Mini Reviews- Margaret, 2 Days in New York, Bachelorette

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The Ultimate Sofia Coppola List

         
           It's Sofia Coppola's 41st birthday today. She is one of my most favourite directors, and definitely my favourite female director. Her films have this wonderfully romantic and lost aspect to them that make them endlessly dreamy. I just love it. The girls and women depicted in her films are exactly like that too, which is why I've always believed that no female can look prettier than in a Sofia Coppola movie.

            I was going to do a mini-reviews post on her films, but have now decided to do a sort of list with all of her directorial work, including short films, advertisements and music videos. This also makes it more interesting since a list with only the movies becomes redundant with a Favourite 100 Movies List like mine. I couldn't find her first short film Bed, Bath and Beyond anywhere. Also the music videos to "City Girl" by Kevin Shields and "Playground Love" by Air are basically just clips from the movies they were in- Lost in Translation and The Virgin Suicides respectively. The latter does include singing pieces of chewing gum, but yeah, I'm not considering that.

11) Shine by Walt Mink

This was all the way back in 1993. The video quality isn't very good, but one can see the theme of rich, bored, beautiful people that will be unique to her films later on. It was edited by her ex-husband Spike Jonze, who was apparently the basis for the Giovanni Ribisi's highly annoying character in Lost in Translation.

10) This Here Giraffe by The Flaming Lips

I'm not that well-acquainted with the music of The Flaming Lips, but I like the idea of these monochrome-clad rockstars visiting the zoo on a nice sunny day. Also the bed looks like it belongs to a very young girl. Also it has Leslie Hayman, who plays the Therese Lisbon in The Virgin Suicides- arguably the sister with the smallest role.

9) City of Light fragrance by Christian Dior, starring Natalie Portman

This has a kind of Audrey Hepburn-ish aura about it. Miss Portman looks gorgeous and I think Alden Ehrenreich is adorable, but still, the whole product ends up being a little bland.

8) Marni for H&M starring Imogene Poots

It is set in the beautiful Marrakesh, Morocco. I love the colours in this ad. Imogene Poots looks lovely.

7) Lick the Star

To explain this, I will use a set of quotes from another of Sofia's films- "What are you doing here, honey? You're not even old enough to know how bad life gets. - Obviously doctor, you've never been a thirteen year-old girl." While I've never experienced the "clique" system of an American high school, there are things even I find relatable in this short film. Also, I love the badassery of the lead character when we first see her. The second part is here.

6) I Just Don't Know What To Do With Myself by the White Stripes

I'm not a Kate Moss fan, but even I can't deny the pure sexiness she exudes here. However it's not perverse... I think it's kind of sad. With the title of the song and how it is sung, it really feels like a lost soul trying to figure out her life in a most free sort of way. I really love it.

5) Somewhere

Many say this is the film that all of her other films were leading up to. As a star-child herself, Sofia's first-hand experience with all the loneliness and pointlessness that a Hollywood celebrity and their children face is an obvious basis for this film. It is a critical look at such a life, but her films ultimately look so gorgeous that it takes a while to get to that. Still, the malaise that her films are known for is most pronounced in this. I love Stephen Dorff and Elle Fanning in it.

4) Lost in Translation

This is the most celebrated of all her films yet, and rightly so. I don't think the meeting of two kindred spirits has never been shown more beautifully than in this film. The performances by both the leads is excellent, though just the little subtleties in everything that Bill Murray does leave me speechless. He should have won that Oscar. Scarlett Johannson's Charlotte is the character most of us connect with the best. Also that inaudible whisper... sigh.

3) Miss Dior Chérie fragrance by Christian Dior, starring Maryna Linchuck

This is my most favourite commercial ever. I want to live in it, for real. It's so pretty and girly! I love the liveliness in it, and everything the enchanting Maryna Linchuck does.

2) The Virgin Suicides

Ugh the Lisbon sisters and their eternal mystery that will never cease to baffle and entice the narrators or us. It's a very ambiguous, dreamy film, but there is a certain magic to it. I wish I could make something like this. I also wish Sofia revisits this kind of a film, one that has a certain amount of enigma and cheekiness to it.

