The Fighter

David O Russell's latest film, The Figther, tells the story of "Irish" Micky Ward's early boxing years. The film focuses on his relationship with his brother Dicky Eklund, his mother, Alice, and his seven sisters and how they influenced his boxing career early on.

Mark Wahlberg plays the Micky Ward role, while Christian Bale plays the role of his brother, Dicky Eklund. Dicky is famous in the town of Lowell, where the film is set, because of his once legendary fight with Sugar Ray Leonard. He was once known as, "The Pride of Lowell", and maybe the most important aspect of the film is how he tries to live out his dream of winning a title through his younger brother. Michelle Leo, is Alice Ward, Micky's manager and mother. Her role is acted wonderfully as a manipulative mother who doesn't have her son's best interests in mind on many occasions. Amy Adams, is Charlene Fleming, Micky's girlfriend, who enters the boxer's life at a pivotal time in the film, when his career is being ruined by his family members indiscretions.

Probably the best aspect of the film, is how compellingly it's acted. Bale's performance will likely win him an Oscar. He is so believable as Dicky, that it wouldn't surprise me if director, David O. Russell included the clip at the end of the movie, with the real life Ward and Ecklund to show audiences just how spot on he really was. The incredible acting though is across the board with Leo, Adams, and Wahlberg already securing Golden Globe nominations. Even the actresses that play Micky's sisters in the film deserve kudos. Their portrayal added to the overwhelming element of authenticity that the film was already ripe with and Russell does an uncanny job of capturing all of this.

The expanded Best Picture category should definitely include, The Fighter, but I don't think it'll have as good a chance as taking home the golden statue as say Black Swan or The Social Network.

Hereafter

Hereafter is a supernatural drama/thriller from Clint Eastwood, that stars Matt Damon. It was released in late October. The film follows the lives of three people who are touched/affected by death in different ways. Damon, plays the lead role of George Lonegan, a man with the ability to genuinely communicate with the dead. Cecile de France, is Marie LeLay, a French journalist who survives a tsunami, but has a near death experience that shakes her grasp of reality. Finally, Frankie and George McLaren, are twins Marcus and Jason, who share a close brotherly bond that is broken after one of them tragically dies. The film shows how mortality affects people from different walks of life, leaving voids in their lives that they choose to temporarily fill by trying to communicate with their lost loved ones through a psychic medium.

The concept of the film is a delicate one, but certainly one that captures the attention of millions of people across the globe. So, it makes sense that Steven Spielberg's Amblin Entertainment would be attached to a project like this one. Spielberg's track record and incredible success allow him to take great chances on movies other producers wouldn't touch. But, unfortunately for him, Eastwood, and Kathleen Kennedy (Another of the film's producers) the movie which was budgeted at $50 million, has only managed to pull in about $33 million in 70 days of release in American theaters. I'm not sure any of these people expected Hereafter to break records, but I think break even was at least anticipated.

The movie's central theme of mortality is without a doubt the reason that moviegoers didn't flock to theaters to see this one, but if you ask me the reason that those that did, didn't have reason to "love" it, is because it lacked one specific element that would've made it great. The acting was very solid, but wasn't exceptional. I wouldn't put all of that blame on the actors either, I don't think Eastwood's directing allowed them to expose their characters enough for the audience to connect with their struggles with the afterlife. But, that could also be attributed to Peter Morgan's script.

I sound like I'm lambasting this film, but truly I really liked it, I just thought it could've been a lot more and I'm disappointed that with the people attached to the project it wasn't,

Black Swan

Natalie Portman's character, Annie, the Swan Queen, essentially sums this movie and her performance up with her closing words the right before the credits roll. I won't give them away, but I'm very confident that you'll have similar feelings as I did towards Darren Aronofsky's incredible achievement, Black Swan.

