Friday, January 17, 2014

Top 10 Movies of 2013

Auteur-ior Motives

Editorial note: I wanted to put this list together sooner, so as not to compromise its already dwindling relevance -- but a few important films remained unseen and I felt that their exclusion would render my own personal recollections of the past year incomplete.

      It was for me a milestone year in cinema. Perhaps more than any previous year, I devoted significant time to the art form. Buoyed by intense curiosity and passion, I've undergone what I believe is my own loosely attentive film school. In my quest to achieve wider cinematic erudition, there was really no limit to what I could do: Studying filmmakers obsessively, seeking out any literature I could get my hands on, attempting to quantify the quintessence of filmmaking, in the hopes of reducing it to a concept that I could more sufficiently understand; I mean who does this stuff? 
      But all of this deep stimulation is secondary to the real reason you've come here—which is to find out what movies made my list of favorites. Because I lack the necessary skills to moderate my passion effectively, I've elected to categorize all the movies I've seen from this past year. What follows then is a glimpse into the soul of a movie junkie. 

Monday, October 28, 2013

The Disconnect Between Gambling Films & Modern Gambling

Guest PostImage result for rounders movie

      In the parlance of strange and passionate people and their strange and passionate affairs, gambling films always seem to gather "cult followings" - which generally means their success in the box office is mediocre, but they're still seen as popular films with niche audiences. Indeed, the basic themes presented in these films - risk, reward, getting into and sometimes out of trouble, and hedonistic atmospheres - are certainly appealing windows into a more gratifying form of entertainment. The attraction, an instinctual desire to test the limits of your personal success, is not too hard to understand after all. 

Wednesday, April 3, 2013

Random Rumination

Looking at Art From The Outsider's POVImage result for movie the outsider nicholas jarecki

     I watched an interesting documentary the other day called The Outsider (available on Netflix Instant watch). Driven by my curiosity to understand everything there is to know about making movies, I started watching it expecting to be educated on a couple of things, a proposition increasingly difficult to satisfy as the more inscrutable, utilitarian aspects of filmmaking can only be learned through the practice of actually making movies. But knowledge is power and I'm not averse to expanding my intellectual capital in the event that I do enter the discipline full-throttle. The downside is a hellacious misuse of my free time, but the upside is incalculable in ways that keep my capacity to dream big alive.

Wednesday, March 27, 2013

Movie Review: Swingers

Show Me The You're So Money, Baby


      Imagine the year is 1996. Los Del Rio's Macarena and Blackstreet's No Diggity are dominating the music charts. The Spice Girls are infuriating every teenage boy who is just beginning to experiment with the opposite sex. Independence Day annihilates the Summer Box Office and convinces me that being dropped off six hours before it screens is an ingenious way to spend six hours. Everyone is "being showed the money!" in inappropriate outbursts to flex their obnoxious Jerry Maguire muscle. The Summer Olympics are being held in Atlanta. Ebay has just launched. Sadly, Ask Jeeves follows suit. No one knows who the hell Justin Bieber is.

Thursday, March 21, 2013

Movie Review: Rust and Bone

Bone Hugs-N-Disharmony


      RUST [rust] v. 
      1. To deteriorate or degenerate through inactivity or neglect. 
      2. To impair or spoil, as by misuse or inactivity. 

The Free Dictionary: By Farlex

      Jacques Audiard dangerously conforms to a sociological latticework that breeds dysfunction and chaos. He is not interested in exploring the complications of life through rose-colored glasses. Materialistic goons spawned from the next incarnation of The Queen of Versailles are not his concernDisharmony is his unifying force. People who operate desperately on the fringes of society are his focus.

Monday, March 18, 2013

Blogfest: Top Ten Favorite Movies of All-Time

It's Not The Final Countdown


      Formulating a list that by its very proclamation boasts of "My Ten Favorite Films" requires a mindset I've never been truly ready to embrace. To exclude so many films that I love is to commit an almost homicidal act upon works that to me are endowed with such everlasting appeal, my affinity for them incontrovertible. What follows, therefore, is merely an attempt. 

Friday, March 15, 2013

Movie Review: The Trial

Sentenced to Write


Editor's Note: Realizing that this is a site dedicated to film and is meant to foster discussion therein, I shamefully admit that I have been derelict in my aficionado duties. Which is the business of reviewing films. So, starting now, I will be fulfilling my ardent obligation and writing a review. I hope this will be a reemergence back into regular blogging and reviewing, and that I will not fall victim to malaise. FilmMattic reviews shall persist in perpetuity as far as I'm concerned...

      Perhaps the hypnotic gestures of fate energized my inner-critic because here I reflect on a movie spawned from the prodigious creative might of Orson Welles. That movie is The Trial. And as I reflect and yield to the calm solace of introspection, I am alarmed to discover that I have not written a satisfactory review in an eternity and a day. This blog has not, as its inception dictates, appropriately performed its primary function. Reviewing films is the fuel of FilmMattic and somehow, through sheer happenstance I suppose, I've been lead astray from that purpose. In this period of infrequent content and in this internal trial of conscience, I am compelled to impose a sentence. The regularity of my film blogging has been disgustingly insubstantial. This is a crime that cannot be condoned. I'm thinking that in my judiciary capacity 1-2 posts (or reviews) per week is a manageable goal (or in keeping with this asinine legal theme, punishment). Now shall we discuss an actual trial? Well, the veracity of even that statement is dubious, so let's just get to my review of The Trial.