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Indelible (Grant County, #4)
Indelible (Grant County, #4)
Karin Slaughter | 2004 | Thriller
5
6.4 (5 Ratings)
Book Rating
Better then the last but still not in the same league as the first couple of books in this series....
This is the fourth in the Grant County series and for a series that started so strong (I loved the first two books) I was really disappointed with this. I would recommend approaching this series in order as they do carry a lot of emotional baggage through the series.

This was the first one I listened to as an audiobook and the Southern American accents used were a bit grating for me, so I'll try to stick to the books in the future for this series (obviously a personal preference.)

With a shootout occuring in the town in the present day, we get flashbacks to an “origin” type story 12 years earlier, which sets out to give the reasoning behind the attack. It’s a pretty shocking attack and the present day part was tense.

This book is very focused on two of the main characters from the series, Medical examiner Sara Linton and her now ex husband / current boyfriend (it’s a complicated relationship) Police Chief Jeffrey. In the flashback parts of this book we see Sara and Jeffrey taking a trip to Jefferies hometown where his best friend ends up shooting someone and a body is found from Jefferies distant past. I didn’t find the investigation part here as engaging as in the previous books, with too much focus on what Jeffrey was like as a lad.

I think my main issue with this particular book is I just don’t like Jeffery and having so much dedicated to back story for him didn’t endear him any more to me. I came out of that part of the story still not liking him or really understanding why Sara is so in love with him (I suppose love is blind.)

Although I enjoyed the action packed present day shootout it still had a character issue in the form of the ever complicated Lena Adams. She is back to being a cop and this is her first day back (talk about bad timing!) I really have no idea why they are letting her back on the force she just seems to be a terrible cop (and not a particularly nice person) who is suffering from PTSD.

I feel I may be being too harsh on this book and I can fully understand people who love the characters in this series (or love to hate main characters) enjoying this book. I just prefer this series when it’s slightly more focused on a case rather than their personal lives.
  
Miss Bala (2019)
Miss Bala (2019)
2019 | Action, Drama, Thriller
Gloria (Gina Rodriguez), a makeup artist in Los Angeles, heads to Tijuana for a fun weekend with her best friend, Suzu (Cristina Rodlo). Gloria is going to help Suzu prepare for the Miss Baja California beauty pageant. They decide to head to a club to rub elbows with one of the more important judges, Chief Saucedo (Damian Alcazar). That is when a fun trip turns into a nightmare, several members of a local cartel, Estrella (Spanish for star), break in and start shooting up the club. The leader of Estrella, Leno (Ismael Cruz Cordova), believes that Chief Saucedo is trying to cut into his business and is there to assassinate him. Gloria escapes but gets separated from Suzu. She searches all night and calls the hospitals but can’t find her friend. She finds a police officer to have him help search and tells him he saw the attackers. Instead of taking her to the police station he delivers her to Estrella and Leno. He agrees to help her find her friend but there is a price. Now Gloria will have go to great lengths to find her friend and survive a deadly battle between a cartel and the police from right in the middle of the chaos.

Gina Rodriguez is really good in this film. I thought her performance was definitely the best part of this film. Otherwise the performances were a mix bag of good and bad. Cruz Cordova in particular failed to really come across as a scary, but sensitive, cartel leader. The cameo by Anthony Mackie was a surprise. The story is really interesting and there were times that were suspenseful. The action was decent with some good scenes. The issue was there were also some campy performances and scene set ups that felt rushed. The film was shot decently and the music fit well. The end, which I would not dare spoil, really fell short of all of the buildup.

Before looking for a trailer for this movie I did not know that this was a remake of a 2012 film of the same name. I would be interested to see this film to compare the two because I enjoyed the story. This film missed on some points but really did entertain me for the hour and forty-four minutes. I would say that you could save this for streaming or rental. I don’t think that it would be a movie I would watch again in the theater.
  
The Bourne Legacy (2012)
The Bourne Legacy (2012)
2012 | Action, Mystery
6
6.3 (15 Ratings)
Movie Rating
When Matt Damon and Paul Greengrass distanced themselves from another trip into the Bourne-verse it was hard to see if any film would ever make it into production. Then, along came Tony Gilroy, writer of the first three films he seemed to be the logical choice to co-write and direct the fourth installment in this ever popular action franchise.

