Being a music lover myself, and someone who truly believes in the healing power of music and can testify to the power of music, when I first heard of August Rush, I knew I was going to see it. I’ve been recommended this movie by many close friends, some friends who knew how much I loved music, and then friends who just found this to be a quite moving film. They were both right!

August Rush is a beautifully, evocative, musical journey that deals with issues of abandonment, neglect, and speaks about faith in things unseen…but felt. I loved the way music was so neatly and wonderfully interwoven throughout this film, it literally was the dialogue. Seeing as how there wasn’t much in dialogue between the characters, music had to be what communicated emotion, it was the bridge and the glue that made this movie whole and complete.

From the opening scene (which is my favorite scene), a masterpiece of emotion, wind, and nature, all within the confines of an epic wheat field, I was swept away by the movement and connection that August had with sounds and his surroundings. That was the perfect way to open this movie, it immediately brought the audience into August’s world and gave us a touch of the warmth August embraces for music. I love that he’s so young and doesn’t even really know what “music” is, he just hears everything, down to the electricity running through the wires, all the way to how a car horn sounds, and it’s all, to him, harmoniously leading him to his family that he never knew.

If you go into this movie wanting to pick holes apart in its story, you will find that the film falters. You have to go into this movie suspending disbelief and let the emotion, the visual poetry, the heart of this movie sweep you away: music and the passion to create it. Keri Russell and Jonathan Rhys Meyers play August’s parents, Keri is a successful classical cellist, and Jonathan is a rock ‘n’ roll guitar player. The musical heritage that’s found in this family seen is early on, particularly in one scene where Keri Russell and her cello and Jonathan and his guitar are juxtaposed, creating this intriguing, haunting, classical rock-hybrid that’s a great metaphor for who August is.

The performances are believable and heartfelt, even if the plot and story are a little far fetched. One particular performance really got to me, and that was Robin Williams’ portrayal of “Wizard,” who was a Fagin-esque character, a guy who seemingly wanted to help runaway kids, but who actually exploited their musical giftedness and set them up on street corners playing music, in which, of course, he received a cut of the money they earned. He was almost like a musical pimp to these kids, and I have to be honest, he was a creepy character. What made it even more weird was the fact that he basically looked exactly like Bono, which is who, from what I’ve read, he based his character off of…hopefully in look alone.

The ending of the film, in my opinion, was its weakest part. It seemed like they spent so much energy and time in developing the first and second act to make it believable and heartfelt, which it was, but when it ended, it was so abrupt and left a lot of things unfinished. I realize that a good ole’ happy ending is great to have at times, but still, I would have liked to seen a little more development in the end, if anything, just to give some closure to the story.

It’s wise to ignore the predictability of the plot and the believability of the film and let yourself be captivated by the spell of its intensely passionate tribute to melody and harmony.

Content Warning: Rated PG for some thematic elements, mild violence and language.

I want to start off this review by thanking my good friend Chris Blanchett for introducing me to the world of Once. He is the one who suggested I check out this soundtrack from a movie called Once, this little nothing of a movie that completely captured his heart. So, Chris, thank you!

If you’ve never heard of Once or don’t know what I am talking about, then that’s great! Here at ToC, I get the privilege of introducing you to the wonderful and amazing little world of Once, a dramatic, romantic, musical filmed entirely around 2 characters, “Guy” (played by Irishmen Glen Hansard) and “Girl” (played by Czechoslovakian Markéta Irglová) in and around the streets of Dublin. This little movie that came out of nowhere utterly captured my heart with warmth, reality, authenticity, humility, and true love…all centered around some beautiful love ballads written by Glen and Marketa.

