Review of Nashville (1975) by Brandon H — 19 Dec 2008

Can someone please explain to me why Nashville is supposedly a good movie? Jesus Christ. What a terrible, long, dreadful bore. I couldn't stand it. I turned it off after someone was shot and someone else started asking people to sing right after the person was shot, or something ridiculously implausible and melodramatic like that. I don't want to waste anymore time on this review.

The Deer Hunter I forgot to put back on here. I'd fallen asleep during it so I'm allowing myself to put t on here, even though technically I've already seen it. Goodfellas, I'm starting a new policy, which is that movies that are considered iconic or great movies, if I've seen them before I started this journal but it was a long time ago and I don't remember much, then I'm going to put them up here anyway.

The Deer Hunter was fine. Too long. Overrated. The drastic shift from the suburban factory housing environment to war and back again is great, but within those segments the characters seem flat because they all act the same way, and we never get to know them intimately.

Goodfellas is great. I'm still unsure about the ending, but it's a great movie to be sure, one of the most well-made movies I've ever seen. A lot of depth, and a lot of simple techniques, easy lines of dialogue, that pack everything together so that the movie never feels tired and keeps moving along, and its characters are so dynamic. It's great.

Happy-Go-Lucky is probably my favorite movie of the year so far. This has been such a shitty year for movies thus far though. We'll see, a lot comes out in the next couple weeks. It felt a little long sometimes, some scenes started to feel a little over-the-top realistic, if that works. People seemed to represent emotions, sometimes, which was a small turn-off. But I don't want to discredit the movie too much for that, because every character has some depth, especially of course the main character, who is so interesting to watch. The movie starts out as if it's going to show us how someone can remain happy in the face of being victimized and scrutinized. But it's so much more than that, the movie slowly blossoms into a much more alive creature, that shows us a full person, not just "happiness" embodied by a caricature, but someone who refuses to be unhappy. Sexual relationship clarity, by the way?