"Okay who didn't arm their spaceship?" [Finland's representative slowly raises his hand]

I wanted to see Iron Sky as soon as I heard about it. Of course by now I've seen it like three times, but I never wrote anything about it. I guess it's never too late.

Iron Sky is about ... Nazis. Nazis who went to the moon in 1945 and now, well in 2018, they are coming back. Everything starts when President of United States has an election campaign to send two men to the moon - a proper astronaut who gets killed, and a male model who is then caught by Nazis, who get a bit shocked to find out that the man is... well, black. And then, after finding out how powerful "telephone computers" are, they decide to go to earth before they'll tear it apart. The idea is stupid, of course, but that's why it's so brilliant. It's so bizarre that you can't make a bad movie out of it. ...Well, you can, but you can't make a movie that is worse than the idea itself out of it.

I love Vivian Wagner very much - she's the character who seems to be in charge of the president's campaigns. At least she is designing stuff and she introduces president to the people who she thinks will help the president to get re-elected. I'd love to be specific why I love her, but I think telling that would be spoiling the movie. And I'm not taking any risks here.

And of course one thing why I have a special relationship with Iron Sky is that it's a Finnish movie. Well yeah, maybe with little help from Germany and Australia, but it's still... Finnish idea, Finnish movie and everything. And do you have any idea how cool it is to see a start of the movie, where they are landing on moon and effects are really nice and we just think "This... this is Finnish." It makes me feel very patriotic, I guess. 

But I really love the special effects and the scenery. I love how colours are used - or how they are not used, since most of the scenery is very grey, especially on the streets and on the base of the Nazis and all that. Effects are nice, but they aren't overused, I guess. They have some sort of unreal effect, but also they don't look too fake like they could in some B-movie. Not that I'd be judging B-movies, sometimes they do something right, so.

But still, the plot and the characters aren't worth watching the movie the second - or the third - time. It's worth the first time, then it seems very awesome, but after few times it's like... It doesn't give you anything new anymore. Very few movies do, but if they are good movies, you never get sick of them, no matter how often you watch them. But Iron Sky... If you're going to watch it, watch it once, and then not again until, like, when ten years has passed. Then it might be nice again.

☆☆☆☆☆

5/10

"Thought you didn't smoke." "I took it up recently, for my health."

Secret Window is based on a short story "Secret window, secret garden" by none other than Stephen King. I've read the short story - since the only things I can read from King are short stories. I'm not fond of his novels.

Author Mort Rainey is visited by a guy named John Shooter, who claims that Rainey has stolen his story. First Rainey doesn't believe him and claims he's a nutter, but after reading his manuscript he sees that the stories are almost indentical - apart from the ending. And that's what John Shooter is asking - Rainey needs to fix the ending he ruined, since Shooter's ending was perfect.

I've watched this movie when I was about 12, and it was almost as good as I remembered. Maybe watching it many times has ruined it from me. It seemed a lot more boring than I remembered. The only thing I really enjoy, funnily enough, is the ending. And I remember watching this for the first time, realising everything and it really fucked me up. But I think the movie was better than the short story. I think I don't like Stephen King as much as everyone else. I enjoy the movies, not his writing. I don't know why that is.

Usually I think that Johnny Depp is terribly overrated, but I like him in this movie. I can't imagine anyone else playing Mort Rainey - even if there probably is many people who would do that part just fine. It's just that that part is Depp's, and that's that.

And as a writer I enjoy every thriller and good drama where the main character is a write / an author, or whatever. That is something I can identify with much easier than simply characters from the same age group, same sex, or stuff like that. And even though I don't like King, he creates excellent writer characters. Maybe a bit unstable characters, sometimes, but of course that is what he aims for, I think.

But the movie is definitely worth watching.

☆☆☆☆☆☆

"I once read an interesting bit. Most people who die in the woods die of shame."

I saw commercial for The Edge when it was a movie of the week on Fox Finland. It was one of those annoying commercials that I saw ten times a week when watching How I Met Your Mother.

In the movie, three people are stranded on the forest, and they have to survive. Yeah, I said three people, and you can see that there's only two in the cover. Well, let's just say that the third man is black, and it's not very surprising that he dies first. Well anyway, the men must survive the nature, to find their way back to the cottage where they left. And the diabolic bear following and tormenting them doesn't help.

There's one thing that bothered me though - they were on a (very small) plane, and they crashed into a lake, and swam ashore then. But, this one man has matches in their pocket, and they are completely usable. And so are some kind of flares, or whatever they were (they were lost so soon I can't remember right now), and everything was completely useful even if they were all in water. I don't know how that is possible - I mean yeah, the matches were in the pocket, but I don't think Bob's jacket was extremely waterproof.