The Bourne Legacy runs almost parallel with the events of The Bourne Ultimatum, but in this film the only time we get to see Matt Damon’s Jason Bourne is from the odd photograph and his name etched into wood on the underside of a bunk bed.

It’s time for a stare off!
For this outing Renner plays Aaron Cross an ‘outcome’ agent who finds himself on the run when the powers that be realize that Bourne has broken through and passed vital information about Treadstone and Black Briar to Pam Landy, who in turn passes it onto the media. So Retired Col. Eric Byer, USAF ( Norton) part of the sinister hierarchy decides it’s time to shut down and eradicate all other ops, including Cross.

It’s fraught with the occasional plot hole, (just how did Cross know where Shearing lived) here and there but that does little damage to the overall story which is actually quite good. Renner, who is already well equipped for these types of action films fills the void left by Damon very well. When he’s not battling wolves and shooting drones out of the sky he’s driving a motorbike through the streets of Manila, as well as running through every back street and staircase he can find. And he’s more than capable at hand to hand combat.

He’s joined on his adventure by Dr. Marta Shearing (Weisz) who worked with Cross in the beginning and was tasked with providing the agents with a specific set of medication to take, of which it seems Cross is no longer required but is desperately dependent on. Whereas Bourne tried to piece together parts of his life, Cross is like a crackhead desperate for the next fix and so his motives are different.

Gilroy manages the story well and there are some brief cameos from the likes of Scott Glenn, David Strathairn and Albert Finney to provide a reminder to us all about what has happened previously, just in case we are dealing with our own bout of memory loss. It’s disappointing not to see Damon reprise one of the best roles of his career but Renner does an admirable job and there is no question that there will be more life in him yet.
  
My Dinner with André (1981)
My Dinner with André (1981)
1981 | Comedy, Drama
(0 Ratings)
Movie Favorite

"Since my films consist entirely of 16 mm urban landscapes and voice-over, I have always been fascinated by the many ways that other films utilize voice-over. Generally, I think the use of voice-over in film gets an unjustly bad rap. It is one of the most effective and evocative ways to connect the audience directly to a character. Both of these films incorporate innovative first-person monologue. While I admire My Dinner with André for its formal ambitiousness, I confess I don’t really enjoy the bulk of the film itself. But I love the opening and closing, especially the simple shots of New York City and Wallace Shawn’s concluding narration: “I treated myself to a taxi. I rode home through the city streets. There wasn’t a street, there wasn’t a building, that wasn’t connected to some memory in my mind. There, I was buying a suit with my father. There, I was having an ice cream soda after school. When I finally came in, Debbie was home from work. And I told her everything about my dinner with André.” Similarly, the best thing about Days of Heaven is the spectacularly quirky, poignant, complicated, and full-of-life narration by Linda (Linda Manz). Years ago, I had a phone call with the film’s executive producer and second unit director, Jacob Brackman, while I was researching the fabulous 1980 teen runaway adventure Times Square, for which he wrote the screenplay. I don’t recall how we got on the topic of his work on Days of Heaven, but I vividly remember him telling me about how the decision to introduce that voice-over as the primary storytelling vehicle arose out of Brackman and Malick’s realization when watching the dailies that the dramatic dialogue scenes weren’t working. They were in the middle of shooting and had the idea to save the film by sending out a second unit to shoot a ton of natural landscape B-roll and then adding voice-over to the footage. About a year after making Days of Heaven in May 1979, Brackman would go on to complete the screenplay for Times Square, a film that happens to bear an interesting resemblance to Malick’s story of a tough teenage girl with a heavy accent making her way in a hardscrabble environment. Days of Heaven’s Linda claims to be from Chicago, but her at times almost unintelligible accent sounds astoundingly similar to Robin Johnson’s Brooklynese in Times Square."

