Jeremy Renner

I went to see “The Town” in the movies on weekend. Too bad my experience was spoiled by the total failure of surround sound in the cinema and by a power cut due to the thunderstorm, two minutes before the end of the movie. But I still liked the movie so much that I downloaded a copy and watched it in the comfort of my own home (really, are there any other options left?).

Before I say anything else, I have to do a disclosure. I am biased here. Crime is one of my favorite movie genres in general, and bank robberies, con artists, and heist schemes are among my top interests in movies.

With that, I am now free to say how awesome this movie was. First of all, it’s a great story with great characters. Not particularly original, but still great. It got a slightly screwed up ending, but by now we should be probably get used to them anyway. Still. There is plenty to see – action, acting, drama, tough guys, car chases, gun fights, hot girls, Boston accent, and more.

Overall, I’ll give it a 5 out of 5. But you still remember, that I’m biased, right?

The other day I went to see “The Hurt Locker“. There was plenty of hype around this movie – 6 Oscars, 73 other award wins, and 47 nominations for more awards. Not to mention that the director is Kathryn Bigelow, who is, among other things, an ex-wife of James Cameron. (And as we know, in many cases, you are who you are married to, and if so, it’s extremely helpful in this case).

Anyways. Obviously, with all that noise, I’ve heard quite a bit about the film, and I saw the trailer, and I had a slight idea on what it was and how it was. I went prepared. Or so I thought…

The film turned out to be totally different from what I was expecting. Actually, I think it turned out totally different from what anybody were expecting. And that’s a good thing. Surprise! Somehow this film is very different from pretty much everything. It has action, but it’s not an action. It has drama, but it’s not a drama. It’s supposedly has documentary, but it’s not documentary. The storyline is very vague and doesn’t seem to stand out or lead anywhere, but on the other hand the film is rather long and I didn’t get tired of it at all. It’s very natural.

The way it works, I guess, is that this film is using atmosphere to tell the story, rather than dialogs, powerful music, and impressive shots. As I said, at times you don’t really know where it goes and if it goes anywhere at all. But yet somehow it all makes sense. Also, one other thing that I really enjoyed, and which I thought was a cornerstone of this film is simplicity. The whole situation in Iraq is not simple. There are many sides to it and many points of views. But this film drops down to a very simplistic view of the whole picture from the eyes of a few American soldiers. There is no propaganda, there are no high-flying ideas. It’s just that simple – a few guys at war. It’s not about why they are there. It’s about them actually being there.

The film is not very entertaining, even though it has a few hilarious bits and quite a few action sequences. It’s simple, and yet deep. It doesn’t force ideas upon thee, but it does make you think. And as I said, it’s different from most films I’ve seen, and yet very similar somehow.

Overall, I’ll give it a 4 out of 5, and I would highly recommend it.