petak, 18. veljače 2011.

La Haine (Hate)

La Haine (Hate)






















A film which will never escape controversy, Mathieu Kassowitz's La Haine is a story of three friends (one black, one Jewish and one Arabic) struggling to cope with the harsh realities of life in tough suburban Paris.
Shot in an appropriately bleak black and white, the story follows Vinz (Vincent Cassel), Hubert (Hubert Kounde) and Saïd (Saïd Taghmaoui) in the 24 hours following riots in their harsh Parisienne suburb, during which their friend Abdel is beaten to within inches of his life by police and is intensive care as a result.
Kassowitz originally shot the film in colour, but switched to black and white in post-production, a decision which in my opinion benefits the film: the relentless repression of expression by the French state and the irrevocable discrimination against these people are issues addressed throughout. The major issue presented is doubtless that of police brutality. Countlessly referred to as 'pigs' by the main characters and portrayed as violent thugs and hypocrites, the French police are certainly the main target in what this film tries to say.
The narrative centres on Vinz finding a policeman's revolver after the previous night's riots and his subsequent power trip, which results in him vowing to shoot a police officer if Abdel finally dies as a result of his beating. This 'suburb' or 'banlieue' is not akin to those we have in Britain and certainly not to those in the USA: almost everyone is either unemployed or not attending school, and everyone seems to be bored, trapped inside this monotonous, sprawling mini-city.



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Requiem For A Dream

Requiem For A Dream




















Darren Aronofsky's Requiem for a Dream, one of the most forceful anti-drug narratives ever to be committed to celluloid. To call this movie a cautionary tale would be to apply a label that is too tame -- Requiem for a Dream presents the darkest take imaginable on a story of hopes and dreams shattered by drug addiction. There's no preaching or sermonizing here, just an almost-clinical depiction of lives laid to waste. This is not a film for the weak of mind or soul. Even in the midst of the whirlwind of a film festival, when I was seeing four films a day and the tendency was for everything to blur into a continuum, this one stuck out, demanding attention and rumination. It is a force to be reckoned with.
As he proved with his art house success, Pi, Aronofsky is not afraid to take chances, and Requiem for a Dream represents a big one. Based on the novel by Hubert Selby Jr., this movie was granted the MPAA's NC-17 "kiss of death" for its uncompromising portrayal of the depths to which some people will sink to get their fix. No punches are pulled, no images "prettied up". Undaunted by the MPAA's hypocritical and senseless stance, Aronofsky appealed the rating, rightfully claiming that cutting any portion of the film would dilute, if not outright destroy, its message. The appeal was denied, but Artisan, in a move that affirms their commitment to art over commercialism (at least in this case) has decided to release the film unrated.




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Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas

Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas







Ah, but he was funny before he flamed out. "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" is a film based on the book of the same name, a stream-of-altered-consciousness report of his trip to Vegas with his allegedly Samoan attorney. In the trunk of their car they carried an inventory of grass, mescaline, acid, cocaine, uppers, booze, and ether. That ether, it's a wicked high. Hurtling through the desert in a gas-guzzling convertible, they hallucinated attacks by giant bats, and "speaking as your attorney," the lawyer advised him on drug ingestion.


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četvrtak, 17. veljače 2011.

Big Nothing

Big Nothing





















Big Nothing is a 2006 British neo-noir comedy film directed by Jean-Baptiste Andrea starring David Schwimmer and Simon Pegg. It was released in December 2006, and had its premiere at Cardiff Film Festival in November 2006.
Big Nothing was filmed on the Isle of Man and in Wales at Barry in the Vale of Glamorgan and at Caerwent and other areas ofMonmouthshire. Other scenes were at Squamish, British ColumbiaCanada.





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Pusher - Trilogy

Pusher - Trilogy





















The Pusher trilogy is a series of films by Danish film director Nicolas Winding Refn. They illustrate and explore the criminal underworld of Copenhagen. The trilogy is composed ofPusher (1996), Pusher II (2004) and Pusher III (2005).



The first part of the trilogy follows Frank, a mid-level drug dealer, for a week. It depicts his depravity, how his actions forces him further and further out on thin ice and the bittersweet relationship he has with his girlfriend, Vic.
The movie was a blockbuster, not only in Denmark, but internationally. It was also the movie that launched both Refn's and Mads Mikkelsen's careers.

