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Quint doubles up on buddy flicks THE KITE RUNNER and THE BUCKET LIST!!!
SPOILER ALERT !!
Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with a twofer. These two films shouldn’t ever draw comparisons, but I saw them in short order to each other and thought they’d make a perfect double-up.
THE BUCKET LIST and THE KITE RUNNER are radically different films. The quality of filmmaking, the tone, the personal impact they both have… polar opposites. But at their core they are both about a true friendship and the lengths you’d go to for a real friend.
I don’t mean an acquaintance or buddy. Those are great, too, of course. But I mean true friendship. “I’d take a bullet for you” or “You’re my family” friendship. You’re lucky if you find that kind of friendship in your life and it’s always heartwarming for me to see it in film.
THE BUCKET LIST is a comedic ODD COUPLE/GRUMPY OLD MEN take on that kind of friendship and THE KITE RUNNER is a more emotional gut punch realistic take on it.
THE BUCKET LIST, if you don’t know, stars Morgan Freeman as a kind hearted encyclopedia of a man. He’s got a loving family and has remained centered even though he’s lived a hard mechanic’s life. He is deadly smart, his brain a sponge that soaks up trivia and facts… and even more impressively stores them away for easy reference (that’s the real trick, I’ve found).
Jack Nicholson is this man’s opposite. He’s insanely rich, a cruel-hearted sarcastic douche-bag of a man. He is self-centered, loud, vulgar… Everything that Freeman’s character isn’t, for good or ill. For instance, Nicholson’s self-centeredness allowed him to become a cut-throat businessman, where Freeman gave up his chance at a high paying career for the sake of his family, leading to a life of hard labor.
They are both diagnosed with cancer and find themselves bedmates in the hospital during treatment and recovery.
The filmmakers cleverly make Nicholson the guy that owns the hospital who has loudly and publicly declared no specialized treatment at his hospitals. No hospital suites. Always one room and two beds. “No exceptions.” Of course, he said that to make it a bigger profit margin for himself, but he’s also too conscious of his personal image to change his stance when he is the one affected.
While they recover they bond, of course. After they both get bad news they decide to live the rest of their lives to their fullest, creating a list of things to do before they die.
Rob Reiner directed and I fucking love good Rob Reiner. THE PRINCESS BRIDE, MISERY, STAND BY ME, SPINAL TAP, A FEW GOOD MEN and THE AMERICAN PRESIDENT… But bad Rob Reiner is just depressing. THE STORY OF US, for instance.
Here, this one is a bit hard to wrap up. The movie really coasts on the charm of Nicholson and Freeman. The emotional moments and funny moments are predictable, but still effective, thanks in large part to the likability of Nicholson and Freeman.
The filmmaking itself is pretty bad. The editing is distracting, the continuity errors (which I never notice on the first viewing of a movie) were all over the place and the CG face-replacements are terrifying (see the skydiving moment from the trailer).
However, I think it’s saying something that despite the sloppy filmmaking the movie still packs an emotional punch and a steady stream of laughs. The audience loved it. Sniffles and chuckles all over the place, from beginning to end.
I honestly almost didn’t go to THE KITE RUNNER. I’ve heard great things about that book and the buzz on the movie has been positive, but the trailer really turned me off. It was so Awards hungry and on the nose that I thought it was going to be the next CRASH.
However, I did end up going and I’m really glad I did. There’s a lot of subtle work in the flick, so my worry of it being CRASH-like proved completely unfounded.
The film covers a lot of territory, spanning the youth and young adulthood of Amir. He is the son of a wealthy and wise man and his best friend, Hassan, is the servant’s kid.
What I loved about the first half of the movie, which takes place in Afghanistan pre-Communist invasion, is what I thought worked really well in THE BUCKET LIST, but instead of a Walter Matthau/Jack Lemmon friendship, it’s those special kinds of friends you only really have as a child. You remember the ones… the reason why summer was anticipated, the days running around apartment complexes, going swimming, sneaking into R-rated movies, hitting the arcades, playing NES and Sega until 3 in the morning.
