Overrated? I'll take Monster's Ball and raise you Titanic

Yesterday, I watched a film I haven’t seen in years; Monster’s Ball. I first watched it when I was eleven and I’ve come to realise that I really didn’t get it. The story is much more complex than it was in my head and generally much better than I remembered. The performances are great, Halle Berry really deserved her Oscar. It also serves as a tribute to Health Ledger, someone we lost way too soon. After being told, I knew that it was him in Monster’s Ball but had not recollection of him. Like most of the actors, he too was amazing. For some reason I remembered Billy Bob-Thornton’s character to more sinister than he actually was. All in all, it’s a very good film. Naturally, not everyone agrees.

The people at Premier decided one day to put out their list of the 20 most overrated films of all time. On this are some films that are far from overrated. To overrate something is to value it too highly and for many of the films on the list this is not the case. The reasons given for why Monsters Ball is overrated were:

Everyone loves seeing pretty people in desperate situations, but this
southern drama is so tragic, it's absurd. Pity Leticia Musgrove: First her
husband is executed. Then her son, who in addition to being saddled with being chubby, gets killed in a hit-and-run accident. Fortunately, Musgrove finds refuge in the arms of Hank, whose father is an alcoholic racist and whose son commits suicide.Enough! Maybe with a more plausible leading lady (say, Angela Bassett), this sobfest would have gained some credibility. But a few sweat stains and exposed breasts weren't enough to transform Halle Berry into an actress worthy of an Oscar.

So tragic, it’s absurd? More unbelievable things have happened in film. The tragedy depicted on screen is perfectly plausible and it is ab aspect of the story that partially explains why Hank and Leticia are drawn to each other (ever heard the term united by tragedy?). As I mentioned before, Halle Berry’s performance was Oscar worthy. The statement has the concept of why someone wins an Oscar the wrong way around. The Oscar is not given based on the actor/actress being Oscar worthy, it is based on whether the performance they gave (regardless of any previous performances) was so spectacular that that is could be classed as the best performance in that category of that year. Berry showed charter progression and real emotion. That, Premier, is why she won and deserved to win best actress. People are very quick to say that the sex scene is the biggest or most important part of the film. What I can say is at least it was relevant to the storyline unlike many scenes out there is movie-land. The scene shows transition; it marks a new chapter in the lives of the main protagonist and stylistically, it is impressive. They also need to remember that it Berry, not the film that many comment on, their reasoning reflects this.

Another film featured in the list was Clerks and here’s why:

Kevin Smith's Clerks is a little funny and a lot boring, just like Dante Hicks, the convenience store cashier it follows for one long, pointless day. This trifle's lame acting and anemic plot were celebrated for their street cred because the slackers among us could relate and the critics all wanted to seem cool. So, sure, a cornchip shark in a salsa sea is funny when you're drunk. But a movie shouldn't require beer goggles. And moving the camera occasionally orhiring unknown actors who can actually act doesn't cost any extra, even if you've only got $27 grand.

Clerks is not just known because slackers can relate to it. It is a film that most of the population can relate to. It relates to having to grown up, having to change for the better and the choice of whether to do what you want of what it technically best for you. Overrated, I think not, most of the world has not even heard of Clerks for them to hold it in high regard. The dialogue is funny and original, many need to remember that originality is becoming a rare commodity.

Forrest Gump? I kind of see where you’re coming from but I still disagree. Their reasoning:

Being There, done that—only not quite as well. Gump makes a big, sloppy show of adoring its puerile hero to the degree of adopting his idiotic notion that whatever life gives you—be it the growth of your Apple stock or the death of a spouse from AIDS—is like a chocolate bonbon. The film is just a short-bus joke wrapped in cloying nostalgia and faux empathy. Robin Wright Penn's Jenny is redeemed by marrying the pure Forrest, but the junkie whore still must die, a plot contrivance that reveals the film's misguided moralism.

Forrest Gump is a film that takes the audience through many of the biggest moments on history. The phrase “Life is like a box of chocolates” does not mean that everything is life is good and sweet, regardless of how dreadful it is. It simply means that life is a bit of a wild card, the event cannot be predicted. Jenny death, is relevant as a marker in history. It reflects the ongoing problem of diseases such as AIDs in the world. People are dying and for Jenny not die would be to condescend the audience. What I do think is that Forrest Gump is overrated to an extent (that’s not say that I don’t own it). I believe that Forrest Gump was given a huge amount of recognition at the time (I say at the time because Forrest Gump is not often listed as on of critics’ top films nowadays), it won a large amount of Oscars, some of which, it believe should have went to other films.

