Richard Linklater - How he makes his stories so realistic and surreal

Richard Linklater - How he makes his stories so realistic and surreal

     Ladies and gentlemen, is with a huge pleasure I present you Richard Stuart Linklater. He's an American filmmaker I'm a huge fan. If you don't know him, you probably saw one of his movies, he directed and wrote "Boyhood", the Before Trilogy (one of the best ever made, by the way), "School of Rock", "Dazed and Confused", "Bernie" and "Fast Food Nation". The reason I'm writing about him today is that I reflected how he is a good and important director, he rebuilt Ethan Hawke, launched Matthew McConaughey to Hollywood and is a pioneer in working with his characters during looooooong periods (I'm waiting for "Before the Next Sunrise" due 2022, lol).

     His debut film is 1988 and almost nobody watched it, its name is "It's Impossible to Learn to Plow by Reading Books" and right with it he stablished his biggest trademark, the lack of climax and rising action, usually his films only a few takes of long dialogues that he puts together in editing. The only two movies I remember that has some sort of climax is "School of Rock" and "Bernie" (Waking Life has rising action, but nothing that damages the beautiful continuous flow present in almost the whole filmography of Linklater)

     He's also very famous for swinging between the mundane realism like in "Boyhood" and the unbelievable surrealism in "Waking Life" and I love that so much, this contrast is so beautiful, I mean, he makes family fiendly movies but these aren't those simple stupid comedy movies with suggestive jokes or epilectic blockbusters (Transformers franchise). No, he just makes soft light movies that a family can sit down on a cozy Sunday afternoon and watch anyone of his movies and relax, sometimes stopping to reflect about life. His filmgraphy is relaxing and dispretensious.
      Linklater is a dialogue master, he teaches us how to write a good screenplay, he teaches how characters should talk depending of the situation is shown on the screen. Although, he has his little imperfections, Linklater loves to impose his idea on the screenplay and, unfortunately, he dreadfully forces this, let's say his intelectual complex thoughts are "fetch". So, Richard Linklater, "Stop trying to make fetch happen".
      Linklater is not a bad filmmaker whatsoever. Nevertheless, I want expect more great features of him, because I feel he's a bit absent of Hollywood since "Boyhood".

Special Thanks, 72nd Golden Globe Awards that presented me Richard Linklater

Baby Driver - Is it the best of Edgar Wright?

Baby Driver - Is it the best of Edgar Wright?

     First of all, I would like to mention I'm writing this review while I listen to The Nerdist Podcast episode with Edgar Wright to help me, maybe try to understand his mind. Secondly I would like to apologize I'm a bit delayed with this review because I live in Brazil and here movies go to theaters a bit later than other countries.

     Baby Driver is the newest Edgar Wright's motion picture and it's sensational. I'm going to tell you this short story because you'll understand how hyped I was with Baby Driver. Last year I watched the Suicide Squad trailer and thought "Holy Grail, I luffed ith two Fs what they just did this outstanding thing in sound mixing and editing with Bohemian Rhapsody and gunshots, so charming" (I knew that this is called Mickey Mousing). Although Suicide Squad isn't good, so that hype I had with the trailer was busted, months later I watched Baby Driver trailer and thought "Ok, take it easy, this might be bad just like Suicide Squad was", but it wasn't and I felt so glad I watched this movie in theaters, because to see it on theaters is an outstanding experience.
    So, now you can understand which was my feelings with Baby Driver before watching it. I'm ready to review. Baby Driver tells a story of this getaway driver with tinnitus, due to that he listens music to block out it and when he finally gets free of this crime life, his boss (Kevin Spacey) asks him to make another job for him. The plot is pretty simple, but Edgar Wright's direction changes everything, I mean, what would you expect from the director of Scott Pilgrim vs. World and the Three Cornetto Flavors Trilogy? His trademarks, the high-quality jump cuts and visual jokes appear here again and it's probably his best work.
     Ansel Elgort is not the most expressive actor on Earth, but here he shows more than he did in The Fault in Our Stars and gets the public's charisma as Baby, Jamie Foxx scared me as an unpredictable anatagonist, Kevin Spacey's character seems to see a criminal version of Frank Underwood but I liked it, I considered Lily James' character as only an element to insert some romance in the movie, therefore was the only character I didn't completely liked, Jon Hamm's character made a too sudden twist in his arch, what I hated at all, not the character, just this charactewr's outburst.
     Even though this movie is outstanding, it's not perfect and most of its imperfections are from the screenplay, there are too convenient coincidences, those impossible ones that would be unlikely in real life and also what I said before, those sudden twists with the chraracters archs. Actually, Edgar Wright has this small problem with character development, on his features he introduces his characters with greatness but then he doesn't develops too much after the character introduction.
        Baby Driver is thrilling, gripping, dancing, cheered me up and the title they gave him in Brazil, In an escape rytham, totally fits with itself. He is already one of the best movies of 2017, Edgar Wright caught Marvel's attention after that (who caught the reference?) and is already on the Top 10 of the best British filmmakers. This is his masterpiece. 9.5/10

Passion of Joan d'Arc - A must see movie

Passion of Joan d'Arc - A must see

     Passion of Joan d'Arc is a 1928 French silent film directed by Carl Theodor Dreyer (one of the first great directors of history). The film tells about the last moments of the Christianity and French culture icon Joan d'Arc.

     In this film, Dreyer shows himself as a brilliant director, capting the scent of Joan's contained pain (who is interpreted by Maria Falconetti, that shows here, in my opinion, the best female acting in silent movies). The texts are ahead of its time, having even notable quotes. Is almost impossible to sympathize with the supporting characters because they either accuse Joan of heresy, or try to save her. Although this doesn't prejudice the public's experience, therefore I won't remove points from this topic.

I watched the 1985 restored version (what was much better because the film ended in the perfect tone, the 20 extra minutes of the original version wouldn't be really required), followed by a majestical soundtrack, helping to dictate the motion picture's tone of tension and anguish. By the way, if I caracterized the feature in one word, it would be distressing. because it was one of the first films that used the gore effects as something that doesn't prejudice the script due to the previous commented Falconetti's acting and because of its cinematography, which with simple horizontal movements passes the main character's anguish, being 'suffocated' by the supporting characters , all the shots made from up to down, representing Joan's servility.
     The Passion of Joan d'Arc is crude, violent, deep, DISTRESSING and should be more valorized by the public due to the odissey that was this picture's production and what happened after been released. 10/10