Freedom Writers

I wonder why is it that whenever I want to write about a movie I like a lot, I seem to get tongue-tied.

It is as if no matter how much I write or how well I explain, I will never be able to fully express to my readers why I like it so much, especially when the movie is based on a true story.

That’s exactly what happened to this week’s review. I’ve been meaning to talk about it for a long time, but I always find an “excuse” to postpone it and leave it for another day… until now.

I have watched this movie at least four times and it never seizes to amaze me.

It’s the story about a woman named Erin Gruwell (played by Hilary Swank), who after having followed a different career, decides it’s time to fulfill her lifelong dream of being a teacher. She applies in one of the schools and is thrilled when she gets the job.

She prepares herself in every way for her first day. She chooses her best outfit, arrives early and stands there eagerly and nervously waits for her students. You can see her happiness in her face. Her dream will finally come true. She will be able to teach what she knows to a whole class of young people and hopefully make them see the world a little bit the way she does.

She is very inexperienced but oh how she hopes she will be able to inspire them somehow!

And then one by one, the students start to come in room 203, where they will have their English classes with the new teacher and as they do so, she smiles at them… she wants to make them feel welcomed.

But she wasn’t prepared for what she saw in their faces. Nobody returned her warm welcome; instead she saw coldness, anger, disinterest, hatred, racism, resistance, prejudice, conflict, anguish, fear… and all that on the first day! Each student sat with their own “group”, turned their desks away from the front of the class and just did their own thing. All they wanted was for the bell to ring so they could go to the next class and then go home. Nobody cared about her, nobody cared that she was there.

Needless to say her first day as a teacher was a complete disaster and the following days were no different. She would try and teach them but nobody paid any attention. She then started to learn that most the students in her classroom and in the whole school were gang members; they carried knives and guns into school, they fought among themselves, they fought outside school, many were poor, some were homeless and none, not one, believed they could be somebody in life.

They didn’t respect her and didn’t care about anything she had to say or teach.

So, maybe wanting to be a teacher wasn’t a good idea after all.

Maybe some dreams never come true… maybe making a difference somewhere or in somebody’s life is not for everyone. And by looking at everything that is going wrong in your life, you realize that maybe… maybe you are just not good enough.

Who has never faced a difficult situation or a great disappointment that left you felling exactly that way?

I know I have.

And so after reading this you might ask, “How can this movie be any good? If this is the story, why should I watch it?”

Well, here’s when the story starts getting really interesting…

I haven’t told you the best part yet.

Come back here next Friday and I will ;)

Despicable Me 2

No, this is not a repetition of last week’s review. This is about "Despicable Me 2" :)

Let me start by saying that I LOVED this second movie even more than the first!

It’s so so so funny!!! I think one post wouldn’t be enough to describe how entertaining watching this movie was.

To tell you the truth, I cried from laughing so much. Twice!

There are two scenes in the movie that are just too much. I was laughing so hard I couldn’t even keep my eyes open. I felt like a little kid!

So before I say anything else, let me say this:

GO WATCH THIS MOVIE! Take your kids, invite your husband, go with your friends. You will not regret it!

But you should really watch the first one first. It will make more sense and you will see how the second really complements the first ;)

And the message is just on point. It really spoke to me…

The first movie showed the importance of having and giving value to a family.

This second one reinforces that idea by making a stronger point that some people seem not to give a lot of importance to. 

If you know a little about the story, you know that Gru (the main character) adopts three little girls, Margo, Edith and Agnes, thus changing their world forever. Now they have something they could only dream about before: A real home and a father to come home to. Someone who loves them, watches over them and will be with them always.

So now they are happy, right? They have everything they ever wanted. They have a family.

Really?

Let me show you a conversation in the movie that made me think twice about that.

Agnes, the youngest of the little girls (and the most adorable one) is having a hard time rehearsing for a school play. The play is about mothers (for mothers day I think) and she just can’t say the lines naturally enough. Whenever she tries, she sounds like a robot. So here comes her father to her rescue. The conversation goes more or less like this:

-        - I can’t do it!

