnny Depp), with The Lone Ranger (Armie Hammer) thrown in as his straight-man sidekick. Depp is fetching and he has some good lines; a lot of it was fun. The plot is ok: something about railway companies and money; it's about un-trust-able companions really, since the plot is not important.
It tries a little too hard, perhaps. But it's still better than Elysium.
Meh. If you must go out and there is nothing else to see.
Monsters University
An entirely unnecessary prequel that is wholly unoriginal and just not that captivating. This may have worked as a Pixar short. It's a straightforward story about a band of misfits and the same type of moral lessons driven home by Monsters Inc, which was a much better movie. Mike and Sully meet; they are not natural friends, but circumstances require them to team together with a bunch of other misfits in order to graduate. Cue the unlikely victories over the more deserving but arrogant foils.
It's not a bad movie. At least the ending is not bad.
Meh. Skip.
The Great Gatsby
Watching this solidified for me the problem with a whole bunch of recent movies: a director with an over-inflated ego. In this movie, as in Anna Karenina and most famously (and, paradoxically, least problematically) in Moulin Rouge, the director is so in love with himself that he treats the actors like scenery on which to hang the score and visuals. Instead of the movie being about the characters and the dialog, it is whiz, flash, sparkle, moving cameras, mirrors, paintings, and basically anything to avoid a single real moment of human interaction. The characters, when they appear on film, drop lines like they are part of the sound effects.
The result is all style and no substance, and I hate it. It's tiring, obnoxious, and the exact opposite of what a movie is capable of delivering. Like Anna Karenina, I abandoned this about a third of the way through.
Showing posts with label review. Show all posts
Showing posts with label review. Show all posts
Sunday, September 1, 2013
Sunday, July 14, 2013
My Top 35 Albums: 5-1
See: 35-31, 30-26, 25-21, 20-16, 15-11, 10-6
5
5
Here it is, the most perfect, most angelic album (so far) from Sarah. What makes this one so much more than her others, so much more than nearly any other album, is its unearthly quality: without any association with religion, this album is holy. Sarah takes the listener away from this planet to some mystical other-world of pure spirit. This is an album of pure surrender.
The instruments don't so much as play as haunt the melodies. The vocals don't so much as sing but breathe. Lyrics and voice float through the air like ghosts; three random examples:
"'I need some distraction Oh beautiful release Memories seep from my veins Let me be empty Oh and weightless and maybe I'll find some peace tonight"
"And I have the sense to recognize That I don't know how to let you go Every moment marked with apparitions of your soul I'm ever swiftly moving, trying to escape this desire The yearning to be near you"
"Am I already that gone? I only hope that I won't disappoint you When I'm down here on my knees And sweet surrender Is all that I have to give"
5 star songs: Building a Mystery, I Love You, Sweet Surrender, Adia, Do What I Have to Do, Witness, Angel, Full of Grace
4
Pink Floyd was the most ambitious - and talented - rock group ever. Other groups created notable 8 or 9 minute songs; sometimes they sounded like they strained to stretch the songs out for that long. This album is dominated by a single song - in two halves and nine parts - that runs 26 minutes. And, like their previous 23 minute opus Echoes (on Meddle), it's pure bliss. Of the remaining three songs, one of them (Wish You Were Here) is also pure bliss; the others sound fantastic within the context of the whole work (and are premonitions of their albums to come).
I wish I knew how they had so much sense: it's possible to make an 8 or 9 minute song, or a thematic album of connected songs, but to make a single 20+ minute calm yet intense, relaxed yet never boring song - nearly all instrumental - takes more than just ambition and talented musicians. It takes a genius for melody and dynamics: when to crescendo and when to diminuendo, when to strum and when to roar. This is Pink Floyd at the height of their control, patience, and dedication to the perfect sound (before Waters took the band through Animals, The Wall, and The Final Cut, growing more political, angry, and desperate with each album).
5 star songs: Shine On You Crazy Diamond 1-9, Wish You Were Here
3
Ah, Joni. I have several other Canadian female singer songwriters on this list, and each aspires to imitate or succeed Joni, the godmother of Canadian female musicians. Interestingly, this album is infused with the sunlit mornings and starry nights of California.
No one else ever conveyed so much naked honesty, longing, tumult and tranquility, song after beautiful song. The guitar is subtle and strong, the lyrics pure poetry, and her voice ... her famous voice dips, stretches, leaps, cries, and laughs, and still sounds fresh after hundreds of listens and more than 40 years. Only Joan Baez could compete (but Joan kept rigid control over her voice and generally sang other people's or traditional songs). Over the years, Joni has remained a true artist, both musically and otherwise (she famously worked with other art genres, such as providing the painted covers for many of her own albums). She's never written a song that betrayed her artistic conscience, even when the fans of her old material didn't follow her new directions.
This album is perfect ... nearly perfect. I just barely docked the last song (The Last Time I Saw Richard) a star because it's a little weaker than the rest of the songs; I'm still not sure. It probably deserves its fifth star.
Other amazing albums of hers include Clouds, Ladies of the Canyon and Court and Spark, and, as she moved into her jazz period, large portions of Don Juan's Reckless Daughter and Hejira.
5 star songs: All I Want, My Old Man, Little Green, Carey, Blue, California, This Flight Tonight, River, A Case of You
2
This album and the next are my only albums that contain nothing but 5 star songs from beginning to end; they are absolutely perfect.
This album, which was the best-selling album of all time for a while (before Thriller) and which spent more time on Billboard's chart (835 weeks) than any other before or since (second place is 490 weeks, so far), was a bridge between the early and middle periods of Pink Floyd. The album perfects the integrity for which the early albums were famously striving,. The songs are shorter, but they bleed in and out of each other with sound and music effects so that you can't tell where one ends and the next begins. Like most Floyd albums, it leads in and fades out with the same piece of music.
The vocals are integrated equally with the instruments (they were more washed out on earlier albums, and were overemphasized during the Waters dominated albums). The instrumentation is supplemented with the creative (and at the time groundbreaking) use of various noise-making objects, like clocks, metronomes, and (what sounds like) helicopters, spoken voice, odd primal screams, and wordless voices.
The album tackles the subjects of corporate greed, time, death, and insanity. The result is genius, captivating, monumental, timeless. It is the premier modern listening experience, and it has never been equaled.
5 star songs: Speak to Me, Breathe, On the Run, Time, Great Gig in the Sky, Money, Us and Them, Any Colour You Like, Brain Damage, Eclipse
1
The best album I know and the only other album I know with only 5 star songs. This album doesn't have an overarching theme like a Pink Floyd album does; it's just eight perfect musical compositions.
Richard Thompson is a fantastic guitarist and lyricist, with a gift for matching the right music to the right lyrics. His lyrics are as painful and cutting as Dylan's, but his guitar is not simply there to support the message of the song; the music continues to speak after the lyrics are done, and it keeps going, one haunting refrain after another.
Though the album has gifted lyrics, melody, and music, what makes the album is the beautiful voice of Linda Thompson. She is as sensitive with her singing as Richard is with his guitar; soft, plaintive, aching, wistful. Richard isn't as powerful a vocalist as Plant or Gilmour - in fact, he sounds like he's from the Fleetwood Mac school of singing: 3 am, slightly drunk, in the depths of misery - and Linda is not as powerful as Joni or Joan, but when she sings, or when they sing together in harmony, they sing beautifully. The albums that they made together (including I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight, Hokey Pokey, and the critics' favorite and nearly as good Shoot Out the Lights) were an order of magnitude better than their solo efforts (which makes their rather public falling out all the more tragic).
Sweet singing, lovely music, and 8 perfectly written and performed dark songs about pain and heartache. What more could you ask for?
5 star songs: Streets of Paradise, For Shame of Doing Wrong, The Poor Boy Is Taken Away, Night Comes In, Jet Plane in a Rocking Chair, Beat the Retreat, Hard Luck Stories, Dimming of the Day/Dargai
Thanks for reading. I hope you enjoyed the list, and please leave in the comments any albums that you think I would enjoy based on this list.
Saturday, July 13, 2013
My Top 35 Albums: 10-6
See: 35-31, 30-26, 25-21, 20-16, 15-11
10
Pink Floyd - Animals
This is the first of four Pink Floyd albums on this list, and all four are in my top ten. This album's inclusion is also somewhat of a surprise to me; I usually think of this as a lesser Pink Floyd album, forgotten between some of their more popular ones.
But this is still Pink Floyd at the height of their lyrical and musical power: Waters has begun adding his scathingly personal politics and lyrics, but they harmonize with some of the finest engineering and playing from Gilmour, Mason, and Wright. There are only 4 songs on the album (one is divided into parts). The melody writing is superb; songs are balanced just so, the instruments entering and exiting, building up and disappearing at just the right moments. The songs creep into your head. Pigs (Three Different Ones) is the only song I don't favor quite as much; it's a bit of a retread of Have a Cigar from Wish You Were Here, and I don't really like to listen to oinking in my music. Sheep has a bit of One of These Days from Meddle in it, but finds new ground to cover (and I liked One of These Days more than Have a Cigar, anyway; Meddle nearly made this list).
Five star songs: Pigs on the Wing, Dogs, Sheep
9
8
Sarah McLachlan - Laws of Illusion
Afterglow has 6 essential songs and 4 very good songs; this album has 9 essential songs (1 is a reprise) and 4 very good songs. She is now far from the holiness of Surfacing (perhaps because she got it out of her system with Wintersong, which was released before this) and entirely entrenched in love and relationship ... or rather its loss: these songs are mostly about losing love.
Sarah's voice and music is as sublime and wonderful as ever, and her melodies, harmonies, and compositions are just as lovely. These songs are even bouncier than the ones on Afterglow. The lyrics are a tad trite and ordinary in some places, but they are sweet and sad, which is fine. I think - and this is no coincidence - this this would be what Pink Floyd would sound like if they were fronted by a woman.
5 star songs: Awakenings, Illusions of Bliss, Forgiveness, Rivers of Love, Love Come, Out of Tune, Heartbreak, U Want Me 2, Love Come (reprise)
7
Van Morrison - Moondance
Die-hard fans and critics will tell you that Van's debut album Astral Weeks was better (because it was more groundbreaking and less accessible). In my opinion this is the great one. It has all the weird jazzy folk pop intensity that he pioneered in Astral Weeks and adds a rich collection of catchy wonderful melodies (I feel the melodies were weaker on the first album).
Like other albums on this list, Van Morrisson carries you away into something liminal, distant, hazy, mystical, and soulful. Yet, on his Motown-influenced ballads, he can be very real and present, an alpha-male personal love-struck suitor.
Into the Mystic and Moondance are two of the finest songs by anyone, ever.
5 star songs: And It Stoned Me, Moondance, Crazy Love, Caravan, Into the Mystic, Brand New Day, Glad Tidings
6
Pink Floyd - A Momentary Lapse of Reason
This is the first of the last two Pink Floyd albums, which means that it doesn't include Roger Waters. Waters had a searing political agenda that drove the band in a certain direction. The awesome musical abilities of the rest of Pink Floyd carried this agenda, but I'm actually rather happy to see him gone here. This album has a freer, less negative and more playful spirit, with a looser, less-rigid theme, without sacrificing any of the amazing musicianship.
There is a nod to Waters'-style political lyrics in Dogs of War (which is a good song, but one the two that I don't rate 5 stars), but the rest of the album is about dreams, flying, adventure, and compassion (kind of a boy's fantasy). The first side contains some fantastic independent songs; the second side is an epic, wondrous fantasy of forests and winter as enchanting as anything written by any rock group; it has four songs (one is split into two parts), but it may as well be one song.
5 star songs: Signs of Life, Learning to Fly, One Slip, On The Turning Away, Yet Another Movie - Round and Round, A New Machine (parts 1 and 2), Terminal Frost
10
This is the first of four Pink Floyd albums on this list, and all four are in my top ten. This album's inclusion is also somewhat of a surprise to me; I usually think of this as a lesser Pink Floyd album, forgotten between some of their more popular ones.
