The Lives Of Others (2006)

Wow. I get so excited when I come across a truly great movie. A movie that eases its way into my subconscious and lingers in my mind for days, or in the case of this movie, infiltrated my dreams and virtually left me with no sleep the night I watched it. A movie, that through all the trite you watch, all the Hollywood fare that gets flung in your face, appears like a diamond in the rough and makes you remember how fantastic the medium can actually be.

I believe that in the right hands, cinema can be a great art form, but to me, what I want primarily from a movie, is plain and simply, to be entertained. Of course there are many levels of being entertained. I am quite happy to slouch on my couch with a drink and pop my brain on the side and enjoy Jean Claude Van Damme high kicking his muscular frame through 90 minutes of uninspired, unoriginal straight to dvd action nonsense, but I am also geared up to sit with my wife Caroline and focus on a deep and passionate subtitled epic that bursts with imaginative originality and blows scenes right off the screen with it's edgy dark fantasy and touching war time drama such as the fantastic Pan's Labyrinth, but it is movies like the latter that smash their way into my infamous top 100 and earn their place as one of my favourite movies of all time and stand as evidence to why watching flicks is my most treasured pass time.

I had had a copy of The Lives Of Others in my collection since The A-Man first raved about it when it was released but it had just merged with a collection of over 100 movies that I have in my possession that I need to get around to watching at some point. It wasn't until Kristina, a very dear friend of mine text me and expressed her feelings about it the night she watched it, that I decided it was time to blow the dust off of it and give it a spin. I love movies, but am pretty crap on history, so through a series of texts, Kristina brought me up to speed with the history to the film, of which is set in East Germany in 1984 six years before the Berlin wall came down, that there 175000 spies for a population of 17 million, less than 100 people per spy with their stated aim to know "everything about everybody." It was clearly very personal and touching to her because she originates from West Germany and was aware of what was going on in East Germany at the time.

The Lives of others, or Das Leben Der Anderen as it is known in Germany, is director, writer and producer Florian Henckel Von Donnersmarck's first foray into feature film territory. And man, does he hit the nail on the head perfectly. The movie tells of how Hauptmann Gerd Wiesler, played very skillfully by Kevin Spacey doppelganger Ulrich Muhe, a member of the East Germany secret police, known as the Stasi, is assigned by Minister Bruno Hempf (Thomas Theime) to conduct a surveillance on Georg Dreyman (Sebastian Koch), a successful playwright and his long time actress girlfriend Christa-Maria (Martina Gedeck), to confirm if they are involved in any anti-communist activities.

Although outwardly communists, the effect the surveillance state is taking on their lives, especially after the blacklisting of fellow theatre director and close friend of Georg, Albert Jerska (Volkmar Kleinert), leads to suicide, Georg and a small group of friends decide to put together a document that is to bring to light factual evidence that the DDR Government are covering up the high suicide rate in East Germany. All the while Hauptmann is listening in on this, but after realising the strain and unfairness put into the lives of Georg and Christa-Maria, and warming to them as people, will he put forward the evidence that would lead Georg down the same doomed path Albert Jerska?

The movie grabs you instantly. Brilliantly scripted and with some of the finest performances from a cast of talented actors and a stirring and intense direction from Von Donnersmarck, topped of with a harrowing story that is brutally told, this movie is bordering on perfection. The movie begins as a disturbing political thriller but soon opens up into a very tense character driven drama that has several great moments of edge of your seat excitement and thrills as well as scenes of tear inducing dramatic intensity. The transition of Hauptmann from isolated and lonely devoted employee to self doubting yet passionate guardian angel is depicted beautifully as through the manipulating and bully he witnessess, realises that there might just be more to life than Law and rules. A great supporting cast with strong characters and several captivating scenes help carry the narrative forward where it could possibly have become slow at times.

I am thankful that this gem is of a low budget and German origin, because in the hands of Hollywood, I am convinced this material would have been raped and the hard impact lost in favour of more over the top thrills and far fetched characterization. It is brought to us very grounded and honest letting the truth be enough to evoke our emotions without having to tweak at it too much if at all.

The Lives Of Others "Absolutely fantastic. A hard hitting, intense and very emotional piece of East Germany's history, this movie, is at the top of it's game on almost every level. " *****

Mamma Mia! (2008)

Not in a million years did I ever think I would write about this movie on my blog! In fact, I have a couple of movies I have been desperately wanting to share my opinions of and write about on here over the past two weeks but just haven't got around to it, what with two of my children's birthdays and our 5th anniversary in the last week. And it is down to our 5th anniversary that I am about to write about Mamma Mia as it was one of the presents I had bought for Caroline.

