The Hours...

[CMJ]

I saw it today. First off let me say, never see a film that wins the Golden Globe THE DAY AFTER in Los Angeles. My theatre was jammed like you'd expect for AOTC or something.

Anyways, I thought it was great for the most part. The acting was supurb, by all three leading ladies. The supporting players were also good. The editing between the stories was well done, and the music was perfect.

The ending was kind of a letdown, then again...I'm not sure what would have been a good ending(if not for the end I'd have it really high on my 10 best list). Overall one of 2002's best films.

[JonathanLB]

The acting was great, the editing was great, and the plot was boring and inane as I suspected.

I am being really nice and awarding it a B-, or 3 stars, but I don't know what possesses me not to give it 2.5.

What the hell is so good about this movie? It's boring and has almost no plot whatsoever. It is about ordinary people doing even less than ordinary things, lol.

Thank god for the good performances and great editing or I would have been bored out of my mind. Also it has bits of good dialogue that made me laugh a few times, not to mentioned I laughed a few times where I probably shouldn't have.

It took me until the end to figure out that Ed Harris was the boy, but many years later. Was I just not paying attention or what? Was that obvious to you CMJ? I didn't realize that until the end, when it was, well, obvious.

I couldn't figure it out still, though, nor does it really matter because there isn't that much to think about whatsoever. Still, I was wondering about Nicole Kidman. Talk about confusing and making no sense whatsoever. So she exists in 1920-something writing a book about these characters that we see in the film, but there's one major problem -- THOSE CHARACTERS exist many yearse after her death and therefore she couldn't write a book about them exactly as she wouldn't have known how the times would look and cannot predict the future. What the HELL?! That was blatantly unclear. I have no idea what the deal was with that. I guess you have to have read the press cards early or something.

The critics must really like Jullianne Moore. Two straight movies that she's been in, neither one very good, and yet they basically creamed themselves over these films. The Hours is not only not one of the best movies of the year, but does not even deserve mention with films such as About Schmidt, Adaptation, The Two Towers (my god! this film is 100 times superior!), Chicago, The Pianist, or anything else.

I'd rather watch Half-Past Dead again personally, but then again, that film was pretty fun and had good replay value, IMO, lol. The Hours was two hours long and I want to know... how can I get those HOURS back?! lol, j/k it wasn't that bad but jesus, what a lot of hype over nothing.

[CMJ]

To answer your question, I figured the Ed Harris connection about 10 minutes before it was made obvious.

Something told me you wouldn't much care for the film, but I did. ;)

[JonathanLB]

I liked it more than I thought I would. The craft of the film is very hard to deny. I mean, it was well made, which is why I ended up giving it 3 stars. I just found little way to fault the actual production values. Sure, I wasn't a fan of the story, but AT TIMES it made me think of a few things, then to be honest I was a bit bored most of the time. NOT insanely bored like Gosford Park, just a little bored. I felt the story was not compelling, which is a tragic, fatal flaw for a film that is supposed to be great, but you can hardly deny that the editing was first rate, the acting and cast excellent, and I actually liked the ending. It seemed poetic in some way.

CMJ can you answer my question though about Nicole Kidman? I'm really confused. I want to know so I can write in my review exactly how the thing was supposed to work. Was she writing the story of these other characters' lives or was this coincidental that what she was writing was happening in other time periods in other lives, or what? I'm really confused about that to be honest.

[CMJ]

I thought it was purely coincidental. Sort of like alot of people's lives parellel each other(and art...art imitating life and vice versa) or something.

[JonathanLB]

I appreciate your take on the film, CMJ. :)

[CMJ]

No problem. It's nice that someone else see's all these films now, I used to be the only one here that did.

Now I have at least one person to discuss them with. ;)

[JonathanLB]

I feel the same way. Although a lot of the classics I see, I wish I had someone to discuss them with, but they are not very widely seen either. I am sure you've seen a lot of the films I am watching, but I mean not many other people I know have seen them.