-        - You just have to keep trying Agnes.

-        - I don’t think I should be part of the play anyway.

-        - Why not?

-        - I don’t even have a mother…

-        - Well… then why don’t you just use your imagination?

-        - You mean I should pretend that I have a mom?

-        - Exactly! Can you do that?

-        - Yes! I do that all the time…

And here’s my question to all the readers of this blog.

Can you see what I see in that conversation?

Does it speak to you as strongly as it does to me?

What does it tell you?

Despicable Me

* This review is for the first movie. For the second one, come here next week.

“Rapha, did you know that you talk just like the Minions?” – said my friend.

“Minions? What are Minions?” – I replied.

“You know, from the movie ‘Despicable Me’? The yellow creatures?”

“Really? I never watched that movie. How do they talk?”

“They don’t talk. Well they do, but you don’t understand them.”

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha…

If you’ve seen the movie you will know that my friend wasn’t insulting me. And if you have ever talked to me, you will know that what she meant is that I’m very expressive when I talk…  that sometimes when I talk I am better understood by my expressions and gestures than by my actual words :)

Needless to say, her comment made me extremely curious to watch it, even though I’m a not a huge fan of animated movies, but I did.

And I LOVED it!

It’s the story about this man who, since he was a boy, dreamed of going to the moon and making his mother proud of him. He craved for her approval.

But nothing he ever did made an impression on her. So since being good didn’t work, he decided to be bad and become a famous villain. He seems to be heartless and care about no one, except the scientist who helps him in his inventions and the Minions (the yellow creatures we were talking about) who help him in his plans.

Then he crosses paths with three little girls who live in an orphanage.

He doesn’t care about them, but because they are the only ones who can help him with his latest plan, he decides to adopt them. And now you have to watch it to find out the rest ;)

The whole movie is very nice and so, so funny! I laughed so much! And I simply fell in love with the Minions hehehe… But what I liked the most about it is the message it conveys. Even though it’s a movie made for kids, it seems to me that the message was more directed to parents.

It clearly shows the importance of a family.

Some of us are brought up in a nice and caring family, others unfortunately are not, but it’s us who decide what we are going to do with that. Are we going to be cold, angry, bitter and treat our own family the way we were treated? Are we going to give more importance to the things in our lives than the people in it?

Whether you received a lot of love or not when you were growing up, someday you will have to make a choice of who YOU want to be for your family and your kids.

There are many things that are important and necessary in our lives, but everyday we have to choose what’s MORE important. For some people, it’s their studies, their careers, establishing themselves as a professional in the field they chose. For others is making a lot of money or being famous. Some others consider their family the most important thing in their lives and for some, God is the most important One.

But it doesn’t really matter what we say it’s the most important thing. We may think it’s something when in fact it’s something else. So how do we know for sure?

It’s not what we say that shows what we REALLY want. It’s what we do. Everyday.

Then you may ask: “And you got all this from a cartoon??”

Yep!

Believe it or not.

Man of Steel

Who has never seen a Superman movie? Who does not know the story?

Some people apparently don’t… one of my friends didn’t until this last one came out (I know… shocking lol) O_o

But I’m not here to tell you about the story; it’s the same as the ones before. I’m here to point out the reasons why I liked this one so much, why I would definitely watch it again and why, in case you haven’t yet, it might be good fun to go see it.

Superman’s real father is quite the warrior himself. I remember in the previous movies, sending his son away involved a lot of emotion. In this one however, he is more decisive and courageous. He even fights!

I think they chose the perfect actor for the role. He portrayed it very well :) Not to mention that they finally got rid of the curl on superman’s forehead. It was ok back in the 80’s but they still used it in the 2006 movie… come on!

I really like the relationship between Clark and his adoptive father. He believed in him so much! And even though he didn’t understand his son’s powers, he always made him see it as a positive thing. He made him feel especial and not “weird”. He believed in him, in his potential, in what he could become. It would be nice if all kids received such treatment from their parents nowadays. It would make it easier for them to believe it themselves…

Superman is not as confident as in the previous movies. He doesn’t think he was all that. And this is one of the things I liked the most about it.

