Mr. Bug Goes to Town (1941)

Throughout my studies of animation history, sometimes I come across terrible animations.  Like really bad.  What I'm talking about is the feature Mr. Bug Goes to Town, also known as Bugville, or Hoppity Goes to Town.  It is so terrible that the Fleischer Brothers were fired by Paramount and Famous Studios was born.  Fleischer Studios produced many quality shorts, but they always fell flat when trying to make a feature.  Why this is historically important is, even though it's terrible, this story is the basic inspiration for A Bug's Life (1998), one of the first fully computer animated films (after Toy Story).

 

The story is a village of various insects live together in a vacant lot.  A skyscraper is going to be built on their land, which will drive them out of their homes.  Hoppity, a grasshopper with the most annoying voice ever, loves Honey Bee and wants to take her family away to safer ground.  Oh no! But evil Mr. Beetle thwarts his plan and forces Mr. Bee to give his daughter away in marriage to him.

 

 

 

Meanwhile, two humans waiting for a royalty check are afraid they are going to lose their home.  They decide to buy the penthouse in the new skyscraper instead.  Oh yeah, sure, when we were broke and lost our first home we totally had enough to buy a fucking penthouse.  The only reason they didn't get their check is because the evil Mr. Beetle hid it.  However, Hoppity finds it and gives it to the humans.  In return, all the bugs go live in the rooftop garden.  Which, they climb up the skyscraper to get to!  Yes, the tiny insects climb up a skyscraper and don't get blown off.

 

The worst part about this film is the voice acting.  It is just terrible.  I can't recommend this film to anyone.  Only if you want to see the inspiration for A Bug's Life for comparison purposes should you ever see this film.  I will give it a 2/10.

Cat People (1942)

Today's film is Cat People.  There is a legend in Serbia of the Cat People, the descendants of the evil witches.  If one of these women falls in love with a man and kisses him, she will turn into a panther and eat him!

 

Irena has lived with the fear that she is a cat person all her life.  This stems from a childhood tragedy where her father was found dead and her mother was accused of being a cat person that killed him.  If her mother is a cat person, then she must be too, she is certain of it.

 

Irena falls in love with a man, Oliver (Ollie), and marries him despite believing that she will kill him.  So every night after that, she avoids him and sleeps in her own room.  Naturally, Ollie is bothered by this, since newlyweds should never sleep in different bedrooms.  Meanwhile, Ollie's beautiful coworker tells him that she's in love with him.

 

Ollie tells Irena that she needs to go see a psychiatrist.  She does, and after some time, she is no longer afraid of being intimate with her husband.  But, it's too late!  Her husband has fallen in love with the woman from work and wants to leave Irena.

 

Ollie wins the King Douchebag of the Year Award.  I can just hear his thought process: "I'm certain my wife has a mental illness, I'm going to divorce her sorry ass and go out with the hot chick from work."

 

That's his own bride he's thinking about!  What happened to his wedding vows, that he pledged "to love and honor... in sickness and in health"?  Did he just ignore this?  Mental illness can be just as devastating as physical illness.  It's her husband who should care most about her well-being.

Now the question is: Does she really turn into a panther?  Probably, I don't know.  It never actually shows her transforming.  I actually found this movie to be more depressing than scary.  I will give it a 6/10.

Lost in Translation (2003)

Today's film is Lost in Translation.  It's an realistic, honest look at two lonely people in a crowded, strange city.  Bill Murray is Bob Harris, a faded movie star reduced to making whisky commercials.  The impossibly beautiful Scarlett Johannson is Charlotte, a young woman accompanying her photographer husband to Japan on business.  She is a recent graduate who majored in philosophy, which explains why she doesn't have a job.

Bob is bored in his 25-year-old marriage.  Instead of love notes, his wife sends him passive aggressive notes and carpet samples.  Charlotte is bored in her new marriage.  Her husband, John, would rather work than spend any time with her.  Through their loneliness, combined with being in a strange city, Bob and Charlotte form an unlikely bond.  They tour the city, party, do karaoke, and generally have a good time.

Yes, they do kiss, but it never goes any further than that.  Their connection is a spiritual one, not a physical one.  At the end, Bob has to leave, and he is sad to go.  When he whispers to Charlotte, I turned my computer Way up, and this is what he says: "The next time you see John, you tell him the truth, okay?"

I like this movie because it feels realistic and yet engages me at all times.  Also, there's no reason why men and women can't just be friends.  It could have easily fallen into the trap of romantic comedies and it didn't.  I will give it an 8/10.

Ninotchka (1939)

Yesterday was our first blog anniversary. Since last February 4th, I have reviewed 289 films.  Today's film is Ninotchka, which is a comedy/commentary on Communism/romance.  I like finding movies that I can quote, and there are a ton of quotable lines from this film.  This is almost like The Big Lebowski of the 1930's in how much I can quote in everyday situations.

Three men from Russia are in Paris to hawk confiscated (stolen) royal jewels for the sake of the government.  When the Countess Swana, rightful owner of the jewels finds out, she takes legal action, which leaves them stranded for the time being.  The Russian government sends an envoy to see what's up.  To everyone's surprise, it's woman; Ninotchka.  She is stern, make-up free, plain, and has absolutely no sense of humor.