I really liked the actors. I mean well, it was mostly watching Baldwin and Hopkins, but both of them were very good. I haven't really seen Baldwin anywhere, apart from Beetlejuice, but I don't remember much of that. But he was okay here. And Hopkins was just as marvellous as always - I read on IMDb that he suffered from slipped disk throughout filming, but went with it. I think that's incredible. And he somehow looked extremely gorgeous in this movie. I think I'm praising him too much.

The nature looked very amazing here. And it looked like the kind of forest we have here in Finland. It almost made me want to go camping in the forest or something. Maybe I should do that when we get rid of the snow - and the people who ski. 

The music in this movie reminded me of the music in Silence Of The Lambs. But the composer isn't the same. Maybe it was the eerie atmosphere in the music.. Maybe.

I saw a person on the message boards in IMDb claiming that this was "the stupidest survival movie ever", and I have to disagree with them, as do so many others. The person claimed that it wasn't realistic like "how did they do this and that", while in the very beginning of the film it was made clear that Hopkins' character knew quite a lot about  many things. I think that was a good thing - character reading a lot, knowing a lot, and when it's time when you need that knowledge, someone has it. I'm not saying everything in this movie is very realistic, I mean very few movies are completely realistic, but then what would be the point of making fiction if everything had to be realistic? But I think The Edge was somewhat realistic - apart from the match thing that  bothered me. But the movie gave me an itch to watch more survival movies. Maybe I should finish that one survival game I still haven't finished... 

Also, I never knew I'd hear Anthony Hopkins say "motherfucker."

☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆½

"It's as important to be able to describe what I'm doing as it is to do what I'm doing."

I saw the trailer of Chloe when watching Red, and I thought I would most definitely watch it - partly because of Julianne Moore, who I adore so very much, and partly because it seemed very interesting. The main character of the film Catherine, played by Julianne Moore, thinks her husband (Liam Neeson) is cheating on her. So, she hires an escort (Amanda Seyfried) to seduce him, to see what he would do, but... well, things get a bit out of hand.

I liked the movie very much. It was nicely erotic and also intense, and those two were nicely mixed. I don't know. Basically, if I categorise this simply as a drama - not paying attention to the genres "thriller" and "mystery", Chloe was everything I look for in a drama. But since it also was a thriller, I enjoyed it very much. (Thrillers are slowly becoming my favourite genre, I think). Maybe the plot was a bit confusing sometimes and some things weren't as clear as some people want them to be. But, well, I guess I like the movies where anyone can somehow have their own theories, like there was a lot of discussion about Chloe's character in IMDb Message boards, so I formed my own opinion about the character and her motives and such.

But I don't think I can figure out one thing I didn't like about this movie. Okay, maybe I didn't like Catherine and David's son, but then again - we never got to know anything about him. He went to therapy, okay, but what for? So, he seemed a bit annoying, but I guess that's mostly because we can't understand the character properly. But that's... okay, since the movie wasn't about him. But no matter how often I say that everything shouldn't be said, it would be nicer to explain characters like that. But that's the only thing that bothers me - but then again there wouldn't have been a scene where they would've explained everything. Like, why would the parents suddenly start talking about why he's in therapy and all that, since they already know? 

Anyway, I liked the movie, and I would recommend it to anyone, who enjoys drama, and... well, somewhat complicated drama. I guess.

☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆

---

Also, by the way, I'm going to start tagging all the movie reviews as the genres, since... Well, I don't want to tag everything simply as "movies", since that would mean that tag would eventually be quite full. So I'm going to do it this way. (Maybe one day my blog will consist almost only on movie reviews and all the other tags could get... smaller. I don't know.)

"You think I'm just going to roll over for you hegemonic, Mickey Mouse-loving Americans?" "Leave Mickey out of it!"

Well, I didn't thought I'd say this about a movie, but I loved the sequel more than the original - and for other reasons that Anthony Hopkins, whose performance I must talk to you later. But I liked the plot more, it was interesting, and I loved the bad guy more. Seriously, he was more interesting than the bad guy in the previous movie - who was some sort of vice-president who went crazy in the war and killed people, and then he even wasn't the bad guy and everything was really complicated! But it was much clearer here - well at one point - and the bad guy was jolly good, all my love to him.

Well, now it was easier to me to realise the names of the characters! Maybe they just said the names more often. And again, someone had hired someone to kill Bruce Willis' character - whose name is Frank, by the way. I don't know if I prefer Karl Urban's version of this characters or Byung-hun Lee. Not that they are the same character, just the type of character, and what's their in purpose in the plot. But Byung-hun Lee also did a marvellous  job.