I’ve written more than I expected and I’m a bit too tired to write about more.

Premier's 20 Most Overrated Movies of All Time

Podcasts was it?

Right...podcasts. Ahhh yes. On the last most I made a little promise to talk about podcasts in this post. Good on me.I think i'll start off by defining what a podcast is. A podcast, according to pcmag.com 

can be defined as:

(iPOD broadCAST) An audio broadcast that has been converted to an MP3 file or other audio file format for playback in a digital music player or computer. The "pod" in podcast was coined from "iPod," the predominant portable, digital music player, and although podcasts are mostly verbal, they may contain music.  

Many make the mistake of thinking that podcasts were invented by Apple for iPods and iTunes; this is not the case. Podcast were availiable online before iTunes put the little Podcast tab on its left hand menu. Apple was very smart and decided to name these little audio broadcast after the iPod and adopt Podcasts as their own. Pure Genius.

I listen to quite a few podcasts, I think I’ve mentioned some before. The main podcast that I listen to is Movies You Should See from the interdependent podcast network, Simply Syndicated. I stumbled upon MYSS back in my hardcore Star Trek days. I was on the Star Trek message boards every day, my whole life was Star Trek. (It sounds like I’m in an AA meeting well, STA Meeting). Anyhoo, the people of Simply Syndicated left a post on the Star Trek message boards about their Star Trek podcast, Make It So. Being the Trekkie I was, I went onto their website and listened to the two Make it So podcasts they had done so far, one of which was about swearing in Star Trek. It was hilarious, much better than Treks in Sci-Fi but I’ll get onto that later. As Make it So was so great, I listened to Movies You Should See. They had podcasts on quite a few movies I’d seen. Movies You Should See was even better than Make it So shock/horror. Due to the humour, I say humour but I mean comedy that may leave you aching from laughing so hard I wouldn’t suggest listening to Movies You Should See or Make it So in public.

Another podcast I listen to from the Simply Syndicated network is The Definitive Word. This features Will Tristram, an occasional guest on many Simply Syndicated shows, as he and his guests discuss the arts, society, popular culture and life in the 21st Century. There many intellectual debates such as “Top Ten Cartoon Ladies”. The Definitive Word is none other than perfection in audio form. Despite the example that I gave, it is possible to learn quite a bit (largely from the Hong Kong law episode) as well as have a good old laugh.

Or do you think that’s just bollocks, well, do you? Or do you think that’s just bollocks is yet another podcast from the Simply Syndicated team. It stars “Ranting” Richard Smith the tech wizz of the group as he, as you may have guessed, rants about any topic he wishes. Some, I must say, are close to my heart such as the nonsense that is Virgin Media (stealing my Sky One). If you want to have a rant, you can even send in an audio file of yourself ranting and be heard on the air. Great.

In my list of podcasts I have three more from the Simply Syndicated network but I don’t listen to two of them very much. The final Simply Syndicated podcast that I regularly listen to is Left Field Cinema. It’s highly dissimilar from Movies You Should See. Left Field Cinema is hosted by Mike Dawson, who reviews and analyses films whilst analysing the film-makers as well.

A podcast that I used to listen to but can’t really be bothered to listen to anymore is Treks in Sci-Fi. Each podcast the host, Rick A Dostie gives a detailed episode commentary on an episode of Star Trek. It’s not the most exiting podcast, that the main reason why I seem to have left it for the other podcasts.

The ultimate podcast for the Geeks out there is GeekNights with Rym and Scott. Geeknights is a late night show for geeks, featuring anime, comics, gaming, sci/tech, gadgetry, and general geekery New episodes every weeknight Monday through Thursday. (I kind of stole the description from iTunes). I’m not really into anime or know anything about the kind of board games to Rym and Scott play so I don’t subscribe to the main feed. Each day on GeekNight has a different theme, Monday is Science and Technology, Tuesday Gaming, Wednesday is Anime Manga Comics and Thursday is a bit random, they may talk about anything, and they do. As each day has a different theme they put each day in a separate feed so it’s possible to only download the things that you’re interested in. GeekNights is very entertaining, It’s most certainly worth a listen.

Any fans of Kevin Smith out there? If you’re really a fan you probably know that Kevin Smith and Scott Mosier have a podcast named Smodcast. If you don’t know who I’m talking about, Kevin Smith and Scott Mosier are the writer/director and producer of such films as Clerks, Mattrats and Dogma. If you like their humour, you’ll like Smodcast. It’s basically the two (occasionally with some guests) speaking about any topic with jokes throughout. Good Times.