Day 334: Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels (1998)

lockAfter today’s film, there are only 32 days left in the year which means the finish line isn’t too far away and I’ve begun my quest to watch films people recommend. The film I chose for today is a film that a friend of mine suggested since I expressed my love for the film Snatch. Snatch was directed by Guy Ritchie who also directed today’s film Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels. Eddy (Nick Moran) fancies himself to be a really good card player, but that changes when he plays the game with the wrong people. You see Eddy and his friends now owe Hatchet Harry (P.H. Moriarty) 500,000 lbs (which in today’s money is over 6 million US dollars). He has one week to get Harry his money or their fingers will be chopped off which in turn sends groups of all different thugs on one heck of a collision course. The film also stars Jason Flemyng (Snatch) as Tom, Dexter Fletcher (The Elephant Man) as Soap, Jason Statham (Crank) as Bacon, Vinnie Jones (Swordfish) as Big Chris, Lenny McLean (The Fifth Element) as Barry The Baptist, Frank Harper (Bend It Like Beckham) as Dog, Steven Mackintosh (Underworld: Evolution) as Winston, Sting as JD, Vas Blackwood (Mean Machine) as Rory Breaker, and Alan Ford (Snatch) as the Narrator.

lock-2I love the style of Guy Ritchie who kind of mixes the world of music videos with his films in where the music is almost an integral part of the film. The music at times can set up the moods of scenes or tell you what kind of characters have shown up on screen. There is one scene where the music is normal until it changes to something crazier when shady characters show up all of a sudden. The soundtrack itself is absolutely brilliant and a must have for any fan of music. The film itself is well written and absolutely brilliant. I loved every moment of the film including the setup of what was going down to the mystery of what in the heck is going to happen next. The acting was also superb from every angle as we get some memorable characters in this film. Two of my favorite characters from the film are these lowlifes by the name of Gary (Victor McGuire) and Dean (Jake Abraham) who are tasked to steal some guns, but in fact set up a giant sh** show that goes down in the last half of the film. I also loved the tones of the film because it has that British feel to it where it’s cloudy and gloomy looking like the weather outside in England. I definitely loved the film and I can see why it was recommended to me in the first place. I am going to give the film an A- for a final grade. 

Day 169: I Origins (2014)

i-origins_soundtrackBefore I woke up this morning, I had never heard of the film I watched and reviewed for today, but there was one factor that made me want to watch. I am a huge fan of Michael Pitt and I have been wondering what he has been up to since he had left the show Boardwalk Empire, but I got my answer in I Origin. Pitt plays molecular biologist Dr. Ian Gray whose main line of interest is the human eye. One thing is for sure when it comes to Ian and that is he does not believe in God and is always out to prove that there is more proof in science than in religion. All of that is about to be put to the test when he makes a startling discovery that may prove that there may be something greater than science. The film also stars Steven Yeun (The Walking Dead) as Kenny, Astrid Berges-Frisbey (Pirates Of The Caribbean: On Stranger Tides) as Sofi,  Brit Marling (Sound Of My Voice) as Karen, Archie Panjabi (Bend It Like Beckham) as Priya Varma, Venida Evans (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) as Margaret Dairy, William Mapother (Mission: Impossible II) as Darryl Mackenzie, and the film was written and directed by Mike Cahill (Another Earth). 

960The film is interesting to say the least and it hits many different genres in one from it starting off as a romance movie that dabs in science to a tragedy movie back to a romance film and back to a science film. The thing that he discovers toward the last half of the film really makes you question whether science is correct or if the religious people had it right all along. What if you could tell if someone was resurrected through the patterns in the eye? Think about that for a second, what if the things you like, don’t like, and the reason you act the way you do is because you were someone else in a past life. Through an eye scan, he discovers that there is someone out there in the world that is a match to his dead wife and I mean an exact match. Wouldn’t you be curious enough to want to see if they reacted to certain things that your past love, brother, or even friend would have. That is the thing I loved about the film was this sense of what if and it didn’t hurt that Astrid Berges-Frisbey was really hot. It’s an honest film that will make you think a little bit, but it can be predictable at times. That was the only bad thing about the film was that you could see certain things happening when they did. Other than that I loved the acting from Pitt and Marling, etc. It was also cool to see them in Delhi, India cause the cinematography was cool. I am going to give the film an B+ for a final grade. It’s airing on HBO and I’m pretty sure it’s available on HBOGO.