Watching Movies

We watched Philomena and August: Osage Country on dvd. Okay, yes, it is true, we are slow. The problem being that Sam and I don't really share the same tastes in movies. I like more human/life kind of stories and Sam likes action/animation, so we don't get to the movies so often because we rarely want to see the same movie.

Many of my friends have asked me over the last little while, have you seen Philomena? It is really good, my pick of the year said some, you should see it. So I had been looking forward to it. Well, shrug. I'm guessing without all the hype I probably would have liked it a lot more.

It is such a light on film. Suddenly it finished and I was left saying, Is that all there is? 

The cast is good. I think that Judi Dench is one of the most gifted actresses of our generation. She is just gorgeous, her acting is a joy to watch and her presence in any film adds a beautiful quality to it. He acting was exquisite as always, in this, in the minor detail of the character she inhabits. But the whole movie was just a bit light on. The trouble with this story was that it wasn't particularly interesting. We've heard it all before.

Then we watched August: Osage County. We went to bed to watch it and I found it to be repellent, to tell you the truth, and I switched it off halfway through not really intending to pick it up again. But, I did watch the end of it on Saturday and did enjoy it more. 

I think Streep's career is heading into decidedly shaky territory, as she is starting to go into caricature with her acting, which a lot of actors do fall prey to. I saw it first in The Iron Lady, where her depictions of a prime minister Thatcher were remarkable, it is true, but her depiction of Thatcher as a befuddled old lady was nothing but caricature and could have been played just as well by Matt Lucas.

I didn't completely buy the character of Vi or why those daughters would come home to her, father's death withstanding. Is that Streep's fault? Or is that the directors fault? Well, considering Streep is the grand dame of acting, she has to take some of the responsibility.

I'm not sure that I really liked either film. No, I like Philomena, I just wanted more.

We also watched World's End, which was stupidly funny. More stupid. I also got The Paperboy just to see Zac Efron in his undies... as you do.