What's up, Doc?

The other day I watched the documentary/movie Freakonomics, based on the popular best-seller that I read last year. Given that I've read the book, I thought I would share my thoughts on the movie with you.

I did see it a little while ago, so my memory is rusty, but from what I recall, the movie is pretty good. They address a number of topics from the book in entertaining and different ways. Sometimes they stick to the story from the book. Sometimes, they go further and explore the theme from the book and look at new research and information on the topic. Sometimes, the information is not directly related to the book, but is similar thematically.

For example, one of the topics they looked at was cheating in sumo wrestling, as had been discussed in the book. However, the filmmakers took it further and looked at some recent news on cheating in sumo wrestling and some journalists who are working to bring the truth about cheating to light. It was an interesting glimpse into Japanese society.

Each subject was directed by a different director. The authors of the book framed each segment, so the overall style of the film was the same, but each segment reflected the style of that particular director. It is difficult to make facts and figures be entertaining on the big screen, but I thought the graphics designers did a good job translating the concepts to the movies.

I was a little disappointed that the movie didn't discuss one of my favourite parts of the book: the economics of drug dealing. I would have liked to hear more from the economist who did the studies on the drug dealer that kept good records of his "business" that were analyzed economically.

Overall, the movie was enjoyable. I'd heard negative reviews of the movie, and, while it was not as good as the book (because not everything translates to the movies), it was still an enjoyable, and informative, evening.

At the Movies

Yes, I occasionally do put down the books and watch a movie. I love that theatre popcorn, after all! (Although the movies I'm about to discuss were watched from the comfortable privacy of my own home and a friend's.) I especially enjoy watching movies based upon books, and then criticizing said movies for not living up to said books. (However, I do admit that the Lord of the Rings movies were great - it was like they tore the scenes straight from my imagination.) Since I recently watched a couple movies based on books that I had recently read, I thought this would be a good subject of discussion for today's blog.

The two movies are The Social Network and Eat, Pray, Love. I did see the most recent Harry Potter movie in theatres recently too, but as it's been so long since I've read the book I don't think I'd be able to comment accurately on the differences/similarities between the two. That may have to wait for the final movie, coming out this summer, before which I plan to reread the entire series.

As you may remember from my earlier posts, I disliked the book The Accidental Billionaires, the book on which I believe the movie The Social Network is based. I disliked it mostly due to its seemingly rampant sexism. I found that the movie did not seem to be as rampantly sexist as the book. Sure, roles for women in the movie seemed to be slim to none, but it didn't seem to be as sexist as the book. Which is hard to explain, seeing as how all the same scenes that I disliked in the book were featured in the movie. Maybe I was expecting it, having read the book, and so was prepared to be insulted.

That being said, I actually enjoyed The Social Network. It is fast-paced, with witty, biting dialogue. It was interesting to see the friendship between Zuckerberg and Savarin grow and eventually be ripped apart. I appreciated the structure of the movie: cutting back and forth between the present-day lawsuits and the story of the founding of Facebook. I thought Jesse Eisenberg did a great job with the role of Zuckerberg - letting you feel sorry for him and hate him all at the same time. You felt sorry for him because he threw away all of his friendships and ended up alone, yet at the same time, you felt that he deserved it, in some small part, because he acted like a jerk with no thought to anyone's feelings but his own. I quite enjoyed the movie.

The other movie I saw recently was Eat, Pray, Love based on the book Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert. I was not extremely fond of the book when I read it, but neither was it that bad. I have pretty much the same feelings for the movie.

I usually have a pretty good memory for books, but I have to admit that it has been some months since I read the book, and many details had slipped my mind. Fortunately, one of my friends that I was watching it with knew the book intimately, and was able to point out where the movie producers had made major changes. For the most part, I don't think the changes added anything to the movie. The book was pretty filmable anyway, so really major changes didn't need to be made.

I thought the movie was okay. The scenery in Italy, India, and Bali was beautiful - especially Bali. I would like a fancy hut like the one she stays in! The story did drag a little bit in India - it's hard to really encapsulate someone's inner spiritual life onscreen. It picked up in Bali though and was pretty good.

I think the problem with the movie is that I never for a minute bought Julia Roberts as the character of "Liz Gilbert". It's not that Julia Roberts is a terrible actress - she's not. It's that she's too well-known. So for me, it was a movie about Julia Roberts jetting off to Italy, India, and Bali, not about Liz Gilbert. I couldn't suspend enough disbelief to really get into the story and the characters. Also, I don't think that Javier Bardem is really all that cute, so I wasn't really interested in him as a love interest for Julia - although he did play the part well. He definitely was younger in the movie than I pictured him in the book! Overall, the movie was all right, but perhaps just not my cup of tea.

While I'm discussing movies, I do have to give a quick shout-out to an excellent movie I saw in theatres recently that isn't based on a book. The King's Speech is an excellent, fantastic movie about a man trying to get over his stuttering problem with the help of a speech therapist. What makes it unique, however, is that that man is the King of England. This was a terrific movie. I loved the slowly growing relationship between Bertie (Colin Firth) and the speech therapist, Lionel Logue. I loved watching Bertie slowly thawing out and becoming human, becoming friends, even, with Lionel, and then suddenly snapping back to his royal persona, his protective shell of prestige. I'm a history junkie, so I loved all the historical bits woven through the story: such as the abdication of Edward VIII. This movie definitely deserved the Oscar. Anyone who is a fan of great film, or is a history buff like me, should watch this movie.