Movie Marathon

This sunday was a movie marathon day. Here is a list of some of the movies i watched (at home) and how good/bad/ugly they were


1. Easy A

Started with this one as it promised to be a chick flick. And it was. Loosely inspired by Nathaniel Hawthorne's classic novel on adultery & romance,Scarlett Letter, this movie tells the tale of a high school socially inept teenage girl, Olive Penderghast who uses a rumor of her apparent promiscuity to climb the social ladder - stitching a red A to further add to her new reputation. The movie then becomes predictable on how she begins to  dislike her popularity, the guy she likes (who was uptil now ignoring her) suddenly falls in love, and other over-used plots of a teenage flick. The movie is a good for one watch- Emma Stone has done justice to her role- acting like a vamp in one scene and an innocent victim in the other. Penn Badgely (of the Gossip Girl fame) is totally wasted (though he does look good in his shirtless scenes :)) is the love interest of Olive. 
I'd give the movie a 6/10 for Emma Stone's performance only and making my Saturday afternoon thoroughly enjoyable.
(image source: mymoviecinema.com)


2. The Devil's Backbone

This one had been lying in my harddrive for a very long time, and i thought it was high time i watched it. This spanish horror/thriller by Pan's Labyrinth director Guillermo del Toro is a MUST WATCH. Set in the Spanish civil war era,this movie is about a young boy Carlos who is left at an orphanage in the middle of nowhere  by his tutor and how he discovers that the place is haunted, what he does thereafter. Quoting AO Scott of the New York Times, "The director, Guillermo del Toro, balances dread with tenderness, and refracts the terror and sadness of the time through the eyes of a young boy, who only half-understands what he is witnessing".
I give the movie a 9/10 for keeping me hooked right till the end. 
(image source: moviescreenshots.blogspot.com)


3. Buried

This one is NOT for the ones who don't like closed spaces. I rarely like movies that follow a single character plot line and without many scene changes or character development.I tend to lose my patience watching such movies This one was no exception. While buried has received good reviews & it IS a good film, i fast forwarded it to the end mostly because i could not bear to watch any longer. It is about a truck driver (Ryan Reynolds) in Iraq who is ambushed and buried alive under the desert with a blackberry, knife, glow sticks, lighter & a hip flask. The ending is a surprise ( i read it in Wiki and then forwarded it to see it for myself) but is a good watch for those (especially men!) who like the how-will-he-survive kinda single plotline. For me, the movie is a 5/10.  


4. Animal Kingdom

I ended my movie marathon with this fabulous movie. Animal Kingdom is an Australian crime film which shows how a young teen is unwittingly caught in the drama that unfolds in his grandmother's life- who incidentally happens to be the matriarch of Melbourne's crime family. This award winning movie has Guy Pearce as the cop who tries his best to bring the family down. Watch the movie for its intensity & excellent character development. I'll give it a 9.5/10. An absolute must watch!