Posts Tagged ‘romance’

Short Take: An incredibly authentic romance with both highs and lows. It weaves the veil and then strips it away.

Director: Drake Doremus

Screenwriters: Drake Doremus and Ben York James

Cast: Anton Yelchin, Felicity Jones, Jennifer Lawrence, Charlie Bewley

Length: 1 hr 30 min

Synopsis: Soon after Anna (Jones) and Jacob (Yelchin) meet in college they develop an infatuation, which quickly turns into a deeper love. Though Anna is set to return to England after graduation to avoid overstaying her visa, she can’t bear to leave Jacob for the summer and decides to stay. However, when she tries to return to the States after a brief visit to the U.K., she is denied and cannot enter until the visa violation is resolved. Because of this, Anna and Jacob must endure a years-long struggle to keep their love alive even when space and change threaten to break them apart.

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Short Take: Perhaps the best video game adaptation to date - for what that's worth

Director: Mike Newell (Donnie Brasko, Four Weddings and a Funeral)

Screenwriters: Boaz Yakin (Death and Love), Doug Miro and Carlo Bernard (The Uninvited), Jordan Mechner (Prince of Persia video game)

Cast: Jake Gyllenhaal (Brothers), Gemma Arterton (Clash of the Titans), Ben Kingsley (Shutter Island), Alfred Molina (An Education)

Length: 1h 56m

Synopsis: One day in an Arabian marketplace one young orphan boy named Dastan would risk his life to save another’s, and the display of such courage and humanity led the disguised King Sharaman of the Persian Empire (Ronald Pickup) to adopt the boy and raise him alongside his two sons. All three boys grew up to share a strong brotherly bond and undying love for their father, however one fateful day the King is assassinated and Dastan (Jake Gyllenhaal) unwarrantedly receives the blame. On the run with Princess Tamina (Gemma Arterton), whose city was just recently sacked by the Persians and was being forcefully wed to Dastan, the two find themselves in the middle of an even bigger problem. A scheme was afoot to retrieve a special dagger from Tamina’s city that had the ability to turn back time. A gift from the Gods, Tamina is the guardian of the dagger, which she and Dastan must keep away from whoever was trying to steal it. On top of that, Dastan cannot rest until he proves his innocence. Read the rest of this entry »

Short Take: Largely romantic and surprisingly clever

Director: Gary Winick (Bride Wars, 13 Going on 30)

Screenwriters: Jose Rivera (The Winged Man, The Tape Recorder), Tim Sullivan (Flushed Away, Jack and Sarah)

Cast: Amanda Seyfried (Dear John, Mamma Mia!), Christopher Egan (Resident Evil: Extinction, Eragon), Vanessa Redgrave (Atonement, Eva), Gael Garcìa Bernal (Rudo y Cursi, Blindness, Y Tu Mama Tambien)

Length: 1hr 53mins

Synopsis: When aspiring journalist Sophie (Seyfried) and fiancé Victor (Bernal) go to Verona, Italy on a pre-wedding honeymoon, she discovers a group of women called the Secretaries of Juliet who respond to letters lovelorn women write to William Shakespeare’s fictional character Juliet.  While working with the secretaries, Sophie discovers a letter written 50 years prior by a woman who ran away instead of eloping with her Italian lover, Lorenzo.  Sophie responds to the letter and is startled when the woman, Claire (Redgrave), and her handsome but uptight grandson Charlie (Egan) come to Verona to find Lorenzo.  So, Sophie decides to aid them as they search for Claire’s first love. Read the rest of this entry »

Miley Cyrus and Liam Hemsworth in the new Nicholas Sparks adaptation "The Last Song," opening this weekend

A very interesting article in the Village Voice, written by Eric Hynes, examines what he dubs the “Eight Tired Themes of Nicholas Sparks’ Love-Stories.” The topic of the article comes up of course due to this weekend’s release of the Miley Cyrus vehicle The Last Song, which is the last film based from Sparks’ novels. Such themes in Sparks’ work that Hynes identifies include a preference of setting (North Carolina), belief in God (Christian but not too Christian), and penchant for letter-writing (which Hynes claims connects Sparks’ works with the epistolary women’s novels of the 18th century). The entire article, though, is not so much a listing of Sparks’ consistencies in writing (things like the motifs listed above can be chalked up to being elements which help define Sparks as an auteur – to use a film term). Instead it functions to claim for an existence of formula, and that this formula does not coincide greatly with the melodramatic love stories of yesteryear (Douglas Sirk is brought up at one point).