The second part of Refn's trilogy, which was made to save his company, Jango Star, from bankruptcy, follows Frank's low-level criminal sidekick, Tonny.
It illustrates how Tonny is rooted in an evil spiral of crime and drugs, his relationship towards his notorious, cynical father and how he adapts to the consequence of being a father himself.

The third and last part of the trilogy, depicts a day in the life of Serbian drug lord Milo.
Milo, who was a feared and respected man in the first two movies, has since aged. He does not have the same grip on the underworld that he used to and is now slowly losing the battle against a younger generation of immigrants, who now want a piece of the action. The film shows Milo's downfall and his desperate attempt to reclaim the throne.






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In China They Eat Dogs

In China They Eat Dogs (I Kina spiser de hunde)




















Arvid is a bank clerk whose girlfriend Henne is about to leave him because he is so boring. When Arvid accidentally foils a bank heist by hitting Franz over head, he realizes that Franz is really just a decent guy trying to raise money for he and his girlfriend Astrid to have a baby through artificial insemination. Seeing this as a chance not only to help Franz, but prove to his own girlfriend that his life is filled with danger and excitement, Arvid decides to rob a mail van, give the proceeds to Astrid, and find a way to spring Franz out of prison. 



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District 9

District 9






















District 9 is a 2009 science fiction thriller film directed by Neill Blomkamp. It was written by Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell, and produced byPeter Jackson and Carolynne Cunningham. The film stars Sharlto CopleyJason Cope, and David James. The film won the 2010 Saturn Award for Best International Film presented by the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films,[3] and was nominated for fourAcademy Awards in 2010, including Best PictureBest Adapted ScreenplayBest Visual Effects, and Best Editing.[4]
The story, adapted from Alive in Joburg, a 2005 short film directed by Blomkamp and produced by Sharlto Copley and Simon Hansen, pivots on the themes of xenophobia and social segregation. The title and premise of District 9 were inspired by events that took place inDistrict Six, Cape Town during the apartheid era. The film was produced for $30 million and shot on location in Chiawelo, Soweto, presenting fictional interviews, news footage, and video from surveillance cameras in a part-mock documentary style format. A viral marketing campaign began in 2008, at the San Diego Comic-Con, while the theatrical trailer appeared in July 2009. Released by TriStar Pictures, the film opened to critical acclaim on August 14, 2009, in North America and earned $37 million in its opening weekend. Many saw the film as a sleeper hit for its relatively unknown cast and modest-budget production, while achieving success and popularity during its theatrical run.




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V For Vendetta

V For Vendetta




















V for Vendetta is a 2006 dystopian thriller film directed by James McTeigue and produced by Joel Silver and the Wachowski brothers, who also wrote the screenplay. It is an adaptation of the comic book series of the same name by Alan Moore and David Lloyd. Set in London in a near-future dystopian society, Natalie Portman stars as Evey, a working-class girl who must determine if her hero has become the very menace she is fighting against. Hugo Weaving plays V—a bold, charismatic freedom fighter driven to exact revenge on those who disfigured him. Stephen Rea portrays the detective leading a desperate quest to capture V before he ignites a revolution.
The film was originally scheduled for release by Warner Bros. Friday, November 4, 2005 (a day before the 400th Guy Fawkes Night), but was delayed; it opened on March 17, 2006. Reviews were mixed, but the worldwide box office earnings were over $132 million. Alan Moore, having been disappointed with the film adaptations of two of his other graphic novels, From Hell and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, refused to view the film and subsequently distanced himself from it. The filmmakers removed many of the anarchist themes anddrug references present in the original story and also altered the political message to what they believed would be more relevant to a 2006 audience.
The film had been seen by many political groups as an allegory of oppression by government. Libertarians used this as a statement against government intervention into the lives of the citizens. Anarchists used this film to propagate the political theory of anarchism.





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Blow

Blow




The story of George Jung, the man who established the American cocaine market in the 1970s.
Blow is a 2001 biopic about the American cocaine smuggler George Jungdirected by Ted Demme (his final film). David McKenna andNick Cassavetes adapted Bruce Porter's 1993 book Blow: How a Small Town Boy Made $100 Million with the Medellín Cocaine Cartel and Lost It All for the screenplay. It is based on the real life stories of George JungPablo EscobarCarlos Lehder, and the Medellín Cartel. The film's title comes from a slang term for cocaine.


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Pulp Fiction

Pulp Fiction





















The lives of two mob hit men, a boxer, a gangster's wife, and a pair of diner bandits intertwine in four tales of violence and redemption.