This movie shouldn’t work. It’s filmed on a shoestring budget with one camera starring very inexperienced actors, and yet it brims with small pleasures that pay major dividends. The story is simple, Hansard stars as a Dublin songwriter who takes his guitar to the streets and sings himself hoarse to people who could care less. He barely makes anything from playing, but that isn’t his goal, he just wants to sing his songs. Supplementing his non-existing singing career is his job as a Hoover vacuum repair man with his Dad. Can you get any more real or depressing than that? His life seems to be heading nowhere until he meets a pretty Czech pianist (Marketa Irglova) who gives him the guts to quit his dad’s repair shop and start finding the bucks to make a recording. That’s it for the story. It’s a bittersweet love story that has Hansard’s gorgeous music at the center with an aching romance for the soul.

There is something so hauntingly mesmerizing about the music that pervades this entire film. It’s music in its rawest form, no studio extras, no synthesizing, just emotion, heart, and a broken guitar with lyrics that paint a sad and bare picture of heartache. The film is driven by and depends on the power of the songs for its heart and they become indispensable towards the end of the film. It’s the uniting power of music that keeps this movie together, without Hansard’s songs this movie doesn’t work, it would fall away into oblivion just like every other small film. It would still be a good film if the songs played over the action as like in every other movie, but the fact that they drive the story, the fact that both Glen and Marketa actually sing them on film at the most poignant times in the story is what makes this film GREAT!

You can’t afford to miss this movie. In a world full of dramatizing and analyzing and “blockbustering” love, this is a quiet little film that shows the reality of love, the pain of love, the joy of love, the awkwardness of love…the song of love. Writer-director-musician Jon Carney (he played bass in Glen’s band “The Frames” until 1993) has made a sweet film, which elevates itself to an entirely different plane of film musicals, by using the simplicity of plot, character, and style to craft a sort of cinematic poem. After you see this movie, you will immediately want to buy the soundtrack and check out Glen’s band “The Frames…” because that’s what I did. Of course, I already had the soundtrack, I just moved it to the top of my iPod in listening priority.

We rarely fall in love at the movies enough, but this is one to adore.

Content Warning: Rated R for language. They use the “F” word as much as we would use the word “the” in a sentence. The funny thing is that because of their accents, it doesn’t seem as harsh sounding. Be warned, there is a lot of language, but believe me, it did not take away from the movie, it actually fit within the context of the story. It was more cute than harsh…you’ll just have to see for yourself.

Ever since I was a little boy I always wanted to be a magician. I would practice cheesy magic tricks in front of my parents, finding a coin in my ear, or pulling an endless supply of handkerchiefs from my hands, whenever I could. I would dream of wooing an audience with mystical illusions that only I knew the trick to. I don’t know if it was the actual magic itself or the fact that I knew something a lot of other people didn’t. Whatever the case, I have always loved magic. And unfortunately, in our day of the Internet and TiVo and YouTube, a lot of magic and illusions have been explained and published and exposed on TV specials entitled, “Magic’s Greatest Secrets Revealed 1-10.”

The Illusionist is a moody, atmospheric fairy tale, about one illusionist—Eisenheim, a fictional turn-of-the-last-century magician—being told by another, writer-director Neil Burger (Interview with the Assassin). Throughout the film the audience will learn truth about some of Eisenheim’s illusions, and some of Burger’s as well. While at first, the more skeptical viewers may see through the plot’s central illusion early on; but others may be as fooled as most of the characters. When it call comes down to it, though, The Illusionist succeeds: While the storytellers are at work, the spell holds.

It’s hard not to compare this movie with The Prestige, the other blockbuster “magic” movie that came out in 2006, and in doing so, I must say that I very much enjoyed The Illusionist over the latter. I felt that the story was more closely rooted in reality compared to that of the story of The Prestige. The story engaged me more and kept me guessing every step of the way, though not carrying me too far into the fantasy world where I dismissed it as an unbelievable cartoony adventure. I really felt connected to the characters and to the story. Their performances were enough based in reality, though a different reality than mine, that I sympathized and empathized with what they were going through. To me, movies that can make me care about the characters and what happens to them are movies that I feel have done their job.

