The Movie Report Card is a monthly series of posts that are dedicated purely to sharing the movies that I watch each month and my thoughts on them. Near the bottom, I assign certain titles to a few of the movies that I watched for the first time. They are Best of Class (my favorite movie experience), Teacher’s Pet (a noteworthy film that pleasantly surprised me), and Failing Students (any film with a grade lower than C-).
Grades:
–The Master (Anderson) A
–Mud (Nichols) A-
–Iron Man 3 (Black) C
–The Fog (Carpenter) B
–The Great Gatsby (Luhrmann) B-
–The Beach (Boyle) B+
–The Double Life of Veronique (Kieslowski) A
–Brazil (Gilliam) A
–42 (Helgeland) B-
–Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol (Bird) B-
–Star Trek Into Darkness (Abrams) B
–The Great Gatsby (Lurmann) B
–Brute Force (Dassin) B
–Holy Motors (Carax) A-
–Beasts of the Southern Wild (Zeitlin) A-
–Dogville (von Trier) A
–Amelie (Jeunet) A
–Arbitrage (Jarecki) A-
–The Phantom of the Opera (Julian) B+
–The Raid (Evans) B
–The Grapes of Wrath (Ford) A
–Good Night, and Good Luck. (Clooney) A-
Comments:
First off, I revisited P.T. Anderson’s The Master, which I gave a C+ back in March. Why did I watch it again? There are two reasons: 1) Some thought it was genius and I wanted to understand why. 2) I honestly felt like I had had the wrong expectations when I first saw it. To paraphrase A.O. Scott, The Master is made in a way that makes it extremely easy to misunderstand. I came out of my second viewing convinced that the film was one of the best of 2012.
Carpenter’s The Fog was a nice, entertaining horror flick. It isn’t anything profound, but it made for a fun watch.
I hadn’t seen Danny Boyle’s The Beach before, but I thought it was incredibly interesting. DiCaprio may overact in a few of the scenes, but I loved the way that the film studied his character. It also had Boyle’s trademark style, which is always a plus.
The Double Life of Veronique was a sublime film and my first experience with anything by Krzysztof Kieslowski. It feels like one of those films that can be studied and dissected in-depth, so I do anticipate that I’ll see it again.
I watched the fourth and latest Mission: Impossible film again. It didn’t quite have as much to offer the second time around, but it definitely wasn’t boring.
In an attempt to see more Criterion Collection films, I watched Brute Force, a prison film starring Burt Lancaster and directed by Jules Dassin. While the film was well-made, it really wasn’t too memorable.
Revisiting Beasts of the Southern Wild, Amelie, and The Grapes of Wrath only further convinced me how wonderful they all are.
Arbitrage was a skillful, tense thriller and it really deserves to be seen by more people.
What I saw in theaters:
Mud was quite good. In fact, it was probably the best 2013 film I’ve seen so far.
After seeing Iron Man 3, I really don’t understand any of the praise that it has received. It is a painfully ordinary superhero flick and probably the worst film of the Tony Stark trilogy.
While 42 wasn’t a perfect movie, I can’t see a better film being made on the Jackie Robinson story.
Star Trek: Into Darkness was quality blockbuster entertainment. I thought it was an improvement over the 2009 reboot (which I did like).
What I wrote reviews of:
–The Great Gatsby
–The Red Balloon
–Brazil
–Holy Motors
–Dogville
–I’m Not There
Progress:
I watched The Phantom of the Opera for my silent film. It was impressive and intriguing, though it isn’t among my favorite movies from that era.
The martial arts movie I watched in May was The Raid. Despite some cliché storytelling, one-dimensional characters, and an all-together lack of depth, it was not a bad movie. You really have to watch the film on its own terms in order to fully enjoy it. The action sequences were awesome and I did have a good time.
Areas for Improvement:
-Write more reviews (at least seven)
-At least one classic B-movie
Best of Class: Brazil
Teacher’s Pet: Dogville
Failing Students: None!
And as always, thanks for reading!
Cinema Train 
The Raid was fantastic!! Fight scenes were unlike anything Ive ever seen 🙂
It definitely had some great fight scenes. Especially the last one with the two brothers fighting Mad Dog.
Great post, the opening scene around the campfire in The Fog used to always creep me out.
That was a pretty good opening, I thought. Thanks for the comment!
Glad you turned around for The Master and Mud’s pretty great as well. I still need to see The Three Colors Trilogy from Kieslowski and I hope to watch The Double Life of Veronique after that.
I haven’t gotten around to the Three Colors trilogy yet, but I know I will sometime. Obviously, Double Life comes highly recommended. Thanks.
G;ad you were able to reevaluate The Master! While not quite my favorite from 2012, it was the highest quality film of that year in my opinion. I rewatched it awhile back as well and I was happy that it still held up.
Sorry you didn’t like Iron Man 3; I had a lot of fun with that film myself. Still not sure how it compares to the rest of them though because I haven’t got around to rewatching them yet. I know I’ve seen them, but I can’t remember them!
Glad you liked Star Trek though, that’s my favorite film of this year so far 🙂
Yeah, I don’t think The Master is really my favorite film of 2012 either, but I do at least think that it’s one of the best.
Of course, I can’t blame you for having fun with Iron Man 3. 🙂 I thought it was funny at parts, but I just didn’t think it was anything special.
On the other hand, Star Trek is one of my favorites so far as well. Thanks!
Your concerns about Iron Man 3 are exactly why I haven’t seen it yet. I’m usually not a big fan of superhero flicks anyway, and that one sounds very run-of-the-mill.
It is very, very ordinary. At this point, there are few superhero films that I am excited about watching anymore (Man of Steel, the Dark Knight trilogy) and I really could have gone without seeing Iron Man 3.
You watched quite a lot and what a great selections! I still haven’t got around to seeing The Master yet but your change of heart about it makes me curious now, I should give it a go one of these days. Glad to see you gave Holy Motors a high score too. Btw, which Phantom of the Opera did you see? Was it the 2004 version?
Thanks! Definitely look into The Master. It’s a very interesting film. And Holy Motors, if you haven’t seen it, is a one-of-a-kind experience.
I watched the silent Phantom of the Opera, the one starring Lon Chaney Jr. I haven’t actually seen the 2004 version. Are you a fan of it?
Oh I did see Holy Motors, I gave it a 4/5 in my review 🙂
I like the 2004 version, mostly because I adore Gerry Butler’s performance as the Phantom. I know critics panned it and I agree it’s not a perfect film but I happen to love it. The set pieces are gorgeous and again, I’m willing to overlook the flaws as I was quite mesmerized by GB’s and Emmy Rossum’s sensual but emotional performance. It’s a younger cast and not meant to be a ‘scary’ Phantom, actually he’s VERY sexy, ahah. I adore the music too, which is crucial for this adaptation.
Oh cool! I’m gonna have to read your review of Holy Motors then. I love hearing different opinions on that movie. 4/5 seems like a pretty fair score too.
I should probably give the new Phantom a try then. I mean, the critics don’t always get it right. I do know a few people who love that movie as well.
I so wish I could squeeze in as many movies as you, that’s some list! I really wanted to see Mud but my local cinema decided to only show it once at some stupid time during the day when I was at work. Good work Garrett.
Thanks! I’m pretty lucky to have this much free time right now, so I’m trying to take full advantage of it. That’s too bad about Mud, I usually end up having to wait for smaller films like that come out on DVD or something, but they actually showed Mud for some reason.
hey this is awesome, love the grading system. 🙂
Hey! Thanks, I really appreciate it! 🙂