The Fighter / Never Let Me Go

The Fighter: This movie was better than I expected. Sometimes I hear "boxing movie" and then "based on a true story" and am not interested from the start. And, to be honest that's how I was with this. If it weren't for positive reviews from friends and all the Oscar buzz this is getting (yes, I am a big Oscar nerd) I probably wouldn't have watched it. But, I'm very glad I did. What I enjoyed about this story was how it was more interested in the family dynamic than the boxing training. Mark Wahlberg plays the boxing hopeful as an extremely reserved and introspective person. I can see how some think his performance is weak and one note; however, seeing the surrounding forces in his life, it makes complete sense to have the character SO reserved. Christian Bale plays Wahlberg's crack-cocaine addicted brother, and (of course) is looking dangerously skinny and unhealthy. This is another fantastic perform ace from Bale, and he continues to cement himself as one of the most consistently great actors around these days. Melissa Leo also delivers a knockout performance as Wahlberg's mother. Roger Ebert sums her character up really well in this way:

"she sees both sons as performers in a long-running tribute to herself. She presides in a living room filled with her seven daughters, who smoke so much and use so much hairspray, they must be considered fire hazards."

Overall, a great movie that I highly recommend for anyone, even if you don't like movies about boxing.




Never Let Me Go: I read this book when I was in a book club in Chicago. After reading, I thought I really loved it; however, after discussion with the club, I discovered it was good, but not as good as I was giving it credit for. But, it was actually the trailer for the movie that made me interested in the book, so I have still been wanting to see the movie. It stars Carey Mulligan (one of my favorites around, SEE - AN EDUCATION IMMEDIATELY IF YOU HAVE NOT YET) Keira Knightley, and Andrew Garfield (who has me VERY interested after this and his incredible performance in The Social Network). So, yeah, the cast is great! The look of this film is fantastic. It made me want to work as a person who goes out and finds locations to shoot scenes for movies. I also really enjoyed how stationary the camera was for the majority of the movie. Sometimes a little pan here a little pan there, but, really, it hardly moved at all. It was a really nice feel. The movie improved on the book in a couple ways. 1 - it did a really great job at developing actual romance that the book fell flat on. 2 - the main character seemed to actually have emotions and was definitely more likeable in the movie than the book.

Overall, a very enjoyable watch. The story is very intriguing and the movie actually improved upon the source material, which was definitely a pleasant surprise.