There’s a scene in the movie where he doesn’t know what to do. He is not sure if he could trust and then someone tells him:

“Sometimes you have to take a leap of faith.  Trust comes after.”

Confidence was something he had to build up with each step he took, with each decision he made and with each enemy he faced.

So to sum it all up, I liked this version of superman because it shows more than just an alien who had super powers. It shows his indecision, his vulnerability, his fears and most importantly, his decision to believe despite all that.

Now, there’s something we can all relate to ;)

And to finalize, there is a sentence his biological father says in the beginning of the movie. He says:

“You will give the people of Earth an ideal to strive towards…”

This sentence stayed with me ever since. I really like it, but the reason I do has nothing to do with superman ;)

Fast and Furious 6 – Two reviews and a question

                     

Since I watched this movie I’ve been thinking on how to best express my opinion about it, and I came to the conclusion that it is quite difficult to do it in one review only.

So I am going to write two: A good and a bad review.

Good Review

I’ve watched all the Fast and Furious movies, except the Tokyo one (for some reason I still have no interest in watching it) and when I watched the trailer of Fast 6 I immediately wanted to watch it. They were bringing the whole team back. They were even “resurrecting” Letty, which in my opinion was quite a stretch but a smart move nonetheless.

So I went to watch it and this is no doubt an action movie. It has action from beginning to end. From one scene to the next you find yourself at the edge of your seat or biting your nails, or wondering what’s going to happen next.

And it has a lot of funny parts, which is a plus in any movie. I laughed quite a bit throughout.

Everything else is the same as the previous five movies, fast cars, races, fights, you know…

That’s it for the good review, now moving on to the bad.

Bad review

The movie has no plot, no interesting story. The “plot” you see in the trailer is the one you will see in the movie. Nothing more, nothing less.

But there they are living the good life, enjoying all the money they stole in their last “job”, until the police comes knocking at their door asking for their help. These criminals are so “good” at what they do, that not only do they get away with whatever crime they commit, but they are also needed by the police, who apparently is not competent enough to do their own job. So now it’s criminals trying to stop other criminals… uh huh…

They portray the team of “good” criminals in such a way that they make them look good in the audience’s eyes. As if they have principles, as if who they are justifies what they do.

The guy says, “Everyone has a code. Mine is family”. Meaning that stealing, killing, breaking the law and whatever other crime you might commit is ok as long as you do it for family. Are you kidding me?

And the funny (for lack of a better word) thing is, after all their wrongdoing, they gather together at the table to have a meal and they all join hands and thank God for everything they have. WHAT? I’m not even going to say anything about that.

The Question

 Fast and Furious has a lot more wrong messages. It has wrong messages all over the place. Everywhere. All the time.

If you’ve already watched the movie, can you guess what they are?

If you do, just leave your comments below.

Sure it’s a cool movie, fast cars, tough guys and all, but the core message? All wrong.

Oh and one last thing, does it bother anyone else that no one really cared about what happened to Gisele at the end apart from the Japanese guy, or is it just me? O_o

Iron Man 3

I had never heard of Iron Man before the first movie came out. I actually thought it had to do with the “The Man in the Iron Mask”… I know, I know… complete different movie. But anyway… Back then I wasn’t as interested in super-hero movies (that has changed) because they were usually all the same thing. There was a villain, there were the innocent people and there was some kind of super-hero that would save them all. But that has also changed.

The basics continue the same, but now it’s so much nicer than before. They have better especial effects, they plot is usually very good, they have the action, the romance, that some of us just can’t go without, and in the case of Iron Man, they have Robert Downey Jr. who, in my opinion, brings the entertainment to a whole new level in any movie he is in.

I enjoyed the first two Iron Man movies, but this third one is just very nice!

And the best thing is that it is so funny. My goodness! I laughed the whole time! It was very, very entertaining indeed.