Edward Norton is one of my favorite actors, I think underrated, and his enigmatic portrayal of “Eisenheim the Illusionist” really adds quality to an already excellent movie. Norton is the kind of actor that can appear in anything and raise its quality by a few notches. His smoldering glare and old-soul sensibilities blend well together for The Illusionist, and he makes the most of a messy situation. When Norton is on stage doing beautiful magic tricks like making an orange seed bloom into a tree, it’s truly mesmerizing and dazzling. The cinematography is eye-grabbing and mystical, like a mesh between Moulin Rouge and a childhood fairy tale. I loved the colors throughout the movie. I thought the sepia tones that filtered everything you saw added a subtle antiqueness to the movie.

The magic here is in more than just pulling off an illusion — it’s in making us forget that we know how it’s done. The Illusionist finds a magic middle ground where it could actually please everyone, where it’s just strange enough to electrify fans of the bizarre and just effortless enough to satisfy those who merely seek a diverting entertainment.

Content Warning: The Illusionist is rated PG-13 for a scene of strong but non-explicit sexuality and some violence, including an implied offscreen murder and an onscreen suicide.

Road to Perdition isn’t your typical mob movie…well, it is, in that the mob are the central characters in the movie and they kill people, but that isn’t ALL this movie has to offer. What you will get from Road to Perdition is a heartbreaking story about a man who has to reconcile working for the mob while being a husband and raising 2 sons. This tension drives the movie all the way through and ultimately provides the backdrop for one of the most heart wrenching stories about a father and his son. There are a lot of movies historically that are about the father and son relationship and they are some of my most favorite movies. There’s just something about watching a father and son interact with each other on the screen through very crazy and difficult circumstances, circumstances that I’ll probably never go through with my Dad in reality, but underlying all of the fantastical situations, it’s essentially about a son wanting to be loved by his dad who, because of his choices in career and not having a dad himself, has to rationalize how to love his son amidst turmoil.

In this movie, Sam Mendes (the director) really goes to great lengths to expose the inner workings of a father-son relationship. At first, I didn’t really buy into the chemistry between Tom Hanks and his son’s, it just looked very cold and forced. And after watching the entire movie all the way through, I realized what a stroke of brilliance it was by Mendes to portray the earlier stages of Hanks’ relationships with his sons in that way, because it really amplified how the relationships took form later on. What took shape, though, was a very progressive and no-frills connection between Hanks and his oldest son Mike Jr., played quite averagely by young star Tyler Hoechlin. The love that they had was very much built upon the intense situations, but later was beautifully founded in how much they cared and looked out for each other. One of the more poignant scenes in the movie involved Mike Jr. feeding his wounded Dad, Hanks, and essentially taking care of him in a way he has never done before.

As I sat watching this movie, I found myself hoping that something BIG would happen that would just send me over the edge in how I felt about this movie…and when it came, I wasn’t totally surprised nor did I find myself reeled by it. This movie had some wonderful performances from Tom Hanks, Paul Newman, and Jude Law, and I would recommend this movie to anyone who wants to watch a movie with mob violence and intense action that can touch you on a real personal level. Dad’s, you NEED to watch this movie…SONS, you ALSO need to watch this movie.

This movie is rated R for violence and language. There is a lot of mob violence and language you would associate with a mobster movie.

For Discussion: What other movies do you like that portray the father-son relationship?

I’ve never seen Gael Garcia Bernal in a movie before and after watching this one, I leaned over to my wife and said, “I want to see more of what he’s done.” His performance as Stephane was filled with so much raw emotion, giving a strong emotional core to the film. Without his powerful and nuanced performance, the spectacle of the film would have been too much; however, Bernal keeps it grounded in reality with a character so truthful that the insanity happening around him seems completely believable. His life becomes so boring and mundane to him that he prefers to live in his dreams and throughout the movie, his dreams actually start creeping into his waking life.

