First the NO! We must have rented a different movie than everyone else ‘cuz I tried to watch Inception last night and after twenty minutes, I was bored to tears. The movie struck me as kind of a cross between The Matrix and Wanted, but with a whole lot more - and very unnecessary - special effects, and fewer, no wait, make that no compelling characters. Zero interest. Blech. Hubby and I turned to each other and with nothing more than a nod in my direction, he opened the DVD player and pulled out the disk.
Then he slipped in my unequivocal YES vote for the week - North Face (Nordwand) - “Based on a true story, North Face is a suspenseful adventure film about a competition to climb the most dangerous rock face in the Alps. Set in 1936, as Nazi propaganda urges the nation’s Alpinists to conquer the unclimbed north face of the Swiss massif - the Eiger - two reluctant German climbers begin their daring ascent.”
Oh my god, I sat on the edge of my seat for nearly two hours…no, I didn’t sit on the edge of my seat - I jumped up and down, I screamed, I covered my eyes, I ran around the corner so I could just barely peek at the screen. My heart pounded, my muscles cramped - I dreamed about this movie all night long. Nordwand, is such a major yes. YES! YES! YES!
If you have Netflix, get this movie - North Face (Nordwand in German) - Oh my God, what a movie! Forget the special effects, watch the story of real people! I’ve watched very few movies that are this harrowing.
And another recommendation: Replay, by Ken Grimwood. It’s a bargain book on Amazon: Replay
I suspect any of you who remember the 80′s will really like this book. Ken Grimwood died at the age of 59 while writing a sequel to Replay.
Thanks for the recommendations. I’ll have to check out the movie. DH loves movies based on true events.
Heh. Glad to meet another person who’s willing to walk away from a movie they’re not enjoying and find something else.
Glad you found a movie to enjoy!
Thank you for the recommendation!
I’ve had my doubts about Inception. Thanks for confirming!
Amber, North Face is harrowing. Wow, still thinking about it!
Oh Anny, that’s the beauty of Netflix - you can walk away!
Yeah, Cindy - Inception is nothing special - less than nothing special, IMO.
OMG! Without understanding a word of German(?) Dutch(?) the trailer is compelling. I don’t have Netflix, but one can hope this actually makes it to the American screen. Wow, is that intense! My nephew is a mountain climber. I’ll have to share that with him.
And Inception? I don’t watch for special effects, so that’s not what pulled me into the movie… or more, kept me watching. I was intrigued with the concept, the dream withiin a dream, within a dream. But I didn’t realize until you mentioned it that I really didn’t care who lived or died. So they didn’t do a good job getting me invested in the characters. Huh. I didn’t over think it. We were watching with our kids who were completely enthralled so it made it at least entertaining for me.
My husband and I loved Inception! We saw it together, talked about it for hours and went back and saw it again. Give this movie another try another day.
There is so much depth and subtly here. Even Hans Zimmer’s movie score is filled with subliminal meaning that slows down as the characters go deeper into the psyche and time slows down. That ominous music in the trailer is actually the French Edith Piaf classic “Non Je ne regrette rien” (Return to me) slowed to 1/5 its tempo.
I got the eerie feeling watching the movie that we were actually seeing many parts of a single person’s brilliant but broken psyche struggling to return to reality, and each of the characters clearly represented a part of a whole personality.
I thought this movie was brilliant, but it is taxing and the viewer does need to be willing to go there. From a Jungian point of view-its a field day!
XXOO Kat
I don’t know, Nina and Kat - I get the draw of Inception and I get the dream within a dream within a dream - but I did not like…or maybe it makes more sense to say I didn’t have any appreciation for the first 20-30 minutes. It’s not that I mind the jumps in time or an alternate reality, it’s just that there was no one character who grabbed me and made me want to know more, watch more. I found my attention wandering.
I viewed it as all the character’s combined equaled one brilliant but broken man who had wandered too far from the shores of normal. The father figure played by Michael Cain all but says so. All of those characters were parts of a whole on many levels especially the women the two Anima characters. One is an over emotional feminine figure and the other woman “Ariadne” is an over intellectual/asexual creative force. Ariadne comes in to help balance an out of control situation and put the hysteric to rest.
In Greek mythology Ariadne weaves a ball of red thread that saves the hero Theseus from becoming lost and slaughtered in the labyrinth of the Minotaur.
For me this movie worked on a symbolic level and as action Sci-fi. There were lots of hints that this reality wasn’t real at all.
XXOO Kat
Sorry! Look at how much I love hearing myself talk! lol
Keep talking, Kat and maybe you’ll convince me to give it one more try!
Forget Inception, I’m bored of it already! lol Onward to Nordwand! It looks fascinating. The primitive climbing equipment those men are using makes me cringe with fear! It’s pretty amazing where human beings will push themselves.
Into Thin Air left me gasping in suspense.
XXOO Kat
Kat, you’re hilarious! Yes, watch Nordwand. It’s so awfully tragic and scary and brave.
I think Kat was the overachiever in English Lit class. There is no way on God’s green earth I would EVER have gotten that much indepth symbolism from a movie. To me a movie is just entertainment. It’s too much work trying to delve any deeper to figure out the symbolism. LOL!
Nina - Kat gets symbolism. A movie is sometimes so much more than a movie - I just wasn’t feeling it with Inception.
Thanks so much for the movie warning and recommendation, Julia. I’m going to be down for awhile after surgery and my hubby and I were looking for movies to watch together. I’m excited to get that one on Netflix.