So, if you also like super-hero movies, you definitely have to watch this one.  And watch out for the Mandarin, he is really, really dangerous. The worst villain in all the movies I’ve watched O_o  

However if you haven’t watched any of the Iron Man movies, you should watch them in the right order so you can really understand the story. Here’s the correct order:

Iron Man

Iron Man 2

The Avengers – if you don’t watch this one, you don’t understand why he mentions New York so much in the movie. He keeps saying “Since New York things are not the same”, “I can’t sleep since New York”… but this is just a tip ;)

Iron Man 3

I wanted to discuss something about the last fight between Iron Man and his enemy, but I can’t because if I do, I will spoil it for you. All I can say is that it has something very much in common with the last fight between Batman and his enemy on the last Batman movie.

If you’ve watched both movies, my question is, do you know what I’m talking about?

Let’ s see who paid attention… hehehe.

Zero Dark Thirty

When I saw the trailer for this movie, I was very curious to watch it. Did you know that depending on what they show in the trailers, you can tell whether it's going to be a nice movie or not?

For example, if they show a lot of the story, a lot of scenes; if they give a lot of the plot away, then it’s probably not a good movie and they are trying to convince you to go watch it by showing you the whole story in the trailer.

When a movie is good, they usually show only bits and pieces of it. They give you just an idea, a small hint of what the movie is about and that’s exactly what makes people want to see it… they want to find out what happens next.

But that can be quite tricky sometimes. It could also be that they don’t show you a lot because the movie is just plain garbage and therefore they don’t want you to find out before time hahaha…

So when I saw the trailer for “Zero Dark Thirty”, I was a bit divided. They don’t show a lot of things, just that a woman was probably responsible for the capture of Bin Laden.

Ok, so let me tell you a bit about the story of the movie.

It’s about a team of CIA agents who were assigned to track down the hiding location of Osama Bin Laden after the terrorist attack on the Twin Towers on 9/11. In the beginning all the agents were working tirelessly to hunt him down, but after using numerous strategies and investigating all the leads they had, they started accepting the fact that they might never find him.

Until a female agent was hired to work on the investigation and boy, did she make a difference!

There are lots of nice things about this movie, but if I tell you then I will be saying too much. So instead let me say what I liked the most about this movie.

It shows how strong, determined, efficient and influential a woman can be when she decides to.

It clearly illustrates how sometimes in life people will not believe in you or your ideas, sometimes no one will, but that shouldn’t be a reason for you to give up.

And here’s my favorite: The power of focusing and investing on something you believe in.

There’s a scene in particular that I really liked and that got stuck in my head since I watched it.

One of the heads of the CIA came to speak to the agent I was telling you about, and trying to make small talk, he asked:

“What else have you done for us in these 12 years you’ve been working for the CIA?”

Her reply was:

“Nothing. I’ve done nothing else.”

This sums it all up for me. This is the scene that spoke louder that all the others, but in order for you to understand it, you will have to watch it ;)

Les Miserables

In last week’s post I promised to tell you my story about the “Les Miserables” movie. So here it is:

A few years ago I was living in London and if you’ve been there or live there, you know that London is big on musicals. There’s a quite a diversity for you to see and Les Miserables is one of them.

I remember seeing the posters in the subway and wondering what it was all about. But it was only when one of the songs from the musical became very popular that I became interested in watching it. But I never did.

After I moved from London I found out that there was a Les Miserables book and movie, but it was old, so I didn’t want to watch it. But then a few months later a trailer was released with the new “Les Miserables” and it had a great cast. So of course I was going to go see it!

When it finally came out, my husband didn’t really want to watch it but I insisted. Then one of my friends tweeted that it was beautiful, that she even cried, so I insisted with him some more. Then another friend also watched and said I should go, that I would love it. So after that I convinced him to go with me J

There I was, early as usual so I could watch the other trailers, sitting comfortably on my seat, eagerly waiting for the beautiful and moving story of the Les Miserables.

