Eternal Sunshine Of the Spotless Mind

Picture this, somebody sending you a message saying that a friend, lover or fiancée, has completely erased you from their memory, and advises you to act accordingly, seriously how would anyone feel facing that, yes indeed sometimes one wants and needs to forget, after forgetting, the second logical step would be "what if i could do it all over again ?"

This is the central theme of Eternal Sunshine, Joel (Jim Carrey) meets Clementine (Kate Winslet) and they have an affair, at first they are excited,
then happy, then bored, then angry, then sad, then vindictive, happens all the time, the final straw being, memory erasing, Joel is accidently informed of this on Valentine day ! and being the man child he is, decides to do the same, so here He is at the headquarters of Lacuna Inc, asking Dr. Mierzwiak to erase Clementine from his mind, a procedure that turns out to be harder then what they thought wich is a good parallel for them to reveal their own issues with memories and love in general.

The fearless team of Lacuna is dispatched at Joel's place, to perform the erasing, the team leader Stan (Mark Ruffalo) is in charge of the operation, along with the frivoulous Patrick (Elijah Wood), and as things get complicated, they are joined by Mary (Kirsten Dunst) Dr Mierzwiak's Assistant, and throughout the night, they visit Joel's Memory, trying to erase it memory management being as hard a task on computer as it is inside consciousness.

Charlie Kaufman is a brilliang screenwriter, his screenplay is the true stat or this movie, nobody does alien scripts with deep social commentarism as he does, Michel Gondry the director is the other force of this movie, brining on his trademark visual inventivity, and as with a good script and a good director, no actor can fail, so the actors have adequate room to play at ease, Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet, have a good chemistry, and it carries the movie, the initial conflict is do they want to forget ? from this central premisse, the movie has a strong structure, where great visual tricks are performed, and in the ambient surrealism of this movie, everything makes sense, with respect to the audience's suspension of desbelief, it is never silly, and never overdone under a brilliant score by Jon Brion.

Gondry and Kaufman are amongst the "Smarter then you crowd" people like Sofia Coppola, Spike Jonze, Chris Cunningham, the bands Phoenix, and My Bloody Valentine and even the White Stripes, these people work together all the time, their work might be too arty for some, but it's output is American art with a European touch, this movie has the feeling of a good French movie, it comes as no surprise since Gondry is French, but it's brilliant, because it respect's the audience's imagination even in it's surrealism, rather then catering to fairy tales fantasies, Kate Winslet in here looks as Kabyle as ever, acts as Kabyle as ever, I never liked her, but i like her part in this movie, she should do that more, and less like "The Holiday"

Maybe it is not the best movie to watch if you have breakup issues, because you will project it on yourself, but any visual proof that inventivity and humour and surrealism can survive in something aimed at a large public is good news for us, and we keep on asking for more stuff from Kaufman to whome we wish a long miserable life, because his misery has such a beautiful output.

The Holiday

First of all, here at JM we are not against any movie genre, because no genre is brilliance proof, even romantic comedy aka «chick flick», Sina did shed a tear over «city of angels» and «sleepless in Seattle», and «When Harry meets Sally» are amongst my favorite, but what about «The Holiday» a movie which a Hollywood executive would explain by saying «Four weddings and a funeral meets there Is something about Mary».

«there is something about mary» leads us to Cameron Diaz, the former model turned actress which was revealed by this movie, in «The Holiday» she plays Amanda Woods an L.A woman too successful for her own good, who did not cry since she was fifteen, lives in a mansion, and has looks to die for, but on the flipside She has a disastrous romantic life, where she suffers a bad breakup during holidays season, So she decides to go for two week holiday to the furthest and quietest possible place, a three clicks online search leads her to a home exchange website where she finds out about a nice cottage in Surrey proposed for a home swapping, the cottage is owned by Iris

Iris Simpkins (Kate Winslet) is the anti thesis of an L.A girl, she is too British for her own good, the kind of girl to own all the records by Dido, but her romantic life is as disastrous as Amandas's, suffering the only thing worst to a breakup during the season, so they both agree, and the Californian ends up in freezing Surrey, and the British in sunny LA. Both girls make interesting encounters Name meets Graham (Jude Law) a British bachelor with manners and wit and a secret, and Name meets Miles (Jack Black) a movie score composer who can't put the right tune on the soundtrack of his life, and also meets Arthur (Eli Wallach) a guy who was there during Hollywood golden age and lived to tell her the story, both of course kind off re discover love and themselves and the meaning of life and whatever .