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Natural Born Killers

Natural Born Killers (Oliver Stone & Quentin Tarantino)




















Two victims of traumatized childhoods become lovers and psychopathic serial murderers irresponsibly glorified by the mass media.




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Old School: Star Wars collection

Star Wars collection



The saga is complete. What George Lucas began in 1977 as a little movie that took the box office by storm, he has completed in 2005 with the most heralded motion picture of the year. With the arrival ofRevenge of the Sith, Lucas places the missing piece of the six-film arc that tells of the rise, fall, and redemption of Darth Vader. It's a rousing and tragic sendoff to a beloved franchise, and the best installment in the Star Wars series since 1980's The Empire Strikes Back. If this is to be the last big-screen installment of the space opera, Revenge of the Sith ushers things out on a high note. Those who have disparaged the previous two prequels (1999's The Phantom Menace and 2002's Attack of the Clones) will find few things to complain about this time around. Lucas has delivered the film that Star Warsfans have been yearning for.
Revenge of the Sith exhibits its writer/director's strengths and weaknesses for all to see. Lucas, who can at best be described as a journeyman writer of dialogue, delivers plenty of clunky lines. And the romance between Padme (Natalie Portman) and Anakin (Hayden Christensen) is as forced here as it was in the previous installment, the sincere efforts of the actors notwithstanding. Nevertheless, although weak in specific areas of screenplay-writing, Lucas is a masterful storyteller. That aspect of his creativity is in evidence here as he spins a tale as compelling as any Greek or Shakespearean tragedy: a man who attains power only after sacrificing everything dear to him, including his soul. There is bitter irony in Anakin's situation: by embracing the dark side of the Force, he loses the very thing he seeks to protect.




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Old School: Hitchcock's Birds


Birds

























The Birds (1963) is a modern Hitchcock thriller/masterpiece, his first film with Universal Studios. It is the apocalyptic story of a northern California coastal town filled with an onslaught of seemingly unexplained, arbitrary and chaotic attacks of ordinary birds - not birds of prey. Ungrammatical advertising campaigns emphasized: "The Birds Is Coming." This Technicolor feature came after Psycho (1960) - another film loaded with 'bird' references.
Novelist Evan Hunter based his screenplay upon the 1952 collection of short stories of the same name by Daphne du Maurier - Hitchcock's third major film based on the author's works (after Jamaica Inn (1939) and Rebecca (1940)). In du Maurier's story, the birds were attacking in the English countryside, rather than in a small town north of San Francisco. The film's technical wizardry is extraordinary, especially in the film's closing scene (a complex, trick composite shot) - the special visual effects of Ub Iwerks were nominated for an Academy Award (the film's sole nomination), but the Oscar was lost to Cleopatra. Hundreds of birds (gulls, ravens, and crows) were trained for use in some of the scenes, while mechanical birds and animations were employed for others.
The film's non-existent musical score is replaced by an electronic soundtrack (including simulated bird cries and wing-flaps), with Hitchcock's favorite composer Bernard Herrmann serving as a sound consultant. It was shot on location in the port town of Bodega Bay (north of San Francisco) and in San Francisco itself. Hitchcock introduced a 'fascinating new personality' for the film - his successor to Grace Kelly - a cool, blonde professional model named 'Tippi' Hedren, in her film debut in a leading role. [Hedren reprised her character in a minor supporting role, in an inferior made-for-TV sequel, The Birds II: Land's End (1994), set in the New England fishing town of Land's End. The director was Rick Rosenthal, although the standard generic pseudonym 'Alan Smithee' is found in the credits. Leads Rod Taylor and Tippi Hedren are replaced by Brad Johnson and Chelsea Field.]





Old School: Hitchcock's Vertigo

Vertigo


























It’s a mesmerizing psychological thriller that beguiles on multiple levels, and has come to be known as the film that most reveals the man behind the camera, Alfred Hitchcock (Rear WindowThe Birds).  Vertigo is an exercise in patience, not a taut thriller in the classic sense, but one that unfolds its mysteries in complexly fascinating ways.  Quite possibly the most analyzed of the Master’s films, the fractured narrative begs for repeated viewings, and in each repeated session we’re left trying to squeeze out hope and happiness for this dysfunctional pairing, but it remains, as it always is, forever elusive.  


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srijeda, 16. veljače 2011.