1) Marie Antoinette

My very unique opinion, but I can't help it. With all the grandeur and the anachronistic pop tunes and American accents and everything that is oh so pretty, I absolutely adore this film. Kirsten Dunst embodies the lavishness and the confusion of the young and doomed monarch. People say it is too shallow- it can be, but only because it was expected of someone like the titular character. Also one of my most favourite endings ever. I think every director does one film like this- plain ambitious and well, selfish in a way. This is Sofia Coppola's and I love every minute of it.

So there you have it. I hope you enjoyed it. 
Also, A Very Happy Birthday to Sofia Coppola. 
Can't wait for Bling Ring!

Evil is as Evil does

Video- Cinematic Villains

NYTimes did the classic silent movie types last year, and this year they are back with Touch of Evil, showing the 13 actors who have given some of the best performances of 2011 as famous cinematic villain types. I love this! Seeing that one of the biggest films this year has ended up being The Artist, maybe unintentionally this will start some sort of trend. And this would be very cool because I adore villains (MUHAHAHAHAHAHAAA). So as my limited film knowledge is failing me yet again (I haven't even seen Touch of Evil), like last year, I will just give my thoughts on the actors and their little skits-

* The ones who I don't know.

1) Brad Pitt- Henry Spencer in Eraserhead (he sort of looks like Gollum in the end) .

2) Rooney Mara-Alex Delarge in A Clockwork Orange (gorgeousity).

3) Gary Oldman- Fats in Magic (He disturbingly resembles one very famous Indian actor-director Raj Kapoor in this. Good).

4) Mia Wasikowska*- The Homewrecker (plain love... kind of reminds me of Barbara Stanwyck in Double Indemnity.)

5) Ryan Gosling- The Invisible Man (ugh, he should totally play this...).

6) George Clooney- Captain Bligh in Mutiny on the Bounty (I'm sorry, but bahaha for the eyebrows).

7) Viola Davis- Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (scary shit...no idea where the bugs came from).

8) Kirsten Dunst- Carol in Repulsion (there's a reason why she sort of invented the manic pixie girl ideal... so much allure, and then just stuff of nightmares).

9) Michael Shannon- Gordon Gekko from Wall Street (the papers were too distracting and unnatural).

10) Jessica Chastain*- The Firestarter (and this is why the whole world wants her- superb).

11) Jean Dujardin*- It's apparently from Green Street Hooligans (very energetic... not that malevolent).

12) Adepero Oduye- Bonnie Parker from Bonnie and Clyde (how is this villainous? It's sad, and melodramatic like Jennifer Lawrence last year).

13) Glenn Close*- The Vamp (sort of in the style of Norma Desmond... her icy cold eyes that have made her so famous help her immensely).

My favourites- women rule with Mara, Wasikowska, Dunst, Davis, Chastain and Close all being absolutely spot on. In the men, it's the Year of the Goz, so how can he not be bloody brilliant? I sort of liked the minimalistic monochrome of last year's better, but with ones like Gosling's, Mara's, Wasikowska's and Chastain's, it sort of makes sense why they went for the spectacular sets and effects. 

Enjoy :D

“I’d like to grow up and be beautiful. I know it doesn’t matter, but it doesn’t hurt.” ~Kirsten Dunst

So I've been a fan of Kirsten Dunst for a very long time. Many of my friends don't like her for that wretched Mary Jane Watson role, but they barely look past it. I think the first film of hers that I saw was the fantasy-film Jumanji. She was so sweet in it, a typical older sister, who had because of the game been released into this world of surprising horrors and insane jungle-stuff. Prior to Jumanji, she had been in a few other films, most notably Interview with the Vampire and Little Women. Both adaptations of famous books; in the first she played Claudia- a young vampire who lives with fellow-vampires Lestat and Louis, played by Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt respectively. It was a very interesting role, certainly a predecessor to the young vampires we see everywhere now. I remember feeling very bad for her, never being able to grow up along with growing old, along with that strange relationship she had with both men. I though she was particularly powerful because she did demand my attentions in her scenes more than her much more accomplished co-stars. She played the younger Amy in Little Women, who is my least favourite March sister, but she was absolutely adorable in the role. From her nose-worries, to being a total brat, to having that very special relationship with Laurie (a very young Christian Bale).