But this is still Pink Floyd at the height of their lyrical and musical power: Waters has begun adding his scathingly personal politics and lyrics, but they harmonize with some of the finest engineering and playing from Gilmour, Mason, and Wright. There are only 4 songs on the album (one is divided into parts). The melody writing is superb; songs are balanced just so, the instruments entering and exiting, building up and disappearing at just the right moments. The songs creep into your head. Pigs (Three Different Ones) is the only song I don't favor quite as much; it's a bit of a retread of Have a Cigar from Wish You Were Here, and I don't really like to listen to oinking in my music. Sheep has a bit of One of These Days from Meddle in it, but finds new ground to cover (and I liked One of These Days more than Have a Cigar, anyway; Meddle nearly made this list).
Five star songs: Pigs on the Wing, Dogs, Sheep
9
Sarah's album right before this, Surfacing, was a pinnacle (for Sarah and for music, in general). I thought that she had nowhere to go but down. How can anyone keep making music that sublime, that holy, that wonderful, at that level?
Somehow, amazingly, she created a whole new collection of songs that are as sublime and wonderful (if not quite as holy). While she can hardly do better than Surfacing, this album is darn close. Ethereal, beautiful, poignant, sad ... well, maybe not quite as sad as Surfacing, and the songs bring her back among us mortals. Some actually have a bit of a bounce to them. On this album she's trying to capture something, find something that she can connect to, rather than just drift around, content in the perfect beauty of her loss.
Somehow, amazingly, she created a whole new collection of songs that are as sublime and wonderful (if not quite as holy). While she can hardly do better than Surfacing, this album is darn close. Ethereal, beautiful, poignant, sad ... well, maybe not quite as sad as Surfacing, and the songs bring her back among us mortals. Some actually have a bit of a bounce to them. On this album she's trying to capture something, find something that she can connect to, rather than just drift around, content in the perfect beauty of her loss.
5 star songs: Fallen, World on Fire, Drifting, Train Wreck, Answer, Time
8
Afterglow has 6 essential songs and 4 very good songs; this album has 9 essential songs (1 is a reprise) and 4 very good songs. She is now far from the holiness of Surfacing (perhaps because she got it out of her system with Wintersong, which was released before this) and entirely entrenched in love and relationship ... or rather its loss: these songs are mostly about losing love.
Sarah's voice and music is as sublime and wonderful as ever, and her melodies, harmonies, and compositions are just as lovely. These songs are even bouncier than the ones on Afterglow. The lyrics are a tad trite and ordinary in some places, but they are sweet and sad, which is fine. I think - and this is no coincidence - this this would be what Pink Floyd would sound like if they were fronted by a woman.
5 star songs: Awakenings, Illusions of Bliss, Forgiveness, Rivers of Love, Love Come, Out of Tune, Heartbreak, U Want Me 2, Love Come (reprise)
7
Die-hard fans and critics will tell you that Van's debut album Astral Weeks was better (because it was more groundbreaking and less accessible). In my opinion this is the great one. It has all the weird jazzy folk pop intensity that he pioneered in Astral Weeks and adds a rich collection of catchy wonderful melodies (I feel the melodies were weaker on the first album).
Like other albums on this list, Van Morrisson carries you away into something liminal, distant, hazy, mystical, and soulful. Yet, on his Motown-influenced ballads, he can be very real and present, an alpha-male personal love-struck suitor.
Into the Mystic and Moondance are two of the finest songs by anyone, ever.
5 star songs: And It Stoned Me, Moondance, Crazy Love, Caravan, Into the Mystic, Brand New Day, Glad Tidings
6
Pink Floyd - A Momentary Lapse of Reason
This is the first of the last two Pink Floyd albums, which means that it doesn't include Roger Waters. Waters had a searing political agenda that drove the band in a certain direction. The awesome musical abilities of the rest of Pink Floyd carried this agenda, but I'm actually rather happy to see him gone here. This album has a freer, less negative and more playful spirit, with a looser, less-rigid theme, without sacrificing any of the amazing musicianship.
There is a nod to Waters'-style political lyrics in Dogs of War (which is a good song, but one the two that I don't rate 5 stars), but the rest of the album is about dreams, flying, adventure, and compassion (kind of a boy's fantasy). The first side contains some fantastic independent songs; the second side is an epic, wondrous fantasy of forests and winter as enchanting as anything written by any rock group; it has four songs (one is split into two parts), but it may as well be one song.
5 star songs: Signs of Life, Learning to Fly, One Slip, On The Turning Away, Yet Another Movie - Round and Round, A New Machine (parts 1 and 2), Terminal Frost
Friday, July 12, 2013
My Top 35 Albums: 15-11
See: 35-31, 30-26, 25-21, 20-16
15
Kelly Clarkson - Breakaway
I already admitted that I was surprised at some of the entries on this list; here's one of them. Some people thought that Kelly's creative efforts had hit their high point on her debut album after her American Idol win - obviously not. This followup is a strong collection of collaboratively written hit songs from one end to the other.
What makes them work, aside from the catchy melodies, is Kelly's powerful, steady, soulful voice, which alternates between raw ferocious and raw bleeding, and some honestly painful lyrics. Kelly really is a great singer, and not just a pretty performer. Maybe there is a little too much early Avril here and a little too much production. She manages to rise above the mainstream morass of cookie-cutter / schmaltzy popular music; this is a great rock album.
5 star songs: Breakaway, Since U Been Gone, Behind These Hazel Eyes, Because of You, Addicted, You Found Me, Hear Me, Beautiful Disaster (live)
14
Alanis Morissette - Jagged Little Pill
Unlike Kelly, I feel no compulsion to make excuses here. Alanis is truly an independent incredible talent. The anger on this album sounds so familiar because she pioneered this attitude that others imitated.
Alanis is special because of her poetry and her performance. She doesn't write a few words of pain and sing them over and over, hoping to hook you with the chorus. Each song is a complete story and some of her songs don't even have choruses. She is not afraid to expose everything real. She curses when she has to. She admits that she can be just as wrongheaded and difficult as the people she's singing about, when she has to. She can't help but be brutally honest.
As for her performance, Alanis, like Sinatra and Dylan, sings slightly off the beat and rhythm, sometimes fast, and sometimes slow, so that her songs don't become pretty, polished, perfect pop songs. She wants you to know it's her and you, alone. She's not here to sing; she's here to talk. And you have to listen. If only someone would have taught her what the word "ironic" means.
You also can't miss her followup Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie.
5 star songs: All I Really Want, You Oughta Know, Hand in My Pocket, You Learn, Head Over Feet, Mary Jane, Ironic, Not the Doctor, You Oughta Know (alternate)/Forgive Me Love
13
Renaissance - A Song For All Seasons
Renaissance returned in 1978, after several years of lovely but electric-guitar-less albums, with this tour de force prog rock album about love and life. It's a more personal album; their previous albums were dramatic but distant, about other cultures, myths, and epic stories. This one is all about the heart, but it's still vast, majestic, and epic music.
It's also their last great album; after this they incorporated synthesizers into their music. The result was a mess and the band quickly fell apart.
5 star songs: Opening Out, The Day of the Dreamer, Kindness (At The End), Back Home Once Again, Northern Lights, A Song For All Seasons
12
Led Zeppelin - IV
Each instrument on each song contributes in perfect balance: Bonham's drums are heavy and resonant, Page's guitar is sublime, Jone's bass (and other contributions) is both delicate and thunderous, and Plant's plaintive, screeching-yet-controlled vocals soar around and through the music with ethereal grace.
Led Zeppelin may have laid the groundwork for heavy metal music, and this music is as heavy as it gets, but it's not a heavy metal album: it's blues infused with strong elements of folk music and hard rock. I think of heavy metal as instrument-centered, overwhelming you with drums and guitar, with vocals that serve the instruments in a wall of sound and fantastical but irrelevant lyrics. Led Zeppelin keep everything in balance. The instruments, vocals, evocative lyrics, and melodies serve the song; the blues and folk tempos keep it all grounded. The melodies are defined just enough to contain it all, and the result is a classic album. And, of course, there's Stairway to Heaven.
Led Zeppelin I, II. and III were also great; all their albums were pretty great.
5 star songs: Black Dog, Rock and Roll, Stairway to Heaven, Misty Mountain Hop, Going to California, When the Levee Breaks
[Until now, all of the albums had at least one filler song (unless noted). Albums 11-3 have no fillers; all songs are very good (4 stars) or essential (5 stars)]
11
Simon and Garfunkle - Wednesday Morning 3 AM
This is the only completely bare folk album from S and G. Their other albums sound less like the Everly Brothers and more like the sounds you may be more familiar with from The Boxer and America.
Actually, only some of the songs on this album sound like the Everly Brothers; slower songs are more like gospel infused with the quiet, subtle, startling harmonies for which these two are so famous. The songwriting is a mixture of evocative gospel and poetry. You would swear that the gospel is centuries old (ok, some of it is, admittedly, from traditional sources). The poetry is as good as it got in 20th century New York. The guitar serves mainly to accentuate the voices and lyrics.
They made four other albums - Bridge Over Troubled Waters, Parsley, Sage, Rosemary & Thyme, Bookends, and Sounds of Silence - all of which have classic songs on them, though they all have (what I consider to be too many) filler songs.
5 star songs: You Can Tell The World, Bleeker Street, Benedictus, The Sounds of Silence, Peggy-O, The Times They Are A-Changin', Wednesday Morning 3 AM
15
I already admitted that I was surprised at some of the entries on this list; here's one of them. Some people thought that Kelly's creative efforts had hit their high point on her debut album after her American Idol win - obviously not. This followup is a strong collection of collaboratively written hit songs from one end to the other.
What makes them work, aside from the catchy melodies, is Kelly's powerful, steady, soulful voice, which alternates between raw ferocious and raw bleeding, and some honestly painful lyrics. Kelly really is a great singer, and not just a pretty performer. Maybe there is a little too much early Avril here and a little too much production. She manages to rise above the mainstream morass of cookie-cutter / schmaltzy popular music; this is a great rock album.
5 star songs: Breakaway, Since U Been Gone, Behind These Hazel Eyes, Because of You, Addicted, You Found Me, Hear Me, Beautiful Disaster (live)
14
Unlike Kelly, I feel no compulsion to make excuses here. Alanis is truly an independent incredible talent. The anger on this album sounds so familiar because she pioneered this attitude that others imitated.
Alanis is special because of her poetry and her performance. She doesn't write a few words of pain and sing them over and over, hoping to hook you with the chorus. Each song is a complete story and some of her songs don't even have choruses. She is not afraid to expose everything real. She curses when she has to. She admits that she can be just as wrongheaded and difficult as the people she's singing about, when she has to. She can't help but be brutally honest.
As for her performance, Alanis, like Sinatra and Dylan, sings slightly off the beat and rhythm, sometimes fast, and sometimes slow, so that her songs don't become pretty, polished, perfect pop songs. She wants you to know it's her and you, alone. She's not here to sing; she's here to talk. And you have to listen. If only someone would have taught her what the word "ironic" means.
You also can't miss her followup Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie.
5 star songs: All I Really Want, You Oughta Know, Hand in My Pocket, You Learn, Head Over Feet, Mary Jane, Ironic, Not the Doctor, You Oughta Know (alternate)/Forgive Me Love
13
Renaissance returned in 1978, after several years of lovely but electric-guitar-less albums, with this tour de force prog rock album about love and life. It's a more personal album; their previous albums were dramatic but distant, about other cultures, myths, and epic stories. This one is all about the heart, but it's still vast, majestic, and epic music.
It's also their last great album; after this they incorporated synthesizers into their music. The result was a mess and the band quickly fell apart.
5 star songs: Opening Out, The Day of the Dreamer, Kindness (At The End), Back Home Once Again, Northern Lights, A Song For All Seasons
12
Each instrument on each song contributes in perfect balance: Bonham's drums are heavy and resonant, Page's guitar is sublime, Jone's bass (and other contributions) is both delicate and thunderous, and Plant's plaintive, screeching-yet-controlled vocals soar around and through the music with ethereal grace.
Led Zeppelin may have laid the groundwork for heavy metal music, and this music is as heavy as it gets, but it's not a heavy metal album: it's blues infused with strong elements of folk music and hard rock. I think of heavy metal as instrument-centered, overwhelming you with drums and guitar, with vocals that serve the instruments in a wall of sound and fantastical but irrelevant lyrics. Led Zeppelin keep everything in balance. The instruments, vocals, evocative lyrics, and melodies serve the song; the blues and folk tempos keep it all grounded. The melodies are defined just enough to contain it all, and the result is a classic album. And, of course, there's Stairway to Heaven.
Led Zeppelin I, II. and III were also great; all their albums were pretty great.