Old School: Godfather - Trilogy

Godfather: Trilogy
















If you visit the Internet Movie Database (www.imdb.com) and take a look at the list of the top 250 movies of all time (based on the votes of its registered users), you won't find "Star Wars" in the exalted number one position (it's actually #9). Neither will you find the American Film Institute chart-topper and critics' fave "Citizen Kane" (#6), nor the recent pop culture phenomenon "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring" (#3). Instead, the number one film is "The Godfather", Francis Ford Coppola's first installment in what would eventually become one of the most revered trilogies in cinematic history.
Since its release in 1972, "The Godfather" has become an indelible fixture in popular culture. It defined the gangster genre and continues to serve as a benchmark for all the films that would follow in its footsteps (such as "Goodfellas" or "Scarface"). Those who have not seen the film can recite a number of the film's iconic scenes, such as the horse's head in the bed, Marlon Brando's raspy voiced performance, or the tollbooth ambush. "The Godfather" is probably also one of the most referenced films in history, with nods appearing in diverse films such as "You've Got Mail", "Annie Hall", and "Scream 2". It is also probably the most parodied, such as the shot-for-shot recreation of Vito's attempted assassination in "Analyze This", or the pathologically unfunny "Jane Austen's Mafia!". Thanks to the recent release of a DVD boxed set, moviegoers can revisit "The Godfather" (as well as its two sequels), and once again appreciate the artistry and craftsmanship of a film that truly stands the test of time.



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Old School: Ocean's Eleven (1960)

Ocean's Eleven






















This 1960 Rat Pack movie really has very little in common with the 2001 remake (and even less in common with the 2004 sequel, Ocean’s Twelve). Both are about eleven guys (led by a guy named Danny Ocean) trying to pull off a big casino heist in Vegas, but that’s where it ends. In the original, the Eleven are a bunch of military buddies—not a bunch of professionals—who decide to use their military training to pull off a “fool-proof” robbery of five casinos in Las Vegas just after midnight on New Year’s Day. At the suggestion of idea man Spyros Acebos (Akim Tamiroff), playboy and prankster Ocean (Frank Sinatra) gathers the boys together, and they all hit Vegas to put the plan into action. 


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Old School: The Holy Mountain

The Holy Mountain




















Alejandro Jodorowsky/Mexico 1973
“I wanted to enlighten the public. I am crazy.” – Alejandro Jodorowsky presenting The Holy Mountain at the Walter Reade Theater in New York City on Oct. 7.
The Holy Mountain is a trip: Blood flows as red ribbons or a stream of delicate birds. A sanctuary of testicles is completed at its 1000th pair. Shit turns into gold and immortality is simply a camera trick.
After 30 years of bootleg copies and dubious distributions, The Holy Mountain has been released from the hands of a so-called monster. No more fuzzy dots over pubic hair or bad PAL transfers from discolored Italian imports. If you have ever seen The Holy Mountain before, but were too young or not entirely hip and/or with the underground scene in 1973, you’ve likely experienced a VHS copy with fixed foreign subtitles or the Japanese bootleg with aforementioned fuzzy dots blurring out pubic hair. While there may be some romanticism (and perhaps elitism) attached to these louche releases – in that it’s just that underground – watching The Holy Mountain in a dark theater and on a gloriously widescreen as the Walter Reade’s, is like seeing it for the first time. Remastered with gorgeous color, Jodorowsky’s psychadelic masterpiece breathes anew.
The success of his previous feature, El Topo (1971), as a consistent late night staple at the Elgin Theatre in New York, had circumscribed Jodorowsky’s work in the genre of “midnight movie”; El Topo and The Holy Mountain as “cult classics”. While some of the basic themes and imagery of The Holy Mountain and especially El Topocoincide with our conceptions of these terms – particularly in their use of violence, visual non sequiturs and abnormal human figures – a film like The Holy Mountain points to something more spiritual and perhaps theatrical in its unloading of imagery.




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Old School: Taxi Driver

Taxi Driver






















Taxi Driver (1976) is director Martin Scorsese's and screenwriter Paul Schrader's gritty, disturbing, nightmarish modern film classic, that examines alienation in urban society. Scorsese's fourth film, combining elements of film noir, the western, horror and urban melodrama film genres. Historically, the film appeared after a decade of war in Vietnam, and after the disgraceful Watergate crisis and President Nixon's resignation.
It explores the psychological madness within an obsessed, twisted, inarticulate, lonely, anti-hero cab driver and war vet (De Niro), who misdirectedly lashes out with frustrated anger and power like an exploding time bomb at the world that has alienated him. His assaultive unhinging is first paired with a longing to connect with a blonde goddess office worker (Shepherd), and then with an attempt to rescue/liberate a young 12-year old prostitute named Iris (Foster) from her predatory pimp "Sport" (Keitel) and her tawdry, streetwalking life. [The young Foster, who had previously acted for Scorsese in Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore (1974), was required to undergo psychological tests to see if she would bear up during filming.]