But…

I didn’t like it. AT ALL!!

It was a musical, so of course I already knew there would be a lot of singing, but I didn’t expect THAT much of singing. I had watched a movie/musical before and I loved it! Sure the actors sang quite a lot, but they also spoke. In this movie, they don’t speak. EVER. They just sing!

They sing and sing. From beginning to end. All the time. The whole time.

So yeah… not my kind of thing. I like music and I like musicals but I found this one very boring. You leave the theatres feeling quite miserable indeed.

If you ask ME if this is a nice movie, I’ll say no, I don’t think it’s a nice movie. If your taste in movies is similar to mine, then you will probably not like it either.

But hey, my friends liked it and I’m sure many other people did too. So it really depends on what you are into ;)

Oh and remember I mentioned last week, that I only watched “Die Hard” because of “Les Miserables”? Yes, after making my husband watch such a boring movie, he decided that he would choose the next one, so guess which one he chose?

Die Hard O_o

But if I had to choose between one and the other, even though I liked neither, I’d choose “Die Hard” hands down. This is for you to see how much I “liked” Les Miserables.

A Good Day to Die Hard

Remember my review about “Jack, the Giant Slayer” last week?

You haven’t read it yet? Ok, so read that one first before continuing with this one.

Think of everything I said about “Jack”. Now imagine the complete opposite…

That would be my review on “A good day to die hard” lol.

I have not watched the previous “Die Hard” movies, but this one… is something else.

It has no plot whatsoever, the acting is quite poor and the story just doesn’t go anywhere.

It’s just… I have no words.

There is however, something you will find A LOT in this movie: Destruction.

From beginning to end.

There are a lot of explosions, fights, people going through windows, falling from the highest buildings but never dying, more explosions, gunshots, buildings getting destroyed, more explosions and the main characters still come out of all that alive!

I guess that’s why it’s called “Die Hard”, because no matter what happens, they just don’t die!

So to summarize: “A good day to die hard” is not a movie worth spending any money on. I would not watch it again. I wouldn’t have even watched it if it weren’t for “Les Miserables”.

Oh I haven’t told you about my “Les Miserables” story, have I? Come back next Friday and I will tell you all about it. Oh my! 

Jack, the Giant Slayer

I wish all movies were like this.

The kind that does not make you uncomfortable with all the cursing, nudity and violence.

 The ones you don’t have to cover your children’s eyes when they are watching.

Such is the case with Jack, the Giant Slayer.

It’s the story we all have read about but with a modern twist.

Here’s what I like apart from what I said above:

It has a plot and it’s not predictable.

It has a bit of romance, which every good movie should have hehe

It has the action, but is not violent… well… the giants do eat people and step on them… and there are some giant killing… does that count? Lol

 What I mean is, they don’t show these things in a violent way, there’s no blood or anything.

And it has the funny bits… watch out for the cook, that’s all I’m going to say :)

And a happy ending.

Sometimes you want to go to the movies and not be at the edge of your seat with all the suspense, or racking your brain to understand the plot or cringing at all the punches being thrown everywhere or even crying because of all the sad events going on.

Sometimes you just want to watch a nice movie with your friends. Or be able to take your kids to watch a movie where you don’t have to worry about the bad scenes and wrong message. Sometimes you just want to have some entertainment and enjoy a nice day out with your friends or family.

If that’s what you are looking for this weekend, Jack is the movie for you ;)   

Skyfall

Since Skyfall is coming out on DVD now, I thought I’d take the opportunity to talk about it.

007 movies huh? What do you think my opinion is going to be?

Let me start by saying that I was never interested in these movies. All I remember from when I was a kid was that the things James Bond could do were just too much, too unreal and as my dear father used to say, it was just “uma mentirada danada”, which translated means “just too many lies”.

After I grew up I wanted to give it a chance and see for myself what the deal with James Bond was. So I watched “Die Another Day” with Pierce Brosnan… O_o

My goodness! What a terrible movie!! It was just… ridiculous. The whole plot was awful and that did it for me. No more 007 movies!