Aronofsky film is incredibly casted, with performances by Portman and Mila Kunis, already garnering Golden Globe nominations. Vincent Cassel, Barbara Hershey, and Winona Ryder round out an ensemble that brings so much emotion and character their respective roles. But, paramount to all of these performances is Portman's, who truly showcases her acting and dancing chops in the picture. She portrays a fragile character who during 2 hours the audience watches transform into essentially the complete opposite of who she was at the films inception (Yep, I just slipped the word inception into a description of her performance, what of it?) I'll be baffled if she isn't given a Best Actress nomination for this role.

To say a little bit about the plot though, it follows the life of Annie, a veteran ballerina as she is given the lead role in a heralded dance instructors re-imagination of the ballet production of Swan Lake. Along the way, Annie is tried and tested by her rival dancers, her over protective mother and her manipulative instructor. It all comes to a thrilling finish on opening night when The Swan Queen gives a performance that none will soon forget.

The most amazing aspect of this film to me was Aronofsky's camera work. The angles, uses of mirrors and over the shoulder shots are incredible. He utilizes them in a way that jolt emotion into the audience because the point of view either hides certain things from them or quickly reveals them. Combine this with Clint Mansell's original music and you have a suspenseful thriller that is truly menacing and very sexual.

See Black Swan, as soon as you can.

Tron: Legacy

I didn't see the original movie or play the arcade game (Well, maybe I did a few times through other mediums), but I thoroughly enjoyed Disney's latest release, Tron: Legacy. Perhaps this goes to show the relative ease, with which anyone can pop into a theater and spend two hours enjoying visually awing special effects and the truly inspired soundtrack that is, Tron. You certainly don't need to be an avid Tron follower or a nerdy gamer to enjoy this movie, but in response to a friend of mine who asked, "Is it a boy movie?" I feel pretty obliged to say that it pretty much is that. Although, Joseph Kosinski, the movie's director made an effort to accompany the sound pumping action scenes with ones dedicated to developing the character's of Sam Flynn and his father, Kevin, I don't think many females will find the story too overtly appealing to them.

A lot of people are cautioning those who might be interested in seeing this movie, that it lacks a solid plot and poses many questions that are left unanswered. While "these people" may have a solid point, often times it's better to just go into a movie, especially one like this, with little expectations and an open mind. Besides, seeing Jeff Bridges act in one movie in this many different roles is well worth the price of admission (3D or 2D).

Easy A

I don't know what it is about movies that take place in a high school setting, but too often characters in them just look way too old. This is definitely the case a few times with Easy A, but that little stigma aside the movie does deliver.

Easy A, stars Emma Stone, of Superbad and Zombieland fame. She plays the role of Olive Penderghast, a precocious teenager who attends a fictional high school called Ojai North High in Ojai, California. This is significant to mention because of the liberal lifestyle associated with the "Governator" state. Olive's family is quite the diverse crew and her parents, played by Stanley Tucci and Patricia Clarkson, certainly give Olive adequate room to express her teenage self.

Express herself is exactly what she does. Olive's English class is studying Nathaniel Hawthorne's, the Scarlet Letter, and she takes it upon herself, after a scathing rumor is started about her, not to deny the rumors, but let them take on a life of their own. This has an alarming effect on the student body at Ojai, who eventually all have an opinion of what she is doing or not doing.

Emma Stone has, in my opinion, solidified herself as a very viable movie star. She basically crushes the role of Olive and is more than easy on the eyes. Also, at 22 years old she has a wide range of roles that she could fit into.

Easy A, has a lot of social commentary directed towards teenagers that might be wasted on them, but it isn't on an older audience that has sat in classrooms similar to the ones in the movie. The advent of Facebook and other social networking sites has made gossip spread exponentially faster, but there hasn't been a movie released in awhile that depicts what types of effects it can have.

The Social Network

The first seventeen minutes of, The Social Network, unravel at a pretty frenetic pace, and is foreshadowing of how the movie will play out. The very first scene in the dimly lit bar with the couple discussing final clubs at Harvard, is definitive of the character of the protagonist of the film, Facebook creator, Mark Zuckerberg. He speaks rapidly, with an immense presence of intelligence and awkwardness about him, but he certainly lacks the ability to properly communicate with the opposite sex. His subsequent dumping and the vengeance he latter seeks out on poor Erica are the driving force behind the billion dollar social networking site and this potentially Oscar-winning film.