By some magical coincidence, she meets Count Leon, Countess Swana's retainer, while she's out and about studying Paris.  He says, "Russians! I love Russians! I've been interested in your 5 year plan for the last 15 years."  I do like how she tries to compliment him.  She says, "Your general appearance is not distasteful", and also she likes his corneas, which is an odd thing to like.  Count Leon falls head over heels for her.  The next day he tries over and over to make her laugh.  When he stands up and promptly falls down, she is caught off guard and finally laughs.

After laughing,  Ninotchka transforms into something resembling a human being.  She tries on lipstick, buys the ugliest hat, and laughs at jokes now.  Unfortunately she is forced to go back to Russia.  What's worse, Count Leon is denied a visa to go see her.  How will he see Ninotchka again?  Don't worry, it's a romantic comedy, he'll figure it out.  I will give this movie an 8/10.

The Skin I live in (La piel que habito) (2011)

Today's film is The Skin I live in, and it's from Spain.  How this movie is not on the list I will never know.  Critics don't appreciate true art.  Let's start by asking a few questions about the film.  Does this film...

...have elements of a medical drama?

...have elements of a psychological thriller?

...involve illegal human and/or animal experimentation?

...have disturbing scenes?

...have a twist no one sees coming?

...star Antonio Banderas?

Yes it does! It has all of these elements and more.  It's a psychological thriller with disturbing scenes starring Antonio Banderas as an incredibly smart surgeon.

Christ on a bicycle this is a great movie.

The story starts out innocently enough.  A noted plastic surgeon, Dr. Robert Ledgard, is obsessed with creating a burn-proof skin, to help burn victims recuperate properly.  He does this because his wife was badly burned in a fiery car wreck.  She was holding onto a thread of life, but her husband brought her around.  He took out all the mirrors from the house, and began working on his skin project.  He worked day and night.  One day, his wife was finally strong enough to get out and open a window.  She caught a glimpse of her reflection in the windowpane, and upon seeing her grotesque features, panicked and leapt out of the window, landing right near her young daughter.

Her daughter is understandably traumatized, and has spent time in a mental hospital.  She is later sexually assaulted by a young man at a party.  I'm not giving him the benefit of the doubt, but he was on a lot of pills and probably didn't fully know what he was doing.  The daughter is so traumatized that she herself leaps out of a window in the mental hospital.  Which I'm calling bullshit because those windows are wired shut and have a thick metal sheet guarding it.  You could run full force at one and it will not budge.  Don't ask me how I know this.

Dr. Ledgard kidnaps the young man and subjects him to his horrible experiments. How far will he go?  You will have to find out.  Dr. Ledgard discovers the key to make his skin.  The key to a tougher, burn-proof skin is to mix pig-skin cells into our human-skin cells.  Pig skin is naturally tougher than ours, after all we play football with it.  This however breaks all established moral laws of the scientific community and the doctor's action are frowned upon.

No one in this film is exactly evil, like I would call a villain.  Even though their actions are not the right ones, they do them for their own ends.  So no one can be considered a "hero", and it's deeper than a traditional film of good vs. evil. I'm giving this film a 9/10.

The War Game (1965)

It's Groundhog Day today, and what is his prediction for the winter weather this year?  Oh, wait, I live in Florida, I don't care.  It's also the Super Bowl today which I am watching right now.

Speaking of the Big Game, I watched The War Game to review here.  It's not about a game at all, but about the devastation and panic that comes from nuclear war.  Sorry, but no matter hard hard you try, a bunch of sand bags piled up against your house, it is not going to help against a nuclear bomb.

The main concern is all the deaths, injuries, and illnesses that arise from these weapons. Also, there would be a lack of food and resources, and most of the land would be rendered useless by the radiation.  Soon, the land will collapse into anarchy. The film is presented as if it's a real-life documentary, as if everything is really happening.  Most of the film is all scare tactics, which makes me wonder, what is the purpose of this film?  Simply to scare citizens?  I don't know.  It's fairly graphic for a film from the 1960's.  What makes this film scary is the stark realism of everything that happens, there's no dramatization of anything.  I will give this film a 6/10.

The Croods (2013)

Today's animated feature is The Croods, nominated for both a Golden Globe and an Academy Award.  It is a lot better than I expected it to be.  Dreamworks has really stepped up its game in the animation department, especially in the portrayal of humans.

Eep is a cavegirl (a Neanderthal) living with her family, the last one in the area.  They're the last ones because they spend all their time in the safety of the cave.  Due to the constant earthquakes and changing of the Earth's landscape, their cave is destroyed and they have to leave for the first time to find higher ground.  Meanwhile, Eep meets a boy, who looks like a more modern human.  He is full of ideas, like shoes and fire! He impresses her family, except the jealous dad, who up until now has protected the family.

All of the animals in this movie are animals that either never have existed, or could never exist, like giant flying turtles.  One such animal is the big cute tiger with colors reminiscent of a macaw.

This is an animation the whole family can enjoy.  It's funny and full of heart.  I will give it a 7/10.