Okay girls, I know you love movies like these, but this one is far too pink even to the Celine Dion crowd, everybody knows that these movies are well crafted marketing ploys designed to attract the «sex and the city» demographics and their huge buying power, but please, I never thought i'd say this, but this movie makes «Desperate Housewives» look like «Casablanca», the interesting idea of the juxtaposition of LA life with British life is lost in endless kissing scenes and senseless dialogues, and the romances unconvincing, Eli Wallach for god's sake, the guy who played «The Ugly» in «The good, the bad and the ugly» seems to be wondering what He is doing in this mess, but can't blame him though he did if for the check, so did Jack Black off course who plays a part worthy of a Telenovela actor.

And while Cameron Diaz drags the movie down with her unconvincing character, Kate Winslet counterbalance it to a certain extent, her character is more interesting, but not even to the level of a Kate Hudson, or Sandra Bullock, and frankly it's not even a compliment.

So look, If you are a boy, it's a good plan to watch with your wife or girlfriend if you have the needed patience, and if you are a girl, it's a good breakup relief, or for an afternoon with your girlfriends, but if you happen to also love movies, toss this off the window, and go watch «closer» which is what this movie aspires (and fails) to be, in all cases, remember that these are only romantic comedies, so please don't take life lessons from them, because if you map your life over a romantic comedy, granted that you will end up lonely in the holiday season, with nobody to swap your apartment with.

Year: 2006
Director: Nancy Meyer
Starring: Cameron Diaz, Kate Winslet, Jude Law, Eli Wallach, Jake Black

Extras - Even moviestars are only human

Being an extra is alright but watching „Extras“ is even better! (Sorry, that one just slipped out)

„Extras“ is or was however a 12 episodes BBC series (plus one final movie lenght special episode) with Ricky Gervais as the main character Andy. Andy is an extra who wants to be a star instead of working with the big ones. Asked for what his job is, he always answers he's an actor and he tries to make his dream come true after 40 years waiting for it.

His friend Maggie (Ashley Jensen) is also a bit desperate about her full time job as an extra, being single, just as Andy, and on her side dreaming of going out with the movie stars. And so they use every single shooting day trying to get their thing done. Andy tries to get short speaking roles and Maggie meanwhile tries to catch the attention of the best looking guys on the set. But the so called stars are only human. Some are totally unlikeable and if one isn't Maggie does the trick to ruin it anyway by saying something very, very stupid.

In Season 2 which is episode 7-12 Andy even made it through to get hi own scripts produced as a weekly series but unfortunately it isn't as easy as he thought it would be and finally he is unhappy again with his so called fame.

This series is a must see, there is no way around it if you like movies, actors, some nice humor and likable characters. The 13 episodes are over far too fast in the end and you maybe even gonna miss the series a bit.

Beware, even your favorite actors will seem a bit too human to you after watching that but just give it a try. In those 13 episodes there do appear:

Ross Kemp & Vinnie Jones, Ben Stiller, Kate Winslet,Les Dennis, Samuel L Jackson, Patrick Stewart, Orlando Bloom, David Bowie, Daniel Radcliffe , Chris Martin , Ian McKellen, Robert De Niro

That is a damn lot of stars with some self irony to play themselves and even that makes it totally recommendable! The series won a Golden Globe and 7 other prices and now it won the status of one of the best concepts I've ever seen on screen! Go, watch it!

Romance and cigarettes - The soundtrack of a life

Christopher Walken with an umbrella and the ode to redheads

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Sometimes happy, sometimes sad, life isn't always the same. That's what "romance & cigarettes" obviously wants to show us.

It comes with a great cast: James Gandolfini, Susan Sarandon, Christopher Walken, Kate Winslet and Steve Buscemi. And it also comes with a pleasant story that could happen everywhere around us.

Nick Murder(James Gandolfini) cheats his wife with a redhead hot girl from around the block since years. His marriage isn't working out anymore and when his wife finds out about the affair he has to choose between them two and she has to get her head, and feelings towards him, right again. And while she goes to the church he goes through hard struggeling between sex and love.

The movie is mixed up with various songs fitting the story and while the music plays, the characters sing with it. So we can, for example, see Christopher Walken killing "Delilah".

A good thing in between drama, comedy and just reality I would call the movie, not made for musical lovers but also watchable for people who don't see an artistical meaning in actors dancing around.