But when they released the first trailer of “Casino Royale” I couldn’t resist and went to watch it.

Loved it!!

Yeah… I’m into these secret agent movies hehehe.

I like it a lot because, apart from the fights, which I also like by the way (no, I’m not a violent person, I just happen to like watching choreographed/fake fights), it usually has an interesting plot, a mystery to be solved. And that’s exactly the case with “Casino Royale”. In my opinion they chose the perfect actor for it.

Anyway, needless to say I changed my opinion about 007 movies… as long as they keep the same actor, that is. After that, I don’t know.

So, I watched the next one, “Quantum of Solace” and obviously I just HAD to watch Skyfall as well!

And I really, really liked it :)

It’s quite different from the previous two. It doesn’t have a lot of fights or car chases, but there’s A LOT of story. A lot of unanswered questions throughout the movie and the plot develops quite nicely. The kind that makes you want to solve the mystery.

I know this is more of a guy’s type of movie (or so I’ve been told) but I just love the whole “my name is Bond, James Bond” thing lol

So if you are also into movies like this, this is the movie for you to watch this weekend.

But if you are not… hey, here’s your chance to try something new ;) 

The Painted Veil

When I watched this movie almost seven years ago, I thought it was an ok movie but definitely not one I would recommend. However one of my friends requested that I write a review about it and so I decided to watch it again… you know, just to refresh my mind (as if I needed an excuse to watch a movie hehe).

And boy, did I change my opinion about it!

The story is set in 1925 and it’s about this woman who rejected every marriage proposal thrown her way. She wanted to be independent and enjoy her life as much as she could, until the pressure  from her parents was too hard to take.

She then decides to marry this doctor who had fallen in love with her and had asked her hand in marriage on the second time they talked.

He loves her and wants to be with her.
She marries him just to get away from her parents’ house.

Can you see where this is going? Not going to work, right?

This is one of the most beautiful romantic movies I’ve ever seen. It’s no chick flick or the superficial kind or romantic story. It’s about what true love really is and how it is born. And that was beautiful to watch!

It shows how love is not a feeling but really a decision you take to commit to the other person, the efforts you make to really know the other person.

Watching this movie was kind of like seeing in real life a few examples Cristiane and Renato Cardoso teach in The Love School. It was really, really nice!

I must warn you though… there’s something in this movie that you are not going to like very much (have some tissue ready)… and no, I can’t tell you what it is. But it’s absolutely worth watching.

It teaches you about true love, commitment, forgiveness and the importance of having and giving second chances and not mentioning the beautiful scenery throughout the movie.

I wish I could tell you more but let me just summarized it all like this:

Beautiful! Simply beautiful!

The Twilight Saga – Breaking Dawn Part II

It’s over people! After 4 years, the Twilight Saga is over.

But hey, we can still talk about it ;) Do you know how?

Through the Twilight Series I started here on the blog sometime ago but never got to finish.

Here’s what I wrote so far:

So the lion fell in love with the lamb

Mind over Matter

You are my life now

I’m nothing if not traditional

Here’s what’s still to come starting next Thursday:

You are only human

Edward X Jacob

Do I dazzle you?

Twilight - The conclusion

But going back to Breaking Dawn – Part II, here are my thoughts on the last movie of the saga:

I think it ended well. Of course there’s no comparison between the movie and the book but I thought they still did a good job.

I’d like to have seen a little bit more of acting though. It seemed to me that there were more demonstrations of what kind of super powers people had than actually people having conversations.

I didn’t like the fact that Jacob is almost nowhere to be seen in this movie. I say this because, well if you read the book you know that good part of this story was told through Jacob’s perspective and not Bella’s. I was really looking forward to hearing him saying all the funny things he says in the book, but no… they didn’t include that. Pity.

I loved the twist at the end though. Very clever!

What else can I say?

