Colditz

All is fair in love and war. And when the two coincide, then all bets are seriously off.

Colditz is a town in Saxony, where the local castle was used as a prisoner of war camp during WWII. But this was not just any old POW camp. This was rather for the very special cases, that had previously escaped from elsewhere.

The film begins with four British soldiers escaping through a tunnel, making their way to the neutral Switzerland. One of them makes it, two get caught and end up in Colditz and the forth gets shot.

The one that made it is one Nick McBride, rather reluctant in serving his home land and generally not the most ambitious person. Nevertheless, he made it out and receives accolades for that alone. He is promoted and starts work for the secret M9, who's job it is to assist other British POW's in escaping, establishing safe houses and transport back home and such.

The two that got caught are Willis and Jack Rose. Willis ended up caught in a barbed wire fence and Jack twisted his ankle. Before McBride departed, Jack asked him to look up his sweetheart back home, Lizzie. This he does and falls in love with her. When Lizzie keeps refusing his pursuit of her, McBride fakes an official correspondence telling her that Jack died when he was shot while trying to escape Colditz. This paves the way for his own romance with Lizzie.

Jack and Willis, meanwhile, plan and try one escape plan after the other (as do many other prisoners) and almost make it every time. Some do make it out, however, and it is through the escape of two individuals that McBride's betrayal is discovered.

This kicks off a series of events.

First, Sawyer, a former inmate writes to Jack to inform him that his Lizzie believes him to be dead and that the one that stands to gain from this can only be McBride.

Jack, as a consequence uses an escape plan that was devised for Willis, breaking Willis at last. This results in the poor guy simply trying to walk out of Colditz and getting shot in the back.

When M9 gets word that Jack is on his way to a safe house, McBride gets understandably nervous. When Sawyer tells him that Jack knows about him and Lizzie, the two start a shuffle that leaves Sawyer dead (this more or less accidental).

McBride then sells out the safe house Jack is in to the Germans and everyone there is shot and killed with Jack the only one getting away.

As a last ditch effort, he tries to whisk Lizzie out of the country for the New World, but Jack arrives just in the nick of time for Lizzie to realize that she has been lied to. As the two men fight (of course they do), the M9 is hot on the heels of McBride and shot him.

All this takes over 3 hrs. total but is actually so well make and played that time flies by.

7/10

Serenity

I have been slacking with my film reviews a little. This happened simply because I did not see that many actual films. Don't take me wrong, I have been watching plenty. But I have simply nursed my newly found addiction with Alan Tudyk by binge watching Suburgatory and then Firefly. Obviously, the next step would be Serenity.

Here we get the answers to all the open questions left over by the untimely demise of the Firefly. There is a new super villain, played by the wonderful Chiwetel Ejiofor. He is ruthless and refers to himself as a monster. But - most rewarding - we get the back story on River and how she got to be this deadly weapon.

It is a rousing finale to a nice little sci-fi show that makes it very clear that this is the end of the line. Not all of the beloved crew survive the big adventure. True, most only take one hell of a beating but the casualties are Shepard, who has left the ship some time earlier and is at a settlement where he offered the Serenity crew a save haven whenever needed. This is what finally causes his demise.

And we lose - after putting in one final grand performance at the helm of the spaceship - Wash, who gets impaled onto the seat he was mostly confined to while others were off having adventures.

Of course, none of this will mean anything to you if you have not watched Firefly.

What a fitting farewell to Serenity and all the people it harbored.

8/10

Saw II

Jigsaw's games are getting more elaborate in part 2. Previously, he usually involved one, sometimes two, people in his little schemes. In Saw II he has a whole house full of players fighting for survival. One of them is a survivor from part 1 of the series, Amanda.

Of course, Amanda turns out to be so much more than this. And anyway, the on-goings in the house are not the actual story. This is much more about Jigsaw wanting Eric Matthews to listen to him. That is the most important rule for this part of the game: listen.

But poor Eric is consumed by his anger and fear because his son is one of the people in the room. In his desperation of wanting to help the boy now! he cannot sit still to abide by the rules. This turns out to be his own downfall. But Jigsaw lets the boy live, which is a nice gesture. Unfortunately, his daddy will never know.

The house holds medication that all the players need to survive the poison gas they have been breathing in since they woke up. The traps holding the syringes with the vital substance or the key (sometimes an actual key) to open the hiding place are evil, of course. There are two I especially love/hate.

A syringe is kept in a box and is visible to the unfortunate woman trying to get to it. There are two openings on the bottom of the box to get your hand through and reach the substance. The problem...once you push your hands in, it is no longer possible to get them back out again, or at least not with help from someone else, because any down movement will make you cut yourself very badly.

My very, very favorite and the most disgusting trap is the pit full of used needles and syringes that was meant for Xavier. But Xavier talks a big game and muscles others into doing the really gross stuff. He throws Amanda into the pit.