5 star songs: Black Dog, Rock and Roll, Stairway to Heaven, Misty Mountain Hop, Going to California, When the Levee Breaks
[Until now, all of the albums had at least one filler song (unless noted). Albums 11-3 have no fillers; all songs are very good (4 stars) or essential (5 stars)]
11
This is the only completely bare folk album from S and G. Their other albums sound less like the Everly Brothers and more like the sounds you may be more familiar with from The Boxer and America.
Actually, only some of the songs on this album sound like the Everly Brothers; slower songs are more like gospel infused with the quiet, subtle, startling harmonies for which these two are so famous. The songwriting is a mixture of evocative gospel and poetry. You would swear that the gospel is centuries old (ok, some of it is, admittedly, from traditional sources). The poetry is as good as it got in 20th century New York. The guitar serves mainly to accentuate the voices and lyrics.
They made four other albums - Bridge Over Troubled Waters, Parsley, Sage, Rosemary & Thyme, Bookends, and Sounds of Silence - all of which have classic songs on them, though they all have (what I consider to be too many) filler songs.
5 star songs: You Can Tell The World, Bleeker Street, Benedictus, The Sounds of Silence, Peggy-O, The Times They Are A-Changin', Wednesday Morning 3 AM
Thursday, July 11, 2013
My Top 35 Albums: 20-16
See: 35-31, 30-26, 25-21
20
R.E.M. - Out of Time
It's hard to take this album seriously. It sounds like they sat around throwing together melodies, lyrics, and vocals, and had a ball. Earlier R.E.M. albums have an earnest, youthful intensity; later ones have a melancholy seriousness. This one is just goofy. What can you say about a song with lyrics like "Throw your love around, love me love me / Take it into town, happy happy / Put it in the ground where the flowers grow / Gold and silver shine"? Say what?
Somehow, maybe by accident, they hit on some really catchy alternative pop tunes. Combined with their signature upbeat guitar sounds and Mills' and Stipe's snide business-like vocals - with the unexpected, uncharacteristic, yet fantastic female vocals of Kate Pierson (The B-52s) - you get something that's so fun and so aware of its own joke that you just have to go along with it. And I'm not even a huge fan of the album's hit song.
For other good R.E.M. albums, don't miss Reckoning (early college sound) and their followup to this album Automatic For The People.
5 star songs: Near Wild Heaven, Shiny Happy People, Belong, Half a World Away, Texarkana, Me In Honey
19
Dar Williams - The Honesty Room
College music was never more collegiate than Dar Williams on this album.
Dar Williams' debut album (after two self-published cassettes with limited distribution and generally weak songs) rocked the independent folk music scene (and impressed the likes of Joan Baez, who covered Dar's tunes and then went on tour with her). Dar is brutally honest here in a way that she (unfortunately) never was again: about gender roles and discrimination, about youth and maturity, about suburbia and relationships. Her poetry is so good that you could read it in a book and not know it for song lyrics.
She plays some fine finger-style guitar and sings with a gorgeously aching vulnerability, while still conveying strength and determination, while still being totally fetching. She sings like a little child (literally, on When I Was a Boy and The Babysitter's Here), like an intimate lover (In Love But Not at Peace), and like a concerned activist (The Great Unknown). And she still finds time to be funny (Alleluia and The Babysitter's Here), nostalgic, and deeply feminist.
5 star songs: When I Was a Boy, Alleluia, The Great Unknown, The Babysitter's Here, You're Aging Well, In Love But Not at Peace, This is Not the House That Pain Built, i love i love ( traveling II )
18
Sarah McLachlan - Fumbling Towards Ecstasy
The first of four Sarah albums on this list, this was her first great album. (I can't help but notice that this list contains a number of Canadian women).
Sarah has a stunning, ethereal, haunting voice ... ok, so do Enya and Loreena McKennit; they are fine musicians, too, with some great albums. Unlike Enya and Loreena, whose songs are like theatrical performances, Sarah's songs are contemporary, raw, and penetrating. Despite the repeated lush synthesizer overlays, she sounds naked, vulnerable, always one step away from complete mental or emotional collapse:
"Hold on, hold on to yourself, for this is gonna hurt like hell." "The ice is thin, come on dive in, underneath my lucid skin, the cold is lost, forgotten" "My body aches to breathe your breath, your words keep me alive" You just want to hold her - or yourself - after experiencing her music.
And then there's Ice Cream; who doesn't want to hear that his or her love is better than ice cream, chocolate, and anything else that is known?
5 star songs: Possession, Plenty, Good Enough, Mary, Elsewhere, Ice, Hold On, Ice Cream, Fumbling Towards Ecstasy
[Until now, all of the albums had two or three filler songs (unless noted). Albums 17-12 have only one filler song each; all other songs are very good (4 stars) or essential (5 stars)]
17
Cindy Kallet - Working on Wings to Fly
Here is Cindy's debut album, a synthesis of masterful finger-style guitar, clever catchy riffs and melodies, assured singing, a rich deep steady voice, and lyrics about the sea, harbor, and environment. Many of her songs - which she wrote - sound like they are centuries old.
From the opening chords of Nantucket Sound to the final notes of Shores of Africa with its unexpectedly lovely harmonies, there is little to complain about. The introductory chords of Blackberry Downs are so beautiful it makes the heart ache. This is the standard in contemporary folk-music excellence.
5 star songs: Nantucket Sound, Wings to Fly (Crow), Three-Masted Schooner, Blackberry Downs, Roll to the River, We Rigged Our Ship, Far Off of the Mountains, Out on the Farthest Range, One for the Island, Shores of Africa.
16
Lynn Miles - Slightly Haunted
This was Lynn's "debut" (her third album, actually). This album has a bit of engineering and other instrumentation - Chalk had almost none. Just enough to add the slight haunting at the appropriate places.
This may sound familiar by now, but here is another collection of haunting, aching, beautiful songs. Some are raw, sad, and naked (Loneliness); others are carefully constructed masterpieces (I Loved a Cowboy, The Ghost of Deadlock). The melodies, together with overlays of strumming guitars, are full of melancholy. Maybe it's the Canadian in her, but each song feels like winter is coming soon: time to go home and cuddle up under a blanket until spring. In Last Night she even pays homage to, and channels, Joni ... just a little.
5 star songs: You Don't Love Me Anymore, I Loved a Cowboy, Loneliness, The Ghost of Deadlock, Last Night, Big Brown City
20
It's hard to take this album seriously. It sounds like they sat around throwing together melodies, lyrics, and vocals, and had a ball. Earlier R.E.M. albums have an earnest, youthful intensity; later ones have a melancholy seriousness. This one is just goofy. What can you say about a song with lyrics like "Throw your love around, love me love me / Take it into town, happy happy / Put it in the ground where the flowers grow / Gold and silver shine"? Say what?
Somehow, maybe by accident, they hit on some really catchy alternative pop tunes. Combined with their signature upbeat guitar sounds and Mills' and Stipe's snide business-like vocals - with the unexpected, uncharacteristic, yet fantastic female vocals of Kate Pierson (The B-52s) - you get something that's so fun and so aware of its own joke that you just have to go along with it. And I'm not even a huge fan of the album's hit song.
For other good R.E.M. albums, don't miss Reckoning (early college sound) and their followup to this album Automatic For The People.
5 star songs: Near Wild Heaven, Shiny Happy People, Belong, Half a World Away, Texarkana, Me In Honey
19
College music was never more collegiate than Dar Williams on this album.
Dar Williams' debut album (after two self-published cassettes with limited distribution and generally weak songs) rocked the independent folk music scene (and impressed the likes of Joan Baez, who covered Dar's tunes and then went on tour with her). Dar is brutally honest here in a way that she (unfortunately) never was again: about gender roles and discrimination, about youth and maturity, about suburbia and relationships. Her poetry is so good that you could read it in a book and not know it for song lyrics.
She plays some fine finger-style guitar and sings with a gorgeously aching vulnerability, while still conveying strength and determination, while still being totally fetching. She sings like a little child (literally, on When I Was a Boy and The Babysitter's Here), like an intimate lover (In Love But Not at Peace), and like a concerned activist (The Great Unknown). And she still finds time to be funny (Alleluia and The Babysitter's Here), nostalgic, and deeply feminist.
5 star songs: When I Was a Boy, Alleluia, The Great Unknown, The Babysitter's Here, You're Aging Well, In Love But Not at Peace, This is Not the House That Pain Built, i love i love ( traveling II )
18
The first of four Sarah albums on this list, this was her first great album. (I can't help but notice that this list contains a number of Canadian women).
Sarah has a stunning, ethereal, haunting voice ... ok, so do Enya and Loreena McKennit; they are fine musicians, too, with some great albums. Unlike Enya and Loreena, whose songs are like theatrical performances, Sarah's songs are contemporary, raw, and penetrating. Despite the repeated lush synthesizer overlays, she sounds naked, vulnerable, always one step away from complete mental or emotional collapse:
"Hold on, hold on to yourself, for this is gonna hurt like hell." "The ice is thin, come on dive in, underneath my lucid skin, the cold is lost, forgotten" "My body aches to breathe your breath, your words keep me alive" You just want to hold her - or yourself - after experiencing her music.
And then there's Ice Cream; who doesn't want to hear that his or her love is better than ice cream, chocolate, and anything else that is known?
5 star songs: Possession, Plenty, Good Enough, Mary, Elsewhere, Ice, Hold On, Ice Cream, Fumbling Towards Ecstasy
[Until now, all of the albums had two or three filler songs (unless noted). Albums 17-12 have only one filler song each; all other songs are very good (4 stars) or essential (5 stars)]
17
Here is Cindy's debut album, a synthesis of masterful finger-style guitar, clever catchy riffs and melodies, assured singing, a rich deep steady voice, and lyrics about the sea, harbor, and environment. Many of her songs - which she wrote - sound like they are centuries old.
From the opening chords of Nantucket Sound to the final notes of Shores of Africa with its unexpectedly lovely harmonies, there is little to complain about. The introductory chords of Blackberry Downs are so beautiful it makes the heart ache. This is the standard in contemporary folk-music excellence.
5 star songs: Nantucket Sound, Wings to Fly (Crow), Three-Masted Schooner, Blackberry Downs, Roll to the River, We Rigged Our Ship, Far Off of the Mountains, Out on the Farthest Range, One for the Island, Shores of Africa.
16
This was Lynn's "debut" (her third album, actually). This album has a bit of engineering and other instrumentation - Chalk had almost none. Just enough to add the slight haunting at the appropriate places.
This may sound familiar by now, but here is another collection of haunting, aching, beautiful songs. Some are raw, sad, and naked (Loneliness); others are carefully constructed masterpieces (I Loved a Cowboy, The Ghost of Deadlock). The melodies, together with overlays of strumming guitars, are full of melancholy. Maybe it's the Canadian in her, but each song feels like winter is coming soon: time to go home and cuddle up under a blanket until spring. In Last Night she even pays homage to, and channels, Joni ... just a little.
5 star songs: You Don't Love Me Anymore, I Loved a Cowboy, Loneliness, The Ghost of Deadlock, Last Night, Big Brown City
Wednesday, July 10, 2013
My Top 35 Albums: 25-21
See: 35-31, 30-26
25
Cindy Kallet - 2
Cindy's debut album is higher up on this list; this is her sophomore release. This woman, a soccer mom originally from Martha's Vineyard and the coast of Maine, is a damn fine guitarist with a captivating baritone voice. The album contains nothing else, nothing but a singer and her instrument. What makes this album so special is the relentlessly good guitar, voice, tunes, and writing: fisherman's music on the rocky coast of Maine so evocative that you can smell the tangy spray and hear the seagulls.
Cindy's lyrics are heartfelt, playful, strong, and full of a yearning for the simple joys of walking on a seashore or watching clouds drift by. She throws in a few complaints about war, sexism, and the absence of a lover; just the kind of talk you'd expect from a good friend on a quiet, contemplative day.
The album has only a single filler song; the rest are either very good (4 stars) or essential (5 stars).
5 star songs: Listen I Think the Rain's Come, Trying Times, Steamboat to the Mainland, Marblehead Neck, If I Sing, Mountains Range, I Don't Have To
24
The Cranberries - Everyone Else is Doing It So Why Can't We?
The Cranberries were a kick in the pants to alternative music with their breathy vocal murmurings and airy and evocative guitar and keyboards. Their debut album captures a magical misty mood that lingers long after the music ends.
