A weekend has passed which means it's time to review more films. Remember, these movies are rated by how many mini wines it takes to enjoy the film. A rating of none is best. A rating of four is worst. Read more about the rating system here.
"Inglourious Basterds" 1/2 mini. First I must confess two things. Brad Pitt is in the film. I love Brad Pitt. I love everything Brad Pitt does. O.K. that was the first thing. The second thing is that Jeff loves Quentin Tarantino, not in quite the same way that I love Brad Pitt but just as passionately. Well, maybe passionately is not the right word. Let's just say Jeff has a great deal of artistic respect for Quentin Tarantino. Alright, on with the review. The film was brilliant. It wasn't as graphically violent as "Kill Bill," thank goodness. And the violence is mostly against Nazis, so it seems tolerable. In fact, many theatergoers cheered when Nazis were scalped. If you're squeamish, you'll definitely want to cover your eyes during those scenes. Yes, scenes, as in more than one. Brad Pitt is awesome as a Nazi-ass-kicker and Christoph Waltz, who plays a Nazi colonel, is superb. Writer and director Quentin Tarantino delivers his story through five chapters which makes the film seem shorter than its 2 1/2 hours. Each chapter is filmed in a different style than the last and offers a new glimpse into the mind of Tarantino if not into the mind of actual World War II soldiers. If you're looking for a documentary, stick with the History channel. If you want to see a strangely humorous, vengeful movie with clearly defined good guys and bad guys, watch this gloriously bizarre film. My only complaints are excessive violence and too little history on certain characters.
"The Time Traveler's Wife" 2 minis. I really wanted to like this movie because I adored the book of the same name written by Audrey Niffenegger. I suspect I would have enjoyed the film more if I'd liked the book less. The movie invents some conflict between time traveling Henry (Eric Bana) and his wife Claire (Rachel McAdams) that didn't exist in the book and therefore wasn't believable to me. The movie deletes entire characters who were featured in the book. It was probably necessary to edit out some characters for the sake of time and to get a PG-13 rating. (The book would have been rated R.) Unfortunately, the omission of supporting characters hurts the development of the main characters. Still, it was a sweet film and though you'll need a tissue or two, you won't be crying throughout the whole movie. Most surprisingly, I preferred the movie's ending to the book's. I also enjoyed Rachel McAdams' performance. There are some very funny moments and fans of the book can have a lively chat (perhaps over some more mini wine) comparing the book and the movie.
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