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13/12/2004: ""WICKER PARK"- and other movies worth a look."
1. This is the Hollywood version of a French film hit "L'Appartement" (1996).....always a good sign.
2. The cast is very photogenic, especially blonde DIANE KRUGER (above) a German lady who recently quit professional modelling and dancing for film acting, a brilliant move, inspired by director Luc Besson (The Big Blue)
3. The story begins near the ending. The flashbacks are not explained easily. It's a mind tease.
4. .......Diane Kruger looks good in every shot and is well matched with Josh Hartnett. Australian actor Rose Byrne plays the scheming friend of both - her plan was to have the man for herself, and it almost works.
5. How true love wins through is the message that makes this film a sentimental masterpiece. (In real life it rarely happens this way - but nice when it does).
6. The synopsis of the film, on the DVD box, if right off track and quite misleading, so do not read.
7. (Dec 23 2005 note) In the film Josh Hartnett said "he wants to be a photographer who photographs tropical fish" - maybe that was the key that helped me enjoy this film so much. Plus the attitude and personality of the character Lisa (played by Dianne Kruger) is every boys dream.
UPDATE: David Stratton reviewed Wicker Park as: "An unnecessary remake of the French film The Apartment (1996) with the action transferred from Paris to Chicago. ......sticks closely to the original then cops out with a Hollywood-ised ending. The main point of interest is the talented young cast..." two and one half stars. (Five points out of ten).
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Other new films, "BAD SANTA" gives some good laughs, surprisingly. "National Treasure" (also featuring Diane Kruger, with Nicholas Cage) is more than 'a bit weak' but is, never-the-less, very good exposure for Ms. Kruger.
As for DEEP BLUE - the cinema version of the BBC TV's Blue Planet hit - there were only two people at the 10am opening session in Sydney (A Quentin Tarantino film would have about 30 people) so that indicates the box ofice future of this documentary. The opening ten minutes was excellent. By the centre of the lengthy polar chapter I managed to go to sleep, helped by the terribly British narrator's voice and a classical orchestral soundrack.
Some white pointer sharks might have kept me awake, but these were not to be seen. An incredible mistake for a big budget film.
The killer whales eating sea lions on a beach was impressive material. A reminder that everything gets eaten eventually, in the sea.
The near all-black camoflague of the killers has a deceiving trick - a white panel on either side of the face. In dark water this white panel might be seen (by the intended victim) as a much smaller threat approaching. A small white shark for example. You'll get the message when viewing this sequence, overall the film is, at best 5.5 points out of ten, spoiled by the music and narration neither being of broad commercial appeal and better suited to a museum or cable TV. Sorry.
UPDATE: Writing in The Australian movie reviewer Evan Williams says of Deep Blue:
"......glimpses of a barely imaginable world of teeming life-forms, more astonishing even than the life-and-death struggles of the whales, sharks and dolphins. First rate. 4 stars (or 8 points out of 10).