Well, that was my summers as a kid. Because of a move at the age of 13 I lost touch with all those friends, but I still have very fond memories.
THE KITE RUNNER very accurately captured those feelings for me. Marc Forster’s a good director and his talent in leading nuanced performances is on display in all aspects of this film. From the child actors, who are very natural (it helps they speak in a different language, I guess, but there is still no over-acting) to the fantastic older cast to even the day players… everyone is firing on all cylinders here.
There’s one day player in particular… I don’t know his name, but there’s a scene in the film where the Communists invade and Amir’s father spends his wealth to get him and his son out of Afghanistan. They’re stopped at the border and the Russian being bribed wants a little more. He also wants 30 minutes with one of the women.
This is probably my favorite scene in the movie because her husband, who is built as a big, threatening guy, is a quivering puddle, pleading for his wife (holding their newborn baby, no-less). It’s a fantastic scene and that bit-part is heart-breaking.
It’s also a great scene for who I consider the star of the movie. Homayoun Ershadi plays Amir’s father and he steals the movie. There’s a quiet strength to him that makes him a true hero, a true man of courage and conviction. He’s fantastic in the above mentioned scene, the only member of the refugees who is willing to stand up and risk being killed in order to prevent the woman from being raped.
If Ershadi isn’t nominated for a Supporting Actor Oscar I will be fucking shocked.
The second half of the movie focuses on the pre-9/11 Taliban take-over of Afghanistan and Amir trying to help the son of Hassan. Their relationship didn’t end on a good note, but their bond of friendship (with some addition information I will not reveal) give Amir the courage he never had. Amir has to leave comfortable married life in America to return to his home and be the brave one that stood up for the weak, which he was never able to do. Hassan was always the one who stuck up for the two of them.
It’s a fantastic arc.
I really liked the movie when I first left the theater, but the more I think back on it, the more impressed with it I am. It is a movie that feels longer than its 2 hours, but I never felt bored or twitchy. This’ll be a big Oscar movie… I don’t know if I’d call it my favorite of the year, but it is a powerful movie that is well-crafted and packs an emotional punch. I wouldn’t complain if it took home the statue.
-Quint
quint@aintitcool.com
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrrIRcCbo9M
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It was charming and poignant.
Kite Runner was amazing. Look for all kindsa Oscar nods for that one. -
Both these movies sound like snoozers.
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make The Kite Runner pure entertainment! A movie that sizzles with charm. You'll have a renewed passion for life. The Kite Runner is a perfect teen dream. It has everything that makes a movie totally cool: laughs, adventure, spirit, hot music, drama and of course BRITNEY! Britney rocks! She is like a comet. A talent of her magnitude only comes around once in a lifetime and you can't take your eyes off her when she is on screen in this totally cool and delightfully hip movie.
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I'm excited to see this, Forster is a pretty gifted and nuanced director who's gonna take Bond to the next level of awesome.
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I watched The Story of Us not too long ago and it was just jaw-hit-the-floor bad. Fake scenes, fake dialogue, fake characters, contrivance after contrivance after contrivance. What a train wreck. Incredible that a once name-brand director would put his name on that and that generally smart actors like Willis and Pfeiffer would do it. Were his good films just luck? The Bucket List preview looked AWFULLY saccharine...when I saw it I just felt bad for once-great actors like Nicholson and Freeman who have to stoop to this level in the last part of their careers. Doesn't seem destined to reverse Reiner's slide.
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but i just can't get up any enthusiasm to see Kite Runner. When everyone was reading the book i picked it up a few times but just couldn't do it. The story just doesn't interest me. Film's the same. No matter all the good things i hear i just know i'll probably never see it. I've seen pretty much every possible awards contender for next year's Oscars but this is one i'll skip. And your man may be nominated for supporting but he'll have a hell of job matching the triumvirate of Javier Bardem, Casey Affleck and Hal Holbrook who all seem shoe-ins. With Paul Dano damn likely as well there might be a place at the table for him but you've gotta bet he won't get to carve. Seeing Bucket List tomorrow. Praying it's better than the drivel Reiner's been doling out lately. Hoping for About Schmidt Nicholson quality, worried i'm going to get Something's Gotta Give!
