Young Hearts Run Free.

Film: Like Crazy
Year: 2011
Director: Drake Doremus
Written by: Drake Doremus and Ben York Jones
Starring: Felicity Jones, Anton Yelchin, Jennifer Lawrence, Charlie Bewley, Alex Kingston, Oliver Muirhead, Finola Hughes, Chris Messina.
Running time: 86 min.

Unless you're counting famous people, I guess you could say that I've never been in love. So when Like Crazy came knocking on my door, I didn't know whether I'd consumed with the tale of two young people who fall hopelessly in love with each other, only to be torn apart. Luckily, I had adorable people like Felicity Jones and Anton Yelchin playing young lovebirds Anna and Jacob. Also playing to my advantage was the fact that this isn't your typical Hollywood love story. It isn't the kind filled with dreadful pop songs and half a tonne of sugar. It doesn't even fit into the twee-romance-between-two-hipsters-indie category. Writer and director Drake Doremus based the film off his real life experience with a long-distance relationship. Added in with a considerably low budget of $250,000 and the fact that basically all of the dialogue was improvised (which makes me wonder why there were two writers, but anyway...), Like Crazy tells a raw story of love, the hard way.

10 2011 Films I Want to See in 2012

By now, you've probably seen all of these films. You're probably sitting there, laughing at me for not seeing any of these films yet. But in NZ, it is still 2011, and will stay that way until at least May/June. 2012? What is this year you speak of? You futuristic beings.

This list is in alphabetical order, just because there's no particular order in which I want to see them.

50/50
So, it would be nice if someone gave this a release date here. I know that Australia is getting it next month or so, but I can't see the same happening here. Like Warrior, it will end up going straight-to-DVD, even though it probably deserves a whole lot more. Why do we do this - give lots of crappy movies a proper release and leave the good-looking, critically acclaimed ones to get put straight on the shelf? It sucks. I might just buy this Blu-Ray off Amazon, because I might actually get to finally see Joseph Gordon-Levitt's latest to tide me over until his mammoth 2012 kicks in to gear.

The Artist
This actually came out last week, but there have been a few problems. First of all, it is only showing in nine small cinemas across the entire country. Second of all, the closest place it is playing to me is three hours drive away. I don't know what the heck is going on here, especially as we're pretty good with showing every movie up for an Oscar in every bloody cinema there is. I think the cinemas are a bit cagey because it is silent, but it has been on the news basically every night (with the most terrible puns I've ever heard - "it was a silent film that made the most sound" etc). I hope it does eventually come to cinemas, just so I can justify my love for Jean Dujardin and Uggie.

Carnage
As anyone, I'm a pretty big fan of Roman Polanski. So it will be pretty damn interesting to see him doing a comedy. This is specifically my type of comedy - it is based on a play, so that means for the most part the sets are pretty restricted, letting the dialogue show through. It also has a very simple idea, too, which I like. Plus, the cast is pretty cool, too. Christoph Waltz is always perfect. I thought this film would have got more attention than it did, so I'm not terribly unhappy that it currently has an April release date. However, I would be surprised if it even made it to many cinemas here.

Like Crazy
This came out two weeks back, but like The Artist, it isn't playing anywhere near me. Don't ask me why I want to see this so much, because I honestly don't know. Maybe it's because I want to give Anton Yelchin a cuddle so much (gosh I love the word cuddle). Maybe it's because I LOVE Felicity Jones. Maybe it is because it looks like exactly like my sort of film - romantic, but realistic. It looks like it could rip my heart out. And I like that feeling every now and again (no, I'm not an emo or goth or whatever you call them now).

Martha Marcy May Marlene
I'm SO incredibly pissed that I missed this at NZFF. And even though I haven't seen this, I'm still kinda sad that it didn't get much Oscar love. I would have loved to have seen an up-and-coming actress like Elizabeth Olsen getting an Oscar nomination. But whatevs, Oscar or no Oscar, I still really want to see this film. Just the idea of a cult (and an apparent great use of editing, which I always love - such a nerd) is enough to get me excited. I think this comes out in March, but again, I doubt it will come to any cinemas near me. If it does, my butt is right on that seat!

A Separation
One of my biggest regrets of 2011 was that I didn't go and see this film at the NZFF. I remember that it played directly after Melancholia, and I did ask Mum whether I could see it as well but nothing ever amounted so I let it go. When I got out of Melancholia, the screening was completely sold out. Now, I have to wait until April (hopefully) to see this Iranian film which is apparently quite amazing. Please please please Palmerston North, GET THIS FILM AT YOUR CINEMAS!

Shame
Okay, so here's one I won't be seeing in cinemas, unless I sneak in as I threatened to do when I go to the capital on a school trip next week. People always look at me strangely when I say I want to see this movie, and then I have to explain that it is about a sex addict and it stars my fifth husband and blah blah blah. But trust me, my reasoning for wanting to attempt sneaking in is because this actually looks like the type of film I'd like to make. I like the idea of harrowing addict dramas. And I know I shouldn't judge a movie by it's trailer, but that trailer makes me want to make a movie so much. Then there's the whole Michael Fassbender and his...golf stick.

