Round Three (Week 11)

Since completing the first round in this challenge, we have watched 8 more films in the past 11 weeks. Just goes to show how much time this process is taking and how busy we both are.

Traffic

This film by Steven Soderbergh was very impressive. I had seen parts of it before (or the whole movie without remembering all of it) and love the various ways that Soderbergh uses to convey changes and differences between the characters' worlds. In the interweaving of lives affected by drug trafficking, Soderbergh creates a fabric close to reality. The performances were spectacular, and only a few times did I notice a character giving a speech about the issue at hand (**cough** Topher Grace **cough**) as though serving as a megaphone for the director or writer. Overall, it was an amazing, valuable film.

Hard Boiled

This was my very first Chinese action film. Apparently John Woo made Chow Yun-Fat famous through this and many other action films. The introduction was excellent, with a huge build-up to an undercover operation to thwart an illegal guns trade. The action and violence was baffling, and way ahead of its time. I noticed where many recent American action films gained inspiration in the flying through the air shootouts and selective slow motion. The primary relationship in the film between a rough cop (Yun-Fat) and a deep undercover cop (Tony Leung Chiu-Wai) was complex and interesting, and I was invested in the character and the story. Considering the relative culture gap, this was a notable accomplishment on the part of the film, and I can definitely understand why John Woo made our list.

Erin Brockovich

I have seen this movie over and over again throughout my young adult life. I have always loved it and to me, it is Julia Roberts most complete and impressive acting job of her career. She is on the edge of categories for me in terms of whether she is more of a character actor or a flexible, versatile actor. Watching this movie again made me believe in her range, and the telling of this story happens so beautifully. I tried to watch this time with a critical eye and even so I was wrapped up in the humanity of this movie, loving the characters and the real people that they represent.

Once a Thief [**SPOILER ALERT**]

This action-comedy by John Woo came out a year before Hard Boiled. In this film the culture gap was more apparent for me, maybe because of the comedy aspect. I didn't understand why the characters did half of what they did, and the strange relationship turns and quick changes in emotion (not to mention the crazy-huge gun battles) made me confused for much of the film. Three orphans (two boys and a girl) who were raised by a thief grow up to become thieves, one of the men now dating the woman (his sister?). When he apparently dies, the other man (who has always been in love with her) begins seeing her, and when the other man comes back from the dead in a wheelchair (which in a climactic battle he leaps from after being shot in his paralyzed legs to reveal he actually WASN'T paralyzed) he shifts between moody glaring at them and bouncy, cheerful proclamations of his broken heart. In the end, they travel the world together and the couple gets married. The permanent third wheel "watches" their baby and does housework in a comical ending where he THROWS THE BABY. It just threw me for a loop, but was a funny, interesting movie to watch.

The winner is Steven Soderbergh! Whether it is due to my more solid connection to the culture in which his films exist or my continued awe for Erin Brockovich, his movies were more fluid, complete, and understandable. I would love to see Woo's later work, but probably won't have time as we still have 180 movies left to watch FOR THIS OUTER BRACKET.