Saving MR Banks :)

A way back to our childhood.
I´ve never seen a movie as touching as this one. I just came out of the cinema and had this gigantic need to write it rapidly, for fear I might forget something. It is full of meticulous mini details that embelish my heart(hahah sorry for this repellent expression, I just had to). I am completely over the moon. Marvelous Tom Hanks and Emma Thompson , as lovely as ever, totally complementing one another. Director John Lee Hancock couldn´t have chosen a better couple, they fit like a duck to water, I will come back to analize tactifully and specifically Emma Thompson's interpretation.  I am afraid to make a movie critic that demands the most delicate sensibility there is in the world, cause its a true story based on events. A story that took place in those incredible Disney Studios by the hand of the grand child entertainer Waltz Disney.

Its the story of  Ms Travers the writer of Mary Poppins, a woman who recreates her life without knowing it, in a book indirectly based on her life.
Who hasn´t watched as a kid Mary Poppins and laughted at those pinguins dancing ,or dreamed about seeing this peculiar nanny approaching your window with an umbrella.
Its a story she lived,a story so precious and private that I can understand it was the writers wish to leave it as it is. Her treasure trove, avoiding big productions to steal it from her. Everyone at some point in their lives has watched Dick Van Dyke dancing Chim Chim Cheer-ee. It´s the child we have inside our adult exterior, the child Ms Travers had decided to forget.

Saving Mr Banks sets the battle from Waltz since 20 years ago for the exclusive rights to Ms travers novel to make it a movie, because he had promised it to his daughter(and he´s a man who keeps his promises). So when Ms Travers finally comes to the Studio, mainly on a need not to her liking, Mr Disney puts all his effort in satisfying the particular needs of this writer.
The grumpy attitude of our character Ms Travers gets on the nerves of everyone of the Studio, making them remain quiet or else all the movie script will be over. It´s incredibly funny to see these concrete acts. We can see Waltz getting really Clingy on her trying to make her rebel an evasive attitude disappear.

 The story of Mary Poppins was written by Ms Travers at an adult age to alude a figure she once met in her childhood and was important to her past, and guided her to become the woman she has turned into. A figure who sew all her family together when everything was going wrong. All along she´d looked back to her memories with sadness and its the Sparkle of Watz Disney and its crew with its ridiculous lyrics, songs and colours which brings the beloved joyfull attitude back to Ms Travers. No one could give  a better ending for her father but Waltz himself. A caricature kind of man who looks on the bright side of life, and as the hard childhood he had, has grown up to put a smile on thousand of generations of kids all over the world.

I admire this Producer/Director/Scriptwriter/ animator who once stood up to a production company with his Mickey Mouse project.
And thank you,Ms Travers, for giving the rights to this movie and left it in the hands of Waltz, an incredible story and a necessity to be told your way. One of the first times Disney included real characters in her movie, and not cartoons.

Amazing set up, truly heartbreaking and real. Tears assured accompanied by laughter all along the movie (not the one you laugh alone in hidden disguise, the one where all the cinema joins you).
This movie will receive a spate of likes, I´m sure,and probably my guess for the Oscar is gonna be for Emma.

Finding Forrester

Sean Connery in Finding Forrester , ASTOUNDING...
a previous version of Le intouchable movie. To my opinion, same plot and same characters, wondering around their lives and finding friendship among each other. I know movies from the past tend  not to be ones plate for a lazy afternoon, but eventhough its less touching than the other,  it´s tenderly sweeter.

Every production media and parlour have gathered around Le intouchable movie because, at the end of the day, is a novel movie , born and with brand new characters, but let´s not forget about this same guideline plot that was launched in the year 2000.

Typical black boy from the Bronx, Jamal, who is very smart but ain´t got the  guts to show it  in public cause hes mates will think he´s a looser. Pristine exam records, but showing-off character , eitherways school ends up noticing him and proposing the entrance to a private school, more to his condition.

 As a kiddo of 16 years old he shows no interest but for basketball , being one of the best around the bronx rink. It all changes one day when as a bet with his friends sneaks into an old mans house, who happens to spy on them out of mere boredom through the window. Like couriosity killed the cat , he drops his backback  while sneaking into his flat and ends up knocking at his door to begin a conversation.

 Turns out that this old man called William Forrester( played by Sean Connery ) is no one else but a famous writer left in the shadows because of past hurtful events. This character intrigues us with a background, which he shows no intention of sharing until you get to the middle plot.

 An old man who doesn´t suffer fools easily.
When dropping his backpack William  peeps into Jamal´s assignments and ends up reading the boys journal. Furthermore, he discovers an immense potential hidden inside the boy´s unwilling desire to write. Jamal is clearly an on-the- ball type of kid.
William ends up assisting and showing this young writer the path into his world, the path into the world of words.