I was very lucky this year, as when I was just a lad, me and my old mate, Darthwoodbine (Chris, to his family) would go the cinema up to 40 times a year but as the years have rolled on and I work, and have a family to look after, I don't go to visit the big screen a fraction as often, last year, I only went to the cinema twice, yup, you heard that right, two times, and I call myself a movie fan! Tut tut.

Well this year I have been grateful to have had the opportunities to go and see all the movies I wanted to see, the Dark Knight, the Incredible Hulk, The Crystal Skull, Rambo etc etc, I have got around to seeing them all on the big screen, the way they were intended to be seen (although I now can watch them on my wall mounted 50 inch via Blu Ray at home, the spectacle and event factor just isn't quite the same). All the time revelling in my joy of being exported into another world thanks to some of Hollywood's finest movie makers, and of course, my darling wife Caroline, of whom has accompanied with me on most of this journeys. Of whom, wanted to see Mamma Mia very much, but sadly didn't get around to doing so due to sacrificing it to see what I wanted to see. Yeah I feel guilty, I would quite happily of endured it for her but we went and saw Hell Boy: The Golden Army instead as we were both fans of the first Hell Boy movie and of course, the cinematic genius that is Guillermo Del Toro. So I was dead cert to buy it for her as soon as it was available and to be a true gentleman, I watched it with her the night we got it.

Although The Dark Knight is this years biggest hit globally, and also peaking as the 4th biggest grossing movie of all time almost reaching the $1 Billion mark, Mamma Mia was the biggest grossing movie in this country. It didn't too badly world wide either, knocking up well over $600 million. And it isn't really a surprise. I was quite up for watching it, I had no expectation as it clearly wasn't my cup of tea, just below horror, Musicals are my least favourite movie genre, but was quite open about it, well I had to be or I would have sat for 100 minutes pulling my hair and banging my head against the wall, but get this sports fans, it isn't that bad!

At first, I was cringing due to the pungent smell of cheese that the movie was omitting but the movie, so convincingly effortlessly, was very light heartedly comedic and toe tappingly fun. You can't hardly disagree that like them or not Abba have one of the most consistently, longest running popularity of all time, all ages, every party or wedding, everyone knows their music and will get up to dance. I have never bought an Abba CD nor would voluntarily listen to an Abba album but was familiar with 90% of the songs sung in the movie and with the sporadic dance numbers and absolutely beautiful locations, the movie is set on a gorgeous Greek Island, although all the scenes shot at the top of Villa Donna were filmed on a sound stage, tropical trees, Brilliant blue sky and beautiful exotic blue sea is the order of the day and with young bouncy dancers in their hoards filling the screen the whole jolly uplifting experience sure as hell starts to rub off on you. The actors clearly have a lot of fun too, Meryl Streep as Donna, is as brilliant and dedicated as usual with fine supporting performances from her "side kicks", Christine Baranski as Tanya and Julie Walters as Rosie, her best friends and former group members who are attending the wedding of Donna's daughter Sophie, played sweetly by the girl next door beautiful Amanda Seyfried. Pierce Brosnan, Colin Firth and Stellan Skarsgard play the three former love interests of Donna of whom one of them, according to Donna's old diary that Sophie has found, is her father....

The story is clearly and unashamedly a thin excuse to put together an extensive string of musical numbers sang by pretty much all of the major leads throughout the movie. Director Phyllida Lloyd is hailed as a first time director, although she is an accomplished theatre director and her credits include the stage version of Mamma Mia itself. She does an absolutely perfect job bringing it from the stage to the bring screen, and watching it on Blu Ray, I was blown away at how crisp and beautiful the image was, clearly one of the best looking Blu Rays on the market, if someone wanted to see how much better Blu Ray was than DVD, I would arguably chuck this on to get their visual juices flowing! It is so vibrant and sharp, it looked as though you could step into the screen and the join the cast in Greece!

So, despite being one of my least favourite genres and quite simply, a chick flick, you can't knock it for doing exactly what it does on the tin. Caroline was blown away by it and has ranked it in her top 5 movies of all time, and it is obvious why, it will stand the test of time, joining Dirty dancing and Pretty woman, as the leading chick flicks for many generations to come.

Mamma Mia "Cheesy, simple, but extremely effective, precisely conceived to look genuinely effortless, it achieves what it goes out to do in transferring one of the most successful theatre shows in recent years into a rollicking blockbuster musical. Women will love it, and guys, secretly, you won't hate it either." ***