Well, I finally have time to write something about The Avengers. But what to say about a movie so massive? Something everybody’s already nattering on about? A film that easily took the record for the best opening weekend of all time?
I thought maybe I wouldn’t bother, but considering that it was my most anticipated film of 2012 and its colossal gross is likely to be the year’s biggest (though The Dark Knight Rises may put a pin in that), it seemed silly not to say something. So here it is.
(Movies discussed in this post: War Horse, Attack The Block, X-Men: First Class, Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows, Paul, Super 8, The Adventures Of Tintin.)
From The Artist to Midnight In Paris to Hugo and a number of others, 2011 is a big year for nostalgia for all sorts of mainly things — but mainly, for old movies. Hugo and The Artist display it most blatantly, but it’s everywhere — take the romanticized look at growing up in the 50′s (not to mention nostalgia for the creation of Earth) in The Tree Of Life, or the paranoid Towering-Inferno-meets-21st-century-paranoia star-killer Contagion, or the retro heroics of Captain America: The First Avenger, or the 80′s kitschiness evoked by Drive, or the surprising success of a prequel to a campy 60′s movie, Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes. Even the latest Mission: Impossible embraced a silliness that felt borrowed from old spy TV series rather than John Woo-style theatrics.
And because of it, you can hear audiences breathing a collective sigh of relief: “Oh, thank God. We’re allowed to have fun at the movies again.”
(Movies discussed in this post: Beginners, Certified Copy, Forget Me Not, One Day, Midnight In Paris, The Artist, The Future.)
I have two questions for you:
1) Have you ever been in love?
And, if so —
2) Was it quirky?
