UN PROPHÈTE

Directed by: Jacques Audiard
Run time: 149 min

This movie is the reason why I like films; the story is solid and unforgiving. This is not your usual Hollywood mayhem movie glorifying mafia and crime, and although the story itself centered in a prison, it is not about surviving or escaping, it is about 'An education' in the truest sense of the word.

A Prophet (the English title) serves up crime as a metaphor for life and power. Just like last year's Gomorrah, this is surely 2010 best film not to be missed. The (anti)hero Malik (Tahar Rahim), is a rootless man. From his Mediterranian look people can mistake him for an Arab, French, even Corsican. Malik has no family or friends, he doesn't feel to belong to any social group. Why he is in prison is not clear and like any inmates he say that he is innocent.

As Malik enter the prison to serve his six years sentence, he is an loner newbie, being beaten by other inmates. But opportunities arose as the Corsican mobsters that rule the prison led by Cesar Luciani (Niels Arestrup), orders him to kill another inmates named Teyeb (Hichem Yacoubi) or he will be killed.

Malik kill Reyeb clumsy, messy and brutal, by hiding a razor in his mouth and use it to slit Reyeb's throat. The murder itself is gore at its best, it will make you squirm. As time goes by, Malik is trusted by Cesar to do his errand, in other words, prison opened opportunities to Malik he would never had in real life. As Malik learns a lot of things (learn to read, speak Corsican, managing to be a small drug dealer), he rose from a newbie to a self-made, self-taught mafia boss and it is too late for Cesar to learn, that his pupil already outsmart him. Malik has undergone a twisted transformation from a nobody to become a somebody.

There is one scene that is very strong and subtle. As Malik is ordered by Cesar to go to Marseille on his leave day (it is really weird that in French prison, prisoner with good behaviour can leave prison for 12 hours and then return to the prison. This chance is used by Cesar to order Malik to do things outside the prison), he passes the metal detector gate at the airport and as the security man check him, Malik all the sudden open is mouth and show his tongue to be checked although he was not asked to.

In prison Malik used to be searched by opening his mouth, so that certain mentality has been imprinted in him no matter where he is. It means that you can take the man out of prison, but not the prison mentality. That one scene itself explain everything about Malik's nature.

Director Jacques Audiard is a talented director. I have seen The Beat that My heart skipped (2005) and I can say that Jacques could be the equivalent of Martin Scorsese or Francis Ford Copolla in Europe.

This film is different than Goodfellas or The Godfather since it use neo-realistic approach by never try to make any scene look beautiful, but real and gritty. It is epic without having need to use wide lenses and good without any marquee name.

If you wonder why you like movies, this one will surely brings you the reason why. A Prophet swept all major categories this year's Cesar Awards, the French Oscars. It won the Grand Jury Prize at Cannes Film Festival and I can say that all the awards is well deserved.

SHUTTER ISLAND

Directed by: Martin Scorsese
Run time: 138 min

In the 50s, a woman is missing from Shutter Island, a remote island off Boston, where a Civil War-era fort has been changed into an institution for the criminally insane. The noir Arkham Asylum based on the novel fof the same title from Dennis Lehane, brought to the screen by the one and only, Martin Scorsese.

To this island travel U.S. Marshal Teddy Daniels (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his partner Chuck Aule (Mark Ruffalo). They are assigned to investigate the missing woman. How come she is gone from her locked cell and why do the institution looks spooky with people who seem to withheld secret information? What is actually going on in Shutter Island? Is there a secret experiment going on? Or is there something more?

Teddy is a clueless character, coming to the island with heavy baggage, the death if his wife in the fire and his memory of liberating Dachau concentration camp in the World War II where he see inhumane things happened.

Soon, like peeling onion layers, mysteries resolved and everyone is treated to a twist that will makes them scratch their head because this film will not just give you the easy answer because they have to fit the unfit puzzle.

Uncertainty is the key to understand this film. Martin Scorsese has successfully tease viewer's sense and take it to the endless maze. Bits by bits the viewers know more about the mysteries surrounding Shutter Island, the lines between sanity and insanity, reality and delusion began to merge.

It doesn't mean bad, since by leaving things uncertain, the director best known for Taxi Driver and Raging Bull, has proven he still has an edge in making good movies. The lensing is powerful and the editing is tight, leave no wasted time and space at all, thus make the story not draggy.

As for those who doesn't like to think, this film is confusing and not interesting at all but for those who wanted to see top notch directing and acting with twisted plots in the spirit of The Machinist, Mulholland Drive and Memento, this one is a must see this year.

If you think this film is mind boggling, wait until you see Triangle, an underrated film from 2009 which will left you dumbfounded for days and has more twist than this one.

PRECIOUS

Directed by: Lee Daniels
Run time: 109 min

Overweight, child out of wedlock, incest. Whoa, that is more than enough to make you depressed. However Precious is not an outstanding movie at all but not bad at all, in fact I think it stands in between, it is actually interesting and not boring. It feels as depressing as Revolutionary Road but also entertaining. What is the word for that anyway? It is the feeling of sympathy mixed with entertainment.

Precious (Gabourey Sidibe) has inferiority complex, she is overweight, illiterate, her father raped her twice and she has been pregnant (again) by his father. To makes things worse, her mother is very abusive, hurling not only verbal assault to her, but physical as well. In this cruel world, Precious must fight so she can be precious again.

In the hand of a generic director this film will be the generic kitchen sink drama where viewers will cry at given cues. But this film stand beyond that, it will not make you cry wildly nor sobbing, but it will make you sympathize with the plight of the poor and abused person.

If there are things that redeem the landscape of despair this film offers, is the two women who want life to be better for Precious. They are Mrs. Weiss (Mariah Carey) the social worker and Ms. Rain (Paula Patton), her teacher who consistently wanted to make the life of their students better.

