Movie Recommendation Time: Geography Club.

Geography Club, at first, one would realize, wow that's funnily curious, it's almost an affected, nostalgic, liking reference to The Breakfast Club (1985). They must've done it on purpose because while the posters (below) are two pancakes in a teflon pan, it's an effective eye catcher. The Breakfast Club is arguably the long-standing timeless classic about high school cliques (funny how that transcends to our very own lives); the discovery of self; the boldness, burden, and blithe of being different; and the opaqueness of which that when crossed creates tension that begins the story.

  

Geography Club at first impression was thought to be the same. Russovoir had never been wrong. Granted the synopsis (where was its trailer?) alludes a purging self-to-self conflict prevalent, oppressing, and pressing issue of recent times, just like how each of the kids in The Breakfast Club then had their own fetters, the film has five (5) personalities alright, but it revolves in one theme. 

"Hey, no one's judging you."

Russovoir won't be that guy telling you its theme; he's never had and never will. What he can tell you is Geography Club adapted itself in hopes of idealizing the society on hand; a society, if not for films like this, deteriorating and prejudiced encroaching. This is Disney's Lemonade Mouth (2011) but there isn't a group of musically-inclined troublemakers, lemonade-in-a-canholics forming a band; however, what the film is trying to accomplish is to tone down what was for a long time loud. Especially every last week of June with this pride.

Heroes. He Rose. Heal rows.

That feeling. That feeling that you inexplicably and suddenly had had the civilian responsibility, on which you're convinced that if you hadn't done so who would, in this brief moment, spur of the moment of looking out for each other; we can be heroes in our own little ways after all - "Is that tub of popcorn trash? Let me get that for you."

You do this because what you have witnessed, the true story of four (4) US Navy SEALs, including those who tried to rescue them, brings to the front and center the nature, crucial nature of what and who to protect, that is ideally everyone, whatever color and racial origin. The little gesture is a thank you to those whom we can still do this.

"Suck. It. Up. You're a fucking frogman!"

Lone Survivor is one of the many films that raises the flag of America in us; land of the free and home of the brave. Truly powerful, awing words in the national anthem indelible and imponderable (that which you needn't to be in the military, to have to go to war to be deemed 'brave'; hence bravery is imponderable). Besides the point, however, those who have served the country and are serving the country could've might as well ensnared an American eagle, plucked one of its majestic plumage, dipped it into their own self-induced slit arm, and finally have, although while painful it too is an act of sheer commitment, written the Star-Spangled Banner onto a surface with their own blood.

"If I die, tell my wife I love her."

Emotions were a minefield: one for Hirsch, one for Kitsch, Foster (above), Bana, and Ludwig. Each is uniquely designed to explode with a unique repercussion in both the mind and body, and ultimately the soul. And they didn't go off in one succession either, no sir. Russovoir had wished it had been the case, to save chronic fit of vicarious suffering; so it would've been just a big, isolated pain. It was, however, as uniquely designed each is, specially a physical strain, incremental at a sporadic. US Navy SEAL Marcus Luttrell, the last man standing - lone survivor, as if the whole operation had had been a Hunger Games for the purpose of full disclosure should one decides to join, sure he and his men failed Operation Red Wings, not that it wasn't a big deal nor we wanted it to happen, but it happened, and the silver lining here is, and Russovoir shamefully admits it was once a shot in the dark, funny how God finally casts a light on this matter through one man's tale, that not all of Afghanistan is barren.

Marcus Luttrell and Mohammed Gulab. Pashtunwali.

  

iTouchment With a OSmeone.

One minute there's connection, another lost it. Dang it, the restarting is the hardest part. Her seems to have made it literally a wireless fidelity (wifi). And just like it, at maybe a cheap motel or an overcrowded Starbucks during which everyone conveniently has their laptops running, the wifi of the plot is a patient progress.

"It's as if you needed oxygen. You're an operating system."

As the audience, much like a man with a purpose with a laptop at a wifi hotspot, you stay because it is at least working; it takes an effect on you than nothing at all. Suppose one is used to have a faster broadband that where one is, what one is experiencing is simply, weird. Because the film was, undeniably and, frankly, for it fell off the cliff where the box was situated - that's how 'outside-the-box' it is, ridiculous. Stay with Russovoir, it gets better.

"I love how you see the world."

Novelty. That's what and why Her is as undeniably, a stunner. As if painstaking in costume design and production value; the deviant, soothing color fusion to where should be a futuristic setting, of supposedly delicate white and chrome. Where we have been daunted by past futuristic films of the downside, the harm of technological advancement: Terminator (1984), I, Robot (2004), Surrogates (2009); the dystopic condition much of which was caused by moral deterioration and neglect: The Island (2005), In Time (2011),  Elysium (2013); and the overused alien/virus invasion: I Am Legend (2007), The Darkest Hour (2011), Battleship (2012), the premise of Spike Jonze, director and the writer of Her, was definitely a pleasant relief and comfort.