Oh yes, the plot. Well, someone has published something on Wikileaks, about something called "Nightshade", which appears to be a weapon of mass-destruction, created by Doctor Bailey, who the main characters thought was dead. But, Bailey has been locked up for 32 years. And so, they free this man, and they go find the bomb, trying to get rid of it. This is probably not what would be said on the cover of the movie, but that's how I'd explain it. 

Now I could talk about Anthony Hopkins, since his character was a new add. Well, a new add that was interesting, and a bit useful to the plot, I mean that Russian agent, Katja, wasn't that important to the plot and she still was there, I don't know. But Anthony Hopkins played Dr. Bailey, which sort of was funny... Since, uh, he was locked up in "asylum for the criminally insane", and when they opened up his cell, he was listening to classical music. But... it took few seconds and your realise his character was far from Hannibal Lecter. But seriously, Hopkins is amazing actor, and I guess it's partly his fault that Red 2 was so much better than the first one.

Again, maybe the plot isn't anything special, it's an action film plot, but I enjoyed it nevertheless. Definitely worth watching, and I will probably watch it again one day. 

"Frank, I never thought I'd say this again. I'm getting the pig!"

RED stands for Retired, Extremely Dangerous.

I wanted to watch RED ever since I had my Bruce Willis phase last year. I don't know how big my phase seemed here, I mean did I watch more than every Die Hard? Probably not. I can't remember. But now I thought that I could watch it - mostly because, you know, I've found another actor I like, and he is in the second part.  So yeah.

But basically anyone who is anyone is in RED - Bruce Willis, Morgan Freeman, John Malkovich, Helen Mirren, Brian Cox, Karl Urban... So many actors, so many very bad-ass actors. But there's the little thing that I don't even remember any names of the characters. Basically I've just been referring to the actors in my mind. So basically the movie is about retired CIA agent who someone is trying to kill, and then he gets his old team back and they start... well, fighting back, trying to figure out what all this is about. Yup. And well, Mary-Louise Parker isn't a veteran actor, she's Willis' character's love interest, and she gets dragged into all of this because Willis' character decides to visit her, even though CIA is following him and all that. Yup, very good explanation on the plot. 

But I don't know if the plot is any better than in any action packed movie, but I didn't mind. Maybe action comedies aren't meant to be watched for the plot rather than... other stuff. And okay, the plot isn't bad, but it isn't so special either, it's a basic action plot. But I really liked the movie. It was fun, really fun. I didn't even think I ould like John Malkovich, but he did fantastic job. I wish Freeman had a bigger part, but then again I'm not that big of a fan, I mean I've seen him only in few movies so I don't know. I just don't see him as an action hero? He seems more like a drama guy.

But, anyway, I really liked RED, and I'm looking forward to see the sequel.

"Stop the Postman!" "How? How? With what?" "Me! Me! Me! Me! Meeee!"

I watched magic because my dad mentioned it to me after I watched everything from Silence of the lambs to Hannibal Rising. Of course he recommended it - it had Anthony Hopkins in it, and it is a thriller, so what could be more suitable? The movie is from 1978, and when I watched the trailer it seemed so fucking lame, and something... well, a B-movie. But... it was surprisingly good.

And by surprisingly good I mean surprisingly fucking terrifying. Especially the music - they could be playing any kind of melody, but it was easily turned creepy when they played that certain thing they played in harmonica, to somehow emphasize Fats, the ventriloquist dummy the main character Corky had. Like - there's a sex scene. And the music on that scene is really beautiful music played with violins. But, then, the camera goes to the dummy few times, when it is sitting in the next room, and that harmonica music strikes again, and it's really creepy - and effective!

Corky was supposed to get examined so he could work on TV, but he didn't want to. And the way he claims there is nothing wrong with him - in quite beginning of the movie - really suggests the opposite. And I think even before that, there was a moment when Corky was completely alone in the room, and he still talked to Fats and the other way around. So... it was pretty clear that Corky wasn't as completely fine as he claimed he was. Also, closer to the end, the way Fats got Corky to do almost everything he wanted to - it was pretty creepy also. "Smile, frown, do a spin, touch the ceiling, grab the knife in my suitcase." 

It was amazing. And let's just praise Hopkins' acting skills on that one! And let's just praise his skills on the whole movie, because he made it pretty awesome. I need to watch more movies with him. 

(Now I have a mental image of me sitting on the sofa with Anthony Hopkins, watching movies and eating popcorn, discussing about it sophistically afterwards.)

