time for movie reviews

to catch up tons of movies i’ve downloaded but haven’t seen yet, i attributed several hours of my weekend for 3 different films.

the marrakech express (1989). this is a italian film by gabriele salvatores. plot is simple. marco receives news from teresa saying that their old friend rudy is in jail in marrakech (morocco) for possesion of illegal drugs. the only way to get him out is by paying huge amount of bail. not having such amount, marco asks several friends ponchia, paolino, and cedro, individually having lives of their own, to help out their friend, rudy. a bit hesitant at first, they decided to embark an adventure from italy to morocco by land to relieve rudy. passing by france and spain (atleast), hitching through locals, and crossing the blazing desert with infinite sand dunes in bikes, they reached marrakech only to find out that rudy wasn’t imprisoned at all. the money was actually needed to buy irrigation machines to produce water in the middle the desert, where rudy and teresa, among others, find settlement. with the help of everyone, they successfully managed to produce water in this arid piece of land, and planned to make it an orange plantation. rudy promised to pay them back from the very first harvest. reuniting their friendship (although there was bit of lies), the story ends when the four has to go back to italy, again by land. this is a movie for adventurers. you would really be inspired to go and see the other side of the world. sad to say, i haven’t even been outside asia, but i know it’ll come, i’ll have my chances to see more of our planet. morocco will wait for me.

under the tuscan sun (2003). coincidentally, this is another movie where you’ll be feeling the urge to travel after seeing. it’s mostly set in tuscany (italy), but the film is mainly in english (unlike the first film). although i think this is not completely a chick-flick movie, it has some elements that are, well, feminine. it involves the recover and search of love by protagonist, frances (diane lane) in a foreign place, tuscany. frances is a writer in a writer’s block after a recent divorce. her bestfriend, patti, offered her an italian trip on a gay tour (which patti bought for herself and her partner (lesbian) but then changed plans after learning that patti is pregnant). frances rejected the offer at first, but then convinced that she needed the break. while in tuscany, she saw an old squalid villa for sale, and on the spur of moment, left the travel group and decided to stay in the town. not knowing anyone, she rebuilt her life, had acquaintance with the locals as well as a group polish who repairs her new house. adjusting to her new life and a possible relationship with a local italian, her bestfriend patty visited her unexpectedly (now with a big tummy) and sadly without her partner; though eventually her italian relationship didn’t work out. at the beginning, frances’ wishes are to raise a child, and witness a wedding in the villa. at the end, she realized that she actually had what she wished for. patti gave birth at the villa, and they hosted a wedding (for a polish boy and a local italian girl).

the prestige (2006). completely different from the first two films, this is a bit heavy, complicated and for my standard, recent (yes, i know i’m always late in movies) and because i’m interested with magics, i’m intrigued by this movie. since this is the most popular, and probably what most of you have seen already (among the three films), i’m not going to talk about the plot. the film is incredibly cunning really. however, i was a bit confused at the end, not knowing if it’s because i absorbed something wrong in the earlier part of the movie, or it was really a movie-plot mistake. consider the tesla machine. it’s not magic but science. earlier experiments show that the tulsa machine is not actually a teleporting machine, but a copying machine. with the help of high levels of energy, the object placed on the center of the machine will still be there, and a duplicate will be produced nearby (just like with the hats and cats). at one instance, when protagonist, angier (hugh jackman), used it on himself, he still remained in the center of the machine, and copy of him appeared a few meters in front of him, which he killed by gun. given that case, it’s obvious to the viewer that the original person will be left unmoved at the center of the tulsa machine, and the duplicates (or prestige) will be somewhere around the area. having said that, i don’t get it why for the stage performances, they’re deliberately drowning the person in the middle of the machine. isn’t he the original angier? i just don’t get that.

also, magic plus extreme tulsanic(is there such a word?)-science-of-lightning-power-physics is just too much for a fiction! i understand it’s fiction, but at least in this kind of plot, there has to be limits. this isn’t the world of harry potter’s.

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‘will get back next weekend for another set of films.