And of course, moreover, Joaquin Phoenix (above) with his patriarchal mustache and sensitive, melancholic psyche as Theodore Twombly, where even the name is soft and cuddly, was what was imperious in Gladiator (2007) accentuated by his 'battle scar' cleft lip, made over a king, disrobed of self-regard and ambition, many instances in the film has Russovoir's thumbs up. No shiny crown, rather leaves one a tiny frown.

DISNEYR-perfection Film.

Russovoir doesn't necessarily write reviews for near-perfection films; he feels, more like he's afraid, he will say more than what's due; or say less; or both. You can't underestimate the clarity of his enthusiastic accolades. Yet he's here, clenching and unclenching his fingers, glowering at the screen, wishing the right, persuasive words come out and why Saving Mr. Banks is nothing short of a Christmas movie. The best of his ability the following paragraphs below.

Saving Mr. Banks is essentially an informative film. It talks about the 'hidden mickey' of the Academy Award winning film Mary Poppins (1964) that 63-year old, round-bellied, as if he'd had eaten happiness itself,  Walt Disney (Tom Hanks) patiently invoked. He claims its production is a promise fulfilled to his daughters who read the doting novel by the misoneist then P.L. Travers (Emma Thompson).

"Your daughter can do whatever she'd like to do."

It was distressing how our childhood, among what hasn't already been ruined in most Disney films of our time, and while this particular came out decades back to even coincide and consider in our period of childhood and what films were released since then; having said that, how this childhood icon, Mary Poppins, with whom we had long admired (to some, known to be long admired) for her reassuring warmth, effervescence, and contagious merriment, had a dark, poignant source of inspiration. Where in between scenes, the brilliantly sequenced scenes, there is a small fight within whether to side with Disney's seeming righteous cause or to Travers' reasonable disdain to a movie adaptation intrusive; and when that was settled, a movie adaptation adulterated from the rightful projection of the author herself.

"Change how you see the past."

This is a Christmas movie because it teaches forgiveness. It teaches that no one should be burdened, trapped, and/or stuck in the past. And if someone is willing and goes great lengths to help at least see, look back at it differently, allow it; embrace it. How many people in this world can change, better yet fund something tragic and traumatic to something magic and nostalgic? The happiest place on Earth, besides Disneyland, although Russovoir thinks it's not generally so, is that, instead, spot in oneself, hollow and disabling before, now is a change of direction, specifically an arch, from left to right for Traver's sake; what's left of her to make it right in one stroke (a blockbuster in this case); a little green blonde-haired fairy sprinkling pixie dust trailing from her tiny form to thank for. Tinkerbell. Pixie dust that only works if one thinks of happy thoughts, further justifying what Disney had had done to the funereal novelist, what do you know, it's the finishing touch to the Walt Disney logo.

A KENNEDYdate to Resistance.

The Hunger Games is technically organized homicide. So one cannot shake the feeling throughout or portions in the film that look, feel, and/or sound already as elaborate as it is improbable. Or so it's an unshared perception. While the story itself, of its stark story telling, a $307M (November 24th, 10:00am) hunger-satisfied box office cannot lie, again, maybe an unshared perception, Russovoir pinned the story to a metaphorical reality; the rich and poor pyramid of today.

We assume everyone figured out the subtle to the slow glaring to the nimble 'tradition' of The Capitol. Where the government has carte blanche by their own disillusioned set of laws to pose authority on which fear is what they feed on to stay atop the food chain. And everyone abides because, on the surface, who are we to question who sees, holds everything whereas each and every District knows only what they know, compounded by fear, compounded by nescience.

Now, the tributes.

"There's no one left that I love they can hurt."

Jennifer Lawrence was set aside for a while (picked up at the wedding gown scene) for this volatile vixen, Jena Malone as the District 7 tribute Johanna Mason (above). Axe-cellent casting. At first Russovoir thought hmm they picked someone comparatively shaded from fame and like lumber from which puts food on the tables of District 7, planted and unaffected by the mainstream, not too close to stagnate Lawrence's strong current of fame. But just like Johanna Mason's back story, who we recall appeared gullible and nonthreatening yet had won the killing spree, Malone killed the role and may seem moronic now, avenged the beloved character unwatered, until this film, in our heads.

"People are starving in 12 and, they make themselves sick here."

The concept of the trilogy, at least the two books, yet Russovoir is confident it's the entire trilogy because he has had read more than half of Mockingjay, is as remarkable as it is daunting how indicative and prevalent the oppression, oligarchy, despotism, and barely shown - yet - rebellion of the masses. The juxtaposition of the assassination of John F. Kennedy and the worldwide premiere of The Hunger Games: Catching Fire dates was no mere coincidence; he had been a mockingjay.

How To Use an Actor Intense Days.

It was surreal Matthew McConaughey (below right) not in his usual macho shape. Russovoir wanted to scold him straight to the movie screen. It's as if he took the role against his will; to redeem himself; to prove himself, to his fans, something. Russovoir doesn't understand, cannot fathom in what state of mind he was in to morbidly shrink to a size unsightly. Meanwhile you're impressed by this. So bizarre it evokes an emotion, until now, still has no name. 