It's not exactly hard, or soft, or casual, or serious, or angry, or wistful, or even alternative. It's a world out of focus, like somewhere in the middle of a David Lynch film. Whatever. This album packs a great bunch of tunes.
Other good albums are No Need to Argue and To the Faithful Departed (although the latter gets a bit heavy-handed with politics).
5 star songs: Dreams, Sunday, Pretty, Linger, Wanted, Put Me Down
23
Lynn Miles - Chalk This One Up to the Moon
Lynn's second album was, like her self-titled cassette, not released in widespread circulation, and is now extremely rare (the above copy on Amazon will run you $200).
It's filled with beautiful, evocative songs sung with naked simplicity. It's nearly as good as her wide-release "debut" album (her third, which is higher on this list). She plays well and she sings with an angst like heartbreak. This is folk music with a gorgeous voice, mesmerizing guitar, elegant tunes, and poignant lyrics. Listening to this album is like listening to a really good coffee house singer with a warm cup of coffee in your hands. The album has a few filler songs, but the best songs are worth repeated listens.
5 star songs: All I Ever Wanted, It's Gone, I Can't Tell You Why, Nobody's Angel, A Little Rain, Never Again
22
Carole King - Tapestry
Carole has the familiar, languorous voice of your sister lounging around, drinking iced tea on a hot summer Sunday afternoon in a Brooklyn brownstone (just like on the album cover). Maybe the vocal familiarity is specific to me, since I grew around that kind of voice in that kind of environment (actually I lived in the suburbs, but I visited Brooklyn often enough, and my relatives sounded like her).
Carole was already famous for her songwriting, and this album proved that she was just as good doing her own interpretations. Her post-liberated, early-seventies soul-infused lyrics and jazzy voice blend with the understated rhythmic piano to create songs that are cool, intimate, casual, and earthy. She sounds as good today as she did back then. The fabulous Rickie Lee Jones and Beth Orton are her direct descendants.
5 star songs: I Feel the Earth Move, It's Too Late, You've Got a Friend, Where You Lead, Will You Love Me Tomorrow?, (You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman
21
Donovan - Fairy Tale
Donovan's second album is his strongest, and an astounding work from a 19 year old runaway doped-up beach bum. No one inhabited the hippie dippie flower child image like Donovan. By the late seventies, everyone was making fun of him, but he was the real deal.
He writes and sings like he means it, and he really does mean it. Bob Dylan was jealous of him; they both had some catchy melodies, but Donovan could actually sing. Dylan's grittiness and anger is more powerful, and his poetry more cutting; Donovan's is more genteel, uses more allusions. Dylan sings about physical pain and politics, while Donovan sings about spiritual ache and love as allegories for physical pain and politics (except for some songs in which he is more direct, like Universal Soldier). It's the difference between America and Britain in a nutshell. Both are awesome. Do you want to feel enraged and bitter or wistful and moved?
After this album, Donovan's next albums pretty much led everyone else in the transition to psychedelia and electronic instruments. I've never been stoned, but I suspect that listening to Barabajagal is about the same experience.
5 star songs: Colours, To Try For The Sun, Sunny Goodge Street, Oh Deed I Do, Circus Of Sour, Candy Man, The Ballad Of A Crystal Man, The Balland of Geraldine, Universal Soldier [on some versions]
25
Cindy's debut album is higher up on this list; this is her sophomore release. This woman, a soccer mom originally from Martha's Vineyard and the coast of Maine, is a damn fine guitarist with a captivating baritone voice. The album contains nothing else, nothing but a singer and her instrument. What makes this album so special is the relentlessly good guitar, voice, tunes, and writing: fisherman's music on the rocky coast of Maine so evocative that you can smell the tangy spray and hear the seagulls.
Cindy's lyrics are heartfelt, playful, strong, and full of a yearning for the simple joys of walking on a seashore or watching clouds drift by. She throws in a few complaints about war, sexism, and the absence of a lover; just the kind of talk you'd expect from a good friend on a quiet, contemplative day.
The album has only a single filler song; the rest are either very good (4 stars) or essential (5 stars).
5 star songs: Listen I Think the Rain's Come, Trying Times, Steamboat to the Mainland, Marblehead Neck, If I Sing, Mountains Range, I Don't Have To
24
The Cranberries were a kick in the pants to alternative music with their breathy vocal murmurings and airy and evocative guitar and keyboards. Their debut album captures a magical misty mood that lingers long after the music ends.
It's not exactly hard, or soft, or casual, or serious, or angry, or wistful, or even alternative. It's a world out of focus, like somewhere in the middle of a David Lynch film. Whatever. This album packs a great bunch of tunes.
Other good albums are No Need to Argue and To the Faithful Departed (although the latter gets a bit heavy-handed with politics).
5 star songs: Dreams, Sunday, Pretty, Linger, Wanted, Put Me Down
23
Lynn's second album was, like her self-titled cassette, not released in widespread circulation, and is now extremely rare (the above copy on Amazon will run you $200).
It's filled with beautiful, evocative songs sung with naked simplicity. It's nearly as good as her wide-release "debut" album (her third, which is higher on this list). She plays well and she sings with an angst like heartbreak. This is folk music with a gorgeous voice, mesmerizing guitar, elegant tunes, and poignant lyrics. Listening to this album is like listening to a really good coffee house singer with a warm cup of coffee in your hands. The album has a few filler songs, but the best songs are worth repeated listens.
5 star songs: All I Ever Wanted, It's Gone, I Can't Tell You Why, Nobody's Angel, A Little Rain, Never Again
22
Carole has the familiar, languorous voice of your sister lounging around, drinking iced tea on a hot summer Sunday afternoon in a Brooklyn brownstone (just like on the album cover). Maybe the vocal familiarity is specific to me, since I grew around that kind of voice in that kind of environment (actually I lived in the suburbs, but I visited Brooklyn often enough, and my relatives sounded like her).
Carole was already famous for her songwriting, and this album proved that she was just as good doing her own interpretations. Her post-liberated, early-seventies soul-infused lyrics and jazzy voice blend with the understated rhythmic piano to create songs that are cool, intimate, casual, and earthy. She sounds as good today as she did back then. The fabulous Rickie Lee Jones and Beth Orton are her direct descendants.
5 star songs: I Feel the Earth Move, It's Too Late, You've Got a Friend, Where You Lead, Will You Love Me Tomorrow?, (You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman
21
Donovan's second album is his strongest, and an astounding work from a 19 year old runaway doped-up beach bum. No one inhabited the hippie dippie flower child image like Donovan. By the late seventies, everyone was making fun of him, but he was the real deal.
He writes and sings like he means it, and he really does mean it. Bob Dylan was jealous of him; they both had some catchy melodies, but Donovan could actually sing. Dylan's grittiness and anger is more powerful, and his poetry more cutting; Donovan's is more genteel, uses more allusions. Dylan sings about physical pain and politics, while Donovan sings about spiritual ache and love as allegories for physical pain and politics (except for some songs in which he is more direct, like Universal Soldier). It's the difference between America and Britain in a nutshell. Both are awesome. Do you want to feel enraged and bitter or wistful and moved?
After this album, Donovan's next albums pretty much led everyone else in the transition to psychedelia and electronic instruments. I've never been stoned, but I suspect that listening to Barabajagal is about the same experience.
5 star songs: Colours, To Try For The Sun, Sunny Goodge Street, Oh Deed I Do, Circus Of Sour, Candy Man, The Ballad Of A Crystal Man, The Balland of Geraldine, Universal Soldier [on some versions]
Tuesday, July 9, 2013
My Top 35 Albums: 30-26
See: 35-31
30
Fleetwood Mac - Rumors
Nearly 40 years on, this album of pop standards is still fresh because a) the songs are so tight, and b) each song showcases a different combination of talents. It's like they passed around the guitar to each member and said "Here. Give us your best."
Actually, many of the songs sound like they were sung at 3 am on the floor of a recording studio, exhausted after six hours of fighting, while intoxicated ... which is actually how the album came to be. Other bands with similar sounds in the seventies are dated (Seals and Crofts, anyone?). Where they were all style, Fleetwood Mac added weariness, pain, and soul.
While some of my favorite Fleetwood Mac songs (Landslide, Sarah, Gypsy) are on other albums, this album contains nothing but good songs the whole way through. Their eponymous album has a similar sound (this is like part 2 of that album).
This album also has no filler songs; it's not more highly ranked because the very good songs slightly outweigh the 5 star songs. I admit that some of the songs that didn't make my 5 star song rating might have been 5 stars on some other band's album.
5 star songs: Dreams, Don't Stop, Go Your Own Way, Songbird, Gold Dust Woman
29
Dar Williams - Mortal City
This is Dar's second major album (her debut is higher up on the list). This album contains simple guitar playing, carefully constructed melodies and harmonies, and some poetry of immense power. It's not higher on the list only because the songs that are not 5 stars are only ok (as opposed to really good; at least they are not bad). This is the second of her two great albums (so far); she has a good material on subsequent albums, but it's mixed with a lot of artifice.
At this point, Dar was still singing folk music with just a little bit of electric instrumentation thrown in. February is one of the best songs of the last 50 years, and The Christians and the Pagans is both meaningful and hysterical.
5 star songs: As Cool As I Am, February, The Christians and the Pagans, This Was Pompeii, The Ocean, Family
28
Lynn Miles - Unravel
Lynn has two other albums higher on this list. This is her fifth album, counting her self-released self-titled cassette. Some people like her fourth album (Night in a Strange Town) more, but, oddly, that album is the only one of hers that I'm not crazy about.
Unravel sees her transition from the poignant but sweet and simple sounds of her early albums to a raw anguish that comes from a late night of brooding over cigarettes and whisky. I'm Over You is perfectly stunning and haunting. Black Flowers sounds like it should be a far older song. The album has a few missteps, such as the somewhat dull When Did the World, and a few lovely phrases, like "sad songs matter most". Lynn mostly sings beautifully, daringly, and wistfully. Listen at night, while on the road.
5 star songs: I'm the Moon, Undertow, Over You, Unravel, Black Flowers, Surrender Dorothy
27
Coldplay - Mylo Xylo
Unlike some of my friends, I think Coldplay gets better with each album. Yes, the original albums had unique and wonderful songs that were more groundbreaking, but many of the other songs on those albums were fillers. The number of fillers gets smaller on each album (I also really like Viva La Vida and X & Y). Mylo Xylo is their first true concept album, and while not completely free of fillers, the good songs now seem to flow effortlessly. I even love their new visual style.
The wall of sound, catchy tunes, thumping lively music, and vocal harmonies are just so ... Coldplay. Mylo Xylo is a story about dystopia, but it never feels anything less than happy.
5 star songs: Hurts Like Heaven, Paradise, Charlie Brown, Every Teardrop Is a Waterfall, Princess of China, Don't Let It Break Your Heart
26
Renaissance - In the Beginning
I'm surprised that I have Renaissance albums - two!- in my list; I would have thought that my enjoyment of inhumanly high-registered vocals over relentlessly over-produced pretentious music would have faded since I left my teens. Why hasn't it?
Maybe I'm still excessively immature. Maybe it's that this pretentious, inhuman, and even hokey, but exceedingly dramatic and talented prog rock band (think Rush, Yes, ELP, etc) stretched the boundary of operatic rock music to the absolute limit. This album, which is a re-release of their first two albums Prologue and Ashes Are Burning, is a kind of culmination of rock: masterpieces of nine minute epic prog rock piece performances, delicate, inventive, powerful, sonorous. Tiring. They reached the edge of the world; rock music had to go somewhere else after this.
5 star songs: Spare Some Love, Rahan Khan, Can You Understand, Let It Grow, Carpet of the Sun, Ashes Are Burning
30
Nearly 40 years on, this album of pop standards is still fresh because a) the songs are so tight, and b) each song showcases a different combination of talents. It's like they passed around the guitar to each member and said "Here. Give us your best."
Actually, many of the songs sound like they were sung at 3 am on the floor of a recording studio, exhausted after six hours of fighting, while intoxicated ... which is actually how the album came to be. Other bands with similar sounds in the seventies are dated (Seals and Crofts, anyone?). Where they were all style, Fleetwood Mac added weariness, pain, and soul.
