Match Point
(5 stars out of five)
It started with Anything Else, continued through Melinda and Melinda, and finally reaches its peak here with this film: the return to form, of Woody Allen. Match Point is Allen's darkest film since Crimes and Misdemeanors in '89, and it's a welcome change from his recent decade-long run in making comedies. Perfectly cast, tightly scripted, and filled with Allen's darkly comic views on faith and humanity, it's probably the most "adult" film he's ever made, replacing the often-neurotic male protagonist of his films with an almost shockingly (at least by Woody standards) confident character. Especially of note is Woody's striking use of slow motion in the film, something he's never used before in his four decades of filmmaking. I won't go into the movie any more. It's best you go into it knowing as little as you can.

The New World
(4 stars out of five)
Terrence Malick is the granddaddy of existential, poetic filmmaking. He's fond of studying the grass on the ground and the leaves on the trees just as much as the characters themselves. He's a strange character: he makes his films for himself, and no one else. He's 62 years old, and yet he's only made four films in his entire career (including the one in this review). After making Badlands and Days of Heaven in the 70's, he retired from filmmaking for over 20 years before returning with The Thin Red Line in 1998. Now, seven years later, comes his new film, which is also the first Malick film I've seen in the theater. It was an interesting experience, to say the least... Now, the audience walkouts for The Thin Red Line are almost legendary (people were expecting a war film, and instead found themselves watching philosophical conversations taking place amid picturesque shots of grass blowing in the wind at sunset), but the walkouts for this film were unbelievable. The theater was filled with a mixture of giggly teenaged girls anxious to see Colin Farrell, their boyfriends who were dragged along with them, and lots and lots of old couples, no doubt attracted to the film by the new TV ads, which compare the love story in the film with Titanic. So, as you can see, not quite the audience for this film. The movie starts off quickly enough, but about a half hour in, I saw the first walkout. The reason? The movie is one of the slowest-paced films in recent memory, with the movie's 2 ½ hour running time feeling more like 3 hours. It's not a problem for me; I actually enjoyed the film. But it is definitely - just like The Thin Red Line - not a film for mass audiences. Periods of 10, 20, even 30 minutes go by without a single line of dialogue spoken. There is a wonderful sequence, about 20 minutes long, that is simply one huge montage with a voiceover, nothing more. There are probably less than fifty actual lines of spoken dialogue in the film; almost the entire film is in voiceover, with the characters having inner monologues. People had no fucking clue what to make of this movie. I'm not exaggerating when I say over half of the people walked out. I will admit it - the film is a little long. A good 20-30 minutes could have been trimmed. But what we have here is decent. At least it wasn't longer than it is... Malick is famous for shooting hundreds of thousands of feet of film, and this movie had four editors - a sure sign that some major trimming was going on (The Thin Red Line's final runtime was 3 hours - cut in half from its original six hour running time). Sure, it drags a little bit. But there are real moments of beauty and honesty present, not just in nature, but between people. The acting is quite good. Newcomer Q'Orianka Kilcher is a revelation! I'd love to see her get a nomination, but this year is really crowded and this film was mostly ignored. A Malick film is famous for its photography, and this film is no different. Roughly half of the film was shot on 65mm as opposed to 35mm, and it really looks magnificent. Look for a cinematography nomination for this. So in summation, this is a film that is better than what most people will tell you. Just give it a chance. And lots...and lots... of patience.

Brokeback Mountain
(5 stars out of five)
In a year of great movies, this tops them all. This is my pick for the best film of the year… it is truly an amazing, AMAZING film. This is a film that fearlessly dares to break down walls and barriers, without looking back and without apologizing. This is a film about love, friendship, and the importance of human tolerance and understanding. It makes the love between two men as potent and beautiful as any other romance you’ve seen on screen before, without sacrificing truth, and avoiding the pitfalls of stereotypes that would normally hinder such an on-screen relationship. Everything you’ve heard about the film is true: it is just as striking, poetic and moving as everyone is saying it is. Possibly even more. Ang Lee (The Ice Storm) directs the film with patience and stillness, and the film deserves an audience willing to give it that sort of attention as well. The cast is excellent, with (of course) special mention going to the two leads, most of all Heath Ledger. It’s a little overlong near the end, but fuck it… it doesn’t really matter. It’s one of those films where it has given you so much throughout the film, that you’re willing to give it as much time as it wants from you. A great movie, and one of the most important films of the decade.

Memoirs of a Geisha
(4 stars out of five)
Steven Spielberg was, at one time, in negotiations to direct this picture. The directing duties eventually went over to Rob Marshall (Chicago) who did a decent job with it, although his relative inexperience (this is only his second feature, and his first was a musical) is apparent from time to time. No, the biggest problem with the film is something that not even Spielberg could have overcame: being an American production funded with American dollars, there's no way the producers would have poured so much money into something that wasn't in the English language... So here we have a film, set in Japan and with Asian actors, who all speak English instead of Japanese. It's a strange thing, and it just feels wrong... but there's nothing that could have really been done about it, unless it was a Japanese production from the start. Nevertheless, the film is beautifully shot, and the actors do amazingly well with conveying emotion in a language that's foreign to them. I still wonder, however, how much more powerful it would have been if the actors had spoken their language instead of (sometimes quite awkwardly) spitting out English. Oh well...
I'm pretty tempted to give this another half star, as it really was very well done and truly packed a punch, but this is one of those films where the story was so amazing, that it could have been done by pretty much anyone with at least decent results... I'm not so sure how much of Rob Marshall was in this film, and how much he really had to do to make it work. Most of the scenes in the beginning have a feeling of a lack of passion for the material... it almost feels like someone else picked up the movie from that point on...or maybe it's because you end up getting into the story and forgetting how lazily directed everything is... either way, the reason why this film is as good as it is...well, it's not Rob Marshall.