Movies of the week

Patriot:
I am not much of a Mel Gibson fan. He is too much of a hunk. I detest period war films. They have a predictable storyline and tame ending.
After ‘Saving Private Ryan’ this a war movie I loved. It’s nowhere compared to SPR and the ending is tame. The reason of my liking is difficult to tell but may be it’s because of a family melodrama mixed in to the war.
It’s about a widower pulled into the American War of Independence. He was well-known for his exploits in French-Indian war. He painfully watches his son join the army, the second being killed and forces the youngest of his sons to kill the enemies to save their captured elder brother.
I was filled with a swell of emotion on seeing the name of Heath Ledger rolling into the screen during opening credits. Truly, the world has lost a great actor. The director too surprised me, Ronald Emmerich. I never expected him to do a non sci-fi movie.
The good thing is movie is not filled up with fight scenes unlike the ones in its genre. But the length could have been shortened. I don’t think I would have had enough patience for it if I was in a movie hall.
The Paradine Case:
This is the third Hitchcock movie I am watching after ‘Blackmail’ and ‘The Rope’. He has moved into my all time favorites (along with Kubrick, Anurag Kashyap, Padmarajan, Nolan etc). I bet even in this age no one can make as a good thriller as Alfred Hitchcock.
Hitchcock’s trump card is his casting. He gets a bunch of good looking artistes and they do act fabulously too. The screenplay is very tight and there is no single unwanted scene. The fabulous camera angles builds up to your tension and thrill. Most of his films concentrate on the well to do class, their deceptions, infedility, egos and mannerisms. In short the film is short, crispy and tasty.
Ividam Swargamanu: (Malayalam roughly translated to This is heaven)
I am really hesitant to invest my time and money to watch Malayalam movies onscreen. There is a good chance that film may not live up to it’s hype. But the movie despite all the negative publicity is moving on to become on of the first success of 2010.
So sacrificing my weekend siesta I went for the movie and I wasn’t disappointed. It’s really risky these days to make a 3 hour long movie. But still Roshan pulled it off. And he has pulled out three blockbusters continuously from his hat and moved into the Hirani league. He does films which has got good stuff in it. He gets the best in industry to write the scripts. He is one among the rare ones today who gives the needed respect to scripts.
One of the plus points of the movie is Mohan Lal acted with great restraint, with no punch dialogues or other acts of heroism. Well until the closing sequences the protagonist is a defeated man. The other specialty is the movie turned out to be an assembly of yesteryear greats. So there is some genuine comical sequences executed with perfect skill and timing.
The theme was very much relevant with real estate sharks eating up the farmlands in the name of development. The hypocrisy of Mallus in terms of morality, love and culture is very well portrayed.