Every day, sharp after school ,Jamal joins William in a private personal scriptwriting class. What at first glance seems only productive for the kid himself, ends up enormously fulfilling to William.
Encouraging the kid to:

" Punch the keys for god´s sake "( to an old, perhaps, Olivety typewriter).
"Don´t think, just write"
"Writers Write so readers can read".
Such inspiring words, if we think too much, most of the things we want to say never exit our minds. If you´re meant to be a writer you must just set hands on your keyboard and start writing whatever nonesense pops out of your mind. There are uncountable readers, but only a close knit group who will like what you write. So write for those people, regardless of the others.

Back to the movie....
Jamal starts handing out impecable essays and one of his literature proffesor´s doesn´t buy it. So here comes the typical character you wanna punch the screen for. Meticulously doubting about the kid and making his life hell. Fascinated with his work , but unable to give him the credit because he himself was denied the publishing of one of his scripts.

A story about the unexpected friendship of two opposites. A tenderly script aimed and carefully written for its expectators. How within this relationship they both find the beauty of life. Can´t do nothing else but applaud to the very last scene that made me cry instantly.

Now type your own melodies....

What Maisie Knew

  

 MOVIE NIGHT for a  night-in with your boyfriend! So far one of the most emotional and heartbreaking movies I have watched. From the director Scott Mc Gee & David Siegel´s.
Starring little Onata Aprile as Maisie, my favorite Alexander Skarsgard as Lincoln (seen in True Blood),Julianne Moore as Susanna (popular in cinema at the moment), Joanna Vanderham as Margo and Steve Coogan as Beale.

 Drama movie with harsh topic: parent divorce and  the battle for the custody. It is a movie which will rip everyones heart,for people of all walks of life and for all types of personalities. So get your cosy blanket, a nice person to have around you and press play....

This is Maisie:

I can´t believe a  girl so young can  play such a strong act like this. It's completely over the top and her gestures are overwhelming.
It envolves the childhood of a little girl upon the neverending arguments, insults and fake destroying relationship of her parents. How a girl comes back from school, with her tiny owl back-pack and has to deal with no attention, shouting, at a so unfair age that it should be a crime. An age were a kid has no possibility of understanding and can only blame herself.
Central argument sets the day when both parents can´t cope with each other anymore and begin the fight for the baby... None of them wants Maisie for what is worth, it´s just a fight between them in which the winner  has it all. Like if the child hadn't had enough by now, to add the constant moving around two houses every 10 days. Parents immersed in their jobs and unprepared to accept responsibilities.

Susanne and ex husband both move on and marry different persons, persons who end up babysitting a baby thats not theirs.

Alexander as Lincoln plays the rebound sex Julian Moore marries so she can appear more responsible to the court and get more access to her daughters custody(PATHETIC). Lincoln falls for Susanna,the famous rockstar  like a Kiddo. What he didn´t expect when marrying her, was the PLUS ONE little girl which he totally falls in love with... Never had he seen himself as a father so its impressive to watch his evolution closely. How he turns from a clumsy dude who forgets to hold the hand of the girl when crossing the streets, to an unimaginable teddybear.

Similarly, happens to the ex husband of Julianne who begins a new life with another girl , of course younger than him ,who turns out to be Maisie´s best nanny. So imagine the wrecking  feelings this little child has to confront!
Maisie, like a soccer ball,  moves from one house to another, with absent parents who really pay  no attention to her. It´s expected that love feeeling originate in this girl towards her stepdads. Maisie starts to call Margo her mum and Lincoln her dad.  Little by little they both begin to care about this girl to unimaginable levels. They start having fun with her, taking her playing and attending her more as their real parents than as step ones. Maisie in a complete mess doesn´t distinguish who her parents are anymore, but for the first time she´s feeling special.

 Heart of the story comes when Julianne and her ex husband both discover how they have ruined their childs life and decide to let her go. Because of their egocentrism and selfishness they have lost their little bumblebee and there´s no turning back now. She no longer recognises them.I don´t  doubt that her parents both loved her, but had taken bad decissions and these has cost them to loose their childs affection. This movie advices parents to hold their children and enjoy with them, because there will come a day when they leave and it will only depend on them if their childs one day returns.

SPECTACULAR! I have nothing more to say... LITTLE SPOILER.....:)

Mystic Pizza

Mystic Pizza 1988 a movie about simple life, friends and everyday situations. The Director is Donald Petrie, starring Julia Roberts as Daisy Aroujo, her drama boring sister Kat (Anabeth Gish) and Jojo the friend of them both( Lily Tailor).

