Marigold

The new X-Men will disappoint especially those who hope that Singer will pick up exactly where he left off, i.e., that after years he will again make a film that will improve on the genre of comic films. Times have changed, and so have Xavier's boys. The series has clear rules, poetics that it supplements easily rather than develops rapidly (as was the case with the groundbreaking X2). It can be said that Singer is merging the old and the new world. Of course, unlike Vaughn, his retro isn't that light-footed, and yet it has a great energy in places. In fact, it only fails in the finale, which falls asleep instead of escalating. Other objections include the fact that Days of Future Past only repeats what we have seen several times, fails to progress the characters (with the exception of Mystique, who is unexpectedly active and important, and she is simply no longer "an object of the professors' wills"... I still have to ask, whose perverted idea was it to make Jennifer Lawrence a symbol of Hollywood emancipation?... nevermind), whilst rather sketches the new characters and uses them as a bearers of interesting action skills. The fact is, however, that Singer focuses entirely on the central characters (Charles, Erik and Logan). Watching the new crew is ballbusting, as both McAvoy and Fassbender are full of energy, cynicism and inner drama. Particularly young Magneto bends space-time towards him uncompromisingly. The old men are more like pitied and melancholic characters. In addition, I completely failed to decipher how they relate to the original trilogy (especially Charles). Another continuum? Maybe. In the end, Days of Future Past is not a riveting act of the "builder of worlds", but for the most part great maintenance of the poetics of the series, its anchor and at the same time a restart. And it is only slightly worse than First Classs. After it ended, I thoughtfully wondered whether the times when similar comic films had redefined the complex relationship between blockbuster and reality are behind us. The gap between the X-Men, Batman, and the formerly frivolous escapists is beginning to be closed on a tolerable compromise that has a certain edge, but at the same time does not irritate in the slightest and does not explore new territories as intensively as a few years ago. Time will tell. [75%]

The screenplay builds on the clash of civilization with nature and is clearly based on the assumption that humanity is a relic of the past. How else can you explain that the characters are stenciled, sometimes speak like they have ingested psychotropic substances, and have no meaningful dramatic arcs? Only the most shabby vicissitudes of all remain - dad has to find his family. The rest is quickly zipped into bags and dismissed by a few approximate sentences. There is no realism, deeper psychology and provocative work with familiar motives (perhaps only death / generally serious stylization are unusually frequent guests here). The second covert (apparently) misanthropic element is the actions of human command, which he plans with the ingenuity of the Stone Age, and if anyone sees a deeper meaning in his actions, please let me know, preferably in writing and with drawings. So what we have left is Godzilla vs. MUTO + an ant human perspective, which can fragment the monster clash, cover it in time or inadvertently see it in all its gigantic majesty. People are simply not here to act and be interesting in and of themselves, but to be able to watch, and the film can be saturated with their views. Here, Gareth Edwards and his crew demonstrate that sometimes it is simply enough to supply nutritious food for the eyes and ears, and the effect still appears in the middle of a dysfunctional human story. Intoxicated by the scale of the monster, its clever aestheticization and framing in photogenic compositions is the meaning of Godzilla as a whole, which is slower and more majestic than usual. Similar to a couple of well-timed scenes and the old school thunder of Alexandre Desplat in the orchestra pit. The monsters from the depths have exactly the ballbusting vibration I expected from Pacific Rim. I finally get it in edible form a year later. We can speculate whether next year someone will deliver what was expected of Godzilla for a change. [75%]

An intuitive gender detective story that needs to be perceived as a giant film project. The division into parts is very artificial and, due to the structure, which is really governed by emotions rather than by a refined narrative plan, actually tears one away unnecessarily from contemplation. I wouldn't be afraid to talk about earthy magical realism, a kind of Picnic at Hanging Rock for the 21st century. The captivating charisma of deranged characters (Patriarch Matt, the gray mother-guru GJ), a very personal reflection of femininity, masculinity, conception, death... the only thing that fails is the predictable and literal point of the film. But the power of Top of the Lake is in what comes after. A scene woven from the captivating New Zealand landscape, silence, wind and a few loose words. An unforgettable, cruel and increasingly engaging world that reveals how deep the possibilities of current TV series are. [90%]

Clever, self-aware, full of information and meta-arguments, yet it seems to me that no match has been found between the form and the transmission of information. The mixture of witness voices becomes more ambient than anything, and paradoxically, there are too many ideas and the film is sometimes childishly enchanted by them. Precipitance and playfulness combined with narratological interest are sympathetic, but not completely balanced. It deserves respect and appreciations as an attempt at an educational documentary 2.0, which will reflect the possibilities of the media and the possibilities of ways of telling about them. And especially the followers... [70%]