It was good. I liked how it ended and I’m happy that it did…

It was time :) 

* The crazy twilight fans probably don’t agree with this last statement… but what can I do? It’s true hehehe

Flight

I’ve never really been in between two opinions when it comes to a movie. I either liked it or I didn’t. It was either good or bad.

But the movie “Flight” managed to put me there… I’m not yet sure if I recommend it or not hahaha…

So, let’s do something here, shall we?

I’ll list the things I liked about it and the ones I didn’t like and then you decide for yourself whether it’s worth watching or not ok? That’s right… Based on the information I’ll give, YOU will be the movie critic today ;)

Let me start by what I didn’t like:

* A scene of nudity. I mean, why do they do that? You know those scenes where it makes no sense to show someone naked? Not that it ever makes sense, but sometimes it’s just ridiculous! And such is the case in this movie. There is the guy talking on the phone and them bam, there goes someone naked. GIVE ME A BREAK! I DON’T WANT TO SEE THAT!

* Cursing. Oh my! They curse quite a few times in this movie. It’s becoming rare when you see a movie when they don’t curse at all, but I still don’t like it.

* Drug use and drinking. Again, very common in movies nowadays. Unfortunately.

* For a good while, you think you are going to hate the movie. I was like ‘No, I can’t believe that that’s the message they are giving! I can’t believe that this will be the story’. But no, something changes and you see where they are getting at.

And here’s what I really liked:

* It gives a very powerful message, a life lesson really. It shows the reality of many people and how many people are living/destroying their lives.

* To me, among many other things, it speaks specifically about temptation, how you should not play with it… You should flee from it instead. Not consider it, not give it a second thought, but flee, run for your life, otherwise it WILL destroy you.

So, what’s your conclusion?

Is it worth seeing all the bad stuff so you can see the good? I don’t know…

You decide ;) 

Argo

Answer fast: What’s the one thing that happens to all big blockbuster movies right before they premiere?  

Promotion.

There’s usually a lot of buzz around the movie. They create websites, teasers, trailers. They send the main actors on talk shows and international tours, hold premieres in different countries, etc, etc. And all with one single objective: Get the public interested in watching the movie. But I don’t remember a lot of promotion being made about ‘Argo’, which immediately made me think that it was probably not a good movie.

Besides, what kind of movie is titled “Argo”?

I watched the trailer and it seemed interesting, but the question was, was it interesting enough? But I went to watch it anyway.

VERY GOOD MOVIE!!!

The story happens in Tehran, Iran. People were working normally and going about their day on the US Embassy in Tehran, until lots and lots of protesters invade the Embassy and take everyone hostage, except six Americans who escaped through a back door and hid in the Canadian Ambassador’s house.

Now the CIA must devise a plan to rescue the six Americans and bring them back safely to the United States. But how can they do that without anyone in Iran finding out? How can they even pass through immigration without being recognized as Americans? It was quite an impossible mission. 

Lots of agents present their ideas, some good, others ridiculous, until one agent, Tony Mendez (played by Ben Affleck) has the idea of using a movie to rescue them.

That’s right. They were going to produce a fake movie, use the excuse that the best place to shoot the movie was Tehran, go there and come back with the six Americans with the pretense that they were part of the movie crew.

I don’t want to tell you anymore otherwise I will end up spoiling it for you. But let me tell you what I like about the whole movie:

·     It’s a very intelligent plot. It makes you think, ponder, pay attention.

·      It gives a nice message about responsibility, commitment and honoring your word.

·      The outfits and glasses are hilarious.

·      And my favorite: It gives you the idea of how everything in Hollywood is a big lie. They show what they want you to see and they make you believe in whatever they want you to believe.

That’s why I think it’s so important for us to choose carefully the movies we watch and most importantly, understand the message behind it and separate the good things from the bad.

I recommend Argo because it is quite a nice movie, except for all the cursing (well, it’s Hollywood after all, what do you expect?).  It has a message, it has something we can take from it and it’s very entertaining.

I tell you, if I had the habit of biting my nails, I’d probably have left the theaters with no fingers… it makes you really tense hehehe…