Musical Saturday: An American in Paris[1951]

I saw An American in Paris at the British Film Institute on a cold end-of-October day and it brighten up my day! It was such a pleasure seeing it, after endless dramas at the London Film Festival before (which I enjoyed also, but in a different way).

The movie tells the story of Jerry Mulligan, a struggling American painter in Paris and his relationship with two wonderful women: Lisa(played by Leslie Caron) and Lilo(played by Nina Foch).

There were many beautiful aspects that I loved about this movie. The first scene, introducing the characters, which is rather atipical and simple; the description of Lisa by Henri, featuring the amazing Leslie Caron dancing in all of her splendor- she is very graceful; all of the costumes and the sets; the piano scene of Oscar Levant, showing us his talent in a dream sequence and many others.

Gene Kelly is probably one of the most charming men I have ever seen on screen. That, plus his dancing skills and the way he makes it seem so easy and enjoyable, you've got yourself an A start actor. He has believeable chemistry with both Leslie and Nina and smoothly switches from actor to dancer in each scene. The musical numbers were sweet, but not very memorable (like the ones in West Side Story, for example), and the final dancing scene stretches a bit too long, but all is forgiven just for that shot of him and Leslie on the yellow, glowing background and the intro/outro editing. Beautiful!

I found myself smiling my way through the movie and it was, like I said, very enjoyable! It's a classic and you should see it!

2 in 1 post!

Hey guys,

So lately I have been going to a lot of movies and I have a rather poor bank account to prove it (tickets+transportation+Coca Cola each time, not a good idea).

Instead of doing 2 different posts, I decided to do a short one, as the movies I saw didn't really give the inspiration to dedicate an entire post for each one!

Thursday, with the help of Time Out Magazine, I got into a screening of Miss Bala, a mexican drama about a woman who wants to be a beauty pageant queen, but gets mixed up with the wrong people just by being in the wrong place at the wrong time. It is a very action based movie, with raw, violent scenes that look and feel real. The leading lady, Stephanie Sigman, offers a very good performance (considering it's her first), taking us to through hard times with believeable reactions. Although I loved the movie and felt that it delivered something new to the cinema, I left the theater thinking the pace was always the same. A goes to B goes to C the end. Yes, the scenes were real and her reactions matched that, but I would have liked more from it, just something to raise my pulse a little bit! Oh...and the movies is based on a true story! You should check it out if you have the chance!

Friday, it was time to see Ides of March! First of all, I don't get the title...I should google it (Did that, now I see)! Second of all, I really enjoyed myself! I thought it was a very smart movie, very alert movie, with good performances and correct direction (I am saying that just because, out of all of the movies I saw recently, this seemed like a normal, nice one, with usual shots, nothing exciting in this department, but still very good). I don't know if it's good or bad, but considering the movie had Gosling and Clooney in it, you can imagine my surprise when I realised the best performance was given by Paul Giamatti (strictly my opinion). Don't get me wrong, all of the cast is good (Hoffman, Wood, Tomei, Max Mingella etc), but I loved him; Ryan Gosling and George Clooney played it safe, and I would be surprised if they get a nomination for this. Actually, thinking about it, Gosling delivered a strong performance, but can it top the one in Drive?No. The best part of the movie was the script: I loved the pace of it, the twists, the dialogue, the feel of it! One of the best big Hollywood movies I have seen recently! All in all, a very good movie you should watch!

Extra one: Saturday, I went old-school and watched An American in Paris at the British Film Institute, in one of the most beautiful cinema theaters I have ever seen! I won't review it now, instead it will be safe in my movie jar for when I'll do a musical week...if you are interested! :)