VIDEO GAME: The Bridge (2013)

by benmweilertNo Comments
The Bridge Year: 2013 Rating: E Time Played: 164 minutes / 2.73 hours Having been a fan of M. C. Escher's works for some time, I thought a game like The Bridge would be an interesting take on his mind-bending illustrations. Presented in a black-and-white monochrome to match Escher's illustrations, The Bridge uses rotation and platforming to solve physics-based puzzles. Unfortunately, because of these two gameplay mechanics, this game was a bit more frustrating than I expected. When solutions to puzzles aren't based on logic as much as they are based on being able to control the physics, it just isn't fun to play. I picked up and played The Bridge several times over a few years. Every once in a while, I'd get some distance from it and think that I should try to tackle the next puzzle that stumped me weeks or months ago. And after completing this puzzle and a few more after it, I'd get stuck again and the entire process...
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MOVIE: Oppenheimer (2023)

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OppenheimerYear: 2023Rating: RLength: 180 minutes / 3.00 hours Christopher Nolan's filmography has been building to this movie. Over decades, Nolan has had gimmicks in his films that make them stand out. Oppenheimer (2023) uses many of them to create a compelling story that's half scientific discovery and half political drama. That a movie like this—about unleashing the Pandora's box of nuclear weapons—hadn't been made like this before is perhaps the more impressive feat. The way Nolan weaves the two halves of the story together is masterful. However, the actors definitely do a lot of heavy lifting here. It took me a second viewing to piece together that the black-and-white segments followed Lewis Strauss (Robert Downey Jr.) while the color segments focused on J. Robert Oppenheimer (Cillian Murphy). This visual stylization hearkened back to the way Nolan made Memento (2000) unique. The shifted timelines between the black-and-white/color segments evoked Dunkirk (2017)., I'm just glad that I could actually understand what everyone was saying,...
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MOVIE: Belfast (2021)

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Belfast Year: 2021 Rating: PG-13 Length: 98 minutes / 1.63 hours It seems a little odd to me that there are so many films that focus on historic events, but this is the first one I've seen about "The Troubles" in Ireland. I was loosely aware of the conflict between Catholics and Protestants in late-1960s Ireland, but Belfast (2021) felt like the first time anyone brought this topic to the big screen. It's clearly a personal story for director Kenneth Branagh, which is likely how it gained its notoriety in the lead-up to awards season. The problem with Belfast, though, lies in some of its inconsistencies. I understand that Schindler's List (1993) can get away with incorporating moments of color in an otherwise black-and-white film. However, when it happened in Belfast, it completely pulled me out of the story. It would have been much better to just keep the monochromatic aesthetic throughout instead of trying to be artistically edgy. I don't consider 1969 as a...
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MOVIE: The Lighthouse (2019)

by benmweilertNo Comments
The Lighthouse Year: 2019 Rating: R Length: 109 minutes / 1.82 hours When Oscar season rolled around a few years ago, I heard a lot of buzz about an artsy film known as The Lighthouse (2019). Years later, I finally found the time to sit down and watch it on Amazon Prime. Now I understand why the Academy didn't nominate this film for Best Picture. It's weird. I legitimately tried to figure out what was going on but gave up when things just spiraled into chaos. I have a suspicion that a key moment in the film resulted in a character's death and that the remainder all takes place in some sort of purgatory, but that's the best explanation I can give at the moment. For a film that features two actors for almost the entire runtime, I have to say that Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson make this movie something to see at least once. In fact, I'm still half-certain that Willem Dafoe wasn't...
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MOVIE: Roma (2018)

by benmweilertNo Comments
Roma Year: 2018 Rating: R Length: 135 minutes / 2.25 hours Don't get me wrong. I like Alfonso Cuarón's films. I liked his films before I even really knew who he was as a director. If anything, he's shown that he's the master of cinematography, especially in long takes that seem to pan through almost the entire film. He first showed this talent in Children of Men (2006) and continued to impress with this technique in Gravity (2013). While he's shown he has mastered the long take, his signature style is still on display in Roma (2018) through its numerous pans. That being said, I found the content of Children of Men and Gravity to be much more interesting than that of Roma. Cuarón pulls us into his Mexican roots in this film, choosing the early 1970s to set this "slice of life" tale. The problem is, while the film looks quite artistic, with the black-and-white aesthetic fusing nicely with the expert camera work (along...
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