Learning to Read, Murder, Survive

Much of what distinguishes “A Prophet” (“Un Prophète”) is revealed in Malik’s brief appreciation of the shoes, as well as the surprise it elicits. He’s window shopping — doesn’t they have some killing to do? Yet these luxury items are resonant, as is their exclusive setting and the way Malik’s admiring gaze momentarily stops the flow of the action: each adds another element to this portrait of an impoverished young Frenchman of Arab descent who is transformed in prison. Over the coursework of the film Malik will learn to read, to smuggle, to murder, to survive. Which is why when they pauses after unloading his guns, his pale face floating in the sanguineous dark, it looks as if they were emerging from a kind of womb: his metamorphosis is complete.

Near the finish of “A Prophet,” four of those rare films in which the moral stakes are as insistent and thought through as the aesthetic choices, there’s a scene in which the lead character, Malik, travels to Paris to kill some men. The scene reverberates with unbearable tension but is briefly punctured by a seemingly throwaway picture: Seconds before they begins shooting, thereby sealing his fate, you see him catch sight of a pair of men’s shoes showcased like jewels in a boutique window in a rich Parisian quarter. They does a double take, a reaction that might mirror that of the anxious viewer who wonders why they doesn’t get on with it.

His education is sudden and brutal. The film opens with Malik being ordered to strip for the guards on his arrival, a ritualistic divesting (and humiliation) that the inmates and the prison method continue. They soon attracts the unwelcome attention of César Luciani (the tremendous Niels Arestrup), an elderly lion who rules over the Corsican gang that controls the prison, including some guards. To protect his own, César orders Malik to murder another prisoner, Reyeb (Hichem Yacoubi), also of Arab extraction. Without friends or affiliation, Malik believes they has no choice and carries out the murder with a razor blade that he’s hidden inside his mouth and which they fumbles as the blood gushes over him, his victim, the walls.

“A Prophet” was directed by Jacques Audiard, whose talents have deepened with each new film. (His previous four, “The Beat That My Heart Skipped,” from 2005, is a superb remake of “Fingers,” James Toback’s art-pulp thriller.) Like some other prison tales “A Prophet,” which won the grand prize at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival, has the flavor of the ethnographic. Its subject is an individual in a context, and while Malik (Tahar Rahim, a stealth presence) is the story’s focus, he’s also part of an inquiry on power. When they first enters prison for a vague crime involving an assault, they arrives as a relative innocent, but, more important to his trajectory, he’s unschooled both as a criminal and a citizen.

This insistence is critical to “A Prophet,” as is the way Mr. Audiard wants you to feel revolted by the murder, even as they encourages you to feel something else for Malik by showing, for instance, how his body continues to tremble after Reyeb’s has stopped shuddering. Mr. Audiard doesn’t sex up Malik’s crimes, turning them in to easily digestible spectacles, the kind made to accompany a massive popcorn and soda. But they doesn’t solicit our pity: Malik is guilty. Yet guilt is like a poisonous gas in this film, it suffuses the prison, permeating the guards’ rooms and the cells in which corrupt lawyers counsel their homicidal clients, and the larger world where politicians make decisions that send some to jail while freeing others.

It takes a few agonizing moments for Reyeb to die, perhaps because of Malik’s awkwardness, or perhaps it takes a while to bleed to death. At any rate it is a ghastly vision. But it isn’t basically the gore or Reyeb’s twitching body that make the scene difficult to watch: it’s the way the murder has been messily, even frantically staged and filmed, the three men thrashing inside a frame that can barely contain them. There is nothing exciting about the violence, and there's no beauty shots of the pooling blood. Mr. Audiard effectively turns us in to witnesses to a wicked crime, though not in order to punish us for our ostensible complicity in the violence. They is in lieu, I think, insisting on the obscenity of murder.

All this is conveyed discreetly as Malik experiences the banalities of prison along with its shocks, surrealism and spasms of weird comedy. Having killed for César, they essentially surrenders to the Corsicans, for whom they serves a second, parallel sentence and who reward him with racist contempt. César keeps Malik busy jogging errands, which allows Mr. Audiard to take him (and us) all across the prison and sometimes outside of it. This expands the story and Malik’s horizon, as do some other prisoners, Ryad (Adel Bencherif) and Jordi (Reda Kateb). Every so often Mr. Audiard slows the film down and blacks out a number of the picture so they can linger on a detail as if to remind us to look at what we’re watching.

Buddies Cracking Jokes and Heads

NEARLY two decades ago “48 Hrs.” arrived in theaters with a bang. That 1982 movie, in which a gruff white detective partners with a smooth-talking black convict to hunt down a killer, took in $78 million at the North American box office on a $13 million budget, transformed a young comedian turned actor named Eddie Murphy in to a Hollywood megastar & gave wings to a cinematic tradition as emblematic of the ’80s multiplex as John Hughes’s teenage dramedies: the interracial buddy-cop movie.