As the title says Mystic is the city where the story of three close friends takes place. Three girls who have just finished highschool and are working as waitresses at a pizza place called Mystic Pizza, being this the last summer where they won´t have to decide what comes next. The summer after highschool where every teen goes NUTS!A summer which will make them grow and they will always remember.

Main actress Julia Roberts plays the pretty careless young wild teen who lives an unplanned and sporadic life based on working and hanging out with boys in town. Her sister Kat is the completely opposite, the responsible one her mother is proud of and the one who is getting an scholarship for next term in Yale( talk about sister to sister competitions! One's got the looks and the other one´s got the brains!haaha).
 Following along goes Jojo,If you ask me, she's  the best character. A temper tramp kinda girl with lots of personality who dates the young love of her life, but is incapable of making a commitment.Perhaps she ain´t want to grow up and assume responsabilities.

This movie counts with the appearance of three types of boy stereotypes. The clasical prince charming Rich daddy boy, who drops out of college and is looking for adventures to piss off his family. Also, a simple and adorable town sailorman and the "I TOLD YOU SO" married man who hires a babysitter and ends up bamming her(typical).We can catch up on  the outfits of the time where the frizzy hair, long sweaters and long blazers take place.

Tears of laughter with everyday situations and daydreaming wishes of three girls who wish to fly away far from Mystic and discover themselves. A Love drama that positions all of the three in a non expected spiral of love that makes you feel the story as if you were part of it...sharing their heartbreaks and wonders.


"BOYS you can have'em many, but friends are counted with a hand(and in this case they are only three, so easy to follow).
Life is complicated as it is, but truth is,it always tastes better on a pizza with friends!


I guess we won´t sleep on the fact that we dont know the secret ingredient hidden beneath the MYSTIC PIZZA!!!

Postcards from the Edge

I was peeking at cinema books at a shop and run into a book called "films that marked me " and there was this one ,between a mother and her daughter, called < Postcards from the Edge> that caught my attention.
Played by Meryl streep and Shirley MacLaine directed by Mike Nichols(1990).

 I have a thing for mother-daughter movies, I always get extremely emotional with them.
This plot takes us to the hollywoood of the 90s, with all the hollywood gang and its actors, all the peculiar sets and the tough implications making a movie. Meryl streep plays Suzanne Vale, a substance addicted hollywood actress, who despite being born at the top is unhappy and this has a lot to do with her mother´s education. The mother, Doris Mann played by Shirley MacLaine  is a mother who was once a talented incredible woman,but ends up as a stubborn alcoholic. All that glitters in Hollywood is not gold, you can have it all and still be the most unhappy.

 It all beg,ins with the overdose of meryl streep related to old hollywood overdoses. It all starts at a set when she's acting and we can tell she´s high. Late in the morning she wakes up with a randomn dude who carries her to the hospital. She´s paraletic and ain´t making sense of herself, so they end up moving her down to a detox service where she makes peculiar friends. In these scenes you can see the relationship she has with her mother and I can tell they have way too much shit from the past. Eventhough the mother tries to get closer, there´s always a pushing away reaction from Suzanne.

What a surprise when director of the movie  Lowell Kolchec played by Gene Hackman forces Meryl to live with her mother, in order to keep her from harming herself, untill the  movie finally is finished. Hilarious to mention is Suzanne´s face when being suggested this situation. Shirley MacLaine is the typical mother who likes showing off, as a young talented singer and actress, loves to shadow her baby and attract all the attention to her. Not was my surprise when Meryl starts singing in a party and right afterwards mother does the same. A totally self-centered character who cannot enjoy her daughter´s success. I can understand this would annoy anyone on earth! 

All in all, there´s always time for love and here comes the character of Jack Faulkner played by Dennis Quaid. A handsome lad who likes to hang around on set and tells lies to all the actresses just to take them to bed. Eitherways, incredibly funny appearance of this character making Suzanne even more phsycotic.

I love the scene when Susanne tip toes back home, after spending a night with Jack and her mother is awaiting drinking in the sofa.


-Doris:  "Why did you turn away from me ?I just want you to like me I just want to be your friend...Everytime I try to get close to you,you push me away. I came from nothing and I made something out of my life, you come from somewhere and your trying to make nothing out of yours.  I think you should just get over what happened to you in your adolescence it is time to move on."

Mother is little by little approaching Suzanne and beginning to realize she may have a part to blame for the attitude her daughter has developed.
During the film making and all along the movie we see the improvement in their relationship and you end up wanting to hug your mother. Because at the end of the day ,darlings,nobody loves us more than our mothers and mother there`s one and only.