While some of my favorite Fleetwood Mac songs (Landslide, Sarah, Gypsy) are on other albums, this album contains nothing but good songs the whole way through. Their eponymous album has a similar sound (this is like part 2 of that album).
This album also has no filler songs; it's not more highly ranked because the very good songs slightly outweigh the 5 star songs. I admit that some of the songs that didn't make my 5 star song rating might have been 5 stars on some other band's album.
5 star songs: Dreams, Don't Stop, Go Your Own Way, Songbird, Gold Dust Woman
29
This is Dar's second major album (her debut is higher up on the list). This album contains simple guitar playing, carefully constructed melodies and harmonies, and some poetry of immense power. It's not higher on the list only because the songs that are not 5 stars are only ok (as opposed to really good; at least they are not bad). This is the second of her two great albums (so far); she has a good material on subsequent albums, but it's mixed with a lot of artifice.
At this point, Dar was still singing folk music with just a little bit of electric instrumentation thrown in. February is one of the best songs of the last 50 years, and The Christians and the Pagans is both meaningful and hysterical.
5 star songs: As Cool As I Am, February, The Christians and the Pagans, This Was Pompeii, The Ocean, Family
28
Lynn has two other albums higher on this list. This is her fifth album, counting her self-released self-titled cassette. Some people like her fourth album (Night in a Strange Town) more, but, oddly, that album is the only one of hers that I'm not crazy about.
Unravel sees her transition from the poignant but sweet and simple sounds of her early albums to a raw anguish that comes from a late night of brooding over cigarettes and whisky. I'm Over You is perfectly stunning and haunting. Black Flowers sounds like it should be a far older song. The album has a few missteps, such as the somewhat dull When Did the World, and a few lovely phrases, like "sad songs matter most". Lynn mostly sings beautifully, daringly, and wistfully. Listen at night, while on the road.
5 star songs: I'm the Moon, Undertow, Over You, Unravel, Black Flowers, Surrender Dorothy
27
Unlike some of my friends, I think Coldplay gets better with each album. Yes, the original albums had unique and wonderful songs that were more groundbreaking, but many of the other songs on those albums were fillers. The number of fillers gets smaller on each album (I also really like Viva La Vida and X & Y). Mylo Xylo is their first true concept album, and while not completely free of fillers, the good songs now seem to flow effortlessly. I even love their new visual style.
The wall of sound, catchy tunes, thumping lively music, and vocal harmonies are just so ... Coldplay. Mylo Xylo is a story about dystopia, but it never feels anything less than happy.
5 star songs: Hurts Like Heaven, Paradise, Charlie Brown, Every Teardrop Is a Waterfall, Princess of China, Don't Let It Break Your Heart
26
I'm surprised that I have Renaissance albums - two!- in my list; I would have thought that my enjoyment of inhumanly high-registered vocals over relentlessly over-produced pretentious music would have faded since I left my teens. Why hasn't it?
Maybe I'm still excessively immature. Maybe it's that this pretentious, inhuman, and even hokey, but exceedingly dramatic and talented prog rock band (think Rush, Yes, ELP, etc) stretched the boundary of operatic rock music to the absolute limit. This album, which is a re-release of their first two albums Prologue and Ashes Are Burning, is a kind of culmination of rock: masterpieces of nine minute epic prog rock piece performances, delicate, inventive, powerful, sonorous. Tiring. They reached the edge of the world; rock music had to go somewhere else after this.
5 star songs: Spare Some Love, Rahan Khan, Can You Understand, Let It Grow, Carpet of the Sun, Ashes Are Burning
Monday, July 8, 2013
My Top 35 Albums: 35-31
Of course, this won't be your list of top albums. It's probably not even my list of top albums: I probably forgot about a dozen albums that should be on it.
I rate songs between 1 (awful) and 5 stars (essential). I typically delete songs rated 1 or 2 from my collection. Given a choice, I would always listen to a 5 star song instead of a 4 star song, unless I've just heard the 5 star song several times in a row. I have rated some very, very good songs as 4s, and some perfectly fine songs as 3s.
The criteria for inclusion on this list are 1) at least 5 (or nearly half of the album, in some exceptional cases) of the songs on the album are 5 stars, 2) there are no 1 or 2 star songs on the album, 3) there are no more than 3 filler songs, and 4) not a compilation album. This criteria is not perfect; there are albums that are more than the sum of their parts, like Born to Run and Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. There are albums that are unarguably more important than the ones I have included. But that's my criteria.
The criteria for inclusion on this list are 1) at least 5 (or nearly half of the album, in some exceptional cases) of the songs on the album are 5 stars, 2) there are no 1 or 2 star songs on the album, 3) there are no more than 3 filler songs, and 4) not a compilation album. This criteria is not perfect; there are albums that are more than the sum of their parts, like Born to Run and Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. There are albums that are unarguably more important than the ones I have included. But that's my criteria.
The ranking is generally based on the average rating of the album. A higher ranking usually means less filler songs. The highest ranked albums have no fillers, only essential (5 star) and very good (4 star) songs. The top two (really three) albums are simply perfect.
The results surprised me is several ways, with the inclusion of certain albums, and with the glut of albums by the same two artists in the top ten.
35
For those who don't know, Terry Reid is the guy who turned down the job of lead singer in the about-to-be-formed Led Zeppelin (Page wanted him, but Reid had a prior commitment, so he recommended Plant to Page). The reason you don't know about him is a) the above story, and b) a series of contract and producer mishaps he encountered in his early years.
Terry has a gorgeous voice, his guitar playing and musical arrangements are top rate, and his songs and lyrics are as good as anything created in the sixties. There is a purity to this music that is hard to find elsewhere. He (or at least this album) deserves a lot more recognition. This music is like where The Yardbirds would have been after they matured a few more years.
5 star songs: Stay with Me Baby, Friends, May Fly, Speak Now or Forever Hold Your Peace, Rich Kid Blues
34
The album that made Meatloaf and Jim Steinman into superstars, this album opens like a bomb and lets up only for the three ballads. The album is kind of "over-produced". But it's played with such equal parts tongue-in-cheek and earnestness that it works. The pounding piano, the smashing drums, the frenetic beat, the yelling frustrated edge-of-desperation male vocals, the over-the-top lyrics. It's like heavy metal music without the heavy metal instrumentation.
Three of the songs go for over 8 minutes. Lots of kids in the seventies lost their virginity while listening to this album. Nowadays, I have to be in a certain mood for this to hit the playlist.
5 star songs: Bat Out of Hell, Two Out of Three Ain't Bad, Paradise by the Dashboard Lights
33
This was my first album obsession as an adult. For two years I drove from New Haven to Fairfield every weekday. On the way to work I listened to side A, and on the way back to side B.
The Sundays only released three albums; they took their time and only released an album when they felt it was completely done. Unfortunately for us, marriage and children came first for them, so they stopped making music when it interfered too much with their lives.
They are squarely in the alternative music genre, and specifically the "wall of guitars" sound sub-genre; think The Smiths with a pretty female British voice and lighter, happier music. This album doesn't quite hit criterion 1 (at least half 5 star songs), but it contains no fillers at all; every song is good. They sing about the small quirks, confusions, and questions of daily life in London.
Actually, some of my favorite Sundays songs are on their followup, Blind, which is also a great album.
5 star songs: Here's Where The Story Ends, Can't Be Sure, My Finest Hour, Joy
32
I don't listen to Bruce very much. While I think this is a fantastic collection of songs, I'm just not often in a Bruce mood. But I can't help tapping my foot to just about anything on this album. The man knows how to write a melody. Bruce, like Tom Petty, is often overlooked for his writing because his songs are wrapped in catchy loud beats. But he is a true American artist.
In my head I think of Born to Run as the better album, because the 5 star songs on Born to Run - Thunder Road, Born to Run, and Jungleland - are better than any songs on Born in the USA. But Born in the USA is solid the whole way through, while the supporting songs on Born to Run range from good to filler.
In my head I think of Born to Run as the better album, because the 5 star songs on Born to Run - Thunder Road, Born to Run, and Jungleland - are better than any songs on Born in the USA. But Born in the USA is solid the whole way through, while the supporting songs on Born to Run range from good to filler.
5 star songs: Born in the USA, No Surrender, I'm Goin' Down, Glory Days, Dancing in the Dark.
31
I bought this album blind, based on an Amazon automatic recommendation. The moment I put it into my CD player and heard the opening strands of Oxygen, I knew instantly: my teenage daughter will love this. I love it, too.
Colbie's music is just so sweet and unaffecting, optimistic and honest. It's home-brew, low key folk pop, without the overproduction that artists (or engineers) put on to try to impress you. This is not an album of power hits, but it's also not just folk music. Colbie has a strong, assured, and reassuring voice. You can listen to these songs all day and hear breezes from the sea, taste a daiquiri, and feel better about the world.
Her followup Breakthrough is also particularly good.
5 star songs: Oxygen, The Little Things, One Fine Wire, Bubbly, Realize.
Sunday, June 30, 2013
Review: Eurogames, by Stewart Woods
Eurogames - Stewart Woods
2012 McFarland & Company
Disclaimer: I was provided with a free copy of the book. Also, some of my articles and my game are referenced in the book.
Summary
A nice introduction to Eurogames and to some game studies topics in general. Well written, accessible, covers the topic without much industry detail. Could have used more about specific Eurogames and its culture and less about other topics.
Overview
Eurogames is around 200 pages, excluding 50 pages of preface, introduction, end-notes, and bibliography.
Chapters 1 to 4 (about 70 pages) cover the history of board games in general and Eurogames in particular. The history does not reach back to ancient cultures, but sticks mostly with modernity. After dividing games into classic, mass-market, and hobby games, hobby games are then divided into genres, each with a short history. The book analyzes the origins of Eurogames in America and Germany and briefly mentions game awards and conventions.
Chapter 5 (40 pages) categorizes Eurogames, mostly through mechanics, with a brief introduction as to how the categories were chosen. This section also includes talk about elements, rules, mechanics, goals, themes, information aspects, chance, and the end-conditions of Eurogames.
The remaining 95 pages discuss players and the motivations behind play. They spend a lot of time on a 2007 survey of BoardGameGeek users conducted by the author, giving us the makeup of a typical circa-2007 BGG user (one type of Eurogamer). They discuss collecting games and the relationship that gamers have with publishers and designers.
Why gamers play is then discussed, including an overview of "flow", social interaction, luck, and the other elements of games that are fun, as well as goals, and the tension between fun and striving to win. Social problems with games (such as cheating) are also discussed. The book concludes with a few pages on games and culture.
Reactions
This book is aimed at the general public, i.e. not academic and not business. It is easy and friendly, and covers the general idea of Eurogames very well. It also covers, slightly more than necessary, various topics in game studies: what gamers are like, why people play games and why they cheat. These topics are covered in order to flesh out the idea of the kind of person who plays Eurogames, but the analysis really applies to any gamers of any genre, and even tp anyone who plays games at all.
It's a fair survey of these topics; for more depth, you can read many of the titles referenced in the bibliography. I found the topics to be only peripherally concerned with Eurogames and gamers, and so were not really necessary. Instead, I felt that the book should have spent more time going into depth about certain Eurogames.
For example, a couple of pages on how Settlers of Catan or Ticket to Ride was designed, how it is played, how the mechanisms interact, and how sessions go. Maybe focus on a dozen other popular games. Also missing were details about the game industry; how the industry arose in general is covered, with mentions of Z-Man Games, Rio Grande Games, Mayfair Games, etc, but not a look at real facts about the current game industry: number of companies, profits, distribution, penetration, country statistics, etc.
I say this only FYI. You can't blame a book for what it's not trying to be.
The book provides good coverage of many parts of the social scene of the die-hard gamers: the early Internet groups, the awards, the evangelists, and so on. It includes many quotes from BGGers on every topic from what makes a game fun to what makes a game serious.
One problem I fault the book for is that its data about gamers and their motivations comes from a voluntary survey of BoardGameGeek users. I don't think that BGG users necessarily represent Eurogamers, or even gamers, in general. They are a certain type of active social gamer/collector, and tend to have a myopic view of the world. In my own town of about 40,000 people, only a handful of people come to game nights and have BGG accounts, but dozens or even hundreds play or have played a Euro or hobby game.
Nevertheless, I enjoyed the read. Those of you who are unfamiliar with the history of modern hobby games, or with the various topics covered, such as what makes a gamer enjoy games, will find this book to be a pleasant overview and a nice read.