I just requested that NetFlix carry a few German films because I'm rather ticked that they don't have them. I mean, they are on DVD, they are among the most significant foreign movies, and they don't have them. I don't subscribe so that I can rent Minority Report, which is available everywhere. I subscribe for the purpose of renting harder to find works. Anyway, there is a four-disc DVD set that has The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, Nosferatu, Waxworks, and The Golem. I haven't seen the latter two films and I want them to get that darn boxed set so I can see them. :)

I did just order about 4 VHS tapes of rather hard to find horror films, plus I added 10 to my queue at NetFlix. After reading half of this film horror book for my class, I just decided to rent or buy about 75% of the major movies they were talking about because it annoyed/annoys me to read about them without seeing them.

[JonathanLB]

I do not feel any obligation to give The Hours 3 stars after seeing that 20% of the critics didn't even like it, many of them saying how pretentious and snooty it is. Even the good reviews are not as good as I thought.

I don't see why I'm giving this movie 3 stars. I'm just a pushover lately, I swear to god. I said it was 3, though, so I suppose I should give it that. It just seems to me that I was going to give it 2.5, while seeing it, and then at the last decided on 3.

I am going to think about this more. I don't know if it really deserves 3. I was thinking C+ or B- and that is the difference between 2.5 and 3. I reserve the right to change my ratings before I review a film officially, especially if I was for most of the running time intent on giving it 2.5 until I somehow relented. I think that should be appealed. :)

EDIT: after looking at some of the other films I gave 3, I think that 2.5 is more appropriate. I can only give a film so much for great editing and acting in the service of a fairly lousy and pretentious plot. Albeit The Hours may be the best 2.5 star film of the year, it would be the worst 3 star film of the year, so it's kind of between two ratings.

[CMJ]

Feel free Jonathan..doesn't dampen my appreciation for the film. ;)

[JonathanLB]

I know, I just hate SAYING I'm going to give something one rating and then changing it, but perhaps you understand how film criticism is really a tough job sometimes because you're forced to objectify an opinion.

Let me give another very recent example, i.e. today. Last night we saw Dawn of the Dead in my film horror class. I felt it was a 3.5 star movie after I saw it, but I took an astonishing 4 pages of written notes on it just while watching it! I was very alert, had just had a SoBe Adrenaline Rush drink (I use energy drinks sometimes when I really need to stay awake and am losing my focus/energy).

Anyway, today I wrote my review from those notes. Well the notes were brief, not full sentences usually. So, my review ended up being a whopping 6.5 pages long! It is one of the 5-10 longest reviews I have ever written, and this about a horror film that maybe some people see purely as a gore-fest. Yet there is a LOT there, this is George A. Romero we are talking about here, the guy who made Night of the Living Dead one of the most important and interesting horror films ever. I imagine my review of Night of the Living Dead will be about 5-10 pages long easily too because there is an incredible amount there. It's got perhaps even more themes and messages and metaphors, which is remarkable.

So anyway, I wrote my 6.5 page review, I read some of it over, and I just thought, you know, yeah sure it was a bit long, and the acting was B-movie quality, and it IS a B-movie, but sometimes the very best of any genre or any type of film DESERVE the A ratings that distinguish them as truly significant. In light of Dawn of the Dead's ranking, #12 on Cinescape's greatest sci-fi AND horror list, and in light of all that has been written about this film, especially by me (haha), I felt it deserved a four star rating. So I managed to convince myself through my own review that it should be bumped up. Otherwise, it's on par with Resident Evil, which is stupid. Resident Evil was a really fun movie, but there are no messages there whatsoever, and that's what makes Dawn of the Dead a great horror film.

I think modern audiences have forgotten what horror can be, which is really too bad. I don't think there is another genre in such poor shape as the horror film, except perhaps the Western, haha, and that's only because they don't make them anymore really (although, if you look at some of the Westerns in the '90s, at least the few they made are really good, like Tombstone). Horror used to have so much potential. A horror movie wasn't just about scares, but was metaphorical and symbolic and rich with imagery that conjures up social situations and political themes. I mean, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari or Nosferatu, for instance, those movies mean a lot more than just the obvious horror on screen. I don't know if I should say "especially Caligari," since I personally like Nosferatu a lot more, but they BOTH have similar themes (is this surprising considering they came out around the same time, or within 3 years, in the same country, Germany?).

Then in the United States, the horror movies in the '30s often had a lot more to say than meets the eye. I don't think modern slasher films say much at all about society. They don't try to make commentary, they are just dumb or funny or somewhat entertaining, but they're not very meaningful.

