The Silence of the Lambs - Pieces Connected = A Whole

Before watching this movie, I found out that Jonathan Demme was the director of this film, once again a film from the director's project that our class had to do.

Never knew that Anthony Hopkins has an acting career before.

The Silence of the Lambs tells the story of Clarice Starling, played by Jodie Foster, an FBI agent who must deal with Hannibal Lecter, played by Anthony Hopkins, in order to solve the case of Buffalo Bill, relating to the heinous murders of several women.

The one thing I especially like about this movie is the use of symbolism to really get the audience on their feet. We have to be investigators in a way as well, almost helping Clarice to get to her ultimate goal: to crack the case and figure out the riddles that Hannibal Lecter is feeding her.

The opening scene features Clarice Starling going through a course in the FBI, giving the idea that she is already being pushed to go through a journey that she must climb over.

Clarice is a sort of character that seems to have a strong feminist presence in the film, clothing separated from every other FBI agent training alongside her in the opening shot. Already off the bat, Clarice appears to be independent and apart from everyone else.

Clarice has to go toe to toe with Hannibal Lecter in a mental game of chess in order to get any sort of information about Buffalo Bill. Even with Hannibal taking stabs at the new sort of bait before him, Clarice responds with a mind willing to combat that of Hannibal Lecter.

A key lesson that this movie teaches is that although pieces of the whole don't seem to make sense when seen as pieces, the conjoining of those pieces causes a realization of what to do. Hannibal Lecter never tells Clarice exactly what she wants to hear. She has to put things together in her mind in order for those subtle clues to make sense, and that is what makes this movie powerful.

Every single moment of this film was motivation for me to watch more.

I give this movie a 5/5.

What's Eating Gilbert Grape - Powerful Film About Family

Before watching this movie, all I knew was that Johnny Depp and Leonardo DiCaprio were in this movie together.

What's Eating Gilbert Grape tells the story of the Grape family in a small town world, where

The opening scene features Arnie Grape trapped in his own little world under the shadow of a tree with Gilbert Grape under it. Arnie gets excited when a team of vehicles comes up over the horizon, and Gilbert tries to keep Arnie under control. There is a really close-knit relationship between Arnie and Gilbert, brotherly and almost fatherly. Arnie could be having a good time then crying the next, but Gilbert is under control. This sort of juxtaposition of characters doesn't seem compatible, but they love each other like any set of siblings would.

I guess that divides are a big deal. The divide between the little sister and the brothers. The divide between Food Town and the small shop where Gilbert works. The divide between Gilbert and Ken Carver, played by Kevin Tighe.

The symbols and foreshadowing of certain things doesn't really sit well. There are looming things that happen around Arnie: the hearse the cricket: that mean that death is near, but we just don't know exactly when. I guess this isn't a spoiler since 5 minutes in, Gilbert tells you that sooner or later Arnie will die, but I guess the anticipation of this death is what drives the movie.

Arnie has this routine mindset of getting himself in trouble because of his condition that forces Gilbert into a more fatherly role. Gilbert gets really defensive whenever someone tries to pick on Arnie. The connection between Gilbert and Arnie makes me wonder about how their relationship will change throughout the movie.

After watching the movie, I have to say that this movie surprised me by the turn that it was taking. It's really powerful. Really emotional. Intense. I love this movie. It's great.

Everything from the character development to the symbols really got me in the end. I feel that you have to see the entire movie to feel the sense of closure. There is so many things that hit in the end that truly make this a cinematic masterpiece.

I give this movie a 5/5.

Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn - Can the UNSC Be Trusted?

Before watching this movie, I knew that the brother of Grace Helbig, a famous YouTuber, had something to do with this film.

Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn tells the story of Thomas Lansky, played by Tom Green, a freshman cadet at Corbulo Academy who is portrayed as a sort of rebel, against the idea of structure and deemed to be one of the troublesome cadets in the squad.

The opening scene features a run-down of all of the cadets working to win a war against a people known as the Isolationists. They all have different viewpoints of the military academy and their mission, each aware that they must be in a clear mindset ready to kill. I feel that this movie already gives a feel as to a divide between the squad.