2012 McFarland & Company
Disclaimer: I was provided with a free copy of the book. Also, some of my articles and my game are referenced in the book.
Summary
A nice introduction to Eurogames and to some game studies topics in general. Well written, accessible, covers the topic without much industry detail. Could have used more about specific Eurogames and its culture and less about other topics.
Overview
Eurogames is around 200 pages, excluding 50 pages of preface, introduction, end-notes, and bibliography.
Chapters 1 to 4 (about 70 pages) cover the history of board games in general and Eurogames in particular. The history does not reach back to ancient cultures, but sticks mostly with modernity. After dividing games into classic, mass-market, and hobby games, hobby games are then divided into genres, each with a short history. The book analyzes the origins of Eurogames in America and Germany and briefly mentions game awards and conventions.
Chapter 5 (40 pages) categorizes Eurogames, mostly through mechanics, with a brief introduction as to how the categories were chosen. This section also includes talk about elements, rules, mechanics, goals, themes, information aspects, chance, and the end-conditions of Eurogames.
The remaining 95 pages discuss players and the motivations behind play. They spend a lot of time on a 2007 survey of BoardGameGeek users conducted by the author, giving us the makeup of a typical circa-2007 BGG user (one type of Eurogamer). They discuss collecting games and the relationship that gamers have with publishers and designers.
Why gamers play is then discussed, including an overview of "flow", social interaction, luck, and the other elements of games that are fun, as well as goals, and the tension between fun and striving to win. Social problems with games (such as cheating) are also discussed. The book concludes with a few pages on games and culture.
Reactions
This book is aimed at the general public, i.e. not academic and not business. It is easy and friendly, and covers the general idea of Eurogames very well. It also covers, slightly more than necessary, various topics in game studies: what gamers are like, why people play games and why they cheat. These topics are covered in order to flesh out the idea of the kind of person who plays Eurogames, but the analysis really applies to any gamers of any genre, and even tp anyone who plays games at all.
It's a fair survey of these topics; for more depth, you can read many of the titles referenced in the bibliography. I found the topics to be only peripherally concerned with Eurogames and gamers, and so were not really necessary. Instead, I felt that the book should have spent more time going into depth about certain Eurogames.
For example, a couple of pages on how Settlers of Catan or Ticket to Ride was designed, how it is played, how the mechanisms interact, and how sessions go. Maybe focus on a dozen other popular games. Also missing were details about the game industry; how the industry arose in general is covered, with mentions of Z-Man Games, Rio Grande Games, Mayfair Games, etc, but not a look at real facts about the current game industry: number of companies, profits, distribution, penetration, country statistics, etc.
I say this only FYI. You can't blame a book for what it's not trying to be.
The book provides good coverage of many parts of the social scene of the die-hard gamers: the early Internet groups, the awards, the evangelists, and so on. It includes many quotes from BGGers on every topic from what makes a game fun to what makes a game serious.
One problem I fault the book for is that its data about gamers and their motivations comes from a voluntary survey of BoardGameGeek users. I don't think that BGG users necessarily represent Eurogamers, or even gamers, in general. They are a certain type of active social gamer/collector, and tend to have a myopic view of the world. In my own town of about 40,000 people, only a handful of people come to game nights and have BGG accounts, but dozens or even hundreds play or have played a Euro or hobby game.
Nevertheless, I enjoyed the read. Those of you who are unfamiliar with the history of modern hobby games, or with the various topics covered, such as what makes a gamer enjoy games, will find this book to be a pleasant overview and a nice read.
Wednesday, May 22, 2013
20 More Movie Reviews
I watch too many movies, which is why I'm having trouble making progress on my book. All of the following movies are from 2012 or 2013.
42
The story of Jackie Robinson, the first black person to play major league baseball since the color line was enacted i.e. for about 60 years. The film is nearly as much about the white team executive who puts him there, Branch Rickley. Unlike the biopic A League of Their Own, there are no side character stories to add color to the main narrative. Jackie's teammates don't display much personality. Jackie (Chadwick Boseman) is told to not react to the hate that will be thrown at him, and he doesn't (for the most part). Mostly he frets. Harrison Ford shines as Branch, as does Ben Chapman in his small role as the Philadelphia Phillies manager who hurls a steady stream of racist epithets at Jackie during a game.
42
The story of Jackie Robinson, the first black person to play major league baseball since the color line was enacted i.e. for about 60 years. The film is nearly as much about the white team executive who puts him there, Branch Rickley. Unlike the biopic A League of Their Own, there are no side character stories to add color to the main narrative. Jackie's teammates don't display much personality. Jackie (Chadwick Boseman) is told to not react to the hate that will be thrown at him, and he doesn't (for the most part). Mostly he frets. Harrison Ford shines as Branch, as does Ben Chapman in his small role as the Philadelphia Phillies manager who hurls a steady stream of racist epithets at Jackie during a game.
The story runs pretty smoothly, which robs a lot of the tension from it: he plays, people insult him, he succeeds. The story also focuses on the baseball games, which is pretty standard movie material.
Bottom line: An ok movie, not a must see.
Bottom line: An ok movie, not a must see.
Anna Karenina
This exercise in cinematic self-indulgence is supposed to be clever, but it was over-produced, gaudy, and distracting - maybe that was its intention, considering the gaudiness of the Russian aristocracy. The movie is filmed mostly on a single stage in an old theater - like a fanciful play - where the sets are swung back and forth and characters from one scene bustle around in front of or behind another scene. Shots are often framed like garish pictures. The music is loud, the whole thing looks like a carnival (think Moulin Rouge), and the camera focuses more on the way sets and props move than on the plot. Keira Knightly and the others do their scenes, but the overall effect serves to distance you from them, rather than to engage our sympathy.
None of the richness of Tolstoy made it into the movie. From about mid-way I skimmed the rest of the movie. In case you don't know, it's a shame piece about a woman who has an affair and is then shunned by society.
Bottom line: Skip.
Argo
The story of six American citizens who escaped from the American embassy in Iran when it was taken over by fundamentalists in 1979. They hid out in the Canadian embassy's residence waiting for the baddies to find them. The CIA and some ballsy Hollywood producers decide to get them out by pretending that the Americans are actually Canadians on location for a movie in Iran doing a scene scope; one of them goes their and hopes to leave with them back to Canada using fake passports.
This was all supposed to be a true story, or close enough to the truth (who did the lion's share of the work in the actual historical event is not necessarily accurately depicted). I kept looking at one of the women characters, trying to place the actress, until it finally hit me that it's Helen Santos from West Wing (played by Teri Polo). Turns out I was wrong; it's Kerry Bishé.
It's dramatic and tense, rife with surprises, and excellently acted. The narration at the beginning puts the story into perspective (explaining - if not justifying - the embassy takeover). Something about it still felt a little small. Maybe it's seeing John Goodman pop up again (he's everywhere, now, isn't he?).
Bottom line: Worth seeing. but just as good on the small screen.
Flight
The story of an airplane pilot (Denzel Washington) who saved most of the lives on his malfunctioning plane with a daring landing maneuver, but did it while high on cocaine and alcohol . The story is about his substance abuses; the fact that he is a hero is just an excuse he uses to not deal with his problem.
Beautifully acted and interestingly plotted. It makes drinking look bad, but it seemed to glorify the cocaine. And oh look, it's John Goodman as the drug dealer friend.
Bottom line: Worth seeing, but probably just as good on the small screen.
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
Part 1 of 3 of what everyone originally assumed would be a single movie. Rather than the children's tale that was the book, Peter Jackson refocuses for a more serious movie based on the same plot, with a global sweep and a whole lot of other scenes from other Tolkein side-notes thrown in for good measure. It all works, except Sarumon is still so ... difficult, it's a wonder that Gandalf ever trusted him.
This is a grand movie that measures up to the original Lord of the Rings trilogy, or nearly enough. Maybe a little slower at the start.
Bottom line: Watch it on the big screen.
Iron Man 3
Part 4 of the Iron Man series (I'm counting The Avengers, which was mostly an Iron Man movie IMHO). A whole lot of people are unhappy with the portrayal of The Mandarin bad guy in this movie compared to how he is portrayed in the comic books. Having not read the comic books, and (even if I had I would still be) not giving a damn about a character's faithfulness to the source, I had no problem with the character in the movie.
What I had a problem with is the plot, in which the god-like powers of Iron Man fail conveniently and specifically when necessary to provide a story. The home of Tony Stark, the world's number one weapon manufacturer, should not be able to be taken out by a few helicopters with missiles. Even if the dozen Iron Men suits that fly around at Stark's beck and call weren't available for some reason (and they are, conveniently, later when the movie draws near its end), the house surely should have a few other defenses that could have been brought to bear.
The Iron Man armor now flies off and on in pieces despite having no visible flying mechanism, and in response to a neck flick from an unarmored Stark who may be thousands of miles away. And the suit, which can withstand a hit from Thor's hammer, falls into pieces when hit by a truck for comic effect.
The entire plot depends on Iron Man being vulnerable so they make him vulnerable so that they can have a plot, and then they resolve the plot by making him not vulnerable again: suddenly remembering all of the weapons and features that are available to him.
Along the way, Tony Stark meets a cute kid who helps him out, and Pepper Potts gets her chance to shine. They give her a tempting love interest in order to create some tension, but I didn't find that part believable.
Bottom line: Skip, believe it or not. It has its moments, but it was nothing like either of the other movies.
Les Misérables
If you like the play, book, or whatever, then you'll like this adaptation. If you have an affinity for musicals where all of the dialog is sung, even when it should just be spoken because it's not really sung with any particular melody, then you'll like this.
I never thought I would ally myself with Philistines, but I am not a Les Mis fan. I like some musicals, but I am not thrilled with plays or movies where every sentence is sung. It's wearying, affecting, and frankly boring. The play itself is rather dreary with miserable and mean characters and situations. The initial songs, in between the singing dialog, were not all that interesting. I quit about half way; some of the more memorable tunes had yet to appear.
Bottom line: you already know if you have to see it; you'll probably buy it, too. If you don't know, you're better off with a lot of other movies.
Life of Pi
I haven't read the book. The story of an Indian boy whose father owns a circus. They pack off to move from India to Canada, but the boat sinks, leaving him with no parents but an assortment of animals on a small raft. The animals die until it is just him and a ferocious tiger. Most of the movie is a disaster/survival movie at sea, where the boy has to stay alive while dealing with the sea, sharks, hunger, thirst, boredom, and a tiger.
This is as well done as it could possibly be. The tiger and other animals are perfectly integrated, and so many shots of the seas, sky, water creatures, glowing lichen in the ocean, etc are stunning. The visuals never interfere with the story, and the story manages to convey the length of the difficulty without actually becoming boring. The scenes where they come across a floating island at sea are particularly beautiful.
Like other stories in this genre, all of his encounters means something metaphorically; in this story, some, but not all, of the metaphors are given a possible interpretation at the end, but not definitively.
Bottom line: A must see, and worth it on the big screen. The film is available in 3D, and it's probably worth it.
Oblivion
Watch Tom Cruise smile, flex, grunt, and cavort around a dystopian landscape destroyed by aliens. That's about all you'll watch, since every other character in the movie - even Morgan Freeman - is a cutout prop for Tom to interact with. Morgan has the same personality you've seen before in every other movie with Morgan Freeman. The two main women characters are hollow shells. The rebel leader could have had a personality, but I suspect it got lost on the cutting room floor (or maybe the floor of the room in which Tom signed his contract).
Tom acts well enough. The effects are ok. The tension works and it moves along. As for the plot and script, it has a certain grandeur, but not quite enough. Moon was a small movie and just the right size for its plot. Oblivion has about the same depth, but more fluff. and the confrontational finale is reminiscent of Star Treks 1 and 5, which is not good.
Bottom line: Entertaining but shallow. Skip unless there's nothing better around and you can stomach a whole lot of Tom Cruise.
On the Road
I read and loved this book. The movie captures some of the book, and what it captures it captures well, although it emphasizes the sexual. Kristen Stewart is quite good (I actually like her: she is not so wooden when she lets an emotion hit her face, like a smile, a naughty glance, or a tear). Sam Riley and Garret Hedlund work as the dynamic duo, and the supporting characters all do fine jobs.
The story is about the road trips and the search for freedom and insight. You get a lot of the free spirit, free love, and road travel, as well as the poverty - monetary and moral - that the main characters inhabit. The ending is a bit of letdown on the one hand, though suitable on the other.