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Jenni Olson recommended Days of Heaven (1978) in Movies (curated)

 
Days of Heaven (1978)
Days of Heaven (1978)
1978 | Drama

"Since my films consist entirely of 16 mm urban landscapes and voice-over, I have always been fascinated by the many ways that other films utilize voice-over. Generally, I think the use of voice-over in film gets an unjustly bad rap. It is one of the most effective and evocative ways to connect the audience directly to a character. Both of these films incorporate innovative first-person monologue. While I admire My Dinner with André for its formal ambitiousness, I confess I don’t really enjoy the bulk of the film itself. But I love the opening and closing, especially the simple shots of New York City and Wallace Shawn’s concluding narration: “I treated myself to a taxi. I rode home through the city streets. There wasn’t a street, there wasn’t a building, that wasn’t connected to some memory in my mind. There, I was buying a suit with my father. There, I was having an ice cream soda after school. When I finally came in, Debbie was home from work. And I told her everything about my dinner with André.” Similarly, the best thing about Days of Heaven is the spectacularly quirky, poignant, complicated, and full-of-life narration by Linda (Linda Manz). Years ago, I had a phone call with the film’s executive producer and second unit director, Jacob Brackman, while I was researching the fabulous 1980 teen runaway adventure Times Square, for which he wrote the screenplay. I don’t recall how we got on the topic of his work on Days of Heaven, but I vividly remember him telling me about how the decision to introduce that voice-over as the primary storytelling vehicle arose out of Brackman and Malick’s realization when watching the dailies that the dramatic dialogue scenes weren’t working. They were in the middle of shooting and had the idea to save the film by sending out a second unit to shoot a ton of natural landscape B-roll and then adding voice-over to the footage. About a year after making Days of Heaven in May 1979, Brackman would go on to complete the screenplay for Times Square, a film that happens to bear an interesting resemblance to Malick’s story of a tough teenage girl with a heavy accent making her way in a hardscrabble environment. Days of Heaven’s Linda claims to be from Chicago, but her at times almost unintelligible accent sounds astoundingly similar to Robin Johnson’s Brooklynese in Times Square."

Source
  
Another Round (2020)
Another Round (2020)
2020 | Comedy, Drama
8
7.5 (4 Ratings)
Movie Rating
Mads Mikkelsen. The rest of the ensemble cast are great too. (1 more)
Momentum of the movie is great.
Didn't fully understand the meaning of the ending (0 more)
A cure for a mid-life crisis? It’s worth a shot!
After giving the most emotional and heartbreaking Oscar speech of the recent awards, Thomas Vinterberg's International Feature winner is now in UK cinemas. "Druk" (Danish for "Binge Drinking") is in the Danish language with subtitles: but don't let that put you off.

Positives:
- Mads Mikkelsen delivers a stunning performance. He really delivers the goods. He was nominated for a BAFTA for the role but missed out on the Oscar nomination. This feels unjust. I would have personally swapped out Steven Yeun for this performance by Mads.

- Thomas Vinterberg was justly nominated for Best Director at both the BAFTAs and the Oscars. The movie never lacks momentum from beginning to end. I was thoroughly entertained.

- It's quite unusual to see a 'buddy movie' concerning a group of men that's not a cop film. My wife described it as a '"chick-flick for blokes". I guess you need to go to "The Hangover" films to find an equivalent. (That of course also centres around alcohol. Are we really that shallow?!)

Negatives:
- Up until a "church scene", I thought the story was well-structured and coherent. But I'm not quite sure what message the finale of the movie was trying to send. Yes, it's fun and full of energy. And Mikkelsen's dancing is both bizarre and entertaining. But given all that's gone before, is it a "what the hell, life is for living and alcohol is part of that" statement? I was unsure.

Summary Thoughts on "Another Round": The movie is dedicated to "Ada" - Vinterberg's daughter, who was supposed to be acting in the film but tragically died in a car crash just four days into shooting. (Hence his emotional Oscar acceptance). The fact he managed to finish the movie at all is amazing. But the fact it's so good is a great memorial to her.

It's billed as a "comedy drama" but, although there are comic moments, it leans heavily on the "drama". The Scandinavians in general tend to drink as much, if not more, than the British do. So this is a reminder of both the benefits and risks of the evil drink.

(For the full graphical review, please check out One Mann's Movies her - https://bob-the-movie-man.com/2021/06/30/another-round-cure-for-a-mid-life-crisis-its-worth-a-shot/ , You can also check out my new Tiktok channel @onemannsmovies. Thanks.)