There are some real neat child-like moments with Bernal and his love interest Stephanie, played masterfully by Charlotte Gainsbourg, that include imagining water as cellophane, playing with Bernal’s one second time machine, and looking through his 3-D glasses. (”Isn’t real life already in 3D?” asks Stephanie at one point) At times I felt sorry for him because I felt like he was a grown up who was trapped in his fantasy of wanting to be a boy again. The most awkward of the scenes were the ones that involved him trying to be flirtatious or charming with Stephanie. You remember in middle school how awkward it was to try and talk to girls you liked? Well, that’s how it felt to watch Stephane work his magic. Yet, it was his indomitable creative spirit that he found mirrored in the equally creative, yet more realistically centered Stephanie.

Contrast to his rough and dissatisfying real world is Stephane’s dream world. It is outlandish, beautiful, and unrestrained. It is in these sequences when Gondry really shows what he’s about. They are filled with so much eye candy it is difficult to take in at times. They range from the absurd (a spider typewriter), to the grand (an entire cardboard city), or to the beautiful (a cloth horseback ride to a boat on a sea of cellophane). What makes the scenes all the more incredible is that, for the most part, Gondry relies only on practical effects. There’s something so refreshingly classic to utilizing stop-motion camera work and actual physical props. It definitely adds that nostalgic touch to the film.

Though not expected but very much welcomed, the film was also filled with some great transcendent humor through the characters’ dialogue. By using truth instead of punch lines to provide the humor, Gondry adds another layer to his already versatile film. The dialogue is in French, English, and Spanish, each seamlessly interweaving with each other, much like the realities of the film interweave. There comes a point in the film where you stop realizing the language of the film is constantly changing. As the film progresses, you forget that at times, it’s either in French, Spanish, or English, it just all flows together as an organic, wonderful dialogue.

This is a film that will amaze you with its visual canvas, and touch you with its powerful emotion. Michel Gondry has created a film that even through the unbelievable situations and perspectives, has so many delicately-crafted human moments. Deep down, this film is a love story. Going back to the title sequence’s spin art, below all of layers being spun and pushed around run currents of human emotion which Gondry smartly anchors the film with; therefore, allowing it to soar.

Content Warning: This movie is rated R for language, some sexual content and nudity. This is not a film for the little ones. Though I am not an advocate of watching rated R movies because of the liberty the studios feel they have to add outrageous content, this one isn’t a STRONG R, but it’s a R nonetheless. There are 2 scenes where my wife and I had to avert our eyes because of female AND male nudity. Be cautious. But, the sexual content does not ruin the film. Just be warned.

Les Miserables is by far the BEST movie I have seen him in. This movie was breathtaking! And when I say breathtaking, I don’t mean visually like the landscape or cinematography blew me away, when I say breathtaking, I mean this movie literally was slowly robbing me of my breath as each scene unfolded.

From the beginning, you are taken on a journey with Liam as he goes from rugged and bitter convict to a man who understands what Redemption means in his life. He’s a man who has been given a second chance and with that second chance he chooses to be a man of justice, mercy, understanding, and most of all, forgiveness. I really felt the inner-struggle he was having between the man he was and the man he is trying to be through his wonderful performance.

The film’s theme speaks very timelessly to all generations about redemption, forgiveness, grace, righting the wrongs you’ve done in your life with an abundance of mercy and compassion to other people, etc. The redemptive theme throughout this movie is what I really came away with loving about it. There’s something about watching a story unfold about a man whose past could likely destroy him and ultimately create destruction around him, yet decides to take his past and learn from it and pursue being a better man.

Another stand out performance in this movie came from Geoffrey Rush. Over the past 5 years or so I’ve become accustomed to seeing him as Captain Barbosa in Pirates of the Caribbean and have absolutely loved him in that role. Before this movie, I don’t think I’ve seen him in many movies when he was in his younger days. After watching his performance in this movie, I feel like I need to go back and watch all of the movies he has done. He plays a hell-bent, rule-abiding, strict-as-nails inspector who was one of the prison guards who watched over Liam when he was a convict. He plays this bitter inspector who doesn’t believe in any gray areas, to quote him, “There are 2 kinds of people: those who follow the law and those that break the law.” To him, you were either born as law breaker or born as a law abider.