Bottom line: Worth seeing, but probably just as good on the small screen.
Oz: The Great and Powerful
James Franco is Oz and a bevy of talented (and pretty) women play the other characters in this prequel to the classic movie The Wizard of Oz. The story tells how Oz arrived over the rainbow and how the witches came to be who they are. This one started out a little slowly and I was happily surprised when it picked up. It switches between targeting a younger audience and a general audience, but didn't quite succeed as well as the original movie did at being broadly appealing to both at the same time.
Again, I wasn't expecting much, but it was a rich and satisfying experience with some memorable characters, like the China doll girl. The ending "transformation" by the main character to reform himself was a bit unsubtle; a lot of modern movies fumble this. But you can go with it. Mila Kunis as the formerly neutral witch who turns into the wicked witch is still too pretty when she's wicked. But she cackles well enough.
Bottom line: Though there are a few frightening moments, I recommend this primarily for kids or as a wholesome movie experience.
Pitch Perfect
The 30 second shot of Anna Kendrick doing the cup song was the best part. Otherwise, this movie inhabits the space between Glee and Bring It On. It's about a high school a capella group: its girls, leadership, and quest to become champions. You have sassy girl, sweet girl, sexy girl, and lots of other stereotypes. It's shallow but funny (with the light snarky insults we've come to know modern comedy) and quotable, and you look forward to every time they prefix a word with "a ca-". It's "a ca-ridiculous".
The performance commentators are particularly funny.
Bottom line: Dumb as designed, and worth seeing if you like Glee and Bring It On, on the small screen.
Safety Not Guaranteed
A deliberately quirky movie about a couple of small-time reporters writing a story about a guy who advertises for a companion to go time-traveling with him and that he has only done it once before. The movie plays it straight, so you know that the final scene of the movie is either going to show that he is, in fact, a lunatic, or that he is, in fact, a time traveler. I wasn't really looking forward to either ending, both of which seemed to be rather cliche. I was hoping for something unexpected.
Getting to one of those endings is kind of fun. Aubrey Plaza (channeling Kristen Stewart) plays the main junior reporter who gets to know the guy. Everyone has his or her quirks, which makes it a nice character-driven movie.
Bottom line: Worth seeing on the small screen, or even the big screen since the characters are involving and the scenes mostly take place outdoors.
Silver Lining Playbook
The whole world loves Jennifer Lawrence, and for good reason: she's a sparkling good actress without pretensions and she is good-humored and funny in real life. In this movie, she and Bradley Cooper play Tiffany and Pat, two borderline mental-cases in a blue-collar world who find and eventually need each other (though Pat continued to obsess about reuniting with his ex-wife). Along the way is a lot of small-town neighborhood, football betting, and preparations for, and performance in, a ballroom dance competition.
The movie is borderline quirky and borderline mainstream, with Robert DeNiro playing a major role as Pat's father. Everybody faces down their demons, and none of it is (entirely) formulaic, other than who will end up with whom by the end.
Bottom line: Worth watching.
Skyfall
This acclaimed movie is supposed to be the return of the Bond franchise. And, to its credit, it is sharply shot and packed with action and some humor. However, I almost got ejected from the movie theater after the third or fourth time I burst out laughing at the sheer idiocy of some of the plot.
Perhaps the most egregious plot problem is mid-movie: The bad guy has already been shown to be a master hacker in ways that defy any kind of sanity (by hacking into the MI5 network he can physically BLOWS UP the entire block of offices). MI5 security guru takes the bad guy's laptop and PHYSICALLY PLUGS IT IN to the MI5 unprotected local area network, a network on which, apparently, lies every control to everything in MI5: every piece of information (no encryption), every screen, the controls to every door and light, even doors about which MI5 didn't know existed (and therefore could not have hooked up to the network). He does not plug the laptop into, say, a physically separated network that can be used to crack possibly dangerous laptops, or even to one separated by some kind of hardware barrier. When they plugged that Ethernet cable into the laptop, I couldn't stop laughing for a minute. For goodness sake, I'm not even allowed to connect my smartphone at work, and I work for company that makes mobile phone software.
Surprise, surprise, a few minutes later the evil guy's laptop has compromised the entire MI5 network. How does the intrepid security expert at MI5 react to this? By pulling out the Ethernet cable, of course! And then saying "Oops".
This type of nonsense happens again and again in this movie. The plot makes no sense, especially the parts that have to do with computers. For a nice overview, see the YouTube takedown video.
Bottom line: If you aren't bothered by the inconvenience of really stupid plot holes and dumb actions from supposedly intelligent professional people, the movie is very entertaining and worth the big screen. Otherwise, skip it.
Snow White and the Huntsman
Kristen Stewart again, in a rousing romp through the Snow White fairy tale, but with a much spunkier Snow White and a dashing Chris Hemsworth (Thor) as the Hunstman turned protector/love interest. You get a little Terminator 2 (the magic mirror morphs into a humanoid), The Hobbit (dwarves), and some Lord of the Rings (battle sequences). Everyone plays their part well and the story works.
This movie is part of the same trend that brought you the TV series Once Upon a Time. On the one hand, Hollywood is obviously low on fresh new stories to bring to us. On the other hand, starting with a famous short story and creating an entirely new one using the same characters is not altogether bad, when done right.
Bottom line: Worth seeing on a big screen (too late for that, though).
The Company You Keep
Robert Redford is Jim/Nick, a former members of the Weather Underground, radical American anti-war and anti-business activist/militant wanted for a killing in the early 70s. Owing to the capture of one of the other members, Jim/Nick wants to find yet another one of the members and convince her to turn herself in and confess to the killing for which he has been erroneously implicated; they won't believe that he wasn't involved unless someone else confesses.
Some of the critics complained that the actors are at least ten years older than they are supposed to be; this didn't bother me. It's acted well, shot well, but paced rather unevenly and I didn't connect with any of the characters to really care what happened to them. A few arguments are made for and against their radical activism, but none are totally convincing and the focus is more on Nick/Jim as a fugitive than it is on anything else.
Bottom line: Ho hum. Skip. If you want to see a great film on roughly the same subject, watch Running on Empty, one of the best films ever made.
The Perks of Being a Wallflower
A fantastic movie about a troubled teenage boy Charlie (Logan Lerman) who has had a mysterious problem over the summer, and who has a hard time fitting in to social groups until he meets sympathetic outsiders Sam (Emma Watson) and Patrick (Ezra Miller). They all shine, particularly Emma in her post-Hermione roll. The only thing that really bothered me was that outsiders generally don't have secret reserves of power to face down bullies at just the right moment; Charlie does. Although the movie tried to make it look like it was scary that he could get so violent, it's much less scary than being a helpless victim of bullies; that threw me off for a minute. Otherwise, I was enchanted the whole way through.
Charlie is obviously named after the protagonist of Flowers for Algernon. Very few movies make me want to run out and read the book right away; this one did. The Hunger Games, Scott Pilgrim, The Hours were some others.
Bottom line: Must see movie.
The Sessions
A movie about a paralyzed man Mark (John Hawkes) who lives most of his day in an iron lung who solicits a "sex therapist" Cheryl (Helen Hunt) because he wants to experience sex once before he dies. Inspired by a true story. I didn't realize that sex therapists actually have sex with their patients as therapy; I thought it was all verbal and diagrams.
I love Helen Hunt, and we get to see all of her here (ahem). The story is about as sweet and straightforward as you might imagine. Cheryl has done this many times before, but for some reason this particular time disturbs her husband; if any couple needed open communication, this couple would be the one, but we don't get to see a conversation like that; the movie could have used it. They wanted to portray Cheryl as maybe possibly falling in love with Mark , but we don't get that sense - only that she cares for him. She also doesn't tell Mark that falling in love with your sex therapist is common, and that he should look out for it and deal with it for what it is, but we don't get to see that conversation either.
So the interpersonal tension that is shown in the movie is all due to a lack of communication. The main tension is whether Mark can actually succeed with the act and feel ok about it afterwards, but we already know the answer to that.
Bottom line: Meh. Skip I guess.
Wanderlust
Yet another Jennifer Aniston comedy, this one about a couple from the big city who land on a hippie commune for a while. It's a trite fish out of water story, with a side-plot about the commune about to lose its land lease ... so the couple comes to the rescue. Alan Alda plays the old hippie patriarch of the group.
A cliche bunch of misfits and a forgettable lot of comedy. Has Jennifer done anything that was actually good since Friends? I think The Good Girl is pretty much it, and it's not coincidental that TGG is not a comedy (it's about a lot of unlikable, desperate people).
Bottom line: It's got some laughs, but skip.
This exercise in cinematic self-indulgence is supposed to be clever, but it was over-produced, gaudy, and distracting - maybe that was its intention, considering the gaudiness of the Russian aristocracy. The movie is filmed mostly on a single stage in an old theater - like a fanciful play - where the sets are swung back and forth and characters from one scene bustle around in front of or behind another scene. Shots are often framed like garish pictures. The music is loud, the whole thing looks like a carnival (think Moulin Rouge), and the camera focuses more on the way sets and props move than on the plot. Keira Knightly and the others do their scenes, but the overall effect serves to distance you from them, rather than to engage our sympathy.
None of the richness of Tolstoy made it into the movie. From about mid-way I skimmed the rest of the movie. In case you don't know, it's a shame piece about a woman who has an affair and is then shunned by society.
Bottom line: Skip.
Argo
The story of six American citizens who escaped from the American embassy in Iran when it was taken over by fundamentalists in 1979. They hid out in the Canadian embassy's residence waiting for the baddies to find them. The CIA and some ballsy Hollywood producers decide to get them out by pretending that the Americans are actually Canadians on location for a movie in Iran doing a scene scope; one of them goes their and hopes to leave with them back to Canada using fake passports.
This was all supposed to be a true story, or close enough to the truth (who did the lion's share of the work in the actual historical event is not necessarily accurately depicted). I kept looking at one of the women characters, trying to place the actress, until it finally hit me that it's Helen Santos from West Wing (played by Teri Polo). Turns out I was wrong; it's Kerry Bishé.
It's dramatic and tense, rife with surprises, and excellently acted. The narration at the beginning puts the story into perspective (explaining - if not justifying - the embassy takeover). Something about it still felt a little small. Maybe it's seeing John Goodman pop up again (he's everywhere, now, isn't he?).
Bottom line: Worth seeing. but just as good on the small screen.
Flight
The story of an airplane pilot (Denzel Washington) who saved most of the lives on his malfunctioning plane with a daring landing maneuver, but did it while high on cocaine and alcohol . The story is about his substance abuses; the fact that he is a hero is just an excuse he uses to not deal with his problem.
Beautifully acted and interestingly plotted. It makes drinking look bad, but it seemed to glorify the cocaine. And oh look, it's John Goodman as the drug dealer friend.
Bottom line: Worth seeing, but probably just as good on the small screen.
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
Part 1 of 3 of what everyone originally assumed would be a single movie. Rather than the children's tale that was the book, Peter Jackson refocuses for a more serious movie based on the same plot, with a global sweep and a whole lot of other scenes from other Tolkein side-notes thrown in for good measure. It all works, except Sarumon is still so ... difficult, it's a wonder that Gandalf ever trusted him.
This is a grand movie that measures up to the original Lord of the Rings trilogy, or nearly enough. Maybe a little slower at the start.
Bottom line: Watch it on the big screen.
Iron Man 3
Part 4 of the Iron Man series (I'm counting The Avengers, which was mostly an Iron Man movie IMHO). A whole lot of people are unhappy with the portrayal of The Mandarin bad guy in this movie compared to how he is portrayed in the comic books. Having not read the comic books, and (even if I had I would still be) not giving a damn about a character's faithfulness to the source, I had no problem with the character in the movie.
What I had a problem with is the plot, in which the god-like powers of Iron Man fail conveniently and specifically when necessary to provide a story. The home of Tony Stark, the world's number one weapon manufacturer, should not be able to be taken out by a few helicopters with missiles. Even if the dozen Iron Men suits that fly around at Stark's beck and call weren't available for some reason (and they are, conveniently, later when the movie draws near its end), the house surely should have a few other defenses that could have been brought to bear.