As I said in my previous entry, the room from part 1 gets a re-visit and is once again a central part to the story. This is where Eric ends up - right place but wrong time. And jigsaw has found himself an eager student in Amanda.

8/10

House of Wax

Paris Hilton dies in the most satisfying way imaginable. This is really all you need as a motivation to watch.

6/10

Feast

This was fun!

A group of people are stranded in a bar when they are attacked by monsters. There is no explanation where those creatures came from and how they ended up in the middle of nowhere. The collection of bar maids, travelers and local weirdos have to work together to survive (not many do).

At first, we are introduced to the characters in the film through humorous inserts. Nobody has a name, they are referred to as "Hero" or "Bozo" or "Grandma" etc. and the entire spectrum of humanity is pretty much covered. There is blood and puke and a popped-out eye.

There is also Henry Rollins in pink ladies' sweats (the monsters will eventually use him as a battering ram to break their way into the bar).

I hear there is a part II. (Yes!)

7/10

Me and You and Everyone We Know

This is indie darling Miranda July's first feature length film as a director.

It starts with shoe salesman Richard (John Hawkes) getting thrown out by his wife and him setting his own hand on fire to entertain his sons. WTF? Right?

He meets and starts up a relationship with video artist and freelance taxi driver Christine (July), while she takes a client shoe shopping. Their relationship is in no way straight forward and often interrupted. They will, eventually, work it out.

Meanwhile, Richard's sons Peter and Robby spend (waste?) their time in an online chat room, possibly mistankenly using the emoticon ))< >((. This, apparently, translates to "pooping back and forth, forever". (But you probably knew that, anyway.) The emoticon prompts a woman to suggest a real-life meeting.

The woman on the chat room turns out to be the curator of an art exhibiton that accepts one of Christine's little videos.

Also, there are two teenage girls giving head to Richard's colleague because they want to know which one of the two is better at it. The guy decides they are equally good.

Strangely enough, all this weirdness is entertaining.

from Roger Ebert's review:
As Richard slowly emerges from sadness and understands that Christine values him, and he must value her, for reasons only the two of them will ever understand, the movie holds its breath, waiting to see if their delicate connection will hold.

7/10

Mrs Henderson Presents

This is based on real events.

Mrs. Henderson, after having lost her son in the first World War, is bored after burying her husband as well. Her well-meaning friend's suggestion of taking up a hobby leads her to purchase a run-down theater in central London. With the help of Mr Van Damm, she puts on a revue that initially is very successful, but only until all the other theaters in town do likewise.

To get back on top, Mrs Henderson decides to put nude women into their sing-and-dance productions. This causes quite the stir and - of course - quite the success. The theater continues to run its shows throughout WWII. Although it is underground and therefore relatively safe from the German bombs, it does suffer its tragedies.

Dame Judi Dench and Bob Hoskins are wonderful in a sort of love-hate relationship. This also features Will Young (singing, of course) and Christopher Guest, who adds a few laughs to the film.

6/10

Nine Lives

These are snippets of the lives of nine different women. The situations depicted are difficult for each one of them, mostly in different ways but always in the settings of some relationship.

Every episode bears the name of the woman at the center of the story. Some of the scenes are done in one lengthy shot, which is interesting/impressive.

All stories are unresolved, most feature well-known and well-respected character actors (Holly Hunter, Robin Wright Penn, William Fichtner).

And of course there is the insufferable Dakota Fanning.

3/10

Wolf Creek

If you ever consider going to Australia and doing the road trip/back packer thing - don't. If you don't get killed by some redneck hick in the middle of nowhere surely one of the ridiculously poisonous creatures will kill you. How do I know that? Through many, many Australian horror films, of course.

It all starts out nicely enough. You hang out on some beach or other, getting drunk and sleeping on the beach and it's all fun and games until your car just won't start again when it's all dark out and you're in an area called Wolf Creek. I mean, it could have stalled in Emu Creek, but that just doesn't sound creepy enough. Then you obviously run into some scary looking guy that pretends to be all helpful but turns out to be this serial killer that can merrily hack tourists into pieces because he lives at a place so remote that - even if you kinda sorta know the general area it is located in - cannot be pinpointed by authorities because the place is just so fucking big and empty. And, anyway, people disappear in Australia all the time (so, why again would you want to go there?).

Sure, you might be able to escape. But where do you go? What if you're on foot? Remember: you are miles and miles of deserted country roads from any civilization, because you did this wannabe hippie road trip thing. So even if you think you have escaped and by chance should meet another human being willing to help you, the bad guy is still out there hunting you and the good samaritan will be collateral damage.

Because bad guys in horror film simply do not die. Like, ever. Nevermind that you shot him and stabbed him. He will come after you. And he will find you.

True story.

4/10