I may not have explained everything here as well as I should've. I mean the plot is hard to explain just like - even the trailer doesn't give you the full idea. Basically - Corky doesn't want to get examined, he flees to a place where he thinks he could find the woman he has loved all his life, and he finds her, and at the same time he is going crazy. So, if that doesn't make you interested, just... you should still watch it. It's very suspenseful, ending was perfect, all that. So if you don't mind watching an "old" movie, then go ahead. It's really nice... and creepy.

"We tried sodium amatol on him three years ago to find where he buried a Princeton student; he gave 'em a recipe for potato chip dip."

I wouldn't say that Manhunter is the worst movie I've seen. But it most certainly is the most disappointing one.

Manhunter's story is the same as in Red Dragon. It's based on the same book, same characters, everything. And you know how much I liked Red Dragon, and how much I liked the book. Well, Manhunter is so bad compared to both of those. I mean yeah, movie doesn't need to strictly follow the book, but I would prefer if they'd keep the right ending in the movie. And well, yeah, basically the ending was the same, but they... made it too quick. Everything was solved too quickly - in Red Dragon you think it is over, but then it continues. But Manhunter just quits the movie when it seems right. And that was a complete and utter mistake. Also, they didn't introduce us properly to Francis Dolarhyde. And his relationship with Reba - everything happened in one day. What the fuck?

I was looking forward to seeing yet another actor portraying Dr. Lecter. But no, Brian Cox was there only for three different scenes. That might be more than in the book, but it still was very little. So I didn't get much out of him. But for what I saw he seemed... just wrong. Not even so much different compared to Hopkins, Ulliel or Mikkelsen, he just seemed... weird and wrong. Of course Hopkins had much more screen time in Red Dragon, since he is a superstar and all, but I don't know. Maybe Dr. Lecter wasn't that big of a deal then, before Silence of the Lambs.

Also the music was so annoying, it was straight from the eighties - well, the movie was made in the eighties - but it was like they didn't even try at all. 

Manhunter seems like a total B-movie, and if you consider watching it, I recommend that you shouldn't. Just stick to Red Dragon, book and the movie. 

"Good evening, Herr Kolnas. You drink better wine that you serve."

Again, just like with Hannibal, I only heard bad things about Hannibal Rising. One person said, that it's like Harris tried to make it too much of a sob story. Again, I have to disagree with this person. I think Hannibal Rising was just fine. It could've been much worse.

Also there's the fact that the screenplay was made by Harris. I don't think he made he other screenplays, at least I didn't notice that. So that makes the movie at least mostly what Thomas Harris wanted it to be, I guess. Also, there's the fact that Harris created the character, so I guess he knows how the story of him truly goes - from the beginning to the end. Of course we can always criticise him, but he creates a character the way he wants to. So there's that.

I really enjoyed Gaspard Ulliel's  acting. He was brilliant, even when Hannibal was partly mute, and when he first opened his mouth - more than just screaming Mischa's name in his sleep - I knew he was perfect for the role. And he truly was. He had something that Hopkins' Hannibal had, but still something less and something more, and just in the right way. But some facial expressions truly reminded me of Anthony Hopkins, and that's always nice. And also, Ulliel's appearance somehow reminds me of Mads Mikkelsen, especially their lips are very much alike.

I don't know how to comment on the story. I knew most of the stuff already, thanks to the Internet. But ... Well, I like the story. And the character development was nice. And I got more proof that Hannibal isn't a psychopath / sociopath. Well, there was one moment where he kind of flipped out, went completely bonkers (really nice way to say it), but it still didn't seem like he went totally insane. It's like it was that one moment, one painful truth that he couldn't bear. But then again - who could bear that? 

"Tell me Clarice, would you ever say to me 'Stop. If you loved me, you'd stop'?" "Not in a thousand years."

What I had heard about this movie before was that it's bullshit. I think my dad used the word "juvenile." (Actually he used a word of our dialect that can't be fully translated.) But then again, what the Internet and cover of the movie - and the book - have said, everything was quite positive.

What's my stand? Well, Hannibal certainly isn't as good as Silence Of The Lambs, but I didn't expect it to be. Also, I sort of liked it. But I'll see if I like it after I've read the book, and I see the true differences between the book and the movie. But I really like the movie now. It was very suspenseful, but also in a different way than Silence Of The Lambs. The thrill, the weird charge between Clarice and Dr. Lecter was always distanced, with a glass or bars between them. Now, there wasn't glass or bars, Dr. Lecter wasn't in prison or asylum any more. At first, though, characters are still distanced, since Clarice is in US, Dr. Lecter is in Florence. Later on they, of course, meet again, and there it is - the tension that were there in the Silence of the Lambs.