The Iron Man armor now flies off and on in pieces despite having no visible flying mechanism, and in response to a neck flick from an unarmored Stark who may be thousands of miles away. And the suit, which can withstand a hit from Thor's hammer, falls into pieces when hit by a truck for comic effect.
The entire plot depends on Iron Man being vulnerable so they make him vulnerable so that they can have a plot, and then they resolve the plot by making him not vulnerable again: suddenly remembering all of the weapons and features that are available to him.
Along the way, Tony Stark meets a cute kid who helps him out, and Pepper Potts gets her chance to shine. They give her a tempting love interest in order to create some tension, but I didn't find that part believable.
Bottom line: Skip, believe it or not. It has its moments, but it was nothing like either of the other movies.
Les Misérables
If you like the play, book, or whatever, then you'll like this adaptation. If you have an affinity for musicals where all of the dialog is sung, even when it should just be spoken because it's not really sung with any particular melody, then you'll like this.
I never thought I would ally myself with Philistines, but I am not a Les Mis fan. I like some musicals, but I am not thrilled with plays or movies where every sentence is sung. It's wearying, affecting, and frankly boring. The play itself is rather dreary with miserable and mean characters and situations. The initial songs, in between the singing dialog, were not all that interesting. I quit about half way; some of the more memorable tunes had yet to appear.
Bottom line: you already know if you have to see it; you'll probably buy it, too. If you don't know, you're better off with a lot of other movies.
Life of Pi
I haven't read the book. The story of an Indian boy whose father owns a circus. They pack off to move from India to Canada, but the boat sinks, leaving him with no parents but an assortment of animals on a small raft. The animals die until it is just him and a ferocious tiger. Most of the movie is a disaster/survival movie at sea, where the boy has to stay alive while dealing with the sea, sharks, hunger, thirst, boredom, and a tiger.
This is as well done as it could possibly be. The tiger and other animals are perfectly integrated, and so many shots of the seas, sky, water creatures, glowing lichen in the ocean, etc are stunning. The visuals never interfere with the story, and the story manages to convey the length of the difficulty without actually becoming boring. The scenes where they come across a floating island at sea are particularly beautiful.
Like other stories in this genre, all of his encounters means something metaphorically; in this story, some, but not all, of the metaphors are given a possible interpretation at the end, but not definitively.
Bottom line: A must see, and worth it on the big screen. The film is available in 3D, and it's probably worth it.
Oblivion
Watch Tom Cruise smile, flex, grunt, and cavort around a dystopian landscape destroyed by aliens. That's about all you'll watch, since every other character in the movie - even Morgan Freeman - is a cutout prop for Tom to interact with. Morgan has the same personality you've seen before in every other movie with Morgan Freeman. The two main women characters are hollow shells. The rebel leader could have had a personality, but I suspect it got lost on the cutting room floor (or maybe the floor of the room in which Tom signed his contract).
Tom acts well enough. The effects are ok. The tension works and it moves along. As for the plot and script, it has a certain grandeur, but not quite enough. Moon was a small movie and just the right size for its plot. Oblivion has about the same depth, but more fluff. and the confrontational finale is reminiscent of Star Treks 1 and 5, which is not good.
Bottom line: Entertaining but shallow. Skip unless there's nothing better around and you can stomach a whole lot of Tom Cruise.
On the Road
I read and loved this book. The movie captures some of the book, and what it captures it captures well, although it emphasizes the sexual. Kristen Stewart is quite good (I actually like her: she is not so wooden when she lets an emotion hit her face, like a smile, a naughty glance, or a tear). Sam Riley and Garret Hedlund work as the dynamic duo, and the supporting characters all do fine jobs.
The story is about the road trips and the search for freedom and insight. You get a lot of the free spirit, free love, and road travel, as well as the poverty - monetary and moral - that the main characters inhabit. The ending is a bit of letdown on the one hand, though suitable on the other.
Bottom line: Worth seeing, but probably just as good on the small screen.
Oz: The Great and Powerful
James Franco is Oz and a bevy of talented (and pretty) women play the other characters in this prequel to the classic movie The Wizard of Oz. The story tells how Oz arrived over the rainbow and how the witches came to be who they are. This one started out a little slowly and I was happily surprised when it picked up. It switches between targeting a younger audience and a general audience, but didn't quite succeed as well as the original movie did at being broadly appealing to both at the same time.
Again, I wasn't expecting much, but it was a rich and satisfying experience with some memorable characters, like the China doll girl. The ending "transformation" by the main character to reform himself was a bit unsubtle; a lot of modern movies fumble this. But you can go with it. Mila Kunis as the formerly neutral witch who turns into the wicked witch is still too pretty when she's wicked. But she cackles well enough.
Bottom line: Though there are a few frightening moments, I recommend this primarily for kids or as a wholesome movie experience.
Pitch Perfect
The 30 second shot of Anna Kendrick doing the cup song was the best part. Otherwise, this movie inhabits the space between Glee and Bring It On. It's about a high school a capella group: its girls, leadership, and quest to become champions. You have sassy girl, sweet girl, sexy girl, and lots of other stereotypes. It's shallow but funny (with the light snarky insults we've come to know modern comedy) and quotable, and you look forward to every time they prefix a word with "a ca-". It's "a ca-ridiculous".
The performance commentators are particularly funny.
Bottom line: Dumb as designed, and worth seeing if you like Glee and Bring It On, on the small screen.
Safety Not Guaranteed
A deliberately quirky movie about a couple of small-time reporters writing a story about a guy who advertises for a companion to go time-traveling with him and that he has only done it once before. The movie plays it straight, so you know that the final scene of the movie is either going to show that he is, in fact, a lunatic, or that he is, in fact, a time traveler. I wasn't really looking forward to either ending, both of which seemed to be rather cliche. I was hoping for something unexpected.
Getting to one of those endings is kind of fun. Aubrey Plaza (channeling Kristen Stewart) plays the main junior reporter who gets to know the guy. Everyone has his or her quirks, which makes it a nice character-driven movie.
Bottom line: Worth seeing on the small screen, or even the big screen since the characters are involving and the scenes mostly take place outdoors.
Silver Lining Playbook
The whole world loves Jennifer Lawrence, and for good reason: she's a sparkling good actress without pretensions and she is good-humored and funny in real life. In this movie, she and Bradley Cooper play Tiffany and Pat, two borderline mental-cases in a blue-collar world who find and eventually need each other (though Pat continued to obsess about reuniting with his ex-wife). Along the way is a lot of small-town neighborhood, football betting, and preparations for, and performance in, a ballroom dance competition.
The movie is borderline quirky and borderline mainstream, with Robert DeNiro playing a major role as Pat's father. Everybody faces down their demons, and none of it is (entirely) formulaic, other than who will end up with whom by the end.
Bottom line: Worth watching.
Skyfall
This acclaimed movie is supposed to be the return of the Bond franchise. And, to its credit, it is sharply shot and packed with action and some humor. However, I almost got ejected from the movie theater after the third or fourth time I burst out laughing at the sheer idiocy of some of the plot.
Perhaps the most egregious plot problem is mid-movie: The bad guy has already been shown to be a master hacker in ways that defy any kind of sanity (by hacking into the MI5 network he can physically BLOWS UP the entire block of offices). MI5 security guru takes the bad guy's laptop and PHYSICALLY PLUGS IT IN to the MI5 unprotected local area network, a network on which, apparently, lies every control to everything in MI5: every piece of information (no encryption), every screen, the controls to every door and light, even doors about which MI5 didn't know existed (and therefore could not have hooked up to the network). He does not plug the laptop into, say, a physically separated network that can be used to crack possibly dangerous laptops, or even to one separated by some kind of hardware barrier. When they plugged that Ethernet cable into the laptop, I couldn't stop laughing for a minute. For goodness sake, I'm not even allowed to connect my smartphone at work, and I work for company that makes mobile phone software.
Surprise, surprise, a few minutes later the evil guy's laptop has compromised the entire MI5 network. How does the intrepid security expert at MI5 react to this? By pulling out the Ethernet cable, of course! And then saying "Oops".
This type of nonsense happens again and again in this movie. The plot makes no sense, especially the parts that have to do with computers. For a nice overview, see the YouTube takedown video.
Bottom line: If you aren't bothered by the inconvenience of really stupid plot holes and dumb actions from supposedly intelligent professional people, the movie is very entertaining and worth the big screen. Otherwise, skip it.
Snow White and the Huntsman
Kristen Stewart again, in a rousing romp through the Snow White fairy tale, but with a much spunkier Snow White and a dashing Chris Hemsworth (Thor) as the Hunstman turned protector/love interest. You get a little Terminator 2 (the magic mirror morphs into a humanoid), The Hobbit (dwarves), and some Lord of the Rings (battle sequences). Everyone plays their part well and the story works.
This movie is part of the same trend that brought you the TV series Once Upon a Time. On the one hand, Hollywood is obviously low on fresh new stories to bring to us. On the other hand, starting with a famous short story and creating an entirely new one using the same characters is not altogether bad, when done right.
Bottom line: Worth seeing on a big screen (too late for that, though).
The Company You Keep
Robert Redford is Jim/Nick, a former members of the Weather Underground, radical American anti-war and anti-business activist/militant wanted for a killing in the early 70s. Owing to the capture of one of the other members, Jim/Nick wants to find yet another one of the members and convince her to turn herself in and confess to the killing for which he has been erroneously implicated; they won't believe that he wasn't involved unless someone else confesses.
Some of the critics complained that the actors are at least ten years older than they are supposed to be; this didn't bother me. It's acted well, shot well, but paced rather unevenly and I didn't connect with any of the characters to really care what happened to them. A few arguments are made for and against their radical activism, but none are totally convincing and the focus is more on Nick/Jim as a fugitive than it is on anything else.
Bottom line: Ho hum. Skip. If you want to see a great film on roughly the same subject, watch Running on Empty, one of the best films ever made.
The Perks of Being a Wallflower
A fantastic movie about a troubled teenage boy Charlie (Logan Lerman) who has had a mysterious problem over the summer, and who has a hard time fitting in to social groups until he meets sympathetic outsiders Sam (Emma Watson) and Patrick (Ezra Miller). They all shine, particularly Emma in her post-Hermione roll. The only thing that really bothered me was that outsiders generally don't have secret reserves of power to face down bullies at just the right moment; Charlie does. Although the movie tried to make it look like it was scary that he could get so violent, it's much less scary than being a helpless victim of bullies; that threw me off for a minute. Otherwise, I was enchanted the whole way through.
Charlie is obviously named after the protagonist of Flowers for Algernon. Very few movies make me want to run out and read the book right away; this one did. The Hunger Games, Scott Pilgrim, The Hours were some others.
Bottom line: Must see movie.
The Sessions
A movie about a paralyzed man Mark (John Hawkes) who lives most of his day in an iron lung who solicits a "sex therapist" Cheryl (Helen Hunt) because he wants to experience sex once before he dies. Inspired by a true story. I didn't realize that sex therapists actually have sex with their patients as therapy; I thought it was all verbal and diagrams.
I love Helen Hunt, and we get to see all of her here (ahem). The story is about as sweet and straightforward as you might imagine. Cheryl has done this many times before, but for some reason this particular time disturbs her husband; if any couple needed open communication, this couple would be the one, but we don't get to see a conversation like that; the movie could have used it. They wanted to portray Cheryl as maybe possibly falling in love with Mark , but we don't get that sense - only that she cares for him. She also doesn't tell Mark that falling in love with your sex therapist is common, and that he should look out for it and deal with it for what it is, but we don't get to see that conversation either.
So the interpersonal tension that is shown in the movie is all due to a lack of communication. The main tension is whether Mark can actually succeed with the act and feel ok about it afterwards, but we already know the answer to that.
Bottom line: Meh. Skip I guess.
Wanderlust
Yet another Jennifer Aniston comedy, this one about a couple from the big city who land on a hippie commune for a while. It's a trite fish out of water story, with a side-plot about the commune about to lose its land lease ... so the couple comes to the rescue. Alan Alda plays the old hippie patriarch of the group.
A cliche bunch of misfits and a forgettable lot of comedy. Has Jennifer done anything that was actually good since Friends? I think The Good Girl is pretty much it, and it's not coincidental that TGG is not a comedy (it's about a lot of unlikable, desperate people).
Bottom line: It's got some laughs, but skip.
Movies I still really have to see this year (unfortunately):
Before Midnight
Cloud Atlas
Ender's Game
Frances Ha
The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire
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