I loved seeing the explosive chemistry between Liam and Geoffrey. Throughout the entire movie, you knew that it was all building up to some big moment involving them both, where they would have to face the reality of who they had become. And in the end, I was totally surprised!

Content Warning: This movie is rated PG-13 for violence, and for some sexual content. The violence is mainly during the French Revolution scenes and the sexual content involves Uma Thurman as a prostitute. She’s gets kind of beaten up and in the process her dress slips a little in the front and her chest is exposed some. It’s not too intense, but if a young one is watching, you might want them to shy away from that scene.

This movie was hard to watch. Literally, when it was over I felt exhausted. I felt used up. It was like I had spent every emotional “dollar” that I had and when it was all said and done, I was broke. Every time the scene changed, I almost feared what would happen next, I mean, could it get any worse? How much more can one man go through? Surely something good is about to happen, right? These were all questions I was asking myself during this film, secretly hoping that around the corner would come the bright light that would take Will away to a better place.

What I thought really added to the overall depressing and hopeless feel of the movie was the colors the director chose to use throughout the film. The suits the people wore, the brightness of the lights, the colors of the walls, they were all very boring and dull and monotone, and I really liked that. It really served as a great lens to see the movie through. A great scene to me was when Will’s character was told that he had to paint his apartment walls white to prolong paying his rent, because I thought it was a great metaphor for what kind of bright and pure person Chris Gardner was where ever he went. From his wife leaving, to him being thrown out on the street, to sleeping in a bathroom, to being hit by a car, to going all over town to sell overpriced scanning equipment and getting rejected left and right, through all of that, he had this huge smile on his face. He always said, “It’s going to be alright.”

One of the most touching and haunting scenes in the entire movie is when Will and his son have to spend the night (unbeknownst to his son) in the subway bathroom, and before they get there, Will pretends with his son that they have been transported through time to when the dinosaurs existed. I loved watching them play this scene out, and I loved Jaden’s reactions, where at first he didn’t believe because all he saw was a subway station, but because of his Dad’s belief, his Dad’s enthusiasm, his Dad’s passion, his Dad’s excitement, he came to believe that they were truly in a land with dinosaurs. That was such a high moment in the film that was soon followed by probably the most low point in the film when they are sleeping in the men’s bathroom and Will was holding the door closed with his foot while tears streamed down his face. I about lost it at that scene.

The last 10 minutes of the movie are some of the most emotional minutes in the entire film. The only thing that I was a little bothered by was that there wasn’t enough time to celebrate. [spoiler] The entire movie built up to this point, this critical point where we find out that he got the job he worked SO hard for, and we as the audience were only given about 8 minutes to celebrate with Will and Jaden. I wanted more. I wanted to cry more, and I wanted to see more of Will’s emotions, to see the explosion of joy that was sure to come over him.[/spoiler]

This is definitely a movie that I want to buy and have in my home to remind me that if I am passionate about something, I need to give everything I have in order to pursue it.

Content Warning: This movie is rated PG-13 for some language and it’s not that noticeable and in fact, I actually forgot that it even had any language. I’m not sure why it’s PG-13 for just language, but I can assume that it’s because of the depravity and the degree of depression that Will Smith goes through that may make it a little too much for the little ones.