A famous film response to Aldiss's classic Non Stop. How does one conjure an adventurous and unpredictable universe from claustrophobic space? Divide the space into fragments, create each fragment as a closed ecosystem and connect them with Bong's poetics, which oscillate on the edge of cabaret stylization and (post) industrial dystopia. Despite the certain anachronistic nature of the metaphor of the eternal machine that devours the bodies of the proletariat, Snowpiercer is the best possible return to the ethos of classical dystopian sci-fi. A film that holds up where Elysium failed due to excess of theses. Excellent performances by Evans, Harris and of course the clown Song. For me, it is definitely a ride in first class, which is not brought down by the weaker "extruder" effects and the fact that Bong has set the bar in mutating genres so high in the past that it probably won't surpass it any time soon. [85%]

Did I understand (I hope correctly) that this is the story of two robots that dream all of it during memory formatting? The film is like Ender’s Game for Bravo magazine teen consumers, or I don't know what the kids are reading these days, I lost contact with trends similarly to how this film lost contact with logic and meaning. If it weren't for those few solid hallucinogenic burgers, it would have been a horrible reduction diet.

An empty emptiness that says nothing, even about emptiness itself. If this is supposed to be an attempt to diagnose generational frustration, only nicely-filmed generational clichés have been created. Screenwriting exercises with poorly-constructed characters, uninterestingly stagnant situations which, even when filmed in one (three) shot(s) do not create the impression of fluidity of time and space, but rather disconcerted volatility from detail to detail, and from there to a helplessly cycled whole. The naturalness of the conversation is constantly brought down by the fact that the characters, in addition to the constant babble, also emphasize the wearing of masks and the exhibitionist covering of their own insignificance (it is sometimes so stubbornly literal that it seems completely unrealistic). The essence of frustration and aggression probably unintentionally appears here as something that the creators secretly fear from behind safe cafe windows, but they are not able to give it a meaningful shape and motivation. When Samir refers to the London Riots, in relation to Hany I remember the mocking chorus of the destructive symphony of London rapper Plan B: "Oiy! I said Oiy! / What you looking at you little rich boy! / We're poor 'round here, run home and lock your door / don't come 'round here no more, you could get robbed for." From the youngest generation, I would expect radicality, irritability, subversiveness, not comfortable undiscovered stereotypes. I really can go squat in Hany Bany and stare dumbly on the street, where the same empty, irrelevant, but noticeably screaming nothing has been going on for years. Two stars for the courage to try to film differently and Žiaran's quite impressive camera. [40%]

The first film was about hormones, the second accepts the fact that it has to expose the character to something more fundamental (death, responsibility, loneliness) and somehow develop and problematize the character. Unfortunately, there is a syndrome of beating empty straw with the expression of a farmer whose cattle have died. The clichés and love twists are so stupid that even the nonchalant Webb loses grace and the whole thing is reminiscent of the weak moralistic moments of Raimi's trilogy. A certain inconsistency also continues between the detached adolescent escapades in the clouds and quite harsh moments (the introductory scene is something like Nolan would do) / an effort to motivate the villains more comprehensively. It's nothing that Spidey would excel at, so exactly, as was said here - the action is excellent and imaginative, whilst the link between it is a bit barren. Still nothing that offends me, but also nothing I would watch with increased attention and affection.

In my opinion, this is a critical picture of the low social intelligence of scientists who, even if they receive unlimited resources to realize their visions, fail because of miserable PR. But maybe I misunderstood it. In any case, it has been a long time since I have had to work so hard to not fall asleep in the cinema. Wally, don't make idiots out of us. [40%]

In my ideal world, Nebraska is a film for the masses. An unpretentiously empathetic, restrainedly funny, sincere and sensitively pointed story about old age, death, a father-son relationship, and an unnecessary journey that gives everything an unexpected new meaning through a stubborn denial of futility. A film subject to the creeping biorhythm of the main character, who is not, in the true sense of the word, the protagonist, because instead of activity, he is instead the subject of conversation and actions of others. The extraordinary beauty of Nebraska is in the passivity of the old man, who will never become an easy object of emotion. We know little about him, and what we do know about him is rather contradictory. Payne thus has to work with extraordinary sensitivity with a world that lacks beautiful and positive characters and is dominated by imperfect, aging and abandoned people. The result is a lyrically captivating indie film that works suggestively with the entire landscape and the faces of the protagonists, in a sleepy rhythm and what here we call, with a bit a irony "humanity". In Nebraska's case, however, it really is an unpretentiously impressive view of "bare humanity". Payne's black and white redemption from the completely opposite colors of The Descendants. [80%]