Gabourey is shining in this film and Mariah Carey is just stunning, you hardly recognize her here. Mo'Nique is also shining, playing the abusive chain smoker mother, she deserved the Oscar.

CRAZY HEART

The harder the life, the sweeter the song.

Directed by: Scott Cooper
Run time: 112 min

I have no expectation whatsoever for this film so as I watched it, it came as a surprise that Colin Farrell is here and he sings country song.

Actually the reason I watch this because Jeff Bridges already won Best Actor at the Oscars, so I kind of expect Daniel Day Lewis's performance in There Will Be Blood sort of thing. My expectations were too high since Jeff Bridges is just okay in this film.

Sure he played a burn out country singer who try to find his redemption and love in his old age. That itself is an Oscar material, but the story itself is not that satisfying. It is not as good as The Wrestler.

So why did Jeff Bridges won an Oscar? Because he has been nominated four times (speaking of most nomination with no winning Peter O'Toole is the master of this category) and the same reason why Martin Scorsese won Best Director for The Departed not for Taxi Driver or Raging Bull: because it is their turn this time and there might be no next time at all so better give it now or history will be harsh to the Academy.

Kinda cruel? I don't think so since I think that sometimes some awards given by the Oscar were given because it it their 'turn', although still deserved, not because the film has risen beyond horizon.

Check Gran Torino for instance. Why hasn't it won Oscar for Best Picture? Because Clint Eastwood already won Oscar from Unforgiven and Million Dollar Baby, it's time to give it to someone else (Paul Thomas Anderson anyone?).

Honestly I don't like the 'it's my turn' principle. I think Gran Torino and There Will Be Blood should won many Oscars instead of that generic Slumdog Millionaire regardless whether Clint has won Oscar for his previous movies or not.

To think that Slumdog won as many Oscars as Amadeus is an atrocity, (Amadeus is superb while Slumdog is just okay) not that I hate Slumdog, but I think There Will Be Blood is more deserved.

Back to the movie, the story is not that bad, it is just okay. What makes it stand out is the performance of Maggie Gyllenhaal and Colin Farrell. Sure Jeff gives all his talents by making Bad Blake (his character) a sympathetic and broken down alcoholic loser without too much self pity, but seeing other best actor nomination this year, he won easily. It's not like he is up against Sam Rockwell in Moon anyway. Wait the minute, even the academy fail to pay attention to the superbly made Moon. Crazy Heart? I am not so crazy about it.

HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON

Directors: Dean DeBlois and Chris Sanders

Following the template of most animation movies (a misfit try to fit in the world, finds something new and then find that he is unique and doesn't have to change a bit), at first I thought this will be another generic Dreamworks animation with too much pop culture reference. But this film is beyond my expectation, there is no annoying pop culture reference and anyone can enjoy this film.

Hiccup (voiced by Jay Baruchel) is a weak Viking teenager who doesn't fit in with his tribe's tradition of slaying dragons. This makes his father, Stoick (Gerard Butler), the tribal leader, disappointed since in Viking tradition every young man must stand up and fight dragons.

But after Hiccup accidentally capture one dragon he named as Toothless, he discovers a new way of making friends with dragon, instead of slaying them. There he is caught between his affection for Toothless and the world he lives in, which despise dragons.

As Toothless take Hiccup through a fantastic ride, it makes you wish that the seat you were sitting could also sway to the left and right with water sprayed on your face (to make it a 4 D experience). The animation itself is flawless, the flying scene itself almost as breath taking as Neytiri and Jake Sully takes banshee to roam the sky of Pandora.

Not only that, you can see that the viking youth were trained to kill dragons and Hiccup find a way to control how Toothless fly in a way that looks like he is riding a bike. Toothless itself is adorable, with his eyes, he communicate. I like it that the dragons cannot talk at all since if dragons can talk than this film will be as crappy as Transformers (talking robots? WTF?).

Judging from the story alone, with a simple twist at the end, Dreamworks has reached Pixar's level of telling a heart warming story about tolerance and understanding.

This is what 3 D animated movies are supposed to be, not only use 3 D as a gimmick but as a tool to enhance your visual experience by not sacrificing the story.

THE COVE

Directed by: Louie Psihoyos
Run Time: 92 min

As always documentary has the power to shock and make people realize things they never knew at all. Take this fact for instance, that 23.000 dolphin was killed in one year in Japan alone and how sonar in dolphin is more sophisticated than what human have made.

The fact unearthed by this film is shocking, on how the fisherman in a small but beautiful town of Taiji, Japan kill dolphin in a bloody way. Taiji itself is number one dolphin exporter to sea world theme park all over the world and seeing on how the city seem to honor dolphin, it is shocking to see the previously unknown to the rest of the world, scenes of dolphin slaughtered in cold blood by the fisherman in the cove, the hidden location where the fisherman trap dolphins to be slaughtered.

Not just that, renown dolphin trainer Ric O’Barry has managed to get the horror scene by conducting a spy operation worthy of a James Bond style. You will be treated to some heart pounding acts by Ric friends who try to elude cops and the fisherman in order to get the harrowing scenes. By planting high tech cameras at strategic place, including the one that can record sound underwater, the viewers can see the cruelty more vividly than ever.

Why are the crew doing that? Because the townspeople of Taiji doesn't want anyone to film their 'secret' activity. The Cove also tells about the dangers of eating dolphin's meat and japan's political stance in whaling policy.

There are many documentaries angry about the human destruction of the earth and let's not forget Avatar, a science fiction movie set in Pandora with imperialism and natural destruction at it's theme which is the highest grossing film of all time, remind us how we, humans are the one that destroy nature but also the one who can save it.