Well, I was on holiday last week, so naturally I went to the cinema a couple of times. I took my gal to see Napoleon Dynamite, in the hope that I would seem better by comparasin, and I went to see Garden State with some mates, and let me start by saying both a totally brilliant.

Major, major kudos to Hakeem, if it wasnt for him I would never have bothered with Garden State and it was totally brilliant. I cant remember being so involved in a film, and so touched when a film ended. The directing was incredible, every singly shot could be framed and put in a gallery and the nuances were amazing. The acting was top notch too, we all knew Ian Holm was a great actor but I never knew Natalie Portman has any talent apart from being wrapped in baking foil, how wrong I was, she was terrific, as was star/writer/director Zach Braff who obviously has an amazing future. Performace of the film for me though was Peter Sarsgaard who was just brilliant, everything he did was just incredible, I think he would get the best supporting actor oscar in my book. He made a strange character so believeable, and was so funny yet so likeable. The whole thing was an amazing exhibition of talent from both sides of the camera, an amazing piece of work, I havent seen much better this year.

Napoleon Dynamite was really good too. It was genuinely funny, well made and well acted with a couple of brilliant moments and a great overall theme. The real touch of genius in this was making protagonist Napoleon so unlikeable, usually one would be sympathetic to a character such as him but he was such a bastard in his own right that we could properly laugh at his failures as well as his successes, making the film so much better. There was no real storyline, but this was good, it was almost a vignette film which I love, but it did have some themes going and a very happy ending. While not in the same league as Garden State, this was a very relaxing, enjoyable and funny film with some great surreal touches.

“That's improv, bitch. You can use it.”. - Peter Sarsgaard


simply excellent (Y)


I got my brother the Napoleon Dynamite dvd for Christmas and we laughed and laughed yesterday when we watched it :rofl:

Shooting the cow in front of the bus full of school children has to be the funniest thing I have seen in a film this year :D

yeah, and what I didnt realize the first time I watched it was that he was killing the cow to give Napoleon the meat to make steaks :funny:

I didnt realise that either :p

I has just been bowled over by Garden State a few hours before I went to see it so I expect I wasnt concentrating properly :p

I just finished watching Garden State on DVD (Y)

Im in love with Dana (played by Amy Ferguson), that party scene is just perfect (In The Waiting Line by Zero 7 is my favorite song in the movie) (Y) (Y)

http://www.soccergaming.tv/attachment.php?postid=1624163

Oh god yes, all the girls in that scene were so bloody fine (Y) Nothing close to Nat though :p

On reflection though, they should have used Ian Holm much more, Braff had so much potential there to bring an edge of contrast and hard realism to it which he threw away, but that's about the only fault I can think of.

well, I watched the deleted scenes on the DVD and there are two really great scenes between Large and his father talking about Large's mother and how she died.

Remember that Large tells Sam in the pet sematary that 'maybe is what she wanted', and in these two deleted scenes Large talks his father about how maybe she did kill herself because she didnt scream or anything since his father says he didnt hear anything.
its a very dramatic and serious scene but I felt that it actually worked to leave it out of the movie because its in the middle of the story and the pace would have been kinda disrupted.

I suppose it would have slowed it down, but I think they should definately have been kept in if they do take the Holm-Braff thing further. DVD wont be out here for months :(

i just watched Garden State....very nice movie. I'm sure many of u guys have felt like Largeman in the movie, lonely & and not knowing what to do with your life:(

Natalie Portman is such a great actrees, first i saw her in Closer and WOW!!! (stripebar scene)...then i see her playing this innocent girl who needs protection (garden state)...she is definitely a great actress(H)

Garden State= 9/10:rockman:

im a tad annoyed after reading this thread, not with calumn, but with my friends. I swear i need to get some more intelectual ones :p

The other day i went to the local UGC cinema in the hope that we might see Napoleon Dynamite, but, due to the un-missable of all emotions, peer pressure, i was guided into watching National Treasure.

Now ill admit, it wasnt as bad as SWAT or Around the world in 80 days, butit was hardly anything memorable either. They simply didnt understand my reasoning behind wanting to watch napoleon dynamite, the humour seems hard to explain (even though i havent seen it yet)

Pity.

Fancy watching a film Calumn? :p

TROD.

Looks like somebody needs a 'Pythonathon' to restore his faith in humanity (H)

hhaha, you may be right.

TROD.

Napoleon Dynamite is one of the best movies i've ever seen

this is all i have to say

http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/napoleon.php

haha.the dance sequence is one of the best parts.did you know that jon header (napoleon) is fat boy slim? my brother told me that,thats how all the dance moves came up

"F*cking idiot. Gosh."

Originally posted by runner4life203
haha.the dance sequence is one of the best parts.did you know that jon header (napoleon) is fat boy slim? my brother told me that,thats how all the dance moves came up I doubt it as Fat Boy Slim is a middle age, middle class Englishman named Norman Cook so I dont see how it could even be modeled on his childhood. Maybe it is though, the dance moves certainly are reminiscent.

my parents watched this movie and my mom loved it but my dad said he got confused lol

Anyone recall seeing this in the movie?Don: [playing kickball] Hey, Napoleon. Did you wet the bed last night?
Napoleon Dynamite: Hey, Don, did you take a dump in your bed last night?
Don: I could kick your butt, Napoleon, so I'd shut up.
Napoleon Dynamite: Why don't you go tell your mom to shut up?
Don: What did you say?
Napoleon Dynamite: Whatever I feel like I wanna say.
Don: Did you say something about my mom?
Napoleon Dynamite: Maybe I did, maybe I didn't.
Don: Do you wanna die, Napoleon?
Napoleon Dynamite: Yeah right. Who's the only one here who knows the illegal ninja moves from the government?
Don: Step up, Napoleon.
Napoleon Dynamite: [slaps him and runs]http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0374900/quotes

thats one of the deleted scenes. Napoleon bitch-slapping Don was awesome :p

Now I have to buy the DVD :(