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Oh, well, in that case it must be really good. I mean, it's not like audiences enjoy shit or anything.
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Man thats gotta be the fastest TV show to movie I've ever seen? I say Nicholson and Hanks should retire before the taint their career with movies for the sake of movies. Follow Paul Newman.
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is going to do Bond 22? Why? He is a boring movie director, I am not one to give up on movies but I fell asleep during Stranger then Fiction and was like ehhh I don't need to see all of it. I don't see him being an action man. Plus Martin Campbell has done the best 2 bonds of the series. He is in talks to do the Birds Remake? ehhh next to No Escape Martin Campbell is only ok outside of Bond. I guess Marc Forsters will focus on the boring aspects of being James Bond... like him sleeping at night.
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The only good movies in the world are the movies everyone hates (excepts for the select, enlightened few such as yourself).
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except for me it was when Angela's Ashes came out, I bought the book, tried reading it several times and despite everyone telling me how great and moving it was I couldn't get into it, tried watching the movie and yes it had some amazing performances but I just couldn't get into it. Anyways so I feel your...well maybe not pain, but I certainly know what you mean re: The Kite Runner
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I'm not being elitist (I'll leave that to Memories of Murder). I'm just saying we live in a world where I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry makes more than $100 million. Thereby proving you can't always trust the audiences.
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nicholson plays the same character he's played for the past decade or so. gotcha. talk about coasting!
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keep it coming. Every movie review should start with "I didn't want it to be another Crash..."
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It would have been more interesting to pair these two films together in a review, since they both deal with protagonists who carry a burden of childhood guilt into adulthood. Both stories are about people who take a lifetime to atone for their mistakes, and both movies are based on phenomenal bestsellers. I haven't seen THE KITE RUNNER yet, still waiting for it to open in my town, but I found the book to be a real page-turner. I told my sister about it, and she had the book read in less than three days. I'm really looking forward to this movie.
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Seriously. Sick.
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Dec 07, 2007 11:44:55 AM CST
"They had it all. They had each other. They had cancer."
by iammrmonkey!
The Bucket List. The feelgood movie of 2007.
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sort of like Oxygen, maybe called Testoren, it sounds like The Bucket List would play on a 24 hour loop.
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I mean, the trailer for "Speed Racer"....
The races look like Pixatr shite. -
Wanted to say something positive, since I disagreed whole-heartedly with you on your last review (Atonement).And the sad thing is, Rob Reiner has potential. The 20 minute Q & A with him after the movie was funnier than anything he's done in 10 years. Why can't he translate that funny to film anymore? What happens to these filmmakers (like Copolla...I hear his new one is horrible.)
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Is there a naked Kathy Bates in Bucket List? I needed a bucket after I saw that shit.
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I wasn't sure I was going to like the Kite Runner when I first read it because it had been so over-hyped. But the novel was incredibly well-written, an emotionally charged page-turner. I'm glad to hear the movie seems to be of the same caliber.
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if there was said channel, Brian's Song would be on alot otoo, not the original but the made for TV ABC remake, which sadly I own on DVD because I thought it was the original
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I read the Kite Runner a few years ago as part of a reading group, and we were pretty uniform in our dislike of the book. I've nothing against the story itself, but the writing was so incredibly heavy-handed. It felt like the kind of book people would read who don't actually like to read, but who want to impress people by reading anyway. I hope the movie finds a more effective way to tell what we all agreed could have been a great story.
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other books our group read and enjoyed: The Poisonwood Bible, A Seperate Peace, The Namesake, and The Stone Raft.
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..and any sports movie where the underdog emerges the winner..oh wait..thats EVERY sports movie...
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Dec 07, 2007 3:58:12 PM CST
So, Freeman and Nicholson are playing themselves... again.
by el scorcho
Rob Reiner CAN be an alright filmmaker, but he is a fuckwad of a man. I don't smoke, but if I ever meet him I plan on starting right there and then.