But then again - tension and chemistry is a bit different. Mostly because in Silence of the Lambs it was between Anthony Hopkins and Jodie Foster - in Hannibal it's between Anthony Hopkins and Julianne Moore. I really liked Foster as Clarice, but I don't have anything bad to say about Moore either. She's a fantastic actress, and she was just as good as Clarice Starling as Foster was. But of course there's differences there too - but the stories are 10 years apart, of course Starling would be a different person after ten whole years. In Silence of the Lambs she isn't even an agent, she's a trainee. in Hannibal she's a full-time agent, already used to everything. So, Moore's Clarice is a bit more mature, if  that is the right word to use.

Of course the movie had it's juvenile moments, that were a bit like "ugh", but still, I think the suspense in the movie sort of made up for all that. 

Also, maybe we got something else out of Lecter's character as well. End of this movie was a proof that he's not a complete psychopath. You do know what psychopath is? Lack of empathy and feelings would be one of the most recognisable characteristics. You can look it up. But Lecter definitely has some kind of feelings for Clarice - really complicated feelings but they are there. If he was a complete psychopath, there wouldn't be any feelings at all, I think. But I think this makes Lecter's character truly scarier than other serial killer characters. They are so clearly insane, it's not convincing character anymore. But then there's Dr. Lecter, who is so clearly sane it's scary. He's completely aware of everything he does, so if he had a mental illness or anything, he'd be a psychopath, but his relationship with Clarice proves otherwise.

"The whole town is listening. Tell me! What do you want to say?"

I don't know how much my readers are interested in / know about Danish cinema, so let me clarify the story of Jagten to you. Lucas is a teacher in kindergarten teacher, trying to get his son's custody, but everything gets - excuse my language - fucked up, when a daughter of his best friends claims that Lucas has showed her his penis. And after that, so many other children seem to say that Lucas has molested them, which makes him easily the most hated person in town, even though he hasn't done anything. But since kids never lie, no one wants to hear him defending himself. 

After you realise what the story is, the whole movie turns so agonizing. You feel bad for Lucas, but you can't really hate anyone who accuses and / or hates him, since they honestly think that Lucas has molested kids. Because if you heard that kind of stuff about someone, of course you'd hate them. But yeah, you can't really blame or hate anyone for how they react. Not even the kid that caused the problem, because well, she's a kid, and sincerely feels bad about everything that's going on. But I think that's what made the film awesome. There's no simple good guys or bad guys, which is a really good thing about a drama movie. Also, there's no side to choose, you just watch it, knowing that Lucas is innocent, but there's no way to be on anyone's side. I don't know.

The scenery of this film was really breathtaking. Autumn looked so beautiful with all the colours, first snow looked like it was straight from a fairytale.

The ending was a bit weird. It just happened and you get no explanation what happened, suddenly it's just next year and ... yeah. 

Danish actors and Danish movies are just starting to seem more and more better than the average Hollywood crap we get from everywhere. I'm so glad I have so many fantastic Danish movies left to watch. So hear my advice: watch Danish movies. Or Swedish, Norwegian, even Finnish... anything Nordic. We know what we're doing. (Before any Finnish reader says that Finnish movies are crap, then you're just not looking hard enough.)

"When I spit in the eye of the gods, then I'll smile."

Look, I started with the new movies already. Clash of the Titans is the first movie I've seen in 2014. And to be honest, what would be a better start for the year than an action film based on ancient Greek mythology. ...Or something.

The effects were pretty awesome. In the opening credits were Io told the back story he effects had a somewhat 3D feeling, even though I wasn't watching it in 3D. And also, thank god for that back story, otherwise I would've been a bit lost, not knowing what exactly it was about. Of course I would've eventually figure it out, but I didn't check at all what the movie was about, so at least I got a bit of knowledge about the movie. 

 Casting was great, but also a bit... Well, watching the big three of Greek gods. Zeus has trained Batman, Poseidon created Wolverine and Hades ate that Red Dragon painting by Blake. Ha! Also, at first I was like "Damn, Perseus isn't bad at all, he's pretty hot", and after Draco is on screen I go all "oh lord mercy." Yup, that's the power of Mads Mikkelsen. ... Yes, he was in this, that's why I watched the movie.

If I have anything to complain it's probably whitewashing. I mean it's ancient Greek, I don't think they were that white there. But I don't know. Also there weren't so many ass kicking ladies as I'd wish, but Io, or whatever her name was, was a pretty awesome character. And I also liked badass Medusa with the bow and all. 

But Clash of the Titans wasn't bad at all. It was just alright as any action packed film, no more or less.

(I needed shorter tag than "new films I've seen in 2014" so for this year it shall be movie watching project 2014, so yeah.)