I feel like Tom's character is someone we can really root for. The conflicted cadet who is torn between following the norm and achieving success by his own means. We feel sorry for Thomas Lansky who has to endure the struggles of being a cadet, shamed by his own fellow peers. However, we congratulate Thomas for his efforts at achieving success.

This movie reminds me of Ender's Game, a sci-fi story of Ender Wiggins who goes off to Battle School to fight off the aliens in the upcoming war. I am excited to see what turns this movie takes to further interest me in this world of space cadets fighting for a better tomorrow.

The whole ambiguity of duplicity is what drives this movie. With each secret that is unlocked for us, the more questioning we are of how the academy runs and what sorts of true conflicts exist between the Isolationists and the UNSC.

Having seen everything, all I got to say is wow. Nearing the end, I felt a shroud of doubt that the movie could go beyond the whole idea of the ambiguous common enemy. But I felt like it was a pretty good movie. A good sense of closure.

I give this movie a 4/5.

Drinking Buddies - Anticipation Sucks

I knew absolutely nothing about this movie.

The opening scenes introduces us to Kate, played by Olivia Wilde, a young woman who works at a brewery, alongside Luke, played by Jake Johnson, constantly hanging out together and going out for drinks. The workers all seem to love each other, both while working and while hanging out. However, Jill, played by Anna Kendrick, and Chris, played by Ron Livingston, seem oblivious to the fun in the world that Kate and Luke share both at work and at the bar.

Already off the bat, I can tell that the conflict will occur between the relationships of Luke and Jill and Kate and Chris. There is this disconnect in each of their relationships that seems will bring these relationships farther apart, leaving space for a possible new relationship to arise.

Within minutes of the group of buddies meeting each other, I could already tell that Luke and Kate tended to be the pair of people I would consider to be the funnest together and that Chris and Jill seem to be a bit more bland but together in their own blandness. Parts of me just want this sort of switch to just happen, but the chemistry between the characters is there. I like this movie somewhat already.

The anticipation of what Kate and Luke will do is too much. I feel that the movie has put forth too much running time to not even present the idea of Kate and Luke being together. Each of them still look at each other in a sort of brother and sister vibe, but really, we are all waiting for a kiss or something.

This story seems to basic and not full of life. I would root for Kate and Luke to get together, but there isn't a lot of instances where I'd say that they need to be together. I wish that the characters would be a bit more vivid that they appear.

After everything that has happened happened, all I have to say to close out this review is that the film does a good job of portraying something fun with little detail, but it is not something that I would watch over and over again.

I give this movie a 3/5.

Ferris Bueller's Day Off - Every Teen Should Watch This

Before watching this movie, I saw the Super Bowl commercial featuring Matthew Broderick skipping out from his travel agent. I personally didn't get the joke, but my parents did and suggested that I watch the movie from their childhood.

It was pretty cool. One of my favorite movies.

Ferris Bueller's Day Off tells the story of Ferris Bueller, played by Matthew Broderick, a young boy in his senior year of high school who decides to fake his sickness in order to skip school with his buddies Cameron Frye, played by Alan Ruck, and Sloane Peterson, played by Mia Sara. Together they have fun in the city of Chicago, free from responsibility and school.

I felt like each character was there for a reason as opposed to a lot of the other teen movies that I see. Ferris Bueller, the protagonist, becomes this inspiring and witty teen who convinces people that life should be lived to its fullest because life goes by fast, as he says in his quote, "Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it."

The thing about this is that you don't really know the characters until Ferris explains them to you. Of course, we can already get a feel for who the characters are based on how they act in their various situations. However, Ferris gives a clear cut image of who that person is and explains their situation in very direct and vivid detail.

Whether it is Cameron, who suffers from a dysfunction life in his family, or Sloane, who feels sad that Ferris will be gone off to college while she has to stay behind the gates of school, Ferris does a great job establishing pathos within us for each and every character.

