Something Something Days, Something Something Movies

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Run Lola Run 
1998. 80 minutes. Germany. Directed by Tom Tykwer. Watchdate: 11/17/2010.
Tom Tykwer seems to be a real maestro at merging form and content. That is to say, he not only successfully matches the story he's telling with a perfect style of telling it but he actually does so in a way that it's hard to tell the difference between the two. I didn't like this quite as much as Perfume, but it was a lot of fun nonetheless - a great cinematic exercise. The bank robbery scene in particular was excellent - bank robberies have been dramatized so many times by now that it's rare to see one crafted in a new way, but he pulled it off with flair.

The Mirror 
1975. 106 minutes. Russia. Directed by Andrei Tarkovsky. Watchdate: 11/16/2010.
Like Stalker, Tarkovsky's The Mirror is somewhat mystifying. With an even more glacial pace, it explores childhood, love and divorce in extremely personal terms. It was difficult for me to watch for various reasons, and I know I'll have to come back to it someday to truly understand or appreciate it. If nothing else, this Russian knows how to photograph wind and fire.

Tapped 
2009. USA. Directed by Stephanie Schoetig and Jason Lindsey. Watchdate: 11/16/2010.
A notch or two above the standard current issue based documentary, including Who Killed the Electric Car? which is by the same producers I believe. Nothing groundbreaking, but it's a worthwhile exploration of a really sleazy industry that doesn't seem to get the awful reputation it deserves. It basically shows how everything about bottled water is really stupid and many things about it are down right dangerous. Don't buy bottled water (except for really specific reasons like emergency preparedness). Tap water is in almost every case superior, even if you don't count it being like 10,000 times cheaper.

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