Tag: Caren Pistorius

Many years ago, I saw a trailer for a movie called Gloria. It was a Spanish movie, but it had a lot of buzz and it looked fun. I decided I would put an effort into watching it. I thought about it for a few weeks, then I forgot about it, and went on with my life.

A couple of years ago, a different film came out called A Fantastic Woman. You may have heard of it, it won some awards. I definitely made sure to see it, given its nomination, and I saw it was by the director of Gloria. “Oh yeah! Gloria!” That movie I meant to see and forgot about. I should get on that and see it eventually. And then I forgot about it.

And then, finally, I got an invite to see Gloria Bell. That sounds familiar. And sure enough the trailer brings back the memories of the Gloria trailer, song and all. Oh no, an American remake? Sort of.

Does it count as an American remake if the remake is done by the same director and in his vision? Does it automatically make it inferior still?

Well, in this case, probably. Gloria Bell (Julianne Moore) is in her upper middle ages, basically old, without being, you know, old. She has kids, they are adults and starting their families. She is divorced, she works, she likes disco, and she wants to have a fun life.

But something keeps getting in the way. You know, herself. She sees so many faults in others, and her anxieties get in the way of finding happiness.

Despite this, she finds Arnold (John Tuturro), a man who likes disco and is also divorced. This feels like true love, in her later live, but there are issues. Issues with Arnold’s family and their dependence on him. It gets in the way of their happiness. And no matter what, he can’t abandon his kids and ex just for happiness.

So what’s a girl to dance? I dunno. Dance, dance, dance the night away.

Also starring Michael Cera, Holland Taylor, Brad Garrett, and Caren Pistorius.

Ah yes, Vegas, city of love, city by the bay./em>

Okay, technically, I don’t know if Gloria Bell is worse than Gloria, since I haven’t seen Gloria. And unfortunately, now that I have seen Gloria Bell, I probably won’t see Gloria ever. It might be better. It might be the same. I don’t know and won’t know because Gloria Bell has turned me so far off from this story, that the last thing I want to see is the story again, but this time with subtitles.

Basically, this is a film that is inspired by the song Gloria. It is a nice song, very catchy, and they use it in the film. And that is the whole story. There isn’t much else of depth. It is not only frustrating to watch this character act that way, but it is boring. I never feel any reason to hope better for her, given her ability to dig her own holes.

Sure being lonely sucks, but she probably just has to be lonely it looks like.

Gloria Bell is forgettable, and bad. I don’t know if it is actually as bad as my rating, but I did feel like hours of my life were wasted at the end.

0 out of 4.

I won’t deny it, I am writing this review like a month late. The site was down for over a month, I was busy, and honestly, I kept forgetting about the film itself.

That isn’t a good way at all to start talking about the film Denial, because if I can barely remember it after watching it, that isn’t saying a lot. Nor does my visible rating.

I will get into it later, but Denial actually does tell an interesting AND important story. It is worth existing. The execution is just the issue. And people watching it and not telling others about it. Yeah, I am also part of the problem, whoops.

I am not denying that Denial exists, I am just forgetful sometimes.

Take out your time machine, because we are going way back. Way, way back, to the mid-1990’s! Dr. Deborah Lipstadt (Rachel Weisz) is a historian and Jewish history scholar, focusing of course on the Holocaust. She has written many books about it and believes one should not argue with a Holocaust denier because that gives them some level of credibility and they don’t even deserve that much.

And then David Irving (Timothy Spall), a very famous Holocaust Denier and Hitler scholar started to argue with her. He hijacked one of her lectures. He posted it online to make her seem week. And then he sued her for libel, because she called him a liar and worse in one of her books.

But Irving didn’t sue her for libel in America. Nope, he did it in Britain. See, normally in America, for a libel suit, the party who claims libel has to prove it. In Britain, the party who is being sued has to prove what they said is true instead. An interesting twist.

Well, Lipstadt says fuck that. She won’t settle or retract. She has to prove that not only was Irving as a Holocaust denier wrong, but he intentionally gave incorrect information in order to lie. Aka, prove that he wasn’t stupid, but there was malice and intent in his words. That is a hard thing to do. Especially because if they do it wrong, they are going to be potentially putting the Holocaust itself on trial, which is not a good place to be at. It is disrespectful!

Needless to say, an interest and real case. Also featuring Andrew Scott, Tom Wilkinson, Alex Jennings, Caren Pistorius, and Jack Lowden.

British court of Law is also funny in other ways.

The story for Denial is a good one, yes, sure. It offers a TON of moral questions for the trial. What methodology will they use to prove the Holocaust existed without putting the Holocaust on trial itself? How can they prove he knows the truth and is choosing to lie? Couldn’t they just bring in a bunch of survivors to tell their stories?

No. Apparently no at all to the last one. The lawyers don’t want to put them up on the stand and have a denier heckle them and denounce their harsh experiences. The hardest part for Lipstadt is letting go and trusting in lawyers who know more about British law than her.

Again, a fine story. And fantastic acting. Weisz, Wilkinson, and Spall. Especially Spall! Spall always plays these villain roles, but this one is something else and he has all sorts of mannerisms and ways of speaking that just fill him out completely. And he lost an incredible amount of weight it looks like to, a surprise to see.

The issues I have with this movie is that it feels like it also has an incredible amount of filler. There are a lot of down moments, some solemn given the topic, but just slow and repetitive feeling moments. Add in an ending that almost feels anti-climatic, or a bit too made for TV and the movie just seems to lose a lot of impact.

It could have been a truly great film, but there are too many minor points to keep it from rising to the top.

2 out of 4.