The Social Network which stars Jesse Eisenberg, as Mark Zuckerberg, isn't just a hyped up movie that's getting a lot of buzz from Facebook lovers. It's a movie about an idea that changed how the world stays connected to one another. It brings to life essentially everything that was going on in Zuckerberg's life that fall of 2003, when he created facemash, which eventually led to interest from the entire campus, notably the Winlevoss' twins. The film presents these events at a pace that is utterly entertaining, while Aaron Sorkin, the movie's screenwriter, infuses it with a script that is witty, clever, and downright masterful.

The film gets a huge boost from the acting of it's supporting cast, especially Andrew Garfield, who plays Eduardo Saverin, a co-founder of Facebook and it's initial CFO. He generates feelings of sympathy from the audience through his falling out with Zuckerberg over the direction of the company in its early stages. Justin Timberlake plays the role of Andrew Parker, the creator of Napster and Plaxo, who has sort of fallen from grace, but is considered by Zuckerberg to be somewhat of a "god". I remember being initially a bit skeptical of his casting in the movie, but after seeing it am convinced that it was a perfect role for him. Armie Hammer, who plays both Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, rounds out a terrific supporting cast.

There's something about The Social Network, (a certain je ne sais que, I guess) but it was very compelling to see a film about an event so transforming to the culture of the world unfold. Maybe it's because I was in college right at the time of Facebook's explosion, or that Zuckerberg took an idea that perhaps I or some of my friends could've come up with and become the youngest billionaire ever. Whatever it is though David Fincher, the movie's director, and Columbia Pictures have created an already impressively successful movie that could have the legs to carry it to a healthy showing come awards season.

Machete

A little late on this one, but I guess it took me so long to see Machete because I listened to a friend, who isn't a Robert Rodriguez fan. He was surprised why I'd want to see it, instead of The American, with George Clooney, he basically convinced me that it would be bad because of how cheesy the trailers made it out to be. Well, I finally made it to a showing, it was a hole in the wall little cinema that gets movies a month or so after their original release dates. The theater was pretty crowded and pretty noisy, which are pretty ideal ingredients when seeing a Rodriguez picture.

Back during the weeks leading up to the movies original release I remember seeing some TV spots promoting the gory flick, but nothing like the marketing that the Rodriguez/Tarantino movie, Grindhouse, received back in 2007 (Machete is actually based on a "faux" trailer from that movie). Maybe this was because that movie was hugely unsuccessful at the box office and studios noticed that the specific type of moviegoer that enjoys and will pay to see Rodriguez or Tarantino movies doesn't love them enough to sit through three hours of anything (I'm not sure anybody wants to sit in the same place for more than 3 hours). Anyways, I'm trying to make the point that Rodriguez tends to make movies more for a specific "cult" or demographic, than for the masses. A sort-of follow up to Grindhouse seemed like a big risk, but budgeted at around $20 million, I guess it wasn't too much of a gamble for a distributor like Fox.

Machete follows the story of the guy by that very name, played by Danny Trejo, who after being recruited for a hit on a Texas senator is betrayed and seeks revenge on the conspirators. The movie includes performances from Jessica Alba, Michelle Rodriguez, Don Johnson, Robert DeNiro, Lindsay Lohan, Jeff Fahey, and Cheech Marin.

There weren't any performances that really stuck out to me, but Marin's minor role was acted very well. Alba steals a few scenes and has an oddly inspiring monologue. Lohan's role as, April, was very forgettable, but it is worth mentioning that the theater I was in got a lot louder when she made her first appearance on screen.

Machete has an alarmingly high rating on IMDB, which is undoubtedly due to the fact that Rodriguez fans are movie addicts who spend alot of time on websites making comments or grading movies. I enjoyed the movie, but I'm a fan of Rodriguez's "style", to those who aren't though this movie will probably come across as too bloody, too cheesy, and too stupid.