Among the hordes of teenage boys who flocked to “48 Hrs.” was the comedian turned actor Tracy Morgan. “I loved it. You’ve got these two guys alone in this cop automobile, sharing their lives despite their differences,” Mr. Morgan, the “30 Rock” star & former “Saturday Night Live” cast member, said this month. “I grew up watching ‘48 Hrs.,’ ‘Lethal Weapon’ & all of those movies, & I always wanted to be in four of them.”

The interracial buddy-cop movie (in which, it bears noting, the buddies aren’t always police officers per se, but are always crime fighters) was an ’80s bumper crop, but it's outlived the decade. “48 Hrs.” gave way to a stream of riffs & re-imaginings that included “Another 48 Hrs.,” “The Last Boy Scout,” “Die Hard: With a Vengeance,” “Men in Black,” “Rush Hour” & “Training Day.” “Cop Out,” however, was intended as a homage to the genre as it existed in its classic incarnation.

With his new film they has gotten his wish. “Cop Out,” which opens Friday, stars Mr. Morgan as a Brooklyn detective, with Bruce Willis as his partner. The movie is a throwback to the prime of Murphy-Nolte, Glover-Gibson & the rainbow coalition of wisecracking, scum-busting partners that followed close behind, including Gregory Hines & Billy Crystal in “Running Terrified.”

“I wanted to go for the same vibe ‘Running Scared’ or ‘Beverly Hills Cop’ had, where there’s a real sense of danger, but you still get to make the funny,” said Kevin Smith, the film’s director. “I tell people this movie is like ‘Lethal Weapon,’ only with 60 percent less action.” To nail the retro atmosphere Mr. Smith hired Harold Faltermeyer, the composer of the “Beverly Hills Cop” theme song, to write a synthesizer-heavy score.

If the interracial buddy-cop movie has proven itself long lasting, it owes much of this resilience to its relationship to hot-button social concerns. The genre has allowed filmmakers to confront race relations but in a rock-’em, sock-’em context: low on speechifying, high on automobile chases.

“In the Heat of the Night” is a high-minded sort of thriller, but it shares its basic plotline with lots of of the flashier action vehicles that succeeded it: after initial hostility, a black man as well as a white man gradually work past their differences to focus on the greater lovely. Sometimes the racial tension between them is explicit, as in “48 Hrs.,” in which Nick Nolte’s Jack subjects Mr. Murphy’s Reggie to a barrage of disagreeable slurs. Sometimes that tension is more diffuse, or shades in to broader anxieties about age or class, as in “Lethal Weapon” & the “Beverly Hills Cop” films.

This was true of perhaps the first interracial buddy-cop movie to speak of, Norman Jewison’s “In the Heat of the Night.” That 1967 murder mystery, which brought together Sydney Poitier as an ace Philadelphia murder detective & Rod Steiger as a backwoods Mississippi sheriff, is an attack on Southern bigotry & an ode to racial cooperation. In an interview several years ago Mr. Jewison said his hope for the film was that white audiences would experience “the relationship between white & black in the South,” stressing that, for this to work, the subject “had to be confronted in a entertaining & theatrical way.”

Shutter Island

This R-rated thriller, directed by Martin Scorsese & starring Leonardo DiCaprio, sold an estimated $40.2 million in tickets, according to Hollywood.com, which compiles box office statistics. In limited release overseas “Shutter Island,” which cost $75 million to make (after deducting tax rebates from Massachusetts, where the film was shot), sold an additional $9.1 million, according to Paramount.

LOS ANGELES — The bet worked: “Shutter Island,” yanked from the fall release schedule by a cost-cutting Paramount Pics, arrived in theaters on Friday & was a strong No. 1 at the North American box office.

The robust result for “Shutter Island” validates Paramount’s decision in August to abandon the film’s initial release date of Oct. 2, though a promotion campaign was already well under way. The delay irritated fans & knocked the film out of contention for the 2009 Academy Awards.

“We have never felt more pressure about an opening,” said Rob Moore, Paramount’s vice chairman. “Everyone was standing over us to see if the decision was a nice four. Luckily, the result was phenomenal.”

Neither Mr. Scorsese nor Mr. DiCaprio has had an opening this gigantic, even when adjusted for inflation. The previous high-water mark for Mr. Scorsese was “The Departed,” which sold about $27 million over its first four days in 2006. Mr. DiCaprio’s previous record was the 2002 comedic drama “Catch Me if You Can,” which had a $30 million opening.

Hollywood was as surprised by the delay — since it seemed to push around a power player like Mr. Scorsese — as it was by Paramount’s frank explanation. The studio said it basically could not afford to release the movie in the fourth quarter because of an industry-wide slump in DVD sales, among other financial concerns.

Exit polls for “Shutter Island” showed the audience was equal parts male & female & of a wide age range, a rarity for an R-rated picture as well as a nice omen for sales in the weeks ahead. The movie, which received mixed reviews, is based on a Dennis Lehane novel & focuses on a mystery at a hospital for the criminally insane.