When I first saw the trailer for this movie, I really had no idea what to expect. I am a huge Daniel Day-Lewis fan, and have been since Last of the Mohicans (”I will find you!”), and when I saw that he was in this movie, and I heard his voice…I guess I was initially expecting some sort of old “western” style Gangs of New York movie. I tagged it as a movie that would be slow going at first, introducing characters, learning about back stories through flashbacks, and one that would ultimately be building up to a huge showdown in the end where Daniel Day-Lewis would heroically, and violently, be killed in some artistic and graphic way…

…I’m not going to say if I was right or not and spoil the movie, but let’s just say that Daniel Day-Lewis has moved up to my Top 3 Actors list after this performance. I absolutely fell in love with his character. He’s a selfish and greedy oil business man who is out to own EVERY drop of oil and spend the money he gets from his every drop of oil on new ways to discover how to obtain even MORE drops of oil. He stops at nothing, at no one, and for no reason in attaining everything he wants…which is everything. His lust and greed drive who he is, it’s his identity, “I’m an oil man” is how he introduces himself, even the color of his skin is stained by the very oil that he so feverishly pursues. I’ve never seen a man, actor, or character in a movie, demand and command so much intimidation by just his voice. Everything revolves around him, he is the epicenter of this oil-filled world out in West Texas, and to everyone else, in order to get to the oil, you have to come through him…well, that’s what he wanted it to be like anyway.

Daniel Day-Lewis so brilliantly plays this character where throughout the movie, at different times, I found myself rooting for him to succeed, cursing his very existence as a character, tearing up for his failures, and at the end, wondering why I cared about him at all. His portrayal was nothing short of genius. Though at times I could copy and paste his portrayal of Bill “The Butcher” Cutting in Gangs of New York onto Daniel Plainview and it might match up pretty close, the difference in Daniel Plainview versus Bill, is that Daniel cares for no one, not even family, when it comes to getting what he wants. His pride, his arrogance, his shame, all of it was wrapped up in trying to get that next oil discovery…ultimately, that next dollar.

To quote one of my friends who I saw the movie with, “He was a killer before he ever became a killer.” The dialogue between the characters, especially from Daniel’s character to Paul Dano’s character Eli Sunday, will leave you wounded in the heart. I’ve never heard dialogue in movies like this. I was literally scared of the words. They were frighteningly real and penetrated you as they were hurled from character to character. At times, I felt like I was in the room with them and could feel the tension crawling around my skin like little pokey ants. It’s a feeling that I’ve never felt before from a movie…and I loved it.

To say that the score in this movie was good is the understatement of the century. In my opinion, a great score in a movie is one that creates itself as an actual character. When the score becomes an integral part of the movie, not just a pretty or thrilling decoration that you move your head to, that’s when it becomes monumental. The music in this movie (if it could be called that, at times it was just eerily sounding violins that scratched my eyes audibly) takes on a personality of its own and forces its way to the front of your mind as you try and concentrate on the dialogue and character, yet can’t figure out why all that you hear is the plickety-pluck of an old scary violin. I will never hear a violin again and not remember the images that flashed across my mind when the violins opened the movie…carrying us to the top of the peak, in its loudest volume, and leaving us there to figure out how to get down. Even now, I am still moved by the reminiscing sounds that are lingering in my memory of the movie’s score.

Shot mostly in West Texas, the landscape of the movie is desolate, dry, and well, West Texas. This movie won’t be awarded nor remembered for its cinematography or use of special new cameras, though I was very moved by just how empty it all was, which I think was a great symbol for what Daniel Plainview really felt…emptiness. Nothing about this movie will leave you smiling or feeling good about yourself, it’s not one of those movies. I do think we can take away the passion that Daniel had for his business and apply that to today’s life, but this is not a message movie. It is a gritty, real, raw, unadulterated, scary, violent, beautiful, haunting look at what greed looks like. What forms greed can take, and what monsters are born out of greed…

If this doesn’t win Best Picture at the Oscars or Daniel Day-Lewis doesn’t win for Best Actor, I will forever be boycotting the Oscars.

Content Warning: This movie is rated R for violence and some foul language, and for, in my opinion the only reason why it’s an R, intense imagery and situations that you do not want youth or kids seeing. The intensity alone deserves an R, but that coupled with how raw and unadulterated the action is, definitely makes it worth and R rating.

Bottom line, you will not forget it…and neither will I.