The Skin I Live In
If I were to judge my anticipation just by watching the trailer, I would not want to see this film. The trailer is so odd, with the feel good, slightly porn-ish sounding music playing in the background when I'm sure this is supposed to be a serious movie. But I've read plenty of good things about this film, and I always like to see something a little out of the ordinary. And I'm glad that Antonio Banderas has decided to do something a little different to voicing an extremely seedy cat. I knew I should have hunted down one of the smaller cinemas in Melbourne (but it was hard enough trying to find the two huge ones that I did...THAT PLACE IS SO BIG) so I could see this, but I'm waiting for an April cinema release.

Take Shelter
Here's another movie that I should have seen at NZFF, but I actually couldn't. Why? Because it was playing on my birthday. And despite the fact that all I wanted for my birthday was a few tickets to the film fest, I didn't get to go over to see it. Which was fair enough, because it was playing pretty late and I had school the next day. But it is okay, as it is coming out on DVD next month. I placed many warnings in my emails to my Dad on the order, threatening all sorts of things. I sincerely hope he did end up getting it (because he only said "I think I did"), because I need another Jessica Chastain movie like I need to breathe air. Seriously.

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
I shouldn't complain too much about this one, since it is my own fault that I haven't seen it yet. It came out in cinemas a month ago, but I still haven't seen it, because I haven't had a chance to go over to Palmerston North to see it. I can't really be bothered begging and pleading to have someone drive me over, but my parents just seem to go over whenever I can't go (which sucks). Oh well, I should keep trying to learn how to drive, even though my Mum's car hates me. Otherwise, it'll be a DVD watch for me, which is more than okay: I can try my best to wait for a cast like Gary Oldman, Colin Firth, Tom Hardy, Mark Strong and Benedict Cumberbatch, directed by the excellent Tomas Alfredson. If I can live without gluten, I can do this too.

What do you think of all of these films? What are some 2011 films that you still need to see?

Stevee's Best and Worst Posters of 2011...

Well, it's December (how, I do not know), so it's the time of the year when everyone rolls out their 'best of' lists for the year. While I might make a top ten films list (though it would be better if I did one at the end of next year), I'm going to look at all of the promotional stuff that I can see with the click of the fingers. Now, I'm quite the expert on movie posters, so I'll take a look at the five worst and ten best posters of 2011 films.

Here are the top five worst posters from 2011:

5. Main St - I already talked enough about this poster in this post. I still haven't seen this movie (I kinda plan to, just to see what went wrong), but here's some wishful thinking: it might be better than whoever photoshopped this hideous Coronation Street-esque poster.

4. The Darkest Hour - Sure, this isn't a horribly bad poster compared to some other ones. When it was one of the featured trailers on my IMDB app, the poster was so bad that I stopped using the app for a while until they changed it. Working at a DVD store, I see a whole lot of Z-grade straight-to-DVD disaster films, and this one - which is actually going to cinemas - looks exactly like one of those. I mean, just look at the lame lightning ripping through the city. And the awful colouring of the tagline. And that tagline being bigger than the title. It just makes it look really awful.

3. X-Men: First Class - The large majority of the X-Men: First Class posters were the victims of someone who got a bit too excited about photoshop. This one, showing all of the characters from the movie (and there are quite a few, hence the troubling one-dimensionality of some of them), is quite the eyesore. It all starts with the blueness, and then you wonder why half of these people are walking and the other half are just standing there looking menacing. James McAvoy probably came out worse off...I mean, look at how disproportionate his body is. Michael Fassbender looks like he is in pants that are miles too big to him and his turtleneck has made his neck disappear. And if you look really hard, you can see Lucas Till in the distance, all faded away. It's just such a silly poster.

2. I Don't Know How She Does It - Apart from having one of the most annoying titles of the year, this movie has an annoying poster to match. First of all, there is the colour. It makes me think of puke. Then there is Sarah Jessica Parker, who looks slightly uncomfortable and has a bizarre looking smile on her face. She's holding a teddy with her bag, just to show that no-one knows how she does it. On the right side of her she is a whole lot of things that she needs to do. I'm so glad that she has to make cookies. I don't know how she does that.

1. New Year's Eve - I don't know where to begin with this poster. It is just bloody awful. Just the way everyone looks. Some people look like they've been cut out of a tabloid magazine (ahem, Ashton Kutcher), some have been cut directly out of the official film stills, others just look purely idiotic. I'm talking about you,
Chris 'Ludacris' Bridges. I'm sorry, but you look like you're a prisoner applying to be Santa Claus, your smile is that un-genuine. There's just way too much gold. We get it, New Year's Eve is gold, but that doesn't mean it's the annual lottery holiday.

Best posters after the jump...