Last King of Scotland (2006) - Based on the facts of the rule of Idi Amin in Uganda this is the fictional story of a young Scots doctor who gets pulled into the dictator's inner circle. James McAvoy is wonderful as the footloose, ethically challenged young man who is running away from his life at home and picks Uganda by spinning a globe and putting a finger down to choose (after rejecting Canada on the first try). But the absolute star of this movie is Forrest Whitaker as Idi Amin. The volatility, the child like wonder, the utter brutality are all woven into a fascinating single persona. His Oscar for the performance was certainly deserved. I always feel like Whitaker gets overlooked for his acting chops. He has done some truly amazing stuff usually with small roles. Nice to see him get a chance to stretch it out a little.
Not quiet, family night entertainment but definitely a movie worth watching.
Rating - **** Highly Recommended
Letters From Iwo Jima (2006) Clint Eastwood doing what he does best, telling stories (not speaking at political conventions). This is an amazing look at one of the deadliest battles ever fought by American forces from the point of view of the other guys. This is the Japanese story of the battle that raged from February 19 to March 26, 1945. U.S. military command had expected the battle to be over in 5 days. The losses on both sides were enormous. 22,000 Japanese troops held off over 70,000 combined U.S. Army and Navy personnel. In the end only 216 Japanese soldiers would be taken prisoner. (A small handful would continue fighting for several years. The last two were captured in 1949, AFTER the war had ended) Eastwood reminds us that the Japanese were human beings fighting for the same things the Americans were. The clash of cultures is striking as well. Ken Watanabe is brilliant as General Kuribayashi, the military mind who made Iwo Jima the military challenge it turned out to be. There is a dubbed English version of it but I'm glad I watched the sub-title version. If I have one small complaint Eastwood doesn't really give you a feel for the difference in numbers between the forces or the length of time it took. I think that's unfortunate. And the only real complaint I have.
Again not fun with the family entertainment but a great movie and educational piece.
Rating - **** Highly Recommended
Better Off Dead (1985) - This is the kind of movie with one solid performance(John Cusack) and some iconic, memorable lines ("
Now that's a real shame when folks be throwin' away a perfectly good white boy like that.", "Two dollars!",
"Gee, I'm real sorry your mom blew up, Ricky.") that makes want to believe it's a good movie. But this isn't. It's a story of a high school student named Layne (Cusack) who is obsessed with a pretty if vacuous girl at school. There's all the usual suspects doing all the usual things with all the usual outcomes. Only not particularly interesting as they do it. In 1986 "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" would come out and show what a high school movie could look like. Sharp and witty with truly iconic point of view Better Off Dead shows itself to be a lame, clichéd re-hash of a 100 movies before it. It's not even as good as the second tier of this movie category, things like Weird Science or Revenge of the Nerds. Cusack has apparently said in interviews that he hates this movie. I'm on his side.
It's better than doing housework.Rating - ** Not Impressed
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