I think Kiki was the quintessential teen-star, something that many of her successors have tried to be, but unfortunately failed. I think it's her blonde locks, and joyful face and sweet voice. This worked behind many of her late 90s-early 2000 films like Strike, Bring it On, Drop Dead Gorgous and The Virgin Suicides. The first two are much lighter roles like the cheerleader Torrance in Bring it On. She's funny and preppy and just plain contagious. I mean how can one not know all the cheers by rote, right? The latter two are much darker roles. I think as Amber Atkins in Drop Dead Gorgeous, she perfected the bright-eyed, beautiful, smart teenager-look that a teen-film like this needs as its protagonist. In all the craziness of the film, her character remains the only sane one. Now Virgin Suicides, which was done much before these, is one of her darkest roles to date. She played one of the younger Lisbon sisters, whose lives are doomed as shown by the title of the film itself. She's the main one, without doubt, just the kind of beauty that all the boys in the film are after... with darker undertones. 

After all of these, she did her most famous role to date- Mary Jane Watson, the love-interest of Peter Parker and his alter ego Spiderman. She was not that annoying in the first one, but as the films kept coming, the more and more I found myself hating this character. Infact, it's number 2 on my most annoying film-characters list, preceded by Bella Swan and followed by Frodo Baggins. While it did what she wanted it to do for her career, that is make her well-known all over the world, it did become one of the most stereotypical damsel-in-distress roles ever.

In between, she tried to let go of her teenage image by choosing more adult, or rather young adult roles. She was there in Michel Gondry-Charlie Kaufman modern classic- Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Her character Mary was this naive girl who is infatuated with her much older employer. he starred in the ensemble female-drama Mona Lisa Smile, a film set in the early 50s, which questioned the role of women in society then. She played a very traditionalist, headstrong character Betty, who is found often sparring with her free-minded teacher, played by Julia Roberts. While it's one of her least-likeable roles, she does adopt the look of a Stepford-ish housewife really well. She was also there in romantic films like Elizabethtown and Wimbledon, the latter being a particular favourite of mine. I liked her relationships with her heroes in these films- Orlando Bloom in the first and one very fit Paul Bettany in the second. 

After these came Marie Antoinette, which is the last film that I've seen of her, save Spiderman 3. I've written time and again about how much I love this film, and how much I love her in it. She got back together with her Virgin Suicides-director, Sofia Coppola and made one of the most unique period films ever. She's just transplendent in it. She looks uncommonly beautiful- a sort of decadence with the freshness of youth, and ofcourse those marvelous clothes and jewelery and hair. She plays the ill-fated monarch from her blooming early teens till her death in her twenties, which is a major part of any girl's life. In that time she has to get her prince to impregnate her, get love from her country, get respect from her mother, and have lots and lots of fun (and candy =P). Of course things do not go that way, and Kiki in the end is just so impactful, that atleast I felt like saving her.

Now the reason why I am writing this whole ode to Kirsten Dunst is because she has won the Best Actress award in Cannes for her upcoming film Melancholia! I am so happy that she is going to finally get the critical appreciation that she has worked so long to get. I thought that this looked bleak after the ban put on it's director Lars Von Trier, for his "Pro-Nazi" comments, but she did it. I will definitely be watching this film, which looks very intriguing from the trailer, and for her ofcourse. She also will be playing Camille in Walter Salles's adaptation of Beat-epic On The Road. I just can't wait!

CONGRATULATIONS TO MS. DUNST FOR BEING SUCH A WONDERFUL ACTRESS!

"When she jumped, she probably thought she could fly" ~ The Virgin Suicides

SOFIA COPPOLA FILMS

What I would give to be in a Sofia Coppola film...