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"Take a buddy along for the ride!"
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"Because of a movie when I was 13 I lost track with most of them". I just had an image in my head of Quint's friends all telling him that SILVER BULLET was awful and him being like "Fuck these people" and never speaking to them again.
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Dude hasn't made a watchable film in TWELVE YEARS.
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Personally, I love to read. I think it is one of the great personal activities an individual can truly treasure and enjoy. Right now, I'm on Irene Nemirovsky's wartime epic, SUITE FRANCAISE. Speaking for myself, I didn't read THE KITE RUNNER because I was looking to impress people. Originally, I had no interest in the book, until my father approached me with it. Both he and my mother had read it and loved it. (They are both voracious readers.) Khaled Hosseini's narrative thread captivated and resonated with me on a deeply personal note from the first page of the novel to the last. What you and your reading group thought was "incredibly heavy-handed" I found brisk, compelling and very easy to read. True, the story has very serious events that play out and have "heavy" emotional consequences, but this is the story of a lives being shattered and of one man trying to repair his soul. It's not really meant to be taken lightly. I've spoken to some other people who've read THE KITE RUNNER, co-workers and friends, and we're "pretty uniform" in our LOVE of the book. By the way, of the other books you and your reading group have read, I've only actually read A SEPARATE PEACE. I thought it was one of the most self-important pieces of crap I've ever slogged through.
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I've heard it used negatively before, but it also has a very positive connotation. If someone is doing something well, they're doing it "on the nose." I suppose this is one of them Janusian words. Could someone tell me what it means in a film context? Also, what does calling a film "precious" mean? That's another word that can be positive or negative.
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I consulted three different dictionaries on this and found the same thing in each one. "On the nose" is an informal expression, North American slang meaning "precisely", "exactly". For example, "It began to rain at four on the nose, delaying the tennis match." Another similar expression is "on the button". It appears that some people use the expression to describe someone as being correct about something - "Jackman is right on the nose in his assessment about the ending of that film." Whether this is actually a proper use of the expression "on the nose" is not clear to me.
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LoneGun, but what's the NEGATIVE connotation of on the nose? My guess is it's something like "obvious", since it's, you know, right there in your face if it's on the nose. So what does calling a movie or a moment "precious" mean?
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To each his own, I say. I, like you, didn't read the book to impress anyone...our group thought it would be an interesting next novel for discussion. I understand that it dealt with serious events and all that, but I think where you found it 'easy to read', we found that it was overly obvious in its presentation...it lacked subtly. Of all the books we read, it was one of the few on which we had a unanimous opinion.
And just so you know, we were very mixed on "A Seperate Peace". I was in the minority on that one (I may have been overstating when I implied the whole group enjoyed it). i liked it whereas several people in the group didn't.
The other book we had a unanimous opinion on, btw, was "The Poisonwood Bible", which i was a bit wary of in the beginning, but eventually fell head-over-heels for. -
I'll look for "The Poisonwood Bible" if that 's one you'd recommend, because I am looking for good books, and while we don't see eye-to-eye on those other two, maybe we will on this one. I don't know if you've read "Blindness" by Jose Saramago, but it's a novel I checked out last summer, very provocative and apocalyptic in its scope. From one reader to another, I would recommend that one. I was quite blown away. Anyway, nice to know another book reader on this site.
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Is the new book by the author of Kite Runner. I loved it. It felt honest and true and is honest that for someone people they only see the ugliness this world has to offer and yet, knowing that are able to do what others wouldnt be able to.
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I read "The Gospel According to Jesus Christ" a few years ago (strangely enough, after one of my middle school English students did a report about him), and fell in love with his style. 'Blindness' soon followed (and its sequel, 'Seeing'). I've tried to read at least one of his novels a year. I think 'Gospel' might have been my favorite so far, although 'Blindness' is pretty amazing. Its such a clean, sharply written book...like a laser beam.
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I've heard good things about Saramago's "The Cave", as well. I'll check out the others. GenreBoy, "A Thousand Splendid Suns" will probably be my next read.
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