Dallas Buyers Club has become a powerful drug that once seen on the shelf in a video store, a rent selection in RedBox, an overstock at an interstate gas station, a random or chosen scene filler in an entertainment infomercial, a poster draped alongside the vertically spines-up arranged DVDs at if not deserted, single-minded shoppers supermarket, one's world stops for a full five seconds, eyes fixates - all else are a blur, and whisper, "McConaughey." with beaming recognition as epiphanic as the apple that fell on Isaac Newton.

He was inarguably, eye-gaping, mouth-shut remarkable. Russovoir is afraid that if he says anything more he might not hit the right words and spoil the praise. So let's move on and talk about Jared Leto now. The guy expanded once, then he emaciated next. Nobody really talked about, as he was Mr. Nobody in 2009 too, his massive, sorely weight gain in (and for) Chapter 27 (2007). The film was either poorly marketed, distributed, or didn't appeal to the palette of influential movie critics that affected those which alluded. After which Leto vowed not to gain a lardful for a role. Gain not lose. So he's an HIV positive gay hooker (below left); he was disease-alarmingly befitting.

"I don't want to die."

 

In the world of acting as a profession, not simply and conveniently all ingratiating roles and intuitive improvs and good looks, although while they are prevalent and necessary, it's the harmony, if one wants to go far in the industry one must be aware, of both the external (script memorization, filming procedure and location, e.g.) and the most challenging factor, internal (drastic weight gain, loss, and sculpt, sexual orientation and behavior, e.g.) where some roles demand of an actor; many of which, though not always effective, are admirable, critical, and premeditated symptoms of an award-winning actor from if not Oscar-worthy, a critically-sealed, must-watch film.

The Re-MELLARK-able Joshua Ryan Hutcherson.

"I have this dream that one day, my kid's gonna come home from school and be like, "Dad, there's this girl that I like, and there's this guy I like, and I don't know which one I like more, and I don't know what to do." And it'd just be a non-issue, like, "Which one is a good person? Which one makes you laugh more?" - Josh Hutcherson.

"I would probably list myself as mostly straight - right now, I'm 100% straight.", Hutcherson breaks the ice as opposed to the heat he emanates already. So regardless, the ice between them, interviewer Shana Krochmal of Out Magazine, has to melt anyway. Talentless in napkin origami at a California cafe during a seeming hunger games of a lunch hour, he accepted defeat and set it aside. "But who knows? In a fucking year, I could meet a guy and be like, "Whoa, I'm attracted to this person.", he unfolded instead with austere yet polite hand gestures, with which the Japanese art of paper folding seems a torture in retrospect - the napkin on the other side of the table wipes a mouth taken aback, though not malicious, with this choking spill.

He's most associated and most profitable as Peeta Mellark, one of the pair of tributes from District 12, love interest with Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence) but complicates as the games and Gale (Liam Hemsworth) may undercook the chemistry. But the recurring, almost a boomerang when one decides to let go already memory of 2005 - admit it, every time you see him all grown up and chiseled, how baked are we now to trace this once tousled but ferociously smitten 13-year old tike in Little Manhattan (below) is the tantalizing mold we see today.

"Love is a pain I wouldn't wish on my worst enemies."

Now when you're 15, you tend to cling on to people who had made you happy, even remember and keep track (in moderation) of their lives with the suppressible, hopeful belief, like making a wish on a comet, that they'll do it again. Hence it was reasonable: Zathura: A Space Adventure (2005), Bridge to Terabithia (2007), Firehouse Dog (2007), Fragments (2008), Journey to the Center of the Earth (2008), Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant (2009), four-time Academy Award nominated The Kids Are All Right (2010), and the confusing Detention (2011), all checked. The Hunger Games trilogy, one could say, is now a pandemic, communal, kettle hissing glorification. That he so deserves.

"I'm ready for a fight."

Straights who support gay rights is like a wifi hotspot, it brings people together. Co-founder Avan Jogia (Nickelodeon's Victorious) of the non-profit organization Straight But Not Narrow (click it) allies with Hutcherson, among other young, famous personalities - tributes, shall we say - to educate and train, a polite euphemism, the toppling generation with gender equality. The NOH8 ad campaign (above) was Adam Bouska's plain yet powerful portfolio in 2008, and Hutcherson, with his fair amount of fame and influence, ennobled public hysteria.

"I would volunteer for my brother in a heartbeat."

The 21-year old $1.5M net worth American actor (The Hunger Games grossed $700M worldwide) has been raised justly, even where he was raised in isn't indicative of diversity nor adaptation. It only goes to underscore that Mewtwo (that's right, from Pokemon: Mewtwo Strikes Back, 1998) is speaking gold (for a make believe children show):

"I see now that the circumstances of one's birth are irrelevant; it is what you do with the gift of life that determines who you are."