We root on Ferris as he goes through the city with his best friend and his girlfriend. We see that the entire city encourages the well-being of Ferris, often times leaving flowers for Ferris on the Bueller's doorstep and even leaving phone calls.

I guess the big take away from this movie would be this idea of living in the moment. No matter how cheesy it is, I feel that this movie does a good job of sticking to the moment rather than worrying about the consequences all the time.

I give this movie a 5/5.

Boyz n the Hood - Impacting Movie I Barely Discovered

I hardly knew a thing about this movie until some of my friends and I, as a part of that director's project, decided to watch this one movie.

Wow. I can understand why it was so impacting for them.

Boyz n the Hood tells the story of Tre Styles, played by Cuba Gooding, Jr, a boy who lives with his father Furious Styles, played by Larry Fishburne, in a hood of California. Furious teaches Tre that although his friends may be experiencing the troubles and struggles of the hood, Tre should not succumb to the temptations of the hood because it will backfire on him.

I felt that the authoritative nature of Furious Styles convinces us that he will be the sort of wise man of the movie. Although cliched, we do believe it because of Furious' direct and eloquent speech.

Tre Styles is, respectively, a good serving apprentice, hoping that some of the knowledge bursting from Furious can rub off of him in a way. Tre gets himself into situations where temptations are all around him. While everyone else gets their story of their interactions with these temptations, Tre struggles to keep himself under his own leash to fully indulge himself in these temptations.

Everything in this film is justified in terms of John Singleton's choices. We do see a better future over Furious Styles' head as he speaks out against the people who essentially placed blacks in ghettos in California. We see the stop sign at the beginning, being warned that this story is raw and life-changing. We see the split path that Tre Styles and Ricky Baker, played by Morris Chestnut, are each on.

Boyz n the Hood is definitely a film that I would see over and over again. John Singleton deserves the attention that he gets from this movie. Not only is this genuinely a good movie in terms of the various emotions that we feel from the situations in this movie, but the movie does a very good job of portraying the idea of choices and how the wrong choices, no matter how appealing, can cause a falling spiral staircase to appear.

I give this movie a 5/5.

X-Men: Days of Future Past - Rift In The Franchise Plot

I've seen the majority of the films from this franchise and know what happens to each of the characters from this franchise. I know that X3 and X-Men Origins screwed everything out of whack, but I did like The Wolverine.

The major problem with this film is the whole line that this movie crossed out for the sake of the franchise.

X-Men: Days of Future Past tells the story of a future where mutants are hunted by sentinels, robots that attack mutants, based off of the DNA of Raven/Mystique, played by Jennifer Lawrence. With the unlikely combination of the latter Professor Xavier and Magneto, played by Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen respectively, Logan/Wolverine, played by Hugh Jackman, must travel back in time to a time before the capture of Raven/Mystique to prevent the sentinels to ever attack mutants in the first place.

The cast was phenomenal. Of course, Jennifer Lawrence was amazing with her acting here, but I did prefer her acting in First Class than this one. She really can pull off this sort of murderous villain bent on the ideals of the earlier Erik Lehnsherr, played by Michael Fassbender.

Hugh Jackman of course was great as he always is in the X-Men movies. I felt there was a good balance between Wolverine and the X-Men in terms of the point of view. There was no skew, and I felt that everything looked good overall.

The action was great. I mean, this could have been the best X-Men movie, but one thing really changed my opinion of that.

I may have said too much, but there is something about the second half of this movie that caused me to think that the X-Men that we know is not the X-Men that we know now. I really did like the action and the power of the first half of the film, and I felt that if Bryan Singer would have followed the direction where the movie was going, it would have turned out great.

The theme of the middle of the movie was hope, provided by Professor Xavier in the future talking to Charles Xavier, played by James McAvoy, of the past. I loved that part because of Xavier's tying in of hope to be the basis of civilization and revitalization. But I guess it wasn't enough whenever the film took a drastic turn in the franchise's plot.

I really want to say 5.

But.

I give this movie a 3/5.