The Informant! (2009)

Directed by: Steven Soderbergh
Written by: Scott Z. Burns
Based on the Book by: Kurt Eichenwald

Steven Soderbergh has done basically everything every director could ever set out to do in his career. He brought independent film to the mainstream with his 1989 debut sex, lies, and videotape. He made a movie about Franz Kafka. He made one of the coolest heist films ever (despite the fact that it was a remake) with Ocean’s Eleven. He made a movie about the life of Che Guevera. And he’s turned a porn star into a leading lady with The Girlfriend Experience. So what’s he doing now? A movie about a corporate whistleblower based on a true story? Didn’t he already do that? Oh no that was Erin Brocovich. She wasn’t corporate, she hates corporations.

The Informant! is the story of Mark Whitacre (Matt Damon), the vice president of ADM, a company that conspires to fix the price of lysine, a food additive, with their competitors. After the FBI responds to a call by one of Whitacre’s bosses about an extortion claim, Whitacre decides to clear his conscience and admit to the scheme feeling that if the plan were to be exposed he would be the fall guy. The film then follows his 2.5 years in service of FBI building a case against ADM. Once FBI finally gets all it needs and raids ADM Whitacre and the film unravel into an unsettling and ambiguous mess (but that’s not necessarily a bad thing).

The film overall is enjoyable, but Soderbergh is overbearing and off-putting. He really wants you to know that Mark Whitacre is unstable by using voiceover to give light to Whitacre’s regular irreverent thoughts about polar bear hunting, Japanese panty vending machines, and Michael Crichton. A ridiculously upbeat score is also used during the movie’s most poignant scenes to contrast the overly serious corporate thrillers of the 90s the film seems to be paying homage to, as well as rejecting. When the film unravels in the third act and Soderbergh lets the film play out on it’s own it’s a welcome break.

But yeah, Matt Damon is awesome in this and I can totally see Mark Whitacre becoming a classic movie character.

7.0/10

imdb

showtimes

Inglourious Basterds (2009)

Written by: Quentin Tarantino

Directed by: Quentin Tarantino

"Watching Donny beat Nazis to death is the closest we ever get to going to the movies."

Everything you really need to know about this movie can be seen in Eli Roth's character's twisted, bloodthirsty smirk as his lieutenant (Brad Pitt) instructs his soldiers on their mission of killing Nazis. As the movie progresses, it reveals a similar twisted identity: ruthless characters bent on revenge, biting dialogue, brutal violence, and a character base largely devoid of morality. Clearly, Q.T.'s paying homage to some of his favorite cult movies again. While the movie delivers more classic Tarantino dialogue, we all know he can get carried away and some scenes suffer from their length, though this is not something to be surprised about coming into one of his movies. The big surprise is the fact that the main Basterds themselves do not seem to get most of the screentime, but their scenes provide some of the most badass violence imaginable. To get more of an idea of the asskicking: Eli Roth plays a baseball-loving Jew with a heavy New York accent who beats Nazis to death with a bat, and his fucking nickname is "The Bear Jew." As much as the movie delivers some very memorable development and progression, above all it is about two things: the clever conversations, delivering insight and hilarity, and, more importantly, the catharsis of watching Nazis get fucking beaten to (dare I say it....) a pulp. Brootal.

8.9/10

Moon (2009)

Directed by: Duncan Jones
Written by: Nathan Parker

I’ve always had a deep fascination with science fiction. When I was younger I was enthralled by the special effects, epic storylines, and explosive action scenes. As I grew older I seemed to lose interest in the things that made me fall in love with science fiction as I started to realize that the genre was full of cautionary tales about political and societal issues. I began to focus more on the themes and morals of the stories and started to lose interest in the stories themselves. Because of this, I suppose Moon is the perfect sci-fi movie for how I feel about the genre right now.

Moon tells the story of Sam Bell (played by Sam Rockwell), an astronaut extracting helium-3 from the soil of the moon. He is nearing the end of his three year contract with Lunar Industries, when he begins to experience severe loneliness. His only means of contact with the outside world is limited due to a malfunction of the base’s communications system and his only companion is a robot named GERTY (voiced by Kevin Spacey). On a mission to pick up some helium-3, Sam hallucinates that someone is outside his rover and crashes the rover. The next scene, Sam awakes finding himself back in the base’s infirmary. He sees the base he crashed at is down, and decides to venture out to see what the problem is, only to find the crashed rover and his body inside the rover. He takes himself back to the base and asks GERTY who the man is, but GERTY refuses to give a clear answer. The rest of the movie investigates who the real Sam Bell is, the limits of corporate greed, and various other questions dealing with existence and reality and some more fun sci-fi topics.

Visually the film is enjoyable as well. Shot on a meager budget of $5,000,000, director Duncan Jones did the best he could to display a realistic depiction of the moon’s surface, opting for models rather than CGI. However, the cinematography seems to suffer somewhat from the low budget set, and it somewhat detracts from the mystical quality most sci-fi films possess. Some mysticism is saved by Clint Mansell’s fantastic score which captures the eerie wonder of space as well as any fan of Mansell’s previous work would expect.

Though the film drags in places and the set feels somewhat empty and hollow, it ultimately satisfies thanks to it’s interesting themes, plentiful ideas, and sympathetic character.

7.8/10

imdb

showtimes

Dan Deacon - Bromst

Have you ever listened to Music for 18 Musicians and thought "I like it, but I can't dance to it."

Well, now you can. Best album of 2009.

The Hurt Locker (2009)

Directed by: Kathryn Bigelow

Written By: Mark Boal

"There's enough bang in there to blow us all to Jesus. If I'm gonna die, I want to die comfortable."

I'll be brief with this post: The Hurt Locker is the best movie I've seen this year, and I doubt it will be topped. It maintains suspense and heart pounding action, until an emotional climax that rips your heart out. It is also a fresh look at life at war, focusing on war as a "drug" (addiction to adrenaline). All in all, it feels like a remarkably genuine portrayal of war experiences (which makes sense, since the writer is an Iraq war veteran and also wrote 2007's In the Valley of Elah), and that makes it all the more affecting. The visual work in the movie is also noteworthy: the shaky cam is an effective complement to the harrowing battle scenes, there is an overall grainy texture to the film reminiscent of recent similar films, such as Darren Aronofsky's The Wrestler, and the opening scene has one of the most memorable shots I've ever seen. Keep an eye out for Jeremy Renner; he gives a moving and honest performance that is certainly Oscar-worthy. Go and see it for yourself, and experience one of the best war films I've seen.

9.3/10

imdb
showtimes