The subject of melodrama is acknowledge by Hynes, but not really focused on. Sparks’ books are clearly melodramatic, and sell themselves for being as such. But, if one of Hynes’ main goals was to argue how Sparks’ developed dramatic formula differs from the famed and well-regarded Douglas Sirk films of yesteryear, then perhaps it would have been better had that subject been explored in greater detail. As it is, the claim is somewhat tucked away.

One major discrepancy that is proposed is that while the characters in Sirk’s films grapple with inner demons or desires, which are problems that are difficult to resolve, the characters in Sparks’ novels only battle with issues outside of their control (hurricanes, cancer, etc.). And perhaps because the conflicts are rooted in circumstance, the characters are “remarkably accepting of the cruelties of fate.” What’s really being pointed out here, I would argue, is that while Sirk’s melodramas sometimes dealt with outside influences like social roles and prejudices (All That Heaven Allows), those concerns were directly related to bigger issues like personal identity. Sparks’ books, and thus the movies based off them, do not delve deeply into overly-personal matters but instead incorporate characters written broadly enough so as to make them as identifiable as possible.

We encourage you to read the entirety of Hynes’ article, as it beyond what is discussed above it includes numerous interesting topics, subjects and tidbits. (We would also like to say that we recognize that Hynes’ wasn’t trying to offer an exhaustive examination, as the format of the article didn’t allow it to become a venue for a laborious argument. Do keep that in mind.)

Short Take: Contrived and unoriginal

Director: Allen Coulter (Hollywoodland, The Sopranos)

Screenwriter: Will Fetters (Début)

Cast: Robert Pattinson (Twilight: New Moon, Little Ashes), Emilie de Ravin (Lost, The Hills Have Eyes), Tate Ellington (Red Hook, The Invention of Lying), Ruby Jerins (Shutter Island, Nurse Jackie), Chris Cooper (The Kingdom, Breach), Pierce Brosnan (The Ghost Writer, Mamma Mia!)

Length: 1 hour 53 minutes

Synopsis: Tyler Hawkins (Pattinson) is a disaffected young NYU student looking for direction.  After being wrongfully assaulted by a cop (Cooper), Tyler’s friend Aidan (Ellington) encourages him to get revenge by bedding and then breaking up with the cop’s daughter Ally (de Ravin).  However, Tyler soon falls for her and their connection helps both of them deal with past traumas. Read the rest of this entry »

Short Take: If your expectations are in line, expect to be satisfied

Director: Chris Weitz (The Golden Compass, About a Boy)

Screenwriter: Melissa Rosenberg (Twilight, Step Up), Stephenie Meyer (book)

Cast: Kristen Stewart (Adventureland, Twilight, Into the Wild), Robert Pattinson (Twilight, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire), Taylor Lautner (Twilight, The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl 3-D)

Length: 2 hours 10 minutes

Synopsis: Picking up where the last film left off, Bella Swan (Stewart) is still trying to convince her vampire boyfriend, Edward Cullen (Pattinson) to turn her into a vampire. While celebrating her eighteenth birthday with his vampire family, an accident nearly leads the family to attack Bella. Convinced that the only way to protect her is to leave, Edward and his family depart forever. Bella slips into a depression only lessened when she spends time with her best friend Jacob Black (Lautner). However, Jacob, a werewolf, and Bella slowly cultivate a romance. Just on the point of Jacob and Bella developing a full-fledged relationship, Bella must go to Italy to stop the vampire royalty, the Volturi, from killing Edward. Read the rest of this entry »