The best horror movie I have seen, personally, in the last 5 years I think is The Others. I may be forgetting something, though. I honestly really liked They and The Ring, too, but The Others is the only one worthy of four stars. That is somewhat because Nicole Kidman is an incredible actress and horror is not a genre usually blessed with great actors (though it has some very interesting ones, like Lugosi, I'm not forgetting about people like him and Boris Karloff, but I wouldn't call them "great" actors in the normal sense).

[CMJ]

I know what you mean Jonathan. I have been doing end of year lists since '97(I was 19 at the time, so really our schedules for these things are remarkably similar). Anyways, I recently looked back at a few of those years and actually REVISED my lists.

It made me feel sick to do it, but with a few of them I literally was like "How in the hell did I rank that above THIS?"

I try to keep revisionist history to a minimum though. :p

[JonathanLB]

Hehe, sometimes it is necessary though. Sometimes time proves the better judgment than we do at the time ;)

Also, I'm not very likely to give a comedy 4 stars, so it's more likely that through 2-3 years I will have found tha ta 3.5 star comedy simply became a classic and therefore was worthy of the full 4 stars. I ended up saying that with American Pie (oh the horror!) because I saw it in 2001 and that was several years after release, at which point film comedy classes were including it, everyone had seen it, and it ended up inspiring numerous parodies (of the pie scene especially), etc.

I also personally cannot see me giving Clueless 4 stars in 1995 even if I were 20 in 1995, too. I would have given it 3.5. It's time that proved that it was one of the best chick flicks. I wouldn't change my ratings drastically, though. I mean 3.5 is still a strong recommend just as 4 is, but sometimes you have to go back and give something the extra 1/2.

[Mu Satach]

I rather enjoyed the Hours. I'd really like to see it a few more times.

oh yeah, and I didn't figure out who Ed Harris was until he was holding the wedding picture.

[JonathanLB]

Good, then I don't feel like a total idiot for the Ed Harris thing...

[Lilaena De'Ville]

Thank you SO MUCH for ruining the movie. :cry

[JonathanLB]

Hey the poor plot ruined the movie, don't look at me! I didn't write, direct, or produce that film and have nothing to do with its relative mediocrity. ;)

[Lilaena De'Ville]

But now, whats the point of seeing it at all?! If Ed Harris is the ...boy? Bah.

:mneh

[Mu Satach]

Ummm... the "boy" thing isn't a major point in the movie. Just a side thing.

Hmm.... actually the point of the movie is given away in the title. :p ;)

[JonathanLB]

Mu is right.

The point of the movie is to waste 2 hours of your life, i.e. "THE HOURS." I should have gotten the clue before I saw it.

haha, I'm j/k, it really isn't a bad film at all. Worth seeing at least because of its awards attention.

[Mu Satach]

*pings JLB on the nose*

don't be such a 'guy' about it... it has a lot of things to think about in it...

key words... 'you have to think about it'
:p

[JonathanLB]

Sorry, Mu. You are right, there ARE some things it makes you consider, at least. It's not fair to say there are NO themes or messages, but few, IMO, compared to what I might have hoped for or expected.

Still, it made me think a few times, not for long admitedly, and I honestly forget what it made me think about (lol), but I remember thinking once that something in it was significant even if I was bored by the film.

[Mu Satach]

One of the things me and my friends have been kind of debating about is whether Laura's decision to leave her family and go to Canada was ultimately the better choice for her, it is a bit of a ponderer and a bit annoying that we don't really get any resolution about that choice. We have the little comment that her life was death and she chose life... but that's it.

Another thing we keep tossing back and forth about her was whether she was a lesbian and that was part of her reason for leaving the family. Or if she was just so miserable with her life that her actions with her friend was more of an experimentation and reaching out to try and find something she felt she was missing.

And there are so many more things to ponder about.

[JonathanLB]

Hehe, the message I got from the film is that every woman is truly a lesbian at heart and they will be more happy if they embrace it, otherwise they'll want to commit suicide.

So THAT explains all of those lesbian themed porn sites...

Enlightening! :D

[CMJ]

Funny post Jonathan. I got a similar message out of it that Mu Satach got..but good stuff Bowen. ;)