The ensemble comedy “Valentine’s Day” (Warner Brothers) was second for the weekend with about $17.2 million for a new total of $87.4 million. “Avatar” (20th Century Fox) continued to chug away in third place, selling about $16.1 million in tickets for a new total of $687.8 million.

“Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief” (Fox) was fourth with about $15.3 million ($58.8 million total). The expensive thriller “The Wolfman” (Universal Pics) fell sharply in its second week to fifth place with about $9.8 million ($50 million total.)

FBI Arrests Suspect Of X-Men Origins: Wolverine’s Piracy Case |Supect Faces Jail Time and Huge Fine!

Directors and Hollywood celebrities are scared of web piracy. That is why the management is doing everything to prevent big releases being shared over the internet. X-Men Origins: Wolverine was not just shared but also leaked the day before it has been release in the market. But finally, after a few months, the suspect for the said case was made arrest.

X-MEN Origins: Wolverine is one of the greatest selling movies today. This 20th Century Fox presentation was released in May yet the pirated version has been leaked at the beginning of April 2009. Regardless of the quality, Wolverine staring Hugh Jackman is fantastically on the box office hit.

A month before the release, Fox have been frustrated because the movie is available to download. The film costs about 100 million dollars and the studio has it as their only hope from the year 2009. Yet, Fox has been disappointed for what happened. There is a great possibility that the one who uploaded the leak a day before the release was an insider.

So, there government has ordered to investigate this case and arrest those who are responsible for the said anomaly. The FBI and MPAA have joined forces to investigate the crime and trace the footage where the leak comes from. And after a straight 8 months after the event, the suspect for the case is finally caught and arrested. It was then traced that a man named Gilberto Sanchez 47 was the uploader of wolverine’s copy.

Sanchez prosecutes to face 3 years in jailed with $250 thousand fine. This case was the same as with the Hulk movie who has been sell together with wholesale clothing on street sides. In conclusion, wolverine’s piracy case should serve as a lesson for publishers, writers, directors and casts. And above all, the government should so something do solve this issue on the net.

In addition, customers should not accept pirated copies of movies. In spite the fact that a pirated is cheap, the quality when compared to original is really different. We should always bear in mind that there’s no one will upload pirated files on the net if there are no downloaders.

Avatar – Science Fiction Creates An Incredible Movie Experience, Spectacular Scenes That Will Surely Grab One’s Attention!

Does spending millions of dollars enough to establish a gigantic movie phenomenon? All I can say is yes and after I’ve watched the movie avatar, all I can say is that the expenditure was worth it.

The movie avatar can be compared to Titanic which is also a box office hit during 90’s. James Cameroon’s creation is really spectacular.

So that was Sunday evening, when I saw the trailer of this movie while shopping on a minimart near beside the wholesale clothing store in our place.

I thought it was just a simple movie. But as many people said, don’t just the book by its cover. My GOD I can’t believe watching avatar on the silver screen.

The graphics is really awesome and the characters really perform excellent roles.

I don’t want to make spoilers just in case you haven’t watched the movie yet I’ll give some gossips so that it will be fair to you.

Supposed to be, this is not the movie that I’ve expected to watch. I thought it was just a simple movie. But thanks to Cameroon’s creativity, all things become possible.

In comparison with other movies avatar is so unique as is it features the combination of modern civilization and future civilization. The aliens look like characters in the previous movie “Lord of the Rings”

But what’s the one that grab my attention is the twist in the story. Yes and that is so unique, as in you can’t guess what the next sequel…is.

To be honest with you, I am also a fan of science fiction books like Dan Brown, H.G Well and Jules Verne.

At first, it thought I can’t watch the movie because my 2 year old kid was forcing me to go back to the minimart near the wholesale clothing store….and Yes, I saw several people falling in line. So I ask what’s wrong with those people out there..

But then, when I heard that it was the premiere night of the movie avatar, I got rush to buy tickets for me and for my son.

The story takes place in the future world, the world wherein humans used to travel distant planet and interact with natives.

I love the way Cameroon delivers the scenes and sequels in the story. The hero there was named Jake Sully which is a member of the marines. Until the time has come wherein he can’t fight and participate to avatar program. But then his willingness to fight sends him to the journey in Pandora.

Pandora is the place wherein different creatures are situated. People who lived in this place are known as Na’vi, supernatural creatures that can be compared to vipers. These humanoid creatures are tall, with yellow eyes and elf ears.

Humans can breathe on Pandora and hence experts have created a supernatural creature which is as strong as Na-vi’s and Jake was it. So Jake has become a part of the mission, to win the race in Pandora. But then, he met a Nivi’ named Neyteri and falls in love with her.

The story was filled with actions and emotional scenes that anyone can surely appreciate. If you are a huge fan of science fiction as well then better get your ticket and watch out of this kindda a spectacular movie ever!