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Old School: Apocalypse Now

Apocalypse Now





















Apocalypse Now (1979) is producer/director Francis Ford Coppola's visually beautiful, ground-breaking masterpiece with surrealistic and symbolic sequences detailing the confusion, violence, fear, and nightmarish madness of the Vietnam War. Coppola had already become a noted producer/director, following his two profitable and critically-acclaimed Godfather films (1972 and 1974) - the epic saga of a Mafia-style patriarch and his successor. This provocative film did for the Vietnam War genre what The Godfather did for the gangster movie.
After a three to four year wait for the notorious film (that brought other award-winning Vietnam war films to the forefront a year earlier - The Deer Hunter (1978) and Coming Home (1978)), the film that was budgeted at $12-13 million was something of an extravagant, self-indulgent epic in the making that cost almost $31 million - with much of the film shot on location in the Philippines. The highly-publicized delays and catastrophes in the grueling shoot (scheduled for about 17 weeks but ending up lasting about 34 weeks), along with extra-marital affairs, a grandiose and suicidal director, drug use and other forms of madness, were mostly due to a rain-drenching typhoon (named Olga) and a star-debilitating, near-fatal heart attack for star Martin Sheen.



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Old School: Brazil

Brazil


















Jonathan Pryce stars as Sam Lowry, a faceless civil servant in a massive futuristic bureaucracy. In this world, the grinding wheels of the state manage everything, as long as the paperwork is in order – although the technology often doesn't work and there's never anyone to complain to. Sam dreams of being free – of flying away from drudgery and bureaucracy to become a great hero with wings. He also dreams about a mysterious but beautiful woman that his hero-self can save. However, in general, Sam does as he's expected to do, even if he doesn't always know why.
Sam's safe life starts to come apart, however, when he sees his dream girl looking down at him through a hole in the ceiling during an arrest. Then he spots a mistake in the arrest paperwork and follows up on the administrative error. It would seem that a Mr Buttle has been arrested accidentally instead of Harry Tuttle (Robert De Niro), a maverick heating engineer on the run from the state. While trying to rectify the wrongful arrest, Sam finally meets his dream girl Jill Layton (Kim Greist). When Sam's air conditioning breaks down in his apartment, he also gets to meet the anarchic heating engineer Tuttle. A confused Sam now finds himself being accused by the state as being behind a spate of terrorist bombings.




Old School: Metropolis

Metropolis
















Stirred by the visionary power of "Dark City," I revisited Fritz Lang's "Metropolis" and once again fell under its eerie spell. The movie has a plot that defies common sense, but its very discontinuity is a strength. It makes "Metropolis" hallucinatory--a nightmare without the reassurance of a steadying story line. Few films have ever been more visually exhilarating.
Generally considered the first great science-fiction film, "Metropolis" (1926) fixed for the rest of the century the image of a futuristic city as a hell of scientific progress and human despair. From this film, in various ways, descended not only "Dark City" but "Blade Runner," "The Fifth Element," "Alphaville," "Escape from L.A.," "Gattaca," and Batman's Gotham City. The laboratory of its evil genius, Rotwang, created the visual look of mad scientists for decades to come, especially after it was mirrored in "Bride of Frankenstein" (1935). And the device of the "false Maria," the robot who looks like a human being, inspired the "Replicants" of "Blade Runner." Even Rotwang's artificial hand was given homage in "Dr. Strangelove."
What many of these movies have in common is a loner hero who discovers the inner workings of the future society, penetrating the system that would control the population. Even Batman's villains are the descendants of Rotwang, giggling as they pull the levels that will enforce their will. The buried message is powerful: Science and industry will become the weapons of demagogues.



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Old school: Scarface

Scarface


























The interesting thing is the way Tony Montana stays in the memory, taking on the dimensions of a real, tortured person. Most thrillers use interchangeable characters, and most gangster movies are more interested in action than personality, but "Scarface" is one of those special movies, like "The Godfather," that is willing to take a flawed, evil man and allow him to be human. Maybe it's no coincidence that Montana is played byAl Pacino, the same actor who played Michael Corleone.