The Sea of Trees. Gus Van Sant. 2015.

I started watching Restless, another Gus Van Sant movie:

But then I remembered that I’d somehow seen that one recently, so I bailed and went with this Van Sant movie instead.

I hope I haven’t seen this one as well. Hm… nope!

Hey, it’s McCaunnegheyheyhey.

Oh, how weird. The sound is all fucked up… Oh, there’s three mpvs of the main feature here and two are fucked up… I guess makemkv isn’t perfect.

Van Sant has done some movies that were all about some people walking about in the wilderness, and the first fifteen minutes of this was McCaugnegwhatever doing that in a forest, so I assumed that that’s what all this was going to be, and I was absolutely fine with that. The forest cinematography is gorgeous.

But we get extensive flashbacks to explain why McCounewhat is in the forest, and while these scenes are good, they’re just not as interesting as the forest scenes.

I assumed almost from the start that Van Sant was going to go all Shamalayamana on us and I was just sitting waiting for it, and… I’m not going to give it away whether that was right or not, but that certainly coloured my viewing of this.

Everybody hates it, but I think
that’s pretty harsh:

The interest that once greeted every new Gus Van Sant film has been evaporating for some years now. And this latest movie, which can aptly be termed pathetic, only strengthens that feeling.

Lik, one third of the movie is really good, but the other three fourths are really bad. I can understand why many people hate it sooo much, and I wouldn’t recommend it to anybody. But I did really like the first er twenty minutes, so there’s that.

To Die For. Gus Van Sant. 1995.

Somehow I have missed this Gus Van Sant movie all these years? I think I got it confused with John Waters’ Serial Mom and thought I’d seen it already?

It’s got a very star-studded cast: Nicole Kidman, Joaquin Phoenix, Matt Dillon, etc.

Hm… Oh! I have seen this before! When Illeana Douglas came on screen (on the skating rink), I recognised the scene immediately.

This movie is so mid-90s. It’s structured as a documentary of sorts, and has rapid cuts between the story, people being interviewed about it, and people talking straight at the camera. This was when reality TV was new and fresh (i.e., The Real World on MTV) and that was the aesthetic to go for.

It works fine now, too. As usual, Kidman is totally in her part. Dillon has a role that suits him, but, you know. Alison Folland and Phoenix steal the show, though, as two slightly zonked-out kids.

I think it loses something when it gets less frenetic and the murder plot gets underway. The first 45 minutes are riveting, and then it gets a bit involved.

Bumblebee. Travis Knight. 2018.

Wow. So, OK, this is a Transformers movie not directed by the guy who does the other Transformers movies. I kinda enjoy those other movies, but they’re less like movie than a spectacle that happens before your eyes and then they’re over. You basically can’t comprehend them, because there’s nothing there, which I like.

But this is a totally different thing. It starts with a 15 minute sequence which is basically all fighting, and for the first time in a Transformers movie, it looks gorgeous and you can actually follow along what’s happening. It all makes sense!

It’s set in the 80s, and instead of the normal horrible soundtrack we get, like, The Smiths and er Howard Jones. It’s fun.

I laughed out loud at several of the scenes, but it’s not without its problems. As usual with these sort of movies, it gets bogged down in “character development”, which is code word for the protagonist talking about their father (who wasn’t there for them when they grew up). This one has a father that’s dead, so there’s a reason for that, for once.

The actors are fun, though, and the animated sequences are a hoot. But even at less than two hours (half an hour less than usual) it still feels like they could have removed about half an hour from the movie. Or perhaps just fifteen minutes.

Then it would have been The Best Movie Ever In The History Of Ever.